On the third ring of The Spire, in the territory of Gaurush the Vast, near his disgusting castle of decadence, in one of the many spawning pits, there lies a clutch of eggs. Each of these eggs is pure white, a stark contrast to the gloomy gray walls of the pit they reside in. They are all perfectly round and twice as large as ostrich eggs. Hundreds of thousands of these eggs line the bottom of this perfectly circular pit, and in each one lies a demon whelp. The eggs are dormant, waiting, and soon the wait will be over and the great hatching will begin.
Suddenly a few of the eggs begin to rustle about, clacking against one another as the hellspawn inside begin to awaken.
Hearing the sounds of the eggs rumbling down below, a lanky, lean demon brandishing a spear. adorned in crude armor, peers over and sighs a breath of relief.
"Finally, thought this group would never get around ta hatchin'." The demon exclaims, he's been here on egg duty for quite a while and he can't wait to get back to the fray. He sits back down, lays his spear to the side, and waits for the eggs to hatch.
By now more of the eggs are rattling, bumping, and grinding against another. The tension in the air becomes so thick, one could tear right into it. These eggs are struggling so hard that some have even started hopping in place.
CRACK
One of the eggs has finally hatched, the perfect sphere has been punctured by a long spindly bit of flesh, sounds of crunching reverberate from within as the being inside eats the egg from inside out. Another egg soon joins in as more of the little buggers start to pry open their shells. Shards of eggshells crumble away as the first egg hatches, a small ball of flesh with several spindly little tentacles rolls out of its shell.
"RAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!" The slimy little flotsam screeches into the air, voicing out its birth to all those nearby.
The other eggs stop for a moment, as if to contemplate the meaning of the flesh orbs screams, and then start thrashing around even more! Another little beast soon finishes hatching and flails out to approach the other, it is a thin long tube of flesh with a hole full of teeth at the front. The little tube flings itself towards the slime ball but before impact finds itself impaled on the fleshy ones many protruding tentacles! Blood is splattered upon the ground and the wriggling little tube struggles before it is violently ripped apart and absorbed into the flesh orb, the orb grows a little wider and gains an additional limb, and shakes in ecstasy. The gore and fluids from the recent shredding coat the surrounding eggs, the eggs still for a moment before they all roar out in hate and visceral bloodlust.
More eggs are hatching now, more bizarre creatures slither, clamber, roll out of their eggshells to fight one another. A large arm with eyes, a living wheel of meat, monstrous eyeballs, living mouths, all rushing to one another with murderous glee. More viscera is spilled, more eggs awaken, the walls and floor of the pit are covered in a thick coating of blood and meat. The mindless rampage gets stronger and stronger as more blood is spilled and more demonic lives are ground into the dirt. Bloodlust is abundant, it is noticeable in the air, the demons killing and eating each other start to notice that as they continue to consume, they are getting larger and tougher, faster, and deadlier. The living wheel demon grows jagged spikes along its edges, to better rip into the opposition. The arm with eyes gains a second arm and its arms grow even thicker. The flesh ball's flailing tentacles have grown more numerous and have gained sharp edges, almost like razor blades. These demons and the ones witnessing their changes come to an epiphany in their barely conscious minds, the more they kill the stronger they become. This primal information pushes them to kill faster, eat more, and awaken a killing lust no mortal creature could ever have.
The clamor and reverberating sounds grow louder and louder and soon, the whole pit is covered in blood and gore.
In the outer edges of the spawning pit, one of the eggs is starting to hatch. The shell is battered apart from the inside, and in the span of a few seconds, the shell itself is consumed by the one residing inside.
