UL1 - Book 10 - Chapter 9

An obsidian gate slid open and Sog stepped through.  

He smiled, feeling a sense of pride and knowing that this was his home. This was his place. Unlike his other world, one might challenge him and destroy everything he had built in a moment. But here… he was the master.

Power radiated from the stone beneath his hand. It thrummed like a heartbeat, rich with life.

He strode out on the wide bridge of black iron that arched across what looked like a bottomless gulf. It connected his fortress to the rest of the city and he needed to spend time among his own kind.

Beneath him were rivers of blue fire that snaked their way through cracks in the rocks. Each tentril of liquid pulsed with the same power, sending sapphire sparks in the air.  

Towers spiraled out of the canyon walls, set inside this expanse. Some were upright, others inverted, their jagged crowns pointing downward. Chains as thick as tree trunks linked ever spire and swung gently in the currents of heat that drifted upward.

Across the bridge the city, his city was bustling with life.

It felt right.

It also felt utterly wrong.

Sog flexed his hands, clenching them tight, ignoring the stone he had crushed that had been used to shape his city in a moment.  A month ago he would have filled the street with competing courts, each demon lord eager to carve him open if they could and take whatever power they might.

Now he imagined plazas where artisans might trade and younglings might laugh.

A demon imagining laughter not connected with pain.

Sog couldn’t help but chuckle.

Max would have laughed harder.

He felt the connection and as he did every day, checking the numbers, Sog pulled the knowledge he kept looking at up.

Capital - Xarak Zhul

Population: 10,001

Edicts: None

“Not for long,” Sog muttered.

Still it appears at least one pair has been busy.

A presence approached from behind, and he didn’t turn around, able to sense who was coming.

He smiled as the succubus in a fancy red and black three-breasted suit landed on the bridge and started walking slightly behind him.

She held a scroll, and red ink fell from its rolled-up shape, vanishing before it touched the stone at their feet.

Her outfit was much tamer than he had planned, but then again, Max’s influence had won him over.

Think of what the kids will say… or Fowl.

It had been funny, but the man had a point. 

“Welcome the Savior in chains! Welcome, the Midnight Star that gives life and hope to all! Welcome, Sog’thollech, prince of this world!”

Sog sighed and shook his head.

“Voktraz, I told you to keep the titles short.”

His herald’s face scrunched, and then a pouty set of lips and puppy eyes appeared.

“I removed twelve, my lord. Shall I strike another?”

“Remove all but one. Call me Sog. Keep it simple for my children.”

“As you decree, O S–”

His glare cut her sentence off, and she bowed, squeezing the rolled-up scroll tighter, more red dripping from it.

They moved past the bridge toward a shallow amphitheater he had initially planned on having some fighting matches in. Now he wasn’t sure what it would host. Tiered benches ringed a dias shaped like an open hand.  Every seat moved, filled with imps.

Some had glassy wings, others were lanky devils with carving blades for fingers.  Some were stocky and larger, their bodies dripping with sweat and ichor.  Thousands more lined the walkways, each trying to pack the place he had summoned them to. 

He felt their gaze, wondering if they believed he would be like the old masters every demon knew of. Inside them was the truth. Cruel masters who enslaved them, chained them, and used them. The only way up was through deceit, chaos, and luck.

He had been lucky. Answering Max’s summons had changed his existence.

It was why he hadn’t slept in days. That and he didn’t need to. His mind was struggling with that nagging thing called emotion. One Max seemed filled with. Compassion.

He lifted his black hand, and the murmurs of the crowd vanished.

“Children of shadow and flame,” Sog said, his voice carrying out across the stone and to those who hadn’t found a place inside. “I shaped this place for you. It is a fortress against the void. It is a hearth for our kind. Here you will grow strong. But know this, you will not grow by preying upon one another.”

Silence was his reply. The idea seemed heretical. It went against everything they knew and believed. A demon was designed to prey upon anyone or anything it could. Contracts were abandoned and ways out of them found, all so that one might take more power than hadn’t been planned on being given.

Still, Sog let that discomfort they all felt linger a moment. Then he clenched a fist.

A bronze screen, shaped in a large ring appeared overhead, filling the amphitheater. Words flared to life above every head, glowing symbols that all could read.

