x-X-x-X-x

Man-Made Dungeon, Knossos

The god Thanatos was currently discussing the progress of Knossos in his office with Barca Perdix, one of his familia's executive, when the sound of an explosion was suddenly heard throughout the man-made dungeon. Shortly after, a man came bursting into the god's office.

"Thanatos!" The man screamed, collapsing before his desk. The man's face was sickly pale.

"A m-monster!" he croaked, voice cracking from strain. "It's...here-" The man crumpled to the floor, revealing a bloody bruise across his throat. Blood came out of his mouth.

Barca clenched his fist. "Damn it" he cursed, kicking the corpse to the side.

"Could it be that someone found us out?" Thanatos asked his familia executive all the while getting up from his seat.

"Argh. How?! We haven't revealed ourselves to the world yet!" The familia executive looked like he was about to throw a temper tantrum.

"…"

Seeing his god's silence, Barca went on. "We have more important things to do right now than deal with stupid invaders!"

"Um, this is indeed quite annoying… Barca, prepare the violas and call Valletta." The god instructed calmly.

"Tch. She's probably already fighting up there…"

x-X-x-X-x

Shalltear was having a lot of fun. Like, a lot.

The mangled corpses, the crushed bodies, decapitated heads, that beautiful scent of blood. It was all bliss.

And those weak little humans trying to stop her. They were all so pathetic that she'd already killed them before they even got close to her or finished chanting whatever spell they had in store.

"T-THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE!"

Oh. Another weakling was whining at her.

"H-HOW CAN YOU BE SO STRONG?!" the man stuttered, paling further, "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU?!"

She felt a sense of deep pleasure inside her. The moment when they gave in to despair was always her favorite part when preying upon the weak.

"NO! STOP! I BEG OF YOU, STO-"

*Slash*

Shalltear hummed, walking over the corpses she made. "Now, where to go next?" she asked herself.

x-X-x-X-x

Valletta sprinted through the bloodbath in the secret man-made labyrinth.

She was the head executive of Evilus and one of their strongest members, being a level five. But Evilus' strength didn't only come from their members. It came from the dangerous demi-spirits they controlled. Those were monsters that could annihilate entire familias.

The veins on Valletta's forehead surfaced with unrestrained rage and her fists clenched. 'This bastard! It will pay dearly!' she said to herself, preparing the violas and took one of the crystals containing a demi-spirit with her.

She was furious at the sight of corpses surrounding her at every turn. 'I'll make it pay. This creature dared to pick a fight with Evilus and ruin all of our plans.'

Her ears perked up at the sound of screaming, probing her to move faster, and as she did, she glanced around the bloodstained scene around her.

The underground labyrinth appeared to be quite crowded with all these bodies and then she could see two red eyes that glowed in the dark coming out of the two small holes in a white mask, looking right at her. These eyes belonged to a petite figure of a fairly dressed silver haired girl, wearing a large white dress that, much to Valletta's surprise, did not have a single drop of blood on it.

Valletta knew very well that this individual was not someone to be trifled with. The girl in the white robes was most likely a creature that got its strength from eating magic stones. A level five like her may not be enough to defeat it. Fortunately, even these creatures could not hope to defeat the demi-spirits Evilus commanded.

"These people are sooooo weak~" The creature yawned as it lazily flicked another man with her hand. The body crashed into the wall with a crunch, then falling to join the rest of the corpses on the ground.

'Found it.' Valletta grinned maliciously at the girl's statement. She was going to show the creature that stood in front of her how wrong it was to overestimate its strength.

x-X-x-X-x

"These people are sooooo weak~" Shalltear yawned as she threw yet another weakling away to come crashing into the wall. She really did want to fight a few more interesting challengers, but it didn't seem like those existed in this world. Even the gods who could've been somewhat fun to play with had decided to seal their powers and that just made everything too easy for the vampire.

She looked around and spotted a pink haired woman in black clothing looking right into her eyes. Unlike all the other humans that charged at her in the hope of landing a hit, this woman instead looked quite confident in her abilities and the vampire could see a glim of rage in her eyes. That was probably in the hopes of avenging her fallen comrades. She might be a fun one to play with.

Shalltear's eyebrows raised, absentmindedly crushing another man's head with her hands. "So, you're the strongest person here, I presume~?" She asked, flinging the decapitated head to the side.

The pink haired woman grinned. "You could say that. But I won't be fighting you." Right after that, the ground shook and plants erupted from the ground like blooming flowers. "They will."

"Oh really~?" Shalltear asked as more monsters burst out like the first flowers.

The flower monsters charged their heads in Shalltear's direction like giant tentacles, ready to blast her away.

"[Implosion]"

And just like that, the plants' stems began to be filled with air and stretch to the point of bursting inwards. Little particles of plants floated in the air.

Valletta looked at the scene in front of her in disbelief. The creature in front of her had defeated the violas with ease. It meant that she had no option other than to use her trump card, the demi-spirit. She broke the crystal ball and let it out.

