1 The ending and a new beginning

At a secluded corner of the street, clashing sounds could be heard.

*clang* *thud*

"Argh!" Low and loud groans sounded with every clash of metals.

"We outnumber her greatly so why can't you still kill her yet?!" A man shouted at the 20 or so men angrily as he looked at the woman who was standing at the middle of the circular formation made by the men with a blood soaked sword gripped in her hand.

She was tall and had a well trained body that neither looked bulky nor weak like usual girls. She was wearing a black long coat with the words 'Defying Heaven' written in bold red vertically at the back over her shirt and pants.

She had her pitch black long hair tied up high on her head while her face and naked hands had some blood splattered. It wasn't hers but of those whom she just killed and were lying on the floor beside her.

"Scared already?" The woman smiled in a provocative way and said with her icy cold eyes staring at the leader of the group, the man who shouted before.

"What are you guys still standing around for?! Go and attack her! We have to kill her right here and now or else we will be the ones to die!" The leader shouted at the assassins who finally reacted at his words and charged at the woman with their weapons in their hands.

'This woman...now I know why she is called the strongest woman in the world! Even after facing such disadvantage against greater number, she could still stand without fear and even kill some of my men without batting an eye. But if we don't kill her here, we will get killed by our masters instead! Ugh! This is such a troublesome thing!' The leader thought to himself in frustration and fear as he looked at the fight where his men continued to fall one after another under the woman's sword.

The woman danced around the assassins with her sword swiftly and precisely attacked them on their vital spots.

"Hyaa! I will crush you to pieces!!" A bulky man ran towards her spot with his war hammer raised up high and then swung it down over her head. The woman agilely dodged it by sliding past the gap between the men from below and blocked the other sword with hers. The hammer hit the floor with a loud 'bam!' and the impact made the ground shudder a bit.

The woman quickly pushed the man who was clashing with her sword and kicked him on his stomach, sending him flying few metres back. She then dodged the war hammer swung at her horizontally by ducking and rushed forward towards the bulky man and stabbed her sword at his neck through the opening in his guard then pulled it out, blood spilling out endlessly.

She continued in her killing spree like a demon and reduced the number of more than 20 to just 11 in a short moment.

But...

"Kkeugh!" While clashing against an assassin, another one sneaked behind her and stabbed at her back but she barely dodged it and only hit her right arm which wasn't a simple injury. She felt her right hand, her dominant hand go numb as she slowly lost control over it. The sword had cut her veins, making her arm disabled.

She gritted her teeth and took away her focus from the pain she felt and gripped the sword on her left hand. Because she just lost her right hand, her movements weren't very swift but she still managed to deal with the men, not without paying any prices. She got injured all over as she fought.

"Ugh!" She let out a muffled groan after getting kicked on her chest and fell back but managed to balance herself with the sword and quickly dodged the incoming attacks.

She lost too much blood and her left arm was shaking while her right arm was hanging limply at her side with blood flowing out of it. Her eyes looked unfocused at some point but still forced herself to stay awake.

"H...heh! Is...is this all you got, you bastards?" She was obviously in a very bad condition but she still put on her prideful smile and looked down at the remaining men as she forced herself to straighten her back, unwilling to back down even in the face of death.

"How...how can this woman still move with such injuries?!" Only 6 men remained from the original 28 assassins and they couldn't help but stare at the insane woman who was still smiling at such a moment with no fear and her back ramrod straight. They felt slight admiration for her but also felt fear.

"You...you deserve your title very much. Even I can't help but respect you. But!" The leader finally decided to join the fight too and unsheathed his sword.

"You still must die here!" He declared with gritted teeth.

The woman looked at the man coldly but her mind somewhat drifted away unknowingly.

'Ah..I can feel that I'm about to reach my limit. I cannot hold on much longer. I might not even be able to defeat them till I lose my strength to move. But...I promised him. I promised that old man that...I would come back home soon and he said that he would check how much I improved these days. I have to go to him and to do that, I must get through this alive!' The woman's eyes suddenly sharpened like a sword and she charged at the men with all her strength left in her body.

"Hyaa!" She shouted loudly and hacked down two men in a row and then jumped up in the air and made a quite imperfect flip and landed upon a man's shoulders then cut his throat swiftly. She then jumped away again and spinned once as she ducked low and cut down the legs of the man who was running towards her.

