Abaddon barely had a moment to process Hel’s words before a literal tornado formed in front of him.
A funnel of green whispy souls descend upon Hel and wrapped her figure in power.
Inwardly, Abaddon clicked his teeth in frustration.
He thought he had finally closed the gap between himself and Hel, yet she had rendered all of his endeavors moot.
Not only did his opponent match his power surge, but she surpassed it.
At present, the energy coming off of her was so terrible that it made Abaddon want to laugh in absurdity.
But still, he had to fell her all the same.
Abaddon soared up into the air on his enormous black wings.
Loosening the seal on his soul, Abaddon gained access to the 4% of his godly power that he was capable of harnessing, and he lit up the black sky like a blazing golden sun.
On the ground, Hel’s frown deepened as she clenched her weapon tightly.
To the closest possible metric, she and Abaddon were now completely even.
The terrible amount of energy they had both accumulated was so much that it was literally suffocating to be around them, and the air had started to vibrate under their terrible power.
“What an unholy monster you are… even my brethren are not as unnerving as you.”
“Complimenting me will not prolong your life.”
“Arrogant bastard!”
“What a gross insult.” Abaddon huffed.
He was the most humble and down to earth dragon who ever did live!
To refer to him as anything else was to sling mud on his character!
Hel had to suppress a shiver when the large unsettling eye within the dragon’s chest suddenly opened.
As a goddess of death and sister to two beings centric to Ragnarok, she thought herself immune to fear in whichever form it might have come in.
And yet, as she stared into the enormous reptilian eye within Abaddon’s chest, she finally realized what true fear actually was.
To stare into it was to know true despair that took root in one’s very bones.
However, she was quickly going to learn that this oculus was not simply for show.
Suddenly, she sensed an enormous amount of power starting to gather within the chest of her adversary.
The hairs on the back of Hel’s neck stood up as straight as an arrow as she watched not only the eye in his chest start to glow, but those within his wings as well.
‘Eight Paths to Annihilation: Gamma.’
All sound within the domain seemed to have been cut out as fourteen beams of terrible destructive energy left Abaddon’s wings and eye.
Hel had only a moment to be stunned before she quickly sprang into action.
“I am a goddess, you dullard! You aren’t qualified enough to threaten me!!”
The swirling green tornado that had been encasing Hel all this time would finally be put to use.
Manipulating the legion of dead souls, she shaped and molded them into a massive knight holding a bright green sword and shield.
Without waiting for the imminent collision, the knight swung it’s sword to combat all of the bright red beams of power that were coming directly towards it.
The two great powers collided and where followed by a burst of white light.
For a while, all that could be seen, heard, or felt was nothingness.
It was a bit like the domain of Helheim had no idea just how to process the damage from such an attack.
But as soon as it figured it out, pandemonium unfolded.
The term ‘explosion’ feels a bit lacking if one were to properly describe what happened.
The reaction produced was so volatile that it was more than enough to make a nuclear bomb seem like a child’s bath toy in comparison.
Not only was the mere sound enough to obliterate the brains of living mortals; the shockwave was so terrible that it decimated these lands of death as far as the eye could see.
Hel was flung back by the power that rippled outward from the collision of her powers and Abaddon’s.
Her armor was damaged terribly; revealing patches of her body’s two different halves underneath it.
As she pushed her windswept silver hair out of her eyes, she looked around to surveil the damage.
And when she did… she wanted to let her jaw fall open from absurdity.
Her realm was almost completely destroyed.
While Helheim was never going to be anyone’s top tourist destination or win a beauty contest before, it was still a vast improvement from this wasteland that was now in front of her.
The very best way to describe the scene would be to say that it was akin to a land of black rubble.
The city of Hel? Gone.
Her mansion? There were pieces of it everywhere.
The freezing rivers of Slidr and Gjoll? Their water had been displaced into the sky and was currently falling back onto the land like a light mist.
Freeing herself of her stupor, Hel looked up into the sky above to examine Abaddon’s condition.
