Hell

When Akuro came to his body was sore and he felt exhausted. He looked up to observe his surroundings and realized he was chained to a wall, his hands over his head. His shirt was gone and across his chest were the black seal markings from the God Slayer. Akuro's eyes widened.

'How the hell did I get cut by my own weapon? And how did I get here? And where is here?' He wondered. 'What happened?' He then thought of Inari and wondered if she was okay. He also thought of Darius, anger and frustrations welling up inside him. He felt a knot in his chest.

He looked around him, shaking other thoughts out of his mind as he knew he needed to focus on getting out of wherever he was. The room he was in was much like a dark age torture chamber. It was small and on either side of Akuro were large torches that burned with orange-red flames that cast dancing shadows over the room.

On one side of the room was a wall of torture tools; daggers, small thorns or nails, whips, hammers, and other weapons that could be effective in torture. The other side of the room was bare and empty, and on the far side of the room was a wooden chair sitting by the heavy metal door. The walls were a dark rust color and the ground was bloodstained.

Akuro pulled against the chains on his arms, but it was to no avail, he only managed to make his wrists raw. He sighed, throwing his head back against the wall.

"Fuck." He cursed. He wondered how this came to happen, and who had captured him. He could guess that he'd gone berserk like he had when they had fought Sedori, that much was obvious, but how he was captured was not so easy to guess. For all he knew, Raijin had came down from the heavens and captured him. Who knew, it was possible, right?

He gave the chains another tug and winced as the rough metal bit into his wrist.

"Quite a pickle, huh?" Mato's voice came in Akuro's head.

'The hell?' Akuro responded mentally, 'How are you talking to me? Aren't you dead?'

"Well yeah, I'm dead. That's for certain. But you have my aura in you, therefor I live on inside of you. You are technically my vessel." Mato explained.

Akuro's eyes narrowed as a theory formed in his head. 'Did you take control of me?'

"Mm, yeah I did. But it's only because you were already going mad, you lost control of your emotions, all I did was direct your emotions towards the proper targets and help you use your own rage to your advantage. I was helping you."

'Helping me? Is that why I'm a prisoner?'

"Well kinda. I guess you could say it was my fault I let you get cut by your own weapon... I should've been more aware it's just..."

'Just?'

"She did some... weird stuff?" Mato spoke awkwardly.

'She? Who's she? Adeline?'

"No. Lilith."

'Lilith? Wait, Lilith captured me? Are you saying we're in fucking hell?!'

"Yes?"

Akuro pounded the back of his head against the wall again. "Fuuuuuuuuuck." He groaned. He tugged in the chains again as hard as he could, but it was no use. He was weak, his physical strength becoming that of a normal human again.

'Mato, is there a way to remove the seal?' Akuro asked.

"Yeah, but I don't suggest it." The boy replied.

'Tell me. Now.'

"Alright, but don't say I didn-"

Just then the cell door opened and a figure walked into the room. Akuro's eyes narrowed.

"Lilith." He said the name as if it were acid on his tongue.

"Hey, handsome. I see Mato no longer has any hold on you, that wonderful!" Lilith spoke in a light, innocent tone. "That means we can play!"

"Let me go." Akuro said.

"Hmmm... no." Lilith pulled the chair across the room and sat directly in front of Akuro. "You've caused me a lot of problems, you know. Lucifer is just furious with me, do you know why?"

Akuro gave her no response, he only glared at her.

"It's because you went on a little rampage and killed not only another demon general, but also over three hundred demon soldiers. Do you realize how much trouble you got me in for that?"

"I don't care, honestly it sounds like a you problem." Akuro responded.

Lilith laughed. "You've got spunk. I like it. But do you realize the situation you are in? You have no powers. You are in hell. And you are about to be tortured by the demon queen herself. You may think that being immortal is your only saving Grace, but it's not. It only makes things worse for you because it just means I can torture you in ways that would usually kill." Lilith ran a finger over Akuro's chest, caressing his skin as she traced the black markings.

Akuro spat in Lilith's face. "Fuck off." He said simply, setting his jaw.

Lilith frowned, wiping the spit from her face. "Well." She said, rising from her chair. "I was going to be reasonable, but now, I just can't do that." Lilith crossed the room to the wall of weapons and continued to observe each of them one by one. Then she picked up a large bucket filled with black nails. "How about these? We can give you some nice piercings, yeah?"

•

•

•

Inari and Onoma stood at the lip of the crater, staring down at the cracks in the earth below. Red light still faintly emitted from them.

