PRE-CHAPTER NOTES

- I am going to continue working on this story, and will recreate the REMASTERED Hazbin Hotel: Layers of Hell to include all of the lore and content from the first season that is seen on Amazon Prime. It may involve deleting and adding new chapters to account for the changes reflected in the first season. Also, if there is somehow the slimmest of chances that Vivienne herself is reading this, just know that your rise from YouTube to Amazon Prime was amazing and, at the very least, inspires tons of creators to believing they can achieve just as much with enough work, passion and dedication. Fantastic work, and I'm grateful that my mere writings were enough to garner such a large audience of readers.

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Testament XIX: Demons Enacted (Part II)

Many, many years ago, when Charlotte was but a little child, living with her parents in the Capital...

(Music: "Chopin - Aeolian Harp, Etude Op. 25, No. 1")

Crescendoing classical music swelled through the massive gilded urban sprawl that was the Capital. A young and spry Charlotte skipped joyously along the marble-coated sidewalk, peering curiously at the great length to which its path extended, accompanied by equally-marvelous buildings to either side. A mega-city with every inch adorned and coated in high-class wealth; and a beacon of power and absolute authority in the vast lands of Hell.

"Father!" Charlotte squealed and giggled in careless glee, lapsed in childish wonder for the world around her; It was one of the few times in her preadolescence that her father gave Charlie the opportunity to roam the city as a family. Even in the pits of Hell, Charlie managed to lead a sheltered childhood, completely isolated from the debauchery and wastelands that laid just outside the glittering walls of the Capital; thus preserving her early innocence. "Daddy! Pick me up!"

Lucifer, the undisputed ruler of this Has-been Hell, leaned down lovingly and scooped Charlotte under the shoulders, smiling with pure adoration as he swung his daughter around playfully, before setting her down and leaving her to do childish things.

"I never tire of seeing that smile." Lucifer mumbled warmly as his wife, Lilith, swelled forward to clasp his hand and rest her head on his shoulder lovingly. They looked onwards with affectionate gazes at the pride of their lives, gallivanting with unbridled joy and jubilation.

"Lucifer." His wife whispered, a contentful smile sat upon her beautiful yet demonic features.

"Yes, honey?"

"At some point, we should let her experience the world outside these walls."

"Nah, I'm good."

Lilith sighed gracefully, exhaling through her nose and adjusting her eyes toward Lucifer.

"What 'good' are we doing for her development by cooping her up here?"

"It's not a matter of development, my love; I thought we talked about this many times before. Every ring, every city outside these walls is reprehensive, atrocious, Sodom and Gomorrah levels of fucked-up. I'm not exposing my little baby girl to those heathens and harlots."

"Dear, you rule over those heathens and harlots."

"And?" Lucifer inquired rather sardonically.

Lilith groaned and jutted her hand at him in an emphatic gesture.

"And... that means you have the ability to change how they act."

Lucifer seemed as if he was about to respond quite bombastically, but instead clasped his hands together, walking ahead of Lilith and sweeping his arm across the magnificent city all around him.

"My dear, you've been with me for ages. You know how long it took us to transform this city into the marvelous pinnacle it remains now. How tiresome it was to beat, train and discipline every citizen here to act with class, dress nice, and not murder and sodomize one another in the public streets. Keeping the city clean, orderly and needle-free... That was over half my entire tenure as the Ruler of Hell; it was spent on trying to rein in just one city."

"And look at the effect it's had on the rest of Hell, dear!" Lilith countered, dashing forward and catching his hand in hers. "Only a few decades ago, Overlords finally started having actual meetings instead of constantly warmongering; Almost every Ring of Hell has a standing military, and provides (some) form of medical care, and-"

"I get where you're coming from, Lilith." Lucifer assuaged her. "But, come on. I mean... come on. This is Hell, sweetheart. These people? They get free will here and look at what they do with it! They fuck, steal, murder, drug-binge, shoot pornos, debase themselves publicly- and more of these forsaken bastards flood in every day! One demon can only do so much for an unstable, irredeemable population like this; and I can't change people who don't care to change themselves."

