With the smoke now cleared, a small pool could be seen forming at the bottom of the crater as the water poured in.

With his heightened senses, he knew she wasn't finished as he waited in the air, unsure of what she was planning.

He couldn't attack again without a clear determination of where she was, all he could sense was she was still alive down there somewhere.

Darkness soon exploded from the bottom, sending the water shooting away like a geyser eruption.

Nevan moved out of the way unclear if he should attack now or not, sometimes attacking without knowing leads to worse situations.

The darkness rapidly filled the crater blocking out all vision of what was happening inside, dark clouds started to form just above it as black lightning discharged from them.

Everything touched by the black lightning vanished into nothingness, Nevan took note of it as he steeled himself for what's to come.

Growing bored from nothing happening after a few minutes went by, Nevan sent an energy blade towards the darkness to see what happens.

It was simply swallowed up by the darkness, growing frustrated at the lack of action that he was craving for, he started to swing his arms speedily as he sent wave after wave of energy blades.

Growing excited as he started to hear explosions from the constant barrage of attacks, he sent even more in a frenzy.

While not seeing anything change from the darkness, it was clear from the explosions and the shifting ground around the area that his attacks were getting through.

A couple of minutes later he stopped with nothing else of note happening.

"Come out and face me," he yelled Indignantly.

Laughing came from the darkness in response.

"My, my, aren't we the impatient fellow, can't a girl put on a little makeup before she meets her date."

Nevan scowled as he heard Dahlia's voice coming from the pit of darkness, choosing not to respond as he crossed his arms in irritation and waited.

He didn't have to wait long though as a dark form could be seen coming out of the top.

The dark form promptly changed into Dahlia as all the darkness and dark clouds were absorbed back into her.

She opened her eyes that now were fully black like a demon as she grinned up at Nevan- "I hope you enjoyed that little victory you had, now I'll show you why the monsters in the dark call me the black queen."

Nevan hearing her nickname was visibly shocked at having come across her now, the black queen.

Dahlia grin grew wider at seeing his surprised expression from hearing her nickname- "I see you've heard of me."

"Yes, I have, in fact once upon a time I spent a good deal of time trying to find you."

Dahlia amused asked- "Oh, whatever for?"

Nevan using his pointer finger to scratch his cheek, embarrassed to say considering their current circumstances- "I, huh, wanted to go on a date with you back in the day."

It was back when he was searching for a mate, he heard about the black queen who brought death and destruction to all her enemies and was widely powerful, but he could never find her.

Dahlia laughed- "My, aren't you cute, you know it's never too late."

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Nevan grimaced- "Huh, no thanks, your kind of past your prime, it's to bad we didn't meet when you were younger."

Dahlia scowled at him- "Your loss, you wouldn't be able to keep up with me anyway." she said firing a bolt of black lightning that he narrowly avoided.

She didn't like being reminded of her aging look, despite being immortal, the dark magic she wielded took a toll on her body, but even while knowing this she couldn't stop.

It's one of the reasons she started leaping through time, so she could keep her looks longer, that and her powers would grow immensely from the slumber and maybe with enough luck figure out a way to preserve them despite using black magic.

After dodging the black bolt, he started to circle her while sending energy blades, she had a translucent black energy shield surrounding her easily absorbing his attacks as she shot some more black bolts at him.

Getting nowhere with his attacks he dived down towards the ground dodging another bolt.

He swooped down to pick up a metal pole continuing to dodge all the dark bolts coming his way, the ground looking like it was evaporating from the bombardment of black lightning bolts as the areas hit vanished.

Dahlia growing frustrated lifted her hands, the earth under a low flying Nevan followed her movements as she closes her hands together and trapped an unprepared Nevan, who thought up until now that she could only use black magic.

Nevan gathered his aura as he sent it out blasting apart the earth that trapped him and proceeded to dodge the next incoming black lightning bolt.

He then infused his aura into the metal pole he picked up and threw it towards Dahlia who counted on her barrier to block it like the rest, but the barrier only blocked the energy coating as the metal pole managed to make it through and impale her.

Seeing this Nevan zoomed around the ground grabbing everything metal hurling it her way.

Dahlia was embittered from the pelting of metal trash coming her way as her barrier failed to stop it, one was a metal ball which put a hole right through her stomach.

Furious now she gathered her dark magic forcibly healing her wounds before sending a wave of magic out from her destroying all incoming projectiles.

With her anger growing she was able to use the dark magic even more efficiently, wanting him to slow down she released another wave of magic this time it was a thicker looking black grey wall that she sent out towards Nevan.

He responded by shooting a blade of energy at it only to have it pass through the sticky looking substance and drastically slow down to a crawl.

Noticing the danger he quickly retreated avoiding it at all cost knowing if he was caught in place she would easily be able to disintegrate him into nothingness.

Dahlia watching him retreat started to chant drawing in more magic than she has ever done before.

The sky blackened, dark clouds formed this time discharging huge bolts of black lightning, one striking the ground wiping out a massive chunk of it.

Nevan noticed her visibly aging as she called on more dark magic then she could handle.

Thinking that he might have to wait for her to age herself to death if he can't think of a way to get close enough without being turned to dust.

A massively huge dome barrier formed around New Orleans trapping those who were left alive inside along with Dahlia and Nevan.

Dahlia still chanting brought her hands up above her releasing a big black ball of dark magic sending it to the center of the dome.

Nevan whistled as he inspected it all- "I have to say, you just outdid yourself, I'm impressed, not even those witches of old were crazy enough to draw this much at once, have you looked at a mirror recently."

Dahlia who heard him paused her chant, recalling what exactly she did, hesitantly she conjured up a mirror and looked at her now grey hair and wrinkled face.

Tears poured from her eyes as she ran a hand along her face- "This is your fault if you didn't push me if you weren't here." she pointed at him in anger as she yelled.

Her sad face soon turned into a maniacal grin- "Don't worry though, you can help me with this, in fact, you have helped me with this." she crazily laughed.

Seeing his confused face, she cleared up his misunderstanding- "You see, you were right I have outdone myself, I have never held so much power, so much dark power and now I've discovered the spell I need to keep my beauty for all eternity."

He didn't like the sound of that as he watched her open her mouth and a black vortex was shown as a suction force started to absorb the surrounding vitality to revitalize herself.

He could hear the screams as the trapped people's very souls seemed to be getting absorbed by her, the white streams of life being drawn into the black vortex from all around.

Her skin visibly grew younger as more was absorbed, Nevan knew that this wasn't what she thought it was though, black magic has a price, there was no getting around it.

This would just extract the price in another form, her sanity, it would warp her into a soul-sucking demon that would go on a warpath for more until nothing remained.

'Well shit, I shouldn't have told her to look at a mirror, now I'm going to have to fight a true demon.' Nevan thought as he already saw parts of her body changing to look more demon-like.

Her ears formed a point, small horns popped out of her forehead, hair falling out, nails lengthening, dark patches of skin popping up.

'Yep, she's turning into a demon.' Nevan thought 'Well on the bright side I've never eaten a demon before, I wonder what would happen if I did.'