Chapter 6: How to Obtain Power

  The next day.

  'Time to show these peasants who's back in the sect,' Ignatius thought as he went to Boruta again with a confident expression.

  Evidently, the humiliations of the previous day had already vanished from his memory.

  His noble features, the result of a distinguished bloodline, and his proud gaze indicated a true infernal aristocrat, for whom a harem of she-devils would line up.

  'Now that I've fulfilled the stupid requirement with the adept, the old man will surely remove this awful nickname from me...'

  During the night, Emptyhead had barely slept a wink, thinking about his lost reputation. This was all due to cultural norms in hell, which placed immense importance on officially bestowed titles. It was an effect of the rule of the Lord of Hell, also known as the King of Names and Symbols.

  'Ugh... why complicate life so much?' Ignatius wondered about the point of these regulations.

  He simply wanted to bask in the glow of his father's legacy and seduce as many she-devils as possible. All in all, very simple needs that, due to the current situation, could not be met.

  With great hope in his eyes, he soon appeared on ??czyca, before the Voivode.

  "I did what you wanted, now take this cursed nickname off me!" he shouted at his superior.

  There was a threat in his voice that, of course, could have no substance. He was much weaker than his boss, but he liked to put on a show, which—as he himself believed—made his romantic conquests easier.

  Boruta was not very interested in this theater:

  "Then instead of standing here like an idiot, get to work. The Regulations for Mountain Development are strict in the first thirty days," he said, waving the unfortunate moron away.

  The Voivode was currently reading new pamphlets—the devils' favorite literary form—delivered directly from the thirtieth infernal dimension.

  His words, however, made Ignatius narrow his eyelids.

  "What Regulations for Mountain Development?"

  The concept rang a bell, but he wasn't at all sure if he was right. He had never before paid attention to such idiocies as rules.

  'Such nonsense is directed only at insignificant devils, so definitely not for me,' he judged in his mind.

  "..." Boruta got a little irritated that the fool was still interrupting his reading.

  He was just getting to the punchline, in which a famous poet was slandering the voivode of the 65th dimension, his old enemy, and meanwhile, the intrusive guest would not let up.

  "Here's a copy, now scram," he only growled, his eyes flashing menacingly.

  A scroll titled "Infernal OHS for a Mountain Lord: What You Must Do to Not Have Your Mountain Taken Away Immediately After Being Assigned" floated through the air to Ignatius.

  'Is this some kind of joke?!' Ignatius was bewildered, wanting to ask what kind of mockery this was. "What—" But then, like a bolt of lightning, he felt Boruta's warning gaze upon him.

  In the end, he could do nothing but sigh lightly.

  'Better not to irritate the old man so soon after returning...' he concluded and, with a graceful leap into the air, disappeared from his superior's residence.

  ---

  Back on his mountain, he reluctantly began to read.

  'Why is this damn thing 66.6 pages long?!' he despaired internally.

  He had once barely had enough focus to read 6.6-page brochures, and it had been 20 years since he had seen any written text.

  'A devil longs for home only to be met with nothing but disappointments...' he shook his head, displeased.

  He had no choice, however, and slowly got to work.

  "The rule about acquiring the first adept, I already know that," he hissed through his teeth impatiently, then, letter by letter, began to read the deliberately convoluted devilish prose.

  "I didn't know the first adept has to be a representative adept," he said, after another five minutes of reading. His temples were tense, and his eyelids were narrowed.

  'Maybe I made a mistake with my choice?' He remembered that the concept was quite important, and he knew nothing about this random human other than the fact that he was naive.

  Unfortunately, the worst was yet to come, and when he read the next sentence, his face darkened, and he almost screamed in terror.

  "The main purpose of the representative adept is to participate in the holy pilgrimage, and his results may be the basis for taking the mountain away from the guardian."

  Ignatius jumped to his feet, his back completely wet with cold sweat.

  'It's impossible! They can't take my mountain away from me!'

  Owning a mountain was a great distinction in hell and had an excellent effect on one's status. They were usually awarded for exceptional services and turned a fiend into a local celebrity. In Ignatius's case, it was an inheritance from his father, who had made a huge contribution to the development of the End of the World Sect and the entire 66th infernal dimension.

