Chapter 339: More Speaking… but by Someone Else

A loud boom rang out, somehow filling Kat's ears completely and blocking out all other sound. Kamiko stopped speaking quickly as well, and they both turned to face the front. There was an extremely tall red demon standing there. He reminded Kat of Kraks the accountant slightly.

He was easily twelve feet tall, perhaps higher, but the perspective made it hard to really judge. He was also large in other ways, with thick bulging muscles in his arms and legs, making any individual limb thicker than Kat and Kamiko put together. He wore light leather armour that was just a slight shade off from his own dark red skin. Kat didn't want to think about it, but part of her was almost certain it was leather made from that same skin.

If his height seemed initially impressive, then the sword on his back had to be double so for it was even taller than him. Most was blocked by his body, but the handle easily extended a head past him. It did make Kat wonder how he even managed to draw the weapon, as his arms weren't needlessly long, but the weapon certainly was.

The other confusing thing about his outfit, was his shoes, or more specifically his lack of. Kat could see no reason for this fact. He had perfectly normal, if large, feet with five toes on either foot and everything. This compounded with the fact that he was wearing gloves, just confused Kat more. *You know what. He's a twelve-foot-tall, at least, hulking demon. He can wear whatever he wants as footwear. I won't complain.* 

"WELCOME" said the big demon. "You are all gathered here for your punishments! Please place your hand on your chosen PARTNER! You will be responsible for each other during the punishment. Any additional punishment incurred during this will apply TO BOTH OF YOU so make sure you pick well.

"In a moment, you will be teleported away from this room into a second one to explain more specifically what you have been charged with. DO YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS!"

*I mean, I really want to question what the point of gathering us all here just to say 'grab a partner and wait for more teleportation is' but I'm not going to say that.* Kat did however, grab onto Kamiko's hand, which firmly grabbed her back. Kat was actually forced to send a bit of demonic energy through her hand, with how hard Kamiko was digging her nails into Kat's palm.

Before she could think on it too much, the demon decided that nobody was going to ask questions. Kat suspected that might be because of his threatening presence when he spoke, but who was she to assume. She felt the world tip sideways, which was weird because her visions stayed centred. Then in a short burst of colour, Kat found herself, hand in hand with Kamiko, in a tiny room with just them.

And a hologram of the big demon from the stage. "Ok listen UP! You two have been given the basic punishment for not fulfilling your Rank 1 debt. HOWEVER you are also both Rank 2 now. As such you will be sent around to each of the Seven Sin factions to do one task of their choosing.

"These tasks can be rejected, but that will require you to then perform two additional tasks at another one of the Big Seven. No task shall take longer than three days. If you spend three days attempting to complete a task, you may request D.E.M.O.N.S overview, or speak to your supervisor to remind them of this fact.

"You will perform all tasks with your partner. If your task would sperate you from your partner, you are to inform them that this is a breach of article 123123123 section xxzf paragraph 3, involving first time offenders of sufficiently high Rank. Good luck. Your first stop will be randomised"

*Wait what?* Before Kat had time to properly absorb the information, she was sent flying through space once again. Flashing flames surrounded her for just enough time for her to realise what was happening before it stopped once again. This time though, she was dropped in front of a massive iron gate. It was a series of iron poles all bound together by strips of iron that ran across, roughly, every two metres.

There wasn't anything special about it beside the fact that Kat couldn't actually see the end of it. Even when she pushed demonic energy into her eyes, she didn't get a hint of where the top could be. *This… is weird. It also makes me wonder what this is made out of. It looks like normal iron, all… grey and steely, but… I don't think iron this thin could stay standing when they are so tall.* 

"Woah!" said Kamiko "The Wrath compound!"

Kat tilted her head. "You know where we are?"

Kamiko nodded "Yup yup, this has to be the Wrath compound. They… well, they like to spread out for some reason. A lot of the other compounds try to more efficiently use their space but Wrath basically just… grabbed a chunk of land and put a massive wall around it. Honestly, I kind of admire the courage that sort of thing must take, but I suppose when you enjoy battle like they do, it's more like a challenge to everyone else to come cause trouble if they dare.

"So that way, either… Wrath wins and gets a bunch of land because nobody challenges them for it, or they fight and well… win or lose they get a big fight out of it, sometimes against multiple factions if the land they grab is actually large enough. They love those fights actually. Apparently, they just grab more land every time and see how much they can hold onto. It's not complete madness, because they don't want it to be a stomp of course.

"That would just be boring. If all the others came down on them, Wrath would lose to quickly for them to have a good time. Though, I've heard, and this is just a rumour, but I've heard, that the factions fight harder for Wrath territory mostly because they know Wrath doesn't like to kill people.

"Strange, I know, but that's something they are VERY careful of. I guess they see it sort of like…" Kamiko switched to a deeper voice for the next part, "Why kill a perfectly good opponent, that means I can't ever fight them again"

"Of course, killing them in other dimensions is fair game" Kat and Kamiko froze. Neither of them had said that last line. Awkwardly turning their heads around to the voice, Kat found…  a beard.

Looker closer, Kat realised it wasn't just a beard… even that was indeed what most of the body seemed to be. The demon in question did of course, have a luxurious grey beard that seemed to hover in place if you ignored the small pieces of body that poked out in various places.

The beard had tiny legs that were just barely visible in the gap between the beard and the ground. The beard also had eyes, they were at the very tip of Kat's horns, and made her feel like she should be looking up to meet them, as one of the few identifying features on the beard's body. What made it stranger, was that the legs were clearly behind the beard. It wasn't that the creature wasn't a beard at all, but that it was something that hid behind the beard.

"Um… hi?" managed Kat after a few seconds of staring.

"Good day youngin. I take no offence to you and your friend's words. Clearly you aren't Wrath but then again, I'm mostly retired so… I ain't too far off your perspective I'd say" said the beard.

"Hi there!" said Kamiko happily. "Mine name is Kamiko, and this is my friend Kat! We are here for the Wrath task I suppose. I mean, I guess we could be here for some other reason, but they did teleport us here after saying we were to do a task. They didn't exactly give us an order for them though…

"Oh, and how come you're retired? My Great Great Great Great Uncle on my Father's side of the family is a bremarin, and your beard is much nicer kept than his is. I mean, even though it's grey, that seems like the natural colouring of it instead of fading with age like some beards tend to. Plus it moves despite the lack of wind implying that you do actually have the signature fighting style."

The beard? Bremarin? Chuckled, it was a deep throaty laugh that seemed to come from just below the eyes, were one would normally expect the nose to be. "I see the young lass has an eye for beards. That's most impressive youngin. But don't be worrying too much about me. I just volunteered these old bones to watch you on the task. You can call me Gramps"