SWOSH! Cain and the girls emerged from the dark sky, staring at the rotten land below. Massive animal-sized insects crawled on the ground feeding on the corpses of the sinners unlucky enough to end up in this cursed place.
"This is more than I expected," Zaleria looked down.
"I know. Let's hope they don't attack us immediately," Hati said, looking down.
"Too bad, they are already coming," Cain said, pointing ahead to a black cloud.
Bela looked ahead, "Coulds?" She looked through her finger, and her face paled. "Mosquitos!" She cried.
"Leave them to me," Zaleria smiled, charging her breath.
Cain rushed in, closing her mouth with his hand, "Stop! You will attract the rest," He looked at the mosquito swarm. "I will deal with this," His eyes flashed blue. ZON! Cain and the girls disappeared, and a monster corpse appeared in their place.
The mosquitos rushed in, attacking the corpse and sucking every last drop of blood. When the paper-dry husk fell on the ground, tens of ants, centipedes, and tiny bugs munched on it, devouring it to the bones.
The girls watched in terror from inside Cain's crystal barrier. "They shouldn't be able to detect us here," Cain said, sitting down.
The girls looked at him, "Are you sure?"
"Yep, we are sitting in the ethereal world." Cain replied, "They won't sense us, but we also can't move away."
Cain had created a spherical barrier between dimensions. It was the same concept as his magnificent mansion, with few minor differences.
The mansion is built in a demi-plane inside the ethereal world. It's like an egg yoke inside an egg in a pool of water, where the water is the ethereal world.
This barrier is just the yoke in the water with no demi-plane. It allows Cain to see the outside world but limits what he can create inside it due to the lack of a base structure (The demi-plane)
Farryn approached Cain, "We can still move," She said.
"That only inside the barrier. It's a hundred feet in diameter." Cain replied, closing his eyes to focus. "We will move like this," With a surge of magic, Cain's body flashed for a second, and the scenery around them changed.
"What did you do?" Zaleria looked around, "Did we just teleport?" Hati gasped.
"I teleported the barrier with us inside it. Our goal, for now, is to find a safe place to set a base." Cain kept teleporting around, searching for a suitable place.
"What kind of places are we looking for?" Bela asked.
"A place where the bugs can't get to us," Cain replied with the obvious answer.
"I meant what it is? There isn't a single spot in this layer without bugs." Bela replied, looking around. Even the air has small insects flying in. If a person breathed inside this layer, the bugs would eat his lungs.
"Hell is designed to make people suffer. Each layer is supposed to be bad. Let's say you used to steal from people. You will end up starving in Avernus while eaten by the devils or Tiamat."
Avarnus is starvation.
Dis has hot iron.
Minauros is rotting in filth.
Phlegethos fire burns.
Stygia is drowning in cold water.
Malbolge is forced sex(That's why Meliliana and Bela's husband ended up there).
"And now we have Maladomini. The place where bugs lay eggs inside your body so the larva can eat their way out." Cain said and then stood, "I found a safe place."
"Are you sure?" Lolth asked.
"Yeah, look," Cain pointed toward a massive mountain, "Iside this mountain, there is a massive rock. I can build a place for us inside it," He said with a smile.
"The insects won't creep in, would they?" Hati stared at Cain with a worried face.
"They won't. I will set up multiple barriers to protect us, so be at ease," Cain smiled and lifted his staff.
Cain's staff flashed blue as his robe waved with the winds. Magic rushed from his fingertips into the massive mountain.
"I finished," Cain clapped his hands a few moments later, teleporting everyone inside.
The inside of the rock looked bland, a single large stone room with an orange hue. The ground felt jagged, and it wasn't that spacious.
"What should we do now? I still want to burn some bugs with my breath," Zaleria approached Cain with a worried face. She had imagined herself flying into the layer from the sky, sending a hell blaze down on the insects. But now she is hiding inside a rock.
"Everything has its time." Cain replied, "I need to find Baalzebul first, and then we can attack,"
Morena approached Cain, "Please excuse my sister's lack of mental capacity. She should learn a thing or two from the rock around us,"
Clensh, Zaleria grabbed Morena by the head, "What did you say? Pot brain," She knocked on Morena's head, and it sounded like an empty jar.
Cain smiled, "Baalzebul is an intelligent devil. If we announced our presence like that. He would run away and hide."
Bela approached Cain, "We managed to beat the previous lords of hell, so he won't take us lightly and will choose a battle of attrition."
"Exactly!" Cain smiled, patting Bela's shoulder and making her blush.
"Well, can we then have some time..." Bela approached Cain, and he pushed her away, "How quick! Calm down!" BONK! He smacked her head with a chop.
CLAP! CLAP! Magic rushed through Cain's veins. He first needs to make this place livable so they can stay.
Setting multiple barriers for protection and adding a bedroom, a bathroom, and an operating room are all needed. All of those were necessities if they wanted to stay here for any length of time without trouble.
? Bela rushed to inspect the bed while can sat in the operating room. Zaleria approached him, "What are you doing?" She looked at Cain, sitting on the ground with his eyes closed.
"I mind-controlled a mosquito outside, and I'm using its search," Cain replied.
"Can I see?" Zaleria sat beside him.
"Of course," Cain extended his hand and put it on Zaleria's face. Her vision quickly shifted. She saw a bunch of people crying and screaming as worms crawled out of their skin, lakes of leeches, and swarms of wasps. "The hell is this place."
"You said it, hell." Cain replied, "We're looking for a massive yellow slug. Tell me if you saw him."
"Let's find him!" Zaleria smiled.
The most uptodat𝓮 n𝒐vels are published on (f)reew𝒆(b)novel.𝗰𝗼𝐦