I trudged across a scorching expanse of glass with an eerie red sun above, focusing on steadily putting one foot in front of another. My breathe was harsh and dry in my lungs, and yet again I deeply regretted having decided to go through. But the Glass Barrens were considerably vaster in width than across it; detouring around it would have delayed my return even further. Something which I didn't want to even think about. Gods only know how worried my mother would be.

But I was going to die. I knew that, now, with absolute certainty. I was going to become like the desiccated corpses dotting the landscape. But they were penitent souls like the one that I had talked to about the Glass Barrens, who regularly trudged across the glass until they died, reappeared back at their original spot, then repeated the travel, leaving their bodies littering the place. In short, they would come back to 'life'. The same couldn't be said for me.

Why had I thought I could do what they couldn't do? As that thought appeared in my mind, my foot slipped and I landed on my face. I simply laid there unable to even raise my head. Waiting for the end. Who knows where I'd end up when I died. Possibly even this very hell. Maybe I'd just repeat this trip in my afterlife.

As incoherent cursing at the Devil filled my mind, I heard a strange sound. It sounded almost like the rockets whose launches I had listened to on television and in movies, only somewhat smaller rather than a roar that filled the world. I tried again to lift my head, but could only tilt my vision simply higher. Before my eyes, feet landed upon the glassy ground, flames jetting from their bottoms. As the absurd thought that I had just seen rocket boots or something like it entered my thoughts, a monotone voice said, "Emotion.greatConcern loaded. Are you okay?"

I was snapped from my memory by my girlfriend asking with a tilted head, "What're you thinking about?"

"Oh, our first meeting. When I was stupid enough to try crossing the Glass Barrens on foot." I reached my arm around her shoulder, shifting around on my parents' couch to do so.

"Yes, that was an asinine move you made," Flick said before a thoughtful expression crossed her face. "But I might not have met you if you hadn't done that."

I found myself thinking about how much better she had gotten at facial expressions and adding emotional tone to her voice since when I first met her. Not that she didn't feel emotions, she just had been bad at expressing them in anything but words. "Yeah, I honestly don't regret that particular stupid decision."

She batted at my face with her hand. "You should! Just because it turned out for the best that time doesn't mean you shouldn't make terrible decisions like that!"

"Well, I can't die now anyways," I said.

Her ears perked up. "Oh, yeah, so I don't have to worry about that!"

And her arms wrapped around me in a hug that would have instantly turned a human into pulp. Of course I wasn't remotely that fragile. I gave her a hug that would probably turn coal into diamonds. She only purred in response.

The moment was spoiled by an idiot goat-demon appearing out of nowhere while yelling "Devil, I challenge you!"

I growled and snapped my fingers, banishing him back to Hell and banning him from leaving it for 100 years. "Go through the proper channels, you moron."

Already I'd had to set up a process for challenging me, which largely consisted of signing up on a waiting list. At the end of the working hours I'd established for my job as the Devil I'd go through and fight everyone on that waiting list. But said waiting list was getting unwieldy and most of the people who signed up were weaklings who thought the new Devil might be easier pickings. In short, it was turning into a dull chore.

And some kept showing up during my off hours, but quick banishments and other punishments took care of that. After all, even the Devil needed breaks to perform her job well, so using the Devil's Authority to protect those breaks fell well within what was allowed by that power. Plus if I'd had to wait for two hours for Chew to come off his break so I could give him an earful, I sure as hell would make others wait for me to come off break, too. More people really should read the "Non-Emergency Interruptions Outside Work Hours Will Be Punished" sign posted up at the entrance of the Devil's Palace. I wasn't even the one who had put it there; some long-past Devil had put it up.

I sighed. "I need a better solution to my waiting list."

"If I may make a suggestion," Ink said, having appeared just as she was needed (which I was beginning to get used to). "Previous Devils have faced similar issues, and come up with various solutions. I think the one you might appreciate the most is establishing a tournament for the right to challenge you. That should weed out the weaklings and reduce the number of challenges you have to go through."

I thought about it and grinned. "I like that idea. Set it up."

"Yes, Lord Devil." Ink vanished.

It was no wonder she kept winning every single serve-off challenge she faced and she faced many for the right to serve the Devil directly. Her ability to not only anticipate the needs of those she served but appear only when she was desired and vanish when no longer desired was highly unmatched. I could really believe she had been honing that skill for millennia. I had got used to the idea of having a servant by thinking of her as my assistant for my job as the Devil and simply not calling on her outside that. And she acted precisely according to that role, respecting my wishes, which made things considerably easier on me.

As I was thinking, Flick returned to the hardcore cuddling and I relaxed into her arms.

\|/

"So I never expected to end up next to a... what are you? Some kind of lizard hybrid? Sorry if that's too invasive, I'll drop it if you want. Oh, name's Gabriel," said the cheerful and big Hispanic human man who had came into the classroom and grabbed one of the few available seats left, which happened to be right next to me.

"I'm Angela. Demon, with Phrynosoma, or horned lizard, features. Haven't nailed down which species within the genus I'm, it's probably something unfamiliar to Earth," I said as I checked Helldream on my phone. I'd just been invited by Chew to a Dreamgroup for Devils and ex-Devils. As much as I hated to accept anything given to me by that asshole, it looked like a useful resource.

"Oh, cool, the lizard that shoots blood out of its eyes?" the guy said.

I scanned the Helldream post titled Useful Resources for New Devils. "Not all species in that genus, but the ones that definitely can't are in the minority. And, yes, I can do the same trick."

