For the Record

It’s been some time now, and Sekhmet has been a decent subordinate. All I need to do is ensure she has plenty of time to dote on her son and she stays… well, happy enough.

…

“You’re young, aren’t you?”

“Eh?” she blurts.

“Don’t worry,” I continue, “it’s just a guess. Obviously you’re at least old enough to have a child, but… you act more like the mortals I see around the other planes.”

And why the hells is she blushing!?

“I’m a bit over three hundred,” she finally answers.

Well, at least she isn’t stammering. I shrug back. “Not like it matters. I’m… well, both, uh. Both maybe twelve years old, and at least a thousand? I’m not really sure how that works, but it doesn’t matter.”

Nyx chooses that moment to chime in. (Why are you treating this like it’s a mixer?)

I have no idea what you’re talking about. No, literally no idea, and I don’t care so don’t bother explaining it.

(I wasn’t going to explain it to begin with.)

Good!

Other than Vivianne delivering the morning updates… the very, very abridged version, since my patience has been growing shorter and shorter, it’s been an uneventful morning with no interruptions.

…Including from my “new allies” in the dark pantheon.

Nothing.

Nothing at all.

I can’t help but wonder if anyone is even trying, or if they care.

Probably not. I wouldn’t.

I sigh my typical cloud of ash, and a few moments later two nightwalker and two gorgon maids teleport in together and begin frantically cleaning my mess. They used to wait until I wasn’t present, but after it began staining the room they stopped waiting.

Which is fine. I don’t care.

I don’t care about much of anything anymore.

***

“HALLO!” some diminutive, mostly naked human says. Well, mostly naked other than that piece of… what is that, seaweed?

“Yes, uh-huh, what do you want and why are you in my audience hall?”

“Well,” it continues, “I thought I shouuuuld say ‘hallo’ to my newest neighbooor.”

I furrow my nonexistent brow, as I’m mostly dematerialized at the moment.

…

It occurs to me that I probably look like a stereotypical undead these days. My robe is unquestionably tattered and stained the darkest gray, and I’ve always got the hood pulled up so it hangs low over my face. And I’m almost never in my Astraea guise, only when I have so-called “polite company.”

Of which I do not classify this thing.

“What the hells do you mean, ‘neighbor’?” I snap.

It smiles back with a half-lidded look of near exhaustion. “We just mooooved into the mooaaaaat outside.”

…

“And why, exactly, shouldn’t I just obliterate you then? And wait, ‘we’?”

“Me and my sisters, we came heeeere because yoooouuu’re a good monster goddess, and we waaaaaant to eat people, we haaaaaaave to eat people.”

“Yes, I understand that all too well. So you all just moved… what, into my plane? Into my home? And you still didn’t answer my question.”

“We caaaaaaan just eat intruders, or somethiiiing?”

…

Wait.

Wait one hells damned second.

Tathra is busy a lot more now, ever since I’ve assigned him to monitor investments for me, which… I’ll admit I don’t care about, but he’s insisted is necessary for ‘running a kingdom’ or whatever. Mostly I just have him financially poking Themis and Erebus in the eye.

But that also means he has to drop everything he’s doing whenever Dipshit shows up.

And so I smile.

“I may just have a job for you after all.”

***

Finally, finally, I’ve made it through that damnable hallway! Past all the traps – the smashers, the rolling boulders, the saws, the flames that mysteriously emit from nowhere, the strategically placed trapdoors and pitfalls…

And here, past all of those annoyances, I stand confidently if tired in the demon lord’s inner courtyard.

…

I must be more tired than I thought.

…Because I could swear I see a small body of murky water… with a small, lithe form sitting on a rock in the middle of it.

…

“Hallo,” the small woman intones with a small wave.

…

“Are…”

“Are?” it asks back.

“Are… you real? Am I hallucinating?”

The woman furrows her brow. “Yes, I’m reeeeaaaal. And I’m traaaaaaapped on this rock, pleeeeaaaase help me, braaaave hero! There are mooooonsters in the waaater!”

…

This almost seems too convenient.

And at the same time…

She…

She is…

“…The most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen! And exactly my type!”

The woman tilts her head, but otherwise doesn’t move.

