Cassius's voice turned shrill with rage. Facing a demon that dared to lecture humanity made him lose control.
"Demons are living things too!"
"Like hell you are! I'll beat the life out of you!"
The demon's roar and Cassius's cursing collided. A massive fist swung upward, connecting squarely with the demon's leg.
CRACK.
Cassius's bone snapped. In exchange, a massive fissure tore through the Mallet Lord's leg. The demon stumbled back, its sturdy limbs suddenly failing it.
Whether demons were technically "alive" was irrelevant. To the humans living in the slaughterhouse called Sanctuary, demons deserved to die. Even if there were cultists driven mad by their influence, whose fault was that? The demons!
Demons didn't need to fight for "living space." They had the Burning Hells—a territory so vast it had no borders. The Angels were the same; they didn't need Sanctuary. The High Heavens were infinite.
And what did humans do? They just wanted to exist in the narrow gap between the two!
Cassius had lived through the Barbarian migrations. No food, no shelter—only endless hunger and a bottomless supply of demonic fodder.
Pity a demon? Not even the stupidest cultist truly pitied them. Powerful, massive creatures that could kill dozens of commoners just by stepping on them didn't need pity.
"Cassius, you're already out of the game," Raekor's voice suddenly rang out.
She had finished her business on the walls. Or perhaps Orek, that old stubborn mule, had finally decided to change his mind and take over his duties.
"So what? We've got a philosopher among the demons. He calls himself 'Crush-Mace'! I'm just having a debate with him!"
Cassius turned and shouted at Raekor, completely ignoring the fact that she was currently far stronger than him. In normal times, he wouldn't dare use that tone. Raekor wasn't known for her patience.
"A philosopher? Cassius, your jokes are getting better." Raekor glanced at the demon, trying to find any hint of "thought" in its brutish form.
"It gets funnier! Philosopher Crush-Mace here thinks humans have never tried to 'understand' the demonic perspective! I'm about to die laughing!"
Cassius let out a roar, charging again despite his dangling, broken arm. It flopped against his back with a wet thud.
Raekor's hand clamped onto his shoulder, stopping him mid-stride. Against a resurrected Raekor who could exert her full power, Cassius had no chance of resisting.
"That is funny. Which is why I've always been better at 'reasoning' than you, Cassius."
She patted his shoulder and stepped forward.
Rules? What rules? Who saw anything? The referee had left the field. The outcome was decided. There was no such thing as "foul play" anymore. If the demons had a problem with the result, Raekor was more than happy to "reason" with them.
Cassius's face went through a kaleidoscope of colors before he grumbled and tucked his broken arm into his collar for support. He needed Malah to look at it; setting a bone fracture poorly would lead to permanent issues. Even if he was a ghost... or a "dead spirit," if you prefer.
He needed a professional. He couldn't do it himself. Eighty percent of his brain was occupied by a vast dictionary of curse words. The rest was reserved for friends and memories. There was no room left for medical knowledge.
"Raekor, I remember your 'reasoning' process. It was one charge plus a hammer, then two charges plus a hammer, right?" Cassius asked, slightly miffed.
"What?" Raekor asked, turning back while standing on the remaining half of the demon's torso.
"Fine. You are better at reasoning."
Cassius's figure flickered and vanished. He couldn't remember if he had cursed at her earlier, so he decided to make a quick exit. He always felt a bit inadequate around Raekor. He struggled even against a raging bull like Kanuck; he stood no chance against a woman who "reasoned" like her. Getting beaten up was never fun.
"By the way! Make sure that demon remembers your 'logic' deep in his soul!" Cassius's voice echoed one last time.
Behind a nearby wall, John Constantine was navigating a narrow passage, heading deeper into the mountain. From the shouts of the battling Barbarians, he had pieced together how this fight would end.
To prove a theory, he intended to be the last one standing in this "rift."
Behind him, Bruce Wayne followed in absolute silence. Both men had something to prove, and thus, they had taken the same path.
This secret tunnel had once been a refuge for the weakest children and the elderly during the great siege. It went so deep that even after Arreat was turned into a crater, this section had remained intact.
Now, it contained only the skeletons of Barbarians who had been trapped and died in the darkness.
The air here was thick with fury and fear.
But there was no "glory." No warriors were born in this hole.
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