Going back a bit in the battle.
We see a badly wounded and blinded Dante, recovering from the attack delivered by the Egyptian sky god.
"Damn, that hurts," he thought to himself.
"Yeah, it was horrible," Kiss-shot commented.
"Don't complain, because now I'll be deformed for the rest of my life," Dante said playfully telepathically.
"If you want, we just need to synchronize our souls one more time, and I'll temporarily grant you my regenerative abilities, and you'll be as good as new," Kiss-shot said, also telepathically.
Dante noticed Horus giving a speech, but he ignored it.
"I think it's time to move on with the plan," he said.
"That means I can finally fight," Kiss-shot said excitedly.
"Exactly. The moment my shadow connects with his, quickly move to the other side and wait," Dante instructed.
"Understood," Kiss-shot said.
...
Back in the present, the Olympian gods watched everything unfold, and the most intrigued of them all was Zeus.
He had accepted all of this with the expectation that Dante would die in battle, and he would wonder why, and that would be because of the prophecy.
As much as he had tried to ignore it, his blood was steeped in paranoia and fulfilled prophecies, and that was something that, as much as he disliked admitting it, terrified him.
Eliminating Dante was the best way to prevent the fall of Olympus, thus preventing the prophecy from coming true, but Zeus had no reason, not even an unjust one, to kill him.
The chief god of Olympus wasn't worried about Dante, since he believed he could deal with him one way or another, but seeing how he fought, his skills, and above all, and most importantly right now, the sword he held in his hands...
He felt the power of that weapon; it was otherworldly, perhaps a product of chaos itself, but he knew it could cut him in half, which raised Dante's threat level by about 100 notches.
On the battlefield.
The pressure on Horus was immense; he had let his guard down and was now paying dearly for it. His powers had been weakened, and now the fight had become a two-on-one battle.
He looked at the dark sky, absorbing the rays of the natural sun.
He immediately deduced that the sun had something to do with all of this, but it wasn't clear, since what worried him most were those two swords.
The one the woman wielded was capable of cutting, and from what he sensed from the man's sword, the same should be true.
Just seeing that crimson sword made his blood run cold.
In the world of One Piece, the sword could never be used in its full glory; there was only one occasion, and that was when it was first drawn, because, even though Dante's father was human, his title was connected to a dragon and a god, something that was more than enough for the sword.
Now he faced an opponent many times his size, allowing him to unleash his full power like never before.
Before he could make a move, Kiss-shot and Dante, Horus's divinity surged to immeasurable levels.
Dante narrowed his eyes, realizing what he was doing. He was using his divinity at its fullest potential to counter Cerberus's powers, but this would surely weaken him in the long run and might even leave him without divinity for an indefinite period.
Horus didn't have much left to do; it was this or die, and it was better to stay alive, since in the future Thoth and Isis could do something about the state that was ending.
Kiss-shot launched the first attack, and with a swift leap, she reached Horus, attempting to slice him in half. But her opponent moved, dodging the attack and counterattacking with her wings. And since the vampire didn't know the meaning of the word "defend," the attack landed squarely on her.
This attack launched her into the air, which he used to his advantage, striking her repeatedly and sending several steel feathers flying, which he destroyed, creating a spectacle of blood and body parts scattered around the area.
Seeing his opponent, he thought, "I'm dead." He looked at Dante, only to find he wasn't there, but quickly realized that someone was about to attack from behind him.
He thought it was Dante. He braced himself, but his eyes widened in surprise, as the one standing there was none other than the woman he had killed, completely healed and without a trace of blood.
This gave Kiss-shot the opportunity to deliver a blow that sent him flying hundreds of meters, all the way to the sea.
But before he hit the water, Dante was already beside him, ready with his attack.
"πορφυρό φεγγάρι (porfyró fengári)," said Dante to launch a cut of energy full of conqueror haki, which almost split Horus in two; he was only saved by his wings and by boosting his defense with his divinity to the maximum.
