3rd Person POV
[Carmine Industries - Central Forge Chamber]
The heavy doors of Carmine Industries' central forge chamber hissed shut behind Clara and Odette as they exited, arms laden with the last crates of retrieved angelic steel. The air still carried the acrid tang of scorched ozone and holy residue from the battlefield haul.
Piles of spears, swords, and shattered halos gleamed under the harsh overhead lights—salvaged spoils from another Extermination Day, ready to be melted down, reforged, and sold to the highest bidder in Hell's endless turf wars.
Carmilla Carmine stood at the long obsidian workbench, her long white hair cascading like liquid moonlight over her shoulders, her red eyes narrowed as she inspected a cracked angelic spearhead. Her daughters had left without a word; they knew better than to linger when their mother's posture shifted like that—rigid, expectant.
Steinarr remained.
He leaned against a console of glowing monitors, arms crossed over his tailored black coat, the faint circuit-like patterns on his pale gray skin pulsing softly in time with his thoughts. His eyes—sharp, analytical, glowing a cold electric blue—hadn't left Carmilla since the extraction team returned.
"You saw it," he said quietly, voice measured but carrying the weight of inevitability. "I monitored every feed. The Exorcist that cornered your team. The one you dispatched with your own heels."
Carmilla's grip tightened on the spearhead. She didn't turn. "And?" "You killed it. Permanently. With angelic steel. An angel slain by a sinner's hand." Steinarr stepped forward, boots echoing on the metal floor. "We have empirical confirmation now. Heaven's enforcers are not invincible. Their weapons can be turned against them."
Carmilla finally faced him, her expression a mask of controlled fury. "You think I don't know what I did? I protected my daughters. That's all." Steinarr's lips curved in a thin, humorless smile. "You did more than that. You proved the vulnerability exists. And you're still planning to bury it."
The room grew colder. "I'm planning to keep breathing," Carmilla snapped. "And so are my girls. If this gets out—"
"If this gets out," Steinarr interrupted, voice rising for the first time, "sales explode. Sinners will stop cowering in bunkers every year. They'll come to us—flocking, begging—for weapons that can actually end the threat. Not just to slaughter each other in petty turf games, but to defend themselves when the Exorcists descend. Demand will skyrocket. Your empire grows stronger, not weaker."
Carmilla laughed—a short, bitter sound. "You speak like a salesman. Or a fool. Heaven doesn't sit idle. The moment they realize their soldiers can die down here, they don't send the same numbers next year. They send legions. They send archangels. They glass the Pride Ring from orbit if they have to. They purge anyone who even whispers uprising. And who do you think stands first in their crosshairs? The arms dealer who armed the rebellion."
Steinarr's eyes narrowed. "Heaven already knows we're innovating. They know we scavenge their trash and turn it into tools. They send Adam and his choir of mindless butchers every year because they believe we're too fractured, too terrified, too under-armed to fight back. Look at what you're holding right now."
He gestured to the crates. "You have the means in your hands, Carmilla. The only thing stopping Hell from rising isn't Heaven's strength—it's our fear. And you're feeding it by keeping this secret."
Carmilla slammed the spearhead down, cracking the workbench. "I am not risking my family on your calculus! I don't care about your defense grids, your predictive models, your grand strategic vision. I care that my daughters wake up tomorrow without halos raining down on their heads because some scientist decided to play revolutionary."
Steinarr didn't flinch. "And I care about ending the cycle. I've already finished the new designs—perimeter grids, adaptive force barriers, automated turrets calibrated to angelic signatures. Integrated sensor arrays that predict Exorcist flight patterns. We fortify one stronghold—here, or anywhere—and it becomes untouchable. Heaven tests it, they lose more than they gain. Deterrence. Survival. Progress."
Carmilla stepped closer, towering over him despite his height, her presence suffocating. "You think Heaven fears deterrence? They fear precedent. One dead Exorcist today becomes a thousand tomorrow if every sinner knows it's possible. And I will not be the spark."
Steinarr met her gaze unflinchingly. "Then you're no better than Adam. Hiding the truth because it's safer. Keeping the powerful comfortable while the rest bleed. You sell death every day—angelic steel to demons who turn it on each other. But when it could turn upward? When it could mean something? You lock it away."
