Heroine Creation: All My Summons Are Custom Made

The chamber went still.

”You are all pathetic worms! Don’t think we changed our minds, the truce was a lie from the very beginning!” Braavas’s bulging eye swiveled wildly, taking in the Council Members, the Sovereigns on their screens.

”You thought we wanted peace? You thought we would share this world with you? No! We wanted time! Time to prepare! Time to build! And you gave it to us like the generous, stupid creatures you are!”

Gasps rippled through the chamber. Council Members exchanged looks of horror. The Sovereigns stared with expressions ranging from fury to grim vindication.

”Deathrock was going to open a pit straight from Hellfyre!” Braavas continued, his voice rising with manic pride. ”A direct gateway into the heart of your precious capital! And you would never have known, there was no way you should have known! We hid everything! The shrine! The corruption! The Scouts! It was perfect! PERFECT!”

Lancet stood motionless, stunned by Spectra’s ingenuity. The Demon Head thought they already knew everything. It thought it was merely confirming what they had already discovered.

It had no idea it was confessing, incriminating itself and the entire Second World with every word that poured from its reanimated mouth.

Lancet looked at Malakai. ”You should probably record this.”

Malakai, his weapon still half-drawn, glanced at him. ”There are cameras are installed in the walls,” he said. ”Everything in this chamber is documented. Every word. Every gesture. Every confession.”

Spectra tightened her tendrils, drawing Braavas closer to her. ”Is that why you sent the Purgatory Demons?” she demanded.

The Councils and even the Sovereigns didn’t recognize that name.

”You didn’t want the humans to stop your master plan?”

Braavas snarled, his yellow teeth gnashing. ”The Purgatory Demons were Lord Baal’s idea! They were the only thing that could stop you all without bringing focus to what was happening!”

His bulging eye fixed on Spectra with a hatred that burned even through the veil of death. ”You were supposed to be dead! Baal killed you!”

”The shrine,” Spectra interrupted, smirking at him as she lied with ease. ”You thought you destroyed it. But we recovered it.”

Braavas froze.

”Even more,” Spectra continued, her crimson eyes gleaming with predatory satisfaction. ”That screen you used. A crystal river portal. Did you really think your blade-staff was enough to destroy it completely?”

She leaned closer, the mischievous smile she used to gibe Lancet flashed all over her face. ”Right now, it’s too weak for a Demon Lord to pass through. But it’s just strong enough for humans to enter. You’ve just left open a direct gate into Hellfyre and helped prepare a invasion against the capital of the Demon World.”

The silence that followed was absolute.

Then Braavas began to shake.

”No.” His voice was no longer a snarl. It was a whimper. ”No! No! My blade-staff. I am... sure I struck the screen twice. I saw it shatter... The roots, the roots were destroyed—”

His mismatched eyes rolled frantically, his reanimated mind racing through the memory of his final moments. ”But did I strike the core? Did I? I was in a hurry. The Valkyrie was attacking. I didn’t check. I DIDN’T CHECK!”

He thrashed against Spectra’s tendrils with renewed desperation, but there was no power in it. Just the terror of a servant who had failed his master.

”Lord Baal! Lord Baal!”

The Council was completely astounded by the mention of that name.

”Forgive me, my Lord Baal! I did not mean to. The portal... I thought it was destroyed—I thought—”

His voice dissolved into incoherent babbling, his massive body convulsing as the brief reanimation began to fade. The lightning that Thor had poured into him flickered and dimmed.

The artificial life drained from his limbs. His mismatched eyes, still wide with terror, fixed on something beyond the chamber—something only he could see. And then, with a final, rattling exhale, Braavas slumped to the marble floor.

Dead once more. Silent forever.

The chamber was quiet.

There was shock and contemplation. But the silence was mostly caused by the gravity of revelation. These people had just been forced to confront the truth they had spent the last hour avoiding.

Council Lord Obel stared at the lifeless body of the Demon Head, his wizardly beard motionless, his eyes showing just how stunned he was. The great tome before him had recorded every word, and the pages glowed faintly with the weight of the confession they now contained.

The Council Members were frozen in various states of disbelief. Some looked ill. Some looked furious. Ressis, the elderly but beautiful Council Member, had tears in her eyes. Verdrak sat in his chair like a man who had been struck by lightning, his pointed beard limp, his face pale, his earlier smugness utterly obliterated.

On the floating screens, the Sovereigns were silent. Ronald of Falcon Standing was no longer laughing. His weathered face was grim, his falcon still on his shoulder. Avanke of Ebonia had pressed her fingers to her lips. Liu Xiu of Asiris had closed her eyes. Odesto of Antarticon leaned back in his throne, his white-on-white gaze fixed on Spectra with an intensity that bordered on reverence.

And Romsgard Goldstone, King of Aethelgard, looked at Lancet with an expression that was impossible to fully read. There was relief in it. Gratitude. But unsurprisingly, there was fear in its rawest form.

Astensia turned to Spectra, her bright blue eyes shining with gratitude. ”Well done,” she said quietly. ”That was... inspired.”

Thor, who had been ready to fight the entire Council moments ago, let out a low whistle. ”I never thought I would say this, Demoness, but you just saved us all.”

Kestrel inclined her head, a small smile playing at the corner of her lips. ”Thank you, Lady Spectra.”

Espel was the only one silent. Did it work? She wasn’t sure.

Lancet turned to Spectra. She was still standing over the body of Braavas, her tendrils of Gloom dissolving into the air. Her chest rose and fell with steady breaths, and her crimson eyes, when they met his, held a vulnerable expression..

”Great thinking,” he said, his voice quiet but full of meaning. ”Thank you.”

Spectra’s lips curved into a smile. She was happy with his praise. Genuinely happy.

He had no idea when she had taken the Demon Head’s corpse. At some point during the chaos — after Braavas died, before they gathered the Demon Scouts, before they walked out of Deathrock’s gates — she must have stored it in her inventory without anyone noticing.

She had known. Some part of her, shaped by a century and a half of betrayal and persecution, had understood that the Council would not simply take them at their word.

She had seen through Lancet and Astensia’s trust in the system, their belief that the Council would do the right thing because it was right. And she had prepared for the worst.

This was what made a great team.

King Romsgard’s voice cut through the silence.

”Malakai.”

The great Berserker straightened to attention. ”Your Majesty?”

”Summon the President of the Kingdom Rangers Board.”

The chamber stirred. The Kingdom Rangers Board was the military arm of the world’s defense, the organization that coordinated every Brigade, every Awakener deployment, every military response to the Second World’s aggression.

Summoning their President was not a procedural step. It was a declaration.

Malakai bowed. ”What is the message I shall give, your Majesty?”

King Romsgard Goldstone looked down from his screen, his summer-sky eyes sweeping across the chamber until it stopped at those dead Demon Corpses. The proof of treachery and deceit.

His voice was deathly serious.

”War is coming.”