While the Illuminati, the mutants, the Knights of Camelot, and the entire world's attention were focused on the fight against the Sentinels, one man instead turned his attention toward something else.
Victor von Doom turned away from Albion, and instead of helping with the Sentinels, he returned home to Latveria.
Latveria, a small, isolated nation in the Balkans, was a place that was, in many ways, a reflection of its ruler. It was a land of order, of discipline, of absolute control.
A place where technology and magic coexisted, where science and sorcery were not seen as opposing forces, but as two sides of the same coin, two tools in the hands of a master craftsman.
And he was that master craftsman.
He was not just a king; he was a sorcerer, a scientist, a visionary. A man who had single-handedly transformed his nation from a backward, impoverished backwater into a technological and magical powerhouse.
He had fought hard to free it from the Sentinels; he had secured his borders and placed defenses all around, making it the fortress it was meant to be.
The sheer hostility of the place, combined with the fact that it was an area of low priority for the Sentinels, meant that peace had returned here almost as quickly as it had left Albion.
Now, he had returned.
Returned to his domain, a place that meant much to him, not because he cared about it, not really.
But because this place was his legacy.
Few people knew Doom's history, but it was not a happy one. His mother had been a witch, a woman who had made a pact with a demon, a pact that had cost her her life, a pact that had damned her soul to Hell.
And Victor, a child, had been unable to save her. He had watched her die, her body wracked with pain, her soul torn from her body by the very demon she had sought to control.
It was a trauma that had shaped him, that had driven him, that had fueled his quest for power. He had sought knowledge, he had sought strength, he had sought a way to defy fate, to overturn the very laws of existence.
He had studied science, he had delved into the arcane arts, he had pushed the boundaries of what was possible, all in the name of one goal: to free his mother's soul from the eternal damnation of Hell.
He had traveled to other dimensions, he had bargained with cosmic entities, he had faced down gods and monsters. He had done things that would have broken lesser men, all for the sake of a single, solitary purpose.
Yet all his efforts had been for naught; his power was but a firefly compared to the moon that was the demon who held his mother's soul.
It wasn't that he couldn't save her, but that it wouldn't be right, because so far, the only way he had found was to bargain for her freedom.
And Doom didn't make losing deals, and all bargaining with cosmic entities carried heavy burdens, a steep price.
The fact that it was difficult didn't mean he had given up, far from it.
He was still as determined as ever.
If anything, the farther down this path he walked, the greater his ambition became.
Whenever he encountered godly beings or cosmic monsters, a burning desire flared up in his chest.
A desire to usurp them.
To take their power for himself.
He had seen the weakness in so-called gods, seen their pride, their ego, and their single-mindedness.
They were strong, yes, but they were clearly flawed; even the so-called Goddess Rhongomyniad, Arthuria Pendragon, was clearly flawed—something she was at least able to recognize, which made her better than most.
But given their many flaws, he found them unworthy of being called gods.
Only someone truly flawless, someone who was perfect in every way, deserved to be called a god.
And he saw only one such person.
Himself.
He, Victor von Doom, with his genius, his willpower, and his mastery of both science and magic, was the only being in existence who was truly worthy of godhood.
It was not a delusion. It was a fact. A self-evident truth that he had come to understand through years of study, through decades of struggle.
And so, when he heard from Sir Agravain that the King of Albion was in Hell, fighting a war against the very beings who held his mother's soul captive, he saw not a crisis, but an opportunity.
A chance to achieve two of his goals with a single, masterful stroke.
A chance to free his mother's soul, and a chance to claim the power of the Lords of Hell for himself.
He walked through the halls of his castle, a place of cold, imposing stone, intricate arcane circuitry, and advanced technological wonders. It was a reflection of his own soul, a monument to his own brilliance.
He reached a hidden chamber, a place that only he knew about, a place where he conducted his most private, most dangerous experiments.
The room was circular, its walls covered in complex, interwoven patterns of runes and circuitry, a fusion of ancient magic and cutting-edge technology.
In the center of the room, on a raised dais, stood a massive circular archway, a gateway between worlds.
It was a device of his own design, a masterpiece of dimensional engineering, a tool that allowed him to travel to other planes of existence, to other realities, to other hells.
He had used it before, on his countless quests for power and knowledge. He had faced down demons, he had bargained with devils, he had walked in the shadow of cosmic dread.
