Grotesque Lord: Ascension

Birth of a Demon King

Stepping out the warp gate, the first thing Deor saw were the two muscular men that guarded it.

"Young miss? Do you have the authorization to take the young master out?" asked Barls in an overly suspicious tone.

Eleanor rolled her eyes "Yes. Even if I didn't could you stop me?"

"...no." Barls said, sweating profusely.

Opposite Barls, the other guard started evaluating Deor he had only been working as a guard for three weeks, so this was the first time meeting him in person 'So this is the young Lord? How repulsive...ugh standing next to him is unbearable. Why is he constantly releasing divine energy?'

Deor was standing with his usual expressionless face, pretending to be unresponsive.

"You. Is there a problem? Why are you staring at my brother like that?"

"N-no, ma'am."

"Tsk! Quit your stuttering and move out of the way."

"O-our apologies, we'll mo—"

"No. Stop, that's not what I want."

"...eh...then...?" asked Barls in confusion.

"Die for me, Barls. Won't you be a dear?" Eleanor wore a smile, but her voice was cold.

The two guards were petrified with fear. They didn't understand what they did wrong.

"What are you doing wasting time like this?" Deor was impatient he didn't have time to play along with Eleanor. Right now, every second counted.

"Why are you in such a hurry to die?"

In her mind, Eleanor just wanted to give Deor a good show of her preying on the two eyesores in front of them. 'Does it matter if he dies now or a little later? Might as enjoy the road there, right?'

"I don't have the time. You do understand, no?"

"I didn't know time was a variable..."

Barls, who was quiet until this moment, gathered his courage and finally spoke up "Then your ladysh—!"

Shuk.

Eleanor and Deor had vanished.

"...t-t-that k-k-killing int-tend is...not normal... just what i-is that woman." Barls couldn't stop stuttering and shaking it wasn't the first time he felt the brunt of Eleanor bloodlust but there was no way he could get used to this feeling.

"O-oi rookie, you okay?" He turned his head, gasping for air.

The sight that fell on his eyes baffled him. His partner was laying limp on the ground, dead.

"eh?"

.

.

.

*****

Shuk.

"...! Ah lady Eleanor and... young master?"

A red-skinned demon welcomed them humbly as soon as he noticed their presence.

"Where are you headed to?"

"I think you know already."

The demon quickly turned heel towards a gate that looked exactly like the warp gate to Deor's prison, except the characters on its sides were way more complex.

The red-skinned demon opened the gate and started chanting until a red-gold portal appeared.

Eleanor and Deor walked through wordlessly.

Woong~

On the other side of the portal, Deor felt a chill run down his spine. It was a scene he had seen numerous times. The room had a thick demonic aura, and the cause of this was the two people sitting at the end of the room on thrones. Two of the 'five monarchs of hell', Lilith and Sarkaima.

Lilith was a beautiful woman with violet hair and eyes. Her beauty was further complimented by her voluptuous body. Sarkaima, on the other hand, was an extremely muscular crimson-haired man. Two bull-like horns were protruding from his forehead, and his teeth sharp like those of a shark, making him look like a wild demon beast. He was seated, but one could tell that he was a very tall man.

"You're late."

Deor winced. His weakened body could not withstand the pressure coming from Sarkaima.

"I'm sorry, father the guards were being slow," Eleanor said, bowing gently.

Sarkaima snorted in annoyance "Did I ask for an excuse? Did you forget your place?"

"...no." She bowed deeper.

"I'll let you off. The preparations are complete you can get started right away."

He gestured towards the giant, throbbing ball of flesh in the middle of the room. The flesh lump had a height of about 5 meters and had a long incision down its middle. It looked like a giant...

"Understood."

They both walked and climbed into the ball of flesh through the opening. The walls of the flesh ball were incredibly thick and slimy, so even though it was large Eleanor and Deor's bodies were tightly pressed together like twins in their mother's womb. The addition of the slimy red liquid only made it more uncomfortable for both of them.

Sarkaima and Lilith also got up and placed their palms on the ball of flesh.

—Throb!

The ball of flesh contracted tightly. Then they started chanting. The power of two Demon King leveled beings started violently pouring into it.

—Ba-dum!

—Ba-dum!

The ball of flesh convulsed violently and started beating like a heart.

