Chapter 34: You Get What You Deserve

The first thing I noticed upon reaching the bottom of the stairwell was the oppressively bright lights that lined the walls. I seemed to have started this floor in the corner of an absolutely colossal room. I couldn’t even see the other side despite the overwhelming brightness of the lights on the walls.

The lights themselves reminded me of spotlights, they were all pointed towards the center of the room but were bright enough that light bled into the rest of the room to light it up. What felt odd was that even though the lights were incredibly bright, there was no pain from looking at them, almost as if the lights weren’t even there.

In the distance, despite it being so far away, I was able to see what almost looked like a cage. The cage itself seemed abnormally large for containing something, as if something large was being trapped there. Perhaps a God.

There it was… the control effect. It was faint, but there was no god trapped there, only a demon who didn’t recognize the situation they were in. If the effect stayed that weak, it wasn’t even able to control my surface level thoughts. What a joke of a demon.

I will regret that. Oh, I’m sure I will. Everything down here has worked the same, the closer I am to some sort of source, the stronger an effect is. I just had to walk around the outside of the room and this floor was going to be over before I even knew it.

However, it seemed that it wasn’t going to be so simple for me. Every time I tried to take a step, I stepped towards the center of the room, towards the cage. Now, why I was doing this, I had a small guess. Why I couldn’t resist it was beyond me.

Somehow, the demon seemed to be able to control my body by going around my mind, without any part of me even realizing. So, I stopped trying to walk. If walking was only bringing me closer, I had no choice but to try alternative means of making it through this floor.

Nothing worked. Everything moved me closer to the center of the room. I couldn’t even go back to the entrance of the floor. I was maybe only ten normal steps away from it, but it may as well have not existed with how impossible it was for me to go back. I was trapped with this God.

Yeah, I really was trapped, fake god or not. This situation was probably as bad as it could get, I could have tried many different things before getting to this floor to try and not enrage this demon, but instead I made every single mistake possible and will come to regret it.

I normally like to avoid swearing whenever possible, but holy shit am I ever fucked. I was working on a fairly limited timer here; I would run out of resources long before I would be able to overcome whatever this demon was doing to me.

The difference between a God and a mortal really begins to rear its ugly head. The control effect was stronger already and I had only gotten ten steps closer. This really was the true power of a demon, or maybe I was still being spared.

I was laying on the ground, the only position that stopped me from moving closer to the demon. I had to think of something quickly, but I had a feeling that everything I tried would be pointless. What was the purpose of this floor, was it to show me the power of demons?

I wonder if I was the only one stupid enough to antagonize a being beyond normal mortal comprehension. I surely had to be, I mean, look at me. In my search for knowledge that started earlier than intended, I angered a demon. I could have just waited until I made it to the library and learned everything there.

“Surely the dumbest mortal I’ve met.” I could hear its voice echo through the whole room, as if its booming voice would stop at nothing to be heard. Why it didn’t control my mind to tell me the answer this time was beyond me, but maybe it was power intensive to control me from so far away.

That wasn’t the case, but an interesting thought. Well, that’s that then. I do wonder if perhaps this demon had a finite amount of energy I could wait out if I just laid on the ground for long enough while resisting its control. That was unlikely to happen within the time I had left with my current resources.

The control effect was even getting stronger despite me not moving anywhere. The demon was focusing more and more on me, probably channeling its rage into trying to get me closer so it could accomplish something more sinister. I wondered if it was too late to apologize and try to make amends?

It was. As curious as any bug might be, if it bites you, you’re going to want to try and crush it. Oh, the classic comparing mortals to bugs, I hate it. Truly, just get something original, plus demons aren’t immortal, you can be killed, or at least stopped. So technically, you aren’t ‘immortal’. Just saying.

“You tread a fine line between aggravating and amusing.” I could feel the pure rage radiating from the center of the room. The demon was pissed, and I was only adding fuel to the fire. I remember once seeing magnesium burn, and this was that kind of fire, and I had no way to put it out, but for some reason, I seemed to be adding water to it.