  'The nickname can be reversed somehow, but if I lose the Mountain of Plague and Misfortune, it's all over for me!'

  Even 20 years ago, he had picked up she-devils mainly thanks to this wonderful status. If he lost it... he would be an ordinary, gray, and poor devil, of which there were billions throughout hell. So he immediately began to search for the points concerning the pilgrimage.

  These events concerned the elite of the infernal dimensions, devils with immense talents, heroes of the masses. And he had taken on as a student... a naive human with no power!

  'I have to undo this somehow!' he thought, terrified.

  Gritting his teeth, he moved on to the next sentence, looking for clues, only for authentic horror to flash in his eyes! Crumpling the regulations in his hand, he immediately leaped into the air in search of his adept.

  The situation was deadly serious.

  Justinian was sitting cross-legged in front of the dry fountain, contemplating the devil's words from yesterday.

  'What did he mean by the path to immortality?' It was a very mysterious statement, and the considerable hunger he was feeling was distracting him from his meditation. 'On top of that, I barely gathered enough water from the surrounding plants to quench my thirst...'

  He was just about to complain that this wasn't how he imagined devilish pacts when Ignatius appeared in the air with a loud boom.

  His temples were sweaty, and there was panic in his eyes. Perhaps even more than when he had first seen him in the tomb.

  "Have you discovered the meaning of my words yet?" he began, smiling faintly.

  Before Justinian could even answer, however, the "master" cut him off.

  "Haha, just as I thought, you have a great talent for immortal cultivation!" he stammered, surprising the boy.

  "Actuall—" Justinian was about to ask when he was interrupted again:

  "Yes, yes, now is the time to choose the right path for you. Follow me!"

  The boy, just like last time, was lifted into the air and, together with the devil, traveled kilometers in the span of a few seconds. He wasn't offended by the unpleasant form of transport, however. On the contrary—his eyes shone with a bright light, and he felt great excitement—he knew what cultivation was.

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  'I've heard that cultivators, with the approval of the Great Order, possess unbelievable powers! Apparently, powerful kingdoms have entire legions of these amazing heroes!' he thought, fascinated. He hadn't expected that this was the path the devil would show him for revenge.

  What's more, a rather awkward thought then occurred to him:

  'But does that mean that devilish powers are also the result of immortal cultivation?'

  He was not given a chance to continue this line of thought, however, because they had just landed.

  Or rather, they almost fell over, landing in a large clearing in front of what looked like a ghostly quarry.

  Black rock fragments of various sizes lay everywhere, and many devils milled about, often families with children, who immediately focused their attention on them.

  "Is that Ignatius the Empty-headed?"

  "Haha, what's that idiot doing here?"

  "What's with the toilet cleaner?"

  The devils commented with smiles of pity on their red faces.

  Ignatius himself, however, had no time to be offended by this now—he had a bigger problem. The terrible sentence he had read in the regulations from Boruta still echoed in his mind.

  'If the representative student does not obtain a technique within a week, the mountain is returned to the Voivode.'

  Such a turn of events was an absolute nightmare for him, and he would rather be sliced up by Diana for the next 20,000 years than let it happen.

  'It's all because this damn human became my adept!' he thought, terrified.

  Humans were simply... not adapted to infernal techniques and usually had to go through several months of acclimatization to even think about acquiring any. And that made the Emptyhead's situation absolutely dramatic.

  'This boy must obtain a technique in the near future!' he repeated to himself frantically.

  "Well, little devil, you must now approach the stones and introduce yourself. You only have one chance for one of them to like you and be the basis of your cultivation," he said, patting the boy on the back in a ridiculous manner.

  Justinian looked at him, confused, as did the crowd, which was paying more and more attention to the strange event.

  "Erm... what do you mean?" the boy finally asked, not feeling very comfortable being the center of so much attention.

  "Well!" Ignatius snapped back, irritated that the stupid human dared to ask questions. "Listen, son, to cultivate, you need to obtain a technique stone. To obtain a technique stone, you have to impress it with your devilishness, and generally, the bigger stone, the better, and the small ones are the worst, and you must reject them!" he recited all the facts he was struggling to recall in his head.

  This caused even more confusion on Justinian's face and strange looks from the crowd.

