"Out of my way!" Dante took down a hoard of monsters with a single slash.

He frantically looked left and right, trying to find his way through the burning carnage. He dashed forwards, running desperately towards the temple where Sora usually resided at, hoping for the best, but thinking of the worst. He finally managed to see the entrance of the temple, half destroyed by the ravaging flames. He ran inside, only to find a multitude of dead priests and priestesses lying on the dirt of the temple's garden.

"God..." he paused at the sight in front of him, "Sora! Sora, where are you?!" he called out to her again and again.

The only thing answering back to him was a gust of powerful wind and the cracking of the burning wood around him. He saw the melting of the iron statues and the crushing of the garden by the collapsing buildings which support gave in to the fire. He almost forgot to contain himself once more, as his growing anger wanted to let go of all control. Right before he could burst into both tears and power, he heard a loud and powerful roar coming from the main building. He instantly looked towards it as he started running towards it.

"Gahah!" Sora was thrown out of the building, rolling along the ground behind Dante, "I-I can't...Hikari...", she whispered before fainting.

"Sora! Are you alright?! Sora!" he shouted back at her, holding his position and preparing for whatever was inside the building to come out.

His expectations were quickly met, and a massive, fire-imbued monster blasted out of the building, tearing it to shreds before also burning the wreckage as well.

"Damn it! This heat..." Dante took a fully defensive position.

The monster then took the surrounding metal it had melted and began turning it into a part of its body, covering its head and arms, giving it a more human-like look. Tall as a building itself, it looked as if it was pinned to the ground, only possessing a body up to its waist. It looked down at Dante and to his surprise, started talking to him.

"Kneel before the mastery of the Pillars, Son of Cecilia. Do so and you may be allowed to serve as our slave."

"What even the hell are you?!" Dante yelled.

"Hell. As you said." the monster scoffed.

"What is your reason for doing this?! We had begun the peace period!"

"Peace? Do you think that we belong to something as puny as your world's so-called clans, nations or regions? You are lucky to be witnessing the world burning anew, so fill yourself with its grace!"

"I think the world is fine how it is, little one!" Viola jumped into action.

Viola landed in front of Dante with a powerful rain of light falling down upon the monster, piercing its metallic parts and filling it with holes. She cleaned the dust off her shoulder and stood up, completely armless in the face of the monster and a face full of confidence.

"Mrs. Viola?!" Dante said in surprise.

"More than just a cook Dante! I thought I'd let you do your thing from the Clock Tower, but better safe than sorry!" Viola giggled.

"How did you do that?!" he gazed in awe.

"Sheaf's secret. Though, the main ingredient is kind of...gone at the moment. Anyhow, shall we take care of this little fella?"

"Little?!"

"Oh, pfft! Come on! Don't let this illusion confuse you. Helash is plain normal size, just that he sucked a little bit too much of that good ol' fire."

Helash then fully recovered his metallic parts, recovering fully and looking back down at Viola and bursting out flames of anger from his body.

"Valkyrie! I'll send you back straight to hell, with all those flying mosquitoes of yours!"

"Nope! Pretty sure they're all dancing high above you right now, given how big of a campfire you came out to be." Viola mocked the Helash.

"Burn in hell!"

Helash began closing both his arms together to crush Dante and Viola together.

"Dante, block for me a little."

Dante took on his blocking stance, "Wait, what for-gnn!" his words got interrupted by Viola's move.

Viola horse kicked Dante's sword, forcing him several meters backwards next to the fainted Sora, as he firmly held his stance. She then jumped back into her form and extended both her arms and legs outwards, preparing for Helash's strike.

"Squished like the fly you are!"

Helash clashed both his massive, metal arms with Viola's, making a massive gust of wind come out between them but failing to crush Viola.

"Doubting a Valkyrie's strength?" Viola smirked.

"I'll kill all of you in a single instance," Helash said.

Helash's palms began to light up, as he bent both his wrists, touching them together and preparing to fire a massive blast towards them all.

"No..." Viola's eyes widened. "Duck!"

Dante fell down to the ground as Viola punched the ground, shifting the platform Helash's hands rested on up and redirecting the blast straight to her, her barely being able to cover her face in the process. After his attack was over, Viola found herself kneeling before Helash, her armor half-burned from the blast. She slowly began to faint as well, the attack petrifying her body.

"Pathetic.", Helash slapped Viola out of the way.

"Stay the hell back!" Dante stepped forward.

Helash scoffed, "Seriously? Even the weak get to raise their voice now? Be gone."

Helash began to mercilessly pound Dante again and again and again, crushing him down to the ground a number of times and that left his boy covered with blood. Dante dropped his sword easily as he then began slowly crawling to Sora who was now beginning to slowly regain her consciousness.

"Dan...te?", Sora began slowly crawling her way towards him.

"Ghk...aghk...", Dante tried slowly standing up, his young body rapidly giving in to his injuries, "Stay down, Sora. I've got this."

"You idiot...don't-"

"You can't stop me. Neither can him."

Sora smirked as she slowly found her footing again, "Don't do it...without me. I've seen enough of you hurting yourself close to death. Let's do this together."

"What? Sora..."