But I’ve seen enough. I draw my sword to prepare for battle with whatever foul beasts are keeping her trapped on that rock – no doubt by the will of that evil demon queen!

***

“Yeah, he just got drowned. What an idiot,” I mutter at the holographic projection in the middle of my throne room.

That small person was right. She and her kin are useful. I didn’t expect her body to be mostly made of leafy plants, and I certainly didn’t expect her to talk the ‘True Hero’ into the water where she could ensnare and subsequently kill him.

Perfection.

Efficient.

And I don’t have to lift a finger.

The… ‘rusalka’, was it? They’re an excellent addition to my menagerie, even though they lack names… not that it matters.

They even pay tithes in the form of the gear once belonging to their victims!

…Except for Dipshit’s, of course. He’s begun vanishing a moment after death as of late, so I assume whoever his obnoxious patron is has decided to take a more active role.

Which is fine. It’s not my problem now. It’s theirs.

And I finally bothered to check the soul trap in the treasury and sure enough, it was empty.

…

I certainly didn’t expect the “True Hero’s type” to be young girls. From the similar cringe and shiver I observed from Vivianne, Omorth, all the maids, and even Nyx through our link, it’s clearly a bad thing.

A very bad thing.

One more reason I can be happy that I’m killing him over and over, I guess.

***

“And that’s an even dozen. How many times is he going to fall for the same stupid trick!?”

Vivianne furrows her brow for a moment before answering, “I know his kind. In the same way that he hasn’t abandoned his goal of usurping your own power, it is unlikely he will abandon any goal he’s truly invested in.”

I slowly nod.

Annoying.

But not without entertainment value, I guess, considering he’s still being teleported to the start of the obstacle course every time, and Tathra worked with Rose to set the obstacle course to randomly move around an expansive set of trap combinations. Dipshit still only makes it to the rusalka’s pond once every ten or so attempts.

And then he dies regardless.

…

But it’s getting monotonous.

…

…

Dipshit is irrelevant. I need to find my wife.

I NEED TO.

…

And I don’t understand why.

***

“Alright. I’ll ask. Who the fuck are you, and why the fuck are you in my audience hall?”

Two small groups of humans stand side by side on the carpet before my dais, some members occasionally sending the other hostile glances.

I don’t have the patience for this… but I guess it’s better than the nothing I’ve been experiencing.

It’s been months since I’ve heard from Izahne.

Months.

The most I ever get from our bond is hesitance and resistance followed by disgust and self-loathing. Over, and over, and over. Sometimes spaced days apart, sometimes minutes.

Over.

And over.

And over.

The leaders of each group of humans start talking at the same time, and keep trying to talk over each other.

Because of course they do.

“Fine. Shut up, both of you. Vivianne,” I bark.

My centipede knight has been kneeling since arriving – something I find myself approving of greatly. “Yes, my queen.”

“Tell me,” I say, sitting in my usual comfortable pose, albeit floating, “who are they and why are they here?”

Without looking up she continues, “Before you stand representatives of Virtue of Fortune and Flameblades, each an adventuring clan presently established in your domain. They are currently involved in a border dispute that has escalated beyond rivalry to bloodshed and is impacting your citizens’ lives and livelihoods. For this reason I bring them before you today to beseech arbitration. Though it be below the station of these mere mortals I ask that you offer your judgment, should you be so inclined.”

I…

I really…

…Can’t stand this.

“Impudence,” I flatly intone, absentmindedly dematerializing to fill the room. “You have no borders here. All land belongs to me, and any opportunity for use is at my benevolence. Do you forget where you are? Stupid humans. This is my plane. THE PLANE OF THE DEMON LORD NEMESIS. And I have no benevolence to offer you, who would harm my people in your stupidity.”

And with no further words to the useless, quarreling mortals, I Consume the entire lot of them.

Then I look to my ancient knight, and the look of faint surprise on her face. “Go forth to those ‘clans’ or whatever they were. Wipe them out. They are to be made an example of those who go against my rule. Make it unquestionably clear the reason for their demise, both to them as they die and the inevitable bystanders.”

I gradually reform my body… or, Astraea’s. Or mine. I still can’t tell.

“Nobody challenges my rule, not here. NOBODY.”