Hell was a boring place.

That usually wasn’t a statement made by most creatures who lived outside of the demonic realm, as the almost everyone sentient race imagined Hell to be plane of existence filled with a lot of fire and torture and burning and screaming that woud go on forever and ever. And while in the beginning this was true, as it was basically used as a trash heap for spiritual waste which was thrown away by eldritch beings, the Hell which existed within the current era had become much more orderly. Some would even say that it had become TOO orderly, as there were now just as many rules in place to govern the realm as there were in the heavens, if not more. This was somewhat expected, as order always crawled its way out from the womb of chaos. The power dynamic which had once governed all had been carved deep into the very bones of the realm by those demons who had crushed others beneath their heels in order to gain power. 

Now there were tiers of rulers who sat above all all those below them. These power arcane demons, which could barely even be called as such, as their true forms were so abominable that they were more akin to crawling chaos than actual hellions, laid down laws of governance with burning fists that could erase those that thought to break the established rules they had set into place. And while Hell was still indeed a place where murder and violence could be found behind every pillar of obsidian raised from out of the floating shards of land, it just wasn’t the same place as it had been milliena ago.

With that being said, was it any wonder that many of the more powerful demons attempted to try and get out of Hell as quickly as they could for as long as they could? After all, didn’t it go against the very nature of a being made for stabilized chaos to actually have to follow rules? That was the thought that led the current ruling demon prince of lust to slip away from his particular circle for a short period of time. 

The young, at least by demon standards, prince Sado was slightly put off as he found himself standing in front of spiky haired rat wearing ripped denim jeans and a white t-shirt which had seen better days. The gargoyle-like figure watched as the mortal yelped and then threw down the can of spray paint he had been using to tag the brick wall in front of him as his green eyes opened wide while gazing up at the eight foot tall crimson skinned hellion that just stepped out from a swirling black vortex behind him. The prince of lust slowly drew itself out from the dimensional breech with a confused look on his beaked face, his pale gold eyes looked around in confusion for several seconds before he found his sights trailing onto the scruffy looking creature in front of him. 

The punk rat gape as he looked in between the obviously male’s legs to see a tube of flesh hanging down so thick in between his legs that the youth was sure that it had to be bigger than his own thigh, and the thing was soft. The soccer ball sized testicles which drifted in between the crimson skinned male’s legs seemed to almost twitch as though they were alive as the other stepped up to him. Had the rodent even been remotely homosexual he might have found the masculine form of the nude hellion to be rather sexy, but since he wasn’t the only emotion which was dominating his mind at the moment was abject fear as he tried to make sense of what exactly it was that he was seeing.

Sado didn’t notice that anything was wrong with his state of dress until the punk rat pointed at his sex and then began whimpering and babbling like some kind of madman. 

Looking down the demon prince sighed and then folded his massive bat-like wings around himself in order to spare the other from losing what little of his rationality he was currently working with. A few whispered words later found his upper form being covered with a silken shirt made from woven shadows, while down below his lower half was strapped with fiery red pants which hugged tightly onto his legs, thigh, and thick booty. His long serpentine wagged behind him happily from the hole for which he purposely conjured for himself as the long appendage had no wish to be strapped down by any sort of restraint. Sado wished he could have done something more with his sexual equipment other than to shrink it down to better fit the clothing which he had summoned for himself, but his hungry shaft would only take so much grief from him before it decided to act against his will. Such was the curse of being a deity made for the sole purpose of drawing mortals and gods into sin.

Though with that out of the way Sado found himself looking around the alleyway which he had teleported into with a slightly befuddled gaze on his crimson skinned face. The demon prince had been aiming for the small store of one of the merchants whom he had befriended several decades ago, but oddly enough instead of entering into said establishment he was...in the middle of two buildings. These twin structures had not been here when he last graced the mortal realm with his devilishly handsome presence, so to say the least he was quite confused at what was going on here. Could it be possible that he had somehow made a mistake in where he had directed the portal? It seemed ludicrous that he, a prince of several thousand years, could do such a thing...but sometimes these things happened, much to his displeasure.

