Infernus by Mike Jones Page B

a man stood in the clearing, apart from the others, and made his solemn pronouncement. "You, spawn of Hell - go back to the pit in which you were born. You will never again kill, after the sun sets this very day!"
    All the eager, pressing bodies fell upon the tree with shrieks.
    The tree shot its cracking, splintering face to the heavens and unleashed a scream so immense that all the ears of the villagers broke simultaneously. Nothing could deter or slow them down. They blurred together as their silver hacked the ancient bark and meat of the tree. Some of them missed and slashed the appendages of their deaf neighbors.
    The demon twisted and tormented its trunk, then attempted to elongate itself to escape the tools in their hands.
    And the villagers' shouts of hatred did not subside. Some wept in their single purpose. Before many hours had elapsed, they found a gray, beating heart, which they burned on the spot.
    The tree became firewood. Then it became kindling. Then it became single chips before they stopped. And many [weeks] times after, when every root had been pulled up and burned in the clearing, the villagers salted the entire area and had their shaman pray a protective chant for their eternal protection. They were satisfied.
    The son, filled with awe, returned to his father and wept as he said, "Was there ever a more completely delicious epic as that tome, my father?"
    "Even if you could write it, my son, you could not do it justice. But you can come here as often as you like and saturate yourself with the beauty, wherewithal."
    *****

Nothing of interest was said after this chapter, but the students glared at him, knowing they could never trust him again. And they always kept their guard up after this.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN
    "ANOTHER EPISODE OF BANKRUPT BEHAVIOR"
    "My son," said the demon as he bent to his work with passion, "is this not a delicious treat, for we are working together, and being together. What do you think?"
    The vampire satyr lay still, unable to speak.
    "Look, my son, the meat hook rises and falls with the blurring speed of a hummingbird's wing. Your eye socket, a mere ruin."
    Crack! Split!
    Red was laughing so hard that he fell on the burning earth and rolled around hysterically for days. The son barely moved; his massive hairy chest rose and fell with shallow breathing.
    Later, the son felt a membrane growing over each shattered eye socket and saw (dimly) many things he wished he hadn't.
    He saw a small red demon forcing a knobby blackened branch up the rectum of a young, surprised man.
    He saw a squirming man who was trying to crawl away from a dwarf who had managed to imbed himself halfway up the man's arse.
    He saw eternally starved serpents silently slurping up slimy fetuses in a boiling lake. And he did confess that this scene was actually pleasing him.
    "Look, my satyr son, behold this horror of religion. Merely seeing this tableau will burn parts of your soul away for all time. You must experience this to become all things."
    And this is what the son saw:
    There were two diamond towers standing fast in the blackened earth; one would say that they appeared to be 110 feet high. No heat could affect them. They were elaborately carved with 3,000 human figures, jutting out at odd angles as if they were agonizing in the flames. A green demon, five times larger than any mortal, stood next to these glittering twin towers. He had a new arrival gripped around the waist with a massive fist. He was jerking the newcomer back and forth between the cruel towers so rapidly that he was no more than a blur, a confusion of arms in the painful rhythm of the nerves of the dead.
    It made Red laugh so hard that many golden tears were falling from his sightless orbs. The large green demon's laughter kept him from seeing what he was doing; it was all instinct. There was snickering as well.
    Red turned to his son after their shared experience and said, "This is what all beings ever created refer to as, 'The Single Most