A large meaty mouth lies where the egg once sat, the mouth pounces the other eggs surrounding it and starts to consume them one by one. Voracious is he, as the mouth grows larger and larger, more and more eggs are crushed and mangled in its strong jaws and sharp fangs. Some of the hatched demons notice the large mouth and rush to engage it. A spindly spider-like demon arrives first and thrusts one of its spear-like appendages towards the mouth to skewer it in place. The mouth, somehow, rolls to the side and dodges the spider demon's thrust, it then lunges forth and grips the offending appendage. Thrashing it to and fro the mouth then starts to pull the spider towards it with pulling bites. The spider struggles as much as it can before it is pulled into the monstrous mouth waiting for jaws. With a crunch and a gulp, the spider is no more, and suddenly from the massive mouth's side, a long arm with a single claw at the end emerges from its side. Flexing and curling the limb the massive mouth smirks, or what appears to be a smirk, and uses its new limb to pull more eggs toward it. Before the monster can consume its new quarry, the other demons arrive. A spiky cube-like demon and a large goat-like beast with a thick plate of keratin adorning its skull instead of horns flank the creature's left and right. Mindlessly the large-mouthed creature attempts to swallow the spiky cube whole, before experiencing excruciating pain as the inside of its mouth is ripped up. Quickly spitting the spike demon out, it is then beset by the armored beast slamming into its side and flinging it to the ground. The mouth monster quickly clambers up and flings itself to the side to avoid another charge from the huge goat beast and grabbing onto its side with its clawed limb. The goat beast startled by the pain attempts to shake the mouth creature off, inadvertently giving the monster the momentum to swing up and clamp around the beast's neck. The insides of its mouth already healing, thanks to its inherent demonic heritage, the mouth uses its sharp fangs to tear into the goat's neck. Ripping and pulling, turning the gear beasts neck into a paste before tearing its head off.
As the beast's corpse collapses to the ground, organs spill out of its gaping neck hole. The mouth quickly begins to rip out and swallow large chunks of its flesh, its long arm appendage growing thicker and stronger, gaining extra digits, its claws getting tougher and sharper still. The monster's mouth is halfway through the corpse and hasn't even started on the head before the spike demon arrives. The growth of the mouth being's body also has an additional effect of growing its mind, using its sharper intellect the mouth monster grabs the goat beast head and uses it as a bludgeon to flatten and crush the spike demon. Happy with this development the mouth smiling gruesomely showing its large strong fangs, a bit of flesh stuck between its teeth.
"This is fun" The first thought this creature ever had was one of love for violence.
Polishing off its meal the monster zips towards the sounds of combat, now having a taste for violence, the beginnings of another limb protruding from its other side.
Now the demons in the thick of the fighting have grown even stronger from their murders. Becoming more specialized, their body begins to take form. A demon made entirely out of arms with a single eye in the center is smashing its foes into a pulp and ripping apart any within range. One demon is using his spinal cord and head as a flail, whipping around its plated skull to bash the other demons into mush. Above the field of combat, a few demons that have developed flight capability quickly zip about clashing in the air. A floating skull with a single eye has also developed mental attacks and is using its enlarged intelligence to flay and scatter the minds of a few unlucky demons.
Up above at the top of the pit, the demon watching over the pit has peered back in enjoying the ensuing combat.
"Wish I could jump in there myself, crack a few skulls!" He crows, seeming to almost consider the possibility before he visibly shudders, remembering his orders, "I'd get my soul shredded if I tried anything though." The demon huffs, sits back down, and dozes off to sleep.
Back in the pit, the number of demons has gone down significantly, only about five thousand the original number, half the starting number! The newborn demons have grown even stronger, and the ensuing battles have grown ever more vicious. With their growing minds, the ability to enact violence has gotten even easier for them, to slaughter was as easy as breathing. Cunning and misdirection nurtured in the nimbler, sleeker demons, blade-like limbs, and deadly venom wielded in ever more skillful ways. While the stronger, tougher demons, developed brutal savagery and manic bloodlust, to crush and tear with more violent, terrifying techniques. Demons that developed stronger mental powers fostered an aura of smug superiority over their opponents, exploding heads, and conjuring bouts of fire and frost upon their foes. Although occasionally the sheer confidence these demons have prevents them from noticing the large fist, or perhaps razor-sharp sickle, heading for their necks, believing the other demons to be too stupid to ever surprise them.