Silence stretched, thick and electric.
Carmilla's voice dropped to a dangerous whisper. "You forget your place, Steinarr. I gave you resources. Shares. A seat at this table. And this is how you repay me? By threatening to burn it all down?" Steinarr straightened. "I'm not threatening you, Carmilla, I am saying you can only protect them so much. The only reason why you're still standing now is that damn pig Adam is too lazy to target to bigger targets."
He comes closer to her "If this exterminating rate goes on, or Heaven decides to move up the Extermination Day, we're bound to doom if we're not doing anything as a union instead of a scatterred bunch of chickens, each one running on a direction with nothing but fear of death. Weapons are nothing without people using them Carmilla, and when you're alone facing the legion of angelic power, will you be able to use all the weapons you hoarded?"
Carmilla's crimson eyes narrowed to slits, the air between them crackling with barely restrained power. She did not step back as Steinarr closed the distance—her pride would never allow it—but every line of her body screamed coiled violence.
"You lecture me about unity?" she hissed, voice low and venomous. "You, who spent years turning my angelic steel into profit margins and kill counts for every petty warlord in Pentagram City? Don't pretend this sudden crusade for 'union' comes from anywhere but your ego. You want to be the architect of Hell's grand defense. The one who finally makes the numbers add up in our favor."
Steinarr held her gaze without flinching, his electric-blue irises reflecting the faint glow of the forge lights like targeting overlays.
"I want the numbers to stop bleeding every year," he replied evenly. "Adam is lazy, yes. Arrogant. Overconfident. He treats Extermination like sport because we've never given him reason to treat it like war. But laziness is not immortality.
One day he—or someone sharper—will stop playing. They'll accelerate the schedule. Double the numbers. Triple them. Or they'll simply stop sending foot soldiers and drop something we can't salvage from the rubble."
He gestured toward the crates of angelic weapons stacked like silent accusations behind her.
"You hoard these because control is safety. I understand that. But hoarding is also inertia. Weapons don't unionize themselves. They don't form strategy. They don't decide when to stop running and start fighting.
Right now Hell is exactly what you fear most: scattered. Paranoid. Every Overlord guarding their own corner, every sinner hiding in a bunker or a deal, waiting for the choir to pass. And every year we lose more ground—not in territory, but in time. In momentum. In lives we could have saved if someone had the spine to say 'enough' out loud."
Carmilla's tail lashed once, the metallic tips scraping sparks from the floor.
"And you think broadcasting that one of their own can bleed will magically turn fear into courage?" she countered. "You think the moment Vox airs grainy footage of me crushing an Exorcist's skull, every coward in Pride will suddenly march in formation? They'll panic. They'll hoard. They'll turn on each other faster than ever, desperate to grab whatever angelic scrap they can before Heaven retaliates. You'll start a civil war before the next Extermination even begins."
Steinarr's expression hardened, but his voice remained calm—almost clinical.
"Maybe. Or maybe panic is the precondition for change. Right now they're too comfortable in their terror. Too used to surviving instead of living. You want to keep selling them comfort disguised as security—'Buy my guns, hide better next year.' I want to sell them possibility. 'You can kill them back. We can make them think twice.'"
He took one final step, close enough that she could see the faint data-stream patterns flickering across his irises as he calculated, always calculating.
"You built an empire on angelic steel because you saw what no one else did: their weapons could be ours. I'm asking you to see the next logical step. Their soldiers can die. If we don't act on that truth—together—then the only thing waiting for us is escalation on Heaven's timetable. Not ours."
For a heartbeat, something flickered behind Carmilla's mask—uncertainty, perhaps, or the ghost of the same ruthless pragmatism that had kept her alive this long. Then it vanished.
She leaned in until their faces were inches apart, her voice a silken blade.
"Then go peddle your possibility somewhere else, Steinarr. Take your defense grids, your beautiful predictive models, your righteous fury. But know this: if your little truth ever sees daylight and Heaven comes down harder because of it—if my daughters pay the price for your experiment—I will carve your name into the first angelic spear I forge after the dust settles. And I will make sure it finds you."
