Once the white hot pain subsided, I looked down at my chest and saw a similar raised brand-like mark that Cain had. The mark itself must have embedded itself under my skin and the skin healed over it. I pulled out sword Steve and tried to impale myself through the stomach with him. Nothing happened. Sword Steve was hot and sharp, but he did nothing to my skin. It didn't even hurt. It just felt like warm pressure.

"Dave! Don't do that! That's dangerous!" Margaret said.

"Margaret, I'm fine. I'm invincible now. Nothing can hurt me, except your disappointment," I said.

"Ok, I'll try not to be as disappointed in you as I have been lately," she said, pushing her lips out in a goofy way.

"Thank you. You have no idea how much that means to me," I said, smiling with my eyes closed. I looked down at the mark on my chest. "I wonder if this is removable. Samael did magic to it to make it come off Cain. Do you think the magic has to be done every time or just the once to make it removable?"

"Considering how much magic it probably took to remove, I'd hope it was just the once. I don't want to be single in the afterlife because my partner can't die," she said.

"Me neither. Should I wait until the world isn't in danger to try to remove it?" I said.

"What, you want to keep me in suspense? I'd kick you in the balls if I thought it would actually hurt you," she said, hands on hips.

"That's funny. It might actually feel good now," I laughed.

"Which is why I'm keeping my feet on the ground," she said. She waited a few seconds. "Are you going to take the thing off or not?"

"Hold your horses, lady! Give me a second before I 'kali ma' my chest open," I said.

I placed my fingers on the outside of the mark and tried to grab it through my skin. It had hard edges, like it really was an object embedded under my skin. I pulled at it and the skin slowly opened and revealed the mark, allowing me to remove it.

I dropped it on the ground because it was burning my hand. "Ow! I guess I can remove it."

The skin over my chest was smooth and unmarked. So the mark was only temporary. And it could be removed, but not quickly or easily. Like in the middle of a fight. I'd have to be restrained and my opponent would need to know I had it and where it was located on my body.

I had a weird thought. What if I put it somewhere no one would think to look? Like my perineum. No that would just be too weird. Right? Or would it?

No, I couldn't do that. Not only would it just be strange, it would also be incredibly uncomfortable and hurt a lot to put on and take off. Over the heart would have to be good enough.

As long as I wore a shirt, Samael wouldn't know where it was. And he'd actually have to know it was removable. I could just pretend that it wasn't. That's what I would do. It was decided.

"Phew! That's a relief," Margaret said, wiping her brow. "It's good to know you'll be able to die when the time comes."

"In any other context, that would sound very strange," I said, smiling.

"Even in this context, it does," she said, laughing.

I looked into her beautiful, empty black eyes and said, "I love you."

"Aw, honey. I love you too," she said, kissing me.

We held the kiss for longer than we probably should have in an office environment, but it felt nice. Get off my back.

"Ok. Now let's get to the getting," I said. "Which sin should I focus on to activate a new power for my fight with Samael?"

"I was thinking wrath," Margaret said while picking a white fuzzy off her pantsuit jacket. "It's the most likely to give you some sort of offensive power you can use to fight. You'll just have to be careful to not let it take over. Since you'll probably have to maintain the feeling behind the sin for the entire time you're fighting, that's a real risk."

"Right. That's a good point. Ok, here I go. Wrath. Come on, wrath!" I said, trying and failing to get angry on command. I looked at Margaret. "It didn't work."

"Ok, let me try," she said, blowing the hair off her face. "You have a small penis, Dave!"

"That's not going to work. It's just blatantly not true," I said.

"Hey, Nimby, Dave has a small penis!" Margaret said.

Nimby came out of the kitchen and looked confused at Margaret. "What do you mean? You can literally see it's not small right now. Just look at the bulge in his pants. Dude's packing heat."

What the fuck? I looked down at my pants. She was right. You could actually see the bulge of my dick through my pants. I quickly covered it with my hands. "Stop that! Stop looking at my dick!"

"Nimby, we're trying to make Dave angry so he can activate the wrath power of his crown of corruption," Margaret said.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

"Oh!" Nimby said. "I can do that." She pointed at me. "Dave, you have a small pee pee!"

"No, I don't!" I said. "Stop saying that!" I was still covering my crotch with my hands. I needed looser pants.

"Steve's, tell Dave he has a small weiner," Margaret said.

"Ok," the Steves said. "Dave, you have a small weiner!"

"Seriously, stop saying that!" I said. I was starting to feel hot. Not like the blood was rushing to my face hot either. I mean, like, really hot.

"Everyone, together!" Margaret yelled.

"Dave has a small dick!"

"Dave's weiner is smaller than my pinky!"

"Dave, you weiner! You're small!" the Steves said.

"That doesn't even make sense!" I said, holding my head. This was getting on my nerves.

"Small weiner!"

"Small!"

"Penis!"

"I said, stop!!!!" I yelled.

Fire erupted from my body, melting the linoleum flooring.

"Ha! See! It worked!" Margaret jumped for joy. Then she looked at the floor. "We might need new flooring. Preferably fire resistant."

"Yeah, I guess it did," I said, still kind of angry. "And yes we do."

I looked down at my arms and hands. My clothes weren't burning off. The fire was being generated an inch away from the surface of my body. The flames were black with red tips. I'd never seen anything like it.

"What is this?" I asked, looking at the flames dance in wonder.

