54: Cain Rises

"So… Cain, huh?" Harley grinned. "Sean 'Caine'~?"

Hades blinked in confusion, "I'm… sorry…?"

We were returning to the story, it seemed. I was more than fine with that. Hecate still needed a 'good' introduction to my special brand of bullshit. Well, another of my special brands. She already knew I was bullshit with my unique relationship to Magic. Now, she just got to hear about my fun that transcended reality and dimensions.

Plus, a few of the better Greek Gods were now here to listen in as well. They were being thrown straight into the deep end, so to speak. I wasn't planning on taking it easy on them just because they were unfamiliar with the Dead End. Introductions had been made. That was enough for me to 'go all out'. And it didn't get more 'all out' than DxD's wild and wacky world.

"That's what Sean was talking about when you three came in," Ivy explained helpfully. "The curse he spoke of was the Mark of Cain, placed upon him by the Biblical God."

"You… don't look anything like the Cain I've heard of…" Persephone said hesitantly.

Didi shook her head, "Try thinking a bit farther afield."

"Ah," Hestia realized. "This universe is not your home, is it, Sean Caine?"

I gave her a subtle smirk, "No. No, it isn't. Of course, neither was the reality I'm talking about now. 'Twas merely another link in my chain of stories."

"Yeah, Dad's bullshit like that," Alice deadpanned.

Hestia smiled warmly, "But what is 'home' truly? You've had many, Mr. Caine. I can tell. Even so far from the hearth of your birth, you've found a place to belong. That is something beautiful and special."

"It was easy when the one who matters most was always so close to my soul," I said, shooting Didi a wink.

She blushed, "Must you make it sound as if I was stalking you, Dear?"

"Weren't you~?" I teased.

Didi turned her nose up at me, trying her best to act unfazed through burning cheeks, "N-Not consciously. Just because someone dies many times doesn't mean they'll grow close with Death."

"But I did," I pointed out, amused.

"But that's because you're you!" Didi blurted out. "Not because you happened to die a few dozen times!"

"So I'm just special in your eyes~?" I asked knowingly.

"Yes, exactly! I would have chosen you even if you only died once-! Eep~!" Didi's lips suddenly snapped shut. "I-I'm going to stop talking now…"

Embarrassment poured forth from her side of our bond. My amusement and love welcomed her with open arms. Even without meeting my eyes in the physical world, Didi sunk into my spiritual and conceptual embrace.

Hestia smiled brilliantly at our homey, loving display, "Still, there is something to be proud of in finding a home wherever you go. There are others who would struggle with such a feat. It speaks well in your favor, in my opinion, Mr. Caine."

"Call me, Sean, Hestia," I insisted. "That goes for all three of you, actually. You've all managed to endear yourselves to me surprisingly well for Greek Gods."

"Thank you," Hades sighed. "I can understand how the rest of our family might make that a difficult task."

"[Insistence: Story]. [Request: Data]," Simmy interrupted, bringing us back on track.

"Mmn," Ophis nodded in agreement, leaning back onto my chest. "Time… wasting… Patience… waning…"

"Of course, of course," I nodded. "Sorry, Simmy, Ophy. Where was I? I covered my origins in that reality and the boob logic the universe ran on…"

"I don't know what he means by that and I'm honestly afraid to ask," Hades muttered.

Persephone tittered, "Sounds like 'Dite would have a time and a half there."

"And Zeus would either become the most powerful being in reality or singlehandedly doom it," Hades added in exasperation.

"┐(￣ヘ￣)┌" Cass shrugged nonchalantly. 'Eh, I could take him.'

"Bold," Black Mask deadpanned. "Arrogant and foolish, some might say."

"( ๑‾̀◡‾́)σ " Cass struck a determined pose of declaration. 'With the power of boob logic, anything is possible!'

"So, yes," I picked my story back up with a chuckle at Cass' antics. "In that universe, I was born as Cain, Firstborn Son of Adam and Eve. The usual story played out from there. I killed my brother Abel, 'bringing' evil into the world. In my defense, I have reason to believe I was subtly prodded in that direction so God could make a statement. Also, I loved him, but Abel was kind of a dick."

"That's… a unique take on the Scripture," Penguin said, his face screwed up in an awkward expression. "But I suppose you were actually there…"

"I don't mean to shake your faith, Penguin," I shook my head. "It was an entirely different reality. Don't take my story as… heh, 'gospel'."

Harley snorted, "Hehe, nice~!"

I continued with my retelling, "I was cursed with the Mark of Cain, cursed to wander eternally. Thankfully, wandering is something I'm quite good at. I couldn't settle down anywhere — cursed to never know peace and all — but that didn't affect me too much in the beginning. I just got up to some biblically accurate incest and set about seeding the world with humanity."

"(͡o‿O͡)***" Cass leered. 'Kinky~.'

"What's a good story without some incest?" Riddler joked.

"Normal," Jason deadpanned. "It's normal."

"Not for quite literally every mythology I know of," Hecate pointed out.

