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_Finally, another long and complex chapter is complete and ready for posting. It took longer than i hoped, and it was very difficult to keep going, at times. The battle scenes are hard to describe: too many words make it all slow, too few and it is impossible to image what is going on. A battle of gods is hard to visualize, with lots of things happening at once. But i hope that the end result will make for a good and entertaining read. Enjoy the big fight, and drop me a comment afterwards, it is always the most welcome of rewards. _

The brutal fury of War, the paralyzing, mind-shattering Fear, the torturing Disease, the sheer power of Destruction. Charging knowingly against them takes great courage... or reckless stupidity.

*Chapter 67 - Master of War, Owner of Fear *

Killer stepped out of the portal, his senses alert and his movements measured as he walked through the last veil of darkness, immediately feeling clearly that he was in a whole different place, on a whole different planet. He hesitated briefly before taking the last step out of the portal, looking on with a little grimace as the black vortex immediately swirled closed, vanishing from sight. With that, he was truly locked into the trap he had chosen to walk into. He would not be able to teleport out of a planet that Taranis entirely controlled, and the only way to break out, now, was to defeat the owner of the place. Killer took a moment to snort quietly at his own stupidity and bravado, always accepting even the most unfair of challenges without listening to common sense, but then shrugged it off and turned his back to the spot where the portal had been.

That was what he was: he did not want to be known for anything else. Would it have been smarter to force an engagement with Taranis back on neutral ground, and with his Disciples ready to support him if anyone came to Taranis's aid...? Of course it would have been. But that wasn't the point. Killer had accepted a challenge, and now he was going to face every last implication of it. A victory against all odds was far more precious and glorious. Guess I will not be remembered for being smart.

He looked up at the sky, gaping a little at the sight of dark, ominous clouds of dust and dirt and smoke. Up to that day, thankfully, he had never witnessed what a nuclear winter was like... but from what he had read and studied, he was immediately pretty sure that those low, thick, grey fogs were the symptoms of exactly that kind of apocalypse. Dust and dirt, blown up by massive explosions, now floated in enormous clouds in the low stratosphere. Eventually, all the dust and ashes would fall back to earth again, but it would have taken many months, and in the meanwhile the curtain kept the light of the stars out of sight. The results were an unnatural, permanent darkness and temperatures sharply lower than normal and every life form on the planet paid a heavy price for that. Killer looked around himself, but nowhere did he see a hint of green: the grass has withered and died and the trees stretched skeletal branches, devoid of any leaf, towards a sky that had nothing to offer them.

It rained lazily, and the dead ground all too quickly absorbed the little water available... but the rain was acid and poisonous, and it only added to the devastation. Killer made a grimace, looking at the drops landing on his flesh as they sizzled in place, trying to burn into his flesh, but failing.

Shards of glass crumbled under his foot, his toes flattening a piece of metallic wreckage into a pancake, with the god barely noticing as he stepped forwards, walking between rows of destroyed cars and trucks. The designs were unlike anything he had seen back home, but the technological level was roughly the same and most mechanical solutions were identical... it had once been a planet much like home. But now all around him there was only destruction, with abandoned vehicles frozen in the awkward positions in which the shockwave from a distant explosion had shoved them. The metallic bodies of the cars had partially melted away, fusing the vehicles to the asphalt, which had liquefied and then had messily cooled down and solidified again. Only skeletal outlines were left of the buildings: the strongest of the pillars and structural elements still stood, albeit often tilted dangerously and looking extremely fragile, cracked and damaged as they were. The rest had been vaporized, along with the people that had lived in those buildings and traveled on that road. Killer could actually see the shadows of many of the dead: the intensity of the nuclear flash had "photographed" the victims in their last moment of life, printing their dark shape on the walls. In many cases, that seemed to be the only sign that those people ever existed.

It was immediately pretty clear, however, that not everyone had died. Killer could hear the sounds of fighting, of blades clashing, of shrieks and roars and yells... and he could feel countless energy signatures, and the air vibrated with feral, insane and incurable rage. Killer walked forwards, holding Wyvern balanced over his shoulder, and he gazed sideways with a little smile as he heard excitement building in the whispers coming from the souls trapped within the Imprisonment Crystal. But, moreover, he noticed, and not for the first time, what felt like another voice, coming from the sword itself, mainly from the Azura blades. He wasn't sure if it was Azura trying to speak to him through the swords she had gifted him, or if Wyvern had truly developed some kind of living soul after being imbued with so much of his energies, or if it was a mixture of the two. He couldn't make out actual words, but he could hear the whispers and they came with a tone that was anxious and impatient, yes, but also confident and eager. It added to his own anticipation for the clash ahead, sending his adrenaline pumping as he flexed slightly, full of vigor and power. He had just crushed a god into a slave, after a ferocious battle... yet, he wasn't tired, but rather eager. The wounds from the earlier clash had almost entirely vanished already, and he was regenerating quickly, his reserves of energy still fearsomely vast. And a good thing it was, because the battle ahead was going to test him like nothing else before.

He was on one of Taranis's temple-planets, one of the world-sized power cells that feed the powers of the god of war... and that made him think that he was definitely going to be faced also by Deimos, Erra and the dragon, and who knew who and what else.

The enemies he expected to face were of such caliber that the millions of energy signatures he perceived, coming from the hostile, insane, bloodthirsty mortals that still crowded the planet, suddenly did not feel that worrisome.

He found them after moving just a few steps ahead and reaching the edge of a vast crater: the bottom of the depression was a lake of blood and ichors and gore, with corpses hacked into bits or hammered into pulp abandoned in the middle of the mess. There were corpses grotesquely impaled on spears sticking out of the ground, and the massacre was still ongoing, as horrendously mutilated and mutated mortals hacked and smashed at every other living being in sight. Insane rage was the only thing driving their movements and keeping them going: there were mammals and reptilians alike, but all of them looked like undead. Those who had sported a hide of scales in their previous life now were covered only in weak, rotting pieces of them, with the flesh beneath exposed and turned a dull, sick white. Those who had fur now had only splotches of it, and even that was falling away as they were consumed by famine, disease and lack of solar light. They all were skeletal and scrawny, having had no food at all for a very long time, other than the decaying flesh they were more than eager to bite off of their kin. Yet, at the same time, they had grotesque, massive muscles that distorted their proportions while giving them monstrous physical power. Their bony fingers had turned into deadly talons, and their rotten teeth had grown into blades, ruining their faces forever and cutting into their own muzzles, tearing trenches into their own flesh and sharpening constantly against the bone beneath.

There were no factions, no armies, and no rules: everyone just mercilessly assaulted everyone else. There were no words exchanged, only feral growling and snarling and roaring as they jumped at each other's throats, stomping upon the dead without any sign of remorse or hesitation.

The drooling, insane ghouls did not only use their teeth, muscle and talons though... they all were clad into improvised suites of armor, thrown together using skins, leather, ancient clothes, tactical vests from the forgotten, fallen past. Bones and skulls were used to form the armors as well as to decorate them, and the beasts all brandished bloody makeshift weapons, from swords obtained from sharpened, rusty metallic wreckage to enormous, heavy maces built with whatever they managed to scavenge from the ruins.

Old tools from the civilized past were not forgotten... it seemed that their insanity did not extend to the practical awareness of how to use rifles or even advanced rocket and grenade launchers: those who carried advanced weapons from the past were able to wreak horrendous havoc upon the crowd of other ghouls... but on the other hand they tended to be targeted by mostly everyone else, as the beasts tried to take over the precious weaponry.

Killer spotted even a massive main battle tank, armed with two gigantic square-barreled railguns and riding tall on four sets of independently hinged tracks moved by electric motors directly powering heavy steel wheels. The enormous beast of tank, far larger than any war machine back at Killer's home world, was however no longer functional: complex weapons were incredibly powerful, but needed care and maintenance that none of the ghouls cared to provide. The weapons were used until they broke, and then they were just abandoned.

That primordial, obscene massacre raged on from one end of the horizon to the other: wherever he looked, even in the distance, Killer could see the shapes of the drooling monsters battling and massacring, with the occasional still-functioning armored vehicle rolling over the ghouls in dozens, leaving behind them only rivers of bloody pulp ground into the dirt. The sounds of the clashing were the only noise on the planet, apart from thunder and from the howling of cruel, icy wind between the skeletal ruins of the once rich and modern towns. It was a true apocalypse... a true temple of war in its most perverse form. Fighting and killing was all those ghouls craved. And each blow they landed fueled Taranis with yet more power.

Killer was unsurprised by Taranis being nowhere in sight: at this point, he expected that the god of war would fully exploit every advantage he could get, and that included having Killer getting past the horde of ghouls. The liger snorted in distaste at that cowardly behavior, but only continued to calmly advance, his eyes glowing sapphire as the ground in front of him rattled violently before forming a large and comfortable staircase leading down to the bottom of the vast crater.

A ghoul turned to face him with a snarl as he stepped into the shallow lake of blood, the mindless beast swinging a crude, gigantic axe against him, but Killer caught the blade in his hand and crushed it like cheap tin, lifting the mutated mortal off the ground as it refused to let go of its weapon. The liger just shoved the remains of the axe backwards, sending the sharp pole piercing through the ghoul's head and upper chest, the beast collapsing in a broken heap with a sick gargle. Another monster leapt against him in the same instant, only to have its head caught in Killer's strong hand, the skull crumbling with an easy squeeze as blood and brain matter sprayed through the huge male's fingers. Killer grinned, his body flexing and his muscles bulging with eager vigor, his massive form emanating tremendous physical power as he stepped upon two more ghouls charging at him, just like they were bugs, their guts and insides bursting out of them as they were crushed as flat as pancakes. More and more beasts turned to hiss and snarl at him, the ghouls quickly forgetting their compatriots to focus their hunger on the far larger piece of meat that had come walking among them. Killer only licked his lips slowly as the horde charged against him, his tail whip-lashing into those coming from behind and smashing them into the ground, the leonine tuft of black fur at the extremity turning into raging hellfire and burning down a whole line of ghouls, consuming them down to ashes. The thick, powerful tail wrapped around another ghoul, lifting him into the air and tearing him in half at the waist as the coil tightened its hold, while the tip of the tail snapped through another monster, piercing through its chest from side to side and hefting the creature into the air before hurling it brutally into its comrades, sending dozens sprawling like pins.

A ghoul ahead, wearing long belts of massive armor-piercing rounds all over his torso and around his thighs, trained a heavy machinegun towards Killer, opening up with an endless burst, but the huge liger charged right through the fire, ignoring the bullets as they crumpled uselessly against his massive musculature, bouncing back like pebbles thrown against a speeding train. The liger swung out his enormous arm, smashing dozens of ghouls flying into the air in a slur of broken body parts and blood, while even more were raked by the deadly spikes of his knees, the talons of his large toes, as he ran over the horde, stepping upon the mutants and squishing them into ugly red stains on the bottom of his footprints, until he reached the ghoul with the machinegun, catching it in his hand and lifting him high into the air before simply crushing the beast into a splatter of liquid gore, the weapon crumpled on itself like it was made of paper. The horde had a moment of hesitation, a shiver running through it as the giant male laughed cruelly, then lashed out a brutal kick into the thick group of monsters charging against him, sending up an explosion of blood and ichors before he gazed down at two more monsters firing large assault rifles, simply squishing them with his fist, before spinning on the spot as he swung Wyvern out, mowing down the beasts leaping at his throat and sending blood and gore raining thickly down to the ground, right as another ghoul charged at him with a long spear just to be stomped into red mist, and Killer flexed, arching his back with a grin as long, powerful tentacles of black flesh surged out along the sides of his spine, piercing through bodies like they would through paper, impaling dozens and crushing even more down into the ground, grinding them out of existence, as others simply exploded when the tentacles wrapped their massive coils around them.

In seconds, Killer had wasted an entire horde, the huge male grinning widely as his body hungrily devoured the energies contained in the gore, in the blood, in the pathetic remains caked all over his body and splattered everywhere around him. It wasn't enough to give him any power boost... but it aided his regeneration, and helped healing the last few wounds from the clash against Anubis.

The air suddenly split with a loud crack as a large caliber round smashed into Killer's temple, making him grunt in annoyance more than pain as his head tilted to the side slightly, before he swatted a second round out of the air with a backhand, like he was chasing away a fly. He turned to the side, his senses easily tracking the sniper's fire and leading his eyes up to a destroyed apartment at the sixth floor of a ruined building at the edge of the crater. A ghoul nestled near a cracked column of reinforced concrete was firing off shot after shot from an enormous tank-busting precision rifle, sending supersonic, large caliber rounds against him. Killer snorted in entertainment at how the heavy rounds looked slow and weak to him now: once, they would have scared him stiff, but now he only watched on with fascination as he saw them spinning slowly towards him. He could easily dodge them, catch them like flies, slap them out of the air... or let them hit him, to laugh as they bounced off harmlessly, unable to even scratch his massive musculature as he took a step forwards, pulling up one foot and growling as he flexed his muscles, letting energy surge down his leg as he stomped hard into the ground, cracking the earth and sending the mutated mortals flying high into the air as the buildings in the distance trembled violently before all but exploding into pieces, collapsing into hills of ruins. Killer grinned as he caught a flash of the sniper, clad in a dirty leather and bones armor which had been assembled starting from a biker's outfit, before he crashed into the bottom of the crater, bouncing painfully with a sick crack of bones before vanishing in a cloud of dust and falling debris as the whole building crumbled, becoming a tomb for countless of the drooling beasts.

The world shook violently with the power of the simple stomp alone, Killer's muscles bulging as his body thrummed with power, energy pumping in his veins as dozens of ghouls were reduced into a crimson mist, as many more began to rain down from the sky where his stomp had banished them, and he twisted his heel into the ground, crushing asphalt into dust the earth cracked all around him and then erupted upwards in a hail of spears and spikes of sharp rock and crystals, impaling the falling ghouls, ripping them into splatters of blood and gore.

Bullets smashed into him from all sides, but he ignored the useless bombardment as the rounds shattered against him, until he heard the loud hissing blast of rocket launchers, and he grinned as he pushed one arm back, catching one rocket in midair like it was a fly and cracking it in half with a light pressure of his thumb, ignoring the explosion as it failed to do more than spread a warmth over his body and blow the long bangs of his mane into the air. He let the second rocket hit him in the middle of the back, shrugging the explosion of like it hadn't even happened as he turned around and charged towards the wreck of a massive bus, spotting the two oversized ghouls carrying the now empty launcher tubes and two heavy bags full of rockets. The beasts tried to reload as other ghouls charged forwards to restrain Killer, but the liger smashed his way through their ranks, blood spraying up to paint his crotch and abs crimson as he crushed the mutated mortals underfoot like they were ants, his powerful legs ramming into others and sending them crashing backwards over their comrades, sending them crashing into the bus or over the ground, where they hissed and growled in a futile attempt to scare off the massive liger feet settling down upon them with murderous force. Killer grinned widely, shouldering Wyvern and letting his energy tied the blade to his back, eyes glowing with power and dark lust as more bullets crashed uselessly into his chest, bouncing off him as he punched through the side of the bus, his fist breaking inside with ease, like the vehicle was made not of steel but of wet paper. His fingers tore into the first ghoul's face, his grip crushing its head into a splatter of gore even as Killer dragged the monster out of the bus, tearing him through the side wall. The other ghoul growled in dumb, feral fury, aiming its just reloaded rocket launcher and pulling the trigger, sending the rocket exploding right against Killer's massive shoulder... but the rocket only shattered into fragments, the warhead not even going off as the impact had been almost immediate. The rockets had a distance-sensitive fuse which only activated after flying across a safe distance, but of course that detail was lost on the drooling mutation.

Killer tossed away the remains of the first monster and then simply hammered his heavy fist down through the roof of the bus, tearing the vehicle almost in half as front and rear leapt into the air, the wreck taking a distinct V shape as his punch squashed the other ghoul into a ugly crimson stain, with liquefied gore leaking down the flank of the car.

His hand gripped into the metallic frame even as it crumpled in his grip, and he single-handedly lifted the bus high above his head before ramming it down like a mace as ghouls charged at him, crushing a dozen into a splatter of red and of dark ichors. He swung the bus around himself, grinning at the satisfying succession of loud crunches and cracks as the heavy vehicle knocked mutants flying bonelessly backwards, and then Killer pushed the long, wrecked vehicle out in front of himself, laughing in merciless entertainment as he started to run down the devastated street, holding the vehicle by the long side, so that he could sweep clear the whole road. He grinned as he felt the bus collide with the horde of ghouls, bones cracking loudly even as the constant impacts wrecked the vehicle, crumpling it on itself as Killer continued to charge forwards, his muscles bulging powerfully as he steamrolled his way forwards, a red mist surrounding him as he crushed the mutants into paste. The abandoned cars littering the street did not slow him down, the vehicles smashed back by his fearsome force, crashing into one another, a few exploding when their fuel cells, still charged with energy, burst into flames as trucks and cars and streetlamps were knocked flying, breaking into pieces, shattering into a hail of metallic scrap as Killer picked up speed, even as dozens of cars piled up in front of him, and he pushed back even more with every step, squishing ghouls into pulp in the middle of the wreckage, his eyes flashing with amusement as he gazed up above the shattered bus in his hand to see the wrecks of cars and even large trucks flying like toys, smashing into the high floors of the skeletal buildings on either side of the road, sending chunks of concrete, dust and other shrapnel raining down from above as the heavy vehicles shot through the buildings like missiles, causing the old, damaged skyscrapers to collapse into mountains of scrap.

An enemy with a working brain would have realized that it was a doomed struggle, but the mutants did not have any wisdom, and they continued to swarm towards Killer in hordes, forgetting their clashes to charge at him instead. The huge male was all too glad to meet their assaults, charging into them and sending them crashing backwards in pieces as he thrust the bus ahead of him, until the vehicle literally fell apart, the whole bodywork crunched flat after ramming into so many bodies.

Killer spun the bent steel framework in his hands, and he laughed as he effortlessly ripped the chassis in half, the metal groaning pathetically as it stretched and tore, before crumpling further as he lashed out brutal punches into the horde of mutants, using the broken halves of the vehicle to hit dozens of beasts at once, blood exploding upwards in thick clouds as he sent devastated bodies and shattered limbs flying all around in a slurry of gore.

Ghouls crowded around his legs, smashing axes and swords and maces into his knees and feet, even as he slapped dozens of them into pieces, ignoring the hailstorm of bullets hitting his body from every direction, only grinning coldly as they crumpled and bounced off without causing any harm. The behemoth leapt high into the air, stomping his foot upon the heads of three ghouls as he used them as a step to rise even higher, not giving them a single glance as they collapsed into broken heaps on the floor while he hurled the broken halves of the bus into the street littered with wrecked vehicles and crowded by drooling, angry monstrosities.

The two heavy pieces of torn, bent steel cut into the asphalt like blades into butter, sparkles flying high as the two slabs of metal continued to advance with the strength of his throw, cutting through cars and maiming flesh and limbs, a red mist filling the street as shrieks and roars of agony rose high, ghouls going down in pieces all along the deep, smoldering furrows dug by the spinning chassis halves, until those smashed into the front of a ruined building at the end of the street, causing the cracked columns of reinforced concrete to collapse down into the road.

Killer floated in midair, watching the massacre down below and repressing a shiver at the thought of how easy it would be to take on entire armies of mortals back home. He really could have conquered the world in mere minutes: there was nothing that a mortal army could use to stop him with any degree of success.

As if to prove the concept, a heavy, wheeled armored vehicle pulled up from a side road, its massive wheels moving up and down as it climbed over wrecked cars and ruins and ghouls alike, crushing mutants into red splatters. Killer looked down at it with interest rather than fear, studying its characteristics and observing the long, square-barrel railgun as the turret turned and aimed up at him... and the liger grinned as a flash of electricity ran down the rails, the air cracking loudly with the violence of the shot as an enormous, dart-like shell rushed towards him at seven times the speed of sound.

Killer stood still, focusing on the dart and realizing after a moment that he definitely shouldn't have been able to see something that fast... and after another instant he realized that he could see the dart spinning on itself for stabilization, easily tracking its movement through the air. It looked slow. It was a further realization of how his abilities, skills and power had developed and continued to develop: he still did not have Alexis's ability to see into the future, but his senses were incredibly powerful. He could have easily dodged the dart, slapped it off the sky, or just avoided it... but he decided to let it smash into his chest, grinning as the heavy shell shattered, barely able to push him back slightly... before the warhead detonated, and Killer's eyes were able to track the expansion of the shockwave and of the blast itself, the explosion unable to even scratch his thick abs.

Killer grinned darkly, grinning as he pointed an arm down at the armored vehicle and a massive, thick tentacle pushed out of his limb, shooting down towards the tank and shrugging off the bullets fired against it. The tentacle shot under the huge vehicle, then wrapped over it, circling it twice and lifting it off the ground like it had no weight, the thick armor bending and crumpling under the brutal squeeze as the turret all but exploded, squished down the middle, the cannon bouncing to aim skywards before the barrel fell down with a loud clang, out of power and of out of commission. Killer pulled his arm back, grinning as the tentacle effortlessly dragged the tank up high into the air, before the liger swung his limb down and sent the tentacle lashing into a thick group of ghouls armed with machine guns, using the vehicle as the head of a gigantic hammer, to crush them into a burst of blood and gore.

Killer swung the tentacle across the street, the tank crushing a whole group of ghouls into the ground and sending others flying away in pieces, before the huge male snarled as he whip-lashed the tentacle down upon the horde, clearing a huge swath through the ranks before slamming the tank down in another direction, squishing mutants into clouds of blood and gore, and all the while the Imprisonment Crystal in the handle of Wyvern sighed quietly as it sucked in what little was left of the souls of the monstrosities, turning them into a reserve of energy. Killer couldn't afford to waste such a precious resource, with the tremendous battle looming ahead of him.

He slammed the tank down into the horde again and again, until the armored vehicle broke into two halves where the tentacle applied its crushing pressure. Before the two heavy pieces could fall to the ground, however, two more tentacles pushed out of his flesh, shooting across the street to slam into the wrecks, sending them crashing like meteors into the ground, squishing dozens into pulp. Killer flicked his arms with a snort, the three massive tentacles slashing down into the crowd of mutant beasts, smashing through their ranks, sending them flying in pieces into the air, slamming broken vehicles around like crazy, gigantic bullets that spread the destruction even further as the gigantic appendages constricted the armored vehicles still operational, crushing them down into crumpled sheets of bloodied metal, crushing bodies into paste as they lashed back and forth across the street, tearing deep canyons in the concrete and asphalt.

Killer grinned in dark amusement as his tentacles slapped dozens of ghouls against the few walls still standing, sending the structures exploding and crushing the bodies into ugly red stains, before he snapped his arm back, and the tentacles tore through several buildings, ripping the foundations and tearing down the sturdy columns, sending an entire city block collapsing into an enormous cloud of dust and debris, burying the ghouls under tons and tons of ruins as the mighty tendrils retreated back into his flesh.

Killer dropped back down to earth with a snort of contempt, rolling his shoulders slowly as he gazed over the devastation through the slowly setting dust... and he walked onwards, energy crackling around his massive form as energy radiated off him with such strength to smash down the piles of rubble, opening a large, comfortable path for him.

He expected Taranis to attack him at any moment... but the god of war did not manifest himself in any way, and Killer was painfully aware that massacring the ghouls only helped in adding to Taranis's might. But he did not have a real alternative: he couldn't afford the risk of being swarmed over by minions while his senses and energy were fully focused on his main rival. Nor could he just ignore their assaults: yeah, they were hardly able to affect his body in any way, but they were distracting and, after so long, they would probably be able to inflict some damage even to him.

He could feel the presence of enormous numbers of the mindless beasts still... and as he reached the edge of the city block he had razed to the ground, more of the annoying pests came charging at him from all sides, while one of the enormous tracked battle tanks he had seen in the distance maneuvered to stand in his path, its independently hinged, truck-wide tracks climbing effortlessly over the few obstacles that the titanic vehicle couldn't simply crush into dust. It was flanked by a couple more of the wheeled armored vehicles Killer had already faced, and by a variety of military and civilian vehicles which still worked and that the ghouls had transformed into mobile fortresses, crudely armoured with thick sheets of metal, slabs of concrete, pieces of wreckage. Sharpened pieces of metal jutted out all over the vehicles, making them virtually unassailable, and long sword blades had been attached to the wheel hubs, to chop down everything that came close to the sides of the vehicles. One of the makeshift mobile fortresses had been a large and well protected military 4x4, but now was mostly unrecognizable, hidden under a thick layer of add-on armor and metallic junk, and with a literal tower built upon the roof, topped by a platform from where a larger, massive ghoul trailed a slowly spinning Gatling gun, taking aim at Killer.

The liger gazed over the horde with a snort of mixed contempt and amusement, his eyes able to follow the bullets as if they were moving on slow motion, but his body powerful and solid enough that he could just ignore the hail of gunfire tapering uselessly against him.

The huge male charged against the enemies, slashing out his massive arm to send ghouls flying, tearing open a path in the thick of the crowd, ignoring the axes and spears that were uselessly slammed into him, his hand wrapping over the head of a ghoul swinging a long sword and lifting him high up into the air, before he seized him by a shoulder and pulled in the opposite directions, ripping him in half like a sheet of paper. Another mutant leapt towards him carrying bags filled with explosives and rocket warheads, and Killer winced, lashing his fist out to catch him in the middle of his jump, his hand smashing through his chest and sending him flying backwards like a meteor, leaving behind a streak of blood and gore. One of the wheeled tanks came forwards with a roar of its engine, the wheels spraying blood everywhere as the driver uncaringly lead the enormous vehicles over his "comrades", intent on running Killer over, while the ghouls locked inside the turret fired both the cannon and the coaxial machine gun into the liger.

Killer made no attempt to evade the vehicle as it rushed him, instead ramming his shoulder into a couple of ghouls, sending them crashing into the front of the tank, their spines loudly shattering. The huge male grinned as he pulled up one foot, arching his back slightly as his mighty musculature flexed, and as the tank came close, he stomped hard down on the front of it, causing the suspensions to groan loudly before the front two wheel burst off the vehicle altogether as the front of the tank was crushed into the ground, the engine flattened like it was made of butter, the driver squished into paste in his seat, blood spraying out from the hatch as it bent and popped open. Killer laughed darkly, pushing one arm up into the air as the tank violently flipped, thrown high into the air as it turned upside down... and his fingers gripped into the turret, clawing deep into steel like they would through butter as he shoved the tank high up above his head, loving how its weight failed to make any impression on his powerful arm. He looked up with a hungry grin, closing his other hand into a fist and taking aim at the closed hatches on top of the turret, hearing the ghouls inside writhing and scampering in confusion and fear, before he smashed his punch through first one hatch, then through the other, blood and gore raining down in thick, sick cascades as he squished both mutants into mush.

He took his time, playing with those bugs, ignoring the gunfire and even the rockets fired at him to look up as the rear doors of the tank in his hand were pushed open, and ghouls scampered out of the vehicle, squeaking as they fell down more than thirty feet to hit the ground at Killer's feet. The liger laughed mercilessly, shaking all the troop out of the vehicle, sending ten of the mutants crashing down to the ground... and just as they pushed back up to their feet to attack him, he slammed the tank down upon them, grinning as blood exploded up to splatter on his chest as the vehicle squashed them like gnats, sinking deep into the ground. Killer snorted in dark amusement as he left the tank there, standing on its rear, the front a crumpled mess, half of the body smashed into the earth and the exposed half looking like a bizarre, monumental tombstone.

He loved his own power, he had to admit: it was a dark, arrogant kind of delight to think that billions had been expended to design and produce those tanks. They had been the pride of an army, and the embodiment of power and the result of years of efforts, of studies, of hard work. There was dark glory in the fact that he could effortlessly tear apart, in a mere instant, years of fatigue and effort of thousands.

"You really want me to play, Taranis...?" Killer muttered, cracking his neck slowly as he walked towards the far bigger, tracked main battle tank, easily four times the size of the wheeled troop transport he had just demolished. "Fine, I can play this game... it might make you stronger, but it won't cost me one drop of my energy. If you think you can wear me down with these bugs, you are deluded."

The massive male glared down at a mutant who smashed a large hammer into his leg, and he slammed his knee into the ghoul, ripping its head off as it was caught between the cruel bone spikes jutting from his joint, before he stomped his foot hard down on two more of the monsters, squishing them with a loud, sick crunch. The ground rattled violently, cracks spreading through asphalt and stone and dirt as his toes sunk deep into the earth, the god grinning viciously as his monstrous strength shook the buildings all around, sending entire palaces collapsing and throwing the vehicles, even the enormous battle tank, high into the air like they were feathers blown by a vicious wind. The ground shattered into small islands and fragments, and many of these shot upwards, jutting out in the shape of sharp, deadly spikes that ripped bodies apart, throwing ghouls up into the sky and causing blood and gore to rain down thickly as their forms were destroyed, limbs splattering loudly against the piles of ruins.

