First Demonic Dragon

"Come to make a last minute bid to change my mind?"

Glancing behind him, he found his parents and sisters standing around him like the old days.

Malenia and Kanami were glaring at him fiercely, just like when they were kids.

It should have been scary, but it actually brought back many fond memories of fighting with them.

"I thought we all agreed that you weren\'t going to stand in the way of our decision?" He asked.

"No one is here for that." Asmodeus dismissed. "Your sisters only came to share their well wishes."

Abaddon glanced at his sisters and found both of them still scowling at him just as they had been yesterday.

"…Yes, because they honestly look so repentant."

Yara nudged her daughters in their sides and forced them to change their demeanors.

Malenia: "… We wish for you to have the safest journey possible, brother."

Kanami: "And we pray that not a single hair on your head is harmed."

\'We hope the whole thing is knocked off.\' They thought in unison.

An entire childhood spent together had given Abaddon the necessary insight to when his sisters were secretly plotting on his downfall.

"Seriously… Haven\'t you moved past this by now? Nyx is going to make an impromptu appearance and she will defend the girls and I if anything goes awry."

"She\'s not family! I don\'t trust her to look after all of you the way that one of us would!" Kanami had made her stance on this matter very clear over the last few days.

And Malenia, who was usually quite cool and level-headed about everything, shared in her skepticism and distrust with a silent nod.

"Nyx may not be family, but she is a friend and that is no less important. Besides, there are very few gods as powerful as her." Abaddon reminded.

"You think she\'s your friend, but what if she\'s only pretending so that she can get you to lower your guard and turn you into her primary breeding bull when she gets the chance!"

"What have I told you about delving into earth conspiracy theories…? Look at what damage it\'s done to your poor brain."

"It\'s my free time and I will do whatever I want with it!" Kanami roared.

"Perhaps you would have less time to spend on that nonsense if you found someone to date." Abaddon rolled his eyes.

"F-For your information, I am-"

"You\'re what…?" Asmodeus asked in a heartbroken tone.

"U-Umm, nothing daddy." For some reason, Kanami was suddenly very enamored with the texture of Abaddon\'s bedsheets.

Coincidentally, so was Malenia.

Making Abaddon realize that maybe he should spend more time with his sisters than he had been.

Imani suddenly came to his side and draped a black covering over his bare shoulders to help him finish getting ready.

She stepped back and took a good look at him and let her mother\'s intuition work it\'s magic.

"You look tense, bebe mwen. (My baby) Take your hair down and loosen up a bit."

Imani made a playful jiggling gesture that made Asmodeus drool and forced him to start counting to ten internally.

Abaddon laughed dryly, but his mood did not change. "I can\'t be too relaxed, manmi. I still need to be prepared in case things go awry today. I won\'t let Nyx do all of my fighting for me."

"…Sit here for a moment." Imani gestured to the couch.

Once Abaddon complied, she was finally no longer being dwarfed in height by her son.

She unbound his hair and began dusting off his clothes the same way she used to do when he was young.

"…Mwen (I) will never know what it\'s like to do the things that you do. To fight, or be strategic, or fear outside treachery.

So mi advice may be missing some outlook, but perhaps it may also have it\'s place, non?

These people… they claim to want to meet you to learn about your identity for themselves.

When many of their colleagues labeled you public enemy, they thought for themselves did they not?

Perhaps it may all be a trick or a facade, but one act of good faith is inherently deserving of another no matter the circumstances.

Go today not as a conqueror, a god, or even a ruler. Simply them see mi son for everything that he is. And let the rest of the pieces fall where they may."

Abaddon closed his eyes as Imani pressed her forehead against his own.

By her design, he started to feel much more relaxed and any anxiety he felt surrounding this day was suddenly sapped away.

Perhaps it was better to not go into the meeting with his head on a swivel and a hair-trigger on his temper.

It was a shame at his big age that it still took a pep-talk from his parents for him to see that.

But he was grateful that he could lean on their wisdom in times of uncertainty.

You could fill oceans with the amount of souls who would long for such an opportunity.

\'One act of good faith is inherently deserving of another…\'

Those simple words recycled themselves in his mind over and over again long after carried himself out of the door.

