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.