Baator Hell Promotion

"That warlock didn't say he couldn't tell fortunes. Perhaps he used some prophetic magic to predict our arrival?"

"What you say is possible, but I don't think he has the motive. If he already has the map, why doesn't he just kill us?"

"So, what do you think?"

"In fact, I think it's even worse. Not only do we have to worry about enemies we haven't seen yet, but we're also facing two more powerful enemies. That warlock didn't use much magic just now. I don't think we can take them down unscathed."

"Then let's use Hell's most common tactic."

"Fake cooperation? I like that."

Hopper took two quick steps and caught up with Dan and Oha. He said briskly, "Mr. Brown, do you know our exact location? Has your familiar pointed out the way out of here?"

She has a good command of her voice, making it sound kind and approachable.

"Probably somewhere under the Longhair Forest," the sorcerer replied vaguely. "I imagine these roads are leading away from Gracia's palace."

"Since we're already fellow travelers, we might as well be clear about this," the demon decided to throw out a bait. "I've been asked to come here to find the treasure. If our goals conflict, since we've already been hunted together, we can compete fairly."

The warlock paused, sharing the same goofy grin as the purple devil hanging upside down on his shoulder.

"The treasure of Malagard? You're not the first devil to have such an idea, and I doubt you'll be the last. But I really have no interest in it. Mr. Oha and I are here for knowledge. Even if I find the treasure, I will be happy to give it to you, beautiful lady."

"That's very generous of you," Hopper responded with a grin.

She had already understood what the warlock meant. He was indeed here to look for something, but he was very confident that the two parties' goals should be different. In this way, at least the two sides could maintain basic peace before finding the thing.

A sudden gust of wind made the succubus raise his head, and Oha, who was walking in front of the sorcerer, also stretched out his right arm to stop them from moving forward.

"There's movement."

Along with the sound of the wind came the faint sound of crying, but Hopper wasn't sure if it was his imagination.

"Lightning, what did you find?"

"It's hard to say. You'd better come and see for yourself. I can only feel that the fog is getting thicker."

The lustful demon waved to Zisi behind the hall, signaling him to follow.

Just as Hellcat had said, a gray, cold mist began to appear on the ground. As they advanced, the mist quickly thickened, and soon Hopper could no longer see the ground below his feet.

Lightning was waiting for them at the corner, not because he encountered any danger, but because the fog had completely submerged the white lion like a dark river, and only the two tips of the ears standing up on the top of the head could be seen.

When Hopper walked to Lightning's side, he found that fog was flowing out from the three forks in the road ahead with a cold wind, and only the top of the cave could be seen on the forks.

"The map doesn't say there will be such a situation." Zis came over and whispered in a low voice.

Hopper said nothing, but connected the three of his men with the activation rope.

Judging from the expressions of Dan Brown and O'Ha, they didn't seem surprised.

"Master Brown, do you know what this is all about?"

Chapter 217: Spirit World

The one who answered Hopper from the "spiritual world" was the taciturn sorcerer Oha. "Are we crossing the boundary between reality and fantasy?"

Hopper looked at the blond sorcerer in disbelief. He was tall and had broad arms. He didn't look like a scholar. He didn't expect him to be so sure about the knowledge of the planes.

Oha took a step forward and pointed at the hole where the mist was pouring out. He said, "The boundaries of matter are beginning to blur."

As he said, the edges of the cave entrances had become blurred, as if they were hazy and silhouetted behind a misty curtain of water.

But Hopper noticed more than that. When Oha spoke, his mouth moved strangely beneath his thick beard. Upon closer inspection, the succubus realized his upper lip wasn't closed, but rather a three-lobed mouth. And it wasn't just a cleft lip; it was a genuine rabbit mouth.

Such a distinctive feature, coupled with the chest hair on his collar and the hairy back of his hands, immediately made Hopper understand Oha's identity.

He was a half-beast! Half-beast people often had a beastman in their ancestry, or perhaps one of their ancestors was bitten but not infected, leaving the beastman disease dormant, leading to the sudden change in their descendants.

However, such special circumstances are extremely rare, so rare that this is the first time Hopper has seen one.

"In that case, shouldn't we retreat?" Lightning said as he took a few steps back, letting gray mist float out of his head.

The spirit world isn't a particularly dangerous dimension. If the planes were a house, the spirit world would be the ivy that crawls all over it, and its danger level is similar to that of the ivy. Perhaps some snakes, insects, rats, or ants might crawl into the house along the ivy and bite the residents, but overall, the risk is low.

However, if you get sucked into the spirit world, it will be difficult to find your way back without the guidance of a spellcaster specializing in plane studies.

"Back off? No, we should move forward, Mr. Hellcat," Dan Brown retorted with a smile. "The treasure of Malagard has never been found. It's very likely hidden in the spirit world."

With these words, he opened his arms and strode into the mist like a lover, followed closely by Oha. Before they reached the cave entrance, the thick fog had completely obscured them and they disappeared completely.

Hopper grabbed Ziz's arm and began to back away. She didn't want to take the risk. Rather than rushing into a dimension she didn't understand, she wanted to study the map carefully. After all, she wasn't looking for Malagard's treasure, as Dan had misunderstood.

