NOVEL WEB 174 - Crowning Achievement
For the first time in weeks, I felt fear.
Roger had been erased. Aside from my eyes seeing him unravel to dust, it also struck me in my core. Not necessarily an emotional response to his demise, but he and I were linked. Did this mean I was about to become unraveled as well? Or lose some of my demonic powers?
It didn’t really matter, for as soon as the flash of fear washed through me, it was replaced with fury almost as quickly.
I slammed into the demon king, daggers in each hand, only barely piercing his thick skin. For a System-created, he truly was powerful. Probably not meant to be assaulted by Players - especially not by just three. He growled and pushed me away, grabbing me instead of swatting me from the air.
Ren dropped to her knees, her arm hanging slack as she downed a potion with the other. She had finally overpowered the spellcaster’s shield and scoured them with bolts. Wolf roared and leaped for the king, almost equally as angered at seeing the destruction of the rabbit demon.
A large wall of spikes burst from the marbled floor, blocking the bear off from landing any hits. I struggled and squirmed against the grip of the demon king as he held me up, his large fist squeezing down on me.
“Such a wretched rat,” he spat, eyes burning into me. “Not worthy of having one silver crown, let alone eight of them.”
I didn’t have the temperament for words at this stage. Instead, I drew my right arm back and lashed out toward his face. With no hesitation, he opened his large mouth and bit my hand clean off - halfway up to my forearm. With a crunch as he crushed my left shoulder, he then threw my body to the floor.
He finished swallowing down the faux-arm, licking his bloodied lips. The others were fighting more of the other elite demons, which was a shame—mostly because I wanted to see what I was about to do.
I dropped Demon Form and rubbed at my head where the horns once were. “A short but worthy battle. It was nice knowing you, nameless king.”
“Wretch! You act so insolent,” he growled and brought down his sword from the air into his hand. “Acting as if you had won, you will revere the name…”
He paused, and I took one last deep breath.
In his eyes, I then vanished - to be replaced by my demonic ace. And yes, I had activated Transposition to switch places with it. Only, I had been holding it in my hand. The one that he had eaten.
From my perspective, I didn’t have a chance to see the look on his face, or know if he had any last words, or even the realization that I had outplayed him. Instead, I just knew warmth and darkness. At least for a brief moment.
And then I unloaded every bulky item from my Inventory as quick as my broken ability let me. The tangible space around me tried to deny me, the System unsure as to how the physics or practicality of my plot was meant to work out. After three confused seconds, where an improbable amount of chairs cluttered around me—the king's physical form could abide it no longer.
With a visceral ripping sound that filled my ears, bright light flooded through the darkness as the demon tore in all directions. I dropped to the ground and rolled across warm entrails and gore. Gasped for air and tried to wipe the blood from my eyes.
I had not gone without my own damage from the venture. Even watching my health now tick up from my regeneration and bones click back into place, it had been a risky endeavor. I had become partially crushed myself before he gave out. A warm pulse of healing righted most of those wrongs, as I turned my blurry vision over to the elf.
The created wall had crumbled to ash, showing my two Party members equally bloodied, but healed up. Any demon still living had paused in place, frozen in surprise or terror at seeing their king ruptured from the inside out.
I grinned, blood escaping from my mouth, as my aching legs took me over to my reward. The golden crown that had rolled away from the surprised head of the demon, now just inert. I shuffled one of the bloodied wooden chairs upright and sat on it. And just… looked down at the piece of headgear.
Relatively simple at first glance - only a few steps above the plain silver crowns. This golden one had faint engravings on it, and a sinister red gem at the forefront. My eyes were drawn to the pile of ash where my former pact demon had been standing.
Ren stepped up behind me and put a bloody hand on my equally gore-slick shoulder. “He gave his life to save me, trickster. Roger wasn’t such a bad egg after all.”
I opened up my hand and drew his card. Floating two inches above my hand, it was blank. Plain white. Not only was the rabbit gone, but the System hadn’t replaced him. He was only meant to be summoned in the over-world, and any deaths would send him back here. Perhaps it didn’t know what to do now that he was erased for good.
With the empty card still hovering there, I turned my tired eyes around the throne room. There were still a few living demons, including the two princes remaining - who had kept out of battle as much as possible to save their own skins. Nobody seemed keen to resume the fight after seeing what I had done to the king. Plenty of them had their glowing eyes focused on the crown laying on the floor.
