The escape: Finale J
Goku was getting addicted.
The demons on each level were stronger than the ones before, in a flash he had reached the third floor, the room with the oil tanks was now empty of demons, he was flying on the high of the immense power going through him, one demon wasn't that much of a treat by itself, but when he absorbed hordes of them hundreds upon hundreds, the rush got better and better, and they were just so weak like sitting ducks. It was almost like Gabriel had sent him down here just so he could absorb these pathetic animals. Sometimes he idly wondered if that really was the case, but he had no time to worry about higher meaning and purpose. He had a job to do.
He had made sure to free every prisoner he passed; he enjoyed the feeling of being revered like a god. The humans wouldn't have been able to keep up with him under normal circumstances, but as he spent a good deal of time hunting down and devouring every demon on the floor the humans never fell too far behind. He had killed every demon on this floor except for one; he was looking forward to this. He stepped out of the oil room and moved to the room across the corridor.
The huge demon was roaring at a group of survivors huddled in the corner next to the opening, just out of his reach. He seemed to be suffering from extreme hunger pangs. Some of them were even glancing down skeptically; Goku realized they were thinking about leaping down like him. Some of them even had, the wretched idiots. Well it wasn't his problem.
Goku started whistling, loudly. The monster turned to him and let out a guttural roar of rage, he remembered Goku as the one responsible for all his pain. He turned and thrust his arm out trying to grab him but in a flash Goku was standing not on the ground but on top of its head. Goku grinned savagely anticipating the rush of his next meal. His power had grown threefold at least since he had come here and now it was going to get even better. He leaped down from the monsters head just as its hand came up to grab him and punched him in the chest, except he didn't remove his hand. The monster exploded into a wraith of flames, flames that stuck to Goku's hand and crawled all over him before the tendrils of power slithered into him. Goku let out a sigh of contentment. It was time to move on.
He looked around for an exit; there was one in every room. And he found a little crack tucked away in the corner. As he walked through he saw staircase winding upward towards the next floor. He leaped, and in one bound reached the top staircase. The next floor was pretty much the same, as he had climbed he had picked up the workings of hell.
The person's heart (physical one) was supposed to contain an imprint of all his good and bad deeds. The imprint was used to create to balls of positive and negative energy; they would then be put together. The positive and negative would cancel each other out, something like algebra. The more powerful energy, (energy power was based on amount and magnitude of deeds) the ball of energy that remained was examined. The power left it in was gauged and decided which out of seven leagues it belonged to (based on magnitude) and then the soul in question was sent to that level of hell or heaven. Goku freeing the people of each level probably upset the balance greatly, but honestly he couldn't care less.
The fourth and fifth level was nothing out of what he had expected. Demons, tortured prisoners and lots of power, by the time he got to the sixth level he was about ten times more powerful than when he had started. The sixth level was disturbing. He had seen the severity increasing as he climbed upward. But on this level he saw the people were being held not in different chambers, but in one single large room in which they were tortured and mutilated with various assortments with knives and other sharp objects, they were being cut into, carved into, their bodies torn up and mutilated in the most horrendous ways imaginable. Some of the demons had even cut out their subject voice box so they wouldn't even be able to scream as the demons had their little playtime. Goku had never felt guilt for murdering such despicable creatures but for the first time he felt as if he was delivering justice.
With an almighty roar he dove into the milling crowd of demons and tore them open eating their power, devouring their essence becoming stronger and stronger with each kill. And suddenly before he had even managed to cut through a dozen of the creatures he was truck with a blow in the chest and he flew backwards onto his back. Goku was stunned more from the fact that a there was a blow this powerful than from the pain.
A tall silhouette stepped out of the crowd. Goku chastised himself for not noticing him before, none of the other demons was that tall. The figure bent low to get a good look at Goku, and Goku got a glimpse of a thin and cruelly handsome face before the man straightened up and kicked him in the side. Or tried to, Goku caught his foot in his hand, acting more out of instinct than deliberate thought. The man smiled "well, well, well. What do we have here?"
In a flash the man's other foot connected with Goku's side throwing him into a spin till he landed on the other side of the room. Winded Goku scrambled to his feet and saw the demon-lord-thingy staring at him from the other side of the room with a glint of evil satisfaction in his eyes. Switching into deep aura vision Goku gauged the demons power to be about twice or thrice (those days were long past, he didn't remember exactly how weak he had been then) as much as his when he had entered hell. He could not understand how it had launched him across the room with such frightening ease. Goku calmed himself and shot a quick dart of energy in the demons direction, it was weak, but not weak enough to justify how easily the demon wiped it away. Goku had kept his eyes in aura vision and caught a glimpse of the demons power skyrocketing (a double of his own power level) and then dropping back down just as fast. So he was hiding his power, though he was doing a lousy job of it, apparently this one wasn't exactly the most skilled in energy control. Goku suddenly was struck by an idea; he darted towards the monster and used one of his tricks, a move he had developed himself while training with Israel. He shot a charge of energy that broke into two parts, it then further broke into two more parts and then into two more. Thus now Goku had under his control eight balls of energy flying around the room. The trick was that as the balls of energy were moving very quickly around the area it would be easy to slip one of them behind the enemy as its hard to keep track of so many zooming streaks of light, the real difficult part though was that only one of the shots was charged with energy and rest were simply streaks of light, the fake ones however would give off an energy signature (very hard) and the real one would be cloaked (easy). The opponent would have a hard time noticing that out of eight, one of the balls was nowhere to be seen nor could its energy be sensed. It had taken a good deal of time for Goku to perfect but when he had shown it to Israel, he had told him it wasn't foolproof. You can only hide a shot of energy, once fired, so well. If the opponent has his senses tuned he would pick up the vibrations of the real shot no matter how well you cloak it. This demon though, obviously wasn't at the peak of his game; Goku guessed he didn't fight many people who were actually a match for him.
