Succubus Lord 12

by Eric Vall

  “No homo?” he blurted out.

  “No homo,” I repeated with a nod.

  “You guys are ridiculous,” Ariel laughed. “Seriously, they should give you your own TV show or something.”

  “Could you imagine?” the imp started as his imagination ran wild. “The Toddster and Jakey- Dynamic Duo. Or maybe it could be Jake and the Todd-man. Or even The Todd and Jakey Power Hour, featuring the Seven Sisters of Sin. The possibilities are endless, Little Mermaid!”

  As Todd continued to ramble on about the possibility of our own show, I noticed one of the members of my Shade Army had wandered over to our position.

  He was a middle-aged man with jet black hair and long, thin features that sat atop his lanky face. The Shade was wearing a set of Ariel’s makeshift armor, and he carried a small dagger in his hands.

  “Can I help you, soldier?” I called out as he approached the ring. “You look lost.”

  “Oh, I’m far from lost, King Ralston,” the man retorted. “In fact, everything is in perfect position.”

  I didn’t like the sound of that.

  “I’m gonna have to ask you to stop right there, soldier!” I commanded, but the Shade wasn’t stopping. “That’s a direct order from your King!”

  “I have no king,” the Shade mocked as he gripped his blade tightly and began to run toward our position. “None of us do.”

  Then the Shade’s body was surrounded by a dark black ectoplasm, and it was outlined by a light shimmer of white.

  I recognized it immediately. It was the magic of a paranormal assassin.

  The Shade jumped up into the air, and the second his feet were off the ground, his true form was revealed. Two giant sets of black, feathered wings sprouted from his back and formed into a shape similar to a butterfly’s. At the same time, his elongated features grew outward into a snout, his ears became pointed, and his eyes turned into a soulless dark pupil. The Shade’s legs outstretched into two lanky, taloned appendages, and a scorpion’s tail emerged from his back.

  Perhaps the strangest thing of all, though, was the fact that there was a long green snake attached to the spot where his penis should have been.

  The demon fluttered up into the sky and outstretched his arms in challenge.

  “My name is Pazuzu,” he announced, “I am the Sumerian God of the Wind, and the most powerful assassin in the Order.”

  “Holy shit, Jakey!” Todd gasped. “It’s the fucking star of The Exorcist!”

  “I thought that was a possessed little girl?” I questioned as I drew the Unhallowed Sword from its sheath.

  “Yeah, bro,” the imp explained, “a little girl possessed by Panzerotti over here. But we can talk about that later. I think now’s the part where you answer his threat back with an even cooler, more badass threat.”

  “Thanks, Todd,” I noted as I turned my attention back to the floating demon. “You know, every single one of you claims to be the ‘most powerful assassin’ in the Order. Yet, I kill each and every one of you just the same. You’re going to be no different, so I’ll give you the chance to give up right now.”

  “Prepare to die, Nephilim!” Pazuzu screamed.

  Then the demon began his downward trajectory, straight toward the three of us.

  Welp, this was going to be as good of a training exercise as any.

  Chapter 5

  As the demon assassin Pazuzu rocketed down toward us, I summoned red Hellfire into my hands, ran it over the Unhallowed Sword, and enchanted it with the incendiary flames.

  I wasn’t sure exactly what this guy’s endgame was. There were literally hundreds of us, but only one of him. Did he really think he was gonna come out of this in one piece? Or was he really just that cocky?

  “Serpentine, Jakey!” Todd shouted as he bolted off in the other direction.

  I followed my friend’s lead and dashed off to the right of the incoming assassin, but Ariel stood her ground.

  The angel summoned Divine Light into both of her hands, shaped them into a pair of two-pronged claw gauntlets, and then crouched down as she prepared for the assault.

  “What are you doing, Ariel?” I called back desperately.

  I figured Pazuzu was cocky and brash, but there was no way he was just going for a straight-up charge. The fucker was planning something, and Ariel was about to fall right into his trap.

  Suddenly, Pazuzu’s entire body began to glow with dark ectoplasm, and the tips of his wings slimmed down into thin, shiny edges, almost as if they had become gliding razor blades. Then the demon’s trajectory changed instantly, and his entire body began to twirl in a circular motion. Within seconds, the fucker had turned his entire body into a life-sized, deadly buzzsaw.

