Scrounger the Bottom Feeder's POV:
I've seen some shit in my nine thousand years of scuttling through Hell's bowels. I've watched Arbiters tear souls apart for sport, seen the Crimson Court turn sinners into living furniture, even survived the War of Weeping Shadows when the Void Walkers tried to unmake reality itself.
But I've never - and I mean fucking never - seen anything like him.
Lord Duskborn.
The Dark Wanderer.
The Breath of Death.
They call him many things now, but all the names carry the same weight: fear. Pure, undiluted, pants-shitting terror.
The mechanical breathing is what you hear first. That steady, rhythmic sound that means death is coming.
Not the ordinary kind of death we're used to down here - where you get torn apart only to reform for another round of torture - but true death. The kind where you don't come back. The kind that shouldn't even be possible in Hell.
I'm crouched behind a particularly disgusting stalagmite, all six of my eyes working independently to track the unfolding massacre.
My leathery skin blends perfectly with the rock - one of ol' Scrounger's many survival adaptations. Nine millennia of evolution, baby. You don't last this long in Hell without learning how to be practically invisible when shit hits the fan.
And brother, the shit isn't just hitting the fan today - it's being launched from a fucking cannon.
The Baroness of Lost Hope stands atop a ridge of obsidian, her childlike form belying the cruelty within.
Behind her, an army stretches as far as my eyes can see - enslaved Red and Blue Ogres, twisted demons of every variety, and souls forced into combat.
Must be tens of thousands of the poor fuckers.
"Duskborn!" she calls out, her voice starting sweet before darkening to something cruel by the final syllable. "Have you come to witness your family forgetting you? The Baroness can show you such delightful visions!"
The dark figure stands alone on the plain before her army. His black armor absorbs the crimson light of Hell, the cape behind him billowing despite the lack of wind.
Golden chains wrap around his limbs and neck - Heaven's bindings, meant to contain his power.
They're not working very fucking well.
"I seek the King of Hell," Lord Duskborn replies, his voice distorted through that mask he wears. "You are in my way."
The Baroness giggles, the sound like glass breaking. "Your son already calls another man father. Isn't that sad? Your precious Empress spreads her legs for a new consort. The Baroness has seen it in the pools of possibility."
I wince. Bad fucking move, lady. Even the lowest scavenger in Hell knows better than to mention this guy's kid or his lizard empress. That's suicide by proxy, that is.
Lord Duskborn doesn't immediately respond. The only sound is that mechanical breathing. In... out. In... out. Like a countdown to extinction.
Then he ignites his weapon - a blade of pure black energy that hums with destructive power. Not red like Lady Amaranth's creations, not blue like the Arbiters' weapons.
Black.
Like a slice of oblivion given form.
"So you have chosen death," he says simply.
The Baroness laughs and waves her small hand. "Kill him! Bring me his chains as a trophy!"
The front line surges forward - hundreds of lesser demons howling as they charge. Lord Duskborn doesn't retreat. Doesn't even change his stance. He just waits, that mechanical breathing never changing rhythm.
In... out. In... out.
The first wave reaches him, and that's when the slaughter begins.
His black blade moves in a horizontal arc, cutting through the front runners like they're made of smoke. But they don't just fall - they vanish - turning into black fucking particles and poof! Gone!
No reforming, no screaming remnants.
True death.
A Blue Ogre breaks through the ranks, swinging a massive hammer. "Your death will be fucking poetry!" it bellows in its metallic voice.
Lord Duskborn sidesteps with surprising grace for someone in chains, the hammer creating a crater where he stood. Before the Ogre can recover, Duskborn drives his black blade upward through its jaw, the energy weapon emerging from the top of its skull.
"I prefer prose," he replies coldly as the Ogre dissolves into nothingness.
Holy shit. He just erased a Blue Ogre like it was nothing. Those fuckers have existed since before Hell had circles!
The army hesitates, suddenly understanding what they're facing. But the Baroness shrieks, her childlike voice cracking with rage.
"FORWARD! The Baroness commands you! He cannot kill you all!"
Actually, I think he fucking can.
Lord Duskborn raises his free hand, and I feel a pressure wave building. The air itself seems to compress around him before exploding outward. The telekinetic blast tears through the front ranks, sending bodies flying in all directions. Some simply disintegrate mid-air, touched by that destructive energy of his.
A group of Red Ogres tries to flank him, their crimson skin glowing with inner fire. "Follow rules or die again, you piece of trash!" one roars, its attempt at rhyming abandoned in its fury.
Duskborn doesn't even turn. He just extends his hand backward, and black lightning erupts from his fingertips, connecting with each Ogre in succession. They freeze, their bodies contorting as the destructive energy unmakes them from the inside out.
It's not just power - it's fucking precision. He's not wasting a single movement.
The army surges forward again, this time from all sides. Hundreds of demons, dozens of Ogres, all converging on the solitary figure in black.
