My Wives are Beautiful Demons-Chapter 674: Phase 1. Battle Royale III

The transmission returned to Vergil without any fanfare, as if the system itself had accepted that, at that point, he was the axis around which events gravitated.

He walked.

Just that.

Without haste, without urgency, without even the posture of someone in combat. There were no weapons in his hands, no open wings, no infernal chorus or proclamation of power. Vergil simply advanced through the forest as one traverses a corridor that is too long.

And yet, everything died.

Sometimes he chose.

Other times, not even that.

A creature moved wrongly—it disappeared.

An aura bothered him—it was extinguished.

Something tried to surround him—it ceased to exist.

Then, he continued walking.

The forest no longer reacted as before. The labyrinth still moved, still tried to reorganize paths, erect vegetable walls, create conceptual traps… but now there was hesitation. The magic that sustained that environment seemed to have developed something akin to fear.

Vergil didn't force his way through with constant violence. He alternated. Sometimes he burned an entire expanse of trees, opening a straight road of black glass and charred roots. At other times, he simply passed through—and whatever was in his path disintegrated silently, as if recognizing the futility of resistance.

He stopped for a moment.

Not because he was tired.

But because he felt something.

Vergil closed his eyes for half a second, taking a deep breath. The air was hot, laden with soot and magical essence. It wasn't that.

It was something else.

"…Divine," he murmured.

It wasn't Athena.

Not yet.

That presence didn't have the cold density of a strategic goddess, nor the rigid structure of an Olympian avatar. It was something more diffuse, younger, more… familiar.

Alice.

Vergil's brow furrowed slightly.

"Damn it…"

When the tournament began, the chaotic transport had randomly separated the competitors. He knew this. He knew alliances would break there. He knew groups would be fragmented.

Even so, sensing that Alice was somewhere in that forest—alone, surrounded by monsters, lesser gods, and desperate champions—stirred something rare in his chest.

Genuine irritation.

Not fear.

Not panic.

But a deep, silent, and dangerous irritation.

Vergil slightly altered his course.

Not drastically. Not obviously. Just enough to align his trajectory with the direction of that aura that pulsed like a distant star.

On the way, a clearing opened up.

It was too artificial to be natural. The labyrinth had created that space as a conflict zone: spaced trees, flat terrain, energy accumulated in the air, ready to favor direct battles.

Vergil entered the clearing.

And the clearing ceased to exist.

The heat exploded around him in a circular pulse, not violent, but absolute. The trees caught fire from the inside out, the ground vitrified, the air rippled as if being bent.

In less than three seconds, there was no clearing.

There was a circle of smoldering black earth, surrounded by slowly toppling charred trunks.

Vergil kept walking.

"Alice…" he murmured again, more quietly. "Where have you gotten yourself into…"

The transmission captured the exact moment something changed.

It wasn't a direct attack.

It was movement.

Ahead, between columns of smoke and collapsing trees, three figures emerged running desperately. Two men pushed a third, all wounded, covered in blood and soot. They weren't monsters.

They were competitors.

Humans? Demigods? Champions?

It mattered little.

They ran as if fleeing something far worse than a quick death.

"Come on!" "He's right behind us!" one of them shouted.

"I can't go on anymore!" another replied, limping.

They pushed through the cloud of smoke and then saw Vergil.

The impact was immediate.

The man in front braked sharply, almost slipping on the glassy ground. His eyes widened as he recognized the figure standing in the middle of the path, enveloped in heat and silence.

Vergil didn't move.

He didn't lift his head.

He didn't change his posture.

He just stood there.

"G-get out of the way!" the man shouted, in utter panic. "Get out of the way, damn it!"

The other two almost collided with him from behind, too desperate to think.

"You don't understand!" the second yelled, looking over his shoulder. "Something's coming! Something huge!"

Vergil tilted his head slightly.

He looked at them.

His blue gaze pierced through all three like a cold blade.

"I understand," he said, with absolute calm.

The men heard no threat.

They heard a sentence.

Vergil raised a single hand.

The palm open.

Relaxed.

"Goodbye."

There was no scream.

There was no impact.

The air ahead of him began to swirl.

Not like ordinary wind, but like a dense, infernal spiral, charged with compressed demonic fire. The hurricane started small—the size of a fist—and then expanded in a single instant.

The three men had no time to react.

The hurricane engulfed them.

Bodies were disintegrated before they were even launched. Flesh, bones, armor, weapons—all vaporized in an incandescent flash. The heat was so precise that there was no scattered explosion, only total eradication.

When the phenomenon ceased, only three pairs of charred feet remained on the ground.

Nothing above the ankles.

