Geller'rekt kneaded his temples, his eyes closed as he tried to suppress the building headache.

In front of him, Kalofick nervously waited for his reaction, rocking back and forth on his scaled heels. "Uhm." He gargled questioningly. "Ish everytink okey?"

Geller'rekt very slowly rose his head to look at Kalofick, placing his palms on the desk as he did. "Is everything okay?"

Kalofick bobbed his head nervously, and Geller'rekt rose to his feet, carefully pushing his chair back. "Is everything okay? You are aware that you just gave me the information that not only is quite possibly the most dangerous individual Hell has ever seen still alive and thriving and that he intends to use his abilities for the sole purpose of annihilating every demon in existence, but that he has teamed up with a bloody Paladin!?"

Thinking for a moment, Kalofick nodded again, and Geller'rekt's expression darkened. The imp immediately began shaking his head violently, and Geller'rekt collapsed back into his chair. "By all the angels, Kalofick, you've got to be the stupidest thing I've ever met."

The imp winced. Bringing angels into the mix was a bad idea far more often than not, and he was sure that Geller'rekt was more than aware of the fact. Hopefully, he asked, "We couldsh kill 'im."

Geller'rekt glared at him. "Can we? In all seriousness, you two-horned excuse for a flying trashcan, can we!? He has killed more than a hundred demons with his bare hands, and who knows how many with those strange weapons of his! At this point I wouldn't be surprised if he turned out to be immortal!"

Backtracking, Kalofick said confidently, "We can ashk Envy!"

The secretary snorted loudly. "Envy? Since when has Envy given a filthy piece of crap about what happens here? So long as she can sit on her hoard and watch the Overworld for any news about new trinkets, she won't get involved. No, what we need is a plan that doesn't involve her. Or any of the Nine, preferably. The odds are good that they'd destroy most of Brimstone in the process."

Kalofick frowned, then tried, "Make him leave?"

Geller'rekt rolled his eyes, picking up a single die and tossing it between his long, delicate fingers. "And how would you suggest that? It's the ideal option, of course, but it's not as though we can talk to the Doom Guy. He's ripped anyone that tried to pieces."

The imp's head was beginning to hurt. "...Kill 'im?"

Geller'rekt flinched noticeably, squeezing the single die in his left hand as he closed his eyes, gripping the desk with his right hand hard enough to leave marks and turn his pointy knuckles white. "Kalofick, I truly believe that sometimes, your stupidity scares me. How have you survived this long?"

Kalofick stood up proudly. "Died a lot, then died in front of Qagth'rak! He likesh me. Shays I makesh him feel smarter by exishting."

The secretary huffed amusedly, muttering, "Yes, I can imagine. I don't suppose you have any more ideas rolling around that brick of a head?"

Kalofick saluted happily, the insult making a low whistle as it went over his head. "Yesh! Shlave him!"

Stolen novel; please report.

Geller'rekt had just taken a sip of a somewhat sludgy drink in a mug proclaiming his status as 'Hell's Best Secretary' when Kalofick said the words, and he promptly spat it into the imp's startled face. As the unperturbed Kalofick began gladly licking the bittersweet drink off his face, Geller'rekt leaned forward. "Do you have any idea of how bad of an idea that is!? He's a human! Can you imagine the havoc he'd wreak if he saw the human trafficking? The gladiatorial arenas? He'd level Brimstone in an hour!"

Kalofick finished cleaning his head off, and returned his attention to Geller'rekt. "Shorry, whut?"

Staring blankly at the imp, Geller'rekt breathed in, an unsteady inhalation of air. Then he considered screaming. Probably very loudly.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The soldier was extremely happy.

As the mob of desperate demons sprinted towards him, he yanked the pin out of a grenade and shoved the pin through the chin of one of them. Lifting the enemy bodily into the air, the grenade pin thoroughly embedded in the demon's mouth, the soldier hurled it at the crowd. Turning, he seized one of the smaller ones and shoved the grenade down its throat, then tossed it into the fray. The explosion came a moment later, and bodies went flying. Behind his helmet, the soldier beamed.

Ch-BOOM!

Aliss sailed over the soldier's head with an enormous grin on her face, the colossal shield strapped to her left arm and a semi-automatic shotgun in her right hand. Lowering her shoulder, she sprinted forward with the shield, literally crushing everything in her path and blasting everything that wasn't in her path.

Extending the brand-new blade mounted to his left forearm, the soldier fired the grappling hook from his right, and its razor-claws sank into the torso of one of the larger demons, a fireball sputtering out of existence in its palm as it tried to extract the metal. Planting his feet, the soldier twisted and brought his arm over his head, and the grappling hook tautened instantly. Soaring through the air, the demon managed a surprised expression before the soldier cut it in half.

The soldier almost laughed, but the sound died in his throat, and he ended up coughing instead. Shaking it away with a slight tinge of disappointment, the soldier paced onward.

The blood was almost at his shins now, and he wanted more.

One of the medium-sized demons, the ones with long horns and claws that liked to hurl fireballs, lunged at him, and he grabbed it by the throat. Placing his other hand between its spiraling horns, the soldier ripped the demon's head off. As the body collapsed to the ground, spewing blood, the soldier appraised the decapitated head. It was in pretty good condition as far as he was concerned. Maybe he'd keep this one.

Shrugging, he tossed it aside. There was something he wanted to try.

Raising his hands, he summoned the minigun and dismissed it instantly. Focusing on the image in his mind, the soldier concentrated and felt a sudden dip in that strange energy in the back of his head.

Gray sparks of light began forming in his hands, spreading outward and forming a familiar shape, one he'd used a long time ago. A bulky area under his left hand, a dense steel handle curving into his palm as a trigger nudged against his right thumb. Three long cylinders took place, each one with three barrels. All nine of them were secured with a pair of metal circles holding them in place, and the soldier's arms barely dipped as its immense weight hit him.

The soldier grinned. Now, this was a chaingun!

Holding down the trigger, the soldier checked the streak counter in the top right of his HUD. Currently, it was at a hundred and forty-nine. That was probably enough to keep him going for a while - this thing ate bullets like a bull at a salad buffet.

The barrels started spinning up, and the ground started to rattle, the calf-deep blood shaking and undulating as a horrendous clanking noise made itself heard. With the barrel of her shotgun shoved in the mouth of one of the smaller demons, Aliss turned and laughed manically. "Haha, I want one!"

The soldier opened fire, and basically everything in front of him for a good two hundred feet was sawed in half by the screaming rain of bullets that erupted from the already red-hot barrels of the chattering chaingun. He could feel his bones rattling from the endless fire, all the way from his boots to his teeth, but he was having too much fun to stop.

He was having too much fun to ever stop.