Succubus Lord 13

by Eric Vall

  The bastards screamed in agony as the molten-hot metal seared through their skin, and then they convulsed as they collapsed onto the ground and clawed at their faces in desperation.

  The last Daeva took a different approach, though, and he made a beeline straight for Ziminiar.

  That was a fucking mistake.

  The King of the Sixth Circle simply scoffed as he held out his hand and shot tiny sparks of green electricity into the ground. Instantly, the Daeva’s body floated up into the air, and the little fucker flailed helplessly.

  I drew my goat-headed dagger, stabbed it into his eye, and then watched as he went limp.

  “Thank you,” Ziminiar mused, “you know I hate to get my hands dirty if I can help it.”

  “But have you found out anything about the Book of Bezaleel?” I panted. “Anything that might give us an advantage or a special spell that could kill a Demon King or anything like that?”

  “I was able to translate one of the spells from the third section of the book,” the goat-faced demon admitted, “but it might be somewhat painful.”

  “Do it,” I commanded my ally. “Whatever it is, I’ll suffer through the pain.”

  Ziminiar raised his eyebrow. “Are you certain?”

  “Just do it!” I commanded. “We can’t afford to waste another minute!”

  The King of the Sixth Circle nodded soberly before he flipped open the book, placed his finger on the page, and then began to speak in a dark, deep voice that sounded like a Gregorian chant. I couldn’t make out the words he was saying, but it certainly sounded like an ominous enchantment.

  Suddenly, a sharp pain shot through my spine. I let out a scream of agony as I fell down onto my knees and tensed my body to try and quell the throbbing, but it was no use.

  “Do you wish to continue?” Ziminiar questioned somewhere above me.

  “Keep going!”

  The Scholar of Hell chanted some more, and the pain became nearly unbearable. My vision started whiting out, so I began to slam my fist into my chest as a distraction.

  My spine was shifting inside my back. Slowly but surely, I felt the vertebrae near my shoulders start to widen before there was another sharp, piercing pain in my muscles.

  They were coming through my skin.

  Wait … it couldn’t be.

  I fought through the pain, reached up, and undid the back panel of my armor. As the dark piece fell away, I felt two large, oversized appendages spring forth from my back.

  Wings.

  Holy fuck … I had wings.

  “There you have it,” Ziminiar said with a bow. “You are now airborne, King Ralston.”

  I stood back to my feet, wobbled for a second, and then commanded my new wings to lift me into the sky. It felt strange to have these things jutting out of my back, but they responded to my brain’s commands just like any other muscle in my body.

  I lifted up into the air, looked down on the scholar, and smiled.

  “Thank you, Ziminiar.” I nodded.

  “Just kill that bastard Beelzebub,” he retorted. “All hail King Ralston!”

  I turned my attention back to the sky, where Ira and the cherubs were still engaged with the flying grunts. Then my massive wings beat through the air as they carried me over to the battleground, and I soon was in position to strike.

  I gripped the Unhallowed Sword tightly, dived down, and then came up on a group of the green demons from below. As I passed by, I held out the sword and let my momentum carry my blade through their bodies.

  Several of the fuckers gasped and screamed as their guts fell out of the freshly-made holes in their bodies, and then their lifeless bodies plummeted down into the abyss below.

  I twirled around in the air, held out my hand, and unleashed a series of yellow shuriken into the crowd of grunts. Several of them were wounded by the attack, and then the cherubs swooped in and finished the job for me.

  “Jacob!” Ira gasped, and her eyes widened when she caught sight of me. “Are those … wings?”

  “Brand new,” I noted as I downed another fucker with red Hellfire. “You like?”

  “Oh, I’m already thinking of all the ways we can incorporate those into our playtime … ” the Sister of Wrath cooed.

  “We have to get out of here first,” I admitted as I scanned the battlefield below.

  My soldiers were still putting up a fight against Beelzebub’s minions, but there were just too many of them. Wave after wave of Daeva continued to crawl up the side of the giant stalagmite, and I worried that they would soon overwhelm my friends.

