Beelzebub looked up towards the human fleet, with a mix of absolute shock, rage and slight awe adorning his face; nevertheless, this soon became pure, unwavering fury. These mortals had dared to barge into his hallowed meeting hall and make demands, but not just any old demands.

No, they told him to surrender and die.

He allowed his peers and lessers the great honour and opportunity of taking first blood. To be fair, he didn’t really allow it, he just let it happen. He stood still, allowing his rage and power to well up and concentrate, using great will and focus to gather his energy. Albeit, it was will and focus he hadn’t applied to himself in a long time.

Some would call it getting sloppy.

Nevertheless, Beelzebub was a powerful creature, one who had grown mighty on a constant stream of mortal souls, eons long. This meant that he was among the mightiest of the demons, and of the supernatural beings in general. He used his mighty eye to discern the details he needed. He just had to know which mortal’s self-preservation instincts had failed them so completely. A cursory scan revealed a wide selection of mortal species, some among them having surprisingly high-quality souls. He looked deeper into what seemed to be a flagship, and found a human sitting in the chair.

Ahh, the humans. He remembered visiting their world pretty recently, a mere dozen of millennia or so ago. They had rather amusingly named their world ‘Dirt’, or was it ‘Mud’? Either way, it was a fitting name for a world that had birthed such a drab species of shit slinging monkeys. Even so, one was directly in front of him, having said something wildly infuriating and sitting in a rather formidable vessel, especially for a mortal. He would have to take care of the problem post haste. After all, who would accept intruders into their home?

He took in an extraordinarily deep breath in order to increase his power further, his pectoral scales greatly expanding and straining under the pressure. The ground shook beneath him, his efforts causing tremors to spread throughout the entire realm, rumbling mortals and demon alike.

The result of this however, was a mighty, mighty bellow, one that could be said to rival the cry of the First Being at the beginning of creation. One that would surely destroy the maddeningly audacious mortal fleet before him.

To his credit, if it were at an earlier date, he would have almost certainly been correct in his assumption of destruction; however, there was one critical thing that he was unaware of.

Unlike him, the mortals didn’t slack off. They had developed a new ship class called the Templar, specifically designed to withstand any kind of supernatural tantrum. These, along with the already formidable Scipio class ship supporting them, were an entirely new kind of foe. The fleet’s flagship, christened the Sultan, with Captain Gerald Mansa at the helm, was practically a death blow, especially given the Captain was in command of the fleet.

Beelzebub wasn’t aware of this, though. The incandescent fury that had entirely consumed him mere moments earlier was all to suddenly replaced by shock, something which he hadn’t felt since he was a mere imp. Upon seeing a beam of light emanate from the foremost ship, he leapt back, avoiding the beam by a fang’s width. The floor where he was standing just a moment earlier simply ceased to exist, which wasn’t too concerning as Beelzebub as he was capable of doing the same.

What did concern him was the complete lack of his energy in the space where the beam had struck, which should have been impossible. He just released a legendary amount of energy, which meant that the surrounding environment should be absolutely saturated with the stuff. But it wasn’t.

There was just… void.

Beelzebub may have been outgoing at times and one to occasionally wear hi s heart on his sleeve, but he wasn’t a fool. No one could become a Greater Demon and remain a bumbling idiot. The mortals had done something game changing, something that no supernatural being had accomplished after eons of existence.

They were able to seemingly destroy spiritual energy, breaking one of the fundamental rules of the universe.

This was dangerous. Very dangerous. Beelzebub had to warn every other supernatural pantheon about this grave new threat, since it wasn’t just the demons who were threatened by this. The mere thought of mortals rejecting their natural place in the hierarchy was…preposterous! He couldn’t escape however, as the mortal fleet was in front of the only accessible rift.

He took a deep breath and steeled himself. They were mortals and he was a Greater Demon, so if they forgot their place it was his duty to put them in their place. The rest of the demons’ present had already been destroyed by their new weapons, so he was the only one present to face them. But he wasn’t like any other demon. He was Beelzebub, one of the Princes of Hell, and he’d be damned if he was taken out by a mortal. He steeled himself, and prepared to dodge a barrage of fire.

The promised onslaught came just a moment later, and the freshly limbered up Beelzebub was as ready as he’d ever be. The instant he saw even a pinprick from light from one of the ships, he gracefully swerved, lunged, veered and sidestepped out of its way, a moment later returning fire. He was able to majorly damage some of the ships, with only the flagship and the two ships by its side taking naught but a few scratches.

He stopped for a second, charging up his energy and concentrating it so that he could launch a final devastating attack. He would only need a moment, then the mortals would be vanquished for sure.

Much to his distress, it seemed that all they needed was a moment too. He prepared himself to gracefully leap once more so that he may have delivered the final blow, yet his feet were weighed down! He struggled and squirmed, much to his anguished confusion. How was he being weighed down?! How had the metal ended up fused to his feet so suddenly!? His confusion quickly gave way to overwhelming panic, as the fleet’s weapons were clearly charging up, except they were much slower than usual. Beelzebub realised that they finally meant to finish him off, which was an idea he didn’t like very much, to say the least.

As the lights got brighter and brighter, he fruitlessly squirmed more and more, becoming more desperate with each passing moment. If you were to ask any crew member what he looked like in his last moment, most would say that he looked like a struggling fly, bound to its hunter’s web. Many would say that was a fitting end for Beelzebub, the Lord of The Flies and The Seventh Prince of Hell. Captain Gerald Mansa certainly seemed to think so.

“Well, at the very least that’s over with”, chuckled the Captain, who was strolling around his desk and congratulating his crew for a job well done. “What’s the damage report, by the way?”

“The Sultan has suffered superficial damage; however, the Scipio’s have significant structural damage. Nothing that will prevent us from going home, however”, replied Bollumo, in a rarely seen cheerful tone.

The Captain walked up to her, and in a hushed tone told her “You know, the Admiral has gotten the coordinates of someone pretty important, and given our track record he may want us to deal with it”.

“Really? Who did they find”?

“Someone’s that’s disliked humanity for a long time.”

“Well, who is it”?

“Have you ever heard of Iblis”?