"Subjects of Hell, destroy them! Drive these filthy madmen back into the Abyss!" Cassius's roar thundered across the battlefield.
At the red dragon's command, players from the Material Plane and native devil soldiers alike charged forward with soaring morale, relentlessly pursuing the routing demons.
At this moment, it was as if the red dragon aloft in the sky were the true Lord of Hell, commanding the armies of Avernus.
Witnessing the devils' fervent response and the magnificent aura with which the red dragon commanded the host, Bel's expression darkened by the second. Fury flickered uncontrollably in his eyes, and his heart grew heavy.
That greedy red dragon, that damned Cinder Emperor—those were supposed to be my lines!
"Never mind anything else, open fire with everything you've got! Slaughter every last demon! Glory to the Machine Cult!"
*Boom! Boom!*
Wyverns wheeled across the sky as bombs and missiles rained down into the demonic horde like a torrential storm, triggering earth-shattering explosions that blasted countless demons into charred cinders.
Sky airships cruised at full throttle, sweeping beams of searing light across the battlefield. Wherever the light passed, not a blade of grass survived, demons were eradicated, and deep fissures were carved into the rugged earth.
Steam tanks thundered across the ground, careening into the mass of demons with utter impunity, grinding heaps of fiends into mangled meat.
"We haven't lost yet! For the great Lord Kostchtchie! For the supreme will of the Abyss!" A frost shaman raised his scepter high, conjuring a howling blizzard that swept toward the players.
The tanar'ri frost giants' eyes turned crimson, their expressions savage. Bellowing at the top of their lungs, they wildly brandished giant clubs and spears, charging toward the players amidst the biting gales.
Yet at that very moment, a menacing blood-red figure materialized in midair. Towering and broad-shouldered, with bat wings unfurled from his back, a steel pitchfork clutched in hand, he was wreathed entirely in infernal hellfire.
It was none other than the pit fiend, the nominal Lord of Avernus—Bel!
"That's..." Horror seized the frost shaman's face. Without a shred of hesitation, he spun around to flee, shouting, "Damn it, it's Bel! Kin, run!"
Bel gnashed his fangs and roared, "Kostchtchie is dead, and you will follow him! Beneath the wrath of Hell, all you abyssal mongrels will be burned to ash!"
If not for Kostchtchie, how could he have ever been forced to surrender his planar authority!
If not for that damned demon lord, how could the Cinder Emperor have stolen the spotlight in Bel's own domain, usurping his rightful place!
Flames of fury surged in the pit fiend's eyes, and searing infernal blaze wrapped around his steel pitchfork. He seemed determined to vent all his pent-up rage upon these remnants of Kostchtchie's host.
*Whoosh—*
Bel snapped his wings, appearing behind the frost shaman in an instant. With a sweeping blow, the pitchfork cleanly severed the shaman's head, sending vile, frigid blood spewing from the stump of his neck.
The frost giant's severed head rolled onto the ground, frozen in a mask of panic and despair.
With the frost shaman dead, the freezing winds abruptly dispersed. The tanar'ri frost giants howled in fury, surging toward Bel wave upon wave in a desperate final counterattack.
Yet reality was merciless. Torrential hellfire spewed from Bel's eyes, reducing the rushing tanar'ri frost giants to ash in the span of a breath.
"Ignorant, pathetic fools! I am a Lord of Hell, the supreme ruler of Avernus! I will cast every last one of you mongrels back into the Abyss!"
"It wasn't you!"
One of the surviving frost giants wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, pointed toward the colossal dragon high in the sky, and shouted with wild laughter, "It was that dragon who defeated us! He was our true opponent! He is the Dragon of Hell! The Enemy of the Frost Giants!
"What are you? You're nothing but a cowardly devil, a pitiful parasite clinging to the strong! What we giants despise most is—"
*Squelch—*
Before the frost giant could finish, an enraged Bel lunged forward. The sound of tearing flesh rang out as Bel drove his steel pitchfork savagely into the giant's belly, gutting him completely and sending a deluge of foul viscera spilling onto the earth.
Moments later, hundreds of high-ranking devils arrived under the command of a pit fiend legion general, gathering respectfully around Bel.
The devil general bowed his head deferentially. "Lord Bel!"
Bel gave a chilling, sardonic glance, his tone laced with menace. "Heh, so you've finally arrived. I was beginning to think... my orders no longer carried weight."
"Of course not! We all know that you are the true Master of Avernus." Cold sweat beaded across the general's brow, and the hand gripping his sword trembled slightly.