“You there, mortal, tell me, am I…” was about as far as the gargoyle-like demon got before he witnessed an interesting spectacle take place in front of him.

Sado raised an eyeridge in confusion as he watched the punk rat scream obscenities at him before reaching into his pocket and pulling out what looked to be an oddly shaped tool of some sort. He quickly guessed that the metallic object was a weapon, because when the rodent’s finger pulled back on its trigger a loud burst of noise echoed within the demon prince’s  ears at the same time something hard and unforgiving hit him in the chest and torso.

Pain instantly filled the crimson skinned hellion’s mind, a sensation which was an oddity for him to say the least, as it usually took something along the lines of one of the specially made daggers filled with the prayers of angels to actually harm him. Thoughts over this very strange conundrum quickly ran free from Sado’s mind as he felt the small beads of metal dig deep into his muscular torso, right before gasps of pain tore themselves free from his throat. Falling onto his knees the prince of lust found himself panting heavily as he reflexively called upon his infernal powers in order to shake off the wounds for which now slowly bled down the front of his body. Thankfully his attacker was too frightened by the sight of him not dying from being shot to aim for his head, a fact for which the winged prince was very thankful for, as he really didn’t want a migraine right then and there. 

Sado didn’t take the time to be all that grateful however, as when he tried to summon up the dark powers for which he had been born with he found that the nether energies for which he normally toyed with back in his circle of Hell refused to come to his command!

Or rather, they did, but in a slow sluggish way, as though they were somewhat impeded by some other force. 

To say that this startled Sado was an understatement, as without his powers he was somewhat rather disadvantaged right then and there. Or rather, as helpless as an eight foot tall linebacker looking gargoyle could be when facing down a literal rat with a now empty firearm. It took the demon prince about six seconds to think up a plan for how to get himself out of this situation; said plan ended up being to simply tackle the other to the ground and then break his hand in order to make sure that the weapon clutched within his fingers would be rendered a non threat.

The rat had just enough to scream bloody murder as he watched the golden eyes hellion literally fly through the air at him, the sound of beating wings would forever echo within his nightmares as the demon prince hit him full on into the chest. Because of their location within the darkened alleyway of the metropolitan city Sado forced the rat’s back bodily into one of the brick walls behind him, the surrounding impact shook the structure, not that the incensed hellion cared about this, or the lingering damage which was going to be left behind from force of his attack. Grabbing the hand which was still clenched tightly onto the empty gun the demon prince crushed the weapon, and the bones within the rats hand, with a sickening crunch sounds. Blood covered the dirty ground underneath them as punk’s fingers popped and twisted in such a way that they pushed out from the fur and flesh.

The street rat tried to scream for help, his beady brown eyes were as narrow as pinprics as pain surged throughout his mind. Because Sado wasn’t in the mood to listen to the other’s pitiful screeching he grabbed the mortal other’s throat with his unoccupied hand and then literally began squeezing the air out of the rodent’s lungs. A gruesome sense of enjoyment welled within the demon prince’s face as his eyes started to glow white with feral pleasure. While he might not have been the prince of wrath, he couldn’t deny that hurting the one who had harmed him was a very fun thing to do right now. 

It was just as the rat’s eyes were rolling up inside of his eyes that a tap came along the side of the demon prince’s naked shoulder. 

Lashing his tail out the hellion found himself greatly surprised once again as he found his serpentine appendage caught within an impressively strong grip. When he failed to snatch his tail free from whatever it was that holding onto him Sado whipped his head around to glare at the fool that had thought to touch him in such a way. The sight of a smiling blue dragon was not one that the demon prince of lust would have thought to see as he blinked white eyes at the other.

“Don’t kill him.” the four armed dragon’s smooth voice spoke in a tone that was somewhere between a command and warning. 

“And why shouldn’t I?” Sado flexed his fingers all the tighter around the now unconscious street rat’s throat for emphasis about how easy it would be to do so.

