Mammon sighed for the sixth time that day. Yes, Hell’s never looked better, he’s at the top of the food chain, and his power and influence haven’t stopped growing ever since the start of the 20th century. But for the CEO of Hell’s Department of Greed, it felt hollow. It felt like he’s already won, and all that’s left was just looking at the numbers rise. How can Greed thrive when there is nothing else to take?
Every day there are new records of human souls collected, more politicians corrupted, the gap between the rich and the poor increasing to never-before-seen levels. Yet for all those accolades that his underlings are more than happy to celebrate, it was all meaningless for the one in charge.
There was no challenge anymore. Mammon remembered having to work his tail off trying to climb to the position he was at now, and although he suffered more than a few setbacks, he remembered the journey fondly. Every day back then was a puzzle, he had to use his wits and demonic intelligence to outsmart his competition and gather souls the old way: contracts.
Now those were the days! Back when giving someone power meant more than just doing some internet research and launching a smear campaign, when wealth was still calculated in coin and precious metals instead of digital numbers in a bank account. He missed getting his hands dirty to fulfill his end of the contract and extracting the souls of the fools who dared summon him.
Nowadays even the extraction process is automated. Nothing was hands-on. And so, Mammon sat on his throne, his empire growing faster than he’d ever seen it, yet all he did was sit back and watch as his work was completed without his input. He couldn’t even find a reason to torture his minions these days, since most of them have been replaced with computers and automata.
Mammon sighed again.
He was bored, and he really didn’t want to go around his layer of Hell for the tenth time checking to see how productive everyone was. He already knew the answer, just as he did the last time he had done so. Mammon was just about to get up from his throne when he felt a very minute sensation. It was faint, like holding your hands close to a live wire. Mammon thought that he probably would have never even noticed it had his mind not been so utterly empty of sensation.
And more importantly, this was a familiar sensation, one that he hadn’t felt in nearly a thousand years. A small smile was creeping up on the demon’s wicked features. Yes, it was faint, but this was definitely the sensation of a summons. He focused his attention on that feeling, trying to see what fool tried to summon him in this day and age, and found something strange.
The summoning was weak, too weak even if it was done improperly by a complete amateur. But more importantly, the summoning location felt off. It was distant, much too distant even when he considered hell’s relative location to Earth. Now Mammon had heard of rumors amongst the Demon nobility of other planes of existence, it was the leading theory as to where Lucifer had disappeared off to, but he had dismissed those ideas as pure fantasy.
Yet something about this particular summoning made him second guess that theory. Was this a call to a different world? One that was hopefully free of the modern conveniences that plagued him every day? He had hoped so, because as unlikely as this idea was, Mammon had long grown tired of his current life as the ruler of all Greed. He had no love for the empire he created.
So without a second of hesitation, Mammon decided to trust his instincts for once and latched on to the faint summonings. He almost grinned as the familiar sensation of being forcibly dragged away from Hell engulfed his body, even though he had always hated the summoning process. Any change was a good thing for the CEO of Hell.
* * *
The disorientation lasted longer than usual when Mammon finally arrived at the other side of the summons. He had to take a moment to compose himself as the pain of rematerialization slowly disappeared, it was something that he could never get used to. Yet despite this, the smile Mammon had never left, because the first thing he noticed was that this new place was devoid of the annoying interference of technology.
The Earth was polluted with radio waves, wifi signals, satellite relays, and everything in between. The humans with their limited senses were oblivious to these signals, but to Mammon’s senses, they were a headache-inducing drone of white noise. Yet here, in this tiny little cellar, there was not even the smallest hint of that usual static.
Which was the next thing the demon noticed. He was in a dirty underground room, faint torchlight illuminated the circle he was in, and everything had the damp taste of mold and decay. In front of him, lying sprawled on the ground in fear, was the summoner in question. He looked to be a youth, perhaps no more than 12 or 13 years of age. He had mousy brown hair that looked like it hadn’t been washed for years, while the rags that he wore looked like they had been used for longer than the boy had been alive.
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But more importantly was the confinement circle that Mammon was “trapped” in. It was some of the most amateur work that he had ever seen; just a cursory glance showed more than 1624 different flaws in its design, and the demon feared that he would destroy it if he breathed too hard.
“Arkas stosta!” the boy said, before speaking more in a language that Mammon didn’t understand.
Mammon frowned. He was fairly certain that he knew every language in existence, which meant that his initial idea of being summoned to an entirely new plane was more and more credible. Yet it wouldn’t do if he couldn’t communicate with the locals. The demon concentrated his vision and really stared into the eyes of the boy who summoned him, and he saw the tell-tale sign of a blazing soul. Good, Mammon had feared that this strange new place would operate on entirely unfamiliar principles, but if these new humans had souls, then they had desires. And if they had desires, then Mammon could communicate with them.
