A long time ago:
A little girl was sleepily struggling to keep her eyes open. She was seated on the warm lap of a large creature, a creature who looked like a strange fusion of a moth and a human. He had the lower body of a muscular human warrior and the head of a gargantuan moth.
His countless eyes speedily scanned a book that he was holding in front of the two of them. The book was a treatise on what it dubbed the "perfected approach to spreading evil".
The little girl's father considered this hefty and academic tome to be a perfect bedtime story for the girl. He valued her evil education after all, and if she fell asleep listening to methodical explanations and evaluations of evil, perhaps she would one day embody a perfected approach to evil herself even in her unconscious and most minute actions.
He saw that his daughter was losing her quiet fight against sleep, and so he decided to impart some final words of wisdom to her before she fell asleep.
"Remember Tristan, true evil concerns itself not with one's lineage. It cares not for one's wealth or social standing. It merely concerns itself with the spread of misery and the advancement of darkness. To the truly evil, the soul of a beggar is as valuable as that of an emperor, and both deserve to be treated as treasures."
Tristan fell asleep pondering those words, wondering how in Infernius someone could decide that the soul of a beggar had the same worth as the soul of even a merchant, and infinitely more confused by the idea that the souls of a beggar and an emperor could be equal.
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Tristan openly studied the bizarre creature in front of her. It was casually hovering in front of her its eerie eyes watching her with equally open and transparent curiosity.
Its wings were constantly flapping, despite the fact that it was using magic to hover. Aside from its wings the rest of its movements appeared to be careful and deliberate as if the act of expending unnecessary energy were somehow contrary to its instincts.
The creature was an odd being, a tall and vaguely humanoid-like creature, at least in shape. It was nude and in its current form appeared sexless. It had a well-defined and muscular body, and its extremities, aside from its head, would change in length and density every few seconds. A lesser mind than Tristan's would have wondered if such changes were random or uncontrollable but she knew better than that.
Its skin was unlike anything she had ever seen. Half of its skin was the color of an alabaster statue, and the other half was the color of charcoal. The color changed seeming to follow an invisible line that went down the middle of its forehead, which meant that both of its hands, ears, and feet were a different color. Its two eyes were the opposite color of whatever color its skin on that side was, so its alabaster-toned half had a charcoal-colored eye and its charcoal half had an alabaster eye.
The creature was more than an odd sight though. It was also a divine being, and though that knowledge might escape many other devils it was something that she was keenly aware of. She knew that one day an odd creature capable of flight would visit the Cathedral she and her father had built in the distant past, and that was part of why she had spent the last few millennia living in the small chapel.
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Althos studied Tristan and was impressed with her courage. The devil was odd. She was studying him with the same intensity and the same openness he was studying her with. Though Althos had no way of knowing this, as he had no frame of reference, she was only as brave as the average true-devil.
She was a devil who wore the white robes of a religious habit. Her face, the only part of her that was exposed to the deity's vision had an amber-like complexion and she had piercing heterochromatic eyes. One of her eyes was a deep and all-consuming scarlet color, so pretty much a mirror image of the eyes of Althos's physical body. The other eye was a little bit more human-like with a green iris, black pupil, and grey sclera.
Her eyes contained a multitude of emotions, but they also contained an unsetting level of zeal that set off mental alarms in Althos's mind. He could feel an intense aura of belief coming off of her, but he was unsure of what it was that she believed in.
His version of common-sense suggested that she believed in the "Dark Saint" for whom the cathedral was probably built, assuming this tiny chapel was, in fact, the cathedral.
The two spent nearly thirty seconds sizing each other up before Althos spoke.
"Is this the Cathederal of the Dark Saint?"
His voice was low and was radiating divine power. He was aware that it seemed to leak out of this new form, but Althos's enhanced intuition told him that this posed no harm to him. For now, he had no choice but to trust that intuition and knew that being scared into inaction would only cost him.
The devil's maniacal grin belied her studious nature and impossibly that grin only grew wider when she heard Althos correctly identify this location.
"Yes, it is! I welcome you, mysterious creature, to the first church of the Dark Saint. My name is Tristan and I am the head-priestess of this church. "
The devil's voice was enthusiastic and warm, traits that he wouldn't have suspected after meeting Paimon and the devilish police officer who had detained the imp on his back.
Althos was silent as he pondered what to do from here. The silence fell on the odd trio, for a few moments before Tristan felt annoyed by it and suggested a logical course of action.
