New Eden: Live to Play, Play to Live

Titania, who could feel a slight change in Astaroth's presence, suddenly backed off. She heard his whispers, and her eyes widened.

She quickly jumped back, trying to put some distance between the two of them.

'I knew I recognized that ring,' she thought, as she backed away.

Astaroth erupted with black flames, as a ring of runes appeared under his feet, growing in size until it was almost a hundred metres wide. The runes shone in red-black shades, as a portal opened up behind Astaroth.

He may have been too busy burning up in demonic flames to notice the portal behind him, but Phoenix wasn't.

And from afar, her eyes widened.

'That portal… It's like the one in the dungeon's last stage…'

Her mind couldn't wrap around the fact that Astaroth was opening such a portal. Just how close to hell's powers had Solomon's legacy made Astaroth?

Phoenix's concentration almost slipped far enough that she dropped her mana condensing. Fortunately, she was smart enough to realize what was happening, and caught herself in time, before having wasted all this effort to no avail.

While Titania was looking at the portal with dread and awe, Phoenix used this respite to finalize her flame condensation, activated Regulus Supernova, and switched it into Battle Regalia form.

Feeling the surge in power from another source, Titania knew the battle had just gotten serious.

"These two sure are troublesome…" she muttered.

She only wanted to blow some steam to start with. But now it seemed like she would have to get serious a bit.

A surge of fire erupted under Titania's feet, like a volcano exploding, but she felt the mana surge before it did and was already moving away.

Astaroth, whose spell had finally finished, was now surrounded by eight demons.

He knew exactly who they were, but was still surprised to see a few of them.

Looking at each demon, Astaroth tried remembering all their powers, since he would need to use them correctly during this fight.

'So many things to control… Is this what Khalor has to consider all the time? No wonder he prefers to play solo.'

In the counts, two of them he recognized and knew their powers well since he had used them not too long ago. These were Räum and Ose.

The former's shadow powers fit with the first rung of hell, now that he knew what it was for. Causing the despair of the falling souls.

What would cause despair more than shadows eating at you?

Then came Ose, whose power to control the minds of her targets, came as no surprise in her allegiances either.

Her ability to see through the minds of her victims allowed her to dig deep enough to uncover their fears and play on those.

But a third Count was there, as well; Andromalius.

His powers, Astaroth took a moment to remember. But when he did, he realized he also wasn't a poor fit for the first level of hell.

The power to corrupt and infect the mind.

It might not be at a level strong enough to make him dangerous, but he was the main reason a lot of souls eventually became full-fledged demons.

At the Duke level, the two Dukes were Gusion and Gremory, a pair of twin demons, which Astaroth didn't particularly affectionate.

Solomon had told him about them, when he first passed the challenge, as he did for all the others as well, and their past was all kinds of messed up.

Gusion and Gremory, in life, had been a pair of cultists turned necromancers that dealt in blood magic and human sacrifices.

When the god of death had reached out to them, to judge their wrongdoings, the twins had sacrificed each other to a demon, in hopes of escaping judgement.

And the demon they had bound their souls to was also present.

The Marquis, Sabnock.

Sabnock was a Marquis, but also the general under the king of the first hell, when they were still in power. His powers were not too dissimilar to Astaroth's or Khalors, as he could summon droves of pawns to fight for him.

The other Marquis that was present was Ronové.

Ronové's powers were a little stranger, as they affected matter of all kinds, changing its shape and properties.

Solomon had said that Ronové had once been a powerful Alchemist, whose search for the philosopher's stone had eventually turned onto a darker path, corrupting his soul until he fell to the demons' promises.

And lastly, the king of the first hell, a female demon, Paimon. Solomon had explained that demons used the word king as a gender-neutral title, signifying power more than sex and that he shouldn't look into it further than that.

And although her rank was king, Paimon's nickname was the Cursed Queen.

He had explained to him that Paimon had once been, a very long time ago, the disciple of a very powerful witch, who had taught her everything she knew.

But in a fit of jealousy, when Paimon couldn't surpass her mentor, she had tried laying a curse on her. Only, her mentor was infinitely more powerful than her and had turned the curse against her, condemning her to burn for eternity, until her soul finally broke and became a demon.

She had quickly risen in the ranks, as her magic was not something the demons could do much against, until she reached the peak of the first hell, at the king rank.

Paimon never bothered trying to reach higher, since the next rank was something which politics would grant more than power. And she was never one to delve into those.

Paimon turned to look at Astaroth, her seductive face smiling at him tauntingly. Her naked body would have made many men forget themselves and slip down to the embraces of hell's fires.

But Astaroth barely glanced back at her, causing her to feel slighted.

She slinked into her shadow, emerging from Astaroth, as she caressed his body and whispered into his ear.

"You finally call on me, boy. I thought you never would. What do you want me to do? Should we go somewhere more private, or did you call the others to watch?"

But a blue flame lance landed near her feet, pulling her attention away from Astaroth.

The next second, a blue flaming fist smacked into her face, sending her back a few feet.

"Hands off, vixen. He's mine."