Smoke billowed as the stench of blood permeated the air. Roars and cries accompanied by the clashing of flesh, metal and elements filled the battlefield. Armies of tens of thousands stood their ground as they fought against the demon army, the battle was chaotic as both sides mingled after the initial charge.

Suddenly, there was a blinding light and a harsh tearing metal sound followed by the rumble of the ground as the demonic giant was taken down by the light magic of the general of the alliance. With the fall of their leader, the demons soon became disordered and many of them fled the battlefield. It became a lot easier for the alliance army to finish off the dregs that remained.

Within the large fresh crater, a tall man with a thick plaited beard and a muscular bear like physique stood staring at the corpse created by himself. His wild long brunette hair flowing with the wind, his bulging muscles could be seen through the damaged gaps of his armour, still tense from the hard fight and exhaustion from years of war. But the man couldn’t care less. His brows furrowed as he stared at the corpse as he remembered what the giant had said as he struck him down.

“You’ll regret this! We will be avenged by Lord Abyssus!”

Divus sighed as he felt troubled. For the last several years, the demon armies he slayed would often say as such, but he had never seen hide nor hair of this lord that they talk about. He decided to put it to the back of his mind until necessary.

“General!” A soldier came to check on the general whilst reporting the situation. “The demons are retreating! We have manged to wipe out a fair number of them this time Sir!”

“Very well.” Divus waved his hand. “We should also retreat. Any further battle will just result in needless losses.”

“Yes Sir!” The soldier saluted before leaving to relay the message.

As per Divus’s orders, the alliance made a swift and organised retreat to their base camp, treating the injured whilst celebrating their victory.

The soldiers also cheered as it was time for them to receive the correspondence from their families and loved ones.

After arriving at the camp and dismissing the soldiers, Divus headed to the communications tent.

“Sir?” The soldier in charge of sorting letters looked towards the tent entrance and saluted upon seeing Divus.

“Anything for me from Mare?” Divus asked with a tiny remaining hope.

“Sorry Sir.” The soldier shook his head. “Nothing from Mare this year either. But there are letters from Calva for you.”

“It’s fine.” Divus’s shoulders slumped as his tiny bit of hope shattered. He received the letters from Calva from the soldier and left the tent.

Divus: …Once again no letter from Lupa. It’s been seven years! Did I say something in my letters that upset him? Or… did something really happen to him?

Divus moped on his way back to his tent, exhausted from the fighting. He flopped onto his bed and fell asleep whilst feeling depressed. After Divus had fallen asleep, his hair began to glow and faintly look as if it had stars twinkling within the strands. His brows furrowed as he was soon covered in sweat, clearly not having a peaceful rest.

The twinkling stars in his hair dimmed as if they had never been there as Divus’s eyes snapped open, a swirling galaxy flashed in their depths for a brief moment before vanishing.

Divus: What the fuck? This isn’t the pantheon? ….Did I really jinx myself!?

Divus sat up and patted down his body. Feeling the physique just like his own and the memories of the general, Divus realised that he really had entered the body of his fragment!

Immediately, Divus shot out of bed and found the razer that the general had left unused for a while and shaved off the thick mess of a bush on his face. Looking at the handsome freshly shaven face reflected in the pail of water, Divus felt a bit refreshed and sat back down to try and organise what had happened.

He sat with his arms crossed and realized that it was likely because only two of his fragments hadn’t been collected yet and by instinct wished to be whole, plus his own thoughts of wanting to be whole as soon as possible so that he could unseal and apologise to Lupa probably had an effect on it. Speaking of, Divus’s brows furrowed as he thought of the lack of letters from Lupa.

Divus: There’s no way my Lupa wouldn’t take advantage of those letters to tease my fragment! Something I’m not aware of must have happened seven years ago…. Ugh, I’ve gotta get away from this battlefield and go to Mare to find out what happened!

Divus clicked his tongue as he knew it wouldn’t be so easy. He had to find a way to deter the demons from making a mess for a good chunk of time to allow him to go back to Mare. He also knew he’d have to find some way of gaining permission to use the teleportation gate.

The demons were simple to deal with, he’d just have to crush them with overwhelming power, which now that he was in the world, he could do with no problem.

The problem was the teleportation gates. They weren’t easy to use simply because of the amount of magic power needed to use them, especially with the fact that their current location was far up in the North, where the tip of the human world and the demon world were connected. Whilst they were called worlds, they were actually just two different huge continents that after several millennia had finally connected at one point due to continental shifts. And that’s when the wars began.

Divus felt annoyed how the human side, despite there being many strong races such as Elves, Dwarves, Spirits and Dragons, they relied on just the two countries, Mare and Calva, to go fight whilst the other races and human countries enjoyed the peace. It had been that way for thousands of years.