Steinarr studied her for a long moment, the silence stretching taut. "Fear has clouded your eyes, Carmilla, you're not the partner I once knew anymore. Maybe one day, you'll know what I am doing is for you"
He turned then, coat sweeping behind him like a shadow detaching from its source. The heavy doors parted without protest. The heavy doors hissed shut behind Steinarr, sealing the forge chamber in sudden, oppressive quiet.
[Carmine Industries's HQ - Steinarr's Office]
Steinarr stepped into his private office at the far end of the executive wing—a space that had once been little more than a cramped corner of the original warehouse, lit by a single flickering bulb and cluttered with hand-drawn schematics.
Now the room was all sleek black metal, tempered glass, and softly humming holographic displays. The view through the floor-to-ceiling window overlooked the sprawling forge complex below: conveyor belts ferrying angelic steel, automated arms welding new prototypes, the ceaseless heartbeat of an empire they had built together.
He moved methodically, the way he always did when emotions threatened to interfere with precision.
First, the essentials: encrypted data drives containing every defense-grid blueprint, predictive algorithm, and angelic-signature calibration he'd ever authored. These went into a matte-black satchel lined with anti-scanning mesh.
Next, the physical backups—small, matte cases of prototype components he'd kept off the official inventory. A compact force-field emitter. A handful of adaptive targeting nodes. Samples of the latest alloy blend that increased angelic steel penetration by 27% against ethereal barriers. All of it slid neatly into reinforced compartments.
Then the money. Stacks of Hell's universal currency—crisp bills stamped with infernal sigils, bearer bonds tied to Carmine Industries accounts, and a few encrypted crypto-keys for off-grid transactions. Enough to operate independently for years if he needed to. He didn't bother counting; the numbers had always obeyed him.
As he reached for the last drawer, his fingers brushed something softer than steel. A small, tarnished metal plaque—hand-engraved, amateurish lettering:
CARMINE & STEINARR FIRST PROTOTYPE – "REAPER-1" DATE: [????????], YEAR OF THE FIRST HARVEST
Beneath it, taped to the back, was a faded photograph printed on cheap demonic photo-stock. Two figures standing in front of that original warehouse: Carmilla, younger, her hair shorter, eyes bright with the fire of creation rather than caution; Steinarr beside her, sleeves rolled up, holding the crude first mock-up of what would become their signature spear design. Both of them were smiling—genuine, unguarded smiles. The kind Hell rarely allowed.
He stared at it longer than he intended.
Memories flickered unbidden: late nights arguing over barrel harmonics while the rest of Hell slept; the first time they successfully melted angelic steel without it rejecting the forge; Carmilla laughing—actually laughing—when the prototype fired true and punched clean through a test slab of reinforced brimstone. Back when the goal wasn't empire or survival, but simply better. When partnership meant shared vision instead of guarded secrets.
He exhaled slowly, the sound almost a sigh.
The photograph went into an inner pocket of his coat—close to where his heart would have been if Hell hadn't long since replaced it with something colder and more efficient.
Everything else—the awards, the framed patents, the model-scale turrets on the shelves—he left behind. Let them gather dust. Let them remind her, every time she walked past this door, that he had been here. That he had given everything until the moment she chose fear over progress.
Steinarr sealed the satchel, shouldered it, and turned off the office lights with a flick of his wrist. The holographic displays faded to standby blue. In the outer office, his secretary—a slender imp named Lira with six years of flawless service—looked up from her terminal, surprise flickering across her face. "Dr. Steinarr? It's… late. Is everything—"
"I'm stepping away for a while," he said, voice calm, final. "Indefinite leave of absence. The R&D division reports to Odette and Clara effective immediately. My access codes remain active for oversight purposes only. You'll receive updated directives from corporate counsel tomorrow."
Lira's eyes widened. She started to stand. "Sir, if this is about the board meeting last month—" "It isn't." He offered her a small, rare nod of appreciation. "You've been exemplary, Lira. Keep the lights on." She sank back into her chair, stunned silent. Steinarr walked past without another word.
