I flew higher. I spread my wings and twirled. The aurora of darkness called to me, and I sought to answer. Projectiles came, but they never reached. Most would've missed either way, but it was also suppressed somehow like how I might crush someone's will. This was a nexus of power, and none would be allowed to interfere. I was free to fly here in these skies, I was free to fly away. The world was one of infinite possibilities, and suddenly, the weight of a mountain was lifted from my shoulder.

I really could just choose to do whatever I wished. I wasn't constrained anymore in a small and stuffy box. The world was my oyster, as it was always meant to be.

"I AM FREE!!! AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!"

I took the time to appreciate it. The excitement fucking built and built. A smile, genuinely happy, floated over my face. My hyperdemon gland remained in full effect, but even that could not dampen the joy. Really, we were now friends. It was a presence much like my own, and I definitely preferred my company.

For a moment, I took one glance at the horizon. There was an army there, far outside the city, and they were faring much better than those who remained within. My eyes weren't good enough to make out any more than that, but the green and red colors were more reminiscent of New Grandera's heraldry. Moonwash should be there, perhaps the rest of my friends. What… happened with Therick was unfortunate. Part of me couldn't help but distrust everyone and everything. But I drew upon my memory core and relived the happiest moment I'd had with them. Only the ones where the betrayer wasn't present, which unfortunately locked out way too many.

I would get over it in time. Perhaps I shouldn't have spent the past months making my mental problem worse. But for now, I recalled perfectly the many times my life had been saved by another, just as it had been devastated by one.

I couldn't let it happen again. Therick's betrayal would not have worked if I was strong enough to scour their forces regardless of any ambush. No scheme could stand up to raw strength. What mattered in the end was POWER.

I touched the sky, and it gave me what I wanted.

The dark heavens fell, and then collapsed like the formation of a star. From dust to sun, I was the center of the phenomenon, and the vast aurora that blanketed the skies all rushed into me at once. My body was drowned in so much energy that I felt I might explode. But this was only the beginning. The phenomenon unmade and remade me all at once.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!"

I could do naught but scream.

I would've done so by instinct if I felt nothing.

But what I felt, was everything.

I lost myself. I was no longer me. My flesh, my bone, my whole body was peeled open like so many pages of a book. My mind shattered like glass, so many distinct pieces and images, each awash with its own wrath and madness unlike anything else I'd witnessed. The experience was overwhelming in so many endless ways, but I was not overwhelmed. I screamed from the pain, but I did not allow myself to be defined by it. The event horizon was not even trying to hurt me, I knew that now. It was simply pure and powerful in a way that I could not comprehend other than by rejection. But unlike the last two times this happened, I had vastly more experience. Of life, of death, of the thin line in between. The sensation continued, and so did I. I remained conscious and aware like no other.

The curse that once filled the skies continued to invade me. I died a thousand different times, but each told a similar story. Of my home burning, and vile curses tearing me apart from the inside. I managed to remain as myself, but in this moment I was so much more. I was each and every one of my victims, and I felt exactly how I had made them suffer in their final moments. The guilt stabbed me in the chest for every child and every innocent, I reminded myself that it wasn't their responsibility to save me even if they knew. But some of the final breaths that I embodied were from people who definitely fucking deserved it. You fucking templars that kept coming down there to torture me. Soldiers who kept doing their job to keep me from being rescued! FUCKING DUKE ASTRO! I'M GLAD YOUR INSANE AND UNRESPONSIVE MIND STILL FELT THE PAIN IN THE END FOR I AM JUST THAT STRONG!!!

I had made good on every threat that I made, and what lingered of all their souls' power was utilized for my own gain. To help their own tormentor. Their fading screams rebelled against the idea, but my ritual was stronger. It was a year of torture incomparable to their own fleeting deaths.

I did feel… sad. I wished it didn't have to come to this, I wished I was never captured, I wished I wasn't betrayed. But I knew that I would've made this choice again if I had to. I was a demon, and I would sooner burn the world to the last speck of dust rather than allow myself to remain chained.

