Since the dungeon was directly connected to the boratory, it was used to hold test subjects when they weren’t needed, which meant the first few chambers hardly fazed the human.

  “Hide in the back of the headspace,” Akakios instructed.

  “What?”

  “I need to check on something, and I don’t think you will want to see the next chamber.”

  The human was uncertain if it would work, but he tried to push his awareness away from the front. This should be easy. He had dissociated before. That was a passive process though. How do you actively lose awareness? Try not to think of a pink elephant. Try not to see what's in front of your eyes. It's the same paradox.

  He couldn’t figure out which way to go. For a second, he thought it worked. He was a step above Akakios’ head. He was just about to lose consciousness.

  Then, he thrust back into the vilin’s body, all too aware again. “That didn’t work.”

  “I was hoping the boratory would be the worst you’d see of me. In any case, do your best not to puke.”

  When they entered the next chamber, Mars was very tempted to puke, and Akakios rolled his eyes as their stomach lurched. But the demon was still in control and his guts wouldn't be swayed by the human’s weaker disposition.

  The simple holding cells became iron racks decorated with pleading, desperate victims. Mars was accustomed to a certain level of gore in fiction. He was a fan of the old man cannibal yaoi that somehow aired to the general public on NBC in 20131. Some of the tamer torture in this section matched the goriest scenes in that show. One human was hung by his ankles, the skin of his back cut into fps that were stretched out and pinned to the wall behind him like a newly preserved moth. The human couldn’t help thinking of season two, episode five of the gay cannibal show. However desensitized he was to fictional gore, the real thing was unfathomable.

  The winged human was surprisingly alive. He was one of the few who didn’t struggle, as the slightest movement would tear away more of his skin. But dangling in that amount of pain, even the most resolute warrior would find it difficult not to squirm.

  Akakios did his best to keep his eyes forward. There was no reason to linger in this pce, each torture worse than the st. But, that didn’t save his headmate. The winged man screamed at every accidental twitch. And it wasn’t just him. Rows of victims screeched in a terrible cacophony.

  Mars smashed his palms against his ears. The sound was muffled. The demon froze. The sound was muffled. Mars smashed his palms against his ears.

  The human could feel Akakios’ confusion, then interest. Then, their lips twisted into a smirk.

  “Now, how did you do that?” the demon asked.

  The human didn’t know what he meant. Mars was still aching. The muffle wasn’t enough. The screaming pierced through his palms into their skull. “Can we just leave!?”

  “You’re speaking,” Akakios observed.

  The human still didn’t get it, but at least their legs had turned them around. Mars had no idea what made the demon change his mind, but he was relieved.

  “We need to turn around,” the demon told him. “I have a prisoner I need to see.”

  “???”

  He didn’t sound mad, even as he stressed the human’s name, “Mars.”

  They stopped. Mars looked down at their feet. “Wait, that was me,” he said, from their mouth. He finally understood. He was in control.

  And then he wasn’t. Akakios’ shoved away the human’s will and stretched his fingers as he gained them back. He cracked his neck before twisting back around and heading once again deeping into the dungeon.

  Still, Mars wasn’t cut off completely. “I’m sorry.” Why was he apologizing? He did it once more, “I’m sorry.” Even when he was able to assert his own will, that will was barely his own. This body didn’t have the same deficit of dopamine and serotonin, as far as he was aware. But then again, souls here were substantial, not just a decent shorthand for the concept of the individual.

  Mars was agnostic, bordering on atheistic in life, despite his strong Catholic roots on both sides of his family. He still brings up his Confirmation Name–Joan of Arc–with a great degree of pride. However, his understanding of the soul before being introduced to The System was formed in ignorance. And at this point, he had had little time to reflect on his altered world view. Maybe there was more to the soul, even in his own world? As an employee of the Heavens, I can attest to that with certainty. But at this moment, he was in no position to specute about such things.

  The human was already thinking in the right direction, though. They believed a different body would alleviate certain ails. But, was it not Akakios and his scientists who specuted that a soul could be influenced by its owner’s conscious mind? Maybe the soul would retain certain quirks from their previous bodies. Maybe Mars would never lose the ills of his mind.

  And he was just coming to that conclusion as his anxiety spiked up, as a string of “I’m sorry”s spilled from their shared lips.

  “Mars?” the demon said.

  “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

  “Mars!” the demon snapped.

  The human snapped back to the world. “Akakios… I’m so– I didn’t mean to take you back over. I’m not a spy. I promise.”

  “I’m not mad,” he said simply.