Edict of Accord: No demon may harm another citizen of Xarak Zhul without duel rite or approved sanction.

One lean fiend, taller than most, sitting on the second row, hissed. Its whip tail snapped toward a smaller imp beside it. Mid-strike, it froze, wrapped in ember chains of light. The attacker gasped, eyes wide as the chain tightened around its limb, pulling it to the stone floor until more chains appeared, binding it so that its horned brow was pressed to the floor.

Sog didn’t say a word, letting the sight speak for him. He grunted and shook his head for a moment. Opening his fist the chains vanished and the fiend scrambled back to its seat, eyes glued to the floor.

“Strength earned through butchery is easy,” Sog said. “I know. I have slain more than most of you could ever imagine. Yet I have learned that greater strength can be earned through crafting, study and kindness. I want you to pursue the harder path. I want you all to have a chance to experience what I now experience.”

“Godhood?!” 

The voice carried through the amphitheater and while he knew which demon had spoken, there was no need to single them out 

“Not just godhood but a true family and friends. This world is filled with other races and we will not wage war on them. A day will come when I will need demons who have honed their strength in the hard times, who have learned that crafted armor and weapons are stronger than one's own skin. A time will come when I need warriors who will help me conquer other worlds so that those who are here remain safe.”

He narrowed his eyes, slowly spinning to look at every demon around him.

“I will need a new race of demons who will help me free our own kind from the chains that ensnare them. A day will come when our true enemies appear and we will show them what strength forged from this calling is like.”

No one spoke, only the wind as every demon sat or stood there.

Slowly, an imp, barely a foot tall rose above the others and drifted toward him.

“What… what if we fail?”

Sog knelt so the imp didn’t have to strain to look up.

“Then we will rise again. Like glass returned to the furnace, we will be reforged. That is the lesson Max Hoste gave me. It is the lesson I pass to you.”

The imp nodded, wings flickering slightly as he back away and returned to where it had come from.

Voktraz cleared her throat.

“Shall I conclude the ceremony, O S… Sog?”

“Yes,” he said, chuckling for a second. “Briefly.”

His herald lifted her scroll.

“Citizens of Xarax Zhul. You have heard the Accord. Swear by it. Build according to it. Conquer, but without cruelty. Your god walks among you.”

She paused, then bowed.

“Thus speaks Sog.”

A small roar came at first from those furthest away and then it swept towards the center of the amphitheater like fire on dry grass pushed by a raging wind.

It was raw and Sog could sense there was some confusion but there was also hope.

It will have to do.

He raised a hand, the silence coming as if someone had cut their head off.

“Now go. Learn a profession, become a warrior, a thief, a mage, or even a baker. Form parties and tackle the dungeons. Get strong enough and perhaps,” he paused and pointed a finger at the tower which was covered by dark clouds. They pulled away, revealing the massive structure to all. “Climb the tower. Defeat it. Become one like me.”

After a few seconds of not speaking, the demons departed immediately, some running or flying away, others calling out for any who might want to attempt a dungeon together.

Soon it was only he and Voktraz standing in the center of the amphitheater.  

Can mercy really build an empire?

He knew the answer. Max used mercy and he also acted with absolute destruction.  Mercy was offered. When it was turned down then he didn’t hesitate.

The thread that connected him to his friend always pulsed with a heartbeat. He knew that Max was family. A term… an idea he hoped these children of his might one day come to know.

“Was the speech to your liking, lord?”

“It will do,” Sog replied, turning and moving in the direction of his city. “Begin increasing requests for resources. We’ll need ore from the northern ridge and crystals from the chasm below. Find scholars who remember the old runic tongues.”

“Already done.”

He chuckled and nodded.

Perhaps having a three-breasted demon isn’t bad at all.

“Shall I prepare guest quarters for when your World Champion… friends eventually come?”

A smile appeared and Sog nodded.

“Prepare the feast hall. And find someone who can make muffins. Max always likes them.”

She bowed and then began to fly away.

As she left, Sog could feel the city, his city, pulsing beneath him.

The heartbeat was strong. 

Alright Max… It’s your turn. Let’s see whose people learn the fastest.

Laughing, he started to jog. Somewhere out there were demons he could train to fight, and when he was done training them, they’d be a match for anyone.