Y/N POV

Me and Dante went as quick as we could. Now that Vergil was back, time was certainly not on our side. After making our way back through the Qliphoth which was nearly unrecognizable from before now that we could clearly see the sky around us, we finally made it back to where the 'Devil May Cry' van was parked.

As soon as we landed Trish asked "Dante, Y/N, what happened?" Straight away, Dante replied to her "Our dumbass brother's back and we're gonna rip him a new one." Trish seemed shocked and exclaimed "Vergil's-? How?!"

Before we could say anything we heard Nico yell "Dante! Y/N!" I turned just to see her throw something to us. Dante managed to catch it as Nico explained "Made it for Lady and she paid for it so consider it a rental."

Lady tried interjecting "Hey, you can't just-!" I calmly said "Lady things are getting very serious now, we need all the firepower we can get." Dante said "Okay okay, we'll take care of that later. Right now you three et the hell out of here." Turning to me he asked "Are you sure I can't persuade you to leave as well?"

I shook my head, saying "Sorry Dante, this is something I've got to see through, I cannot let you or Vergil do something you'll regret on the long run." Dante laughed and said "Some things never change. Okay, we're gonna go take care of old douchebag, got a feeling this one's gonna be a doozy."

We turned to leave however I heard Lady behind me calling "Y/N." Turning around we approached one another and met in an embrace. She looked up at me and said "Good luck. And promise me you'll come back alive."

I smiled and asked "When have I ever broken a promise? Besides, I'm not going to leave you to single parent. That would just be cruel." We both chuckled faintly before Dante interrupted saying "Y/N! Come on." I turned to him, saying "Right." 

I said my goodbyes to Lady as she hurried into the van and drove off. I speed walked to catch up with Dante and he chucked the weapon Nico gave him to me, saying "Here, felt you'd feel better with this."

Looking down I saw it was an upgraded version of Kalina Ann, the black paint job was replaced with grey, almost silver. The bayonetted was replaced with a harpoon all around it looked like an upgrade over the original.

Image of Kalina Ann II:

I still had the original following the battle with the King Cerberus so using both of them in tandem with one another would certainly be helpful. As I slung both launchers over each shoulder, I followed Dante.

As we walked Dante commented "You know you don't have to carry both weapons at all time, I can shoulder one if you want." I thought about it for a moment before saying "Yeah alright." I gently handed him the original. I warned "But please, I want this back once this is over. I don't think Lady would appreciate us losing both her old weapon AND her new one."

To that Dante laughed and said "Yeah, she'd have our heads for that one." After that we dropped the subject of weapons and instead focused on the path ahead. A steep incline heading upwards. It was surprisingly quiet, with new demons anywhere nearby.

I heard Dante muttering "Never would've guessed you'd come back. Dammit V, was this your plan all along?" I added "Never trusted that guy. Even before I realized his ties to Vergil, now I see why."

We kept going, navigating our way deeper into the Qliphoth, it was much brighter now, nothing like the network of tunnels we'd had to navigate before. After a short walk we entered a large open area where of course there was something, however what that something was was interesting.

I poked Dante before saying "Speaking of  V-." I pointed directly ahead of us where sure enough, the three familiars, Griffon, Shadow and Nightmare were all stood. I will admit, I was surprised to see them. After V's merging with Urizen, I thought they'd've ceased to exist.

Dante must have also been confused as he said "Hey guys, where've ya been? I thought you went back into Vergil." He muttered afterwards "You're gonna wish you did." I warned "Dante, don't you think it'd be best NOT to antagonize them? We are on a tight schedule remember."

Griffon spat in a clearly angry tone "Oh the wise guy Dante and the ever observant Y/N. We were spawned from Vergil's abominable thoughts. But you knew that already." Dante remarked "Come to think of it, I did know something was off. Just like with my old brother."

Griffon went on to explain "Well we're merely the discarded thoughts from when he was Nelo Angelo. No longer bound to his consciousness." I pointed out "I see, so that's why you resemble the Griffon we fought back then." Griffon nodded before saying "Exactly."

He then continued "Anyway, we're here now to kill you both of our own free will. LIBERATING!" He flew up and created a series of electrical sparks! I cut through the electrical attack as Griffon finished "And kill you both we shall. US, not Vergil."

I turned to Dante and said "You get the big cat, I get birdbrains over here." Dante shrugged and said "Okay, doesn't matter which way we do it. As long as it's quick." In an instant, I ran forward and jumped up so that me and Griffon were at the same height.

I heard him yell "You don't have Eclipse's influence over you now Y/N! Let's see how well you do!" He fired a barrage of electricity at me however once again, I just cut right through it and landed a slash that made Griffon shriek in pain as I retorted his previous comment "I broke out of Eclipse's influence by assimilating IT into myself. So I'm not as strong as I was before, no, I'm much WORSE!"

Pulling out Cinder I rapidly shot several rounds at the bird Familiar causing it to ragdoll a bit before I swapped to King Cerberus, more specifically its electrical staff in which I then went crazy, landing a seemingly endless stream of attacks one after the other.

Griffon flew back and yelled "Time out! Gimme some time out!" With that he flew away further down the path ahead. I turned to Dante to see that the Shadow familiar had also vanished. He looked ahead and said "Great, can't wait for the rematch."

After that we fought through some Hell Caina demons and pressed on. The rematch didn't take long to come. We headed along more paths across the Qliphoth's now-exposed network of pathways and after a somewhat short walk from our previous location, we found both Shadow and Griffon, the latter of which commented "Ready for round two?!"

