“These things are so loud, why did they have to design them to bust your ear drums?” I complained as the boom tunnel charged up.

“No idea, maybe it’s a design flaw!” Astragoth yelled, his voice drowned out by the deafening sound.

Eventually, the tunnel opened and we all passed through, arriving on the other side. I noticed our lord and master seemed nervous, he took a while to pass through. It must be my imagination but it looks like he was unfamiliar with the boom tunnel.

Well, whatever, it’s not my problem, just need to follow orders and everything will be good. I learned that when I was human and it served me well as a demon. Masters come and go, so just keep your head down and make sure not to piss off too many people.

Hopefully, our lord doesn’t have too many enemies, I wouldn’t want to get caught up in some demon war. He seems to want a build a magic school for demons, no clue why would want to do that.

Wizardry was generally despised on this side of the planes. I mean all of us ended up in this place because of it. And yet our lord practised the art and even planned to found a school for it. It was very likely this was doomed to fail.

But I was a go-with-the-flow kind of guy. Ever since I became practically immortal, I have been doing just that. This time will be no different, new boss, new circumstance, same shit.

Upon exiting the boom tunnel, it was a short flight to the courts. We made decent time and soon we found ourselves in the city. We passed by the typical hooligans prowling around, and a few hours passed by in their limousines. Rich assholes the lot of them, but when you need the coin and can stomach them looking down on you, you take a job or two.

Ironically our new boss didn’t seem like he looked down on us. In fact, he was pretty chill for a demon lord. Excluding his odd taste for wizardry, he acted more like a second-order buddy. Sure he did order us around on occasion, but hell, Etragos liked to do that too.

I ignored the sights and let the flow of the road take me. The place was chaos incarnate, but it was home. I looked at the group, they were sorting out their tasks.

“Jelmak, Kal, Astragoth head to the pawnbroker. I will escort our lord to the places he wishes to visit.” Etragos ordered, being the teacher’s pet he always wished to be.

It was not a bad thing, you kind of needed that in a group. And given what I knew about his human life, he deserved to have a lord to serve. His whole human past had service to some great Khan being his whole personality. He had been pretty down ever since his accursed masters from Nysegard got killed.

The two left us to do whatever tour guide shit they wanted to do. Now there was just the three of us and a crap ton of loot to haul.

“It’s this way guys.” Jelmak hovered down the street, towards the commercial district.

We hauled the bags and started trekking. We passed the typical break-out brawls and fights. Only maimings, so pretty tame for the commercial district. Mostly demons fighting over some item they each wanted.

We ducked and weaved past the bulk of the chaos, I nearly got run over by some crazy greater demon throwing his weight around.

We turned a corner and found ourselves down a narrow street, littered with disreputable stores. They were the good disreputable kind, didn’t ask where you got the shit you wanted to sell.

Pawn brokers in the Abyss were known to be very discrete in their dealings. Since most if not all the stuff they buy is stolen goods. In our case, it’s spoils of war, but in most cases, some demon robbed another and needed to move it quickly.

Jelmak pointed to the one on the far right. It was a little store, much smaller than the others. Simple stone design with a single front door that looked very much like wood.

Either it was enchanted or just made to look authentic. On the two sides were windows with a variety of items. I could see a decent selection of arcane devices, weapons and leisure equipment.

Above the door was a decorative sign that read. A Lady’s Secrets, which sounded more like a brothel than a pawnbroker, perhaps they were a dual establishment?

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It was very mixed and lacked any sense of order. Not that order was a prerequisite in a place literally called the Courts of Chaos.

We stepped up to the door and immediately were stopped by an exiting first-order demon. The little bastard opened the door slightly, completely ignored us, flung some sign on the door and zoomed back in.

It happened so fast, that none of us even got a word in as the door slammed shut. Perplexed we all shifted to read the sign.

“Summoned by my accursed mistress, be back in an undefined time span. Hugs and kisses, Valerie.” I read turning to the others.

“So do we wait or what?” Astragoth asked.

I really didn’t want to do that, I would rather head to that crappy bar than wait here for some demon to come back. This was always a problem with demons, especially if we wanted to hold down a business. Some wizard could just summon us from the Abyss in the middle of work.

“I really don’t want to, should we just go to a bar and wait?” I suggested.