Offering a fawning smile, the general continued, "How do you wish to dispose of these remaining frost giants? Their degree of demonic corruption isn't severe; perhaps they could be put to use as our assets..."
Bel cast a disgusted glance at the mangled corpse of the giant he had just slain, waved his hand, and commanded coldly without hesitation, "Slaughter them all. Leave none alive."
"Understood, Lord Bel."
The devils chorused their compliance. Under the general's direction, they formed a tight military formation, completely surrounding the surviving tanar'ri frost giants, their pitch-black eyes brimming with unmasked bloodlust.
"Kill them all!"
"Damned devils! Break out of the encirclement!" the frost giants roared.
A feast of slaughter commenced.
Yet as Bel reflected upon the dying frost giant's words, an encroaching sense of unease gnawed at his heart.
"The Dragon of Hell, is it..." Bel muttered under his breath, in a voice meant only for himself.
He gazed toward the distant horizon, looking up at the towering, magnificent infernal dragon. His brow knitted tightly, a deep, cautious dread surfacing in his eyes.
Flapping his broad, bat-like wings, the Lord of Hell took to the air, flying toward the red dragon.
...
Above the crimson skies of Avernus, the colossal dragon blotted out the heavens, casting a vast shadow across the scarred and cratered battlefield.
"It is finally over."
Cassius gazed down at the battlefield as the dust settled. The corners of his mouth curved upward slightly, a puff of sulfurous breath venting from his nostrils, and a rare look of ease settled over his majestic draconic visage.
Suddenly, he sensed a gaze laden with fury and jealousy boring into him from the distance. Turning his head, the red dragon traced the gaze to its source.
*Heh, so it's my convenient ally. It's about time to return that seventy percent of Avernus's authority,* Cassius mused, withdrawing his gaze.
Under the influence of his oathbreaking power, that contract was little more than scrap paper in his eyes, devoid of any true binding force.
However, Cassius had no intention of exposing his capabilities just yet, much less completely falling out with Bel.
One had to eat meat one bite at a time and walk the path step by step. Claiming Avernus for himself right now would bring far more harm than good.
After all, Asmodeus still stood above Bel.
As the saying went, the shot hits the bird that pokes its head out. If that ancient being who had existed since the dawn of the cosmos discovered his true powers and ambitions, the consequences would be catastrophic.
Even if the Lord of the Nine Hells turned a blind eye, the other Lords of Hell would inevitably feel threatened and might even join forces to oppose him. Rashly seizing Avernus now would only invite enemies from all sides, an entirely losing proposition.
The superior course was to gradually turn Bel into his puppet and proxy, reducing Avernus to a semi-colony that was forced to rely on the Cinder Empire.
With that in mind, Cassius watched the approaching pit fiend with a cheerful expression, murmuring under his breath, "Bel, my dear ally, I intend to throw my full support behind your continued rule as Lord of Hell..."
At that moment, the space before him warped violently. An extraordinarily immense, yet strangely familiar and intimate aura surged forth, accompanied by the cacophonous roar of dragons echoing from afar.
"This aura..."
Cassius's expression shifted drastically, turning deadly solemn. "Damn it, it's Tiamat!"
Dragons bellowed, the fabric of space twisted, and an oppressive evil aura rolled across the sky.
Two colossal talons tore through the void. Five ferocious dragon heads—red, green, blue, black, and white—writhed and snaked out of the rift as a nightmare-sized draconic body, massive as a mountain range, descended upon the skies of Avernus.
At the same time, swarms of chromatic dragons loyal to Tiamat—blue dragons, green dragons, and more—poured through the planar rift one after another. Beating their wings, they wheeled around Tiamat, among them a particularly powerful red dragon.
These chromatic dragons were adults at the very least, and three or four were massive great wyrms.
Yet against the mountain-like grandeur of Tiamat and Cassius, their forms seemed utterly diminutive, like a flock of fluttering moths circling giants.
"She didn't come with good intentions..." Cassius clenched his jaws, his gaze locked firmly onto his nominal mother goddess.
In his haste to reach Hell, he had overlooked a critical fact—
Tiamat's divine realm.
The Lair of Tiamat was situated right here in Avernus!
Because the Nine Hells of Baator were an Outer Plane, Tiamat could manifest her true divine body directly within Avernus!
Fortunately, Cassius currently wielded the planar authority of Avernus, so he was far from defenseless. At the very least, he had a high chance of escaping Hell and returning to the Material Plane.
Bel looked up into the sky, his face clouded with shock and mounting fury. "Curses, the Chromatic Dragon Queen! Did that greedy red dragon summon her? Is this his plot?!"
"By the Lord of the Nine Hells..."