Killer laughed darkly, bathing in the deluge of blood as he effortlessly destroyed ghouls by the thousands, erasing whole armies at once, his destructive force razing everything to the ground, in every direction, for miles, leaving him standing in the middle of a devastated wasteland, surrounded by thick clouds of dust and dirt and debris, as the vehicles crashed heavily back to earth, the wheels coming off from most cars as the suspensions groaned and then burst into pieces of metal.

"Send more... put me to the test." Killer teased, grinning slightly as he lashed up a turning kick, catching the wreck of a large car as it came down from the sky and sending it shooting across the square like a missile to crash into the heavy 4x4 supporting the makeshift tower. The car smashed right into the weird superstructure, tearing through it with loud screeching and groaning of metal as the massive ghoul on top was thrown off the vehicle, crashing more than forty feet away while the heavy jeep tilted over on its side and flipped four times, bursting into flames before exploding as it smashed into a tall pile of ruins.

The chief ghoul still had the force to stand up, though, clutching a rocket launcher even as blood spurted from a body that had been pierced several times by sharp pieces of metal and assorted shrapnel. Killer looked at his efforts with dark amusement, only smirking as the beast aimed the rocket at him... before the liger's eyes burned solid sapphire, and the ghoul backstepped with a grunt, as if slapped in the face, before turning against his comrades, roaring in rage as it fired the missile into the nearest tank, now a slave to Killer's domination.

The rocket shot towards the second wheeled tank, but the vehicle's sophisticated defensive system detected it and automatically fired a barrage of smoke grenades, hiding the tank, while a hard-kill projectile was fired right into the warhead, causing it to explode harmlessly before it could hit.

Killer shook his head slowly, letting out a small sound of disapproval before flicking one arm up, an enormous tentacle pushing out of his flesh and stretching across the distance to hit the ghoul in the back, piercing right through his body and then right into the tank, smashing through the thick armor like through paper, whip-lashing inside the troop compartment to grind all the ghouls inside into pulp as it jutted with tremendous bone spikes that effortlessly holed the hull of the tank, before the tentacle ripped its way out of the other side of the vehicle.

Killer grinned as the tentacle effortlessly lifted the huge vehicle high into the air, blood and gore leaking out of the holes in the thick armour as the tank was absently waved back and forth into the air, as the liger made his position known to the other ghouls, grinning as he felt them rushing in hordes towards him, coming from every direction.

Ahead, the massive battle tank trained its enormous square guns against him, and Killer only walked towards the vehicle, grinning predatorily as the fire of the heavy machine guns of the goliath vehicle crashed uselessly into him, the armor-piercing rounds unable to even just scratch him at this point, making him snicker at the thought of what it would like to face mortal armies back home: a triumphant, unstoppable stroll over all the countries in the world, walking all over their forces to crush them into submission... or out of existence, if he just wanted. And that was if he played slow and fair, keeping his minimum size and holding back his strength to make the game last, to enjoy it scene by scene: he could literally take the planet between the tips of his fingers if he wished, just as easily. What could mortals ever do about that kind of power...? They were just billions of zeroes. No matter how numerous, they would always add up to a pathetic zero in front of Killer's perfect ten.

The ghouls inside the tank could not understand such power nor could realize that they were throwing away their lives: they did not care anymore, having long lost every semblance of sense and no longer attaching any value to their existence, their brains only fixed on killing and maiming and barely aware of the concept of life. The tank continued to advance, crushing corpses and wrecked vehicles as flat as pancake under its enormous tracks, the asphalt and concrete cracking and crumbling over that gigantic battleship on land.

The twin goliath railguns on top of the tank glowed and crackled as the rails were supercharged with electricity and the very air was loudly torn apart as two gigantic darts were fired against the liger, each dart easily as large as a bus and traveling at least eight times faster than sound. Killer was fully aware of the monstrous power of the alien, advanced technology facing him... but not for one second he doubted of his ability to take it down, to humiliate technology with his fearsome physical power. It came as no surprise to him being able to see those enormous darts rolling down the barrels, then exploding out of them, being able to count their revolutions as they began to spin and small fins sprung open to keep them on course. He was able to see clearly every phase of their breaking of the sound barrier, his eyes following the cloud of vapor as it formed and as it was left behind by the projectiles... before he laughed as the darts were stopped to a sudden, impossible, instantaneous stop as his hands shot up and caught into the solid steel, his fingers ripping into the metal like into warm butter, his biceps flexing idly as he stopped the shells dead motionless. "So. Easy." Killer stated, grinning widely as he pushed his thumbs against the bodies of the two darts and bent them with a light pressure, breaking them in half like they were twigs, letting the halves fall heavily down to sink deep into the dirt.

The tank rumbled forwards, steering slightly so that one of the gigantic, ominous tracks loomed right over Killer, the enormous steel blocks making up the track crushing cars and even an abandoned truck into flat pieces of tin as the ghouls attempted to run Killer over. The liger only crouched under the incoming front of the track, and then gripped into them, lifting the gigantic vehicle up until even the rear tracks lost all contact with the ground, the liger grinning gamely as he took a step to the side, beginning to spin on the spot before throwing the mammoth vehicle, laughing as it flew into the sky before crashing down to earth miles away, breaking into pieces as it bounced and flipped once, twice, thrice, then again, and again, until it landed on its turret and sunk partially into the soft ground, digging a long trench in the wasteland before screeching to an inglorious halt, a smoldering wreck that burst in flames and sent loud explosions echoing over the vast plains as the ammunition stored inside cooked off.

"That was pretty quick." Killer amusedly snorted, cracking his neck slowly, before he took a look around himself, making a grimace as Taranis still refused to show up. He tried to detect him by closing his eyes and seeking for energy signatures... but all he detected were ghouls, filling the other towns and villages all over the sad, ruined planet. This is one of his sanctuaries... I will not be able to find him unless he wants to be found.

The liger made a grimace, cursing the god of war under his breath and beginning to wonder if the trap wasn't just being imprisoned in one of Taranis's sanctuaries for all eternity, killing ghouls only to make the master of war even stronger. He looked up at the dark, poisoned sky, gritting his fangs as he thought about what to do, seriously considering the option of trying to smash a breach in the defences surrounding and isolating the planet. From there, he couldn't even reach Alexis's mind, so he had no way to know what was happening to the girls. He cursed his own stupidity, assaulted by the worry that Taranis might have just sought to imprison him to go after Alexis and the others without him interfering: it was one thing to charge into a trap and putting his own life at risk, but he would have never been able to forget himself if he ended up leaving his loved ones in danger instead.

"What is this game, Taranis...? You challenged me to a duel. Show yourself!" Killer roared, clenching his hands into fists as he glared at the unforgiving sky. If you don't show up within a minute, I'm out of here.

"Are you always in such a hurry...?" Taranis's voice mocked, coming from all directions at once. "There are still a lot of ghouls all over this world. Won't you put an end to their misery...?"

Killer snorted, making a grimace of distaste even as he closed his eyes for a moment in something like relief: Taranis could in theory be listening and talking to him from an entirely different spot of the universe, since the planet was in his entire control, but something told Killer that Taranis was close. He could not be certain, but instinct told him that the god of war was looking at him from close by, and was not assaulting Alexis and the others. And usually, his instinct was pretty good... he hesitated for a moment, then closed his eyes and clenched his fists, praying unknown entities to help him and make sure that he took the right decision.

He put faith in his instinct. "Taranis... if you are tricking me, I'll wear your guts as decoration."

The god of war snorted in arrogant amusement at that, and his voice boomed loud and clear as he reassured: "Don't worry, Lord Killer... I'm here with you. I challenged you, and I would never run away from a fight. I will enslave your Disciples after dealing with you, not before. I might even be so kind to let you live long enough to see it happen."

Killer gritted his fangs at his words, a low, murderous growl escaping his throat as his fingers flexed, eager to sink into the god of war's flesh, before his eyes narrowed as Taranis continued: "I just want to take a look at you, Lord Killer, before we fight. It is amusing to observe such young and childlike god... still so naïve and so easily impressed by his own power. A young, inexperienced lion full of vigor and hunger, that flails around trying out his strength."

Killer made a grimace, spitting a curse under his breath and feeling stung by the teasing comment, but he shrugged it off, turning the grimace into a gamely smirk as clenched one fist and provoked: "And why does the experienced master of war need to study his rival this much...? Come to me, show me your superiority. Or does your experience come encumbered with the problems of old age'"

"In good time." Taranis's voice coldly replied, and Killer easily guessed in the tone the irritation of the god at being teased so openly. "Experience brings wisdom: the old lion knows that studying the young rival will make his victory easier. And anyway, it is only right that you offer a sacrifice to me... consider it your payment for the honor of crossing swords with the god of war."

Killer snorted derisively at that, shaking his head with a grimace and wondering again if he shouldn't just try and open a breach between dimensions, to get out of the sanctuary. He really wasn't sure he would be able to break through Taranis's defences and dimensional walls, which he expected to be far stronger than anything Anubis had been able to create, but trying might force the god of war to finally step out and fight in first person. However, he decided to once more play along: he did not want to look like a coward, trying to run away from the fight. He knew all too well that in so doing he was letting his rival shape the fight even more. He knew it was dumb. But he was too prideful to ever consider an option that could be interpreted as fleeing.

He did not bother giving Taranis an answer, instead focusing his attention on the energy signatures he could feel, scattered all over the planet... and he went for one of the largest ones, vanishing from the spot as he teleported right over a distant, ruined metropolis crawling with drooling ghouls.

Killer looked down at the devastated town, grimacing at the sight of the near-complete annihilation in what had probably once been the center of the city and now was nothing but a radioactive wasteland, the signs of a massive nuclear explosion well evident. Ghouls moved chaotically around the ruined streets, and he could see armored vehicles and modified, fortified cars and trucks: even though they hadn't spotted him yet, they were not assaulting each other, a sign that Taranis had probably given them back enough sense to wait for their intended target.

Killer gazed from side to side, scanning the town to evaluate their numbers... and then he grinned in slight surprise as he saw the tank still impaled on the tentacle stretching from his arm: he had all but forgotten that insignificant presence, but he thought it would now come useful to smash the ghouls into mush.

Just as he began to descend towards the ground, he heard distant screeches and roars, and the crowd of ghouls down below began to move like an angry sea as the monstrosities rushed towards him to welcome him as soon as he touched the ground, and bullets and rockets immediately rose into the sky, the missiles leaving streaks of smoke while tracers painted colored lines across the air. Heavy caliber anti-aircraft artillery began to fire at him, the rounds exploding all around his body and showering him in burning shrapnel and spheres of tungsten, but the god tore his way through the clouds of metal fragments without suffering any wound.

Killer's eyes opened wide as he caught sight of a flash of light at the corner of one street, spotting surface-to-air missiles as they climbed into the sky towards him, leaving behind a huge cloud of dust and smoke, and he grinned as enormous, mighty tentacles pushed out of his muscular back, arching above his head and then shooting down to intercept the missiles, wrapping tightly around them.

Two of the SAMs crumpled like paper and exploded under the tremendous pressure applied by the powerful appendages, but the third attempt went better, as Killer carefully caught the last missile and stopped it dead in its track, grinning as the rocket continued to burn and vomit a long streak of fire even as it failed to push the weapon any higher into the sky... and when the rocket spluttered pathetically out, the liger's huge tentacle flung the missile back down at the launcher vehicle, annihilating it with a huge explosion.

And yet it was nothing compared to what followed, as Killer dropped down from the sky like a meteor, grinning viciously as flames of energy burned around his form until he landed in a crouch, slamming his feet and the palm of one hand into the ground, hitting with such fearsome violence that he tore open a deep crater, which expanded rapidly as a shockwave of tremendous force fired outwards, slapping ghouls and vehicles and buildings and ruins away like they were toys, disintegrating the wrecks and pulverizing the ruins, razing what was left of the buildings to the ground as the mutants were literally turned into nothing but vapor.

The god straightened slowly, grinning coldly as the ground around him smoldered and sizzled, and as he floated upwards into the air, out of the crater, he smirked in dark entertainment: gone was the horde, annihilated was the town. Unlike the nuke, he left no survivors and no ruins. The atomic explosion had left the skeleton of most buildings outside of the epicenter standing... his assault, instead, had razed everything to the ground, leaving only flattened, scorched earth for miles and miles in every direction, forming a circular valley of death covered in dust and ashes. Not a single brick was spared.

And that was merely the beginning of the devastation: Killer reached the next town by running, covering enormous distances in mere moments and letting his feet and the shockwave caused by his sheer speed destroy the smaller towns and villages. Small towns did not promise enough entertainment, and weren't worth his precious time: he just obliterated them in mere instants, laughing darkly at the ease of it all. One small village he tore apart by throwing his arms out as he ran down the single street, his hands tearing down the skeletons of the buildings on either side, as his sheer speed caused hurricane-strong winds that blew the rubble and dust away into clouds of dirt. Another was razed to the ground with a mere glance, blasted to smithereens by his psychic force, before he incinerated another with the flick of one hand, causing dark hellfire to erupt under the ruined buildings, burning them out of existence. He took some time to destroy a larger town, instead, using the tank held by one of his tentacles as a hammer, using it until it exploded into small fragments, after he had leveled a good part of the city. The other half, he annihilated with an easy stomp that sent pillars and spikes of stone and eruptions of magma His charge was unstoppable, and hills, mountains and seas could not slow him down, nothing could. He swam through entire oceans with ease, crossing them in moments. He leapt past entire mountain ranges, or just smashed his way through them like they were flimsy doors, ripping open deep canyons into the ancient stone. His feet smashed into the ground with fearsome force as he ran at hypersonic speed, rattling entire continents and pulverizing entire towns with the violence of the earthquake. It was glorious, intoxicating: he felt truly powerful as he deliberately zigzagged back and forth across the oceans, from one continent to another, just to stretch out the fun, to make it last a little more... just to enjoy the fact he could cross the ocean in mere seconds, just to laugh as he smashed through the mountains without even being slowed down by their mass. He went after each energy signature that his senses detected, chasing after the largest ones, those coming from the greatest towns, where entire hordes of ghouls waited for him. On the way, he made sure to stomp all over every last energy signature he detected: he didn't even need to hit them directly. He moved with such speed, with such brutal force, that the shockwave caused by his passing smashed into the ghouls and caused them to burst apart into splatters of gore.

Out at sea, he found ghouls crowding the decks of boats and even some warships which had survived the nuclear war and Taranis's conquest: he went after each and every last boat. He smashed through hulls of steel like they were made of thin air. He laughed as the shockwave from his speed alone rammed into large warships, deforming their flanks and slapping them so hard that they toppled over, their keels exposed to the sky before they quickly went to the bottom.

He lifted a battlecruiser out of the water like it was a plastic toy, tearing it in half with the ease of ripping a sheet of flimsy paper. He dived underwater to swim right into the front of surviving submarines, tearing through their thick steel hulls at the bow before smashing his way out of the stern, watching as the puny, unrecognizable vanished quickly into the dark depths, where what was left of their hulls was flattened by the pressure. Those mighty war machines couldn't take the sea's vicious weight upon themselves if they ventured too deep... yet Killer found it so easy to defeat the ocean, his muscles bulging explosively as he caught another submarine in the embrace of his tentacles, grinning as he effortlessly crushed the massive boat, the hull crumpling like it was made of paper before bursting into pieces as the tentacles whip-lashed in opposite directions, throwing pieces of the wreck away with dismissive arrogance.

He chased down every submarine dispersed in the world's oceans: going first of all after the largest ones, the behemoth missile-launching boats that had had such a primary role in the nuclear apocalypse caused by Taranis's poisoning of the minds of the inhabitants. Those gigantic submarines, each six hundred feet long and displacing 40 thousand tons, had carried over two dozen intercontinental missiles each. Each enormous missile had been loaded with ten or more nuclear warheads. And they had carried torpedoes and a crew of two hundred. They had been the most powerful weapons on the planet, they had brought the apocalypse... but now Killer's monstrous strength made a mockery of them, as he crushed them out of existence, one by one, smirking at the tremendous, scary ease of it all. He lifted one out of the water, handling thousands of tons of steel like he was lifting a feather, and he threw the enormous nuclear-powered submarine towards the distant shore, laughing as the submarine flew two hundred miles before crashing down upon the ruined port of a smoldering metropolis, crushing warehouses and buildings and roads under its mass, grinding hundreds of ghouls out of existence...

Others, he broke in half like twigs. With another, he decided to mock not just the submarine, but also the ocean itself, as he wrapped his mighty tentacles around the boat, almost with gentleness as he carefully avoided crushing a hull that felt so frail and puny in his grasp, that he could crumple it without noticing. He let himself dive deeper and deeper into the darkness, instead, dragged the submarine down, deeper and deeper, even as the boat's screws turned at full speed, trying to break free, even as the boat pushed out water from its tanks as the ghouls attempted to order it back to the surface, to no avail. Finally, as Killer smirked in lazy, arrogant amusement, the depth reached proved excessive and the pressure caused the hull to cave in with a loud, sinister crack, followed by a ripple in the water as the boat simply imploded, collapsing on itself.

The smaller, nimbler attack submarines didn't hold his interest quite as long: as impressive as they were, they did not weight more than 15 thousand tons and did not carry the kind of awesome firepower of the bombers. Armed with torpedoes, anti-ship and cruise missiles, they were the killers of the sea... but they could only look puny to his eyes at that point. He annihilated them quickly, only blessing one or two with special attentions and lifting a third out of the waters to throw it down against a surface ship close by, laughing as the two enormous vessels destroyed each other in the tremendous impact, their wrecks crumpled together in a smoldering mess of bent and torn metal that sunk quickly out of sight.

There were a lot of ships out at sea, and Killer thought it made sense: there was everything from warships and submarines to boats which had probably left the ports to escape the violence of the last war that sad planet had known, plus every merchant vessel which would normally be found along crowded routes and had clearly elected to stay well away from the shore and the nuclear holocaust on land.

They had escaped the worst of the fall out, but had not been spared by Taranis's corruption: everyone had been mutated and turned into a ferocious, mindless beast, which meant the ships had been merely floating about, out of control and carried by the waves, while on board the ghouls tried to rip each other apart. Only now, united by Taranis's order to assault Killer, the mutants were showing initiatives of a more complex nature, and the warships actually tried to maneuver and fight. But there was really nothing they could do against the huge male: none of their weapons was strong enough to achieve anything and any attempt to maneuver was completely useless. They were so slow and hopeless in Killer's eyes that the liger almost pitied them: after all, even the faster warships couldn't move at more than 50 knots, less than 60 mph, while Killer moved at astounding hypersonic speeds. Effectively, to his eyes they were dead in the water, motionless and hopeless.

Very quickly, he tore apart, sunk and destroyed every ship and boat and vessel sailing the seas, and all the while he kept crossing the continents to hit towns and villages as well, as the apocalyptic world became more and more desolate and lifeless with each passing moment.

Only the larger towns caught his interest enough for Killer to stop and take some time to destroy them and the hordes of mutants and ghouls crowding the streets. But even there, it did not take him long to wipe the opposition out of existence. It all gave him mixed feelings: guilt, because he was destroying millions of innocents whose only fault was having been corrupted to the core by Taranis's bloodlust. He would have rather wanted to save them, but there just wasn't a way to fix their minds. Then there was undeniable, pleasure. Dark, sick pleasure, true arousal at the extent of his own power as he put himself to the test, using that unfortunate planet as a proving ground, trying feats of power he hadn't ever attempted before, flexing his muscles in new ways and finding out more and more that the limits and the beliefs and rules that had shaped his old life as "mortal", however special and strong, were no longer valid. He was far above any limitation he had thought impassable. He could, and indeed he should, learn to think in whole new ways.

For a military mind like his, for a general that had used to carefully maneuver his forces on the field to achieve victory, it was still amazing and deeply unnatural to accept the fact he did not need weapons nor he had anything to fear from any country, any army, any navy, any air force. No weapon that could be fielded against him had any prayer: even nuclear weapons, he was sure, would prove too weak to affect him in any way. He was faster and stronger than anything that could be thrown against him, and could curb-stomp any country into submission without breaking a sweat. How could he not be aroused by such omnipotence...?

But then there was rage. Rage because the real fight continued to be denied to him. Rage because he couldn't tell what Taranis really wanted from such planet-wide massacre. And he was anxious to face the god of war himself, and to discover what monstrosities and abominations he would have to oppose. The waiting and the uncertainty were worse than the fight itself: at least he could punch back against an enemy, no matter how strong. But there was little he could do against uncertainty, doubt and expectations.

"Come out and face me, Taranis... I grow tired of these useless goons." Killer finally roared, glaring at the hostile sky as he arched his back and threw his arms out, flexing his enormous musculature as gigantic, thorny tentacles pushed out of his back and limbs, arching high into the air before savagely whipping and slashing down in every direction, tearing through walls and piercing through thick columns of concrete like it was butter, grinding bodies into nothing but crimson pulp, sending buildings collapsing into piles of scrap, bending armored vehicles like strings and crumpling heavily protected battle tanks into unrecognizable wrecks.

It took him merely minutes. When he roared his challenge, the whole planet was a wasteland and there was no sign left of any town or village. Not a single ghoul. Only silence and death and destruction, planet-wide. He had completely annihilated that unfortunate world, just like that. His tentacles completed the horrendous slaughter, making mincemeat and dust of the little that remained, before they arched high into the air behind him, twisting slowly from side to side, as if each of them was a predator with its own mind and its own insatiable hunger.

"So rude." Taranis's voice replied, his tone patronizing and full of contempt. "Didn't you like the little game...? I gave you a whole planet to play with, filled only with monsters... evil mutations that can be killed off without any remorse to fear." The god of war paused, and Killer gritted his fangs in rage, trying once more to sense energies in the air, hoping to be able to somehow locate the bastard... but there was no way to. He was in Taranis's sanctuary, and that meant playing to Taranis's rules. "I have to give it to you: it was an impressive demonstration. A childish way to take over a planet, but nonetheless impressive. Your physical vigor is indeed overwhelming." Taranis observed, clapping quietly, before his voice became soft and full of mockery as he teased: "Surely you don't think it is over, do you...? This is a sanctuary of war... and death is but a painful passage, a fleeting moment in an eternal fight. Here the ghouls fight, die, and then fight some more..."

Killer tensed slightly, not surprised but nonetheless worried as he felt new energies blossoming all over the planet, growing quickly greater and greater, some signatures becoming gigantic as bones and gore and ruins and wrecks were drawn together in violent vortexes, mixing to form new and enhanced monstrosities. "... but, clearly, ghouls aren't worthy adversaries for you, so let me show you something better."

"Come out in person if you've got the balls for it, bitch." Killer venomously said, his massive musculature flexing and bulging with power as he saw the nearest monstrosity advancing against him, still absorbing ruins and gore from the ground to grow even bigger. The gigantic creature had no legs, and no well defined shape: like some sort of titanic snail, but incredibly quick, it slid over the wasteland, pulling up wrecked vehicles, gore, bones, dirt, and the ruins of the shattered buildings. The monster was made of a fleshy, corrupt goo which dripped blood constantly, even as more and more wrecks and pieces of concrete emerged and pushed outwards as if to form a spiky, cruel armor. Swords, spears, axes and shields and weapons of all kinds covered the creature, giving it a metallic, deadly hide, and enormous, stubby tentacles pushed out of its back, all ending in enormous mace heads composed of crumpled cars and trucks or even the broken remains of warships that Killer had thrown ashore. The beast seemed to have no eyes of its own, but many broken skulls covered it, their empty sockets pointed at Killer as the abomination opened and closed massive, disgusting jaws all along its body, each fearsome mouth leaking greenish acid and stinking horrendously of death and decay, as ragged, cruel teeth and fangs were formed by swords, broken blades, sharp wrecks, bent beams of steel. Thousands of feet long and tall, the fleshy juggernaut advanced swiftly, crushing everything under its monstrous mass and leaving a trail of blood behind itself. It was a nightmare incarnated, the poor remains of billions of souls and bodies fueling it and composing its body, while millions of tons of rubble and ruins and weaponry gave it its crude but tremendous offensive power.

Killer went into an easy ready stance, scanning the beat in search of a weak spot of some kind, even as his sharp senses picked up three more enormous energy signatures quickly rushing towards him from the corners of the world: each continent of the doomed planet, it seemed, had focused its "resources" to create an immense undead golem of flesh, gore and ruins. And now they were all charging at him, while Taranis laughed and his voice boomed: "Let's see how you do with those!"

The enormous beast suddenly rushed forwards, gaining speed so quickly that Killer backstepped with a grunt of surprise, leaping backwards as a first enormous tentacle lashed down from the sky, ending in a messy, enormous spiked ball made up by the blackened, smoldering wrecks of a series of large tankers and tipper trucks. Pieces of metal and heavy chunks of reinforced concrete exploded outwards like shrapnel when the mace-tentacle hit the ground, tearing open a vast crater and a deep trench in the dirt, but Killer easily slapped the largest debris away with a swing of Wyvern, using the large flat of the blade as a shield. He charged forwards and leapt easily onto one of the wrecked trucks, gripping into it as the metal crumpled like paper under his weight and speed, his claws tearing the bodywork apart as he jackknifed past the cockpit and ran up the curve of the enormous sphere of steel and ruins.

He stabbed Wyvern down into the fleshy, disgusting organic matter and dragged the sword forwards, slicing through flesh, metal and concrete with the same ease as blood sprayed up from the deep cut... but he grunted in surprise as the wound immediately sealed itself, while the ugly, dead flesh formed into tendrils and tentacles, all ending in sharp metal pieces or swords or other weapons that were immediately stabbed towards him with vicious force.

Killer's arm readily swung backwards and his hand clamped down on a bunch of tentacles with such strength to cause the flesh to burst apart into crimson splatters, the metal pieces falling away, and he ignored the other tentacles even as they slammed into his back, as the mortal steel crumpled like paper against his massive musculature.

Another enormous tentacle slashed through the air to slam into him, but Killer sensed it coming and his free hand gripped into the front of the nearest truck, smashing through the bodywork to grip right into the heavy engine block, the metal feeling frail and puny in his grip as he snarled and pulled back, ripping the wrecked vehicle out of the dead flesh and throwing it like it was a plastic toy. It smashed into the incoming tentacle, exploding into pieces with the violence of the impact and causing the tentacle to writhe in agony and recoil backwards... But before Killer could move more than a few steps forwards, the mace-head under his feet rippled powerfully, then flexed... and the liger snarled and raised Wyvern in front of himself just as all the other vehicles, wrecks and heavy chunks of buildings were blasted out of the tentacle and straight into him.

He swung his arms out, slapping trucks and cars backwards and crumbling heavy slabs of reinforced concrete as he leapt out of the cloud of smoke and dust, but the fleshy mace-head beneath him suddenly split open down the middle, becoming an enormous circular mouth lined with grotesque curved fangs that burned with the black fire of Taranis's powers.

The dark mouth lunged upwards and the gigantic jaws immediately snapped closed, Killer wincing as he threw himself back away from the enormous fangs, flipping backwards before stabbing Wyvern up into the fleshy palate of the monstrosity, holding on to the sword as the obscure tunnel beneath him flexed and clenched with brutal force, as spikes burning with evil energy jutted out from the flesh.

The stench was unbearable, heavy with illness and death and decay, making Killer's eyes burn savagely as his skin began to sizzle, making him hiss in pain and amazement at the sheer brutality of the poisonous air in that dark, hot, humid place. He aimed his palm down at the "throat" beneath as it attempted to swallow him, and a sphere of golden energy fired from his hand, shooting down the dark tunnel for what looked like miles... before it exploded with an enormous blast, and the tentacle writhed violently, lashing back and forth through the air as it bloated violently.

Killer exploited the moment, stabbing Wyvern deeper into the disgusting, dead flesh and letting his weight do the rest, sliding down the spiked tunnel before it could close, using the sword as a brake, controlling his descent until he reached the curve where the sphere of energy had exploded, blasting a vast breach in the corrupt meat.

The liger flicked his wrist and threw himself out of the bloody hole, dragging Wyvern out with a swift, elegant grand cut... and as he landed on the ground far below, the tentacle split in half down the middle, blood and gore raining thickly down from above as the two halves of the immense appendage collapsed heavily down to the earth.

