text: [Themes: grimdark fantasy, villain protagonist, grimdark]
  
  Going deeper into this gray shit seems like a great way of getting even more lost and eventually losing your endurance given how this place is doing its best to try to sap your energy physically and mentally.
  
  You might as well put what strength you have now to good use and you certainly aren't lacking in that yet.
  
  "You want me inside you Sin? Fine, let's make it a date." You say and intend on making Sin your first casualty.
  
  Despite Sin's new transformation she's still not much of a fighter. She does her lunge attack again which you easily dodge and bring your sword down on one of the fleshy lumps on her back. Predictably it splits open unleashing all sorts of nastiness in the form of oversized bloody maggots with distorted faces all over them.
  A few of them latch on to you and you're really glad you're wearing armor right now because they start chewing through it almost immediately. You quickly grab them off of you and toss them into the gray.
  
  While Sin is attempting to turn around to attack, you strike again, running your sword through her back and out the new mouth that formed on the front of her body, you then pull upward as hard as you can, splitting her nearly in half as your sword carves up through her chest and out where her shoulder and neck meet.
  
  Sin unleashes an ear-piercing wail that causes you to reel backwards. A single long tentacle of hers wraps around your leg, but you chop it off before it can drag you back towards Sin who now is just a bloody mess of flailing limbs attached to a large piece of flesh.
  
  With the other abominations closing in, you figure you'll have to be satisfied with this amount of revenge on Sin and proceed towards your escape.
  
  First one that comes near, you manage to carve up while still not slowing down too much. After two more encounters like this, you can see one of the cubes floating in the distance. You really hope you're heading in the right direction and this place hasn't decided to completely change reality again.
  
  And then it does.
  
  Suddenly you find yourself no longer in an endless gray sea. Solid ground lies beneath you. Grass, blue sky, flowers, trees, looks like a mortal world. Nearby is a city, which looks painfully familiar.
  
  "No Not real." you whisper.
  
  Then it flashes back to the gray again.
  
  You're about to continue to the next floating cube you see in the distance and that's when you hear Engan again.
  
  "But it could be real. Anything can be real. You're only seeing grotesque horrors because you're because you're giving off hostility. If you stopped fighting for one moment, you would see that the ancients can allow you to experience wonderful things." Engan's voice says.
  
  You ignore these words and just continue towards where you believe is the exit. Engan doesn't stop talking of course.
  
  "I know, THEY know all about you Cista. You weren't always what you were now. They know how you suffer; you could eliminate that suffering and put away your struggles. Think about it. Don't you get tired of always having to fight all the time?"
  Your mind begins to slip and wander to simpler times in your past. You try to focus, but it's incredibly difficult. Your mind's defenses are starting to weaken.
  
  "All your life has been one big struggle with no end in sight. Your very nature has doomed you to such a fate. Even if you manage to escape from here, you will not avoid what is coming. Even if you managed to succeed in your impossible task to unite the infernal realm, you still would not be satisfied. The ancients WILL rise again and the infernal realm is going to one of the first places on the agenda to target."
  
  You get ambushed by an abomination while lost in thought. Your armor manages to absorb the blow, but it still feels like a crushing weight hitting your chest. You dodge its next attack and chop off a few of the thing's extra limbs followed by part of its head (or what's passing for its head at least)
  
  You're then attacked by another one latching on to your back and you feel your armor starting to weaken as one of its set of jaws sink in between your shoulder and neck. You give it a few blind punches to its face. You can't quite see what you're doing due to the angle, but you soon realize you've literally smashed its face into mush as the solidness becomes less so, causing it to release its grip.
  
  You follow up with a spinning sword strike, chopping it in half before flying away from both of them.
  
  "Join us and I promise you, the ancients will reward you. The ancients can change your nature, they can change reality! You're seeing this right now! I've seen this many times, it's why I abandoned to petty laws and misguided concepts of morality of the celestial realm. The heavens, the hells, the mortal realms, EVERYTHING can be changed for the better. Why would you fight against a better future when you could have a place in it?"
  
  You see it, you see the door. It's a distance away, but you see it. You instantly fly towards the only beacon of brightness in all this gray.
  
  Engan suddenly appears right in front of you and before you can even react, your mind is completely overcome by feelings of sadness and hopelessness. Feelings you haven't experienced in...well quite a long time.
  
  Your surroundings change again. This time the sky is red, the ground is red and the temperature is much hotter. Looks like the infernal realm, but of course you know it isn't. Doesn't change your current negative feelings though. You feel this overwhelming urge to start crying.
  
