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My Inner Demons (Pihirio)

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this is a hell of a lesson

~°•enjoy•°~

When the red thunder stopped echoing, Sero realized he was standing on a bridge made of bones.

Actual bones.

They glowed faintly and creaked when he moved, which was… comforting. Not.

“So,” he said, looking around, “is there a gift shop, or do you just hand out trauma for free?”

Satan was already walking ahead of him, coat dragging smoky shadows that tried to crawl up Sero’s shoes. “You joke a lot when you’re scared.”

“I joke a lot *always,*” Sero said. “It’s my brand.”

Below the bridge stretched a whole landscape that didn’t obey physics. Rivers ran upward, castles floated sideways, and trees grew from nothing but light. The air smelled like metal and rain.

Sero squinted. “Okay, this is either the worst dream ever or I’m dead.”

“You’re neither,” Satan said. “Hell isn’t for the dead. It’s for the pieces of them that don’t know they’re gone.”

“That’s… comforting,” Sero muttered.

They reached a tall gate made of what looked like glass shards. On each one, tiny moving pictures flickered—people screaming, laughing, running. Memories maybe.

Satan touched one, and it flashed an image of Isabella running through the streets above. Sero stepped closer. “That’s her!”

“Yes. Your friend,” Satan said. “She’s looking for you.”

“Then send me back!”

Satan smiled. “If I did, you’d break apart before you reached her. You haven’t learned to contain what’s inside you.”

Sero crossed his arms. “You keep saying that like I’ve got a monster in my pocket. I’m *me,* not—whatever you think I am.”

Satan tilted his head. “You’ve seen flashes. The roar. The scales. Do you really believe you’re still just a boy?”

Sero hesitated. The memory of his arm glowing, bones stretching, made his stomach twist. “Yeah, well, if I’m something else, it’s news to me.”

“Then it’s time you learned,” Satan said, pushing the gate open. “Welcome to the Hollow Fields.”

---

The Hollow Fields weren’t fields at all. They were a maze of cracked earth where giant bones stuck out like skyscrapers. The air buzzed with voices—hundreds whispering at once.

“What are they?” Sero asked.

“Remnants,” Satan said. “Leftovers of demons who burned out. They envy you.”

“Because I’m still alive?”

“Because you’re something they can never be again.”

Sero kicked at a pebble. “Cool. Being envied by dust. Living the dream.”

Satan actually laughed. “I begin to see why you irritate people so easily.”

“Thanks,” Sero said. “I work hard at it.”

They walked past a pool of black water that reflected things wrong—Sero’s reflection had golden eyes and scales creeping up his neck. He stepped back. “That’s not funny.”

“Not meant to be,” Satan said. “This place shows you the truth faster than you want it.”

“I liked lies better,” Sero muttered.

---

After what felt like forever, they stopped at a small ruined temple half-buried in ash. Strange carvings of giant reptiles covered the walls—claws, tails, wings too big to belong to any bird.

Satan turned to him. “This belonged to your kind.”

“My *what*?”

“The Dinathros,” Satan said. “The first beasts. When the world was young, before the tribes, before demons, they ruled the skies and the earth. Then they vanished.”

Sero snorted. “Let me guess. They didn’t do their homework.”

Satan ignored the joke. “Their souls sank here, below Pehirio, trapped in fire and memory. Until one of their hearts was reborn in you.”

“Reborn,” Sero repeated. “So you’re saying I’m—what—a walking fossil?”

Satan smiled faintly. “Something like that.”

Sero rubbed his face. “Great. Can’t get a driver’s license, but I’m apparently prehistoric.”

He looked around again. The carvings glowed softly, almost alive. One of them—a huge, horned creature—looked exactly like what he’d glimpsed in his visions.

Satan touched the wall, and light flowed from his hand. “They were not evil, Sero. They simply existed before rules were written. Before I was even born. When they died, their power broke apart into what you call demons. You carry the original source.”

Sero stared at him. “So, wait… you’re saying *I’m older than you?*”

“In spirit,” Satan said.

“Awesome. Guess that makes you the baby here.”

Satan laughed again—quiet, low. “You really are insufferable.”

“Thanks, I try.”

---

They stepped outside again, and the air shimmered with heat. Red sparks rose from the ground like fireflies.

“Why show me all this?” Sero asked. “If you wanted to kill me, you could’ve done that already.”

“I don’t want to kill you,” Satan said. “I want to understand you.”

“Sounds like the start of every bad horror movie.”

Satan gave him a sideways glance. “You joke, but you’ve already felt it—the strength under your skin. If you learn to control it, nothing in Pehirio could touch you.”

“Or I could destroy everything by sneezing wrong,” Sero said. “Hard pass.”

“You fear yourself.”

“Wouldn’t you?” Sero shot back. “Last time I freaked out, I nearly leveled a street.”

Satan’s expression softened just a little. “Fear can chain you, or it can guide you. I can teach you which it will be.”

Sero squinted at him. “You teaching me anything sounds like a bad idea. What’s in it for you?”

Satan looked out across the glowing plain. “Maybe I’m tired of being alone with monsters who only obey. Maybe I want to see what happens when something wild refuses to kneel.”

Sero blinked. “That’s… oddly poetic for a guy named after evil.”

“Names lie,” Satan said simply.

For a moment, they just stood there, the red sky above them pulsing like a heartbeat.

Finally Sero sighed. “Fine. You want to ‘teach’ me, whatever that means—where do we start?”

Satan smiled, almost proud. “With balance. You cannot control the beast until you accept it.”

Sero groaned. “If this turns into some meditation thing, I’m out.”

“Not meditation,” Satan said, raising his hand. “Experience.”

The ground beneath Sero cracked open, light pouring out, and a massive shadow rose behind him—his own, shaped like the dinosaur from the carvings.

Sero’s eyes went wide. “Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me—”

The shadow roared, and the sound filled the entire underworld.

Satan stepped back, grinning. “Lesson one,” he said over the noise. “Try not to eat me.”

“NO PROMISES!” Sero yelled as the light swallowed him whole