Hell, Plains of Torment, Ingress Control Division.
----------------------------------------
Hell was a business unlike any other, but with many similarities. One might think Hell opposed the Heavens but that dichotomy was far from the truth. Hell was the counterpart to the Heavens, the janitor, plumbing, and waste disposal that allowed the Pearly Gates to remain unblemished and in a state of eternal party.
Souls were indestructible, a fact the denizens of the Lower Realm exploited very well. They were born in the Guf, descended upon the material worlds, became flesh, then died. But where did these souls go after death? In some worlds, they recycled them, rejecting brand new souls and reincarnating what they had. But most worlds were integrated with Hell and sent there the souls their own versions of the Divine Afterlife rejected.
From these rejected souls, Hell extracted precious magical power and sold it at a discount to several worlds. Theirs was a business in constant expansion. As the Universe expanded, more and more worlds were created and these worlds were a lush market for the demons.
Sometimes they expanded through trade, through agreements of mutual benefit. Some worlds refused to accept the infernal benedictions and these were slated for aggressive takeover. Somewhere in the multiverse, they were having problems with a specific world where an envoy from a Nordic deity blocked their invasion efforts but this is another story.
At the ICD, they kept a tight tally of the souls arriving for their due punishment. Accountants and mathematicians with minor offenses usually worked overtime here, their punishment the eternal counting and assigning of the new souls. One such day, a soul went missing, the first in decades.
The issue was raised to the second-level support, where they recounted the souls coming from Earth that day. Lo and behold it came off by exactly one, belonging to someone called Catherine Wallenstein, guilty of suicide and murder.
Like any business, some articles were more valuable than others. An accountant that just did some tax fraud was condemned to hell just because of a minor legal twist. Since they stole from the country, they were guilty of theft from every single citizen of that nation. The number of minor theft offenses doomed them to an eternity pushing numbers. “Eternity” being the marketing term for their stay in hell. It wasn’t truly forever but a long enough time that nobody really cared about that technicality.
Taking a sentient life was a major sin on Earth. These souls could be tormented for more energy and were highly valued by the demons. After the second-level support confirmed the slip, they raised the issue to the Department of Repossession.
Very few worlds allowed demons to freely come and go. Some allowed them to stay but usually were antagonized by the mortal races. Earth, specifically, disallowed demons even if someone attempted to summon them. One of the few opportunities hell had to send someone up and cause some havoc was exactly when a soul managed to evade punishment. It fell to the Department of Repossession to send an agent up into the material world to take the escapee back to Hell.
The DR agents had a queue to answer a call. Since these slips are rare and far between, these demons usually roamed Hell and the connected worlds, causing mischief wherever they went. That day, it fell to Rorgramathan, a “hulking creation of death and fury” as stated on his resume. A summoning spell whisked Rorgramathan away from wherever he was back to the DR.
Rorgramathan’s most remarking features, according to himself, was his two pitch-black obsidian eyes “from which light could not escape”. Adorning his chunky head, two curved horns with cracks running all over them gave him the semblance of a bloated cross between a goat and an anteater. A long and dangly nose ended in two nostrils that ejected tongues of flame every now and then. His body was vast and blubbery, his folds of greasy flesh giving him great defense against physical attacks. Lightning crackled between the skin and long, thick coarse strands of hair that protruded from anywhere on his body. He despised physical attacks but wasn’t defenseless. He had a long vine-like tail ending on a barbed tip that secreted a sticky acidic goo.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
“Who dares summon me!” Rorgramathan bellowed as the spell cut his fun time short.
“Work!” The chief of the DR slammed his hand over the demon. “We have a runaway soul on Earth.”
Rorgramathan deadpanned. “Earth? THE Earth?”
“Yes, you dumb fat ass. Don’t make me repeat myself. Centuries without anyone going up there, and you of all demons is the one going. Damned God of Abraham. I added our last report about Earth’s conditions there.”
Going to a material world was a great opportunity to corrupt souls and gain more power for a demon. It was wasted on Rorgramathan, according to most other demons that knew him but Hell wasn’t a place of Chaos. It was even more orderly than the Heavens, the eternal fowl party, and pillow fight, what with all the feathers the angels shed during millennia. The queue was absolute. Rorgramathan would either recover Catherine Wallenstein’s soul or fail and lose a great deal of power upon his return.
“Huh. Feudal with weak magic,” Rorgramathan mumbled as he read the report. “Are you sure this is accurate? This report is rather old.”
“It’s the best we have. Once you return victorious, you can submit an update. Great idea, me,” the DR boss said. “I’m adding this to your assignment.”
“Huh, boss, why don’t we ask the condemned souls that come from there?” Rorgramathan suggested.
The boss laughed so loudly he burst into flames. It took him a long while to recompose himself. Literally and figuratively. “Ah, Rorgramathan, always the jester. Look, you stupid blob of fat. Souls condemned to Hell are all liars and con men. They would tell you anything you want so they can lessen their torment. And less torment means less power extracted from them. Are you willing to do such a charitable act?”
Rorgramathan snorted. “No.”
“They get your fat ass on the teleportation circle. I’m using a ridiculous amount of magical power to send you to Earth. Beware of silver, holy water, and crosses. These are the main items against demons in the place you’ll go. It’s all in the report but I know you just skimmed it, so here’s me doing a favor for you.”
Rorgramathan cursed. He indeed had just skimmed the report, and now he owed his boss a favor. Demons were worse than lawyers when sticking to contracts.
He sauntered into the spell circle, telling himself it would be easy. New York was a small dutch settlement that was recently taken over by the English, a small village with less than twenty thousand people. With what little magic people had access to, he could easily corrupt souls by trading them for magic powers. After all, that’s what the last demon in the region, Greyorg’burroughazam did and he was wildly successful. He even masqueraded as a member of the clergy to then kill the people who sold the souls to him, cashing in his side of the bargain for basically free as the mortals barely had the time to use the magic gifted to them.
The guy lived a lush life after returning to hell. That was Rorgramathan’s game plan.
----------------------------------------
The demon appeared in the middle of a castle courtyard. Or what, to Rorgramathan, looked like a castle. He was surrounded by tall towers with colorful displays, obvious signs the lord of this castle had a powerful mage at his service. He looked around, slowly moving his blubbery body to turn around. People in all sorts of clothes walked around, some of them sending bursts of light at him from slabs of colored metal.
He didn’t expect to appear in such a crowded place.
“Dude, what a rad cosplay!” Someone clearly inebriated shouted at him. He looked like a pirate. “Aren’t you feeling hot in that suit? I’m sweating just by looking at you.”
It was bad. He could sense silver from one of the man’s rings. He could also sense the general direction to his mark. North. But the real reason it was bad was that demons needed a modicum of secrecy to operate. Out in the open, humans usually hunted them down despite being weaker. Quantity indeed had its own quality. The demon decided to shapeshift and disappear. A cloud of brimstone fumes covered his form as he turned into a bat and flew away.
He also ruined a cosplay convention at Times Square but Rorgramathan never learned that.