Frey discreetly observed the king of Angelus.
At first glance, his strength didn't seem particularly impressive. Perhaps a very high B-Rank. Around the same level as her daughter, Claire.
No. Something felt wrong.
This man knew who she was. He knew she was a Demon Lord. And yet, there wasn't the slightest trace of fear in him.
Frey knew better than anyone that she wasn't among the strongest of the Demon Lords. That fact had caused her no small amount of frustration over the years.
Among the Ten Great Demon Lords, she and Carrion occupied the lower end of the hierarchy. Even Roy Valentine, whose strength she held in reasonable regard, wasn't a Demon Lord at all. He was merely the subordinate of the mysterious Demon Lord known as Twilight.
Still, none of that changed one simple fact. She was a Demon Lord.
That title had not been handed to her out of charity. It had been earned through strength.
Entire nations feared her name. Kings bowed their heads. And this human... This human had the audacity to look down on her?
Frey's smile became strained.
"My protection is not an insult, King Angelus," she said calmly. "It is an acknowledgement."
"Acknowledgement?" Angelus repeated with a chuckle. "Perhaps among Demon Lords. But I serve the heavens."
Frey's eye twitched.
"And I fail to see why a god should concern herself with demons."
"Hey." Kaede's smile vanished. The dark-haired Demon Lord looked genuinely offended. "Can you stop calling her that?"
Angelus blinked. "Hm?"
"She's Frey." Kaede pointed at the winged queen beside her. "She's my friend. She's nice. She's responsible. She helped me when I didn't know a few things about this world."
"And she's way cooler than me."
Frey quietly looked away. Claire nearly coughed.
Angelus smiled patiently. "Lady Kaede, surely you do not mean to compare yourself with..."
"No, I'm serious." Kaede frowned. "You're pissing me off."
The king looked slightly bewildered. "But she is a Demon Lord."
Frey raised her hand before Kaede could retort again, stepping forward. "King Angelus." Her voice was as supple as sweet fruit. "I offered you my protection because Angelus lies within Fulbrosia's domain. It was a courtesy."
Her golden eyes narrowed ever so slightly. "Yet from the moment I entered your palace, you have spoken as though I were beneath your notice."
The smile remained. "I am accustomed to fear, King Angelus. I am even accustomed to hatred. Disrespect, however, is considerably rarer."
"I can tolerate much, but a ruler who refuses to recognize reality is a danger not only to himself, but to his people." Her gaze briefly drifted toward Sumire before returning to the king.
"And a danger on my border is something I cannot ignore."
Angelus laughed. He laughed loudly enough that Frey briefly wondered if the man had finally lost his mind.
"As expected of a Demon," he declared between bouts of laughter. "So consumed by pride and overbearing confidence."
Beside him, the young girl suddenly reached forward, panic spreading across her face. "Dad, no!"
The floor beneath Frey abruptly split apart.
Gears clicked into motion. Layers of white crystal-like glass shifted beneath the marble, revealing an enormous mechanism that had apparently been hidden beneath the throne room all along.
A trap.
Of course, being a harpy, Frey simply remained in the air, her wings carrying her effortlessly above the opening.
Beside her, Claire had done the same.
And Kaede... Frey blinked. Kaede was standing inside a massive cage made entirely of the same white glass.
The Demon Lord herself looked no less surprised.
Frey raised an eyebrow.
The trap was for Kaede? That made no sense. Hadn't this man practically been worshipping her moments ago?
Inside the cage, Kaede tapped the wall curiously.
The white glass rippled like water beneath her hand before briefly darkening to an ominous black.
Kaede tilted her head. "Huh?"
"Hahahahaha!" Angelus burst into laughter once more. "This is the price of pride!" he proclaimed triumphantly. "To think you could enter this divine place so casually!"
He pointed dramatically toward the confused Demon Lord. "You, who have obtained the power of a god, shall tell me how you acquired such power!"
His eyes gleamed with fanaticism. "So that I may ascend beyond mortal limits!" He spread his arms wide. "I shall attain the godhood that is mine by divine right!"
Then his gaze shifted upward toward the two harpies hovering above the shattered floor.
