Coming into his office, Plaze picks up a note from his desk that simply read, "Jessie and Herta are using their vacation days to be with me. - Mehira."

With a bit of a dumb expression on his face, Plaze turned on and off his eyes to check if he was reading correctly.

Then, he sighed, "Satan damn it, Mehira. Ah well, they can have their girl's day."

It was slightly curious that all of his best workers were women. He should get the boys to start working harder before they get left in the dust.

Or Hell, maybe women are just better at coding and he should hire more women. The one guy on magical coding duty was pretty competent so maybe it really was a gender thing…

Boredly looking at his notes from the previous day, he began to make a few changes to his multiplayer idea. He got 8 hours of sleep last night, so he could now make better decisions on how he can try out this new idea in the next console…

"Sir! Sir!" Alha suddenly came bursting into the room, shouting hysterically, "There's- There's-"

Calmly, Plaze tilted his head and asked, "There's what? Speak calmly, dude."

He's seen Alha stressed and nervous before, sure. He's never seen his secretary do whatever this is, though.

Catching his breath, Plaze realizes Alha was running up here as he managed to get out, "It's- Vox! Vox the TV Overlord just arrived!"

He lets that register in his head for a second.

Then, he shouted out, "WHO IS HERE?!"

Vox?! The TV Overlord himself?! Why in Lucifer's Hell was he here!?

Did he fuck up somehow? Did Vox not like something Plaze did? Was it one of the games, maybe it was the way his consoles could be put into any TV, or, Hell, he doesn't know.

Collecting himself, Plaze cautiously asked, "Okay, shit, what's he doing right now?"

Alha looks behind him just to make sure Vox wasn't behind him as he said, "I… Think he's politely waiting in the front lobby. He asked to meet you personally."

Well fuck, he's after him specifically.

Looking at the window, he makes sure that he has an escape route through being able to jump out of it before telling his secretary, "Send him in. I'll handle him."

Alha salutes as he quickly makes his way back down to the first floor.

Sitting down, Plaze cleared the desk and thought of everything he knew about the man who was thought by the laymen to potentially be the strongest Overlord in Hell right now.

Personally, he still had Carmilla over him, but that was just because Plaze saw her fight. He has no idea what Vox can do.

Still, she described him as someone who was obsessed with keeping up with the future. Mehira described him as someone who wouldn't hesitate to exploit his inventions the moment he figured out how he can replicate it. The workers who heard of him all describe him as kind of an asshole.

The VoxTech TV he had in his office loved the man, though.

So, what was the truth? What was Vox going to be like?

What does it mean for him?

The door to his office knocked, and Plaze called out, "You can come in, Vox!"

The door didn't open, however, as a current of electricity shot out of the TV. In a flash of light, the TV Sinner was now standing in front of him.

He knew of his appearance, and while his body was basically just a lanky human, his head was a TV. There was some slight camaraderie between the two due to their inhuman forms, though Plaze still thought he had it worse between his torso and feet.

With a jolly smile, much more visible than he was expecting, Vox reached out with his hand and greeted his fellow Overlord, "Plaze! Nice to meet you, you already know who I am. Great choice in TV, by the way."

Taking his hand and shaking it, Plaze continues the polite greeting, "Thank you. I've heard a lot about you from my previous colleagues, so I am curious how you truly are."

Vox took the chair in front of the desk and sat in it, casually leaning back, "I am too. By the way, I had the opportunity to check around your offices while coming up here. You managed to independently invent the computer down here? Or did someone bring it to you? Because we have it too. Someone came to me a few years ago with the concept and I took it. But we were keeping it a secret for now before we started selling it to other companies. You know, to get a head start."

Crossing his arms, Plaze decided he probably shouldn't tell him that he had one of the inventors of the damn thing with him, so he nodded, "Yeah, I managed to find someone who knew about it and helped me recreate it down here. The gaming consoles were mostly done by me, I just had help from another engineer."

"Impressive," Vox complimented, leaning on his desk, "You only came down a few months ago, right? You had a really fast ascension to Overlord compared to some of the others down here. I really admire people who get things done quickly, you know. There's nothing more valuable than time. Though we're all immortal, some people forget that time still affects us."

Nodding along, Plaze decided to skip the pleasantries and asked, "Well, speaking of time, let's not waste any more of it. Why are you here?"

With that, Vox smiled and clasped his hands as though he was about to offer him a deal, "Well, Plaze. As you might have heard, I am a man obsessed with keeping up with the times. You know how you have your radar ability to detect newcomers to Hell, right? I used to have to do that manually with my cameras trying to find new people whose ideas I can pick from their brains to see what was happening on Earth. Through that, I kept my TVs up to date with the latest trends back home and built an empire based on being as current as possible. So, to see a brand new industry so closely related to my TVs pop up… You understand why I'm interested, yes?"

Yes, Plaze did get it. He was basically the new guy on the block with all of the shiniest new toys from Earth. He's pretty sure he knows what's going to happen.

"If you want to buy me out, I'm not doing it," Plaze kept his voice as disinterested as possible, "I want to be an Overlord. This is my industry, and I'm not giving it up to you."