Before he could say another word, the little goddess stood beside the young Dante, leaning on him as he did the same. The two now stood before the hellish monster that kept on fueling itself with the burned carnage that once resembled a temple.

"So they stood before me, both those who denied the bond, only to be burned to ashes." Helash poetically said, almost laughing at their miserable state, "Disappear the same way you appeared, insignificance."

Dante closed his eyes before taking on a defensive stance, hoping for the best and praying that this hell would pass too. Helash raised his hand once again, hastily hammering it down to the injured Dante and Sora, only to have it completely broken into bits, from Dante's powerful slash.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

"Gyah!" Helash retracted his injured arm, "What?!"

Dante slowly opened his eyes, "What? Wait-", he took a look at his body.

Dante was shimmering with his signature red sparks all over, as the sword he thought to be a military standard had managed to cut through the massive chuck of hammering steel, saving him and Sora. However, what he thought to be a moment of saving grace swiftly turned into further and deeper despair, as he looked next to him to find a horribly bleeding and in a worse state than before. It looked as if she was barely able to bleed through the ongoing flow of red covering her young lips.

"Sora?! What the hell did you do?! Sora, talk to me!"

"Enough!", Helash punctured the ground with his broken arm, rapidly obtaining the metals below ground and instantly getting back into the fight, "Get out of the conquest's way!"

Helash raised all hell, as massive pillars and tornadoes of fire rose up and started to close in on the temple's parameters. He broke the edges of his metal part's gauntlets, revealing a menacing, crystal-like pair of claws. His form began to rapidly shrink, as he brought himself down to the size of the average human, now standing at the centre of the temple, looking straight at Dante.

"Fear the fire concentrated, not separated. Son of Cecilia, this is where the line is drawn. Prepare to face a fate worse than demise, for your sin of procrastination!"

Dante burst into a fit of rage, sparks rapidly flowing out left and right as he started to handle his massive sword with one hand. The young Dante took on a wide stance, left hand behind his back and right arm extended towards Helash, preparing to make a lethal move against him. Helash paused for a long moment, truly realizing what exactly was standing before him and regretting ever provoking the monster within.

"No way...this kid...he's killing himself for this? There's no way he possesses that power, let alone control it..." he whispered.

The silence continued for a little while longer, both still firmly holding on to their positions. It was then that Helash decided to make his move.

"Die, imbecile!" he raised his left hand, preparing to make a powerful attack.

"Full speed ahead," Dante muttered.

Dante blinked directly and behind Helash, landing a devastating strike straight through his chest before turning around to finish with a powerful backslash. That specific slash, though lacking the clash of an actual hard surface, echoed throughout the city as time itself seemed to freeze from the sheer speed and power within the movement itself. Dante then blinked again as the ground underneath Helash suddenly burst, sending him upwards where a series of dazzling, red-sparked X slashes stroke his body and disappear in an instant afterwards. Practically frozen in mid-air, Helash gazed around as his vision faded as he too failed to realize what exactly was going on, before looking directly above him to witness Dante reappearing right then and there.

"Checkmate, asshole."

Finishing his barrage Dante made a vertical slash similar to his finisher on his first blink. That slash however had its power way less controlled as it emitted even greater strength than the initial one. The world came to a sudden freeze again as the remains of the temple seemed to rapidly divide into multiple slashed pieces, those refusing to drop from the laws of nature, as time itself seemed to be meaningless. The surrounding tornadoes and pillars of fire seemed to also freeze from the devastating slashes coming their way. Harshly landing, Dante twisted the massive claymore around with ease, before seething back. What followed the moment he seethed it was a massive blast, as the slashes began to rapidly detonate in rapid succession and time began to come back to its normal state. The temple's sliced parts rapidly collapsed around them as Helash was violently thrashed from mid-air straight to the ground, following the momentum of Dante's finishing slash. All came to a swift end in a moment's notice, as if a raging storm suddenly were to disappear and be replaced by sunlight. It was the first time he had seen himself with the absolute necessity and will to go overboard on the abilities that made him the monster inside that he was. And despite it all, his body started giving in continuously, despite Sora's healing, as if a poison began rapidly shutting down his body. He desperately tried to limb his way towards the dying Sora.

"D-Damn...these...powers! Screw this Obsulyte! Why me?!"

He shouted before he returned to the engulfing silence. Not long before he could say another word, the silence was filled by the hoard of the coming monsters who were all menacingly and rapidly climbing up the hill. Dante quickly climbed his way past Sora's wounded body and close to the remnants of the temple's gates, preparing to give what little he had left to the coming hoard of monsters. Before their steel could come into contact, once again, a wide range of divine horizontal lights came from every sort of direction, taking out all the monsters around, behind and on his sides. Not able to support himself any longer, Dante pinned his sword on the ground and used it as support to hold himself up as he lifted his head to see the source of the light, immediately regretting what he came to face with.

"B-Big...brother?"

Dante's little sister's widened and tear-soaked eyes met with his as she quickly realized what her brother had pushed himself into. Firmly holding on to Viola's bow, she slowly tapped one tiny foot after the other, unable to run but stare at the state that everything around her was. To him, it was a familiar second. To her, it was a new kind of hell. Finally making her way up to him, she looked around at the wounds on his body. None. He dared not to muffle a word as she failed to do anything but shed tears into realizing her powerlessness at the moment.