“Because if you, I’ll have to both report you, and then send you back home, your majesty.” the blue dragon chuckled.

“Excuse me?” to say that Sado was confused by these words was an understatement, as the only ones who could even think to make such a bold claim as to forcibly remove him from an area was one of the elders of Hell, or...a god of equivalent strength. Yet this dragon didn’t seem to be all that powerful, despite the feeling of the elemental powers surging from off of him. With that thought in mind, it was very clear that the unknown male would have been no match for him in a battle...if he had all of his powers. 

It was that sobering thought that made the demon prince grumble and then turn to look back at the now slightly twitching rat. While it would be fun to snap the other like a twig and then do things to his mortal soul that would forever twist his being...the fact that he was still being held by this strange bipedal dragon gave him enough pause to seriously consider the ramifications of what he was about to do. 

“It’s not worth it.” the nameless dragon chuckled as if reading Sado’s mind.

“I’m currently bleeding and in enough pain to actually make feel irritated, so I question that statement.” Warm water instantly began swimming over the demon prince’s muscular body upon him finishing that statement. 

Looking down at himself Sado watched as the bullets which were still stuck inside of his chest and abdomen were pulled out by thin strands of magically conjured moisture. Sado looked down just in time to see the bits of metal land onto the dirty concrete underneath his clawed feet, his gaping wounds soon closed as they were mended shut by the flowing water which was still caressing his body like a long lost lover. 

“Now that you’re no longer bleeding or in pain, will you please release the young rat?” the dragon asked in a sugary sweet tone for which almost sounded mocking to Sado’s ears. 

Throwing open his claws the demon prince let the street punk drop onto the ground with a heavy thump. 

“Thank you, your majesty.” the blue dragon released the demon prince’s tail...and then watched as the crimson hellion whipped himself around to hard that the tip of his serpentine appendage smacked into the side of the unconscious punk’s head hard enough to send him crashing headfirst into the ground. “You know that was petty, right?” the golden eyed dragon asked while smirking at Sado.

The demon prince raised his eyeridge as if to ask, ‘Did you expect anything less?’, to which the four armed dragon reached a clawed hand up to brush his fingers through his long black hair.

“Right.” the blue dragon turned and then waved for Sado to follow him. “We need to talk, and while this is the perfect setting for a crime drama, I don’t want to smell the stink of garbage and filth while I have this conversation with you.” 

“Well aren’t you an elegant one.” the gargoyle-like demon huffed as he watched how dramatic the dragon moved himself about, as though he knew that he was performing on stage for an audience.

“It nevers hurts to show off a little.” the unnamed male teased before bowing before Sado.

The demon prince could only snort in barely repressed amusement.

Once the four armed dragon lifted himself he turned to step out from the alleyway. Sado followed after him as they made their way out onto the street, his golden eyes widening with every step they took as he looked out upon the strange landscape for which had once been a quietly little shopping district filled with brick and mortar buildings. It was about an hour into their walk that the demon prince chose to ask the question that had been burning inside of his mind. 

“Just who in the nine hells are you?” 

This question made a playful smirk rise up onto the unnamed dragon’s lips. 

Turning his head, serpentine eyes found themselves laying across the demon prince’s face, “My name is Meelak.” the dragon said. “And before you ask, I’m the self-proclaimed guardian of this sector of the region.” 

The implications behind such words were deep enough that Sado paused midstep. Everyone who knew anything dragons knew well enough that they were not creatures who took to guarding something likely. Even in the hells a demonic dragon that set themselves to protecting either a horde of treasure, or another demon was a force to be reckoned with, if only because the dragon in question was likely to use their very burning flame of their own life force to smite whomever decided to try and cross them. The tales of the lord of demon dragons was one that Sado knew quite well, as while he might not have been an elder of hell, he was equal to them in powerful, since it had been the same said dragon that had carved the nine hells into the lands they were today with his cataclysmic like breath weapon.