I should run. I really fucking should. But I can't tear my eyes away from what happens next.
Lord Duskborn leaps into the air - higher than should be possible in Hell, where flight is forbidden without physical wings. At the apex of his jump, he unleashes a barrage of ki blasts from both hands. Each blast tears through multiple enemies, leaving nothing but empty space where they stood.
He lands in the middle of a group of Blue Ogres, his black blade whirling in complex patterns - vertical slashes that cleave skulls, horizontal sweeps that sever torsos, diagonal cuts that dismember limbs. Each strike is perfectly placed, wasting no energy.
A particularly massive Red Ogre charges from behind, its club raised high. Without looking, Duskborn drops into a crouch and executes a perfect leg sweep, taking the Ogre's feet out from under it. As it falls, he rises and thrusts his black blade through its eye socket.
"Your rhymes were terrible anyway," he comments as the Ogre dissolves.
The battlefield has become a charnel house. No - that's not right. A charnel house would have remains. This is becoming a void, an absence where an army once stood.
I've seen powerful beings fight before. I've watched Arbiters battle rebellious demons, seen Lady Amaranth's Crimson Court execute traitors. But this... this is different. This isn't combat - it's erasure.
A squadron of elite demons - the Baroness's personal guard - surrounds him, their weapons formed from solidified suffering. They attack in perfect coordination, a dance of death they've performed countless times.
Duskborn counters with his own lethal choreography. He parries a thrust from the right while kicking backward to shatter a demon's knee.
His black blade severs the arm of a third attacker while his free hand catches a fourth by the throat. All while those golden chains clink with each movement, a musical accompaniment to the massacre.
"Is this the best you have?" he asks, the mechanical breathing never faltering. In... out. In... out.
The Baroness screams in frustration, her childlike facade cracking to reveal glimpses of her true form - a writhing mass of symbols and equations that define despair.
"Show him the visions! Break his will!" she commands.
The air around Duskborn shimmers as the Baroness's power takes effect. I can't see what he's being shown, but I know her methods. She's forcing him to witness his worst fears - his son forgetting him, his woman with another man, his existence erased from memory.
For a moment, he goes still. The mechanical breathing falters, just once.
The Baroness laughs, high and cruel. "See? They've already forgotten you. Your son calls another 'father' now. Your Empress moans another's name in ecstasy. No one remembers the man in the mask."
Lord Duskborn's head tilts slightly. Then, to my absolute shock, he laughs. Not a chuckle, not a nervous titter, but a full-throated laugh that echoes across the battlefield.
"Is that the best you can do?" he asks when his laughter subsides. "Show me false visions and expect me to believe them? Images that contain not soul or essence but are simply changing light and perception? And you think that will break me? How pathetic."
He takes a step forward, and despite being a good hundred yards away, I swear I can feel his focus narrow onto the Baroness like a physical weight.
"Let me tell you something about my son," he says, his modulated voice dropping lower. "He is brilliant. Far smarter than you give him credit for. He remembers everything - the sound of my breathing, the feel of my armor, the way I held him. He will not forget me."
Another step. The remaining demons back away instinctively.
"And Freeza? You think she would take another consort?" His laugh this time is cold, dangerous.
"She is the Empress of the Universe. The strongest woman in existence. And she knows that no one - no one- can match what we have. We made a promise, she and I. If either of us betrays the other, the punishment is death - for the traitor and whoever they chose instead."
The Baroness's confidence visibly wavers. The visions around Duskborn flicker and fade.
"But most importantly," he continues, now close enough that I can see the red glow of his eyes through the mask's lenses, "you've made a critical error in your calculations."
"What error?" the Baroness demands, her voice no longer childlike but shrill with fear.
"You assumed I would still be here to be forgotten." His black blade hums with renewed energy. "I'm going home. And nothing in Hell or Heaven will stop me."
With that, he launches himself toward the Baroness, covering the remaining distance in a blur of motion. Her personal guards move to intercept, but they might as well try to stop an avalanche with their hands.
Duskborn cuts through them -a horizontal slash that bisects two demons, a spinning kick that crushes another's skull, an upward thrust that impales a fourth through the chest. All while those chains clink and jangle, somehow not hindering him in the slightest.
The Baroness backs away, real fear replacing her usual cruelty. "The Lady Amaranth will punish you for this! The Crimson Court will hunt you forever!"
"Let them come," Duskborn replies, advancing steadily. "I'll give them the same welcome I've given you."
She turns to flee, but his hand shoots out, telekinetic force freezing her in place. He walks around her, studying her like a scientist might examine a particularly disappointing specimen.
"You know," he says conversationally, as if they're discussing the weather and not her imminent destruction, "I've been thinking about what you said. About my son and Freeza."
The Baroness whimpers, her galaxy-filled eyes wide with terror.
"It made me angry at first, no the word is too small for the absolute rage I felt. " he continues, circling her. "But then I realized something important."