"That would most likely be hellfire," Margaret said. "I've only read about it though. I've never actually seen it in person. Not even Lucifer could directly summon hellfire. Hellfire is supposed to just be a naturally occurring phenomenon that is generated deep in the depths of Hell. A person is not actually supposed to be able to summon it. This is historic!"

"I'm glad you're pleased with yourself, but I can feel my anger starting to subside," I said, watching the flames getting smaller until they disappeared.

"Hmm. You're going to have to learn how to control your anger, mister!" she said.

"I don't think generating anger is what most people mean when they talk about controlling anger. It's generally advised to not get angry," I said.

"Well, you're going to have to learn how if you want to defeat Samael!" she yelled.

I winced. "Is the yelling really necessary?"

"No. I'm just trying to help you get angry," she said, innocently.

"Thank you, Margaret, but I think I need to learn how to generate it internally. Having it generated externally felt bad. Like I was going to lose control and accidentally kill you all," I said, scratching the back of my neck. "I don't want that, so please just speak normally. No more teasing."

"Yes, dear," she said. "Maybe meditation will help."

"Anger meditation. Interesting. I guess it couldn't hurt to try," I said, shrugging.

"Hey, Dave," Gilbert said.

"Yeah?" I asked.

"I just wanted to remind you I'm here, too. And I didn't make fun of your penis. I think it's a very nice penis," Gilbert said, giving me a thumbs up.

It felt like he was trying to smile, but he literally couldn't. He didn't have lips or even a face anymore. I never thought about how inconvenient that could be. He couldn't express any emotions through facial features, because he had none.

"Thanks, Gilbert. Do you eat?" I said.

"I can't. I don't have any of the organs required anymore. With sufficient life force, I could regenerate my organs, but right now, I'm just a skeleton barely keeping itself together through magic," he said.

Technically, he didn't even have vocal chords. I suppose he was talking through magic, too.

"What's your story?" I asked, genuinely curious. He was the first lich I had ever run into. I had seen several necromancers, but none that went all the way with it, so to speak.

"Oh, it's long and full of disappointment. You don't want to hear it right now. I'll hold on to it until it's relevant," he said, waving me off with a skeletal hand.

"Suit yourself," I said. That was fair. Maybe he had a dark and haunted backstory. I wouldn't begrudge him for keeping things close to the chest. Not everyone was as open to being judged to their face like I was.

"Thank you. I can promise you I'm not keeping anything secret that would harm you in any way," he said, holding my hand in his skeletal ones.

"I appreciate that, and I trust you. So you can reanimate dead bodies, right? I mainly wanted to recruit you so you could keep my army going when bodies started dropping. Not to be too morbid about it," I said, wincing.

"I figured. That's a big concern in a major battle. Yes, I can do that. It's slow, but I don't have capacity limits if that's what you're wondering," he said. "It's more like a blessing that just kind of takes a certain amount of time to activate and then just goes forever if that makes sense."

"That does make sense, and I like that more than the alternative. Capacity limits would be really concerning in a battle with hundreds of bodies," I said.

"Me too. Technically, you can train the magic to work either way, and I chose the slow but methodical way that doesn't have limits rather than the fast and limited version. The idea of limits in general makes me feel caged, and I don't like it," Gilbert said.

"That's understandable. I feel similarly. I'd rather be limitless with downsides than be limited with no downsides," I said, thinking about my new wrath abilities.

"I can see that. Your abilities seem rather formidable. I'm a little jealous. I've spent centuries cultivating my talents and here you are with unimaginable power in the matter of a few years," he said.

"All power comes with consequences. The greater the power, the greater the consequences. I'm sure you can appreciate that, being someone who sacrificed his dick for immortality," I said.

"Hey. Temporarily. I temporarily sacrificed it for immortality. I will get it back one day. Just you wait. And on that day I may not fuck, but I will use it one way or another," he said.

I waved my hand in front of me. "Fair enough. Say no more."

"So I may be able to help you with your predicament," he said.

"Really? How so?" I asked, curious how he could help me with my hellfire impotence.

"Think of something that frustrates you endlessly, but only so much that it doesn't put you over the edge. Then focus and ruminate on that until you can maintain a steady amount of controlled frustration," he said.

"Interesting. How did you come up with this idea?" I said.

"That's how I regulate the magical energies required for my necromantic techniques," he said matter-of-factly.

"Oh. That makes sense, I guess. Let me try it," I said. I thought about the one thing that frustrated me most often, but never enough to lose control of my actions and behaviors. The fact that I couldn't keep Margaret happy all the time.

I could make her happy at times. I could even make her happy most of the time, but I couldn't keep her happy. Inevitably, I would do something or say something to upset her and it would throw me out of wack.

I wanted so badly to be perfect for her. To be the man she needed all the time. I hated upsetting her, but no matter how hard I tried, I would always mess up, eventually.

I knew that was part of my hubris. Something I needed to learn to accept, but I didn't want to. I wanted to be perfect. I needed to be perfect. I would be perfect. Nothing could stop me.

It was in that moment I opened my eyes and realized I was surrounded by black and red flames. Hmm. Maybe this whole wrath thing wasn't all bad. I now had the power to take my frustrations out on my enemies and hurt them as badly as I hurt inside.

And yes, that was an incredibly fucked up thought to have, but I didn't care. I was strong. I was invincible. And that's all that mattered.