Far away from the chaos of Mount Meru, in the depths of the shadowed Abyssal Citadel, the Demon King Ravan sat on his obsidian throne.
His figure was colossal, a monstrous embodiment of power, veiled in a swirling shroud of darkness that seemed alive, whispering secrets of terror. His four horns curved menacingly backward, framing a face that was as cruel as it was terrifying.
Eyes like molten lava burned with unrelenting malice, and the very air around him crackled with his restrained fury.
The hall was vast, lit by the eerie glow of hellfire torches lining the blackened stone walls. Elders and generals of the demon court knelt in submission, their faces pale with dread. Before the throne, the eldest of the demon kings trembled as he delivered the news.
“Your Majesty…” the demon’s voice quavered, each word feeling like a stone dragged across glass. “The prince… your son… he… he is dead.”
The hall fell silent, the weight of those words pushing the room into suffocating stillness.
For a moment, Ravan didn’t move. The burning intensity of his gaze bore into the trembling elder. Then, his voice, deep and thunderous, echoed across the hall.
“Dead?” he repeated, his tone carrying a mixture of disbelief and menace. “My son, the Demon Prince—slain? Are you joking? Which god dared to lay finger on my son?”
The elder swallowed hard, his claws scraping against the stone floor as he bowed even lower. “A human, Your Majesty… from the Nine Realms below. He… he killed the prince during our attack to stop the ritual on Mount Meru.”
“A human?” Ravan’s voice rose, reverberating like the eruption of a volcano. The hall quaked under the weight of his fury, and several of the kneeling demons collapsed to the ground, clutching their heads.
“How dare you insult my intelligence with such lies!” Ravan roared, his clawed hand slamming against the armrest of his throne. Cracks spiderwebbed through the stone. “No human could defeat my son—my blood, my pride!”
The elder hastily continued, his voice breaking. “It is the truth, Your Majesty. The human… he is unlike any other. He possesses the aura of a demigod and the strength of a beast. He tore through our forces, ripped the prince apart with his bare hands…”
Ravan’s molten eyes narrowed, his rage simmering into something colder—sharper. “You mean to tell me that my son, who held my bloodline’s strength, was defeated by a mortal from the lower realms? And you—all of you—stood by and let it happen?”
“Your Majesty, we—”
“SILENCE!” Ravan’s roar shook the very foundations of the citadel. The elder’s words died in his throat as he crumpled to the floor, paralyzed by the king’s oppressive aura.
Ravan rose from his throne, his towering figure casting a shadow that seemed to swallow the room whole. He began to descend the steps of the dais, each step reverberating like thunder. The demons trembled as he approached, the air growing colder with his every movement.
“Who is this human?” Ravan demanded, his gaze like fire on the elder’s bowed head.
“We… we only know his name, Your Majesty,” the elder stammered. “He is called Kent.”
“Kent,” Ravan repeated, the name rolling off his tongue with disdain. He stopped before the elder, his clawed hand reaching out. With a sharp yank, he lifted the demon by his throat, holding him in the air like a rag doll.
“Where is he now?”
The elder struggled to breathe, his claws scratching futilely at Ravan’s iron grip. “He… he is still with 7 eternal sages,” he choked out.
Ravan’s lips curled into a snarl. He tossed the elder aside like garbage, his attention shifting to the rest of the court.
“A human dares to defy me—to spill my son’s blood—and you think I will let this go unpunished?”
The demons quaked under his gaze, their fear palpable.
“I will raze the Nine Realms to the ground if I must,” Ravan growled. “This Kent will pay for his insolence, and his screams will echo across eternity. Send word to the demon legions. Prepare the Abyssal Armada. Don’t kill him. Bring him to me—alive.”
One of the generals, braver than the others, stepped forward. “Your Majesty, if I may…”
Ravan’s glare pinned him in place, but he continued. “This human is not ordinary. He killed the prince and routed our forces. If we are to capture him, we will need more than brute force. Perhaps… we should summon the Abyssal ghosts.”
The suggestion hung in the air, heavy with implication. The Abyssal Ghosts were Ravan’s most elite warriors—monsters of unparalleled strength and cunning, kept in reserve for only the most dire of circumstances.
Ravan’s gaze softened into something more calculating. “The Ghosts… Yes… they will do. Summon them at once.”
The general bowed deeply. “It will be done, Your Majesty.”
Ravan turned, his gaze drifting toward the great black window overlooking the churning abyss beyond the citadel. His fury simmered beneath the surface, restrained but no less dangerous.
“How can a mortal kill my bloodline? There is definitely some mystery here! Hmm… once I torture the mortal’s soul, he will spit everything.”
—
In a chamber deep within the citadel, a black altar stood, its surface engraved with runes of blood and shadow. The demon elders gathered around it, chanting in a guttural, ancient tongue. The air grew heavy with dark energy, and the room seemed to collapse inward as a portal tore through reality.
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From the portal emerged three figures, their forms shrouded in darkness. The Abyssal Ghosts were terrifying to see—each one a unique monstrosity of power and malice.
The leader of the Ghosts, a towering figure with a body of shadow and burning crimson eyes, stepped forward. “Who dares summon us?” his voice rumbled, deep and echoing.
The elder bowed low. “The Demon Emperor Ravan commands your presence. There is a human—a mortal—who has slain the Demon Prince. Your orders are to find him and bring him back to the Abyssal Citadel alive.”
The Reaver’s eyes flared with interest. “A mortal killed the prince?” he mused. “Interesting. Tell your Emperor that we will find this mortal… and we will bring him to his knees.”
As the Ghost’s vanished into the shadows, the elder rose, his heart pounding. The hunt for Kent had begun…