The...The Abyss?! Oh no. But the Abyss died a thousand years ago! This was bad.

I turned and started running, but only after running a short distance from the black hole, a black tentacle had grabbed my feet. I slowly traced where the tentacle came from and it protruded from the black hole. Soon, more tentacles came out. Noooooooo!

The tentacles slowly entangled me, trying to hold me down while I struggled to run away. I tried to concentrate on trying to blast these damned things but the mana in the air was being sucked by these gropers.

Arc2Illu2.5 [http://i.imgur.com/lOU2xO0.jpg]

I yelped as the tentacles started to touch me in places that I didn’t want them touching me. Damn these things! I’m a thousand year old man! I shouldn’t be squealing like a little girl! However, the tentacles weren’t my biggest concern. I looked over where the black hole was at and I saw two mesmerizing eyes staring at me. My suspicions were correct…

“My dearest Conqueror. I have finally found you. I have longed your embrace and your undivided attention. How you cared for me, protected me, loved me without conditions. Oh, my dearest. I’ve wanted to see you all these time,” The female voice boomed. The voice was mature, with a commanding and seductive tone like a gentle empress that loved to torture people in her free time.

She revealed herself out of the black hole. Her body was like a staring at the endless space, devoid of anything, yet filled with everything. While her body mostly had a feminine humanoid shape, her hair was a nest of tentacles, like a medusa’s head. She was holding a colorless curved greatsword with jagged ends that doesn’t look like it has a fixed shape. I could tell that it was a void sword, a weapon that could tear through reality.

Arc2Illu3 [http://i.imgur.com/N2Z0MY2.jpg]

She stared at me for a second…- No, wait. Time itself had stopped. Logically speaking, it should. Because there’s a black hole right where the Abyss was standing. I scratched the side of my head with my free hand.

“Who are we talking about here?” I asked.

“YOU! My dearest Conqueror, it seems that your form had changed. Perhaps your memory, too? That is fine. We could always make new memories that would last an eternity!” She embraced her greatsword.

“Wait, hold on. I sent you a restraining order. Judging by how small you look right now, I’m sure it did a number against you.” I shook my head at her.

“Fifteen legions couldn’t even be considered a restraining order. In fact, they were almost wiped out as soon as they made contact with me. Kuh huh huh.” She laughed mockingly.

Damn. As expected of this creep. Though she was twisted in mind, she was immensely powerful. The Abyss was the only true demon god. That’s right, the other Demon ‘Gods’ were fakes. A thousand years ago, a massive war broke out which ended in the disappearance of the Abyss. As soon as she was gone, all the demon lords started calling themselves ‘Gods’.

“Then? What’s with your size? You were taller than I remembered.” She looked around just a head taller than Ellysa. I felt like there was a pattern somewhere here.

“After you sent your breakup letter..”

“Breakup letter?!” She considered 15 legions of demon-slaying rage-induced berserkers a breakup letter?!

“...I had severe depression. The thought of losing you just broke me and I couldn’t leave my dimension. Distraught and disheartened, there was nothing but the void to accompany me.” She pressed her cheek against the void sword caringly as she sniffled. Somehow the Abyss who was powerful enough to be the Lady of the Void was crushed by me indirectly...

“I was so depressed that I didn’t eat any dimensions for a long time. Over the time, I lost weight...Oh poor me,” She cried. I wasn’t an expert of eldritch abomination physiology so I couldn’t say anything to her.

“However! I had figured out that you simply wanted my attention!” She prepped up and got closer to me.

“Wait what?”

“You were saying ‘We’re breaking up, but not really! I want you to fight for me!’, am I wrong?”

“Yes, you’re definitely wrong!”

“Don’t be shy! I’m terribly sorry for not noticing earlier, my dearest! I’ll take you inside me so we can become one FOREVER!” She started running towards me with her sword. OH SHIT. IT’S TIME TO MOVE NOW.

I struggled against the tentacles that appeared from the black hole. They were slowly pushing me closer to her.

Since these things were sucking the mana from the air, I couldn’t use normal magic. Well, as if normal magic would do anything about the horrors of the void. I concentrated on creating mana from my body to use it instead of using the ones from the surrounding. The voices started to appear again and there’s that damned annoying song in my head again.

With a single click of my tongue, I performed a short distance near-divine teleportation spell. I was on a different position but the tentacles were still holding me down. What?!

“Fu fu fu. Near-divine spells won’t work, my dearest!” She was getting dangerously close now. So. This was the end, huh.

Use me. Oh, Great One. Release thouself.

It’s thyself not thouself. How was I supposed to take advice from something that couldn’t even use Ancient Commons properly?

