"I'm sorry about this… I wish I could give you a proper funeral, but…" Seris's voice came out low, carrying a weight she didn't have time to sustain, her fingers still firmly around Vergil's body as his unstable energy pulsed against her chest like something alive, something that still refused to completely disappear.

She couldn't even finish the sentence, because her instincts screamed violently at the same instant the space in front of her abruptly distorted, and Dante's presence appeared there like an inevitable rupture.

The sound came before the full comprehension of the movement.

CRACKK!!!

Dante's blade descended in a brutal arc, not only cutting the air but tearing the very ground below, creating a line of destruction that advanced directly towards Seris and Vergil's body, as if the blow carried the intention of erasing both from existence in that single instant.

The pressure of the attack was enough to make the ground explode in multiple directions, fragments being launched like projectiles as the impact created a new fissure in the already devastated battlefield.

But Seris was no longer there.

Her body reacted at the limit of its ability, leaping back while still holding Vergil tightly, and before she even touched the ground again, the space around her folded, swallowing her presence in yet another forced teleport, leaving behind only the distorted trail of her passage and the devastating impact of the attack that missed its target.

Dante didn't have time to continue.

Because another presence was already upon him.

Sapphire appeared directly in front of him, without hesitation, her expression hardened despite the evident fatigue that now marked her face, something extremely rare considering the absurd nature of her power.

In her hand, Belial materialized with an intense demonic glow, the spear vibrating like a living entity as she advanced with absolute precision, aiming directly at Dante's center of mass. The shock came immediately.

Belial's blade snagged on the Rebellion's hilt the exact moment Dante attempted to reposition his weapon, creating perfect leverage that Sapphire exploited without wasting a single instant, twisting her body and using all her remaining strength to redirect the movement.

Dante's sword was ripped from its trajectory and violently thrown to the right, opening a gap that she didn't hesitate to exploit.

And then came the impact.

From the left.

A kick.

Sharp.

Brutal.

Sepphirothy's feet surged into Dante's field of vision at the last second, striking his face with an absurd force that distorted the surrounding air upon contact, the impact reverberating like a heavy crack as his head was thrown to the side and his body, even with all that monstrous resistance, was pushed back.

"Ouch…" he growled, his voice thick with irritation as Rebellion slipped from his hand and fell to the ground with a dry, metallic thud, its body sent flying several meters before finally stopping, carving deep furrows in the shattered earth.

Sepphirothy landed lightly after the blow, her breathing controlled but unsteady, her eyes immediately shifting to Sapphire, analyzing every detail of her posture, every tiny tremor that hadn't been there before, every sign of wear and tear that simply shouldn't be there.

"We have to put an end to this." Her voice came out firm, but there was something behind that tone that wasn't just determination, it was calculation, it was perception.

Her eyes narrowed slightly as she observed Sapphire, who still held the spear raised, but whose aura no longer burned with the same intensity as before.

And that… didn't make sense.

"Something's wrong…" the thought clearly appeared in Sepphirothy's mind as she quickly analyzed the situation, connecting the details that had been scattered amidst the chaos. "Our potential is sealed in the demon world and the human world… but here… it shouldn't be affecting us so much."

She took a deep breath, without completely diverting her attention from Dante, but clearly immersing herself in a deeper analysis of her own condition.

It was real.

In the human world, Sapphire operated at only twenty-five percent of her total capacity, an absurd limitation that still placed her above most existing entities. In the demon world, even with restrictions, that value rose to around sixty-five percent, still limited, but much closer to what she truly was.

But there…

There, in the midst of that dimensional collapse…

They were too weak.

Far more than they should have been. 𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

'This isn't right…'

"Sapphire—" Sepphirothy began, her voice carrying a different urgency now, less focused on combat and more on understanding what was happening.

But her senses screamed.

Loud.

Violent.

Instinctive.

Her body reacted even before her mind completed the alert, tilting to the side in an almost impossible movement, and in the same instant, Dante's blade passed where her head had been a second before, cutting the air with deadly precision, so close she felt the pressure tear her skin.

Her neck burned.

A trickle of blood escaped.

But she was alive.

Her eyes widened for a brief instant, not from fear, but from recognition of the absurd speed of that attack, and without hesitation, she raised her bare hand, gripping the blade the next instant, the metal cutting her fingers deeply as the impact forced her body backward.