With our large mouth demon friend though he has developed even more so than the demons that hatched first. Currently, the nub that was developing on his left side has developed into a strong arm with razor-sharp claws like his arm on his right side. The head itself has grown wider and longer, to catch more prey into its maw, the start of a neck and torso is also starting to show. He has become a very proficient killing machine, carving his way throughout the battlefield, disturbingly enough he has left no viscera in his wake, every opponent he slaughters is consumed completely. Not even a drop of blood is wasted! As he kills the other stronger demons take notice of his presence, previously he's been killing so quickly that he has remained under the radar, any screams of pain or yelps of agony quickly snuffed out by his extreme proficiency. A new powerful opponent has entered the fray, a threat to their positions as the strongest. These demons start killing at a quicker rate, refusing to be overtaken in growth by the newcomer, a few of them however seek to stop this new demon in his tracks.
The mouth monster is quick however and easily avoids the attacks unleashed from the other demons even though it only has two limbs. Grasping a barbed snake-like demon by the head, it uses this demon as a whip flaying the flesh from another demon laughing as it does so. The amount of demons challenging the mouth monster quickly drops as for any mistake in combat results in a quick violent death. Its claws have grown even longer now and have developed properly jointed fingers, its musculature and torso have developed even further, now rippling muscle all tuned to slaughter adorns its dark purplish flesh. Any combat with this demon has become a delicate matter, it has become so strong it kills most of its prey with one slash of its claws, a single bite from its unholy jaws can break through the strongest of natural protection. Begining to form at the bottom of its heavily muscular torso are two nubs, surely the beginning of a set of legs.
During its slaughter of the stronger demons, it notices a pattern. When it eats a demon with strong muscles, its musculature gets slightly stronger, almost barely noticeable. Demons with strong natural defense make their hide stronger, as a result, the flesh around their forearms has even started to develop a plated exterior. Those tricky demons with their larger skulls, and odd abilities, like shooting bright bursts of light from their fingers, further enlighten his mind, making it easier to think on the fly and to better resist those strange attacks that hurt his head.
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The slaughter continues for hours upon hours, the number of demons in the pit dwindling further and further. Stronger and stronger the living demons become through the bloodshed and combat. One of the demons though starts to act oddly, thoughts rush through a large bat-like demon's mind as its star-like eye watches the mouth monster tear through the others. While some of the demons have stopped gaining any significant increases in strength from slaughtering and consuming the other demons. The mouth demon seemed to never stop growing, getting stronger endlessly!
"That one is a freak! It kills and eats, and kills and eats endlessly! If it isn't stopped soon it will consume us all!" The bat wailed in its mind, the thought of facing that purple bastard made it squirm to no end! Unbeknownst to it, it is among the first in the pit to develop its intelligence to this point. It has become smart enough to feel fear.
Erratically the bat demon flutters about attempting to tell the other demons about the looming threat that threatens to consume them all. Most of the time it has to evade attacks from the other demons, for they are too dull to even understand language at this point. While those that can grimace at it in disgust and rush forward to engage in combat with the mouth demon, usually getting bisected or torn in half by its now incredibly muscular arms and cruelly sharp talons. The smaller ones get swallowed in one or two bites, the mouth monster's maw has gotten even larger. The slits of its mouth now extend all the way down its neck to its shoulders. At this point it has grown powerful bestial legs with strong feet, thick claws adorning its toes, allowing it to better tear into the ground for longer leaps for wider cleaving strikes. His forearms are now so armored that he has developed gauntlet-like plating that is spreading to his palms and fingers, helping him take stronger attacks head-on, and to better bludgeon his prey.
A few of the smarter demons heed the bat demons warnings about the predator at the other side of the pit and decide to work together, carving their path through the hordes surrounding them to quicken their growth. They must hurry if they hope to match the predator.
Time passes and more and more demons are killed and consumed, making way for even stronger demons to be killed and consumed by even stronger demons. This continues until only a handful of demons are left. The mouth demon stands tall and proud among the carnage he has wrought, although this isn't immediately discernable as his half of the pit is completely spotless. Every morsel, every single drop of blood has been consumed by him, if not for the various marks and indents in the floor and walls, one could not even tell a fight happened here. On the other side of the pit, three demons stand among a similar sort of carnage. Their half of the pit remains stained with blood and viscera, they are visibly shaken from the sight of the predator's clean plate.
