by Eric Vall
The Shades responded with a resounding wave of hoots and “yeahs.”
“My companions,” Henry announced as he raised his hands above his head, “go forth, and liberate!”
The rest of the Shades cheered as they ran off toward the horizon and scattered. Within a few minutes, they had all disappeared, and the seven of us were left alone with the Lacerating Lamph.
I turned back toward the tree and focused in on the three tombs underneath its deadly limbs.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Libidine said with concern. “Even if we get through the tree, we don’t know what’s inside of those sarcophaguses. What if there’s another demon bear or Leviathan or any other sort of mindless monster that could attack us?”
“We won’t know until we try,” I admitted.
Then I stepped forward, summoned purple Hellfire into my hands, and began to formulate a plan to get around this thing.
We were about to go toe-to-toe with a fucking deadly tree.
Chapter 10
“So, what’s the plan of attack?” Eligor questioned as we stared at the Lacerating Lamph.
“Eclipse,” I called out to the tattooed succubus, “is there any way you could blind it? That way it won’t know where we are.”
“Two problems with that plan,” Eclipse explained, “one, it’s a tree. It might be a sentient, demonic tree, but it’s still a tree. It has no eyes to blind. Second, even if I could blind it, that would just cause it to go into a panic and flail about wildly. At least if it can see us, we can predict when it’s going to attack.”
“Maybe I’m missing something here, Jakey,” Todd noted as he stroked his blond goatee, “but if this thing is only a tree, why can’t we just bukkake the thing with fireballs and then be on our way?”
“That is a metaphor I could have gone my whole life without hearing.” Gula shuddered.
“That wouldn’t work, either,” Eligor stated matter-of-factly. “Naturally, the flora that grow in Hell are much more fire-resistant than the ones you see on Earth Realm. Burning it down is out of the question.”
“Could Firecracker and Lizbeth here go all Paul Bunyan and chop it down with their weapons?” the imp suggested.
“In theory,” Sia spoke up, “but the Lamph would certainly realize what was going on and try to kill them before it perished.”
I turned to Gula and Eclipse and looked at them grimly.
“Do you trust us?” I asked.
“Of course I do,” Gula chuckled, “I’d trust you guys with my life.”
“It sounds like that’s exactly what’s about to happen,” Eclipse mused as she summoned forth her massive naginata with a flash of red Hellfire. “We try to cut this sucker down, and you guys all protect us from its attacks?”
“A fucking protect mission,” Todd groaned, “the only thing worse are the ones where you have to follow somebody and they walk at the speed of a snail who just did a bowl. Fucking Blizzard hacks ruined MMOs!”
“It’s our best option,” I reminded the imp. “We have a shot at gaining three new Demon Lords, and that’s an opportunity I refuse to miss.”
Gula looked nervous for a moment, but she quickly pushed those feelings to the side and summoned her double-sided battle axe into her hands. Then the Sister of Gluttony took a deep breath before she stepped forward to join Eclipse.
“I’m ready whenever you guys are,” she announced.
“Alright, team,” I ordered, “here’s the plan. I’ll use my green and purple Hellfire to block any of the swings it takes in your direction. Eligor, I want you to use your environmental magic to do the same thing. Toss up some rocks or logs or whatever you can find to deflect the attacks. Sia, you hang back and use your black Hellfire to try and freeze this thing’s branches. If any of us get hurt, you can heal us from afar.”
“What about me and Lib, Jakey?” Todd questioned.
“You two get to do what you do best,” I explained, “swoop in, attack, and fly away before the thing can get its hands on you.”
“A fly-by, ehh?” Todd snickered and then surrounded himself with black flames. “I think we can make that happen.”
Todd and Liby floated up into the air, and Eligor, Sia, and I summoned our spells into our hands.
“Are you guys ready?” I asked the two succubi who were about to charge the deadly tree.
“As ready as we ever will be,” Gula admitted and tightened her grip on her axe.
“Then let’s go,” Eclipse growled, “let’s show this evil tree who’s boss. Three … two … one … go!”
