Opening Notes: Yeah, Ok, I know what you're all thinking: "You said this was a story about Xelloss! So where is he already?!" Patience, patience, my friends. It's only the third chapter. I thought it was important to understand something of the Mazoku Lords' relationships and lives first in order to understand later goings on. Anyway, don't give up on me! I know this chapter is a little darker and moodier than the previous two, but I promise you all that there is plenty of Xelloss coming up shortly! (btw, this chapter contains sexual references, though nothing graphic.) Oh, and Dragonbane, no, Dolphin is not insane yet, although I do intend to cover that moment in history. ^_~

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The King of Beast's return to her palace on Wolfpack Island was announced with a gust of wind and a loud crash. Innumerable precious vases and trinkets were sent flying and the glass fell out of several windows. "Master," one of her servants cried, running to greet her and throwing himself at her feet in a position of total humiliation.

Zelas, quite the opposite of Phibrizzo, liked to surround herself with minions and slaves. Dolphin claimed the reason for this was that unlike the powerful Phibrizzo who had no need for supplemental aid, Zelas not only needed help, but used the presence of lesser mortals to make herself feel better. After all, she always said, weak people generally bully others who are even weaker to makes themselves feel good. Zelas, however, knew this was not true. Well, not entirely true. She did not bully her servants or spend her time torturing them to death. Instead, she devoted herself to that thing called pleasure.

As the King of the Physical world, Zelas controlled all that in life which is animalistic, instinctual, base, and material. This was part of the reason for the rivalry between her and Dolphin. Dolphin, king of the Psychological world, was interested in the intellectual and, well, psychological aspects of life. She found Zelas' interest in physical pleasure a waste of time and disgusting besides. She simply didn't understand. The simpleton couldn't grasp the concept that just because someone's realm of interest differs from yours doesn't make him a fool.

Seeing the groveling form in front of her, Zelas relished the fact that at least some people gave her the respect she deserved. "Rise," she intoned coldly. "Fetch Kanbyoo." Without waiting for a response, she turned and retired to her chambers. These rooms were decorated with the utmost attention to aesthetics; soft, silken pillows decorated a bed whose mattress and pillows were filled with the finest down. Scented lavender candles provided just enough light to fill the room with a soft, gentle glow. A mahogany bedstand held little trays of fine chocolates, a bottle of ancient wine, and an ash tray. These little pleasures--eating, drinking, and smoking--which seemed so trivial to the other Mazoku Lords, were considered extremely important by Zelas. She could taste the flavors and feel the caresses of all those physical delights. But today she found comfort in none of them.

Restlessly she threw open the double glass doors which led to her terrace. She let the wind play in her hair, watched as the setting sun cast a purple glow over the entire island, and sighed. At the sound of her voice, even so distant and soft, a movement began in the garden below. Slowly, a pack of enormous wolves began to rise out of the darkness, separating themselves from the other shadows and coming forth on silent feet. Gaining speed as they ran, the pack, one after another, jumped from the garden floor to the terrace ledge and began to invade Zelas' room. Panting and growling with deep satisfaction, they surrounded their master and began wagging their tails vigorously. They were every shade of gray, black and white, with varying designs upon their fur. Some were black as midnight, others spotted gray, some had shaggy manes of white, others were short-haired. All of them had long, bone-white fangs covered in saliva that glittered in the dying sunlight. Their powerful legs and jaws were frequently used to leap incredible distances or tear the heads off rabbits, horses, even men. Especially men. They were her pride and joy.

Her momentary respite was interrupted, however, when the servant from before returned with Kanbyoo. The young man entered the room soundlessly and bowed to Zelas. The light from the sun glistened on his darkly-tanned skin and ebony curls. It made the Dark Lord smile. "Sit on the bed," she commanded, waving the servant away impatiently.

Kanbyoo obeyed, reclining back against the pillows and gazing at her with his startling green eyes. He was scantily clad as per her general request and she stood for a moment admiring his muscular arms. He was a native islander, whom she had singled out when he was still a boy. In return for eternal life and demonic powers he had gladly become her servant, and she had welcomed the companionship. Creating servants out of humans or animals or demons was a much simpler task than creating them from oneself, and Zelas was by no means weak, so long as she wasn't being compared to her siblings. She was after all, the fifth most powerful being in the world. She assured herself of the meaninglessness of Dolphin's words and turned her attention to her half-human slave.

