Not far behind them, the Ogre's body, which should have been headless, actually wobbled and stood back up.
From its neck, several slippery, jointed appendages sprouted, clawing wildly at the air as if searching for something.
A second later, the Ogre's headless torso turned toward the pair.
"No... no!"
Scott backed away in terror.
Looking at Minxie in front of him, his eyes suddenly turned cold, and he used every ounce of his strength to shove her toward the Ogre.
"Eat her! Don't eat me!!"
Minxie's eyes widened, but before a scream could escape her throat, the wings on the Ogre's back unfurled like a giant Venus flytrap.
They wrapped entirely around the falling Minxie, forming a massive, pulsating fleshy cocoon. Blood began to seep from the bottom of the mass.
Watching this horror unfold, Scott turned and ran like a madman into the distant darkness.
Sephirot watched the retreating back with cold eyes, his mind stirring.
Standing beside Patty, Alessa's clear eyes instantly turned pitch black, and the corners of her mouth curled upward.
What she loathed most were things that betrayed their companions just to scrounge for survival.
—--
In the distance, Scott ran, completely failing to notice the mist thickening around him.
He gasped for air, and as he ran, he suddenly realized that many buildings had appeared in the vicinity.
"People?!"
A look of ecstatic relief washed over Scott's face. He jumped in place, waving his arms and shouting at the top of his lungs, "Help! Mortals! There's a monster here! Someone save me!"
Screee...
From within the fog nearby came the sound of dragging metal.
Scott's expression froze.
A humanoid silhouette wearing a massive triangular object on its head slowly stepped out of the mist, dragging a colossal blade in its hand...
"Ah! Stay back! What is this?! No!!"
...
—--
Squelch!
The fleshy cocoon in front of Sephirot tore open.
The Ogre stood up once more, a humanoid skeleton scattering before it, every scrap of flesh gnawed clean from the bone.
Its abdomen bulged as a sphere-like object was pushed upward through its torso. Finally, a head resembling Minxie's face grew out from the neck.
Very quickly, it contorted back into the Ogre's hideous visage.
"Where did you learn such a bone-licking technique?"
Sephirot looked at the white bones before it with pure disgust. "I'm tempted to call you the ultimate simp."
The Ogre's newly grown head stared fixedly at Sephirot, the greed in its expression completely vanished.
It seemed to realize that the "food" before it was an adversary it could not defeat. Its wings flapped and its legs braced, preparing to flee.
"Running?"
The red light in Sephirot's eyes flared brilliantly, his demonic power rising like flames. "If I let you get away today, you can take my damn name!"
He sprinted rapidly beneath the Ogre and then leaped high into the air.
Seeing this, the Ogre frantically beat its massive leathery wings, attempting to climb higher to escape. Mid-air, Sephirot saw the movement and stepped off the empty air once more. His body surged higher, leaping directly above the creature with an overriding momentum before he slammed a foot heavily onto the Ogre's back.
"Boom!"
Two figures crashed into the earth, sending dust billowing in all directions.
Within the haze, a purple, shimmering giant skeletal hand emerged, seizing the leathery wings on the Ogre's back.
"Give... way!!!"
Rip!
With Sephirot's explosive roar, the Devil Bringer violently tore away a section of the Ogre's incredibly resilient wings, wrenching them straight from its spine.
"Hoorgh... hoorgh..."
A guttural shriek tore from the Ogre's throat. It tried to flee, but Sephirot kept it pinned ruthlessly beneath his heel.
Sephirot frowned as he looked down at the monster writhing frantically on the ground.
Do I have to rip out its core?
The creature woke every twenty-three years. Even if its body were blown to pieces or burned to ash this time, it would simply use a corpse to resurrect itself once the next cycle began.
In fact, even without a corpse, it could manifest directly within a specific territory.
If he merely destroyed its physical form, he likely wouldn't achieve the "complete kill" required by the system.
Sephirot glanced at the mission panel in his mind.
[Mission Objective: Completely kill the Ogre]
[Mission Reward: 2000 Points]
[Bloodline awakening degree increased by 2%]
[Special Drop: Ancient Demon Essence (Regeneration) ×1]
The system offered no explanation as to what this "Ancient Demon Essence" actually was.
As he pondered, Patty had already dragged Jack and his son from the pickup truck not far away.
"Cough, cough..."
Old Jack spat out a mouthful of blood. He looked battered, but fortunately, he hadn't sustained any fatal injuries.
The fiercely proud father pushed away his son's supporting arm and limped over to the monster.
He stared at the creature struggling manically on the ground, his eyes overflowing with hatred.
"You damned animal!"
Jack bellowed, delivering several savage kicks to the monster's head.
Once he had vented his rage, he stood panting and looked up at the brooding Sephirot.
"You're wondering how to finish it for good, aren't you?"
Jack wiped blood from his face. "Brute force won't work. Even if you burn it, shoot it, or chop it into mincemeat, it'll just come back once the time is right."
"To avenge my boy, I've spent my life hunting down every legend on this land."
Jack glared at the monster and kicked it once more. "It isn't some mutated beast or an alien."
"It's a god. A fallen god."
"Camazotz."
An odd set of syllables fell from Jack's lips.
"In Mayan mythology from over two thousand years ago, he was the bat god of death, night, and sacrifice. He resided in the legendary underworld: Xibalba."
"Back then, he didn't need to skulk around like a hyena eating people."
Jack pointed toward the sky and continued.
"Fanatical priests would stand atop the altar, cut open the chests of sacrifices, and offer him fresh, beating hearts."
"To him, those organs weren't just food; they were the fuel that maintained his divine power and immortality."
"Later, the Mayan civilization collapsed, the temples fell, and the believers died out. No one was left to offer sacrifices. Without food, his power began to dissipate, and his divine body started to rot."
"To keep from fading away entirely, this once-exalted God had to crawl out from underground and hunt for food himself."
Listening to this, Sephirot looked thoughtfully at the Ogre on the ground. "So, he's been hunting humans all this time just to patch together his rotting body and sustain his divinity?"
"Exactly."
Jack nodded and continued, "Over the long ages, the passage of time and the loss of power have eroded most of his memories."
"Waking every twenty-three years isn't random. It's based on an ancient celestial calendar. When the nodes of the calendar align, the heavens grant him a brief surge of energy, allowing him to wake for twenty-three days to hunt."
Jack pulled a bone dagger from his pocket, something he had found in the field where his younger son, Billy, had been taken.
(Translated by yourtl.app)
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TL NOTES — CROSSOVER GUIDE
Some references in this chapter come from source universes that may be unfamiliar to some readers. The notes below are here to help readers unfamiliar with these universes follow along more easily.
PLACES
Xibalba — In ancient Mayan mythology, Xibalba is the underworld, a realm of darkness and death ruled by death gods. The name translates roughly as "place of fear." It is described in the Mayan epic the Popol Vuh as a subterranean kingdom filled with rivers of blood and pus, presided over by lords of death. It is the domain where Camazotz originally resided before the collapse of the civilization that worshipped him.
CONCEPTS
Camazotz — A figure from Mayan mythology, Camazotz (meaning "death bat") is a bat deity associated with night, death, and sacrifice. He appears in the Popol Vuh, where he kills the hero Hunahpu by decapitation. As Jack explains in this chapter, the story adapts Camazotz into the Ogre: a once-divine being, formerly sustained by ritual sacrifice, now reduced to hunting on his own after the collapse of the Mayan civilization deprived him of his worshippers and the hearts that fuelled his power.