Y/n trudged through the muddy and wet landscape of the circle of gluttony, his grunts resonating through the murky swamp area. Icy rain―cold enough to freeze on touch―hailed down on Y/n but did little to slow his progress, it instead encouraged him to move faster.
It had been approximately four days since the meeting in the tower, and Lucifer had not contacted any of the sins since then, at least not till now. During those days, Y/n had time to do his daily routine of indulging himself in some of his favourite things: Gold, cigarettes, and gold. It was in the middle of his indulgence that he received a call from the Queen of Hell herself, asking him to check on the Gatekeeper who resided in gluttony as they had stopped sending in their daily reports. Y/n wanted to deny the responsibility and say otherwise, but Lucifer would have none of it and had made a threat to burn his manor down and take all his gold if he didn't obey.
Lucifer wasn't one to go back on her word, so he had no choice but to comply.
The Sin of Greed had been walking for quite some time, angrily grumbling all the way. Just as he was about to question himself if he had maybe walked past where the gatekeeper lived, the weather conditions began to lessen and were instead replaced by the appearance of hundreds, maybe thousands of souls wallowing in the mud, taking the forms of fat people, pigs, frogs and the such. The sight made Y/n cringe with disgust and try his best to avoid looking at the sinners, though it did raise his mood slightly as the sight of souls meant that he was near his goal. After a few more minutes of struggling to walk through the mud and rage induced muttering, his destination came into sight.
A fairly large sized cave laid in the middle of gluttony, with a few torches to light the outside along with the skeletons of unfortunate demons who were unlucky enough to cross the gatekeeper.
"How homey," Y/n said to himself.
He grabbed and twisted the handle, finding it unlocked and stepped in. The moment he set one foot inside, Y/n had his nostrils immediately assaulted by the smell of blood, mud and raw meat, a rather unpleasant combination of stenches. The sin of greed pinched his nose, gagging slightly from the appalling odor. He didn't know if demons could get sick or if they could throw up, but he felt that he might find out soon if he kept breathing in the smell.
With great hesitance, he stepped inside. The first room of the cave wasn't what Y/n was expecting, having toys and balls littering the place. At one end of the room, a fairly modern looking Tv rested on the ground and a large pile of pillows and blankets laid in front of it, which he presumed was what the gatekeeper slept on. Noticing that the pillows had writing on them, he squinted and looked closer. The three pillows were labelled accordingly, "Enas, Dyo and Trio".
Enas, Dyo and Tria were the names of the triplets who guarded the gate to Hell, but they were usually referred to by one name: Cerberus, as all three twins shared a hivemind.
Enas, Dyo and Tria were born centuries ago, just after Beelzebubs rebellion. Their sole purpose was to replace Kerberos, the original gatekeeper, after he was slain by the great fly and her allies.
Y/n never had many chances to interact with Cerberus, only having met them once or twice in the past, but knew just how troublesome and chaotic they could be despite their cutesy appearance. Olympia, the Sin of Gluttony, had told him many stories about them, and if they proved to be true then he would have to take caution in approaching them, and maybe even use excessive force in case things got out of hand.
Walking further into the house, Y/n's nose wrinkled in disgust once more. The foul smell had grown tenfold. It was at that moment that Y/n decided to himself that his work was cut out for him. He could already feel the bile rising from the back of his throat.
Following where the smell led to, Y/n carefully opened one last door.
The last room must've been a feeding room, judging by the half-eaten souls strewn about, the various claw marks plaguing the walls and blood staining the floor.
The most powerful wave of stench yet had hit Y/n in the face like a full force punch. His pupils dilated, lungs constricted and stomach threatened to jump out of his body. Out of everything the Sin of Greed had ever had the pleasure or displeasure of smelling, this was by far the worst thing ever, even more worse than the smell of Modeus' sex dungeon.
With the speed of light itself, Y/n slammed the door shut and ran out of the house, his lungs finally letting him breathe again. How Cerberus was able to bear that smell when her smelling sense was stronger than his, he would never know.
Free of the god-awful smell, Y/n was left with only one thing on his mind. A question.
The gatekeeper wasn't home, so where were they?
It was a very high possibility that they were off guarding the entrance, but then that would mean he would have to travel all the way to the end of Gluttony...through the mud...again...
Yeah, there was no way he was going out again.
With great hesitation and the full force of his willpower, Y/n strode back inside. He was not going to just wait outside with the company of pigs, after all.
As Y/n sat on the pile of pillows, tapping his foot impatiently, he decided to give the person who gave him this task a little call. He reached into his trusty pocket and whipped out a cell phone. He quickly punched in a set of numbers and waited as it rang.