I wanted to hurl. Energy kept rushing into me, and it felt like so much more than I could take. It was as if I was drunk on the alchohol of gods, and I'd eaten far more buffets than I could ever chew after being starved for an eternity. Half of the energy that filled the air was now held in the pathetically weak vessel that was my body.

[The conditions have been met for a species evolution!]

But so what if I was uncomfortable? Finally, I got the confirmation that my hunch was correct, and I was about to evolve. Nothing could be more important. It was not what I intended for the vengeance that took place this day, but my actions had somehow created some sort of event horizon in the magic that filled the world, and I would be a fool not to take advantage. The process continued to progress and I kept a good watch of it. What was left of the dark aurora was no longer rushing inside of me, but instead forming a hardened cocoon around my weakened body. It was necessary, for even now the denizens of this city tried to kill me. I could feel it all, for I was in tune with their every move. From archers that drew their bowstrings, and how magic flowed from between their physique and weapons. Mages bent reality in a more direct way, and mana shifted according to our will. I felt like I was a thousand different ants, as warriors fought against each other beyond the walls. The mana within each one pumped rapidly and chaotically as we moved with sheer grace and raw violence. I experienced the joy of flight from so many different wings, all fleeing from the same event. I became as if an avatar of the weak, the creatures so small to ever reach for greater heights. They hid underneath their burrows, wishing to never see the light of day. I was every tree that remained standing, and through my limitless roots, I connected to the world and drew upon the power of something far greater than I.

I was Varyala itself, I was a small part of it, I was nothing at all.

"Who cares?" I rasped. I did care, but the cocoon had finished forming now. I crashed into the ground and made a great crater in the manor. The hellish landscape I created flared with even greater power. All invaders were rebuffed by the fire and curses that now spilled out into the streets.

[Warning: Species Evolution will alter the core direction of your Mutations!]

[ALERT: THE POSSIBILITIES ARE INFINITE!]

[Seize the power that you wish.]

[Or perish.]

[Species Evolution has been initialized!]

More notifications came in, and I did not allow myself to get lost again. Even as I felt every death and every failure beyond myself. It continued to ramp up outside of me as the greater war reached its zenith. This evolution was evidently different from all the others that came before it, and now I knew how, or at least a part of what it could do. I had more control here, which was wonderful. I had the freedom to shape my destiny to an even greater extent, and that was my greatest desire. But, it would be a grave disaster if I was unable to steer the ship that was myself, Haell the demon, slaughterer of a ducal manor, and she who had broken all chains. I couldn't know what would happen exactly, but this evolution was a whole world instead of a mere few paths. The infinite possibilities came with subsequent chaos, and I could become anything without a controlling hand to guide it.

I might not be a demon anymore if that happened. I might not even be Haell. That, I could not let happen.

More knowledge drifted into my mind. I understood myself and everything that was happening to me, just like how knowledge of the wider world continued to be crammed into my mind, and then promptly ignored. I focused on what I wanted, and my body regrew. Faster than my own healing could ever accomplish, my prosthetic arm morphed and compressed and changed until it was just like the one I lost. It felt different from normal healing, like a fundamental change, but exactly to how it was in the past.

The way my horns regrew were different still. I felt it be pulled almost on a metaphysical level, and I groaned from the ecstatic pain of the sensation. But regrew they did, I took back what they had taken, and I felt ever more connected to the chaotic ritual that only continued to take place around me.

This was only the beginning. My body filled out, instantly recovering from over a year of starvation. And then I continued to grow. Larger than I'd ever been before. More mass instead of density and efficiency, for I'd become more and more a creature of brute force. My anatomic mastery could attest to that.

I gnashed my teeth. It was an excruciatingly weird feeling, to manually twist new muscle into existence and elongate my bones. I knew all too well that every pull and tear I made would only intensify the feeling even further. A part of me wanted to pause. It was one thing to have these changes done to me after I'd made all the relevant decisions, but it was a whole other thing to actively be causing the pain to myself and continuing to do it anyway. Yet that was exactly what I did. I had more freedom in this moment than I ever did, and I reveled in it in between the gasps of pain.

