Chapter 160

Arc 15 - Dead Men Rising - Part 13

Oblivion:

In a white dimension that transcends the Ultraverse, a corpse like man sat on the ground (?) and whimpered slowly.

He was Azazel, the Angel of Death who was killed by Alice Brown, the Angel Killer.

“Lucifer…?”

Before this man stood his oldest brother, Lucifer, the first angel.

Lucifer smiled softly at his dead brother and said, “Sorry, I am late.”

“A little too late,” Azazel scoffed bitterly.

“...”

Sour feelings welled up within Lucifer.

These negative feelings caused his throat to become dry, so he swallowed his saliva to wet his throat, but it did not help.

He then raised his right hand and massaged his throat a little.

Clearing his throat, Lucifer added, “I am sorry about this but… Can you come with me?”

“...”

Azazel looked down at the ground and forced out a weak laughter.

“All my life, I was shunned away by everyone. They avoided me for an eternity. Then one day, you came, giving me hope… Only to then disappoint me.”

Lucifer averted his eyes in a guilty manner.

“For as long as I can remember, I wanted one thing…”

He raised his head in fierce speed and looked at his older brother.

“Death. I wanted to die.”

Not too far from these two, Aarin glanced at Nazar who was standing next to her.

He had a somewhat sympathetic look on his face.

She moved her hand and clutched onto his tightly.

Nazar looked at her in a state of confusion, but in return, she smiled softly at him.

“I couldn’t die, I couldn’t be a slave to the system, I couldn’t be accepted… Alone in the shadowy world, under the jet-black sky, I wept, waiting for this day, and it is finally here. It’s… wonderful.”

Lucifer clenched his hand in anger after hearing the hopeless words of his younger brother.

He had millions of years to help him, but he didn’t.

No matter how busy he was, did he not think to do more for his own sibling?

Could he not use his influence and power to change the view of the other angels?

Azazel had many expectations, but at every turn, he was left with disappointment.

“I have to thank the Angel Killer, she freed me at last, but…” the corpse-like man glanced down with a depressed look on his face. “I wish I could save her the same way she saved me.”

Lucifer wanted to tell him everything is going to be all right, but he knew he would be lying.

So, he threw away his emotions and spoke in an emotionless tone.

Or at least he tried anyway.

“That is not important, I am sorry to unload this on you at once, but the dead have risen. They rose from their graves and are now terrorising the multiverse. Orion is doing his best to keep their terror at minimum, but I am unsure about how long he can hold up.”

“Ah...”

Azazel let out a heavy sigh.

He knew what Lucifer was here for, after all, he is the multiverse itself and sometimes, everything else comes before one person.

“You want me to return to the living world once more.”

“I...”

Lucifer wanted to sugarcoat his dark proposal, but he swallowed his words.

With a serious look in his eyes, he stared at his brother.

“Yes, I need you for everything to continue. And no, I don’t want everything to continue because I am everything, but because there are too many people and worlds, innocents who don’t deserve to go up in flames.”

“...”

Azazel let out a hushed laughter.

“I did not know you cared about the innocents.”

“Maybe I don’t, or maybe I actually do, but I don’t wish for this creation of ours to crumble down.”

“THEN ASK ARAEL!” Azazel shouted at his older brother angrily. “He has the power to do anything, so ask him.”

“Arael...” Lucifer’s voice muffled. “He is missing. If worse comes to worse, he might be dead.”

“!!”

Azazel widened his eyes.

“...How?”

“Wait, wait, wait, what do you mean Arael is gone?” Nazar let go of Aarin’s hand and walked hastily towards Lucifer. “What happened? How?”

“I don’t know," hearing his voice, annoyance and anger soared within him. Despite the situation they were in, he did not try to hide his true emotions.

"What the… No, this can't be right," Nazar spoke slowly as his eyes turned white. "This is Arael we are talking about. He won't vanish without a trace---!"

While looking at the cosmic stream that is time, he noticed a black hole at a certain point in time.

Those of us who exist above certain dimensions, we are above time, space, and reality. We can only exist at one point in time. Although there is a shell left behind, our true selves are not there. But...

"This is… complicated," Nazar muttered.

I can see beyond the black hole and I am looking at Arael. But that's not a shell either. That's just an illusion.

He did not need to think hard about who was responsible for this atrocity, only one man came to his mind.

You are getting on MY FUCKING NERVES NOW, X!

With the anger in his eyes soaring, Oblivion shook vigorously.

"Gah!" as the dimension suddenly shook, Aarin's body flinched in surprise. For some odd reasons, she was expecting Sephrah to be still alive and attacked this place. But then she realised she was wrong, so she felt relieved.