Lilith was considerably depressed by his assertion; as she couldn't find a good argument against it.

"I suppose you have a point." She conceded. "I just wish... I wish we could rise above all this. You're still trying that whole Redemption to Heaven program, right?"

"Yeah..." Lucifer trailed off. "It'll have been the 67th time appealing to Heaven..."

"Well, all that said." Lilith said, recomposing herself. "We still need to let Charlie see the kingdom she may one day rule."

"Maybe in a few years." Lucifer stated firmly. "I badly want to see her grow, even if I despise the idea of seeing her innocence tainted by the reality outside these walls. But she needs to get enough emotional and mental maturity before being exposed to the unfiltered. If she blows a gasket at the first uncouth demon to greet her..."

"Another good point." Lilith reaffirmed. "You've been teaching her to control her temperament, and her powers. But you need to teach her just how... powerful she is, Lucifer. If she is going to wield the combined might of Hell's rulers, then she must be aware of its extent."

"Babe, how many times are we going to repeat our conversations?" Lucifer muttered with a look of despondence. "My answer hasn't changed since last month- I don't know where her limits lie."

"YOU STAND AGAINST ONE OF THE DEADLY SINS, GLUTTONY, IN YOUR FUTILE ONSLAUGHT AGAINST THE NEW ORDER! STAND DOWN NOW OR BE INCINERATED IN THE PATH OF OUR CONQUEST!"

Charlie and the Slayer stood aside one another, glowering at the behemothic fleet of Gluttony, gathered before them at such an obscene scale that it made the appearances of the Slayer and Charlotte seem ant-like in comparison. The churning of roiling hell-engines, the spewing of noxious fumes; almost instantly, the landscape was polluted by the horrific leagues of smog and detritus that seeped from the hellish designs whose shadows eclipsed the sun entirely for miles of desert and plant fauna.

"Six flagships, six destroyer fleets, six aircraft carriers, and several hundreds of support ships." Vega rattled off instantly. "Corny. From surface analysis, there are approximately 32,764 combatants, primarily a mixture of ranged and melee types, including enslaved Demons from our universe."

Even despite her elevated sense of carnage and thirst for violence, Charlie was somewhat intimidated by the near-incomprehensible size of the forces fighting against her and the Slayer. In the midst of this confrontation, she asked a rather insecure question to comfort the feeling of overwhelming danger that flooded her mind.

"VEGA, how many demons has the Slayer killed?"

VEGA was silent for a moment, before spitting out a number.

"96.7 quadrillion."

Charlie lost her breath at the number.

"How is that even possible?!"

"Long story- BAD NEWS. YOU HAVE 7 SECONDS TO MOVE, 477 800mm artillery shots en route-"

Charlie glanced to her right, noticing the Slayer had already disappeared from his spot on the ground.

"OhSHIT!" She yelled in shock, flapping her wings in one lightning-quick motion to propel herself away, watching as 2 seconds later-

BWIP- BWIP- BWIP-

A torrential rush of hundreds of massive explosive shells slammed into the mountainside, creating such a cacophonous onslaught and overwhelming explosive radiance that Charlie was momentarily blinded and deafened, left swirling aimlessly through the air once her senses were temporarily nullified by the over-stimulation she'd been so closely exposed to.

"Charlie, there's 56,894 munitions headed your way- Charlie!"

The Slayer managed to redirect his course trajectory, almost slamming into Charlie as he escorted her rapidly away from the impending maelstrom of bullets that would pierce through the place Charlie was just at only a few seconds ago.

"They're equipped with greater firepower- engage in close melee." VEGA instructed; the Slayer quickly used one gauntlet to slap Charlie out of her stupor, then tossed her into the air.

"AAHH!" Charlie shouted, re-orienting herself midair to curse at the Slayer-

BRRRRRRRTTTT-BRRRRRRTTTTTTTTT!

BWOM! BWOM! BWOM! BWOM!

BOOOOOOOOOOOM!

