A Terrible Landing

Yicha did not hate Chaos Hell.

In fact, after these past few days of prison life in the Prime Material Plane, which had felt like years, the reverse-flowing sulfur waterfalls belching pitch-black smoke, the bare weathered skulls scattered across the ground, and the crimson sky occasionally swept by massive swarms of insects had become increasingly endearing in his memories.

There were many things he liked about it.

For example, the convenient materials.

The thick layer of top-grade fibrous bone dust at the foot of Kishino's Three-Tiered Blade Mountain was an excellent stabilizer, while Primitive Marrowstone could often be dug out from the scraps of corpses in Burning Fire Valley—he usually carried a bag of refined ones with him, in fact.

It looked like a porous, irregular little sphere. Its holes contained great amounts of Power of Disorder, while also retaining corresponding spiritual energy based on the mood of the corpse's owner before marrow transformation. Once refined, it was highly suitable as an additional energy source.

And then there were the activities.

The most popular one, and naturally the hardest to get a good spot for, was Branding Judgment.

The judgment was held once every hundred and fifty years atop Kishino's Three-Tiered Blade Mountain. There, every new member exchanged a portion of their soul for the true name bestowed by the King of All Demons, then branded the name, written in demonic script, onto Kishino's Flame Cliff as an anchor.

Many names were doomed to be forgotten from the moment they were given, since quite a few demons could barely read.

This later triggered a period of chaos, neither particularly brief nor particularly long. Since Beelzebub had ascended as the King of All Demons, the efficiency of Hell Broadcast had been severely affected—no one could possibly distinguish whether she was reporting today's weather or issuing an edict to purge traitors amid the buzzing of ten thousand flies.

So Beelzebub's solution was simply to describe the main content in writing, just as Yicha had seen.

That made things even worse. The drawbacks of illiteracy immediately surfaced—countless demons paid no attention to her carefully produced irregular evening program.

Incidentally, many demons did not have mouths either. They could not even ask someone else.

Of course, the matter was ultimately resolved.

In a way that caused Yicha immense suffering.

As the most learned demon, Beelzebub had him tutor the entirety of Chaos Hell in demonic script for sixteen hundred years.

It was truly an unbearable memory.

When the last demon walked out of Yicha's home, fluently reciting Thirteen-Line Poem of the Violent Dead, he watched the figure who had arrived empty-headed and departed refined and scholarly, then immediately fell backward and slept for a hundred and fifty years.

This matter brought both a good result and a bad consequence.

The bad consequence was, naturally, that Beelzebub was deeply impressed by him afterward.

The bad part of that consequence was that no one wanted to leave any impression on Beelzebub. Even the few demon gods who shared her ideals kept a respectful distance from her.

Because she...

Forget it. He would explain when they met her.

Still, the good result was not bad. It barely made up for the psychological trauma he had suffered from those idiotic demons over sixteen hundred years.

That was, he had been allowed to name himself.

He had been able to erase his demonic true name from Flame Cliff and give himself a new one.

Naturally, his anchor vanished with it. He did not need an anchor. Wherever truth was, that was where he should go.

He had long decided on this lengthy two-part name, distinct from those of other demons.

Echaint Sinkardesto.

It meant: Shepherd of the Ten-Headed Snake Cavern.

It was truly wonderful that they had not run into Beelzebub immediately upon returning to Chaos Hell.

If the angel had not been beside him, vomiting silver glowing liquid like a fountain, Yicha's plans would likely already have been underway, and his mood should have been quite good.

Unfortunately, none of that happened.

The golden horn chain he had given Keir could disperse and reorganize the Order Energy within the angel, preventing other demons from recognizing him. After all, appearances could be changed; concealing one's energy aura was the crucial part.

The horn chain was functioning normally. Keir's Order Energy aura was concealed even better than Yicha had expected. Even if he brushed past demons, they might not be able to smell him out.

The problem was that he had not expected the angel himself to be completely unable to endure Chaos Hell's environment. The moment he landed, he began coughing. Before long, tears filled his eyes and he started vomiting, successfully holding everyone back.

