Hell’s 9

Before Ariel's eyes, Grim changed.

The skeletal harbinger of death she had known twisted into something else—something terrifyingly beautiful. His bones reshaped, expanding outward. From his back, wings erupted—vast, feathered, and luminous, stretching high enough to scrape the heavens. Light, celestial yet somehow mournful, bathed him. It wasn't warmth—it was radiance without compassion.

The ground beneath him cracked and splintered, unable to contain the weight of what he had become.

Ariel did not flinch.

She met his gaze across the battlefield, where the remnants of shattered earth and warped time hung like broken glass around them.

This was it.

The battle against Death itself.

Grim's voice echoed like a sermon from the void.

"Since the fall of the first humans, I came into being. Aging. Disease. Pain. Suffering. And ultimately—death—were born alongside me."

He stepped forward, his wings expanding with a sound like thunder cracking bone.

"I am not demon. Nor angel. I am something else entirely."

The light around him dimmed as his tone deepened.

"I once served the Divine—His punisher. I razed cities. I ended bloodlines. Every life I took had purpose. But still, I wondered: Was I just a weapon? Could the Divine ever love something like me?"

His wings trembled, their brilliance tarnished by sorrow.

"Then Lucifer came. He told me the truth. That I was never meant to exist. That I was an afterthought. An abomination."

His lips curled.

"But he accepted me. Gave me purpose. Brotherhood. You think I'm mad, Ariel?" His eyes burned now. "Then answer me this—when the Son of Man was crucified… why did He descend into hell to retrieve the keys of death? That proved everything. I was never meant to belong."

The light around him darkened to stormcloud gray.

"That's why I chose Satan. And betraying him…" He raised a hand. "…makes you my enemy."

Ariel's expression never changed. Her voice was calm, unwavering.

"You're missing the bigger picture, Grim. Who was it that caused your existence in the first place?"

Grim snarled.

"Silence!"

With a flick of his hand, he carved the air with a blade of Zail. It shrieked through the battlefield, and Ariel barely slipped past it, the energy cleaving a deep gouge in the earth behind her.

Still, she spoke.

"Ask yourself, Grim—who started this chaos? You say the Divine cast you aside, but He gave you purpose. You were His sword of judgment. Would He have trusted that to something meaningless?"

Her voice echoed, not just through the battlefield—but through him.

"Satan uses you. He fuels your pain. Blinds you with rage. But the Divine? He offers more than vengeance. He offers love. Meaning. Redemption."

For a moment, Grim said nothing.

Then—he laughed.

A cold, unhinged sound, brittle and sharp like glass underfoot.

"You're just bargaining for your life." He spat the words. "It won't work. I—Death—will take yours!"

Suddenly, the air changed.

A dense green fog spread outward. The temperature plummeted. Hissing rose from the stone around them as acid rain began to fall—each drop carving through earth and steel like molten fire.

A tidal wave of acid roared toward Ariel.

She screamed—not in fear, but defiance—and a burst of radiant zail exploded from her, forming a shockwave that split the wave in two and evaporated the toxic rain.

But victory was short-lived.

She stumbled.

Blood seeped from her pores—first in threads, then rivers. Her nose. Her ears. Her eyes. Her mouth. Every part of her bled.

Grim smiled.

"I've infected you with a sickness beyond cure." His voice was low. Triumphant. "Your body is shutting down. Slow. Agonizing. Poetic."

But Ariel's spirit didn't falter.

Even as her body broke, her eyes stayed steady.

Then—she screamed again.

Louder.

Deeper.

The earth cracked, the heavens trembled, and even Grim's Zail shield shuddered under the force. For the first time, he flinched.

Her throat tore as she screamed. Her cords frayed. Blood surged again—but her voice held. Divine energy shimmered through her lungs.

Grim raised a hand, snaking tendrils of Zail like fangs toward her.

"I underestimated you," he growled. "I won't make that mistake again. This ends now."

He laughed.

"Quick. Final."

Ariel dropped to one knee, the sickness dragging her down.

And then—she began to hum.

Soft. Almost imperceptible.

But real.

A tremor of sound amidst death.

It grew.

From a hum to a melody—gentle, steady, golden.

Light curled from her lips with each note, pushing back the shadows. Her pain, her sickness, her despair—woven into song.

Grim stepped back.

The battlefield hushed.

And then—

"Breathe again, oh breath of light,

Though lungs be filled with shadow's blight…"

The Song of Hope had begun.

Her voice trembled—but it glowed. Each word a flame, a prayer, a miracle. The poison in the air retreated, dissolving around her in halos of golden Zail.

Grim's eyes narrowed.

"Let every drop of blood I weep,

Awaken souls that death would keep."

Glyphs spun around her—words given form. The acidic rain, the fog, the sickness—it all fell away. The battlefield shook.

Grim's sneer wavered.

"So rise, oh heart, from burning ground,

Let every silence turn to sound…"

The ground beneath her shimmered. Grass—green and alive—sprouted beneath her feet. The dead land rebelled against death itself.

Grim raised his hand to strike—but his Zail faltered. He hesitated.

"If voice must shatter, let it ring—

Let even Death be taught to sing."

And then—he heard them.

The voices.

Mothers. Children. Soldiers. Cities.

Every soul he had claimed.

They sang with her.

"That voice…" he whispered. "No… this isn't possible…"

He tried to strike. His hand refused. The Zail wouldn't answer.

"O child of night, who walks unloved,

There's still a throne you're worthy of…"

His wings began to glitch—feathers falling away like ash. His past surged forward, unbidden: the days before Lucifer, when he was still the Divine's hand. When his justice had purpose, not rage.

"Stop it… shut up!" he screamed.

But the song continued.

"So if I stand where darkness breaks,

Let mountains fall and oceans quake,"

Ariel rose—literally. Her body, broken moments ago, now hovered. Zail pulsed like sunlight through her skin. Her eyes blazed with Divine fire.

"This scream I lose, this truth I bear—

Will blaze through silence, strip despair."

She drew in one last breath.

And then—she screamed.

Not in pain.

Not in fear.

But in hope.

The barrier exploded, shattering into arcs of gold and white. The sky cracked. Light pierced through days of darkness. The earth convulsed beneath her as reality itself was rewritten.

Grim was thrown back—wings shredded, flesh scorched, his Zail core unraveling. He crashed into the earth with cataclysmic force, tumbling for hundreds of meters before crumpling into stillness.

He rose to one knee.

Bleeding. Shaking.

"I… I am death itself. This can't… be… happening."

He coughed, black mist pouring from his mouth.

For the first time—he felt fear.

"That wasn't power…" he whispered.

He looked up.

"…That was something worse."

A pause.

Then—truth.

"That was hope."

Ariel drifted back to the ground. Glowing faintly. Breathing heavily. Her voice—nearly gone. Her body trembled, riddled with cracks of radiant Zail, the cost near-fatal.

And yet…

She stood.

She whispered:

"You wanted me to die in silence…"

Her eyes closed.

"…But I'd rather sing myself into eternity."