A new arc, Devil's Reign, begins. Orion Assante, and his advisors Fadi and Sherri Caniff, try to improve the world after the fall of Pope Innocent XLII and the widespread rise of vampires.
They begin to consolidate all the different Systems in the U.S. into one country, Calmerica. They turn the remnants of C.O.P. into Orion's Sword, their private army, and use it to fight a short war with SCAUR (South America), and to try to exterminate the vampires.
Orion also begins a romantic relationship with Sherri.
The vampires, led by Pellon Cross and his advisors Zebra and Kierch, hide out underground in VEGAS. They finally manage to infiltrate Caesar's Palace casino, renaming it Grendel's Palace, and making it their new base.
This arc has a very unique storytelling structure. Each of the comics in this arc are divided into two stories, each of which continues through the arc. The first half of each issue is about Orion, and is told using multiple small rectangular panels of the same size, usually 8 to a page. The text is often placed in large paragraphs the size of the drawn panels. The second half of each issue is about the vampires, and is told using a more conventional panel/text layout. Each of the vampire stories are themselves made of two parts: one about Cross, Kierch, and Zebra, and another about one of the "everyday" denizens of Grendel's Palace. They are narrated by either Zebra or Kierch.
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