  And he was headed right for Ariel.

  I quickly threw down a portal of green Hellfire beneath the redhead’s feet, and she let out a gasp of shock as gravity pulled her downward. I reopened the emerald portal just above my body, extended my hands, and caught the angel in my hands like a new bride.

  Not a split-second later, Pazuzu’s blur of a body slammed into the sand and cut down into the ground with a spray of grit and dirt. He disappeared from view, but we could all still hear the massive whirring of his body as he tunneled beneath us.

  He was headed right for my army of Shades.

  “Guys!” I called out to my soldiers as I sat Ariel upright. “Get the fuck outta there before--”

  It was too late.

  The demonic buzzsaw shot up right in the middle of the group as blood sprayed into the air, and I heard several of my Shades let out wails of pain.

  Thankfully, they were all already dead, so what they were experiencing right now was little more than a flesh wound. A massive, gaping flesh wound.

  Even so, I didn’t want my soldiers getting hurt.

  “Open fire!” Cupiditas shouted as she unleashed a blast of blue Hellfire at the spinning target.

  Her spell struck the glowing ectoplasm around Pazuzu and dissipated instantly, though.

  Fuck. Even with all of our new Demon Lord upgrades, it looked like Hellfire was still cancelled out by ectoplasmic magic. I guessed some natural rules just couldn’t be broken.

  Arrows, crossbow bolts, and even a few slingshotted rocks rained upward at Pazuzu, but they were all tossed away harmlessly by the momentum of the demon’s spin.

  Pazuzu made another pass downward, and the Shades scattered as he burrowed back into the ground.

  “We have to figure out a way to take out his wings,” I explained to Ariel and Todd, who was now rejoining our group.

  “That’s going to be kinda hard to do,” Ariel sighed, “especially when his magic will just absorb all or our attacks like that.”

  “Is there really no sort of magic that can break through ectoplasm?” I questioned as I looked around frantically and tried to figure out where Pazuzu would pop up next.

  “I’ve got an idea, Jakey,” Todd announced proudly. “Let me take a shot at Panzerotti here, and I’ll banish him back to the fucking Shadow Realm.”

  I wasn’t sure Todd knew what he was talking about, but at this point, anything would be worth a shot.

  The ground beneath us began to rumble intensely, and I quickly teleported the three of us out of the way as Pazuzu erupted from just beneath our feet. We landed a few feet away, and Todd was already on the move.

  “Yo, asshole!” Todd yelled as he dashed forward. “I got somethin’ for ya!”

  As he ran, the imp’s body began to bubble and transform. His hair turned white atop his tiny red noggin, and he was wearing a full-length black robe with purple fabric draped around the shoulders.

  “Oh no,” I facepalmed as I realized what he was doing.

  He was the fucking priest from The Exorcist.

  “The power of Christ compels you, bro!” he screamed as he made holy hand motions at the demon in the air. “There can be only one!”

  “He’s even quoting the wrong movie now,” I sighed and held my sword at the ready. “Let’s g
et in there and make sure he doesn’t get turned into fucking mincemeat.”

  Much to my surprise, Pazuzu halted his momentum and returned to his normal, floating form. He stared down at the charging imp curiously for a second before he slowly lowered himself down to the ground.

  My heart sank as I watched the Todd-priest dash toward the assassin with the intensity and gait of a Naruto character, with the good book extended out in front of him like a shield.

  “Be gone, great spawn of Satan!” he growled once more.

  Pazuzu shook his head and clicked his canine tongue with amusement. As Todd got right up on him, the assassin suddenly began to make over exaggerated gasps and fake screams of horror. Then, once the imp was right upon him, Pazuzu snatched him up by the throat.

  “Todd!” I screamed and hurled a fireball at the fucker, but he dispelled it with a flash of ectoplasm.

  “You know,” Pazuzu chuckled as he squeezed tighter on the imp’s throat, “I have a love-hate relationship with that movie. It’s made me a household name, but it also makes people think I’m some sort of easily-defeated, soft-hearted patsy. I am not.”