  "You know what you're feeling right now? You're feeling the weight of all your guilt, sadness, and regret. You may be able to keep those weaknesses locked away, but they are never really gone are they? They constantly torment you. I tell you again, you can shed all of that and be part of the new order that is to come."
  
  You begin to feel actual tears running from your eyes. You even drop to one knee as if all the things Engan is describing are literally on your back right now. It isn't just things from before either, it's also things you've done to achieve your position. You've been an embodiment of violence and war for quite some time now and it hasn't all just been against other demon assholes. You've committed so many atrocities in general that you've lost count, but not really. It's all still there in your mind. You just don't think about it.
  
  And despite having the fiery blood of hell in your veins, there's still that tiny speck, that weak spot that maintains all those feelings that you would like to get rid of, to make everything much easier.
  
  You can barely hold your sword anymore, you look up and see Engan hovering slightly above and in front of you, extending his hand.
  
  "This is the place you call home. The infernal realm feeds on suffering and pain, and despite being an apex predator in it; YOU are merely still just prized livestock. In fact the higher your position, the greater your inevitable downfall, leading to the greater the feast. You don't need to go back to it though. You don't need to experience your personal hell ever again. It can ALL go away. Join us, and you'll never have to endure this torment ever again. Just take my hand."
  
  You know this has to be a trick. You know it, but you're struggling not to give in. You need to get out of here and despite Engan being in your way, the door isn't far.
  
  You also know that Engan has a tendency to just teleport away from your attacks, but maybe if you took his hand you'd prevent that from happening and could finally get a solid hit in and at least weaken this power draining you.
  
  > move towards the door
  As much as you might like to cleave Engan in two, you figure he'll just teleport again, or worse if you actually touch him directly. Who knows what the hell his true form is given what you've seen here.
  
  You stagger back up and with some effort you flap your wings to get to the door quicker. The surroundings change back to gray again.
  
  "If you really knew me as much as you claimed, you'd know that I've long since learned to deal with any petty notions of morality that might linger and even that one I haven't, well that will sort itself out in time. Your ancient masters aren't the only ones that are patient." You say giving Engan a wide berth.
  
  Engan just watches you, he doesn't look angry, or upset, or anything. Just a blank stare.
  
  "So be it." You hear him utter which seems to echo in your head, which is then followed by several more voices chattering about everything and nothing. It's an overload of noise in your mind. Doesn't matter though, because the end is in sight and you're soon right before the exit.
  
  You fly through the exit and you soon find yourself back in the town, though it looks very different now. In fact the town doesn't look like the traditional town anymore at all. Buildings are missing, some are phasing in and out of existence and a few of them are new because you're certain a floating black fortress looming in the sky wasn't there before.
  
  All around you on the ground are bodies though. Some unrecognizable lumps of flesh, others more intact. Some are still moving about. Apparently while you were inside, a great battle took place out here and nobody won.
  
  "You're alive and still untainted. You'd be the first from that place. Figures it would be an infernal. You lot always was more resilient." A voice calls out; you look over and see that it's one of the celestials that isn't completely eviscerated. The wounds look pretty severe though, he probably isn't going to last too much longer.
  
  You cautiously keep your guard up as he staggers towards you.
  
  "No need for that infernal. I don't believe I'm in any condition to dispense any sort of celestial justice on you. Indeed, you may be the only thing left in this accursed place that adheres to any sort of laws, twisted though yours may be. Never should have followed Engan,...bah it's done now. This place is finally showing what it always was. That wrongness that lies under this illusion. I can only hope that there is a peace in oblivion for I know I won't be experiencing the bliss of paradise...I just...just wish I could have seen it one last time..."
  "I am not here to absolve you of your imagined sins celestial." You say with annoyance.
  
  The celestial laughs.
  
  "Perhaps that wasn't your intention, in fact I don't even know or care why you came here in the first place, but whether you realize it or not, your actions have done exactly that. Perhaps not absolved us, for nothing could have done that for what we did, but you've put an end to our torment. Heh...you might even be considered what the mortals call a hero."
  
  At this point the celestial collapses, he continues to keep his eyes affixed to him. You see tears in them.
  
  "You better get out of here quick infernal. Even in my final moments, I can still hear the voices of the others. They're coming. And I don't mean just here. I mean they're coming to destroy everything. The hells, the heavens, everything...warn your sadistic fellows, warn my people if those fools will even listen to you. Warn the ignorant mortals, warn everyone you can infernal, they have to be stopped..."
  
  You realize that this is no idle warning. Even without the seriousness of this celestial's tone and words, from what you've seen here, there definitely is cause for concern.
  