More flower monsters came out like tentacles to a green blob of fat in the middle. After a few seconds, the blob slowly opened and from it emerged a giant woman's upper half body.

She was green. Every inch of her, from her hair to her skin. Everything apart from her eyes that were bright gold.

The monster girl seemed unshaken by the demi-spirit's emergence. "What a disgusting pest~. [Purifying Javelin]."

A gigantic lance of white light appeared from the masked monster's hand and she threw it at the demi-spirit, piercing it in half.

"AhhhhHHHHHHHHHHH" The green woman screamed in pain.

The creature in the white robes then proceeded to make two more lances of light and threw it at the demi-spirit once again. The two consecutive shots obliterated the plant woman and she fell on the ground. All the plants dried up as if there was a curse that sucked their lives out and they broke into thousands of pieces.

"That may not have been the most effective way of killing that thing~… Now I can't use my holy lances for at least twenty-four hours~." The masked creature muttered to itself as Valletta stared at the whole scene with her eyes widened in disbelief.

"Impossible…"

"Uh? What is~?" She heard a voice from behind her say and quickly turned around out of reflex to see the white robed monster, or god?

"W-What the hell are you?! Are you perhaps a god?" She exclaimed. This monster managed to kill a demi-spirit with ease. That was unheard of. Even the now-deceased legendary level 9 adventurer from the Hera familia would've had trouble defeating it alone. Only gods could beat it with ease, but the being in front of her had somehow kept all of her powers.

The creature let out a laugh that was slightly muffled behind the mask it was wearing. "Who~? Me~? No, I'm just a cute little monster~." She said playfully as she began to walk slowly towards her prey.

Valletta began to cry. "Damn it! We could've gotten rid of the gods plaguing this world if it wasn't for you!" In the end, all of her efforts were for nothing. Her existence only served to entertain this monster.

The creature suddenly came to a halt. "Get rid of the gods~?" It asked with a small hint of surprise in its otherwise uncaring voice.

Valletta wasn't certain as to what to make of this situation but decided to answer the creature's question in the hopes that it would help her situation, somehow. "Y-Yes… These damn gods descend on the lower world because they were bored and they dare to start bossing us around and telling us what to do! They do not belong here!"

Under her mask, an evil smile came across Shalltear's lips. The idea of overthrowing the leaders of this world with chaos was a good one. Most likely impossible to achieve for this small group, but their efforts may end up being entertaining enough.

"Yahahaha! Sounds fun~! Okay, I'll keep you alive and you do your thing~." The vampire said aloud while pointing at the confused pink haired woman.

"Huh?"

Shalltear went on: "You heard me right, human~. Entertain me and I'll keep you and your little friends alive~."

The woman had her eyes wide in disbelief. After a few seconds, she managed to muster out a few words. "Y-You want to j-join us?"

Shalltear flinched. "Nah~. I would never work under someone like you~." She said in a somewhat neutral tone. That human's statement would've been worth the death sentence if only she wasn't so happy right now. She had found something interesting going on in this city and she would not allow herself to ruin it all. In truth, she must've already killed half of this terrorist organization, so things didn't seem too bright for them.

Caught in all of her excitement, the vampire had forgotten that she came here in the first place to give these people as sacrifices to her beloved supreme beings.

Shalltear approached the woman on the ground and took off her mask. She then grabbed the head of the still confused human and forced her to stare right in front of her. "Look into my eyes~." She said as she activated her skill, [Mystic Eyes of Charms].

The woman complied, having no choice but to look into the monster's eyes as there was no other place to look at. She felt numb as her eyes turned crimson red; exactly like Shalltear's eyes.

"What do you plan on doing?"

The mind-controlled Valletta started to explain Evilus' objectives and future plans for a couple minutes.

"Humph. I see~." Shalltear said after learning everything about this terrorist organization. "So, what are your immediate plans~?"

"We will make the violas attack during Monsterphilia." The woman replied in a monotone voice.

"Monsterphilia~? What's that~?" Shalltear asked, confused about this strange term she'd never heard of.

"It is a festival hosted by the Ganesha familia in five days from now. Tamed monsters do stunts for the public to enjoy watching." The pink-haired woman replied.

"Sounds alright~. Make sure you do not disappoint me~. [Greater Teleportation]." As Shalltear teleported far away, the charm effect on Valletta wore off and she forgot everything that had happened while being mind controlled.

"What the heck…" Valletta exclaimed as she looked everywhere around her in disbelief. One second ago, she was forced to look into that monster's eyes and right after she did, the creature seemingly vanished.

Valletta slowly rose up, wiping her tears from earlier. The woman really hoped that whatever happened when she stared into its eyes, the monster had not decided to possess her soul or anything of the kind. After everything she'd seen already, anything would be possible.

After a few minutes of contemplating the bloodbath around her in silence, she heard the sound of running footsteps getting closer and closer. Turning around the corner of the labyrinth was her god, Thanatos, along with Barca Perdix and other Evilus members.

"Valletta, are you alright?" Thanatos asked in a worrying tone.

"I… Think so…"