Killer dropped one shoulder and went into a roll immediately, however, as the disgusting beast trembled in rage and slid forwards with a howl of fury, swinging its other mace-tacles down towards him, rattling the earth as the massive hammers smashed into the ground, sinking deep into the dirt and throwing up clouds of dust and debris. They followed him even through the cloud, viciously slashing down towards him, seeking to crush him and blasting discharges of debris and metallic rubble all around, rending the air with shrapnel that hailed down in waves, kicking up dirt and gravel.

Killer surrounded himself with a shield of energy, snarling as the mace-heads constantly jutted with new spikes and blades of metal, Taranis's energies burning over them and turning the steel into dark, alien alloys, far stronger and deadlier. The massive projectiles crashed against him from all sides, and there wasn't really any cover anymore... which made him curse under his breath, regretting having been so through and enthusiastic in his rampage over the planet.

He leapt up to his feet after avoiding one violent smash and immediately ducked with a wince and backstepped as a second tentacle lashed out, smashing into the ground barely inches ahead of him. Immediately, both mace-heads burst forth with waves of shrapnel, and Killer gritted his fangs as he saw and heard the bullets smashing into his translucent shield, the echoing clashes deafening him as sparkles and flashes of energy flew from each impact, before he grunted as some of the larger pieces shot through his protection and sunk into his flesh, burning like hellfire as blood sprayed out of his form.

He almost missed a step, but still leapt onto the mace ahead of him, dropping Wyvern down and then swinging it upwards in a majestic cut, chopping the tentacle right off as it tried to rear back out of the ground in which it had sunk. The appendage shot right up into the sky, writhing in silent agony as the heavy sphere of flesh and ruins fell heavily down to the bottom of the crater instead... and Killer leapt higher into the air, gripping the bloody end of the tentacle and letting it launch him upwards.

Another tentacle immediately slashed down towards him, but Killer's eyes glowed solid sapphire as he focused his psychic force around its body and forcefully bent it backwards, before flicking his head to the side and grinning as the tentacle was viciously yanked off the fleshy body of the monster, pieces of decayed meat flopping to the ground as the gigantic appendage hovered in midair... and then whipped down over the back of the beast. Three other tentacles angrily swung up to parry the blow, while another lashed out against Killer, forcing the liger to twist in midair, a flap of his mighty wings sending him flying around the edge of the deadly spikes and blades of metal, before he stabbed Wyvern hard forwards into the mace-head, the blade sinking all the way to the hilt until he roared and channeled his burning energies down the massive weapon. Blinding, white hot light shone through cracks and veins in the decayed flesh, before the large chunks of concrete cracked and fell apart into dust and gravel as the metallic wrecks melted away to liquid, as Killer's enormous energies shot through the heavy ball, causing it to explode with a wet, sick squelch. The liger immediately charged through the cloud of gore and dark blood and debris, cocking Wyvern back until another tentacle swung against him, and he stabbed his blade into this, using his body weight to continue falling towards the body of the disgusting creature, slicing the enormous appendage open.

Killer grunted as Wyvern sliced through wrecked armored vehicles and chunks of reinforced concrete as he cut in half the heavy ball at the end of the tentacle, until the momentum ended... and as the tentacle immediately tried to smash him down into the earth, he tore Wyvern back and allowed himself to fall.

Another ball rammed into him from the side, and he grunted in pain and surprise even as he gripped into its disgusting dead flesh, looking over his shoulder to see one enormous circular mouth opening in the back of the beast, ready to swallow him and hungrily snapping its ugly, deadly jaws.

Immediately, his finger flicked up against the top of Wyvern's handguard, pushing the hidden lever and grinning as the mechanism gave its clear click, one of the twin Azura blades suddenly shooting forwards, springing free. Killer's free hand caught the handle of the long blade, and he swung his body up and to the side, stabbing Azura into the tentacle and using the two swords as axis to climb up along the tentacle.

He quickly moved up past the edge of the mace-ball, grunting as he was suddenly surrounded by the acid, poisonous, disgusting fog coming up from the deadly open maws, and he stomped his feet hard down on the mace, ripping his swords out of the dead meat as he shoved it down as hard as he could.

The monster let out a howl of shock and agony as its tentacle was sent shooting down through its own mouth, Killer grinning as he pile-drove the enormous appendage down, knocking teeth flying out in pieces and tearing deep wounds through the dead flesh as the mace-head punched through.

"Right in the kisser." Killer said, grinning with dark amusement as the monstrosity writhed with a roar of pain and fury, the tentacle flexing and lashing back and forth as it tried to rip free, while the metallic fangs tore into it, sending blood and gore splattering out in thick volleys.

The liger dropped down from the sky, stabbing Wyvern down in the middle of the beast's back, while slashing out Azura to chop off a tentacle that tried to slap him away like a gnat. He roared as he channeled his energies down his sword, and he charged down the spine of the monstrosity, dragging the blade as white-hot energy shot through the beast and deep into the ground beneath.

The undead horror howled in agony and struggled as hard it could, trying to slide in the opposite direction, its remaining tentacles swinging viciously through the air, but the energy flowing through Wyvern was enormous, and it lifted the beast off the ground, swelling like a wave as the monster was sliced in half down the middle.

Killer roared as he approached the end of the monster, swinging Azura to slap back the spikes and blades of dark metal that fired up in waves from the dead meat under his feet, ignoring the pieces that cut into his flesh and only making sure to drag Wyvern forwards... before he grunted in surprise as he sensed a new, massive energy signature, his head turning to the side just in time to see the blur of something charging at him at phenomenal speed.

He flicked his wrist and stabbed Azura sideways, grunting as the blade smashed into something hard, sparks flying from the impact, but the next thing he felt was burning blades biting into his abs and into the base of his spine, and he was knocked flying to the side.

He cursed under his breath, snarling as he felt himself flying off the undead beast and he sent energy firing off the blade of Azura, flexing his massive musculature and pushing back against whatever was constricting him. A moment later, he crashed into the ground, hard, and he went into a roll before donkey-kicking as he felt a solid body and unknown limbs wrapping around his legs. Whatever it was, it let out a loud yell of agony as bones loudly cracked, and the pressure fell off Killer's back.

The liger stomped his foot into the ground next, and brought himself to a screeching stop, using his other leg to immediately spring up into a ready position, swinging the two heavy swords in his hands so that he held them blade-out, handling them as easily as they were light, agile knives.

His sharp eyes fixed immediately on the undead slime, the beast nearly broken in two and laying in a bloody pile in the distance, its tentacles still angrily whip-lashing back and forth... and he cursed as he saw new fibers of decayed meat already stretching and moving like snakes between one half and the other, knitting them back together.

His attention quickly shifted to the second great undead beast, however, that he had just grappled with: the product of another continent worth of ghouls and ruins and dead meat. It was an ominous creature, with a long, thick body made of death meat but entirely plated over with dark metal and unrecognizable wreckage. It moved upon thousands of hands and arms and legs of all sizes and shapes, which stuck out of its bottom, its sides, and its top. Weird, horrible super-limbs made up by weirdly-combined legs and arms and ending in giant scythe-like blades completed its offensive power, and it seemed not to have a recognizable head, evident senses or anything else that could be listed under "weak spots". It just was a disgusting, sick nightmare, a collection of body parts that could move over anything, in every direction, and at simply blazing speed, while applying tremendous physical force. It had dozens of massive scythe blades, each easily heavier and greater than a truck, while other limbs ended in spikes of dark metal, no less lethal... and Killer rapidly tried to memorize its unique energy signature, fixing his senses upon it, knowing that he needed to keep track of its movements, or he'd pay a painful price.

"Not so arrogant now, are you...?" Taranis's voice mocked, but Killer sealed it out of his mind, trying to ignore the taunting, keeping his senses focused as he sprinted across the battlefield, charging towards the tentacle slime as it rebuilt itself. If I can take that one off the field...

The beast seemed to understand his intentions, as it tried to turn back away from him, hiding the wound from his sight and slashing its tentacle-maces down against Killer, tearing the ground apart as the heavy hammers smashed down one after another.

Killer threw Wyvern up over his head, grunting as one of the maces rammed squarely down on the flat of the blade, his arm recoiling painfully even as his solid, chorded muscles bulged with power and pushed back, slapping the mace away. Shrapnel was blasted against him from every direction, almost blinding him as the world around him erupted in a series of geysers of dust and debris wherever a projectile hit the ground. His eyes glowed sapphire as he used his energy to shield himself from the onslaught, leaping past a crater and ramming his shoulder into a tentacle that slashed down against him. He grunted at the impact, but slapped the enormous tentacle out of his way, dropping back to the ground... before catching himself at the last second with a flap of his wings as he sensed the energy signature of the other monster moving... and he snarled a moment later as scythe blades swung out in a vicious cut that missed him by mere inches.

The Thousand-Hands arched up into the air, chasing after him propelled by the horde of hands and feet gripping into the ground, but Killer shot higher into the air, stabbing his swords into a massive tentacle and climbing up its side before leaping off the top, dragging his blades in a semi-circle to send the appendage crashing into the multi-limbed monstrosity, causing it to fall back down to the ground, where it immediately slithered away, moving faster than his eyes could track.

"These are undead constructs, Lord Killer... it will not be easy to kill them in a lasting way." Taranis mocked, and Killer snarled in rage as he dropped back to the ground, going into a slide as he approached the edge of the snail-like body of the first beast. The liger flicked his wrists to stab his swords right under the body of the monster, before using his blades as levers to lift it off the ground, sliding under it. From behind, the Thousand-Hands slashed savagely down with its scythes, but it caught only into the dead meat of its comrade, the snail writhing in pain and howling in agony and outrage, making Killer grin in dark entertainment as he emerged in the middle of the monster's body, in the bloody canyon he had ripped open earlier.

"You sure do talk a lot." Killer grumbled as Taranis went on and on about how he had no hopes to leave the planet alive, the liger only making a grimace at the stench of death and illness surrounding him as he kicked up to his feet. "Come out and show me what you are all about, pansy of war!"

The insult hit home, because Taranis fell silent... but a moment later Killer roared out in pain and shock as two dark blades shot up from the ground and through his feet, nailing him in place right as a vortex of deadly black fog exploded against him, cutting deep wounds in his arms, in his legs, in his chest, his blood spraying thickly out of the cruel gashes.

"Don't challenge me, fool!" This is my planet... I don't have to come out, I'm everywhere!" Taranis snarled, venom dripping in his tone as the vortex constricted around Killer, the dark fog seemingly made of swords and blades, chopping into his flesh as it coiled around him like a python... before Killer snarled and flexed his enormous musculature against the coils, throwing his physical power in the struggle until the black smoke broke down in a cloud around him and he immediately flicked Azura in his hand, stabbing it backwards. Killer grinned as the blade bit into something, piercing through what felt like a body, and he stepped back into the form behind him, even as he winced in agony as he tore his feet free of the blades stabbed through them. He smashed back into Taranis and immediately bent forwards, loading the heavy shape onto his shoulders and flipping it over, slamming it down into the ground.

The shapeless body of darkness dissolved on impact, vanishing back into the ground even as Killer's foot stomped down where the head should have been, only shattering the concrete beneath. Immediately, tendrils and tentacles of decayed meat shot at him from either side as the undead beast tried to absorb him to aid its regeneration: the fibers of dead flesh pushed into the deep wounds in Killer's body, making him grimace in pain and distaste as he felt the worm-like tendrils probing into him even as he gripped into the strings and ripped them apart, throwing the sick pulp away.

He stepped forwards, tearing the tendrils as they tried to restrain him, and he pulled both Wyvern and Azura up, the blades glowing and burning with his energies as they blasted out to the opposite sides, smashing into the torn halves of the snail-beast and blowing them away from him, consuming them, burning the flesh down into sick, ugly slush. The beast howled in agony as it was pushed apart, its body ripping further down the spine, the just healed parts exploding in a splatter of dark blood.

Killer snarled as he saw the Thousand-Hand emerge on top of the snail's body, though, his eyes glowing with rage as the multi-limbed creature dived into the wound and rushed towards him, uncaringly stabbing its scythes into the flesh of its comrade to charge forwards even faster. The liger pulled up one foot and slammed it down hard into the ground, causing the earth to burst up in pieces, sharp spikes and blades of crystal jutting up high out of the land, but the monstrosity moved right over the deadly spikes, its uncountable hands gripping into their bodies and hefting the creature up into the air.

It immediately lunged against Killer, slashing its scythes towards him, and the liger stumbled backwards, snarling as he brought up his swords to parry the mortal blows, sparkles flying from the blades as he forced back against the creature. The body of the Thousand-Hands however could move in ways he couldn't foresee, and it snaked around his legs, talon-like fingers piercing into his flesh as the monster gripped into his lower body, a dark spike piercing through his thigh from side to side and making him roar in agony as he fell to one knee.

Scrawny yet powerful arms gripped into his legs from feet up to waist, as the snake-like creature twisted around his torso and worked to bend his spine painfully down... before the monster let out a cry of pain as hellfire burst into being all over Killer's form, flames enveloping both their bodies as the liger attempted to burn the undead construct into ashes.

The flames consumed the dead flesh down into an ugly, horribly-smelling slime that slid down Killer's powerful body as the liger stabbed Azura into the tangle of limbs and assorted body parts, blood flying in his face as he chopped mutated limbs off, until he thrust the long blade down to the hilt, and broke the body of the beast in half.

He let go of the sword for a moment, gripping instead into the sharp spike buried through his leg, snarling as he ripped it out of the wound and bent the limb back the wrong way, the bone loudly snapping before he impaled the spike through the monster's own body.

Even so, the two halves of the creature didn't seem to suffer much of a setback, as both reared up and charged at him, moving independently upon their tangles of limbs, slashing their blades against the liger. Killer stepped out of the way of the first scythe, gritting his fangs as his leg began to regenerate, the ugly would beginning to seal up as a tremble went through his musculature, before his hand shot up to intercept a second scythe, gripping into the cold metal and crumpling it as his enormous bicep bulged explosively. He stabbed Wyvern forwards into the body of the creature, even as a thousand limbs scratched at the sword and at his hand, tearing into his flesh as the monster rolled forwards and tried to crush him into the ground. The liger grunted, then allowed his back to bend just enough to exploit the beast's own momentum against it, flipping the gigantic monstrosity over his head and smashing it down into the earth. The other half of the beast surged forwards just as viciously, but Killer grinned as he saw Azura still pierced deep into its dead flesh, his eyes glowing sapphire as his sword glowed with white-hot energy.

An enormous explosion followed, sending broken limbs flying in every direction as the top part of the beast's body burst in a splatter of gore and sick mush, while Azura flew gracefully back to Killer's hand as he leapt out of the bloody canyon in the middle of the snail's body, slotting the blade back into Wyvern, smirking as the mechanism readily locked it in place. This works brilliantly.

Tentacles immediately whip-lashed angrily against him, but he shot between them with a mighty flap of his wings, supercharging Wyvern and Azura with his energies before slashing both towards the ground, sending two crescent-shape swords of white fire ramming into the monster below.

The enormous explosion that followed caused several tentacles to crash down to earth like chopped trees, as the heavy, shapeless body of the creature finally split in halves that were blasted far apart, splattering heavily down on the wasteland with loud cries of pain, mouths opening and closing in agony.

The Thousand-Hand was caught in the explosion, but Killer could tell it was far from dead... and, worse, the third great monstrosity had arrived, rushing across from its own continent: it announced itself with beams of darkness that shot across the sky, cutting like lasers as they chased after Killer, forcing the liger to drop down close to the ground, grunting as a ray of dark force smashed into the earth and went up in an enormous explosion right at his side. He half-crashed, screeching to a stop in a crouch, and he looked up to see the newcomer, a gigantic golem apparently built up by thousands upon thousands of dead bodies, with faces all frozen in the same horrified expression, with wide open eyes which stared blankly ahead, and with jaws gaping forever, revealing black holes instead of throats. Each mouth was a deadly cannon, able to shot rays of focused dark energy, and the massive body of the construct gave it crushing physical power as well, making it another dangerous rival.

Killer swung Wyvern up as another beam of dark energy came rushing down, gritting his fangs as the tremendous force rammed into the flat of the blade and slammed him backwards even as his feet bit deep into the ground, muscles bulging as he pushed back... before he smirked through gritted fangs as he began to absorb the dark energy into Wyvern, the blade glowing and crackling with black electricity as it greedily consumed the evil essence. He stomped his way forwards, snarling as he allowed the energy to flow through the handle and into his body, adding to his power and aiding the regeneration of his wounds as he chopped his way through the hurricane of black fire, charging towards the golem.

The beast stumbled backwards, recoiling from the shock as the beam of dark force dissolved into motes of energy floating like lost feathers, but Killer groaned in pain and fell to his knees as black chains exploded out of the ground, all ending in vicious meat hooks that pierced deep into his flesh, gripping into his bones and dragging him down.

The liger snarled in fury and agony, blood flowing from his many wounds as he struggled against the chains, while more and more of the dark bounds burst out of the earth and shot over him, burning like hellfire whenever they touched. Killer threw himself forwards, flexing against the chain and dragging his powerful arms forwards, muscles bulging explosively as he struggled to free himself, chain links exploding into fragments and entire lengths of chain vanishing into puffs of smoke with every movement but more and more coils shooting at him from all sides.

He struggled to hold his eyes open as one length of chain wrapped around his neck, then coiled over his muzzle, his flesh sizzling as the dark metal burned its way to the bone, dragging his head backwards... but even between the flashes of pain, he guessed the movements of... something, rushing in circles around him, moving just under the surface of the ground, like an hellish ghost.

His eye narrowed, focusing on that barely visible shadow even as the golem rushed forwards and beams of focused dark energy began to hail down upon him, exploding against his body even as he did his best to use his own energy to shield himself... before he suddenly lashed out against the ghost, the ground cracking for miles around him before exploding upwards in a colossal blast, psychic force digging underground like a gigantic hand and clawing the dark presence out of its hiding place. It emerged from the crater, a shapeless hurricane of black smoke that struggled against Killer's psychic hold, trying to break free while firing heavy projectiles of solid darkness against the liger's chest, knocking the breath out of his lungs.

Killer exploited the moment, throwing himself forwards again, the chains tensing as they tried to hold him down, before multiple links burst apart and dissolved, and the behemoth male broke free, lashing out his arms to use the broken chains as whips, slamming them into the black smoke.

The impact knocked the figure backwards and out of its fog, Killer's eyes burning with rage as he recognized Seth, the jackal stumbling backwards with a grunt of pain, clutching an enormous rifle in his hands. The god of war swiftly caught himself and took aim at Killer with the four-barreled weapon, the heavy, square barrels glowing with electricity as he blasted shot after shot against the liger charging forwards with a roar... but Killer ignored the massive bullets even as they smashed into his chest, sinking into his hard musculature and forming a tight circle of bloody wounds right at the height of his heart. The bullets were imbued with Unworld Residue, and the tremendous substance immediately began to greedily eat away his flesh and his energies, while Time itself slowed down for Killer, his movements becoming sluggish as much as he tried to advance, even his snarl of rage coming out slowed and stretched over several seconds as Reality seemed to become a mire of quickly hardening concrete, locking him in place.

Seth cackled and leaned forwards with new confidence, his deadly fangs bared as he yanked back the cocking element of the composite, enormous weapon to load up the shotgun barrel at the bottom, blasting out a hailstorm of cubes of dark metal that tore into Killer's chest, smashing the liger backwards... only for Killer to barely move at all as Time continued to hold him prisoner.

The liger spat out a gout of his own blood, coughing as the life fluids clogged his airways, muscles flexing powerfully as he pushed back against Time, against its unflinching grip on him... and Seth only grinned wider, getting closer, floating upon black smoke that kept his legs hidden as he aimed the huge rifle right at his face.

Seth pulled the triggers, all barrels barking at once as Killer's eyes bulged... before flashing sapphire as the huge male split himself into two, leaving behind an image, a simulacra made of sapphire energy, while his true body reappeared right outside of the prison of Time.

Seth stumbled backwards in shock, shaking his head in disbelief as Killer caught the bullets in his hand, the jackal missing one breath and his eyes bulging in shock at the sight of the massive, square projectiles caught like they were just a bunch of gnats... before the dog let out a cry of surprise as Killer flexed his enormous musculature and sent crumpled bullets popping back out of his chest, the wounds quickly healing, dripping with Unworld Residues that was unable to consume him. "I so hate these little tricks of yours..." Killer venomously growled, charging across the short distance separating them and grinning viciously at the sight of Seth's face: half of it was plated over with dark steel, the metal etched with silvery runes and one eye replaced by a bionic construct. It seemed that the damage Alexis had inflicted on the jackal back in Kemuel had been too severe for the god's regenerative ability to fix.

Seth slid backwards quickly, carried by the dark smoke, raising his aim to point the massive rifle between the liger's eyes, but before his finger could squeeze the golden trigger, Killer snarled and threw the caught bullets back at him, hurling them with ferocious strength that eclipsed that of the rifle itself as the heavy blocks of metal hit him squarely in the forehead, slamming the jackal flying backwards bonelessly.

Killer grinned and sprinted forwards, reaching Seth as he flew backwards with a groan of pain, and the dog's eyes bulged as he stared up at the liger's fist rushing down. The massive punch caught him in the face, and his skull loudly cracked as blood flew from his features, the jackal crashing into the earth with tremendous violence, sinking forty feet into the dirt before bouncing up and out of the crater, his spine creaking sickly... and Killer smirked at the sight of his lower body, as his legs had been replaced by robotic limbs, heavily armored and ending in heavy, deadly hooves of solid steel. Just like half of his face, Seth had lost his legs to Alexis's fury in the battle at Kemuel, and he had been unable to regenerate any of the parts that the femme fatale pulped.

"Looks like Alexis took away most of you." Killer teased, grinning predatorily as he lashed out one vicious kick. "Don't worry, I'll make sure I complete what she started!"

Before Killer's foot could catch him in midair, Seth vanished in a puff of black smoke that filtered down into the ground, vanishing from sight, while the jackal's voice venomously replied: "I'll take back everything I lost... with heavy interest rates."

Killer snorted in frustration as the god fled, but he had no time to even think about how to pursue the jackal as the two halves of Thousand-Hands leapt at him instead, shooting out of the last motes of dark smoke. The liger ducked under the scythes, but the beast had no top and no bottom, and was never disoriented for long: as it sailed above Killer's head, the monster's limbs gripped into the ground and immediately steadied the beast, which arched its long body and stabbed its blades and spikes down against Killer. Wyvern swung up to parry the blow, the blades clashing with a roar of thunder as sparkles flew from the metal, before the liger leapt into the air and slashed the heavy sword to the side, slamming the Thousand-Hands away and sending it crashing to the ground, once more severed in two pieces.

Killer cursed under his breath at that, however, immediately realizing that he had merely created a third monster, before he snarled as the other half of the undead construct charged at him from the opposite side. Blades and spikes snapped towards him from either side as leaned towards the attacker, stabbing Wyvern upwards to use the wide blade as a shield, the claws of the beast slamming into the thick sword while his free hand found the body of the undead, gripping into it and tearing outwards with violent force. The monstrosity let out a howl of agony as it was ripped in half down the middle, the liger throwing the torn piece off to the side as the beast collapsed into the dirt... but even this was not enough to stop it, as the two broken pieces bound together again, the hands seeking and finding each other and locking tightly together.

All three multi-limbed monstrosities charged forwards again, their uncountable hands and feet moving in a blur on the ground as they began to spin at tremendous speed, becoming like tornadoes made of blades and spikes that stabbed viciously in all directions. Killer gritted his fangs and stomped his foot into the ground, the earth exploding upwards to form a wall of stone in the path of the first monster, which crashed into it but rapidly tore a passage through even the hard granite. The liger took that moment of respite to leap backwards to safety, however, cocking back Wyvern and slashing the heavy sword out just as the beast broke through the wall. The crimson blade slammed into the spinning scythes and knocked one flying, a bloody stump of mutated arm dangling from the end of it, while Killer's sword chopped into the dead flesh of the construct, sending sick, corrupt blood exploding out in waves as the monster collapsed upon its side.

The other two spinning beasts rushed in from the sides, attempting to take Killer in the middle, but the liger teleported away from the spot, leaving behind an image of himself made of sapphire energy: the clone split one Azura blade out of its copy of Wyvern, and stabbed his swords into the two monsters before exploding in a blast of supernatural fire, the blue flames greedily consuming both beasts, dragging them towards the center of the burning inferno even as they struggled to move back.

Killer landed on his feet a dozen feet away, but he immediately had to leap backwards, spinning in midair to avoid a gigantic tentacle-mace that angrily slammed down from the sky. The liger snarled, swinging his hand up towards the sky and causing the ground to explode beneath the tentacle, as a pillar of sharp crystal shot out of the dirt and pierced the evil appendage from side to side, nailing it in place even as the snail-ghoul howled in pain and outrage.

Killer had to turn his attention to the gigantic golem, however, which stomped its way forwards with surprising speed, swinging an oversized fist towards him even as the many ghastly mouths covering its body took aim at the god and blasted him with beams of dark energy, forcing the liger to deploy his wings and maneuver around the deadly rays of darkness.

Killer twisted between two rays, folding his wings to shoot through them and then flapping them once to shot up past another beam, thrusting his hand into another as it came roaring at him: the liger was slammed backwards violently, electricity cursing up his arm and burning its way into his nerves, but the huge male smirked as he pushed back with his brutal strength, his bicep bulging explosively as he began to gain ground... before he allowed the energy to flow inside him, absorbing the attack, greedily eating it like it was food.

The golem was too stupid to understand what was happening as the god cut its way through the large beam of darkness, but Taranis and Seth could tell quite easily, and immediately reacted: Killer's eyes narrowed as he clearly perceived the shifting of their energy signatures, even though they seemed to come from every direction at once, making it impossible to react. Dark fog seeped up from the cracks in the ground and down from the clouds above, descending upon Killer like a cascade and leaving him blind and deaf, the sounds echoing in weird, absurd ways within the cloud. He guessed the presence of Seth a moment too late, turning towards the jackal but already feeling Time slowing down as a shotgun blast hit his arm and the side of his body, making him hiss in pain, only his eye able to follow the glimpse of Seth shooting away past his side, the canine laughing cruelly and arming the shotgun for another shot.

Killer tried to break free of his prison, but the shotgun barked again, and he arched his back with a grunt of agony as the massive pellets shot into the base of his spine, sending a shiver through his form and slowing him down even further.

The liger turned his gaze in the other direction as he guessed Taranis's presence, and he blasted a shockwave of telekinetic force in the general direction... but he only caused the thick smoke to flutter before the god of war pushed out of the black curtain and stabbed a spear through Killer's chest, shoving it through the liger's lungs and leaning forwards to grin into his face as he slowly gyrated the weapon into his flesh. "Coming here was a terrible mistake, Lord Killer... and it'll be a lot of fun to show you just how doomed you are because of it."

Killer snarled, spitting blood out of his mouth as it flooded up his throat, and he threw himself forwards with all his strength, Time itself bending and creaking as the powerful male flexed and steam snorted out of his nostrils... before Taranis grunted in shock as Killer roared and broke free of the prison, reality bending around him, trembling messily as Time warped and caught the god of war instead, while Killer's body quickly grew, muscles bulging larger as the liger's mass easily doubled.

"Talk me about it... you sure are an expert in big mistakes." Killer hissed, gritting his fangs with fury as he gripped the pole of the spear and dragged it back out of his flesh, while his other arm slashed Wyvern against the god of war, sending Taranis crashing backwards into the smoke, leaving behind a trail of blood.

Time went back to normal with a flash of light and a distant roar of thunder, and Killer grunted as he felt something enormous incoming, hurriedly ripping the spear out of his chest and stabbing it forth. There was a howl of pain and rage as the long weapon pierced deep into something... and the liger grunted as the something turned out being the golem's enormous fist, the fingers made up of corpses molded together, their empty eyes staring at him as all the mouths gaped wide.

The liger was slammed back through the sky, and the dead faces vomited their blasts of dark energy into him, pounding his body brutally as he fell towards the earth... before he conjured a shield of his own energy around himself, flipping to land on his feet, dropping to a crouch as he panted messily, blood leaking out of his jaws.

Killer hissed as he looked down at the horrible wound in his chest, making a grimace as the flesh and muscle painfully regenerated, and he squeezed hard on Wyvern's handle, giving the sword a silent order that was immediately fulfilled as pure, precious energy came out of the Imprisonment Crystal to flow through his veins, racing for the damaged areas. The relief was immediate, and the wound quickly sealed closed as the crystal gave a quiet, sad sigh, glowing ghastly as some of the many souls contained inside were squeezed and milked for all they were worth, turned into energy to feed his needs.

