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Demon Queened - Chapter 82 - Moving On
🕑 Added 2025-07-08 19:43:20 +0000 UTCDevilla
“You… what?!” I demanded, flabbergasted.
“Well, I mean, your mom and I did celebrate our twenty year anniversary not that long ago, soooo…. Yeah… How do you feel about having a stepmom? Or stepdam, if you prefer? Because honestly I already see you as my precious stepdaughter, soooo…..”
“I feel like I can barely wrap my brain around having a mother!” I replied. “My entire life I thought she was dead and now I find that she’s not only alive and well but close to marrying the Goddess I thought had abandoned us? It’s…” I paused. “Irrelevant. This is completely irrelevant and getting us sidetracked besides. We should be dealing with the Grand Patriarch, not…”
“Personal issues?” Liz asked. “I mean, if you ask me you’ve earned the chance to worry about yourself for once.”
“I agree!” Lucy said. “The Goddess-”
“Liz, actually! It’s the nickname my future stepdaughter gave to me!”
“...Well, I agree with Liz, too,” Abigail stated after a moment of silence. “You deserve to worry about personal stuff, too.”
“I do believe a proper Queen would-”
“Nuh-uh!” Liz interrupted. “None of that ‘proper Queen’ stuff! Not from you, Doll! Not after what you pulled. We all know you care about victory more than her.”
“Whether or not that’s true, she is right,” I stated with a sigh. “Assuming she was going to say what I think she was. A proper queen would not focus on herself at a time like this, not when everyone - human and demons alike - are potentially in danger from… whatever the Grand Patriarch is up to! For all we know Luci gave him a nuclear bomb or some such.”
“Ooh, that would be bad,” Liz muttered.
“A what bomb?” Abigail asked.
“Do you remember that huge fireball I threw into the air a while ago? I know you weren’t there for it, but you must have at least heard rumors. Think that, but multiplied hundreds or even thousands of times. I’m not even sure we’d survive it.”
“You actually would!” Liz hurried to assure us. “You’re built to literally survive the end of the universe, so… Yeah. Not much else would, though? And uh, well, considering I made this world as a singular supercontinent - without any of those continental plates, or whatever, mind you - well… Uh. I’m not entirely sure what the effects of releasing a nuclear bomb in the middle of all that would be…”
“Wait, there’s no tectonic plates? Aren’t those… I mean, there has to be a reason Earth had those, no?”
“Probably!” Liz confirmed. “But I didn’t want a Panagea situation, so I nixed them! It’s fine… I think? …Just so long as I keep pouring magic into the divine system, at least… Look, there’s a reason every god says that first worlds are like pancakes - or, well, they would say that if they knew how hard pancakes were to make, but like… the point is, it’s expected to be a bit of a mess. Honestly, most gods just wash their hands of it all by the end and let natural physics take their failed creations… but there’s no way I could do that, so yeah!”
“Right… that was the opposite of reassuring, but I suppose that’s another reason why you can’t simply cut off Luci at the source?”
“Um… Am I the only one having a lot of religious revelations right now?” Lucy asked, looking almost nervous. “I mean, the Goddess… I mean Liz isn’t anything like what I expected! Though I’m not really sure what I did expect… And I guess she really didn’t have anything to do with me being picked? Which I already knew, but there’s really no denying it now, and… our world is like a pancake?”
“I didn’t really have much faith in Liz to begin with,” Abigail said with a shrug. “We were taught she abandoned us forever ago, so… I guess it’s nice to know that wasn’t actually the case? But at the same time… I mean, like angel like Goddess, I guess? I’m pretty sure I’ve gotten over the idea of the high and mighty actually acting like anything but people at this point.”
“I guess that’s fair,” Lucy mused. “And I probably shouldn’t put the weight of all my assumptions on Liz, just because she’s a goddess… I think?”
“I mean, I’m basically in the same boat as you are,” Liz pointed out. “You and Devilla both. Everyone’s expectations on your shoulders. Everyone thinking you should be a certain way… and let me tell you, it was a lot easier to ignore that back before I took on a human brain and started being affected by all these human emotions, hormones, and thought patterns! All I can be is me, though, same as anyone else.”
“Like me…” Lucy murmured to herself before closing her eyes. A moment later brilliant red wings sprouted from her back and spread wide behind her.
“...Impressive,” I murmured, eyeing her new limbs. I’d never really thought of wings as attractive before, but the glossy feathers had a certain aesthetic I could appreciate. “They match your hair.”
“I guess I really am an angel, huh?” Lucy whispered, sounding almost awed for a moment before shaking her head to clear it. “But that’s not the point! The point is… Well, I don’t really know what the point is, but we have to stop the Grand Patriarch!”
“By killing or petrifying him, preferably,” I added.
“After I talk to him, maybe,” Lucy hedged. I opened my mouth to complain, but she held up a hand. “Please? He can’t hurt me anymore, from what you and Liz have said, and I really want to know why he did what he did… If nothing else, I want to hear the truth from the head of the church! What the church knows, and what it doesn’t… who knows what… it’s all really important to me! I mean, if we don’t know at least that much it’ll be way too tempting to paint all of the church with the same brush once this is over!”