"Perhaps, mysterious flying one, we should go inside and have a conversation outside of the brutality of the elements? I predict that a sandstorm might be happening soon. Paimon tends to stir those up when he's upset, and whatever course of events led you here was sure to upset him."
Althos considered this rational suggestion before politely nodding his acceptance of it.
He wondered how someone out here in the devilish desert knew of Paimon's powers, given that this was several kilometers away from the modern metropolis he and the imp on his back had just escaped from. But then he quickly assumed that if anyone lived out here they'd at least have heard of Paimon given his status as an iron-fisted overlord of a massive city.
The imp, feeling thoroughly forgotten in all of this, spoke up as Althos began to slowly fly towards the devilish nun. As he spoke he climbed up Althos's back and showed his head to the nun.
"I am Salifinos! And I will not be ignored! You two have a lot of nerve to be talking like I am not here!"
The devilish nun patiently listened to the imp's outburst and let out a soft giggle. Then she spoke.
"Mr. Salifinos, I am not ignoring you! I didn't even know you were there. I deeply apologize, and I hope you'll participate in whatever conversation we have inside of the chapel."
Her words and tone were contrite if a bit direct. This admission of ignorance on her part coupled with her apology and her encouragement of his participation in the soon-to-happen indoor conversation placated the imp who sighed and glared at the back of Althos's head.
The godling himself was silent, but Salifinos knew better than to challenge a creature who penetrated the defenses of a devilish police officer with a single hit. Imps survived because they were wise and knew better than to antagonize more dangerous creatures. And Althos was infinitely more dangerous than Salifinos.
The trio approached the chapel. This also gave Althos his first examination of it.
The chapel itself was a small building made out of a dark material that appeared to be the devilish equivalent of bricks. It was a few dozen meters tall and at the top of it, it had a thin roof that seemed to exist to protect it from the sand that would otherwise probably dirty its floor.
From the outside, Althos could see a single pair of currently closed stone doors that led inside and if he looked up to the roof of the building he could barely make out a thin weather vane as well as a chimney.
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A few minutes later Althos, Salifinos, and Tristan were seated around a small table, inside of a small room inside the chapel. While they were silent they could hear the wind outside starting to pick up.
Hearing this seemed to have had an adverse effect on Tristan's mood. She had been the last to sit down because shortly after having had heard the wind begin to get noisy she excused herself for a moment to go out and send a mental message to someone.
She made no effort to disguise this action, in fact, she proclaimed it to them before she left, and Althos wondered if such honesty were an idiosyncrasy of hers or a common trait among devils.
Without knowing more creatures like her, more devils, he wouldn't be able to make that determination so, for now, he decided to make a mental note of her actions and compare them to other devils when he met them.
After Tristan came back she joined them at a small table which had barely enough room for the three odd creatures. Althos looked around and decided to be forthright with the devils.
While others, especially lesser beings, may have hesitated this was an easy decision for the decisive creature. He remembered that he had been aided by Salifinos and had been instructed by his updated system that this was supposedly a safe place.
He was the first to speak once everyone was gathered and did so proudly.
"I thank you, Tristan, for your hospitality. My name is Althos and I am a deity. I am also, for now at least, a refugee who fled from the city of Bastille. But in time... I intend to make it mine."
Salifinos stared blankly at the deity. The imp had no clue why the deity had decided to be honest. It was a decision that to the deceitful imp made little sense. But when he turned his gaze from the godling to the self-proclaimed "head priestess" his impression of the deity shifted slightly.
Tristan was impressed by the deity's boldness. To her, it made sense for the deity to feel free to be honest, since she didn't pose a threat to him, and she doubted the imp posed a threat either. And her slightly higher estimation of the deity shone through on her face. She decided to speak after thinking in silence for a few moments.
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"Well Althos, then I suppose I should inform you of the tale of the Dark Saint."
This made Salifinos groan in annoyance.
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"Why would you bore a living god, with a tale of the ancient leader of Infernius?"
Salifonos chided Tristan, annoyed and bored with the idea of rehearing that ancient story.
Tristan rolled her eyes at the imp, disappointed but not surprised that the imp had that common and inaccurate understanding of the prophecy. She didn't feel like correcting him, so instead she focused on Althos.
Althos had also ignored the imp's outburst, and this caused the small creature to let out a pathetic noise and threaten to storm off. Tristan was delighted by Althos's stoic response and took it as a sign to proceed with a slightly falsified version of the prophecy that had dominated her life.
