Tanya rubbed Amelia’s back as she barfed up the last of her prison food. There was nothing left in her stomach, but she kept retching and dry heaving. Cold sweat formed on her skin, and she sat there shivering. Demon magic was not kind to her body. She was able to cast Minor Healing all day and feel fine, but not this spell.

The first time she cast Occulith’s Dust she felt awful. Either through luck, or Verita’s will, she’d somehow been able to kill the demonic knight that smashed through her cell door in one shot. Immediately afterwards, she felt overwhelmingly nauseous, and her muscles lost their strength. She’d been almost too feeble to walk. This time the effect was even worse.

“Probably mana burn,” Patricia said, standing in place, looking weary and learning on her black metal staff for support.

“Euagh!” Amelia’s body tried to throw up again, but nothing came out. “Sorry, I didn’t hear what you said.”

“It’s a common affliction for novice spellcasters relying on external mana sources. That spell looked simple on the outside, but I could feel its power. That was a lot of mana. Your body isn’t used to handling that much magical power, so this happened…” Patricia gestured to the kneeling Saintess. “Acute effects usually last between one to three hours. Continuous overexposure to mana can cause some minor… flesh melting. But if you don’t cast… whatever you just cast again before your body recovers, you’ll probably be fine.”

“Oh. Good.” Amelia tried not to think about the flesh melting.

“Care to explain what you just did?” Patricia asked.

“I learned it from the Black Book. It’s a divine spell granted by Demon Lord Occulith, Lord of Sloth. It seems to be… Euagh! …pretty powerful.”

“That’s an understatement,” Patricia replied. “You just killed a vampire with a single spell. A powerful vampire…”

“Didn’t seem very powerful,” Lily said, with a nonchalant shrug.

“She moved faster than I could see, and she flung you through a stone wall like it was nothing… She would have utterly destroyed you if not for the combination of my Witchfire and your pyrokinesis.”

“Pyro-what?” Lily asked.

“Fire control.” Patricia replied.

Lily nodded. Amelia groaned and rubbed her tummy.

The nausea was becoming manageable but her legs still felt like cooked noodles. Tanya continued gently rubbing her back. Lily stood and watched them awkwardly. Now would be a good time…

“Lily, I want to apologize for what I said earlier,” Amelia said. “Thank you for coming here to help us. Back with the Inquisitor, I realize now that you were trying to protect us both, and I shouldn’t have reacted like that. I was overwhelmed and emotional, and I lashed out at you unfairly.”

“Yes, you did,” Lily replied.

“I still think we could have still talked him down with words. Something seemed shady about him, but I could have used my abilities and status to threaten him. That said, I do understand why you decided to attack early. It made sense… tactically.”

“He wanted to ‘confiscate’ me. I don’t know what he planned to do, but he would have likely tried to kill me. Anyone who threatens my life dies, and he wasn’t someone I could ignore. I had to take him seriously.”

“Yeah, I understand. Regardless of whether talking would have worked or not, I didn’t handle the aftermath of the situation well. I’m sorry for reacting the way I did.”

The demon stared at Amelia silently.

“Are you willing to forgive me?”

The demon closed her eyes, and thought for a moment, “Okay, I’ll forgive you.” Her face softened slightly as she replied. “And I’ll try to wait a bit longer before attacking the next Inquisitor that threatens us.”

“Thank you. I haven’t talked about it with everyone, but I think Tanya and I should leave the town soon and head to Dursten. You’re welcome to come with us again, if you’re still interested.”

The demon nodded.

“What about Patty-cakes?” Tanya asked. “She coming with us too?”

“Patty-cakes?” Amelia raised an eyebrow towards the delinquent. Tanya gestured at the dark elf mage.

“My name is Patricia. Don’t you dare start calling me Patty-cakes too.” Patricia glared down at Amelia.

Despite her apparent fatigue, an ominous aura seemed to surround the dark elf. The air was charged with the residual magic of elemental destruction. Patricia’s eyes still glowed blue, revealing the monstrous power dwelling inside her.

“Heh. Patty-cakes.” Lily giggled to herself, earning an angry glare from the dark elf. “Is it because dark elves taste good? Like a cake?”

“Taste good?” Patricia looked at Lily nervously.

“Oh yes,” the demon replied. “I ate some of the demon summoner people… Dark elves. They tasted way better than humans.”

Patricia kept staring at the demon.

“You’re my new favorite meat!” Lily gave Patricia a sinister grin, bearing a full row of shiny white man-eating teeth. They looked so normal… but Amelia had seen what they could do.

“Lily, please don’t eat Patricia.” Amelia said. “Patricia, you’re welcome to come with us if you like. The church can hire you as an interim protector. I’ve been told the pay is pretty good, though I don’t know how much you’d get exactly. You also don’t have to swear an oath like Tanya if you’re not aspiring to be a holy knight. You just have to promise not to quit the job while I’m in peril.”

