Devil's Business

Hell's journey

 Devastated, it’s the gentle curve of feature smeared upon Juno’s expression. The indomitable quest of Hell, to defeat an entity with tremendous power and unknown properties of the demon who were there as the caretaker of his poor self. Back on earth, the demon’s surging energy could be felt right through from thousands of meters, and it’s rising up immensely when they arrived within the very land of scorching madness.

His mouth is dangling freely, showing up his impaired teeth inside. The jaw is incapable to close it as a whole. He had thought of something dubious since the very start by the ‘challenge’ that the demon had stated, but there is no leads to such commitment. Being a hero for the realm’s citizen, he clearly settled a perilous margin to his swelling target. He has to cleanse away the money he possessed for the bargain. One billion of the money, after 2 weeks of extravagant spending of his, were reduced profusely. It is still staggering amount of cash, nonetheless, since he only had $ 10 million of them all to use for his own leisure time. He even had in mind of doubts that he could be poor in two months after the demon’s challenge, not in four years like the demon gave to clear up.

“You are impressive so far, Juno. I could see the look of determination from the state of your deposit. I believe you would be grateful for such lavishness to be intact from the past 2 weeks of your life.” Stated the demon as it bites away an apple on its left hand.

They were wandering on the market’s street for an hour long of their life. The whole household of the city could also be called as a malevolent residence, for the people of the street would be an evil to one another and being resentful to their own existence. There are no police officers nearby to counsel and protect. Thieves, beggars and common thugs were strolling down the aisle to hunting somebody that has not been on guard of themselves when laying themselves to the city’s market. Listening to such atrocity and madness of the city, and the responsibility to become their hero of the land, is outrageous for the wealthy human and serene nature of his homeland.

In Juno’s mind, this city would not need any hero in whatsoever form, since they were being cruel and vile to themselves from the start. The demon was noticing his doubts of this task, since he could reap away thoughts from human, and happened to make fun of the pitiful and short-sighted ideas of its hopeless leader of the future.

For the set of qualms from his mind, Juno was ready to put his rejoinder of the sudden moniker assigned towards him, but halted by a single sign from the red palm of the demon itself.

”Before thinking of something to mock this city and its rowdy culture, please hear my explanation for the start of your journey.” Said the demon in abrupt fashion by the last bite of its magical apple,” You must be questioning the role of yourself as a hero, right?”

Juno, in reminder to its steaming order from the demon, nodding excessively in answer,”Well, you didn’t tell me of being a hero from our first meetup, so...”

“Hahaha, puny mortal. You’re so pure for thinking I would not do something for my own entertainment.” Chimed the demon in his bold and brash tone,”You have to implant this to your absent-minded brain, Juno. I am a demon, and an ancient one, to add. I am here, inviting you to be rich, it’s all for myself.”

The man himself was apparently feeling anger by the undermining statement from the demon. He remembered something fairly cheap, a spark of innovation for his main objectives.

“Why wouldn’t I...”

“What? State it clear, weakling.” Spoke the demon to Juno.

Before the wind of war was blowing to their standing ground, Juno unleashed an immediate fist to the demon by his left palm. He wasn’t so mindful with what sort of power that he has for the time, but opportunity like this would not come to waste if he spent it out earlier. That is why the outcome was not as fruitful as he would think of from the slight-too-fast pondering of the man, as the demon easily fend off the threat and locking both of his wrist in a single sweep.

“Hah, You don’t say? I haven’t tell you of how it works, silly Juno. At least you can attack me after listening to this blabbering firsthand.” The demon mocked his wild tenacity after it dodged a poor aim of his melee shot,”You are not the first person to do this, for sure. I have myself swallowed better punch from someone smarter than you.”

“Well, better safe than sorry, right? Who knows?”

“Hah, too shambolic to digest, Juno. You would regret such things like this in near future of your journey.”

---

The scene of battlefield was not there for the tale of Human hero in hellish realm. For the tragic scenery of malicious deeds of the demon kin, a human has to be their savior and beckoned to strive upon the grid of sacrifice. Contemplation on this level were occurring in unconscious manners over Juno’s head several times under the note of the demon beside him. It silently judging every sort of annotation and opinion within his mind, for it counts as the part of delicacy for the demon to eat.