Althos was interested in knowledge and was curious as to why this chapel was located far out in the devilish wilderness. He was also using this time, this moment of rest, to sort through a multitude of notifications, which meant that he had two reasons to be silent, not just one. But he was willing to deceive Tristan if it aided him, and she seemed ready to educate him as to this "myth".
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As Tristan began spinning her yarn she also began to silent cast a mystical spell. This spell was potent and when it took effect it called into being a thin and transparent green mist that surrounded the three people gathered around the table. This silenced Salifinos, who was wary of the mist but also intrigued by it.
"In the ancient past, Infernius didn't exist. Or rather... Infernius as its known now didn't exist."
The mist transformed around them, changing from a thin layer of green gas into a picture-like image of a gigantic rocky mountain. They were at the "bottom" of this illusionary mountain and the image gradually floated upward, unveiling more and more of this non-existent mountain to them.
Tristan continued her telling the myth, and Althos and even Salifinos appeared to be interested in her version of it due to her interesting illusionary magic.
Althos was listening to the story and could see the mist but only through a filter. He was taking this time to finally sort through a multitude of notifications. The first notification Althos received was a new one, one that had popped up in the aftermath of Althos nearly crashing into Tristan.
[NOTIFICIATION: MYSTERIOUS ENTITY DUBBED "M.A." BY ALTHOS HAD CONFIGURED THE AFOREMENTIONED DEITY'S NOTIFICATIONS SO THAT ONLY A HANDFUL FILTERED THROUGH. GIVEN THE CIRCUMSTANCES, SETTINGS ARE AT LEAST TEMPORARILY RETURNED TO THEIR DEFAULT MODES. FROM HERE ON OUT, NOTIFICATIONS WILL BE DISPLAYED VISUALLY AND AFTER NEARLY CRASHING INTO THE HALF-DEVIL NAMED TRISTAN A DECISION HAS BEEN MADE: ALL FUTURE NOTIFICATIONS WILL BE TRANSPARENT SO AS LESSEN THE ODDS THAT ANY FUTURE NOTIFICATIONS MAY CAUSE A COLLISION.]
Althos visually willed this notification away and focused on the next notification that manifested itself as the top of a pile of notifications in the top right corner of his vision. This notification was fascinating.
[NEW SPECIES KNOWLEDGE GAINED: TRUE-DEVILS
TRUE-DEVILS ARE A POWERFUL SPECIES OF DEVILS, INHABITANTS OF THE DARK PLANE KNOWN AS INFERNIUS. DEVILS CAN TAKE ON A MULTITUDE OF FORMS, AND MOST ARE NOT "TRUE-DEVILS". SO-CALLED "TRUE-DEVILS" ARE UNIQUE CREATURES WHO HAVE POWERFUL ABILITIES, INCLUDING THE ABILITY TO COMMAND DEVILS WHO EXIST ALONG THE TRADITIONAL "HIERARCHY OF INFERNIUS".
KNOWN TRUE-DEVILS: PAIMON.]
This was the first of a new type of notification dubbed a "KNOWLEDGE" notification.
After thinking through the benefits of this sort of notification, Althos willed the notifications he received to reorder themselves based on category and he selected the "KNOWLEDGE" type of notification as the one to be prioritized. After waiting for a second the deity began to sort through the reordered notifications, and before he knew it he was paying more attention to the notifications than to the story Tristan was telling him.
Althos received more than one of these notifications, including ones for Imps and for half-devils. It was the one for Half-Devil that he really stood out to him.
[NEW SPECIES KNOWLEDGE GAINED: HALF-DEVILS.
TO CALL HALF-DEVILS A SPECIES IS TRICKY BUT FOR THE PURPOSE OF CODIFYING THEM THEY WILL BE CLASSIFIED AS SUCH. HALF-DEVILS ARE CREATURES WHO HAVE A FIENDISH PARENT AND A NON-FIENDISH PARENT. THEIR POWERS AND APPEARANCE ARE DEPENDENT ON THEIR PARENTS. HALF-FIENDS TEND TO BE DARK CREATURES, WHO ARE FANATICALLY LOYAL TO THE HIERARCHY OF INFERNIUS AND UPON THEIR DEATHS MANY OF THEM BECOME FIENDS THEMSELVES. PARTICULARLY POWERFUL HALF-DEVILS INSTANTLY BECOME THE SAME TYPE OF DEVIL AS THEIR DEVILISH PARENT, WHICH LED TO THE CREATION OF SCARY STORIES IN MORTAL WORLDS THAT WARN CHILDREN NOT TO INDISCRIMINATELY MURDER SUPPOSEDLY EVIL CREATURES. HALF-DEMONS ALSO EXIST, AND THERE ARE A MULTITUDE OF DIFFERENT KINDS OF "HALF"-EXTRAPLANARS.
