Eheheheh... Their souls, and their bones. It's mostly decorative, but I feel it helps keep the souls under my absolute control to have a part of their bodies contributing to the design of the guard and handle. The blade itself was made by taking simple infernal iron and melting it together with the charred bones of my conquered victims until it made a high grade steel. The steel was then melted again, and combined with a sample of my own flesh.

That last part is critical if your master wishes for a weapon that is truly his and his alone. You must add a part of yourself to the very metal of the weapon, thus making the weapon a part of yourself. A hand, an arm, a leg... I went with my heart quite literally in this regard. Your Lord Andras should not fret about this. Whatever he gives to make the blade his, it will grow back.

While the steel was forged into blades, binding runes were carved into their surface. This is why the introduction of a part of yourself is an important step. This binding process enchants, and curses, the blade, ensuring none other than yourself can wield it, and it cannot be used against you. I can even see and feel through the blades. I can control them, to a degree, without touching them. I can channel my power through them. They are my weapons, and my weapons alone.

They are not all fuel for my power. The more physically adept become laborers and slaves, toiling away in the halls of my fortress. The kings and emperors make for good trophies, so I imprison them in armor or weapons. Every bit of metal and leather and cloth in my armor is enhanced by the soul of a mortal conqueror.

Even my more favored mortals, the most ambitious and ruthless scourges to have carved a river of blood across the land, are never granted authority in my ranks. Once they are in Hell, they succumb to the environment, become weak and pathetic. They suffer and scream whether I torture them or not. The best they can hope for is to be granted a place in my armor. At least then they can feel some of the power they craved, even if it is not their power to wield.

Only one mortal has ever been promised power in my ranks. When the Blood Witch tore apart my armies, I realized her power would be a great asset. And the fear she inspired in my troops, and indeed myself, was exciting and new. I offered her a place at my side, leading my armies and sharing my power, and I fully intended to grant everything I promised, mortal or not. Our powers united would have been an unstoppable force in Hell, second only to Helel himself.

Regrettably, she refused my offer. If she will not unite with me willingly, I shall devour her, and make her power my own. I do hold out some semblance of hope she will come around to my offer. She is far more interesting than any mortal or demon I have encountered before. It would be a shame to waste such an exciting soul in such a manner.

I grant my soldiers a great number of benefits. They get to enjoy the spoils of our conquests, feast upon the mortals we conquer. They can torment the slaves for amusement. We burn and pillage and take what we wish. It's good for troop moral.

My most loyal soldiers enjoy even more. More of everything. More spoils, more feasts. They get to order around the lesser demons. But most importantly, they get to enjoy a fraction of my power. Vice has been repeatedly rewarded with small slivers of my essence infused into his own, granting him great powers. My signature attacks, Dark Spikes and Hell Chains. My ability to gain strength and recover by devouring souls. Even my ability to use, and my resistance to, Hellfire.

Vice has partaken in the souls from my healing fountain. He has enjoyed the greatest of spoils, amassed a king's bounty in Sins and weapons and treasures, all through the share of spoils I have granted him, and through the guidance I have given him on his own conquests.

True loyalty is not gained through fear alone. Vice is loyal because he has seen the great successes we've had under my authority, and he has gained a great deal of material wealth under my leadership.

It was brief and small, but I will not soon forget it. I was not an archdemon at the time, and could be summoned through simpler means by any ambitious conqueror or tyrant. One who summoned me sought to trade some of his own people's souls in exchange for my services in conquering his neighbors. I knew this kind of deal was against the rules of Heaven and Hell, but I was young, reckless, and not opposed to inflicting additional suffering.

I reached a town of peasants on the kingdom's border, and I started to burn it to the ground. I hunted the townsfolk, striking them down as I came across them. This proved to be a mistake later on, as killing them sent them to Heaven, and alerted the Guardians to my activities.

As I razed the town, as I watched the people flee in every direction, I first felt the hunger. The next mortal I caught, I drank their soul as I squeezed the life out of them. I could feel the surge of power. A single soul had caused my strength to multiply.

I repeated this process with more mortals, and went and razed more villages. I was on my way to the third when the guardians arrived in their full force. This was the first time I felt the sting of a Celestial weapon singe my essence. I was outnumbered, and even with the power the souls provided me, I was still only a low level demon at the time. I did not stand a chance.

However, they never did free the souls I had consumed. I told no one, not even demons, what I had done with them. Nobody knew what had happened, and nobody knew how to free them. Nobody, that is, until the Blood Witch.

Those souls she freed from me had been within me for longer than her species has existed. She caught me off guard, and it cost me everything but my rank. I will ensure she pays for what she took from me with her own soul.

Ah, you must be one of the infernal traitors who showed up late to the party. Frankly, I barely felt your punch. But I did feel it. Perhaps you could have done something more if you hadn't held back for the vast majority of the fight and only jumped in when I was already down on one knee like a coward.