The teeth I was gnashing through this process also had to be reforged just like everything else, and I felt it melt inside my mouth, before hardening once more. I wanted to fucking throw up.

I did. The vomit sprayed into my cocoon, before promptly being absorbed and recycled by its pulsating flesh. I didn't know why I even had anything to throw up, when I'd hardly been eating at all. But I got through the experience, just as I always did, until shit was finally done.

So naturally, something even worse came next. My beautiful organs too experienced fundamental change. A precipice that had loomed tantalizingly for years, now finally crossed. True gold-rank. Evolution. By my hand, a qualitative transformation. My breath was stolen, my eyes unseen, thoughts unthinkable, neurons shifting within a skull that too was in flux. My hyperdemon gland finally ceased for the first time in weeks, even my dreams plagued by horrid visions, but the insanity only doubled upon its departure.

I cursed this world. I wanted to see it plunged in the same chaos I unleashed today. I was angry at it. More cruel than those who had seen me tortured. I trusted no one. I wanted them all to trust me. I wished to betray them, just as I'd been betrayed. I longed to see the circles of hell recreated. Everything that was once sacred and holy, now perverted. This world of people deserved nothing else than its own honest reflection. Within every heart was a vile inner-world, and the vast landscapes around them should reflect that ugly reality.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

[Curse Heart - The heart of a demon that curses the world. Creates curse mana with every pump.]

I breathed. There was no air here, within my cocoon of darkness, yet the evil nourished my lungs anyway. It was I who decided to reach for the origin of this element, and I used the energy around me to bring it about. I would live with the consequences. I would live, though the madness, whole and hale.

I had done so countless times. I didn't see why I would fail now.

[Resentment - Resentment.]

No this is what I am I shall listen to my desires the world shall be bent by my will and it shall break upon the strain for everything it has done to me for I am a curse and I curse Varyala the burdens it has foisted upon my shoulders–

The madness returned for just a moment, before promptly retreating once the deed was done. Resentment was what became of my hyperdemon gland, and its physical form was an endlessly chaotic and imperfect fractal nightmare of many different conflicting materials that threatened to trap me in one if I examined it too long with my current expanded senses.

I decided to just move on.

[Unbreakable Memory Core - An extremely durable organ that can store memories and information.]

There was only one other Mutation whose course I chose to alter. I had plans for this one, and I took another step to make that eventuality stronger. I felt the marbled core grow so much denser, but I doubted that it was actually unbreakable. Nothing ever was.

[Demon Tail - A fast and powerful tail that allows for rapid and tight turns.]

My spine then elongated above my ass. Vertebrae was expanded like a tumor, and then snapped off. Stacked and stuck together, the bones of the tail formed, followed by the exposed nerves, the tissue, and finally the skin.

It was a Mutation I had long ago decided on with Moonwash. We had even set aside a drake's tail for it already. I didn't see a reason to deviate from this plan now. My hooves weren't the best at taking rapid turns, and my wings were even more ill-manueverable. Having a tail would address both those issues, even if I'd already made myself more cumbersome by growing so much bigger.

Besides, having a tail was such a cool and demonic thing. I was already growing excited inside my cocoon.

[Congratulations! You have become an Archdemon!]

[You have obtained a new Soul Feat: Progenitor III!]

[Progenitor 3: Gives you three additional free choice Mutations.]

[You will obtain a new Soul Feat: Archdemon Progenitor!]

[Archdemon Progenitor: Gives you one free choice Mutation. This Mutation will become part of the Archdemon lineage. The Mutation will start at Level 40.]

The name that I'd chosen was finally acknowledged. I could have become anything, but a demon I chose to remain. It was an important and vital part of me, and that would not change. No matter if uninvolved assholes wished to make more of myself, or to eradicate me from existence. I shall remain.

