章 247: Devil's Nightmare
'Underworld here I com-
-BANG!!
"Arghhh!"
Not allowing him to finish that thought. Teleporting in front of him, Grim took advantage of his new found weight to draw his leg back and send Lucifero crashing far away from his spawn point.
-Grrrrrrrrrrrr
Growling and digging his heels into the ground, numbness spread through Lucifero's arms as he left two long stretch marks on the ground.
"Damn it!" He snarled. "Move Grim! YOU'VE ALREADY WON! YOU BEAT ME! WHY WON'T YOU LET ME GO!"
"Let you go?" Grim cocked his head to the side and laughed. "But I'm not done playing yet."
Showing off an animalistic grin, Lucifero felt his chest tighten.
'Those eyes... He's treating me like prey.'
Shaken by such a development, he couldn't believe that such a sinister being could exist up here. Even in the underworld you'd be hard pressed to find such a demented devil.
Instead of an elf, it felt like he was fighting against a devil that had taken on a different evolutionary path.
'I-I'm going to die.'
For the first time in his centuries long life, he was scared. No, this was more than fear. It went deeper. Far deeper. It was like every fibre of his being was on edge.
This boy, he was his natural enemy. A true monster in every sense of the word. A predator that preys on devils. A crazed beast that devours hope.
This boy, he was-
The One That Devils Fear.
Shivering, cold sweat covered the entirety of Lucifero's back as he looked at the spawn point behind Grim.
If he could just make it there...
***
'This boy... He's a problem.'
Watching from the safety of his floating rock, something about Grim's [0th Form] terrified Adramalech. It was like the closer he got the worse he felt. Even from up here, he couldn't stop his hands from trembling. He couldn't even imagine how Lucifero was dealing with it. This feeling, it was coded into their DNA, into the fabric of their very being. Whatever Grim was, it was no longer a human or elf.
'He's evolving.'
***
Taking a step forward, the ground beneath his feet cracked. Even the air was begining to twist and distort as it was being devoured.
Brimming with a power that could only be described as primal, everyone felt their hearts shake. With those sharp yellow eyes and swaying white hair, without saying anything, everyone unilaterally agreed that right here and right now, Grim was-
The Strongest
But just as quickly as that feeling came, it quickly crumbled.
Abruptly and out of nowhere, blood spilled out of the corner of Grim's mouth.
"What!"
Then various cracks started appearing all over his skin. From within those cracks, fountains of blood started spurting out as Grim dropped to his knees.
Covering his mouth, he couldn't stop the stream of blood passing through the gaps in his fingers.
'Fuck!' His eyes shook. 'I'm throwing up all the damage I've devoured!'
What is happening?
Despite not knowing what was going on, seeing Grim in such a state caused the corners of Lucifero's mouth curved upwards.
Stepping forward, his power exploded.
'My [Gravity Magic], its not being devoured.'
"Haha...Haha...HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!"
'I'm back!'
*BOOOM!!*
Unleashing even more magic, his power ran wild.
'Oh no.'
Teleporting in front of the kneeling Grim, power surged out of his as his hand clenched into a fist. Radiating pure malice and hatred, memories of his humiliation made his hostility damn near tangible as he poured all of his feeling into this blow.
*BANG!!*
"Gyahhh!!"
Kicking him in the side, the sound of his ribs breaking echoed out as he was sent flying.
*BANG!!*
Teleporting above him, he brought his hands together and smashed down.
*BOOOM!*
Grim felt several bones in his back break.
*SWOOSH!!*
Teleporting to his right this time, he delivered a punch strong enough to create a shockwave.
If it weren't for him being in the [0th Form] toughening his body, the accumulated damage he threw up would have been enough to take him out let alone these blows from Lucifero.
-Sigh
Gazing up at the snow filled sky, Grim, bloodied with his limbs crushed and grotesquely twisted gasped for air, his hair desheveled.
'I devoured too many unnecessary things.' He sighed.
'I need to find a way to digest the damage I take or I'll risk throwing it up again.'
Falling quiet, he assessed the damage.
-Almost unusable limbs.
-A rib that punctured one of his lungs.
-Several damaged organs.
-Internal bleeding.
-Several bruises to the brain.
"..."
Workable.
Struggling to lift his head, he saw a billowing figure drawing closer.
Lucifero.
"Have you come here to gloat?"
"No." The devil shook his head specs of fear still lay in his eyes. "I've come to end things."
"Is that so." Grim smiled.
"Despite everything, out of every being I've ever met (devil or otherwise), you are the only one to draw my hatred. The only one who ever humiliate me, make me fear for my life. The only one to almost end me. For that, I respect and loathe you. But I will never forget. Because from now on, if there is even someone capable of scratching me, I will not hesitate."
"Good to know I inspired you."
"Mmm. I think I'll start with thinning out the supreme devils. But that's not something for you to worry about."
Forming a fist, he punched down without any hesitation.
"DIEEEEEEEEEE!!"
!!!
"ARGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!" Lucifero suddenly screamed.