Looking over the blue dragon wearing a simple white t-shirt and black jeans Sado tried to mentally gauge just how strong the other really was, as now that he was paying the other his full attention he could see the threads of energy running from off of the other into the ground below him. However, the truly awe inspiring thing about this was the fact that the lines of energy weren’t being drawn in by the other, but instead being forced out into the ground. 

‘As if he trying to release his powers in a way that won’t cause the world around him to tremble at his presence.’ the demon prince thought with a deep frown. 

When the other merely smiled back at him knowingly all Sado could think to respond with was, “How charming.”

Two hours later the pair were seated within a small diner that catered to ‘people like them’. To say the least the prince of lust was somewhat taken aback to see so many mythical creatures ambling about the small eating establishment, the fact that almost all of them looked  rather subdued told him of just how much they did not enjoy the lives that they were living at the moment.

“It can’t be helped,” Meelak sighed, as though he were once again reading Sado’s mind. Meelak sighed. “Creatures such as ourselves had our time to enjoy this planet without much interference, however the time has now come for mortals to have their turn at sailing the ship, as it were.” the blue dragon chuckled when the demon prince’s scowled at him.

“Does that have something to do with why I couldn’t summon my powers as I had once been able to?” Even now the prince of lust attempted to call up the infernal energies, but just as before his powers seemed to be moving towards him with all of the momentum of a drunken hippo trapped in a tar pit.

“Yes.” Meelak ducked his head down as though personally embarrassed by this turn of affairs. “The elder gods decided to stem the flow of magic coming and going out across the world, so only those who have mastered the ability to channel the elements can really do much to influence the realm at the moment.”

“Great.” the demon prince sighed while reaching up to brush some of his long black tresses from out of his face. No matter who they were, elders always had to try and put a handle over other beings in order to prove their own opulence. “And how long do we have to wait for this ‘restraint’ to be lifted?”

“About two thousand years, give or take a century.” Meelak couldn’t fight the chuckle that bubbled out from his throat as he watched the demon prince’s pale gold eyes go wide in disbelief.

“Tell me that was an ill timed  joke.” the hellion ordered while digging his claws deep into the hardwood table placed neatly in between the two of them.

“Afraid that I can’t, seeing as that would be a lie.” the four armed dragon winked.

Sado was greatly displeased by this information. “So for the two millineia I have to wait around for...what exactly?” 

“I’m not sure.” Meelak said after taking a large drink of his tea. “I think a final world war to tear apart this planet or the extinction of ninety percent of all mortals.” This thought made the blue dragon lift a hand up to place his finger against the front of his lips, a contemplative look crossed his handsome scaled face a few seconds later. “I’m not that close to those who are seated upon the throne of authority over this planet, but if I were to guess over their plans, then I expect that they are waiting for the later, as once mortals have all but disappeared we can resume business as usual here.” Though given the state of affairs between mortal leaders it was just as likely that a world war would destroy the planet before then, but the blue dragon got the feeling that if such a threat were to take place then the supernatural races still living within the world would rise up to overthrow the elders who sat above them, but it was just a hunch for the moment. 

“So what am I supposed to do to entertain myself until then?!” the entire reason that Sado had come up to the material plane in the first place was because he was bloody bored within his own realm. Being a prince over the circle of lust was delightful at times, but it could be mind numbingly boring when the elders of Hell were constantly doing an ‘assessment’ over each circle. Usually the older entities just wanted to get reports written up in order to judge whether they should get involved with whatever was happening in each circle, but sometimes, thankfully quite rarely, they enjoyed torturing the various princes by coming around personally to watch how they handled themselves in their particular circle. 

Sado, couldn’t say for certain that he was doing the best job at keeping up with his realm, but he wasn’t exactly letting the place fall to ruin. With that in mind he had decided to have his servants ‘clean up the place’ for when his turn came around, and because he wasn’t exactly one for menial labor the demon prince had decided to wander off while everyone was busy making the halls of his great palace spotless and the souls within presentable for the elder’s arrival. Which shouldn’t come to pass for another century, as when last he checked they were currently investigating reports of an uprising happening within the prince of wrath’s dominion, which wasn’t really all that surprising, given who the other was and how she operated. 