"I'd go as far as to challenge you to find a creation myth 'WITHOUT' incest," Minerva put in.

"Unfortunately, I can't argue with that," Jason sighed.

"It's something of a common theme for humanity," I smirked. "Sometimes, all you can do is fuck your sister."

Harley groaned, "Back to the story, please, Gothboy~… And maybe skip the nitty, gritty, Freudian incest stuff, yeah~?"

I grinned wickedly, "Alright, I won't tell you about all of the intimate, lovey-dovey, brother-sister, breeding for the sake of breeding that happened in those initial years… No one wants to hear about that stuff anyway, right~?"

"╰(● ⋏ ●)╯" Cass' eyes went wide. 'Wait, wait, wait~! Let's not be so hasty~!'

"Anyway, I wandered the Earth, populating it and coming back every hundred years or so to check on my descendants," I pressed on right over Cass' protests.

"(ᗒᗣᗕ)՞" Cass 'screamed' her disappointment to the heavens. 'Nooooooooouuuuuuuuuu~!'

Again, she went ignored, "My reach was actually pretty impressive considering the times. From the tip of Cape Horn to the frozen wastes of the Scandinavian Arctic, from Portugal to Siberia, I left my mark on the whole world. I even made it to the Americas with the original nomadic migrants. Fucked around there for a bit — literally — before getting bored and walking back to Eurasia and Africa across the bottom of the Atlantic."

Everyone stopped to gape at me with that casual bomb. I just shrugged, "Immortality both sucks and rocks. The world changed throughout my wanders. Civilizations rose and fell. Gods and monsters were born, ruled, and died. Humanity… developed. But not without their hiccups…"

"Fuck if that isn't ominous," Jason muttered.

"God decided to reassert control of his Creation at some point while I was 'isolated' in the Americas," I explained. "I returned to a known world at war. A Great War between the three supernatural factions that spawned from God. The Angels — bathed in His Light, the Fallen — cast out from His Grace, and the Devils — cloaked in sinful darkness from birth, cruel shadows of His Creation."

As I spoke, scenes flashed in the mirror behind me. Angelic radiance, Fallen glory, and Devilish temptation. Then… came scenes from the Great War. Cannon fodder from the sides of Light and Dark — even the weakest individual strong enough to topple skyscrapers — clashed in seemingly endless waves that blocked out the sun. The Fallen mostly kept out of the battles between Heaven and Hell but when they joined, they joined in force, often more powerful on average despite their limited numbers.

Spears of Light boiled away at demonic flesh. Demonic Clan traits and powers fought back in wave after ceaseless wave. Halos and burning horns locked in a vicious clash. Wings from two to twelve carried their owners in grand aerial dogfights that lit up the sky. White feathers. Black. Darkness-stained, leathery skin. All were the same when they fell to Death's final embrace.

The Angels would say they were all crafted with His Personal Attention. The truth of that matter was brought into question by just how many of them fought and died all the same. The Devils didn't lie to themselves there, at least. As soon as they spawned from Lilith's tortured, twisted blood, they were thrown right into the meat grinder. Endless fodder against the armies of Heaven. The Mother of Devils was never seen, locked away as a close-coveted secret of Lucifer himself.

She must have lived a sorry existence, I considered somberly. Forced to condemn her children to the Great War without a chance, likely enthralled and chained by Lucifer's Devilish Love. I never got the chance to meet Lilith in that life. If I had, I imagine I would have stopped at nothing to take my father's first wife for myself…

"My God…" Selina exhaled breathlessly.

"Holy shit…" Jason nodded his agreement.

"Jehovah save us…" Penguin intoned.

"I'd make another 'literally' joke but, uh, yeah…" Even Harley was forced to trail off from the scenes of the Great War.

"By Cerberus' fucking balls! It's worse than the Titanomachy!" Hades exclaimed.

"You know he doesn't like you using his name for swears like that, Dear," Persephone absently chided, mostly distracted by the sheer scale of conflict they all now bore witness to.

"I think the damn dog would fuckin' understand in this case," Hades grumbled.

"The Great War was waged for millennia," I continued, my voice serious. "No place in the known world was left untouched. The forces of Heaven and Hell dueled themselves nearly to extinction, recovered, and did it again. Over and over. For close to two thousand years. Even other pantheons were sucked into the conflict. It truly was the war before all wars, worse than anything humanity alone could hope to dream up…"

Stunned horror answered my words, "During the Great War, I did my best to stay out of the main conflict. I wasn't always successful though, that much was an impossible task. The Devils tried to pressgang me into their service at one point at least. I came down on them with the force of a Son of Adam…

"See, even before being cursed by God, I was the very definition of a primordial human. I was of the original blood of humanity. And it showed. After being cursed, I only had more time to grow stronger. I mastered and pioneered the first magicks of man. My strength was practically unmatched. Only God, His Archangels, and Lucifer themselves were truly above me. And even then, I wouldn't have gone down without a Hell of a fight."