Then the two succubi both let out a yell of anger as they charged at the Lacerating Lamph.
The vines on the tree coiled down the trunk and wrapped around its body, but it wasn’t showing any signs of aggression. We all watched cautiously as Eclipse and Gula approached the Lacerating Lamph, but nothing seemed to happen. The two succubi reached the base of the three unscathed and then stared at each other with confusion on their faces.
“Why isn’t it attacking?” I pondered aloud.
“Maybe it’s triggered by touch?” Sia suggested. “Perhaps its enchantment only activates when somebody tries to open the tombs?”
“I’m not gonna take that chance,” I said and then projected my voice, “take it out, guys!”
Gula gave me a thumbs up from afar before she took her axe in her hand, hauled back, and prepared to strike. Eclipse did the same with her naginata, and then I saw her mouth a countdown to her partner. When she got to “one,” they both took a hearty swing and lodged their weapons into the trunk of the Lacerating Lamph.
This time, it noticed.
There was a gargled, inhuman squeal as their blades smashed into the demonic tree, and its limbs began to flail about as if it were going into shock.
“Todd, Liby, go!” I commanded, and my friends took to the sky.
No sooner had they gotten above the tree did a tangle of spiny vines lash out at them. Todd’s small figure allowed him to zip in and out between the deadly vines with ease, and Libidine was agile enough to dodge the incoming snare.
Meanwhile, a bunch of more vines shot down at Eclipse and Gula.
I tossed out a shield of purple right above Eclipse’s head seconds before the deadly brambles would have wrapped around her neck. The vines bounced off with a dull thud, and the succubus let out a gasp of shock.
Luckily, Eclipse was able to compose herself quickly, and she yanked her naginata out of the trunk in a single heave. As she removed the blade of the weapon, a bright orange liquid shot out of the wound, splashed across the tattooed succubus’ body, and covered her from head to toe. Eclipse let out another gasp as a second vine shot down and was caught inches above her head by Sia’s black Hellfire. Then the dark-haired woman hauled back and brought the naginata’s blade straight back into the Lacerating Lamph.
The tree let out another shriek of pain as even more orange liquid splashed onto the ground.
On the other side of the trunk, Gula was making small, hurried chops with her battle axe. Each strike with her weapon produced a tiny spray of orange liquid, but it didn’t seem to faze the Sister of Gluttony.
Meanwhile, the vines that tried to strike her were being held off by another set of vines that arose from the ground and were engulfed by Eligor’s lime green spell.
Suddenly, a vine nearly three times the thickness of the rest sprouted from the base of the tree and shot up directly at Gula’s face. It had a deadly spike on the tip, and the succubus cringed as she awaited her fate.
Luckily, I was quick on the draw.
I tossed out a portal of green Hellfire in front of the vine’s trajectory, and it passed through harmlessly.
At least, harmlessly for us.
I forced the spiny tendril to reappear right in front of the trunk itself, and with the momentum of the appendage, it was too late to be stopped.
The large spike of the vine hit the trunk of the Lacerating Lamph with a fleshy thunk, and the tree went ba
llistic. It let out another vicious hiss as its leaves all stood on end, and it began to tremble like an unlevel washing machine. It slowly pulled its chunky vine out of its trunk, and a literal gallon of orange blood-sap poured out onto the grass.
Eclipse and Gula increased the pace of their swings, and they were both about halfway through the base of the thing.
However, the Lacerating Lamph was done playing games.
This time, seven deadly vines shot down onto Eclipse and Gula on each side.
I double wielded my green and purple flames and threw up as many protective spells as I possibly could. I couldn’t defend against all of them at the same time, but I could use the tree’s own attacks against itself.
Two of the vines passed through the emerald portal and then reappeared horizontally in the path of the other incoming tendrils. In one fell swoop, I engulfed the vines with green Hellfire, forced them to tie themselves around the next three vines, and then tossed the entire package back up into the branches of the tree. At the same time, I threw out two purple shields to deflect the other vines.
“This thing is stronger than it looks,” Sia grunted as she tried to hold back three of the vines on Eclipse’s side of the tree.
