37 - Hell

I felt an uneasiness inside myself. Before I realized I was once again conscious, I first felt this uneasiness.

It was as though my very soul was resisting the pull of something.

I heard a voice that sounded distant yet clear.

"Oh? How unusual. Here, let's try this again."

The next moment, I opened my eyes.

I was greeted by a red sky.

No, it wasn't a sky. It was...

A cave ceiling?

A large expanse of red rock covered the sky, and I instinctively felt like it was a cave, but what cave would be that big?

Hurriedly sitting up, I found I couldn't for a moment.

I applied more force, and only then did I move a little.

It was weakness. My muscles weren't as strong.

Applying as much force as I could, I barely managed to get up.

Looking around, I was bewildered by the sights.

But before that, I had only one thought.

'I'm alive?'

Looking at my hands that had become thin and malnourished, attached to thin, starved arms, I couldn't tell if this was reality.

My brain had a hard time processing my surroundings because I had suddenly lost a lot of my heightened senses.

Still, I had eyes and ears.

And what they showed me was...a nightmare.

In front of my eyes was a sea of corpses, and just less than 50 meters away from me was what just had to be the cause.

It was a small hill of corpses one on top of the other, and at the peak was...

Was...

A demon.

Large black wings emitting a dark energy, and a body in contrast with pure white, but not the white of humans. It was a pale white, looking sickly and unnatural.

It had horns, of a different style than Ixtra in his Release, and pitch black eyes with yellow-black irises.

They were like a kind of obsidian black, with specks of gold as though infused with crystal.

In the center of the eyes was the abyss of the pupil, but it looked eerie with the black replacing the whites of the eye.

The lower body, from the waist to the calves, was covered in what looked like black fur.

It had an oddly clean and even somewhat handsome face, but you'd have to ignore the gory mess of flesh and blood near its mouth, which was filled with pointed teeth, to accept that conclusion.

In its hands were the body parts of the corpses under it, and it was sitting leisurely on the corpse hill while scrunching away.

CRACK

It ate the bones too. All in one bite.

It wasn't anything hard or that required too much strength, relative to my previous strength, but it was jarring to see and, more importantly, to hear the loud crunch of death come from its mouth.

It slowly turned its head and looked in my direction, before locking eyes with me.

I had only one thought.

'Shit.'

If I still had a hard time understanding my situation, I'd be a fool amongst fools.

I tried to stand up and run, but I couldn't take more than one step before hearing the wind blow past while the monstrous creature appeared before me.

One flap of the wings was all it took to cross several dozen meters in a heartbeat.

It towered over me, at a staggering 8 feet. This would have been nothing to me mere moments before, of the moments I was experiencing, but it was now enough to make me instinctively cower and panic.

It reached out its large hand at my skull, attempting to eat me too, but suddenly, a large gush of demon energy appeared and spread out rapidly from behind me.

I felt it. And upon feeling it, I immediately relaxed.

I had felt this energy many times before.

In front of me, the demon looked in front of it with newfound fear to replace its previous boredom, and in its pupils was reflected the sight.

I was standing there, weak and starving. But behind me was a floating, childlike figure.

It was Ixtra, and his 1st Release was on full display, releasing energy like crazy.

The demon was brought to the ground by the aura alone, and Ixtra came out from behind me and floated over to its soon to be corpse.

Stabbing it through the heart with its tail, he enveloped the demon's body with his demonic energy and absorbed it all in one go.

It wouldn't really do much for him at that level though, of course.

Heaving a sigh of relief, I started speaking when I got interrupted.

"Oh, thank the gods, Ixtra, you're still here. I don't know ho-"

"Stop."

"Wha-"

"Stop talking."

"Huh?"

My face adopted a confused look, but then I realized.

Ixtra was not his usual self.

On his face that was usually so relaxed and calm, now was an expression of scrunched muscles and a violent gaze.

But what was wrong?

I mean, I get we were probably in Hell, by the looks of it, but was that enough to shake him, a demon?

"Merca...my contract says I have to do as you say for another 30 years. Release it. Now."

