Chapter 54: God Has No Mercy, But the Devil Does

Steve sat on a dark, jagged boulder on the riverbank of Gotham City, holding his shield as he silently watched the river wind its way down from the upper reaches. The water surface shimmered with faint starlight, and the ripples crashed against the stone piers supporting the bridge, stirring up layers of pristine white snowy foam. A few demons stood behind him, slinging their hunting rifles over their shoulders and whispering among themselves about the current tactical situation.

"Arkham is tougher to breach than we imagined..." they murmured under the bloody moon, "I heard it's because someone tried to break into this prison from the outside once, which caused that guy called Batman to repeatedly reinforce the security measures."

"Batman? I saw his picture; he looks a bit abstract. Is he a demon?"

"No, he's not. The horns on his head aren't natural."

"He's craftier and more evil than a demon, friends. Never underestimate any living human—only dead bad guys go to hell, and smart criminals are all still fucking alive, living better than the vast majority of people."

"But we can't waste too much time here getting tangled up with vigilantes and Arkham's idiots. The Gates of Hell have a time limit. If we can't complete the sacrifices required for the Samhain ritual, it won't be long before we're forced to crawl back to the Pride Ring—that ghost town is basically an 'Arkham' carved out for us jointly by Lucifer and God, and gods and angels don't even respect human rights as much as Batman does... demon rights, I mean. I'm sick of the annual 'Extermination'. If possible, I'd rather live in Arkham Asylum!"

"Worse still, we aren't the only ones thinking this. The 'sinners' throughout the entire Pride Ring are tempted by this. Why do you think our progress is so slow? Because those of us with Yellow Lantern rings, along with the Nazis and mercenary groups in hell, are still fighting, and fighting even harder! You know demons have never had a concept of shared prosperity where all thrive together. The best outcome is that one's own side manages to stay outside, while the mortal enemy rots forever in hell... We're already short-handed, yet we have to split up a portion of our forces to guard the gates. I'm really worried the legion won't be able to take down Arkham fortress before dawn."

"But compared to slinking back in defeat, I'd hate even more to see my arch-nemesis break free from the shadow of the 'Extermination' and live the high life in the mortal realm—seeing them do well is far more painful than seeing myself fail miserably."

"What the fuck, why can't you be rational for once? Forget it, actually, I feel the same way."

"Don't worry, brothers and sisters," an unremarkable-looking demon suddenly said. "I contacted the leader, and he said he'd come help."

The whispering demons instantly froze and stared at each other in blank dismay. After a long moment, one demon slowly widened her eyes, her pupils—which had dilated into dots in the darkness—unconsciously shrinking into vertical slits. She asked, "What did you say you did?"

"I contacted the leader..." the demon answered honestly. "Can't Yellow Lantern rings communicate with each other remotely? Even though our rings are the Hell Edition of the Yellow Lantern ring, I just found out it seems able to connect to the mortal world's servers as well. So I called Commander Sinestro, and he said he just happens to have time right now..."

"You motherf—" The other demons instantly panicked and cursed furiously. "Why didn't you say something before you called?!"

"What do we do?! Why is the leader coming? Does he know what's happening in hell?!"

"Duh! Why do you think we started a war?! Because the dead Red Skull offended the leader's lov... lover!"

"That was actually true?! You guys weren't making it up to mess with me?!"

"..."

Steve had no idea what to make of his own feelings, only looking into the darkness ahead and letting out a faint sigh. As the demons had said, the bigshots were either researching how to break into Arkham and sacrifice that bunch of lunatics, or holding the line against the stench at the Gates of Hell to intercept other demons. The troops staying with him were nominally called rear support, but in reality, they were a bunch of misfit rabble that nobody wanted anywhere, each one more outrageous at making trouble and more useless at anything serious.

Given Steve's status and strength, he wouldn't normally mingle with this bunch of demons, but he neither wanted to help Batman check Arkham's security loopholes nor cared to tangle with the mad dogs of hell. So he simply asked for this assignment, treating it as a vacation.

Sinestro and Elijah Esposito's scandalous affair was something Steve had also heard about. After all, he had been embedded with the Hell Yellow Lantern Corps for a while now, though to avoid polluting his brain, he had never thought too deeply about it.

Even now, Steve didn't believe the rumors were true. It was just that hell never lacked an excuse to start a war, and this time the excuse seemed a bit... more romantic. It involved living people, commanding superiors, gossip, and the homosexuality most despised by the enemy army. It could be said to gather more than half of the trending topics in the Pride Ring recently, so the demons naturally grew immensely interested and deliberately exaggerated the cause and effect.

Anyway, Steve thought, there might be a tiny bit of genuine affection between Sinestro and Elijah, but Sinestro would never kill his subordinates for Elijah, nor would he travel thousands of miles to Earth and declare war on hell, and certainly not—as the rumors claimed—carry a big bag of rings to propose to Elijah only to be rejected. Those were things that absolutely, positively could never happen.