“That’s…” I shook my head. “Trust you to be searching for good in the clergy, even now…”
“Some of them did help raise me!” she pointed out. “And I’m pretty sure they couldn’t have all been in on it… I’m sure at least some of the clergy are true believers!”
“Even if what they believe in is a lie?” Liz asked. “Sure, some of the church’s teachings hold true to me - like, don’t go around killing your neighbors, for example - but the whole human supremacy thing? The population propaganda, the way they talk about demons and monsters… There’s a lot of bad shit in there, Lucy. It might have started with one of the religions I founded, but it lost its way over two thousand years ago at this point.”
“Even if the framework’s rotten, there are still good people trying their best to work inside it!”
“And they’ll get their say when this is all done and sorted,” I declared. “If it’s what you wish for… As much as I would warn against it, I’ll stand back and let you have your speech with him. If I see his fingers on any sort of buttons or triggers, though…”
“That’s fine!” Lucy replied. “I’ll trust your judgement if it comes to it!”
“...Appreciated,” I murmured, all too aware of how easy it would be to take advantage of Lucy’s trust. To snuff out the man’s life and declare there was a threat Lucy was simply too slow to recognize… but I respected her too much for that. No matter how safe I wished to keep her safe, I could only do so on her terms.
So, instead, I sighed and gestured towards the teleportation pad. “Come on, then. Let’s get this over with.”
***
Lucy
***
Being an angel was weird! Not because it felt weird, but because it felt so… normal. Like, more ‘normal’ than being a human ever had!
I mean, my whole life, there’d been holy energy inside me - even before I found out I was the Heroine and learned how to harness it, I’d always known that energy was there. It had just taken me a while to realize that everyone else didn’t have it, too. Mom had always taken it in stride when I talked about it, after all…
The thing is, even though it had been a part of me, it apparently had never truly been a part of me. It was borrowed power, as I later learned - something given to me by the Goddess!
…Though I guess it was really given to me by a renegade angel.
Either way, though, it had always been a bit strange… I think? I’d never really thought of it as strange. It was all I’d ever known, so it had just been my normal. Compared to what I felt now, though… It felt like the power belonged! Like it was right where it was meant to be. Which I guess it was, since I was an angel and not a mortal anymore…
Thankfully, I’d been getting pretty used to weird things of late! I mean, I was dating the Demon Queen! And going on dates with her like we were normal people! If that wasn’t the definition of weird, then what was?
So I decided to take it in stride. Much like the revelation that the Goddess I believed in was being held prisoner by the very woman who’d given me my powers. And the fact that the Goddess wasn’t an all knowing entity of endless love and well-dispensed justice, but just another person stumbling through life like the rest of us.
Also the fact that the Grand Patriarch had tried to enslave me… Though I guess I wasn’t exactly taking that in stride, seeing as how I was about to go question him… and maybe petrify him? It seemed like the least terrible of the options I’d heard so far - though I still hadn’t given up on finding a better one!
Eena looked rather mad, though. There was this cold anger in her eyes right now. Anger like I’d never seen in her before. It was easy to miss, though, because it sort of melted away every time she looked at me or Abigail… I could tell that she was happy to have us alive and well!
At the same time, I didn’t really want to imagine how she might have reacted if things hadn’t ended well… Which sounded like something I needed to have a conversation with her about! Just… maybe after we confronted the Grand Patriarch? I mean, he did potentially have a world-ending bomb in his hands…
For now, I was following her lead - which meant putting my foot next to Eena’s on the teleportation circle. Abigail’s went down on the other side - but instead of teleporting us, Eena just blinked at Abigail.
“What?” the succubus asked, crossing her arms in front of her chest defensively. “I said I was coming, didn’t I? And I’m as strong as both of you now, right? So why shouldn’t I come along?”
“It’s not that you can’t,” Devilla replied quickly. “It’s just… are you sure that you wish to? You’ve been through quite the day already, and this-”
“What? Don’t you dare say it doesn’t concern me, because if it concerns you then I’m automatically part of the package! I mean, I’m dating you, aren’t I? And… Lucy, too, I guess. Sorta, kinda, maybe… And anyways, it’s not like I wanted power just to keep you from worrying over me you know? I’m sick and tired of worrying about what you’re getting up to, too! So let's save this apparently not-so-goddess-forsaken world together already!”
“I was more planning to say that this might not be the best way to stress test your new abilities when you haven’t even learned them all yet, but… if you insist upon coming, I have no right to stop you.”
“You’re literally the Queen, Devilla,” Abigail replied. “Not that I’d listen if you tried to order me, anyways.”
“Isn’t that treason?” I couldn’t help but ask.
“Says the Heroine who’s going against her church,” Abigail replied, shaking her head. “Come on, let’s just get going already.”
By the time I’d finished nodding, we were already there, standing in the middle of the disaster zone of a bedroom, with a broken down wall and a shocked looking pair of guards staring straight at us.
~~~
Author's Notes
I'm not entirely satisfied with this chapter. It feels like I spent too much time focusing on a brief transitional period, that didn't really advance the plot until the end - but at the same time, getting everyone's emotions out was sort of important? It could be depression affecting my view, too...
Regardless, I want to thank FallingLeaf for taking the time to edit this chapter - and all of you readers for... well, reading it~! Not to mention leaving comments or likes. It means a lot to me.
