In the unexplored lands of Hell from which no souls seem to have reached yet and was still full of life, Kisuke set up a temporary camp, "I've been teleporting nonstop since the other day, enough to circle the whole Earth a few times, and I'm pretty far from any civilizations yet I still haven't had a glimpse of this unknown monster that they are talking about."
However, that doesn't mean that he wasn't able to discover a few things. He initially thought that Hell was very large because he couldn't see the curve in the horizon, but as he moved away from where people are, the laws of spacetime are slightly changing as if the whole space was getting smaller and smaller, "This world is flat."
[Master, I can also feel something strange now that we're nearing the edge.] Tiamat on his waist suddenly said.
"Tell me everything that's bothering you."
[...] Tiamat was silent for a while, gathering her thoughts, before saying, [This doesn't feel like a normal land.]
'We're in Hell though.' Kisuke retorted in his head but didn't interrupt Tiamat's thought process. While he couldn't really understand her perspective due to how different they are from each other, her point of view is still something that could see the essence of the world, and anything she says could be a useful clue.
[It's full of life... yes... But everything around us... feels dead.]
"We're in Hell though." Kisuke finally voiced it out.
Since Tiamat couldn't articulate herself, she became silent after saying, [Master, the land is teeming with life but the land itself is dead. That's the best I can explain it. Go to the edge of the world. Maybe we'll find out more about this strange feeling.]
It was Kisuke's turn to be silent. Aside from the absence of 'dead' people and the descending barrier on top of them, he can't tell how the land is dead, 'If the land is dead, how can it support life?'
Nevertheless, Tiamat's suggestion of going to the edge of the world is good, 'But where is this monster?'
As if answering his question, Kisuke suddenly felt the ground shake slightly and he hurriedly packed his belongings. Just half a minute later, the slight shaking turned into a full-blown earthquake.
Feeling the several presences underground, Kisuke took to the air and waited.
A few seconds later, twelve 15-feet wide white worms with countless black sharp teeth lining their front end shot out of the ground and one of them was directly aiming at Kisuke with blistering speed.
Kisuke put his hand forward and conjured a barrier to meet this gigantic worm.
Kisuke was pushed back by a few feet but he was able to stop the worm's lunge. He wanted to study it for a bit but immediately changed his mind when he felt and saw his barrier rapidly losing power and being eroded, "!?"
He dispersed his barrier and went under the worm's 'chin' to give it a kick.
Kisuke thought that this kick would be enough to pull it out of the ground but was surprised yet again when he was only able to send back its head and there was no visible damage. In fact, it only made it angrier as it lunged back at him with greater force. And not just that. The other worms also started moving towards him.
'That skin has as much defense as a high-level Arrancar's Hierro.' Kisuke thought to himself as he dodged the incoming attacks when all of a sudden, he felt a fluctuation of Magic Power from one of the farther worms, 'Magic Power? Not the Psuedo Demonic Power?'
The next instant, he felt the space around him bending and the gravity multiplied several folds, making it hard for him to move properly.
Meanwhile, the worms that were directly attacking him also emitted Magic Powers of their own and the space around them returned to normal, making the Gravity Magic of their comrade negligible on their part, 'It's hard to properly calculate how to normalize the fluctuating space so this means that they could directly communicate with each other and with accuracy enough to nullify each other's Magic.' Kisuke calmly thought and adjusted his breathing.
Kisuke flew up and was soon followed by the worms. He flew for about 820 feet or 250 meters when the worms stopped following him, 'Is that their limit? My senses are telling me that they are still massive under that ground.'
However, the worms didn't stop attacking and instead switched to attacking with various Magic projectiles. Kisuke put up another barrier to stop these projectiles and unlike the first time, his barrier didn't strangely disappear, 'So only when in contact with their mouths?'
He wanted to test more things but his instincts were kicking in and telling him to finish this now.
Kisuke dropped back down while dodging bullets and pulled out the tanto blade on his waist. Without releasing her, Kisuke swung Tiamat at one of the worms while covering her with very dense Reiatsu-Ki, instantly severing its head.
Black blood spurted out of the beheaded worm and Kisuke hurriedly collected some of it while securing the head, 'It's still alive? Amazing.'
After sealing the head and placing it in his inventory, Kisuke immediately left the place, leaving behind the worms, 'Something big is coming. I have to retreat first.'
Thanks to this immediate decision, Kisuke was able to leave the area before the earth started shaking again, this time, much more intensely. A second later, the earth below the worms started bulging up before a pillar of light more than 500 feet wide engulfed them, instantly reducing them to ashes.
"!?" Kisuke braced himself and deployed multiple barriers to protect himself. He watched as the pillar of light hit the thick barrier above them that covered the entire world and pierced it. Beyond the barrier was nothingness, but that's not as important as the light that pierced it.
A few seconds later, the light subsided, leaving behind a giant hole in the sky and ground.
While the only in the sky started repairing itself, Kisuke approached the 500-foot hole. He couldn't easily tell how deep the hole was but after his eyes got used to the darkness a few seconds later, he shuddered and hurriedly flew back up to get away from it.
Deep inside the hole was another worm just like the others from earlier. However this one felt much more dangerous and he could only see a part of its head full of teeth peeking from the abyss, 'The hole is about 500 feet wide, but I can only see a part of its head facing up... This guy is at least 600 or 700 feet wide... Not to mention, my detection abilities are disrupted and I didn't realize that thing was looking at me until I found it.'
Kisuke didn't want to deal with it right now so he started teleporting away from this region, 'Yep. That's an unknown monster, alright?'
And just as he was about to disappear, a certain thought occurred in his head, '...What if that's not a unique thing? How many of them are hiding down there?'
Editors:
28th00: Something properly hellish! Magic Hellworms! Reality is non-existent at the edges of the flat plain dimension that is hell, but the worms seem to control it. Hell’s ecosystem is weird.