.^^ the Blade of the East ^^

— Seth —

"Good. Take care, Michael." I smiled.

The Archangel bowed facetiously, then stepped through the fire again, disappearing just as Frigga saw his wings, set on his shoulder blades, and gasped.

"Oh shit... was that-... no, never mind." She shook her head, sinking down into his vacated seat.

I nodded. "That was indeed Michael, the Archangel. We have an amicable relationship mostly built on me destroying his enemies."

"So the Council he mentioned... that was THE Council?" She asked.

"Yes. Though soon there'll be another, for the Sorcerers of the world, under my banner, who will have amicable relations with the Order, and humankind in general. Magic can help so many people, after all... if it is only used properly." I hummed, and then nodded. "Well, now let's contact the Talkative Ones, the Information Demons. Do try to rein in your temper, Hmm? These ones are rather useful."

She scoffed. "I can be nice!"

I stared at her for a moment, and shook my head. "Just let me do the talking... please?"

She grumbled a bit more, crossing her arms, and nodded. "Fine..."

The demon came as soon as called, as always, and bowed slowly to both of us. "Another Victory for the Rose Camp, I assume, Master?"

"You assume correctly. Inform the Horn Camp, in the way I'm sure you do already, that they are mine, now, and subject to the same rules as the others under my banner... and the Abyss has given me Titles, now, as the Silent One, instead of the Briar..." I hummed.

"Oh? How intriguing, Master... might I know them, in order to spread your name into your peoples?" He asked slimily. I didn't trust him, but I did want them to know my name, so that they didn't need me to lie and call myself Briar, anymore.

"I am the Silent One, the Greedy One, the Hungry One; the Valiant, Ignoble Child and Champion of the Abyss; Lord of the Realms of Ice, Fire, and Storm; Master of The Briar, Captor of the Horn, Slayer of The Thorn; the Dark Prince of the Realm of Man; the Rose of the West, and the King of Shadows. You may tell them this, and that I will not interfere with them, so long as they follow the simple set of rules I have set into place with the Thorn and Briar Camps." I gently picked up my violin, dismissing him casually. He bowed slowly, and disappeared into the circle as the first notes sung off the instrument.

Frigga hummed. "He was a slimy one."

"Mmhmm."

"So... what now?" She asked expectantly.

"Now you get some sleep, in this room. It's not safe, anywhere else, because the Blade can pull you into the realm of dreams, which isn't safe, and is honestly dangerous, as he is a literal God inside his own realm, not just a hacky False-God, like the other Greater Daemons." I nodded at the pillows behind me, and continued playing a gentle melody, improvising a bridge leading into some Vivaldi.

"Good to know..." She nodded, and walked over to the pillows, making a bed for herself out of them.

I eventually let myself rest, setting the violin down and laying down in the pile of Succubi. "Mmm... hello, ladies." I sighed.

"So what happened when you lost your virginity? Free rein of the Briar, had to hold him again?" Frigga asked.

"No, and trust me you'll want to lose yours, too. It's dangerous, the effect of pheromones on your body... and yours is a demon of Passion, plus you're a woman, so it'll be even worse for you." I sighed.

"Oh... hmm... and it won't make it easier for her to take my mind?"

"No. It only helps when taking control. After that, it's a liability." I shook my head.

"Good to know..." she hummed.

"Get some sleep. Handle everything else tomorrow." I hummed back sarcastically, then chuckled, allowing myself to fall asleep.

—

"Such an interesting dream... I had no idea you held such droll ideas of yourself... I always viewed you as more of an arrogant creature... self-serving and entitled..." a tall man with black hair and porcelain skin stepped into my dream, through a curtain of Shadows, standing next to me as I played violin on a patch of sidewalk in Times Square, my army of children off to the side, watching with awe.

"You say that because you still thought of me as Briar, not Seth, and the Briar is like You. You were so self-centered and casually arrogant that you thought I didn't have my own ideas or dreams. And we both know you can't drag me into the dream realm, which is why you came here, so why don't you skip to the bargaining stage? The false pleasantries irk me." I sighed, and let the scenery fade, sitting down in my chair, in front of the fireplace.

He hummed, and took the other seat. "I suppose it does cut down on time, doesn't it? Alright... I want-

"You want me to stay on 'my side' of the world, -ignoring that fact that 3/4 of the world is mine now,- and not try to fight you. What do I get in return?" I asked impatiently.

He sighed. "I would agree to a truce."

"And?"

"That's it, I would agree to a truce." He shrugged.

"You're misunderstanding how bargaining works. If we agree to a truce, what do I get in return? The truce is the cause, not the effect." I shook my head.

"Perhaps, but that's all I'm willing to offer." He smiled.

I nodded, and shifted into my primordial form, sealing his mind into my dream with the Solomon's Trap. "Now... Let's try that again..." I snarled.

He smirked, and snapped his fingers. "That's the thing about dreams, though... they're my domain, whatever realm-" he paused, and snapped again, then again.