The other four tendrils were being kept at bay by Eligor, Todd, and Liby, but it looked like none of our solutions would be permanent.
Gula and Eclipse got a few more good whacks in before the tree began to tremble and roar with the fury of a thousand pissed off hornets. Suddenly, the ground beneath us began to quake, and I got a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach.
“Guys, retreat!” I called out to my friends.
“We’ve almost got it!” Gula protested, but I wasn’t going to play games.
“That’s an order!” I repeated. “Get over here right now!”
My friends took to their wings, Sia was picked up by Eclipse, and they all zipped back over to where I was standing. The second they were within my proximity, I summoned purple Hellfire into my hands, made a square pattern, and formed a giant cube of violet flames around us.
“What gives, Jakey?” Todd asked in a huff. “We were totally kicking that thing’s ass.”
Before I even had a chance to respond, the roots of the tree sprang forth from the ground. There were four of them, and they each were nearly five feet wide and equally as spiny as the vines that had been attacking us before. The Lacerating Lamph lifted its roots into the air and then brought them down on our position as a single, wooden club.
The impact from the blow knocked us all off our feet, but my barrier still held.
The tree struck us three more times with its massive roots, and I could tell I was beginning to feel fatigue. I didn’t know how much longer I could keep this up.
We needed to end this right now.
As I inspected the Lacerating Lamph for any sort of weakness, I noticed Eclipse had nearly taken out its entire left side, all the way down to the halfway point of the trunk.
That was our ticket.
“Gula,” I ordered as I turned to the Sister of Gluttony, “I need you to give Liby and me a boost. Liby, we’re going to use our telekinetic flames to finish this fucker off. I’ll have to release my protective spell, so we’ll only have a split second to make this happen.”
“I-I don’t know if I can--” Libidine began to protest, but I cut her off.
“You can do anything, Liby,” I reassured her, “you’re my Demon Lord.”
“Okay, Jacob.” Libidine’s expression slowly turned from one of being distraught to one of determination. Then she summoned green Hellfire into her hands, turned so she was facing the Lacerating Lamph, and prepared to attack.
“One boost, coming right up,” Gula promised, and then I felt my body being surrounded by a dull, tingling sensation.
Gula’s brown Hellfire was powering me up.
The tree raised its deadly roots into the air once again and left itself open. This was it. If we fucked this up, all seven of us were going to be impaled or crushed to death. Liby and I only had half a second to take this fucker down, and we had to make it count.
“Now!” I commanded as I switched out my purple Hellfire for green.
Liby and I both unleashed a beam of green flames directly into the trunk of the tree, and it was encased by our emerald spell.
“Force it to the left!” I ordered the Sister of Lust, and we both swept our hands to the side in unison.
There was a loud, abrupt cracking noise from the trunk of the tree as a massive fissure ran up its base. The Lacerating Lamph let out an ear-shattering shriek of pain as it splintered, but we weren’t done yet.
“Pull it in separate directions, Jacob!” Libidine called out.
I listened to the succubus as I commanded my emerald flames to yank the tree to the right. Libidine must have ordered it to move to the left, because the massive trunk of the tree was torn in half.
Geysers of the orange, bloody sap spilled out onto the ground below as the two halves of the Lacerating Lamph were tossed to the side. Its roots wobbled in the air for a moment before they went limp and smashed into the ground beside us harmlessly. The environment around us went dead silent as the leaves on the two halves of the tree withered and fell of their branches, almost as if the life itself was drained out of the tree.
The Lacerating Lamph was no more.
“I never thought I’d say this,” Gula sighed as she fluttered over and landed on top of one of the remaining tombs, “but that tree was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever fought.”
“The Whomping Willow ain’t got nothing on the Evil Dead tree, Firecracker,” Todd scoffed. “At least this thing didn’t try to have its way with us first. That’d take diverticulitis to a whole new level …”
“Ughhhh,” Eligor groaned and gagged at the same time. “That’s vulgar, even for you.”