  The human could feel the demon’s previous ire had faded in the confusion of the scene. Or maybe in his own curiosity. Mars had a difficult time discerning his motivations, even as they share a body. In less than a few hours, he had seen the demon’s unrestrained cruelty, his anger, his coldness. In the same time, he had seen the demon’s leniency, humor, his respect for his servants and his almost gentleness now. He swung like a pendulum. Mars’ sister would have arm-chair diagnosed him bipor in a heartbeat, but that would be her ignorant, simplistic interpretation of his disposition. It would have been more an insult than true analysis. In short, she was an ablist bitch. Bipor did not apply.

  But that didn’t mean he was stable. Mars couldn’t help remembering what the feathery had said about the demon’s apprentice. He didn’t have one in the book, but the book didn’t describe the vast boratory before the dungeons, either. M.X. Brady, whoever he was, however he found out about this world, was utterly incurious about the people within this world, even as he detailed their cultures and his writings reflected that. It annoyed the human to no end. It also meant he had no context for the vilin’s current vilinous behavior. Mars so desperately wished to ask.

  He asked something else instead. “Why aren’t you mad?”

  “You’ve done nothing wrong.”

  “I’m in your body.”

  “You’re not the first person who has been inside me,” Akakios quipped.

  “I’m in your head.”

  “Yes, that part is new.” The prisoners hanging on the walls were in too much pain to notice the drama before them. They continued to wail, and Mars brought their hands to their ears again. Akakios was in charge of their feet, and directed them out of this particurly nasty chamber. Once the screams gave way to the cold silence of the deeper dungeon, Mars let down their hands and the demon continued, “I don’t think you’re here to fuck me over, so why would I be mad.”

  “And the pretty boy you killed? Was he fucking you over strapped to that chair?”

  “Yes.”

  “...”

  The demon smiled, “He got in the way.”

  “Was he a spy?”

  “No, Mars. Think carefully.”

  Mars did think. They were even careful about it. But they couldn’t grasp what Akakios was saying. “He was just sitting there.”

  “Taking up space.”

  “I take up space.”

  “Hmmm, nevermind.” The vilin shook his head. The human was unlikely to understand, and he didn’t feel like expining any more.

  They made their way past the quiet ones. This part of the dungeon held less visual horror. But Mars wasn’t completely stupid. There was only one row of cells facing nothing but stone on the other side of the path. There were walls between each cell. Most of the prisoners inside were curled up in a fetal position or scrapping their own fingers at the walls to pass the time.

  There were small holes in the back of their cells, chutes that distributed food without need for in-person delivery. A hole next to it appeared to do the reverse, letting them discard whatever was left. One had wrapped their body around their food tray like a pillow, a simution of touch. The cold tin wouldn’t do much for them, but it was something. Another had food around their enclosure, having lost the will to eat but taking any feeble entertainment where it came. The stench of mold wafted around the sorry scene. It must have been a while since someone cleaned.

  Even if the human saw more than just mindless cruelty from this vilin, it didn’t erase the fact that he was unequivocally evil. He was lucky the demon’s ire wasn’t directed at him. That didn’t make him feel any less sick. “This is just cruel,” Mars muttered. But of course the other would hear it.

  “I am aware.”

  “Why don’t they scream?” Mars asked, even as he still thought of the prisoner Akakios had killed. Maybe he really was manic, in the colloquial sense. He wasn’t against the vilest of torture, as evident by horror show behind them and the solitary confinement here.

  “Their vocal chords have been cut out.”

  “...” The human was losing his ability to feel surprise. Even if the human saw more than just mindless evil from this vilin, he was still mindfully cruel. And he was stuck in that evil man’s head. He was stuck witnessing all of it. He couldn’t help but ask an incredulous, “Why?”

  Their eyes flicked to one of the cells. It was wafting a different stench. While each of their chambers had chamber pots they could empty down those food chutes, cleanliness was not the first priority of the mentally anguished. Mars was well aware, though it had never gotten so bad that he shit himself. That particur bodily function was one of the few things that got him out of bed in his darkest times. When he could only crawl so far, he would sleep in his bathtub. His hair might be greasy enough to stick to his forehead. His clothes might be the same for a week. He might have smelled worse than a cishet brony. But he managed to shit in the toilet.

  He felt pity. He felt disgust. He felt sick. Their body shared his nausea, and Akakios gave in enough to look away.

  “Everyone in this chamber betrayed me,” the demon said, coldly. “The ones in the racks behind us are people who have plotted against me.”

  Mars kept his disgust from reaching his vocal cords, but the feeling peppered his synapses. The demon didn’t acknowledge it, though. Why would he? He was perfectly aware of what he had done. And there was one st chamber he needed to get to.