So, as it stood, I was walking into a fire I couldn’t put out. I was truly going to be in trouble here. However, I knew I could get through this… I learned when I was going to die. The thought sunk into my mind, even if I got through this, I was just going to die to an even more powerful demon.

I was tempted to just give up, just lay in the same spot until I died… but I couldn’t. What if I could change the outcome, there was the second option, or the fact that I kept living after dying. Maybe there was some way to change my fate. Rather than run from it like a coward, I was going to face the inevitable head on.

I stood up and starting intentionally walking towards the demon trapped in the cage. This was the most confusing decision yet. Somehow, I couldn’t agree more. What point is there in delaying the inevitable, it’s going to happen eventually anyways. Why not let it happen on my own terms.

“No matter how much you seem to want to anger me, a God. You refuse to accept reality. Of course I won’t kill you here. I will keep you here for eternity as a pet, something to entertain me.”

We’ll see about that. Humans like me are fragile, we need food, water and rest to survive, not to mention out limited lifespans. You’ll maybe get a few decades out of me if you keep me fed and watered. A God would have no such problems after all, I would be well taken care of. A servant to a God, and all that entails.

Well, I don’t know what that entails; do I become quasi-immortal? Like, as long as you are a demon, I won’t die kind of thing? These details are important for me to know. Details you don’t need to ponder.

You didn’t even try to mask that as my own thoughts anymore. I really am getting closer then. Something that should have been clear to me, as I was walking at a near jog towards the center of the massive room. It would take the better part of three hours to reach the center by my estimate.

Of course, walking forwards would put me closer to my goal. Who could have guessed? Now, no need to be so rude. Sure, I may have gone overboard a few times, but someone as wise and timely as yourself, you should think nothing of my meager insults.

“I’m going to be the least cooperative and nastiest speed bump you’ll ever have the displeasure of hitting. That ring any bells? Then, you go on to later learn how to actually kill a demon. Do you think for a second that I will go easy on you after you learned how to kill something immortal? Do you?”

Well, I guess that was a minor oversight if you ask me. I don’t even have any of those spike things I needed to kill that other demon in the first place. The floor was set up in such a way that the only way I could continue was to follow the instructions that were clearly laid out before me.

I felt contemplation over the forming connection from the demon, as if it had something new to consider. I was certain that she had to have already known this information. I thought demons were near omniscient, but if they were, they wouldn’t have a need to talk to me in the first place.

Another valid point she made into my mind. It was easy to tell which thoughts were my own and which weren’t at this point. What did the fox-masked creature call it, a mind collapse, maybe that was helping me decipher my own thoughts, but also make my natural defences weaker and senses easier to manipulate.

Ah, of course there had to be a downside. I wondered why the fox-masked creature never told me about this downside, but then again, I never asked explicitly. The creature never once told me a single piece of information I didn’t ask for, and in fact was just as vague when I was. If I had the chance to go back, I might, just to see what other answers I could get.

“You’ll be her until the day you die if I can help it.” The demon spoke to me, the voice much louder now that I was a lot closer. Unfortunately, my earlier confidence in approaching the demon having been the best answer was waning.

I was getting nervous, a visible slowing in my pace towards the demon. Having noticed I slowed down, the demon seemingly controlled my legs to move at the earlier pace, ignoring the pain that was building in them after walking for an extended period at a fast pace.

Then, I arrived. The cage was much larger than I had imagined it would be. The cage itself was probably about four of me tall, and eight of me end to end long on each side. Every part of the cage was perfectly illuminated, not a single shadow was present within the prison that held the demon.

Now… the demon itself was hard to describe, but I was going to do my best.

It was a massive fox-like creature, but it had three heads and five tails. The fur was a golden-brown color shining off what I could only describe as radiance. The feeling of wrongness from staring into the demon’s eyes was immeasurably uncomfortable.

At the same time, I saw a humanoid figure that stared at me with immense disdain as it towered above my own height, forced to sit in the cage too small to hold it. Her appearance identical to what I had seen on floor eighteen, only the size differing.