  “No,” Todd choked out, “but you’re gullible as fuuuucck. Cock kick!”

  The imp’s leg bubbled and contorted into a full-sized human leg, and he slammed it right into Pazuzu’s crotch. The demon let out a hiss of pain as he released Todd from his grasp and doubled over in pain.

  At the same time, Todd landed on his tiny leg, spun around, and brought the human-sized foot into Pazuzu’s face.

  “Superkick, bitch!” Todd cackled as the demon stumbled backward, completely disoriented.

  Then the imp raised his glowing red hand up to attack Pazuzu, but the demon was too quick.

  Our opponent quickly grabbed Todd by the arm, spun around in a flash, and tossed him violently across the landscape. The imp’s momentum was wonky as it alternated between his human-sized leg and his imp-sized one, but he eventually skidded to a stop in the dirt.

  Thankfully, Todd’s plan had worked. Ariel and I were now only a few feet away from the fucker, and he didn’t know any better.

  I jumped up into the air, raised my sword, and brought it down on Pazuzu.

  He sidestepped the attack, but not nearly fast enough. The flaming blade of the Unhallowed Sword stabbed into Pazuzu’s shoulder, and he let out a wail of agony.

  At the same time, Ariel drove her dual claws right into the bastard’s gut.

  Blackish-red blood spilled from his stomach as she removed the blades, but he was already countering. He lashed out at Ariel with one of his eagle-like talons, but the redhead was able to quickly twirl out of the way.

  That’s when I felt it. A sharp, piercing pain in my knee, just where the joint in my armor was located. I glanced down and let out a groan of surprise.

  “You gotta be fucking kidding me,” I growled.

  His fucking snake-penis bit me.

  I yanked the sword out of Pazuzu’s shoulder, twirled it around, and then lopped off the head of the snake with one fell swoop.

  Pazuzu screamed as blood erupted from his manhood, and then he hopped backward and took to the sky once more. He turned himself into a buzzsaw again and shot straight toward me as he spurted blood across the sand.

  I went to jump out of the way, but nothing happened. My brain was ordering my legs to move, but they weren’t responding. My head began to spin, and my stomach lurched as I realized what was going on.

  I’d been poisoned.

  I summoned purple Hellfire into my hands, formed a large barrier behind my body, and then forced it to lurch forward violently. It struck me directly in the back and then tossed my rigid body forward into the dirt, just in time to avoid getting sliced in half by the demon buzzsaw.

  Pazuzu disappeared into the ground, and I forced myself onto my back.

  The world was beginning to spin. The normally blue sky of the Fourth Circle was now a swirling mixture of purple and green, and there were spots all over my vision.

  “Oh, fuck,” Todd gasped as he and Ariel appeared above my head. “Jakey’s been literally cockslapped!”

  “Sia’s too far away to heal him in time,” Ariel explained, “one of us is going to have to suck out the poison, or Jacob’s a goner.”

  “Uh, look,” Todd argued, “Jakey’s my bestie, but I dunno if I wanna suck--”

  Before he could finish the sentence, Pazuzu shot back out of the ground, and Ariel had to combat roll forward to avoid the attack.

  “The army is almost on us,” she called out. “I’ll lead him away from you guys, but you’ve got to suck out the poison!”

  Todd raised his finger to protest, but the angel was airborne before he could utter a word. The imp sighed, undid the armor on my leg, and inspected the wound. He shuddered at the sight of the purple, inflamed skin, and then he shook his head.

  “I dunno if I can do this, Jakey,” he admitted. “Sucking another guy, that is--”

  “Thhodd!” I growled through my now-swollen tongue. “Do it righth now!”

  “Fine!” the imp sighed. “No homo.”

  Todd took a deep breath and then slammed his lips against the wound on my leg.

  My vision was beginning to darken around the edges, and I could barely breathe past my swollen tongue.

  “H-huree upth, Thodd!” I gasped.

  The imp spit out a mouthful of venom onto the ground and heaved through the taste.

  “I’m goin’ as fast as I can, Jakey!” he retorted. “It’s not like I have a lot of practice with this.”

  The imp slammed his lips back down against the wound, inhaled deeply, and pulled away with his entire mouth full of venom. He twisted his head to the side, spat out what looked like a gallon of purple goo onto the sand, and then vomited intensely.

