Warning! This chapter (and this fic in general) contain strong language and scenes of violence that may make some readers uncomfortable. Viewer discretion advised.
Red arms the size of my torso and bulging with muscles dragged my half-conscious and beaten body on a cold stone floor. Through my broken helmet, issued by the UAC, I caught a glimpse of polished piles of human bones, littering what I assumed was a cave as if they were mere garbage. A massive hoof to my right stomped on a skull without a care in the world. It belonged to a demon. A Baron of Hell, to be precise.
Fantastic as it may sound, the demons are real. And they are a force that plagues Creation since time immemorial. For all I knew, I might have been the only mortal in the universes that could stand up to them and come out victorious. As long as I had ammo, as long as I had weapons, I would be a pain in their side. And if those weren't an option, there was always the chainsaw or, in extreme cases, my fists after pumping myself with rage-inducing drugs (also issued by UAC). I had several sabotaged invasion attempts under my belt. I was unstoppable.
I was also on the verge of a painful death.
More than once, even. It is true that a lot of demons are insane, bloodthirsty monsters, but they also have brains. The latter are the most dangerous bunch, as they retain their knowledge and mental faculties that the rest of their brethren had forgotten or stopped caring about. Usually they are easy to recognize, as they often lead hordes or can abuse their magical powers however they please (yes, magic is a thing... it's also demonic in case you're wondering). And, more often than not, they plan ambushes. Not the blatant ones, but those cruel and of a rather nasty type. I fell prey to some of them and I barely came out alive.
But into each life some rain must fall I guess. So too it had to fall in mine. The teleporter that I had to use stripped me of my weapons and placed me in a room full of demons. I killed five of them before the horde fell on me. For some reason beyond my mind or memory, they didn't kill me on the spot. I guess that's why those two gentlemen dragged me around like a sack of rocks.
We arrived at a small room tinged in red due to a faint glowing mist that fell from the ceiling. At the centre of the room, surrounded by four marble pillars decorated with human remains, stood a demon I've never seen before. It was a hoofed biped, tall and thin, with two arms and hands that extended from them like branches on a tree. It had a head that's somewhat hard to describe. Imagine a near perfect spherical rock with a bunch of craters and holes on it, but inside is hollow and there's a tiny red light that comes from something you can never truly see because, somehow, it is always hidden by the head.
That thing was known as Seeker of Thrills, as I later learned when I crossed paths with it again some time after I evolved to be more efficient. It recognized me, as all demons do, and we fought after I blew up its demon-tech machine that the demons used to transport one of their conquered and corrupted planets into the physical realm. It took a lot of patience and a lot of shooting, but it fell down, just like the others. After that, it faded into obscurity, as does every self-professed leader that I eventually kill.
But I digress.
The barons threw me down and put their hooves on my back, impeding any attempts of escape or confrontation. The Seeker of Thrills turned around and cocked its head. A thin, buzzing noise emanated from its head as the light flickered brightly with each spoken word.
"Looks like a rat has founds its way into my granary. An interesting one, at that."
It closed the distance between us in a time it took me to blink. Its ridiculous head was inches away from my helmet.
"How you've killed the Mother and the Icon is beyond me. It seems it gave you strange ideas, though. I can't remember the last time a mortal dared to walk in and out of Hell however they pleased."
Its head turned sideways.
"Hell. What a hateful little horror. It took a lot from us. Our beauty, our light, our minds, our decency... Setting your foot in this holy place is an act of blasphemy. Blasphemy makes me mad. I don't like being mad."
I didn't say anything. My glare was more than enough for those worms. And I let my guns do the talking.
"Is your pride hurt? Or you think too highly of yourself?..." The Seeker turned to one of the Barons. "Tell me. Was I understandable enough when I said that I don't like being mad?"
I couldn't see what was happening. All I heard is a loud pop, followed by a squishy noise as something warm splashed on my left arm. The Seeker's voice turned into an ear-splitting shriek as the Baron's headless corpse was thrown in front of me, to be used as stress relief for the stronger demon.
"Then why does he keep ignoring me?! Why he won't respon when I'm speaking his primitive language?! Why?! Why? Why? Whyyyyy?!"
The things it did to the corpse almost made me vomit. I never could've butcher a demon with my chainsaw like that. The seeker grabbed the corpse and threw it effortlessly somewhere away.
"Well... I would challenge you to a fight. But there is no joy in killing a wounded animal. That's not what hunting is about. Luckily for me, I have a replacement."