A large snake-like demon with five large finger-like appendages atop its torso instead of ahead. A slim effeminate demon covered in blades from head to toe, a long spiked tail sways erratically behind it. Finally, the Bat demon is larger with an additional set of wings and a smaller eye atop its chest.
"How is he so efficient!?" Shrieks the slim demon, she cannot believe the sight before her, such a display of pure dominance has her terrified.
"A worthy foe to be had for sure." The snake-like demon says, flexing his large appendages, the sight of such a powerful opponent has his blood boiling.
The two demons are interrupted by a loud yell, causing them to glance over towards their bat companion.
"YOU FUCKING MONSTER WHAT THE HELL DO YOU EVEN WANT!!!" Yelled the bat demon, exasperated at the sight of the mouth demon, terrified and full of rage for the being in front of him, why does he want them all dead? How can he eat so much? Surely he must have enough intellect to see reason, to come to an agreement? Right? RIGHT??
The mouth demon, barely even startled by the outburst, straightens his posture, chuckles darkly, and cracks his neck before speaking in a sharp deep voice that cut through the silence.
"I Want More." He stated this as a matter of fact as if it was obvious to what he desired as if to ask such a question was foolish in of itself.
Sauntering towards the trio, he stops and turns to the snake-like demon. He beckons the snake closer with a waggle of his longest talon, smiling mockingly. Angered by this the snake demon rushes roaring a battle cry.
"YOU WHELP! I'll CRUSH YOU INTO PASTE!!!." He shouted out, winding up a flurry of blows to crush the mouth demon.
Fast strikes blur towards the mouth demon, who dodges around the larger snake demon's attacks, letting the snake tire itself out hitting the air. The snake demon noticing his plot aims his two topmost finger appendages and launches both directed towards the mouth demon's chest attempting to puncture his lungs. But the mouth demon, expecting such an attack, raises both his hands and catches the two massive fingers in his claws. Startled by the sudden counter the snake demon attempts to pull back only to find his fingers caught in the mouth demons grasp. Digging his claws deep into his opponent's flesh the mouth demon spreads his legs and begins to pull the two fingers apart, attempting to tear the snake demon right in half!
"AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!" Screams the snake demon, the pain unbearable, his very being separated right down the middle. He can feel his spine start to crack, his ribs separating, his flesh tearing apart.
Unable to accept such an end for himself the snake demon uses its other giant fingers to strike and batter the mouth demons muscular arms, but his attempts are fruitless as the mouth demons claws are dug in tight and his strength is not enough the dislodge them. Finally with a grunt and a sickeningly, loud crack.
RRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIPPP
The mouth demon triumphs over the snake demon's strength and rips him right in half straight down the middle! Flinging the two halves to the ground, the mouth demon turns towards his next opponent, the slim blade demon hurtling herself at him seeking to strike a decisive blow.
Darting to the side to avoid the blade demon from spearing him through, the mouth demon quickly darts forward to cleave the blade demon apart, before being parried by the blade demon. The blade demon retaliates slashing to and fro, while the mouth demon blocks her attacks with his armored forearms. Seeing the cuts and scratches the blade demon is leaving on his arms the mouth demon leaps back to widen the distance. He then makes a large sweeping attack toward her head leaving his side wide open. Seeing this vulnerability the blade demon steps forward with a lunging attack to puncture the mouth demon in the side, so focused on landing the blow she doesn't even notice the mouth demon smiling viciously! Abruptly shifting his weight the mouth demon sidesteps the attack and grabs the blade demon's arm, quickly he grasps her by the waist and pulls hard. The blade demon realizing her mistake attempts to cut off the mouth demon's hand on her waist, before feeling the excruciating pain of having her arm ripped off! Now in horrible pain, the blade demon staggers backward almost falling over. She attempts to strike back at the mouth demon, failing to do so, too weak to make a decisive move. The mouth demon, grabbing the blade demon by the other arm, uses her very own arm as a spear and forced the blade demon's arm through her head and into her torso. Dead, the blade demon's corpse falls over signaling the end of the battle. The mouth demon turned to his final opponent, the bat demon, and calmly walked forward.