Divus felt it was ridiculous. Why was it only the allied countries that had to fight to death whilst the other countries could feel nothing but peace thanks to their efforts!?

And there was another thing that bothered Divus. The name Abyssus. He was concerned as to why the name of the being who was his equal and came into existence at the same time as himself appeared in Seineff. Unlike how most in the actual Demon world and the heavens think, Abyssus was never the God of Demons. He was more the God of night, dark, moon and dreams. It just so happened that Demons were attracted to the dark more and congregated to where Abyssus lived, eventually leading to the creation of the Demon world. Unlike the demons of Seineff, the Demons from Lupa’s homeland, whilst rough and straightforward, the majority of them weren’t evil and scheming, they just had no filter on their mouths when speaking and were very hot-blooded.

Divus remembered how he never really spoke to Abyssus, he hadn’t even seen what the person’s face looked like. He just remembers occasionally spotting him sitting on the peak of a mountain, staring at the moon with a lonely back. But that very Abyssus completely vanished a millennia ago, Divus couldn’t even sense his power. He never knew what happened to him, so he was surprised and confused as to why the name turned up in Seineff, a weak small world.

Divus: No matter… I’ll probably find out later, no point dwelling on it now.

“General!”

Divus was startled as a soldier from the communications unit burst into his tent.

“What is it!?”

“It’s terrible! We just got word that the demons attack today was just a decoy!” The soldier handed reported with a trembling voice. “Their real target were the countries beyond the defence line! Starting with the Dwarves, the demons have swept through the lands and have currently reached the Elven country!”

“That is indeed dreadful.” Divus blinked whilst hiding a trace of schadenfreude that nearly appeared in the form of a smile. “But what can we do about it? We’re so far away and don’t have the manpower.”

“About that.” The soldier continued. “You’ve been summoned, General,  back to Mare. They’re going to be holding a meeting to see what to do about the situation with representatives of the other nations and races also being present.”

“They’re going to let me use the teleportation gate right?” Divus had no objection in going and got to the point. “Otherwise it’ll take me a year to get back to the capital from here.”

“Yes Sir.” The soldier nodded. “That was in the instructions they relayed. The rest of us are to stay here in case the demons attack whilst you, who has the most experience against demons, are to go to the meeting.”

“I’ll not waste anymore time then.” Divus headed out the tent as soon as the soldier finished talking and went straight to the teleportation gate.

Divus: I’ll be able to find out what happened to Lupa now.

*********

Divus exited the teleportation gate and stretched his muscles. Due to the situation, the teleportation gate had been connected directly to the royal palace, but that wasn’t Divus’s priority.  Remembering the right direction, Divus ran as fast as he could, through the palace woods and beyond until he reached the old half submerged manor. The place he knew Lupa preferred to live.

He stared at the manor covered in overgrown vines and felt his heart sink. He cautiously entered the manor using the spare key given to the general long ago. As soon as he opened the door, a gust of dust hit him in the face making him splutter. Once the dust settled, Divus looked around, finding that the manor was covered in dust and lifeless. It was clear that no one had occupied it for many years.

Divus bit his lips as the ominous feeling he’d had since arriving in Seineff increased. With a slump in his posture, Divus headed back to the palace, he needed answers from the king.

*********

Within the meeting room, representatives from every race and country were present and had finished arguing, cough, that is, discussing the way forward and had finally settled on a decision. Now, they were just waiting for the man they had all unanimously agreed would lead the operation.

No sooner had they began whispering whilst trying to be patient did the doors to the meeting hall open.

Divus stepped into the hall, not in the best of moods, only for said mood to worsen as every person in the room looked over at himself.

“Sorry I’m late.” Divus showed no expression as he apologised.

“No no, it’s understandable with where you were summoned from.” The king of Mare waved his hand as he beckoned Divus to come closer. “We had just finished making a decision.”

“Fill me in.” Divus came over and sat in the seat next to the king, his cold gaze sweeping over all present.

In the end, Divus came to understand that the demon armies that had attacked had all named themselves to be under Abyssus, as such all the nations have come to the conclusion that to stop the endless wars, they needed to send an elite team to find the Demon Lord Abyssus and put an end to him. Divus rolled his eyes at the fact that he had been chosen to lead the party of elites, but he accepted it nonetheless. But he still said his opinion that even if they take out Abyssus, it was unlikely going to put an end to the war against the demons.

“For that matter, there’s another goal for your team.” An elderly Elf pushed their glasses back up the bridge of their nose as they spoke. “There is an item in the demon world that we need you to bring back. With it, we can separate the human world and demon world completely and erect a barrier to ensure they don’t rejoin.”

“And what kind of item is that?” Divus asked sceptically.