He nodded with a grin. "Cool, cool, are you a history major, too, or do you have another major?"

Taking note of the info in that post about the Palace's secret chamber for Devils to scream into, I said, "Zoology major, planning to go into herpetology. That's the study of reptiles. This class is for my humanity class requirements."

"Ah, no wonder you know so much about horned lizards," he said, "Me, I'm thinking about focusing on the Byzantine Empire. Just so many interesting things going on there."

Given the class I was taking was an introductory one about the Byzantine Empire, his presence here made a lot of sense. Me? I was just here for some juicy backstabbing and intrigue, and I've heard the Byzantine Empire'd had plenty of that. Plus some demons liked to use more subtle tricks to mess with you for fun instead of fighting you heads-on, so knowing how humans did that sort of thing would probably help.

He went on, "Feel free to shoot me down, but want to get lunch?"

Oh. I shook my head. "I already have a girlfriend I love dearly. Who probably would shoot you with a bunch of mini-rockets if you keep trying to ask me out."

He raised his hands in surrender. "No worries, I can accept a rejection. But I really am interested in being just friends if not that. Also that was a funny joke."

"It wasn't a joke. She has special non-lethal ones she saves for use on annoying humans," I said, "And just why do you want to be my friend?."

He blinked. "Really? Your girlfriend sounds hardcore. And, no, I won't ask again, it's just that you seem like you'd be fun to hang out with? You're definitely an interesting person."

I crossed my arms. "Really. She's a demon too, and we do that kind of casual violence all the time."

He looked intrigued. "I see... Your people's history must be bloody, then."

I shrugged. "Given we have recorded history even longer than this universe's age and hold casual wars and shit for fun all the time since we don't really die? Yeah lots of fighting. Though there're all sorts of other things, like grand building projects, massive scale pranks, various cultural movements, the raise and fall of empire-sized organizations, and so on. Didn't see a lot of that history because I became a demon only 300 years ago, 7 years by Earth time. Earth's actually my homeworld. Used to be a human."

He raised an eyebrow, looking impressed. "Goddamn, maybe I should make demon history my focus instead. Though I'd have to find a specific place and period to focus on."

I said, "I know my girlfriend's into history, she particularly likes talking about the War of the Colors and the Black Sun Era, she could probably suggest some possible focuses for you."

"I'll think about it," he said, "It's not like this college has classes on demon history anyways."

He was definitely showing more interest in this than I expected. I said, "Yeah. If you do decide to look into it, I'm pretty sure you can find primary sources just wandering around still alive. People who remember when a black sun dominated the sky of Hell and all."

His eyes widened. "Wait, that's what the Black Sun Era refers to?"

I nodded. "And the War of the Colors was a massive war over which color was superior that engulfed nearly all of Hell. Ultraviolet won, by the way."

He leaned forward and said, "I'd like to talk with this girlfriend of yours, maybe we could do lunch where you bring your girlfriend and I bring a couple of friends?"

I raised an eyebrow. "...Would those two happen to be women you asked out before becoming friends?"

He said, "Yeah. But they're now my two best friends. Both're history majors, I'm pretty sure they would enjoy the conversation."

"How many of your friends are women?" I asked.

"All of my college friends," he said.

What the hell. This guy. I said, "No men friends?"

He shrugged. "A few acquaintances, I guess. And my old pre-college friends, but I feel like I get along with my current friends better."

I squinted at him for that. "I suppose I can ask Flick if she wants to do this lunch meeting."

\|/

I was getting a headache, and even the pained grunts of my stress toy as I pushed pins into him wasn't relieving it. "So," I said, "You morons're asking me to arbitrate a dispute over a fucking sandwich."

Jolly, the spiky elfin head of the Orthodox Sandwich Torture Guild, nodded. "A sandwich with significant historic and symbolic value."

Pain, the rocky troll-like head of the Unorthodox Sandwich Torture Guild added, "The one who holds it is the head of the Sandwich Torture Guild."

I sighed as I looked them over. The Sandwich Torture Guild had split a decent while ago over, of all things, whether a hot dog counted as a sandwich, with the orthodox faction saying it didn't and the unorthodox faction saying it did. After they split, they had a lengthy dispute over the ultimate question of who got to keep the Emerald Paradise Sandwich. I had glossed over the dossier Ink had given me detailing the multiple small-scale wars and other conflicts they had waged over it, with the sandwich ending up changing hands many times.

Even the penitent soul standing by my chair, who I had been slowly turning into a pincushion, rolled his eyes at this. I sagged back in my highly comfy chair and reminded myself that just Gigadeath beamming them wouldn't resolve this. Though... an idea came to me. "Okay, listen up you idiots. You get to choose: either I eat this sandwich or I duplicate it."

The two looked at each other and began arguing over who would get the duplicate. Lovely. "Ink, I'm feeling like having a sandwich today," I said.

Ink appeared with a plate with a serving cover over it. She slowly raised the cover, revealing an extremely green sandwich, which I took and lifted to my mouth. At this point, the two guild heads noticed what was going on. Their eyes bugged out as they watched me eat the sandwich bite by bite.

...It was an extremely delicious sandwich.

As I wiped my mouth with a napkin provided by Ink, I said, "Just create your own separate guild head sandwiches or something."

Surprisingly, the two of them actually looked thoughtful at that. "A new start, a new tradition," one said as the other nodded.

Wait, they hadn't even considered that before? With a growl, I said, "Now leave my office."

As the two left, the penitent soul, whose name I hadn't bothered to learn, patted my back consolingly.