But this journey was not yet over. I was only just getting started. This evolution was different, and I had to do it all at once. Only in doing so, shall I set a precedent that would forevermore be a part of my power.

[The effects of the Soul Feat Demon Harbinger have been upgraded!]

[Demon Harbinger: You are the harbinger of demons. From you, a new web of existence will emerge. Your soul yearns to be a demon, allowing you greater success in evolving your species so long as your species remains in the strain of demons. New Mutations that you obtain will start your full general level. You gain the ability to further customize them based on their new starting level.]

I'd been thinking about it occasionally over the past year, and now finally, I decided to deviate from some of my plans and vaguer ideas. My recent experiences had truly taught me about my weaknesses, and I would be a fool to not ensure that something like this never happened again.

[Localized Dimension Scanner Matrix - a sensory organ that lets you perceive the space around yourself.]

Knowledge of the new Mutation entered my mind, and I had to complete it. I embodied it as I continued to embody myself, and I decided on how I would like for this new power to serve. The marbled core began to form inside my head as I continued to tinker. Fleshy nerve tubes extended out from it that quickly branched out like lightning into thinner and thinner strands. It connected to the pores all over my head, and then suddenly I was more aware. It was like I was seeing for the very first time. It was a whole new sense. I could feel the general shape of the cocoon around me. I could tell what was going on in the literal back of my head. It was… a 3D view of a small rough sphere around myself, but lacking many details, and delivered somewhat similarly to how I would know where my own limbs were.

That awareness extended past my cocoon, and then further still. The range continued to expand as the Mutation rapidly evolved under my command. I focused on extending it further, because I didn't need anything fancy to fulfill my purpose here. A rough idea of shapes and movement was enough.

I would never be taken by complete surprise again.

[Rapid Combat Nervous System - A nervous system that greatly improves your reflexes and reaction time.]

Next came the Rapid Combat Nervous System. Immediately, I felt like my nerves were on fire, but I was more than used to that sensation. So I grabbed and remade every single nerve on my body with the meticulous care the Mutation required. This new nervous system would help me react faster than I ever could before. So that I could continue to keep up, with my own body, and the many enemies that would forever come.

I braced myself for this next one.

[Blood Heart - A heart that pumps blood mana directly into your blood.]

My perspective changed to that of a new heart growing inside my body. I encouraged it to take form alongside the other three as I understood that this heart would pump blood inside of me. But that was what every heart did. Except this blood was not just the physical one. It was also the metaphysical. The magic. The mana. The heart finished forming, and it only got better at its one job the more power I put into it. Veins and arteries were rearranged and added upon inside of me to accommodate the new organ. The heart pumped for the first time and I felt trapped in a world of endlessly flowing red.

It was a craving for life. A longing for death. I wanted to heal and kill the world in equal measure. Every being a prey and patient for me to dissect. It was an emotional state more confusing than any other. Unlike the curse and hellfire that preceded it, this one actually desired to do as much good as it wished to do evil. It was easier to deal with in a way, because now at least, I had something positive in the constant shouted whispers that begged for my attention.

Perhaps the future generations of archdemons would be grateful for it too, for this was the Mutation I had chosen to pass on to them. My blood had increased in capacity once more, and could now hold another element alongside the existing two. They needed something to fill that slot, lest it be wasted. And no one Mutation could give more power than a whole entire element.

Some might argue then, that demons didn't need any more power. Perhaps I should be minimizing whatever madness might plague their mind instead. I doubted that I would ever want to have children of my own, so there might never be another demon anyway. But, like every other time I made this choice, I wanted to give my potential kin what I found to be the most important. I was their fucking progenitor. And there was nothing in this world more important than power.

I believed that now, more strongly than I ever did before. It wasn't love that saved me, nor was it kindness. My… remaining loyal friends tried to do it, but was I saved!?

No. No, I was not. I saved myself, for only I had the power to do so. The madness could be endured, if one had the will to do it.

[Blood Eater - An organ that can consume blood and convert it into a variety of forms.]