Panicking, the bat demon ran a thousand scenarios through his mind, all of them lead to his death, he just could not see a way to defeat this monster. It was impossible! There was no way! No way in- oh, how foolish of him, the fear made him dull. The bat demon calmed himself and then focused all his mental energy onto the mouth demon's skull. His skull bulged with mental power, and the mouth demon clutched his head in pain, almost keeling over entirely. His skull felt like it was about to explode, and then he realized that was what would happen if he did nothing about it. His rage towards the bat demon swelled, the killing intent he gave off rose abruptly as he refused to let this be the way he died!
The bat demon, focusing with all his might, cracked one of its eyes open to see if its attack was working. This would be the worst mistake of its life. The bat made eye contact with its one eye, with the mouth demon's six pure red eyes, and it was frozen in place. Falling to the ground the bat demon felt its muscles lock up, and its mind slows to a crawl. The mouth demons killing intent was so strong it materialized itself in the physical plane and paralyzed the bat demon!
Feeling that the weight imposed on its mind was lifted, the mouth demon calmly walked over to the bat demon, still immobile on the ground, and stared right into the large eye on its head. The bat demon teared up, mentally begged the mouth demon not to kill it, to let it live! Its begging would be for naught though, for soon the bat demon saw the mouth demon raise its foot right over its head and it closed its eyes not wanting to see what happened next.
SPLAT
The mouth demon flattened the bat demon skull with its foot. He mashed and crushed the bat demon's brain and big eyes beneath his heel. Now he was the only one left, he let loose a roar, a mighty shout to no one but himself. He basked in the glory and truly he felt invincible. The mouth demon calmed itself and looked to the corpses around him and began to feast.
At the top of the spawn pit, the lanky demon was woken from his nap by a loud sound coming from the pit. He quickly stood up, grabbed his spear, and peered into the pit.
"Must have finished a while ago if I'm only hearing them clamber up the pit now!" He thought, but upon looking into the pit he saw the most peculiar thing. The spawning pit was spotless! Usually, a spawning pit would have quite a bit of viscera left over, and he would have to get a gluttonous demon to come and clean up the remains to prep for the next hatching. The only reason a pit should be picked clean like this is if a gluttonous demon was born down there and managed to survive past infancy to become a whelp. The lanky demon quickly located the noise he was hearing and his heart rate started to pick up.
"That ain't no glutton down there, never seen a whelp like that before, he's way too big!" Though the lanky demon, stepping away from the pit now, a revelation sparked in his mind. The whelp coming up the pit must have eaten every other whelp down there! Usually, a couple of hundred whelps come out at the end to be conscripted into their lordships Gaurush's hordes. But that single whelp killed and ate everyone else. He would have pondered on this abnormality longer but soon the whelp in question has made it to the top and was now pulling itself out of the pit.
This lanky demon is now staring at what could be described as killing incarnate. The whelp is almost taller than himself, and he was over seven feet tall! Its entire body is muscular, and toned, its posture slightly curved. Its skin is a dark purple coloration, while its six eyes on the sides of its skull were a blood red. Its forearms were coated in a dark armor-like substance, and its claws were at least eight inches in length.
They stared at each other in silence, as if they were sizing each other up. The lanky demon could almost taste the killing intent radiating off this whelp in front of him. It was quite obvious what was about to transpire here.
"Better get the first hit in at least!" And with that thought, the lanky demon took a stance and released a fast thrust straight towards the mouth demon's chest.
But the mouth demon was faster, he ducked and released an even faster attack. A fast cleaving motion brought its claws right under the throat of the lanky demon.
Then he flexed his claws.
SSSHHHLLIIIIIIIIIIIIICK
A clean cut. The lanky demon's head soared through the air before landing in the outstretched palm of the mouth demon. Swallowing the skull whole, the mouth demon proceeded to shear all the flesh of the lanky demon's corpse, devouring it and its organs. Took its bones and cracked them open to suck out all the bone marrow, then ate the bones as well. In under twenty seconds the lanky demon vanished, it was as if he was never there.
The mouth demon then walked off into the great wastes.