The seven decoys zoomed around while the real shot hovered patiently behind, the opponent was distracted. Suddenly the fakes all closed ranks on him and as he shielded himself they went off harmlessly with a bang. He opened his mouth to utter a call of triumph but what came out was a scream of pain. Goku's shot hit him from behind full force. As the demon whirled looking for his hidden challenger Goku ran forward and with his fingers burning with charged fiery energy he forked the demon straight in the eyes. The creature let out a guttural roar as Goku leaped backward narrowly avoiding his flailing arms and raging shots. Goku leaped into the air and completely masked his power as best as he could. The demon stopped dead, it may be blind but it could still sense energy, and his opponent's energy was nowhere to be sensed, was it possible that one of his wild shots had hit him? No it couldn't be he was too shrewd for that. But it seemed to be the only explanation.
Those were the demons last thoughts as a fully powered Mahar crashed into it ending its miserable existence. Not missing a beat Goku fell to the ground and sucked up the demons essence. Ah! Dinner was served. Goku looked at the fearful horde of demons before him, now it was time for desert.
Not too much later Goku stepped into the stairwell for the final floor, he could see the light yet it had little appeal for him. But he felt a sweltering wave of heat, he couldn't understand what it meant but he climbed up. As he reached the top he saw a wall of fire standing before him. Suddenly he realized where he was…hellfire. The most perilous and fearful of all of hell, the hellfire was from where demons were made, where this place was fueled and held together. Without the hellfire hell would freeze over. The mysterious red lighting in the walls, it was hellfire burning through the veins of the brimstone, why did demons explode into flames when they were killed? Hellfire left them, and why they burned as they were remade? Hellfire came back to feed them. Goku had been devouring pieces and fragments of hellfire and here the original source was the final floor. He could see the greatest sinners of every age burning in the hottest of all flames. And Goku knew that this was what he would he would have to pass through to reach the upper realms. With a deep fearful breath Goku stepped into the wall of fire.
It hurt, it hurt like hell…the irony was so bad it hurt too…but no pain he had ever felt hurt like hellfire. It burned and scorched and tore him apart all at once, every kind of pain in more extreme forms than he could ever imagine, he could not imagine moving forward, yet he could not imagine going back either, he could not imagine anything. The pain was too great to think of anything else. But as he lay there burning for seconds, minutes, hours and maybe even days, his dead mind conjured up one more thought…food.
Yes, that was it. That must be it, he could not think of anything else. Wasn't this fire what he had been eating himself all this time? Wasn't this fire what he had been looking forward to on this floor like every other? Wasn't this the food he had been craving all this time? He had said it himself after all 'Goku had been devouring pieces and fragments of hellfire and here the original source was the final floor'. He had food, and he was hungry, so what was the problem? Nothing!
And as Goku opened himself up to the fire he knew he had been right all along, the power he felt was unlike anything he had ever felt! The aching hunger in him was finally satisfied, all the fire had wanted so long was to be reunited with its original source. Finally he was complete. And so he let the fire flow into him as it fills him and burns him and destroys him…
A figure clad in white bloodstained robes crawled out of the hole. The figure was unmarked and whole, the first figure Gabriel had ever seen to come out of hell. Gabriel had a decent idea of who he was he went down to greet him. The figure was standing at the lip of the hellhole (literally) as if waiting for someone. But as he approached the figure with awe in his heart and amazement on his face his chest suddenly clenched, very painfully.
He doubled over and gasped but as he looked at the figure the pain faded into nothing "see?" the man said in a quiet voice that he recognized "I am your salvation. Look where you cast me, the pain will not return." Gabriel turned and looked. He gasped in horror and fear. "What have you done?" he whispered, the man stayed silent. The pain returned greater than before and growing by the second. People with destroyed and mutilated bodies came running full sprint out of the hole and as they took their first few steps on heavenly ground they evaporated into mist with great sighs of contentment.
"Goku?" this was the final word that Gabriel whispered before he toppled over into a frozen empty hell.
To Jay: Thanks Jay, I'm glad you liked the twist. Well this is it, this is going to be the final chapter for a while, and I won't be posting for maybe a month or two. I hope it lived up to your expectations see you
XXX
Hope I can get some suggestive reviews for my new story. Later guys!