“I know,” the imp snickered, “I’m so proud of myself.”
“Alright, alright,” I chuckled as I tried to get everyone to settle down. “Now that the tree is out of the way, let’s get some of these tombs open. Eligor, do you have any suggestions on which one should go first?”
The knight in the scale-male bikini wandered over to the sarcophagus furthest away from us. Then she bent down, inspected the Inferoglyphs intensely, and shrugged.
“It’s hard to say,” she admitted, “this one is somewhat cryptic, all it says is inside is a wise demon who was ‘too wise for his own good.”’
“I don’t know what that means,” I admitted, “but we’ve kinda been missing the whole ‘wise, grumpy dude’ from our group since Gamigin turned on us. Let’s pop this baby open and see what’s inside. Gula?”
The redheaded succubus quickly summoned brown Hellfire into her hands and tossed its warm glow around my body. Instantly, I felt myself growing stronger, and the Hellfire inside my body burned with the intensity of a dragon’s breath.
I called forth my green flames, tossed them around the black tomb, and felt the weight of the brimstone as I slowly lifted the lid off the sarcophagus. Even with my enhanced strength, this shit felt like it weighed a million pounds. Finally, I gave it one last heave, and the giant slab of stone crashed into the ground with a wet thud.
Smoke and red Hellfire erupted from the tomb like a volcano, and then the shadow of a figure emerged from the smoke. The demon was wearing a loose-fitting robe that draped off his lanky arms like a melting marshmallow, and he stretched vigorously before he placed his hands on the sides of the tomb and pulled himself up.
As the demon appeared through the smoke, his aesthetic became clearer. He had a head shaped like a human’s, but his face was protruded out with a bovine muzzle, and his teeth stuck so far out of his mouth I was worried he would bite his own lip off if he wasn’t careful. His robes were a dark red, with black inferoglyphs engraved all over them. The demon wore a pair of round glasses on the bridge of his nose, and he adjusted them as he slunk out of the tomb and toward our position with the speed of a snail.
>
“To whom do I owe the pleasure?” the chalky white demon questioned with sage-like grace.
“Jacob Ralston,” I announced as regally as I could, “but you can call me King Ralston, King of the Fourth Circle and Succubus Lord.”
The demon raised his eyebrow at me curiously.
“Succubus Lord and King?” he questioned. “Aren’t those two contradictory? Also, what happened to Azazel?”
“Azazel is dead,” Superbia explained. “So is Baphomet, and Gressil will be gone soon, too. Things are changing around here, all thanks to King Ralston.”
“I see,” the scholarly demon mused as he rubbed his rounded chin. “Much has happened since I was locked in that tomb by Lucifer ten thousand years ago.”
“Lucifer put you in there?” I gasped. “I thought Gressil was the only one who locked people in these things?”
“That explains why these three tombs were so heavily guarded,” Eligor contemplated, “these are the prisoners Lucifer really did not want to escape.”
“Yeesh,” Todd whistled. “What’d you do to get under the Prince of Darkness’ skin so bad, Lambchop?”
The demon scowled at Todd and let out a verbal scoff.
“Ziminiar,” he corrected, “my name is Ziminiar. And I still don’t see myself as being in the wrong. I was once the great scribe of Hell, the demon who stood at the side of Lucifer and wrote down all of his plights and the history of the land he called his domain. But, as you could probably guess, Lucifer does not like to be contradicted. I publicly spoke out against one of his battle strategies, and he had me condemned to this tomb for all eternity.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, “that bastard’s got an ego ten times the size of Texas.”
“You’ve interacted with Lucifer?” Ziminiar said as he leaned forward and stared intensely into my eyes. “You? A new Demon King who congregates with succubi?”
“Well, Jakey is the Luke of this story,” Todd added, “which I totally hope means we get to see Lucifer’s true form one last time as he dies in Jakey’s arms. I just hope my best bro doesn’t have to lose a hand and almost accidentally commit incest to get there. Also, I’m like Han, the handsome and roguish scoundrel who guides Luke on the path while picking up all the choice women.”