Lucas studied the being in front of him.
After the quest, he had expected to walk in and beat something absurdly strong. This was not a game. The thing sitting across from him had a life and a reason to be here. Before he decided anything, he needed to know what that reason was.
"Name the price."
Veyth's nail hovered over the stone, as if the answer itself had weight. Then he lifted his head properly. Those ember-slit eyes did not make Lucas tense so much as still. There was pain in them. Tiredness. A face old and withered past the point of pride.
"Not gold. Not treasure. Not pleasure. There is only one thing I have wanted for the last three hundred years."
The nonchalant mask slipped. What showed under it was hunger of a different kind.
"Death."
Lucas stared at him for a second and lost the first words that wanted out.
If you want to die, bite your tongue. Pierce your own heart, old man. Why ask me?
Riven shifted a half-step back. The colorless fire hummed against her teeth. She had braced for an absurd demand — eyes, lifespan, something ugly enough to make her glad she had come. He was asking to die.
Veyth went on before either of them could sink further into the thought.
"You must be wondering why this old demon would ask for something so simple."
Lucas nodded. He did not hide it.
"Death is not as simple as you think. Some fear it. Some yearn for it. I am the second kind."
Silence sat with them. The colorless fire hummed, a low forge-sound that lived in the ribs.
"Whether you can grant me what I want or not, let me tell you a little about this fire, and about me."
Veyth's gaze drifted to the flame that had no color.
"The fire you see beside me is the reason Pandemonium was cut into layers and locked behind restrictions. It happened six hundred and fifty years ago. One ambitious day, the ever-silent Pandemonium welcomed invaders it had never asked for — things from higher planes. At first we did not understand why they came. We fought. We died. They died. We never cared much for reasons. We wanted blood."
The nail tapped once against the stone. Skrit.
"The reason revealed itself later, in a single line. A Destiny was waiting in Pandemonium for the Doom Bringer. That was all it said. Everyone interpreted it in their own way. I was ordered by my lord — Ashen Sovereign Malakar, Duke of the Cinder Throne — and many like me to search the entire realm. We searched every sand that shines and every water that never ends."
Veyth's mouth twitched. It was not a smile.
"Fortunately or unfortunately, I found it. This cursed fire beside me."
Lucas glanced at the flame. Looking too long made the eyes ache. He looked back at the demon.
"Then what happened?"
Veyth's fingers trembled. He held the pain the way other men held weapons.
"Agony. At first I thought it was some kind of Hellfire. It had no color in our records, but I told myself that if beings from higher planes were hunting it, it had to be an immeasurable opportunity. I should have reported the finding to my lord. Greed made me blind. I entered that Veil."
He swallowed. The hum filled the gap.
"That was it. I lost all connection to the outside. I tried to leave. It would not let me. So I tried to claim the fire. A Hellfire must acknowledge you. That is why the higher the rank, the harder the claiming. This one had no rank. I thought I could subdue it."
His voice thinned.
"So I touched it."
Tears cut down the old demon's face, tracking through the ash-color of his skin.
"It did not kill me. It did not leave me alone. It bound me here. To this cursed thing, I was only a curiosity. Fantastic, isn't it? Only from Rank V do Hellfires gain a mind. This rankless fire had a personality — and a very annoying curiosity."
He smiled. The smile was broken.
"I thought of countless ways to escape or contact anyone. Nothing worked. At first it fascinated me. I told myself I only needed to understand it. Years passed in the same cave, with the same fire. Because of it, I do not hunger. I do not sleep. I stay alive all the time."
The nail scraped once, soft.
"Time gets you at some point. Then the first challenger came. It was a demon, so I thought I could finally leave — or at least learn what was happening outside. That demon knew nothing. Pandemonium had already been divided into layers, and my land sat in the inner regions. The challenger died."
Veyth's ember eyes lifted to Lucas.
"It continued. Celestials. Demons. Dragons. Voidborn. Seraphim-blooded. Even a Hollow Titan that had to fold itself to fit the hall. Everyone below D-rank. And everyone died. The answer it gave for every death was the same."
The colorless flame leaned, as if it wanted to hear its own sentence again.
"You are not the Destiny I am waiting for."
Lucas took a moment to find his bearings. The amount of information was not easy to hold. He had thought this was only an early rank-up quest. The old demon was saying the treasure had drawn not only Pandemonium's own inhabitants, but foreign beings as well.
And the important part — he came here before the restrictions were placed. That means there is a chance he was above D-rank.
Lucas's throat tightened. The heat in the chamber sat inside his chest.
Riven's face had gone ashen. Her grip locked around her daggers.