“You might offend your peers offering such a position to a dark elf.” Patricia replied, with a slight smirk that said she’d enjoy offending Amelia’s peers.

“That would be the least of my blasphemies. I’ve got an unbound demonic guest in my personal entourage, and if you didn’t notice, I just directly manifested the power of Demon Lord Occulith in the material plane.”

“Yeah, that spell felt sinister as fuck,” Tanya said. “Are you sure you should be playing with demon magic?”

“Verita is still with me,” Amelia said, straightening her back confidently. “She’s… not exactly happy to see me wielding the Lord of Sloth’s magic, but she doesn’t disapprove either. I feel that she tolerates it, she’s a refreshingly pragmatic goddess.”

“Candy the succubus used that spell too…” Lily said. “It couldn’t damage my bones, but it ate away my flesh. It was probably the most damage I’d ever taken during a fight, and Candy wasn’t even that powerful of a demon.”

“Candy… that was the succubus Elias Bigby summoned right?” Amelia asked.

Lily nodded. She stepped closer, and her attention was captured by the blood-red ruby on the ground in front of Amelia’s knees. She pointed at it.

“Feels weird,” she said. “It’s too empty. Not magical enough.”

Amelia gave the demon girl a confused look.

The ruby was quite large, probably about an inch in diameter. It had been the centerpiece of a beautiful ruby necklace worn around the vampire matriarch’s neck. When Lord Occulith’s spell turned her to dust, the elaborate gold setting, and the smaller gems around it was reduced to dust as well. Only this single gem remained, completely undamaged by the magic.

Amelia delicately picked the ruby out of the dusty pile and wiped it off on the hem of her robe. She couldn’t feel any sort of magical aura coming from it, but that was normal. Her senses weren’t as sharp as Lily’s.

“May I?” Patricia asked. Amelia handed her the stone.

Patricia walked a short distance away, and sat down, inspecting the gem carefully. Every so often she cast a small spell at it, observing the reaction. She even held it over a small Witchfire flame, to no obvious effect. She reached over and scraped the surface of the gemstone against the head of her black metal staff, trying to scratch the perfect surface. After a couple minutes, she shrugged, and returned the stone to Amelia.

“Don’t know what it is,” Patricia said. “It’s giving off no aura, but it’s obviously magical. It seems to be enchanted to negate magic. All I can see with Arcane Sight is a stone shaped void where no mana exists, not even the normal ambient background mana. Divination magic has no effect. Witchfire doesn’t burn it, because, when looking from the outside, there’s no magic to burn. It’s got some sort of physical protection ward on it too. I can’t detect it, but it’s obviously there. Adamantine is harder than ruby, but I’m not able to scratch the surface with my staff. All I can say for certain is that this gem was meant to survive anything we could throw at it. Someone really didn’t want it getting destroyed.”

“I could crush it,” Lily volunteered.

“Maybe,” Patricia replied. “Depending on the strength of the ward it’s using, it could be pretty hard to break, even for a demon like you.”

Lily thought for a moment. “I could eat it,” she volunteered again. “I can eat anything and things that go inside my stomach never come out.”

“Hmm… a Gluttony demon?” Patricia mumbled, before returning to a speaking voice. “Just what kind of demon are you Lily?”

Lily shrugged, “A mix of many. One father is Z’Kraugh, one mother is Nixxildraz, and the other mothers and fathers I don’t know.”

“Z’Kraugh… I know that name…” Patricia mumbled to herself. She snapped her fingers, trying to goad her memory into recalling some old, barely remembered detail. Suddenly her eyes went wide. “Eternal Champion of the Endless Battlefield?”

Lily scratched her head. “I think he said something like that, yes.”

Patricia smiled distantly, and her eyes became glassy. Amelia looked at the dark elf with concern. “I don’t get it. What does that mean?” she asked.

“The domain of Aragnok, Lord of Wrath, is a layer of the Abyss known as the Eternal Battlefield. It is a fiery landscape of jagged volcanic rock, choking toxic fumes, and rivers of molten rock. Inside Aragnok’s domain, Wrath demons fight each other to grow stronger. When they are defeated, if they fought with enough brutality to please their lord, Aragnok resurrects them to fight again. My demon lore is about two hundred years out of date, but last I heard, Z’Kraugh, the Archfiend, was still the undefeated champion, stronger than any other demon on the battlefield. He’s never been killed, not even once. If Lily’s right, she inherited her Archfiend traits from the single strongest Archfiend in existence.”

“Oh.” Amelia wasn’t sure how to reply. She looked at Lily, who was smiling proudly at hearing her father being praised. “And what about Nixxildraz?” Amelia asked.

“Don’t know anything about that one,” Patricia replied.