-Until she witnessed him tank a few thousand artillery shells and arms fire, now understanding why he'd thrown her upwards. Watching him careen into the mountains behind them, Charlie responded with quick-rising anger and flapped her wings once, propelling herself like a high-speed bullet towards the first floating flagship she glimpsed. Her vision and sense of balance were still shot to hell, and so instead of gracefully landing on the ship to begin combat, she slammed horns-first straight through the first flagship in her path- and the second, and third; causing them to list and swirl chaotically in the air from the several ship components now obliterated.

Charlie, still completely impaired, continued to plummet at several miles per hour towards the rocky ground below, eventually making contact with the terrain at highspeed.

CRACKKK-K-K-K-K-K!

The impact of her hellishly-durable body split the ground into several webbing cracks, and made a bus-sized crater at her landing point. And yet, just as her fragmented consciousness thought it had found solace for a few moments-

CRACK-CRACK-CRACK!

CRACK-CRACK!

-Five giant drop pods from Gluttony's airships crashed into the nearby vicinity in tandem, immediately releasing five abominable amalgamations of inchoate flesh; mouths, animal heads, tentacles, tongues, claws, eyes, fur and hooves all melded together into guttural-sounding atrocities. The moment their pods opened, their minds were injected with several chemical concoctions that drove the flesh horrors into a murderous rampage, and they tore the pods apart in pursuit of things to tear apart- their eyes beset on Charlie first. Hundreds more of the same drop pods were on their way towards the ground, along with enough munitions to obliterate a small city.

As if subconsciously sensing the danger, Charlie used what little semblance of consciousness she had to regain her senses, and in a hazy, bumbling rage, launched stray fireballs and hell-beams in random directions (managing to set ablaze one of the Flesh Horrors), then transformed into her full demonic form; red curved horns, razor-sharp claws, gnashing canines and blackened eyes parted by burning-red pupils.

"INTRUDE ON MY KINGDOM?!" She screeched, completely eviscerating one of the charging Flesh Horrors with a swipe of her claws, and impaling another through the middle. Its fleshy tendrils, full of barbs and thorns, swiped and beat at Charlie's head and arms, leaving enough of their own gashes and wounds; but soon after she twisted her impaled claws and used them to tear a wedge through the Flesh Horror, eventually ripping it in half. "I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU!" She screamed before launching into the air, narrowly sliding by hundreds of artillery shells twice the size of herself and flew back upwards toward the fleet.

Meanwhile, the Slayer -still waging battle in the air- was firing his entire arsenal of weaponry at the airships and warriors brazen enough to engage in close proximity against him. Almost every second was engulfed in some form of conflict, violence, and chaos; bullets, artillery shells, missiles, demonic magic, and a whole host of other projectiles were almost always heading in his direction, meaning he could never stay still, and was forced to continually reorient himself in the air, change his trajectory, and contort his body to narrowly avoid hits to his armor.

Unleashing the BFG-9000 from his interdimensional storage, he took quick aim at the largest ship of the fleet; Greed's airship, which dwarfed even the second-largest airship with a width and length comparable to New York City. The Slayer analyzed the millions of individual components on the ship within a few seconds, eventually settling on the bridge where the intelligence officers relayed commands to the rest of the crew.

Slice off the head and the body can't move, was the Slayer's path of thinking. It was time-tested, supported by past experience against organized enemy forces, and a fundamental tried-and-true tactic for any soldier or lord who's had to wage war with strategy. The Slayer could only fire one shot off from the BFG before it took five minutes to recharge- and even then, he needed to supply it with enough Argent energy for a second shot- and such a weapon as the BFG took a country's worth of energy to fuel. The Slayer knew he only had two more weapon charges for the BFG for this fight, and so had to use them cautiously.

Nonetheless, Gluttony's airship remained the main target. Almost every fight the Slayer had in this world ended once the 'boss' was taken out; as afterwards their cronies and hired military would flee or surrender in the face of overwhelming might. There was nothing to provide substance to the contrary, and Gluttony's forces showed no deviation from the formula.

BWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO-

The BFG shot out its infamous green radiance, a destructive arc of energy vibrating with the instability of a dwarf star soon to become a black hole, and deafening to anyone within 300 meters of the shot, due to the sheer amount of force colliding within each particle of the energy-scythe. Onboard Gluttony's mothership, several bridge operators were yelling frantically at one another about the state of their ship defenses.

