Conquest Of The Fallen: Dark Dominions

"Mothafucka!" Rafel boomed. He shouted out in an accent he didn't even know he had. He lost his freaking mind seeing Daichi pin down and gore-bang Tanaka. If horror porn went nuts, this was it.

There were many macabre ways to die: drowned in a pool of piranhas, fed to gators, or buried alive in a red giant ants anthill—but not many worse than death by rape. In Hel Rafel thought he had seen it all. But obviously not. He sized up the seconds the Major had to keep breathing.

Approximately none!

"Get off her, you bastard. Oi!"

He heard professor Ivy's yell as if distant when she was actually beside him. The Doctor of Poisons sent out a prong of her plants; she fashioned the vines writhing around her into a large trident and hurled it out by an upward jerk of her hands, controlling it with her mind.

Smash! Squish!

The thorns crashed into Daichi's red muscular back, squelching into the raw flesh and instantly oozing black, viscous blood. The devil howled out in pain, removing himself off the Major, but Tanaka Hanzo was already dead; she had been dead for some seconds but the demon had gone on fucking her—dead as she was.

Daichi hurled out such heinous cursing as his four ham arms clutched to his bleeding back.

"What did you do to me, plant wench? Get your vile thorns from inside me, you unwashed cunt!"

"Right back at you, you gigantic ballsack. Even trolls do not have testicles for a head!" Cora spat back at Daichi. It was just as Ivy lifted the growling devil up by her vines, twisting it deeper into his back. He howled out louder in pain, causing the general fighting in the room to an abrupt pause as Ivy planted another bramble head firmly into his one giant eye.

Daichi spat blood, raised several feet up in the air. He wrangled his four hands, suddenly blinded and not knowing where to clutch.

Rafel grasped the proximal ends of Ivy's vines and released [Darkfyre] over the tendrils: "Hell Arts! Bleeding Wrath!"

And a furious red fire engulfed the shoots, running up the vines and wrapping up where they entered Daichi. The Cyclops devil opened his mouth in a soundless scream just before he exploded into a livid pile of hissing and steaming organs.

Splack!

His remains splashed the walls of the assembly hall and abandoned seats in wet crimson. The bulbous one eye landed with a splotch in the bloody pile. "Get fucking splattered, bitch!" Rafel insulted. He turned and found Ravenna hiding under a half-burned table from her father; the demon king who was consuming everything in harsh green poison fires. Rafel gulped when he saw his Little Raven crawl to hide under the stage.

King Thebault de Vríes tore off the red carpet, and set it ablaze just because. The assembly hall was thick in smoke.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

"Distract her!"

Rafel ordered Aya and Cora, pointing straight to his Auntie. Both girls looked to Lilith: in all her goth glory—flanked by a Seraphim and a faerie; she simply crooked a beckoning finger with a torturous smile. "I'll handle the fucking King." Rafel turned back to the Usurper's flaming figure.

"Oi! Cunt! How 'bout Round two?"

Rafel hadn't forgotten when the man had put two in him—two lightning Spectre daggers.

On the fighting grounds, the former decorated hall was a mess. Broken chairs lay upturned and in every conceivable place, and one staggering girl had a seat's pine leg sticking out the back of her head. Clearly she hadn't gotten out the room fast enough. Lilith had only come in with a small troop at her alligator-heeled feet, but the company was large enough to wreak just the right amount of havoc: detestable. Utterly despicable. Her minions were doing to the professors and students whom had taken the stand with Israfel what the Titans had done to the Capitol.

The chandelier above, filigreed in beryl and opal teardrops had blood solidified in bits of brain matter dripping down onto the floors, which in itself was a mural of death. And the diamond podium on the stage was shattered into bits by a hurl of [Umber Rays].

The demigoddess responsible for the sickly purple Cosmo was at the moment snickering as she drowned a sophomore in his own blood. Dr. Blood was trying futilely to free the poor boy out of her grasp. She was Belbys, one of the Fallen.

"YAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" One of the tutors came springing out the corner, merging an aerial attack with a brandished light saber, and aiming for Lilith's fine head. A slender crimson hand caught the saber at its luminous tip, gripping the blade like it was only made out of wood, and not brimming heat. The professor slowly looked up the hand, making contact with the owner of the red arm's eyes: two words—

Hèla Tirnanoc.

The goddess of war.

She too was one of Lilith's powerful accomplices in the storming of the Graduation ceremony, and she was just as bloodthirsty as her infernal sister, if not more.

"BOO!" Hèla mocked the man. He flinched. And she took his head... in a heart's beat, with one of her long, scarlet claws.

On the other side of the hall, as the fight thickened, Rafel stopped the king just as he shoved off all of the stage in one arm pull. Mephistopheles was the strong of legends. Bricks and wood went flying, spraying the already brimming air and sparking into cinder from his fiery arms. Rafel put his hand to the demon king's arm, ignoring the burn of the emerald flames against his own arm. He cracked the air with his hard voice, his face an inch away from Meph's:

"Don't touch her." He meant Ravenna.

The Usurper turned from gazing at where his errant daughter knelt, crouched in her hiding place which he had just ripped away, to stare daggers at Rafel. He growled his wrath upon the redhead. "I have had enough of you, boy. JUST ENOUGH! You dare come between me and my child? AGAIN? No wonder she shys from her destiny. You fucker... You corrupt her. I no longer care if you are Lucifer's nephew. Or Lilith's best boy toy."

The King jammed his snarling face closer to Rafel and their hot breaths mixed. "—I will gladly send you back the abyss. You do not deserve the attention all of the Fallen bestow upon you. This time, even Sekhmet's great healing powers would not be able to save you. However," Meph smiled darkly, "I am well sure Hel would accept you with open arms."

