***The Infernal Plane of Lust***

***Amon***

“This Sozzudon fellow is actually a really interesting character,” Isabella commented from her position on the couch. She was lazing on it like a bored cat while studying her half of the documents.

We were forced to retreat to her sister’s living room after Hellith and Jada practically threw us out of the office. They apparently had something very important to discuss before we barged in on them.

I grumbled while I squinted at another page, trying to make out the fine script it held. Someone had compressed these files by setting the font size to zero. At least as far as I was concerned. It was worse than the uncapitalised sections on a demonic contract. “How the heck are you supposed to read this without a microscope? Are there spells that enhance your vision?”

So far, all I was capable of was my mana sight. Maybe I could cobble up a spell that changed my sight to infrared on the fly. But I never thought about something beyond a glorified magnifying glass. The next opportunity I got, I would search my memories for something that solved issues such as this one.

Apparently, Isabella had no issues at all with reading her sister’s notations.

“Succubi actually have really good eyesight. I think my sister stores her files in this form so that other demons can’t have an easy look at them, should they manage to sneak into her office. Look, here. I think that I found something!” She raised another sheet of paper. “This says that Sozzudon even worked for Greed himself at some point. It feels like our target actually tried to see and travel all of the Infernum in his exploits.”

“He mentioned that he is a collector of sorts,” I point out, remembering that Sozzudon mentioned something about his hobby. “If he is really after rare artefacts, then it’s unavoidable for him to travel a lot.”

“Yeah, hmm. This is a chronological list of all of his employers. Guess what!” She handed the paper over to her tail and showed it to me while she was already studying another document.

Because of sitting across from her, I had lean over the small table between us to see. “What?” I tried my best to focus my eyes, but the document was too hard to decipher. “I can’t read it at all if you don’t hold still.”

The succubus purred. “I would always hold still if you ordered me to. But fun aside, this says that this guy worked for you at one point in time.”

“For me?” I replied with quite a bit of surprise in my voice. “One could rather say that I worked for him! He even paid me.”

“Not the new you, but your old self. A few thousand years ago, Sozzudon was the right hand of Demon Lord Amon. It doesn’t say much more than that, because that’s really old information, but there is a remark that a detailed summary is to be found in Mom’s castle. That makes Sozzudon rather old, my love. I am surprised that you actually met him again after several millennia.” She rolled over and gave me a look which made it clear that she didn’t really believe in coincidence.

I lowered the documents in my own hand and scratched my chin. “I can’t remember anything from my time as Amon, even though I have one of his souls and taken his name. The memories I can dig up are of lives as a mortal. Some wizardry stuff, and general knowledge about magic. Maybe some personal details about one life or the other if I concentrate enough.”

“Not very surprising,” Isabella commented. “Souls are huge depositories for a living being’s memories. My mother says that they hold all the information they ever collected during their holder’s lifetimes. Nothing is ever really lost. The only difference lies in how much of a soul’s memories the holder can access. Immortal souls are highly-priced because it’s so much easier to access their memories. It’s like having several mortal souls, which can often only hold a faint imprint of their most recent existence. Only sometimes older memories from a former life come to the surface, which the mortals like to call a déjà vu.”

“I wonder why that is,” I mused. “It feels like it should be possible to remember a lot more based on what I know about souls… or rather… what Amon’s soul knows. Shouldn’t I have at least some memories of my time as Amon? Yet, it’s like there is a hazy barrier that blocks most of it.”

“Maybe because of whatever the old Amon tried to do to himself,” she pointed out. “From what I saw in your memories, he tried some pretty shady magic.”

“A curse?” I asked myself.

“A blessing that it didn't work,” Isa refuted the idea immediately. “Imagine remembering an uncountable number of lives in every detail. All of your predecessor’s experiences, hopes, wants, and dreams. You would be overwhelmed by even a single soul’s memories. Any demon would be paralysed into inaction and caught in his own mind for all eternity. Us demons have natural advantages when it comes to pilfering a soul’s potential, but even we aren’t perfect. From what I understand, it’s pretty much random which information is easy to access. Though, mother may have a point that the more powerful a memory’s emotions, the likelier it is that a future incarnation will have access to it. Explains why Immortals are such a priced treat among our kind.”

I smacked my lips. “Actually, could you explain that? It sounds like I am missing some important piece of knowledge.”

She looked up. “What exactly?”

“The thing about incarnation and immortals,” I clarified.

Isabella sat up and gathered her thoughts. “The multiverse is inhabited by all kinds of creatures, but all those who think and are capable of reason carry a soul… or souls, like in our case. The most basic of which are the mortals with their mortal souls. No matter how long they live, once they die and their soul finds another host, they will have no access to their previous lives. The memories are there, and demons can access some of them, but to the mortals it’s like they are a blank slate each time they reincarnate. Then there are Immortals, beings with immortal souls. They remember some of their past lives, though not all of it. That’s why I talked about incarnations. And then there are the gods. Some say that the Planar Lords might be just normal demons who lucked out in acquiring a god’s soul.”

