Interlude 1
What is the System?
Kchshhh. The hermetically sealed door opened, revealing a strange mixture of the regular fire and brimstone one may expect from Hell, superimposed atop the layout of a modern office, complete with cubicles filled with overworked drones.
“I have to say, I like what you’re doing here!” A middle-aged, almost friendly demon said in his low and gravelly voice. His dark red twisting horns scraped the top of the eleven-foot door frame as he entered, and his goat legs were forced to bend to admit him. The shirt and tie that strained to hold his muscular bulk creaked with the motion but held, if barely.
“Who’s in charge?” he asked with the tone of an uncle bearing gifts.
With a delighted smile, a bright green, octopus-like demon scurried over, its singular horn glowing a vibrant yellow in happiness. The miasma in the room thickened as the myriad demons maintaining this sector of the System project groaned silently. Squidulous was a slave driver, and if its torturous methods were being applauded, their conditions would only get worse.
Squidulous bowed before its manager, disgustingly smug grins plastered over its many mouths. Faster than any of the technicians could register, Squidulous’ beaked head was severed from its flailing tentacles.
The temperature in the room simultaneously plummeted and rose. The lower-ranked demons froze in fear, their blood and other juices running cold. Steam rose from the now terrifying manager’s bald dome. A rugged black sword, too heavy for any man to wield, dripped luminous blue blood on the shag pile carpet. He roared in a flash of frustration and anger, causing a pillar of flame to burst out all around him.
The lesser demons who had been spared the fate of the pit because of their above-average intelligence were incinerated, to a one.
??
Something had been wrong with Faun’s infernal brew. He suspected Squidulous had spiked it with something when he bothered to point out a mistake in the Trial’s code. That was the worst kind of demon to work under; it would smile to your face and then turn around and stab you in the back. Because Faun had dared to question its work, he had been rushing in and out of the crap trap all day.
He flushed for the hundredth time then walked out, over to his desk. Pulling out his chair he sat, and fell straight onto a still smouldering floor. There was no chair; there was no desk. The entire office had been turned into nothing more than a scorched mark on the basalt floor and ceiling.
For a moment, he just sat there, stunned. Faun didn’t even notice the greater demon as he retrieved a new suit from his inventory and put it on.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
“You!” a gravelly voice demanded, snapping Faun out of his shock. The half human half goat quickly got his hooves under him when he realised what was going on. Faun bowed with his head to the floor before the powerful demon.
“What can I do for you, oh great and powerful one?” Faun asked in the most subservient tone he could manage. He had learnt that demons, as a whole, had huge egos. If he wanted to survive the next few moments, it would be best to butter this one up as much as possible.
The large infernal creature huffed out dark smoke from his red nostrils in a sound that may have shown approval.
“You’re now in charge of Universal System, department 2.7.1. The Prince has staked his reputation on this System; there will be no more errors.” The large demon's words were surprisingly soft, but there was no hiding the command in his tone. These statements were irrefutable orders.
Faun lifted his face, eyes and mouth twisted into an obsequious smile. He lowered and raised his horned head several times to show that he understood, his hands rubbing together nervously.
“Yes, of course, sir. It will be none—done,” he spluttered in correction.
The giant of a demon nodded; this was the only response he expected. His horns twisted as he turned to leave, but after a moment’s thought, the behemoth spun back around. Faun held his breath as fear filled him.
“I will have a new team sent to you right away. As for the decor…” he trailed off, snapping his claws. At his signal, a two-headed scarecrow demon with a pink and a purple floppy hat appeared in a splash of aquamarine sparks.
“Yes, Master?” it asked, its voice a duet of male and female.
“Fix this,” the manager said, gesturing to the office before exiting back out into the fiery hell of Hell. The scarecrow creature chittered happily before jumping about on its single stick leg. Everywhere it touched was reconstructed, as if it had never been destroyed, sans personal effects.
Faun’s mind was still reeling when seconds later, the building was repaired, and a fresh batch of demon hatchlings poured in, waiting for him to give them orders. Ever since the f?ling had been dumped in the demon realm, he had been forced to scheme and connive to survive. But none of that mattered in the face of absolute power.
A slime demon with too many tentacles for Faun’s taste asked in a gurgled voice:
“What should we do?”
Faun had to bite back his instinctive reply. He was shaken and had nearly ordered them to fix whatever was throwing up so many errors. He knew where to look; his stomach rumbled to remind him of the experience. There were issues in the Trial code and he would bet Squidulous’ buggy mess was to blame.
But then again, anything that could cause this many problems was an opportunity. Now that he had been promoted to middle management, against his will, the clock was ticking on Faun’s life. He had seen it time and time again. Sooner or later, someone in his position would get too greedy, overreach, and be smacked down with deadly force.
It didn’t even matter if he stayed in his lane; someone above Faun would assume that he was lying low to hide a plot against them and kill him just to be safe. It was the nature of demons. He needed a way out of here now more than ever. At most, he had a cycle.
Faun quickly outlined the basics of regular System maintenance before nature once more called, and he was forced to rush back to the throne. In the privacy of the bathroom, he began skimming through the interface he had been awarded with his promotion, scanning through the surprisingly long list of error flags that were now visible to him.
Faun had no idea how Squidilous thought it could just ignore this. It probably was too proud to admit there had been anything wrong with its work and had died for its hubris.
The f?ling would need some time to find the source of this problem, but when he did, he hoped to leverage whatever loophole was causing this to his advantage. In the interim, he believed he had a way to mask the errors so that he didn’t meet the same fate as his predecessor.
In the bog of a multidimensional office complex, nominally hosted in the bowels of hell, Faun set to work trying to undermine a System that had existed for millennia.
patrons:
patron, click on the link and it's free for anyone to look at! I would have put it on here but RR doesn't let you upload a chapter that's just an image anymore.
Thoughts on the new synopsis?
