War's first duel was about as interesting as Ashtoreth had expected it would be. Pretty much all of the humans were using guns, and in the first few moments of battle it became clear that the human didn't have the stats to pierce War's armor and defensive spells with their weapon. After that, it was over: they dodged War's colossal sword as it sped through the air to explode at their location, then were promptly trampled to death by the red horse.

Frustratingly, War managed to find Ashtoreth's place in the seats very quickly. Once the human was dead, he removed his helmet and spent the last moments before everyone was teleported back giving her more or less the same look she'd meant to give him.

"You know, in human bloodsports, there's way more buildup even though there's less stakes," she said once they'd been deposited back in the ballroom. "I don't know if you've seen with human fighting sports, but the combatants always get a chance to get in each other's faces. Like, really close. Like, kissing distance."

"I've seen," said Frost.

"I just feel like we could give my fight with War a little more pomp, you know? Instead it's like the System is just taking care of a chore. Handling us like an errand. But it's a battle for the fate of the world, you know? How come neither of us gets theme music, is what I'm saying."

"Because the System didn't grow up in Hell," said Dazel. "As such, it has no cause to pander to the grandiosity of archfiends."

Ashtorteh considered this, then gave a conciliatory nod. "Sad, that."

"Damn it," Frost said. "Looks like we're on to the second round." There was a clear note of frustrated disgust in his voice, and Ashtoreth looked sharply over at him.

"Shit," said Kylie. "Poor luck, Sunshine."

She saw that the System had given them a notification while she'd been complaining about the lack of theatrics.

{The fifth round of the election has been decided and will take place in 9:51.}

{Vampiric Archfiend Ashtoreth vs Jeremy Baker}

"Ouch," she said. "That guy sounds pretty American, too." She tried to surreptitiously glance around the ballroom, then moved to put Frost between herself and most of the other groups of people. "Quick," she said. "Hide me from anyone who looks like they have baking ancestry."

"Baking ancestry?" Kylie asked. "I'm not sure that's how names actually work."

"Ashtoreth, we can't hide you," said Frost. "You'd have to glamour away your wings, and even that wouldn't work. We're the only group of humans that contains three teenagers and you have purple hair."

"Uh, hi? I'm not a teenager," said Kylie.

"All right, sorry," said Frost. "But you still stand out somewhat among the endless congo line of late middle aged men who probably all work in special forces."

"Fair enough."

"Question," said Hunter. "How come humans don't have their race appended to their name? You're not just Ashtoreth, you're Vampiric Archfiend Ashtoreth."

"You can if you want," she said. "It's like showing your name versus your race to the System tags." She shrugged. "I'm an archfiend, so obviously people should know that. I'd be proud to be human if I were you, but I dunno how impressive it is to the rest of the cosmos."

"Unlike your race?" said Frost.

"Exactly!" said Ashtoreth. Then, looking around at some of glances she was drawing from the other humans present, she said, "Do you guys, uh, think we should get out of the ballroom?" she asked quietly.

"Yes," said Frost. "I think that's a good idea. We never needed to be in here in the first place."

"It's too bad," Ashtoreth said, looking up at the opulent brass carvings along the vaulted ceiling. "Nice place like this and nobody's going to actually do any dancing."

"Please don't start," said Frost as they left the ballroom to stroll aimlessly through the halls. "I doubt it would make you any more popular than you already are."

"Sort of unfair that I'm getting glared at," she said, looking around. "I haven't even killed the guy yet. And I killed Famine—humans hate mass starvation, right?"

"Look," said Frost. "I'm just going to ask one last time. Are you sure you're not bothered at all by this?"

She shrugged. "The only reason this guy has the power to do this is because of me," she said. "If killing him is gonna bother me, I'll find out after it happens. But doing the actual deed? I'm trained to fight."

"If you say so," said Frost.

"But thinking of the fight reminds me that I've got to load my magazines," she said, conjuring her cannon and letting it thud against the ground. "Be a shame to pop into a fight and not have any shots in the ole Rammstein."

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She loaded her cannon, and the others tried to talk about different things to distract them as they waited for the fight to arrive. They were clearly a lot more uneasy about what Ashtoreth had to do than she was, but she supposed that made sense.

Ashtoreth was grateful as the clock wound down and approached zero. The discomfort of the rest of the humans was making her uneasy.

At last she was ushered back into the arena once more, this time facing down one of the humans—Jeremy Baker.

The first thing Ashtoreth did was conjure a massive burst of hellfire to obscure herself from Sir Baker's view, diving to one side once she was sure he couldn't see her movements.

She formed her sword next, then launched it into the ground at her feet to send her flying high into the air. At the same time, she created as many hellfire javelins as she was able while conjuring her cannon.