  "Everything...dimming...funny...with you hovering above me like this...you almost look like an angel...close enough I suppose..." the celestial says and then closes his eyes.
  
  You then look up and experience a dimming of a different nature. You see the sky starting to turn from gray to black. It's almost as if a void in the sky is opening up.
  
  While that isn't quite what is happening, it might as well be. Thousands of beings are coming from the black fortress and starting to cover the sky. The sounds of madness follow.
  
  You fly as fast as you can towards where you came in, the mass of bloody bodies under you and the encroaching black void of madness behind (and above) you.
  
  Legions of voices, vision of unknown creatures, faces and worlds enter mind and you try to ignore all of it. You see the tree where you entered and just when you're picking up your speed, you feel a great weight slapping you down. You nearly fall flat on your face though you stop that from happening, merely landing on your hands and knees instead.
  
  "Ah yes...exactly in the position you should be in. Let us strip you of that heavy armor!" a hissing voice says and you suddenly feel a force claw at your back, penetrating your armor.
  
  You naturally react very violently; flailing and twisting your body in such a way that you roll away from immediate danger, or at least so whatever is attacking you doesn't rip your armor off completely.
  
  By the time you manage to stand up, you narrowly dodge a spiked appendage. As is typical of this place, a barely humanoid thing "stands" before you, several faces exist within its mass, but of course the most dominant one is Engan.
  
  "You should have taken my offer. You should have just submitted to me. Now you've ruined everything and released the pressure valve. Now they've awakened fully and NOTHING can stop them. Now embrace us. EMBRACE the torment. EMBRACE THE FUTURE."
  
  You can feel the vibration of the voice throughout your body causing you to experience dizziness and a wave of sickness. A large mouth opens up from the mass filled with jagged teeth. More spiked appendages attempt to grab you in an effort to draw you inside.
  
  While all this is going on the darkness of the creatures from the fortress is growing ever closer. Things are not looking good and you're trying to maintain your composure, but this place is really getting to you. You almost feel like just giving up, like this is just a glimpse of things to come. Never before have you had these feelings of utter insignificance.
  
  You cut away more attacking appendages, though more grab you and begin to draw you in. You can feel your armor being slowly cut through by the sharp saw like teeth. In desperation you attempt to cast a blast of acid at it. Thankfully your magic decided to work and it's enough to drop you as it caterwauls in agony.
  
  Whatever force that's preventing you from flying is now preventing you from running. You feel like every step is an effort and everything is trying to kill you. Not that you're not used to that back home, but at least there you always have a fighting chance. Here, it's like the very laws of reality are conspiring against you, and they probably are.
  
  "You're not leaving here. I still have such terrible pleasures to show you that I could not have imagined even in HELL."
  
  Following this familiar voice are several serpentine appendages with Sinthinia's face on them coming out of the ground wrapping around your legs. Others attempt to wrap around your arms. Another still starts gnawing at your crotch trying to bite through your armor.
  
  "Hmm, can't wait until I get to the creamy filling." It says looking up at you, before your slam your fist through its face. You swing your sword cutting down more of Sin's heads, but more spring up like a hydra.
  
  Engan (Or whatever it is with him part of it) recovers from your last attack and resume its pursuit. Several of the dark creatures are now also close enough that they'll probably reach you soon.
  
  And then suddenly a purple wave washes over you. You feel nothing, but you see it visibly affect Sinthinia's heads most of which disintegrate immediately save for the ones that retreat back into the ground.
  
  Engan is also hit by the purple wave and while it doesn't destroy him completely, you see pieces of him disintegrate, reducing his mass.
  
  You look around and see where the magic wave came from and see Arash standing a few feet away wielding some sort of "gun" though it's obviously not firing bullets as you have been familiar with in the past.
  
  "Glad to see the no violence rule was finally discarded, I was waiting a long time to use this." Arash says.
  
  The tree near where you arrived is just a little further away, and with the invisible force no longer seemingly affecting you, you fly quickly towards it and access your beacon stone which you activate.
  
  The portal back home is open. You turn around and see Arash retreating by quickly walking backwards, still firing his weapon. As damaging as it is, he has no hope against the legions coming at his position (And yours).
  
  Arash finally turns around to just run towards you, but he is immediately jumped on by several of the dark abominations. He's busily trying to fight them off with some sort of blade, but he's going to be overwhelmed.
  
  Unless you help.
  
  Though in doing so you're not only risking your existence, but also an invasion by these abominations, if one of them slips into the portal.
  
  Of course you did make a deal with Arash that you would get him out of this place. Breaking such a pact would be very repugnant to you and potentially causing a loss in power, hence why your kind doesn't make such binding promises often.
  