Nothing else.

Silence.

For a full second.

Then, one of the feet fell to the side.

Vergil blinked.

"…Hmph."

In the demons' VIP room, there was an awkward pause. Roxanne was the first to react.

"…That was awful."

She grimaced.

"And kind of funny."

Vivianne covered her face with her hand.

"I shouldn't laugh at that."

Neberius let out a short, dry laugh.

"He wasn't even trying to be dramatic."

Sapphire watched with a crooked half-smile.

"He really did say 'goodbye'."

In the arena, Loki roared with laughter.

"AH, THAT WAS PERFECT!" he shouted, clapping his hands. "ZERO MONOLOGUE! ZERO EXPLANATION! JUST… POOF!"

Back in the forest, Vergil had already turned his back.

He passed by the charred feet without even looking down.

The residual hurricane dissipated behind him, and the labyrinth tried—timidly—to close that path.

It failed.

Vergil continued walking.

With each step, his presence seemed more focused. The chaos around him was no longer accidental. He was no longer just traversing the tournament.

He was searching.

"Alice…" he said again, now with a firm voice.

The divine aura he felt pulsed stronger for an instant.

Closer.

Much closer.

Vergil narrowed his eyes.

"Just a little longer," he murmured. "Father is coming."

The transmission cut off abruptly.

Not with static.

Not with a delay.

The image simply changed.

The forest was still there—or what remained of it.

A vast field, devastated beyond recognition. Trees reduced to broken pillars of crystallized mana. The ground had been rewritten in impossible geometric patterns, concentric circles, spirals, and lines that intersected like a living equation. The air vibrated, saturated with arcane energy so dense it distorted the light.

At the center of it all…

Alice.

She wasn't standing.

She wasn't running.

She wasn't conjuring anything.

She was sitting cross-legged, her hands resting lightly on her knees, like someone observing the world from an improvised throne.

The throne, however, was moving.

A colossus of pure mana supported her: a gigantic, humanoid golem, made entirely of condensed energy, floating runes, and translucent layers of raw power. Each of its movements made the ground tremble, not from weight, but from magical authority.

It was as if magic itself had decided to take physical form…

…and kneel to carry her.

In the demons' VIP room, silence fell immediately.

"…She's not even moving," murmured Vivianne, her voice too low to hide her shock. "This isn't active conjuration," Sapphire said, her eyes wide. "It's permanence. The magic is… obeying."

In the arena, several drones focused on the field.

Bodies were scattered.

Not torn apart.

Not burned.

Defeated.

Some had been crushed against the ground with such force that they seemed part of the terrain. Others were petrified by excess mana, like broken statues in mid-collapse. There were marks of attacks—lightning, blades, invocations—all interrupted mid-way, as if they had never been completed.

One last competitor remained standing.

Or rather… trying to.

He staggered backward, stumbling among the magical symbols on the ground, his face pale, his eyes wide with utter terror. His armor was cracked, his body covered in sweat and dried blood.

He stared at Alice as if she were facing something forbidden.

"T-this…" his voice faltered. "T-this isn't possible…"

Alice tilted her head slightly.

There was no anger in her gaze.

Nor pleasure.

Just… absence.

"Isn't it?" she asked, in a tone too calm for the situation.

The competitor swallowed hard.

"Magic like this… control like this…" he stammered, almost crying. "You're not even using seals! No focus! No catalyst! This violates all the laws!"

The golem took a step forward.

The ground gave way under the movement.

Alice remained seated, motionless, as if the world were merely something passing beneath her feet.

"Laws," she repeated thoughtfully. "Ah… that explains it."

She looked down at him, her violet eyes reflecting the glow of the runes around her.

"You still think they apply here."

The man tried to take another step back.

He couldn't.

The lines on the ground moved on their own, rearranging themselves, closing the space around him like a chessboard deciding where a piece can exist.

"I-I surrender!" he cried. "I don't want to fight you! This isn't a battle, it's—"

Alice watched him for another second.

Then she spoke:

"You even look like an ant."

The competitor froze.

"W-what…?"

She raised a finger. A small gesture. Childish, almost.

"It's just a touch and—"

The golem moved.

Not quickly.

Not violently.

Just inevitably.

The colossal fist descended in a straight line, compressing the surrounding space before even touching the target. The impact didn't generate an explosion. There was no loud sound.

There was absolute silence for a fraction of a second.

Then the ground gave way.

The competitor's body was instantly crushed, reduced to nothing but an indistinct blur beneath the mana fist. No scream. No resistance. Just the end.

The golem raised its hand again.

Nothing remained.

Alice finished, in the same neutral tone:

"…dies."