Dante turned to me and asked "So, how about we switch it up, I get the bird, you get the panther." I didn't even verbally respond and instead just nodded in agreement. Again, we each rushed forward and began our individual battles.

As the Shadow familiar pounced on me I said "Ah ah, bad kitty play nice!" I used Eclipse to slash at its side causing it to roar and topple off me. I drew Kalina Ann II and fired a rocket towards it that knocked it to the ground, switched to Cinder, shooting multiple rounds in quick succession and finally used used the King Cerberus to swat it across the face.

In retaliation its face opened up resembling a giant Venus flytrap as it rushed forward attempting to chomp at me whole. I effortlessly dodged the attacks, using Eclipse to land small slashes here and there as well.

Shadow even tried healing itself, appearing as a pink core in the middle of  a black swirling mist however I didn't give up my effort and the fight ended just like round one, with the two familiars defeated and once again, they ran away, leaping over the nearby rocks and out of sight.

Dante commented "Running away? Nah, didn't think so." Again we pressed on and again we encountered demonic opposition, it's funny  how before there was no one but now there were loads of demons.

The encounters with them though weren't even worth mentioning though as me and Dante would just cut through them. Even when some of those Scudo Angelo appeared, with both of us here they weren't much trouble for us.

As you may have expected, it didn't take us long to arrive at the third battle and once again, both Shadow and Griffon attacked. I knew that Nightmare was around here somewhere however it seemed to be keeping hidden.

This time it was a free for all, a full-on 2v2 battle. I started out by targeting Griffon and attacking with Eclipse, going in for a violent barrage of slash attacks that caused the bird to ragdoll again before I swapped to Cinder and fired several rounds into him.

I swapped with Dante and then targeted Shadow, using the ice nunchaku version of King Cerberus, I landed a multitude of quick attacks one after the other. I heard Griffon yelling "You can't kill what's already dead! And a demon is a demon, even is death!"

Dante commented "Not a bad line, I feel the same way." I continued to fight Shadow for a moment before swapping yet again, attacking Griffon with Kalina Ann II firing an explosive round from it before slashing again with Eclipse.

Griffon snapped "I won't let either of you go to Vergil!" The two familiars tried to fight however they were completely out matched. As I landed an aggressive slash to the Griffon once more, the two familiar once again called it quits, as they retreated Griffon yelled "Even that didn't stop you?! You both aren't bad!"

Once they disappeared I heard Dante comment "One more round, it's like I'm back on Mallet Island." I facepalmed and said "Don't remind me of that. Griffon's existence as well as those Proto Angelo are giving me enough flashbacks as it is."

We had to use this blood tube thing that zipped us to another area on the Qliphoth and once we landed I brought up a point "They know they don't stand a chance, are they trying to atone for something?" To that Dante replied, "Possibly but what?"

It didn't take long for the final round of this little game to begin, shortly after exiting that blood vine, we found ourselves in a large area once more, this time we found V's cane suspended above a large crater.

Suddenly there was a pillar of bright purple energy shooting upwards before a giant orb shot down to the ground. The orb impacted the surface before standing up and revealing the Nightmare familiar I'd been waiting for.

As the colossal familiar stood over us, Griffon could be heard yelling "Bring it on! This is a grave! Either yours or ours!" To that I commented "Well if you want to die that badly. I won't stand in your way." Dante joked "Not the worst place to die, but death's not on my agenda just yet."

The Nightmare fired a beam from its eyes towards us and for the first time since this little gauntlet began, we used our Devil Triggers to dodge and rush forward. As I flew, I raised Cinder and fired more shots at the giant before ducking suddenly, sliding along the ground and slicing into its leg.

Griffon and Shadow once again returned however this time I wasn't in the mood for playing with either of them and neither did Dante. We singled them out and using Devil Trigger, took them both out as quickly as possible.

We returned our focus to Nightmare, while this familiar was tougher than the other two by a considerable margin, when I was under Eclipse's influence, I took it down on two occasions with only minimal amounts of effort. This time I was stronger AND had Dante with me.

The three familiars were giving it everything they had though and to a degree I respected them. They knew they didn't have a chance and yet, they tried nonetheless. And to be honest, they actually seemed to do BETTER than before.

We still didn't need Sin Devil Trigger but every now and then Nightmare would vanish and we'd have to contend with Griffon and Shadow again, once they'd been subdued we would be back to fighting Nightmare.

Unfortunately for them, the fight came to an end in our favour. Dante finished off Shadow with  a stab from the sword named after him, Griffon was defeated by me with Eclipse and Nightmare was a joint effort, both of us stabbing into its eye causing it to topple to the ground.

With that all said and done, Shadow and Nightmare both disappeared as Griffon landed on the ground. Dante addressed the familiar "Should've known better, you've got a good heard, but you're about as sharp as a marble."

I added "I'm sorry it came to this. You fought well." Griffon commented "Perhaps. But if you had even a little bit of trouble defeating us, imagine what Vergil can do to you. Both of you go see for yourselves. Us? This is our final fight. And the end of Vergil's nightmares. Godspeed you two, you'll both need it."

Dante commented "Rest in peace little chicken." I couldn't help but laugh at his comment before my face went serious as I said "May you all find peace in death." All three familiars all vanished one after the other.

We remained in silence for a moment before I said "Dante, it's time." Dante just looked up at me and nodded. Urizen was defeated, V was gone and now his familiars had gone as well. And yet, things weren't over yet.

There was still one final matter that needed dealing with...

Author's Note: And that's it for this chapter, we have about three chapters left before the end of the story now so I really hope you enjoy what is still coming. I hope you liked this chapter as well and as always, thank you for reading.