  "But I... well..." the boy replied, as the Empty-headed lost his patience.

  "Listen here, there's only one chance to do this. I've covered you in a devilish aura, so a few good stones will surely choose you. Just go there and introduce yourself," the irritated devil whispered, leaning over the boy.

  Justinian still hesitated, but he thought of the revenge he had to achieve and, with determination in his eyes, nodded his head. At the center of many gazes, he slowly approached the sharp, black stones lying in front of the quarry.

  'I must remember to choose the biggest rock possible and reject the small ones...' he repeated to himself.

  A little stressed by the looks the devils were giving him from the right and left—some looking quite inhuman, with large wings protruding from their backs or strange horns—he took a deep breath and decided what he would say.

  "My name is Justinian the Just, from the Kingdom of Peace, and I am here to find a tool to administer Justice!" he shouted with all the strength he could muster.

  As his words echoed through the quarry, at first, he was met with silence.

  What happened next exceeded his wildest expectations...

  The magical laws in the air seemed to stir, and suddenly the entire mountain in front of him, as well as the ground, began to shake! The devils present began to scream in shock, and many even started to flee! What's more... some began to bleed from their ears and howl in pain!

  "What kind of degenerate is this?!"

  "Mercy! We're here with small children!"

  "Who let this awful migrant in here?!"

  This was all because the 66th infernal dimension... had never heard such blasphemy before!

  It wasn't just the devils, who were covering their children's ears; even the stones in the area were jumping back in panic! What was worse, the diabolical aura woven by Ignatius around Justinian completely dissipated!

  'What is the meaning of this?' the boy thought, watching the pandemonium unfold.

  Quite a few fiends, disgusted by the behavior of the degenerate who had just appeared, left the clearing without delay.

  'Did I do something wrong? It seems to me that these rocks actually moved away...'

  Taking it for an illusion, he decided to approach the nearest pile of stones and simply reach for the first one he could. Then, to his surprise, a completely absurd scene took place.

  The stones, sensing him nearby... began to flee in a panic!

  In the quarry, just a moment ago loud with curses and slander, silence reigned once again.

  'Okay, something is very wrong here,' the boy turned completely pale, and Ignatius felt like screaming.

  The surrounding crowds reacted with consternation, but soon, more and less hidden smirks blossomed.

  "Has that stupid migrant gone mad?"

  "What was he even trying to achieve?"

  "Maybe he came to embarrass himself on purpose to brighten our day?"

  The young man didn't know what they were talking about, but he felt the gravity of the situation.

  So, gritting his teeth, he began... to chase the stones.

  'I just need to catch one!' he told himself.

  Unfortunately, his attempt ended ridiculously—all the stones fled from him in a panic, and not one even let itself be touched.

  Desperate, he looked towards Ignatius and then saw that the devil himself was terribly panicked.

  'I must have screwed something up...' he thought, clenching his fists.

  Of course, he couldn't have known that the technique stones simply preferred devils and infernally-disposed individuals. Such was their nature, and if he were undergoing a similar test in the human kingdom, he probably wouldn't have had any problems.

  On this infernal ground, however, the virtues he had honored all his life were his biggest problem.

  'Ignatius warned earlier that there's only one chance to win over the stones...' he thought, growing paler in the face of the problem's gravity. 'I can't fail now!'

  Realizing that this was his only chance, he decided not to move from the spot until he convinced a stone. Unfortunately, he had no idea what kind of situation this would lead him into.

  After sitting in place for two hours, he slowly became the talk of the town. Absolutely no stone was interested in him, unlike the surrounding fiends, who looked at him more and more often and more and more sarcastically.

  Devils loved to gossip, and thanks to cultivation and the associated rapid travel, rumors spread quickly. Because of this, the news of the strange man who, after uttering a blasphemy, couldn't convince a single stone to join him spread like wildfire.

  "Did he try to cheat the holy test by hiding under an infernal aura?"

  "His master is the Empty-headed?!"

  "The first thing he did to show his character was blasphemy against hell?!"

  The whole area was abuzz with rumors.

  Although the news had not yet spread throughout the entire dimension, crowds still came to the quarry to see the impudent man who, with such foolishness, had alienated the entire cursed rock.