Inside the ball of flesh, Deor was cringing in pain. He was born a transcendent being and it could be said mentally or physically nothing could break him. But right now? It was agony his sovereign-core was being completely absorbed normally this shouldn't be this painful but when he was younger, Deor used the power of [Order] to fuse a part of his soul with his sovereign-core, the result of this was his core being 5 times the size of a normal Demigod. It seemed like a genius idea at the time but now he was painfully regretting it, his core was deeply rooted in his soul and it felt like chunks of his flesh were being ripped off only worse.

After four long and agonizing hours—

-thump

-thump

Both Eleanor and Deor were ejected from the ball of flesh, falling blandly on the ground. Eleanor was the first to get up.

"Haa..." She felt full of energy. It felt like she had endless power, but the first thought that came to her mind wasn't her newfound power instead—

"Deor..." her voice cracked "Are you already dead...?"

"Ah no...cough!... not yet at least I wanted to witness what my power and talent was used to create... amazing..." Even now Deor was in constant pain, when he fell a moment ago his bones were so brittle they shattered into pieces.

Even so, he wanted to witness Eleanor's power, and her presence was way above that of Demon King Sarkaima. He had no clue how the ancient demon king would try to control Eleanor, but he was confident that she wouldn't lose.

In his head, Eleanor could pride herself as his equal and rival. He was confident if he was a True God he would never lose against Sarkaima, so how could she lose as his equal?

With that thought, he was about to invoke the spell that took him a total of six years to perfect, but a distant yet familiar voice stopped him.

"Eleanor, help Derygortheus sit up. I wish to speak to him." It was Lilith who said this as she walked to her throne and sat down elegantly.

"...!"

"What's the matter? Oh. Fufu~ did you think I didn't know he was sane the entire time?" she paused before continuing, "And didn't he just give a clear answer when you spoke a moment ago?"

Sarkaima snorted at Lilith's words.

"A-ah..." Eleanor blankly helps Deor sit up since she was going to do that anyway to say her goodbyes, but after recovering from the shock, she fell into thought.

'She knows Deor's not insane? What else does she know...? Wait, that's not important, the fact that she said she wants to speak to Deor is already weird...'

Deor also thought the same. Lilith, this woman, could not even stand his existence. Over his 25 years of life, she barely had a conversation with him. Lilith was gentler to Eleanor, leading him to conclude that it was because of the fact he used the Holy Element.

Ignoring the speechless duo, Lilith opened her mouth "Derygortheus, how does it feel to lose everything and die a dog's death? How does it feel to fall? How much are you despairing knowing there is no afterlife waiting for you?"

"... dear mother, please don't refer to me as Derygortheus... Deor would be fine." he said solemnly, closing his eyes. "I feel no despair, only anger. That much is obvious, no?"

Indeed, it was obvious everyone in the room could feel Deors killing intent; it made even Lilith's skin crawl. She felt as if a million hateful spirits were constantly screaming into her ears.

'The killing intent of a mad god.' thought Lilith in amusement.

"But what about your lover? I thought you were quite fond of that little girl. Without your presence, the little influence she has would crumble. Does that not make you despair even a little?"

"I'm not worried." He peeked at Eleanor. She nodded gently.

"Aha~ I see. Mhm. Then I won't restrain Eleanor from getting involved. I like that girl too when I found she was still a virgin, I found it quite humorous." Lilith let out a small laugh "6000-year-old demon virgin ahahaha."

Deor nodded solemnly "Technically she is an Evil God... but even I found that a little weird. Cough...!" he coughed up congealed pieces of blood.

"Hmm, looks like your time's up," said Lilith, with a bored expression.

"eh?...uh, Deor I'm s—"

"Save it."

Eleanor hastily tried to apologize but was cut short by Deor. Then—

Tsst-

sst-

stsst-

The soft sound of flesh burning.

"...?" confused Eleanor looked down at Deor's chest. She noticed black tattoo-like characters she didn't recognize or understand spread rapidly all over his body before finally masking his face.

"... hmm? What is this self-destruction?" Sarkaima was perplexed he couldn't sense any energy fluctuations.

'!?!??!' she didn't let it show on her face, but Lilith was so shocked at the scene happening before her eyes that she almost fell off her chair 'This is [Sriilve]—!!'

10 minutes later Deor was dead for about 8 minutes yet everyone, especially Lilith, was staring blankly, waiting for a reaction from his stiff corpse.

Quiet. Forty minutes more. Nothing happened.