The Abyss now had an arm reaching towards me, she’s close now. Just one touch and I would be disintegrated and melded into her body. To be together with the void. The eternal sleep, so soothing.….WAIT NO.

I made a choice. I allowed the voices, the whispers, and the song to take over. I felt my consciousness slowly drifting away, something which hadn’t happened in a long time. I was slowly drowned away in a myriad of chaos of thoughts. I suppressed these feelings a long time ago, but, you know….it was...very...relaxing…

.

.

.

“Hm?” I looked at my dearest. He stopped moving. Perhaps he had finally accepted me? Oh, my dearest! Come here...Heu?!

Before I realized it, There was an explosion from where he was standing which sent me flying away from where my Conqueror was. Before I hit the ground, multiple crows were flying ahead of me. The murder of crows blended together and there I saw him.

He had a cloak made out of black feathers. No. To be exact, they were crows. The messengers of death and the followers of the Raven. How fitting for him. His metal mask was rapidly rusting and crumbling, but you could see two red dots for eyes, solely locked onto me.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

On his hand was the sword that was on his waist prior to his transformation. He swung down towards me and I blocked it with my void sword. However, it caused me to slam onto the ground, sliding through.

With my tentacles, I fixed my body upright on the ground, taking a stance to block his next attack. I checked around to look for him, but there was only crows flying everywhere.

“There are many ways to die,” A choir of crows cawing barely made out those sentences. I swung my sword at the crows, disintegrating many of them. I noticed the ground below me was shaking and I jumped and floated upwards.

Skeleton hands were popping up, trying to claw their way out of the suffocating ground. A rusty bronze spear was thrown at me, but my head tentacle swatted it away. The skeletons quickly rose up and started to attack me. I flew through the mass of undead and crows, swinging my sword rapidly to cut through the crowd, trying to get some space.

It seemed that my dearest was using divine shielding on every skeleton and crow, allowing them to attack me without being erased.

I stopped, then raised my hands up. At my command, hundreds of tentacles flew out from every direction seemingly out of nowhere to attack the skeletons and crows.

“But what exactly is the best way to die?” The crows cawed.

“My dearest, it seemed that you have gained new powers while I was away. I was not aware of this.” I chuckled. To show me this much power, was he trying to make me fall harder for him? Fu fu fu! Too bad, I’ve already fallen so hard for you!

I raised my greatsword up and swung it horizontally in an arc, wiping out a lot of skeletons and tentacles alike. I swung it the other way, wiping out more. I repeated the swings, getting faster each swing until the number of skeletons and crows started to wither down and I was able to give myself some breathing space. I looked around for my Conqueror and noticed he was next to my black hole. What was he up to?

Against every logic, he ‘grabbed’ the black hole and started to roll it up like a newspaper. He straightened his rolled black hole and looked towards me. Eh?!

“Fatebinder is too weak to kill you. Since you look like a disgusting spider from another dimension, I’ll treat you like one. And what’s a better way to kill a spider than with a newspaper?” He shouted at me before charging with me with it. How..?!

He teleported to my side using divine teleportation before I even realized it and slammed me with the rolled black hole. The impact of being hit with a black hole was too strong and I lost hold of my greatsword. I positioned myself mid-air and saw my dearest flying towards me.

I launched my head tentacles at him, rapidly trying to skewer him to take him inside me. He rolled sideways, then teleported mid-flight to my right. He swung his rolled black hole downwards at me and I shifted my body right, dodging it. Without an effort lost, he swung his sword upwards and I dashed backwards to avoid it and to give myself some space from him.

Kuh! To be trying to go away from him instead of closer! What kind of lover was I?!

I tore up more holes, creating portals in the air. Tentacles were thrown towards him to subdue him as he kicked away. He noticed my greatsword which was floating off the ground and picked it up and slashed at the tentacles. The remaining skeletons formed a ragtag shieldwall around my lover which barely kept the tentacles at bay.

I started to gather mana to cast a divine spell. I held my hands out, letting an orb of purple light to form. I threw the spell 'Statis Net' at him, hoping to capture him while distracted.

He noticed the net and threw the greatsword at it, letting the void sword be caught by the net. After he threw the greatsword, he had seemingly disappeared. He teleported! Where was he?! I activated my lover's senses and I found him.....behind me with the rolled black hole raised.

With a heavy slap with the black hole, I was sent flying away from him but he teleported above me and hit me downwards, causing me to slam onto the ground. I couldn’t feel my body move and skeletons started to surround me, attacking me. My head tentacles were barely able to protect me.

“Enough,” I could hear him say. The skeletons were ganging up on me, kicking me. Eventually they stopped and one of them even spat at me. Was that even possible? Kuh! To be defeated by my dearest!