"As for you..." Angelus smiled. "I shall demonstrate the difference between heaven and demons."
He raised a hand and pointed directly at Frey. "Truly, Queen Frey, I must thank you. You Demon Lords are so arrogant, so thoroughly convinced of your own superiority. Did you actually believe me unaware of the birds circling my nation?"
Frey raised a brow, though her expression remained otherwise composed.
"The harpies you sent to spy upon Angelus have already been captured." Angelus spread his arms theatrically. "And I thank you for the souls."
Frey's eyes narrowed slightly. He had mentioned only the harpies. Not a single word about Kaede's shadows, which meant one of two possibilities presented themselves. Either he genuinely remained unaware of them, or her own scouts had simply proven less proficient than the Demon Lord's. Neither conclusion pleased her particularly, though the fact that he had managed to capture her people at all was enough to raise the threat she attributed to this man by a measure. Only a measure. But a measure nonetheless.
"I see," she said simply.
Angelus smiled with evident pride. "Do you know, I almost admire your naivety. You entered my kingdom with such little caution, offering protection to a nation already protected by heaven itself. And now you stand before me believing yourself untouchable."
"Then you truly intend to kill me?"
"Indeed. It is necessary." His smile widened further. "The world must learn that demons stand beneath heaven."
Frey studied him for a long moment. She found herself entirely unable to comprehend the depths of this man's confidence.
"I see," she repeated.
The priests slammed their red coffins onto the ground in unison, the sound echoing violently throughout the chamber as the entire palace shuddered in response. Beneath the broken floor, massive gears began grinding to life, thousands of interlocking mechanisms long hidden beneath the throne room roaring awake all at once. The opening in the floor expanded further, and from the depths below, chains began dragging something upward. Slowly. Methodically.
A coffin. No, a sarcophagus, dwarfing even the smaller ones the priests carried.
The red coffins opened in sequence. Inside each rested a humanoid figure with white skin, white wings, and artificial halos affixed crudely above their heads.
'Statues? No, Golems.' Golems, certainly, yet the power radiating from within them gave Frey genuine pause.
She recognized that particular feeling. She had felt it before, during the Tenma War, in the presence of the angels. 'So that is the source of his confidence.'
Beside her, Claire had gone pale.
Inside her cage, Kaede tilted her head with open curiosity. "Huh." She reached out and tapped the glass. "Neat."
Frey nearly sighed. Only Kaede could describe something like this as neat.
"Kaede." Her voice carried quietly across the chamber.
"Hm?"
"Do not interfere. This is Fulbrosia's matter."
Her tone remained calm, measured, almost conversational. Yet Claire straightened instinctively beside her, because she recognized the particular stillness in her mother's voice. Frey was angry.
"This king has dared to lay hands upon my subjects." Her golden eyes settled fully upon Angelus. "He has slaughtered my scouts. He has stolen the power of heaven for his own ends. And now he intends to make an example of me before his people."
She smiled, and it was both a beautiful expression and a deeply unsettling one in equal measure. "Very well. I shall educate him."
The air around her wings stirred gently as she paused, "One final question, King Angelus." Her smile remained perfectly intact. "Do you understand precisely what it means to declare war upon a Demon Lord?"
The king only laughed in response.
Behind him, the great sarcophagus finally emerged fully from the depths. There was loud sound like a heavy lock moving into place, and the sarcophagus opened.
'It's just as I suspected.' Frey narrowed her eyes at the sight resting within the great sarcophagus. 'This bastard…'
For a brief moment, another thought crossed her mind. 'I wonder what Guy would think if he learned of this. Would he hold me accountable? After all, this happened beneath my territory.'
"Truly revolting."
Gone was the gentle tone she had maintained until now. Her voice had become cold. Sharp. Like the endless tundra upon which Demon Lord Guy Crimson had built his castle.
"Human greed knows no bounds, it seems."
Within the sarcophagus lay a massive golem, pure white like the smaller ones scattered throughout the priests' coffins, though far more substantial in its construction. Unlike those lesser creations, this one carried no luster of metal beneath its surface. No trace of earth or stone or any material found within the physical world.