The scenes behind me shifted again. In the mirror, I fought a multi-winged ancient Devil — the stuff of humanity's nightmares, an embodiment of pure sin — to a standstill. He tried to scorch me with Hellfire and Demonic Power. I simply straight-up boxed him into submission with pure, overwhelming physical might.

Left. Right. Right. Left. A straight jab smashed into the Devil's face. A vicious hook threw his whole body to the side. An uppercut rocked him, physically launching him off his feet for a moment before he fell back into a devastating left cross. Spit and teeth flew free from his mouth. Blood splattered off his brow. His whole face was one big, deformed bruise and I still wasn't close to being done with him. In the mirror, a past version of myself obliterated a country-killing being with fists and fists alone.

"(; ꒪ö꒪)" Cass reacted with visceral glee, 'shouting' at the top of her lungs. 'OH, FUCK YEAH~! Beat his ass~! Get 'im~! Fuck~! FUCK~! I'm so close~!'

"You're totally getting off on this, aren't you?" Jason deadpanned a question at her.

"Shit, I can't even blame her~!" Harley cackled. "That's fucking hot, Gothboy~!"

"Not enough magic," Hecate pouted slightly.

I chuckled, "How about this then?"

The scene in the mirror changed with my words yet again. Array after array of spells were crafted in an instant, Magic answering my beck and call. The small squad of Angels before me barely had a chance to react. They burned. They froze. They danced beneath unseen lightning. The world itself twisted to do my bidding, subduing Angels until they rejoined their Father's Light.

"Calculation-based magic?" Hecate perked up at the sight. "How intriguing~!"

"I actually teamed up with that world's Merlin to help harness magic into a system all humans could use," I elaborated. "That was a fun decade or so. We had to do a lot of research on Demonic Power and God's Miracles before settling on calculations and coming up with a set of formulas to start with."

"I can't even begin to be surprised that you pioneered a whole system of magic for humanity to use," Klarion sighed.

"[Request: Data]?" Simmy dinged.

I blinked, "Ah, that would actually be a good magical system for you, Simmy. Perfect, in fact. Here, [Magical Calculations]…"

Simmy's whole form vibrated for a moment, her Shard shining through. She let out a content little 'ding' noise before settling into a state of thoughtful, semi-stasis.

Hecate also blinked as [Data] filtered into her mind as well, "How fascinating! Positively splendid!"

"So you were, like, what, Gothboy~?" Harley cocked her head. "The third party to end all third parties or something~?"

"Something like that," I waved my hand so-so. "I most closely aligned myself with the Fallen. It simply made sense. Angels fallen from His Grace and one of His personally chosen humans who was cursed out of His favor. I'd say it was a match made in Heaven but, well…"

"Really," Chuckling, I shook my head. "The only faction I didn't help at some point was the Devils. They were awful under Lucifer, just deplorable. Everything you'd imagine a race of literal Devils to be. But even the Angels requested my assistance occasionally."

"How the Hell does that work?" Jason's expression screwed up in confusion.

"Turns out that in a war, the First Murderer and his skills suddenly become quite desirable," I smirked.

"Makes sense," Persephone nodded. "Bit hypocritical though, isn't it?"

"As if we have anything to say there…" Hades muttered.

"It wasn't as hypocritical as you might think," I chuckled. "Him Above never stopped loving me as He loved all of his children. He just didn't approve of me — made me into an example for the rest of humanity to follow. It was a unique sort of relationship but I suppose I didn't hate the Old Man either…"

Alice stopped and stared at me with a flat look, "You had daddy issues with God."

"That's one way to put it, yes," I nodded. "Maybe 'grand-daddy issues' would be more accurate though."

Penguin barked an incredulous laugh, "I would NOT have put the pieces together like that."

"Looking back on it now," I considered. "A fair amount of us had daddy issue-type relationships going on with God. Me, Azazel, Lucifer — of course, Michael — though he would never admit it… Good ol' JC was the worst off, I think, but I never actually got to meet him to say for certain…"

"It seems even omnipotent power can't make you into a good father," Black Mask sniped.

"Nah, that's on God personally. There are plenty of gods and godlike beings who are good fathers. The Old Man just isn't one of them," I shook my head. "Anyway, I spent most of the war aligned with Azazel and his Fallen. Great guy. I can honestly say I miss the MILF-seeking netori-enjoyer."

"(　`_ゝ´)" Cass stroked her chin like a wise, old master. 'Ah, a man of culture. How… based…'

"Netori-enjoyer?" Jason hit me with a dead look. "Really?"

"Yeah, really," I laughed. "In later years, he even started bleaching his hair to look more like the Japanese pretty-boy/delinquent stereotype. He was quite fond of stealing wives away from their husbands. Lust was his sin — his literal downfall — after all. Don't let his laidback, horny attitude fool you though. He was the leader of the Fallen for a reason…"

"So how did this supernatural Great War end?" Penguin asked.