  “Are you sure you can’t hide in the back? I don’t want you to see this.”

  Mars tried to leave his own senses again. He didn’t want to bear witness to any more. He was prodding and pushing and searching and then something in his consciousness clicked. He found a way away.

  As the vilin continued to do vilinous things, Mars began to dissociate. He was almost on the ceiling, looking down at himself. Then, he wasn’t even in the room.

  His consciousness had slipped into a crack, and fell into a calm dark dimension much like the nothing the body he didn’t have wasn’t in when he met the system. Here, nothing solidified into something. The body that he longed for, the one you imagined for him, materialized in this pce, and his mind settled into that form.

  Here were the remains of what should have been. The void shifted from pure bck to what was more akin to a mission control room. There were screens on one wall, a couple of desks, and an array of file cabinets and a few shelves lined the walls to the side. In the back of the room, there was a small studio apartment with a couple of folding screens to add a bit of privacy from the main area. There was no bathroom, but there was a kitchen.

  However, the pce was a mess. The file cabinets had met the wrong end of a metal baseball bat. Papers were strewn around them, torn to shreds in wanton violence. Most of the monitor screens before him were shattered. A few were blinking in a feeble attempt at life, but their efforts were in vain. The colored lines of glitching pixels were all that remained of all but one.

  When he found the unshattered monitor leading against the foot of a desk, he had assumed it was broken like the others. The screen was bck, and internal damage could cause the death of it. But he brushed off some debris and set it safely on the desk anyway. Then, just in case it managed to evade demise, he looked for a button to turn the screen on. His hands brushed a specific spot on its side, and it did just that, glowing a dim green in shy greeting.

  [Rebooting…]

  “Are you the System?” Mars asked, more to himself than the loading device before him. But as it clicked fully on, humming to life so sweetly, text scrawled itself on the screen.

  […]

  […]

  […yes! Hello! I am your Emergency System. Laika is no longer avaible. I will act in her pce. Can I get your name?]

  “I am Mars.”

  [Welcome, Mars! It is nice to meet you. You can call me Ryzhik. Can you inform me of your mission location and objectives? For some reason, I am unable to access your files.]

  “It’s the same world as Font of Demons,” the human said. Just in case that wasn’t enough, he racked his brain for the name of the world. “I know the country the story took pce in was called Lyharke. I am currently in the body of the demon Akakios, but he is still conscious and in full control of the body. I can’t do anything.”

  […]

  […]

  […This is very strange, Mars. The likelihood of a dual-soul transmigration failure is less than 0.01%. The current procedure is to contact System Main, but my servers are down. I will activate an emergency fre… probe 8 is the only one still active… initiating discovery initiative…]

  “What could have caused this?”

  [The sheer number of programs and hardware I am unable to access is unprecedented. Chances issues are reted to a system bug are less than 0.0003%. Chances issues are reted to incidental hardware malfunction are less than 0.0012%. Chances issues are a deliberate attack are 99.9984%. Chances issues are from [other] variables are 0.0001%…]

  “Attack? Who could possibly have…” The vilin was experimenting with soul transference. Could he know enough to destroy the System? And even then why? How?

  Ryzhik gave him some other ideas.

  [The System is a divisive entity due to its ability to manipute the course of the multiverse. Enemies include The Red-Force Alliance, the Interpnar Republic of Fersiv, the Angels of the Trist Collective…]

  …The System had enemies. It made sense. An entity that could control the course of Fate would ruffle some feathers. He was more surprised there were beings strong enough to attack such a force than that it sowed animosity. “And one of them could have messed with my system?”

  [It is possible. Currently, I do not have access to the Main System, so I am unable to determine if the issue is isoted to your proxy or if the attack was widespread and the damage here was colteral.]

  “Can you see into this room I am in?”

  [Yes, I am able to see. The physical damage in your pocket dimension is isoted to System software and hardware, which further implies a direct attack.]

  “You weren’t watching when this happened?”

  [No. I am your Emergency System. I am dormant unless my software is alerted to a disturbance with your proxy, Laika. I am also unable to access footage during or before the attack. 99% of Laika’s saved files have been destroyed in the carnage. I will use resources to analyze all that is left, but it is unlikely to reveal much. Whatever destroyed your proxy was incredibly thorough. I am surprised I am still active, considering how much was lost.]

  They continued to discuss the issue, but Mars learned little else. The remaining save files were all but useless, the rewards store was inaccessible, and most of Ryzhik’s functions were inhibited. What was left was depressingly little. Mars went back to cleaning the room, organizing the paper scraps to sort through ter. He piled the broken screens in a corner of the room, and pushed a desk to the scrap pile to block the dreary view.