"The Mother of Evil Dragons has descended at a time like this! She hasn't set foot in Avernus for centuries!"
"Could it be... Avernus is about to change masters?!"
The devils looked up in unison at the nightmarish five-headed dragon, seized by panic.
Could Avernus truly be reduced to a realm ruled by dragons? If so, where were they, the native devils, supposed to stand?!
"What's going on here?"
"Holy crap, isn't that the mother goddess of the chromatic dragons? Why would she show up here?"
"Logically speaking... the Dragon Queen is also Cassius's mother goddess. Are they teaming up to conquer Hell together? Damn, that's wild!"
"The atmosphere looks completely off, though. There's zero mother-son love in the air. Is Emperor Kai about to throw down with the Dragon Queen?"
"Pass the popcorn! Selling sunflower seeds in the front row! Nothing beats watching top-tier bosses duke it out—special effects dialed up to max!"
Unlike the panicked and tense devils, the players were buzzing with excitement, chattering enthusiastically like spectators eager to see the world burn.
High above, dark divine radiance emanated in all directions. Tiamat's five heads turned toward Cassius, who was still in his infernal dragon form, studying him intently.
Sensing the aura of Avernus's planar authority radiating from him, the red dragon head first betrayed a glimmer of astonishment, which quickly melted into a predatory smile as endless greed pooled within her pale-gold slit pupils.
The Dragon Queen spoke slowly, her voice carrying a smooth laugh. "Long time no see, Cassius, my child. I am truly proud of you.
"I truly never expected... that in merely a few short years—not even long enough for me to take a brief nap—you would grow to such an extent, even conquering Avernus on behalf of our chromatic dragon race."
Classic Tiamat rhetoric: what was Cassius's became the entire chromatic race's, and what belonged to the chromatic race belonged to her.
Even though she had nothing whatsoever to do with this battle from start to finish, the Dragon Queen effortlessly twisted the narrative, claiming all the spoils and glory for herself.
Hearing those words, an uproar erupted across the field, sending shockwaves through the ranks.
"What?! This really was the Dragon Queen's conspiracy!"
"By the Lord of the Nine Hells, Avernus truly is changing masters!"
Bel's face contorted violently as he roared with unbridled rage, "Cassius, you damned reptile! How could you be so utterly shameless?! Avernus belongs to the devils!!
"The great Lord of the Nine Hells will never let you off! You will pay the price you deserve!"
To the Lord of Hell, his worst nightmare had come to pass: this greedy red dragon had conspired with his mother goddess to seize Avernus!
Meanwhile, the chromatic dragons circling Tiamat erupted into excited roars and cheers, reviving a title that had long gathered dust: "Praise be to His Highness the Dragon Prince!"
"Prince Cassius truly is the most valued child of the Mother Goddess!"
"Splendid! From now on, Avernus belongs to us chromatic dragons! Those silver-tongued red-skinned devils will all be our slaves!"
"If only I could mate with a paragon like him..." The powerful female red dragon gazed with idolatry at the colossal draconic form nearby, her golden slit pupils restless and burning with undisguised desire.
Confronted by the suffocating divine pressure and the cacophony of clamoring voices, Cassius lowered his head in a slight nod, then spoke in an even, dispassionate tone:
"Good day, Lady Tiamat.
"However, I must disappoint you. I have not conquered Avernus. I merely borrowed the planar authority of Hell from my ally, Bel, in order to combat the demon lord.
"Furthermore..." Cassius paused, raised his massive head, and looked straight at the Chromatic Dragon Queen, adopting a feigned air of curiosity. "These were my own actions. What does any of it have to do with you?"
He laid bare the truth and stated the cold facts, mercilessly ripping through Tiamat's web of lies and manipulative rhetoric.
Cassius's words instantly set off another tempest of shock.
"Thank the heavens... thank the heavens this wasn't the Dragon Queen's scheme after all..." Bel finally managed to compose himself, panting heavily with lingering dread as he tensely watched the situation unfold in the sky.
The devils, completely unable to gauge the shifting tides, remained dead silent, not daring to utter a peep for fear of being dragged into a dispute involving gods.
Only the players continued their carefree, boisterous banter, completely indifferent to the risk of drawing divine wrath.
"Hold on, that dialogue sounds totally wrong! Why are they already at each other's throats?"
"Mama Tiamat: Hand over the territory! Emperor Kai: Old hag, you trying to shake me down for loot?"
"Filial piety at its finest! Pure, unadulterated filial love!"
"Holy crap! Is this the rebellious phase?! Yes, yes, yes—bring on the mother-son showdown!"
Chapter 740