"Yes, who won?" Ivy added with a nod. "The Angels? The Devils? We already know God died at some point. Was it during the war?"

"No idea," I shrugged. "I didn't make it that far."

"You… died…?" Jason looked at me strangely. "As a cursed immortal?"

I laughed, "I know I'm good at the whole dying thing but I think you're giving me a bit too much credit there. No, I was merely incapacitated before the end of the war and set into a sort of stasis coma by the woman I loved."

"How romantically tragic…" Persephone mourned softly.

"The woman you loved did you dirty like that?" Minerva asked.

Didi frowned slightly, "I'm not sure I like the sound of this, Dear. It sounds too much like a lover's betrayal to me."

"Hey, don't knock on Gabriel too hard," I defended the Archangel. "She was doing her best. She loved me too, though she could never really show it in the traditional way since we were fated enemies. I mean, really? The First Murderer and the Might of God, His Archangel of Salvation? It was practically unthinkable."

"(*′☉.̫☉)" Cass nodded with wide eyes at my reveal. 'Sure blows pussy-ass Romeo and Juliet out of the water…'

"You had a lover's affair… with an Archangel…?" Jason asked, his voice strained.

"Not physically," I half-denied. "At least, not then… She simply saw me as redeemable. It was honestly inspiring. She held out hope for me, went against her Father's decree, and still managed to keep her Faith and Light. Gabriel worked hard to redeem me, to offer me another chance at His Salvation."

My voice grew soft and forlorn, "It didn't quite work out that way, sadly… We fell in love over decades of her chasing me and trying to redeem my cursed immortal soul. I confessed. She didn't reject me… but she was never able to outright return my feelings either. Not while her Father's Light denied me.

"She would never dream of abandoning her purpose. It was part of what brought us together in the first place. Falling from her Father's Grace… It would have broken her. Broken the woman I loved. So eventually, I gave in to the inevitable.

"Gabriel would never be able to redeem me while her Father's curse marked my soul. But she couldn't kill me and offer my final Salvation. She wouldn't have been able to even if it was possible…

"As much as I enjoyed our games, I grew tired of running from her. She caught me. We 'fought'. I could never truly hurt her, just as it physically pained her to hurt me. In the end, I simply allowed her to seal me away from the world. The last thing I saw were tears in her beautiful eyes…"

"Oh, Gothboy~…" Harley sighed in sympathy.

"༼ ༎ຶ ᆺ ༎ຶ༽" Cass fought back tears. 'I-I'm not crying! You're crying!'

"Truly, a romantic tragedy," Hestia shook her head sadly.

A small smile grew on my face, "Thankfully, it doesn't end that way. This is only the halfway point of our story, after all."

"Tell them about the dreaming…" Ophis said, almost blushing. "How we… met."

"I'm getting there," I promised with a chuckle. "So there I was, immortal and sealed by the one I loved. And as I slept, I Dreamed. At first, my sealed slumber was ruled by my curse. My brother's murder haunted me, over and over again. Then, something changed…"

"I was visited by a great red dragon in my dreams. Great Red, you might call him," I elaborated with a smirk. "He was a size beyond sense and reason. A scale immeasurable and incomprehensible, even in a dream. He came to me with a single question…"

I paused for effect. Behind me, the mirror showed scenes that corresponded to my words. An impossibly massive dragon filled the view. His scales were like tectonic plates. His teeth — pillars that held up the sky. Even just his slitted pupil and iris were like a lake visible from space. With the voice of an apocalyptic explosion, Great Red asked…

## Wanna see something cool?! ##

The words contrasted strangely with his majesty. A voice to herald the end of the world called out to me like a child, urging me to 'Watch! Watch!'. From millions of miles away, I watched the strongest pure dragon I'd ever met do loop-de-loops the size of the sun.

Ophis twitched, "… Still too loud."

I soothed her with headpats and an extra application of Silence, "He can't bother you anymore, Ophy~."

"Oh, Mother Nature," Ivy groaned. "He's just a big kid!"

"The biggest," I nodded.

"(രᴗര๑)" Cass smiled coyly and pointed. 'To be fair, it is pretty cool.'

"I mean, yeah, he's a huge fuck-off dragon doing aerial stunts," Two-Face snorted. "Shit doesn't get much cooler than that."

"Give the poor dragon some hoops to trick through~!" Harley called.

"I recommended just that, funnily enough," I chuckled. "Spent a good dozen years or so just helping him come up with stunt routines and the like. Honestly, there are much worse ways to spend an eternity seal. Of course, after a while, I realized we were bothering a certain someone…"

The mirror matched my words, showing off some of the obstacle courses and routines Great Red and I came up with. Impossible, flaming hoops. Tightropes that a dragon (especially of Great Red's size) had no business dancing across. It turned out that Great Red was a natural performer. Instead of being the Dragon God of Apocalypse, he'd missed his calling as the Dragon of Daredevils.