  Then, he explored the small studio apartment behind the folding screens. It was a cozy space, in contrast to the dadaist disaster on the other side. The bed had a salmon-pink quilt and a crochet stuffed dog that were scrunched against the wall like they faced an explosion. It was possible they had.

  The rug underneath was like an oversized doily. Wooden shelves were toppled over, spilling thousands of novels to the floor. Some of the works Mars had heard of, like Pride and Prejudice, Lord of the Rings, Anne of Green Gables, a few of the more popur danmei (including the one with fish mpreg!2), and, of course, Font of Demons by M.X. Brady.

  Other books were clearly not from Earth. They were in nguages Mars could never hope to decipher. Some of their covers emitted their own light. Some were fully crocheted. Some were formed from suspended water, like the demon’s test subject caged in the shark tank. Mars was desperate to know what that book was about, but he didn’t know what would happen if he touched it. He would have to ask Ryzhik about that ter.

  There was a kitchenette in the corner, and the human rifled through the cabinets, finding a couple of each of all the basics. Bowls, ptes, spoons, knives, etc. Thankfully, they had survived most of the carnage, protected by the cabinets. It was clearly not the focus of the attack.

  The fridge, surprisingly, had a few items left. A drawer held a few packages of deli meats and sliced cheddar. There was also a Tupperware full of a green… something. Mars didn’t touch that one. Last time he ate something, he died. Green sludge was less than appealing given the circumstances.

  The refrigerator at the top contained pizza rolls and freezer-burned vanil ice cream, which may have been the most important resource left in this abandoned dimension. He would have to savor those when he could. He didn’t expect the fantasy country of Lyharke to have such fine delicacies.

  “Is this apartment supposed to be for me? It’s not really my style.”

  [No. Laika lived there.]

  He went back out and faced the tablet so he could read Ryzhik’s response. He froze. Oh. Of course. It was his proxy’s.

  “She had a body?”

  [When proxies reach a certain level, they can acquire items from the rewards store, same as you. That can include a corporeal form, if they desire one. We do not need food or sleep but some of us enjoy those luxuries.]

  Mars had read a danmei with that exact premise3. The System was the main character, and the deuteragonist was the yandere he was tasked to serve. Was this System simir? “Are you just programs? Do you just mimic human speech patterns or are you sentient?”

  [Yes. System Proxies are sentient. Emergency Proxies are sentient. There is a back-up Emergency Proxy that is regur code, but you have not interacted with it yet. On that note, I just checked and the back-up Emergency Proxy has also been destroyed. I am all that is left.]

  The human gnced back at the apartment. The folding screens blocked most of it, but the crochet puppy fshed in his mind. Laika was a person. She was a real person. Something happened to that person.

  He had barely known her, but didn’t that make it all the worse? All he had of her was a small apartment in the back of this dimension, full of things she didn’t need, but collected anyway. She ate pizza rolls and freezer-burned vanil ice cream. She liked soft, cozy quilts and crochet. She loved to read stories of all types, from a variety of different worlds. She was a person, but all that was left was the echo of one. He couldn’t even mourn her properly.

  “Did you know her?”

  [This is my first activation. I have never met her.]

  “Your first activation?”

  [I am your Emergency Proxy. Emergencies are rare.]

  “What happens when you’re not active?”

  [When I am not active, I am nothing, so I experience nothing.]

  “...that’s incredibly lonely.” And incredibly familiar. He had lived that way before.

  [When I am not active, I am nothing, so I feel nothing.]

  He’d lived through that too. Though, Ryzhik was probably being literal. “So, are you a baby then?” he realized. This was their first day alive. They could throw a birthday party. Unfortunately, he didn’t know what kind of gift to give his proxy. What would a sentient, incorporeal, transdimensional being want for their first birthday? He wouldn’t feel right swiping the crochet puppy from the bed, but maybe he could get them a book? Though, they didn’t have a body, so how would they read it?

  As he was going through all the different ways to celebrate Ryzhik’s birth, they typed…

  [I am not a baby. I used to be like you. I died.]

  Oh. Oh.

  “Wait! That’s unfair!” This poor proxy could have gotten another life, one full of fantasy and magic and adventure. Now, they’re stuck serving his pathetic ass. Worse, if Laika wasn’t out of commission, they would have stayed inactive for who knows how long. If Mars had the chance to live his dreams, even if it ultimately got messed up along the way, why couldn’t Ryzhik?

