Demonic Devourer's Development

I landed near God of Rogues, but didn't offer him anything like my hand to shake. Neither did he. Instead, he looked at his surviving dagger with sadness and sheathed it before raising his eyes at me again.

"I should really ask you to compensate me for this, somehow… Fancy giving me the Tome of Wizardry so I could forgive you for eating my Soft Cut?"

It took me a moment of reading his thoughts to realise that Soft Cut was the name of the dagger I ate. Then I snorted. "You wish."

"Think about it." God of Rogues smiled charmingly. "What would you even do with it? You are no wizard. We can have an exchange. I have plenty of treasures in my collection, ones that will be much more useful."

"No." I cut off, frowning. "Stop asking."

God of Rogues hummed. "And this makes me wonder, Devourer, what are you even doing here in Hell? How did you get here, without magic, without losing your power?"

I decided that since this was something Goddess of Wizards would pass on to her cohorts sooner or later if she didn't yet, I could safely disclose this information. But… I glanced around. A single dry demon didn't attract much attention of roving in search of prey and carrion birds, but a group of three was bound to be noticed, and that would just be annoying. "Let's chat inside."

It was more comfortable, too. I made an effort in decoration, using my web for hammocks and softening the flaming furniture. The temperature of fires would wear the webs off eventually, but for now, they held. God of Rogues inspected the insides of the stone dome with curiosity before carefully sitting on a soft chair.

I plopped on a hammock and flapped my wings to stop it from swaying. "Information for information, how's that? I would still like to know what you talked with the demon guy," I said, grinning. "And don't feed me this bullshit again."

I wondered how much he would tell me in the end, and if I'd be able to call him out on some of that without showing my own cards. God of Rogues had similar concerns. He wasn't sure how much I knew or remembered about the events, but believed that if I didn't know about them yet, letting me know would make me stronger than I was already, which was against his interests.

Finally, God of Rogues shrugged with a sheepish smile. "It was actually about you, Devourer. There's so little known about you, it's a shame! I thought asking the denizens of Hell would be the best way to fix this, but most of them know awfully little. Including this poor demon. He knew you by name, but didn't even realise you were the same demon who lives in this… dwelling. You change your looks so often, no one knows how you will look tomorrow! A great quality for a spy or an assassin, I have to say."

I narrowed my eyes at him. Yeah, he was totally bullshitting me. Well, an eye for an eye it was. "I just grew the ability to go to Hell and back, how's that to you? The same way I grow all other abilities."

God of Rogues gave me a long unreadable look and concluded that I was bullshitting him, too. And all was fair and well in the world. Outwardly, he grinned. "I wish I had your power. If I had no need to study to use magic, I would've become quite a wizard myself… Or would that be a sorcerer? Since you have it, and obviously are strong enough to kill one of us, gods, I wonder if you need my help at all."

Given time, I'd do it all myself, but God of Rogues could do something that I would have a very hard time managing by myself. "You could lead them into a trap. You are one of them—just lure them somewhere, and then we ambush them… one by one, until there's no one left. Simple and effective, isn't it?"

God of Rogues nodded thoughtfully. He was thinking a lot, and fast. Whom he'd like to see killed (God of Paladins), with whom he'd like to talk about things he learnt recently (Goddess of Wizards and Goddess of Druids), what he could say to delay me because he wanted to learn he could everything before acting.

"It's a neat idea, but it's not something I'd be able to pull off immediately," God of Rogues finally said. "First… well, in the light of Goddess of Wizards' death, I'll be pulled in her complaints and revenge plans, I'm sure. Nothing ever gets done fast in Heaven, and this will be even more of a drag. They will look for you… Though, while in Hell, her scrying spells won't reach you unless she directs them here on purpose. That's good for you, since you didn't want to fight everyone at once, right? But we will have to run in circles for a while until everyone gives up on that."

"And of course, using information about my location would just make them all come down…" I narrowed my eyes. "But anything less than that would be ignored because of the search for me. Is that what you want to say?"

God of Rogues smiled, though inwardly he was much less happy than he showed. "Exactly. You know, you are more astute than the brute we all imagined you as. If we only knew about that in time, we wouldn't have been talking now…"

I snorted. "What I really want from you, is some proof that you won't call your pals on me as soon as we part ways."

"And what kind of proof would be enough for you? I can't imagine anything I can say that would have more value than my promise… Which, I can tell, doesn't hold much value for you, Devourer."

What a good question. I was only asking because it'd be suspicious if I didn't.. Suspicious in how dumb I was.