Minute Mage: A Time-Traveling LitRPG

Chapter 44: Welcome to Hell. Let’s Have a Chat.

A Devil sat at a desk in a damp, dark room. Long-forgotten papers were scattered across the floor, covered in so many dirty footsteps it was impossible to tell what was written on them anymore. The Devil leaned, hunched over the empty desk, chewing on one of his fingers. It had become a bad habit of his, biting down on a thumb or pinkie any time he became stressed. It had gotten so bad, in fact, that he regularly bit down hard enough to accidentally draw blood. But some small wounds on a finger were the least of his worries. For now, he listened intently to a report being given to him by an underling, eyes focused on an arbitrary bump in the desk.

“–five-hundred and six Overworld losses in the past twenty-four hours. Of those, two-hundred fifty-five Infernals are currently comatose in the Underworld, along with forty Hellions, and a Hellion has perished due to complications in the awakening process, as well. Eleven Human settlements have been completely destroyed, and sixteen Classed Humans of Level twenty or more have been killed. We suspect there are still at least one-hundred and twelve with teleportation capabilities and the ability to track our forces, of which one-hundred and eleven are currently being combated or tracked. There are two-hundred ninety-one individuals which we suspect might be capable of the same, of which we are investigating two-hundred fifty-seven. Eighteen Human settlements–”

“Ton’dao,” the Devil interrupted. He looked up from his desk and into the underling’s eyes, or rather, eye. This particular Demon was a Balor, a large, one-eyed race of Demons. They stood tall and wide, so the Balor, Ton’dao, had to hunch over to fit in the Devil’s office. Its body was covered in patchy hair, tiny groups of strands sprouting up along random spots of the Demon’s brick red, muscled body. Its face was covered in folds as though there was twice as much skin than necessary on its head. The Devil fought back a scowl as he looked across the Balor’s ugly form. “Is Arlan Nota dead yet?”

“...No, Superior Xhag’duulinithar’obaba’iidook’naisantipoduun’torobaroxhixhonxhaxintep,” Ton’dao said in a deep, rumbly voice. Its sentences were stilted, a pause just barely too long after every phrase in its speech. “He has been spotted two times, though, and we have Diviner squads working around the clock to locate him. His constant movement proves him a difficult target, but–”

“–but you haven't done it yet,” the Devil sighed and rubbed his eyes. “Fucking worthless. What Level is he?”

“Formal expression of apology, but that is currently unknown. He has dispatched one Infernal that we know of, utilizing the help of another Classed individual, so our estimates say above Level five.”

“‘That you know of?’ Can you not keep track of your own troops?”

“No, Superior, that is not the case. It is just that we do not know if he has killed any in alternate timelines.”

“So, what you’re telling me is that we have just been feeding our own enemy power in the form of gift-wrapped units for him to kill, and we don’t even know how strong he is.”

“...”

“Listen, Ton’dao. I have about thirty different meetings that I need to go to after this, so I’m going to have to cut this one short. Just tell me this: why, in your own opinion, is this taking so abysmally long to do? How incompetent can these soldiers be that they can’t even kill a scared little boy hiding in the woods? We control the entire fucking kingdom he lives in. How in the name of the lord below has he survived more than ten fucking minutes? It has been seventy-two hours, Ton’dao. We outnumber him tens of thousands to one.”

The Balor scratched his head, obviously confused at the Devil’s emotional outburst. Such things were rare to see in Demons. “...Well, in my opinion, the main problem is the rest of the Humans. We cannot mobilize the majority of our forces because, any time we try, the Humans will attack and try to kill our troops. There are groups of individuals in law enforcement who are focused on keeping the peace in the cities. These individuals posed problems at first, but now that we are searching for Arlan Nota in the forest, they are not as problematic. However, there are also Humans who call themselves ‘adventurers’, who will go into the wilderness to kill any Demons they see. We are fighting a war on two fronts, and if we attempt to focus too much on Arlan Nota, the Infernals will be slaughtered.”

The Devil bit down on his index finger once again, and soon tasted blood on his tongue. He looked down at the bleeding finger, blue ichor dripping from the wound onto his desk. He scowled and closed his eyes, trying to bring his stress under control. “And why haven’t you spoken with the Humans?”

“I do not have an Overworld form, currently.”

“I mean ‘you,’ the whole. Just… fucking, any of you. A single Demon, ever. Why has nobody spoken with the Humans that are attacking you?” The Devil waved hands angrily as he spoke. “They aren’t fucking brainless, you know. They are capable of conversation, same as the rest of us. If they’e killing our men and sending soldiers to slaughter the Infernals, maybe you should have considered fucking diplomacy? Or are you so fucking meatheaded that your first instinct was punch your way through the problem?”

“I do not possess the power to speak with the Humans, or to ask others to do so on my behalf.”

“I am once again talking about ‘you’ the whole, you fucking dumbass. Tens of thousands of Demons in this operation, and not one person thought ‘oh hey, maybe we should, fucking, I dunno, try saying words.’” The Devil groaned. “This shit is going to be the death of me. I swear, my chest is just going to implode one day and I’ll be dead.”

“...Formal expression of apology, Superior, but what should we say to the Humans?”

“What should you say? Listen, we are only going to be in the Overworld for as long as Arlan Nota is alive. Once Arlan Nota is dead, we leave. So, all you need to do is to point out to the Humans that it is within their best interest to ensure Arlan Nota is dead.”

“Would they not want to ensure the survival of one of their own?”

