Monarch of Darkness, Arsene

"We can't!" I muttered beneath my breath, clenching my fist as my wounds began to bleed a dark rich red.

"We've been given an order," Leviathan grimly argued, bowing her head. "An absolute order. Tell me you can't feel it? Tell me your blood isn't howling as well? Mother has given the Order."

"This is going too far!" I shouted, spitting the blood that congealed within my mouth. It wasn't sweet as it once was. But somewhat coppery and bitter. "If Arsene doesn't kill us, then our daughter surely will."

"Hon," she muttered, taking a seat near me.

"It's one thing to pull some shit like this of my free will, but when it's at someone else, it makes my skin crawl. We are taking things too far."

Leviathan released a long sigh as she sat next to me, resting her head over my shoulders, "they'll never know the truth, you know. They'll only know that we ordered it. We were asked to kill the entire celestial family. Shit is fucked up."

Clenching my fist, I looked up a the moon, covered in flames; the heat was pressing against my skin, as were the screams that echoed every night since twenty-five hell gates opened up. We'd lost the army a week ago to the Dao of Sin; all of them had fallen into monstrous states. And with each day that passed, Levi and I were losing our will.

"I'd had this theory long ago, Levi." I softly said, wiping the blood from my lips, "A theory that states that all of us were just sacrifices to some higher power. That no matter what we do. No matter what we say, we are empty husks believing free will exists.

"Asmo," She whispered.

"My love for you, my achievements as the current incarnation of Asmodeus, the Divinity I hold." I closed my eyes and sighed, "Looking at my current state now, I think it might be true. We demons and Devils have no fucking free will. We're dogs. Dogs of the Fallen and—

Feeling something soft cover my mouth, I knew I was saying too much. Removing Levi's hands from my lips, stained by my blood from the earlier battle, I bitterly smile.

"Time to clean house. It's been a long time coming."

"I'll handle the Celestrial and Arsene's family; you head out and get Azeroth. We need a true Devil to stand with us on the front lines." I commanded and stood up like a spear on two feet. Holding back the searing pain from having my chest run through by an angelic blade, back when almost every Paragon fought one another, I clenched the wound over my chest that had missed two of my hearts.

"Asmo, when this war started," she started sending me a sad look, "I never thought I'd betray our daughter. If I see Arsene, I'll give him the Throne of Darkness; I've already placed the shard into his—"

"I don't wanna know," I said, shaking my head; who knows the damage I could do, at a later date. I'd say you wipe your memories of it too. No telling what the hell will happen a hundred years later."

Rising high into the skies, I hastily stopped myself as I snapped my head towards the east, as a foreboding power rippled out.

"Lord Belphegor?" I muttered, feeling Arsene's presence nearby.

Knowing what was happening, I flickered to see one of my Marquess releasing a fiendish smile as he opened his palm.

"ARSENE!!! " he howled.

"Stop!" I adamantly commanded. "Arsene is off-limits. You know the rules; you can beat him, torture him, **** him but never kill him. We clear?"

Marquess Yor'fenli's greyish eyes lingered on me as I pushed my every fear down as Lord Belphegor's blessing rippled out.

Each blessing had its particular effect. Lucifer's granted semi-invincibility all around by adding Almighty Essence into your every attack. Beelzebub was the most dangerous as it would extinguish any life that didn't have a blessing. I was sure my daughter was protecting them with her Abyssal Qi, but when Lord Beelzebub's essence rippled out a week ago, everyone should have died.

Lord Belphegor's blessing robs the laws, making it so that no matter what you do, where you run, or how strong your body is. Everything will turn into an illusion, and with a single snap, you fade away just like every illusion does.

It's a terrifying blessing that leaves a small window of survivability.

"And Elder God such as yourself using a blessing against a low god? What the hell is wrong with you?" I snapped, watching the grey in his eyes glow.

"I'll say you've no right to speak to a fallen like that?" A coldly amused voice uttered as I fell to my knee, coughing up a mouthful of blood; a wave of unholy pressure came crashing down, almost crushing my soul.

"So you possessed one of your followers?" The amused voice remarked.

"Mephisto, what is it your doing here?"

"Nothing much; I was planning on visiting my disciple, but something stopped me when I felt a mighty fallen like yourself power pierced through the thirty-three heavens.

"You can't always be there to interfere." Marquess Yor'fenli or whoever was possessing him said, causing me to shake in my boots.

Satan's beard, why the hell did I have to come here!

"Belphegor," Mephisto stated, drenching me in sweat, "I will not hesitate to kill you."

"Oh? And you think you can?" Lord Belphegor uttered, bellowing in laughter, as I felt a scarlet sigil of a royal crest that stands above the laws, above the gods, above the thirty-three heavens appear.

The wound upon my chest began to ooze deep dark blood as I felt it began to be covered in pestilence. Gritting my teeth, Mephisto chuckled.

"Do you know why Zariel is not here?" He patiently asked, "Because I've led him to you, dear brother, and because my real body is also there, I don't mind taking the time out of my day to kill you now."

"You think I'm scared of Zariel? The so-call silver devil? The boy is merely one chosen!" Lord Belphegor argued, bellowing in cruel laughter, 'I've got Adam and Eve,"

"And we've got Zero," Lord Mephisto calmly said, "I'll be heading to your layer of hell, and I assure you nothing short of Father's command will not stop me from tearing your head off. Arsene is off-limits."

"Little brother!" Lord Belphegor thundered in laughter, "We are fallen! Nothing is off-limits! We rebel!"

"Then I'll not be the only one cleaning house this day."