The last Mutation of the bunch was bulbous blob with a rabid mouth. It grew near my esophagus with ample space. My increased size had created plenty of space for me to expand into inside my own body. Another tube branched out from the esophagus, which could selectively open to feed the second mouth deep inside of me. But this mouth wished for only one sustenance. Blood.

A few other tubes began to branch out from the hungry organ, leading to different parts of my body. The Blood Eater longed to drink upon the lifeblood of my enemies and convert it into my own. Any blood would do really, even the rivers of it that already flowed inside of me, but that would surely result in a net loss. For now. But converting blood into a different form of blood wasn't the only function of this Mutation. The blood that it feasts upon could instead heal me, sustain me, become the nutrients needed to nourish and fuel my body. It was a new source of the blood mana I had only recently gotten.

These were the functions I had decided upon, so that I may fight forevermore.

And with that, I had chosen all the new Mutations my soul feats had given me. Yet the energy that coursed through my body was not yet depleted, just as I had anticipated. It was enough for one or two Mutations more… but instead I had other plans. It was almost unthinkable for me to choose anything other than more direct power here… but this would strengthen me further than any new Mutation in the long run. And… if I were being honest, this next action of mine just felt right. It was a new connection I didn't wish to lose. A newborn life I sought to preserve. A favor that I had to return.

I did not hesitate any longer. There was no reason for me to deny myself. I chose to make that which should have been fleeting and temporary, into something that would haunt the world for ages to come.

I felt it in the burning air around my cocoon, the moment the change happened. Its boundaries solidified, a nightmare that would never end. The whole manor that helped me kill my enemies, was now a single individual entity of its own.

The ground trembled. Even in my egg, I felt the coursing power. I guided it. Molded it. Intertwined it with my own, just as it was already connected.

The manor continued to change. Its previously empty halls were filled. Magic circles were etched into the very foundation. Vats of pulsing blood grew out of walls. A blistering inferno roared, hot enough to make anyone believe they were in hell. Perhaps they would be right. My bedroom was created deep inside the complex, and something about it felt incredibly wrong. Like it wasn't real, an illusion, a dimension separate from our own.

I felt all these changes happen in the moment, I was the catalyst and so was my new friend.

"Pandemonium," I muttered. I said it proudly with a smile. The world around me cracked and fissured in deep approval.

Pandemonium, proud of the new name I had bestowed, made a suggestion. I hesitated for a few moments, my mind working as fast as it could before this fantastical phenomenon ended. I gave my approval only when I was sure I was certain.

We didn't waste any more of our precious time. In unison, in collaboration, we etched upon the symbol of a demon and a house of horrors in my chest, encircled by tendrils of flesh, spirit, and steel. It was the physical manifestation of our bond and our promise, and I helped draw the same heraldry on way too many parts of Pandemonium.

All shall know of my domain.

[New Soul Feat acquired: Slaughter of the Astro Manor!]

[Slaughter of the Astro Manor - You have toiled and suffered for a long time to punish your enemies. Now your punishment shall remain a scar on this world. Your evolution has been empowered. Future evolutions may be empowered as well if done on the same location.]

[New Soul Feat acquired: Pandemonium.]

[Pandemonium - You have stolen the home of the people you've massacred. You've twisted it to your own ideals. You have bestowed upon this land a new name. Pandemonium possesses a variety of abilities based on your own. It shall continue to grow as you do, if you dwell within its halls.]

[New Soul Feat acquired: Mark of The Beast.]

[Mark of The Beast - The mark of your heraldry has been carved into your flesh, and to that of Pandemonium. The connection between you is eternal. The mark cannot be hidden. Your connection empowers both of you based on the general prowess of the other.]

The mystical event began to die down, and what was left of my cocoon started to wither and die. My evolution, and that of my new home, was finally drawing to a close. But before the end, came three final gifts. It was a reminder of what I had achieved here today. What I had created, and what I had destroyed.

I was satisfied.

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