"Hello? Who is this?" Lucifer's voice said through the device.
"Heya Lucy, it's me," he replied, voice slightly different since he was pinching his nose with the other hand.
"Y/n? What do you want? Have you found Cerberus yet?"
"Well, that's what I'm calling about. Haven't found them just yet, so I'm just waiting in their little man-cave right now. In the case that they don't come back for a while, where could I find them?"
"Have you checked outside? They could be out hunting, or maybe they're out by the entrance."
"I refuse to go back out there," Y/n hissed at the phone. "I was asking just in case. I'd rather stay inside with the putrid smell of decaying bodies than be out with the company of pigs, rain and mud."
"Oh stop being a drama queen. I'm the only queen allowed here." Lucifer laughed a little at her own joke.
"Oh, how funny," Y/n deadpanned. "Do you want a cookie for that amazing joke?"
To his frustration, Lucifer took that offer seriously. "That doesn't sound like a bad idea actually."
"Wait, I wasn't being serious-" before he could finish, he was cut off by Lucifer yelling out, "I demand chocolate chip cookies with milk!"
In the background, another voice replied, "As you wish."
The phone was silent for a few moments.
A few seconds later and she was back on, the sound of munching loud and clear. Y/n impassively stared at his phone. "Did you actually just do that?"
"Indeed, and I have to say, these cookies are exquisite, just simply divine," she moaned as she took a bite and gooey chocolate flowed into her mouth.
Y/n just sat there stone-faced as Lucifer moaned with each bite she took. This went on for about five minutes before Y/n finally decided he had enough and just hung up on her.
With nothing else to do, the Sin of Greed decided he should get some shut-eye. Now demons, unlike humans, could live without sleeping, but they still needed to recharge their batteries from time to time, and it felt good.
Within just a few minutes, he was fast asleep, hands behind his head and covered from head to toe in blankets.
As the Sin of Greed entered the realm of dreams, a figure creeped in from the entrance of the cave, eyes watching Y/n like a predator would prey.
――――――――――
[In Y/n's Dream]
Y/n sat in a hammock in Hawaii, surrounded by gold bars and money notes. He smirked, turning over to his left to see his cousin Justice in a hammock right beside him. The two clicked together the coconuts they had in their hands before chugging them.
A few feet away was a bar, with Lucifer manning the counter and wearing beautiful Hawaiian dress, dreamily gazing at Y/n.
――――――――――
[ (Snap) Back To Reality]
"Heh, coconuts...," Y/n chuckled in his sleep. The figure reached out and poked Y/n's side, eliciting a small grumble from him. They did it again, this time it was harder. Y/n sluggishly opened his eyes just before the figure poked him again, but even harder. "Argh! What the Hell?" he growled.
Y/n tossed the blankets off wildly and sat up, only to come face to face with a mask wearing individual. Both entities looked at each other, neither saying anything.
"...The fuck?" Y/n blurted out. The cloaked figure responded by throwing their fist forward, narrowly missing his face as he moved.
Y/n was on high alert now, and sidestepped just in time as a pair of claws came raking towards his face with a menacing glint. The claws wooshed past, mere centimetres from taking off his nose.
"What the fuck are you doing? Stop this!" Y/n roared as he dodged another claw swipe that was instead aimed for his midsection. Y/n tried to retaliate but the cloaked figure jumped back before he could. He was momentarily distracted, astonished by their speed, but quickly shook the feelings of awe away and snapped back to anger.
Whoever this was, they were too fast for Y/n to actually land a blow.
The black cloaked figure landed with a back flip , their hands together to form weird symbols. Y/n had no idea what they were doing, but he had a bad feeling about it. The figure kept changing their hands and forming new symbols until they stopped and shouted out, "Ninja Clone-jutsu!"
"What?" Y/n squawked with a raised brow. For a moment, nothing had happened, and Y/n looked around. "Was that supposed to do something-" The Sin of Greed never got to finish as he quickly ducked to avoid getting nailed in the head from behind. Y/n growled out in annoyance as a third figure pounced out from behind cover and attempted to slash at him. To the three figures' surprise, Y/n had actually managed to counter this time, moving faster than they did. He reached out and grabbed the hem of the second's collar and tossed them into the first figure. As for the third, Y/n latched his hand onto their masked head and slammed them into the ground, not enough to hurt them, but enough to disorient them.
