Excerpt from the wise dragons demonicon: hellhounds

Not all demons and devils are intelligent or humanoid, some are far more bestial and form the fauna of the abyss and hell, one such creature that can be found in both realms is the hellhound.

There are different races of hellhound, the most common hellhound is the black hellhound, these fiendish beasts have fur black as ash and move through the shadows and the darkness before striking as a pack, intelligent and fierce they are able to take down prey several times larger than themselves, since they are beast like demons they do not want your soul but your meat and flesh…..

They can grow as big as an average human and will never lose a trail when they have found it…..

Other varieties exist too like the burning hellhounds whose packs are under the command of matriarchs or patriarchs who can fight against higher ranked demons and devils….

….maybe the most rare and terrifying hellhound is the hell pug whose…….

Thorn looked around her as she walked next to Onewing, the houses in this town were all inhabited by humans, children, adults, elders, she could feel their souls presence from where she was standing. Had she been a demon like Kratos or an unbound one she would probably have tried to claim them by killing these humans or by tempting them. Yet here she was, a deviant succubus who had never been interested in seduction but had been interested in combat, in a contract with a summoner that would only allow the claiming of the souls of truly heinous people.

Needless to say that Thorn had not gathered many souls in the mortal realm after joining Iskander, in fact, she never truly had such a huge desire for souls anyways but still it felt strange for her to be in the presence of so many easy victims whose souls could greatly enhance her power and not striking. “Strange is it not?” Thorn said it out loud, making Onewing stop to look at her, “s-strange?”

The stormwing succubus nodded, “yes it is, don’t you feel them, all these souls?” The griefwing succubus looked at her feet, “I feel them but what does it matter anymore, I am a griefwing now, not a proper succubus, I wouldn’t even know how to collect them even if I wanted to.” Onewing closed her eyes, she remembered every lesson her mother had given her on the succubus way to extract mortal souls, the memories were now painful like every memory she had for nowadays those lessons could no longer help her.

“Well I never wanted to use the succubus way, Thorn said thinking back to her own youth, my mother tried forcing me to do such things but I rather fought.” Onewing looked at her, “at least you are still you, you were a warrior and now you are a warrior demon, I was someone before becoming this and now….” She shivered, what was she actually, a griefwing, a dishonoured, scarred and weak succubus who was little more than an imp.

“Thorn tell me honestly, she began, do you think I will ever be normal again?” Thorn flinched, “what did you just say?” Onewing looked her straight in the eyes, “will I ever be able to become normal again?” Suddenly the griefwing succubus felt a strong breeze rush through the air as lightning crackled in Thorns eyes. “Onewing, She said with a voice that sounded as if Thorn could snap any moment now, listen verry carefully now.” Onewing felt afraid, but not from the lightning or the wind, Thorn would not try to harm her, she knew that, but she was afraid for the answer the succubus would give.

“You did not choose this, Thorn said, just like I did not choose my family but what is done is done, you have to move on before you go crazy, mortals are not the only ones who can be driven mad by such things, even semi immortals like ourselves.” Onewing shook her head, “you don’t know what this is like Thorn, it’s not just the memories or my wounds, do you know what I feel even stronger than the souls of these people here?”

Thorn seemed taken aback for a moment, she and Onewing got along but talking about her feelings or memories was something she had only ever done when she was mad at someone, it had only happened one time before but she had never told anything about feeling something else than souls. Every demon, including herself wanted to gather mortal souls, some like the wrath demons wanted to gather power to let their master into the mortal plane of existence, others like greed demons simply hoarded them to gather wealth and influence, but for most demons it was to grow stronger and to rise up the ranks.

After spending so much time with Iskander Thorn no longer truly desired to gather them but if she could do it and no one could prevent it she would probably still do it, as long as doing it did not inconvenience iskander, then she would be screwed thanks to the terms in her pact of trust.

As a stormwing succubus she could now only gather souls by making contracts or killing mortals (btw: since stormwing succubi are destructive fiends their contracts most often involve slaughter and battle). Onewing however didn’t know how she could gather souls or which contracts she had to make to get them, it had only made her even more unsure about herself. But what could she possibly sense in this village other than souls?

“I feel the pain, the suffering and all their bad memories, Onewing began, of all these mortals in this town!” Thorns eyes shot open, what did she just say? Onewing pointed at one of the houses they passed, “that man living there lost his wife and became an alcoholic, he thinks about committing suicide.”

Before Thorn could fully process what she said she pointed at another house, “that woman beat one of her children to death in a fit of rage and suffers from it every day!” Thorn then saw her pointing at the direction they came from, “and there in that inn lies Iskander, thinking about why the gods have done this to him and why it came to this!” Again tears of blood flowed across her torn up face, “how can you talk about accepting this thorn if these mortals can’t even accept the things they did and live on like before!?”

Thorn was speechless, Iskander had told her about griefwing succubi, about the suffering that they had to go through according to what other demons had told him but never had she realized just how different her kind of deviant succubi was from Onewings kind. “Please do not talk about it anymore Thorn, Onewing sobbed, We’ll just go get those weapons and return.”

Thorn nodded, she could feel that arguing with Onewing or talking to her anymore in this state was not going to end well for both of them, Onewing did not know this but Thorn had fought a griefwing in the arena once, the only reason she had not been killed was because even as a deviant succubus she still was a succubus, illusion magic was not verry effective on her, but it had been on other demons in the arena.

“For the rest of the walk the two demonesses were silent, apart from the sobbing of Onewing that was. Soon they stood in front of the blacksmith and the weapons shop and Thorn grinned menacingly as she looked through the shop window. There laid a weapon that she’d been searching for since the day she got out of the abyss, a weapon made by human craftsman for foot soldiers that had proven itself so effective that all Frienian soldiers had been taught to wield it.

“Finally I have found you, Thorn said in a voice that sounded like she’d found a long lost loved one, my dear halberd.” Onewing looked at the weapon that her companion seemed so fixated on, she had to admit that even though she did not know much about weapons it certainly looked quiet deadly. At first glance it looked like some type of spear, meant for stabbing, but then she saw the axe blade and realized it was a more versatile weapon, and of course Thorn being the weapon obsessed person she was would want one.

“You know Onewing, Thorn looked at her with an exited look, some human women in the mortal realms apparently say that gems and diamonds are a girls best friend, in my case that is weapons.”