I couldn’t tell which was the real appearance, as both were present at the same time, yet neither obscured the other. No matter the angle I looked from, or how many times I mentally tried to change my perspective, nothing changed. The feeling of wrongness was worse than when I had fallen onto the first floor so long ago, the moment still clear in my mind.

Neither presence existed without the other, yet neither seemed to want to exist in my vision. My head was beginning to hurt, but that was all that happened. The demon, in both forms, had not once moved beyond turning its heads to watch me as I walked around the cage.

“Does the appearance of a God awe you?”

“Honestly, I’m impressed. Is it an illusion, or something more that allows me to see two forms of the same demon?”

“What you see is only how your mortal mind is comprehending the impossible. My appearance is too vague for something so concrete to be viewed. What you see is an approximation of feelings and thoughts that make up what I truly am.”

“That’s a flowery explanation, but probably the most fitting I guess.”

“Have you never once pondered what this ‘feeling of wrongness’ truly is? What it is that your mind is trying to convey to you?”

“I can’t say I’ve ever really thought about it too hard. After I learned what demons were, I kind of just shrugged it off as ‘demon powers’, and it was none of my business what it really was.”

“Things like these are why you interest me, Logan Rivers. You ask a lot of questions, but never the right ones. You walk around in circles, but somehow manage to keep your head above the rising water.”

“I do ask the same questions a lot, but if you ask the same person the same question, but you get a different answer each time, you learn more than just the topic at hand. Asking the same question to different people will net you entirely different results, even if everyone gives different answers as well.”

“A convoluted method even I must admit, but it still leads you to the same point. You don’t know the answer. Even if you try and put it together on your own, you’re going to be missing pieces, or even off the point entirely. So, I as you again, the ‘feeling of wrongness’, what do you think it might actually be?”

“It most likely is still related to demons in one way or another, as mostly demons have this feeling around them. However, I’ve felt the feeling in some other moments as well. When I fell to this place, the first boss, and the fox-masked creatures when they did certain things.

I’m going to be honest with you, I have no idea what it might actually be. Any guess I could possibly make would only make me sound crazier than I already am, however, I might just be correct, no matter how dumb it might seem.”

“Go on, I want to hear your answer, I won’t even read you mind for this one.”

“Does it have something to do with what makes demons immortal in the first place?”

“No hints.” She scowled at me with all her heads as I tried to glean any information I could without actually making a single guess.

“Alright. The feeling definitely has something to do with what makes you and every other demon immortal. But it is probably more than that as well, because of the first fall, and the first boss. The feeling is more of my brain trying to understand something it can’t. Placing emotions and feelings onto something that I would never normally encounter.”

“Vague, but not good enough. You are attempting to deflect me by using my own words, and while you aren’t wrong, you’re avoiding the details, what really matters.”

“The feeling of wrongness is what my brain tries to make me feel, but it is probably power, something I don’t even know about that controls the things beyond my understanding.”

“That, is more accurate. You are as correct as I guess you can really be, with your lacking knowledge. However, I won’t elaborate for you, there’s no need to. You will learn the details later, whether I like it or not.”

“Well, I must be on my way, I have an appointment with the final floor to get to, so I must be on my way now.” I repeated myself as anxiety fell over me from the rising sense of urgency to leave.

“This isn’t how that’s going to work, and you know it. You will stay here as long as I make you, whether you feel like you’ve done enough to quell my rage or not. I WILL MAKE YOU UNDERSTAND YOUR PLACE.”

The feeling of wrongness washed over so fast it felt like an ocean had been dropped on my head. The pressure was immense, and I felt as if my head was about to explode. I tried to raise my arms but could only move my left arm. My right felt like it had been pinned under a boulder.

Without anything actually being in my blurred vision as I fell to the ground, I felt my arm crush and warp as the bones broke and folded. I watched as parts of my arm started to disappear in front of me. The pain was nearly unbearable, one of the worst I had faced in my entire life.