The ominous black dragon was suffering from a few scorch marks along his enormous wings; almost as if he’d used them to take the brunt of the explosion.
Their eyes met in midair and it was clear immediately that neither of them were done.
Resigning herself to see this through, Hel flew into the air and tightened her grip on famine.
The temperature around her began to drop dramatically as huge pointed columns of black ice encircled her figure.
She fired each of the columns at Abaddon’s massive scaly figure as she made several slashes at the air with her knife.
“Die!”
The dragon met her projectiles with ones of his own, and the two of them lit up the dark sky with a fireworks display of unparalleled power.
This tumultuous back and forth went on for forever.
As the two of them were completely even to the closest measureable degree, neither one was able to gain a discernible advantage over the other.
And because the well of power the two possessed seemed to be literally bottomless; they could have done this dance of death for a literal eternity if they so wished.
If nothing changed soon, they would be locked within a constant struggle; until the time came where Abaddon hit the time limit on the usage of his godly powers; signaling Hel’s victory.
Something had to change before it was too late.
Abaddon held a massive black and red battle axe in one hand and brought it down atop the tiny Hel. 𝓞𝗏xt.𝗇t
Though the size difference between the two was like a skyscraper and a parked car, the death goddess had no problem raising her knife to catch his massive blow.
Even as her body trembled from the impact, she stood against him all the same.
Admittedly, seeing a woman who was not even a tenth of his size stand up to him hurt Abaddon’s pride just a bit.
He let out a hateful roar that made Hel’s ears bleed as he raged internally.
‘This is absurd..! I have no more patience to waste on this woman!’
As Abaddon became increasingly frustrated, he heard two sweet and familiar voices within his mind.
‘Darling~’
‘You’ve been making quite a mess out of this domain, you know?’
‘Seras? Audrina? Have you found our son??’ He questioned.
‘Of course we have, dear husband.’
‘You’ll meet our dear Belloc in seven days time. But for now, he sends his daddy a homecoming present. Aren’t you lucky?’
Even with his massive body, Abaddon could immediately tell that a small and very familiar hand had just been placed on his back in between his wings.
A very warm and invigorating feeling was transmitted to every cell of his being.
Right before Hel’s eyes, Abaddon molted.
His old skin peeled off his body on it’s own and dropped onto the ruined ground underneath his tail.
In the time it took one to blink, Abaddon had grown significantly larger, from 95 meters to a whopping 150.
A sixth head grew from among the five he already possessed; adding to his mythical frightening appearance.
Instinctively, Hel backed away without even noticing that she had done so.
Though she and Abaddon had been even for quite a while now, that was no longer the case.
His latest power surge had put him above her in terms of both ability and raw power.
It was such bullshit that she didn’t know what else to do but laugh.
‘Where could he possibly have gotten this source of power from? A being like this makes guesswork so needlessly tiresome that I’m tempted to just ask him mysel… wait.’
Briefly, Hel recalled Abaddon’s true origins and the identities of his so called fragments.
Upon expanding her senses just a tad, she was able to sense something very important missing from her realm.
‘But how did he do it…? He hasn’t left my sight this entire time!’ She lamented.
Abaddon let out another horrible roar that seemed to be coursing with his overflowing power.
Though Hel thought herself strong, it made her feel as if she were a little girl again who desperately wanted to take cover and hide.
But then, an arc of golden light descended upon the ground right in front of her, and she felt a renewed spark of hope blaze brighter than ever before.
A man appeared from the pillar of golden light.
He wore silvery white robes of the same coloring as his hair and beard, and he sat on the back of an eight legged horse.
On his shoulder there were two black crows; each of whom seemed to be nothing short of otherworldly.
His left eye was missing, instead covered by a golden monocle.
His entire presence radiated an aura of divinity and wisdom.
Abaddon’s eyes narrowed as he stared down at the intruding old man.
‘Who is that, beloved?’ Audrina asked.
‘Chief deity of the Norse gods… Odin, The All Father.’