Rudra kept a close eye on Lucifer with his god's eyes as he realised that even with his exaggerated speed of flight due to his wings and his gravity manipulation, the devil was still faster and closing in the distance between himself and Rudra extremely fast.

Just when Lucifer was about to catch upto Rudra and stab him in the back, Rudra quickly flipped mid-air and started flying backwards while facing lucifer as he had been taught by sariel.

Lucifer unleashed a strong attack towards Rudra with his sword, however Rudra blocked it with the technique that Sariel had taught making a near 2-5° angle between his blade and Lucifer's giving the devil no chance to pressure Rudra backwards using his exaggerated power.

SHING!!!

Grim reaper collider with Lucifer's blade and started to vibrate violently. Eventhough Rudra had tried to minimize the attacks power, the devil was so powerful in his strike that Rudra's arm still felt the sting eventhough he blocked it perfectly while grim reaper violently trembled from the impact.

" I see sariel had educated you .... " Lucifer said with a distasteful expression on his face.

Rudra gave the devil the most bashful smile his face could produce as he said " Yes , i had to learn from a true Archangel to defeat some scum like you ".

Lucifer was not at all amused by this joke of Rudra's as he unleashed a terrifying fury of attacks.

SHING!

SHING!

SHUNG!

SHONG!

All sorts of musical melodies played out as the two battled it out while flying at high speeds in the air , but after about 70-80th time of trading blows Rudra felt his arm grow heavy to the point his responsive ability was slowing down, putting him at the risk of failing to counter an attack in time.

" You are doomed boy , your protectors won't reach you in time to save you " Lucifer said as he increased the tempo of his attacks , however Lucifer did not understand something fundamental about Rudra.

If the leader of the elites was not confident enough in getting away from this fight alive and unscratched he would not have taken it up in the first place.

Rudra monitored Lucifer's eyes closely as he tried to block him strike for strike , however just when he saw that Lucifer's eyes were focused on his right arm position , Rudra activated the sun god's bracelet and used the move ' Solar Flare '.

A blinding white light erupted from his bracelet causing Lucifer to momentarily take his eyes away from Rudra as he blinked to save himself from the high luminosity.

This was all the opening that Rudra needed , as in about 0.5 seconds Lucifer was back and fully aware of his surroundings but in that split second Rudra had already summoned furball and asked his pet to use mass teleport as he escaped the battlefield from infront of Lucifer and reached back to the True Elite legion in the capital city.

When Lucifer realised that Rudra had gotten away he let out a howl of rage and despair but as he turned to chase the rat into the city he saw that the two god's had already taken to the skies and were waiting for him in between the city and himself.

It was frustrating, however Lucifer had to let Rudra off for now as he had much bigger problems currently on his plate.

The war had just started a few hours ago and on the very first day itself it seemed as if the god's would start engaging in their terrifying battle.

As Hades and Omar prepared their spells, Lucifer prepared his. The inevitable clash was finally about to begin.

**********

( Meanwhile Rudra )

Rudra panted as he sat on a rooftop in the capital city overseeing the battle of his legion from a vantage point.

Rudra was massaging his right hand with his left one as currently it felt as hard as a rock with every single muscle in his arm contracting to their maximum.

With this small exchange against Lucifer Rudra realised the gap between the two even after his training.

Although trading so many blows and managing to hold one's own against a god tier opponent as a lower tiered individual was a monstrous feat in and of itself , Rudra knew in his heart he was not even close to inflecting and proper damage which was not a positive sign considering his ambition to slay the devil.

For now his only role was to oversee his legion and makesure that the city forces were wiped out as soon as possible, however until Lucifer was slayn he also needed to be resdy to engage in combat with Lucifer at any given moment should the god's be defeated.

After recovering a bit, Rudra jumped down from the roof and landed his blade on the necks of two tier 4 demon generals , killing them both with one sword slice each.

With the fight of the god's still in its infancy Rudra still had a chance to fight and slay the tier 4 and 5 generals of his enemy forces and improve the odds for his side and that was the exact thing that Rudra planned to do.

By the time Rudra went to help the gods as a reinforcement , he wanted to completely route the tier 5 forces of the enemy and shrink the tier 4 advantage in numbers to atleast 1:1 ratio with his own army.

Kissing his grim reaper who remained untainted from the demon blood it had just slain, rudra whispered to the blade and said " It's time to slay some souls ".

Bursting into action exactly how only the war god Rudra could , Rudra began his menacing tear through the battlefield as he decimated enemy forces.

/// Character art for Jhonny English and Rudra has been uploaded on patreon, join the patreon if you want to check them out for more such book related art and polls on what character should be illustrated next.