Fuck. This bastard just dragged me to my death.
Veyth watched the young human in front of him. There was a reason he had explained with patience. Normally, he would not have cared. After a certain point, he had concluded: no being could subdue the fire. The reason was simple. He himself had been a high-rank demon and had failed. How could any youngling below D-rank succeed?
He recorded entries. He recorded deaths.
This time a sliver of hope had cut through that habit.
He could not see through Lucas.
It was absurd. Veyth had looked through every challenger before this one. No matter what gift they carried, he could force his sight through them by standing. He could not force it through this boy. And the boy had brought a helper — something no one before him had managed.
There is only one conclusion. The ancient laws of Pandemonium allowed it… or they were forced to allow it. Just what gift did he receive?
Lucas stood. His gaze stayed on the fire.
Do I become another number, or do I wield this mystery flame?
A smile widened on his face.
Do I really need to think long? When has life ever been easy for me?
He looked down at Veyth.
"My quest says I need to kill you to complete it. Can I actually do that?"
Veyth stared at him and mumbled, almost to himself.
"Kill me, ha."
He stood. Old bones cracked as they took his weight — a dry pop-pop-pop that sounded too loud in the glass hall. The nonchalant look sharpened. A heavy pressure dropped into the cave.
It was not a warning. It was a collapse.
The air thickened until it had edges. Heat without color slammed the chest first, then the knees, then the thoughts. The hum of the flame became a drill behind the eyes. Stone dust shivered off the walls. Lucas's tongue went dry; the taste of cinder and old metal flooded his mouth. His ears rang. Sweat burst cold along his spine even as the skin on his face felt cooked.
Riven hit the stone on all fours — THUD — a raw sound tearing out of her throat. Rank-up or not, her body folded. Her daggers scraped, useless. The Imp screamed in Lucas's skull, high and thin, like glass under a boot.
Lucas's legs shook. His vision tunneled to a narrow, shaking strip. Even with every buff he carried, standing felt like holding up a mountain with his teeth.
Shit. Even with all of it, I can't hold this.
Then it was gone.
As suddenly as it had come, the pressure lifted. Cool air rushed back in like a slap. Everyone dragged breath like they had been drowning in the hall. Riven coughed until her eyes watered. The Imp went silent, trembling in the shadow.
Veyth folded his hands behind his back.
"No. You cannot kill me at your current level. I may have fallen from my original rank, but I can still kill you both in a breath."
He pointed toward the fire.
"There is a way. Subdue it. The moment it lifts its binding from me, I die on my own. Without its support, I end."
Lucas kept himself upright with a hand against his ribs. His legs were still trembling.
This old fossil. You could have said that first. Why the show?
He drew a few breaths and walked forward. The flame burned brighter, as if it were greeting a new challenger. Heat without color pressed his face. Lucas glanced at Riven. She was still on the ground. Her eyes said enough.
No teamwork, then.
He looked at Veyth.
"Well then, Veyth, Warden of Cinder. If I succeed, we both get what we want. If I fail… that would not be new to you."
Veyth's dried lips almost curved at the way the boy treated the problem. He opened his mouth to answer.
He never got the chance.
Lucas's hand was already in the fire.
The first thought that crossed Veyth was simple and ugly.
An impatient imbecile. I overestimated him. Or my senses have gone dull, putting hope on a human of all races.
He started to turn away, expecting the ending he had watched nine hundred and ninety-eight times. First the face goes. Then the flesh. Then the bone. Then nothing. There is never anything left.
He walked a few steps.
He stopped.
Why isn't he screaming?
His brow furrowed. He turned.
Lucas stood in the same posture — one hand in the colorless flame, the other scratching his chin — and looked back at Veyth as if he were waiting for a clerk to stamp a form.
"Do I need to chant something, or what? Why hasn't it started?"
For a heartbeat, Veyth did not move.
Then his ember-slit eyes went wide, too wide for that thin, withered face, as if the fact itself had forced them open. The nail at his side hung useless. His mouth opened and closed with no sound. A dry click caught in his throat.
Six hundred years of the same death had nowhere to put this.
He took one step closer, then another, as if distance were the error. Lucas's skin was whole. The flame moved between his fingers and left nothing — no blister, no smoke, no smell of cooked meat. Only the hum, louder now, almost curious.
Veyth's hands, folded a moment ago like a warden's, fell to his sides. What showed on his face was not fear of the boy. It was fear of hope. The sliver he had felt earlier had been kicked wide open, ugly and bright.
"That is not possible," he scraped out.
Riven stared from the floor, the same stunned silence on her mouth.
The flame hummed louder.
**
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