“She’s a succubus,” Lily added helpfully.

“Huh? That doesn’t make any sense,” Patricia buried her head in her hands. “Then again, nothing about you makes any sense…”

Amelia and Lily both looked at her, waiting for an explanation.

“Lilith and Aragnok do not get along. Aragnok, Lord of Wrath, wants to kill every living thing in the material plane. Lilith, Lord of Lust, wants to corrupt everyone into self-indulgent sexual depravity. Their goals conflict. A hybrid of multiple demons of the same aspect is… plausible, but to the best of our knowledge, there’s never been a multiple aspect demon. None of the demon lords trust each other enough. And if two demon lords were to make a multi-aspect demon together, it wouldn’t be those two.”

Lily seemed unconvinced, “I am Wrath and Lust, I know that for sure. I think I might be Gluttony too because I like to eat…”

“Yeah,” Patricia said. “Gluttony demons gain strength from eating. They’re the only demon type that feels hunger for food. The other aspects can eat, but they don’t need to.”

“So that’s three types. I don’t know what else I am.”

Patricia cast her gaze over Amelia’s shoulder, and Amelia turned to look. She saw Mister Shadow, limping out from inside the barracks. He’d disappeared when the wave of magic turned all the imps to ash. Amelia thought he’d been killed too. Apparently not.

Still, the Sloth demon looked… weaker. His movements were jerky and slow, and his smoky silhouette looked less coherent than before. No longer was he a nine foot tall slender man made of shadow, he looked more like a vaguely humanoid cloud of smoke.

“Another demon,” Patricia raised her hand, readying a spell. It seemed her Arcane sight was capable of perceiving the otherwise-invisible demon.

“Stop, it’s okay,” Amelia said, raising a hand to stop Patricia. “He’s… an acquaintance of sorts, and he helped me out. He’s Witness of Blasphemy. He’s been following me ever since I picked up the book, and he hasn’t hurt me yet. He doesn’t speak, so I named him Mister Shadow.”

Patricia looked incredulous, “Sloth demons aren’t pets. They’re only mostly harmless. They’re still cunning and subtle. They’re not supposed to do anything, but they still can. The older ones can occasionally develop… quirks and act according to their own whims. Occulith doesn’t keep a tight leash on his Witnesses.”

That made sense to Amelia, Mister Shadow brought her the Black Book and told her what pages to read. That was much more active than just being a witness to blasphemous acts. “Mister Shadow,” she asked, “Do you think you qualify as an older sloth demon, like Patricia is suggesting?”

The sentient cloud of smoke took a moment to think, and finally nodded. It was an Honest nod.

“He says yes,” Amelia translated. She wasn’t sure what Patricia could see with her glowy eyes, but Tanya and Lily couldn’t see him nodding.

Mister Shadow walked over to Lily, and hovered an incorporeal hand over her head, making it look like he was affectionately patting her. Lily’s sole remaining horn pierced through his smoky chest, but he didn’t seem to mind. The demon girl looked around warily, able to feel his presence, but not see what he was doing. A strange thought occurred to Amelia. Mister Shadow had revealed himself while they were talking about Lily’s ‘parents’. That surely wasn’t a coincidence.

“Mister Shadow, are you… trying to tell us you’re one of Lily’s fathers?”

The shadow man nodded.

“He says yes,” Amelia smiled. “Lily, apparently one of your dads is right here. You’re part Sloth demon too.”

Lily gave Amelia a dirty look. “I like napping sometimes, but I’m not lazy…”

Mister Shadow extended a smoky finger and tapped it against his own white eyeball. He moved his hand and tapped against his forehead. Amelia wasn’t sure what he meant, so she just explained the gesture he was making.

Patricia apparently understood, “Witnesses have the sharpest senses of any demon, including a natural gift for detecting magical auras at a distance. They’re also highly intelligent, gifted with excellent memories. It is said they can perfectly recall every act of depravity they’ve ever witnessed. That’s probably why you were able to learn Common so quickly, Lily. Those are both good traits to inherit.”

Mister Shadow nodded and walked away. He stopped when he reached a stone wall and lay down in the shadow of a moonbeam. He seemed to melt into the shadow, and only two little eye-shaped white dots revealed that he was still watching them.

“Okay, so what’s next? This is all very interesting, but...” Tanya broke the silence, but trailed off, waiting for someone else to figure out the next step.

“Well, I’ve discovered I’m an assassination target. The Envy demon said so, right? It’s not safe for me in this town anymore, and I’ll probably cause them further harm by staying here. Like I said, I should probably get myself over to Dursten, hole up in Verita’s temple, and surround myself with holy knights until whoever is plotting my demise gets caught,” said Amelia.

“Aren’t you still under arrest?” Tanya asked.

