The air around Azazel didn't just crackle; it screamed. The combined assault was a storm of pure, focused intent.

Kratos hit first. There was no finesse. The Blades of Chaos, wreathed in the fire of a personal hell, slammed into a wall of shifting darkness Azazel had thrown up. The impact didn't sound like metal. It sounded like a mountain being dropped on a tomb. The darkness held, but it shuddered, rippling like black water.

Before the ripple could settle, Ares was there. His spear, now a lance of pure, crimson wrath, struck the same spot. Not the mindless rage of before, but a cold, sharp hatred for the thing that had made him a puppet. The spear tip ground against the dark barrier, spraying sparks of black and red energy.

Azazel's head twitched. The sand in his sockets swirled faster. He made a pushing motion with his left hand.

The ground beneath Kratos and Ares erupted. Not with fire or rock, but with memories given physical form. Shattered toys from a Spartan boy's past rose to entangle Kratos's legs. The mocking faces of warriors who had ever doubted Ares solidified from the air, clawing at his face. It was a desperate, vicious defense.

It bought him a second.

A second was all Michael needed.

The Archangel didn't run. He took one step and was simply there, his golden sword already in a downward arc. It wasn't a swing; it was a pronouncement. The blade met the dark shield and this time, it bit. Light and void shrieked as they annihilated each other at the point of contact. A web of golden cracks spread across the darkness.

"Your corruption ends here," Michael stated, his voice flat and final.

Azazel's mouth, a thin, grey line, twisted. You are merely a symptom. A tool of a silent master.

From the side, Uriel's blazing sword came in low, aiming to shear Azazel's legs out from under him. At the same time, Raphael, his hands glowing with a searing, white-hot light, slammed his palms against the cracking shield. His was not an attack of destruction, but of unraveling. He sought to purify the very essence of the darkness, to make it remember a time before it was twisted.

The shield groaned under the four-pronged assault. Kratos and Ares tore free of their psychic snares, joining Uriel and Michael in hammering at the failing barrier. Gabriel hung back, his horn held ready, his eyes scanning, waiting for an opening, for the one perfect moment to sound a note that would shatter the corrupted being for good.

Azazel was being pressed. Hard. His full attention, his immense will, was bent on containing the five powerhouses trying to tear him apart. The sandstorm in his eyes was a frenzied whirlpool. He had to focus.

And in focusing, he let go.

---

Across the battlefield, Sun Wukong was in the middle of swinging his staff at a confused Vanir when he suddenly froze. The staff, the Ruyi Jingu Bang, hummed in his hands. The red, misty anger that had clouded his vision for what felt like an age… just evaporated.

One moment, he was ready to smash this tree-spirit into pulp for a slight he couldn't even remember. The next, he was just… him. He blinked, looking at the terrified Vanir, then at the chaos around him.

"Hey!" he yelled, more confused than angry. "What's the big idea? Who turned out the crazy lights?"

A few yards away, Nezha stumbled, his fiery wheels sputtering. He looked down at his own hands, then at the spear he had been aiming at a Shinto kami. He lowered it, a look of profound disgust on his young face. "What filth was that?" he muttered, shaking his head as if to clear a bad smell.

There was a deafening crack of thunder. Thor, who had been locked in a brutal wrestling match with a Titan, suddenly found the Titan's grip slacken. The giant looked just as confused. Thor shoved him away, hefting Mjolnir. The hammer crackled, but the lightning was clean now, not the sickly purple it had been a moment before.

"Enough of this trickery!" Thor bellowed, his voice booming with its familiar, honest fury. "Face me with honor, you shadows!"

Loki, who had been gleefully setting a pack of einherjar against each other, stopped. A slow, wicked smile spread across his face. The compulsion was gone. The fun was back. He looked toward the epicenter of the conflict, where light and darkness were clashing in a furious storm.

"Oh, now this looks interesting," he purred. "The real party's over there."

Wukong followed his gaze. He saw the archangels, the raging Ares, the relentless Kratos, all hammering away at the gaunt, grey figure. He saw the darkness buckling.

A huge grin split the Monkey King's face. "They started the main event without us! Not cool!"

He didn't need a strategy. He saw a problem and he had a staff. It was a simple equation. With a whoop, he launched himself into the air, a golden comet shooting across the hellscape.

Nezha was right behind him, his wheels leaving trails of clean fire. "Do not rush to your death, monkey!"

"Too late!" Wukong cackled.

Thor didn't jump. He spun Mjolnir once, twice, and then hurled it with all his might. The hammer became a bolt of pure, divine lightning, screaming across the throne room, aimed directly at Azazel's back.

Loki simply vanished from where he stood and reappeared perched on a broken rib high above the fray, daggers in hand, watching for an opportunity. Somebody was going to need a knife in the back, and he was happy to provide.

Back at the shield, Azazel felt the new threats coming. The Monkey King's chaotic energy. The pure, righteous power of the thunder god. The focused aggression of the third lotus prince. A distraction. An annoyance. But against this concentrated assault, an annoyance could be fatal.

He was forced to split his focus. A portion of his will snapped outward, forming a second, thinner shell of darkness to intercept Thor's hammer and Wukong's incoming dive.

It was a mistake.

The main shield, already cracking under the relentless pressure of Michael's sword, Uriel's fury, Raphael's purification, and the brutal, unwavering assault of Kratos and Ares, finally gave way.

It didn't explode. It imploded with a sound like a dying universe gasping its last breath.

The collapse of the shield sent a shockwave of pure force in every direction. Michael and Uriel stood firm, their own light absorbing the blow. Raphael was thrown back a step, his healing aura flaring protectively. Kratos and Ares dug in, weathering the storm through sheer stubbornness.

For a single, unguarded moment, Azazel was exposed.

It was all the opening they needed.

Kratos was the first through the broken darkness. He didn't yell. He was silent, a predator closing in. The Blades of Chaos lashed out, not at Azazel's body, but at the space around him, weaving a cage of searing chains to trap him.

Ares was a half-step behind, his spear a crimson drill aimed at Azazel's heart. "This is for my mind!" he roared.

Michael's golden sword came down in a clean, decisive arc, aimed at the Watcher's shoulder, meant to disarm and maim. Uriel's blazing sword swept low, a scythe of light meant to take his legs.

And from above, Wukong's staff descended like a falling star, while Thor's hammer, having shattered the secondary shield, arced around to smash into Azazel from the side.

They hit him all at once.

The world turned white, then black, then a violent, screaming mixture of every color at once. The throne room of Pandemonium ceased to exist as a place and became a canvas of pure, unleashed power. The very foundations of Hell trembled, not from the heat of its rivers, but from the impact of a corruption meeting its end.

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