And no. No other demon has put up such a fight against my control. My second domain aside from conquest is domination, and few demons can resist the influence of an archdemon with such a power. He would not have given me any trouble either if I had made him target anyone else other than his own blood. Knowing who his target was gave him the will to resist.

Hail, Lady Gretchen. Your question brings to mind a handful of experiences I have had. I have been struck by holy weapons of all designs and calibers, cloaked in holy fire or made from holy water. Each one breaks my scales and burns my flesh, but so long as I have souls to consume, I can recover. This has allowed me to develop a great resistance over time, as I no longer need to retreat to Hell to recover. I only have to feed if I have not done so already.

There are only two times where I have been unable to heal myself after being hurt. One was when the Blood Witch sank her teeth into my throat and filled my blood with her venom. I found myself paralyzed, in an almost dream-like state where I witnessed my greatest fears play before me on repeat. It fascinated me, but I was not able to recover until the venom wore off on its own.

The second time was when I attempted to seize control over your mate's mind. Something within him retaliated against me. Something powerful, and incomprehensible. It flooded through me, seeking somewhere to settle and, finding nothing, threatened to burn it's way into my very soul. As these were wounds upon my mind, the wounds upon my body they corresponded to did not heal for a long time.

I still do not understand what power it was, and until I do, my best defense is to avoid repeating my mistakes. I tried to make Halphas attack your son, and his resistance appears to have triggered the backlash I felt.

Indeed I do, Lady Almarala. I carry twin swords, made of Infernal Steel, quenched in the blood of the innocent, infused with Hellfire, and powered by the souls of rival kings. Twins, each given a portion of their father's empire, each hoping to kill the other and take the other's half. Both sought me out to access my armies and my powers.

I granted them their wish. Now their bones form the handle and hilt of each sword while their souls remain trapped, fueling the Hellfire enchantment with their sins for eternity. Afterward, I razed their kingdom to the ground for good measure.

These are the blades I fought the Blood Witch with. I have burned cities with these blades. They have never failed me.

No, I have not resumed my assault upon him, nor do I intend to. I will fight him with all of my might should we ever encounter each other again. I will destroy him if I must. At the very least I will attempt to clamp a muzzle on that mouth of his...

Perhaps you are not aware of what that unassuming, jolly, saccharine disguise he has hides? Perhaps you are not aware of what 'Pepper' really is?

Devorator mundorum. Also known as a Mundivore. A World Eater.

'Pepper' as you know him is a type of gluttony demon theoretically capable of devouring entire realms. They consume everything from plant, to animal, to mineral. They devour everything, leaving nothing but a cold void in their wake. They are like black holes, and embody entropy and decay. Most had to be contained, locked away in special prisons, or they would have devoured Hell itself.

Pepper has remarkable control over his appetite for a Mundivore, and he is surprisingly picky for a demon capable of eating space and time itself. Most of his kind barely have cohesive thought, let alone an obnoxious obsession with 'art'. As long as he stays far, FAR away from the 7th circle, I will not attempt to target him again.

I was lucky that first time. He simply used magic on me that I was too young at the time to understand or counter. He could have done far worse.

He is an irritation and a thorn in my side. I still do not even know why he showed up here other than to be a nuisance. There is no claiming his soul while he is connected to that Cylestial creature, and making the attempt would not be worth the annoyance. So I kept my strongest forces back and feigned defeat just so he would leave. A little out of character for me, but better to cut one's losses sometimes.

It was a fight against a mortal who cannot die and who's soul I cannot take. In other words, a fight for nothing. There wasn't any conquest to be had, and nothing to be gained. I would not have even had the bragging rights that comes from defeating a Celestial. I could have won, but winning would have gained me nothing and cost me more than losing did. So I sought mainly to ensure that if it was going to be a waste of my time, it would at least be a short waste of my time.

Greetings, Goetia. You speak with the maturity, grandeur, and intelligence of a mortal child. I care little for your petty disagreements with your brother, nor for how he deals with mortals. He struck against me first and stood in the way of my victory. Evidently, he still cares about his son and grandson, loyalties aside.

I was glad to accept the challenge.

I do not know what saved him. Not entirely, anyway. The realm I have developed an appetite for has many exotic enemies and peculiar quirks, resulting I would assume from the same instability that allows me to enter largely at will. One of these quirks appears to be that certain parts of one's soul are... reinforced. They become a force of nature as tangible as any earthquake or hurricane.

Evidently, my mistake was ordering him to strike down his own blood. His love for his family gave him the strength to refuse, and the backlash from his resistance filled my own soul with a force utterly incompatible with it's nature. As a result, I burned, experiencing a pain deeper than any torture I have concocted, hotter than any fire in Hell.

I confess, it was a power I had not anticipated, and still do not understand. A power even I am not eager to cross. Even now, after regrowing from specks of blood and dust, I still feel pain where the burns left blisters upon my skin.