And he didn\'t know it then, but this small nugget of wisdom he received from Imani would alter the course of this meeting significantly.

Even if there were a few hiccups along the way…

-

After a necessary talk with his family, Abaddon bid the five of them goodbye before he stepped into the room just across the hall.

He didn\'t bother knocking as there was nothing inside that he hadn\'t already seen before, and simply poked his head inside.

"Are my loves ready?"

"Not yet, honey, this one is being difficult. Every nice thing that Valerie has created for her she swears isn\'t a good fit." Lisa denied.

"I-I\'m just not cut out for all of these dainty little dresses and stuff!" Sif wrapped her nude body in a blanket like one giant cigar and hurled herself back into her bed.

Abaddon waived his hand and the sheets miraculously unwrapped her and spat her back out- much to her annoyance.

"Fuck!"

"Yes, yes, I know you\'re upset. In hindsight, maybe we should have given you more than an hour\'s warning before we told you we were taking you with us."

Sif slowly sat up on the bed and stared at Abaddon and the room full of women.

"Yes you should have… Why did you all decide to bring me at the last minute anyway?"

"Well… we said that we were going to try new things in this arrangement, did we not? This can be the first of that… Unless you would prefer things stay contractual?"

"I-I didn\'t say-"

"Good, now hurry up and come on."

Abaddon started picking up any random clothes until they resembled an outfit and began forcefully dressing Sif like she was two years old- with help from Erica of course.

"H-Hey! I don\'t need you two to do this!"

Erica: "You\'re too indecisive, so apparently you do… Do you want to wear underwear or not?"

"I-I don\'t thin-"

Abaddon: "Works for me, it\'ll speed things up once we return home."

"P-Pervert!"

Abaddon: "Uh-huh, sure. Lift your arms."

"This is so… Please don\'t tell Thrudd about this."

All: "We\'ll think about it."

A minute and thirty seconds after Abaddon had entered the room, Sif went from being completely nude to fully dressed.

Erica quickly finished doing her hair and finally the twelve of them were ready to attend their mysterious gathering.

"So… how do we get to this Svarga place again?" Bekka asked.

Abaddon looked at his phone and the three short texts he\'d received from Shiva.

The old god texted like he\'d never gotten his hands on a phone before…

"Apparently… We don\'t have to do anything at all?"

Almost on cue, Abaddon felt a certain pin-prick sensation on the back of his neck.

He strode out to Sif\'s balcony and looked up into the sky where a brand new portal had appeared high above their heads.

Though it was faint, Abaddon could very clearly sense Yesh\'s touch from the opening.

"Oh. Guess that\'s what they meant."

-

Svarga is one of seven higher realms belonging to the Hindu Pantheon.

It is their seat of power, just as Mount Olympus is to the Greeks.

Although it is far more grand.

The realm is laden with godly splendor including rivers consisting of wine, water, and milk; along with a mountain made of pure gold.

Water lilies and beautiful lotuses dot the land itself and the hair of every beautiful maiden that dwells within the land.

Within Svarga, the capital city of Amaravati is home to the tree that grants all wishes, the cow of plenty, and the king of the devas himself, Indra, and his consort Indrani.

The palace of the king is exactly as over the top and fanciful as one would imagine it to be.

Huge pillars made from diamond hold the golden walls of the temple upright, and luxurious, red silk drapes adorn most every window.

There is not a single bit of furniture within the temple that is not made of solid gold.

Which honestly makes sitting on the throw pillows that are stuffed with feathers a kind of necessity if one was honest…

Sudharma is the name of a famous hall within the palace, and while it is usually used as a meeting place between Indra and the other deva deities, today it was a banquet hall for outsiders.

A huge circular table in the shape of a football held upwards of thirty gods.

At the head of the table, Indra was seated closely next to his consort and was mulling over the wine in his goblet.

\'I wonder… is this going to be strong enough to carry us all through the day?\'

"They\'re coming." Shiva suddenly said.

The red-skinned king looked to the blue primordial at his side, and found him staring into a portal on the opposite side of the room.

Everyone in attendance seemed to be waiting with bated breath for what would happen next- and a few were seriously beginning to question whether or not this was a smart idea.

Their doubt nearly doubled in an instant when a single clawed foot stepped through the portal, and the entire temple began to vibrate.