However, before she could take two steps back, she felt the rope tighten around her hand. Hopper looked up and saw Hellcat standing there with his back arched, his fur all over his body, as if resisting the powerful force.

"Pull harder! Something's trying to suck me in!"

Lightning's cry for help exploded in Hopper's heart. She immediately grabbed the rope and signaled Ziz to pull it out.

The force from the hand was heavy, but not impossible to pull. Hopper pressed the toe of his boot against the ground and moved out inch by inch.

Before she could breathe a sigh of relief, she felt her grip loosen, and the rope stopped moving. Hopper lost her balance and fell directly onto Ziz, then fell to the ground covered in gray fog with him.

The expected impact didn't occur, and Hopper felt herself back in the air, protected by the Feather Fall technique. She understood instantly. The ground had been unnoticed, and the gray fog had blurred the boundary between matter and spirit.

The lust demon struggled desperately to stand up from the soft mist, but he could only hear the whistling wind and see endless fog.

-

Before Hopper woke up, he felt a rough hand slap his face and heard a young male voice calling his name.

She forced her eyes open, and the first thing she saw was the gray, gloomy sky and twisted, dense branches, followed by a somewhat familiar, beardless face.

"You're finally awake," the young man breathed a sigh of relief and tried to help her up.

Hopper looked at his face, noticing his activation cord was still tied around his waist, and asked hesitantly, "Are you... Ziz?"

"Yes"

He looked a lot like Ziz, yet completely different. Ziz was a dragonborn tiefling, a mahogany-brown skinned with scales. The man before him looked like an ordinary human, with Ziz's features, but his skin was milky white, and even his turquoise eyes had turned a darker brown.

"How is this going?"

Then she found that she had also turned into a human. Although her skin color did not change like Zis, the wings on her back had disappeared.

"I was like this when I woke up," Ziz replied. "You'd probably be even more surprised to see Master Lightning."

Only then did Hopper notice that there was another man squatting not far away. Hopper could see the muscular back as he rushed towards him. There was also a rope tied around his waist, and his messy waist-length black hair looked like... a lion's mane.

"Monster Hunter Lightning?" Hopper called tentatively.

The man turned around, and his broad nose, prominent jaw and masseter muscles, and shaggy eyebrows reminded Hopper of a lion again.

"Okay, you can laugh out loud, no need to hold it in," the man, Lightning, said viciously. "Look at what a mess I've become."

Hopper looked down at her hands. The transformation ring hadn't activated. So it wasn't a case of magic gone haywire. She reached out to Ziz, but nothing happened. Her body felt empty. The hellish power that should have responded to her call was completely gone.

"This is not a simple transformation," the succubus concluded, and checked his quiver and armor again. Fortunately, the magic power on these things was still there.

"Do you know what this is all about?"

Lightning hurried to stand up, but he had never walked on two legs before, and he fell to the ground before he could straighten up.

"Oh, don't worry, dear witcher, you still have a long time to adapt to this form."

"What do you mean? What kind of magic is this?"

"I mean, I'm afraid we won't be able to change back to the way we were before we leave here."

Hopper shrugged and showed them his dull ring.

"I don't think it's magic, or not entirely. My transformation ring has lost its effect, but the armor's enchantment is still working. And I can feel that I have become a human being from the inside out, pure and perfect, with no flaws to be found. Very few magics can achieve this."

"Since magic has been ruled out, and no charlatan has come forward to declare this divine punishment, I can only reasonably infer that our current form is the result of the world's consciousness assimilating us. In other words, this world itself does not tolerate the existence of any non-humans, and when it encounters outsiders, it transforms them into humans."

"What nonsense are you talking about?" Lightning asked doubtfully. "Whether it's the Nine Hells or the Spirit Realm, no plane has will."

"Normally, there aren't any." Hopper stood up, dusted off her skirt, and looked toward the seemingly harmless mist in the forest. A wave of fear welled up in her heart. "But there's a place that's famous for its dimensional self-awareness."

"where?"

"Demiplane of Fear"

Author's words: It's actually Ravenloft, but because I'm not particularly familiar with Ravenloft, in order to avoid mistakes, a lot of the content is purely original. You just need to understand the meaning and there is no need to match them one to one.

Chapter 218: Fear Demiplane

"I haven't heard of it," Lightning confessed. "And aren't we drawn into the spirit world? I know the spirit world only has dead ghosts."

"You haven't been to school, and I don't blame you," Hopper scoffed. "Torchhold doesn't teach us the specific origins of the Demiplane of Fear. According to scholars, the Demiplane of Fear lies deep within the spirit world, its distance from the other planes like the distance between an island in the middle of the ocean and the continent."

"The entire demiplane is sentient. It is a discerning collector, with a particular fondness for fallen souls. Just as nobles keep rare animals from other planes, this consciousness collects souls that have committed particularly egregious acts of evil."

Lightning tried to sit up straight, trying to adjust to his new body.

"So, this is how we were targeted?"