"UGHH—!!" the sound came out as a stifled roar as blood trickled down her hand, but she didn't let go.

And then she counterattacked.

Her fist clenched and surged forward, striking Dante's face with enough force to make the surrounding air vibrate again, the impact being dry, direct, charged with everything she could still muster at that moment.

Dante absorbed the blow.

Literally.

His face moved just enough to acknowledge the impact, and the next instant, he spat out the blood that had accumulated in his mouth, swallowing some of it with a low sound before responding in kind.

Her fist came back.

Heavier.

Faster. And when it struck Sephirothy's face, the impact launched her away like a projectile, her body traversing the air before colliding with the ground dozens of meters away, raising a cloud of dust around the point of impact.

"Damn it…" Dante murmured, wiping the remaining blood with his thumb as he observed his own hand for a moment, opening and closing his fingers slowly as if testing something.

His brow furrowed.

"My body… feels strange…" he said softly, almost to himself, clearly sensing that something wasn't quite right within him yet.

The adaptation wasn't over.

But it was close.

'There's room to improve my strength still…' he thought, slightly rotating his shoulder as his aura oscillated erratically. 'But these two… won't give me time.'

He didn't even finish his thought.

Because Belial was already back.

The spearhead emerged inches from his neck, advancing with deadly precision, but Dante reacted at the last instant, kicking the weapon out of its trajectory as he twisted his body and caught it with one hand, the movement too quick to be completely clean.

The blade still struck him.

A shallow cut opened on his neck.

Blood spurted in a small arc in the air.

"Damn it…" he growled, gripping the spear for a second before releasing it, pushing it away as his eyes fixed on Sapphire again.

She was smiling.

Even tired.

Even clearly at her limit.

"What's wrong?" she taunted, her voice laden with defiance. "Weren't you the strongest?"

His smile returned.

More dangerous.

And then she lunged again.

Meanwhile, far from that direct confrontation, Seris knelt beside Vergil's body, her breathing heavy as her hands trembled slightly, not from fear, but from the extreme effort of keeping everything under control at once. The energy around him pulsed irregularly, reacting to the environment, reacting to the imminent removal of the anchors that held him in that state.

"Come on… damn it…" she muttered through gritted teeth, positioning her hands on the first of the golden swords embedded in his body.

The sacred energy of the blade reacted immediately to her touch, burning her skin, resisting as if it had a will of its own, as if it didn't want to be removed. After all, although Seris wasn't a demon, which has a weakness to the sacred, she was a witch, and she used too much dark magic during her life. It's no exaggeration to say she's more demon than witch.

Even with the burns, Seris didn't stop.

She pulled.

"Let's go!!" She shouted, drawing the first of the seven swords.

Seris didn't recoil for a second, even as the sacred energy began to aggressively consume her skin, burning not only the surface but trying to penetrate deeper, as if completely rejecting her existence in that forced contact. Her teeth clenched tightly as her fingers sank even deeper into the hilt of the golden blade, ignoring the pain that rose up her arm like an uncontrolled fire, ignoring the smell of burnt flesh that began to mix with the already saturated air of destruction around her.

"Let's go!! I need this energy!!" With a hoarse cry, more driven by stubbornness than actual strength, she pulled the first sword from Vergil's body, and the sound that followed wasn't metallic, nor physical, but something deeper, as if an invisible anchor had been ripped from his very existence.

Dark blood gushed out in small amounts, heavy, dense, almost too viscous to be natural, as the blade finally broke free and fell beside her with a dry thud against the broken ground.

Seris took a deep breath, her chest rising unevenly as her hand trembled, not only from the physical exertion, but from the instability of the energy that still enveloped that body. Her eyes immediately dropped to the second sword, without hesitation, without pausing to think, because she knew that stopping meant wasting time, and time… was exactly what they didn't have.

In the distance, the sound of the impact between Sapphire and Dante echoed again, an explosion of force that made the ground vibrate beneath her knees, constantly reminding her that this wasn't just a rescue… it was a race against inevitable death.

"They're having trouble, I need to get this over with…" she murmured, more to herself than anything else, as she positioned both hands on the second blade, ignoring the fact that her skin was already open, cracked, marked by deep burns that continued to slowly expand.

When she drew the second sword, the resistance was greater.

