During a brief, tense moment in my interaction with the one entity, I would consider a persistent and possibly dangerous enemy, Paimon, I starred at him and used Identify. The power took hold immediately, and unlike my mind-affecting powers it wasn't blocked by whatever means of defense the dreadful devil had that rendered my other powers ineffective.

[Name: Paimon Mooncaller

Class: dark night, Level 30

Species: True Devil

Faction: Self

Alignment: Neutral Evil

Personal Vice: Pride

Status: Healthy, arrogant

Innate Magical Ability: Paimon is the strongest creature you've met face to face so far. He is deeply innately magical.

Class Suitability: Paimon is already the class he's the most suited too: he's a self-sworn dark night. That grants him incredible physical and mystical might.

Magic Suitability: He is equally suited to both conjuration magic and evocation magic. And he's capable of using those schools of magic in conjunction. Throughout his life he used that to horrible, sometimes genocidal ends.]

I breathed a relieved sigh, causing a look of confusion to appear on the face of my foe. The power, Identify as usual came in clutch and let me know a lot of things about Paimon that I hadn't known, not to mention the comforting fact that it worked at all was relief-inducing on its own. Good, this means that this asshole's defenses against mind-powers don't neutralize all of my powers. I realized, which caused a grin to suddenly appear on my face. Paimon saw this, and glared at me.

"Little godling, why are you so happy?" He asked anger and fear audible in his voice, as well as confusion due to the look of happiness that graced my face. I locked eyes with him and widened my grin.

"Well, Paimon, you aren't immune to everything I can do." I informed him. And suddenly that look of fear that grew more prominent as he wondered what I meant. But that fear was quickly supplanted by an attempt at calmness.

"Oh? Well it matters not." He said, attempting to sound regal and authoritative. I chuckled.

"Listen, you fool," He said, a hint of anger entering his tone. I gritted my teeth but bit my tongue. I will not let my emotions control me. I told myself, refusing to lose control.

"I am not here today to attack you." The devil proclaimed, his voice infused with self-confidence. "I am here to talk to you. To learn more about your paultry rebellion." He said, haughtily referring to the rebellion I was leading as if it were insignificant. I laughed and looked at him, my eyes radiating smugness.

I chuckled. "Why do you expect that I'd tell you anything about it? Do you think that I am a monologuing cliche who'd unveil my grand scheme to you?" I asked, invoking images of the villains from fables and myths of the humanoids who inhabited the mortal worlds. He was a bit shocked as his attempt to parley was rebuked. His eyes narrowed to thin, enraged slits.

"You and I are foes Paimon. You have spent months attacking me." I told him, realistically and honestly conveying the situation as I saw it to him. He sighed and glared at me.

"You and your minions are in open rebellion against me." He said, which in fairness was a true point even if it lacked critical context. I looked at him and shook my head.

"We are in open rebellion for a number of reasons which we feel are justified. You are not lawful. You hate and practice open bigotry, sometimes illegally, against animalistic, even only loosely so, devils." I told him, adding context which he conveniently left out when pointing out our rebellion.

"In both of our previous encounters you sought to claim me as property. And you have since sent minions after me to secure me and dismantle what I've put together." I told him, further explaining my perspective. He chuckled at that, like it was an inside joke shared between two friends.

"You know what Paimon? I... don't get you." I said, opting as I often did, to be honest. This frankness caught Paimon off guard, whose face shifted to a more neutral expression as he processed my statement. He was still and silent for a few heartbeats, as he thought about what I said. After a few moments of silence, he spoke in response to my off-putting proclamation.

"What do you mean? What does it mean to 'get someone'?" He asked, genuinely ignorant of the expression.

"It means to understand someone. I don't understand your motives." I explained, looking my scarlet-eyed foe in the eyes. He sighed and thought about my response.

"I am a collector. A collector of many things. Of power. Of sin. Of artifacts. And soon I will be the one collector who possesses the ultimate prize: a god." He told me, mixing lies and arrogance into a potent and toxic verbal construction. I rolled my eyes at him.