"At least I have you, is it not so?" she murmured, approaching the bed and setting herself gently down on it. "Give me a massage. I have need of relaxation tonight." Silently, Kanbyoo obliged. It could not have been said that she loved Kanbyoo. She was incapable of loving in that sense. But she was not incapable of receiving pleasure from his ministrations, and for that she loved him in a way which was not love, but which had no other name.

When she had tired of the back massage, Zelas laid herself out languorously across the bed and allowed her white gown and sandals to evaporate. The rising moon made her bronzed skin look golden and her hair shone silver. 'Truly,' she thought, 'I must look like an island goddess. No wonder he adores me.' Smiling, she commanded, "Pleasure me."

Although she was not really female, for monsters have no sex and no sexual drive, Zelas enjoyed the act of love making. And she enjoyed taking a woman's form the most. In pleasure taking, as in most things, Zelas preferred to lay back and let others do the work, and she found the female form often lent itself to this, particularly as she was unconcerned with her companion's comfort. She had often employed human lovers for this purpose, favoring them until that day when they ceased to please her, through inability to perform, lack of loyalty, disobedience, or any other flaw, at which time she fed them to the wolves. But Kanbyoo was different. On him she had bestowed immortality. Or this is what she was contemplating, anyway, when he failed her for the first time.

"Kanbyoo, immediately! I am in no mood for insolence!" But Kanbyoo did not stir. He merely gazed down at her from where he sat on the bed. Disturbed, Zelas sat up. Why must everything go wrong today? She was beginning to feel like decimating a small town to make herself feel better.

"Master, I must speak with you," Kanbyoo said quietly, avoiding her gaze.

"Well," Zelas growled impatiently, "Speak then."

Kanbyoo gathered his strength and continued. "I have decided not to serve you anymore." If Zelas had not been stunned into immobility, she would have fed him to the wolves right then. Sensing her intention, the canines in question began to salivate intensely and their low growling could be heard. But Kanbyoo ignored them. "Over the last few decades, I have received so little compensation for everything I do."

"Greedy bastard! I gave you eternal life..."

"That is one gift. The power you gave me is minimal. I must think of myself, you know. And all things considered, I don't feel that it is a wise career choice on my part to give myself to a Mazoku Lord of such low standing..."

It was all beginning to become annoyingly familiar. Zelas began to wonder...

"So instead, I have accepted an offer from my Lord Deep Sea Dolphin, who has promised me power and wealth far beyond what you can offer."

"What?" Zelas exploded, "Deep Sea Dolphin? I should have guessed that bitch was behind this. You do realize that she will care for you no more than I, indeed less. You are good for nothing except what I employ you for. Don't estimate your value at greater than it really is. She only wants you to get at me, you know. You are an expendable pawn in her plot!"

"Am I any more than an expendable pawn for you?" Kanbyoo cried in an accusatory voice.

"....but, at least I have a use for you..." Zelas muttered, but she could see what had happened clear as day. Dolphin had seduced him with promises of power and wealth merely in order to annoy her. Zelas had to hand it to her sister, she was ruthless and cunning to a terrible extent. The real question was which of her other wayward servants had allowed Dolphin admission to the island without informing Zelas herself.

"I take my leave then," Kanbyoo said, mistaking Zelas' silence for submission. As he rose to leave, her hunched over form began to shake with ire and she turned to strike him dead. But even as she did, she saw the mark of the dolphin upon his skin and knew he was under that Lord's protection. Useless, it was all useless! The insolent boy disappeared from sight, as Dolphin teleported him, no doubt, to the depths of the Demon Ocean.

Rage and pain grew in Zelas until she felt she might explode. Trembling, she stood and walked to the edge of the terrace. She let herself float to the garden below, and there, surrounded by the bright island moonlight and the lush tropical wildlife, she unleashed her fury in a wave of wild, terrible blackness. The very island seemed to cry in pain as her hundreds of human, half-human, and demonic servants fell to their knees in unbearable pain and slowly, one by one, returned to the chaos from which they had been created. The island's central volcano, believed to be inactive, erupted, spewing lava upon several small towns at its base and cooking the inhabitants alive. An earthquake shook the ground, splitting the rock and swallowing villagers as they scrambled like idiots from place to place, trying to avoid the punishment of their mistress.

