**As always, please point out any errors you see**
**
Guinevere levitated above the enclosed town, silently observing it with calculating eyes.
Everywhere she looked was plagued by the dark energy. It stuck to every surface and even the water sources.
The buildings were crumbling and demonic monsters were roaming the streets, each carrying a few corpses with them. Strangely enough, those monsters were wearing clothes—or more like rags that were once clothes. Their eyes emitted the same purple glow and they wore collars.
Guinevere's body shook, making the air around her thousands of times heavier. Anything that got near her would be crushed instantly. But she regained her composure when she told herself that finding the source of all this was more important than searching for survivors.
Could there even be survivors in this hell? Hopefully more managed to escape the town before its lockdown, like the priest.
In any case, it had been centuries since Guinevere last smelled the stench of demon energy.
Putting both hands together, she weaved a runic sign and then opened her hands, slowly spreading them apart. The next moment, a golden ring surrounded her and expanded midair at a rapid pace. The dark clouds were swallowed up in an instant, allowing light to shine down upon the town again.
The individuals marching below on the streets looked up and pointed at her. Some tried to fire arrows at her but she was too high up to reach.
She ignored them.
"I sense a powerful demon's signature from that direction." She looked to the left, at a graveyard that suspiciously threw all its coffins outside in upright formations.
A condition for a ritual, no doubt.
She closed her eyes and concentrated, "This demon they are trying to summon… It is no ordinary devil. Odd, did they break free from the demons' command or did a stronger mind control bind them?"
Guinevere hasn't fought any of the demon lords so she couldn't really make out a comparison using this demon's signature alone. But what she does know is that the devil the humans were trying to summon had a signature equal to that of a God.
Why are they trying to summon a devil with this kind of power? Is the point of this purge not to open a demon portal?
Before she could draw any conclusion, several spells were shot at her the very next moment. At the same time, the circle of light cleared the whole town. She charged right through the spells and smashed the ground with such force that the dark robed magicians were sent flying back and the concrete collapsed the buildings around them.
She could smell the demon energy radiating from their bodies, evidence that they had been corrupted by demonic power.
After a summoner magician chanted an incarnation, a magic circle appeared that released smoke that transformed into demonic creatures of all shapes and sizes, even one as large as a two-story house.
They charged at her all at once.
Guinevere swatted her hand as if getting rid of a fly. A powerful gust of raw power blew them all away, sending even the crumbling buildings behind them flying. After crashing through two districts, they finally stopped. Only the largest of them survived and managed to stand up, though barely.
Guinevere crushed a chunk of rock she picked up and jumped onto a nearby building.. She coated them in divinity then placed a small piece on the palm of her hand. she then flicked that piece, the rock cutting through the air with a hiss.
Thunderous boom resounded as they struck the big monster perfectly, turning it into chunks of meat, collapsing all the buildings around it.
After that was through, she jumped back down.
Not faltering despite the difference in power, one of the other mages erected several barriers and shot spells at her through it. Again, she charged right through those spells and broke the barriers with one punch before grabbing the mage by the collar.
"!"
"This is no ordinary dark magic power you are using. These spells are not the sort humans should be using. In fact, humans are incapable of anything this corrupted and sick." After saying so, she forcibly sent her divinity into the person's body, making them gasp as black aura escaped their orifices.
Strange black symbols glowed on the person's skin then faded away with the smoke. After the power vanished, the mage's eyes rolled back in their head.
"A ritual granted them this power, as expected" the symbols were the kind she remembered so the demons that manipulated them gave them power to coax them into helping the demon side.
Guinevere gently put the mage down after confirming they were alive.
She walked forward slowly while watching the magicians that surrounded her.
'40 in total. This many humans betrayed their own kind for a smidge of power that will rob them of their lifespan if they continue to use it.'
Demons may promise you incredible power but they never specify the risks. As such, all of them are mere puppets with a finite amount of wood being thrown in a fire.
"If you were threatened by the demons and aren't doing this willingly, please raise your hand." she came to a stop among the debris, looking at all of them, "I promise to save you and that no harm will come to you as a demon's mind control is incredibly powerful. But what I ask for you in return is to truly devote yourself to Melis once you are freed from this control, as only Her faith will protect you in the future."
There may be millions of priests out there, but can you tell who is actually devoted to Melis? Who is just there to learn the divine magic the temples teach priests? Who is there because their parents forced them to go pray every last day of the week? Who is there to seek innocent religious girls? And lastly, who became a priest only to steal from donations to the churches and temples?