  At the same time, I felt my heart rate begin to decrease, and my tongue began to return to its normal size. My vision became clearer, and the feeling began to come back into my fingers. Finally, I was able to sit upright.

  I was safe.

  “Holy fuck!” I gasped as I picked up Todd in a bear hug. “You saved me, bro!”

  “Easy there, Jakey,” Todd gagged, “there’s still a lot of stomach stew that can see the light of day. Having a mouthful of gooey, foul-tasting shit is nasty. I totally got some apologies to make to my ex-girlfriends who were spitters, bro.”

  Todd was fine.

  More importantly, so was I.

  So, I stood up from my position on the ground and turned back to see the all-out assault going on across the battlefield.

  Pazuzu was flittering above the army of Shades and tossing down tarry balls of ectoplasm into the crowd. Blood was dripping down his body, and I was kinda shocked to see that he was still going.

  Meanwhile, Daniel was on the ground, and he was commanding the Shades to attack in waves. Cupi and Ariel were both in the air as they took shots at Pazuzu in turns.

  It only took me a second or two to recognize the battle pattern. It was one we had practiced time after time. The Shades would shoot up arrows, force the target to dodge, and then the heavy hitters would go in for the kill.

  Unfortunately, even in his weakened state, Pazuzu was too agile. He would flit past the hailstorm of arrows, dispel Ariel’s claws with a swipe of his talons, and then duck under Cupi’s polearm as if it were being swung at him in slow motion.

  “Alright, bro,” I turned to Todd and nodded, “you wanna help me exorcise a demon?”

  “As long as I can keep my lunch down, bro,” he responded as he patted his belly.

  The imp and I took off toward the rest of our allies as I tried to formulate a plan. Our Hellfire magic was useless against this bastard, and he was way too quick to hit with traditional hand-to-hand weapons.

  Unless …

  “Todd,” I panted as we approached the army of Shades, “I’m about to give you a case of deja vu.”

  “I thought Clockblocker was still back at the castle?” Todd questioned.

  “Not
Deja the succubus,” I explained, “I’m about to do something that looks reallly familiar to you. Now, when I give you the signal, I want you to hit this thing with the biggest fireball you can muster.”

  “What thing, bro?” Todd asked curiously. “Uhhhh, is there still some poison in there, scramblin’ up your marbles?”

  I didn’t reply. Instead, I summoned green Hellfire into one hand and bronze Hellfire into the other. Then I reached out to the ring behind us, surrounded it in an emerald glow, and then pulled it into the sky. I tossed my hand forward and launched the entire fucking thing at Pazuzu. At the same time, I hit the ring with a blast of bronze Hellfire and made it vibrate wildly at a subatomic level.

  “Now!” I ordered.

  Todd flew up into the sky, summoned red Hellfire into his hands, and then spun his body forward with the intensity of a spinning top. After a few rotations, a fireball the size of his entire body sprang forth and hurled directly at the airborne ring.

  The second it struck, the entire thing shattered into a million flaming pieces.

  I tossed up a massive wall of purple Hellfire over my army as well as Cupi and Ariel, and then I watched as Pazuzu was assaulted by the tiny bits of enchanted debris. They didn’t seem to do much damage to his body.

  His wings, however, were another story.

  The demon gasped as the debris tore holes through his razor-thin wings. He tried to return to his buzzsaw form, but the air now rushing through his swiss-cheese wings made his trajectory completely unpredictable.

  Now, he was a fucking razor-sharp pinball.

  Thankfully, Pazuzu didn’t go far. He tried to launch an assault on the Shades down below, but he simply crashed into the sandy ground far off to the side.

  I sheathed the Unhallowed Sword, summoned silver Hellfire into my hands, and then transformed the metal ball at my side into my two-handed warhammer.

  Pazuzu might still be immune to Hellfire magic, but now he was grounded. And if he was grounded, he could be pummeled just like any other sorry demon bastard.

  “Charge!” I roared to my army as I ran toward the fallen demon.

  Instantly, all of the Shades moved toward Pazuzu. I got there first, though, so I delivered the first strike.