Killer pushed up to his feet, glaring up at the golem through his shield of energy, even as beams of darkness rammed into it again and again, going off in massive explosions. The liger rolled his shoulders slowly, cracking his neck as he advanced against the monstrosity, pulling Wyvern up, and the appearance of the Thousand-Hands did not slow him down: as it lunged at him, Killer ducked and stabbed Wyvern squarely into its body before slashing the massive sword upwards, cutting the beast in half along the spine and throwing the two halves high into the sky. Before they could fall back on him, their many limbs still flailing with wild rage, the liger's eyes glowed a deep, murderous sapphire and two columns of fire erupted from the ground, washing over the beast and consuming it into a dark mush with a fetid, sick stench.

The two columns of fire continued to rage on even as the greenish liquid rained down to earth, the flames going after the foul liquid and forcing it to evaporate away into nothingness, before the two tornados of flame moved against the massive golem.

Killer looked up to the sky with a snarl, however, as a novel energy signature dived towards him: a gigantic eagle, with wings of bone and tendrils of death meat that stretched out hundreds of feet, dived down towards him, extending bony claws bigger than trucks and sharper than razors. The beast was made up of bones, millions of them, sealed together to form enormous, solid sections that shaped a gigantic figure, half-dragon and half-eagle. It had a long neck, holding up a skull which was topped with majestic horns yet ended in the deadly-sharp beak of a bird of prey. Yellow flames burned in the otherwise empty sockets of the beast, and the ribcage of the construct was actually another, immense mouth, with the sharply-pointed ribs acting as fangs. The monstrosity had no organs and no flesh, no skin and no feathers, but was no less alive because of it... the only decayed flesh attached to the massive bones formed long, flexible tendrils and tentacles, stretching from the bone structure of the wings and, worse still, from the construct's ribs. They moved hungrily in the air, whipping back and forth and seeking preys to drag to their death into that massive, horrendous mouth of sorts. A mouth that drooled with a hunger that could not be sated; jaws that snapped hungrily, seeking food for a stomach that did not exist yet demanded to be filled.

The giant talons of the monster snapped down viciously, digging deep trenches into the ground as they closed down upon Killer, the male grunting as he shouldered Wyvern, the blade staying attached to his muscular back with a crackle of their shared energy as he threw his arms out instead, gripping into the solid, enormous claws and pushing back against them, wrestling them away from his body.

The eagle took off, shooting up into the sky and letting out a roar of triumph as it flew towards the agonizing snail, to drop Killer down into one of its deadly mouths... but before it had flown a hundred feet away, Killer roared and pushed so hard that the fingers of the monster's feet loudly cracked. The beast let out a howl of outrage and pain, bending forwards to snap its deadly beak over Killer, but the liger twisted out of the way before seizing the construct by the foot, dragging it back down to earth.

The gigantic beast squeaked in pain and protest as Killer gripped firmly into its short legs and swung it down into the earth, but the massive male only snickered in dark entertainment, wrapping his powerful arms around the beast's legs and lifting it out of the first crater only to flip it over and smash it down in the opposite direction, slamming the monster down again and again, each impact rattling the ground.

The eagle cried and kicked, trashing as hard as it could and trying to rake him with its enormous talons, but Killer only snarled and squeezed harder on the bony legs, gritting his fangs as the steel-hard bone creaked and splintered. The golem rushed over, his heavy stomps sending earthquakes across the wasteland as it pulled up its oversized arms to strike, but Killer only glared coldly back at him from over his shoulder, lifting the eagle up once more and then spinning around with a roar, smashing the winged-construct into the golem and knocking both monsters flying across the battlefield to crash in a broken heap several hundred feet away.

The eagle quickly scrambled to get back up, flapping its enormous wings to get off the golem and dragging itself forwards, squeaking angrily as its shattered feet ground into the earth. It hissed against Killer as the liger charged forth, and its tentacles shot forwards en masse, trying to envelope the now over forty-foot tall male. The liger did not reach for Wyvern, letting the tendrils wrap around his body, constricting his arms against his side and making his ribs creak as the tentacles squeezed as hard as they could, more and more of them wrapping around him as they hefted him easily off the ground and dragged him towards the massive, scary fangs made up by the beast's sharp ribs.

They snapped eagerly, the sharp bones closing and grinding upon each other, sharpening themselves even more as an acid, sick drool leaked down over them, the beast roaring hungrily as Killer came close... before the eagle threw its head backwards with a shriek of pain and surprise as the liger's own tentacles burst out of his powerful back, the dark, fleshy appendages ripping their way through the eagle's tendrils, tearing them to shreds. Killer flexed and pushed against the tendrils with all his might, bursting through the tangle and breaking free while his own tentacles, ending in terrifying jaws lined with saberteeth, shot against the rib-fangs of the beast, biting into the bone like into tasty morsels. They wrestled against the monstrosity's strength, breaking the bones with the power of their teeth as they forced the chest-mouth open wide, even as the eagle trashed and squeaked angrily, drool flying from its beak as much as from its ribs.

The monster used its long neck to swing its beak down against Killer, lunging at him and biting hard, the tremendous weight of the bony maws slamming heavily and sending a sick, deadly sound echoing down the wasteland, but the liger moved backwards and out of the way, laughing as his black tentacles lengthened and easily pushed him out of the danger zone.

The eagle shrieked in rage and lunged forwards again, and Killer's eyes glowed with dark amusement as he cocked back one heavy fist, slashing it out as the beak came down. There was a loud, sick, terrifying crack as the beak exploded into slivers and fragments of bone, the dragon-head recoiling backwards violently as the monster trashed and threw a cry to the sky... and Killer growled as he used his tentacles to push himself up, seizing the shattered beak in his hands, muscles bulging explosively as he steadied the beast and dragged its skull down, forcing the neck to bend painfully.

The monster understood a moment too late what was about to happen as Killer's tentacles suddenly let go of its ribs, which immediately snapped closed with a growl of anger, while the liger smashed another tremendous punch into the dragon-skull, knocking it hard backwards. Before it could do anything about it, the monster caught its own head in its chest-mouth, the ribs closing upon the skull and crushing it into dust and bone fragments, before they cut the neck apart, decapitating the eagle.

The flames in the eagle's sockets died out even as the wings flapped one last time, but then collapsed upon themselves, crashing to the ground in a cloud of dirt, as Killer floated in midair and dusted off his hands, his tentacles slowly retreating into his back.

Killer's attention shifted immediately to the golem, a hint of curiosity in his eyes as he saw that the gigantic construct had walked away from him... before he gritted his fangs as he realized what the monstrosity was up to. The golem had reached the two halves of the snail-monster, stretching his arms down over the two pieces... and their dead flesh had reacted and melted together, the two halves of the snail becoming shields solidly attached to the forearms of the golem, with the massive tentacle-maces still swinging angrily in the air, giving the giant a whole new weapon.

The golem turned towards Killer with a dumb grin, the gigantic beast flexing his muscles and smashing his oversized fists together as the tentacles whip-lashed back and forth, before they shot towards the liger, slamming forwards enormous blows and blasting huge waves of dark-metal shrapnel through the sky. The mace heads split open along their diameter, opening jaws that were lined with ragged, cruel metal teeth.

The liger brought Wyvern up in front of himself as waves of shrapnel slammed into him, the heavy metal fragments bouncing off the blade, before he flapped his mighty wings to fly backwards, ahead of the titanic beast that charged in his direction.

The liger avoided the slash of a massive tentacle, and then twisted around another that rushed down from the sky all the way down to earth, where it smashed a deep, enormous crater. He was not too worried by the golem on its own, truth be told: the beast was massive and powerful, but not too quick and well within his possibilities. He knew, however, that both Seth and Taranis continued to circle around him like invisible birds of prey, ready to strike him down and leave him vulnerable as soon as he exposed himself. It was frustrating, it was unfair, it was unnerving... but he had no other option than dealing with the risk.

Killer took a deep breath as he prepared to attack, gathering his energies and preparing to unleash them as he used his wings to launch himself up past one tentacle, before diving along its length, shooting towards the golem's chest. Rays of focused darkness shot past him as he rushed forwards... and between them, without any surprise, he suddenly spotted the dark fog that announced Seth.

Things happened quickly at that point, as the liger spun to face the jackal, lashing out with focused psychic force and slamming the god backwards, causing the dog to grunt in surprise and pain... before a thick black chain appeared right in front of Killer, shooting towards his throat. The liger reached up with one hand, snarling in rage as he caught the burning-hot chain and struggled to keep it off his windpipe, his other hand reaching up for the handle of Wyvern as energy crackled around his body, muscles bulging explosively and his eyes burning with power.

The golem charged in for the kill, swinging his enormous fists towards the liger, but he whined in pain as the god's energies exploded outwards in form of lightning, the sapphire bolts traveling up the golem's arms and burning into the dead flesh, melting it into ugly sludge. Killer's shape grew quickly, his mass expanding enormously as he yanked the chain away and broke it like a frail string, the links exploding in pieces and quickly vanishing away into motes of energy as Taranis once more dissolved in a puff of smoke, merging with his sanctuary.

The golem grunted dumbly and stumbled backwards as Killer quickly grew to match his sizes, the liger's body crackling with energy as it doubled, trebled, grew to one thousand, then four thousand feet in the space of a blink... before Killer grinned predatorily as the golem began to look small to his eyes, the gigantic monstrosity suddenly no longer impressive as the god seized the tentacles in one huge hand, crushing them into pulp with an easy squeeze. The golem's many mouths fired beams of darkness against the growing body of the liger, but the energy was greedily swallowed into Killer's bulging muscles, adding to the god's strength instead of hurting him. Killer yanked on the tentacles, his eyes burning with vicious amusement as the golem was lifted clear off the ground with a yelp of pain, until the thick appendages tore, breaking up in a splatter of blood and gore and letting its heavy body fall back down to earth, hundreds of feet beneath with how quickly Killer was growing.

Wyvern swung through the air with the tremendous force of its increased mass, the enormous blade chopping through the construct's body and cutting its legs off with a clean cut, sending the limbs flying a long distance away before splattering sickly onto the wasteland while the upper body of the beast crashed in front of the enormous god. Immediately, as Killer let Wyvern swing lazily back, the blade tore deep through the ground and effortlessly chopped the golem's body in half down the spine... and a moment later, before the undead creature could attempt to regenerate its body, Killer's foot crashed down upon the two halves, stomping them into a splatter of mush that squirted up between his toes, the greenish, sick gore spurting noisily out from under his sole as the god slowly ground it on the spot, as if shutting a cigarette butt.

"Any other troublesome pet you want me to take care of...? Or are you finally ready to play, now...?" Killer mocked, his voice low and deep as his eyes burned a deep, solid sapphire, energy crackling around his massive body as he flexed lightly, enormous muscles bulging with fearsome physical power.

"Your arrogance will be your ruin." Taranis coldly replied, the whole planet trembling violently under Killer's feet as the clouds in the sky swirled angrily, moving in astonishing ways. Killer looked up at the apocalyptic sky with a snort, his growth continuing still as the ground cracked under his toes, solid stone cracking and turning into dust, soft dirt caving in, the concrete and asphalt disintegrating under his growing mass. He restrained himself still, though... he did not want to reveal all his cards yet, or worse to lose control. Even he did not know the full extent of his strength, and he couldn't afford a mess up against rivals of the caliber of the god of war. He needed a clear mind to fight properly, not just muscle and mass. Becoming bigger and bigger will not do any good if I lose the grip and become as dumb as that golem... and Deimos will make it already more than hard enough to keep focused. No need to make things easier for them.

It was pretty clear that Taranis was trying to push him to reveal his full potential and the full extent of his abilities: the god of war probably hoped to push Killer into revealing his Ascended form, his apex, but the liger had no intention to give him such valuable knowledge.

His sapphire eyes traced the quick, vicious swirling of the clouds, as enormous waves of smoke and dust and ashes clashed nervously in the sky, lightning cracking and flashing in tremendous discharges at each impact, as the energies of Taranis continued to grow and reached him, monstrously amplified, from each and every direction. Killer gritted his fangs, trying to focus his senses even more, to detect any hint he could... but it was impossible to pick up much of anything.

His instinct, though, proved as powerful as always when it screamed at him and he turned around, facing a vortex that suddenly seemed to tear the sky apart before vomiting an enormous meteor of dark, hellish fire. The comet shot down towards the planet's surface, filling up the sky as far as Killer could see as it came closer, and the liger deployed his enormous wings, shooting up into the air and flying away as quickly as he could. His eyes couldn't see through the flames, but he knew that, somewhere in the center of that supernatural comet, was the massive war chariot of the god of war, pulled by two massive stallions of burning fire and of immense destructive power.

The comet shot down dangerously close to him even as he threw himself out of the way as quickly as he could, flying all the way to the coast and over the vast ocean... but the meteor was simply too fast and too immense, its flames blasting over him, along with enormous, cruel shrapnel coming from the hooves of the horses, which slammed down against the sky with fearsome force, each impact booming louder than any natural thunder.

Killer hissed in pain as the dark metal shrapnel pelted him, large fragments sinking deep into his flesh and making it sizzle with their heat, the dark hellfire eagerly enveloping his entire body, trying to consume him down to ashes even as he dived straight into the waves. The water could nothing against the eternal flames of war, and the ocean only boiled and began to quickly evaporate as Killer dived under the surface to avoid spinning blades of dark steel and fire that extended from either flank of the meteor.

Killer looked up towards the surface, gritting her fangs at the flash of burning light that he saw passing overhead, while he focused his energies to tame and absorb the fire that continued to bite at his flesh. It took him a moment, but he finally managed to snuff the flames out of existence, using their very own energy to heal the burns and wounds they had inflicted to his body... before he grunted as the gigantic fire stallions slammed their hooves on solid earth, stomping entire regions out of existence as the meteor landed upon the wasteland, crushing hills flat and grinding the mountains into dust as Seth guided the chariot in a tight turn, the wheels digging fearsome canyons into the crust of the planet, scarring the continent forever as the immense vehicle of war charged into the ocean.

The temperature of the water skyrocketed as the immense, flaming chariot charged into the ocean, forcing the seas to part and turning the liquid into vapor as it charged forwards, its wheels and the hooves of the massive horses crushing the mountains and cliffs of the seabed into nothing but powder.

Killer stared in awe at the ocean as it was broken into two, the chariot forcing open a dry corridor flanked by walls of water rising to the sky while rapidly evaporating into a white mist, while the entire planet trembled like a leaf, rattled by the weight of the horses and by the mass of the vehicle.

An immense spear came out of the comet of fire, shooting towards Killer with tremendous speed, the liger using his wings to throw himself to the side and avoid it, while the water around him turned into steam, making his moves easier and quicker... but right when he thought he was safe, the spear took on a dark blue glow and crackled with energy, exploding in a massive discharge of electricity, thunderbolts traveling across the ocean and catching the liger, making him roar in agony, smoke coming out of his mouth as his nervous system felt like on the verge of melting completely away.

Moving became almost impossible for Killer as his muscles began to spasm painfully, out of control, as blood leaked from his nostrils and ears, his vision becoming a succession of flashes of white and black even as he arched his back and struggled, trying to push back against the discharge. Killer's eye bulged as he stared sideways at the rapidly advancing chariot, hearing Taranis's vicious laughter and the barking amusement of Seth, before the jackal armed his enormous shotgun and fired another trio of shots in quick succession.

Killer felt the time immediately slowing down as the bus-sized pellets traveled quickly towards him, turning the water around them into vapor. Killer snarled, his body burning with rage and frustration as he flexed and forced his energies outwards, using them as a shield to drive the electricity out of himself... and, to his surprise, it worked, bringing relief to his nerves and to his muscles as he shut his eyes and tried to visualize the flow of the discharge, pushing the thunderbolts down towards the blade of Wyvern.

It all happened in a second as he spun on the spot and slashed wyvern out in a wide cut in the direction of the incoming chariot, hurling the focused inferno of electricity into the comet of fire. The flow of time returned to normal as the electricity slammed into the incoming shotgun blasts and vaporized them, before an explosion of light turned the darkness of the ocean's depths into bright midday as the thunderbolts clashed with the flames of war.

Killer snarled and squeezed his eyes to look through the blinding light, as electricity and fire clashed and the meteor suddenly lost some of its impenetrable outer layer of eternal fire. Within, as Killer had imagined, was the chariot of war in its full glory, hundreds of miles in width and in height, its weight ripping deep wounds in the crust of the planet. Deadly scythed and spiked wheels carried a sleek, armoured chariot of black steel, pulled forwards by two immense, muscular stallions made of fire and covered in scars, with long manes of flame and heavy, enormous hooves with a diameter of dozens of miles, making them apocalyptic hammers that rammed the ground with the booming thunder of a million bombs, each impact sending deadly shrapnel exploding in every direction.

For a brief, fleeting moment, Killer's attention was caught by the two glorious horses, and his mind was crossed by the thought of how epic it would be to ride such scary, magnificent beasts into battle... but he pushed that distraction away with a snort of contempt at his own lightness.

Both Taranis and Seth were in their Ascended forms and their size was mind-blowing, each god standing hundreds, maybe thousands of miles tall as they rode side by side into the chariot. They had taken their ultimate forms right from the beginning, clear sign of how seriously they took the battle against Killer. Then again, they clashed with Alexis already, and she forced them to Ascend... so, I guess it's a mere case of learning from experience.

The battle in Kemuel had not just taught the gods of war not to underestimate Killer and Alexis: it had also left deep scars on them. Seth, in particular, had lost a fair part of his body on the battlefield, and now sported robotic replacements for half his head and for his legs, as Killer had discovered earlier. Massive, powerful mechanic limbs, bent in unguligrade stance, sustained its enormous and grotesquely muscular upper body. Just like his arms were immense, bulging with tremendous biceps and reaching all the way down to the ground, the legs were thick and mighty, enclosed into heavy armour plates which bulged around massive pistons and actuators which hissed and whirred ominously, giving his lower limbs even greater strength than the originals made of flesh and bone.

Having to get half of his head rebuilt had given him the chance to get a thick helm of dark metal plates built upon his skull, made even more imposing by a ridge of cruel blades curved backwards and running down the middle, while enormous ram horns curled on the sides of his lengthened, ugly muzzle. Both the natural and the robotic eyes glowed crimson as his hungry, deformed and oversized jaws constantly gaped, drooling a mortal acid in thick strings and leaving the multiple, successive rows of cruel fangs exposed, as the four sharply-pointed metallic tentacles that replaced his tongue twisted and whip-lashed eagerly in the air, seeking fresh meat.

His hair turned into silvery steel when he Ascended, making his body at once an armor and a weapon as each strand of fur turned into a thin but solid spike. Extra ribs encaged the front of his body, tightly grouping together over the chest, forming a ridged plate of impenetrable armor that protected his organs, while the lower abdomen, while bulging with powerful abs, turned almost emaciated, thin with the retreat of his insides into the protected core. His back was armored by a ridge of deadly spikes of bone, the result of his spine becoming thicker, stronger, armored and ending in cruel blades that jutted down along even his tail as this lengthened and lost its canine appearance to became dragon-like, as its extremity split open to form thick, potent jaws lined with grotesque, massive fangs. The hungry jaws of war, destroyers of life which could never be sated, never tired, which would gladly consume entire worlds, turning nations into bloody battlefields.

Taranis was even larger, even stronger, his Ascension even more terrifying as he towered over Seth, the dog's horns only reaching up to the bottom of his broad, masculine chest. The thick, solid armor that Taranis normally wore became part of his body when he ascended, the metal merging with his flesh and with thick, indestructible bone to form an exoskeleton that was almost invulnerable. The chiseled lion head on the chest of his armor mutated into a real, apocalyptic mouth lined with undead corpses instead of lips. Soldiering on shoulder to shoulder, uncountable warriors of the past, condemned to a horrible non-death, now had the sole purpose of grabbing other pour souls and throwing them down into the life-destroying black hole, which was lined with jagged, cruel teeth growing in rows upon rows. The god's head was ugly and grotesque, deformed by massive, square jaws, his muzzle turned into a solid, thick mask of bone covered in rows of curved spikes and blades, his mouth a forever gaping black hole ready to swallow all life. Two pairs of enormous horns stretched majestically up from his skull, curving towards the front of his face, at once protecting the sides of his face from enemy action and giving him an additional weapon to gore enemies with, as black, hellish fire danced in the air behind him, forming a long mane donned up in a tall mohawk.

Four extra arms stretched out of his back, giving him six powerful arms to deal out destruction with, and Killer made a grimace as he saw that they had undergone a further mutation from when he had first seen them, in Kemuel: they now were much longer and segmented into thick, heavy pipes of dark metal jutting with spikes and thorns, with the hands morphed into deadly, flexible talons as sharp as razors. They now looked a lot more like spider legs than arms, and they gave him a far longer reach in every direction.

He still had Aegis, his shield turned piece-of-gauntlet installed over the back of one hand to give his already devastating fist the ability to turn enemies into stone, so that he could punch them into nothing but sand and powder. The cruel eyes of Medusa glowed brilliantly in the middle of the shield, and Killer reprimanded himself for even seeking that glow: he had to avoid eye contact at all costs.

The arms and legs of the god of war were armored by millions of thick, heavy shields overlapping each other like scales. The shields were handled by the victims of a thousand wars, brought back to a miserable existence as undead slaves, melted into his very flesh, only their torsos sticking out of Taranis's limbs. They were mindless, drooling creatures, ghouls that lived only to protect the god of war and drag new victims forwards to join their ranks. With one hand they held the shields and with the other flexible talon they slashed angrily at the air, some still brandishing deadly blades and spears and modern firearms. The legs of the god were bent forwards, and his knee pads were now grotesque mouths lined with saber-like fangs and with a long, flexible metallic spike in place of a tongue.

He no longer had feet, instead sporting massive triangular hooves that compressed the world beneath into nothing but powder. The surface of each hoof was completely covered by forests of long pikes of rusty metal, upon which millions of bodies were impaled: each undead monstrosity was a victim of war turned into weapon as they swung heavy weapons, gnashing their fangs and clawing at the air, eager to snag a new unfortunate soul to drag forwards and impale upon the pikes, to add yet another soldier to the army of despair. Six long, endless tails swung viciously behind Taranis, made of massive vertebrae, sharper and deadlier than any axe, coming out of his spine and dropping down to the ground and stretching miles beyond, whipping the air with cruel eagerness. It was the true personification of war, unleashed in all its glory, so massive to annihilate entire regions with just a mere step, so hungry for blood and death and ruin that every bit of gore and remains from the giga-ghouls Killer had earlier slain was absorbed into Taranis's body as he advanced, adding even more to his power, as the tremendous beast constantly absorbed energy from the fighting, from the planet itself, from the other sanctuary-worlds scattered across the Dimension.

The gigantic chariot charged right towards him, and Killer felt suddenly small and vulnerable, even though his body was thousands of feet tall by now. The ocean quickly dried around them, rising towards the sky in clouds of vapor as the spinning scythes sticking out of the chariot's wheels cut through the cliffs and mountains of the bottom of the sea.

Killer gritted his fangs as he moved back as quickly as he could, trying to put some distance between him and the charging stallions of fire while he raised his left arm in front of his chest, focusing his energies to form a large, heavy rectangular shield, using it to cover himself as Seth roared and fired a succession of shotgun blasts against him.

Killer recoiled with a grunt as the enormous pellets smashed into the shield, thunderbolts flying from each impact point, before his eyes narrowed as he gazed up over the edge of the shield to see Seth cackling and firing his enormous rifle into the ground.

He understood immediately what was about to happen, spinning around to thrust the shield out behind himself as a ripple went through reality and the pellets exploded out of thin air, aiming for him. They bounced off the shield, but almost knocked Killer over, forcing him to one knee... before the liger let out a howl of pain as the ground beneath his feet rippled and the other shotgun blasts exploded up into him, before he managed to leap back out of the way.

He spat a gout of blood, hissing in pain as he flexed his powerful musculature to force the bullets out of his flesh, hearing the pellets crumpling on themselves, crushed like toys... but he immediately hard to retreat further as he felt another shift in the energies around him, and Taranis's spear thrust out of the ground, almost impaling him.

"There's no hiding, young and foolish lion! The entire planet is mine to toy with!" Taranis boomed, laughing darkly as he stabbed his deadly tails into the ground, the sharp tips sinking not into the earth but into reality itself, and Killer grunted as he swung Wyvern up in a wide cut, while using the shield to protect his other side. The tail-whips shot out of thin air, coming from all directions at once, and it took all of Killer's instinct to slap three back with the flat of Wyvern, while two more clanged loudly against his shield, tearing deep gashes in it... but the sixth, he could do nothing about, and it stabbed viciously into his hip, making him grunt in agony as blood burst out of his body and the harpoon-shaped vertebrae at the tip pierced into his guts, cutting even into his rib.

The sharp tail twisted viciously into the wound, grinding his insides into a bloody mess as his bones creaked, before the long appendage snapped backwards to drag him right in front of the chariot, the stallions erupting magma from their nostrils as they flexed their mighty shoulders and leapt forwards with renewed speed and vigor. Killer snarled and planted his feet into the ground, digging trenches into the stone as he resisted, and he turned around to slash Wyvern down upon the bony tail, chopping it off. Before he could seize the tip-less tail, it vanished away in a puff of black smoke, leaving behind the piece stuck into his flesh, which began to spin brutally, drilling into his body, trying to delve deeper into his insides.

Killer groaned in breathless agony, but his eyes continued to burn with determination as he hurled the heavy shield against the incoming chariot, his now free hand shooting down to grip into the torturing weapon lodged into his hip. It tore the palm of his hand apart as it continued to viciously spin, but he ripped it out of his flesh with a roar, clenching it in his fist until the vertebrae exploded into puffs of dust.

He immediately threw himself to the side as the chariot rumbled forth, twisting out of the way as one of the gigantic fire stallions tried to ram into him, before he spun around to throw a sphere of concentrated energy towards the open back of the vehicle as it rushed past.

The sphere only hit the dry seabed, however, the massive explosion ripping a huge but useless crater into the spooky, steaming wasteland that had once been a beautiful ocean, while the chariot sunk into the ground and vanished from sight with a ripple in the fabric of reality.

Killer snarled in frustration and steadied himself, taking on an easy ready position and focusing on his sharp senses, trying to guess the direction from which the next assault would come, hating how disorienting it was to perceive his enemies' presence at once in every direction, in the dirt under his feet like behind his back or above into the sky.

He gritted his fangs in a snarling grin, thinking that he would not allow Taranis and Seth to laugh at him, looking down at him like he was a bug. He closed his eyes for a moment and let more of his energies burst out of the floodgates, pumping in his veins before heflexed with raw power, growing stronger by the moment, more and more restraint falling away. His eyes burned with hunger and lust from his view so high, high above the world, that same world he had scarred so viciously, his hungers growing greater and darker as he thought with cruel pleasure of the ease with which he had annihilated thousands upon thousands upon thousands of ghouls and destroyed the most powerful weapons the civilizations of that hi-tech planet had managed to create. It was still hard for him to maintain a cool head and firm control when he allowed his godlike force to surge free like that, his body thrumming with fearsome physical power and continuing to grow in mass and muscle and strength, the smallest movement of just one toe easily crushing a whole region into powder now as he grew to match the gigantic proportions of the ascended gods of war.

Taranis snarled in fury at the sight of his growth, the earth rattling under Killer's feet as the planet reacted to its owner's rage, and the liger tensed and pulled Wyvern up as he felt a ripple of dark energy shooting through reality. The bony tails of the god of war burst out of the ground almost immediately, arching high into the sky before whip-lashing brutally down against him. He leaned forwards, swinging Wyvern into the first whip, slamming it back as fragments of bone shot in every direction, before the Liger's eyes glowed as he blasted another tail into pieces with a colossal slap of psychic force. He seized another whip as it slammed down onto his shoulder, grinding loudly into the bone spikes jutting out of his joint, and he used his monstrous strength to twist the tail backwards until the bone loudly cracked apart.

Wyvern found its mark into the fourth as he brought the heavy blade back, vertebrae splintering and exploding in every direction as his sword cut the long appendage in two... but more surged out of the ground, viciously stabbing at him from every direction like the damage he had inflicted had been completely meaningless.

Killer stomped one foot into the ground and ducked behind the thick wall of stone that surged up as the seabed cracked apart and split into islands and plates of rock, magma surging up and erupting out of the fractures. The bony tails smashed into the hard stone, tearing through it and angrily hacking it to bits and pebbles, but the shield gained Killer enough time to let him spring back to his feet, cocking Wyvern back before spinning it in a full cut all around himself, his roar rattling the planet as the heavy blade cut through the stone and through Taranis's whips, shattering them all.