Lucifer clicked his tongue at this inconvenience caused by the God in the room.

On the other hand, Metatron took back a step with a wry smile.

"This guy…" Metatron muttered under his breath.

Nazar's angry smile led to the veins in his body popping out to an extreme degree which caused the muscles in his body to stiffen.

The muscles grew big and big, almost hulking out into his real form.

"No matter what you do, I am going to send you to the worst hell imaginable."

Lucifer breathed in deeply and focused on his brother again.

"Azazel…"

However, Azazel was not looking at him or even listening to him.

Following the trail of Azazel's almost non-existent eyes, Lucifer too looked at Nazar.

"You are like… me," Azazel said to Nazar with a faint smile on his face.

Nazar turned his head abruptly towards Azazel, anger still visible on his face.

"You, too, like me, want to die."

"You got that right," Nazar forced the veins in his body to go back to their original and dampened the anger deep in his heart.

"If you had the chance, will you take it?"

"..."

Nazar looked at Aarin with a complicated look on his face.

Aarin clasped her hands in front of her chest. With a sad look on her face, she patiently anticipated for his answer.

What do I want and what do people want for me? Nazar asked himself an old question. I want to die, I really do. I don't want to live forever. That is my answer and always will be. But...

Aarin forced a smile on her face, gesturing to him to speak his mind.

However, seeing how broken her smile was, he clicked his tongue.

"Yes."

Aarin's smile faded in a disappointed manner. But despite that, she understood his answer.

She was hoping he had changed his stance on death after he started living with his family again, but it seems she was wrong.

"Is what I wanted to say," Nazar added in a weary muffled voice.

"!!"

Aarin's eyes widened in a bewildered manner.

Too many emotions were running through her at this moment, so even this angel of emotions found it hard to control it.

"I can't die for the sake of a few. I don't want to see them suffer in any way because of me. Besides that, I cannot let them like this. My name is the mud, and they are paying for it. I need to fix that somehow."

"Is…" Azazel looked down with a sad smile. "I see. I understand."

Nazar nodded.

"You are just like me."

Nazar ignored that and asked another question.

"So, what do you really want?"

"I wanted to be accepted, loved. I wanted to cheer with everyone else, smile and live in the universe like everyone else. I don't want to harm the universe or its people for no reason… But… It's not up to me. I am just a tool, after all."

The word 'tool' caused sour emotions to erupt within Nazar once more.

"Now, I just want to die. I want to die. I don't want to see any of them again nor see myself."

Azazel looked up at his brother.

"I am sorry, Lucy, I cannot help you."

Nazar glanced at Lucifer with narrow eyes.

Is that why he never liked it when I called him that?

"No matter what you promise me, we both know those are empty. No matter what I do, everyone will hate me even though I am the cure of the creation."

The baffled Lucifer repeated, "Cure?"

Azazel ignored his question and continued.

"I don't want to live that life again. I don't want to live anymore. So, please…"

Azazel's sockets lit up with red energies.

The corpse-like body turned into an enormous red growling beast. Its dark slimy tentacles stretched out of Oblivion and slithered in the darkness.

Its large body like a Dumbo octopus squirmed.

In pain, the beast screamed, "Please killlll me!"

He pleaded to his brother.

He transmitted his thoughts and his suffering, his loneliness, and his sadness.

And deep within those thoughts, he asked Lucifer, "Please kill me."

However…

"No."

Lucifer threw away those thoughts and his pleading.

"I will make sure you are happy; I will make sure no one hates you; I will make sure…"

Lucifer's voice vanished as bitter feelings became transparent on his face.

With sad eyes, he reached a hand towards his brother.

"Please, come with me. I will save you--"

"Nooooooooo," the beast growled in pain. "You don't understand, Lucifer, you never did. None of you did."

"Then help me understand!" Lucifer shouted. "Help me understand your pain. Help me understand you and what you are going through--"

"No!"

The tentacles shot right at Lucifer.

"Kill me, kill me, kill me, kill me."

Lucifer did not move, he let the tentacles attack him.

A tentacle slithered around his neck and tightened around it.

"I don't want to live anymore!" The beast roared once again.

"Fuu," Nazar exhaled slowly through his nose.

His red eyes flared.

Next to him, a golden portal opened.

He slid his hand through it and picked up a dark glowing dagger.

"Yeah, I understand."

Moving faster than anyone could react to or see, Nazar moved and swung the dagger around.

"NOOOOOOO," Lucifer reached out his hand with his welled-up heart.