As the scenes continued, a certain Infinite presence made herself known in the background. Ophis then was a grumpy, hateful being. Everyone and everything disturbed her Silence. She hated it. Hated it all. Hated, hated, hated! A well of Infinite power twisted toward lashing out at the rest of reality.

"You were… mean… in the beginning," Ophis murmured, pouting with the tiniest shift of her lips.

"I know, Ophy," I sighed. "I'm sorry. I didn't know we were bothering you so much."

Eventually, the me in the mirror left Great Red to his increasingly elaborate stunts. Astrally projected in the Dimensional Gap, there wasn't much else for me to do. Or so I thought. Until Ophis attacked me with Infinite fury in her heart, lashing out at the one who she thought made the noise of reality even worse for her.

Infinity pressed down on my sealed soul. It nearly overwhelmed me in an instant. The mirror itself shook as Ophis unleashed her frustration. Pure Void threatened to spill out into the real world from just the memory. The audience in the bar recoiled as one, from mortal to god to Avatar of Magic.

"Tartarus on a fuckin' stick!" Hades grunted.

"Fuck, Ophy-chan~!" Harley squealed. "We're cool~! We're cool~!"

Ophis in the present made a little noise of realization, "Ah. My bad. Resonance goes… brrrrr…"

Didi's lips twitched in amusement, "Indeed, it does. Perhaps a little warning next time, Sean?"

I matched her smirk, "Heh, where's the fun in that~?"

"Some of us prefer not dying to collateral damage from a fucking story," Jason grumbled.

With great amusement, I let him grumble and the others recover. The scene in the mirror continued, Ophis rushing my sealed and astrally projected soul with intent to ERASE infusing her every action. By some miracle (perhaps literally considering my Godly curse at the time), I weathered the first assault. Then I spun the tables back on Ophis.

I took the little Infinite Dragon Loli over my knee and began to discipline her like a stern, disappointed father figure. Spank after spank rained down upon her little bottom. Infinity was taken to heel. For the first time in existence, Ophis herself was the one to break her Silence, with paradoxically monotone pained squeals and squeaks and tearful apologies.

The audience stared in open shock and blatant disbelief. The literal embodiment of Infinity surrendered under a simple, stern, spanking hand. The Ophis in the mirror had no real choice but to repent. The Ophis in the present shuddered slightly against my chest.

"Spanks… Love… Deserved… Nostalgic…"

"(*′☉.̫☉)" Cass was the first to 'break' the audience's stunned silence. 'Wow… Lucky bitch. So all I gotta do to get the spanking I deserve is attack Sean with the force of Infinity~?! Deal! Ophis! I require your assistance!'

Rolling my eyes, I casually swatted my hand at thin air. Despite hitting nothing, a satisfying, meaty *thwack!* resounded through the bar. Cass jumped in her seat, earning me the first actual sound I'd heard from her in the form of a surprised and excited squeak "E-Eeeep~!"

"Behave," I shot her a stern stare.

"(˵¯͒〰¯͒˵)" Cass settled back into her seat, prim and proper, with a blushing, smug grin on her face. 'Yes, Daddy.'

"This…" Jason began. Almost instantly, he seemed to just… give up, shaking his head, "You know what? No, not my problem."

Persephone wore a mischievous smirk now that everyone had started to recover from the scene in the mirror, "You know, I can think of a few of my immortal peers that could use discipline like this."

"You're not wrong," Hades couldn't help but snort. "I'd pay to see Athena taken off her high horse like this. And the less said about Artemis, the better."

"Please don't give our new vengeful friend any ideas," Hestia chided weakly, as if she didn't even fully agree with her own protests.

"This is a wild fucking night," Minerva shook her head in disbelief. "But I suppose I shouldn't expect anything less from the Dead End."

"You shouldn't," Klarion deadpanned. "You really shouldn't."

Chuckling, I continued with my story, "This is the part of the story I shared a while back. Just to reiterate though, Ophis' punishment went on for a little more than a century."

"Even for you, that seems excessive, Dad," Alice said hesitantly.

"I took breaks for sweets. A mix of positive and negative reinforcement, if you will," I explained, shrugging. "I simply felt it was necessary to break the Infinite Dragon God out of her hatred for anything and everything in existence. Leaving her as she was, Ophis might have done something silly like hand out portions of Infinity to gather a faction hellbent on ending the world for Silence…"

Looking away with a pout, Ophis mumbled, "It was just an idea…"

Alice paused to stare at her, "… On second thought, good job, Dad."

I chuffed in amusement, "Yes, I thought so as well. Besides, Ophy was happy this way, though I doubt you'd get her to admit it. And Great Red fled the Dimensional Gap out of second-hand embarrassment so Ophis got her Silence back in the end. By the time I left, she was content to nap away the days, only waking up to prod me for sweets and affection every few decades or so."

Ophis pinched me and buried her face in my chest, "Embarrassing."

"[Commisseration]. [Consolation]," Simmy hummed at Ophis' plight.

"Thank," Ophis nodded to Simmy without removing her head from my chest. "Rest of story now. I will. Return to Silence."