Even if the two of them accidentally fell in love, it should be like Captain America and Agent Carter back in the day, surrounded by a subtle warmth and tacit understanding imperceptible to others outside the serious battlefield, occasionally exchanging a glance, an inadvertent touch of hands...

He was letting his mind wander a bit too far when a muffled sound suddenly echoed from within the walls of Arkham behind him. Steve snapped back to attention immediately, just in time to hear a demon behind him shout excitedly, "Frontline news!! Alastor led a squad of demons charging into the prisoner zone and successfully severely injured a sacrifice!"

Hearing this, Steve's spirits jolted as worry and a certain inexplicable emotion surged up simultaneously. The former was for the ordinary people who might be caught in the crossfire, and the latter was for the sacrifice supposedly stabbed in the back by demons... He usually didn't care much about Arkham, this famous cradle of crime, and he agreed with Batman's philosophy. Nor would he have the leisure to go play vigilante in an asylum, which was why he was hiding under a bridge instead of standing on the frontlines with his shield.

That said, hearing that dead demons had severely injured a living 'demon', he found it hard to muster any pity.

Not even God had ever pitied these criminals anyway.

He almost broke into a smile, quickly reined it in, and asked solemnly, "What's going on? Is anyone hurt?"

"No," the demon answered joyfully, thinking Steve was asking about their own casualties. "We can't harm ordinary people under the influence of the contract anyway. Fortunately, Alastor has a very capable commander under him... the kind who fought the Nazis for many years. With his help, our side successfully bypassed the guards.

"Then Alastor discovered a magical thing: weapons blessed by angels aren't incapable of hurting all humans! They can precisely eliminate those destined to go to hell after death! So our compatriot, a horned demon holding her beloved, high-priced carmine-refined gospel rifle bought on the black market, sprayed the radiance of heaven into every corner of the asylum..."

Steve: "..."

He felt his soul shudder slightly at these words and hurriedly changed the subject, asking, "Do they need help then?"

"No, no." The answering Yellow Lantern demon shook her head like a rattle drum. "The battle at Arkham will be over soon, we have to support other places—I received another piece of information: the remnants of Hydra in the mortal world have sent people to support the Nazi demons in hell."

Steve instantly turned grave: "What's going on?"

"Their alliance in hell is pretty flaky, but they still have a common enemy, which is us, the Yellow Lanterns," the demon replied. "Now, neither side wants to see us win and gain freedom, so they've teamed up to harass us from the rear. Since the enemy has superior numbers and many excellent commanders, they've indeed caused a lot of trouble near the Gates of Hell.

"However..." she smiled as she spoke, "the good news is the leader really rushed over! Right now, he should be chatting with Batman and waiting for Mr. Esposito to arrive!"

Steve almost thought he misheard: "Wait, who did you say came?"

"Commander Sinestro!" the demon said loudly, "And he brought other surviving corps members with him. We can counterattack hell!"

"……?"

**

"No, I have no intention of counterattacking hell," Batman said blankly. "What good would conquering hell do you?"

Pre-occupying territory for after you die?

"I promised my friend Esposito that I would avenge him against Hydra," Sinestro replied with an unperturbed expression. "This is an excellent opportunity, and it can only bring benefits to you Earth vigilantes with zero downsides. To express my goodwill, I have come to urge you to put aside past prejudices and cooperate with us for mutual benefit in the upcoming war."

"‘Friend’?" Batman wore a mocking expression. "You won't even use his name."

"It's merely a personal habit of mine."

Sinestro casually remarked.

His yellow eyes drifted slightly toward Arkham, and he asked, "Your subordinates are keeping an eye on that island? Are they reliable?"

"They are far more reliable than the members of your corps."

Batman was growing tired of the process of beating around the bush with a scheming alien. He could completely guess the other's motive: the Yellow Lantern Corps had always lacked control over Sector 2814, and after the death of Rome in Sector 2813, the Corps' influence had weakened further. Sinestro could only use Elijah as an excuse and try every possible means to personally rush over and reverse the situation.

"Let me be frank—you and your corps landing on Earth without permission has severely violated Earth's territorial sovereignty. Not only will the Justice League take emergency measures at any time to expel the Yellow Lantern Corps from our planet, but the Green Lantern Corps is also gathering near Sector 2814, ready to join the battlefield at any moment."

Sinestro blinked unhurriedly: "But Earth's Yellow Lantern Corps consists of more than just us. Have you forgotten Elijah Esposito and his Yellow Lantern ring?"

As if waiting precisely for this question, Batman immediately retorted, "Then that would only be the Sinestro Corps. Elijah Esposito and his team belong to another organization, which perhaps could be called the Esposito Corps."

"……?"

Sinestro was so exasperated he laughed, and just as he wanted to snap back at him, a red-skinned succubus poked her head out from not far away and asked timidly, "Is this considered property division after a divorce?"

Batman abruptly whipped his head around, moving so fast that Sinestro even worried a little for his fragile neck: "What did you say?"