And in that moment something happened which had never happened before: Zelas cried. On the material plane, they must have looked like normal tears, but Zelas felt as though a part of her being left her with each sob. They were tears of pure rancor, pain, and hatred, flowing from her body and gathering at her feet in a growing puddle. And as each moment passed, the pain only grew worse. Fury racked her soul and she thought she would lose control of her physical form, but just as she thought she could stand no more, something caught her attention.

A form, a power of some sort, had been growing on the Astral Plane ever since the first tear had fallen. At first it was small and insignificant, like a single drop of water, but as Zelas' grief had increased and her tears had flown more freely, it had grown as well, wider and taller, causing its form to be somewhat like that of an inverted cone. On the Material Plane, it seemed to be represented by the puddle at Zelas' feet.

Zelas blinked and looked again. It seemed to her now that a hand extended from the pool, as though someone had been immersed in her sadness and sought to escape. Amazed, Zelas shook her head and looked agian, but the hand had not disappeared. Instead, it moved weakly, extending itself further from the shallow puddle, until a full forearm showed. Curiosity got the better of Zelas and, kneeling beside the pool, she reached forward slowly until her hand met that of the strange being. She closed her fingers around it and it responded with a surprisingly strong grip. With a sharp tug, Zelas drew the hand out of the pool and stared, astounded, as the arm was followed by a shoulder, and the shoulder a head, and the heard an entire body.

In the end, the mazoku lord found herself sitting in the garden next to a strange black pool with a naked body draped across her lap, for it had collapsed there. It had a completely sexless, featureless build, white-skinned, and white-haired, resembling a human's. The cause for this would be inexperience, she decided. It had no experience with humans and didn't know quite what to do with itself, and yet, for some reason, it had wanted to take human form very badly. Perhaps, she mused, it had seen her, in a human form as she was, and attempted to imitate her. Perhaps it was trying to convey some message to her. Or perhaps it had other reasons entirely, or even no reasons at all. In any case, it must have been extremely powerful to have created even such a simple human form.

It was now, however, completely drained of power with the effort, and without delay, Zelas retired to the Astral Plane, commanding it to relinquish its form and join her.

On that other plane, she was able to examine it more closely. And it became instantly apparent to her what the thing was: a mazoku. She had created a mazoku.

For several moments Zelas sat and thought about the implications of this. Then, slowly, she began to laugh. Quietly at first, and then hysterically. She had proven Dolphin wrong! She had proven all of them wrong! True, she had accomplished it completely by accident, but that was beside the point. The point was that she had created a mazoku being out of her own self, for that was undoubtedly what had happened. So great had been her grief and rage, so potent, that it had separated from her and taken on a life of its own. That meant that the thing before her was shaped entirely of pure wrath and hatred. How deliciously appropriate, for what are mazoku but beings of darkness and malice. Here was a being that would surely be a dark prince among mazoku for as long as this world existed.

But the feelings of betrayal had not yet left Zelas and she extended herself to the thing cautiously, conducting the Astral equivalent of prodding it with her finger, or rather, her claw, as her natural form was that of an enormous, winged werewolf. The cone quivered on the Astral Plane for a moment and then came to a halt. Gathering strength, Zelas wrapped it in her influence, sending her senses washing over it, reading its signals, feeling its existence. And she became aware that it was laughing.

Startled, she withdrew, not knowing whether to be pleased or offended. "What amuses you so?" she demanded of the strange little being. And to her mild surprise, it responded.

"Why Master," it giggled, "I was merely imagining what indescribable havoc we shall wreak on the world."

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A/N: The crying scene was inspired by a pretty little doujinshi I have which centers around Xelloss and Zelas. It contains a similar scene in which Zelas cries which I found so beautiful I had to use it. I had originally had a totally different idea for the creation of Xelloss, but, well, imitation is the highest form of flattery, right! ^-^;; (btw, Dragonbane, don't worry. Although I think it contains interesting possibilities, I do not support the idea that Xelloss was created from a human. I've always thought of him as 100% mazoku!) Anyway, it should be noted that this in no way represents what the doujinshi author originally intended. Most of this scene was completely made up by me. In fact, I don't even know what's happening in the doujinshi. The scene is described in Japanese of course, but, my Japanese being what it is, I have *no* idea what is *actually* going on there so I just sort of made up something to go with it.