"The particle dissipators are up, right?!" One intelligence officer demanded of the crew.

"Yes, it's been up for the past thirty minutes!" A subordinate officer hissed confidently. "So are the decelerators, the atomic forcefields, the-"

"STOP WASTING TIME ON A VERBAL CHECKLIST, FUCKNUT!" The officer shouted. "You see that giant fucking green laser heading towards us? THAT IS WHAT I'M WORRIED ABOUT! So make sure ALL of our outer-shell defenses and CIWS systems are functional and ready to take that fucker and all of his arsenal on!"

The entire bridge crew watched rapturously as the BFG's energized attack sliced through air and everything in between, headed straight for the viewing window of the bridge with no indication of losing momentum or power. The mothership's CIWS systems fired hundreds of thousands of bullets per second at the energy beam, hoping to dissipate some of its force- only to watch as the bullets vaporized when they got near its flight path. This, on top of the forcefields, decoys, screens and counter-munitions deployed by the mothership were all futilely obliterated with indifference by the oncoming beam.

"THIS IS FUCKING BULLSHIT- EVACUATE THE BRIDGE!" The commanding officer screamed into the radio, giving no second warnings as he dove out the nearest window and plummeted several hundred feet towards the flight deck below- a feat he could easily withstand compared to that BFG attack which-

BWFOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!

-had completely torn through the bridge's infrastructure without slowing, traveling onwards through several hills and mountains, eventually dissipating several meters deep into the earth. The intelligence officer who had jumped out the window managed to slam into the flight deck without injury, standing up to see the massive onslaught taking place a mile or two further down the flight deck.

In the distance, the officer could see the green-plated enemy, "The Slayer" as he was repeatedly termed, smashing and cleaving through dozens of hulking demons at a time in the seconds it took for the officer to comprehend the dreadful sight before him. He (the officer) was lower-tier compared to the vast majority of the demons that accompanied Gluttony on this journey toward taking down the Slayer. To see a lone figure slaughtering dozens of beasts, demons and otherworldly beings with such precision and unending bloodlust was demoralizing to the point of losing a battle entirely; The officer had already heard more than his fair share of legends and recountings from other demons who'd witnessed the Slayer themselves, and the sights he was seeing before him did nothing to dissuade his belief in this.

This is just UNFAIR! The officer thought in agonizing resentment. How is one mere man allowed this much power? Why doesn't he tire? WHY ARE HIS WEAPONS SO OVERPOWERED?! WHY IS HE OVERPOWERED?!

"Fuck." The officer cursed, ripping off his outfit, with a pin labeled "Heterbury" coming undone from the military uniform he'd just torn. Heterbury threw the jacket into the wind, before sprinting for a set of stairs behind the obliterated bridge which would lead to a storage room of parachutes and other lifesaving material. A mile down the flight deck, the Slayer was engaged with several hundreds of demons and unholy beings, all of whom were both eager to tear him to bits and simultaneously hesitant to engage the Slayer in close combat.

"YOUR LIFE ENDS HERE, SLAYER!" One demon screeched, bringing a two-handed greataxe down unto the Slayer's helmet, only to have his head blasted off by the Super Shotgun a half-second later. Another dove forward, trying to sweep the Slayer's feet with its claws, and promptly meeting face-to-face with the barrel end of the Slayer's Doomblade.

SHICK!

The Slayer impaled the eager demon through the skull, grabbing his body and ripping it entirely apart from its head, which remained lifeless and slack-jawed on the end of the Slayer's blade.

A being who has survived eons of battle, with only the worst, most sordid, diabolical and cunning opponents awaiting his every move. Experience, strategy, power, skill, wisdom- All of these tenets fell into irrelevance for the ancient soldier; these were no longer principles to adhere to, but fundamental axioms of his existence. His very being was defined by unrelenting vengeance and unstoppable force; and even if he were not fighting the enemies which wronged him so many millennia ago, the Slayer remained eternally bound to the fateful declaration said to him when he first accepted this divine duty.

||| TO RIP AND TEAR UNTIL IT IS DONE. |||

(Music: "Meathook", by Mick Gordon | DOOM Eternal OST)

Just as the Slayer recited the ancient tenet in his head, Charlie flew into his vision, using her claws to rake through his enemies and spewing blazing white-hot hellfire at any unlucky enough to be in her path. The two joined into a silent cohesion, using everything at their disposal to deal damage to the enemy fleets; no longer constrained by an environment with their allies and peers around, the chaos and destruction they'd both craved was unleashed all at once.