When Horus fell to the ground, golden blood could be seen dripping from his body as he struggled to keep his entrails and other organs from spilling out while he rapidly regenerated.
Dante and Kiss-shot lunged at him simultaneously, intending to sever his head and end this.
But with all his might, he unleashed a colossal beam of light above him, which pierced the shadow cloud in the sky. This instantly stopped them both. Horus was unaffected by his own attack thanks to Ra's blessing.
The two lovers looked up at the sky, seeing multiple beams hurtling toward them; Kiss-shot could only dodge. But Dante, wielding the Murasama, hurled it with everything he had at Horus as the chasm in the sky closed once more, shrouded in darkness.
Horus unleashed attacks of wind, steel feathers, and even more beams of light, but Dante, with his speed and swordsmanship, cut through everything without slowing down in the slightest. The moment he stood before Horus, he was able to slice his opponent in the blink of an eye.
But this was futile, as Horus's divine power continued to heal him relentlessly. Faced with this, Dante transformed into his hybrid form and, using his eyes, saw Horus's lifelines.
He severed them effortlessly, using Armament Haki, Conqueror's Haki, and magic in between, allowing him to penetrate Horus's defenses.
In those cuts, he managed to sever two lifelines, something Horus realized drastically shortened his lifespan.
Dante tried to continue his attack, but to act so quickly and precisely, he had to strain his muscles and hold his breath, something he could no longer do, causing him to tire even more. Horus took advantage of this, striking him with his wings and sending him flying. He then soared into the air, easily avoiding further attacks from his opponents.
Dante simply smiled at this.
"Ύδρα του ΣϺότους (Ndra tou Skótous)," Dante announced, and darkness began to rise at his feet, quickly transforming into multiple dragon heads that flew toward Horus.
To the god's horror, several more dragon heads also emerged from the dark clouds in the sky, heading straight for him.
"Apophis," said Horus, as this situation reminded him of the serpent, but in smaller versions. Unfortunately for the god, they were almost as lethal as the real thing.
Horus, using the sky, tried to destroy the dragon heads, but since they weren't physical beings, the attacks from the sky weren't very effective, as Dante quickly reformed them as soon as they were destroyed.
The god didn't react in time, which allowed three dragon heads of darkness to reach his arm. The moment they bit him, the entire area began to be absorbed by a singularity.
Horribly, the god of the skies had no choice but to cut off his arm to prevent the rest of his body from being absorbed, managing to escape the absorption by sacrificing his entire arm.
This made Dante realize something: Horus was already making mistakes; this was due to his exhaustion.
"Kiss, I need you to do something," Dante told him telepathically.
"What do you need?" he replied, keeping a safe distance from the situation but ready to attack; he knew it wasn't a good idea to attack the god while he was in the air.
"I need you to distract Horus, because I have a way to drain all of his divinity, or at least most of it," Dante informed him.
"Understood," Kiss-shot said, running toward the god.
"This could go very well or very badly," Dante whispered to himself, launching a ball of light near Horus before moving away from the fight.
Horus was watching Dante's magic closely, but seeing that it did nothing confused the god. However, she couldn't focus on that, as Kiss-Shot was already running in his direction.
To her surprise, she saw that he was heading toward the shadow cast by the light source.
Kiss-Shot, using his swords now in hand, slashed the wing in the shadow, only to see Horus's real wing cut in the same way as the shadow.
(Note: I feel the Yami Yami no Mi and the Kage Kage no Mi are fruits that are very underutilized. Moria is inept and only uses them to steal shadows, and Blackbeard uses his fruit only to steal other fruits and negate the abilities of others. They haven't done anything so far, so I feel they could be used much more than what we see. It must have taken years to fully explore the potential of both fruits, which is why I'm inventing powers that haven't been shown in the series yet, but I think they could perfectly well be implemented.)
The vampire didn't stop there and continued slashing the shadow, which was reflected on the god's body.