"I don't think so. This consciousness seems to only like mortals. At least the records of the Torch Keep don't mention that it specifically captures demons. Neither the baatezu nor the tanar'ri have done so."

"I have two suspicions." Hopper touched his lips and slowly expressed his opinion. "My primary suspicion is those two strange spellcasters. After all, they walked into the fog on their own initiative. So, our presence here is most likely their fault."

"Also, I'm skeptical of your map. After getting rid of the wolf cockroaches, we've been following the directions on the map. Ziz, what do you think?"

Zis, who was on guard nearby, suddenly heard his name and shuddered. "Madam, I am a soldier, not a scholar. I cannot compare with your wisdom."

"Just think of it as helping me broaden my horizons, huh?"

Facing Hopper's encouraging gaze, the young soldier thought seriously for a long time before hesitatingly speaking, "I think those wolf cockroaches seem to want to drive us away from our original target."

Hopper became interested: "Why do you think so?"

"I've kept the map, and I've looked at it many times. After falling into the rift, I estimated the corresponding distance and direction. We retreated almost directly in the opposite direction of the map. In the rift, we first turned right and walked a long way, but then after a series of turns, the final path and the map markings almost overlapped. Therefore, I am more inclined to think that the map led us here."

"Also, the end of this map is a circle, and the Weaver wrote a word next to the circle that means 'gate.'" A shy Ziz took the map out of his bag and unfolded it for Hopper to see. "I originally thought it was a portal, but now I think about it, it could also mean a passage."

"Well done, Zizi!" the demon exclaimed in surprise. "I didn't know you knew this."

Ziz's face flushed, a color particularly noticeable against his milky white skin. He turned his head to the side and said loudly, "Thank you for the compliment. Learning to read maps is a soldier's duty."

"So what do we do now?" Lightning held onto the tree trunk, trying to tame his uncontrollable legs. "According to you, this demiplane is deep in the spirit world. How do we leave? Teleportation?"

"It's not that easy. This is a cage for rare villains. Since it's a cage, there's no intention to let the prisoners escape easily."

There was another reason Hopper didn't mention. She had just tried it, and the spells that Hell had given her disappeared here. However, even if they still retained their power, Hopper doubted whether teleportation could work properly here.

After all, since the will of the plane specially built a cage, it would not deliberately leave the cage door open.

"Did anyone mention how to get out of that magical Torch Hold?" Lightning finally stood up, and after repeated efforts, he took a step forward and moved carefully.

"No, if I had taken the Planar Studies course, I might have learned something about it," Hopper shrugged. "Only scholars who specialize in the mysteries of the planes would delve into such obscure content."

The word Planarology reminded Hopper of someone.

"Where are Dan Brown and O'Hare? They should have been in here before us."

She looked at Zisi hopefully, but he just shook his head and said, "When I woke up, I only saw you. I didn't see the two spellcasters."

"Why are you suddenly concerned about those two sneaky spellcasters?" Lightning asked with a frown.

"Ohha, he recognized the edge of the spirit world at a glance," Hopper reminded. "I guess he must have done a deep study of the planes. If we can find him, we should be able to find a way back."

"Great, at least we have a goal now. But it doesn't seem like our goal is to escape." Lightning snorted and habitually retorted, "We're here to find something, aren't we?"

"Looking for something you don't even know what it is?" Hopper choked back, but she knew in her heart that if her trial led to this place, just thinking about escaping would be useless. "Finding them will at least give us a better understanding of this place, right?"

Lightning raised his hands in surrender, but this action almost made him lose his balance, so he had to quickly grab the tree trunk next to him.

"You are the one with the strongest fighting ability right now. I have no objection."

Lightning had misunderstood. While he was now in a state where he had to walk cautiously, Hopper wasn't much better. After losing the power of Hell, she felt incredibly weak. Perhaps the training at Torchhold had allowed her to retain some fighting skills, but her strength was gone. She certainly couldn't draw a heavy bow now.

Hopper seriously doubted that even Ziz could defeat him in his current state. But it didn't matter. She hadn't relied on brute force when she was a little devil, and she didn't need it now.

"Very good!" Hopper jumped on the spot and almost sprained her ankle. Even so, she still shouted with great energy, "Then listen to me. The goal is the castle in the distance!"

They were currently on a gentle slope. The sky was thick with dark clouds, and the sun was nowhere to be seen. Beneath the gloomy sky lay a dense, dark-green oak forest. A path, seemingly sparsely traveled, stretched into the shade. And at the far end of the sight, between the clouds and the treetops, the silhouette of a castle, no bigger than a fingernail, rose upon the terrace.

"Please wait a moment, ma'am," Ziz politely interrupted Hopper, which made the succubus who had just lost his power sensitively nervous.

"what's up?"

The soldier boy, Ziz, had clearly never experienced a woman's mood swings. Hopper's cold tone made him flinch, but he still mustered up the courage to say, "Should we find Mr. Lightning some clothes?"

Facing the two men's gazes, Lightning was nonchalant. "I have four legs, so what if I don't have clothes? Do you know how much it costs to custom-make a suit of armor?"