There was a point in my career as a Demon Hunter where word started getting around that I was bad news. And not as in a 'I brought the mood of the party down' way. More like a hurricane or other natural disaster. Demons had come across the landmarks turned to ash by my brief visits, and I had become folklore. There was a danger in becoming famous within the Lowers - and for every clan or demonic type that would scarper at the mention of my name, there would be two others looking to pick the meat from my bones and use my head as a trophy. If they could.

Amber washed over me as I stepped into the Lowers. It had become routine now, like stepping into the bathroom every morning. Slightly different ambient temperature and color hues, but just a part of normality. The looming structure in front of me was different, in that most of it appeared to be underground. Hardly loomed at all, in fairness.

Wight pooled in beside me and I handed him his knife.

//Visual clear.

“Audio clear.” I worked my jaw.

//Audio confirmed. Target is within that building, will update you as we get closer.

I held my hand up to thank the ethereal voice overhead, watching us. With my eyes closed and my focus concentrated, I could make out the thread - the connection that joined Rodney’s tech to my current position. There were currently no others spying in on us, but I would keep my mind open to spot if the Org wanted a look in on their new toy soldier.

[Let us proceed, Eric. I hunger for success.]

Although my feet began walking, my eyebrow raised towards my patron. He had been a little unstable as of late, and I wondered if it had anything to do with the amount of power he had been expending.

[Just so that you are aware, Domains are a once per day thing.]

“Understood.” The fishy Hunter was this morning, so that ruled out that power for this encounter. Looking up at the amber skies, I had no idea how to even tell the time in a place like this.

The hot gravel beneath my feet crunched as I got closer on what looked like the backside of a skyscraper that instead went down into the ground instead of into the air. Why I assumed this based on what I could currently see, I wasn’t sure. There was just an element of knowing. Things looked wrong enough to paint a picture of what it wasn’t.

“Do we want to go nicely through the front door, or just carve a hole in the back and drop in?”

[The choice is yours, Eric. How are you feeling?]

After killing the Hunter and then Isaac, I kind of wanted things to feel like they were okay, and that I wasn’t turning into a monster. However, I had also watched enough old action movies in my youth to want to pretend I was an action hero when the opportunity presented itself. Fight my way down a tunnel into Hell? Ever-increasing danger floor by floor? Target probably at the bottom - count me in.

“Around we go.” I smiled as my obsidian mask and gloves pooled over my body like mist.

My patron just nodded as we headed around the side of the building - it was a good eighty feet square, nowhere near the size of the nightclub, but a little less compact than the usual apartments we had fought devils in previously. It was more of an office block - another intrusive thought that didn’t hold any visual weight due to there being no windows around either side we had witnessed.

//Two hostiles guarding the entrance, top floor has four more guards. All Level Two demons.

Piece of cake. I almost felt bad for the demons. Actually, nowhere close to it. If anything, they were lucky that I-

//Target emerging on the top floor. Moving toward the entrance.

My brow furrowed, and I sidled up against the wall, Wight doing the same behind me. We shuffled alongside the stone until we got to the corner.

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//Target exiting building.

“Fuck, man. Can’t believe they only give us one smoking break.”

“Keep your lips shut, Dreba.”

//Target moving toward you.

I was furious, and the revolver shook in my hand. The target was coming closer to me? I hadn’t even fired off a shot or broken a limb yet. I exhaled at the sheer audacity of it.

//Contact.

The sound of footsteps approached the corner, accompanied by the murmurs of someone unable to get their lighter to light. Then the figure stepped out in front of us.

He frowned in shock at seeing Wight and I just hiding about, and then I pulled him by his shirt, tripping him so that he landed on my patron’s blade. The bird-demon cut through Dreba’s throat before he could yell out, and then I twisted his neck with a grinding snap.

//Target neutralized… Quest complete. No threats. Return when ready.

“No, no, no,” I hissed up at the sky behind us. “How many demons are in this tower?” Underground tower, but I wasn’t about to ruin my vocabulary for it.

//Standby… two-hundred-thirty, approximately.

“How many floors, and what’s at the bottom?”

Wight kneeled down beside the dead target and started to poke at him with the knife.

//Twenty floors, a… Level Eight demon, unknown type. Please advise, Eric?

I stretched out my trigger finger. It wasn’t fair to call it itchy, but there was certainly a scratch that I need to carve through this building. Nothing to do with it resembling the old office block that I used to work at. Nothing at all.

“Quest is complete, correct? This is off the clock, then. Let’s give Passage a bit more of a test run.”

There were a few moments of silence, where either the Blank was trying to get the green light from the Org, his demon, or perhaps his own sanity. Eventually, just as I thought about going on without him, he responded.

//Org has nothing further for you today… so we are here. All green.

All green, and things were about to be all red. All Redd - yeah, that sounded better. I put that in my notes for later. I raised an eyebrow to Wight, and he looked up from mutilating the corpse.

[While these demons are usually not worth your time, I believe this will be a good chance to blow off steam.]

Not like I didn’t spend half my waking hours shooting demons, but I wanted to carve that tumor out from the bottom of the tower. Perhaps some part of my brain wanted to erase some old memories. I’d let it - it sounded fun.

I stepped around the corner of the building and fired two shots off. Pegged each guard through the head. Despite wearing some form of armor, it wasn’t too useful in protecting their craniums - which was crazy because that’s where the important stuff is held.

My right eye twitched as I approached the automatic sliding doors. Too on the nose.

//Back right: hostile is going for the alarm.

blew through the door, sending shards of glass clattering across the dark marbled flooring of the foyer. The two devils on the left had also met the beam, and what was left of their bodies slumped to the floor. Another shot to the leg of the closest on the right, then a follow-up to the forehead as he buckled.

I held my revolver level at the last one on this floor - a bearded guard, panic across his ruddy skin as he pulled at an alarm. A smile was etched on my mask, crimson teeth below my bright red eyes. I didn’t pull the trigger.

With a clunk, the alarm was raised. Immediately, the floor was painted in deep red emergency lights that rotated. The doorway behind me started to block out any natural light as thick metal shutters began to lower over the exit. A noise blared through the floors below, a siren call readying the monsters in the deep that their end was soon approaching.

Wight ran up and tackled the last guard as the devil tried to withdraw his weapon, the bird-man stabbing downward repeatedly on the collapsing figure.

//Neutralized. Eight approaching stairs, four coming up the elevator. Elevator devils are level five.

I turned my eyes, joy burning away beneath the crimson glow, to see the metal doors on the opposite wall where the elevator would stop. A runic symbol in pixelated green hung over the middle and changed every couple of seconds.

bore a foot-wide hole through the top of the door and through whatever cable mechanism held the rising box up. An elevator seemed like cheating. I didn’t want to make this any easier for me. Or them.

//Elevator is now… descending.

The doorway to the stairwell burst open and the devils ran through. and then I emptied the rest of the cylinder. Shouldn’t stack up. I strode over to the true hell - stairs - and peered down.

Wight finished off the injured demons, slitting their throats and piercing their hearts.

//Next floor has thirty hostiles.

I spun the gun as I continued down the stairs. A single plain doorway was the only thing holding me back from going onto this floor, or the stairs continued downward. There was only one option, really.

My boot kicked the door wide open to reveal what appeared to be an open plan office. There were no working computers, just a weird facsimile of office life, as if they were going through the motions for some sick reason.

Dozens of eyes glared at me, as the devils within brought up melee weapons.

Cool energy alongside the flutter of feathers flowed down my arm. I smiled and raised my death-dealer toward those totally out of their depth.

Perhaps this was what it felt like to be a demon.