The Slayer went to work; unsheathing his Doomblade and sticking it through a row of demon heads; simultaneously whipping out his Rocket Launcher and firing it point-blank into the surrounding crowd, obliterating dozens and clearing room for the Slayer to move more easily in. In a half-second, the Slayer immediately recused his Rocket Launcher and whipped out his infamous chainsaw, bringing it down upon the shoulders and heads of those unlucky souls to stand in front of or around him. In another half-second, he pulled out the Plasma Rifle, slamming the barrel of the weapon through the teeth of one demon, blasted its face off, then grabbed the barrel and used the gun's length to sweep the feets of charging demons, then equipped his Ballista and hopped into the air, shooting it downwards at the demons he'd tripped while simultaneously rocketing into the air to escape the horde descending on him.

Charlie dove into the hundreds-massed crowd that previously surrounded the Slayer, using her momentum to slice through multiple bodies at once with her claw-tipped fingers, before slamming into a particularly-burly demon with thicker armor and skin than the rest. He looked down to see Charlie having embedded her claws two inches into the armor, and roared a mighty bellow before arcing his giant mace to squash Charlie's body. She struggled to pull the claws out, but didn't have long to panic once the Slayer entered her eyesight and grabbed the mace at 60 miles an hour, snatching it away and breaking the demon's hand from the sheer force. Charlie took advantage of this, grabbing the demon's leg and pulling it from out under him. He fell, and she quickly began spinning in a circle, generating force to hurl the demon several dozens of meters across the flight deck.

The demon stood up, grinning as it spit out blood onto the cold steel below. Charlie's battle-haze died down, allowing her to more closely scrutinize the hulking mass of muscle and scars that stood valiantly across from her. His face was that of a goat's, with curling horns protruding out of his head and calculating horizontal pupils that glared daggers at the Princess of Hell. He stood no less than twelve feet tall in dark-brown fur, almost twice the Slayer's height, and used that stature to presume a commanding and authoritative presence. He wore armor of crimson-gold, packed with small defensive spikes and decorations from previous battles won. His left hand sported a massive rectangular tower shield of the same color as his armor, and an onyx-black mace that visibly radiated toxic fumes from its flanged head.

"More!" The goat brayed with malicious passion. "I have been STARVED of great combat for ages. Grant me THIS!"

Charlie scowled, using her wings to propel herself into the air to prepare for an aerial strike, when the Slayer suddenly launched himself towards the Goat-demon, who anticipated his arrival and immediately dove aside to avoid the attack. The Slayer and the Goat-demon uprighted themselves, face-to-face with one another, and Charlie took this moment to dive in for an ambush. She hardly expected the Goat-demon to glimpse her attack, and merely sidestep out of the way- watching her careen at the Slayer uncontrollably.

Before she could yell for him to watch out, the Slayer sidestepped her trajectory, grabbed her leg, and spun her around twice to dissipate the inertia of her attack, then set her on the ground feet-first next to him. Charlie was dazed and disoriented by the spin, but quickly recovered and stared down the Goat-demon in front of them.

"Finally, you two can hear me." VEGA chirped from Charlie's shoulder with the brevity of a megaphone. "Dissemble Gluttony's airship, and the rest will fall or retreat. Do not focus on the goat-like enemy, from observation I've deduced he is a slow-moving tank that learns to adapt from his opponent's attacks. Leave him and focus on the parts of the ship that keep it airborne."

Charlie and the Slayer, without responding, flung themselves into the air away from the Goat-demon, who brayed in frustration and resentment as his opponents fled. The two of them immediately honed in on the massive turbine engines on both sides of Gluttony's airship, firing all of their ranged attacks at those engines.