  Though of course it wouldn't be the first time an infernal has outright broken their word.
  
  > enter the portal
  Going back for Arash would be bordering on foolishness even if you weren't only considering it to stop from breaking a deal.
  
  Still, you don't like doing this, but a temporary loss in power is better than allowing the abominations follow you into the portal. The longer they're pre-occupied with Arash, the better.
  
  However the portal certainly hasn't gone unnoticed.
  
  "THE PORTAL! INVADE THE INFERNAL REALM! LET IT BE THE FIRST STEPPING STONE TO OUR RETURN! WE SHALL REIGN AGAIN!" a deep voice orders from all around you.
  
  You waste no time and enter the portal and soon the disorientation you've been suffering from begins to lift. You're back in Sinthinia's room where Zel had her machine open up the portal. Her machine is on, but no sign of her though.
  
  What's more concerning is the portal you just came through isn't closing and given what's behind you, you sort of need it to.
  
  "Fuck, where the hell is Zel, probably blowing fucking Spol. The pair of them are going to pay, gotta do everything myself..." you begin muttering as you head over to Zel's machine hoping it can close the damn portal.
  
  Just as you get to the machine, a figure comes through the portal. It's Sinthinia, and surprisingly she's more or less looking like her original form, though she's got extra mouths and eyes all over her.
  
  "Ah, home sweet home. Time to take it back, time to take it ALL back! My new allies will be here soon." Sinthinia hisses.
  
  You curse and uselessly press some button and pull some levers in the hopes of shutting down the portal before Sinthinia is upon you. You call for help as you lop off one of Sin's weaponized arms.
  
  As you're battling Sin, more abominations come through the portal, though some of your own troops finally get their asses in the room to help. Still no sign of Zel though.
  
  And that's when you feel it.
  
  The cost of your deliberate breaking of your deal. Arash must've have finally been killed on the other side because you feel a drain on your power causing you to falter during battle and fall to floor.
  
  Sinthinia wastes no time in take advantage and manages to bite through several areas of your armor with all her new mouths. She even manages to penetrate your flesh.
  
  "Mmm, there's that creamy filling."
  
  You summon up all your rage and grab Sinthinia, slamming her against the machine and casting a blast of dark lightning into her face (or her main one anyway). An unnatural scream emanates from her multiple mouths, but you don't let up. Even in your weakened state, you unleash a continuous stream of lightning, which is now starting to damage Zel's machine and at least starting to have an effect on the portal.
  
  It's also having an effect on you. You felt drained just a few moments ago, but now you feel like you're about to go unconscious.
  
  Sinthinia's charred body slumps to the floor and you stagger back just in time to see Zel and Spol run into the room, meanwhile the portal is shrinking though there are still smaller abominations jumping in. You also see some mass with Engan's face, but it's still on the other side and he's reluctant to try to squeeze his bulk through the now shrinking portal.
  
  As Zel's machine starts to spark and make ominous sounds, Sinthinia crawls away from you and shake your head in disbelief that this bitch is still alive.
  
  You stumble towards Sin and just as you think you're about to land the killing blow, you collapse to the floor again.
  
  Your eyes flutter and you see Spol going in to finish off Sinthinia, meanwhile you feel Zel trying to lift you up.
  
  "General! Are you alright?! Spol! Help me with her, I have to make sure this machine doesn't explode and kill all of us!"
  
  Spol decapitates Sinithinia and orders everyone out of the room as he runs over to lift you up while Zel starts fiddling with her machine.
  
  You see the portal finally close completely and your troops are busily mopping up the remaining ones.
  
  "General, you need to get out of here just in case Zel isn't skilled enough to shut down her machine." Captain Spol says.
  "Yeah..." you answer a bit in a haze.
  
  Captain Spol helps you out of the room and you partially lean on him the whole time. You turn down one of the corridors and Captain Spols asks "General, you feeling good enough to walk on your own?"
  "Yeah...yeah I think so. Shit..."
  
  You let go of Captain Spol and lean against the wall for a brief moment trying to gather your wits about the situation. Everything has happened so fast that you haven't had time to think.
  
  And you don't get much more time to assess the situation either because you suddenly feel a sharp pain go through your side. You look down and see a sword shoved into you nearly to the hilt.
  
  The treacherous Captain Spol sensed this would be the perfect opportunity to take advantage of your weakness and drives a smaller yet no less lethal dagger into your chest with as much strength as he can.
  
  You fall to the floor for the last time disbelieving that after everything you survived, your end came at the hands of a third rate infernal officer.