The chariot reappeared right in the same instant, erupting out of the surging sea of magma and rushing forwards in the form of a meteor, dark flames completely enveloping it as Killer turned back to face the new threat as a huge spear flew towards his head. He knocked it off course with a swing of Wyvern, but when he tried to charge the chariot, bony hands pushed out of the ground and seized into his ankles, cruel talons sinking deep into his flesh and yanking him backwards, making him hiss in pain as he fell to his knee.

The ground beneath him immediately exploded upwards, deadly spikes of metal and bone and stone surging from the seabed to pierce into his abs, into his chest, making him roar in pain as blood spurted out of the wounds... but energy crackled around his massive form as he flexed and his musculature bulged explosively, tremendous physical power radiating from him as the spikes crumbled away into pebbles and dust.

He threw himself forwards, gripping into the ground as he first donkey-kicked the hands holding his feet, then sprinted, ripping the talons apart and breaking free just as the chariot rushed him. He went into a roll, throwing himself out of the way as the enormous vehicle rumbled past, and he clawed into the seabed to quickly turn around, slashing Wyvern towards the legs of the massive fire stallions. The mighty beasts leapt over the blade, however, and Killer grunted as the wheels of the chariot rumbled over the huge sword: he grinned even as the tremendous weight dragged him down, using his fearsome strength to push back as he stood up and slashed Wyvern skywards.

Seth cursed loudly as the chariot was lifted off the ground, Taranis gripping into the front of the vehicle with a grunt of shock as Killer roared and threw them up into the air... but before the vehicle could topple over, the stallions launched themselves down into the ground and vanished into it, pulling the chariot to safety as it dissolved out of sight.

Killer snarled in frustration and rage, but he nonetheless resumed his ready position, his mind hard at work to find a way to lessen the disadvantage of fighting on Taranis's home turf, and stop the accursed chariot before it could run him over for good.

He was granted no respite, however, as the ground beneath his feet disintegrated, an enormous explosion throwing him into the air as every pebble morphed into a sword, an axe, a dagger, a spear, thousands of weapons shooting against him as he backflipped to land in a crouch, Wyvern raised up to shield him from the onslaught. He stood up and slapped a whole armada of weapons away using the flat of Wyvern, but the swords viciously flew back towards him, forcing him to intercept assault after assault, until he swung his hand up and sent a wall of dark fire exploding in front of him, the flames melting the weapons down into white-hot liquid as they shot through.

Even that was not quite enough, as the molten metal self-forged into a series of armor piercing darts that shot against him, while the fearsome chariot charged out of thin air, reality rippling as the heavy vehicle reappeared behind his shoulders. Killer raised his arm and used his energies to form a new, heavy shield, slamming this into the incoming barrage of darts, gritting his fangs as the impacts made him stumble backwards... before he used that same momentum to spin around and face the chariot, the flames smashing into the shield and making it incandescent as Killer went down to a crouch and squeezed his broad frame under the cover.

Taranis cackled as his segmented extra-arms shot forwards, stabbing down towards Killer, each of them growing a scythe-like spike of black steel at the tip. "What's wrong, hero...? Too much for you...?"

Killer glared at him from over the edge of the shield, swinging the heavy barrier of energy up to knock the first spike wide, while at the same time slamming Wyvern up into another. The third arm viciously hooked around the shield and aimed for his hip, but Killer backstepped and flicked his wrist, spinning Wyvern's blade downwards and slamming into the spike, knocking it away from his flesh.

He sidestepped another vicious slash, and grinned as the spike, overeager, stabbed into the ground: immediately he stomped his foot hard upon the segmented arm, making it crack loudly as it was compressed into the ground, and Taranis snarled in pain and outrage, but only engaged him even harder with the other arms, forcing the liger back as Killer used Wyvern to meet each slash, his eyes darting from one side to another to track all threats at once.

The huge male dodged sideways as the chariot rushed him, but one of the fire stallions angrily neighed and leapt to the side as far as the harnesses allowed it, the enormous beast ramming its powerful shoulder into Killer's shield.

The god met the tremendous blow with a snarl, pushing back against the wild stallion, muscles bulging explosively in that duel of raw power... and the horse was slammed backwards, rearing with a neigh of shock and pain as it nearly fell against its comrade.

Seth pulled on the reins and snapped an electrified whip at the two horses, trying to bring them back under control as the chariot tilted to the side and swayed violently, and Killer grinned as he stomped forwards, ramming his massive shield into the flank of the colossal horse. The beast tripped and fell to the side, but Killer suddenly found himself rushing through a wall of fire as the chariot once more dissolved.

"Coward!" Killer roared, his eyes glowing with fury as he spun around, energy crackling around him... and his instinct guided him as he slammed his shield into the ground, pumping his raw, tremendous force into the seabed. Right in that moment, the chariot reappeared and charged straight at him while he was facing the wrong direction... but it did not matter, as four copies of Killer, made of solid sapphire essence, appeared back to back to the real one, each facing a different sector. The clones slammed their own shields down into the ground, and an immense power erupted outwards in a blast of fearsome force, as Wyvern and her three copies, plus dozens of spears made of raw, crackling energy, stabbed outwards.

Seth gaped in surprise and barked in pain as he was almost knocked off the chariot, holding on to the reins for dear life as the vehicle was slapped backwards like a toy and the gigantic horses reared up to avoid the spears, the shockwave of the explosion throwing them backwards into the chariot itself.

Taranis stepped in, snarling in rage as he pushed his palm out, his force gripping the horses and steadying them as the chariot tumbled back to earth and, after bouncing hard a few times, Seth managed to regain control, leading the horses in a majestic gallop, beginning to run in circles around the wall of shields.

"I'm a winner, not a coward... should I not take advantage of my power, and of your stupidity...? You should have never dared facing me... and I can't believe you were so stupid to come here, of all places!" Taranis cruelly teased, picking a massive spear out of the holster in the side of the chariot, balancing it and hurling it down towards Killer.

The sapphire clones, however, formed a tight testudo, as one of them slipped in the middle of the group and raised his shield up to cover the top side, as Killer coldly glared at the chariot, waiting for the right moment, his eyes narrowing as he studied the moves of his rival, ignoring the spear as it bounced loudly off the shield over his head. The long weapon exploded a moment later, the blast putting a tremendous pressure down on the small fortress of shields, but Killer and the clones easily resisted to it, causing Taranis to snarl in rage. The god of war picked up another spear, launching it with all his strength, and then hurling another, but nothing seemed to break through Killer's defence... and when the god of war angrily swung his palm towards the sky, he discovered with a twitch of rage that he couldn't strike from beneath the liger's feet, as a solid floor of sapphire energy blocked his assaults. "Come out and fight, young lion! Hiding like that makes you the coward!" Taranis snarled his taunting, then gripped Seth's shoulder and clenched hard on it, in a silent but clear order, and Killer saw the jackal snap the reins to order the stallions into a tighter turn. The chariot immediately moved closer to his shield, the deadly scythe sticking out of the wheel spinning rapidly... You are mine.

Killer braced for the impact, gritting his fangs at the tremendous violence of the crash as the chariot slammed into his shield, the spinning blade cutting into the solid energy and grinding it into bits as the sapphire clones dissolved, but the liger had wanted nothing else. He leapt to his feet and threw himself against the side of the chariot, dropping his shoulder as he rammed the heavy vehicle and sent Taranis crashing into the ground, Seth bracing to stay inside as the chariot tilted upon one wheel. The jackal pushed immediately back to prevent the chariot flipping upside down, and he raised his enormous shotgun as the vehicle crashed back down on solid ground. "Eat bullets, kitty!" Seth barked, drool flying from his cruel jaws as he armed the shotgun and blasted Killer's face once, twice, thrice...

But Killer only laughed, his eyes glowing with predatory pleasure as he flexed and leaned forwards into the shots, his enormous musculature bulging with monstrous power as energy crackled around him and his height increased, his body thrumming with his strength and pushing back against Time as it began to slow down.

Seth's eyes bulged in shock and fear as the god realized what was about to happen, staring at the heavy pellets as they bounced off Killer's musculature like pathetic pieces of soft rubber, before a ripple went through reality as the liger used his sheer physical power to slam the Time-warp effect back against the jackal. The very air trembled as the fire stallions neighed and flexed their muscles, throwing themselves forwards with all their strength... but even with their effort, they were suddenly moving in slow motion, along with the chariot and with Seth himself. Killer grinned predatorily down into Seth's horrified eyes as he grabbed the god's shotgun, slamming it up into the jackal's face, once, twice, thrice, before taking hold of the trigger to blast a series of shots right into the dog's features, blood flying up in thick splatters as the flesh was ripped off the bone and pieces of the god's skull flew off.

"There goes your puny little toy..." Killer announced, his fangs gritted in a snarling grin of satisfaction as the heavy rifle groaned in his grip, the dark metal bending and twisting under his fingers until the weapon crumpled on itself like it was made of paper. Seth's eyes bulged in shock, fixed upon the rifle as Killer bent it with all the ease of bending a blade of grass, the canine trembling in slow motion at the sight of the liger's enormous muscles, at the terrifying feel of the power radiating from the gigantic male. "Eat your toy, doggy." Killer teased, grinning as the rifle groaned loudly as he bent its multiple, heavy barrels at a 90 degree angle, shoving them into the jackal's mouth, before he punched the whole rifle down the god's throat, ripping his neck apart as the V-shaped weapon went down, sending a splatter of blood upwards. Seth choked on the massive lump of metal, blood and spit flying from his mouth even as his jaws chewed on the hard metal, ripping it into shreds, his acid drool consuming the cold metal as his body worked to swallow it.

Killer stabbed Wyvern through Seth's chest, the massive sword cutting through him from side to side as the liger's other hand seized into the jackal's skull, crushing down on it with tremendous force... until Killer tore back with all his fearsome strength, ripping off one of the god's horns and shattering the flesh-and-bone side of his head.

Killer turned to the side with a snarl as he felt an immense energy signature rushing against him, and he gritted his fangs as a tornado of black ghosts and blades smashed into him, knocking him off the chariot, even as he attempted to twist Wyvern into Seth's chest, swinging the weapon upwards... but there was nothing he could do as he was slammed viciously away, his grip only tightening upon Wyvern's handle as the blade tore out of the jackal's body.

The flow of Time resumed at normal pace, a ripple of energy making reality tremble... and Seth fell back into the chariot, panting breathlessly for a moment, blood leaking out of his deformed, shattered head his eyes burning with murderous hate as he glared at Killer, his hand clutching at the horrible wound in his upper chest. The chariot moved rapidly as the horses' hooves hammered the ground, and before Killer could try and pursue, the vehicle dived into the solid ground and vanished from sight.

He could not do more than curse mentally for the lost opportunity, though, because he was slammed hard down into the seabed, the tornado grinding down on him with terrible force as the ghosts of war clawed and gnawed at him, swarming all over his body. He slashed Wyvern into the black fog, but the blade went through the ghastly beings without damaging them, while the darkness felt like a powerful glue that captured the sword and slowed its movements horribly, wrestling to tear it out of the liger's grip.

Killer swung the heavy blade over himself, muscles bulging almost painfully with the effort of cutting through the mass of swarming ghosts, but he managed to smash blades and axes flying off course before they could tear into him... before he flexed and shoved his hand into the vortex of darkness, roaring as he pushed back against the tornado, wrestling it away from his chest as the ghosts cut deep into his flesh, slashing his abs, cutting his chest, covering his arms in wounds. Fire exploded out of his body, a hurricane of hellfire that hungrily enveloped the black vortex... but the ghosts, even as they burned, continued to move without fear and without obstacle. One of them grabbed Killer's face, its sharp thumb-talons squeezing down on the liger's eyes, and the huge male bucked with a snarl, arching his back and slashing his enormous fist through the creature. There was no impact, only his arm getting caught in the glue-like darkness... and Killer let out a growl of pain as he felt his eyes pushed back into his head, blood leaking out of his sockets. The flames raging out of his body rose higher and more powerful, but it did not help... and fear began to grip him, the agony clouding his mind as new and new wounds were ripped open into his body, and his eyes felt on the verge of bursting apart. "Get... off... me!" Killer snarled, bucking again with the sheer power of terror, and energy crackled violently around his body as he shoved back against the black tornado, his monstrous physical power pitted against dark, supernatural magic as he pushed up into a crouch, panting roughly even as he flexed and jolted his arms forwards, brute strength on display as thunderbolts of sheer energy crackled around him. One huge discharge of energy caught the ghost squeezing upon his eyes and blasted it back with a howl of agony, the dark creature dissolving... and Killer bared his fangs in a snarling grin as he took notice of that sign of weakness, standing up and ramming his fist into the obscure tornado.

The vortex exploded into motes of darkness which dissolved quickly, Killer panting hard and coughing out a splatter of blood, but as he straightened, the wounds covering his body already began to regenerate, the bleeding quickly stopping as he flexed his enormous musculature, rolling his shoulders slowly as energy crackled furiously around him, his step pulverizing the stone beneath and cracking the crust of the planet for hundreds of miles in every direction as his height and mass increased once more, his form thrumming with brutal, unholy strength.

"You are so primitive and savage... the only solution that your mind can come up with is overwhelming force, and more of it when it is not enough!" Taranis snarled, his voice dripping hate and contempt as he leapt out of a cracked cliff of granite, dark smoke solidifying into his enormous body just as he lunged against Killer, his six arms all brandishing enormous weapons, from swords to spears to axes.

"Yeah, and your problem is that I have so much of it that you fear the day in which I crush you like a bug." Killer easily replied, grinning predatorily as he flicked the trigger inside Wyvern's handle to release one of the Azura blades, catching it in midair and slashing both swords upwards to meet Taranis's assault, the liger growling as his arms flexed, recoiling from the impact as four of the god of war blades smashed viciously down into his own. The other two spider-like arms of the god snapped viciously in from the sides, but Killer knocked both attacks wide as he spun his swords, parrying and then slashing to meet other cruel stabs coming from above.

"You are annoying, and an obstacle to my plans. But you will never be more than an annoyance... and I will make sure to end that annoyance today." Taranis hissed, stomping one gigantic hoof towards Killer, missing narrowly as the liger leapt backwards and used a flap of his mighty wings to shoot backwards.

Immediately, a rumble came from underground, and Killer spun on the spot to face the chariot as it charged straight at him, to close to be avoided, Seth snapping the reins again and again, snarling with murderous fury and barking orders to the massive stallions.

The ground trembled and shattered under the pounding of hooves as the two massive beasts galloped against Killer, shrapnel exploding from each impact as they left behind a burned, devastated wasteland, but the liger did not retreat, charging instead right towards the chariot.

Seth recoiled in surprise, his hand reaching for the spears sticking out of the large holster, and the stallions snorted big clouds of steam from their nostrils as they flexed and dropped their heads, pushing their massive chests out as they rushed proudly against Killer, their manes of flames dancing in the wind as they prepared to trample their enemy.

Killer spread his powerful arms and tensed, gathering his enormous strength as his veins bulged, pumping blood into his massive musculature as he roared his challenge, smashing into the horses and thrusting forwards with brutal force. The stallions neighed in shock and pain as they smashed into him but only managed to knock him back a few feet, Killer's toes digging into the ground as he braced himself and shoved back against the chariot... and amazingly, the enormous horses were slammed back into the vehicle, the wheels beginning to turn backwards as the liger stomped his way forwards.

"This is impossible...!" Seth barked, snapping on the reins with one hand while throwing the spear with the other, snarling as Killer dodged it, twisting to the side and hiding his head behind the muscular neck of one of the supernatural horses. "It's impossible... no one can stop the charge of War! No one is this strong!"

Killer laughed darkly at that nonsense, grinning predatorily as he heard a distinct note of fear in Seth's voice, a tremble distorting his tone, and the liger felt that terror feeding his battle lust and his already monstrous strength as he rammed his shoulders into the two horses and shoved the chariot one hundred feet backwards.

One of the horses viciously lunged for his neck, the jaws of the stallion opening to reveal huge fangs more suited to some kind of enormous carnivore, the canines of the beast curved and tremendously sharp... but Killer only snarled up at the horse, smashing his fist into its muzzle, the bone loudly splintering as the creature of fire and destruction recoiled and let out a neigh of pain. Killer took it as a clue to move, however, and suddenly let go of the horses, squeezing sideways to fit between the two enormous beasts before ducking under them, his arms going up to seize them by the bellies.

It all happened in one instant, just as Taranis furiously slammed his multiple weapons down on the spot where Killer had stood an instant before, one of the god of war's arms morphed into a monstrous, heavy cleaver-sword sticking out of a cruel mace head that had replaced his hand.

The enormous blade narrowly missed, and Taranis growled in rage as he side-stepped to avoid the charging horses... before grunting in a mix of surprise and hate as Killer pushed back up to his feet, muscles bulging as he straightened... and the two gigantic stallions neighed in confusion and shock as their hooves no longer touched the ground, as they were lifted clear up into the air.

Killer roared as the beasts kicked and bucked and tried to break free, his fangs bared in a snarling grin as the chariot itself rose into the air, and he spun on the spot, throwing the vehicle with all the strength he could muster, his eyes glowing with flames of retribution and pleasure as the war vehicle crashed into the seabed hundreds of feet away, one wheel exploding into splinters of metal as the other snapped off, the chariot exploding into fragments as spears and arrows and ammunition scattered in every direction as the wreck bounced up, spinning wildly before smashing again into the solid rock, again bouncing and losing pieces until it simply disintegrated, the pieces screeching to a stop after digging deep trenches into the ground. The stallions neighed loudly as they crashed back-first into the ground, falling over each other, but as soon as their restraints shattered, they rolled over and leapt to their hooves, running away... they stopped, however, once they reached a somewhat safe distance, apparently interested in seeing what would happen next. Seth was slammed into the ground and crushed as the chariot flipped and bounced over him, making him roar in agony as bones loudly broke and blood flew up from a tremendous, ugly gash in his abdomen and chest as the spiked wheel landed right on him, piercing into his flesh as it exploded in fragments.

The jackal spat out a thick gout of blood and drool as he pushed up on all fours, slamming his fist into the ground and rattling the earth as he hissed in fury and in masochistic, agonizing pleasure as metallic, sharp tendrils flowed out of his wounds, whipping at the air as they worked to rebuild his abdomen, his bones snapping back together with sick, loud sounds. "I'm going to rip your balls off, and it is going to be delightful to see you cry as I crush them in front of your eyes!" The god barked, spit flying from his damaged muzzle as he pushed up to his feet, throwing his arms out as he flexed powerfully, rage fueling him.

"You don't have hands big enough to be able to grip one of my balls." Killer coldly replied, and the weight of his insult was in the fact that it was actually true. Seth's eye twitched in fury at that, even as the god stepped forwards with a growl, a multitude of metallic tentacles stretching out of his wounds and whipping at the air angrily. The jackal looked idly down at those, then grinned as he met Killer's gaze, licking his broken lips as he announced: "Pain will not slow down War. The suffering only feeds War, and makes it stronger. We like the pain. We feed on it... and that makes us the perfect war machines. Fighting makes us stronger, destruction gives us power, and pain fuels us. The more you fight us, the stronger we get... which means you are doomed." The canine god held up his hands and a thick, heavy metal pole appeared in his grip, ending in a gigantic mace, shaped with a brutal spike at extremity end and a flat hammerhead at the other. Conical spikes on the flanks of the mace head crackled with electricity arching in powerful discharges.

"I don't want to hurt you bitches... I want to break you into pieces. So, no problem." Killer easily replied, grinning gamely even as the jackal rushed forwards, assaulting him, the enormous mace crackling with thunderbolts and discharges of tremendous voltage. Killer ducked the heavy swing of the mace, snarling as the impact sent a massive earthquake tearing through the world, electricity exploding out of the weapon and blasting upwards in a shockwave of destructive force.

The liger grunted as electricity crackled up through his legs and burned into his nerves, but only pushed forwards, stabbing Azura forwards into the jackal's abdomen, piercing it from side to side. The dog grunted in pain, but his grin only widened as he swung his heavy mace up to smash it into Killer's back... before Wyvern slashed into the mace, slamming it out of course as thunderbolts of energy flew from the two weapons. The ominous mouth in the dog's chest snapped open as the jackal leaned forwards, the tentacle-spikes shooting out of the terrible jaws and stabbing towards Killer's chest, forcing the liger to backstep and tear Azura up through the god's abdomen, slicing it open until the blade tore into the monstrous mouth and chopped the four tentacles.

Killer's eyes widened as they stiffened and became darts that fired forth against him instead of falling to the ground, and he blasted them back with a shockwave of pure energy. They pierced into Seth's chest, but the divinity only hissed in masochistic delight, charging forwards with renewed power and slashing up a vicious kick with his mechanical, heavy leg. Actuators whirred and the hydraulic piston hissed, supercharging the blow as the god's enormous steel hoof slammed into Killer's side, knocking the wind from his lungs... but Killer only grinned as he flicked his wrist and stabbed Azura down through the robotic leg.

Seth howled in fury at that, using all of his strength to tear the mace back up out of the ground even as Killer wrestled it down using Wyvern, the liger's other arm flexing and muscles bulging with the effort of tearing Azura downwards through thick slabs of dark metal, crystal armour and machinery.

Sparkles flew from the deep gash in the robotic limb, and one hydraulic piston exploded, cables tearing loose as Seth seemed to lose balance, one leg suddenly weaker than it should have been...

But before Killer press the assault any further, daggers made of darkness rammed into his back, making him roar in pain as blood sprayed out of his wounds. He leapt backwards immediately, spinning in midair to face Taranis... and the god of war grinned widely as he swung down his enormous, mutated arm, the cleaver blade clanging against Wyvern, before Killer snarled and shut his eyes as he saw the venomous glow of Medusa's glare, as Aegis was shoved right in his face.

Killer winced as he felt his face already beginning to turn into stone, his eyes locked shut and leaving him blind just as Taranis's flexible, segmented arms snapped downwards to stab through his body. He threw himself backwards, pushing Wyvern up to force Taranis's cleaver away from him and swinging Azura up, guided by instinct, to knock a scythe wide before it could cut his skull in half. He flexed and arched his back with a roar, letting his tentacles rip out of his back, the fleshy appendages sprouting with deadly bone and steel thorns and spikes and ending in terrible jaws as they arched up into the air, crimson eyes opening at the end of each snake-like beast... and Killer saw the world through those eyes, as the tentacles wrapped around Taranis's segmented arms, squeezing them in a deadly embrace.

Two tentacles shot into the ground, and Killer used them as an axis, leaning back on their support to kick both legs up, smashing his feet into Taranis's mutated arm, knocking the god stumbling backwards with a grunt of pain... that became a snarl of rage and agony-pleasure as the tentacles whip-lashed in the opposite direction and tore the four segmented, bony arms out of his back, the coils of the black appendages tightening with brutal force and crashing the metallic bones into splinters.

Taranis snarled in rage, but the hiss coming through his fangs spoke of mixed agony and pleasure as the god flexed and charged forwards again, as his body quickly began to regenerate. Killer's tentacles whip-lashed to hurl pieces of his metallic arms at him, while greedily absorbing the rest into their thick black flesh. In a moment, they began to mutate, silvery metal spreading over the obsidian meat and armoring it: sharp, deadly triangular sections of steel, locked one into the other, rapidly spread down the length of each appendage. The tentacles pushed Killer back up to his feet, the liger flexing his enormous musculature and opening his eyes, sapphire flames glowing into them as the stone covering them crumbled away, his flesh regenerating quickly.

"How... how do you do that...?" Taranis furiously roared, drool flying from his mouth as he stared at the evolution, unable to believe how Killer's power seemed to devour everything that could make it greater still, his eyes wide in disbelief at the sight as energy crackled angrily around the liger as his body continued to grow in strength, in mass, in height, in definition, in sheer power.

The god of war spread his arms with a snarl, the monstrous mouth in his chest opening wide as dark smog came out of the deadly jaws, swirling ropes of darkness slithering out and shooting towards Killer before a beam of focused energy and ferocious ghosts of war exploded forth to smash into the liger.

Taranis gritted his fangs and leaned forwards, drool falling from his lips before he vomited a second beam of dark power, his hand crackling with electricity and the gigantic cleaver sword at the end of his other arm glowing as he thrust both forwards, adding to the tremendous hurricane of black fire.

Taranis's massive muscles bulged explosively as he shoved forwards with a roar, hating the fact that he could feel Killer's strong resistance on the other side of the burning inferno of darkness, hating that the liger somehow could stand up to him even as he greedily absorbed energy from the ground, from the entire planet, his planet, his sanctuary. Killer was an invader, an unwanted presence in his sacred grounds... how could he still stand? The very planet was sapping away at his energies, trying to weaken him... and even so, Killer had only been growing bigger and stronger ever since he had arrived.

Taranis howled in fury at the thought, hating the fear he could feel in the depths of his being, for the first time in Eons; hating the fact that Killer still stood and fought back. The god of war snarled and rammed forwards powerfully, flexing as he sucked in the planet's own vital energies, the flow of power pumping up through his veins... but he only managed to move one step before Killer's resistance made him stumble backwards, his eyes going wide in shock and rage.

He stared at the roaring darkness in front of him... and suddenly, Killer's enormous tentacles burst forth through the black fire, the enormous appendages pushing forwards like a single entity, a gigantic spear that stabbed into Taranis's chest, lifting him off the ground as the tentacles invaded the ominous mouth in his torso, their spikes and blades tearing apart the undead warriors lining the lips, grinding them into gore and splatters of corrupt, dark blood.

Seth stomped forwards with a yell of rage, his heavy legs clanging loudly as he advanced towards Killer's back, cooking back the gigantic mace for the strike. Killer stood still, his tentacles arched up over his head and pushing forwards through the wall of darkness, Wyvern and Azura held in his hands as he advanced steadily, pushing back the ghosts and the black fire.

The liger shot Seth a glare from over his shoulder, taking notice of how the damaged robotic leg was self-repairing itself, as nanomachines and magic worked together to restore the machinery and rebuild the thick outer armor. Killer slotted Azura quickly back into Wyvern's handle, before growling in contempt as Seth swung his mace upwards and sent a blast of force exploding from the ground beneath his feet. The liger did not move, only focusing his force to repeal the blast, and even as the ground all around him burst apart in a massive explosion, not a single pebble moved under his toes.

"Your puny tricks are growing annoying, dog..." Killer venomously said, flexing his enormous muscles and pushing back against the boundaries of Time as Seth roared and slowed it down, trying to close him in a prison. The chains of Time snapped apart as Killer pushed back with his tremendous physical power, and Seth grunted in shock as he swung his heavy mace only to see the liger's hand shoot up to wrap around the thick pole.

The metal groaned desperately as it crumpled like paper in Killer's grip, the liger pushing and laughing darkly as he bent the large pole like a blade of grass.... Before he yanked the huge weapon out of Seth's hands and swung it violently down into the jackal, smashing his abdomen and sending the dog flying bonelessly across the wasteland.

Killer pushed out his arm, and new tentacles pushed out of it, shooting across the air to stab through Seth's arms and right into the cruel wound in his abs, piercing through his body from side to side and violently arresting his momentum, making the dog howl in agony... which rapidly became a maniac laughter even as the god vomited blood and ichors. "Yes! Yes! Hurt me... hurt me worse...! You only make me more eager!"

Killer snorted steam from his nostrils at that, flicking his arm and glaring at the dog as the tentacles retreated and brought him back, holding him up in easy reach. The god's body trembled violently, the jackal's lips crested in an agonizing yet hungry, gamely grin as he flexed and pulled his legs up, pushing himself further down the steely, spiked tentacles buried through his torso, impaling himself with insane eagerness. "You can only make me stronger..." Seth hissed, chuckling darkly as he yanked his arms forwards, even as blood burst out of the horrible wounds as more and more of the sharp metallic segments of the tentacles tore through his limbs.

Seth's hands mutated into large, massive weapons as his fingers became flexible scythes, the god bucking and swinging his arms forwards to try and cut Killer's face to ribbons... but Killer only growled in fury, stabbing Wyvern right in the middle of his mouth-chest, sinking the enormous sword down to the hilt into the god's body.

"More...!" Seth teased, laughing even as he gargled on his own blood. "More!" The beast of war cackled and flexed eagerly, his height increasing, his mass expanding as his musculature swelled larger, growing more toned, tighter, more powerful. "See...? You cannot stop us... we are the embodiment of conflict."

Killer twisted Wyvern savagely into his body, grinding his flesh into pulp and breaking his tightly packed ribs, his internal organs bursting into a bloody paste that leaked down the crimson blade of the mighty sword... but still, it was not enough.