HALF-DEVILS LEAN STRONGLY TOWARDS CLASSES THAT ENABLE THEM TO INFLUENCE OTHERS, AND THUS MANY OF THEM ARE SPELL-SINGERS, CLERICS, PALADINS, AND POLITICIANS.
KNOWN HALF-DEVILS: TRISTAN]
It was after he sorted through that notification that he began to pay attention to Tristan's story again and the odd mystical mist. He mentally kicked himself as he realized that he hadn't been paying close enough attention to the story and had missed a lot.
"The Dark Saint himself after boldly leaving the aerial aeries of the celestials shaped our demesne, our domain, with his own legendary hands."
After Tristan finished this declaration, the image of the mountain that had surrounded them shifted and changed. Now the mountain began to crumble and over the course of a few seconds became one large static cube of immeasurable height and thickness. The cube was also seemingly impenetrable and all the image showed was a thick cube.
"Our mighty progenitor sagely recognized the threat posed by the demons and so he decided to fortify our plane's inner workings. He knocked down the vast mountain that was once this plane and rebuilt it."
After Tristan said this she paused for a moment. She was obviously considering how to proceed which intrigued the deity listening to her.
"Aside from grim, defensive fortifications that protect us from the demonic scrouge our plane's surface is not inhabited or settled. Instead, we dwell, even where we are Althos, deep underground. This entire layer is below the 'surface' of our plane. Do you understand?"
After Tristan asked her question the image in the mist went from being that of an indescribably thick cube of impenetrable rock to an image of the same shape but hollowed out in a way that revealed the layers of Infernius. Althos nodded at Tristan and realized that this must be why there were no stars in this place, despite the apparent state of eternal night.
Althos had noticed the odd lack of stars earlier but had too much on his mind to really pay it much mind. That said understanding that gave him an odd sense of satisfaction.
"He who reshaped this plane inhabited it not only with the ancient creatures who followed him after hearing of his promise to deal with and contain the demonic hordes. He called upon the litany of debts he was owed to fill each layer with mighty kingdoms and ancient species. Some of those kingdoms and species were filled with rage and sorrow."
At this the mist showed a still image of the nobility of human kingdoms, elven presidents, and dwarven C.E.O.'s united in sorrow and rage, quietly vowing to one day escape the dark plane of Infernius.
"Others... well others didn't mind it so much."
The mist's bizarre image generating capabilities rapidly flashed a series of images of monsters and monstrous humanoids. Each of the images generated and shown to the imp and the godling was that of a different small community of monsters, in different layers across the plane of Infernius.
Each of the communities seemed quite content in the plane, ranging from large giants who had built a small community in a volcano surrounded by other volcanos, to a small coven of sickly looking witches who were gathered around a thick cast-iron cauldron and were sprinkling ingredients into a thick looking soup.
Althos had only not been listening to the story Tristan was saying he was also gradually sorting through various notifications. Only some of them awarded him with new information.
[NEW MAGIC KNOWLEDGE GAINED: ILLUSION MAGIC
ILLUSION MAGIC CAN ASSAULT THE MIND AND BEND THE SENSES. IT CAN TRAP VICTIMS IN A NEVER-ENDING HALLUCINATION, OR IT CAN CAUSE THOSE AFFLICTED BY IT TO SENSE FALSEHOODS, SUCH AS FAKE SMELLS OR VISIONS THAT AREN'T ACTUALLY REAL.
POWERFUL ILLUSIONISTS CAN FILL THEIR VOICES WITH POWER AND MAKE SUGGESTIONS THAT INFECT THE MINDS OF THOSE WHO HEAR THEM. A MIGHTY ILLUSIONIST COULD USE MAGIC IN A THRONE ROOM TO URGE A NATION TO WAR OR TO BROKER PEACE BETWEEN WARRING TRIBES OF MONSTERS.