My thoughts withered away as sheer terror gripped me the moment I began to understand what it talked about. Turning around, the Seeker of Thrills approached one of the pillars and grabbed a marine in green armor just like mine. I thought everything on those pillars was dead flesh. I was wrong.
"On one of my travels where I was assigned to annihilate a solar system, I learned that mortals had this tendency to seek revenge when they perceive something has wronged them. You kill the parents and the child grows up to hunt you down. You rape and kill the spouse and the husband will turn the worlds upside-down just to find you. The moralists of the bunch get most furious when they witness the deaths of those who are not even related to them. I trust you are one such specimen?"
I didn't know whether it noticed my horror or not. The Seeker threw the marine on the ground and stomped on his back. The marine, a man, screamed loudly as a loud snap echoed the room. It managed to turn him into a cripple without outright killing him.
"Remove his helmet and hold his head. If he closes his eyes, you are free to rip off his eyelids. He needs to see this."
The Baron did as instructed. Despite my fruitless struggle, the Baron succeded and held his fingers on my head with enough pressure that I thought it would squish my skull. That's when the torture began.
"See," The Seeker spoke, "Hate can be a very powerful emotion. It can drive lesser beings into spawning delusions of grandeur, thinking how they are the hero of the story and I am just another monster to be put down. How to even begin to describe the excitement that runs through my being when I kill them? When they think they were this close to victory?"
One of its fingernails, size of my finger, cut the armor from the marine with impressive speed and ease. Then, that same fingernail, began cutting through the man's back, whose screams were muffled by the helmet. A second hand took off the slab of skin and flesh with all the care of an expert surgeon. The sight made my blood boil, but the baron placed his knee on my back and it was back to square one.
"If I drew that much ire from you with such a simple procedure, imagine what will breed deep within you after what I am about to do."
The damn fingernal tapped on the man's exposed back like a woodpecker's beak, followed by a loud pop every now and then. Didn't take a genius to figure out what was happening. The Seeker was breaking the man's ribs, somehow without damaging the lungs. Never before have I heard a man scream and shake like I did back then.
The Seeker took out the broken bones and tossed them sideways. I think it was watching me the whole time. Enjoying my descent into helplessness-induced rage. The marine's screams died out when The Seeker tore off his lungs and squished them until they were drained of blood. He finally got the act of mercy when the demon plucked his heart out with the same fucking fingernail.
"There is one more left. Do you feel like you are up to the challenge, mortal?"
It then picked up a woman.
She was also a marine, clad in armor just like mine and the man's. Where did it get her without me noticing it? I figured that the demon would try the same trick again. But then it confused me when it slammed her with her back to the ground. Its head moved closer to the helmet, cocked sideways, then stood up.
"You are still refusing to talk? If so, then this one will suffer even more than the previous victim."
I don't know why I did it. No. That's a lie. I know exactly why I did it. I knew the reason behind all that torture. Just as I knew that its victims wouldn't come out alive regardless of what I did. Damned if you do, damned if you don't, you know? I thought the bastard would gut her with all the creativity a deranged mind like that could come up with.
Boy, was I wrong.
"Very well. Let it be know that this mortal's blood will be on your hands."
It happened so fast that my mind didn't even have the time to process all the information it got. The first thing that demon did was raise one of her legs. A fingernail cut off slices like a sheff cutting a cucumber. For some reason beyond me, The Seeker seemed like he got tired of her cries, so it plunged the thing between her thighs and through the stomach, killing her instantly. I stared, my mental faculties leaving me for a second or two. I vomited and then screamed as hard as I could.
"DAAAAAAMN YOOOOUUUUU!"
My voice rang through the place with a force I didn't know it had. It was deep and feral, as if my soul used my throat to express the absolute hatred it created for the demon. I hated the demons before, yes, but not like this. This was something else. Dunno how to describe it better, sorry.
The Seeker of Thrills stood there, frozen in place, then turned its whole body to me. I'm sure I was seething like a madman.
"I am... dissappointed, really. One would think that a mortal such as you would have a greater strength of will. You crumbled after a second execution! What a farce! Throw him in the dungeon. His time will come."
Before the Baron of Hell could drag me away, something caught my eye. Something I wish I didn't see, because later I thought I lost my marbles right then and there. It was the head of a rabbit, dangling on a hip of a dead marine. But not any rabbit, mind you. My rabbit. Daisy. My poor Daisy...
The head looked me in the eyes as its mouth moved. I was able to make out a single sentence before the demon dragged me into the darkness.
"Evil is eternal, as is Hell, Flynn."