Treachery truly was a fiery blue haired bitch wearing a painted smile.

“I think you should go and enjoy some nice horse racing, your majesty.” Meelak chuckled as he noticed how the other seemed to come back into the conversation some seconds after he had been rattling off various events that he could enjoy.

“Horse racing?” Sado knew of the concept, as there were competitions by those who owned nightmares to charge them across the empty plains of the burning hells, and yet it such pastimes weren’t all that interesting to him. If he wanted to see others run around he could go down to the circle of envy and watch one of the souls of a rich man try and outrun a mob looking to literally rip the gold which had been melted onto his incorporeal form off of him. A chuckle escaped the demon prince’s beak as he thought about how much he enjoyed seeing that, he had to admit that the prince of envy could be rather ingenious when he wanted to be especially cruel. 

“Yes,” the blue dragon nodded before reaching out to place one of his hands onto the hellion’s. A vision of a white steed with brilliant feathery wings instantly filled his mental vision. “I think you’ll find someone to excite yourself if you do.” Meelak whispered.

“Who was that?”  Sado asked as he pulled his hand away from the other as though he had suddenly had his fingers dipped into liquid ice.

“You’ll find out soon enough.” the four armed dragon chuckled.

“Fine.” Sado growled, his tail lashed angril out behind him like a pissed off serpent. “Who are you?”

“You’ve already asked me that question.” the blue dragon smiled.

“Yes, and you never really answered me.” the demon prince knew better than to accept a name as having any meaning there in the mortal realm, as it often meant very little in comparison to the creature who took on the burden of the word.

“I’m just someone who wants to help others be happy.” Meelak said with a cheshire cat-like smile.

To say the least Sado didn’t quite trust that statement, however, he also didn’t get the sense that the other was lying to him either. An odd dichotomy to be sure. However, he decided to put it out of his mind in order to ask a question that had been really bothering him.

“By the way, what’s the story with the purple beast sitting behind you?” these words made the Meelak’s eyes snap open.

“Pardon?” the four armed dragon asked, his mouth slightly agape.

“The large horned creature.” Sado stated pointedly. “He’s sitting beside you. And now he’s looking at me with a look that says that he wants to rip me apart.” the demon prince grunted as he lifted one finger and then lit it on fire with a dark magical flame, a snarl covered his face a moment later.

“I’m sorry, but I don’t see anyone behind or around me.” the four armed dragon whispered as he turned his head to see what could not be seen. 

“Well, it’s there. And if it takes one more step towards me I’m going to obliterate it.” Sado growled making several faces turn towards him.

“Stop.” Meelak said suddenly, his scaled muzzle was covered with a mask of confusion and sorrow. “Please stop.” the demon prince dismissed the black flame a second later. “You shouldn’t know anything about this, but…” the blue dragon’s serpentine eyes focused a trembling gaze upon the hellion. “The creature you are seeing is...was my husband.” 

“You mated with a beast?!” Sado instantly found himself regretting those words as the blue dragon fixed a ferocious stare onto him. “Sorry.” 

“It’s fine.” Meelak replied, even though nothing about the look he was giving the demon prince seemed to display a hint of forgiveness. “Moving on, the creature you are seeing was the one who I...gave myself to a long, long time ago.” Meelak shivered suddenly, his eyes squeezing shut as he tried to repress his emotions from seeping out from his grasp. “He passed away centuries ago, however, and so I’m a bit surprised that you say that you can see him, seeing as his spirit should still be...” Meelak let whatever he was going to say slip from his voice as he went silent for several seconds. 

Sado patiently waited for the other to continue speaking, to which the blue dragon did nearly a full minute later. “You’ve just reminded me of something that I need to look into, so I thank you for that.” the four armed dragon said with the same pretentious smile which once covered his face. 

“Right.” the demon prince replied while looking between the other and the purple beast which was nuzzling its incorporeal head into the side of Meelak’s body. “Glad I could help.” 

The blue dragon giggled. “Now then, about the racetrack which might interest you…”