"Yeah... except you're wrong... this is my mind, not a Realm, and as I've proven against Greater Daemons before, even without magic, in here? In here I'M the God!!!" I slowly built the Solomon's Trap around him, then let the scenery fade entirely, building layer after layer after layer of traps, and waking up.

His mind, or at least a portion of it, was inside mine, fighting to get out. I pushed it into the gem with Briar, and let them duke it out, smiling at my good luck.

Then I paused, and looked around. 'Wait a moment...' I hummed, and gripped the air, ripping my way through the Fabric of the Realm of Dreams.

"Ahh, you figured that out rather quickly... how boring... now-" the mental voice was coming from the traps, and I ripped it apart, feeding the mind to Briar, and looking around as it silenced.

I tried again, and found the outside, in the middle of a street in Tokyo, but I swam through the ether, and shifted into my primordial form again, taking bites of everything around me, to provoke a response. When nothing happened, I continued, and lost track of time. Maybe a day, maybe a week, maybe a few decades, Time was impossible to tell here, but eventually it was just me, floating alone.

I hummed, spreading a Solomon's Trap around the entire realm, one massive hexagon at a time, to see where it ended and also to block everything in. Once it finished, connecting, I began condensing it, using it like a sieve, adding layers every few miles or so. After a few more rather indeterminate lengths of time I would come to call Days, the first layer reached me, with the remnants of the Blade, his consciousness barely even considerable as such.

It looked up at me slowly. "No... I have survived the Culling of Kings... some human will not be the death of me..."

"What's the Culling of Kings, Briar?" I asked casually, pulling the rest of the Traps to me, and finding a few more tiny pieces of his body, but none with any consciousness. I laid the hexagonal plates together like layers in a yearling tree, -at least, a Trillion-year-old tree,- and smiled at the buzzing of power, which stung his flesh.

He was silent for a moment. '... around 500,000 human solar cycles ago, a few millennia before I was made into a Greater Daemon, There was a Greater Daemon of the Blade's caliber in every single Plane. Then, The Abyss began a Conquest, not unlike yours. He hunted the other kings, destroying them, feasting upon them, and when he finished, after 50,000 years of eating, he was the Last Greater Daemon... but he became something else, along the way.'

"And the Blade survived that?" I asked.

'I was unaware... but it is very much possible. He is older than me, and the First Horn, the Thorn, and I, we were all alive during that time, just as Arch Daemons. The Horn was a Lich Dragon, I think.'

"Interesting... well, his knowledge will be useful." I nodded, and grabbed the weak humanoid figure, breaking its neck mercifully, and pulling its consciousness into my sword, then turning it to Ashe, and looking at the remains, all around us.

The near-nonexistent gaps made the tiny amount of blood that had been gathered spread into a perfectly symmetrical covering of the polyhedral pseudo-sphere, and I had a brilliant idea, pulling the Briar out of the gem, then stepping out of the sphere, and closing it again, and finally removing the entire thing, shrinking it down and placing it inside the gem again.

'I find this increased security entirely unnecessary.' His voice was softer now, almost to human levels, though it still echoed oddly.

"Yes, well, I do not. I'm about to do something crazy, and I don't need you doing something stupid, too. Only one stupid thing a day." I grinned, and then stepped out of the realm, Upwards, instead of down.

The Abyss spread around me, infinite and empty, but also... not. Like having to be able to hear well enough to catch a slight sound, or a taste that you can't quite catch.

It was alive. And It recognized me.

—

I lurched upward, snarling defensively, and paused at the sight of the basement, which I hadn't apparently left.

"You dreamt a Dream, and built something impressive, but that's all it was. As of this evening, The Blade yet breathes... though your dream gave me a very good idea of how we could defeat him, as he won't fall for the same trick as the others." Briar informed me quietly.

"Won't he? He's arrogant enough. Was the rest of what I dreamed real, as well?" I rubbed my face tiredly, and stood, stepping around the Succubi, who were all awake, from the volume of my snarl, but respectfully silent, feigning sleep.

"The Culling of Kings? Yes. You drew that knowledge from my memories, and used it in your dream. But don't worry, nothing you dreamed left this room, so your plan is safe from his notice, for now." He hummed.

"So the Abyss really was just one of the many Greater Daemons, once? And he happened to be from the Realm of Darkness?" I raised an eyebrow, and sat in my chair, staring at the fire.

"There were fewer Realms, back then. Fewer Named ones, anyway. Dark, Light, Power, Knowing. The Realm of Man is what remains of the Realm of Knowing. The Realm of Power became... the rest. Humans turned Power into so many things, over the course of history... Cruelty, balanced with Kindness; Rage, balanced with Serenity. The light beings took the Light Realms, and we dark beings took the Dark Realms. Simple Math."

"In other words, he only needed to conquer one other Realm?"

"And his own, of course... but yes. Back then, the Planes were each ruled by the Greater Daemons, like I said... and there are millions of Planes, spread evenly throughout the Realms."

"I see... and what if one were to merge the Realms again? Create only Four, all centered around the earth, connected integrally, like the Realm of Dreams?"

"That would be an incredibly difficult feat of strength."