Instead, Jelmak approached the door, tapped lightly and spoke. “Sylvia, hey it’s me, Jelmak.” He announced.

What followed was the sound of shuffling and the flapping of wings. The door opened and a first order poked its head out. I didn’t get a good look before, it was in fact a female demon. The exposed breasts kind of gave it away.

“Oh Jelly dear, sorry, didn’t see you. But the mistress is out on business.” The little demon explained its beady eyes scanning us.

Getting a good look, she looked like a typical first order, red-skinned, with small horns, and bat-like wings. If she didn’t have tits, I wouldn’t have expected her to be female.

“Sylvia, my lovely dark queen, would you be most gracious to allow us to wait inside for your mistress? I have so much to tell you.” He shifted really quickly to his attempt at flirting, it was not very good, at least in my opinion.

Despite the cringe attempt, Sylvia actually blushed, which was odd for a demon. Did she do that on purpose? Was this some sort of act between the two? The rabbit hole that was.

“Darling you know that is most inappropriate.” She said demurely, play-acting.

“Please my lovely, would you be kind to this humble demon.” He begged and it sounded far too real.

She paused, thinking to herself. Eventually, she relented and let us in. “Keep your hands to yourself.” She announced, eyeing the two of us before she slapped Jelmaks rear as he entered. “Except for you darling, I wouldn’t mind your hands to wander.”

Now Jelmak blushed, these two were an odd pair, but who was I to judge? We entered the shop and the door closed behind us.

The first thing I saw was shelves upon shelves with an odd assortment of items. Daggers and swords, pottery and even an electric guitar.

“Sweet axe, I could totally rock stairway to heaven on that thing.” Astragoth pointed to the guitar.

“Keep your hands off the merchandise.” She barked and ge straightened. “Now come dear, you must tell me what you have been up to.” She settled on the counter like a bird of prey, smiling at Jelmak but eyeing the two of us warningly.

“You will never believe it, but we are the minions of a powerful demon lord!” The little demon waved his hands in the air.

“Demon lord you say, what happened to your accursed master?” She asked, perplexed.

“Got himself whacked, probably by our new boss.” Astragoth chimed in, making poses in front of a full-length decorative mirror.

“Beware, objects may look bigger then they appear.” She gestured down south.

“It’s big enough baby.” He grinned, thrusting at the mirror.

Juvenile demons, I was surrounded by them. Finding a chair I sat down to wait, letting the first orders chat.

“So your working for a big shot demon lord, what’s the name. I know some big shots.”

“Lord Asmordis, have you heard of him?” He asked, expectantly.

She shook her head. “Can’t sat I have, but the Abyss is a big place, could be hundreds of unknown big shots out there.” She explained and we all nodded.

“So what happened?” She asked, putting her chin on her hands, listening.

“Well we got summoned to the material plane. Some castle and we helped our master allies fight off an undead horde!” Jelmak spread his stunted little arms as far as he could, trying to convey the size of the army.

“Unlife, yikes. Don’t want to fight those guys.” She said, disgusted.

“Yeah not very pleasant but I met some cool vampires and a necromancer. They were pretty helpful, they were even on our side.” He explained, much to her confusion.

“Necromancer and a vampire on your side. That’s very strange, weren’t the unlife the enemy here?”

Jelmak nodded before tilting his head to the side. “Yes technically, but our master’s allies had a necromancer helping them. His name was Belus I think and that vampire defected from the enemy army to our side.” He explained before pausing. “Then we had this epic battle where we used the masters magic wands to blast the undead army to bits before we came down and crushed them.” The demon gestured here and there, trying to play-act fighting.

“Must have been quite the fun time. Invite me some times, it could be a date.” She winked and again Jelmak blushed.

I shook my head, ignoring the two as they continued chatting about mundane stuff. I tuned them out as I waited. Astragoth was looking around the store, probably casing the joint for a heist. I mean I don’t know.

Several D-Hours passed and a figure slowly phased back into existence. I turned to them, noticing their features. The demon was a she, based on the lithe figure. She had red skin and bat wings. Probably second order, maybe third.

Her curvaceous hourglass form was covered in patches of red scales, her spade-tipped tail whipped back and forth as she stretched. Once she locked her cat-like eyes upon me, I felt my heart skip.

She smiled, tilting her head adorably. “Who are you handsome?” And the moment she spoke, I swear I fell in love.