Chapter 905: A Date in Helheim

Yamato’s cut opened directly in the center of Helheim’s throne room, a violet line appearing in the air before expanding enough for Vergil to pass through.

He stepped across without hurry, sheathing the sword as the fissure closed behind him.

After the last few hours, this almost felt like a peaceful visit.

No creature trying to tear his head off.

No entranced god landing absurdly powerful blows.

No World Tree complaining because he had helped burn and freeze its roots.

There was only Helheim, with its green-blue mist drifting through the enormous openings in the hall and that cold, dead atmosphere that, strangely enough, was starting to feel familiar.

Hela was seated on the throne, which by itself was nothing unusual.

The problem was her expression.

The woman who had previously practically thrown herself at Vergil, teasing him and making it very clear how interested she had become after learning how thoroughly he had humiliated Odin, now looked like a different person.

She leaned against the throne with her face resting on one hand, legs crossed, and a tired scowl on her face.

"You look terrible," Vergil commented, stopping several meters in front of her.

"Good evening to you too," Hela replied, raising only one eyebrow.

"What happened?" he asked, tilting his head slightly.

Hela simply turned her face away and let out a long sigh, refusing to answer.

Vergil watched her for several seconds until another sigh came.

He closed his eyes for a moment.

Typical women.

Naturally, he did not say that aloud.

He had learned something over the course of his life.

Vergil walked toward the throne, climbed the few steps, and stopped directly in front of her.

Hela kept looking to the side, making a point of ignoring him with such obvious dedication that she was practically begging for attention.

He watched the performance for a few seconds before deciding to play along, kneeling in front of her and gently taking one of her feet by the ankle.

Hela finally looked at him when she felt Vergil lift her foot and rest it in one hand.

"So..." he said, discreetly running his thumb along the side of her foot. "Who made the great Queen of Helheim so sulky?"

Hela turned her face away again and sighed.

"Do you intend to communicate with me using only sighs?" Vergil asked.

She answered with another one, making him slowly nod.

"I see. Advanced language."

Even while joking, Vergil noticed that beneath the sulking there was genuine exhaustion.

Helheim had gone through disappearances, compromised routes, thousands of Valkyries torn out of its administrative system, gates temporarily closed, and, as an improvised solution, Itharine had been left on the bridge devouring and storing souls while everything was reorganized.

After that, Vergil had simply disappeared inside Yggdrasil, ended up fighting Niddrog, found Freyr practically dead, and returned to Sparda without even stopping to speak with Hela.

Thinking about the situation more carefully, he really had left her behind.

"Sorry," Vergil said, releasing her foot and resting one arm over his own knee.

That finally got a reaction.

Hela looked back at him, and Vergil continued before she could say anything.

"I shouldn’t have gone straight home without talking to you. The Valkyrie situation turned into something else, then that turned into Yggdrasil, then Niddrog showed up, then I found Freyr looking like a walking corpse and..."

He paused, realizing how absurd the sequence sounded.

"It was a strange day."

"You forgot about me," Hela accused, narrowing her eyes.

"Temporarily."

"That doesn’t make it better."

"I know."

Hela stared at him, apparently divided between remaining angry and accepting that he was at least being sincere.

In the end, she chose a third option and rested her face on her hand again.

"I was so ready to let you fuck me," she complained. "Now the fire is completely gone."

Vergil blinked twice before starting to laugh.

Not loudly, but enough for Hela to immediately become even more irritated.

"Don’t laugh!"

"Sorry."

"You don’t look sorry."

"Because that was very direct," Vergil explained, still holding back a smile.

"I am the Queen of the Dead. I don’t have time to pretend to be modest."

"Fair point," he agreed.

While still kneeling in front of the throne, a strange conclusion began passing through his mind.

At some point Vergil could not identify, his life had turned into an ever-growing sequence of absurdly powerful women appearing around him for different reasons.

Aphrodite had been Aphrodite, so there was no point trying to understand that.

Selene, or Artemis depending on what he decided to call her, was another matter.

Freya now lived in Sparda as a demoness and shared a closeness with him that hardly anyone would call ordinary friendship.

And now there was Hela.

That did not even include a World Tree that treated him like a troublesome teenager, two Dragon Empresses spiritually married to him thanks to Ophis, Niddrog temporarily installed inside his soul, several troublesome demonesses, a vampire, a werewolf, and so many other situations that Vergil had already given up trying to organize them mentally.

"I’m starting to miss Katarina, Ada, and Roxanne..." he murmured without realizing it.

Hela immediately narrowed her eyes.

"You’re thinking about other women."

Vergil looked at her and simply nodded.

"Yes."

"You’re not even going to deny it?" Hela asked, genuinely surprised by how casually he answered.

"Why would I?"

"Because I’m here."

Vergil slowly stood, facing her while the elevated throne left them almost at the same height.

"Hela, we don’t have a relationship."

Her expression darkened immediately, and Vergil realized he needed to explain before she interpreted that in the worst possible way.

"You’re acting like this with me because I humiliated Odin. It was fun for you, it sparked your interest, and it probably fulfilled some very specific fantasies related to how much you hate him, but so far, that’s all it has been."

Hela remained silent, her fingers tightening slightly around the arm of the throne.

"So you don’t want me."