He allowed the words to flow through him. The way that a language was spoken wasn’t important to him, but its meaning was. Mammon was certain that he could understand any speech if there was even a hint of need behind it, a potential for Greed to blossom, and so he waited patiently for the boy before him to speak.
Eventually, the unintelligible words coalesced into recognizable syllables, then into words, and finally into sentences. Mammon smiled, it seemed that the strange new world he found himself in followed enough of the old rules that he could operate.
“Can you hear me?” the boy said, his words finally understandable, “Did… did my ritual go wrong? M-my notes didn’t specify an elemental looking like that.”
An elemental? Was that what he thought he had summoned? But he clearly saw Mammon, and he doubted that anyone, no matter how ignorant or backward, could mistake his scaly legs, hoofed feet, and massive red body for anything other than a demon. That is, of course, assuming the idea of demons was well-known in this plane.
Mammon decided at that moment not to destroy the little summoner. No, what Mammon saw then was the beginning of a passion project, his very first project to celebrate his start in this new land. He was going to make a lord out of this boy, or perhaps something even greater. Yes, here was the perfect canvas for him to showcase his millennia of accumulated knowledge and power, He looked forward to what he could do with this lowborn nobody with no aspirations, no wealth, no power, but just that perfect amount of Greed.
“I apologize, young lordling,” Mammon said smoothly, “does this form displease you?”
He blushed, “I’m no lordling, I’m not much of anything… but you’ll stick out if you look like that.”
Mammon nodded and shifted into a more manageable form. He thought about the perfect guise to wear, something that would help properly motivate the young man. His body shrank down to approximately the same size as the boy before him, and he donned a body that was just slightly older than the boy’s.
Once his transformation was complete, Mammon looked like an androgynous young individual no older than his early teens. He had blood-red hair that ran down to his shoulders which framed a beautiful, angular face. He chose to clothe himself in a simple black robe, hoping it was a period-appropriate attire for this new world.
“Better?” Mammon asked, his voice now silky smooth that matched his visage, a huge contrast to his usual guttural growls, “Or would you like something a little more subtle?”
“N-no, thank you, sir, er, ma’am?”
Mammon, or demons in general really, had little need for the distinction of gender, with the sole exception of those weird Lust demons. Now Mammon understood full well that Lust had its proper place in demon society, and it made for a wonderful gateway sin for the vastly superior sin of Greed, but he could never understand those Succubi and Incubi that pursued nothing but Lust.
Mammon fashioned himself a man simply because it was the easiest gender to accumulate wealth and power for the longest time in history. Things had started to change with the modern world, not completely, but perhaps soon, but Mammon had seen little reason to change his looks or gender back then.
Here, however, in this unknown land, he chose a more neutral appearance. Mammon wasn’t sure if the dominant sex was male or female or anything in-between here, or if there was a dominant sex at all when it came to power, so he would use his current guise. He appeared as a slim, androgynous individual with shoulder-length, red hair. A loose robe draped his body that made the shape of his body ambiguous, great for when he needed to make minor changes in the future. The only thing striking about his features was his perfectly innocent face and playful smile.
After a moment of consideration, Mammon chose to incorporate a little more femininity in his appearance, with some slightly fuller lips, a rosier cheek, and a playful smile. After all, some slight flattery and flirting would do wonders to keep the boy off-kilter. It’d be a good tool to use before he understood more of the world he now inhabited.
“Use whatever pronoun you want, lordling,” Mammon smiled as he leaned in closer to the boy.
The boy stepped back instinctively before collecting himself. It seems like his subconscious still understood the danger that the demon possessed, even if his conscious mind didn’t understand a thing.
Confused, the boy pulled out a crumpled notebook from his pocket and checked its contents. Mammon noticed that although the book was in rough shape, it was unmistakably ancient. Far older than it had any right to be, considering the material it was printed on. Which begs the question, how did the boy get his hands on that?
“Um, it says that elementals are genderless, but it never says that they could take human shape…”
Ah, so that’s what the boy used to summon him here; Mammon will have to take a peek inside that journal to see just what was on it, because someone like the beggar boy beside him should not have the capabilities to call forth a being like him, much less so from an alternate plane of existence.
“Surely that information is incomplete,” Mammon answered with a mischievous smile, “You have the real thing in front of you, or would you like to look at me closer up and in more detail?”
The boy’s face turned a deep scarlet as he quickly shook his head, “No, uh, thank you. I um, I know enough.”
“If you say so,” the demon answered with a casual shrug, “So what did you call me for, lordling?”
“I said I’m not a lordling,” he muttered, “call me by my name, Wren.”
“Alright, sir Wren,” Mammon replied, “Once again, what did you call me for?”
He gave the demon a fiercely determined look before composing himself enough to speak, “I… I want revenge!”