Plink! Plink-Plink!

VEGA noticed first that their attacks were completely blocked by an invisible field surrounding the turbine engines. He took a half-second to analyze the footage and determine what resource the enemy was using for protection.

"Particle deceleration fields using antimatter." VEGA rattled off. "Almost instantly depletes the inertia of any oncoming projectiles. You two must find a way around i-"

Without further explanation, the Slayer pulled out a Ballista firearm and blasted it in the opposite direction of one of the turbines, immediately launching himself towards said engine with frightening velocity.

SCHLBHK!

The Slayer hit the forcefield and almost instantly came to a standstill. It was like an impossibly-thick gel that immediately engrossed the Slayer's armor and slowed his movement to a near-standstill. Having expected this, the Slayer then decided to start moving around as much as possible, extending and contracting his legs and arms into the kinetic forcefield with unrelenting pressure.

"Charlie," VEGA spoke in her ear. "We need to get several miles away from here. The enemy may not have realized it yet, but they have just lost this fight in one fell swoop."

Charlie yelled in frustration.

"The fight just started!"

"While I'm glad you have found your bloodlust, this is for your own safety. You need to get away from here- NOW."

Charlie was well past the point of questioning VEGA, and so immediately flapped her wings to launch in the opposite direction of the fleets. The fighting didn't last as long as she had expected it to, which was a major disappointment as she was just beginning to enjoy the cohesion between herself and the Slayer; but there would be more than her fair share of fights in the coming days.

"What the fuck is he doing?" The goat-demon muttered under his breath, watching the Slayer at work as he continued to move around in the forcefield surrounding the turbine engine. The goat-demon began to think more feverously, but his mind was not designed for such complex interpretation. Rather, an intelligence officer named Hiok (another who'd escaped the airship bridge's obliteration and happened to previously hold a physics degree in his past life), had a separate line of thinking.

"Particle decelerators produce low-energy antiprotons... this is what keeps matter out of the forcefields... but he's producing a ton of entropy each second while encased in what is essentially an anti-matter field... and when you combine antimatter and matter in massive quantities... No, these anti-matter fields have an impossibly-high tolerance to particle collision... There's no way-!"

And yet, even as he outright denied the possibility, he could feel the intense vibrations emanating from the Slayer within the anti-matter field, signaling a terrible occurrence was soon to arrive. The intelligence officer had a dreadful realization that the very thing which was intended to protect the airship was now going to be the result of their collective demise.

"YOU SHOULD HAVE ATOMIZED THE MOMENT YOU TOUCHED THAT FUCKING FIELD, YOU IMPOSSIBLE BASTARD!" The officer shouted in fury at the distant Slayer, apoplectic that even the sky-blotting air-fleets of Gluttony failed to provide the Slayer with a difficult challenge; it was now clear to him that the entire fleet was about to turn into ash and dust. This particular officer had already witnessed the Slayer in action two times before; having been present for both the Slayer's retaking of Portland as well as his first arrival to this Earth. He was no stranger to the impossible feats this invulnerable being was able to accomplish.

The officer then immediately bolted for the edge of the airship, screaming frantically and panicking with all the dignity of a dying blind cat. He yelled at other members to jump off the airship, seeming a lunatic (many of the demons did not possess wings as he did); but no one understood just what danger they were in.

"HE'S GONNA BLOW UP THE SHI-"

BWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!

The collision of antimatter and the massive entropic energy the Slayer had generated imparted several hundred kilotons of nuclear explosive energy, which instantly burst out from the original point of contact and consumed almost the entire country-sized mothership; the kinetic force behind the shockwave sent the other airships careening away in multiple pieces or outright obliterating the nearest unfortunate fleets. A mushroom cloud bloomed from the original point of collision, finalizing the battle's conclusion with overwhelming force.

In the unwinding chaos of the massive fleet breaking into pieces that slammed into the cracked earth below, Charlie looked idly around for the Slayer, unfearing of his fate; she had seen him survive and thrive in so many hopeless scenarios that she no longer truly believed he could actually die.