Not useless, though... Killer grunted in understanding as he saw the body of Seth growing larger and stronger, his regeneration becoming faster as well, his body rebuilding itself almost faster than Wyvern could inflict damage. But the key word was almost. Seth grew stronger with each blow, but the damage done to his body, at the same time, was real. It would not stop or deter him from continuing to fight, no, the opposite. But it all took its toll. I need to inflict more damage, faster. I must destroy his body before it can heal and grow stronger. I must be quicker than his growth.

Metallic, deadly tentacle-spikes burst out of the jackal's chest, shooting towards Killer's eyes and chest, but the liger swung down Seth's own mace, slamming the gigantic, damaged hammer down upon the dog's chest, caving it inwards with a splatter of blood and gore as its armored bones exploded in splinters. Immediately, Killer landed another blow, then another, putting all of his strength into the strikes, the hammer's thick pole bending with the violence of each impact as Seth agonized and laughed at the same time. Even as its body was broken and maimed, his power only grew, his height more than doubling after another vicious strike of the hammer, which all but shattered into thick fragments, his regeneration growing quicker still.

"The big bad dog is coming for you, kitty..." The monster barked, his voice deeper and more brutal than ever now, as the gigantic god bucked harder. Seth managed to rip one arm free, swinging it down towards Killer with tremendous force... and the liger snarled as more tentacles shot up to wrap around it, grinding its flesh into shreds, clawing into the very bone as they dragged the powerful limb back, twisting it and working to break it. "For how much longer do you think you'll be able to hold me...?" Seth teased, laughing even as his blood spilled out of his devastated torso and cascaded from his maimed arm, his wounds by now regenerating so rapidly that Killer struggled to inflict any additional damage, as even the most tremendous wounds sealed in mere instants.

The jackal swung his arms back with a roar, the tentacles tensing and their long bodies swinging closer to him as they were pulled, and Seth cackled as he managed to close his talon-fingers upon several of them, ignoring the spikes that tore through his hands and cut his flesh to shreds as he flexed and squeezed with all his strength, crushing the metal before ripping several tentacles in half.

Killer growled in pain, snarling up at the gigantic jackal, who now towered above him like a mountain, the canine tearing his arms free and slamming his fists together with a laughter before swinging both down in a monstrous hammer blow.

Killer snarled in fury and frustration, spreading his legs and shoving his arms up to arrest the assault, his spine creaking and his arms bending painfully with the force of the oversized fists smashing down, his feet sinking into the ground... before the liger roared and shoved upwards, gritting his fangs as he let his own body grow, his muscles bulging with power as he slammed Seth backwards, his body thrumming with fearsome physical power as he snorted steam from his nostrils and let the energy sealed deep within him explode out in a flood.

Seth stumbled backwards in shock, gaping stupidly as he looked up at the liger's massive form as Killer flexed powerfully, focusing his energies and growing even further, his mighty body growing past Seth's own height , the liger bulking up with even larger, bulging muscles, his powerful build becoming even more impressive, even more herculean. The weight of the giant and the tremendous power of the massive body sent large cracks tearing open in the crust of the planet as the liger's toes dug deep, vast footprints, crushing stone like they would soft, wet sand. Killer's sheer behemotic immensity was intimidating, especially because the liger still showed no hints at all of his Ascension, meaning that he was nowhere near the top of his possibilities... while Seth had long gone all-out.

"No... this is impossible... Impossible...!" The jackal muttered under his breath, shaking his head in disbelief as Killer spun the bent, ruined pole of what had been his mace, flicking it in his hand before stabbing it viciously up through Seth's torso, the top of the pole ripping out of the back of the god's neck, impaling him brutally. The jackal let out a breathless howl of agony, his mouth gaping open but only blood exploding out of it as Killer seized the handle of Wyvern, the sword crackling with energy at his touch and immediately growing to match his new dimensions, its blade becoming so thick and wide that it almost annihilated Seth's chest. "You... no... no one... no one can be... so powerful..." Seth gargled, vomiting blood with each word he pronounced.

"I'm afraid that I am..." Killer teasingly replied, yanking Wyvern back and twisting it into the wound, grinding the dog's chest into a pulp before dragging the sword down, cutting his spine in two like a weak string, before reaching the hip... and from there, Killer slashed the massive blade in the other direction until it tore free with a great splatter of blood, chopping Seth's robotic lower body completely off. Immediately, the massive legs charged towards Killer, moving of their own accord as the shredded flesh at the waist became solid metal, forming long, sharp whips that angrily lashed against the liger's let... But the god only snorted in annoyance at that, spinning Wyvern point-down and stabbing it with brutal force into the robotic construct, half of the immense blade sinking into the ground as magma exploded out of the wounded planet beneath, while the two enormous limbs were pinned to the ground and then broken into a pile of scrap metal as Killer twisted Wyvern in a circle, grinding the heavily armoured structures into pieces.

"Don't tell me that you are afraid...? Weren't you saying that you are invincible...?" Killer mocked, his movements terribly rapid as he let go of Wyvern to seize the top half of Seth's body before it could even touch the ground.

Killer gripped Seth by the damaged jaws, ignoring the teeth sinking into his flesh to instead grip firmly into the cracked skull... and the jackal howled in agony and terror, clawing at the liger's wrists and trashing as hard he could, desperately trying to break free, before Killer growled and yanked in the opposite directions, ripping the lower jaw right off and all but tearing the dog's skull off his body, blood and gore exploding in a thick splatter as the god's head was broken in two.

Killer grinned viciously as a long section of Seth's broken spine was ripped out of his body, dangling from beneath the damaged skull, and the liger smirked in the pleasure of the revenge as he flexed his enormous arm and crushed the dog's skull into nothing but dust that filtered between his fingers, along with liquefied gore that leaked and dribbled to the ground far below.

The devastated, headless torso of Seth fell to the ground with a wet, sick thwack... yet, to Killer's disbelief, two crimson eyes immediately burst open in the maimed chest, just above the cruel mouth. Seth desperately clawed at the ground, scampering backwards to put as much distance as it could between himself and the titanic male, as the tremendous wounds in his body regenerated quickly, and his spilled guts hardened and became long, flexible tentacles that replaced the legs he no longer had, allowing him to move away faster.

"You sure are persistent, I'll give you that." Killer muttered, glaring down at him in disgust and raising one massive foot to curb-stomp the monstrosity out of existence.

The liger snarled over his shoulder, a jolt of pain shooting down his spine as several of his tentacles were destroyed, and his eyes narrowed with rage as he saw Taranis breaking free, the god of war roaring in savage fury as blood leaked from his devastated chest, two twitching tentacles still clenched in his hands.

End Seth. Now.

Killer stomped down with all his tremendous power, while gripping the handle of Wyvern to swing it upwards, tearing it out of the earth... but his eyes bulged as a new, fearsome and well known energy signature shot down from the sky.

Before he could dodge or use Wyvern to shield himself, the toeless boot smashed into his muzzle with tremendous force, his eyes wide with shock as he saw a flash of long, sharp talons and beautiful female toes that he knew so very well, his heart racing painfully as an indescribable sinking feeling seemed to completely scoop out his insides, leaving him empty and confused as his gaze touched the muscular, enchanting leg, the mighty calves, the strained black laces of the boot, groaning as they struggled to contain her glorious musculature.

He flew backwards with a growl of pain before crashing on his back with a grunt, eyes open wide and mind beginning not to see, praying to be proven wrong, even as he slammed his hand into the ground to push up as quickly as he could, knowing what would follow if he had seen right.

He saw her coming, saw her predatory grin, her powerful, beautiful body, the burning flames in her sapphire eyes. He couldn't believe to it, yet he had to. He lifted Wyvern and slashed it hard upwards, the massive blade glowing angrily, but Alexis, of course, had seen it coming long before he had even thought about his move. The goddess snickered as she stomped down on the flat of the large blade, knocking it downwards as she lunged against Killer, stomping one foot down on his throat and the other on his abs, crushing him into the ground and using him as a surf table as her momentum slammed him backwards, his back tearing a deep trench in the rocky seabed.

"Let go of the dog, Lion... he sucks, but we don't want to lose his services just yet." Alexis teased, leaning down to gaze straight into Killer's eyes even as she pressed viciously down on his throat, while Seth dragged himself away, crawling out of sight.

"We...?" Killer gargled, looking up at her in shock and agony, his worst nightmare now a painful, devastating reality as his soul mate, his beloved half, his real, unending love turned against him.

"Master Taranis and I, of course... come on, I know you aren't that dumb." The femme fatale easily replied, grinning widely as again hefted Wyvern only to have her stomp his hand viciously under her heel, her eyes glowing as she hit his chest with a tremendous shockwave of psychic power, the ground exploding beneath him and caving in to form a deep, immense crater as he felt his ribs crumble, and blood burst up out of his mouth and nostrils.

"This... this can't be true. It is just an illusion!" Killer snarled, shaking his head desperately, closing his eyes and focusing his senses, trying to break through the tremendous image in front of his face... but when his eyes snapped open again, she was still there, grinning sharkishly, her deadly fist cocked back, before it rushed down into his face, the power of the blow causing the crater to expand by miles and miles in every direction, Killer sinking into magma as a terrifying crack spread from horizon to horizon, the planet broken almost in half by her fearsome strength.

"Does that feel like an illusion to you...?" Alexis cruelly mocked, squatting down over his chest, resting her arms on her thighs and looming over him, the most fearsome of rivals, the most devastating of losses, the most mind-breaking of betrayals, as Killer looked up in horror, seeing her through the crimson filter of his own blood, his face shattered by her blow.

"Why...? How...?" Killer dumbly asked, as a deafening whistle filled his mind, the pressure unbearable, his stomach feeling at once horribly empty and yet full of bitterness, as it twisted painfully on itself, while his heart seemed to have lost the will to beat.

"We both know I've always been the best, the strongest of us... I need a male who's truly worthy of being my king. That clearly can't be you. Your strength did not increase half as much as I expected it would... you are too weak, in body and spirit, to sate my hungers. We could have taken the world apart, conquered Hell, vanquished Heaven... but no; you are never ready to use even that little power you have. Too afraid of your own damn shadow." Alexis coldly replied, before looking to the side with a loving smile as Taranis walked closer, wearing a smug grin, gazing down at Killer with mocking, triumphant joy, the liger swallowing thickly as Alexis nuzzled him with love.

"I can't waste my time with an eternal candidate, an unfinished article. Yeah, you were promising... but now I know that there is only one Master of War. Alcana opened my eyes... she made me see the truth." The blonde femme fatale continued, crossing her mighty, muscular arms.

Killer stared at her in horrified disbelief... but her body was the one he knew so well. Everything about her was right... She was Alexis, there could be no doubt about it... and yet... no. No, she could not be.

Alexis lusts for power, yes... but I know her too well not to know how that is only a superficial attribute of her, of our relationship... no. No, Alexis, this can't be you...

"You are not her... you are screwing with my mind... and I will tear you apart for it!" Killer roared, bucking violently and yanking his arm upwards, even as her boot pressed his hand against the ground. He lashed out with his fist, the fingers gripping tightly into the handle of Wyvern, and Alexis stumbled backwards with a curse, her eyes burning with rage.

No, Alexis... you would have seen it coming, wouldn't you...? Of course you would have.

Taranis stepped forwards with a growl, hefting up his gigantic cleaver sword and stabbing it viciously down towards the liger, as Medusa's eyes glowed murderously at the base of the blade, where Aegis had settled.

Killer slashed Wyvern upwards, the massive blade clashing against Taranis's sword and knocking it upwards... but not enough, as the god of war stomped down on Killer's crotch and drove the massive weapon down with a roar, piercing it through the liger's shoulder, his lips bared in a snarling grin as Killer roared in pain. "No matter how hard you try to resist, your fate is sealed. Even your dear beloved has turned her back on you!"

The god stomped hard on Killer's groin, again and again, acid drool flying from his lips as he growled in fury, leaning down with all his weight to sink his cleaver deeper through the rival, wrestling against the liger's strength as Wyvern pushed upwards, forcing him back slowly but inexorably. Taranis howled in unarticulated, savage fury at being overpowered like that, snarling as he twisted his fist around to shove Aegis out in Killer's face, the eyes of Medusa glowing as they sent their magic washing over the liger, even as Killer did his best to avoid eye contact. "You can't win against War!"

Killer felt his flesh burning and decaying, his face becoming hard and brittle as stone began to spread all over his features, the acid drool burning the rock into nothing but vapor wherever it made contact, and his crotch was on fire with pain as Taranis repeatedly stomped his spiked hoof down on his massive shaft and heavy testicles, growling with even greater rage, it seemed, whenever he felt the sheer size of the liger's virility under his foot.

Killer flicked his wrist to turn the flat of Wyvern upwards, his eyes darting down to look not at Taranis but at his reflection in the crimson blade, and he bucked hard, arching his back and gathering his legs before donkey kicking the god of war, right between his legs, sending Taranis flying limply backwards... right as Killer hand clawed into the edge of Aegis.

The liger winced in agony as stone immediately encased his fingers, making them frail as the flesh of his muscular arm turned into rock, as Taranis's cleaver violently tore out of his flesh, adding to the pain... but he only pulled backward with even greater strength, feeling the metal bending with a loud groan. Taranis howled in denial and Killer's petrified fingers cracked, but the liger's grip was unyielding and Aegis suddenly came loose, ripped off the god's hand along with much of the flesh, leaving the bones beneath exposed.

Taranis flipped in midair and landed in a crouch, skidding backwards and tearing trenches in the ground with his feet as he looked down at his hand in disbelief, even as it quickly healed and armored itself once more, while Killer held Aegis up, flipping it around to point Medusa's eyes against the god of war.

"It doesn't work against me, you arrogant idiot!" Taranis roared, lightning crackling around him with his rage as he smashed his fist into the ground, sending swords and spears tearing upwards from the ground to pierce through Killer's body, the liger screaming in agony as he struggled to push himself up, away from the deadly blades. They only grew longer, however, piercing through him and lifting his impaled body off the ground before he could get away, and Taranis cackled in angry, evil pleasure as he rushed forwards to deal the killing blow.

His eyes bulged in shock before he could move more than two steps, however, as Killer's body glowed with golden flames of energy, the liger kicking to his feet with a snarl as the blades shattered, then exploded out of his flesh, fired against Taranis, who smashed them into bits with a furious diagonal swing of his heavy cleaver sword.

Killer panted harshly, his breath hissing out of his mouth as the horrendous wounds in his body attempted to heal, his eyes glowing and his muscles bulging explosively as he squeezed Aegis in his hand, bending the legendary steel on itself like it was made of tin, crushing Medusa's eyes into pulp as he crumpled the shield that the legends described as invincible.

Taranis stared in awe at that casual act of destruction, his charge breaking into a ready position as he swallowed in shock... before Alexis walked between them, grinning widely as her eyes flashed and blasted a massive shockwave of telekinetic force into Killer, who cursed and half-turned, raising Wyvern up and shoving his hand into the flat of the blade as he leaned into her force, arching his back and planting his feet into the ground with all his strength as he was shoved violently backwards. He resisted, even if his feet tore trenches into the ground and his arms trembled with the effort, before he snarled and charged against her, swinging Wyvern out in a vicious uppercut that seemed to tear her energies in half, the two blades of telekinetic force rushing past him like supersonic waves, booming on either side of him and then crashing into a tall cliff of granite in the distance, cutting through the hard stone like through butter.

The muscular female vanished from the spot, flashing him a grin as the thick blade of Wyvern swung through thin air, and Killer immediately twisted to the side, driving the sharply pointed pommel of his sword into her chest as she reappeared.

It collided into her solar plexus and made her vomit blood as she was slammed backwards, but as Killer leaned forth and slashed the massive blade towards her head, she elegantly leapt up to stomp her boots on the edge of the sword, knocking it tip-down into the ground as she charged rapidly up the blade, flipping backwards and kicking both feet towards his face.

Killer knew those moves well, though, and he arched his back, throwing his head backwards, out of the way, as his free hand balled into a massive fist and shot violently up towards her mighty abs. She elegantly flipped out of range, however, landing in a handspring and then on her feet, facing him with a gamely grin.

She can't be her. She can't be... I can't believe it's her... The moves resembled the teasing, irreverent, mocking style of Alexis, who so often made fun of her enemies, forecasting their every moves with ample margin and anticipating them, using their very attacks against them, dancing around them with mortal, beautiful elegance. They were her signature moves... and yet... no. They weren't. The real Alexis was faster, stronger, deadlier. And she would not let him react so easily. No... she knew him well, and she was aware of how well he knew her. She would not challenge me in such a predictable way... She'd choose the right moment, when she knows I'm out of position and will not be able to react quickly enough... This can't be you...

Yet, his heart continued to painfully race, his mind filled with despair, disbelief, and with frenetic thoughts, obsessive prayers, whispered hopes as his eyes desperately tried to see something that would prove it an illusion. But no matter how hard he tried... it continued to look and feel horribly real.

Were the discrepancies he noticed real...? Or was he crafting false hopes for himself...? Was he just denying the painful truth...?

It made his mind reel, his sanity shaken, his senses focusing on her, only on her, leaving him vulnerable...

"It is cute, how much it hurts you... You really, really love me, huh...? I'm almost sorry, seeing you in such a miserable state. We did have some good times together... But I've set my eyes on a far greater prize." Alexis teased, grinning as she held her hand out and Blue Vixen appeared in it, the femme fatale taking an easy ready position before lunging forwards against him, lashing back and forth with her sword, moving with beautiful, enchanting and deadly elegance as she dodged his counterattacks and swung her blade with mortal skill, her impossible strength sending trembles down the blade of Wyvern as Killer slashed his massive sword in retaliation, their blades clashing again and again.

Taranis exploited the moment, assaulting him from the opposite side, a vicious grin on his features as he slammed his gigantic cleaver swords out in brutal, crude but fast swings, his terrible force sending Killer stumbling as the liger extracted one of the Azura blades and used it to fight back the god of war's assault.

Killer grunted as the two divinities forced him back, slowly but inexorably, Blue Vixen finding the mark more than once and cutting deep, bloody gashes in his legs and arms whenever she managed to successfully pre-empt him and his counter-counterattack wasn't perfect... and he sneaked a gaze over his shoulder, his eyes scanning the horizon quickly to find a way out, and catching sight of a spire of dark granite looming above him.

It'll have to do. Killer sidestepped as Blue Vixen clanged against Wyvern once more, the huge male ducking behind the wide flat of the blade as the machinegun in Alexis's sword growled and vomited a long burst of armor-piercing rounds, the bullets sinking into the granite and sending splinters of it exploding in all directions. Taranis lunged in from the side, spying an opening between Wyvern and Azura... and Killer grinned as he twisted on the spot and slashed the two swords in opposite directions, trapping Taranis's cleaver in the middle and roaring as he backstepped and swung both of his massive swords towards the spire, guiding Taranis's own blade right into the stone.

The cleaver stabbed into the granite like it would into butter, but Taranis grunted as he found himself trapped for an instant, immediately swinging his sword in a wild diagonal cut that chopped the spire in half like a blade of grass. The instant was all Killer needed, though, as the liger savagely slashed both swords up into the god's chest, cutting his torso from hip to shoulder, the spikes at the base of Wyvern's blade catching into his body and hefting him into the air, throwing him into the air as dark blood exploded from the wounds, ahead with countless broken shields and devastated undead corpses.

"You arrogant, impotent vermin..." Taranis snarled, as he caught himself with a flip, landing on his feet and rapidly healing, muscles flexing as he gained yet more power... but Killer was already deflecting another assault from Alexis, Blue Vixen knocking Wyvern wide before the female shoved a hand forwards and blasted Killer with a vortex of sheer, immense energy, slamming him back into what remained of the stony spire.

"You can't win, Lion..." She softly teased, grinning widely as she pushed up his muzzle with the tip of her sword, their eyes meeting and hers glowing with evil glee as she threw three heavy, large rings of bloody metal into his face. They bounced off his muzzle and clanged to the ground, and he looked down at them with horror, his heart missing a beat as something extremely heavy sunk in his chest, eyes going wide with shock. He recognized Ira's collar, the inside of it still etched with the word "daughter" and with some of her lucid black scales sticking to the metal, shreds of bloody flesh covering the jewel... and there was Vesta's collar as well, with splotches of golden hair visible in the gore attached to the now cold alloy... and Gaia's collar, dripping blood.

"Take some relief in the fact that they really loved you... they were faithful to the very end." Alexis cruelly said, grinning sharkishly. "Alcana is taking her time torturing that little bitch Diana... I don't know what of her interested you so much, she's so small and unimpressive... But she is sweet and innocent, I'll grant you that. It makes torturing and butchering her a lot funnier."

Killer stared at the collars with complete despair, trying not to believe, trying to tell himself it had to be a trick... but at the same time, feeling boiling hot tears rolling down his cheeks as his eyes fixed on the letters forming the word "daughter".

No one knew of that... only me, and Ira...

"As you see, it is over. While you were playing with the ghouls like the retard you are, we took care of your servants, lovers, and friends..." Taranis announced, grinning with glee as he stomped his way closer to him, his height increased tenfold, terrible energy crackling around him as he loomed above him like an absolute titan, holding a hoof high up above his head, ready to stomp him out of existence. "It was a fun game until it lasted."

"I'm afraid that little bitch Mriya will have to die as well... and Anubis, too. I'll have to clear up the genetic pool. Can't let your trash survive, even if it has part of my perfection within... But if you promise to behave, I might still keep you around. You would still look great curled up at my feet like a pet, with a tight leash around your neck, licking and worshipping my legs all day. I know you've always been a sucker for them." Alexis viciously added, and Killer looked at her with desperate fury, his ears filled with a painful whistle of pain, panic and rage... before he gaped and frowned as the femme fatale said: "Erra... take care of our guest. But don't ruin his crotch too much. He still has a universe-class cock... I could use that as a toy, to keep me amused when Master Taranis is busy."

Killer snarled in fury, muscles bulging explosively as he stomped forwards, his height more than doubling with that single, tremendous step as his foot rammed the world with brutal, unforgiving strength, sending a deep, enormous canyon exploding open in the crust of the planet, vicious earthquakes rattling every corner of the barren continents as volcanoes exploded in great fountains of magma. He paid little to no heed to the monstrous presence of Erra, personification of sickness and decay, an unkillable divine entity that appeared at Alexis's side, in the shape of a swarm of metallic, massive bugs which flew in tight formation, forming the floating body of a muscular, bulky monster wrapped in a dark, torn cloak, a hood hiding most of an insect-like head with massive, cruel pincers pushing out over his chest and with crimson eyes made of hundreds of octagonal sensors.

Killer barely gave the fearsome newcomer a glance, instead walking towards Alexis with a ferocious snarl as he venomously formulated a single word, his voice alone splitting the heavens as thunderbolts of tremendous, destructive energy whipped the planet, breaking the continents into islands of cracked, charred stone: "Deimos..."

Killer's behemoth musculature flexed with power, his blood boiling, his veins bulging as his body thrummed with his dark, bottomless fury and with enormous, fearsome destructive power. Reality trembled violently around him as he glared down at the muscular female... and a ripple of godlike, brutal force washed over her, silencing her words and cracking the fabric of reality, making it explode like frail glass. Alexis vanished from sight as the illusion fell apart, revealing a shapeless, emaciated black shadow clad in a chainmail cloak, the hood hiding only a black hole, not a face of any kind, even as two distant flames of a dirty yellow stared at Killer, eyes which did not reflect any kind of soul. Deimos hadn't one. Deimos was only fear, and panic, and despair. His birth had brought fear into the universe, his poison spreading from one extremity of Creation to the other, infecting every living being and planting deep roots into their thoughts, into their minds, into their feelings. Deimos lived inside each and every living being within the vast confines of Creation, and that made him unkillable. He was a horror that would never return into the box.

But seeing him, seeing his main manifestation... actually filled Killer with relief, because had the image of Alexis stood firm, his heart would have shattered. The liger's gaze immediately rushed down to where the bloody collars had landed, seeking confirmations... and the jewels dissolved into puffs of black fog, the motes of darkness spiraling upwards to sink back into Deimos's immaterial body.

Killer gritted his fangs in a snarling grin, explaining coldly what the final mistake in the illusion had been: "Alexis would never, never, never hand her prey to someone else... nor would she ever tolerate someone who gets his power from having assorted monstrosities as pawns."

The god of Fear floated backwards with a hiss, his eyes burning with rage as he glared up at the gigantic male, and a creaky voice came in a sinister whisper from seemingly everywhere at once, hurting Killer's ears like a knife: "Don't think that you can keep your mind safe from me... I know your worst nightmares. I am your worst nightmares. And I will rip your brain apart."

The monstrosity vanished from the spot before Killer could even attempt to strike... and anyway, it was a problem that Killer couldn't tackle using his fists, or his sword. He had to keep a cold, sharp mind, and survive the assault. But how do you fight a battle if what you see is not real...?

Taranis's enormous hoof filled the sky above him, yet the god of war did not let it fall to obliterate him, making Killer unsure of what was real and what wasn't... The Taranis he could see, it was pretty clear, was not the real one, or he would have been stomped into pulp already.

But it was Erra that lunged forwards, the personification of sickness, illness, pain and decay, another horror that, like Deimos, could not be eliminated. Killer wasn't even sure if it could be hurt or damaged at all... and the thought of monstrosities that his strength could do nothing against was, in its own, horrendous.

Erra's body lost its shape as the swarms of hideous, armored bugs it was made of split and spread across the sky, their loud, sinister humming sound spreading over the wasteland as they replicated themselves, becoming more and more numerous as the swarms dived down against Killer, aiming for the deep, bloody wounds covering his body.

Killer grimaced in distaste as the giant cockroach and wasp-like bugs rushed down in dark clouds made of billions of beings, his body tensing as he swung his fists towards the sky, sending an explosion of magma bursting up from underground, the flames washing over the swarms as enormous boulders and plates of cracked stone were hurled through the clouds of bugs, squishing millions of them, as even more were consumed and burned away to ashes and molten metal.

Yet there was no stopping them, as they turned the sky black with their number, the disgusting bugs clawing and biting into his flesh as they began to land upon him, completely covering his form in mere instants, even as flames erupted from his body, melting thousands and thousands of them into nothing but foul smoke, his arms swinging wildly back and forth, slapping and crushing and destroying, but it was never enough, never effective... and he couldn't even scream his agony, as they would swarm right into his mouth, and the thought horrified him.

"I'm going to have fun with you, Lord Killer... you are clearly very resistant, and that is a blessing for me, as I'll finally be able to experiment my nastier creations without the test subject being consumed before the fun part even starts!" Terra announced, cackling viciously as the buzzing and humming of the swarms gave the body-less monstrosity its voice.

Killer's attention, however, was fully captured by far worse feelings as he felt the bugs crawl into his ears, bite and sting into his eyes, bite their way deep into his wounds, their poison countering his regeneration and causing him fearsome, horrible agony that brought him down to his knees. He couldn't resist the pain, and his jaws opened with a roar of agony, but it only got worse as the bugs filled his mouth and crawled into him... and he smashed his fists into the ground with world-breaking yet useless strength as he squished millions and millions of the bugs yet felt more of them pushing even inside the vast, glorious cumslit of his massive cock. His blood dripped and leaked onto the ground as the hordes consumed him from outside and from within... even as he made his body incandescent, energy crackling around him to destroy entire swarms, his muscles flexing and spasming and crushing the terrible beasts to pulp as they chewed their way into his flesh.

Taranis cackled cruelly, snarling in evil glee as he cocked back his massive cleaver sword and his completely regenerated bug-arms, each blade glowing with ferocious hunger before he began to land blow after blow into the shapeless pile of squirming bugs that Killer had become, his body completely hidden under the mountain of beasts.

"How does it feel, you arrogant bastard...? How does it feel to be killed by goddamn bugs, by dirty, disgusting, disease-ridden vermin...?" The god of war roared, savoring each strike, grinning at the sight of each thick splatter of blood as his blades smashed down into the pile of swarming bugs, his muscles flexing as he put all his tremendous force into each blow. "How does it feel, when they eat you from within, when they consume your precious dick and make you impotent like an old mortal...?"

"You can tell me!" Killer furiously roared, seizing two of the bug-arms as they slashed viciously down into his chest, the liger gripping into the solid metal-bone and yanking hard on both limbs, dragging Taranis into the crawling, swarming mountain of bugs, the god of war shrieking in denial before regretting it bitterly as Killer savagely slammed his fist into his face, shoving hundreds of the vermin into his jaws.

The liger stabbed both of his swords up into Taranis's body, impaling him upon his blades as he pushed up to his feet, a vortex of hellfire roaring into being around him, surrounded at the same time by a vicious, cruel blizzard that sent clouds of icy mist spreading over the wastelands. Millions and millions of bugs were frozen solid, falling to the ground like ice cubes and shattering into cold powder on impact, while the fire cleaned and purified the god's body, consuming the vermin into nothingness as pure, immense energy radiated from his form, vanquishing every parasite that had torn its way inside Killer's body, as he stood up tall, naked and glorious in his virile, masculine presence, his arms holding up his swords, aimed skywards and impaled through the god of war's chest.