"What do you think?" Onoma asked.

"About what?" Inari replied. She was careful to keep her distance from Onoma, as there was no way she could trust him.

Onoma looked over at Inari and sighed. "About following them. Think we should go and save him?"

"I was already planning on it." Inari said.

"We're you? We then, would you mind if I accompanied you?"

"Why the sudden change of heart?" Inari asked suspiciously. "You were hellbent on killing Akuro and now all of a sudden you want to help save him? Why?"

"Because, I see him as a rival. Only I can kill him." Onoma answered simply.

Inari furrowed her brow. "You've got to be kidding. This is not a game."

"I know that. I take all of this very seriously believe it or not."

"I don't."

"Ok, fine, even if you don't believe me, I killed the mini boss for you, so you should at least trust me a bit, right?" Onoma joked.

"Did you seriously just tell a joke?" Inari asked.

"Yeah, I did. What of it?"

"It's extremely out of character..."

"Out of character? Well tell me then, what exactly is my 'character'?"

"A moody E-boy asshole." Inari answered.

"Wow. Okay then, is that really what I look like?" Onoma asked in surprise.

"Yeah. It is."

Onoma sighed. "Aight, look, do you wanna save your boyfriend or not, because we are running out of time."

•

•

•

Akuro winced as Lilith hooked another black chain link with pointed ends through his ear. He had three on his left ear and now he also had three in his right.

"The fuck are you doing? Is this your idea of torture?" Akuro asked.

"No." Lilith answered. "I just like to decorate my toys is all."

"I'm not your toy." Akuro growled.

Lilith moved closer to him, putting her lips against his neck and moving them up to his ear. "You're wrong, you are mine, and you won't be going anywhere." She whispered directly into his ear, "You are my little pet."

Akuro grit his teeth and tugged the chains about his wrists, resulting in Lilith letting out a soft laugh. She then turned and grabbed a large black spike and a long black chain. She held a chainlink to Akuro's shoulder, then placed the point of the spike inside it before she pressed her finger against the top of the spike, causing it to dig into Akuro's shoulder.

Akuro winced and groaned in pain as blood spilled down his body.

Lilith smiled as she drove the spike in deeper and deeper until it was completely embedded into Akuro's shoulder. She then wrapped the chain tightly around his arm up to his elbow, where she repeated the process. Akuro let out a word pain, which brought a dark grin on Lilith's face as she looped the chain further up his arm to his wrist, where she shoved another spike into his skin just below the chains holding his wrist.

Akuro was gasping for breath as his wounds slowly healed themselves around the spikes, sealing them into his body as if he'd undergone surgery.

"Let me ask you something." Lilith spoke as blood pooled below Akuro's feet. "Do you know what happens to a soul when it's shattered?"

Akuro gave Lilith no answer, he only gasped for air and decided it was better to ignore her.

"I'll take that as a no. Well, the answer is simple; when a soul is shattered it comes here. The shattered soul then becomes a prisoner of hell, on of the many slaves to the demon race, and in the end these souls become demons. Now do you know what happens when a demon's soul is shattered?"

Again Akuro gave no answer.

"Well, again, the answer is simple. When a demon's soul is shattered it goes through the same process again. This process will repeat over and over again. But, in some rare cases, when a soul is shattered so many times it will become something new; an Archdemon. And the unique thing about Archdemons is that they no longer have souls, they are simply corrupt and tainted beings of hate and destruction. That's what I am, I am an Archdemon. Cool, right?"

Lilith turned and grabbed another chain from the ground, and began to repeat the same process as before except on Akuro's other arm.

"The best thing about being an Archdemon is that I am completely unkillable, it's impossible for me to be defeated. I mean, there's one way, but we won't even discuss that, seeing as there is no reason for you to know. I mean, why would I tell you how to kill me?" Lilith laughed as the second spike dug itself into Akuro's right arm.

'Mato! How the fuck do I remove this damn seal! Answer me already!' Akuro roared in his mind.

"Yeah, alright. I Just didn't wanna ruin this little sex dungeon thing you've got going." Mato said as Lilith moved up Akuro's body, pressing herself against him with a crazed smile.

'I never consented to this shit! This is creeping me out!'

"Really? I figured you'd like it, I mean she's got some big-"

'Mato!'

"Alright, fine, sorry." The boy said, then went serious. "The only way to remove that mark is to scorch it off of your skin with fire."