"Don't worry about searching for him, Charlie." VEGA chirped. "He's currently embedded several meters deep in the mountain behind you, and is climbing out to meet you a few miles Northeast of the crashed fleet."

"I've never heard the Slayer speak much; how do you know what he intends to do?"

"When you've spent a long time with someone, you can gleam their intentions without verbal cues."

"Okay, but knowing where he wants to meet up is a bit of a stretch-"

"Do you hear that?"

"...No."

"That was the silence I was enjoying a few moments ago."

"You're so funny, aren't you..."

She looked around the wreckage that spanned for miles; seeing dozens of demons emerging from the rubble and tending to their wounds. For a moment, she wondered if she should go down there and slaughter them to prevent them from reinforcing future battles. At the same time, her kindness and compassion prevented her from performing executions, and so she was stuck in mental conflict.

"VEGA, what the hell happened?" She asked him, trying to get her mind off the morbid considerations in her head. "What was that explosion?"

"Do you have a basic understanding of particle physics?"

"Uh, what?"

"I'll just summarize. The Slayer generated entropy, AKA energy, while inside the antimatter field surrounding that turbine engine. When antimatter and matter collide, it creates a nuclear explosion of several kilotons from the collision of particles at the atomic level."

Charlie scratched her head, trying to wrap her brain around VEGA's explanation.

"Why would they even put that on their ship?" She asked innocently.

"My observation is that they had built in a tolerance for incoming energy to the forcefield, but only to a certain level. Naturally, any other person who jumped into that antimatter field would have immediately disintegrated. The Slayer, of course, is not 'any other person', so he could perform that insane feat. I suppose our enemies just do not anticipate the power difference between their forces and the lone Slayer; and they can hardly be blamed, as an anomaly like him does not (as I have said) seem to be present in your universe."

Charlie sighed, taking a momentary breath to simply view the behemothic wreckage of the fleet across the arid landscape.

"Don't get me wrong, I'm more than glad the Slayer is here to help us take out these enemies, but... he's just so insanely powerful. He practically ends every fight the enemy brings, and I'm left looking utterly useless to the people I'm supposed to protect."

"Would you rather dead comrades than disappointed ones?" VEGA asked.

"No! Of course not, that's not what I'm saying. I just... I can't improve in combat and help the Slayer, and help fight back against these demons when he destroys our enemies so quickly. I need experience."

"I get where you are coming from, Charlie." VEGA replied in a comforting tone. "But surely you understand- we are here to accomplish a goal, and that goal is to annihilate this demonic threat to your world, then head back to ours to assist in the repairs. The Slayer has gone through this whole ordeal once already."

"What do you mean?" Charlie asked.

"Our earth was similarly besieged by demonic forces from Jekkad. Most of the population was wiped out, with only a few remaining in defiance. The Slayer fought through and eventually slayed the Icon of Sin."

"I still don't understand how he survived the first encounter in Hell." Charlie muttered.

"This requires a long explanation that isn't worth the breath it would take. Back onto the point at hand- the Slayer is here for one purpose. To Rip And Tear Until It Is Done. He does not take time to concern himself with anything else most of the time. He is an ancient warrior whose sole objective is to exterminate the demonic threat that was long-anticipated to one day invade Earth. In all honesty to you, Charlie- trying to build bonds with him is futile."

Charlie was genuinely hurt by VEGA's response; especially since she had been slowly acknowledging a budding affection in her heart for him recently.

"Why would you say that, VEGA?" She asked somberly.

"You need only see with your own eyes. You have seen him in battle- and you have seen him out of battle. His mannerisms, behavior, personality and drive; they remain the same in both situations. The Slayer has been engaged in constant, unending battle for most of his life. Though he serves to protect humanity, he has lost nearly all of his own in the wake of countless eons spent fighting a terrible and unrelenting menace. He breathes in rage and exhales violence; his heart beats only in hopes of finding more demons to slay; his limbs move of their own accord, forged and tempered by millennia of slaughter and mass destruction. He is a weapon, unchanging and unfaltering in his pursuit. Imagine if you yourself were facing nothing but combat, day in and day out, every second of every minute of every hour. Imagine if you were tasked with a duty that had no seeming end to it. Imagine, and I will need not speak; you will understand why I advise you against attaching yourself emotionally to him."

