Chương 107: Chapter 106: Arrival at the Demon Capital, and Disappointment in Hell

The dark purple spatial vortex slowly dissolved into scattered arcane embers, drifting through the air. Lucian's team of four stepped through the transport threshold, landing on a vast stone plaza. According to the heroic epics of the Holy Church, the Tartarus Demon Realm had always been depicted as an earthly hell: rivers of churning red lava, an eternal rain of fire, and millions of bloodthirsty demons howling as they gnawed on human bones. But the scene in front of Lucian right now looked nothing like that.

The sky overhead hung in a permanent, gentle twilight purple. Around the plaza stood stunning Gothic architecture in black stone, spires reaching high enough to brush the clouds, and elegant bronze arcane streetlamps. Except... the urban infrastructure here was a total wreck. Along the cracked marble sidewalks, piles of magical mineral slag and scrap metal rose like small hills, sending up wisps of grey smoke.

On the steps of shuttered shops, hundreds of working-class demons — short-horned, wearing patchwork wool coats — sat clustered together, puffing on cheap magical cigarettes, yawning through hours of desperate idleness. Lucian pulled the brim of his hood low, looking at the smoking pile of mineral slag beside a trash bin, his mouth twitching.

"This is the brutal Demon Realm from the legends? It looks exactly like a bankrupt metallurgical district on the outskirts of some city, left to rot." Astra, standing beside him, sniffed the air, her nose wrinkling.

"This smell... it's like burnt sausages from the school cafeteria." Ting! A Unified System V2. 0 notification appeared at the corner of Lucian's vision. [ENTERING REGION: THE TARTARUS DEMON EMPIRE — CAPITAL OF BLACK MOON] Local-route scan, using the visible road grid and Carmilla's arrival map: 120 traffic bottlenecks and 45 likely arcane waste dumps flagged within the surveyed approach.

Visible-infrastructure assessment: underfed workers, unpaid fuel logistics, and a municipal maintenance backlog large enough to make the capital's approach look bankrupt. Clack... clack... At the far end of the boulevard, a black steel royal carriage, embroidered with House Lilith's briar rose crest, slowly approached. It was pulled by two powerful two-headed Dark Beasts, followed by twenty Demon-race knights in full black armor, spears held upright and solemn.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings. But when the carriage came within about twenty meters of Lucian... CLUNK... WHIRRR... POP! The carriage's rear arcane engine let out a strangled shriek, spewing a thick cloud of black, acrid smoke. The two beasts pulling it lurched to a stop, and the carriage skidded a short distance before dying completely in a pool of black mud.

The lead knight jumped down, opened the engine compartment to check it, then scratched the black horn on his head and turned to his second-in-command, voice defeated.

"Out of mana-ore again... the fuel station hasn't gotten its supply quota this month." Lucian watched the whole scene, pressing a hand to his forehead. Buzz... buzz... The silver hand-mirror communicator in his coat pocket flickered with light. Lucian pulled it out and pressed the connection button. Princess Eleanor's beautiful face appeared on the crystal surface. She sat in her office at the capital, blue eyes narrowed with suspicion.

"Did you arrive safely? Has any demon woman gotten near you yet?" Lucian panned the mirror across the trash-strewn boulevard and the smoking, dead dragon carriage.

"No demon women in sight yet. Barely stepped off the platform and the local scan has already flagged a hundred twenty traffic bottlenecks and a pile of unpaid waste-disposal invoices." Eleanor looked through the screen.

"..." She was silent for three seconds, then spoke, thoroughly exasperated.

"I should've known — even in the shadow realm, all you see is garbage and money." Click. The mirror went dark. Lucian tucked the mirror into his coat and waved the group forward.

"We're walking. If we wait for that carriage to recharge, it'll be dark before we arrive." The four of them set off down the stone-paved road toward the central castle. Evelyn, in her protective coat, studied the ramshackle wooden houses lining the street as they walked. Skeletal Demon-race children, small horns not yet fully grown in, sat huddled on porches, caked in mud, staring at the strangers with wide, red-rimmed eyes. Evelyn let out a thin, hazy sigh.

"No matter what world you're in, it's always the ordinary people who suffer most from embargoes and war." Sylvia walked beside her, consulting the economic notebook in her hands.

"For three hundred years, the great human empires have maintained a formal civilian embargo on food and medicine into the Demon Realm. Ordinary people were cut off; smugglers, neutral intermediaries, elite procurement, border casinos, and old private debt networks never vanished. Demon nobility worships war and ancient bloodline, holding trade and commerce in contempt.

The currency in circulation here is Cursed Iron Coin, with four hundred percent inflation annually — a single loaf of dark bread currently costs a miner's entire monthly wage." Along the boulevard, thousands of nobles and common demons stood on either side of the road, watching a ten-year-old boy in an ash-grey cloak walk casually through smoking piles of magical slag, his hem not gathering a single speck of dust, his face carrying not a trace of disgust or fear.

Demon nobles standing on their black-stone balconies began whispering with reverence.

"Look at the Fourth Knight's son..."

"Walking calmly through the filth of this world, his composure still as cold and still as a snow-covered mountain!"

"That's the 'Unshakable Mindset' of a true shadow monarch!" Lucian arrived at the towering iron gate of Castle Lilith. CREEEAK! The steel gate swung wide open. Countess Carmilla von Lilith, in a formal dark red-and-black velvet court gown and a silver fox-fur cloak, descended the marble steps at an unhurried pace. She stopped in front of Lucian, her gown flaring, and slowly dropped to one knee on the stone, in full accordance with the Demon Realm's highest royal protocol.

Her blood-jade eyes lifted to Lucian, her voice elegant and deeply respectful.

"Welcome, Young Master... The full council of Twelve Demon Lords is already seated in the great hall, waiting for you to open the summit session."