"I never said that," Vergil replied, raising an eyebrow.

"You just said we don’t have a relationship."

"Because we don’t."

"That’s the same thing."

"It isn’t."

Hela finally turned her entire body toward him.

Vergil placed one hand on the arm of the throne and leaned a little closer, keeping a faint smile.

"I said our relationship does not exist. I didn’t say it can’t exist. There’s a difference."

The strength of her scowl faded a little.

Hela watched him for several seconds, apparently trying to understand the logic of this man.

She was probably accustomed to people fearing her, flattering her, or simply taking immediate advantage of interest shown by a goddess.

Vergil seemed determined to complicate everything.

"You really are strange," she concluded.

"I’ve heard that before."

"And equally interesting."

Vergil laughed.

"I’ll take that as a compliment."

"I don’t know if it was."

"It is now."

Hela finally let the scowl almost completely disappear and leaned slightly forward.

"Then how does this relationship begin?"

"A date," Vergil answered immediately.

She blinked.

"A what?"

"A date."

"I know what it means. I’m asking why."

"Because that’s how people normally start getting to know each other," Vergil replied as though it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Hela slowly spread her arms, gesturing toward the entire hall around them.

"Vergil, I rule Helheim."

"I noticed."

"I’m Loki’s daughter."

"Also noticed."

"Half the living are afraid to even say my name."

"Their problem."

"I have commanded entire armies of the dead."

Vergil nodded with an expression far too serious for the answer that came next.

"Great résumé."

Hela narrowed her eyes, but he continued before she could complain.

"None of that means I know what food you like, what you do when you aren’t administering corpses, or whether you can go two hours without talking about Odin."

She opened her mouth to answer but stopped for several seconds after realizing he had a point.

"I can."

"You can?" Vergil asked, clearly suspicious.

"Maybe."

"Then we’ll find out."

Hela let out a small laugh.

"You are actually asking me on a date after invading my throne room through a dimensional fissure, kneeling in front of me, holding my foot, and telling me we don’t have a relationship?"

"It’s an efficient sequence."

"It’s a ridiculous sequence."

"That too."

A smile finally appeared on her face, and Vergil stepped back slightly from the throne.

"First date. No expectations beyond that."

"No expectations?" Hela repeated, looking slightly disappointed.

"You know what I mean."

"I wanted expectations."

"I figured."

She crossed her legs again, now far more comfortable than when he had arrived.

"And where do you intend to take me?"

Vergil thought for a few seconds.

"Somewhere outside Helheim."

"That eliminates my first option."

"Was it a cemetery?"

"An old execution ground."

Vergil remained silent for a moment.

"Definitely outside Helheim."

Hela laughed.

"You’re demanding."

"I want one night where no one tries to kill anyone."

She raised an eyebrow.

"You?"

"I try."

"Is that a promise?"

"It’s a goal."

"More realistic."

Vergil looked around the hall.

Some souls still moved through the side corridors under the supervision of Helheim’s inhabitants, but the situation already seemed far more organized than before.

Brynhildr had confirmed that the recovered Valkyries were being treated, and for the first time in a long while, it seemed as though no one was about to appear asking him to solve a crisis.

"When you have time," Vergil said.

Hela looked at him as though the sentence were absurd.

"I’m the queen. I decide when I have time."

"Then decide."

"Now."

Vergil blinked.

"Now?"

"You came all the way here."

"I came to see how you were."

"And you found out."

"Yes."

"I’m irritated, tired, and supposedly no longer in the mood," Hela said, rising from the throne.

Vergil smiled.

"Supposedly."

"Don’t get cocky," she warned, pointing a finger at him.

"Too late."

Hela stepped away from the throne and walked toward Vergil, stopping close enough that they practically shared the same space.

"Then take me on a date."

Vergil looked at her and then at Yamato.

The sword vibrated discreetly at his waist, almost excited at the possibility of being used again.

Mjölnir answered with a small tremor on the other side, making Vergil sigh.

"You two don’t start."

Hela lowered her eyes toward the weapons.

"Are they fighting?"

"Constantly."

"You have strange problems."

Vergil gave her a look.

"You rule the dead."

"Point for you."

He brought a hand to Yamato but hesitated before drawing the sword.

Hela noticed immediately and tilted her head.

"What is it?"

"I promised myself I would use fewer portals for short distances."

"Why?"

"Long story."

"We’re in Helheim, Vergil. Everything is a long story."

He ended up smiling.

"Let’s walk to the bridge. It’s a date. We can start by talking."

"Walking?" Hela asked, looking genuinely surprised by the idea.

"Yes. Normal people do that."

She watched him for several seconds before slipping her arm through his and holding him naturally.

Vergil looked down at the gesture, and Hela smiled with satisfaction.

"You said normal people start like this."

"I said normally. I didn’t say we’re normal."

"Too late now."

The two began leaving the throne room together, walking unhurriedly through Helheim’s cold corridors.

Vergil realized this might be one of the few times in the last several days when he was going somewhere without a war waiting at the destination, a disappearance to investigate, some cosmic creature meddling in his life, or a primordial tree complaining about the damage he had caused.

It was just a date.

Considering Vergil’s life, something would probably go wrong in less than an hour.

But at least this time, he was choosing the problem voluntarily.