Speechless

Upon reaching the massive black gate of the city the sound of wails and cries could be heard.

"Stay behind me and don´t look anyone in the eyes, Raas. Wendy, turn yourself into a rootling and stay dormant between Raas´ scales so that you could protect him in a case of emergency," spoke Scorge without a hint of his usual jolliness.

The two of them nodded as Wendy quickly shrunk in size and hid between Raas´s scales. Feeling something between his scales moving, he shuddered but otherwise quickly followed behind the demon lord.

Reaching the gate the stench of rotting corpses assaulted Raas. The fumes of dozens of dead and half-dead bodies made Raas almost blacked out. But with sheer willpower and his [Mental Fortitute] skill being level 9 he fought through. The stench only worsened as they walked between mountains of dead bodies.

Scorge noticed Raas struggling, but disregarded it and continued walking forward.

The first buildings on sight made Raas eyes nearly pop out. He expected a bloody and rundown city, like Scorge told him, but instead of the horrendous image of gory sights everywhere he saw beautiful black marble houses that were in pristine condition with red and golden linings. The floor was made out of polished blood-red stone slaps. The street was empty only a few shadows in the alleyways could be seen lurking around. The sound of pained cries is the only sound that Raas heard making this place awfully creepy as the contrast between what he saw and what he heard/smelled was too big.

Before Raas could utter his astonishment and confusion Scorge whispered, "Don´t let the view deceive you. There are many things hidden in the shadows, you will see in a minute."

Raas thought for a while and wanted to ask Scorge what he meant by that but a thick grey fog spread through the street, before suddenly condensing a few meters in front of Scorge.

The twisting flesh of a tall humanoid bird-like creature stepped out of the fog. It wore a blood-red suit and a classy top hat, and a rotten hand grasped an equally boney cane. Its head was that of a bald eagle, but with 5 eyes and two long tentacles that hung around like a mustache. The eagle-headed creature looked elegant and disturbingly creepy at the same time.

"Cra cra cra cra, who do we have here! If it isn´t the lord of wrath and pain himself! Cra cra cra cra!"

"Cut the crap Strochnar and give us the masks, I will pay the usual."

"Don´t be like that Scorge, why don´t you introduce me to your little companion first?"

The 6-meter tall monster's eyes turned towards Raas and its piercing gaze stared right into his eyes. As soon as the five eyes landed on him he felt his strength leave his body. He fought against the draining feeling inside his body and tried to turn away. But he couldn´t. He felt his soul being dragged out and wrapped around at the same time.

*DIng*

[Warning! Host´s soul is being highjacked!]

[10 seconds before complete takeover!]

Raas panicked as he saw the countdown, but before it could tick down Raas felt his body returning back to him.

Gasping from air Raas collapsed on the blood-red floor.

"Awww, don´t look at me like that Scorge, you know me. I can´t resist a soul even if it shattered. I must say, it is quite unusual for you to take care of a low-tier monster like that... is that your new hobby or are you now into that stuff?"

With barely hidden rage the demon hold out his hand and hissed, "Just hand over the masks Strochnar."

"Cra cra cra cra..." with a low laughter a small fleshy mass poked out of his suit and formed into a human hand. Grasping the outstretched hand the bird's amalgamations face split into an unnaturally long smile as he took out two pure white masks. "Fine, no fun. The old Scorge was much more amusing and entertaining. You have become quite boring over the millennials. Anyway, I hope you enjoy your stay in my city Scorge and please try not to kill too many of my subjects this time around~"

With those final words, the creature disappeared in a puff of grey smoke. Scorge held the mask towards his face and it melted on him like a second layer.

Raas in the meantime managed to grasp his breath again and took was surprised by the mask forming around his face.

"I told you to not look into their eyes," said Scorge plainly.

Raas was still speechless, and more so after the mask fully wrapped around his face.

The lifeless street turned into a buzzing street with horrors wandering the streets that Raas hasn´t even thought about.

The half corrupted creatures came in all shapes and sizes, but amongst the hundreds of creatures, there were one or two that were completely untainted. There were probably more but most of them were hodded or hid their bodies behind large ropes and cloths.

"Come on, let's get moving. The sooner we get out of here the better." Spoke Scorge. Raas mindlessly nodded and followed close behind. He saw dozens of creatures looking his way a few even tried to touch Raas, but a few glares from Scorge made them quickly scurry off. But not all of them, as Scorge had to casually burn a pompous looking hulking black mass of eyes and rotting flesh to a cinder. The rest ignored the act as if it was common... Well, it was quite common in this city.

