Zertos was only a greater demon— no more a demon in the same class as Thelia or the succubi twins, Lorica and Xana. What set him apart were the magic crystals he swallowed, much like how I was still a witch despite having consumed a soul stone. Even so, letting my guard down could prove fatal. I still didn't know where Abstinence was, if she were even still here.

The demon women I brought with me escaped my clutches and retreated to the back of the room. It didn't look like they had any intentions of helping either of us. But at any point I began to lose, their opportunistic nature might set their fangs on me again.

A barrage of fireballs flew out of his mouth. I conjured a wall of ice to block the attack, but the ensuing impact sent shards flying across the room. Fortunately, no one was hurt. Many of the knights were being raped behind pillars or beneath the pews.

"Last chance, Zertos. Stand down or it won't end well for you," I warned, offering him a clemency.

"Pitiful witch. Only the weak bargain!" Zertos opened his mouth to unleash another spell, but the tentacles of my living robes wrapped around his throat. The fire was snuffed out, and the demon was left grasping at his neck, clawing vainly at his restraints.

More appendages emerge from my robes to grab each of his four arms. He had been soundly immobilized, more so than he was before. He tried to choke out an insult, but the words erupted in the form of a gurgle instead.

I put a foot to his chest and pushed. He collapsed like a tree in the forest, slowly, creaking, until the satisfying crash of him hitting ground boomed.

"You were just a meager demon after all," I teased.

Beneath the fat and between his stumpy legs was a rather small penis for his size. It wasn't the gargantuan elephant trunk that I was expecting, it was instead like a turtle peeking out of its shell. I dared call it cute.

"Awww. Maybe someone wanted to get big to compensate for their small little thing?" I cooed at him.

"You won't get away with this. When that knight reaches Edith and the demons coming pouring out, we'll see who's laughing!" he shouted.

Hearing Edith's name stirred the fury inside me. Fire and smoke billowed from my robes, burning away the fabric until it became the black, wispy regalia from when I fought the dracolich. The tips of each tentacle sharpened, and I angled the blades at Zertos' head.

"What's this about Edith and Abstinence?" I demanded.

He wouldn't speak. If fear couldn't convince him, I had to go at it from another angle.

"What are you— stop that!" Zertos squirmed as I pressed the sole of my foot against his turtleneck of a penis.

I recalled Mira mentioning that she made the men during her trial orgasm using nothing but her feet. A part of me was curious. What better way to try it myself than to use a demon and humiliate him at the same time.

"What's the matter? Big bad demon afraid of a little stimulation?" I teased him. Zertos clutched at the tentacles pinning him to the ground. The elixir of gigantism not only increased my size, it also raised my strength by an absurd margin. He couldn't hope to fight back in a battle of pure strength, and with my tentacles wrapping around his neck and hands, he couldn't cast spells either.

As I continued to tease his cock with my foot, pinching it between my big toes and kneading it with my sole, his struggles began to subside. Now was the time to strike.

I compelled two tentacles to pry open his mouth, and another to reach down his throat. Zertos became many times more animated, writhing and screaming to get me to stop. The tentacle slid through his esophagus, down to his stomach, until it made purchase on something hard. In fact, there were several dense objects.

He choked and gagged, his cock twitched with contradicting excitement despite his panicked struggle. The moment I pulled the first pulsating crystal out of his gullet, his member ejaculated thick cum all over my foot.

"So you have a foot fetish and a choking fetish? I won't judge." I giggled into my hand.

"Screw you, bitch!" Zertos snarled.

I stuck another tentacle in when he opened his mouth to speak.

This went on for a few minutes. Each time I pulled one out, Zertos shrunk in size until I held five giant crystals, and he was about the size of an orc. Without all the bloat, I recognized him as a greshka. A pig-faced demon with the ears and snout of a bat. He was still fat in appearance, but much less so. I could crush him under my foot if I wanted to.

"If you liked my foot so much, maybe I should step on you as you are now." I offered him the most wicked grin I could muster.

Being evil wasn't my tune, but demons couldn't be treated any other way than with fear or demonstrating superiority over them. They weren't like humans and demi-humans who, with enough kindness, might be won over. These creatures of another plane knew only to dominate others.

Zertos fell to his knees and apologized. "I don't want to die! The deal— I only brokered it between the witch called Edith and my masters!"

Previously, Thelia informed me that Zertos gave Abstinence a soul of a high demon. They were a class of demons cut from a different cloth and could be viewed as the overlords of their kind. Zertos being a greater demon couldn't have gotten his hands on something like that without help— or if he was used as a pawn by another demon.

"Keep talking. What was that about setting demons free into my world?" I asked, stomping the space next to him.

"I don't know! Ask the witch. She is the one who came up with this bargain. She somehow found a way to bring us into Talmora," Zertos squeaked.

And the demons were willing to give anything for that to happen. 

"Wait… soul stone… how did you demons entrap a soul? That's not possible, not even through advanced witchcraft." Zertos looked at me clueless to what I said.

No matter how much I thought about it, something didn't add up. A soul was intangible. We've only recently discovered that soul stones could be created at the top of the tower. Did they kill a high demon in this forged world to trap its soul?

The only one who knew more on the topic of soul stones was Demos— the very god who created them. An itch at the back of my head makes me wonder if he had a hand in this bargain. I thought he was on our side, but maybe it was more complicated than the gods initially led on.

Unless Demos was playing us all for fools.