  Even if they were the greatest fighters I’d ever known, my army was eventually gonna get tired, and once that happened, it was over.

  “Jakey!” Todd gasped as he zoomed over to my position. “It’s them! I totally knew they were gonna pull a Gandalf!”

  The imp was right. There, just across the bridge on the nearest oversized stalagmite, was the rest of my army.

  Lilith, Eligor, and Cupi stood at the front of the army, each one with their weapons at the ready. Finally, Cupi flew up into the air, held her polearm forward, and called out to her soldiers.

  “Leave no Daeva alive!” she roared.

  “Damn it, bro,” Todd sighed, “she was supposed to say ‘To the King!’”

  I watched with excitement as the Shades marched across the bridge, while the generals and the incubi soared over the deep chasm on their elegant wings.

  Several of the Daeva and grunts diverted their attention to the incoming army, and that was all we needed.

  The odds were now even.

  But I still had unfinished business with Beelzebub.

  It wasn’t hard to find the bastard. He was standing smack-dab in the center of my army of Shades and tearing through them like they were made out of cardboard. He was shooting flaming arrows into the skulls of my soldiers while simultaneously cutting them down with his razor-sharp wings and claws.

  Thankfully, they were already dead, and Sia could heal them all later.

  Still, that had to fucking hurt.

  I blasted a few more grunts out of the sky as I flew over to Beelzebub, swooped down, and landed on the ground before him.

  “Do you really have to pick on the infantry?” I mocked as I readied my sword. “Some fucking leader you are.”

  “You talk a big game, Nephilim scum,” Beelzebub growled, “but it’s all for not. As soon as you’re dead, your army will bow to me. All of your Shades … all of your Demon Lords … hell, probably even all of your lovers. They’ll all be mine soon enough.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong,” I growled, “they follow me because they believe in me, not because I scare them shitless.”

  “My army believes in me, too,” Beelzebub shrugged, “did you not hear the elegant speech Uriel gave? I thought it was quite nice.”

  “I did,” I shot back, “right before I killed him.”

  “Fucking abomination,” Beelzebub said as his face went emotionless. “Wings or not, I’m going to do what I should have done a long time ago.”

  The King of the Eighth Circle called forth a handful of arrows, threw them all onto his bow at once, and then fired them at me at point-blank range.

  I knocked them away with a cast of purple, but then the Demon King’s claws hit me square in the chest. Sparks flew from my torso as his claws scraped across the Caliginian Metal, but my armor held up.

  I retaliated with a blast of red Hellfire, but Beelzebub was quick to get his scaly wings in front of the attack.

  The next thing I knew, Beelzebub’s arms were around me, and he tackled me into the sky.

  I lashed out with the Unhallowed Sword as we flew, but all I could reach was his wing.

  We shot across the landscape of the Eighth Circle at breakneck speed as I tried to push back with my own wings. However, we were going way too fast, and all I could do was hold on and hope for the best.

  Then Beelzebub released me from his grip, summoned arrows to his quiver, and launched
them at me as I flew backward.

  I dispelled each one with my sword, but then it hit me.

  Literally.

  I slammed into the rocky side of a nearby stalagmite, and my vision flashed white as pain coursed through every inch of my body. The impact made me lose my grip on the Unhallowed Sword, and all I could do was watch helplessly as it fell down into the darkness below.

  I threw down a platform of purple to keep myself from meeting the same fate, but Beelzebub was already on me before I even had a chance to catch my breath.

  I grunted in agony as I forced my body up into the air once more and felt the King of the Eighth Circle swish beneath me. I was in a world of hurt, but I couldn’t let that slow me down.

  I couldn’t lose. Not to this fucker.

  In one swift motion, I commanded my warhammer to materialize in my hands, spun around, and swung at Beelzebub.

  This time, my weapon found its mark.

  The head of the hammer slammed into the side of Beelzebub’s face, and I couldn’t help but smile as I watched a handful of teeth fly out of his mouth, accompanied by what looked like a gallon of blood.