"I know that you're lying. I am the Lord of Lies." I informed him, referring to one of my titles. He frowned at me, anger flashing in his scarlet eyes, breathing unholy and unradiant life into them.

"I can sense that the person before me is incomparable to the person you were when I last encountered you face to face." He told me, being surprisingly candid in doing so. I grinned at that.

"You don't have the slightest idea." I told him, aware that my strength was real. I felt my power radiate out of me every second, and I felt the immense, unimaginably thick network of magic that composed my being, keenly aware of it in moments like this.

"Though... if you're strength increases each time we encounter each other as it appears to... I suppose I have no choice but to claim you now." He informed me, a cruel grin on his face as he informed me of this.

I chuckled at him. "I wouldn't recommend you try that." I told him, grinning right back. I heard the tightening of his muscles as he subtly prepared to attack me. And internally I laughed, as I began to ask myself a simple question.

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

I wonder which of my abilities work on him? I suppose I'll find out. I realized, as the devil's magical aura flared to life and an object began to materialize in his hand.

Not if I can help it. I thought, glaring at him. I began to prepare a potent ability I hadn't had a chance to use yet.

"Do I strike you as the sort of person nice enough to let you do as you wish?" I asked, as I took a shot in the dark and lashed out at the devil with one of the abilities granted to me by the domain of magic.

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Mentally, I reached out and focused on Paimon, metaphysically targeting him and surrounding him with my magical aura. Physically I grinned. Eat this. I thought as I activated what was currently my greatest offensive ability: the ability to snuff out magical power.

I felt an invisible ray of black energy fly out of myself and skewer Paimon. I could see the ray, due to my vision, but it appeared that he couldn't. The ray penetrated Paimon's chest, and I watched something not dissimilar to what I had seen when I watched unlife energy create a ghoul hours ago happen.

Black energy, but not unlife energy, crisscrossed Paimon and vivisected his body. It was some other form of dark and unpleasant energy, one hitherto unknown to me. But he was oblivious to this, apparently not even able to feel its effects on his form. It took the span of a few heartbeats, or rather a few of his heartbeats for his entire body to be covered in the dark lines.

Only a second or two had passed since I had spoken ominously to him. But to him this stillness, this calmness was proof that I had been filling the air with useless noise and not foreshadowing the sort of attack he was unable to see. So he spoke. "You speak well little godling. But its all purposeless. It's as if you're acting solely to ward off silence." He said, arrogantly. But then my ability began to take hold.

At this point, the object that had begun to appear in Paimon's hand had become more identifiable. The thing was ethereal, but it was very noticeable since his hand was curled around it. It appeared to be a sort of cane or walking stick.

Paimon had been grinning as it came into being in his hand, but I watched that grin begin to turn into a look of shock and fear, as the ethereal cane began to dissipate in his hand.

And now... what to do with you? I shouldn't kill you just yet... that would make this little more than an assassination, even if it was one in self-defense. And that would more than likely cause my campaign objective to change... Gah, for now, I'll take a different route. Instead, I guess I should inconvenience him. I thought, wishing I could more easily opt to take the "kill him" route. And then the system itself chimed in.

[Hello Althos, this is a system administrator. Killing Paimon now and under these circumstances would fail the campaign and lock you out of the ability to gain further devil powers. The current route you are on of completing the trials of dark sainthood is the correct path. That said... if you deposit him somewhere far from here, to humble and strike fear into him your actions would result in you getting a bonus reward at the end of this trial.] The system told me, to try and keep me on the "correct path". I sighed mentally and closed the notification. Fine. I thought, annoyed.

His eyes were focused on the object in his hand, and so he wasn't looking at me. I rose a hand and pointed it at him like it were a sword or a bow, and then spoke.

"I am a god Paimon. Did you think that collecting me would be that simple? That it would be as easy as you informing me that that's what you were going to do?" I asked, tauntingly. He looked up, locked eyes with me, and opened his mouth to roar and spit some infernal obscenities at me, but I didn't give him a chance.

The instant between our gazes locking and sound escaping his throat I hit him with a single targeted, forced teleportation. And then, while chuckling, I teleported myself to where I had sent him.