This can never be answered unless all of these priests and nuns are visited by the demons.
The magicians looked at each other, confused as to why an enemy was trying to persuade them to stand down.
"I apologize for hurting your comrades but they were irredeemable." She bowed her head, "As of right now, all of you standing here is standing on the line between irredeemability and redeemability. Help me help you cross to the side that will result in salvation." She spread her hands toward them.
There was silence for a moment but a few of the robed individuals approached her slowly.
Even if demon control had poisoned the human mind, the body and soul can still be saved. A mind can be restored through rehabilitation and magic.
Of course, this control can even reach the soul, at which point Guinevere knows they are beyond saving.
That is because the soul is one's identity.
"!" the ones that approached her brandished daggers coated in poison and stabbed her with them.
However, their blades broke when coming into contact with her armor that negated most damage.
She let out a quiet sigh, expressing disappointment… and sadness.
"I see." Her face was gentle and voice composed… but in the span of a second, she tore them all apart even before anyone could blink.
One's head was still attached to his spine and the other's right side of his body was torn off his skeleton.
Another's head was crushed under her backhanded fist while the last one's head burst when she punched him in the face.
Several shrieks resounded.
No mercy to the irredeemable—that is what her people taught her when she underwent her Valkyrie training.
"T-Taste the Hell Fires of the demon world itself! Fire that can never be e-extinguished!" a moment later, the magic circle spat out a torrent of searing hot flame that melted everything as it made its way over to Guinevere.
The follower behind her literally turned into particles, as did everything else behind her.
Engulfed in the fire of Hell itself, all sound vanished and she could only listen to her own thoughts.
But as someone who vowed to rid this world of irredeemable souls, she could not stay alone with those thoughts.
"Wha!?"
Guinevere stepped out of the line of fire, escaping the flames unscathed. Her armor was perfectly fine as well.
"You killed your comrade without any hesitation. There is no doubt about it—all of you are irredeemable."
They stepped back upon seeing her without any injuries.
"Shit! That's our strongest spell—an Eighth-Rank dark magic spell—and she felt nothing!?"
"Retreat to the morgue! Let Head Priest deal with the knight there!"
Upon one of them shouting, the others scattered.
Guinevere jumped lightly onto one of the buildings and began to follow them. This Head Priest must've received the most corruption (power) from the demons so he must be more powerful than the others.
As she flew, she noticed her eye was tearing up.
'Why?' she squinted hard to force it out but both eyes continued to tear up.
She came to a stop and looked down at her hands. The tears came down like a waterfall.
Through clouded vision, she took another look around.
These streets were once filled with laughing children playing with all their friends, merchants keeping the markets lively and dogs barking happily at each other.
Guinevere landed on the ground and looked at the victims, most of whom died with their eyes open.
They lay lifeless—a little child impaled by a sword, a pregnant woman's head cut off, a hardworking city guard's stomach cut open with his intestines used to strangle him.
These deaths were not meant to serve as sacrifices alone.
They were toyed with, all so that the perpetrators can test their newfound strength or embrace their corruption.
"Twelfth-Rank Magic - Einherjar." A giant magic circle appeared behind Guinevere. Upon finishing the divine incantation, six women—their faces covered in bandages and each with four wings behind their backs—appeared. They wore identical white robes with strange necklaces made of pure gold. All six carried exorcism artifacts.
This was one of her highest-ranking divine summons that she only uses in a mass exorcism if she has her hands full with a powerful enemy. She never needed the spell until now but whatever the humans were about to summon was perhaps some evil god that must never know what lay beyond these walls.
She won't be able to take care of the roaming demons while fighting.
"Any human who accepted the demons' power—purge them." The six angels nodded and left her side with tremendous speed.
She went back to flying towards the graveyard and arrived in mere seconds. Unlike the rest of the city, the graveyard had wooden walls instead of stone. Normally there wouldn't be walls in a graveyard since it's ever-expanding. But seeing as how the wall wasn't that high up and looked quite shabby, it was built in a hurry.
As expected, they don't want anything getting in or out. And by anything getting "out", that's referring to "sacrifices".
Guinevere landed in the middle of the graveyard. There was barely any room to walk since there were holes in the ground all around her. seeing that, she opted to levitate instead.
A sudden red light came from the building up ahead, a morgue where all the bodies were cleaned and prepared, perhaps.
She wasted no time and approached. As she approached, the voices coming from inside the building grew louder—
**
Inside the morgue—The Head Priest spoke the ten pages long incantation, reciting it in perfect godorin dialect. But his voice sounded distant, as if something deep within him was speaking in his place.