Dreaded feelings, haunted emotions and despair is common for human. Juno himself were struck in amidst the pool of distress in every chapter of his voyage upon the mysterious kingdom. He looked at the huge castle at the core of the city. With thoughts of enjoyment, but coated within the veil of fear, he instigated every minuscule of the building with inquisitiveness upon his mind.

‘In a city full of crime, who dares to be the leader of them all? Why would he left out those ineptitude in his territory?’

This question bloated out of his thoughts. The demon chuckled a little by such degree of sincerity from its human, before laid out a good laugh to it for a minute later. Juno, in adverse, can’t fathom with the cause of such comical reaction from the beast and just laying his attention to the sudden expression from the demon.

“Hahaha! I’m apologize, human. I can’t stress out of how much those question tickled my mind as much.”

“On what?”

“Those pesky leadership from your mind, Juno. You have to agree with yourself later on when thinking something trivial.” Stated the demon in resolution.

The former tramp stumbled a bit by the demon’s honesty over its incorrigible prowess, but did nothing as feedback to the truth. Mind reading is one of the foremost desire in social skills to human life for a trick up to the sleeves, and this demon could gouge information out of it like it is Sunday morning. Juno has nothing in expense to such power, and he felt a humongous boulder were there to make him stuck in this objectives for long.

Their walk carried them to the sole potion maker of the city. Rumbia, it is called as such by the signage up above in demon’s tongue. Juno was baffled to himself, as he capable on reading the language swiftly, but he could not decipher of the cause for this form of ability. It might be because of his bond with the contract, or he possessed a random ability in language proficiency for his first mission of the day.

“So, Demon, what should I do for the beginning? I am ready for the challenge.” Boasted Juno in front of the demon. It does not put an ample attention to the human, since it appears busy with its own errands against the shop’s doorway. For the inquisitiveness of the man, he asked,”What are you doing right now, master demon? I am waiting behind you right here.”

Despite the cry of Juno from the rear,  the demon does not responding at all. It would rather feeling fuzzy with its own matters down below. It was scouring through any available pocket of its pants, or any crevices that happened to lay down beneath its magical deposit. After awhile of searching, the demon appeared in joy with its findings and smiling incessantly for the struggle.

“Ah, here it is. This is the prime entrance to your starter kit, Juno.”

A golden colored key is the item that the demon has within its grasp. It fits with the key hole of the store with ease.

“Now, now, where is it? I have it down somewhere, but it takes time to locate it. I haven’t open this store for decades. ” muttered the demon to Juno before it laid its focus to the shelves behind the counter,”To kill the time, please read the guideline for your journey. It is important for you to know everything before doing the business around here.”

Without further ado, Juno snatched a magazine from the bookshelf nearby for his own knowledge to the drill in the future. The content inside could be defined by the direction from the cover. It is titled “The adventure manual for dummies”, meant to anybody relished for a refreshment or information of the city and their role as an adventurer.

“Interesting. I wonder if that demon published this one and wrote everything inside all by himself.”

The material inside refers to the basic induction of being an adventurer in the city. Within the meticulous writings of the demon, as Juno had in mind after seeing the heavy marks of scriptures upon the paper, it informed him of two essential facts. First, his threshold of power is measured after the amount of money spent on earth. Every $1000 is equal to 10 energy of damage, which he could allocate to whichever course of development of his available abilities. On the other hand, he could also choose to input the For the “points” referred in the criterion with value of 1 in every 1000 in cash used up in his domain,

For all of this ‘statistics’ and virtual imagery of the damage to work, he could access the information down his unconscious state to configure.

“Let me try it for once. I haven’t think of this before.”

By the instruction of the manual, Juno proceeded to follow it in his own thoughts. Picture of the categories appeared before his head a moment later, showing visual numbers of his statistics in real-time situation.  His highest rating goes to the intelligence by 10 in numbers, while it only exceeding the other ratio by one in overall. As a normal human with no supplementary training to his physique, his entire stats is pretty much ordinary to boot.

“I am weak, that’s so precise.” Murmured Juno to himself.

Secondly, he has to choose one random power for days of his disembark in the hell’s fighting grounds after the summoning phase. It could be more than just a single ability, but he has to level up to 20 for it to be unlocked, and the slot will increase in the interval of 10 level afterwards. There is no limit to his choice, since only his development and diligence for emptying the banks counts for this to work out.

After all, who would be fractured by a powerful, high level technique with zero damage output?