The corridors were quiet at this hour—only the distant clang of night-shift forges and the low hum of ventilation. He passed security drones that registered his biometrics and let him through without query. Even they knew better than to question the man who had designed half their targeting matrices.
Outside, the crimson sky of Pentagram City pressed down like a bruise. Neon advertisements flickered across towering spires: VOXTEK promos, Velvette fashion drops, 666 News tickers crowing about the latest Extermination body count.
[Pentagram City]
The streets of Pentagram City still reeked of holy smoke and charred brimstone. Bodies—or what remained of them—littered the gutters in twisted heaps, some reduced to ash silhouettes against cracked pavement, others sprawled in pools of ichor that shimmered faintly under the red sky. Sinners who had been too slow, too drunk, too hopeful that this year might be different. Exorcists had swept through like locusts with halos, laughing as they cleaved through the crowd. Steinarr stepped over a severed arm still clutching a useless pistol, its barrel bent from futile shots at armor no mortal metal could scratch.
He paused beneath a flickering streetlamp, gaze sweeping the carnage.
They didn't have to die like this.
Not if they'd known. Not if someone had handed them the data: angelic steel pierces angelic flesh. Not if someone had given them barriers, grids, targeting solutions instead of platitudes and panic rooms. Heaven's choir didn't descend for population control anymore—they did it because it was easy. Because Hell let it be easy. Because fear had become the default operating system.
Steinarr's fingers tightened around the strap of his satchel. The blueprints inside felt heavier than the corpses around him.
If Carmilla won't see it—if she's too blinded by the shadow of what Heaven might do—then I'll prove it another way. Build the proof. Fortify one place until it laughs at halos. Show her daughters can sleep through an Extermination without waking to screams. Show her that safety isn't hoarding in silence—it's deterrence loud enough to make Adam think twice before he opens his mouth again.
He needed a proving ground. A controlled environment. Somewhere public enough to gather real-world metrics, quiet enough to iterate without immediate interference from Vox or Velvette. Somewhere naive enough that no one would suspect what he was really building until it was too late to stop.
Steinarr kept walking.
A few blocks later, the neon haze parted around a dive called The Guttered Halo—a squat, windowless bar that looked like it had been punched into the side of a condemned apartment block. The sign buzzed and spat sparks. Inside smelled of cheap sulfur whiskey, burnt feathers, and regret.
[Guttered Halo]
He pushed through the door. A few patrons—hulking shark demons nursing drinks, a cyclops playing solitaire with blood-stained cards—barely glanced up. Steinarr took a stool at the far end of the bar, set his satchel between his feet like it contained state secrets (because it did), and raised two fingers.
"Black Label brimstone, neat," he told the bartender, a four-armed imp with a missing horn. "And keep the bottle close."
The drink arrived in a chipped glass that had probably once held holy water before someone pissed in it. Steinarr took a slow sip, letting the burn ground him.
Above the bar, a cracked flatscreen tuned to 666 News flickered with post-Extermination coverage. Katie Killjoy's saccharine voice cut through the low murmur of the room.
"…and in other news, Princess Charlie Morningstar is at it again with her little pet project. That's right, folks—the Happy Hotel. Our sources say she's still peddling this fairy-tale nonsense about redeeming sinners. Yes, you heard that correctly—redeeming them. Because what Hell really needs is more hug therapy and group sing-alongs while the rest of us are still scraping Exorcist glitter out of our hair."
The camera cut to an exterior shot of the hotel: a dilapidated monstrosity on the edge of the entertainment district, its sign crooked, windows boarded in places, yet somehow still standing. Then Charlie appeared on screen—blonde hair bouncing, eyes wide with that infuriating, unbreakable hope—gesturing wildly at the camera.
"—everyone deserves a second chance! We've already got residents working on themselves, and with a little love, a little understanding, and maybe some trust falls, we can prove to Heaven that souls can change! The Happy Hotel isn't just a building—it's a beacon! A promise that redemption is possible, that—"
Steinarr's glass paused halfway to his lips. Around him, everyone has stopped as well, for a single silent moment where every demon in Pride Ring was stunned by the nonsense dream of a girl who doesn't seem to know how it's like to live in here, so she is naive enough to think this entire society allows this fleeting 'good' term she has been babbling senseless about the entire broadcast.