"Ah, it seems that Ophy's social battery is all used up," I nodded. "I suppose we should move on from focusing on her. So… on to my awakening!"

"Woooooo~!" Harley cheered. "Good hammin', Gothboy~!"

"Thank you, thank you," I sketched a shallow bow. "Now, I was awoken somewhat rudely, about two and a half thousand years after I was originally sealed. As I said, Sweet Gabriel had erected a sort of tomb around me as I 'slept'. And some nosy little Devils decided I was a good target for some classic tomb raiding."

In the mirror, the sealed version of me lay still atop an altar. The shadows of time ravaged my form, leaving me desiccated and almost skeletal with gauntness. Across my body, glass-like cracks of Gabriel's Light kept me sealed and asleep.

The scene was soon interrupted by those pesky Devilish tomb raiders. Four of them. The lead two argued back and forth in hushed whispers. The two behind them seemed to be nothing more than dumb muscle.

## And I'm tellin' you this is a terrible idea! ##

## Quiet, fool! We've struck gold here! I can feel it! ##

## This hardly seems worth the trouble. How in Satan's name is an ancient fucker supposed to help us create a functioning King Piece?! ##

"King Piece? What are they talking about?" Riddler asked curiously.

"Ah, that's a good point," I realized, pausing the scene in the mirror for a moment. "It'll make the rest of the story flow more smoothly if I give a bit of background information now. Bear with me for a moment.

"After the Great War, all three of the Biblical Factions were left devastated. God and Lucifer were both dead and the factions were relegated to purely natural methods of reproduction, which they sorely needed after a millennia-long war. The Angels were actually left the weakest since they could still Fall to Sin after their Father's death — like, say, Lust when trying to procreate? — But none of the Three Factions had an easy time of it.

"To make matters worse, the Devils found themselves engulfed in a civil war between those who wanted to follow in Lucifer's footsteps and those who wanted their race to change, adapt, and improve for the better. The second group — the Anti-Satan Faction — won in the end and the Devils on a whole became an actually functional race that wasn't just 'pure evil'. But as things tend to go, the first group — the Old Satan Faction — wasn't completely eradicated. Its leaders slipped away and its sympathizers slipped back into society so they could bide their time to strike.

"Now, to help solve their population problems, an absolutely brilliant Devil named Ajuka came up with a neat little system. A sort of 'peerage' system of service and a nifty series of inventions to help the system along. The Evil Pieces. They were magical artifacts given to Devils of a certain rank that allowed other species and races to be converted or reincarnated as Devils and sworn to a 'king's' service.

"The Evil Piece System had its problems, of course. Some Devils stole the other races into their service without consent. The Reincarnated Devils experienced something akin to racism based on the fact they weren't born as Devils. And understandably, the other two Biblical Factions got all up in arms about it. But the Evil Pieces went ahead anyway and honestly did a pretty good job of saving a dying race."

A few people shifted uncomfortably at my explanation. Harley said it best, "That seems… kinda fucked up, Gothboy. Isn't peerage just feudalism with extra steps?"

"Sounds an awful lot like slavery," Two-Face grunted.

"It was," I nodded. "It was a system ripe for abuse, run by literal Devils of all people. I'm not going to defend it, just point out that the Devils didn't really have any other options. As a race, they're notoriously infertile. Like, to the point that a child per couple every thousand years is considered pretty damn good. If they didn't adopt the Evil Pieces, they would have undoubtedly died out with a slow, pitiful whimper. And like all living things, Devils want to live, thrive, and not freaking fade into extinction."

"Still, they did so at the expense of others, it sounds," Riddler argued.

"Some, yes," I partially agreed, playing literal Devil's advocate. "But the new Satans — those from the Anti-Satan Faction — did a remarkably good job at turning Devil culture around. By modern times, they were no worse than humans on average. It was honestly one of the most impressive feats of social engineering I've ever seen.

"Essentially, they were Devils in name alone. Quite a lot of the peerage leaders — 'Kings' as they called them — genuinely cared about those in their service. That doesn't excuse the other cases of straight-up slavery but the whole Devil race shouldn't be written off just because of the peerage system."

The feeling in the air was still somewhat awkward after my clarification. But my audience mostly nodded and left it at that. They didn't have to like the Devils or agree with them — I know I didn't, not completely. Just understand how their society was structured as background information.

"The King Piece was an unsanctioned spin-off of the Evil Piece system that was being developed without the aforementioned Ajuka's consent. He was a genius. The ones working on the King Piece… not so much. But it was too tempting to pass up on. If it worked, it would have concentrated an entire Evil Piece peerage set worth of strength into a single piece. It was exactly the kind of boost the lurking Old Satan Faction needed to further their cause…" I explained.

"Which brings us back to the scene in the tomb," Selina nodded, motioning at the mirror behind me. "Those four Devils are of the still-evil, Lucifer-idolizing variety and they seem to think your tomb holds the key to their ultimate power."