“We’re killing hundreds of Humans every day! Do you think they don’t know that? Every day Arlan Nota remains alive, more Humans die. All that needs to happen to ensure those Humans don’t die is for them to let one single Human into our hands. It is simple negotiation.”

“But the Humans do not want us to kill Humans. If Humans will die either way, they will fight us like they are doing now.”

“They aren’t a monolith, moron,” the Devil groaned into his palms, rubbing his face. “Listen, talk to the ruler. Be diplomatic. Be convincing. Be threatening, be friendly, be whatever. It shouldn’t be difficult to convince the Humans to save their own lives.”

“I do not understand. Which of those should I be?”

“Fuck this shit. I’m doing it myself.” The Devil stood. “Ton’dao, are you busy after this meeting?”

“Yes, Superior. I will be reporting to fourteen other higher-ups with the information I have told you, and then going back to reconfigure troop arrangements, assign Commanders to key locations, gather intelligence on significant enemies, and–.”

“Yeah, you’re not doing any of that anymore. You’re in charge of canceling or rescheduling the thirty meetings I have after this one. I’m going to be busy.”

“...Yes, Superior.”

The Devil walked out of his office, squeezing past the Balor’s oversized body. He stepped into the main complex office, hundreds of desks pushed together with Ember Mites and Gargoyles working away, trying their best to uphold the duties that the Devil had been forced to abandon in order to focus full-time on the Arlan Nota project. He looked around the room, trying to catch the eye of one of the workers, but all of them seemed to perfectly avoid his gaze.

He shook his head. He was too overworked for this dumb office mindgames shit.

“Who here can manage an Overworld trip?” he projected his voice across the large room.

Nobody answered.

He rolled his eyes with a scowl. “If nobody volunteers within the next, let’s say, five seconds, I am going to kill all of you.”

A few dozen hands went up.

“Thank you. You,” he pointed to the nearest one, a Gargoyle. “Take me to the nearest projecting station.”

Once they got there and got through the inordinate amount of bullshit bureaucracy necessary to get assigned a Projector Demon, the Devil laid himself down in a projection pod, impatiently readying himself to be transported to the Overworld.

It was strange. He normally never felt like the amount of paperwork or checks and balances that had been put into place in the Underworld was unnecessary, but in his recent days, he felt himself becoming more and more critical of the way things were run down here. When he was on such a tight timetable, there were a lot of things he realized were completely unnecessary. The amount of time needed to get confirmation for a simple troop reassignment, the fact that he was expected to read every single report of all the meaningless information given to him, it was ridiculous.

But at least he was able to take some actions in a reasonable timeframe, like his traveling to the Overworld. He’d have to use a weaker projection of his true self because of his lack of scheduling ahead of time, but it was fine. He was going in for negotiations, not to fight on the front lines like the rest of those brutes.

The pod he lay in was stone on the bottom and a clear, refined quartz covering the top. The Gargoyle that took him there was still outside the projection room, making preparations and arrangements. The Devil could hear its sniveling voice through the walls.

Eventually, a Projector Demon came in. It was short and shriveled, its skin sagging from its body and back hunched dramatically. It walked with a wooden cane. None of this was testament to its age, however – that was just how the Projectors were born. A simple rucksack of a hood covered most of its face, but a long snout pointed from it, whiskers coming from its nose. Its snout was wrinkled, too.

“Formal expression of greeting. It will be a pleasure to project you, Xhag’duulinithar’obaba’iidook’naisantipoduun’torobaroxhixhonxhaxintep.” It spoke with an old man’s voice, as well, a crotchety croak of a sound. “My name is Ar’dinaalandinyuu’amwinton”

“What kind of body can you get me?” The Devil intentionally ignored the greeting. He’d been doing so more and more often recently. Once again, he was busy and didn’t have time for those formalities.

It wasn’t like he was being urgent about the issue of the body to be difficult on purpose, though. Bodies were an important part of negotiation. They dictated your looks, and thus, peoples’ first impressions of you. They created the sound of your voice, and the tools you would have available to you. Some people could yell threateningly, others could only whimper. Some could make themselves look pitiful and inspire empathy, others only looked brutal. If the Devil was to be an effective negotiator, he would need an effective body.

“Ah, I am a newer Projector. I was the only one they had on hand when you came in. Normally, there is a waiting list, but… we understand some matters are urgent.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“Uh, yes, of course. I will be able to project you into a form that is – and pardon my rounding to only six decimals – 3.942517% as powerful as your true self.”

The Devil sighed. That wasn’t exactly ideal, but it wasn’t the worst, either. It seemed he wouldn’t be very imposing, but at least he’d have a face and a voice that had a good range of emotion. Some Projectors could only put Demons into formless wisps of smoke that couldn’t do anything but observe the world around it. At least this way, he’d still look like himself. “That’s fine. Take me there.”

“Well, we first need to get initializations set up on paper–”

“Just start projecting. I don’t have the patience for this.”

The Projector Demon looked at the Devil for a moment, before sighing. “Yes, Xhag’duulinithar’obaba’iidook’naisantipoduun’torobaroxhixhonxhaxintep. I will do so immediately.”

“Good.” The Devil leaned back and closed the quartz top, creating a casket of sorts that the Devil lay inside. He allowed the Projector to do its work, weaving Spells with the utmost accuracy. They’d already worked out the general area that the Devil would be projected to and the other mundane details. The Devil had been mentally working out a plan for how he’d go about his discussion with the Humans, and he was confident.

After the preparatory Spells had been cast, the Projector spoke up, its voice coming muffled through the quartz and stone case. “Are you ready?”

“Send me in. I have some people I need to speak with.”