At this moment, the once arrogant Demon King was letting out a blood-curdling, skin-crawling scream — because her head had been pierced by a black skeletal hand.
Along with her wails, her body spasmed violently as though being electrocuted, and she completely lost control of her bodily functions.
Eventually, the Demon King, appearing utterly broken, was released and crashed to the ground.
But it wasn't over yet.
The Undead King slightly waved the scepter in his hand. The red crystal orb at the top — which resembled an eyeball — gave a faint flash, and the broken Demon King began to change.
Her bat-like wings started growing pure white feathers — but not as a full transformation. Instead, the feathers sprouted chaotically and randomly, with many parts unchanged.
Her limbs also began transforming — inconsistently — into the form she had taken as a goddess.
In simple terms, she had become a hybrid of divine and demonic forms, but not in an even or harmonious way — more like a grotesque patchwork.
Normally, two extreme forces like this cannot coexist, and her body reflected that: one half radiated dark, evil power, while the other half emitted divine, holy energy — not in balance, but in opposition, like oil and water.
"No, no, AAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"
She screamed again in agony. Her body reacted like the violent chemical reaction between sodium and water Yukino once saw in chemistry class — emitting hissing sounds, bursts of flame, and glowing eruptions. Her limbs gave off immense heat and white smoke.
"BOOM—!"
A deafening explosion erupted, a reaction thousands or even tens of thousands of times stronger than before, surging into a towering pillar of black and white flame.
It lasted for no more than a breath before quickly dissipating.
In the end, the Demon King melted like a wax candle several dozen or even hundreds of times faster than usual, leaving behind a puddle of filthy liquid on the ground.
That was just her body. Her semi-transparent soul remained — but it, too, burned like a wick, shrieking in ghostly agony before flickering out like a dying flame in the wind.
"Stop! You bastard, stop!"
A terrified, unhinged voice came from the fallen goddess. She had initially tried to flee, but now appeared to be stumbling stupidly toward the Undead King.
Or more accurately — was she being controlled into walking toward him? She would struggle to take one step back, only to take two or three steps forward.
Was she truly being controlled?
"Damn it, stop twisting my thoughts! Let me go, please!"
Twisting her thoughts? She tried to run and acted on that intention, but the power of distortion manipulated her thoughts, turning her desire to escape into a desire to surrender.
Each time she reversed her thinking to resist, the distortion would vanish momentarily, only to reassert itself — making her look as though she were being manipulated step by step toward the terrifying figure.
Finally, with a face twisted in sheer horror, she too had her head seized by the same bloodstained claw that had just destroyed the Demon King.
"GYAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH...!"
Her piercing, feminine scream turned into the roar of a beast, as if something vital was being extracted from her brain.
Then, the Undead King reached into the air and grasped something invisible. A twisted, dead soul — some sort of monster — appeared in his hand.
With a white flame burning in his eye sockets, he infused the soul into the body of the fallen goddess.
Her body began to transform — not like the Demon King's destruction, but in a shrinking, grotesque way. She was becoming... tiny?
No — rather than "petite," it was more accurate to say she was becoming a dwarf — a hideously malformed one.
Her body was hunched, her arms longer than her legs, and her five-fingered hands turned into clawed talons. Her skin turned from brown to a coarse, dark green.
Her face was grotesque, resembling a deformed, unevolved human child. Her ears became long and pointed, her head bald, and beneath her protruding forehead were two massive, murky eyes.
Her appearance exuded greed and depravity.
To put it simply — she had turned into something that perfectly fit the image of a goblin — a lowly, filthy, and revolting monster in most fantasy worlds.
And this goblin-like creature was released, fleeing in utter disgrace. After running some distance, she realized something was wrong — she touched herself.
"N-no... No, AAAHHHHHHHHHHH—!"
She let out a shrill, glass-scraping wail before collapsing as if broken, muttering nonsense to herself.
With things having reached this point, only two figures besides the Undead King remained.
Yukino, biting her lip, tightly hugged the unconscious goddess in her arms. The goddess — Ariadoa — looked terrible: bloodless, lips purple, and her body growing colder and colder, like holding a block of ice.
In front of her, the skeletal monster that had cruelly tormented the Demon King and the fallen goddess was still staring — straight at her.
Yukino's heart leapt to her throat.
But the figure merely stood there, unmoving.
Her ice-blue pupils shrank — she was certain. It was watching her.
The next second, the scepter in its hand glowed red again, and the space behind it began to twist — distorting, warping, and finally, with the sound of shattering glass, a hole like a broken window opened in the air.
Normally, it would suck in everything around it, but it appeared to be fixed in place — a pure gateway.
And the skeletal being began to drift toward that gateway.
"Wait... Please, save her!"
Words escaped Yukino's lips before she could even think — words she couldn't believe came from herself. She was pleading with a being even more terrifying than the Demon King?
Had she gone mad? The being was about to leave — would her foolishness cause them both to suffer the same horrible fate?
But... but something told her this being had never intended to harm her.
And perhaps because of those words — the figure that was about to vanish from the world froze.
She couldn't read its expression, of course — but for a brief moment, it seemed... stunned.
"You're quite the interesting human. Should I praise your courage, or mock your stupidity?"
A ghostly voice echoed inside Yukino's mind, making her eyes go wide. It had responded — not in words, but directly in her thoughts.
Unfortunately, it didn't seem intent on helping — it resumed moving to leave. But just then, the gateway behind it was overridden — replaced by another portal.
And from that portal stepped a silver-haired woman clad only in chains that bound her chest and lower half.
"Fourth Destruction Technique (ForthValkyrie) — Astral Break!"