Bahamut

Valac lunged forward, the six-armed Duke a blur of twisted motion. Claws raked the air, each slash sharp enough to shear metal, but Mike moved fluidly as he ducked under the first two swipes, jumped to the side as another hand tried to cleave his head from his shoulders, then slammed both claws into Valac's torso with enough force to send out a shockwave behind him.

The Duke stumbled back, armor cracked.

But Mike didn't stop.

His claws wrapped around one of Valac's lower arms and ripped it from its socket. Tendons and black blood sprayed across the canyon floor. The Duke screamed, a high-pitched, inhuman cracking sound.

Mike's eyes glowed molten red. "You're not even close to Bune."

He opened his jaws wide and bit into the base of another arm, tearing it free like gristle from bone. His tail coiled and snapped, smashing through two demons who'd come crawling from the canyon shadows. Their bodies exploded on impact.

Valac tried to stagger backward, wings unfurling to take to the air.

Mike leapt before he could ascend.

He tackled the Duke mid-flight, driving both of them into the side of the canyon wall as stone and dust filled the air. They crashed deep into the canyon floor in a crater.

Mike stood over the broken body of Valac.

The demon Duke gasped, twisted sideways. "You… you are wrong to resist the Witch. Hecate will rip the veil wide…"

Mike slammed his clawed foot onto the Duke's remaining wing, crushing it.

"Where is Hecate?"

Valac snarled, trying to raise a hand in defiance. Mike grabbed it by the wrist and drove his claws through the palm, pinning it to the canyon floor.

He leaned down, his fangs inches from Valac's face.

"You want to talk about the witch and her plans?" he hissed. "I will kill all of your kind. Either way, you die. How you die is on you."

Mike grabbed the edge of Valac's twisted helmet and peeled it off.

Underneath was not a face. Half-melted flesh. A twisted mimicry of humanity. Empty sockets burned with violet fire.

Mike drove a claw into one socket and hooked it.

Valac screamed. "I will tell you nothing, dragon!"

Mike drove the claw in further.

"Only the kings and great dukes know her plans!"

"Where can I find them?" Mike growled.

"You can't go there!" Valac continued screaming.

"You're going to open a fissure," Mike snarled. "To the location you come from. I will find the ones who know her plans."

Valac thrashed, frothing black blood.

"You can't enter the Pit!"

Mike shoved the claw even deeper as the socket around the once-burning eye began to cave in. "I didn't ask if I could enter. I told you to fucking open it."

A hundred demon soldiers surrounded the canyon rim now, watching in stunned silence. Their Duke, bleeding, pinned, mutilated.

"Do it!" Mike roared.

The Duke gasped. "You'll burn… in it. Even your soul…"

Mike grinned.

"I already burned and suffered, demon. Open it."

Valac extended his trembling remaining hand. With a choked incantation in the ancient tongue, he began carving infernal runes into the air. The symbols glowed, then snapped downward into the earth.

The canyon floor cracked.

A fissure opened.

The air around it howled, a vacuum of death and pressure. Screams echoed from within.

Mike rose, stepping back just enough to let the Duke see his expression.

"Fucking demons," he said in a low growl.

Valac's face twisted in rage. "The other dukes and kings will tear you apart!"

Mike put his clawed hand to the demon's chest. He drove his claw forward.

Straight through Valac's chest.

The demon screamed as the last remaining burning eye socket extinguished. The canyon trembled at the scream of the Duke.

Mike grabbed what remained of Valac's body under his claws. He consumed chunks at a time. Small bursts of power flowed into his body. He felt minor wounds sealing, scales knitting over rent flesh.

The demons at the canyon rim sounded horns of retreat, but before they could flee he shot blasts of black and red fire, engulfing the rim.

Screams filled the air as demons burned to ash. Charred bone and twisted iron crashed into the canyon below. He turned, satisfied.

Mike stood at the edge of the opened fissure. The Pit stared back at him as if it was alive, vast, and hungry. From its depths came the screams of horrors and voices whispered in languages no soul was meant to hear.

He didn't blink. Didn't look away.

"Wait!"

Mike turned his head to see a falcon land on a nearby boulder. It stared at him with familiar intelligence.

To Mike's surprise, it spoke. "It's me Binyai! I am not permitted to leave the domain of my king. That fissure is a separate domain. I will inform Hamza that you have entered that domain."

"…Thanks," Mike replied, almost absently.

The falcon vanished in a ripple of air, leaving only a few disturbed feathers behind.

Mike spread his wings. The air shuddered around him. He felt the boundary resisting his passage, pushing him away like two magnets repelling.

He roared, essence flaring red and black, and pushed through, forcing open the gate with raw force.

The Pit pulsed as Mike vanished into its depths, his roar echoing behind him.

The world changed.

After a shimmer of light and a violent pulling sensation, Mike emerged into a skyless realm. A vast plain of red sand stretched endlessly before him with fires dotting the sand. The sky was black, not with clouds, but with nothing.

The air was heavy with sulphur and rot.

Below him were structures of black stone, wrought like twisted cathedrals, each radiating heat and hatred. Groups of demons patrolled, unaware of his descent.

Mike roared, and fire washed across the landscape.

Demons burst into flames, their shrieks short-lived.

He landed beside a blackened structure and tore the iron door free with one hand. Inside, a terrified demon cowered behind a brazier.

Mike grabbed it with one claw, yanking it into his grasp.

"Where are the kings and dukes?" he growled.

The demon trembled, eyes wild. It pointed shakily toward the horizon. "T-the Obsidian Road… leads to the Three Thrones… s-south past the Daggered Spires…"

"Then lead me," Mike said.

The demon's legs gave out. It crumpled.

Mike snarled and raised his hand, two wisps of flame flicked from his snout and burned off the demon's arms.

It howled in agony, writhing in the sand.

"LEAD ME!" Mike's voice boomed as his claws cracked the ground beneath them.

Sobbing, the demon staggered to its feet, the ends of its stumps still glowing. It began walking toward the far horizon.

Mike followed behind, his shadow long and monstrous, stretching across the red sand.

The kings and dukes of hell would know soon enough:

The Dragon had come to the Pit.

And nothing born of this realm would leave it unchanged.