Floating above the shredded corpse and soaked furniture was the demonic sword. The eye on the hilt was looking at me. I tilted my head and observed it. It didn’t look angry at me. Impassive, maybe. But the stare was intense and unblinking.
“I just had a new position open up, if you’re looking for regular work.” My voice came out rough like I had caught a cold. I grasped at my plain card and held it up to the weapon.
It maintained eye contact with me for a few moments before it started to fade away. Similar to how Roger had been destroyed, but calmer and more controlled. As it did so, lines started to draw on my magic card. Grooves of deep purple and black that were sharp and angular, before circling around with a flourish.
The design was a simplified version of said demonic sword. I blinked a couple of times to make sure I wasn’t just imagining it before I allowed the card to fade away.
“Does… the sword talk?” Ren asked, half hopeful and half apprehensive.
“We can test it.” I furrowed my brow and looked down at the crown. The weight of it was… it had been what we had wanted. What I had wanted. Ever since we set off in hell. To not take it up would be pissing on Roger’s sacrifice.
As Wolf went to sniff around the lumpy remains of the previous king, Ren put her arms around my neck from behind and leaned her face down close to mine.
“I’m with you. Whatever you decide, and whatever happens.”
I rested my head against hers for a moment, before she relinquished her grasp so I could lean forward. I took up the crown into my hand and raised it to place upon my head.
It merged with the others.
With a sigh, I stood to my feet and stretched out my arms and then legs. Despite the tension in the room, I turned calmly and regarded the demons that hadn’t been smart enough to run yet. My eyes fell on the two princes, and I gestured for them to come over.
They were apprehensive, but did so, shuffling through the small crowd to stand before me. Each double my height. Muscled beyond normal means. One of them had a mouth wide enough to swallow me whole.
“Kneel,” I commanded.
Both princes wavered, before dropping to a knee, hanging their heads low.
I was pretty sure I heard the elf briefly purr from behind me. “As your new king, I offer my first proclamation. No, wait… before that.” I spun on my heels to face Ren, who had clearly been ogling me up.
“What is it, your majesty?” she asked, biting her lip.
“I have the capacity to actually marry us under the System. You will become Queen of Hell, beside me. Till death do us part.”
She stepped closer and put her hands on my cheeks so that her bright blue eyes could dig into my muted purple ones. “I accept. There is nothing I want more.”
“Then it is done.” I leaned in and we shared a slow kiss. As we parted, she was all smiles - and I realized that I was too. There was no tangible benefit to this… no, that was a lie. We were both now immune to the corrupting influences of hell. No slowly being ground down. No overheating. No madness.
I turned from her. “My next edict…”
The large demonic sword burst back into reality between the humbled princes, quickly rotating in a full circle to lop off both their heads with the same swipe.
“No princes or successors,” I announced, as their heads bounced across the marbled floor. “I will be the last king here, after which I will put together a council to have a democratically elected official lead hell in my absence.”
That was assuming that we had a way of leaving here.
I took the two crowns and absorbed them, too.
“Alright. Now everyone fuck off out of my palace.” I crossed my arms as the sword hovered over to flank me.
After a couple of moments where the demons were still trying to process everything, they eventually got the nerve to leave. Cautious footsteps became something of a stampede, as they were all keen to get away from my glare.
Soon enough, it was just us three left.
I sighed and rubbed at my head, walking across the room. With little ceremony, I sat myself on the throne. It was warm and uncomfortable. Didn’t even get much chance to survey my kingdom from this new precipice before the elf had climbed up with me, straddled across my lap.
“You might want to give us some space,” she said, craning her head back to look at the displeased bear.
“Actually, Ren…” I placed my finger on her lips as she turned back to face me. “I was thinking we put a pause on this.”
“But it was my fantasy.” She pouted, something that easily wormed into my heart. A total break from her usual stoic and dour attitude.
My eyes were too focused on my menus. On the new skills that I had gained now that I snapped hell in half and made it my own.
I now did double damage to demons, which made sense with how easily I dispatched those princes. My kingship also granted several boons to my summoned demons and my demonic form. The third skill was perhaps more important, and had totally been a handful of ice cubes on the passion Ren was trying to stoke up.
“We’ll do it next time we’re here, I promise.” I smiled and struggled to run my bloody hand through her matted hair.
Her pout remained. “Next time?”
“Yes, my dear. I can now create a portal between hell and Othea, anytime I like.”