The moment he attacked, light had flashed through Grim's eyes. Rolling out of the way and dodging Lucifero's punch at the last minute, two of his fingers shot up and stabbed at Lucifero's unprotected eye!
Taking this chance, he hooked his fingers in Lucifero's bleeding eye socket and pulled him down.
*MUNCH!!*
Opening his mouth and biting into his neck, he ripped out a chunk of his flesh.
"GYAHHHHHHHHHH!!!"
Unable to withstand the pain, he unleashed a reckless amount of [Gravity Magic] and sent Grim flying back.
Skidding on the snow and grinning, Grim wiped away at his bloody mouth and looked at Lucifero with hunger in his eyes.
"HOW!!" Lucifero roared covering his bloody eye.
Standing with completely intact limbs and caked in blood from head to toe, a bloodied Grim looked at him with a playful smile.
"Throwing up the damage emptied me out and created more space in my stomach. While I can't devour what I threw up before because ew. Who said I couldn't devour what came after?"
"You! All this time!"
"Played you for a fool? Yes. Yes I did."
"ARGHHHHHHHHHHH!!"
*SWOOSH!!*
Teleporting and throwing a punch, an enraged Lucifero watched in horror as Grim leaned his head to the side and effortlessly dodged the attack.
*BOOOM!!*
Finding a knee burried deep into his gut, it took everything he had not to throw up as he stumbled back clutching his abdomen.
"To simple Luci." Grim chuckled moving in slowly.
*BANG!!*
He uppercut him.
"You know, after throwing up all that damage, I didn't even use my devouring ability and let you attack me any way you wished. While I did it mostly to test just how much damage my body could handle without devouring anything, I gotta say I'm disappointed. Your torture methods are just as simple as your fighting style."
*Stab!*
"Arghhh!!"
Piercing the centre of both his palms with his swords, Grim nailed him to the ground.
"Oh c'mon, don't be a baby." Sitting on top of him, Lucifero noticed that the whites in Grim's eyes had filled with blood. In contrast to his yellow eyes and slit pupils, he looked like something straight out of a nightmare. Not that his blood covered face and bleeding teeth helped.
"But the damage you've taken..."
"Hmm? Oh yeah. Its gonna hurt like a bitch when it comes back up. See *points at eyes* its already starting to come back up slowly. Together with the damage I threw up earlier, this shit might just kill me." He chuckled.
"Y-You want to die!" Lucifero's eyes widened with shock.
"Die? Nah, but life's to boring if you don't live on the edge every once in a while. I mean, didn't you have fun today? You even say that you'd never forget me. I'd say that today was an unforgettable day for you."
"You're insane!"
"Haha yeah~ But seriously, I gotta thank you."
"Thank me? For what?"
"For helping me find the flaws in the [0th Form] duh. Now after I kill you and head into the underworld to kill your other half, I'll be even stronger than I am now! Isn't that great!"
"..."
"Well this has been a good talk, but there are tons of devils in the underworld waiting for me so-
"Wait! How long have you been playing with me!"
"Hmm?" Grim paused. "Now that's a good question. Lets see, I'd say after our first couple of exchanges."
"What! But how!"
"It wasn't that hard really. I only needed to fight you for a little bit to realize that you can't fight for shit. I mean punching and kicking is good and all. But you don't even have the basics down. You left yourself open sooo many times that at one point it actually started to piss me off. You don't even want to know how many times I could have killed you."
"..."
"It makes sense though. You've always been the strongest, you've never known defeat. But its because you're the strongest that you lost. I bet you couldn't even imagine someone else being above you. Such thoughts must be completely foreign to you. But me? I had to work my way to get here. I built this shit, me! Brick by brick!"
"All the strength I possess. All the abilities I wield. It was all born out of a hunger to get stronger! I fought, I bled, and I overcame every challenge that came my way! And while I didn't win all of them, every loss taught me a lesson. That this wasn't my limit, that I still had further to go, that I could still improve!"
"..."
"But you? You're the type of person I hate the most. Stagnant. You've never had the hunger required to get stronger, to improve, to go beyond. You wear your unearned arrogance like a crown. Its fucking sickening."
"...If you hate me so much, why didn't you kill me?"
"Huh?" Grim looked at him as if he were stupid.
"Who else is strong enough to be my punching bag?"
"..."
"Seriously though, its thanks to you that I've gotten such a good grasp on my current abilities. You don't even know how much I appreciate that."
That was not what Lucifero wanted to hear.
"So all this time, I've been dancing in the palm of your hand." He asked dejectively.
"Pretty much. I mean the King of Clover couldn't do shit to me, the Queen of Heart couldn't do shit to me, you saw what happened in the Diamond Kingdom, what made you think you'd be any different King of Devils?"
"...You're a monster."
"Maybe, but you know what I'm not?"
"What?"
"Dead."
Wielding his sword, he separated Lucifero's head from his shoulders and put an end to the king of devils in the human world.
クリエイターの想い 
Arada
Arada And he's dead! Ultimately, Grim was just playing with his food.
Next chapter will close this arc.
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