"Indeed," My lips twitched with amusement. "Four ambitious idiots interrupting my beauty sleep… I was quite fond of that nap, considering Gabriel put me to sleep for it. As such, I thought it was best if my intruders were… properly chastised for their rudeness~…"

"Oh, this is gonna be good~…" Harley grinned, the expression appropriately devilish.

"(⋋‿⋌ )" Cass matched her with wicked glee. 'The Devil dummies should have known better than to disturb your sleep! Funnily enough, they're gonna be the ones to get a rude awakening…'

"Deserved," Jason nodded, surprisingly vehement in his stance. "Fuck tomb raiders and grave robbers. On principle. The bastards destroy way too much history before it has a chance to be properly cataloged."

The playback behind me resumed at my mental urging. The interior of my tomb was dimly lit by magical light carried by the tomb-raiding Devils. At the very least, they were being somewhat professional about their 'post-mortem' desecration, using special spells purpose-built for grave-robbing.

Shadows seemed to dance at the edges of the light. My tomb was a simple thing. Merely stone, with the single altar in the center of the room that my 'corpse' lay upon. The Devils would not find any traditional treasure there. Just a long-sealed 'corpse'…

## Who did this tomb even belong to? Who's rest are we disturbing? After the labyrinth to get here, he better be worth it. ##

## Some ancient Devil King or something probably? I don't know. Nothing I've read about the area even hints at a tomb being hidden here. The carving up above was in Enochian so they have to be old. From the first half of the Great War, at least. ##

## Then why the fuck do you think he'll be useful to our research?! ##

## Do you even hear yourself?! Who knows the secrets of our ancestors that have been lost to time?! Think of the power he could have wielded in life! Devil King! King Piece! It's all connected! ##

## Do… Do you think he knew Lucifer…? That he was one of the Original Satans' Lieutenants? ##

## Perhaps even better. The body of the first Asmodeus still hasn't been found, after all… ##

## Wow… I almost don't feel worthy… ##

## He's long dead either way! Any of the True Devil's servants would happily give themselves after death to further our work toward his cause. ##

The two lead Devils bickered as they came to stand over my 'corpse'. One of them began casting spells, 'careful' not to disturb me. Not nearly careful enough. Subtly, the Demonic Power began to eat away at Gabriel's weathered Light. Millennia of time had left her seal weak and vulnerable. Unnoticed by the fascinating, working Devils, my seal slipped…

My eyes snapped open like something out of a horror movie. One of the Devils had been leaning over my face as they did. For the briefest moment, he caught a glimpse of ancient, primordial malice. A glimpse of the First Murderer staring back at him with glowing eyes of shining silver. Then the light spell the Devils had been maintaining went out without a whisper, casting the whole tomb into utter darkness.

## Satan, FUCK! Did you see that?! ##

## Idiot, what'd you do! What happened to the lights?! ##

## Uh, Boss…? What are we supposed to do now? ##

## Create a new light, you simpleton! ##

## Err… We can't. ##

An eerie chill filled the tomb, leaking through the mirror to my present, watchful audience. The sounds of too many skittering legs suddenly filled the darkness. The Devils — dimly illuminated by my memory — locked up in sheer primal terror. The air itself hung heavy with a visceral, burning rage that smothered their Demonic Power. The view in the mirror followed me as I slipped from the altar into the shadows.

Only then did I allow them a modicum of control over their magic again. The light spell came back just as suddenly as it had disappeared. The Devils jumped in their skin, looking around frantically. Eyes landed on the now-empty altar and the two leading Devils froze as one.

"〔´∇｀〕" Cass grinned and giggled. 'Ooooooooh~ yeah~… That's the good stuff.'

"Ehehehehehehe~!" Harley cackled. "They awoke the Mummy's curse~!"

"Very… Horror-movie-chic, Sean," Ivy commented as if she were casually critiquing a film.

"Scarecrow would have loved this," Riddler said, smiling with amusement.

Back in the mirror, I stalked the tomb-raiding Devils as an unseen predator. I was still slightly reeling from my abrupt awakening, watching the culprits closely to try and discern what was going on. The creaks in my bones and the near-complete lack of muscle or fat in my body told me I'd been asleep for a long, long time. The world must have changed since my sealing, that much I knew. Thankfully, I had four lucky volunteers to help me figure out just how much it had changed…

## Sir Nebiros…? The corpse… He's gone… ##

## *Through painfully gritted teeth* Yes. I. Can. See. That. Thank. You… ##

## Fuck this shit! You're on your own! I'm out! ##

The second lead Devil — yet unnamed — made a break for the tomb's exit. Without the light spell following him, the darkness quickly swallowed him whole. There was an ear-splitting, spine-tingling scream. Then… silence.

Crouching on the ceiling of the tomb in the darkness, I held the Devil that tried to flee. His body dangled limply in my clutches. His terrified eyes were forcibly locked with mine. They began to dim as I tore through his mind and absorbed his life force to help my body recover from its long slumber. In seconds, he matched my skeletal gauntness. An instant later, he dissolved to dust and ash.