The Head Priest had long lost his humanity, both in appearance and mind. Upon receiving demon energy, he transformed into a devil with red, scaly skin, with the head of a monster with hundreds of teeth. His red eyes blitzed across the page as his throaty voice resounded in the chambers.
Behind him stood four other priests, ready to sacrifice their own lives if it meant summoning the great Suvuluk. This was no ordinary devil or demon—it was a Demon God of Old who ruled the mortal realm and cast fear upon it before magic beasts or demons even lived in this world.
He was driven out by All-Father Zephyros before he could extend his rule and revive his brethren.
He was the calamity before calamity, a being said to equal the Demon King in strength.
How could those corrupted by demon energy not seek to receive power from this powerful figure?
The Head Priest was visited by this dark revelation in his dreams—or so he claimed. In truth, no one knew whether it was a dream or a seed planted into his mind by the very will of Suvuluk himself. Each night, he heard whispers beneath his pillow, each word spoken in a voice that wasn't meant for mortals to hear.
The other priests feared him at first. But fear soon gave way to devotion, for the power seeping through him was undeniable. His miracles became twisted—the dead no longer rotted, but stood up and served. His blessings healed wounds, but replaced flesh with scales. Every act of his faith became a curse to the living, and still, his followers believed.
And so, when the Head Priest declared the time had come to summon Suvuluk into the mortal realm, none opposed him. They carved the bodies of the sacrifices into grotesque effigies, aligning them around the morgue in a formation. Blood dripped into channels carved into the stone floor, flowing like rivers toward the black altar.
The ten-page incantation reached its final lines. The priest's voice broke into guttural roars that no human throat should have been able to produce. The air quaked, the torches along the walls flickering with green flames, shadows writhing as though alive.
The four priests raised their daggers in unison and plunged them into their own hearts. Blood sprayed, the last of their strength feeding the spell.
The remaining five priests watched on in silence, their eyes unable to leave the back of the head priest.
The ground shuddered.
The bodies on the floor twisted, bones cracking, flesh bubbling as they merged together into a grotesque mass, then turning into particles of red light that was sent into the runic formation on the floor. A single, massive heartbeat echoed through the morgue, shaking dust from the ceiling.
And then—
Like a storm announcing its arrival over the wetlands, a thunderous boom resounded when the magic formation formed a portal, as red as the blood of its victims.
A claw broke free from the red portal, tearing through the air like a blade.
A horned head emerged next, far too large for not just the portal but the chamber, its ridges scraping gouges into the ceiling.
Rows upon rows of teeth gnashed inside a maw that stretched across its whole face, the sound like grinding boulders. The Head Priest and his comrades fell to their knees in reverence, their eyes wide with ecstasy.
A beastly growl rumbled throughout the building.
Suvuluk's body unfolded from the portal. His limbs were too long, jointed at odd angles, claws scraping along the walls, leaving trails that hissed like acid. Where his feet touched the stone floor, it cracked and wept black fire.
The Head Priest's voice trembled, broken yet elated, as he lifted his arms:
"Behold—the Old Demon God, calamity of calamities! SUVULUK RETURNS TO CAST FEAR INTO THE DIVINE REALM!"
The great beast lowered its head, its rows of teeth splitting apart in mockery of a grin. Its eyes—if they could be called eyes—burned like furnaces, not with light, but with hunger.
And then it spoke.
Its voice did not come from its maw but from inside the minds of all present, a sound like a thousand whispers spoken at once, hollow and endless:
"Ahh, at last… I breathe your world again."
The torches went out.
The morgue was plunged into darkness, save for the molten cracks spreading beneath Suvuluk's feet and the portal twisting on the floor next to him.
With a single breath, he exhaled a wave of heat so intense the corpses in the room turned to ash.
The Demon God of Old had manifested.
A golden light suddenly crashed through the front of the morgue, breaking its wall apart in a storm of dust and shattered stone. The brilliance was blinding, streaking faster than any eye could follow. Before any of the corrupted priests could even gasp, the radiance speared straight through Suluvuk's monstrous chest, driving him backward with a thunderous crack.
The Demon God's roar shook the very foundations of the morgue as his body was hurled into the rear wall, the weight of his form collapsing the ceiling and burying him in rubble.
Someone blitzed into the room, landing right on top of Suluvuk—one foot on his forehead and the other standing on her sword that had pierced his chest.
"—You shall not leave these town walls alive, Suluvuk."