And as if it's not enough stun, her song came after, throwing another flashbang at everyone watching the show, putting them through even more stun until she stops, and the inevitable came, laughter, at her delusional dream, from Kattie, from the people in the background, the girl looks really pathetic at the moment, trying to defend her dream. Steinarr sets down his cup after a full shot of wine and looks around him, everyone is mocking Charlie
The laughter rolled through The Guttered Halo like a slow, ugly wave.
Katie Killjoy's cackle cut sharpest—high and practiced, the sound of someone who'd built a career on tearing hope apart for ratings. In the background of the broadcast, studio crew snorted and wheezed; even the camera operator seemed to be shaking.
On screen, Charlie's face crumpled for half a second—wide eyes glistening, mouth opening in that instinctive, wounded protest—before she rallied with another burst of earnest lyrics, voice cracking but refusing to break.
Around Steinarr, the bar erupted in its own ragged chorus. A shark demon at the next stool slapped the counter so hard his glass tipped. "Redeem sinners? What's next, group therapy for cannibals?" The cyclops with the bloody cards barked a laugh that sounded like gravel in a blender. "Trust falls. In Hell. She's gonna trust-fall right into an Exorcist spear."
Someone in the back yelled, "Sing us another one, princess! Maybe 'Kumbaya' while Adam shoves a halo up your—"
Steinarr didn't join in. He set the empty glass down with deliberate care, the clink almost lost under the jeering. The broadcast cut back to Katie, who was wiping a theatrical tear. "Oh honey, bless your delusional little heart.
What in the 9 circles make you think a single citizen of Hell care shit about being a better person? You have no proof this little experiment of yours actually works." Her twisted smile widens even more "You want people to be good just for the fucking sake of being good?"
It seems this has triggered Charlie's defense instinct as she comes back at Katie with an example that makes Steinarr cover his face in embarrassment for her words "-I've got a client already and he is behaving really well"
Katie turns to her, half surprised, half mocking "Oh~And who might that be?" Charlie displays a confident look as she states the name "Angel Dust, he has been behaved, clean and out of trouble for 2 weeks now"
But soon after that a breaking news came and slapped in Charlie's face Katie Killjoy's face filled the screen again, her grin splitting wider than should be anatomically possible for a demon with that many teeth. She leaned forward like a predator scenting blood.
"Breaking news, folks—hold onto your halos! We're getting live feeds from the West Side turf skirmish. Sir Pentious's egg bois are getting absolutely creamed by Cherri Bomb's latest batch of homemade explosives… and guess who just rolled up in a pink limo, dual-wielding tommy guns and cackling like it's Christmas?"
The feed cut to shaky drone footage: neon-lit streets, smoke curling from cratered asphalt, Cherri Bomb perched on a wrecked car hurling another cherry bomb with manic glee. Then the camera swung—and there he was...Angel Dust...Long legs kicking open the limo door, four arms already in motion, pink fur dusted with gunpowder and glitter. He fired a burst into the air just for the drama of it, then spun toward Cherri with a wink and a blown kiss before joining the fray like he'd never left.
The bar exploded. "Two weeks my ass!" someone howled. "Clean and out of trouble—yeah, if 'trouble' means 'not getting caught on camera'!" A shark demon near the front choked on his drink, slapping his knee. "Princess just got fact-checked by live ordinance!"
On screen, Charlie's confident smile froze. Her ears drooped half an inch. The camera caught the exact moment her eyes widened in horrified recognition—then darted off-screen as if hoping Vaggie or someone would materialize to save her.
Katie didn't miss it. "Oh, sweetheart," Katie purred, turning back to Charlie with mock sympathy. "Looks like your star pupil decided tonight was 'bring your work home' night. How's that redemption arc looking now? Still on track for sainthood, or should we pencil in 'accessory to arson' instead?"
The broadcast devolved into glorious, unhinged chaos.
Charlie's face flushed crimson—literal hellfire flickering at the edges of her pupils. She leaned so far into the camera that her horns nearly scraped the lens.
