The Summoned One [Private]

[poisonbite01]

The Underworld is an odd place. It's not all fire and brimstone like some believed, nor was it an empty morass of darkness and shadow, like some others believed. It was....a place. That's all that can be said. Its landscape is variable, molded by the minds and powers of those that live in it. Over the course of a thousand years, for example, one human soul, trapped after a deal with a minor devil, watched his patch of the underworld go from a forest of huge, black trees made from stone and spikes to a lush underground cave, full of poisonous mushrooms and monsters. This was due to a leadership change in the area.

Granted, no part of the underworld was entirely 'good', or 'peaceful'. After all, if you get billions of malevolent monstrosities in a place affected by their emotions and desires, chances are the majority of the place is going to be quite nasty.

For one demon, however, the place was not good, or scary, or evil. It was home.

Azu, a simplified version of his own demon name, was reclining on a sofa in his home. The sofa had been brought in by an imp after his master had been murdered, and was quite comfortable on the red-headed creature's human form. His small home had few furnishings, as most of his time was spent fighting in the wars that were always taking place among the demons. His bed, his ice cooler (an interesting device that a time-sleeper had brought back, which, when plugged into the spine of an Electric Zap-hound, would keep anything placed inside it cold), and this sofa was about it. He had numerous books, also taken from the surface world, and a dozen different weapons and suits of armor, as well as various memorabilia from his more...challenging foes.

But Azu was bored. This world, despite its constant changing and never-ending battles, had grown stale. The demon was well over three hundred years old, and already he yearned for exploration, and to get out of this plane and into one of the others. Any other, really.

So, it was with utter delight that he felt the tingling of a portal opening. All demons would feel this sensation, and cast their eyes upwards, seeking the source of the energy. Some would even begin uttering their own spells, trying to get a lock on the energy-signature of the spell-caster, and thus get close to them. This is what Azu did, by muttering a few words that no human mouth should have been able to pronounce. There was a flash, and the tanned human with bright green eyes, slightly pointed ears, and a huge mane of red hair was momentarily swept away, revealing a form much closer to the truth. Ten feet of muscle, black scales, red quills, massive green wings, and a tail that looked like a huge python were visible in the harsh, acid-green light of his spell-work.

Then he was gone, and in front of him stood half a dozen demons, all staring at the rip opening in space before them all.

A summoning spell was a complicated thing, but in its complication, a name was created. In a process that would take decades to explain, the caster's words were turned into a name, a true name that belonged to a demon. However, the name itself is up for interpretation, and the spell so far, had drawn these demons for they all had names similar enough to the spell for it to mean them. If the mage actually knew a part of the name, and consciously uttered it, the selection would narrow monstrously, but this human did not seem to have that knowledge. So, it was the demons's job to choose who got to go through the portal, and Azu chose himself by slaughtering all of his kin on this end, and then he waited for the portal to open enough for him to enter...

 

[Kid muffintop]

Its been years since Sophia took up the art of magic. She was only ten when she discovered her potential of becoming a powerful mage and since then had practiced day in and day out for this day. Today would be the day where she would perform a summoning and make a contracted with a demon. Summons were always a taboo among mages but Sophia had a goal in mind, and in order to accomplish that goal, she would have to make a contract with a demon that would be strong enough to help her but still lower power than her in order to control it. It was dangerous, but it was a risk she was willing to take in order to make a difference in this rotten world that was ruled by greedy power hungry beast that tormented the poor for sport.

"Alright...Lets begin..." Sophia began to create a summoning a circle on the ground, then took a few steps back while beginning to chant a couple of verses under her breath. She had to be careful when it came to opening the portal that connect the human world with the underworld, any mistakes and she could end up allowing all kinds of demons to infest the world and cause unbelieveable mayhem. Chanting, she spoke rapidly, concentrating as the circle began to glow brightly signalling that the portal was opening and that a demon was being drawn towards it. She could sense all kinds of different demons heading towards the light but focused her energy onto the portal in order to ensure that only one demon would pass. When it came to summoning a demon, most mages would require a name in order to prevent an unknown from coming into the human world but since Sophia didn't have a name in mind, she simply let the demons fight it out. The strongest would be able to emerge victorious and at the moment, thats exactly what she wanted.

The numbers were quickly decreasing, till there was only one. She could sense that the demon was strong but as long as she would win at the challenge, she knew that she would be fine, she already had an idea of what kind of challenge she would take a part in that would insure in her winning the demon over. A small smirk appeared on her lips as she chanted the final verse of the spell which allowed the demon to enter into the human world and pulled him out of the underworld and into the human world. The pull caused a cloud of smoke to appear around the circle, causing Sophia to cough and shut her eyes for a moment until the smoked cleared. When the smoke was gone, her eyes landed on the demon that she had managed to summon and stood there in shock. "I...I did it...I actually did it..." Not many Mages success in their first summonings so it was surprising and encouraging that she was able to accomplish this.

 

[poisonbite01]

In the mortal realm, the portal that opened was a sick green color that seemed to remind the woman of every illness she'd ever suffered in her life. It was the color of disease and rot, and the smells that came through were of the same. If the summoner didn't have a strong constitution, she may well end up vomiting whatever her most recent meal had been, and thus add the acrid bile smell to the overwhelming stench of brimstone and half-eaten carrion.

Then she would see something moving, and a hand clawed through the rip. It slammed down, almost three feet in length from wrist to elbow, and was clearly not even humanoid. It looked like the limb of some kind of lizard, perhaps a komodo dragon or crocodile. The claws were as long as steak knives and dug deep into the hard-wood, but almost as if contact with mortal air caused a reaction, the limb began to bubble and mutate. It shrank, and as it shrank something was pulled through the portal. By the time it was a human-sized limb, a creature was planting one foot on this plane for the first time in centuries. He was still changing, features rippling and deforming and almost impossible to pin down.

He appeared to have been some kind of gargantuan reptile with dull, black scales and a mass of red spines jutting up from his squat neck and huge skull. But as he changed, the features were replaced with tan, vaguely Mediterranean skin.

He was a lean man of about eight, maybe eight and a half feet in height. Muscular and standing tall, he was an imposing sight, what with his spiky hair almost brushing the ceiling. He wore only cloth pants that hung loosely about his powerful legs, and a belt with two slightly-curved swords was draped across his hips. Any similarity to humanity ended there, however. A thick tail coiled around his hips, ending in a scorpion-like stinger as big around as a dinner plate. Wings clung tight to his back, unable to extend very far what with the binding magics of the circle preventing him from leaving its circumference.

From what she could see, the skin hanging between the bat-like fingers was a lime green color, matching his eyes, and the fingers themselves were the same color as the black scales of his tail. Brown horns jutted up from his red-hair, and his smile was full of sharp, jagged fangs.

Now that the theatrics were over (he could have stepped through the portal in any form, and without any lights, sounds, or smells accompanying him, but where was the fun in that?), he decided to examine this unfamiliar place, and the person who had called him forth. He stared at the woman for a moment, then let his eyes, almost lazily, examine the circle. He hadn't been in this realm for a long time, and was curious to see how powerful the magic of it had become.

Finding no real flaws in the circle's design, he looked back at the woman, staring down at her, and spoke. It took very little magic to speak her tongue, so his words were easy and teasing, tinged with just a hint of some unidentifiable accent.

"Why do you summon me, human?"