He was not afraid. He was not intimidated.
He was ready.
He raised his hands, his fingers tracing the air, weaving a spell of immense complexity, a delicate tapestry of arcane energy that he had spent years perfecting.
The archway responded, the runes glowing with a sickly green light, the circuitry humming with barely contained power.
The air in the room began to shimmer, the very fabric of reality seeming to twist and warp, a vortex of swirling, chaotic energy forming within the archway.
He could feel the pull of the other side, the allure of the forbidden, the promise of untold power.
He stepped forward, his armor, a gleaming suit of adamantium and enchantments, a testament to his own genius, humming in anticipation.
He had no idea what awaited him beyond the threshold; he didn't know how the King of Knights' war was going, how Hell was faring.
But he was still confident; he believed that as long as Mephisto was properly distracted, he would be able to save his mother's soul.
To others, Hell might be a place of dread and doom, but to Doom? Only Mephisto himself gave him pause.
And from everything he knew about that demon, he had no doubt that he was behind this war, the mastermind pulling the strings, which also made him the biggest target.
While Doom might have a thing or two to say about Arthuria Pendragon, he didn't think she was someone who would fail to recognize an opportunity when she saw one.
If she was even half as smart as he thought her to be, she would be targeting Mephisto, which in turn would give him the chance he needed.
Both to save his mother, and to take advantage of the conflict to steal some power for himself.
One of Mephisto's countless treasures? Or perhaps something belonging to one of the lesser lords?
A soul, a powerful artifact, anything would do.
So long as it was a victory for him, and not a loss.
With one final, confident step, he crossed the threshold, the vortex of energy swallowing him whole, the world of Latveria fading away, replaced by a new, more terrifying reality.
He was in Hell.
The air was thick with the stench of brimstone and sulfur, a nauseating miasma that clung to the back of the throat. The sky, a swirling vortex of blood-red and sickly green, was a canvas of eternal torment, a masterpiece of cosmic horror.
The ground, a cracked and barren wasteland of jagged obsidian rock, was littered with the broken bodies of the damned, their screams a cacophony of agony that echoed across the desolate landscape.
It was a place of unending suffering, a realm of pure, unadulterated evil.
Or so it had been the last time he paid it a visit.
Now? It was broken, filled with holy and pure energies that clashed with the power of evil. Seas of blood had been boiled and mountains of bone reduced to dust.
This wasn't a mere battlefield; there was no fighting, no clashing armies.
Only total devastation.
Hell itself had been cleaved in two! The very land was broken, and through the gap, one could see the swirling energies of the void itself, pure chaos.
To call this devastation a beautiful sight would not be an exaggeration, at least not for him.
His lips curled into a smile, a thin, cruel expression of satisfaction. The King of Knights had exceeded his expectations. She had not just started a war; she had brought about the apocalypse.
He had never expected a mere goddess to have such strength.
Perhaps he had underestimated her? Or perhaps she had been hiding her true power?
Either way, this was a good thing.
He had thought he could, at most, steal a little power, but if this was how Hell had ended up, what about Mephisto himself?
The demon must have suffered greatly; maybe he was already half-dead?
Whatever the case, this was the perfect chance, not just to save his mother, but perhaps he could even try to take half of Hell itself.
The idea that he, Doom, would become the ruler of Hell was intoxicating, a dream he hadn't even dared to have before now. But now? He wasn't so sure it was a dream anymore.
But he also forced himself to calm down. He knew better than most that greed was a fatal flaw; there was no chance that this victory was so clean. After all, even if Mephisto was near death, the others weren't.
The other lords might have grown weaker too, but none would be truly dead. So even if he managed to get what he wanted, he would also become the target of all of them.
And even if he got rid of Mephisto, he had no desire to become the new main target for the rest of the lords.
No, he still had to be smart.
Doom never acted rashly, and he wouldn't start now.
And so, he took to the skies, his armor's propulsion systems, a fusion of repulsor technology and arcane levitation, allowing him to fly over the ravaged landscape with silent, effortless grace.
He had a destination in mind, a place he had visited before, a place he knew well.
He was heading for the Citadel of Mephisto, the throne of the Lord of Hell.
It was a place of immense power, a nexus of dark energy, a fortress that had stood for eons, a symbol of the demon's unyielding dominion.
And the place that held his mother's soul.
(End of chapter)
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