"You know what, Katie? At least I'm trying to fix something in this dumpster fire of a city instead of sitting behind a desk jerking off to other people's misery for ratings! Maybe if you spent less time being a walking hate-boner and more time developing a personality that isn't just recycled cruelty, you'd have something worth redeeming!"
The studio went dead silent for exactly 1.3 seconds—long enough for Steinarr's internal chronometer to register it as the calm before orbital strike. Then Katie exploded. Her eyes bulged, ink-black veins spiderwebbing across her face. She slammed both palms on the desk so hard the entire set rattled. "You little bitch-princess—you think you can talk to me like that on my network?!"
What followed was less journalism and more live demolition derby. Katie lunged across the desk; Charlie—surprisingly spry—dodged and countered with a wild swing that clipped a teleprompter. Papers flew. A stage light shattered.
Someone in the crew screamed "Worldstar!" like it was still 2015 on Earth. The camera wobbled violently as interns dove for cover, and the feed cut between shaky handheld shots of the 666 News set turning into a brawl and split-screen inserts of the ongoing West Side turf war—Angel Dust now riding Cherri Bomb's shoulder like a demented rodeo clown while egg bois scattered in every direction.
The bar howled with approval. Glasses clinked in toasts to televised violence. Someone yelled, "Get her, princess!" while another countered, "Rip her throat out, Katie!" Steinarr didn't wait for the ad break. He laid a precise stack of bills on the bar—enough to cover the bottle and a generous tip that would probably buy the bartender's silence about the quiet guy in the suit who'd watched the whole meltdown without cracking a smile. He shouldered his satchel and slipped out the side door into the relative quiet of the alley.
The night air tasted like gunpowder and ozone. Distant booms from the West Side rolled in like thunder. Steinarr walked, boots clicking on cracked pavement, mind already running projections.
The Happy Hotel. By now, it was probably in freefall. Between Charlie's public meltdown, Angel Dust's very public relapse, and the simple fact that every sinner with a grudge or a camera had just seen the princess lose her shit on live TV, the place had to be a smoking crater—or at least trending toward one. Boarded windows shattered. Roof leaking hope like bad plumbing. Residents either fleeing or turning the lobby into a mosh pit.
Cheap real estate, in other words. Dirt cheap, if there was even a price tag left. Except…Except this was Charlie Morningstar. Daughter of Lucifer.
The King of Hell didn't do "budget constraints." The man had bottomless vaults of infernal gold, cursed artifacts, existential dread, and enough liquid assets to buy half the Pride Ring twice over without blinking. If Charlie wanted to keep her little redemption spa afloat, Daddy's checkbook would materialize faster than an Exorcist could say "purge."
Steinarr's lips curved faintly. Perfect. A fortified position funded by Morningstar money. A public-stage experiment with zero budget constraints on the hardware side. A princess too stubborn (or too sheltered) to quit, even when the entire city laughed in her face.
He didn't buy the rainbows-and-unicorns pitch. Never had. But he didn't need to. Charlie's core premise—break the cycle—was sound. Her methodology was laughable. No structure. No metrics. No survival layer. Just feelings and songs and trust falls while Exorcists sharpened their blades upstairs.
That's where he came in. Survival first. Always survival first.
Build the fortress. Layer the defenses. Perimeter grids. Angelic-signature sensors. Adaptive barriers tuned to Exorcist harmonics. Automated turrets that didn't waste ammo on sinners but waited for halo signatures. Predictive modeling that turned every Extermination into a wargame Hell could win—or at least survive without bleeding out.
Once the hotel could stand—once it could shrug off an angelic raid the way Carmilla's compound shrugged off gang incursions—then maybe, just maybe, Charlie's delusional positivity could get a real test run. Not because it was true, but because it would finally have room to breathe without being snuffed out on day one.
And if it worked? If the data showed measurable behavioral shifts under controlled, secure conditions? Then Carmilla would have no choice but to look at the numbers. She'd see the proof: Hell didn't need to cower. It needed preparation. Deterrence. A spine. She'd see her daughters could be safe—not because Heaven was kind, but because Heaven had learned the cost of being cruel.
