The Blood of Asmodeus

I awoke on a plain of jagged gray stone and wilted black moss. Taloned hands crumbled the stone into coarse sand and pushed me to my feet. I couldn't feel my toes properly, one second I'd feel all five and the next it was like they'd fused into one.

Echoes of heat coiled in and around my whole body. My vision was blurry and distorted, then it gained a sharp clarity I'd never had, then back to a dreamlike haze. I felt powerful, ready to leap tall buildings and catch bullets, then slow and weak as a newborn.

In the distance, a ring of obsidian towers stood around a pit billowing crimson smoke. It called to me. I began to walk forward, the landscape warping and shifting with every step.

The sky was nothing but roiling clouds of red and violet starlight and chains of golden lightning warring endlessly. Sporadically, one of the towers would be struck by a bolt of lightning and the landscape would be lit up by the flash.

The journey to the pit could have taken me seconds or weeks, but it did not, could not matter. I was tireless, with the single-minded focus and drive of a fanatic on a pilgrimage. My sense of time and self were meaningless.

Either soon or finally, I knelt before the pit, placing my horned forehead upon the proper place. Wait... Horns? The incongruity shook me out of the trance. Where was I? What was going on?

Welcome, Child, to my Prison. All that remains of my Realm after the Elohim's betrayal. The Garden is but ash. My apologies for the compulsion that led you here. Mortal minds struggle with the infernal planes. You would have wandered until your mind adapted or twisted into a monster.

The voice rumbled from the pit without true sound, the obsidian towers resonated like tuning forks and my bones itched.

"Who are you? What is this place?" I looked down and saw my normal human hands. They felt wrong, incomplete. My fists clenched and were replaced by strong talons made of red flesh tipped with black iron. "What's happening to me?"

You do not know? Have your Elders told you nothing? How far have my people fallen? So much has been lost already...so many brothers and sisters slain or twisted...

The voice was distraught, more spires of obsidian tore through the stone and ribbons of crimson smoke billowed from cracks in the landscape. The smoke condensed into the massive figure of a classical demon, purple body emaciated and withered, ghostly chains binding him. Tears fell from his eyes and his face contorted into a mask of despair beneath a crown of gnarled horns.

Bolts of gold lightning fell like rain in retribution. Shredding the demon's body and evaporating most of the towers. I was blinded but otherwise unharmed. Nevertheless, I was left huddling in a depression in the ground, stunned.

The remnants of smoke coalesced into a floating head with trailing wisps like a torso and arms. It spoke once again.

I am Asmodeus. Lord of Lust and Debauchery. He declared. You are of my Blood. A Nascent Incubus, destined to spread pleasure and freedom to the mortals of the Earth and beyond. All around us, the crimson mist flowed and billowed into various shapes. A pair of breasts there, a woman's smile here, smooth curves and hard muscles.

Well, that explains a lot. And raises a whole encyclopedia of new questions... I cleared my throat. "What if I don't want to do any of that?"

Asmodeus seemed amused. You have already done so. Barely a week into your power and you've established a harem of your own and gifted a thrall to your mortal father. He bowed his horned head. In Babylon, Ishtar would be asking you to introduce her virgins to lust and Dionysus would invite you to attend festivals on Olympus. I am proud to claim you as mine. He gave me an almost fatherly smile that wilted into a frown. His eyes stared past me into the distance.

Ah. "Then... What do you want from me?"

The demon grew solemn. I want you to free me. Avenge our family and dethrone those treacherous Elohim and their corrupted Seraphs. Rage burned in his eyes and across the ruined landscape of his prison. The radiant chains in the sky rumbled threateningly. Please Mason, gather more power so I can be freed and learn what's become of my family. A family that has history leading back to the Age of Titans! Do not allow it to be erased. He pleaded.

I gulped at the task I had just been given. Unsure on what to do.