"Fascinating..." Erra cheerfully mused, clicking his hideous pincers and rubbing dead, skeletal hands of an unhealthy, sick color. "Nobody ever resisted more than a few moments before being reduced to a few egg-infested bones... but that was only the first phase, I'm afraid. A new generation of bugs will grow within you; the parasite will eat you alive from within."

Killer made a grimace of distaste at the thought, glaring into Taranis's eyes with untamed, unrestrained hate and rage, before he slashed Wyvern and Azura in opposite directions, ripping the blades out of him and slicing his upper body open, sending the god crashing to the ground in a puddle of dark blood. Taranis immediately pushed back up to his feet, however, leaping backwards and out of reach, his wounds already healing... but as Killer glared at him, his image cracked and then exploded in splinters, revealing a far smaller Taranis, badly hurt and almost dwarfed by the gigantic mass of the liger's body, which continued to grow stronger and greater even as Erra's infections poisoned it. Killer took a moment to grin at the way the ground shifted under his toes now, as the cracked and ruined planet began to literally fall apart under his feet, magma arching lazily in space as the force of gravity of the world became weaker and less coherent, as enormous fragments of the crust floated away.

"What's the problem, master of war...?" Killer mocked, grinning predatorily down at the smaller god, flexing his massive musculature as he slashed Wyvern across the sky, the gigantic sword slamming into Taranis with fearsome force, sending him shooting across the atmosphere of the dying planet to crash down to earth like a meteor, a dry, dead ocean away from Killer.

The godlike male was by now so immense that it took him but a few steps to cross the scorched wasteland that had once been the ocean's bed, the planet cracking under his toes as his tremendous weight sent ripples through the whole world, causing earthquakes which would have annihilated each and every mortal town, had any of them been still standing.

Taranis continued to grow as well, his wounds healing rapidly and the pain turning into raw power, feeding his hunger for destruction. Even the terrible cut across his chest had already sealed, the destruction of his own body only able to regenerate a stronger, darker him... but the god of war snarled in disbelief and fear as Killer approached, naked and glorious, growing faster than he could dream to, radiating tremendous, impossible physical power,

"Erra, kill him... destroy him...!" Taranis urged, the god standing up and lunging forwards with his massive cleaver, swinging the blade up in a raising cut, his sword clanging against Wyvern and bouncing back as sparkles and thunderbolts of energy exploding from the clash. Killer's fist shot forwards above the crossed swords, ramming into Taranis's face and sending blood and gore exploding in a thick splatter as the god of war stumbled backwards with a snarl of outrage, stabbing viciously upwards with his bug-arms and gritting his fangs as the scythes scraped uselessly against a translucent shield of energy.

Killer leaned forwards against the god's cleaver, bearing down on it with all his strength, using Wyvern to force the rival's weapon into the ground, pinning it in place and raising his foot to stomp onto the flat of the blade, grinning as it loudly broke in half, leaving Taranis staring in shock for a moment... before the liger's shield of energy burst forwards and smashed into him, sending him arching bonelessly backwards through the air.

Killer charged forth to press on the advantage, but his instincts screamed a warning, and he spun around to face his side, crossing his swords in front of himself and gritting his fangs as a fully healed, enormous Seth leapt at him, tentacles outstretched and enormous, oversized arms stretched towards him.

True or false...?

Wyvern swung up in a vicious arc, and its blade clanged into the terrible metallic talons of Seth's hand, the jackal slapping the sword backwards as a number of his steel tentacles whip-lashed around it, trapping it in a cruel vice, yanking it away from Killer's grip. And yet, something felt wrong, Killer's eyes narrowing and trying to look deep into the immense, roaring creature... and as he tore Wyvern free, slashing it up through the jackal's head, the gigantic figure of Seth cracked and then exploded into black fog that rushed through his chest and away from him.

Killer grunted in pain and discomfort, all air pushed out of his lungs as shivers of cold and fear running down his spine for an endless, painful instant as Deimos shot through his body... before he cried out in far worse agony as he felt like thousands of blades were sinking into his flesh, from within.

"Congratulations, Lord Killer... your sickness has just entered its second phase..." Erra announced with evil glee, laughing as the liger looked down at his arms with horror, eyes going wide as his massive musculature lost its tone, then its size, his biceps deflating like punctured tires as a terrible weakness began to take over him, his brain pounding painfully within a skull that suddenly felt too tight, a deadly fever almost knocking him unconscious on the spot as parasites began to eat him alive from within.

He grunted in distaste at the sight of countless bulges beginning to appear like blisters all over his body, each of the bumps moving and leaving behind bulging, sizzling scars as the vermin chewed tunnels within his living flesh... it was horrible, it was devastating... and unfortunately it was all too real, not at all an illusion caused by Deimos, as his body became terribly, mortally weak, his legs trembling and his eyesight becoming hazy as Wyvern and Azura became too heavy to hold up.

Killer felt himself slipping away rapidly, his mind struggling to make sense of what his eyes saw as Taranis leapt to his feet with a cackle and charged forwards, the stump of his broken cleaver splitting into a series of smaller but deadly harpoons that fell heavily to the ground, dragging behind long, cruel whips made of intersected blades of bone.

The whips began to strike him, viciously, even as he did all he could to deflect the blows using Wyvern and Azura: with every passing moment, however, the two swords became heavier and his movements weaker, sluggish, and ineffective. He couldn't really notice it, but already he couldn't distinguish the sounds around him, all drowned in a painful whistle echoing in his head.

But yet, even as he fell on all fours, vomiting blood, he refused to give up the fight. He focused on his insides, instead, where his body was fighting a battle for its survival, adapting and evolving to crush the sickness and the parasites rampaging through his system.

He tried destroying the parasites with pure energy. He tried by heating his body up to unbearable temperature. He tried to kill them with freezing cold. He tried to dissolve them with acid. But the small but terrible beasts seemed unfazed by it all, continuing their work of annihilation...

Until Black Killer's annoyed face appeared clearly in his mind, the gigantic black-furred male snorting in contempt. You are a god, you moron. And not a low-tier one... but a powerful mix of Creation and Destruction. If you don't have the weapon you need, create it. Warp reality, corrupt it, and bend it to your will.

Killer recoiled a bit at the suggestion, not sure of how he could make it work, especially as his energies were so rapidly corroded... but then he realized that, yeah, if he could create goddesses and warp them to reflect his wishes, creating Disciples, he probably could figure something out even in his current, terrible state.

And so, instead of trying to destroy the parasites feasting on his insides, he took hold of their very lives, sensing their malignant energies and viciously gripping into them. Immediately, he was able to restrain them, blocking their movements, and as he thought of how to make them suffer and eradicate them, he warped their very being. They writhed in denial for a painful, torturing moment... but after that, the parasites were the ones suffering hell as their organism was completely rebuilt, their living mechanism rewritten as they began to crawl backwards along the tunnels they had chewed open in his flesh... and as they retreated, instead of consuming, they rebuilt, regenerating his flesh, giving him back everything they had stolen... and then more, as he forced them to engineer a stronger, tougher muscular fiber, giving himself new resistance and new strength, until the parasites simply withered away into nothingness.

His senses rapidly returned, his mind clearing as his hearing came back, and the first thing he heard was Erra shrieking: "Kill him! Kill him! He's healing, kill him now!"

Killer gargled, spitting blood as he found himself strangled by the cruel whips coming out of Taranis's arm, the four long appendages cutting viciously deep into his neck as the god of War pulled back on them, choking him and working to tear his head right off. The god of War gaped as Killer reached up to seize into the whips, the bone blades creaking in his grip as the liger's muscles bulged explosively, once more filled with power, with strength, with vigor. Killer tore the whips back, hissing in rage as they painfully ripped out of his maimed flesh, and he growled venomously: "You and your friends have really, really abused of my patience." He yanked on the whips, hard, dragging Taranis forwards and headbutting him with brutal force, knocking the god of war down to his knees and immediately swinging his bone-whips down around his neck, squeezing them viciously into his flesh. The liger slammed his spiked knee up into Taranis's face, again, and again, and again, blood splattering all around as the god's muzzle exploded into fragments of bone and crimson pulp, before he tensed the deadly bone whips and pulled them forwards, snarling as the blades tore through Taranis's neck and ripped out of the throat, the god's head falling to the ground with a dull thwack.

Killer immediately stomped hard upon it... but he was denied the pleasure of victory as it and the body of the god fell through the ground, vanishing in a ripple of reality, while the whips exploded in the liger's hands, throwing him hard into the ground, the deadly bone shrapnel pelting his arms and chest.

"Coward!" Killer roared, leaping back to his feet immediately as his body consumed the bone fragments and absorbed the little but precious energy still in them, his eyes glowing with rage as he spotted Taranis in the distance, the god leaping out of the solid ground to rush towards Seth. Even the jackal was still alive, and indeed was quickly healing and regenerating, making Killer growl in frustration. I need to end this, quickly.

He charged after them, but immediately Deimos and Erra materialized on his path, shooting against him like arrows and tearing through his chest, one after the other. Deimos pierced through him first, making him stumble as his mind was filled with blood-chilling visions of his loved ones laying in bloody shreds on the ground, their blood dripping from his hands as shrieks and cries echoed painfully in his brain, along with his own voice booming: "It is all your fault. You caused this!"

He knew it was an illusion, yet it was hard to shake it out of his mind, Deimos's power filling his eyes with that horrible sight, the corpses surrounding him... and immediately, Erra landed his own blow, shooting through him like a tangible, solid wave of sickness, making him sway on the spot as his head spun viciously and he felt vomit pushing up in his throat.

The cruel pincers of the god of illness snapped closed around his arm, making him roar in pain as the sharp blades cut deep into his flesh, pumping some kind of poison inside his body... and Erra cackled as he rushed away in the form of a swarm of gigantic bugs. "You can resist to all epidemics and even to god-killing disease... but what will be of you if I assault and erase your DNA, huh...?" Erra cruelly teased, clapping his hands with glee. "Whatever the root of all your power and all your vigor, it will be codified in your DNA... think of the possibilities, Lord Killer! I will erase the godhood from your genetic code, and change you into a weakling, before putting you through a slow, tormenting and mortal decline towards death. We'll have so much fun together!"

Killer hurled a sphere of focused energy against Erra, but the personification of illness only laughed as it shot through him without effect, the bug-like divinity tapping one pincer and faking uncertainty about his next move, mocking the liger before grinning sharkishly as he announced: "We shall begin with removing your ability to handle energy like that."

Killer snarled, turning his back to Erra and charging after Taranis instead, even as he felt something change within him... his eyes lost their sapphire glow, and a moment later his irises all but lost their color, becoming white and ghastly as he felt his energies dramatically faltering. Even Wyvern felt different in his hand, as he no longer could feel the sword's energies and he no longer could pump his own into the blade, and he grunted in pain as his strength was hacked to bits, his size beginning to rapidly and dramatically shrink as his godlike abilities were cancelled from his DNA code, his genetics torn apart and dissolved.

"Isn't it wonderful...?" Erra teasingly asked, swarming around Killer's body, laughing in evil glee as the liger rammed his world-breaking fist through his form again and again, roaring in rage and powerless frustration as he found himself unable to inflict any damage to the incorporeal abomination. "Soon, you'll be nothing but a tiny, old, weak and impotent mortal... I can turn you into an old rat, literally..." Erra paused, and then looked down at the heavy, massive shaft and humongous testicles hanging majestically between Killer's legs, adding darkly: "I will turn you into a female, too... I'm sure father War will love ending your life by raping you into bloody pieces, even if you'll be old and wrinkly."

Killer looked down with absolute horror as he felt his ponderous balls deflating rapidly, becoming lighter with each step, as his proud obsidian cock shrunk away... and he gritted his fangs with a snarl of despair, slashing Wyvern viciously through Erra's face only to hear the monster laughing louder.

"Oh, but I have an even better idea..." Sickness suddenly purred, looking at Killer's disappearing mass with a whole different light in his eyes. "Why should I just cancel a genetic treasure like your DNA...? No, I know better: I'll steal it. I'll steal it all from you, and add it to myself! I'll take your everything away...! Oh, the things I'll be able to do with your body, with your power added to mine!"

"Erra, no! Don't do it!" Deimos shouted, but his warning came too late, as the god of disease greedily reached into Killer's body with terrible, ethereal claws, dragging out fine ropes which glowed with enormous, godlike energy, made of spiraling strings of sapphire, of gold, of darkness.

Killer gaped at the sight of his divine DNA, pulled out of him in such a solid, beautiful and unbelievable shape, swallowing in shock at the sight of the glowing, thick ropes fading and dying away, turning into grey, frail strings ... and then his eyes narrowed as he turned to glare at Erra, now able to guess the dark ropes of his DNA, made of black and crimson strings spiraling tightly.

Deimos shot through Killer's chest, trying to numb the liger's mind once and for all, but the huge male gritted his fangs and pushed back against the fake but so realistic nightmarish sights suddenly crowding his mind and eyesight. He ignored it all, focusing all his remaining energies upon Erra's DNA.

"I think this is a game that can be played by two." The liger snarled, and Erra frowned in confusion and disbelief, before looking down with a gape of horror as his DNA was dragged out and rapidly warped, sapphire spreading over long segments that had previously been crimson and black.

"No... No, stop it! Stop it! This is not possible, you can't do that!" Erra shrieked, clawing viciously at Killer's massive chest, slashing his arms from side to side... but he could not deal physical damage, and the terrible diseases he tried to inject into the god were instantaneously defeated by the liger's defences, as Killer's DNA quickly rewrote itself, the grey strings regaining their powerful glow and thickening, becoming rich with information, with special abilities, with godlike possibilities, with new and improved resistance to Erra's terrible biological weapons.

"I can do it, and I will do it!" Killer replied, grinning predatorily as his strength quickly returned, as his body shredded away the uncountable years of age and weariness that had been forced on him, as his muscles bulged explosively, his prodigious virility back to its full glory. "You gave me just the right idea. It is your greed that brings forth your enslavement."

Erra howled and cried in denial and despair as his body shrunk dramatically, his pincers withering and then falling away in a puff of dust, the massive bugs swarming to form his body and limbs shrinking smaller and losing their dark steel exoskeletons, as millions of them all but died, falling to the ground to form piles of dead flies. "Please, stop... stop it, please... I... will fight for you! I will serve you! I will strike your enemies... but stop, I beg you...!"

Erra could not be killed, unfortunately... but he could be dominated and contained, and Killer made sure to cut him down to size as much as possible, destroying his most fearsome attributes and reducing him to a minimum. "I'm not interested in your disgusting, dishonorable services, Erra." Killer venomously growled, overriding the voice of the monstrosity even as it cried loudly, begging him not to erase this and that part of his abilities. "One day, I will find a way to erase you entirely from the face of Creation. So my suggestion to you is to hide, and hide well. Make sure I never see your face again... because the day I see it, is the day you cease to exist."

Erra's eyes stared into Killer's ones in a deadly silence, the personification of disease suddenly silenced, and one gaze into the glowing sapphire flames of power burning in the liger's expression was enough to understand that it was over. The last word had been spoken. The sentence had dropped, and Erra vanished from sight, leaving no sign of himself other than the rapidly decomposing piles of dead bugs.

Killer snorted in contempt, rage and violent eagerness to put an end to his enemies, turning around to face Taranis and holding out his arms, his fingers wrapping around the handles of Wyvern and Azura as the two swords flew back to his hands from where he had lost them when his strengths were abandoning him.

The immense liger looked down with a grimace as he felt a horde of undead warriors hacking uselessly at his titanic toes. He ignored them, stepping towards the god of war and crushing the armada of zombies under his foot, barely able to feel the wetness bursting out of their squished forms.

Whips made of steel and bone blades slashed into his legs as he advanced, and the ground exploded upwards in spikes of crystal and dark metal as Taranis tried everything he could to stop him... but all those attacks bounced uselessly off him, unable to hurt him in any way now that his size almost dwarfed the planet itself, the crust of it crumbling and shattering under his apocalyptic steps.

Taranis stood ahead, eyes open wide, an expression of shocked disbelief on his features, even as he towered taller still than Killer.

_But that is probably another of Deimos's tricks... _

The god of war spread his legs and made a shoving gesture, roaring as he blasted focused darkness and hordes of ghosts of war into the incoming liger, the undead bodies covering his body shifting their shields out of the way and throwing a barrage of heavy spears, their gaping jaws glowing with terrible energy as they all blasted beams of it into the vortex of black spirits. The fury of war and the rage and despair of its victims roared towards Killer, forming a tidal wave of darkness and blades, terrible thunderbolts of deadly energy crackling among the ghosts as they charged forwards, their vicious claws extended, their heads deformed by massive, cruel jaws.

Killer growled as he walked into the tornado, slashing Azura in a diagonal cut across the solid darkness as the smog tried to tie him down, thick tendrils of it whip-lashing forwards to wrap around his limbs, before the glowing sword cut through them, ancient shrieks echoing over the dying planet as the tentacles dissolved, falling apart in splatters of dark goo. Thorny tentacles and electrified chains ripped out of the ground, arching into the sky and slashing down over Killer's body, wrapping tightly around his massive form, but it was like trying to stop a train with a few blades of grass, the chains bursting apart as the god's muscles bulged explosively with each movement, the tentacles exploding in splatters of gore and fragments of bone as their blades failed to pierce into Killer's flesh.

Thunderbolts of energy lashed into him, reality rippling as Time attempted to slow down around the immense male, but Killer only snarled in rage at the attempt, flexing powerfully and shoving his massive fist into the storm, sending glowing cracks spreading in the fabric of reality as he punched the cage of Time into shreds, walking into the thick of the black hurricane as he slipped Azura back into Wyvern's handle.

The spears bounced uselessly off him, but the dark ghosts clawed and slashed and viciously bit into his flesh from all sides, their howls leaving him deaf to any other noise as the darkness spiraled around him, filling his senses and hiding the position of Taranis, leaving Killer reliant on instinct alone as the god of war charged forwards and slashed an enormous saber through the swirling mass of ghosts.

Killer backstepped with a grunt, gaining some time and space to swing Wyvern up, the two blades clashing and sending lightning bolts firing in all directions, before the saber vanished again, swallowed by the moving darkness, until it stabbed towards the liger's back.

Killer flicked his wrist and turned Wyvern around like it was a small, agile knife, thrusting the massive blade backwards and knocking Taranis's saber away, before stabbing blindly, viciously through the darkness. It probably missed, because a moment later his instinct screamed at him and he squatted to duck a savage slash, Wyvern swinging out in a wide circle in answer... before Killer smashed his fist into the ground, and all around the black tornado the earth exploded upwards, jutting with spikes and blades of stone and crystal, as dark hellfire roared up towards the heavens.

Killer grinned, guessing a distant snarl of pain outside the vortex and he thrust his arm up into the ferocious tornado of tortured souls, energy crackling around his limb before blasting into the ghosts, cursing through them like an immense discharge of electricity. Their angry swarming ceased, their movements becoming dead and sluggish, and they glowed a faint sapphire as their bodies began to quickly solidify, becoming physical. Killer looked at this with a predatory grin, unsure about how he had even made it happen... but all too glad to take advantage of their sudden vulnerability, seizing scores of them in his massive hand and crushing them into pulp with an easy squeeze, swinging his arm viciously through the crowd of confused, terrified ex-ghosts, smashing them out of the way and sending pieces of gore raining over a vast area as he tore his way through using the flat of Wyvern to slab the armada of spirits out of existence.

"Stop right there, or your darling daughter dies!" Taranis snarled as soon as Killer smashed the black vortex into heaps of broken bodies, the liger slowing his pace and gritting his fangs at the sight of Mriya, held up by a multitude of savage tentacles made of sharp, blade-like bones. They sawed into her flesh, blood streaking down her young, beautiful and innocent body, her eyes staring at him in confusion and despair, tears rolling down her cheeks as her hands uselessly yanked and clawed at the cruel tentacle squeezing on her throat.

Deimos...?

"Daddy..." Mriya called, and Killer felt his heart racing as he recognized her voice, as he stared into her eyes to see her soul.

It must be Deimos. Yet... she is Mriya.

Killer moved another step closer, and Taranis moved back, snarling and slicing Mriya's throat with his tentacle, making her scream. The wound wasn't deep, but blood leaked abundantly out of it, and the young girl stared at her father with confusion and fear, shaking her head in denial. "Daddy... help me..."

Killer bit his lower lip and stopped in place, torn between the sheer horror at seeing and hearing Mriya in pain and the awareness that it probably was a trick.

What if she is the real Mriya...? Taranis could have kidnapped her out of her bed in mere instants when I was in the vortex. There are no defences back home that could ever detect him if he did not want to be seen... nor any defence that could stop him from doing what he pleases...

"Drop your sword, Lord Killer, or she dies." The god of war barked, wearing a snarling grin of evil satisfaction. "It is a fair deal, I promise... you surrender and accept to give me your strength... and she lives."

It is just Deimos. Strike him down. Black Killer snorted in his mind, but Killer did not want to trust his vicious, evil "twin" when it came to his daughter's life.

What if she really is Mriya...?

"It is an unacceptable proposal. You would just kill us all right afterwards." Killer venomously replied, taking time as he again tried to look into Mriya's teary eyes, trying to read her soul, to find a sign, a hint of the truth.

"I don't think you are in the position to negotiate... you'll have to trust me." Taranis replied, grinning with evil glee, and Mriya sniffed and cried: "Daddy, please... do as he says..."

A flash of burning light went through Killer's eyes at her words... but the huge male closed them to hide it, taking a deep breath, bowing his head and lowering Wyvern until the tip of the massive sword touched the ground, and Taranis's vicious smile grew wider, the god nodding to himself in eager approval... before the liger roared and charged forwards, his enormous hand seizing Mriya's head and crushing down on it with tremendous strength while his other arm drove Wyvern through her abdomen and right into Taranis's chest, impaling both upon the gigantic blade.

Mriya let out a gargle of agony, blood bursting out of her mouth and nostrils, the young girl looking up at Killer with disbelief and pain, betrayal and sadness filling her expression as her tears became crimson when blood leaked from her eyes and ears as the huge male squeezed harder on her skull. "Da... D... dad..."

Killer swallowed thickly, panting in horror as his fingers sunk into her head, the skull exploding into fragments in his grip, the top half of her face crushed into bloody pulp, and he felt vomit rising in his throat, his legs going weak and trembling violently as the illusion didn't shatter.

No... No, it can't be...

Killer ignored Taranis entirely even as the god of war seized into Wyvern's thick blade, gargling as he slid backwards to tear free from the giant sword, pulling both feet up and donkey-kicking into the liger's abdomen, throwing himself backwards, away from danger. Taranis's blood splattered thickly over his muzzle and chest, but Killer's attention was all for the warmer, more precious blood leaking out of the corpse of his daughter, her body twitching a bit before going still, slumped against his chest, into his trembling arms.

"No... it can't be true... it can't be..." Killer whispered, looking down with horror at his bloodied hand, at the splotches of beautiful golden hair messily sticking out of the crimson pulp of her crushed brain. He couldn't breathe, he couldn't think, he could only stare at her lifeless body, clad only in the long, baggy shirt she wore in her bed, her toned legs wrapped in simple black shorts. His Dream, his beloved little girl, kidnapped out of her bed... and he had killed her with his own hands. It couldn't be, it couldn't...

Killer fell heavily down to his knees, tears rolling down his cheeks as he hugged her warm body to his chest, nuzzling her and breathing of her perfume even as her blood painted his body crimson, his mind becoming a dark pit of guilt, despair and sorrow as he was tormented again and again by the image of her head shattering, by her voice calling him for the last time, by the surprise and fear in her tone as he turned against her instead of protecting her.

"I was sure... I was convinced it wasn't you..." Killer sobbed, rubbing his thumb over her soft cheek, caressing her last tear away, leaning down over her much smaller form and hugging her tightly to his chest, his muzzle against hers.

And he felt it, finally. Felt the darkness, the cold and unforgiving despair flowing from her corpse into his body. Felt the fear moving up to reach for his brain, vicious claws tearing open the doors to his mind as ropes of darkness wrapped tightly around his heart, crushing it in their deadly grip.

He felt his sanity slipping away, but fought to retain his control, hiding it in a distant corner of his mind, hoping that Deimos would not find it until it was too late... until he had pervaded him completely, until he had settled within him. Killer surrendered to the fear, letting it flood his body and his spirit... he allowed Deimos to invade his mind. He waited patiently, yet with a ferocious, fearsome hunger to strike, to hurt, and to punish... a savage fury he had rarely ever felt before. Too far... they had pushed him too far, and they would pay for it.

Deimos arrogantly strolled into Killer's mind, grinning widely as he easily began to shut down his thoughts, filling him with terrible, irrational panic... Killer's body began to tremble violently, his eyes bulging in terror as his eyesight was warped and corrupted, showing him a Taranis ten times bigger and mightier than the real one was, and Deimos cackled, waltzing in another conquered mind, like so many others he had broken in the past.

But suddenly, just when he was savoring another triumph, the god of Fear suddenly found himself falling into terrible, complete darkness. Deimos immediately tried to escape, trying to shoot through Killer and out of him, but he crashed into a wall that just would not budge, and whatever he attempted to do, he continued to fall into unforgiving darkness.

When he finally slammed against a hard floor, he found himself swimming in a sea of broken skeletons, scattered bones, cracked skulls... and that was when he first felt the bitter taste of fear, when he realized with horror that he no longer was an ethereal entity, but a physical one, that would no longer be safe from Killer's devastating fist.

You are dangerous, Deimos... Mriya looked exactly like the real one. I suppose you use your victim's own memories and thoughts against them, huh? That would explain a lot of things.

Deimos scrambled to his feet, swallowing thickly and looking around himself in the pitch black darkness, as Killer's voice came to him from all directions at once, the ground trembling under his feet.

But Mriya is a tough girl, the worthy daughter of her mother. She'd never give up that easily. She could never tell me to give in, like you did. No matter the danger, she would not bend.

Deimos again tried to run, even though he had no idea where he was, where he was going, how he could get out. The ignorance added to his fear, as he groped in the dark, stumbling again and again over bones and skulls, sinking to the knee into that ocean of death and annihilation, his eyes bulging in terror at the thought of becoming just another pitiful bunch of bones lost in that vast sea. He was Fear, he was used to being a perfect, untouchable entity which did not need a body and the weaknesses that came with it and now that he could touch and feel the world around him, now that the pointy, sharp bones poked painfully into his flesh, scratching his skin and leaving gashes all over his legs, he experienced panic for the first time.

Eons without experiencing pain or fear. An entire existence spent believing to be invincible... quite traumatic to be on the other side now, huh...?

Deimos snarled, but it was an empty threat: he could not hope to stand up to Killer in a physical confrontation, and his growl was filled only with frustration and fear as he waded through the wasteland of skeletons. There was a vicious wind that made everything worse, making each movement slow and awkward and painful, the air rushing into Deimos's face with tremendous force, before the god of fear paled and went stiff, eyes bulging wide in shock as the wind almost completely stopped... and then returned with a deafening roar, coming from behind him this time, and blowing air so incandescent that his newly acquired flesh sizzled and then caught fire, burning down to the bone.

Killer's laughter boomed in the darkness as Deimos fell into the sea of bones, rolling around and shrieking in despair as the flames enveloped him, consuming his body until the wind changed direction again, sucking all oxygen away from him and snuffing out the fire. It left Deimos broken and smoldering from charred wounds that reached deep down to the bones, his devastated body sprawled over cracked, blackened bones, his face melted away and revealing much of the skull beneath as his eyes stared in shock at the darkness, wondering what had just happened... until the flames erupted again, in the distance, at an amazing height above him, far up into the sky. Two twin black holes into the sky suddenly glowed as air was expelled with a booming, deafening roar, so hot that the oxygen burst into flames that rushed down over Deimos and over the whole world around him.

Deimos's mind shattered in that very moment, right after comprehending the impossible: it was not wind of any kind, but rather the breath of a sleeping dark beast that dwarfed the universes into puny insignificance. The lazy breathing of a predator so glorious, immense and powerful that could destroy Deimos's divinity and life in his sleep, without sparing a single thought for his existence, for his feelings, for his hopeless resistance.

He began to cry, shedding tears that sizzled and evaporated as they touched his charred, still incandescent flesh. He shrieked in denial as the invincible beast breathed out once more, sending a tidal wave of fire washing over the world: Deimos could only stare at the solid wall of fire, seeing it rushing closer until it rolled over him, consuming him down to ashes and charred bones. But even so, the torture did not end, as Deimos's spirit clung to the bones... and the god howled in despair and agony, cursing his divine nature. Fear could not die. Fear could not leave the universe. Fear could not be killed. Fear could not escape the tremendous torture ahead.