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We found ourselves no longer atop desert sands under a moonlit sky. Instead, we found ourselves in a different, deeper place. The place we were in was a lightless, remote tunnel. And it wasn't in Infernius.

Paimon was looking around in confusion, fear, and anger when I warped into the tunnel as well. I went unnoticed by him because his back was turned to me, in the instant that I closed off one end of the tunnel, the end behind me, through a quick usage of my Earth Control power. Which caused an explosion of noise to echo and rumble around us.

He heard the monstrously loud sound of a wall of stone surging up and shutting off a route of escape. He turned and made eye contact with me. I grinned at him. He didn't grin back.

"Welcome to my world, Paimon." I said arrogantly. It wasn't true that I had brought him to my world, but I didn't mind the deception. Not to him. His eyes opened wide in alarm as he tried to assess what I meant.

He and I were in a remote part of the subterranean wilderness around the city of Undermoon. I knew of this eerie tunnel because of the memories of a dark elven ranger who worshipped me, and it came to mind as a safe place to deposit Paimon and teach him a lesson in humility.

Paimon suddenly roared and aimed a hand in my direction, as if expecting something to happen. I watched as the dramatic gesture resulted in little more than the devil looking silly. He looked at his hand quizzically, and I grinned at him before taunting the man.

"It's comforting for me to know that whatever defenses you have against my mental-abilities are not due to your intellect." I said, mocking the devil. He looked at me, anger in his gaze but also a look of expectation like he expected me to explain what I had done to him. I looked back at him, my own gaze calm and in control. After a few seconds of silence, I broke the atmosphere in the tunnel by speaking.

"What? Don't tell me you expect me to explain what happened to you. What I did to you. Or do you really believe I'm that dumb?" I asked, annoyed at his expectations. The look in his eyes changed, the anger overwhelming the small flake of expectation. I grinned, as I again activated Earth Control and began to draw this encounter to a close.

Paimon was again prevented from howling blasphemous curses, what I didn't doubt he would have done as he opened his mouth, by another usage of my powers. This time the tunnel walls that surrounded him suddenly closed in on him like some sort of dark-colored and heavy sludge. They snaked around him and wrapped him in an earthen embrace, pulling him into a newly formed wall.

"Heh." I chuckled as I watched my foe be rendered not only powerless but also deprived of his freedom. Not only was his body bound, but he was taught to keep his mouth shut by loose dirt that slipped onto him and threatened to slip into his open mouth. Wow he's even been silenced. I thought, with a smile on my face.

At the moment he was just suspended in the newly formed wall, but I wanted to do more. So I decided to ask the system a question.

[Hey, system, can you inform me of something? Do devils need to breathe?] I asked, curiosity compelling me to be sure before I did what I wanted to do.

[Hello Althos, no they don't. And just so you know, this won't hold Paimon forever. He too has teleportation powers, but they are costly. Not only will he have to wait the hour he needs to wait before his magical powers are useable again, but he'll also have to wait while he builds up the required amount of magical energy to be able to teleport.] The system told me, bringing a big smile to my face. I walked over to Paimon, empowered by this new knowledge and locked eyes with him.

"I know this won't hold or kill you. But I'm sure it'll enrage you and even teach you that you need to acknowledge the reality of my power. And what I'm about to do? Well... Honestly, it'll just enrage you." I told my foe as I activated Earth Control once more, just to draw the entirety of Paimon's body into the wall I had just created.

The earth of the wall that suspended him began to slowly pull his face, the only part of him out of it, into it, and I watched it do so. While my gaze was on him he glared at me with a rage unlike any I had ever seen or felt. I quietly wrapped myself in my teleportation aura and vanished, going back to Infernius to resume my quest.

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In the span of the moments, it took me to teleport from the World Beneath the World to Infernius, I sent my more important devilish minions a mental message.

[I just had an encounter with Paimon. I defeated him, but I didn't kill him. The system is insisting that we do this 'the right way'. But this gives us a chance to recruit more devils.] I told my council, aware of the unprecedented opportunity before us while Paimon was indisposed.

I heard excited and shocked mental murmurs and gasps as my supporters reacted to what I had just told them.