Well... Charlie thought to herself in comfort. I remember him in Portland. I remember when he took off his helmet, when he gazed at me... that was communication. He wanted to be human again.

Still, depressed with VEGA's explanation, Charlie declined to provide a response and hopped down the mountain, about to meet the Slayer at the agreed-upon place when she got curious about the derelict crash site of Gluttony's air fleets. Those airships which weren't obliterated by the explosion had made a full retreat, and the vast dry landscape was littered with the wreckage of the remaining fleet. She looked among the detritus, realizing that neither she nor the Slayer had actually confirmed the death of Gluttony, as if on queue, his booming voice emerged from a nearby speaker embedded in the ground; leaving Charlie to wonder how it was still functioning.

"It was good insight that prevented me from boarding it to meet you and the Slayer. I'd heard more than enough about that walking disaster to know that I should avoid open combat with him before I find a weakness."

Charlie walked over to the speaker, speaking to it as if Gluttony were there himself.

"Have you ever considered surrendering? I can say with 100% confidence that the Slayer would at least spare you, if nothing else."

A humorless laugh was Gluttony's response over the loudspeaker.

"It seems what I've been told of you was not false; you are uniquely different from the other denizens of Hell. Redemption, kindness, compassion. You should know, Charlie- these aren't qualities that are antithetical to being a demon. Join us, and help cleanse this world for those of us demons that want to free ourselves from the divine chains placed on us so many eons ago."

Charlie shook her head fervently, her face grit in solemn defiance.

"I cannot agree with that fundamentally. If you know of me, you know I have only tried to seek redemption for demons through peaceful means. Conversion, not conquering. And I would never side with those who think we have to genocide the human population to make a place for ourselves in this world!"

An audible and menacing sigh emanated from the loudspeaker, before being followed by a final statement.

"Decades it took to construct that fleet, to staff and supply it for conquering this realm. It's a good thing I've spent eons amassing power; this was the first of many war machines and warriors. I look forward to meeting you on the battlefield, Princess Charlotte."

And with that, the loudspeaker went silent.

"This diabolical plot sounds an awful lot like the situation we had back home." VEGA commented. "Divine beings using demons to cleanse the Earth for their own gain. How fortunate for you that the Slayer arrived here by accident; since it seems your world didn't have their own 'Slayer' to face off against these forces."

"Maybe it's fate for this to happen on every Earth." Charlie muttered rather despairingly.

"Fate cannot exist when free will lives among every soul." VEGA responded rather firmly. "These are the actions of the self-interested; not fate. You and the Slayer must vanquish these demonic forces and restore humanity to its place on Earth. Then, and only then, can you continue your quest for redemption- although I don't see what 'redemption' you need."

Charlie let out a pure, wholesome laugh; something she hadn't done for a long while now. For some unexplainable reason, hearing VEGA tell her she needed no redemption, after all the trouble and tribulations she'd endured in Hell to reach such a goal, had comforted her unreasonably so. A question popped into her mind and she asked it of VEGA.

"VEGA, who are you exactly? A supercomputer, sure, but you speak with such wisdom and humanity... it can't be all you are."

VEGA was silent as his voice node sat clipped to her shoulder, and she eagerly awaited whatever response he was going to give.

"Telling you would result in you either completely disbelieving my statements, or would potentially shatter your entire worldview and possibly place you in a catatonic state."

Charlie made a face of temporary horror at that response, but steeled herself and insisted.

"Come on, it can't be that dramatic."

"It is."

"Well... just tell me!"

"Charlie, what is the being in your universe that created all things named?"

"...God."

"In my universe, I was once known as the Father. I created untold amounts of realities and worlds, shepherding innumerous species and civilizations into existence."

...

...

...

"...Huh?" Charlie muttered, obviously in disbelief of what she was hearing; and much to VEGA's expectations.

"Let us convene towards the Slayer's location, as this is going to be a very long explanation."

"Can you tell me about your world, too?"

"...This is going to be an extremely long explanation."