It had been a long day. Way too long, too tiring, too draining on even the greatest, strongest, most exalted of beings.

  Take the most tiring day you can think of and multiply it by having to tell over 90% of humanity, each of whom you know since birth and love more than yourself, face to face, that you'll never see each other again. And then sending them off to go suffer for eternity.

  El had fought for them all, every single one of them, every waking day of their lives, and again today for one last time. It had been so sad, so frustrating, so heartbreaking.

  If one were to go through all that, their first instinct might be to cry, to crawl in bed and let the sweet embrace of either sleep or death claim them, or to simply run away.

  El had chosen the last option.

  Far removed from the realm of human existence, there is a plane of nothingness, a place outside reality, devoid of time and even space. And yet it existed. No laws of nature, science, causality or even basic logical concepts could apply there. If something could exist in said place, it would be utterly inconceivable to any mortal being.

  El rarely ever visited this place, this embodiment of solitude. But right now, this is where he wanted to be. Everything was a reminder of all of his children, so he enjoyed the absolute silence. The absence of everything.

  Since before he arrived at this place, pain so unbearable, so unfathomable, even thinking about it would drive any person insane, continually assaulted every fiber of El’s existence.

  But El remained unfazed.

  El contemplated and reflected the day, every person he had met face-to-face today - for most of whom it had been the first time, every person he would never see again making him feel like his very existence crumbled away. Every life that had turned away from him made him question if he could have done things differently, if he could have somehow saved them. Regardless of how many times he had tried.

  But alas, Tetelestai. It was finished. What he had started ages ago was finally finished and the time for eternal peace had arrived at last.

  Except for one tiny detail, but that should be well underway by now. The fated battle between his right hand man and the one who had once filled that same exact position. He had been El’s confidant, as well as El’s first friend. Now though, he was only the one who had taken the lives of so many. Of far too many. So many had he corrupted, turned against each other and taken from El’s loving arms.

  Belial.

  "Hello, old friend," a soothing, alluring and faint, yet undeniably powerful voice called out to the being. Not receiving an answer, it continued cautiously, "I believe it has been quite a while since we last had the pleasure. I imagine you might not be in the best of moods and I'm sure you want all of this over with: Would you at least hear what I have come here to say?"

  For an immeasurable amount of time, El did not respond. If time existed here, and it would, if El willed it to, it would not have been on Belial’s side though, prompting him to try again.

  “I have a proposal about the people who turned away from you, never to see you again. I know it’s not my place to say as I’ll be joining them soon enough, but would you be up to one last, final bet? For old times sake?”

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  “You pretend to know your place, yet dare to mention this even though we both know you’re in no position to negotiate?” El responded with a mixture of curiosity and anger.

  “You can hear me, how wonderful. So, we both know you’re gonna say yes anyways, so let me save you some time. I’m talking about potentially giving one person who turned away from you the chance to redeem themselves. What will I get out of it? Entertainment, of course. And you get yet another sheep returned into your arms, isn’t that wonderful?”

  “I have given chances left and right, you think if given one more chance they will act differently?”

  “They might. They might not. Are you interested nonetheless?”

  “Let’s hear what you have in mind first,” El caved in, the prospect of even having one more of its loving children reunited with him was something he simply couldn’t ignore.

  Belial started explaining and to El’s surprise, what he proposed this time around sounded uncharacteristically fair. El’s victory conditions of the bet were simple, yet neither very probable nor completely unrealistic.

  The contents of the bet would undoubtedly be the most fun and entertainment Belial would have ever experienced, yet at the same time it would be a constant source of pain, worry and anxiousness for El. It would all be worth it though, if even one person would return to him.

  “I’m curious, you could have gone with your usual strategy of giving them everything they ever wanted. Why change it up now?” El asked.

  Belial simply grinned, “Where would be the fun in that now?”

  “Right. I accept your bet, though there are some details I wish to discuss. Also, what shall the stakes be?”

  “Fabulous! I was thinking if you win, congratulations. One, heck, every human who satisfies the win condition will return to you. And if I win, I get to keep Gehenna as a plaything so that in my eternal damnation I’ll still have some sort of entertainment.”

  El mulled it over, but couldn’t see any reason why he shouldn't accept. He had no reason to and could just get everything over with in an instant, but for some reason, today he just felt like it.

  “So, you know how we’ve been doing this every five hundred years now, starting with your son and ending with that professor? I was thinking this shall be the greatest bet of all, unparalleled in grandeur. With your assistance we shall bring to life a new world, similar, yet different from your creation. I have it all planned out, just need to borrow your powers of creation, dearest El Elyon. Want to see?”

  El sighed and nodded compliantly.

  What Belial proposed made El smile a little in nostalgia. No matter how much Belial may try to claim it as his own, this new proposed world held a striking resemblance to his project. Some aspects were adjusted, so as to avoid blatantly plagiarizing his own creation, but at the core, it was the same.

  “What do you think?”

  “You probably know what I think about it.”

  “I think I do, but I want to hear you say it.

  “It closely resembles Earth, yes, but I’m curious about your adjustments. You know well why I did not make Earth with the characteristics of your draft, but for this occasion, it works well.”

  “Geez, flatterer. Anyway, you mentioned talking over some details?” Belial asked mock-bashfully.

  “You suggested that every human in this world will have a soulbound. I would like the guardian angels of my lost children to take over this duty. Also, as I’m sure you also have many of your subordinates take roles in that world, I would like my right hand man to also take part. You may decide how.“

  “Condition two is acceptable, it could be fun. The first condition however is something I can’t accept. I intentionally didn’t assign my subordinates these roles, as a soulbond with a spiritual entity of the proportions of either of our subordinates would influence the participants too much. Instead, they should be entirely neutral and impartial beings,” Belial countered.

  “Very well, it shall be done. Make the necessary preparations, I will begin the construction of Gehenna immediately. Your judgement will arrive, but shall be postponed until our bet is done with.”

  Belial took that as his cue to leave, giddy at the prospect of finally starting his own project in earnest.

  With that, El was alone again. He took a deep breath and simply willed the empty space to be filled again.