We were already approaching the massive doors of the palace when I stopped and looked at Mira.

  "Listen... who are you?"

  Mira froze. She slowly turned her head toward me, and in her eyes flashed a spark of something between laughter and a desire to strangle me.

  "What do you mean 'who'? Zen, we've known each other for... well, let's say several eternities. Memory leaking again?"

  "Mm-hmm. Slipping away like soap in water. Are you my grandmother? Or my daughter? Maybe my mother?"

  Mira burst out laughing, the sound echoing off the castle walls.

  "You are Zenhald Helvard. And I am Mira Helvard, your older sister."

  "Ah, right," I rubbed the back of my head. "Family. How could I forget."

  A butler met us at the threshold. He looked impeccable, except for the fact that he smelled of damp earth. He silently led us inside.

  The hall was enormous. Hundreds of people sat at endless tables. The tables groaned under the weight of food: roasted meat, mountains of fruit, exquisite desserts... It seemed the food here never ended.

  But the people themselves... they were a waking nightmare. Living skeletons. Skin stretched over sharp bones, sunken eyes, trembling hands.

  We were seated in "honorary" spots. I took a piece of cake. An impossible, transcendent sweetness spread across my tongue. But my stomach remained empty.

  "An illusion," I muttered, spitting out the "sponge cake." "No calories, no weight. Just a signal to the brain that you're chewing something."

  The people around us were eating at a frantic pace, shoving handfuls of nothingness into themselves, but their hunger only grew. The butler approached us and poured a dark liquid into our chalices from a heavy decanter. The smell of blood hit my nose. Human blood.

  I pushed the chalice away. My table neighbors, however, were already draining their fifth cups, relieving themselves right where they sat, unable to tear themselves away from the ghostly feast. They were turning into animals.

  Suddenly, the lights went out. Darkness covered the hall for several seconds.

  SNAP.

  The light returned, but the tables were empty.

  A ringing silence fell. Hundreds of hungry eyes stared at one another. A second later, the hall turned into a meat grinder—people began tearing each other apart for non-existent crumbs.

  From above, right from the massive chandelier, came a ringing, childish laugh.

  "HA-HA-HA-HA! Yes! Look at yourselves! What are you willing to do for a crumb of bread? Show me your hunger! YES!"

  There, on the gilded bronze, sat a boy of about thirteen. Gray hair, eyes that were two black pits with no bottom. He looked at our group and pouted in disappointment.

  "And why are you all so boring? Don't want to fight for a bone? Ah... I see. You're just not hungry."

  Mira stood up. She walked over to me and said quietly, almost tenderly:

  "Kaboom, Zen."

  If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

  I understood her without words. Laziness gave way. I simply stomped my foot on the floor.

  KABOOM!

  Mana erupted from my soles, tracing fiery cracks across the floor.

  KABOO-O-OM!

  The palace simply ceased to exist. It flew apart in a blinding flash.

  The next second, space buckled, and we were thrown onto an empty gray field. Standing before us was that same boy.

  Alastor (Poverty) transformed instantly. His muscles bulged, tearing his shirt; extra arms burst forth, and black horns began to ooze from his head. The demon was returning to his true form.

  "Scum!" the Demon of Hunger pointed a finger. "What have you forgotten among these humans? Have you forgotten who we are? We are the very spawn of fear!"

  A black sphere flew from his finger. Alastor managed to dodge, but the sphere grazed one of his extra arms.

  CRACK.

  The limb simply evaporated in a black micro-explosion.

  "Ha-ha-ha! Weaklings!" The Demon of Hunger dissolved into laughter, but suddenly cut himself off.

  He stared at Mira and me, wrinkling his nose in an amusing way.

  "Wait, stop... Are you even human?"

  He pointed a finger at us, and genuine bewilderment appeared in his gaze.

  "Her... maybe. But you? Who are you? Why can't I hear your thoughts?"

  I blinked in surprise.

  "What do you mean you can't hear them?"

  "Exactly that!" the kid twirled a finger at his temple. "I hear voices in every head within a certain radius. But right now, all I hear are the screams of these two freak traitors. In your head... silence. A hollow, dead silence."

  He took a step back, squinting suspiciously.

  "And why... why don't I have an instinctive desire to kill you? This is wrong. Demons hate all living things. So who the hell are you?"

  I looked at Mira. She only shrugged.

  The Demon of Hunger looked at us with sincere confusion. Apparently, the silence in my head finally got to him.

  "Fine," he said, "I'll just kill you anyway. What difference does it make who you are if you're dead."

  He held out his palm. The grass beneath his feet instantly turned gray and crumbled into dead dust. A "black tongue"—a stream of viscous, rotten darkness—burst from his fingers. I raised a barrier, but the kid was quick.

  POP.

  He teleported behind my back. I immediately jumped through space, appearing higher up. Hunger didn't even turn his torso—he simply spun his head one hundred and eighty degrees and stared at me with his empty voids. A crimson field began to expand around him.

  I reacted on instinct. I grabbed Mira, Alastor, and Aya with mana and hurled them away from the epicenter.

  KABOOM!

  Where Hunger had stood a second ago, a pillar of black flame shot into the sky. When the smoke cleared, the boy had changed. The veins on his face bulged and blackened, his muscles swelled, his eyes turned scarlet, and his hair stood on end, sparking from the excess of power.

  "So, they actually know how to move through space in this world?" he hissed. "Amusing."

  Mira didn't wait for the rest of the lecture. She drew her hammer and swung it at the enemy in a spinning strike. But Hunger simply held out his hand.

  CLANG.

  The hammer froze in the air, as if it had hit an indestructible wall. Mira tensed, trying to force the weapon through the defense, but the artifact didn't move a millimeter. She had to let go of the handle and jump back.

  "Explode!" Aya suddenly shouted.

  One of the Demon of Hunger's fingers suddenly swelled and popped, flying apart in bloody tatters. I froze. So that was the true essence of the Demon of War. The Form of the Voice. She didn't need swords; it was enough for her to simply command.

  In both of them—Hunger and Aya—almost nothing human remained. The boy's skin became violet-black, covered in deep cracks, while Aya began to turn red, her eyes becoming glowing amber slits.

  Mira began pouring mana discharges directly into the ground, trying to fry the enemy's heels, but Hunger only took a step toward her.

  "Stay!" Aya commanded again.

  Hunger's face twisted with rage.

  "HOW DARE YOU?!"

  He swung his hand, sending a wave of black energy at Aya. She barely managed to dodge, and Mira nearly flew away from the shockwave. The kid's body began to literally fall apart in chunks.

  "So this vessel is that weak..." he growled. "THEN YOU SHALL SEE MY TRUE FORM ON MY OWN TURRITORY!"

  I felt a spatial vortex beginning to swirl around us. A powerful portal that was impossible to break from the inside. I looked at Mira. She had a chance to leave.

  I pushed her with mana, throwing her outside the forming circle.

  POP.

  The world flipped.

  We began to fall from a massive height. The wind whistled in our ears, stinging our lungs. We crashed onto hard, dry, dark-red earth.

  Aya landed nearby. She curled into a ball, clutching her head with her hands. She was shaking with terror.

  "No... no... no..." she whispered. "Anything but this..."

  I stood up, brushing off my knee. I looked around. The sky here was the color of clotted blood.

  "Where are we?" I asked, feeling the mana in this place beginning to behave aggressively.

  "In Hell," Alastor answered hollowly, rising from his knees. "We are home, Zenhald. And this is the worst place we could have ended up."