"Arrrghhh!! My legs!!" The man rolled around on the floor and wailed in pain.

The woman then kicked another assassin on his face and then stabbed his chest after quickly turning over.

"Haa...haa." The woman panted for air after such big movements and looked at the last person left standing.

The leader looked at the scene in fear and horror but he still didn't back off and gripped his sword tightly in front of him.

"Only...you are left now." The woman said as she closed in to him slowly. The leader back away bit by bit with trembling legs.

But just when the woman was about to charge at him, a sword suddenly stabbed through her chest from the back, the tip shining bright red from her blood. The woman froze and looked behind her then saw the man who had his legs cut off by her holding the sword tightly.

"You...must die today!" He said with an eerie smile on his face but before he could do anything, the woman cut his head off in one swing.

The woman wobbled unsteadily and balanced herself by leaning her weight on her sword. She then vomited mouthfuls of blood.

" Ha...hahaha..hahahaha! You..you are finally going to die! Hahahah! I can live now!" The leader suddenly laughed in great relief after seeing her miserable state. The woman glared at him like a ferocious tiger and then charged at him when he was left unprepared. Her sword stabbed into his heart while his sword that was held out stabbed into hers. The man stated at her in disbelief, shock and horror.

"If...I'm to...die then..you can't be..left out!" She uttered with difficulty and then lifted her lips into her usual arrogant smile. She then pulled away from the sword and collapsed on the ground, her eyes blurring and her breath becoming shallow.

"I..am...sorry..gra..n..p.." She then died before she could finish her sentence.

***

Long long time ago, in the world of Zerefia, one human being found a relic that held all the negative power and elements in the world. She accidentally signed a soul contract with the relic, never to part for eternity even after she died.

She then went through a mind-blowing change both physically and mentally to keep up with the strong powers inside the relic which made her into a figure feared by all under the heaven who was known as a devil or a demon.

Because of her powers, she became feared and hated by all so she had to seclude herself where no one could find her but her powers suddenly went berserk after not being able to contain it completely and started a massacre wherever she went.

Due to her fearsome and unparalleled power, the other races had been wanting to find a reason to eradicate her which they found with no need to make up by themselves and the different races joined hands together and fought against her which was recorded as the greatest war in the history where hundreds and thousands of lives were lost under her hands.

The bloodshed suddenly triggered something and it made her go through another change where her eyes became bloody red and her black hair turned white as snow and two pairs of big black feathered wings and two horns appeared on her back and her head. The remaining people fled the battlefield in horror and she also managed to stop.

After that, the land was then known as the 'Land of Death: Eifa'. But after the demon girl went back to where she hid, she made 7 demon life forms through half of her powers who were then named 'the 7 deadly sins'. After the second transformation, she found that she couldn't get pregnant and have any offsprings so she ordered her 7 guardians to reproduce.

She then built a kingdom of her own and named it 'the demonic kingdom: Eifa' while she was then hailed as the 'devil king'. The population grew up rapidly and they were then categorised as another new race and were called the demon race.

The hostility between the demon race and other grew but the other races withdrew themselves from the conflict and decided to sign a peace treaty with the demon race instead and they were successful. But the humans were too greedy.

They got to know about the information of the relic inside the Devil King's body and they lusted over its powers so they continued to wage war to the point that they even came up with the magic to summon the 5 heroes from other worlds who were blessed with the God's holy powers and made them fight against the demon race in exchange for endless glory and riches.

The heroes were able to kill the devil King but they couldn't eradicate the demon race because of the barrier of infinite darkness that the devil King formed which surrounded the whole land of death and was also able to kill some heroes with her. The humans tried to find the relic in her body but it was nowhere to be found. Her body immediately disintegrated and became ashes before they could do anything to it.

But this wasn't the end at all, the devil King continued to reborn every 100 years and spread terror around the world everytime she came back. And the humans continued to summon heroes from other worlds and passed on the knowledge of the previous heroes to them and defeated the devil King again.

It became like a never ending cycle so even now the threat of the devil King hadn't gone away.

"Mom...will the devil king come back again? If she will then when?" A little girl asked her mother who was telling her bednight stories with curious eyes.

"She...will not. It hasn't been over 100 years yet so she won't come back for few more years so you don't have to worry about it. Now go to sleep." The mother then quickly put the little girl to sleep and looked over her.

"I'm afraid...the time is near. And she will be back again." She muttered in fear and helplessness.