King Domine's third eye tracked both of them as they came in, even while his hand was still pressed against his chest, fingers digging into the wound as Vilak's spell gnawed at it. His jaw tightened, teeth grinding as the pain flared again, and instead of retreating, he drove his foot down into the ground. The impact did not just crack the stone beneath him, it forced the crater deeper, the entire basin collapsing further as the shock traveled outward and shook the foundation of the city itself. The edges fractured violently, sections breaking away and crumbling inward, and up at the rim Vilak's concentration broke as his footing gave out, his body pitching forward as he nearly fell into the crater before scrambling to keep himself back.
The same force carried through Bram. The ground beneath him shifted and kicked upward, throwing off his footing and launching him back just enough to break his approach and force him to disengage. Ercale, however, did not get pushed out. He slipped through the disruption instead of resisting it, adjusting mid-step and driving straight in, his fist coming up and slamming into the Demon King's face with a sharp crack that snapped Domine's head slightly to the side and forced a short stumble back.
Domine recovered immediately, his right claw coming across in a fast, brutal swipe meant to take Ercale through the torso. Ercale twisted in the air as he came down, the claw passing just in front of him as he rotated past it and landed, his footing barely settling before the tail came in. The first strike tore across where his upper body had been, the second followed immediately after from the opposite direction, both fast enough to carve through stone, but Ercale moved through them cleanly, slipping past each one with tight, controlled adjustments rather than wide evasions.
He planted once, lightning sparking underfoot as he kicked off the ground and drove forward again. His knee came up in a tight arc toward Domine's midsection, but Domine met it head-on, his forearm coming down to block the strike. The follow-up came immediately, Ercale's leg snapping out into a kick, but that was blocked as well, Domine absorbing both impacts without giving ground. Then his hand shot out and closed around Ercale's leg mid-motion.
"Got you!"
He slammed him down hard. The impact drove straight through Ercale's body into the stone, cracking it outward as the air was forced from his lungs and blood came up with the cough that followed. Domine's tail rose immediately after, the bladed tip angling down to finish it, but it never reached him. Bram was already there, his sword crashing into the descending tail and forcing it off-line, the metal ringing sharply as the two collided.
"This teamwork was fun to fight against at first," Domine spat, turning into the block as he forced the tail back, "but now it's growing really irritating."
The pain flared again.
Vilak had regained himself at the edge and forced the spell back into place, the gem atop his staff pulsing as the wound in Domine's chest was seized again from within. Domine's expression twisted, irritation snapping toward anger as the sensation cut through him.
"Filthy piece of-"
He didn't finish it.
Even as he had been slammed down, Ercale had already begun forming the spell. His hands came together with a sharp clap, a condensed sphere of lightning forming between his palms in the instant before impact. When they struck together fully, the ball collapsed and detonated outward in a violent burst of plasma.
The force hit Domine point-blank and launched him upward.
It wasn't a stagger or a step back, it was a clean displacement, his body driven off the ground and thrown into the air, his grip on Ercale breaking as the momentum carried him upward and away.
Ercale rolled onto his side and pushed himself up, one hand going to his back as he forced himself upright, irritation clear in the motion.
"You alright?" Bram asked, already repositioning beside him, sword still up and eyes tracking Domine above.
"Peachy," Ercale muttered, rubbing his back once before dropping his hand and resetting his stance.
Meanwhile, at the edge of the crater, Lia leaned forward slightly, eyes fixed on the fight below. "Hey, that's the guy that beat the other Demon Lord back at the mansion," she pointed out, indicating Ercale.
"M-must be some kind of Demon Lord hunter or something!" Xain said, his voice coming out just a little too quick, not at all awkward, no hesitation at all.
"That spell of yours sure is helping a lot."
The voice came from right beside them.
All of them jumped.
They turned at once to see him there, X having appeared without sound or warning, standing casually as if he had been there the entire time.
"Whoa! Where did you come from?" Zee asked, her stance tightening immediately, the others reacting the same way as they shifted into readiness from the sudden presence.
"Calm down all of you, I'm on your side, I saved you from the falling building," X said, raising his hands slightly in a loose, non-threatening gesture.
"You did that?" Mae asked, her eyes narrowing as she studied him.
"Yes I did, and I've been helping the other two try and beat the Demon King over there," he replied, gesturing upward.
They followed his point.
King Domine was still in the air from the blast, his body beginning to descend, when his hand lifted slightly.
"Dominus Gravitatis Vincere."
His fall stopped instantly.
Not slowed.
Stopped.
He hung there in place as if gravity had simply ceased to apply to him at all.
"Wow, that guy's ability is frustrating," X muttered, looking up at him.
The rest of them just stared, trying to process what they were seeing.
"Anyway, I am going to go around looking for more stuff to use," X continued, already turning slightly as if preparing to leave, "take this by the way, you'll be able to put it to good use I imagine."
He tossed the steam-shotgun toward them.
Lia fumbled it for a split second before catching it properly, adjusting her grip as she looked down at it, then back up at him. "Thank you?" she said, uncertainty clear in her tone.
X gave her a thumbs up.
Then his head turned.
He looked directly at Xain.
Even with the skull mask, the focus was obvious, the way his attention fixed on him for just a moment longer than necessary.
"Wha-what is it?" Xain asked, shifting slightly as Nori stepped in front of him just in case.
X tilted his head.
"Wow your really weird to look at," he said plainly.
Then he disappeared.
Xain blinked, then pointed at himself, looking genuinely confused. "What'd I do?"