Blood and Reign (Blood and Ruin Series Book 3)

Clouds overcast us as the sky grows gray, slowly turning it into the darkest night. It ripples around us, the ground and air soon stained by its black taint.

Huge, flamed pits grow from the ground with embers coating the air above them. They shed sparks of heated light that spit and suffocate. But with the heat comes flames.

Flames so hot they scorch the land dry.

A shriek calls out as winged demons appear, flying above us as if they were always there, while hundreds of shadow creatures appear, crawling along the scorched ground.

“Fuck. Me.” Jax gapes around at our new surroundings. A place you would imagine the true nightmare of Hell to look like.

Axel stands next to Jax, a mirror expression of shock on his face. “I think I’ll leave that to Kiarra. You’re not pretty enough for me.”

My mouth drops open at Axel’s joke. Turning to him, I catch Jax’s smirk grow out of the corner of my eye.

“Lies. I’m prettier than everyone here.” Jax winks at me. “Apart from you, of course.”

Luka gives Jax the side eye before glancing at Axel. “I think you two are spending too much time together. Jax is starting to rub off on you.”

Jax, seeming to have already shaken off his shock at our surroundings, turns to Luka, a wicked smile on his face. “Axel is very… accommodating when it comes to rubbing anything off Kiarra.” He smirks but quickly covers it, looking the picture of innocence as Axel gives him a slanted look.

“Let’s get through this realm as quickly as possible. What’s left of the souls here is nothing we want to run into.” Soren has a grim look on his face, making us all pay more attention to our surroundings.

Moving forward, I notice the ground beneath us is much rockier than the Shadow realm, the heat more stifling even without the sun.

I glance over at the huge pits of fire and smoke, feeling the heat even from here.

“Aren’t those a little cliché?” Jax asks, nodding at the pits.

“If you can find another way to burn impurities while also tormenting the unforgivable, please do tell us and I’ll pass it on to management.” Soren gives him a mocking smirk before moving around the inflamed pits, unbothered by the scorching blaze.

We follow him, steering well clear of the pits and their hellish heat.

“What’s the difference between the souls in the Shadow realm and the Realm of the Damned?”

Soren’s eyes flicker to me before he answers. “The Shadow realm contains souls that have the ability to move on. The Realm of the Damned is what’s left of the souls when they can’t move on, their souls too rotted to be saved. They become soulless creatures far too lost to become redeemable.”

“What the—”

Our eyes jump to Axel’s line of sight only to see a group of human-like creatures, their bodies completely made of a black tar substance with shadows that cloak them. They have no eyes, just a hollow, dark space filled with more swirling shadows.

Although they have a similar shape to a human body, that’s where the similarities end. Their limbs bend at awkward angles as they crawl along the ground, scavenging the land for… something.

“Are they demons?” I ask, having never seen anything like them before and hoping to never come across them again.

Soren shakes his head, steering clear of them. “They’re soulless.”

They’re the soulless? A shiver works its way down my spine the more I look at them.

Even with the scores of flames around us, there’s no warmth in their appearance or energies. They’re just… hollow. Hollow and endlessly cold.

“What happens to them? After this?” I keep my eye on one that claws closer to a flamed pit.

Soren keeps moving while answering me. “For any being that no longer carries a soul, there is nothing more. They will wander here before becoming a part of the realm itself. It’s a cycle that keeps everything in balance.”

Balance… apparently everything needed a balance.

I turn away from the soulless and move closer to Soren. “What about the Gods? Couldn’t they help with the balance?”

Soren scoffs, giving me an amused look. “The Gods abandoned us long ago. The only remains of them are what essence they left behind and, of course, their descendants.” He gives Kai a pointed look before doing the same to the rest of us.

“Wait. There are no Gods left?” I glance at the guys, wondering if they’re as shocked as me. Luka mirrors my expression while Jax looks unbothered by the news.

Rion and Kai both wear a similar expression of acceptance, like they already thought as much.

Axel rolls his eyes. “Doesn’t surprise me. Most Gods are dicks with too much time on their hands. And I of one am fucking glad they’re gone.”

Luka frowns at him. “You’ve never met a God. How do you know they’re all dicks?”

Axel shrugs. “You’ve met one powerful being, you’ve met them all. We have enough powerful people in the world fucking it up, adding Gods and their kind of power to it is a shitstorm waiting to happen.”

Kai shakes his head, glancing ahead. “They’re no longer here, so it’s pointless to keep talking about them. Let’s focus on the sadistic psycho gaining too much power instead.”

Gaining too much power…

Something niggles at the back of mind, stopping me from moving past what Kai said. “With no Gods, then who’s in charge?”

We avoid a large group of shadows clambering over to a pit. It’s not until we’re well past it does Soren answer my question.

“Apart from descendants and Guardians, there are the Lords of the Underworld. They’re powerful beings and the closest thing we have to Gods.”

“What happens if something were to happen to these powerful beings?”

Soren smiles at me. “You don’t have to worry. There’s nothing but the Gods themselves that can destroy the Lords.”

I pull back to the guys. They slow their pace while Soren moves ahead, not noticing we’re lagging behind.

“What if Soren’s wrong?”

Kai gives me a look. “You’re thinking that King might be down here to kill them?”

I nod. “King always wanted to rule. Maybe his plan is a lot bigger than we think it is.”

The guys share a worried look.

“Is that even possible? Someone making themselves a God?”

Soren glances back, finally noticing we’re not right behind him. We catch up to him just to see the annoyed look on his face. “And here I thought we were in a hurry. We need to get to the Infernal Kingdom as quickly as possible.”

“How do you even become a God?” I ask him.

He gives me a strange look. “Some beings are born powerful, while others amass it over time. If you gather enough power and are able to sustain it, you can make yourself all-powerful. Others will fear you and through that fear you can control them.”

Jax scoffs. “Sounds like a simple plan. Gain enough power and then knock out the competition, then make everyone fear you.”

Luka frowns. “Would any of this… competition happen to be from the Underworld?”

Soren stays silent while listening to us, his eyes widening as if something clicks. He moves quickly, not looking to see if we’re following him. “Once we get to the gates, I’ll need to look into a couple of things.”

“The gates? What gates?” I glance around, seeing nothing but the dark fiery pits and creepy soulless.

Soren is lost in his own thoughts, his head down as we move through the realm, avoiding the rest of the soulless. A few minutes pass in tense silence before the realm shifts and changes before our eyes.

“Your plan might need a slight adjustment,” Luka tells Soren.

“What? Why?” Soren glances at Luka before looking ahead, stopping dead in his tracks.

Two large black gates stand in the middle of nowhere with a very large and very mean-looking demon in front of it. Hundreds of demons swarm around it like its minions. They gather in groups, trying to get past the enormous gates.

“They are not supposed to be there,” Soren tells us, stating the obvious.

“No shit.” Axel scoffs at him while eyeing up the demon and its horde.

Soren curses. “Not only are they not supposed to be there, but Orthis is missing.”

“Who’s Orthis?”

Soren’s eyes flicker to Kai and then over to the horde of demons crawling all around the gate. “It doesn’t matter right now. All you need to know is that our only way in is through those gates.”