Not even a minute after Scorge burned the creature to nothingness when a half-shark half-ogre creature tried to take a bite out of Raas. [Grey out] automatically activated and Raas barely dodged the rows of thousand barbed shark teeth. Seeing the world move in slow motion Raas could see Scorge´s figure blur and the head of the monster crumble in on itself, but just before his [Grey out] ran out he spotted a hooded figure in the distance waving at him as if time wasn´t slown down. The hand belonged to a human, elf, or something like that. There was some kind of symbol on the palm of the hand, but Raas couldn´t see it clearly from the distance.

"Ts those annoying punks really are full of themselves." spatted Scorge.

The hodded being disappeared among the crowd as the world turned colorful again.

Raas ignored his remarks and asked, "Did you see someone waving towards us?"

Scorge turned his head and looked at the snake confused before continuing walking, "No I didn´t sense anyone looking in our direction while that imbecile tried to take a bite out of you. Oh, and good job on dodging."

Raas mumbled a quick "thanks" before thinking about the hodded person.

Raas witnessed many messed-up stuff while walking through the crowded streets. Some of them being, public torture shows, murder and dismantling, cannibalism, revolting sexual acts, and many many more unspeakable things. 'Scorge was correct, the "people" here are worse than sewage dwellers... never met them, but they can´t be worse than this!' thought Raas walking behind Scorge and trying to ignore the carnage that is happening around him and avoiding eye contact.

Finally reaching the destination Scorge mindlessly walked into a large building with colorful flames burning brightly in the exhibition windows. Walking in Raas could see large arms sprouting out of the ground and dragging a roped creature into the ground while it was wailing and cursing.

After dragging the customer into the abyss the creature behind the desk spotted the two new customers and clasped his hands together while happily saying, "Oh, sorry for the commotion customers, what can I do for you?" spoke the creature behind the table.

Scorge walked up to him and pointed behind it, "One of the mending sprouts and a chemfusion injector. The good one, not the cheap ones from the factory."

The clerk's eyes shone for a moment before a large greedy grin split his face in two, literally. "Ah, yes I will bring them right away! HUA HUA HUA HUA HUA HUA HUA!" With hurried steps and boisterous laughter, the creature disappeared into the floor.

"What are you buying? I thought you wanted to buy the triple armored mana-powered air sailor..."

Scorge smiled for the first time entering the city and spoke in an amused tone, "Yes, but while we are already here just some stuff that will make you into a fortress destroyer..."

"..."

Raas just sighed, not knowing what to make out with this information.

Slowly rising through the floor the clerk got back behind the counter and laid a leather pouch in front of the desk. "Here are the items, that will make 10 thousand and 500 souls.

Raas raised a brow but otherwise stayed silent.

Reaching into his pocket Scorge took out a small flask with many different colored tiny specks swirling in it and dropped it on the counter before taking the back.

The clerk quickly snatched the flask and stored it inside its body. "Pleasure doing business with you."

Walking out of the store Raas somehow bumped into a small clothed person.

"Ouch!" squealed a high-pitched girly voice. "Watch where you are slithering you limbless reptile!" spat the person while standing up and dusting off its clothes. Raas looked at the clothed person, it was wrapped in cloth like a mummy only its purple eyes shone through. The scent of incense reached Raas, the smell was quite soothing and made him sleepy.

Scorge looked at the person Raas bumped into and sighed. "Acedia, why are you here?"

"Hah?" grumbled the mummy turning its head towards the demon, "Oh, Scorge! Fancy seeing you here! How long has it been, three or four centuries?"

"Half a millennia. Back to my question. Why are you here?"

"A right right. Emmmm i think I am lost..."

"Lost? Where are Trueca and Trueco? Aren´t they usually always following you around?"

"Ah yes, but I ran away because they were just too overbearing!" Pouted the one-and-a-half-meter tall mummy. Raas still couldn´t make out if this "person" was a girl or a boy.

Scorge wanted to ask something but a loud explosion happened just a few streets away. "Ah, that was probably them! I will go now bye!" exploding into a swarm of scarab beetle they flew towards the noise and rising smoke.

"I am not even going to ask..." said Raas, "can we please just get out of here, Scorge, before the last of my brain cells die?"

Scorge grinned sheepishly, but nodded and continued walking towards their next destination.