“Hmmm.” I hum, feeling like there is something important about this. “It feels like this is important, but I can’t put my claw on the exact reason.” I can still vividly remember the old Amon’s message, and how he raved about becoming a god. Did my old self actually find out something important about souls that the new me forgot?

“The puzzle pieces might fit together once we find Sozzudon,” Isabella interrupts my thoughts and returns her attention to the documents. “I think it’s important that he worked for you at some point.”

Then it hit me. “The debt is paid…”

“What debt?” She looks up from her papers.

I sit up straighter. “When Sozzudon left me to rot in Amon’s crypt, he first said something about our deal being finished, which likely referred to me getting him the spear. But then he added something strange that I couldn’t make rhyme or reason of. He said that I am now where I am supposed to be and that the debt is paid.”

Isabella licked her pretty lips with a thoughtful expression on her face. “That actually makes sense. I wondered how your reincarnated soul would find its way back to Amon’s inheritance by mere chance. Sozzudon didn’t visit the caretaker just for any demonling, nor by mere chance. He was there for you, explicitly for you. Together with the fact that he was once working for the old Amon, that can only mean that the old you held him under a contract! By my mother's shaking tits, he likely even was the one who delivered the souled egg to the caretaker in the first place. How else would he have known where to find you?”

“I must have,” I nodded to myself. “The other me was a loon from my point of view, but he seemed concerned with the possibility of his pursuit of power ending in failure. He built that crypt, which you would only do if there is a significant chance of dying. And everything there was somehow keyed to his soul. Somehow, he had to ensure that his soul would find a way back. What better way than to contract one of his minions… or several. Nobody says that Sozzudon was the only person with the order to find and bring me there. But why take the spear?”

“I think that was simply something he did out of spite,” Isabella pointed out. “If someone put me under a millenia long contract to find his soul and bring him back to that crypt, I would be pissed. And you already pointed out that he is a collector.”

“Why not take the spear earlier?” I wondered.

“ 'Cause the contract forbade him from stealing. As soon as his obligation to you was fulfilled, Sozzudon was free to do as he pleased. I bothered to read up on Amon’s history after I met you, and you were pretty much only feared because of that spear. It was said to fell any demon with a single strike, permanently. If Sozzudon wanted to get back at you, taking the weapon that would ensure your quick rise to power is a good starting point.”

So many questions suddenly make a lot more sense now. But at the same time, I got new questions. Were Sozzudon’s actions truly malicious? Or am I falling into a trap of my own making? Is it truly possible that Amon simply overlooked a loophole in one of his contracts? I couldn’t help but voice the thought, “What if Amon, the old me, did all of this intentionally?”

Isabella gave me a considering look. “You think that he somehow set things up to manipulate his future self into doing something? Why would he? Wouldn’t it be easier to write some inciting message which a future incarnation wouldn’t be able to resist? Don’t take this the wrong way, but I think that you are overthinking things now. Your distrustful nature is shining through, much like you are refusing to give me the benefit of the doubt.”

“I don’t know.” I shrugged, not sure of what to say. Then again, if the old me was playing mindgames, it would have likely been enough to write a more enticing message into Amon’s diary. The naive demonling from back then would have likely fallen for any promise of power, locked up in that crypt and without any way out. “You are probably right.”

I returned my attention to the documents but didn’t make any headway compared to Isabella who rifled through the papers without much of a problem. Sadly, the little I got wasn’t much. My files were about Sozzudon’s recent exploits. Most of it public hearsay which didn’t give any clues towards his current whereabouts.

It took over an hour until she cooed upon inspecting another file. “Lookie! This says that Sozzudon has a permanent domicile at the edge to the Lower Planes.”

“I am sorry to admit once again to having no clue what or where these Lower Planes are,” I grumbled. Somehow, when I was with Isabella, my lack of education regarding all things demonic tended to shine through.

“Have you never seen a topological map of the Infernum?” She sighed and took an empty sheet of paper. Then she used a sizzling fingernail to sketch out a rough map. “The Infernum is a group of interconnected dimensions at the edge of the known multiverse. Do you remember me mentioning that there are ways to travel to other planes without using the Lode Stones? Going through one such intersection is one possibility, although it’s incredibly dangerous.”

Isabella thought for a moment and then continued. “The reason why we refer to the seven Infernal Planes as the Infernum is because they overlap in places. There are arguments that all of the Infernal Planes are just facets of a single dimension. These points of overlap create dimensional fissures that allow access to other planes, but if you aren’t careful, you could get thrown into other random dimensions, in the worst case the Lower Planes, as the fabric between the dimensions is weakened at these fissures. Sometimes the Lower Planes are also referred to as the Chaos Realm, which fills out the cracks between the multiverse's various dimensions according to the latest dimensional science.”