SPELLS KNOWN: N/A. ALL ILLUSION EFFECTS TO DATE HAVE BEEN CAUSED BY WILL AND INTENT, NOT THE USAGE OF NORMAL SPELLS.
NEW SPELLS GRANTED: MARK OF HEROISM, MARK OF FEAR, MARK OF FURY, MARK OF LOVE. SIGIL OF AVOIDANCE, SIGIL OF AWARENESS, PROPAGANDA, CHARM, COMPULSION, AND OVER 40 MORE SPELLS.
YOU CAN ALSO CONSTRUCT SPELLS BELONGING TO THE ILLUSION SCHOOL OF MAGIC.]
Upon gaining awareness of that notification Althos sucked in a breath. He felt as if his brain itself was expanding, as the notification immediately granted him powerful magic.
This suddenly and loud breathing caused Tristan to look at him in concern. He waved her away, and she looked at Salifinos. The imp shrugged his shoulders, bemused by this reaction. She herself was annoyed by it but persisted in telling her story.
"The Dark Saint was the original founder of Infernius. He was also our ancient god, the overlord who ruled over all devils and the majority of lawful-evil creatures. His majesty was indisputable."
Tristan spoke of this creature with a tone that was fanatical. Despite her relative youthfulness, she spoke of the Saint like she was alive when he walked the plane.
"Even the celestials in their lofty planes grudgingly respected his strict adherence to order and how he shook off the temptations of chaos to betray his own kind in favor of protecting all of existence against the scrouge of the demons."
The mist that surrounded them all suddenly no longer showed the various non-devilish inhabitants of the plane. Instead, it showed a gigantic statue made of ornately sculpted stone that was located on the plane's surface.
The massive statue was of a darkly beautiful creature. It was a red-skinned man dressed in noble robes, who was silently standing watch over a blasted landscape that was trod on only by a silent army of automatons.
The statue had massive black wings, much like Althos's own. And the more Althos looked at the statue the more he realized something a bit disturbing: when his form was changed after he met M.A., his form looked eerily like the statue.
One of the biggest differences between Althos and the statue was that the statue had thick curling horns, which he hadn't had in the form he took after meeting M.A. But this weird coincidence filled Althos with an odd compulsion that he didn't even try to fight. He was compelled to ask a question.
"Is this a story an origin myth, or a vision of the future?"
Tristan looked at Althos and began to grin again.
"It's both. Or rather... there's a sort of sequel to it that is happening right now. A prophecy. That involves this very building."
Her eyes began to glow and emit dark smoke as she finished that statement. The crypticness of this stroked Salifinos's interest, who was suddenly paying Tristan considerably more attention than he had till that point.
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Back in Bastille:
The ancient devilish overlord who ruled over Bastille with an iron fist was currently underneath Bastille.
Paimon, an ancient devil who remembered the days wherein gods lorded over domains and subdomains, was currently sitting at the head of an ornate table. This ornate table was located at the heart of a secretive "war-room" located underneath the great and terrible marketplace of Bastille.
This table was surrounded by a veritable horde of chairs. And in each of those chairs sat a powerful devil who controlled different parts of life in the city of Bastille. And they were all speaking at once, convinced that their points were the most useful to making sense of the situation at hand.
Paimon let them squawk on and on for several minutes before he rose to his feet and shouted a single word at the top of his lungs.
"SILENCE!"
The small horde of powerful devils fell silent in the face of this outburst. In exploding like this Paimon, the city's authoritarian overlord, let out some of the anger he was feeling towards his unsuccessful effort to capture the godling. It was useful for him and that act allowed him to speak what he had to say next with less malice than he would have otherwise.
"I'm gonna need you bumbling fools to explain to me why none of you moved to capture the godling after you heard my voice echo throughout the city."
His diction was only slightly aggressive but his tone carried with it the implication of horrendous violence depending on what was said next.
None of the devils were eager to break the silence that fell over the crowd in the wake of the devil's demand.
"Well? You were all so vocal before, dear friends might I ask what happened to your outspokenness?"
Paimon's voice was oozing venom and the assembled devils could feel the razor's edge they were on.
"If you can't speak of the past, then I STRONGLY suggest you start speaking of the future. A living god escaped our clutches. More importantly, he escaped MY clutches. What are we going to do about it?"
The devil's suggestion caused the wheels of the other devil's minds to start turning, and they began thinking of ways they might be active participants in whatever scheme Paimon was planning if only to save their own hides and be spared the wrath of the mightiest fiend in the whole city.