"With the help of the God's and their little council?" I smirked.

"Why would they-... because you're giving them a better connection to the people who feed them... they gain power, just as the Abyss does." He chuckled, impressed.

"It'll be great! Anyway, that's the long game. How long until this shift in Realms?"

"3 years or so of your human time."

"Good! Time to kill the Blade, then, and gather up a few million Evil Sorcerers! Fun times!"

"That Sounds uncomfortably like an ethnic cleansing."

"Call it what you want, but Baby killers and Child Rapists don't deserve sympathy... besides, these fuckers come in all colors and creeds. Their one unifying characteristic is a love for Sadism and Murder, not religion or skin color." I frowned, lacing my fingers together. "Now... let's get to work."

—

A fake Blood Drive was my first thought to get Virgin's Blood, and saying so was one of the funniest things I'd ever said, for two reasons. One: Diana's Face, a mixture of disgust and confusion, like someone who'd just stepped in a pile of shit. And Two: the Briar actually Laughed, both at my deadpan delivery and at her face.

"What? We can give what we don't need to a hospital, I guess, if your soul is weighed down by the theft of a few thousand unused pints of blood that no one will miss." I shrugged.

"THOUSAND?!?" She squeaked.

"Yeah. Big summon, big demon, big chains, big magic... lots of Blood for lots of Sigils." I shrugged.

She groaned, rubbing her temples. "Remind me why we can't just do what we did last time?"

"Because the Blade has been in power for 17,000 years, and he's more powerful than all three other Greater Daemon's, combined. So, whoever ends up with him in their head, they're going to need all the power that they can possibly have put into their mental defenses, and they'll need it before the battle begins. Also, the summoning room itself isn't currently capable of holding him. I'm going to change that." I explained casually.

Diana hummed slowly, then sighed, rubbing her face dejectedly. "Alright... Fine. Blood drive it is."

—

The Sigils on the walls were so potent that just drawing them had burned at my skin like direct sunlight in my Lich form. When each was fully realized, I had to literally shield myself from the power radiating off of them.

I had managed to wheedle Michael into giving me a drop of his blood, which I'd poured in the Giant vat of blood I was using as paint, and the resultant blast of holy sunlight fried one side of my face, before I leaned away, and I spent the rest of the day, as it recovered, snarling at Gale for calling me 'Two-Face'.

Still, once finished, just standing in that building was difficult, so I went above for a breather, only to find that every lesser demon up above had apparently vaporized spontaneously.

"A useful ability. Gale, make a note for me, 'Archangel Blood Drop=Anti-Demon Nuke'." Diana hummed.

I extended my senses, and paused, feeling nothing below a certain level. "Ooooooooh that might be unpleasant... Yeah, Nuke is Correct. I think I killed all the demons in Chicago..." I hummed.

Diana slowly raised an eyebrow. "All of them?"

"Well... it feels like anything below lesser-Lich in power just heard the bell toll." I nodded.

She hummed. "That... is exponentially more powerful than I thought he was."

"Really? Seems about right, to me. He can toss me around, and I'm worth 15,000 Lich, at least, which means 100,000 lesser demons would be cock-drippings for something like him." I shrugged.

She snorted, and shook her head. "I can't believe you just worked that into a sentence."

"I know, it was smooth, wasn't it? You nearly missed it." I smiled, and then turned, and squared my shoulders, walking back into the lower floor.

"No I didn't!" She called after me.

"She totally did." A flame burst into being next to me, and Michael stepped through. "Also... no, you know what? Never mind."

"Lemme guess 'stop stroking my ego'? 'Don't stoke my flame'? 'Don't fluff my feathers'?" I smirked.

He grinned. "Ahh, double entendre... the best invention humans ever came up with. Even more than shoes." He nodded seriously when I looked at him, confused. "Yes. Shoes. The first versions were a little lacking, but they got so much better. My arches are modeled after Greek's, and let me tell you, they need all the support they can get."

I snorted, and nodded. "Alright, I'll take that. Now what do you want/need? A return on my favor, that quickly?"

He shrugged. "Time works differently for me. I've known you for decades and yet days and yet weeks and yet eons. I honestly don't even know when I gave you that blood."

"Literally last night." I hummed.

"Cool. Anyway, need you to go kill a group of Lich that are giving me trouble. They're defiling a church." He shrugged again.

I sighed, and nodded. "Fine. I'm a man of my word. Let's go. Beam me up, Scotty."

He blinked. "Wait, I thought this was England, 1013? You have Teleportation technology already? Or is this 4013, I always make that mistake?"

"Off by 1-2,000 years, and location. It was a joke... mostly." I chuckled. "Also, time-travel is a thing? Cool."

He shook his head. "No, it's Omnitemporance, or maybe Omnipresence, I'm really not sure. I'm in all times, at all times. It's incredibly frustrating, sometimes."

I grinned slowly, ignoring his unsettled expression at the no-doubt alarming facial feature. "Oh... that's SO fucking DOPE..."

"Nope, Not Even gonna Wait to see how that works out!" Gale sprinted out of the room.