'Oh, is that all?'

"Sure."

Releasing the contract was a simple matter, both parties just had to will it and send some mana in a prearranged manner into the contract paper originally used.

Doing so, as the contract expired, Ixtra returned to a calm gaze, but it looked especially terrifying right now.

He...wouldn't eat me...right?

After all, he too was a demon.

No, surely not. I wasn't tasty. I was weak. Weak equalled not tasty to demons, right?

Closing his eyes for a moment, Ixtra looked away when he opened them and said,

"Merca...go away from here."

"Wha-huh? Why? Are you coming? I guess its pretty dangerous with all these corpses here. Another demon could come to eat them an-"

"Merca."

"Huh? What?"

Ixtra looked at me with completely emotionless eyes.

"This is the end for us. Now go away before I kill you. And this time, you'll end up far worse."

'???'

"Hey, Ixtra, what are you talking about? We've known each other for so long, aren't we friends? Why not help me out? You don't have to do much, just help me gain a little bit of strength."

"Merca. We aren't friends. And if we aren't friends, we're enemies. I should be killing you right now. Letting you leave my sight is a grace."

"...You...you're serious, huh?"

"Entirely."

"..."

Looking at the childlike demon I had known for years, decades, even...even centuries, I felt at a loss.

I had never expected him to care too much about me, but wasn't this too much?

Ixtra gave me one last glance before he began to walk away, and I wanted to reach out my hand to him and tell him to stop, but I couldn't.

Even in the midst of my murky emotions that were slowly bubbling up and threatening to erupt, I understood the most important thing.

That was a greater demon. A greater demon I even raised up to that level, essentially.

It was too dangerous to try and say one more word to him.

'Well...what now?'

***

Normally, when a demon got summoned and their contracted master died, the demon would be released from the contract and suffer a significant but not utterly debilitating penalty.

However, this process used a mechanism related to the soul.

When a grim reaper came to take a soul, they cut its connections to a variety of mortal attachments, including any demon summon contracts.

Of course, there were always exceptions, like special contracts with absurdly powerful demons.

However, Ixtra was not one of those demons. The reason his contract stayed was because of the treasury.

The reaper could not cut the connection to the treasury, and Ixtra had stayed in the treasury when the reaper collected my soul.

There was a secondary connection Ixtra had to the treasury, which was considered a part of my soul, and none of the treasuries connections had been cut.

In other words, strictly speaking, the contract I released Ixtra from wasn't the one he made with me, but with the treasury portion of my soul.

On the other hand, although I had done that, and Ixtra was now gone, I still had the treasury.

Tom was still along for the ride like always.

And inside the treasury were all many treasures.

There was mana in Hell. Looks like it was time to power up again, from scratch.

Re-cultivation.

Having said that, I didn't really know where to start.

After all, if I did what I had already done, I'd just die again.

Wait...did this body age?

I mean, there wasn't any real reason why it wouldn't, but the thought occurred to me.

Storing the thought away in my head, I began to think.

Firstly, I put on some good armor, including my cloak, which I had stored in the treasury.

Immediately, I felt my body return to its previous muscular strength.

I had once, over the years, pondered over anything the cloak was missing, and I realized it was an increase in basic bodily health and strength.

However, I hadn't really wanted more base strength, so I added an enchantment that brought me up to a certain level if I ever went under it.

The compass still had its Status function, so I checked it.

----------------------------------

Name: Merca Godrich

Sex: Male

Age: 190

Lv. 1

Stats:

Strength: 0.5 (+19.5)

Speed: 0.5 (+19.5, then +40)

Stamina: 0.5 (+19.5)

IQ: 122

Health: Starved, Fatigue, Undead (Re-animated Body), Soul-Spirit-Avatar Mismatch, Curse:Forsaken, Spirit-Avatar Forced Bloodline Infusion (<0.1%)< p>

Cultivation:

Energy Cultivation: None.

11th circle Array Master

Bloodline: Arachne's Direct Descendent

Effects:

[-Complete Co...]