He leans in close to her ear. "You've never known love. You've never had a family. You can only imagine these scenarios because they're what you would do - betray, forget, abandon."
His hand closes around her throat, lifting her small form off the ground. "I pity you. But pity won't save you."
With his free hand, he deactivates his black blade and reaches up to grasp the top of her head. What happens next makes even my hardened stomach turn.
He begins to pull, slowly separating her head from her body. Not a clean cut like with his blade, but a gradual, agonizing tear. The Baroness screams, a sound that starts childlike and transforms into something ancient and terrible.
And man does that have to be painful. He's gotta have some technique or something to amplify pain, because demons as old as her have experienced pretty much anything, and won't scream like that - at fucking all!
"My son," Duskborn says calmly over her screams, "is myHeir. Mine. He has my intelligence, his mother's ruthlessness, and power beyond imagination. He will remember me."
The Baroness's neck stretches impossibly as he continues pulling.
"Freeza is the Empress of the Universe. She does not 'move on.' She takes what she wants and destroys what displeases her. And she wants me."
The Baroness's screams reach a crescendo as her neck begins to tear.
"And most importantly," he finishes, his voice dropping to a whisper that somehow carries across the silent battlefield, "I am the Flaw of Duskborn. The Greatest Mistake of your 'Gods.' I do not stay where I'm put. I do not accept limitations. I do not remain forgotten."
With a final pull, he separates her head completely from her body. Instead of blood, galaxies pour from the wound - tiny star systems and nebulae spilling onto the ground before evaporating into nothing.
The Baroness's head continues to scream for several seconds, her eyes locked on his mask. Then, like the others, she simply ceases to exist - not just her body, but her entire essence erased from Hell itself.
Lord Duskborn stands alone in a field of absence. Where an army of thousands once stood, now there is only him and the emptiness he's created.
And me, of course. Ol' Scrounger, hiding behind my stalagmite and trying not to shit myself.
The mechanical breathing fills the silence. In... out. In... out.
Then, without turning, he speaks: "You can come out now. I've known you were there the whole time."
Fuck me sideways with a soul-reaper's scythe! How did he-
"Your breathing," he explains, as if reading my thoughts. "Six different patterns from six different lungs. Rather distinctive."
Well, there's no point hiding now. I emerge from behind my stalagmite, trying to look as non-threatening as possible. Not difficult when you're four and a half feet of scarred, leathery skin and bulging eyes.
"Impressive show, your Lordship," I say, giving my best approximation of a bow. "Ol' Scrounger's seen a lot in nine thousand years, but nothing quite like that, see?"
He turns to face me fully, and I get my first good look at that mask up close. It's black as void, with angular breathing apparatus and eyes that glow faintly red.
Intimidating as fuck, but I've survived this long by not showing fear.
"You know this place," he states rather than asks. "The paths. The hierarchies. The rules."
I straighten up a bit, pride overcoming fear. "Know Hell better than the Arbiters themselves, I do. Been here since before the Ninth Circle had a fucking name."
"I seek the King of Hell," he says, the mechanical breathing punctuating his words. "Do you know where to find him?"
Now that's a dangerous fucking question. The King of Hell doesn't have a fixed location - he wanders the realms, his very being the authority of Hell itself. Finding him isn't just difficult; it's potentially suicidal.
But looking at the field of nothingness surrounding us, I reconsider what "suicidal" really means in this context.
"Might do," I reply cautiously. "Might have an idea or two about his movements. But information like that... worth a lot to the right buyer, see?"
"What do you want?" he asks directly.
I consider my options carefully. Wealth is meaningless here. Power attracts attention I don't want. But there is one thing...
"Freedom," I answer finally. "When you find what you're looking for - when you do whatever the fuck you're planning to do - ol' Scrounger wants out. A ticket to the living world. Been in Hell too long, see? Miss the stars. The pleasures of life."
Lord Duskborn considers this for a moment, the mechanical breathing the only sound between us.
"When I conquer Hell and fashion a throne from the King's body," he says matter-of-factly, "I will need advisors who understand this realm. Serve me well, and you'll see your stars again."
Well fuck me. He's not just looking to find the King - he wants to replace him. Take over Hell itself. The sheer ambition of it would be laughable if I hadn't just watched him erase thousands of demons from existence.
"Deal," I say, extending one of my clawed hands.
He takes it in his gloved one, and I feel a chill run through me - not fear, but something else. Something I haven't felt in millennia.
Hope.
"Lead on," Lord Duskborn commands, releasing my hand.
As I scuttle ahead of him, guiding him deeper into Hell's labyrinth, that mechanical breathing follows behind me. Steady. Relentless. Inevitable.
In... out. In... out.
The sound of death approaching.
Or maybe, just maybe, the sound of freedom.
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(Author note: Hello everyone! I hope you all enjoyed the chapter!
Do tell me how you found it.
I hope to see you all later,
Bye!)