“Eeh… Technically? I think I’m done letting myself be an easy target though. If the town guard have a problem with me walking away to seek better protection after they let a demon knight walk into my cell, they can voice their grievances to the church. If they make trouble, I think either one of you is scary enough to intimidate them into letting me go,” Amelia gestured to Patricia and Lily.

“And the sketchy magic gem thing?” Tanya asked, gesturing towards the ruby in Amelia’s hand.

“I’ll hold onto it. Verita will help me resist any potential mental corruption, and I have a bit of practice resisting the Black Book. If the gem carries some sort of brainwashing curse, I’ll probably be able to resist it for a while. I’ll ask Verita about what this gem is next time I pray. Hopefully she’ll have some guidance for me.”

“Verita talks to you?” Tanya asked.

“Umm… not exactly, not with words anyway. It’s more like she shares vague impressions of her will and helps me realize the Truth behind things I’ve seen. That’s how I realized the Black Book was messing with my head.”

“Right. So anyway, I am fucking done for the night. Let’s get back to the tavern, and hope it’s still standing,” Tanya said. “You coming too Lily?”

“I’m going to eat the giant first,” Lily said. “Greater demons have powerful essence, and I need to get my strength back after turning so much of it into fire.”

“Should we come with you? The humans are going to be nervous around you if you go off by yourself…” Amelia started.

“You can come if you want, but I can also scare them off without hurting them,” Lily said.

Amelia looked at the others. Patricia didn’t seem to care. Tanya looked exhausted and beaten up. Even though she said it would be fine, Amelia was still worried about leaving Lily to her own devices inside the town.

“I think it’s better to stick together for now,” Amelia decided. “Here Tanya, this might help.”

Tucking the gemstone into her pocket, Amelia stood again and walked over to the fighter. She pulled off Tanya’s gauntlet, and held her hand. Focusing on the shape of Verita’s healing spell, she channeled the magic into Tanya’s body. Tanya’s expression relaxed a bit as her pain faded away. Amelia started feeling a bit queasy again. It was probably the mana burn that Patricia was talking about, but this much was tolerable. This was a much weaker spell than Occulith’s Dust.

Lily turned and started walking. Amelia led Tanya by the hand, still channeling healing magic into her. Patricia followed behind, propping herself up with her staff. The exhausted women walked out of the garrison.

The throne room was silent. No living soul walked the halls of the once glorious castle. Dust covered the floors and statues, left undisturbed for centuries. It formed a continuous layer over most of the white marble floor. The vast hall had a high vaulted ceiling, held up by thick, grey stone columns lining the sides of the room. The ceiling was painted with beautiful artwork of gods and angels, but the color had faded from the art over the years, leaving behind a dull grey reflection of their former beauty.

The room once held hundreds of nobles, guards, and petitioners but it was nearly empty now. The room’s sole occupant was sitting on an ornate golden throne on a raised dais. He was dressed a simple black robe, devoid of all the usual trappings of royalty. While he had access to the lost kingdom of Ossa’s entire treasury, and several magnificently crafted robes embroidered with silver and gold thread, he disliked such audacious displays of wealth.

He’d watched his servant’s disgraceful defeat through her own eyes. She had been foolish, toying with her prey until it was too late. She should not have held back her lethality. It would have been trivial for her to slaughter the mage and the knight by ambushing them and attacking before they were ready. She thought herself invincible and had been proven wrong.

It wasn’t entirely her fault, however. He carried some of the blame as well. Delegating the task to one of his servants was meant to be a statement to those who squandered his good will and tested his patience. He had not been delivered the payment he was promised, and already they had used two bones. There were only three fingers left on the hand he gave them.

His mistake was giving the task to Vivian without investigating the nature of the task first. She was the most deadly of his servants, able to shift into mist form and drain the life from all she touched. But the enemies she faced had been unexpectedly competent, and their abilities had been perfect for countering hers. She might have been the worst possible choice of servant to send against that particular group of foes. The use of Witchfire had surprised even him, it had been centuries since he’d seen it used by another mage. In retrospect, he should have sent one of the Death Knights to perform this task instead.

It was a small humiliation, but ultimately there was little harm done. The soulstone had survived. He would not punish Vivian for her defeat, but once resurrected, she would still be punished for her arrogance and lack of judgement.

As for the soulstone, he could sense its location and he could tell it was still intact. But it wasn’t guaranteed that it would remain so indefinitely. His wards were powerful, but not impenetrable. Vivian was quite valuable, he couldn't care less about what the stupid demons wanted, but this was a serious matter that deserved his undivided attention.

Zal’Gotherak, King of Undeath, held out a fleshless skeletal hand, and an unadorned staff made of black wood flew into his grasp from the shadows. Giving a mental command to all eleven of his elite Death Knights, he rose from the throne, staff in hand, and went to meet them in the courtyard.