The sacred energy reacted with more violence, as if it were perceiving the pattern, as if it understood that it was being removed one by one, and it didn't like it. A wave of golden light coursed through the blade the moment she forced the movement, and Seris let out a low groan as the pain shot through her entire arm, causing her muscles to lock for an instant.

But she didn't let go.

With one last effort, the second sword was pulled out, and once again, that strange, almost conceptual sound echoed around, as if another layer of imprisonment had been broken.

The third came soon after.

This time, she didn't scream.

Her body was already beyond the point where pain could be easily expressed, so she just endured, pulling with brute force, feeling her fingers slip because of her own blood, mixed with the residual energy that still burned her skin. When the blade finally gave way, she fell back for a brief second, breathing heavily before forcing herself back into position.

"Get up… get up…" she whispered to herself, as if ordering herself to continue, as if stopping wasn't even a real option at that moment.

The fourth sword was worse.

As soon as her hands touched the hilt, a direct surge of energy coursed through her entire body, causing her muscles to involuntarily contract while her eyes widened for an instant. The contact was so violent that her arms almost gave way, but she clenched her teeth even tighter, ignoring the metallic taste rising in her throat as she forced the movement again.

"GET OUT…!"

The blade resisted.

For a second… two… three…

And then it gave way all at once, being ripped away with enough violence to make Seris fall back again, this time with more force, her body hitting the ground before rolling slightly to the side.

She didn't stay there.

She couldn't.

Dragging herself back, almost at her physical limit, she returned to Vergil's body, now with four of the seven swords removed, her breathing ragged, her hands completely destroyed, her skin partially charred in places, but still functional.

The fifth sword came out with less resistance.

Perhaps because the system that kept it active was beginning to collapse.

Perhaps because… something was changing.

When she pulled the fifth blade, there wasn't the same violent reaction, just a slight tremor in the energy around Vergil's body, as if something was… weakening.

The sixth came soon after.

And this time… it was strange.

Seris hesitated for a brief moment before pulling.

Not out of fear.

But out of feeling.

Something was different.

Even so, she didn't stop.

The blade came out with a cleaner movement than any other before, almost without resistance, as if it had never really belonged there, and that sent a shiver down her spine, something that didn't fit with everything that had happened up to that moment.

Her gaze then fell on the last sword.

The seventh.

The final one.

Her entire body was already on edge, her mana practically nonexistent, her arms trembling constantly as small drops of blood fell to the ground around her, forming an irregular pattern that reflected her state.

Still…

She advanced.

Her fingers gripped the hilt of the last blade.

And in the instant of touch…

She felt it.

Something completely different.

There was no immediate rejection.

No explosion of energy.

No violent resistance.

It was… strange.

Too silent.

Her eyes narrowed slightly as she pulled the sword out more carefully this time, as if instinctively knowing something was wrong. The blade slid out with absurd ease, almost as if it had never been deeply embedded, and this made her heart race for a reason completely different from the fight around her.

When the sword emerged completely, Seris stood still for a second.

Staring.

Confused.

All the other blades were covered in dark, thick, heavy blood, as if they had pierced deep into Vergil's vital structure.

But that one… That last one… It was only superficially stained. As if it had pierced… And passed right through.

"…No…" Her voice came out low, almost inaudible, as her gaze slowly descended to Vergil's body.

Something was wrong.

Very wrong.

With a careful, yet urgent movement, Seris turned his body partially, ignoring the weight, ignoring the state he was in, focusing only on what her instinct now screamed with absurd force within her.

And then… She saw…

For an instant, her brain didn't fully process what her eyes were showing her, as if the information simply didn't make sense within the reality she had accepted until that moment.

Seris's eyes widened, her breath catching in her lungs for a full second as her mind struggled to process it all.

"...No..." she repeated, this time with more force, more disbelief, her hand trembling as she approached the point where the sensation was clearest.

One of the seven hearts...

It was still beating.

The world around them continued to be at war, Dante was still fighting, Sapphire and Sepphirothy were still being pressured, reality was still slowly collapsing under that absurd battle...

But in that small spot...

Something changed.

Vergil...

He wasn't completely dead yet.

"You... are unbelievable." She said as she placed her hand on his chest. "Damn... you bastard... what a scare you gave us..." she said as tears began to well up.