Below her, Sir Baker was firing his weapon as he ran along the arena floor. But the speed she'd gained from her initial [Mighty Strike], combined with her racial flight and her ability to angle her wings to make her path through the air erratic and unpredictable, meant that he hadn't come close to hitting her once.

She launched all her javelins his way, then brought her cannon to bear on him, waiting until the javelins were closing in to start firing.

To his credit, he avoided the first shot with a teleportation ability. But the impact of the round against the arena floor was enough to shake the ground around him, and he stumbled as he came out of his teleport, allowing her to hit him with two of her javelins a moment later.

He could have survived that, of course, but suddenly being engulfed in profane fire was agonizingly painful as well as visually impairing, and the next shot from her cannon took him through the chest, almost dead-center.

Jeremy Baker, Elite Human, was scattered and smeared across the polished stone floor of the arena behind him.

Ashtoreth frowned down at his smoking remains. She would have liked to take his heart, but it was clear that she'd completely destroyed it. Unless there was another round, she'd have to battle War with only 6 of 7 hearts slots in her locket filled.

The world rushed away from her, and soon Ashtoreth was back in the hotel with her people.

"That was round 5," Hunter said. "The next fight is between War and Santiago. War kills him, then you kill War."

"Yeah, something tells me that the fancy bullet ricochet isn't going to cut it against the Horseman," said Kylie. "Twenty minutes to you and the big guy."

{The sixth round of the election has been decided and will take place in 9:58.}

{Mark Santiago vs Archangel War}

As with the leadup to the previous fight, there was little for them to talk about, and so they talked about anything and everything inconsequential. Ten minutes wasn't long enough to get well and truly distracted, just to pretend you were.

Soon enough they were back in the arena, looking down at the fight.

Maybe some part of Ashtoreth had expected Santiago to completely upend all their expectations.

She felt nothing as she watched War tear him to shreds using his Legion Assault Rifle. Not horrified, not sympathetic, not amused… nothing. Her mind was fixated on the battle ahead of her.

As with his other duel, War finished by looking up to find her in the stands, his gaze resting on her and then never leaving before they were all deposited back in the hotel.

She was reading the new System message right away.

{The final round of the election has been decided and will take place in 9:59.}

{Vampiric Archfiend Ashtoreth vs Archangel War}

"So are we wishing you luck?" Kylie asked. "Or does that just make it sound like we're worried?"

Ashtoreth flashed her a smile. "You can be worried, Kylie. I'll take it as a sign of our friendship."

"We're allowed to be worried?" Frost asked, reaching up to rub at his stubble. "Because shit, I am so fucking worried right now."

Ashtoreth laughed.

"Even Frost is losing it?" Dazel asked. "There's a vote of confidence."

"What?" he asked defensively. "Someone I care about might die in ten minutes—and if she does, the Earth is doomed. I'm concerned, okay? That's concerning."

"Well I love that you're concerned," Ashtoreth said. "And I love that you'd put on a brave face just for my sake. But you don't have to worry, Sir Frost. I've always got a trick up my sleeve."

"I can't wait to watch you destroy him," said Hunter. "Too bad about his heart."

"I know!" said Ashtoreth. "I think that in a fair world, you'd be able to eat the heart of anyone you killed."

Once again, she found that the small talk they made leading up to the duel had an edge of unease to it. She couldn't tell which was worse: if they were made more uncomfortable by the idea of her dying than of her killing another human.

She was nervous herself, of course, but not by much. She'd been brought up to fight for her life, after all, and there was always the possibility that archfiends were just built different.

Soon she was being bombarded by their well-wishes as the clock ticked down to zero.

Then, at long last, she was whisked back to the arena.

Across from her stood War.

His skill with his weapons was paramount. His horse meant that she couldn't even give him her full attention. His stats were stupidly high.

Unless he was out of his massive suit of armor, she probably wasn't going to be able to deliver the sudden, decisive blow she needed to kill him.

And he could clear her debuffs.

The last was the worst. Her normal strategy for foes such as War was to drain his stats until he was ineffectual, but she already knew that wouldn't work against him. She might be able to use [Spellsteal] to counter his ability to clear her [Energy Drain], but that was wishful thinking. Eventually, he'd get a use of it off.

And so her most likely victory was by taking a long, tedious path. She needed to get him out of his armor, then deliver a powerful killing blow. To do that much, she'd need to either drain enough [Dexterity] that she could too fast for him when he had the armor on, or dispel it.

She could swap weapons faster than him. There was that, at least. And she could regenerate and had copious amounts of resources.

They'd have to be enough.

Ashtoreth and War both began moving at once….

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