Yicha could gently dissolve and harmonize the Power of Order, but Keir's condition required the exact opposite.

After vomiting all the silver liquid, Keir opened his mouth, and pure white balls of light began drifting out like bubbles.

Yicha frowned at the angel who was continuously creating sacred pollution.

Fortunately, they had arrived at the edge of Chaos Hell, in the middle of the dead, secret Fang Desert, where eternal night had lasted for ten thousand years. Otherwise, hiding their tracks would have been impossible.

Nese was affected as well.

With one arm, he clumsily tried to support Keir. Quite a bit of silver liquid had splashed onto him—though the angels of the Source of Order had proven not to be easy to deal with, Keir had still left him with a rather good impression.

When he failed to hold on, Keir fell face-first to the ground. Nese was dragged down with him—he was still unfamiliar with his new body.

Xiqisi shrieked with laughter as she walked beside them with her arms folded. Perhaps because she had left the plane inhabited by her believers, the divine radiance around her had grown quite dim.

The traits of her bloodline became apparent then—her hands had turned into curved bird claws, the demon horns atop her head curved backward, her skin had become a faint pink, and her eyes had grown narrow and long. The whites of her eyes had completely disappeared, leaving not a trace of light in her pitch-black pupils.

"Help us." Helplessly, Nese called out to Xiqisi.

Xiqisi swung her arm—indigo feathers tinged with violet suddenly spread from her shoulder to her wrist, forming a narrow wing.

She flapped it and sent Nese flying.

The other half of her mixed blood was a harpy... Yicha frowned and snapped his fingers. He appeared beneath the airborne sorcerer and caught him, then lifted Keir remotely as well.

"Do not do that again." He flashed in front of Xiqisi and stared at her.

What they needed least right now was an angel spreading sacred stomach fluids everywhere and a half-demon, half-fey causing trouble.

"Oh."

Xiqisi unhappily turned her head away. Irritably, she leapt onto a steep rock wall and crouched there, her black eyes fixed on the distance. "It's been half a day. What exactly are we doing?"

"I remember you had something to say to me."

"Not anymore."

Yicha was not particularly curious about it. After thinking for a moment, he decided to solve two problems at once.

"We'll split up for now."

He gave Keir a push. Weak and obedient, the angel collapsed beneath the rock wall where Xiqisi crouched. "Take him home."

"Home? The Source of Order?" The Joyful Saintess tilted her head like a purple hawk.

Yicha took out a red Marrowstone and tossed it to her.

"My home."

Only fewer than one-quarter of demons had a habit of settling down, and Yicha happened to be among them. His books, laboratory, specimen room, and various law fields all required somewhere to be stored.

He could not drive Keir away. The fellow could be arrested at any time outside. Though Chaos Hell made the angel uncomfortable from head to toe, it was also a natural barrier preventing other angels from arriving.

The red Marrowstone radiated familiar energy, no different from that on Yicha himself.

"It contains enough Disorder Energy and some of my spiritual essence. There is also a drop of my blood inside. It will guide you to where you need to go without triggering backlash from the blood pact. It will also grant you permission to enter my courtyard."

After Yicha finished his brief explanation, he moved his fingers. "All right, go. There is a protective dome there. He will feel better there."

This time, he was not worried at all about the Joyful Saintess's malicious sense of humor. Even if the angel passed out, Xiqisi would not be able to do anything to him.

The courtyard of a bloodlord demon...

Xiqisi stared at the vivid red Marrowstone. It was filled with a wonderful sensation... She could not help becoming interested.

Her birdlike eyes rolled. "All right. See you later!"

The Joyful Saintess clenched the Marrowstone between her teeth, leapt down from the rock wall, and hoisted up the angel, who was busy hiccuping. She shook both arms.

Dense indigo feathers wove themselves into four slender pairs of wings.

Her body shot upward. She hovered for half a second, then vanished into the distance like lightning.

This chapter begins laying out several scattered threads. They will all be twisted together. The twisting begins in Chapter Seventeen. Some demon names and spellcasting incantation patterns in this Chaos Hell arc were drawn from two famous occult books, Solomon's Greater and Lesser Keys.