“The heart of the sea.” The elderly Elf replied smugly. “It is a powerful item said to originally belong to the God of the sea. We don’t know what it looks like, but we know that as soon as you go near it, it’ll release an aura of the seas. It’ll feel gentle, all encompassing yet oppressive and heavy. At least, that’s what’s written in the ancient records.”

As soon as he heard the words, Divus’s expression distorted and became ferocious.

“Do you have a problem Mr. General?” The elderly Elf looked at Divus condescendingly.

“How could I not have a problem with you sending us on a wild goose chase!?” Divus glared at the Elf. “Taking on Abyssus, or the demon claiming to be Abyssus, we can do. But finding a fairy tale? That’s wishful thinking. You’d be better off researching with the Dwarves and seeing if you can make something yourselves with a similar affect.”

“How dare you speak that way to me!” The elderly Elf had never been spoken to in such a way. He was a high standing Elf, second only to the High Elf!

“I think he makes sense though.” A fierce man with sharp teeth grinned. “Us Dragons don’t mind lending our aid to the Dwarves to create one. I said it before that your heart of the sea is a nice pipe dream.”

“Then how about this.” The representative of the Dwarves rubbed his brows as he spoke up. “Us Dwarves will work together with the other races to try and find a way to create a device that can replicate the affect of the heart of the sea. In the meanwhile, the elite team can look for the heart of the sea after they have managed to take out or seal Abyssus away. Both will take time though.”

“…I suppose that’ll do.” The Dragon representative snorted in reluctant agreement.

“So be it.” The elderly Elf sighed, looking disgruntled.

“….Let’s adjourn this meeting shall we?” The representative of one of the many human countries spoke up a bit timidly.

All the other representatives grunted in agreement and made their way out of the meeting hall, leaving only Divus and the king of Mare who was worried about Divus.

“What made you so angry Divus?” The king asked. “It’s not like you to talk so much.”

“Before that, I have a question for you.” Divus turned a stern gaze to the king. “Where is Lupa?”

The king’s eyes widened at the question before his eyes were filled with pain. He slumped back in his chair silently for a moment before telling Divus everything that happened seven years ago.

As soon as the king tearily finished telling Divus everything that had happened, including his promise to Lupa to not tell Divus, Divus’s magic power fluctuated and blasted out, shattering the meeting hall’s tables and chairs.

He felt angry at his fragment, himself, for not abandoning the battlefield and coming to try and find Lupa as soon as the letters stopped. He should’ve gone to chase his wife! He should’ve been here to kill Sordes’s remains himself!

“Divus!” The king was startled by Divus’s outburst and cried out, but it was no use, he could only wait until Divus calmed down.

Divus’s heart was disturbed. He could tell from Lupa’s action of asking the king not to tell him about this until he returned from the battlefield was strange. A thought came to mind that made him shudder. He had a feeling that whatever Sordes did had undone the seal he put on Lupa’s memories. Otherwise, Lupa wouldn’t tell the king to keep it secret, he would ask him to let Divus know as soon as possible. This was his wife’s way of saying come catch me if you can! It was the beginning of his punishment!

After reaching that conclusion, Divus slumped down onto the floor, feeling nervous and fearful for the possibility of his wife never forgiving him. But he also had a different determination to lead the elite team now. He would find Abyssus, get it over and done with, and scour every nook and cranny of the demon world until he found Lupa.

As for the heart of the sea? Divus sneered as murderous intent welled up in his eyes.

“Your Majesty.” Divus stood back up and looked to the dazed king.

“Yes?” The king looked cautiously to Divus and was relieved to find that he was calm.

“Give up on finding the heart of the sea.” Divus stated.

“…Can I ask why?” The king tilted his head, he knew Divus must have a reason.

“The Elves might not know what it is, but I do.” Divus clenched his fists. “Or they might know and were planning on taking it but couldn’t once they got here.”

“…What do you mean?” The king’s brows furrowed.

“The heart of the sea, is the heart of a mermaid. To be precise, the heart of a royal mermaid that can manipulate the sea.” Divus’s voice was cold as he spoke. “You and I know of only one mermaid that can manipulate the sea.”

“Lupa!” The king’s eyes widened in shock. “They wanted to kill Lupa!?”

“If they know what the heart of the sea is, then yes, but even if they don’t know they’ve still basically said to do so anyway.” Divus didn’t care whether the Elves and other races knew what the heart of the sea was or not, the moment they wished to use it they were all dead in his eyes, including the king in front of him. Divus wasn’t nice enough to forgive ignorance when it came to his wife. He could care less that the king of Mare truly didn’t know, the order had already been given and the king had agreed. So, Divus wanted the man to know what his decision meant.

 

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Hope you enjoyed it.
（づ￣3￣）づ╭❤～