"I...I can't heal you. This...I can't heal this. The Remedy Knights can't..." she looked at Dante with a frightened face.

"Your oath..." Dante silently said before looking at his little sister's hilt.

Sword confined. This was her loophole. This was how she first chose to bend the rules...all for him. Not because she had to. But because she wanted to. She had managed to protect her oath and simultaneously him.

"Little sis...I'm...sorry." he silently said.

No reply from her ever came, rather than a look to the side, gazing upon the wounded body of Sora, laying there on the ground behind him. A sudden and massive echo of a hoard of monsters came forth again, making their way from the other side of the hill. It was at that moment that the inspiration of Sora's image made her make her decision.

"Stand still. I think...I think I can do it.", she pressed her hand against her brother's chest.

"What the hell are you-?"

"I think...it worked." Dante's little sister began losing her consciousness too.

She kneeled and grunted as she brought herself to a similar state to Sora's, dropping down and squealing in pain as he grabbed her, breaking her fall and realizing that the situation had quickly repeated itself.

"What did you do?! Lil' sis, come on!" he shook her in his arms.

Viola grunted as she moved ever so slowly towards the two. She took a look to the front, looking at them both before looking back at the dying Sora. She paused briefly before exhaling and moving up to Dante and his little sister.

"Viola! What's happening?! What's going on?"

"Hold her still." Viola approached and placed her hand on Dante's little sister's chest.

The grunting and panting stopped as his little sister fainted completely. Viola seemed to recover herself, as her wounds faded. A squeal came soon after as she grabbed her head as if she were having a massive headache.

"God..." Viola squeezed her head.

"What did you do as well?! Someone explain to me!" Dante yelled.

Viola powered through the pain, "She's fine...your sister. It's an art used by Valkyries that Sora knew, probably passed down to your little sister. We share injuries...the first time Sora healed you, it was just wounds. This time, your little sister took something much, much worse than just physical wounds...ghak!" Viola kneeled, "It was like an infection. I stopped it...by taking it in. She won't be affected by the spread and her healing should kick in because of her Remedy Knight's abilities. Please...run. Listen to me, take your sister and run!" Viola yelled.

"No! I'm not leaving anyone behind, not you and not Sora!"

"Your friends have escaped. Anya is safe, Terna has been taken out of here by an officer and so did Sisi with her dad. Please, run back to your brother on the royal grounds...please be together!"

"I refuse to let them get away with what they did!" Dante tightened his grip on his little sister.

Coming up the hill, the monsters gathered around Helash's extinguished body and so did their leader. From top to bottom a powerful presence, the armor clanked against the metal seethe with every step on his descent. The figure went and stood above Helash's body.

"Looks like all that hate of yours burned you up.", he folded his arms.

Viola's eyes widened at the mere sight of him, "Gladeon..."

"Reburn him. I've got other tasks at hand."

Gladeon turned around and walked away slowly, fading away as quickly as he appeared, as the monsters all started to burn each other alive around Helash's body. From the ashes of the burned monsters, Helash's consciousness started slowly coming back as a massive roar of anger as he got up, reigniting the entire area around him in a much more devastating and violent manner than before.

"Dante!" he yelled with all his might, "I'll ruin you!"

Helash turned and looked at Sora's body and before anyone could make or say another word, he clawed the air, separating Viola and Dante from Sora with a massive ring of fire. He punched the ground, forcing fire to ceremoniously gather around Sora.

"No-ah!" Viola tried to move towards them but kneeled to the ground again, suffering heavily from the pain in her head, "G-Goddess! Don't you dare-ghk!" she fell to the ground.

"No, no, no!", Dante tried to move towards her, ignoring the fire, before realizing again that he was holding on to his injured sister, "Dammit, not like this! Not like-"

His yelling stopped abruptly as his eyes connected with Sora's. She was not in pin. She was not frightened. All she could return to him while being engulfed by the fire was a kind, gentle smile that she always gave to him, encouraging him to go forth. He watched as the fire burned and ravaged her body and as tears started rolling down her face, her smile never faded, before she mustered all her remaining strength to speak a few soft words before her demise.

"Remember me....when it all goes down...I will always be there. I will always be there...for you..." she closed her eyes to embrace the inevitable.

He thought of crying, he thought of bursting into a fit of anger again. He thought of mourning her and vengeance against those who dared to hurt her. He did none of those but instead stare in the familiar feeling horror at what was happening before him. As his body was consumed, Helash fed off Sora, engulfing the entire area into flames again, regaining his entire strength and laughing above everything and everyone.

"I'll kill them all. I'll kill them!" Dante snapped out of it.

"You'll do none of that. It's not you." Viola slowly rose up.

"Viola if you stop me again I swear-", Dante's fit of rage was interrupted by Viola violently breaking his sword in half.

"Get out. I'll do it for you. You're just a kid...let me destroy them." Viola slowly walked towards Helash, summoning her own sword out of thin air and moving forwards.