It may bring consequences, but he was not going to give in so easily-

"I wasn't going to buy you," Vox revealed, eliciting surprise within him, "Rather, I have a better offer for you."

"Oh?" Plaze dropped the disinterested act and started listening keenly.

Gesturing to the windows, he spoke, "In Hell, all of the worst people that humanity has to offer are sent down here. It's not that often that we get someone smart down here as, after all, if they were smart, they wouldn't have sinned. But you, my friend, are a natural genius."

Liking the compliment, Plaze allowed him to continue.

Leaning toward him, he smiled, "In the span of a few, short months, you managed to create a whole new industry in Hell. Not only that, you managed to ally yourself with one of the biggest Overlords that Hell has to offer to knock down an Overlord that was keeping the old industry in limbo, to update it and futurize it from just arcade, to gaming. Not any idiot can manage that, right, my friend? And I love those who can tell when things need to change.

Sitting straight, Vox made his offer, "Plaze, I am not offering to buy you out. I am offering you to join me, as one of the Overlords at VoxTech alongside me and Valentino. I am giving you the chance to rise with me as an equal."

That was…

Unexpected, to say the least.

Like, holy shit. This was a far better offer than what he was made to believe would be given to him.

It was so suspicious that he just had to ask, "What's the catch? There has to be a catch, this is Hell."

Chuckling, Vox waved him off, "There is no catch. This is genuinely beneficial for the both of us. See, if you join us, you're entitled to the same souls Val and I have, while you also lend your souls to the pot. That way, we're all roughly equal to each other in strength while we can work together on our products and make it better together."

Shit, that is a good deal. In fact, he doesn't even believe that it's a real deal yet.

"Where's this, uh, Valentino then?" Plaze asked, wanting another opinion, "Why isn't he here?"

Vox shrugged, "He isn't interested in games, so he didn't really care to come, but he did approve of you joining. I can call him right now if you wanted his word on it, though."

Needing it, Plaze nodded, "Call him."

Pulling out his phone, the TV Overlord calls his colleague. A second later, he picks up, and Vox hands the phone over to the Gaming Overlord.

"Hello? This is Plaze, the Gaming Overlord that your, uh, colleague, Vox, is trying to recruit to your alliance or whatever you've got going on," Plaze fumbles through the introduction for absolutely no reason at all, "I just needed your opinion on your deal with him so I can make an informed decision."

The Overlord on the other side sighed, "Oh, really? Well, let me think… His TVs really help with my porn studio stuff-"

His partner is a Porn Overlord?

Valentino continues as he couldn't hear Plaze's thoughts, "And my profits increased massively since teaming up together. Uh, he is a bit of a bitch sometimes but that's normal in Hell… Eh, I haven't had a tough fight since joining him since we're so fucking powerful we just destroy anyone who stand against us. That's nice, since actually fighting sucks dick. Hm… Well, I don't have anything else to say. Was that enough?"

Thinking it over for a second, Plaze asked, "Do you feel equal in your partnership?"

To that, Valentino chuckled, "My friend, I fuck him and I get to be on top. Is that not equality?"

Okay, so that's why they're in Hell.

Regardless, he didn't need to know that so he clarified, "I didn't mean it in that way. I mean in a business sense. Do you feel that your contribution is equal to his? Or does he get to lord over you sometimes because he brings in more to the alliance than you do?"

Valentino pauses for a moment, thinking it over, "Uh, he does make more money than I do. He's also just more active and shit. I think he does too much but eh, he can do whatever. If he wants me to do something, I usually don't have a problem with it since it's good for me or it doesn't affect me at all. Upgrading his TVs or hunting down people who can't pay him doesn't affect how much porn is consumed, after all. Heheheh."

Well, considering that Valentino sounds as though he owns a lot of the porn industry, it does make sense that he seems to be the lesser partner in this equal partnership…

Not to mention, he does kind of sound lazy. Purely discriminating by the basis of his voice.

"I see, thank you for answering my questions then, Valentino," Plaze thanked.

Hearing him stretch and sigh, Valentino replied, "No problem, Plaze. See you-"

The Porn Overlord disconnects himself before he can even say later.

Well, that helped slightly, even if Valentino was a bit odd.

Essentially, it sounded like despite being "equals," Vox still had most of the say in their partnership simply because his industry was bigger than Valentino's.

That, in all likelihood, was what was going to happen to Plaze. After all, if his consoles relied on being connected to a TV, then it was only natural that his sales would likely fall behind Vox's.

Unless, theoretically, they could create enough games that the customer pays more in games than they do in actually buying new TVs…

…Which could be possible with the amount of resources that joining Vox would give him…

With a sly smirk, Vox asked him one more time, "So, what do you say, Plaze? Do you want to join us and create a bright future together?"

Considering all of the options in his head, Plaze finally comes to one final decision.

He had his own dreams and ambitions.

"No."

AN:

Yeah, of course. If I was going to make a 4Vs story, I would've just started in the future.

Maybe I'll make a one-shot about that timeline some day.