However, Nazar did not pay attention to it.

He slashed the dagger once more and stood back in his place.

"I understand very well."

The dark dagger left an after image of its slashed through the white dimension. It was as if it were frozen in time.

"I do, Azazel."

The beast was cut into a million pieces as the after images of the slashes from the dagger slowly faded away.

"!!!" Aarin gasped loudly.

"!!!" Metatron tightened his grip on his sword and launched himself towards Nazar. "Why you--"

Before Metatron could do something, Nazar created a dome of black light, imprisoning him within it.

Lucifer's face twitched in anger and sadness as a tear dropped from his eye.

He looked at the body of his brother as it was fading away.

Slowly but surely, the one he cherished the most was leaving him.

He tried to hold onto him, but it was too late.

He was erased.

Hey, Lucy, one day people will accept me, right?

...Yes, I promise you. I will make sure to change the angels. I will make sure to find a way to change you.

Will Esme still hate me?

Haha, no, not at all. Esme will love you just as she loves everyone else.

…

Why the disappointed look, Azazel?

Well, I am her brother, shouldn't I get more love the rest.

Ha, that is true. Perhaps I ought to tell her this one day.

Nooo, please don't. I don't want to die of embarrassment.

Haha.

Why… Lucifer thought angrily as old images clashed through his mind.

Those old images where he was confident, he would save his brother, but since then, it has been millions of years and yet he hadn't saved him.

Why…

In the past, Lucifer was alone too. He was a tool who had no need for emotions.

But no matter how much he tried; he could not keep his laughter down when he was with Azazel.

"WHY DID YOU DO THIS?!"

As Azazel's last remains faded out of existence forever, Lucifer activated his true power and tapped into his true aspect; the Ultraverse.

With two infinitely large multiverses and higher dimensions that dwarf them by an infinities to power him up, Lucifer shot himself at Nazar with red bloodshot eyes.

The first angel held the Supreme God of Everything by his neck and picked him up, only to slam him down into the hard floor of Oblivion.

"WHY DID YOU DO THIS?!"

Without waiting for Nazar to answer, Lucifer created a large white blade of energy.

The 「Blade of Light」, the contained power of Heavens stabbed Nazar in the chest.

The pain inflicted upon Nazar kept increasing the more Lucifer thought of him as evil. The eviler a person, the more pain this blade caused them. So, in his mind, he turned Nazar into the evillest creature in existence and applied punishment equal to that.

"WHY DID YOU DO THIS?!"

In this white glowing dimension, dark purple chains slithered, leaving an ugly goo behind it.

The chains slowly entered through Nazar's mouth and shot out of his stomach.

A concentrated attack of [Destruction] was bound to hurt this monster, but to Lucifer's disappointment, it did not.

None of his attacks even hurt this monster.

Why… WHY WON'T YOU JUST DIE?!

As the fire in his heart burnt hotter than ever, he equipped every power, skill, and weapon within his disposal in his fist.

The first came crashing down onto the face of this monster.

Once. Twice. Thrice. And so on.

Repeatedly, Lucifer slammed that fist into his face, but Nazar did not do anything.

He just stared at the blood lusted Lucifer.

Seeing how the bloodlust did not vanish after a while, Nazar clicked his tongue and caught onto Lucifer's hand.

"Your actions are pissing me off."

The dazed Lucifer was thrown back.

Nazar stood up and held Lucifer by his collar.

"What did I do wrong?" Nazar asked him coldly.

"What did…" the anger within Lucifer soared up to an extreme degree. So much so that fire leaked from his eyes. "You pest! You do not--"

"I did nothing wrong by killing a beast who was in a never-ending pain. I had thought, out of everyone, you would understand."

"He wanted to be saved. That was a cry for help. He wanted to be saved. To be given a glorious life. To start over, but not alone this time. To be truly free and happy. And you stole that from him. But I could have saved--"

"STOP FUCKING GIVING PEOPLE FALSE HOPE!" Nazar twirled Lucifer's body in his hand and slammed him into a wall of light. "Fake promises of a neverland they know they will never get to. Fake promises of acceptance and love that will only hurt them in the long term."

Lucifer, without fighting back, lowered his head.

The power he had activated to fight his monster slowly faded away.

"That man had suffered enough, and even in his last fucking moments, you gave him false hope. You said, you will change the angels?? THEN FUCKING DO SOOOOOOO!"

Nazar clenched his hand, shot himself forward and punched Lucifer in the abdomen, causing the first angel to cough blood.