Steinarr paused under the flickering streetlamp, the crooked neon sign of the Happy Hotel now clearly visible just two blocks ahead. One letter—"H" in "Hotel"—kept stuttering like it was reconsidering its entire existence.
He exhaled slowly through his nose. Charlie Morningstar was, without question, more angelic than half the Host still wearing white upstairs. Soft-hearted. Sheltered. Infuriatingly earnest. And right now—after that broadcast meltdown—her little redemption project was bleeding out in public.
Perfect timing. The hotel was in freefall. Reputation in tatters. Residents probably already packing (or at least thinking about it).
No sane sinner would touch the place with a ten-foot pole after tonight. Which meant the asking price—if there even was one—would be somewhere between "please take it" and "I'll pay you to make it stop being my problem."
And Charlie? Naive enough. Desperate enough. She'd grasp at any lifeline that promised to keep the dream on life support for one more sunrise. Even if that lifeline came wearing a Carmine Industries-tailored coat and carrying blueprints for things that went boom instead of hug.
Steinarr's lips curved into the faintest smirk. He could walk in there, offer "technical consultation" and "structural fortification services," and walk out owning fifty-one percent of the deed without spending a single soul-dollar.
Morningstar money would cover materials anyway—Lucifer wouldn't let his daughter's pet project collapse without at least writing a check to save face. And if the defense grid worked? If the hotel stood through the next Extermination while every other block got turned into holy confetti?
Then the value of his shares—both in Carmine Industries and whatever stake he carved out of this crumbling circus—would skyrocket. Profit on top of proof. Carmilla would have no choice but to look at the data then. Steinarr raised a hand.
A battered yellow cab—dented fenders, mismatched hubcaps, driver's-side window taped shut with duct tape—rolled up almost immediately. The imp behind the wheel leaned across the passenger seat, one yellowed fang glinting in the dashboard glow. "Where to, suit?"
"Happy Hotel," Steinarr said calmly, opening the back door. The imp blinked. Twice. "You serious?" Steinarr slid onto the cracked vinyl seat, satchel settling beside him. "Deadly." The driver let out a low whistle and pulled away from the curb, tires crunching over broken glass.
"Buddy, I just dropped off three drunks who were laughing their asses off about that princess getting roasted on 666. Place is probably on fire by now—or at least the reviews are. You got a death wish or just bad taste in real estate?"
Steinarr gazed out the window at the passing neon blur. "Neither. I have nothing better to do tonight." The imp snorted, glancing at him in the rearview. "Nothing better than walking into a dumpster fire run by the Devil's kid? That's a new one." Steinarr leaned back, folding his arms. "I'm considering buying it. Cheap. Very cheap."
The driver barked a laugh. "Buy it? For what? Gonna turn it into a giant brothel? Stripper poles where the trust-fall mats used to be?"
Steinarr's smirk returned, small and private. "Haven't decided yet. Could be a brothel. Could be a fortified compound. Could be my personal residence with extremely selective tenancy. The bones are decent. Location's… tolerable. And the current owner is highly motivated to divest."
The imp shook his head, still chuckling. "You're either the smartest bastard in Pentagram City or the dumbest. Either way, I'm charging extra for the crazy tax."
"Fair," Steinarr replied, sliding another bill through the partition slot—more than enough to cover the ride and buy silence. The cab rattled on. Two blocks became one. The crooked sign grew larger, its stuttering "H" now clearly visible even through the cracked windshield. Steinarr adjusted his cuffs.
Time to see how desperate the princess really was...Time to see if her angelic optimism had any room left for a devil's bargain wrapped in cold, hard pragmatism...The cab slowed. "Here we are," the driver muttered, eyeing the dilapidated facade like it might bite. "Last chance to change your mind, suit."
Steinarr opened the door and stepped out into the crimson night. "No need," he said quietly. The door clicked shut behind him.
The cab peeled away, tires squealing like it couldn't leave fast enough. Steinarr stood alone on the cracked sidewalk, satchel at his side, gaze fixed on the front entrance. "Let's see how far this could take me."
A psyche for his own mind before he heads towards the crumbling hotel that is doesn't look as happy as its name.