  Before he could recover, I thrust the blunt end of the warhammer into Beelzebub’s stomach and sent him flying back into the same rocky cliff he’d just thrown me into.

  However, the Lord of the Flies caught himself. Then he turned his body into a buzzsaw as he hit the cliff, sliced through the whole fucking thing as if it were made of butter, and then came back around.

  Not this time, asshole.

  I summoned a portal of green flames in front of me, took aim, and swung my warhammer as hard as humanly possible. I timed the blow perfectly, and the other end appeared just above the swirling body of my opponent.

  There was a loud crack as the hammer struck Beelzebub, and his trajectory was changed. Then I watched with relief as the King of the Eight Circle flew down into the darkness below.

  It couldn’t have been that easy, could it?

  I scanned the darkness below and waited for the bastard to pop back up. There was no way the mighty Beelzebub would go out like that.

  Finally, as if right on cue, a slew of flaming arrows shot up from the abyss.

  My warhammer knocked many of them away, but then Beelzebub’s body appeared right below me.

  The fucker stabbed an arrow right into the crease in my armor, right where it bent at the knee. A sharp pain seared my leg, and it was immediately followed by warm blood as it oozed out of the wound.

  Beelzebub grabbed my warhammer, yanked it out of my hands, and then tossed it nonchalantly to the side.

  “It doesn’t feel so good, does it?” he mocked as he lashed out at me with his wings.

  Again, I was put in the position to make a fateful choice. My weapon, or my life.

  Again, I chose my life.

  I quickly ducked out of the way of the first wing, followed up with a punch to the bastard’s gut, and then felt a sharp, stabbing pain as his other wing struck me in the stomach.

  “Ohhhh,” he chuckled, “that’s gotta hurt.”

  It really fucking did.

  My armor had taken the brunt of his wing, but I could feel the tip of the deadly appendage just barely stabbing into my stomach.

  I was pretty banged up, but I wasn’t going to give up just yet.

  I wanted to see this fucker bleed.

  So, I reached down, pulled out my goat-headed dagger, and then stabbed it right into Beelzebub’s right eye.

  The eyeball came clean out when I removed the blade, and Beelzebub wretched in agony as he pulled back and clutched at his face.

  “I bet it does,” I mocked.

  As I glanced back at the battle that was raging near the castle, I saw the Daeva were still coming. Even with evened odds, even with my reinforcements … they were still swarming my army like lemmings.

  Not to mention, I was losing blood fast. If I didn’t end this soon, I was fucked.

  What would happen to my friends if I died? Who would take care of my women? Would my kingdom be safe? Would Todd watch over my parents?

  As the horrific thoughts trickled into my brain, my armor began to glow intensely with black Hellfire.

  Wait … that was it. If I couldn’t defeat Beelzebub here, then maybe I could take him out in the Shadow World.

  Beelzebub, in a fit of rage, pulled out an arrow and attempted to hit me with it. Instead, it flew about a mile above my head.

  “What’s the matter?” I growled as I surrounded my body with even more black Hellfire. “Having some trouble shooting straight? There are specialists for that, ya know.”

  “Shut the fuck up!” the Demon King growled, and then he launched toward me with the speed of a cannonball.

  I reached out, blasted the incoming demon with black Hellfire, and then closed my eyes as I felt us being transported through space and time.

  When I finally opened my eyes again, I saw the stalagmites were stretched to ungodly proportions, and all of the figures from the battle afar were frozen in place.

  Meanwhile, Beelzebub had stopped in his tracks and was trying to find his bearings.

  “It-It can’t’ be … ” he gasped, “you couldn’t have survived this place. No demon has!”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw several tall, shadowy figures appear over the horizon, but for the first time, they didn’t strike me with fear. Instead, I was happy to see the Shadow People.

  “Well,” I mused as I held out my goat-headed dagger and summoned red Hellfire into my hand, “you said it yourself. I’m not a demon. Or a human. I’m a Nephilim. Oh, and I’m also the Savior of the Caliginis.”

