Right after crossing through the portal, I felt an immense pain, as my physical body started reconstructing itself around my soul.
Soon after my body was fully reconstructed, I felt my senses slowly come back to me. And as they did, my mind was overwhelmed with all the different information that I haven't had to process in such a long time.
Closing my eyes, I started to sort out every piece of information coming to my brain. I could smell a strong sulfur scent, accompanied by the smell of burning flesh. And the scent was getting stronger each second as I felt hot air bombarding my body.
I was falling.
After that, I decided that it was finally time to open my eyes.
And the sight before my eyes was unlike anything I've ever seen in my life.
Terrain which looked like that of a volcano, with ash everywhere. Lava rivers long at least several hundred miles cutting across the expanse, sometimes forming entire lakes of hot, bubbly lava. Surrounding the rivers lay an endless amount of ashen houses of different sizes.
"Well this looks like Hell alright."
But there were two things which especially piqued my interest.
First was way off in the distance, at least a couple hundred or maybe thousands of miles away. There, suspended in mid air and slowly rotating was a structure unlike any I've seen before.
It appeared to be a large 'palace' in the shape of a demonic crown, and it appeared even darker than the night itself. There were also veins of orange running throughout the structure, emphasizing its darkness.
Just by looking at it, I could feel an immense aura.
"So that must be the Devil's palace." I murmured.
The other thing to peak my interest, which was of more immediate concern, was a massive pit of hellfire, towards which I was inevitably falling.
"Well, shit."
Cursing out loud, I started thinking about anything I could do, but I soon realized that there was absolutely nothing.
I'd inevitably crash into the fire pit.
Even if I did survive the impact of falling into the pit, I'd soon be swallowed by the flames and turned to ash.
If the flames didn't turn me to ash before even crashing, that is.
"Talk about bad luck."
Who would've thought that right after going through the portal I'd be thrown into such an inescapable situation.
And then there was also that strange soul which helped me get through the portal.
But I could think about that later.
I estimated that in about 15 seconds I would crash into the flames.
I decided for my legs to take the brunt of the impact, regardless of knowing that my chances of surviving such a fall are close to none.
"3... 2... 1..." I was counting down the time until I'd inevitably reach the flames and bracing myself for impact.
And then I crashed into the flames.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH....."
Screaming in agony, the flames caused me pain unlike which I'd never felt before back on Earth. All of the pain receptors inside my body were fired up by the flames, all that filled my mind was pure agony.
I was literally being burned alive.
Though this agony was truly unbearable, after a while I was able to adjust to it to a certain degree.
After all, I used to push myself to the limit all the time back on Earth.
There's no way some pain could stop me.
Although it was so intense that it was only a matter of time before I'd go insane.
Soon after, I was able to formulate coherent thoughts inside my mind again.
And that's when I realized that I'm lying on the ground, unharmed.
Trying to figure out how that was possible, I figured that the flames must've cushioned my fall and that the flames themselves were here just to inflict pain, they didn't actually harm the body.
And that's when I heard it.
The screams.
It was a scene of pure horror.
Massive hordes of bodies, an entangled, bloody mess of limbs and heads. All of them alive, lying on each other, screaming, most of them having been driven insane.
You could see the bloodshot eyes and foaming mouths wherever you looked.
And with the flames torturing them for eternity, there was no chance of their suffering ever ending.
Well, it was also my suffering right now, if I don't somehow escape.
Thankfully, as I looked around myself, I could vaguely see the edge of the pit of fire a few kilometers away from me.
So I decided to head that way, thinking that it's my best shot anyway.
But my speed was very.. very slow.
Not only was the burden of walking under the constant pain of the flames being drilled into my mind the most exhausting thing I ever did, ever so often there would be hands grabbing onto my legs, causing me to topple over.
However, as they weren't that strong, I always managed to shake them off.
There were some more persistent ones, and for those I would make sure to snap their neck so that they don't keep coming after me.
And since I still felt thirst, every time I killed themI drank their blood.
It helped me progress faster since I didn't have to think about being thirsty on top of feeling insane pain.
Repeating this process for quite a while, I eventually managed to reach the edge.
It looked solid enough and had enough places for me to hold on to.
But if I was going to escape from here it would have to be quick.
I could feel the pain slowly but surely eating away at me.
Deciding that I've been here for way too long, I started climbing up the rocky wall.
It was undoubtedly the toughest climb of my life, and I was close to falling many times, but through sheer power of will and the desire to get out of this literal hellhole I persevered and managed to reach the top.
Peeking over the edge to the surface, I soon spotted a strange figure about a hundred meters away from where I was.
It wasn't even close to anything resembling a human.
It was just a clump of black sludge, about twice the height of a human, sliding slowly across the ground, leaving behind a trail of disgusting black slime.
Deciding it wasn't a good idea to fight it until I had more information about it, I tried to look for a way to get past it unnoticed. Then I spotted some loose rocks on the edge of the pit near which it was standing.
Holding on with one hand and grabbing a stone with the other, I threw it towards the loose rocks.
As soon as I hit my target, the creature let out a terrifying roar and immediately turned its attention towards the direction that the noise came from.
As it was looking over the edge, I leapt up onto the surface and ran past it towards one of the ashen buildings that were strewn out all over the place.
Most of the buildings here were abandoned, so the risk of running into anyone inside was pretty low.
But as I was about 10 meters away from the building, I was stopped in my tracks by a humanoid figure with red skin and two little stumps in its forehead.
"What do we have here?" said the figure.
With that black creature still being somewhere behind me, and the only way to escape being narrow streets on the sides which may very well end up being dead ends, I decided to confront it.
"Let's see how I fare against a demon" I mumbled to myself.
Picking up on what I said, the demon replied.
"Oh-ho, a mere human thinks he can harm a demon? Do your worst."
With that, the demon completely relaxed his guard, leaving himself absolutely open.
Not wanting to miss the chance, I took a stance and decided to use one of my strongest hand to hand combat moves.
I just called it 'The piercing hand'.
I would lunge at my opponent with inhuman speed, and just when I would reach them I'd stab my hand right through their heart, or any other part of their body, if I needed to.
Back on Earth, there was barely anyone who could manage to defend against it.
It was a simple technique yet very deadly.
And now I would make the demons fear it too.
However, right when my hand came into contact with the demon's chest, it turned into a bloody mess, with just a scratch on the demon's chest.
Staring at me with a smug look on his face, the demon said:
"Is that all that you've got?"