Chapter 621

Chapter 621

Unlike the gates he was used to, either taking one to another plane of reality to act as a shortcut or else connecting two separate locations by making a hole in space itself, the interstellar one he’d been dragged into acted more like a tunnel filled with branching paths, letting Ben catch glimpses of what he suspected were separate worlds, even if the views beyond gave him few clues to verify that fact.

Different times of day, slightly different colours of sky hinting at different atmospheres and even stellar bodies such as the glimpses of strange suns and moons if the exits were angled right for him to see it, all if it paled in comparison to the same landscape he was seeing among everything. Brutal, desolate lands, devoid of any obvious hints of life beyond the demons that already made it home, with those either shoving through or fighting amongst themselves on the planets they’d stolen.

Each view was sickening in a way that would have made him laugh at the irony if not for his current situation. During the first wave, his actions had earned him the job option of world killer, but from what he was seeing, they’d have likely already done as much to the planets they’d held themselves even without his input. The only difference was that he’d wiped away the blight that had doomed the rest of it.

He had no one to share that observation with though, nor much time to appreciate it himself. Even if it wasn’t as instantaneous as the gates he was used to, it was only a few minutes of travel before they’d reached their mysterious destination, leaving Ben suddenly confronted with a deep, crushing force.

At first he couldn’t breathe, made worse by the hand that still held his throat, but through that he observed his surroundings, trying to get a grasp of what he’d been dragged into and the madness of what waited beyond.

Not just getting glimpses, being on a whole new world let him see far more than he had just moments before.

The lands looked devastated, but not completely. There were occasionally tufts of grass and moss that could be seen, telling him that there were likely bits of non-demon life hanging on, there had to be to feed them all unless their goto option for food was either invading worlds or pure cannibalism.

It was apparent that there were some simple structures around too, nothing approaching the level of even the simplest of structures his world or Earth held, instead being simple dirt hovels for whatever minor bits of privacy and protection from the elements they would provide.

But those were just the small features, something he had to assume would be consistent across every demon world given the races’ proclivity to violence and destruction, they were nothing compared to the other structures around.

It was something he’d only been able to catch glimpses of as he was carelessly dragged along, but out of the corner of his eye he could see the portal he’d come through, as well as everything that lied beyond it.

Along with a dozen other portals stretching across who could know how many planets, he could see strange, transparent containers filled with inky darkness, a huge one at the center of them all but each one picking at his sacrilege, almost blinding him to what sat farther back in his curiosity.

From where he was, it appeared to be a massive glass structure with hints of movement within, the most complex thing he’d gotten his eye on compared to anything else around that was forcing him to re-evaluate some of his other assumptions.

Even if he didn’t have a good view of it, he could see it largely arched around the gates while being a few stories tall, the sort of thing he couldn’t imagine the demons creating and forced him to question if they had depths he hadn’t seen. Perhaps some did in fact grow into builders and makers when they gained their intelligence and the others let them do as they pleased or maybe they kept slaves from the planets they conquered and put to work. It was impossible to say without more information and as things stood there was no guarantee he’d live long enough to get it. He couldn’t escape the one holding him and the weight bearing down on him from all directions was oppressive enough that he was sure he’d struggle under it even if he escaped. All he could do was fight against it as he forced his body to finally take a breath.

No, a king wouldn’t fit the bits I know about them but look at the universe I live in. With only a couple of exceptions, gods rule the intelligent races of this reality, that is a fact. The demons have gods too and they have to give faith, that points me towards one thing then. This is some sort of church or temple.

It did make him question who had made it, be it the demons or if it was a leftover from whatever race had previously held that world before it had been conquered which had since been repurposed, but he had greater things to worry about. Why would he be being dragged to the church of a demon god?

Every mind in his head screamed that the answer was to be sacrificed in some way, with the only thing left being how torturous it would be. At the very least, he could envision no alternatives, leaving him no choice but to wait and see what would come, all while he observed everything, trying to take in any clue that would let him leave with his life.

Clues he never found, instead only having questions. When they entered the building, what he found in that grand structure was a single, straight hall, no side doors leading to other parts of it to access.

It was possible they were simply hidden away or that there were different entrances to them outside, it was even possible that any other rooms were only accessible by space magic, but with a single door that could be seen at the very end of the walkway, it wasn’t the impression it gave.

No, the building left him with the feeling that it was created by something that liked the idea of such a structure without understanding the practical purposes of such a thing. Like it had been carved of solid stone to give the impression that it held something great and then not realizing it could be used for more, a play at the basic acts of creation that any intelligent race would figure out in their development.

Its very nature unsettled him but there was nothing he could do, no escape. By that time he’d already been dragged to the end of the corridor, the demon that held him bowing its head as it waited without a word.

“Enter.”

Sounding casual but with the air of an irrefutable demand, the doors opened, letting Ben catch his first glimpse of what waited beyond, making his heart freeze in his chest.

He’d been partially right in both his guesses at what the building might have been but wrong in what it contained. Palace or temple, call it both or neither, it didn’t matter, it wasn’t a king or priest that it held.

No, lounging on a chair, holding a feeling of power greater than anything Ben had ever been in front of before, sat a being that Ben could barely stand to look at with the way his sacrilege lit it up in his eyes.

Before him was a god, more powerful than he’d ever witnessed before and spewing that fact across the world.