  The most emotional, of course, was Ignatius. He was completely terrified and was already considering what to do when he lost his status-granting mountain. The awful panic combined with his noble features looked absolutely comical, and more than one she-devil laughed to herself upon seeing him.

  "I need you to achieve my revenge!" Justinian, who was also becoming more and more of a nervous wreck, shouted at the stones.

  Over the past few hours, he had learned what exactly the test consisted of and felt his crisis growing ever larger.

  'If these stones really don't choose me, I will never avenge Sister Teresa...' he thought, turning deathly pale.

  He frantically tried to come up with some solution, but he knew too little about hell to turn the situation around.

  The next day, Justinian was still sitting in the same spot. Throughout the night, he had begged the stones to choose him—of course, to no effect. The sensationalism he was generating was also slowly wearing off, and the devils were increasingly focusing on themselves.

  Some were taking the rock test, some were simply gossiping, and still others were engaged in a healthy walk or other activities.

  "Did you hear that in the finals of beating up human goody-two-shoes, the eighteenth hell won against the forty-fifth?!"

  "Impossible! The forties are known as the biggest brutes!" two devils conversed over a bitter, pitch-black beer.

  There were even some who tried to turn the blasphemer's plight into an opportunity for profit:

  "Do you think he'll sit there for long?"

  "Ha, I'll bet he collapses in less than an hour!"

  "I'm in!"

  They didn't care about his suffering. What mattered was the entertainment this unusual situation provided.

  Ignatius was biting his nails in the crowd and had even prepared a list of human kingdoms where he would spend the remaining tens of thousands of years of his life in exile.

  'Maybe I should try again with that queen from the kid's kingdom?' he wondered frantically.

  All in all—life in the infernal dimension went on—only the human boy, dehydrated and hungry, still sat in the same spot.

  Two days later, the interest in him once again reached a kind of peak.

  It was clear that if this continued, the boy would die here. Despite a general dislike for human migrants, even the fiends didn't want to watch such scenes, especially since the human's struggle with the rocks was being observed by children.

  Ignatius, who in the meantime had finished studying the regulations, also felt a little moved by the boy's actions.

  'Why is that fool sitting there so stubbornly, anyway?'

  He then realized that he knew practically nothing about him, despite the fate that had previously brought them together.

  Justinian himself felt himself losing and regaining consciousness. The lack of water was becoming unbearable, but he was ready to die if he had to.

  'After all, what kind of life is it if I can't settle the score?' he thought. 'What kind of life is it where there is such a stain on justice?'

  His skin already looked very sick, and his eyes were sunken. If someone saw him in a dark alley now, they would probably find him more terrifying than many a real devil.

  The rocks, however, remained unmoved by his tragedy.

  When four days had passed, there were fewer crowds than before. The devils had taken their children away so they wouldn't watch such drastic scenes. It became clear to everyone that the strange man would die today. Ignatius didn't want to watch it either and was even considering whether to return to his mountain, but something was stopping him.

  'Haha, what a story I'll miss if I miss his death!' he tried to convince himself, pushing away thoughts of remorse.

  Justinian, however, could not hold on any longer. Not more than thirty minutes passed before he involuntarily fell from a kneeling position onto his back. He tried to fight, but he couldn't get up again.

  The fiends present sighed quietly. They had to admit that despite his defeat, the man's stubbornness had earned their respect. He had not given up until the very end.

  "..." It was unknown who started it, but soon, quiet applause filled with respect broke out from the few devils who were still in the clearing.

  Ignatius was clapping too.

  Of course, Justinian didn't care; he was in too terrible a state to pay attention. His health was deteriorating further, and he was even having hallucinations.

  Sometimes he heard his guardian sister's voice. Sometimes it seemed to him that he saw his brother dying in the fire. And now, a worm appeared on his skin.

  The boy, feverish and fighting the delusions, tried to brush it off, but it was no use.

  Losing the last remnants of contact with reality, he decided to crush it and then... he suddenly opened his eyes wide.

  Only now did he see that the clearing, which had been clapping before, was in absolute silence. Before their eyes, something without any precedent in history had happened. After four days, a tiny infernal stone decided that his suicidal stubbornness was sufficiently devilish for it and bonded with the human!