What formed its body was something far worse.
'To desecrate the corpse of an Archangel like this…' Her expression darkened. 'Angelus will have to be purged. There is no other choice.'
Gasps suddenly filled the throne room.
Ministers stared in horror. Priests froze. Even the knights seemed unable to comprehend what they were seeing.
Frey glanced briefly toward the ministers and priests lining the walls, their faces pale and twisted with shock, before returning her attention to the matter at hand. A heart still beat faintly within her claw, and she took care to keep it raised, unwilling to let it brush carelessly against the floor beneath her.
Only then did the realization settle over the room.
During the brief moment she had spent examining the archangel's corpse, she had already moved.
There was no warning. Her body had crossed the distance faster than anyone present could perceive.
Anyone except Kaede.
Angelus looked down slowly at the fist sized hole now occupying his chest. Blood traced a thin line from the corner of his mouth, his teeth stained crimson as he managed, somehow, to smile through it.
"It's too late." His voice came out as little more than a rasp.
Frey's frown deepened. The king remained standing, despite the fact that his heart now rested firmly within her grasp.
"Did you truly believe a single heart would matter to me?" Angelus's lips curled despite the blood still trickling down his chin. "I severed my dependence on such trivial things long ago."
Frey's eyes narrowed further. So he had already begun the process. Somewhere beneath the layers of theatrical robes and divine posturing, something fundamentally human had been carved away and replaced.
"Artifact Angels." Angelus raised his free hand despite the wound in his chest. "Kill her."
The white figures stirred within their coffins.
Frey released his heart and let it fall. She did not wait to see where it landed.
The first Artifact Angel lunged toward her with a speed that would have impressed her under different circumstances, its artificial wings carrying it across the chamber in a single fluid motion. Frey's own wings answered before conscious thought caught up with instinct, carrying her sideways through the air with a burst of speed that left the golem swinging through empty space where she had been standing a heartbeat earlier.
Indoors, her advantage shrank considerably.
In open sky, speed belonged entirely to her. There was no ceiling to clip her wings against, no walls to redirect her momentum, nothing to interrupt the long elegant arcs she could carve through open air without ever slowing. Here, within the confines of a throne room however grand, every turn had to be tighter, every burst of speed cut shorter than it wanted to be.
It cost her time. Not much. But it cost her time.
She drove her talons through the chest of the nearest Artifact Angel before it could fully orient itself toward her, the golem's body splitting apart in a shower of white fragments that scattered across the marble floor like broken porcelain. Two more converged on her position immediately, their hollow golden eyes tracking her with mechanical precision.
Frey twisted between them, wings folding tight against her body for the half second necessary to slip through the narrowing gap, then exploded outward again to put both of them in her wake before either could fully register the maneuver.
Claire moved beside her, her daughter's smaller frame allowing for sharper turns than Frey herself could manage. Three Artifact Angels fell to her in quick succession, each strike precise and economical.
Ministers and priests scrambled away from the chaos, pressing themselves against the walls as golem after golem dissolved into scattered white fragments across the throne room floor.
Within the cage, Kaede watched with open curiosity, occasionally cheering when a stray fragment skittered too close to the glass.
Forty seven Artifact Angels had emerged from their coffins.
By the time the last of them shattered beneath Frey's talons, perhaps thirty seconds had passed.
Thirty seconds longer than it should have taken her in open sky.
Frey hovered amid the wreckage, breathing evenly despite the exertion, and turned her attention back toward the throne.
Angelus was no longer standing where she had left him.
The fist sized hole in his chest remained, blood still seeping steadily down his golden robes, yet his expression carried no trace of pain or urgency. If anything, he looked almost pleased.
"A valiant effort," he said, "but ultimately irrelevant."
He turned toward the sarcophagus behind him. Toward the desecrated remains resting within it.
"I have waited a very long time for this moment, Queen Frey." His smile widened, blood staining his teeth a deep crimson. "You have given me no choice but to ascend early."
He spread his arms. "Behold the true power of heaven."
His body began to dissolve into streams of golden light, the fragments drifting steadily toward the open sarcophagus and the ruined corpse waiting within it.