She was suddenly caught. A huge claw reached out of the black fog, wrapped around her entire body, and dragged her back. "Hey, I was just testing the attitude. Don't flip the whole dinner table on me!"
In a hurry, Belial dragged back the little intruder who had suddenly gone all out. Seeing how close she was to dying, he could not let it continue. With a casual sweep of his tail, the surging tide was completely swallowed and erased.
"Well, now it's done. No way to hide it from those old bastards. The meal ended early." This was not what Belial expected. He had not meant to wipe her out over this, and if he had kept pretending, he might have squeezed out some more Gold Coins from them.
"I never should've trusted that so-called brilliant wisdom. What a mess." "Forget it. I was leaving anyway. I'll just go loud!"
The massive shadow of the Black Dragon tore apart all restraints around it. The black chains bound to its body shattered like toys, ground into Shard by the radiating blue-white flames. A huge black altar was crushed under a falling claw and split apart, while the sweeping tail released ring-shaped plasma that cut the illuminated High Tower into Shard.
It spread its wings fully, revealing a more violent form, and roared so hard that dense Crack spread through space without it even acting further. "!" "…!?"
Several black shadows widened their eyes. They had not cared when that pitiful slave and little mouse slipped in, but the use of the Crown to block their corruption crossed a line. Still, that power had originally been theirs, and the intruder was only a Clone. Adding more force would be enough to expel her.
Then the Black Dragon bound to the altar tore through all obstacles with ease and roared as if to rip open space. In that moment, they froze. All the backdoors and measures they had planted inside it failed and were crushed, and the power channels were cut.
Everything was lost, and the Black Dragon looked completely fine. They suddenly realized they were the fools.
Fury erupted among all the Crimson God. The blood-red space twisted as more monstrous godly shadows appeared. Trying to leave? Nowhere to go.
Those who never reached the crimson peak were nothing but ants, destined to be crushed. They stood high above with control intact, certain the other side could not harm their true selves. Losing was not an option.
All of them, including Belial, flipped the table at once. The enraged Crimson God poured in more power, manifesting combat Clone throughout this god-ruled domain. Then they froze again.
A familiar-looking sun slowly appeared. "Surprised?"
Belial had prepared this treasure for a long time. First, it needed the effect of a Blue Pill, able to slap them across the screen. Second, it needed enough power to wipe them all out at once, since the chance only came once.
Neither a pure Corona Beam nor a Charged Particle Cannon alone would work. Raising output alone hurt even him, so the trick had to be in the mechanism. That was where Diablo shined, since while Space and planets could interfere, Diablo was the real specialist.
He remembered fighting Fire Rodan. No matter how he attacked, its body kept reforming, only draining energy without touching its life. But once possessed by the God of Destruction, he gained the ability to deal real damage. These beings felt similar to that Rodan.
If so, the power of the God of Destruction and Rodan should be the most direct way to hurt them. "I slept this long and worked this hard. Enjoy my new ultimate move."
The Black Dragon roared as the newly built System linked decayed solar power, giving its strength a special effect. He had not fully figured out the legacy of Rodan, but after taking so many hits, he had learned something.
This move combined Space, darkness, and planetary power, carrying space-level output, dark special damage, planetary Ecological Corrosion, and the penetration and forced health loss of Rodan. White-hot light formed in his grasp, crackling with lightning, devouring the blood-red surroundings back into void.
His massive body glowed red, flames pouring from its seams and igniting everything in sight. "Space domain." "Wraith Constitution." "Magnetic rotation."
"All three as one. Damn atomic Rend level power. Ultimate move." "God-Cutting Thunder!"
Rage drove the final strike forward. How could the clowns of the Abyss withstand this? They refused to believe they could lose to a mere sacrifice and unleashed their strongest bursts, shattering the blood-red domain even further.
Their answer was action, and the answer was no. "No doesn't matter!"
"Come on, filthy rats and low dogs. Die under my God-Cutting Thunder!"
The last thing Chloe saw was the Great Dragon beating flaming wings, carrying a beam of absolute destruction into the towering god-shadows. Then her Clone broke apart from earlier overexertion, and blinding white light split the domain until it collapsed.
After another bout of dizziness, Belial sensed his surroundings. He seemed buried underground. "Finally back. That was a good meal. Hope there are more clowns next time."
"But first, I need to shrink this body. There's enough material around, so I'll grow properly first." Back in the real plane, he thought of the uninvited woman who had exploded after his test. He had barely patched her up with darkness, so she should still be alive.
"I'll look for her later." After sweeping the area twice with Energy Field and finding no trace, hunger took over. Belial stopped thinking, stayed buried in the ground, and fell into a deep sleep.
"Mm…?" "I am still alive… no, is this Clone still alive? It did not return to Throne?"
Chloe also crawled out of the soil, but fortunately this body was only a Clone molded from Abyssal Darkness, so it did not need to breathe. She looked down at herself with some confusion, checking her condition from head to toe. After a full inspection, she reshaped a layer of black robe over her body, though the body itself felt worse than expected, like fragile porcelain that could be torn apart by Rend into a blockbuster-sized Crack.
She soon realized that inside her body there was an unknown source of dark power sustaining the operation of this Clone. "And also… that feeling is gone?"
The constant pressure on her mind, the lure of the gods, and the pain of whispered corrosion were gone, and her body no longer felt like brittle blocks that might fall apart without careful control. There was also no sensation of being torn apart by Rend, and everything felt normal, so normal that Chloe almost thought she was still human. She took a deep breath, then let it out slowly, savoring the simple act of living without pain.
Still, Chloe clearly understood that her body could only last because of that slowly draining dark power. Once it ran out, the Clone would collapse and return to Throne. The time left was not long, perhaps only a dozen years, and using power along the way would speed up the loss, meaning she could no longer wield the strength of a Demon King as before.
"Was this done by that Black Dragon?" she muttered. "Can his Laws and domain let my Clone avoid the erosion from the main body?" "Then… where is he now?"
As these thoughts surfaced, Chloe felt her breathing quicken slightly. It was not only about this strange ability and freedom from divine corrosion, but also because Erin would descend before long. More importantly, the Lords of the Demon Nations that nominally belonged to the Demon King would soon begin a war, backed by the Crimson God behind them.
The end was approaching, and even Goddess of Dawn was close to her limit. If she could gain the help of that Black Dragon, it would buy a little more time for the future. However, Chloe sensed no trace nearby of the same Black Dragon who had fallen out of space with her, which was only natural. After such a massive Extra-Dimensional Space shattered into a Shard, two beings returning to the world of the Lord from different spatial nodes would end up very far apart.
"Come to think of it, I have not seen the outside world in a long time," she said softly. "What does it look like now?"
She pulled up her hood and walked out of the mountain area at an unhurried pace, forming some plans in her mind. A vacation could wait for some uncertain future, but not now. This place was close to a town at the border between Paraten Empire and Faris Empire, and along the way Chloe dealt with some monsters, trading their remains for a bit of coin.
Whether it was eating proper food or reading a few books, she felt she needed to understand the current era first. With that in mind, Chloe entered a popular bookstore. Watching the crowd, she waited quietly until it dispersed, then picked up a book, only to stiffen the moment she saw the cover.
"No way… it has only been this many years, and Otherworld has already evolved into this kind of cel-shaded style?" "The evil dragon the Lord and the Chosen Hero in a love triangle? A mysterious childhood friend Demon King falling from the sky? Since when did Otherworld stories become this open, and people actually read this?"