Devil's tale

Devil's tale, chapter 36

The mist felt cold against Avarice's red skin. He'd hoped to never return to the nameless valley, yet here he was, walking straight down to its deepest depths. He started his descent by turning around and trying to get back to Jazz and Emily, the moment he lost sight of them. As he'd expected, this only brought him further down into the chasm. He spoke a prayer to Leto, and sure enough, he soon found the temple with the statue in his likeness that he'd tried to avoid the first time he'd been in the valley. He thought about how badly he wanted to give Roland his wings back, and how finding a path to speak to Leto would be the best way to achieve that. He strode into the temple and allowed himself to wander through its darkness. In getting lost, he knew he'd find his way. After some time, how much exactly, Avarice didn't know, he found himself at a dimly-lit entranceway, carved out of the stone walls of the temple. It was illuminated by two dimly flickering torches, containing purely scarlet fire. The entryway revealed a staircase behind it, steeply descending into a shadowy abyss. Avarice blinked and suddenly, a familiar, eldritch form stood before the doorway. Glorofin smiled politely.

"Welcome back, Avarice."

"You must already know why I'm here, right?" Avarice asked.

"Indeed. I ask you, is this truly your desire? Keep in mind that this is your last chance to turn back."

"So that staircase? It leads straight down into hell then?" Avarice asked.

"It does. To the upper layer and outer shell of the hells. The hell of storms."

"Before I throw myself into almost certain death, maybe you could explain a bit more about why exactly there's a portal to hell here." Avarice asked.

"It's like I told you and Emily. This place is a wound in reality. Contradiction becomes truth. what is hidden is laid bare, what is obvious is enshrouded in mystery. A portal to hell, which should be nigh impossible to open in the rest of the material world, is a trivial matter here."

"Care to explain exactly why this place is a wound in the fabric of reality, then?" Avarice asked.

"I think those better qualified to answer that question await you at the bottom of those steps."

Avarice scoffed. "Honestly, I couldn't care less about the world, the universe, or whatever you want to call it. I just want to save my home, so don't expect me to go fulfilling some ancient prophecy about saving the world or something like that."

"It's precisely that motivation which makes you so fit for the role of saviour. Now go, there's no use in delaying your descent any longer." Glorofin said.

Avarice nodded and felt at his armoured coat. He adjusted his rapier, to make it easier to reach if he needed it, and then with a deep breath, stepped forward onto the steps.

"There's no guarantee I'll survive, is there?"

"No, and if you do, you shan't be the same."

"Then that's the price I must pay." With those words, Avarice descended the steps, down into the darkness. He was met with a sudden shock when his foot fell through empty space, rather than landing on another step, he spun around to look at Glorofin, on the other side of the entrance, but the opening to the outside world was gone, leaving Avarice surrounded by nothing but pitch blackness. He lost his balance and fell backwards, down into the abyss. Air rushed past him, whistling in his ears, whipping his hair and coat into a frenzy. Fear overcame his heart as he knew that now, there really was no way back. He fell into the unknown abyss, he soon lost track of time. He might have been falling for only a few seconds, or perhaps it had been several hours, he had no way of knowing, as his very sense of time was becoming clouded and diluted. He tried calling out a prayer to Leto, to shed some light, but he felt his words hit some sort of invisible, intangible barrier, the power of the gods would not be able to reach him here. He then understood what he had to do. He flexed his hand and a flame appeared in his palm, within the darkness, casting an orange and red light. Avarice saw now that he was falling through clouds, and he heard the cracking and roaring of thunder. Lightning flashed beside him and a strong wind blasted him off his course, sending him into a chaotic free-fall, flying to the side. There was another flash of lightning and Avarice saw a large, serpentine shadow hidden in the clouds. The form flew towards him and Avarice quickly waved his hands, turning the clouds around himself into water so they'd fall from view, letting him see more clearly. A massive, grey and blue serpent with piercing, yellow eyes and a multitude of massive wings few towards him, its fanged mouth open wide. Avarice panicked for a brief second, but then he calmed himself, he'd faced demons before, this was nothing new. He cast a fireball in his hand and blasted it straight into the serpent's open mouth. The monster recoiled as it swallowed the blazing flames and it howled out in pain. Avarice felt a brief surge of triumph. The monster then snapped its mouth shut and glared at the falling devil with a searing hatred. Avarice gulped, of course it wouldn't be that easy. The snake charged him again, and this time, Avarice used fire to blast himself to the side to dodge the attack. He chucked a mass of flames towards the beast's wings, but the fire harmlessly blew over the monster's tough skin. The beast charged him again and bit down on his arm. It's fangs didn't pierce the dragon-scales of his coat, but he still felt the overwhelming pressure of the monster's bite, and a searing pain shot through his arm. He was almost positive some of his bones had been broken. But his hand was once again inside the snake's mouth, and he conjured another fireball. The monster's eyes lit up with an orange glow and with an ear-splitting hiss and a loud boom, the snake's head exploded in a ball of crimson flames and Avarice was once again stuck in free-fall. He looked down and saw something resembling ground hurtling towards him at a break-neck speed. He tried to position his hands to conjure flames to slow his descent, but his broken arm made the manoeuvre impossible. He couldn't rely just on the power of his blood, he wasn't just a devil, he wasn't just a minstrel, he was both. He let out a chilling, musical cry and the clouds around him all turned to snow. He pulled the massive collection of snow towards himself and positioned it underneath himself. He also manipulated the wind around him to blow upwards and spread out his body, slowing his descent further. Not long afterwards, he hit the ground. Pain rung all throughout his body as even with everything slowing his fall, a massive and terrible force blasted through him as he made contact with the ground. Everything felt sore, and his broken arm felt like it had caught fire. Tears of pain welled in the devil's eyes as he struggled to stand up. He looked around and rubbed his aching head. Surrounding him was a barren, rocky landscape of sharp rocks, jagged cliffs and towering mountains, surrounded by massive, billowing storm clouds. The outer-most layer of hell, Avarice knew next to nothing about what to expect. He supposed his only choice was to walk forward and find a way down into the next circle. This place wasn't the layer of fire, that was for sure. His demonic parent probably lay much deeper. As he walked through the barren hellscape, the howling wind almost seemed to form whispers, speaking in hellish voices.