"Fuck death!" Rafel yelled singularly.

[WorldGobbler], his battleaxe was up in a moment, and he sent it outward in a fast arc for the king's chest. Mephistopheles blocked it out easily with a smile and a [flame shield]. WorldGobbler struggled against the leaping fires. "Your daughter doesn't want you. You are evil. She knows that." Rafel said into the wall of fire between them. "When are you going to get that into your fucking head. I'll help!"

The [Divine-grade] axe vanished with a flick of Rafel's hand, disappearing off into his pocket dimension, and just as quickly he whipped out his broadsword.

[Bloodthorn] sang hotly into the air, in a chasm of chaos magic and a bloodred aura.

"Blood Arts! LEPER'S CURSE!"

Rafel was aiming for Meph's corded throat, but the fucker went back and the death blade only nicked his chin. It was pierce enough though.

Ravenna watched from her crouch on the floors as her father froze suddenly, frothed at the mouth and began to shudder in forced spasms. He went white as snow. Rafel stretched out a hand to help her up. "Come now, the Leper's Curse won't hold for long. He'll break it, and then come for us. I must get you somewhere safe. Somewhere where he can't use you to get to me. I need to know you are beyond his reach before I can face him fully."

Rafel knew that was perhaps ninety eight percent reason why he wanted Ravenna out of the hall. The other two percent relied heavily on him knowing that in order to beat, and kill the god of deception and vanity, he had to match the man's cruelty. To give as hard as he got. To not hold back: a crude battle. And he couldn't do that if Ravenna was watching.

When she was upright and against his chest, he looked into her eyes and told her, "I can't let him take you. This is for us."

He kissed her midnight, jasmine-smelling hair.

Ravenna's mouth was opening. "Wait! What—"

Rafel pushed her, and she fell into a [Kronos Bubble], one of the few vacuum spheres even he couldn't break. Since he didn't have it in store, it had costed him a cool seven million to purchase it from [Divine Mage Shop]. Unblinkingly, Rafel had spent that much soul coins. Anything for Ravenna.

In the [Kronos Bubble], he couldn't hear her or touch her.

She couldn't get out. No one could get in.

Perfect.

He turned... and just about missed Meph's [Dark Fingers] arts about to plunge into his head. This particular ability was a martial command thought lost to the Age of Druids.

Rafel bent so far back he heard his spine nubs shift, just to dodge the shadowy arm.

Mephistopheles struck him across the face with the other hand he wasn't expecting. Rafel was thrown backward in the air, and like free fall, he went hurling past Ravenna's [Kronos Bubble] and crashed into the opposite wall. His back hit so hard the shape of him forged into the stone. He fell to the ground on his knees.

Sensing the Apollyon's injury, all of the Fallen invaders turned. Lilith spoke first. She held a squirming Brunhilda at arms length as she yelled at the King.

"What the fuck are you doing, Meph? We capture my darling boy and the girl. Capture only! Do with the others what you wish."

"YOUR DARLING BOY'S A BASTARD!" Meph hurled back. "HE STOLE MY DAUGHTER!" His forefinger pointed forth and back to the [Kronos Bubble] and Rafel's fallen form.

Right then, Israfel lifted his head, red hair spilling all over like a leopard, and began to laugh.

"Hahahahaha!"

Mephistopheles was angered. "You engorged arse-hole! You won't be laughing when—"

Slash!

Silver flashed in the air... and Brunhilda stopped squirming in Lilith's arms.

Hèla cut off her head.

And Lilith let her ripped upper drop to join her body. Rafel froze, like a glacier.

"—when that happens." Meph finished.

As if that wasn't enough, Lilith turned and pulled Rosamunde off Nicara's hands, dragging her off to a nearby fountain of water—now mostly blood in light of all the dismemberment floating in it. She pushed her in it and held her down. Down... Until she stopped moving. Lilith drowned her.

In the bubble, Ravenna dropped to her knees in tears. Rafel couldn't move. He'd watched it all. And had not blinked. Not once.

His eyes turned into the fright of a thunderlord.

"Peitho?" His voice was like soft breeze.

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[Ding!]

[Yes, Host?]

"EQUIP RED TITAN!"

[Ding!]

[Host's request confirmed!]

[Summoning Blood Rage and Rampage. . .]

[Mana Core reaching +1 000%]

[Red Titan, Equipped!]

All the blood in the destroyed room began to gather into Rafel, of those dead and bleeding. He was like a magnet of it. It entered inside him, seeping into his skin. He began to grow in size. His clothes tore away. His boots flat out exploded as his feet became gargantuan and demonic. And he grew and grew. And the Great Hall of Magdalena couldn't hold him anymore. Lilith sighed, and fear for the first time that twilight entered her lilac iris:

"Oh no he didn't?"

A full minute later, the Citadel tower erupted in a volcano of dust and hot air and ash.

And out from the rubble of great stones, Rafel arose.

Only he was no longer Israfel Blüdthïrste. But a 90ft horned giant with plutonic red skin and feet that was taller than the people pushing out of the rubble. Those coughing in the ruins. Hèla easily hefted off the boulder over Lilith and helped her out the collapse. Yuriel, Ravenna's mum held the faerie, Giselle up in the air, her six golden wings flapping as the dust and smoke cleared.

"By all the gods of Hel!" Giselle uttered.

They all lifted up marveled eyes as the Red Titan took his first giant step; the might of his foot left a sinkhole crater in the earth... full of brimstone lava and literal Hellfire.

Lilith looked upon the gargantuan devil and broke in a gasp: "my darling boy, what have you done?"