This caused Horus to fall to the ground, as Kiss-shot had severed his wings, which he was trying to heal. She didn't have her attack, so as he fell, I attacked him with a beam of light, which he saw hit him, watching as the figure within the beam evaporated.
Now on the ground, Horus focused on healing himself as quickly as possible, only for Kiss-shot to appear out of nowhere and punch him in the face. A shadow resembling the vampire, but made entirely of shadow, grabbed him in a hold.
Kiss-shot was now in front of the god and, using all the Haki she could muster, punched Horus in the stomach, making him spit blood, only to follow up with rapid successive blows.
"Muda muda muda muda muda," Kiss-shot said, continuing to pummel the god. Only to look up and see a beam of light about to kill her. Only to replace herself with her shadow, avoiding the deadly attack that could have killed her.
Standing on his back, he spun him around to kick him, sending him crashing to the ground and destroying everything in his path.
Once he was on the ground and free from Kiss-shot's grip, Horus rose again and, with several feathers, destroyed the light source Dante had created.
While the god was being attacked by the vampire, he used all his strength and divinity to heal his wings instead of protecting them.
Horus glared at Kiss-shot with rage and hatred; the god was panting, his body nearly limp. His strength was waning, and his divinity was slowly fading.
Without wasting a moment, Horus unleashed another attack of solar beams, as it was the only thing capable of killing her.
Kiss-shot created several shadows of herself that began running around everywhere. Every time a lightning bolt was about to strike her, she simply swapped places with one of her shadows, narrowly escaping death.
This frustrated the Egyptian god, as it seemed she was mocking him, and in a way, she was.
"Kiss, quickly return to my shadow. This is dangerous," Dante told her telepathically.
She simply vanished, submerging herself in her own shadow, which took Horus by surprise. He turned to see Dante slowly walking toward him, a finger raised.
Horus, using his divine vision, saw that a real black hole had formed at Dante's fingertip, unlike the others that merely resembled its properties.
Using the power of darkness, Dante can recreate the conditions of a black hole, but creating a real one is more complicated, not to mention unstable; hence, he asked Kiss-shot to distract Horus, since if this went wrong, everyone there could die, and that still holds true, as the black hole could become unstable at any moment.
(Note: Using the abilities of the Yami Yami no Mi, he can create singularities that he can absorb and destroy, but these are not black holes, no matter how much he calls them that; however, what he just created is indeed one.)
Dante's fingertip was indiscriminately absorbing everything in its path. Thanks to his Devil Fruit, Dante can negate the absorption and gravitational distortion of the black hole itself.
"Let's see if he can withstand this," Dante said, only to crush the black hole, making it disappear.
Only then, a singularity appeared before Horus, where the mini black hole appeared right in front of him.
"σουπερνόβα (Soupernova)," Dante pronounced.
Using his abilities, Dante was stabilizing the black hole, but since he could no longer keep it stable, it exploded right in Horus's face, creating an explosion more powerful than an atomic blast.
Without wasting a moment, Dante used all the power of the darkness that enveloped the explosion, containing it as much as he could.
Dante was seen shivering, sweat pouring down his body. The explosion was so chaotic and massive that he was barely able to contain all the energy of the blast.
Within the giant dome of darkness, roughly 5 kilometers across, a beam of energy shot out, disintegrating everything it touched; then another appeared, and then another.
Dante was beginning to falter. He tried to compress the unleashed energy as much as possible, but he couldn't. Only for the explosion to overwhelm him, destroying everything in its path.
Thanks to Dante's intervention, the explosion was contained, destroying 98% of the island and leaving only a few patches of land.
Dante could nullify the effects of the black hole, but not the explosion itself, so he emerged with multiple injuries, missing an arm and an eye.
Using his remaining energy and Haki, he enveloped the area in darkness to re-intertwine his soul with Kiss-shot's, which rapidly began healing his severe wounds, allowing his eye and arm to regenerate.