-Attempting Bloodline Fusion into Avatar (<0.1%)< p>

Techniques:

(Unusable) [Void Severance Technique] - [Void Severance Slash]

Skills: None.

Equipment:

[Cloak of the Deep]

Rarity: Legendary

Description:

[A legendary cloak resembl...]

--------------------------------------------

'...What. The fuck.'

The number of things listed after "Health", none of them seeming like anything good, had me in tears.

Well, not really, but I was shocked by it.

'So I'm a reanimated corpse? I never got into necromancy, but if I recall, a reanimated corpse stays active until the spell is released. So who's casting reanimation on me?'

There was a little button next to each health condition. Clicking it, I found out what the other 3 after the undead part were.

[Soul-Spirit-Avatar Mismatch: The soul, the spirit body which houses the soul, and the physical avatar that engages in the physical layers of reality. These are the three components of a person, and when they are not in coordination properly, it causes a mismatch.

Effects can include: difficulty to maintain balance, overexertion, underexertion, impaired senses, improved senses, metabolic changes...]

The list of effects went on and on. At least some of them I recognized as being currently afflicted by.

[Curse:Forsaken: A curse of forsakement, as the name suggests, this curse permanently reduces providence and restricts the attainment of more, making it extremely difficult, albeit not impossible. Generally cast onto denizens of Hell, including most demons, dead humans, and others.]

'Providence? Wonder what that is. Is it literally just tangible luck or something?'

[Spirit-Avatar Forced Bloodline Infusion: When the spirit body forces changes unto an avatar, specifically of altering bloodline.]

'Altering bloodline...so am I going to regain the effects of [Arachne's Direct Descendent] in this reanimated corpse?'

If that was the case, it'd be a dream come true.

Seeing the (<0.1%) figure, I didn't know how long it would take for to reach 100%.< p>

For now, I'd just try and change the most glaring issue. Well, besides all the health conditions.

My cultivation.

None was not ok. It could be anything else, but not none.

I'd never accept having none. Not after experiencing what it was like to control mana and cast spells.

I could try using the previous techniques I knew, but there were two key issues.

For one, Hell had red mana. That was probably fine, I could change around some techniques personally if it came to that.

More importantly, I had no talent.

Well, I didn't know that, maybe this corpse I was possessing had great talent, but I doubted it. And until that bloodline infusiom progressed some more, I'd stay with no talent.

And natural talent at sensing mana was the most important in the beginning. After that, it became more about technique, and I had some of the best techniques of my prior realm.

Still, just go test it, I tried sensing mana.

A few hours later, no luck.

Well, that didn't say much. If I could sense some after a few days, that'd be fine too.

At least it would be better than nothing.

I felt a minor hunger as a reanimated corpse but nothing major. And that minor amount waas stifled by my cloak.

I thought about wearing a full set of mythril armor, but decided that might get me in some trouble, so I put on a bunch of enchanted leather equipment instead.

It was significantly worse, but it'd be worth it if it meant I wasn't targeted by some big bad demon aiming for my armor.

Suddenly, I thought of something.

Taking out a summoning scroll from the treasury, I wondered if there was any use summoning a demon while in Hell.

I decided against it. There probably wasn't. The contract was made separately after all, so I could always summon them and be backstabbed before the contract was signed.

Looking around, I didn't know if the sea of corpses made it safer or more dangerous for me.

A demon walking by would be tempted to eat, but also might think I caused the massacre, and run away.

I decided to stay and try and sense mana.

Hours passed and "night" fell. Not really, there was no night here.

It was just always the same, bland red rocky sky.

Ixtra had told me there was something sinilar to night on the 1st, 2nd, 8th, and 9th floors, supposedly, but he wasn't sure. I wondered how that worked.

Ixtra...yeah, he had told me a lot of things about this place.

I wondered why I was here.

Had someone brought me, my soul, here? I had heard a voice before waking up.

Why would anyone bring me here? And how powerful were they?

I had a lot of questions again, and my previous ones from when I was alive still weren't even answered.

Looking up at the red "sky", I wondered how long I'd stay here, in this place.

This Hell.