I screamed as the arm disappeared until just above the elbow. It was gone, and it hurt as if it had been amputated with a blunt rock. Thankfully, there was no blood, I couldn’t imagine going through that pain, then only having to cause myself more just to seal the wound.

My breathing was labored and shallow. The pain was almost too much for me to handle, but I held on in the end. My arm was gone, my dominant arm had been cleanly removed by the demon calmly sitting in its cage. The stub I now had on my right side hung there.

It wasn’t a case of the arm being illusioned away. I knew that. It was gone for good now.

To be perfectly honest though, it is kind of amazing I hadn’t lost a limb up until this point. I could have lost this arm much earlier. Even floor sixteen could have easily made me lose a limb. Not to mention all of the other highly dangerous floors.

“You still manage to uphold yourself in the face of losing your dominant arm?” The demon speaks to me in a calm tone, and despite wanting to snap back some snarky comment, I clearly shouldn’t. I really have been shown my place in this pecking order.

“Yeah, I only have a bit left to go anyways. This is floor thirty-four out of forty total. Hopefully I won’t need my arm to solve any puzzles, but it is what it is, really. I have no one to be angry at other than myself. I could have leveraged your curiosity of me better, tried to just wait out the time you wanted me to spend here, but I made the wrong choice and paid the price.”

“You really suck the fun out of everything I try to do. You truly are an unpleasant speed bump.” The demon sighed as she looked at me on the floor, slowly trying to get up. There was no pity, no rage, no curiosity anymore. She just watched as I stood up, unwilling to be defeated.

“I’ll do as you say from now on, I’m not interested in losing another limb. One is already too many to lose in my opinion. I reap what I sow.”

“Normally, at this point, I would force you to suffer for a few months to a year. Indulge myself a little as I tear apart your fragile mind, but you’re different from the people who normally come through here. You’re boring to me, you have too much will to live. No matter what I’d end up putting you through, you’d come out the other end just as resilient, if not more.”

“I appreciate the praise from someone such as yourself.”

“Shut up, I do not desire empty words.”

“They aren’t empty to me. I really do appreciate the praise, for my mental fortitude to be complemented by a demon, something my mind can’t even comprehend properly, it really does mean a lot to me.”

“Here you go gaining my interest again. I just took your arm, aren’t you terrified?”

“Not in particular to be honest. Sure, apprehensive now that I know I’m not beyond being crippled, but not scared. My goal is to escape this place, I’ve lived through days of pure abject horror. The pain you gave me surely was a lot, but at this point, I’m already broken.”

“Admitting you’re broken yourself rarely means anything. However, I do admit, I’m at a loss. I am not allowed to kill you or do too much more damage than I already have. I can keep you here until I see fit, but to quote you; ‘to be honest’, I don’t want to talk to you.”

“I’ll stay silent if you wish.”

“Just leave. In fact, let me help you.” As the demon finished talking my vision shifted. I was staring at a door to what looked like a shopping mall. Just a large glass door, it was amazingly clean, and the green sign above the door told me everything I needed to know.

“Thank you very much. Ms. Demon, I hope to meet you once again on better terms.”

“I never wish to see you again.”

I laughed a little as I walked through the door. No control effect, no joke, I was just told to leave after having my arm removed. The door closed behind me, and I could no longer feel the demon. The floor was behind me.

I took my bag off and tossed in on the ground, not really caring. I leaned my back against the wall and slowly slid down it until my butt hit the floor. I held my only remaining hand over my face, the other arm now only a short stub.

I cried for the first time since coming to these floors.

I deceived a demon. I was terrified. I lied about almost everything, and it worked, however, the pain in my arm still lingered. I still had no clue what the feeling of wrongness was. I was terrified that I had now lost my right arm. I couldn’t use my weapon nearly as well anymore, so if I had to defend myself, I was as good as dead.

The praise was as empty as it could have come. The bitch removed my arm, and I was expected to just smile and thank her for the lesson, don’t fuck with me! But… I did it. I managed to fool even a demon and make it through. There was nothing more she could do to me.

I grabbed my bag after wiping away my final tear.

Six floors to go.