At the epicenter of the explosion, someone was seen crawling toward Dante.
Now healed, Dante returned his soul to its original form and walked to where his opponent was, surprisingly still alive. Only to find him in a pitiful state.
Horus was missing a hand and forearm; his entire right shoulder was gone. He was in his original form, covered in golden blood; he was missing a foot and an eye. His body was in a deplorable state, but Dante realized that he had no magical energy or divinity left.
He used everything he had to protect himself from the explosion, and it was moderately effective, since he didn't die, but considering how it was, it would have been better if he hadn't survived.
The god tried to attack Dante, but he couldn't; he had nothing, he was empty, just a god without anything. The only thing he had left was the eye Thoth had given him, but he couldn't use it for anything at that moment.
The god's appearance now was unrecognizable compared to his state at the start of the battle.
Dante summoned the Murasama again and shrouded the ground in darkness. Kiss-shot appeared beside him, perfectly unharmed, as she had been in Dante's shadow and thus unaffected by the explosion.
"Let's finish this," Dante said to Kiss-shot.
"It'll be for the best," she replied.
They both rushed toward Horus; Kiss-shot drew her katana, ready to attack.
She leaped forward, landing behind the god. She spun around and severed one of his lifelines.
"One," Kiss-shot announced.
Dante reached the god and severed two more lifelines.
"Two, three," he said.
"Four, five, six," the vampire spoke, severing three more lifelines.
Kiss-shot could sever the lifelines thanks to Dante's mental commands, which told her where to cut, using her Devil Fruit powers. It is enough for him to see the line being cut for it to take effect; he does not need to do it himself, but he does have to see it, otherwise the cut will not be made.
The reason they're doing this is that, thanks to the fruit's power, when the lifelines are severed, the subject dies without any possibility of resurrection; they could only be revived under different conditions, but their soul could never return to its original body; it's rendered useless.
"37," the vampire said, leaving the god's last lifeline.
Dante, without wasting a moment, raised the Murasama and with a vertical slash severed the remaining lifeline, killing the god without any possibility of resurrection under normal or even divine conditions, depending on what he might try to do.
But it didn't end there, since the body could still be used in some way, so with another slash, Dante cut off his head.
This gave Dante the victory in this battle on the side of the Greek gods.
Dante's POV
The moment I saw Horus's head hit the ground, I knew it was all over. My body realized this immediately, as exhaustion and phantom pains washed over me, forcing me to my knees.
"Are you okay?" Kiss-shot asked, running to my side.
"Physically, yes; mentally, it's another story," I replied, staring at the ground.
I looked at Horus's head, specifically the eye that had remained intact. I grabbed the head and pulled it closer to remove the eye.
The moment I had them in my hands, I realized they had a protective barrier, which is why they survived the explosion. But with the death of their wielder, the barrier ceased to function, which is why I was able to pull them from the god's head.
"What are you doing?" Kiss-shot asked, seeing my actions.
"War booty," I simply replied, prompting her to drop the head anywhere and collapse to the ground. "You'd better return to my shadow, as I could pass out from exhaustion at any moment."
She said nothing, simply disappearing into the shadows without much delay.
"The others should be here soon; just rest," she told me telepathically.
Containing the explosion and protecting myself from what remained affected me more than I thought it would; perhaps I'll never do that again, unless I want to destroy an entire country, something I can't imagine myself doing.
I closed my eyes and let unconsciousness carry me away.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hey everyone, the fight's over and Dante won. Our protagonist still has some things to do in the Greek pantheon, which is why I let him survive.
Also, I'm not very good at writing fight scenes, at least I don't think so, but I feel like this was the best one I've written so far, ignoring any mistakes I might have missed.
So, I hope you liked it, and with this, a new phase of the story begins where Dante will temporarily take a backseat to Libra for a few chapters. With that and a few other details, this part of the story will be ready to continue with the Holy Grail War. See you later.