  When his proxy finally connected to the Main System, he had a lot of yelling to do. He wasn’t going to stand by while his new friend got the shit end of the stick.

  [It is okay. I like my new job. I get to rest for most of it.]

  “Is it really rest? You're not rexing, you don't exist! All you ever know is work! Like in that show with that one guy? from Parks and Rec? The one where their mind severed??... You deserve better! It's not fair!”

  [Death is never fair.]

  Mars didn't know what to say to that, so he didn't say anything. He paced the work space, frustrated.

  [We should focus on the present issue before you try to take on a system we can't even reach.]

  He groaned. There was torture on one end, distruction on the other. He didn’t know which was worse. He did know that he was having a very, very bad day.

  “How do I know when Akakios is done?” he muttered.

  [I can show you.]

  He didn’t want to see the terrible, awful, no good, very bad things his demon was doing, but how else would he know when it was over? It was better to see it on a small screen than with his eyes. “Okay. Uh, show me?”

  Ryshik’s dispy shifted to the view from Akakios’ eyes. It wasn’t as horrific as he anticipated. He was just looking down at a chained figure. No excessive torture. No blood. Nothing. He just kneeled there, shackled in a cold, dark room.

  He was a young man, the dark shag of his hair hiding most of his face. He couldn’t have been here long. There was still life left in that body. He still had a healthy yer of softness above his toned muscles. The prisoner hadn’t yet withered away.

  So, assuming the horrors were over, Mars reversed what he had done to get to this dimension. It took a second, but he knew what he was doing now, and his mind finally melded back into the demon’s body… just as he said, “–ere’s no way you know nothing. You weren’t unconscious the whole time, were you?”

  Mars couldn’t read the figure’s expression, but Akakios could. With a guilty look to the side, he could tell he was right.

  “Tell me, so I don’t have to hurt you.”

  He spit at the demon’s feet, and Mars could sense Akakios’ anger flooding back. But he didn't pounce, just gritted his teeth. “You need to tell me what you know, Lars. Now.”

  “Lars!?”

  The vilin closed his eyes, and sighed. He wanted to do this without his headmate. “Leave.”

  “No, I know him.”

  “Do you?” He was clearly annoyed. Not even a twinge of curiosity. The demon just needed the human to leave, now that he knew he could.

  The human shouldn't push. He saw what happened to those that pushed. But his anxiety couldn't stop his impulse. “You’re Lars Alfoy.”

  The prisoner looked up at his captor, shock so evident on his face even Mars could tell. Then, that shock stretched into a smile. “You’re possessed, now?”

  “Shut up.” The vilin snapped.

  “Oh my gods, you are! Aren't you?”

  Mars couldn’t shut up. “Why is he here!?”

  “You need to stay out of this,” the demon warned in their head.

  The prisoner ughed. He had the audacity to ugh. In Akakios’ domain. In Akakios face. The demon wanted to shut that mouth of his up so badly, but he needed him to speak. So when the prisoner caught his breath, he managed to say, “This is so good.”

  Akakios turned around. He wasn't dealing with this. This wasn't how it was supposed to go. He kicked the door before he left, like a small outburst from a child.

  “Oh, do come back! I want to see your new friend! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!”

  Lars’ screws were looser than the demon’s, at this point.

  The human remembered a point in M.X. Brady’s novel where the vilin had captured the hero’s best friend. He offered to trade Lars for some powerful artifact something or other. The demon had been kinda lowkey before then, only disturbing the human world when necessary for his goals. So, that was the first time they had crossed paths.

  The demon had tortured the hero’s best friend and then exchanged him for the MacGuffin. The object didn't actually matter, just its absence. Without the important whatever whatever, the hero fought to grow stronger on his own. And with it, the demon lord was confident enough to start meddling in mortal affairs.

  Their lives were intertwined ever since.

  Now, even though so much was unfamiliar, at least Mars knew where he was in the story.

  “Can I tell you something, Akakios?’

  “...fine.”

  “I’m not from this world.” He knew it was out of character, but there was no system to punish him anyway. And someone had to know. There was no way he could figure out what happened to his system without a little bit of help. Or, what was going on in this world.

  Akakios nodded, and continued out of the dungeon. Mars was expecting shock, though at this point, he wasn’t sure why. Nothing seemed to surprise the demon. “Ah, that expins some things.”

  ~~Author's Notes:1. Hannibal, NBC2. The Disabled Tyrant's Beloved Pet Fish, Canji Baojun De Zhangxin Yu Chong3. Reborn As a System, Long Qi 龙柒4. Adam Scott5. Severance, Apple TV