The wind once more rushed back over him as the gigantic god in the darkness breathed in, and the still-hot ashes flew up, forming a cloud that settled upon the living skeleton, painfully regenerating to form new organs, new flesh, and new skin. Deimos cried louder, panicking and panting breathlessly as he looked around himself frantically, looking not for an exit that he knew did not exist, but for some ways to kill himself. "Kill me! Kill me, and make it end...! Make it stop!"

"Sweet, delicious terror..." Killer teased, licking his lips slowly as he walked out of the darkness, towering over the whimpering god of Fear and looking down at him with distaste, spitting in his face and then settling one huge, heavy foot on the monster's scrawny chest, crushing Deimos down into the sharp broken bones, making him shriek in agony and denial as several ribs pierced through his body from beneath.

Killer grinned predatorily as Deimos desperately clawed at his toes, trying to wrestle them off his chest, bucking and trashing to try and break free, tears rolling down his cheeks as another tidal wave of dark fire rushed forwards. "Let me die, kill me, please, kill me..." Deimos cried, his fists beating uselessly on Killer's foot before he howled in despair as the fire consumed him once more... only to painfully rebuild him a moment later.

Killer effortlessly held him pinned down, laughing as he was annihilated and rebuilt again and again, moving his heavy foot directly over Deimos's face and smirking as the insane god immediately began to lick his toes clean, worshipping them between one pathetic prayer and one breathless supplication.

Not once did Deimos dare asking for anything other than lasting death, for an oblivion that would end the agony... but Killer showed him no such mercy, punishing him for his arrogance, for daring to assault his mind with images of Alexis betraying him, and for forcing him to kill his own daughter, to stare at her all-too-realistic agony.

Finally, Killer bent down to pick up Deimos as soon as his body once more regenerated: he picked him by the sides of his head, lifting him up calmly, almost with kindness, bringing him up until they were eye to eye, the god of Fear swallowing thickly and once more begging: "Please... kill me... I'm begging you..."

But the liger only looked back with ferocious, merciless amusement as he announced: "Clearly, I'm a far better master of Fear than you'll ever be. From now on, you are just a tool in my hands, a toy in my grip. I hope that you like it here... because this is your eternal home." Killer laughed darkly, flexing his massive musculature and pulling slowly, easily outwards, his biceps bulging explosively even with that lazy movement, overflowing with vigor against which Deimos was utterly powerless. The body of the monster slowly ripped in half down the middle, and Killer pushed his arms out, holding up each bloody half up until another explosion of fire turned both into small hills of ashes.

Outside, Taranis was left staring in awe as Mriya's corpse vanished, dissolving in Killer's arms as the illusion was revealed and defeated, before the black essence that had made up Deimos's spirit pushed slowly out through Killer's muscular body, wrapping around it like a cloud of dark smoke and beginning to take new shapes. Gaping in disbelief, Taranis trembled as the black smoke solidified over Killer's chest to create a heavy breastplate made of chiseled, solid darkness edged in glowing gold and ending with a collar of long black fur, not unlike his old set of mortal armor, the one he had worn in his old days and that had the fur of his ancient enemy, Dark, as decoration.

Another plate, locking neatly into the chest armor, covered his powerful abs, the black steel sculpted to fit over his body and replicate the profile of his massive muscles. Overlapping, form-fitting plates of armor covered his back, protecting it without impairing his mobility, and a thick double-belt wrapped around his waist, connecting into a lion-head clasp and holding up thick plates protecting his hips and upper legs, while another elongated element of armor stretched down between his legs, like a metallic loincloth, the length and width of it was caused by the sheer immensity of the liger's flaccid cock and heavy, ponderous testicles.

Two heavy, rounded pauldrons formed around his massive shoulders, but they were cut in a way that left the top of it uncovered, letting his massive bone-spikes free to continue giving him both protection and offensive power at once.

His massive biceps were left exposed, but darkness wrapped around his forearms instead, forming thick, heavy armlets connecting into beautiful and deadly gauntlets made of countless plating parts free to overlap and stack up, engineered to cover his fingers entirely without restricting his freedom of movement in any way.

And finally, heavy black boots took shape over his feet, the plated shin-guards decorated with a pattern of flames that resembled that found on the chest, as the profile of cracked sabertooth skulls glowed faintly just beneath the knee, the armor stopping short so that it would not conflict with the massive bone spikes sticking out of his joints. The solid, squarer and ridged metal plates covering the foot extended all the way to the toe-talons, each of them overlaid singularly by a perfectly shaped armor plate, making his already cruel claws all the more devastating.

"Deimos..." Taranis babbled, staring in awe at the transformation as Killer straightened and cracked his neck, flexing one massive hand slowly and looking idly at how perfectly the gauntlet adapted to his movements, feeling like it wasn't even there.

"Deimos is no more." The liger calmly announced, shouldering Wyvern and walking towards the God of War and the still mutilated but rapidly regenerating upper body of Seth, the jackal looking up from the ground and trembling in fear. "Erra is no more. That leaves you two, but it won't take me long to complete the job."

Taranis snarled, but he instinctively retreated as the enormous male liger advanced, repressing a shiver as his steps rattled the broken, agonizing planet, staring in disbelief as Killer continued to grow, and still with no visible hints about his Ascension. "Who... What... what are you...?" The god of war muttered, glaring up into Killer's eyes as the liger grinned predatorily.

"Master... please... protect me, I'm not ready to fight him... I can't fight in this state, I need time to regenerate my legs... please..." Seth quietly prayed, crawling closer to Taranis and stretching one hand up towards his owner and commander, practically begging as he whispered: "Please... I promise that it'll be worth the waiting... I will crush him, I promise... just give me a chance..."

Taranis looked down at Seth with a snort of contempt, one eye twitching in a mix of rage, frustration and fear, and the jackal trembled violently under that merciless gaze, murmuring another prayer that did not contain any real belief or hope, before the god of war snarled and flicked his arm out, enormous tentacles of flesh and bone shooting out of his wrist and snapping closed around the lesser god.

Seth howled in agony and denial as he was lifted clear off the ground and crushed within the deadly embrace of those powerful appendages, his bones cracking loudly as the tentacles tensed and flexed, with brutal force, as if chewing him. In mere moments, the scream of the jackal died away, replaced by the sick sound of his body bursting apart as it was squished into pulp and absorbed, swallowed down between the huge tentacles.

Taranis's eyes glowed a ghastly, blinding white, a grin spreading on his face as terrible discharges of energy crackled around him, and the god threw his head back with a roar of triumph and delight at the sudden surge of power raging inside his form, a shockwave of fearsome force exploding out of him and breaking the planet even further, sending enormous chunks of it shifting outwards, slowly floating towards open space as the world completely shattered. The moon in the distance cracked and then exploded into pieces, as the formidable ripple of power traveled through the cold expanse of deep space.

"You'll be the first being to see my full Ascension, Lord Killer... and believe me, it will be the last thing you'll see in your life. Cherish the honor of being destroyed by the real shape of War!" Taranis cackled, arching his back with a snarl as he began to grow at a fearsome rate, his legs becoming enormous and horse-like in shape, entirely protected by thick armor plates, each the shield of a gigantic undead monstrosity pushing out of his flesh. His upper body grew massive, bulging with enormous muscles that were made of dark steel, removing the need for any other protection. Heavy chains wrapped across his broad chest and down his powerful arms, as dark blue flames enveloped his form, becoming taller and flowing angrily in the air to form a fiery mane on top of his head and down his back. A mask of dark steel and bone covered his face, his mouth growing deadly pinchers supplementing the powerful jaws, and tall demonic horns framed his majestic figure... before his body morphed further, giving him the body of a feral horse, turning him into a centaur of sort, his mighty hind legs completely plated over by the same dark metal covering his upper body. The tail pushed out next, a gigantic, flexible draconic appendage made of deadly mace-heads finished with blades rather than mere spikes.

And as if all that wasn't enough, a second upper body began to take shape, like the goat head on the back of a chimera of myth: a muscular, metallic chest appeared, and the arms were still recognizable, having once belonged to Seth. A long, curved neck made of overlapping steel plates stretched up, but instead of ending with the jackal's head, it took the shape of one large-caliber cannon, the barrel of which glowed with terrible energy, as electricity crackled down the length of the weapon.

Taranis flexed with a growl of delight, his tremendous strength sending ripples of power through deep space, rattling the silent vastness of the universe as he held up one huge hand, grinning as a thick, colossal staff appeared in his grip, topped by a cylindrical, spiked mace-head, and then again by one enormous pyramidal tip formed by thick blades intersecting in the middle. The planet-crumbling weapon could stab, swing and crush like a hammer, and the god of war caught the long pole in both hands, effortlessly handling the monstrous weight as his biceps bulged explosively, straining the chains wrapped all over his body.

"Now you are really screwed, young lion... it is amazing that you could force me to this, but now you've really reached the end of the line." Taranis roared, his voice booming louder than any storm as he glared down at Killer with an arrogant smirk. The liger's head now only about reached his waist, and Taranis felt that his new, towering mass restored the right proportions and relationship, forcing Killer to tilt his head backwards to look up at him.

Yet Killer only grinned, beckoning at him teasingly and saying calmly: "Bring it, bitch... If you think your party tricks impress me, you are deluded. Come forth, finally. It is really time to end this... and finally there's no one left that you can shove forwards to fight for you."

"You arrogant little bug!" Taranis roared, slamming his mace-spear down towards the liger, forcing Killer backwards as Wyvern rose to parry the tremendous blow, before the Seth-cannon trained on the liger and opened fire, blasting forth a beam of white, ghastly energy that smashed into his chest, knocking him down into the hellish wasteland of magma and broken islands of charred rock, as thunderbolts of pure force crackled around him, acting like chains and binding him, slowing down the flow of Time as the liger struggled to break free.

Taranis reared up on his hind legs, laughing as he kicked his massive hooves in the air, letting Killer stare at them from down below, before he stomped down as hard as he could, crushing the liger into the ocean of magma, thrusting him down towards the centre of the doomed world as the planet completely broke apart, becoming nothing but a field of asteroids as giant chunks of stone floated silently into space.

Taranis easily retreated away from the planet as the burning core rippled, ready to explode, the magma becoming bright white as the heat increased immensely... and deep into that burning inferno, the dark silhouette of Killer could still be guessed.

"Yes-yes-yes, Lord Killer... time to die!" Taranis cackled, grinning widely as the smaller body on his back arched and thrust his hands together, the palms struggling to meet as if they were pushing against an immense weight... and in fact, the floating chunks of the devastated planet were shoved back over the core, crushed against it, pressed down into its instable mass, the immense muscles of the god of war bulging with obscene power as he made an idle gesture to the remains of the moon and sent them smashing down like meteors into the flaming inferno.

It was the final straw, the core exploding in a gigantic blast, an atomic furnace that sent a flash of light and a devastating shockwave through the galaxy... and Taranis grinned widely, only regretting the absence of sound in the emptiness of space. He would have loved to hear, as well as see, the end of Killer. He had had to sacrifice one of his sanctuary-planets, but it was a small price to pay... with him out of the way, he was soon going to establish his supremacy over all other gods. Soon enough, all planets would be his.

The grin on his face became a grimace of fury and disbelief only a few moments later, when he realized that Killer's powerful energy signature hadn't gone away... but actually grown even greater. Taranis roared in unarticulated rage, charging forwards with a powerful gallop and thrusting his enormous spear forwards, tearing his way through the fragments, meteors and asteroids left by the explosion like they weren't even there. He stabbed the spear-mace viciously into the slowly dissolving cloud of debris and still incandescent magma, while Seth's body made a shoving gesture to blast the cloud out of the way, revealing Killer just as the liger caught the tip of the enormous spear in his hand, his gauntlet grinding down into the multiple blades and his enormous bicep bulging explosively as he began to bend them like sheets of tin, pushing back single-handedly against the god of war.

Killer flicked his wrist, aiming Wyvern's blade outwards and slashing it up like the massive sword was a small, agile knife, aiming for Taranis's exposed flank, but Seth's body leaned down and long katana blades appeared in his hands, the two weapons repealing the attack, before thick tentacles made of stacked metal plates tore out of Taranis's flesh, stabbing viciously towards Killer. "I hope you did not think you could surprise the god of war with your sword play." Taranis hissed, glaring at Killer with hate as the liger swung his sword into the flurry of angry tentacles, knocking them wide, slapping them back, even as they attacked in quick succession, mixing with the slashing of Seth's blades.

Killer grunted as one katana found its mark against his chest, but the blade could only scratch his new armor, bouncing back violently... and before Taranis could react, Killer's own tentacles shot out of his back, arching over his head and then shooting down to pierce deep into the god's flank.

Immediately, Killer spun on the spot, holding on to Taranis's spear and to his flank, lifting the god up and then hurling him violently against the next planet in the Dimension.

Taranis ruinously crashed through the atmosphere of the second of his sanctuaries, his flank annihilating an entire continent as he fell like a meteor, his immense body almost as big as the planet itself and far more resistant. The apocalyptic impact sent deep cracks spreading from one pole to the other, breaking the crust of the planet into pieces, sending enormous slabs of stone floating over oceans of flowing magma. Not a single one of the millions of ghouls that had been battling senselessly over the ruins of their world was spared from a terrible but quick death: those who were not squished right away did not survive the shockwave, the earthquakes and the tsunami waves that ravaged the earth after the immense impact.

Taranis groaned in pain and shock but still hurriedly raised his massive spear to stab it against Killer as the behemoth dived over him, casting the entire planet in his shadow. The liger's tentacles however whip-lashed upwards, yanking Taranis's body up and sending the spear-mace out of mark while the soft belly of the horse-like body was offered to Wyvern, which did not miss the chance: Killer stabbed the massive sword down to the hilt into his enemy, roaring as he tore the sword down along the center of the overturned body, ignoring the horse legs as they kicked viciously but blindly. With one forceful, savage cut, Wyvern ripped its way from front to rear, coming free with a thick splatter of blood as Taranis's guts burst out of the terrible wound, the ascended god trashing in agony and bucking in an attempt to get back on his hooves, but Killer was faster and drove his word through Seth's body-appendage next.

The god of war howled in agony and despair as Killer gripped into Seth with one hand and drove Wyvern through with the other, half-cutting and half-ripping the remains of the jackal off from Taranis's back, before Killer began to hammer his gigantic fist down into Taranis's armored head, shattering his bone mask and cracking his skull like a nut, blow after blow after blow crushing the ascended divinity against the broken, dying planet.

"How...?" Taranis asked, and it sounded like a desperate cry now as Killer once more loomed over him, immense and glorious, radiating tremendous power and fearsome physical strength, his fist breaking his skull with ease, splattering his brains over the devastated planet below. "How do you do it...?"

Before Killer could answer anything, Taranis's massive form glowed a brilliant white and dissolved, revealing a bloodied, exhausted, broken god back in his normal shape, terrified and paralyzed by horror as he hugged himself miserably.

Immediately, Taranis vanished from the spot as Killer's fist rushed down again, and the godlike punch missed him but not the planet beneath, which was hit by the full force of the blow, shattering like it was made of glass, its core dissolving in tongues of fire and magma that floated away into space and quickly cooled and ceased to burn as they left the disappearing atmosphere.

"Hiding won't do you any good at this point, Taranis." Killer calmly stated, floating in space and looking around himself to locate the few sanctuary-planets remaining. "You've lost. The only thing you can still do is show a bit of a spine in your last moments."

No... I have lost, but I can still recover. And there is someone that will kill you for me. Taranis's voice boomed, echoing from one corner of the dark dimension to the other... and Killer turned around with a growl, just in time to see the "planet-eater", the immense, monstrous black dragon born from the first love of Taranis and Alcana.

Meet Xaar, Lord Killer!

The beast was immense, so great that it really could swallow planets whole with ease. Its tail stretched an enormous distance away through space, all of its length jutting with spikes and sharp, overlapping scales shaped like knives. Enormous ridges of bone covered his back, running in three rows over his spine, between muscular, vast wings that casted their darkness upon a vast area of the galaxy. Its massive, elongated snout was covered in thick, sharp scales that acted almost like external teeth, even though his fangs did not need any help, massive as they were. The gigantic beast grinned toothily as it flew its way past the planets, dwarfing them as it passed by, rushing towards Killer with a snarl: "Xaar kills! Xaar eats!"

Killer took a ready position, body tense and prepared to react as he muttered: "Sounds like a plan. But plans never survive the impact with the enemy." The dragon clearly didn't shine for brain power and tactics and finesse: it was pure size, hunger and brutal, planet-crumbling strength. That actually makes him the easiest rival today. A clash of brutal strength is my cup of tea.

The dragon slashed his powerful arms towards Killer, the long talons seeking to rip him apart, but the liger found it quite easy to fly over the assault, right towards the dragon's muzzle as the beast angrily lunged forwards and snapped its tremendous jaws closed.

Xaar growled angrily as his teeth clashed together without finding any morsel in between, and his baleful yellow eyes darted from side to side, searching Killer, before bulging in surprise as the liger emerged from the darkness and stabbed Wyvern vertically up. Xaar howled in rage and pain as the enormous sword pierced under his chin and through his snout, the dragon furiously shaking his head from side to side, trying to shake Killer off, clawing at his own snout as it slashed blindly in front of his face, before fire erupted from his nostrils as he managed to force his jaws open, Wyvern sliding out of the terrible wound.

Killer's wings flashed into being for a moment, beating once to produce a formidable thrust that allowed the liger to dive out of the way as the dragon opened his jaws wide and vomited a planet-annihilating vortex of dark, demonic fire. Xaar twisted his long, muscular neck to follow Killer's evolutions, snarling as it hurled fire out in an unending stream of destruction, but the beast grunted in pain a moment later as the liger flipped over his neck to stomp on his snout, and he couldn't follow him in that movement.

"Xaar chews you like candy!" The dragon angrily roared, but Killer only cocked back his fist before ramming it right between the reptile's eyes, grinning as even the thick, immense skull of the beast loudly cracked and partially caved in, even with the massive size difference.

Xaar arched his back and reared up with a howl of pain, blood leaking out of his eyes and spurting from his nostrils and from his tiny, mostly invisible ears, and Killer exploited the moment to leap off, floating into the deep, dark sky. He let his eyes close for a moment, taking a deep breath, and he thought back to when he had dwarfed planets in his growth. I must want it. That's the only requirement...

His eyes opened a moment later, and he let out a hot, snarling breath of delight as he looked at the dragon eye-to-eye, his body crackling with terrible, immense energy as he dwarfed the nearby planets, smaller than tennis balls to him now, looking so deliciously fragile and puny, mere toys in front of his bulging, immense muscles.

Xaar stared at him in shock for one moment, amazed by his growth and his sheer immensity, but then the dragon growled and lunged forwards in savage aggression: "No one greater than Xaar!" The beast snarled, snapping his jaws with mortal hunger, but the liger could not agree with that statement. Killer twisted to the side as the dragon's head rushed forwards, dodging the assault and going for the long neck instead, squeezing it between his arms, catching it in an unforgiving vice grip.

"What a disappointment..." Killer snorted, ignoring the trashing and struggling of the dragon to instead twist his neck, savoring the sick sound of breaking vertebrae as the long neck became limp and weak in his grip, the dragon gargling loudly as the liger literally tied a knot in his throat, shattering his spine into dust.

Killer tossed the immense corpse aside, watching idly as it quickly dissolved into a cloud of ashes, forming a new, vast nebula that stretched across much of the dimension, and he flexed idly, grinning as his muscles bulged with monstrous, unbelievable power, sending ripples of energy through the galaxy and causing the walls of the Dimension to tremble and crack, as the control of Taranis over that corner of universe was shattered.

"You became silent, all of a sudden..." Killer teased, floating closer to the remaining planets, grinning down at them as the barriers delimitating what had once been Taranis's private heaven exploded into tiny fragments that quickly dissolved away, revealing the stars and the immensity of Space beyond. "But hiding is no longer an option, Taranis."

Killer carefully pushed his hand beneath the group of 5 planets, grinning slightly as the worlds were shrunk down rapidly, their orbits changing as they were dragged down towards his wrist, all of them beginning to slowly circle around it, conquered, slaves to his immense strength.

The liger held his arm up and flexed his gauntleted hand slowly when the planets reached their new steady state, the small spheres orbiting slowly around his wrist. He took a moment to appreciate the immensity of what he was doing and of what he had accomplished, and he had to repress a shiver of delight and lust. Five planets, slave to his will like that... Fear itself, enslaved and turned into his armor. War, conquered, defeated, crushed under his foot, with Seth crushed out of existence and Taranis broken into impotence and sent cowering in some dark hole on one of his sanctuary planets. Erra, defeated and forced into submission, along with all his nightmarish arsenal of diseases and epidemics. Xaar, the planet-eater, slain like a chicken and thrown aside with a snort of contempt.

It was hard to believe his own power at this point, or even just estimate what he could do... or better, tell if there was anything at all left that he could not do.

Killer shook his head and let out a deep, hot breath, taming his own lusts and pushing the temptations and arrogance back into the depths of his mind, repressing another kind of shiver as he was assaulted by the images of Mriya dead in his arms, of Alexis turning against him... How close he had been to losing his mind, to losing the battle, to being torn apart.

He was glad it was over. It was nice to be able to close his eyes and relax for just a brief moment, gritting his fangs a bit as the adrenaline receded somewhat and he felt all the clearer the pain pulsating in his many wounds as they progressively healed and regenerated. It would take him a while to shake all the damage off... it really had been a fearsome clash.

I should probably stop charging headlong into obvious traps...

"Come out, Taranis." Killer finally said, as he allowed himself to shrink down to his normal 20 feet size, the armor shrinking with him without difficulties, along with the captive planets. His feet settled upon a transparent floor of energy floating in open space, which his mind created without him having to really think about it.

And Taranis instantaneously appeared, falling out of a dark portal that pretty much spat him out with distaste before rapidly vanishing. After all, Taranis's sanctuaries were now Killer's sanctuaries, and he could not expect to be able to hide inside them.

The defeated god fell to his knees, breathless and bleeding from deep, terrible wounds all over his body, his hands pressed upon some of the largest and ugliest gashes as he hugged himself pathetically. Once a proud 30 feet tall giant, Taranis now stood no more than fifteen feet tall, his body still muscular and godlike, yet scrawny and weak compared to what he had been, and puny in the shadow of Killer's behemotic frame. He had used all of his power in the fight, pushed his limits all the way to full Ascension, and he had been defeated: that was going to leave him scarred and weakened, forever. It was not something he'd ever be able to regenerate.

Killer looked down at Taranis with a grimace of distaste, shouldering Wyvern and repressing the temptation to torture the ex master of war right there, immediately, playing with him until nothing was left but a crimson puddle of gore on the floor. Taranis, after all, had been a shameless enemy, ready to ignore and violate any and every concept and rule of honor in order to gain an advantage... and that was something that Killer simply hated, even before considering all the arrogance, the mocking, and the pain that Taranis had inflicted upon him by exploiting Deimos's powers to torture him with his worst nightmares.

Taranis was all too aware that he could not expect any mercy, and he trembled violently as he stared up at Killer, trying at once to imagine what his future might hold and to chase the terrible images out of his mind. He scrambled backwards with a cry of panic when Killer finally thrust a hand out towards him, but his shriek was suffocated by a thick, cruel collar of burning-hot steel that clamped down on his throat and deployed curved hooks into his flesh, reaching down to catch the top of his ribcage, making sure that he could not break free in any way. A long chain-leash connected the collar and Killer's hand, sealing Taranis's fate in the worst of ways: the leash meant a long and torturing existence. Taranis had dared hoping for a relatively quick death, but that was a mercy he would not be shown.

Killer turned around, ignoring the muffled crying and sobbing coming from Taranis as the defeated god unsuccessfully tried to hide his lamentations from the ears of the winner. The liger smirked a bit at that, taking a short moment to savor the sound before yanking on the leash, dragging Taranis down into the dust as he calmly, teasingly commanded: "Shut up, bitch. I did not ask to hear your whining. Save it for later, when your wife will tongue-bath me clean from the battle sweat."

The god of war swallowed thickly, glaring at Killer's back with terrible hate... but all he obtained from it was a stinging, humiliating sense of hopeless weakness. Hate, no matter how profound, wasn't going to help him face Killer's monstrous strength. He tried hard to rein in his sobs, knowing all too well that disobeying wasn't an option. There was nothing he could do.

Taranis dejectedly rested on all fours, his breath coming in disorderly gasps as he looked up at the muscular, powerful back of the massive male ahead: Killer was giving him the shoulders, ignoring him completely, treating him truly like he was nothing more than a tamed, fearful puppy.

It was terribly, infuriatingly humiliating... and worse still, it was horribly appropriated. Even with the advantage of surprise, Taranis could nothing against the behemoth at that point.

The defeated god stood still, head bowed, eyes closing as he fought back the tears, trembling and convulsing violently.

A moment later, though, Taranis made the effort of lifting his head to look up, surprised to hear Killer launching a long whistle; and his eyes went wide as bright red flames erupted from two twin ripples in the fabric of Reality, as the two surviving stallions of fire charged out of their burning portals, galloping majestically over the short distance separating them from the liger, before slowing down to graceful stops.

The two magnificent beasts stood shoulder to shoulder, snorting steam and sparkles from their nostrils as they gazed at Killer, the god facing them with silent, calm dominance... and both horses bowed deeply, their heads hung low in submission to their new master.

"Ruin..." Killer calmly stated, as he pushed his palm against the head of the horse at his right, running his fingers through the blazing, dancing mane of fire. "And Wrath." He added, as he settled his other hand on the stallion to his left, petting the large beasts.

Both horses neighed quietly and banged their heads as if to express agreement, and Taranis gaped slightly, shaking his head slowly in disbelief. The stallions had never behaved like that with him... they had always been beasts of rage and barely restrained aggression, that he and Seth had worked hard to control and put in line. Their submission to Killer, instead, appeared total.

The defeated divinity groaned in pain as the leash tensed and dragged him forwards, the chain squeezing without mercy on his throat as Killer walked around Ruin's massive, powerful shoulder, the liger flicking a hand idly to send twin clouds of darkness floating over the mighty backs of the two horses. Within instants, the darkness solidified and formed armoured saddles finely chiseled with images of war and fighting. Each saddle connected with a series of interlocked dark armor plates which ran down the back of the stallion out to the root of the tail, while heavy chains stretched from heavy steel rings on the sides of the saddles towards the front of the horses, holding up thick chest-plates decorated by large roaring lion heads in the middle.

Without Killer needing to utter a word, Taranis rushed forwards, crawling on all fours and stopping in front of the huge male, who leisurely settled a heavy foot upon his head, crushing him face-first into the dirt while easily climbing up on the back of Ruin.

Killer patted the mighty steed on the neck, shifting a bit in the saddle to find his position, feet in the large, heavy stirrups and Wyvern held at an angle on his back, not to cut into the stallion's body. Wrath stomped one hoof nervously, snorting clouds of steam from his nostrils at being apparently rejected, but Killer smiled calmly and patted his neck too, announcing quietly: "Don't worry, I'm sure Alexis will like you. And I know you will love her. I'd say that being hers beats carrying me, so I wouldn't complain if I was in you..." Killer paused, then snorted in amusement and grinned, adding: "You have no idea how many males would give their everything to have her legs squeezing their sides, so... Ruin here should be the one complaining."

Wrath neighed and banged his head a few times, seeming to agree with Killer's words, while Ruin only blew steam from his nostrils, his hooves hammering the ground with impatience, with barely restrained vigor and eagerness.

Killer commanded the massive stallion into an easy walk, Wrath following easily, just one respectful step behind; and Taranis dejectedly closed the formation, head hung low, the leash biting viciously in his throat whenever he failed to keep the pace. Silent, hot tears of powerless rage and hopeless despair streaked down his cheeks as he stared at the flaming portal opening ahead, a passage to Eaglenest that to his eyes was the door leading to his hell, to an eternity of punishment and misery.

His days of glory were over. His nightmare was now reality: War had found a new and greater, stronger Master.

And behold a red horse; and he who sits thereon, has the power to take peace from the earth, and to make men slay one another; and his great sword conquers worlds and routs all armies.

He dons Fear as his armor, flooding the worlds with panic at his mere appearance.

His arm has conquered disease, pestilence and misery. His finger commands famine, epidemics and disaster.

_His crimson trail is destruction, death and despair. _

The rider is the Master and Embodiment of War; and his horse is Ruin.