"When will any of you understand the pain of a beast that has been hurt and needs to be put down for good? How long can they continue existing? How long can they force a fake smile on their face and pretend they are okay? The world won't change, and THEY HAVE NO POWER TO DO SO THEMSELF! So…"

Nazar swallowed his saliva to wet his dry throat.

"Some of us don't like living. Some of us don't like existing. Some of us don't like hearing those shitty promises made by someone like you. Some of us don't like being given false hope."

"..."

"I want to die too. I want this whole damn existence of mine to stop existing, but I cannot. Arosus said something today. We cannot change it, so we must live with it. I will live with it because there is no other way for me. But Azazel… for him there was. You could have truly saved him a long time ago, Lucifer, but you didn't."

Lucifer bit his lip in anger so hard, he could taste fresh blood.

"When someone wants to end it, you don't tell them to live for you. If they can't live for themselves, if they don't want to live for themselves, forcing them to live for others… It's truly the worst thing anyone can do."

Aarin stared at her brother with a heavy heart.

All his life, people told this monster to live. Live for others if not himself.

She, who once told him this, felt anger at herself.

"For me, I have more or less accepted my fate. As of today, I am throwing away my desire to die. I am throwing away my search for finding someone who can kill me." In a barely audible voice, he added, "Because being disappointed in failing to finish this is even worse. Constant disappointment in that regard is… Ahhh, damn it!"

Aarin sucked in a breath.

A new wave of emotions befell her.

She was not sure whether to be happy about this development or be sad.

"When you can do the same for others… Maybe don't hesitate. If they want to end this miserable existence, maybe end it. HE HAD BILLIONS OF YEARS OF PAIN WELLING UP in his frail heart and none of you thought to do something for him."

Nazar started to clap his hands.

"What wonderful creatures you all are. The holy ones. God's most loved creation. And so and so… WHAT A FUCKING JOKE!"

Nazar slammed his foot into the ground of the dimension, causing it to crack.

“I don’t care how you wanted to bring him back, but making false promises and giving him false hope… A hope that will bring nothing but pain… HOW CAN YOU DO THAT?! To your own brother, too, at that.”

Lucifer did not say anything but kept quiet.

There was a lot he wanted to say, but he knew Nazar was not completely wrong in this situation.

His brother was suffering, and he knew that, but at the same time, there was only so much he could for him. He had billions of years to help Azazel but could not because of problems of his own.

“Ahhh, damn it,” Nazar kicked the air.

Damping down his anger, he shot a fierce gaze at Metatron.

“You, get down to Heaven. You can’t live in this place anymore. You too, Aarin, this place might get destroyed and end up hurting you greatly, if it does not end up killing you.”

“And what are you going to do?”

“I don’t know, someone has to do something about this mess. Well… It is my mess so I need to do what I should have done a while ago. I am going to create a new entity to take Azazel’s place. Albeit it will not be alive. Just… a thing.”

Aarin wanted to say something, but instead shut her lips tightly and nodded.

“Okay, I understand,” Aarin said slowly.

Metatron looked at Nazar then Lucifer with many questions floating in his head.

The scene before him confused him beyond belief.

But he knew one thing, if he does not say what this white haired and red eyed monster says, he might die.

“I...” Metatron let out a muffled sigh. “I will do as you say.”

He prepared to create a portal to leave this place.

Nazar walked towards Lucifer and crouched in front of him.

“What are you going to do now, Lucifer? Sit here all day or come with me to create this entity?”

Nazar let out a soft groan as he thought about what he did today.

What if, instead of Lucifer, it was him and his older sibling? Or his sister?

That would be… Nazar clicked his tongue.

“Look, I am sorry about what I did today. But if you had taken Azazel back with you, his life could have gotten worse.”

Nazar put his hand on Lucifer’s head and healed his injuries.

“You can try to kill me later or attack those I care about, I can understand that, and obviously I will retaliate in my own way… But what I am trying to say is, get up now and let’s go save you. If this continues for longer, everything we both care about will die.”

“...”

“If you prolong it anymore, the scale will lean on Esme’s side and cause a total collapse shortly after. Azazel... Azazel is dead now, forever and ever, but the universe still stands a chance.”

“Who is dead?”

The four of them widened their eyes as they heard an unfamiliar voice.

Abruptly, the four of them looked at the source of this voice and started questioning.

“...”

“...”

“...”

“Who…?”

What they saw was a small child, roughly eight years old, with light blue hair and purple eyes.

Every one of them wondered who this child was and why he had so much power.

There was something oddly familiar about him, but before Lucifer could look up to confirm it, the child spoke.

“I am Azazel, the Angel of Death,” the child introduced himself.