I didn't like that one bit.

My enlarged size made arranging the crystals a lot easier. If I was small, this would have taken ages. As I currently was, I could lift each one with a single hand. The circle in which they were originally set was on top of where Zertos had sat before I knocked him over.

All it took was moving them back into place to begin floating again. All five crystals hummed, like a chorus in church, they played a synchronous melody that drowned out the moans of sex that was still going on.

Zertos, now powerless, was made to submit to Thelia. In their hierarchy, erinyes were several ranks above greshkas despite being under the same categorization. It was amusing to watch her whip him for the torment she was put through earlier.

"Thelia, order the lesser demons to stand down. No more raping the knights." I then grabbed Zertos, who fit perfectly in one hand, and plopped him down in front of the crystals. "You can will this castle to your whims using magic. Find my companions and lead them here."

Not wishing to get on my bad side, all four of them went to work.The erinyes swallowed hard, bowed, and began whipping the demons to stop. Lorica and Xana joined her, using their clout as greater demons to bring the lesser ones to heel. Zertos also obeyed without protest, going to work using the crystals to channel his magic into the castle.

Never in my life would I imagined myself ordering demons around, but here I was. My own little tyrant. A giantess tyrant. 

"All I wanted was a peaceful life in the forest," I said, sighing.

The spell Zertos incanted was complex, possible only in this forged world brimming with magic. It seemed to function like Demos' neverending mansion. Entire floors shifted and groaned as they moved from place to place, morphed by magic to stretch and widen.

I remained on guard because letting the demon who I had humiliated go around casting spells could turn on me. However, after a while, my worries were unfounded. The doors to the cathedral creaked open, and in came my three companions.

"Ah. Everytime we are reunited with you, there is a surprise waiting for us. This time, you've become a giant." Mira chuckled. She ignored the demons and naked knights to meet me at my ankles.

Belle gave the demons the stink-eye walking past them, and Taurac appeared to have gotten himself a greataxe to wield while I was gone. None of them appear particularly injured, but I supposed that was only natural being how capable they were.

"Mira wouldn't admit it, but she was crying crocodile tears about losing both you and the erinyes— bwuooh!" The rest of Belle's sentence is interrupted by Mira jabbing an elbow into her ribcage.

"You figured something out. Go on," Mira urged her.

"These towers remind me of an experiment we did back at the academy," Belle began, rubbing her side. "Magic-detecting tuning forks, once embedded into the soil will vibrate. Planting three forks in the soil and connecting each arm with string causes magic to flow through them."

"Severing one string causes the magic flowing through it to flow into the others, correct?" I answered, recalling the same experiment.

Belle nodded. "I believe Edith was smart enough to ensure that if we destroy or sever the connection to this tower, the remaining tethers will create another megatower."

"Then what do we need to do?" I asked both of them.

"Think of a bathtub full of water. There are multiple drains. I just need to plug up the biggest one that's leading out of the Weeping Expanse. In order to do that, I need to stay behind to constantly redirect the flow," Belle explained.

Leaving Belle behind with a bunch of demons while occupied with the tower's magic flow wasn't the best choice. If only there was—

My eyes fell on Zertos.

"Maybe you don't have to stay behind, Belle. We may have another choice, a less willing one," I said.

Belle and Mira followed my gaze to the greshka, who had no idea what we were about to do. We proceeded to chain him up with the same shackles placed onto the succubi, and pinned him against the ground next to the crystal formation's runic circle.

"Well, looks like it worked." Belle clapped her hands, marvelling at Zertos' incapacitated state.

The tower shuddered for a moment, but the tremors subsided. It must have been the tethers rearranging themselves. With the anti-magic shackles keeping Zertos from struggling, all we needed to do was ensure nothing could help him out.

Mira caught on to what I was thinking and pulled Thelia into our group.

"You demons like making deals, yes? How about becoming a turncoat? You have seen what we can do. There were hundreds of us out there in Talmora, do you truly think demons stand a chance?" Mira asked the erinyes.

"N-No…" Thelia stuttered.

"Be a good girl and keep an eye on Zertos. If you're ever released into our world, we may even show you mercy. If we find out that you betrayed us, there is nowhere you can fly to escape from me." There was a certain point where we began to sound like the real demons. Mira was probably the closest thing with how sadistic and cunning she could be. Her threat was heard loud and clear.

"Nothing will happen under my watch, I promise!" the erinyes exclaimed.

"Taurac stay behind to guard. Confident we will see each other again," Taurac said.

"It was good seeing you again." I put a hand on his chest, then joined Belle and Mira at the teleportation circle in front of the altar.

We emerged from the tower to the fresh scent of evergreens and gargantuan oaks. It was dark out, and a lot more humid than before we arrived. Not much time should have passed, I estimate no more than two weeks had gone by, seeing as we spent months inside the forged world.

Our familiars cuddle up to us as they awaken from their slumber.

The trees rustle violently. There were no winds to cause the disturbance, but our exit from the tower had drawn some attention. Each of us raised our staffs expecting a fight, when suddenly, three harpies shot out from the trees.

"Raaa! Raaah!"

Red, Blue, and Green dove into the clearing and tackled me to the ground.

Mira and Belle stowed their staffs. The tension has disappeared with the sight of friendly faces. 

I stroked each of the harpy sisters heads as they snuggled affectionately into my chest. "Oh, you three. Don't tell me you came to pick us up?"