  I moved my hand over the blade of the dagger, and it lit up with the red enchantment. At the same time, the goat-headed weapon stretched out and curved until it had the appearance of a cutlass.

  Beelzebub let out a roar of rage as he lifted up his bow and took aim.

  However, his hand was quickly yanked back down by a much darker, nebulous one.

  “Hellllloooo, Beelzebub … ” I heard one of the Shadow People whisper. “You dare harm ourrrr savior?”

  The Lord of the Flies’ eyes went wide, and he began to frantically lash out at the Caliginis with his wings. Soon, the sheer number of Shadow People overwhelmed the Demon King, and he let out a scream as they pinned him to the ground and began to tear at his flesh with their teeth and claws.

  Suddenly, there was a spray of black blood, followed by Beelzebub’s signature spin. The King of the Eighth Circle made his way through the Caliginis like they were paper, but then he came to an abrupt stop.

  He really didn’t look good now.

  Beelzebub’s entire body was clawed to oblivion, and blackish-red blood oozed down his torso and dripped off onto the ground. His head was misshapen from the blows he’d taken from my warhammer, and he was heaving like he could barely breathe on his own.

  It was now or never.

  I didn’t even know if my God Bomb would work now without the souls of my friends to help, but I had to try.

  “Caliginis!” I called out weakly. “I need your spirits!”

  I held out my hands, summoned Divine Light into them, and tried to reach out and feel the spirits of the Shadow People.

  “This old trick again?” Beelzebub mocked as he wrapped his wings around his body. “You know it doesn’t work.”

  Suddenly, I experienced something I’d never felt before. My entire being was drenched in a sense of dread, as if I could feel nothing but sorrow and pain and suffering.

  The spirits of the Caliginis.

  The white light in my right hand went dark and was replaced by an intense black flame. Then power like I’d never experienced before began surging throughout my body, and Beelzebub looked petrified.

  For the first time in this fucker’s life, he was afraid.

  So, I clapped my hands together and unleashed the dual God Bomb black Hellfire attack.

  It blasted around Beelzebub’s body, and the Lord of the Flies
shrieked in agony as he was engulfed by the flames. I held the attack for a solid minute, and when I finally released my spell, I barely recognized the poor bastard.

  Beelzebub’s charred, leathery body crumpled to the ground on his hands and knees. All that remained of his “impenetrable” wings were two gory stumps, and the green-skinned demon spat blood onto the ground as clumps of his flesh fell away from his body.

  He looked up at me weakly as I approached and opened his mouth to say something, but I quickly silenced him by stabbing my sword into his skull.

  I wasn’t going to give this fucker the luxury of any last words.

  Beelzebub’s eyes rolled back in his head as his mouth fell agape, and his body went limp. Then I yanked the blade from between his eyes, and his corpse collapsed to the ground.

  At the same time, I felt all my adrenaline wearing off, and the pain was returning to my body.

  “You did it, Jacob!” I heard Zilla exclaim, but the world was already turning white.

  I fell down onto my knees, dropped my goat-headed dagger to the ground, and then collapsed.

  Chapter 18

  My eyes sprang open to the sight of an amorphous black ceiling, accompanied by the sound of white noise. I sat up in a flash, grabbed my injured stomach, and was met with several pairs of glowing red eyes.

  “He’s awake!” Blagdan’s voice exclaimed. “I was afraid we’d lost you, King Ralston.”

  “Yeah,” I coughed, “I was afraid I’d lost me, too.”

  I was currently sitting in the medical wing of the Shining Alliance’s base, stripped down to just my trousers, with Blagdan, Zilla, and several dozen other Caliginis surrounding my bed. A dark black piece of gauze was tied around my stomach wound, and it was soaked with bits of my crimson blood.

  “We dragged you here after you killed Beelzebub,” Zilla explained. “We just barely got you back in time, but our healer was able to get you stable and then restored you back to a somewhat healthy state.”

  “Somewhat healthy state?” I chuckled. “What exactly does that mean?”

  “It means that you’ll live,” the Shadow Queen smiled, “but I wouldn’t go out on any more adventures anytime soon.”