That made all of my alarm bells ring.

I remembered the chaos-magic powered teleportation spell which brought me out of that crypt, and it was not a pleasant experience. If there was any chance of avoiding another encounter with Chaos, I would take it. “Please tell me that we don’t have to go through such a fissure to get to Sozzudon.”

Isabella licked her lips. “Not quite.”

“Not quite?”

“His estate is at the halfway point inside such a fissure, which explains why nobody tried to take away his home,” the succubus explained candidly. “Only madmen or people who want something would go to such places. Never live there.”

I groaned. “You know, the one time I encountered chaos magic gave me a really healthy respect for it.”

“Yeah, well, in that case, we simply will have to be careful or hope to catch Sozzudon somewhere else,” Isabella admitted. “Though, I would like to point out that if he thinks that his residence is reasonably safe, then there is a high chance that he will stash all of his collected items there.”

“Which means that my spear will be there,” I admitted that she had a point. “Unless he decides to carry it around.”

Isa looked at me as if I were nuts. “If the rumours about the spear are true, then it’s an incredibly valuable item. Any demon lord would want it. Unless this Sozzudon is incredibly powerful on his own, which I am reasonably certain he is not, then waving the spear around in public would have everyone after him in no time. The fact that he is very old means that he isn’t stupid, so he won’t have the spear somewhere where any powerful demon could get it.”

“But…” I wanted to argue, but Isabella seemed very confident in her reasoning. “The spear alone would make him powerful.”

“Only if he is able to stab people with it. The spear is just an instant-kill weapon and nothing more. From what I gathered, it doesn’t make him super strong or super fast. Do you think Ex would be afraid of you if you had the spear? He would just flash right next to you and take the thing.”

“Now, that’s a little overdramatized. Maybe before he trained me, but not with my current skills,” I defended. “But I get your point.” One should never assume that there isn’t someone faster and stronger lurking in the cave. “Any suggestions on how to get there and approach him? Should I call the team together?”

She tilted her head and shook it shortly afterwards. “The area around the dimensional fissures is neutral ground and incredibly dangerous. I would suggest going with as few people as possible. The fewer people, the less likely it is to be caught, and the faster you can get away if something creeps up from the Lower Planes. There are things close to the fissures that even Demon Lords don’t want to mess with.”

I pulled a face. “Sounds like Sozzudon chose a really lovely place as his summer residence.”

***The Lower Planes***

***Sozzudon***

A shudder ran down my spine. It felt almost as if someone was scrying my position with divination. I stopped playing with the phaser gun and searched my surrounding for any sign of lingering magic. When I found nothing, I shrugged and dismissed the strange occurrence. “Don’t get paranoid in your old age. There is no way for someone to spy on you in this dimensional grey zone.”

Once I had reassured myself that there wasn’t somebody going after my stuff, I set the phaser to its highest setting and pointed it at the android which I had abducted from some technologically advanced dimension.

“Mercy, Master,” the thing begged with its mechanical voice and raised both arms.

I fired and burned a hole through its torso, right where the main processing unit was located.

The gold-plated machine sparked and gave off a little puff of smoke before its limbs locked up. Then it tilted over and fell to the ground with the loud ‘clang’ of metal on stone.

It’s fellow android looked at me almost accusingly. “Why are you doing this?”

I pointed the phaser at the ceiling and waited, but there was nothing. “I am trying to find out whether there is a possibility to harvest souls through machines. But alas, it seems like at least the two of you don’t have one. The question is whether that applies to all machines, or whether your models are simply not complex enough to house a soul.”

“We are IG-89 Battle Droids, the latest and best-equipped soldiers on the battlefield…”

The android started to spool off some recorded line, probably triggered by me mentioning its model. I stopped listening, unbothered by some mortal’s description for the device. To spare myself any more wasted time, I executed the second android in the same manner.

“I guess there goes my grand idea of establishing myself as the overlord of a machine race to harvest an endless amount of souls.” It appeared like the Infernum had something against my brilliance.

In that moment, the bell for the main entrance chimed.

“Oh?” I put the phaser into its holster on my belt and left the shooting range behind the mansion. It had been centuries since someone dared to visit this place, I was slightly intrigued about the reason. Only idiots dared to venture the places between dimensions.

Instead of going back through the mansion, I circumvented the large house along the narrow trail that led to the main gate.

What I found at the gate was entirely unexpected, but also explained how the rare visit was possible in the first place. Two demons of large renown, a Lord and his right hand, were waiting patiently for me with a small army in tow.

I guessed that didn't make them so much idiots, but simply indifferent to how many of their people they sacrificed on this expedition.

The well endowed demon noticed my presence immediately and turned to face me with a smile on his face. “Sozzudon, we have to talk.”

I also forced myself to smile and bowed slightly. “Lord Ostreios! Welcome to my humble abode! How can I serve?”