A low, menacing chuckle echoed through the tomb as I found my voice again after so long. It was all the warning the remaining Devils received. The light spell flickered again, causing all three of them to quite literally jump. One of the two guard Devils was unlucky enough to jump into my grasping claws. In that brief instant of darkness, I stole him away to repeat what I'd done to his boss.

The light spell flickered back on just in time for an ominous, chilling *splat* to resound through the enclosed space. At the very edge of the light's reach, a blood stain splattered into view. The Nebiros Devil's jaw slowly dropped in abject horror. An unnatural wind underground carried delayed, echoing screams his way.

## *Muttered terror* Oh, Lord Satan, what have we awoken…? ##

## Sir? Sir?! We need to go! It's already too late for them! ##

Whispers of my laughter followed them as they ran. I stalked them from above, matching their pace with a casual, menacing walk on the ceiling. They never looked up…

Stone hallway after stone hallway passed until they must have blurred together in the terrified Devils' minds. They ran for salvation, any hope that they could be saved. The entire time, I haunted them with ghostly whispers in Enochian — the language of Angels, literally scalding their Devilish ears and brains with every word.

The guard Devil tripped and fell at one point. His boss didn't even look back, even as the guard cried out and begged for help. It honestly made me feel a bit bad for the guy. According to his colleague's memories, they were just doing their job. Pitifully, the guard screwed his eyes closed and accepted his fate after realizing his boss wasn't coming back for him. I let him live, going after the lead bastard instead.

The Nebiros Devil made it all the way to the entrance of the tomb, through a winding maze that I couldn't help but smile fondly at the thought of pure and serious Gabriel setting up. He was panting — impressive for a Devil — by the end of his flight from death and damn near cried as he reached the fresh air of Hell's surface. Those tears didn't stay relieved for long as I flickered into being in front of him and he caught his first clear sight of certain Death.

## *Begging* Lord Satan, please…?! ##

My hand gripped his throat. My will tore through his mind. The last thing Zaorama Nebiros knew was a whisper, knowledge taken from his mind to be used against him, ## Your lord is not here. The dead will not help you. But rejoice. The True Lord's First Murderer sends you to join him… ##

He crumbled to dust as his power was drained to further fuel my recovery. Impressively, he got me nearly a quarter of the way to what I would consider my bare minimum power level. Must have been one of those High-Ultimate-Class Devils…

"Hard-fuckin'-core," Alice said breathlessly, reacting with awe.

"(づ ◕‿◕ )づ" Cass waved her arms excitedly. 'Yes! Yes~! Violence! Horror! One-liners! CHAOS~!'

Jason groaned, "Dammit, Cass. Are we going to have to put you through sensitivity training again?"

"／(=✪ x ✪=)＼" Cass 'gasped'. '*Gasp!* No, no, I'm perfectly well-adjusted!'

In the mirror, I looked around as Devil Dust drifted away in the wind. I quickly found an Enochian message carved into the stone above the tomb's entrance. Reading it was enough to make me go utterly still.

## I dearly hope that one day this will be read by the one it's meant for. If it really is you, know that I am deeply sorry for what I've had to do. I'm sorry I never found another way. I pray that you can forgive me. If not and even if I never see you again, know that you will be in my thoughts and prayers forever more… - Your Gabi ##

"Hey, hey, Gothboy~! What's it say~?" Harley asked in the present as we all watched my past self reel from shock in the mirror.

I quietly repeated the message, translating for my audience's benefit.

"Oh, wow," Selina muttered, slightly stunned by Gabriel's heartfelt words.

Didi smiled softly, "That's very sweet. I take back what I said earlier. I think I quite like this Gabriel."

Two-Face grunted gruffly to hide the emotion in his voice, "Hell of a woman."

Penguin shook his head, "Aren't we all looking for someone like that?"

"┐(´～｀)┌" Cass shrugged. 'Eh, I'm looking more for someone who will slaughter their way through an entire fortress for me. Like Sean~!'

Attention returned to the mirror as something in the scene changed. The guard Devil I'd spared wandered out of the tomb, dread and shock written all over his face. He gaped at me, practically frozen in place. I didn't even look at him, simply staring at Gabriel's message.

## … Go on. You alone will be spared today. Go on and spread what happened here. Spread the word. ## Only after saying that did I turn to look at him, silver eyes boring deep into his Devilish soul. ## Tell the world that Cain, the First Murderer has returned… ##

In the mirror, the Devil scrambled off as if he'd seen the End of All Things…

"(´ π`)" Outside of it in the present, Cass was practically drooling. 'So fucking cool~…'

"You sure put the fear of… heh, God into him," Selina gave a catlike smirk.

"Is that… it…?" Klarion asked slowly. "Because that was already a lot."

I grinned, "Oh, no, the story's second act is just getting started. It just so happened that I awoke during some VERY interesting times for that world…"