He ordered the skeletons to go back to where they popped out from and they quickly complied, sinking onto the floor like the ground was quicksand. He looked at me with those two powerful glowing lights without his hood or his iron mask, which crumbled away.

“I..I..Wuaaaaah!!!” I sat up and started to cry. How was I supposed to protect my dearest if I couldn’t overpower him and kidnap him?

“There, there, you eldritch abomination. A Demon God shouldn’t be crying.” I felt his gentle hand pat my head and my tentacles hugged his hand. I rubbed my head against his hand, letting the feeling be embedded into my memory. He was using divine spells to touch me so that he won’t be sucked into me so I was a bit disappointed.

He took a step back and his cloak slowly melted into crows, flying away into the distance and disappearing into black mist. He had something...or someone tied around his waist with a rope and he placed that person onto the ground.

“Who...who is she?” I muttered.

“She’s apparently my maid,” He answered.

“Do you like little girls? I could be smaller, you know.” I pouted.

“Eh. No. Not really.” He sighed and tiredly stretched his arms. He felt the cracks on his mask then muttered something about how he liked that mask.

“Alright, Abyss. If I continued to use divine spells, I would just slowly kill myself. And since I can’t use normal magic to kill you, I’ll let you go this time. But if you force me to use divine spells once more…” He cracked his knuckles.

“Heeh….giving me mercy. Is it because you love me?” I blinked a few times cutely at him.

“This headache is getting stronger by the minute. Just get out of here already.” He tossed the rolled up black hole at the side and the black hole reformed. I stood up and quietly moved towards the black hole.

“You know that I will come back for you, right?” I told him. He pointed upwards and my sight followed. All I could see were unmoving clouds.

“Not while whatever divine being up there is stopping you from trespassing this place without a ritual. By now he or she or they have noticed your presence and would soon be checking in.” He chuckled.

“Someday, my Conqueror.” I gave him one last wave before I jumped back into the black hole. He held his arm out and a raven landed on it. He looked at the raven then glanced me at one last time.

The Archlich [http://i.imgur.com/cyfdlH5.jpg]

.

.

.

“...Hmm?” Lucia looked around. I could feel that time had started to move once more when the black hole disappeared. The wind was blowing, and the trees were swaying. I turned my head towards Lucia.

“Something happened just now, right?” She asked me.

“How did you know?” I asked her. I let the raven on my arm fly away and turn into mist.

“This one simply doesn’t know. But this one understood that something happened. Ever since this one started to stay within the proximity of your lordship, this one had been...changing. Also this one seemed to be in a different position than before...” She looked at her palms, contemplating about what just happened. Interesting. It appeared that she was gaining more powers as she stayed around me. I could probably turn her into a vampire lady or even better...A vampire queen! Heh heh. Think about the possibilities!

Kill her and take her powers. Kill them all. Burn them all. Eat them all.

Shush. Your job was finished. Time for you to be buried again deep down into my mind where you would haunt me like a hangover that couldn’t be fixed.

“Your lordship seems...different,” Lucia noted.

“Me? I feel pretty much the same...I think.” I patted my body down.

Just a precaution, after using divine spells for a long time, I had to check if I lost anything. What about memory? I still knew Sarjay...Daggerless….Maven….and quite a lot of others. I hoped that I didn’t lose any memory.

“You got a spare mask, right?” I asked Lucia. She took out a mask without questions and I fixed up my disguise once more. Tsk. I liked the other one more.

I sighed and walked over to the heroes.

“Wake up, generic mob.” I kicked Blackhair and he woke up with a groan. In a panic, he swung his sword at me but I simply blocked it with my wrist guard.

“Oh...teacher! I apologize! Where’s the demon?!” He looked around startled.

“She...ugh….couldn’t bear the guilt of killing children so she killed herself.” I coughed a bit and Lucia gave a thumbs up at Blackhair.

“That...doesn’t seem..”

“Now, now. It’s the most logical explanation. You hit your head, probably. So you couldn’t be thinking straight,” I told Blackhair.

“I cannot dispute that. I understand, teacher. I’m just glad to survive and win over the demon.” He got up and went to help the other heroes.

As I watched him help the other heroes, I thought about the current situation. The Abyss has started to become active again. She’ll probably fix up the demons and try to kill whoever was watching over this world. The heroes would soon be forced to face a lot of hardship trying to stop the world from being destroyed.

“Bah! I’m not getting paid enough.” I cursed at the air. How would I get out of this situation? Hmm….I had an idea! I was desperate so no matter how bad it was, I’ll just use THAT!