The three figures groaned out in pain at the beating they had received. Y/n slowly strode towards the trio of masked menaces with a mean glare in his eyes. Y/n loved fighting, as did the other Sins—except Pandemonica, Modeus and Olympia—but being ambushed in his sleep wasn't exactly pleasant. Y/n preferred to fight honourably, without the assistance of outside forces or surprise attacks and with one's own strength and power.
As the saying goes, "Professionals have standards."
Y/n's hand began to glow an eerie gold with glowing golden cracks forming along his arms and the skin darkening into a charcoal black. It was time Y/n ended this, and he had decided how he would do it.
He let out an animalistic growl of annoyance and swung at them. The trio of attackers had no idea what the Sin of Greed was doing, but it could not have been good by the looks of it. The first cloaked figure grabbed both their companions and launched themselves through the door and out into the open. Y/n's fist came crashing down in the spot they were moments ago, shattering the ground and sending dirt spraying everywhere. Seconds later, the earth and mud began to glow the same colour as Y/n's arm, with the area he had punched slowly becoming solid gold. Y/n looked up to see the three perpetrators standing a few feet away looking slack jawed with awe. Don't ask how Y/n knew they were surprised since they all had masks, he just knew.
"So, you all managed to dodge that," Y/n simply stated, hiding the annoyance in his voice. "I'd say you're rather skilful to be able to dodge that, but we both know all of you are kind of lacking in that department."
He couldn't see the facial expressions on their faces, but he could feel the anger coming from them. Knowing he touched a nerve, the Sin of Greed showed his large shining smile. All three attackers snarled at Y/n, but did not move from their spots, deciding to wait for him to come out. Y/n carefully walked out, and when he did the three began to circle Y/n like a pack of wolves closing in on a deer.
The sin of greed, though startled and confused at the lack of response to his attempt at provocation, quickly gained his bearings and looked around to keep his eye on all of them. "Huh, I really thought that would work. Guess you three cowards aren't as dumb as I thought you to be"
Provocation could prove to be a powerful weapon. A fighter who disregards all rational thought in flavor of acting on pure emotion was a dead one. Though as it appears, these three masked mutton-heads weren't dead fighters, at least not yet.
In the blink of an eye, one of the aggressors lashed out and swiped at him. Y/n was fast, coming third in terms of speed of all the sins, but even he could not predict an attack so quickly. He had no time to fully move his body to dodge, so he did the only thing he could. Before the claws could even touch his body, a bright and vibrant golden colour encased Y/n with it's light. The assailants claw slashed at Y/n, but instead of feeling the sweet tear of flesh, they had instead felt a cold and hard surface cover their entire arm. Looking down, they noticed—to their horror—that their entire right arm was solid gold. They couldn't feel nor move their now trapped arm, it was like it wasn't even there. The only thing letting the aggressor know it was still there was their arms' new weight that sent them stumbling to the ground.
Y/n let out a gasp of surprise as the assailant released a ear-raping scream, one that sounded extremely feminine. That's when it hit him.
Three assailants, in the circle of Gluttony, who he had now identified as female.
The trio of attackers were none other than Cerberus the triple demon.
"Holy shit. Cerberus, is that you?" Y/n managed to ask in his stupor.
The third sister, Tria, whined out in panic while ripping off her mask. Without so much as a second thought, Y/n ran towards her and fell to his knees as she fell backwards, catching her in his arms. Tria's entire arm was now a beautiful gilded colour, and the gold was still spreading up to her neck. Y/n snapped his finger and the Cerberus triplets watched as the golden arm of Tria melted and morphed back into flesh and bone. With a look of wonder, she rubbed at her arm while Y/n huffed.
The other two had ripped off their masks, and were now standing beside Y/n, which was poor placement considering what he was about to do. Dropping Tria, Y/n whipped around and slammed his fists on top of their heads..
"What in the hell were you three thinking?" Y/n snarled at the triplets, the anger in his voice evident. "I could have killed you! What in the fuck were you three doing that you thought was a good idea!?"
While rubbing the pained spot atop her head, Dyo cheerfully replied, "We were being ninjas!"
Y/n glared at her, but she remained unfazed. Even if someone was mad at them, Cerberus never really cared. The only person they were afraid to make angry was Lucifer.
"The fuck are you talking about?" Y/n asked, folding his arms while he waited for a reply.
"We were pretending to be ninjas! Look, we even have the costumes!" Enas said as she pointed to the black attire she and her siblings wore.
"...That is the dumbest fucking thing I've heard in centuries." Y/n pinched his nose and shook his head. "I swear to Satan, where the hell do you three get these stupid damn ideas from?"
"From Tv!" Tria ran inside and over to the television and switched it on. Y/n and the other two sisters followed behind slowly. Now standing in front of the television, he got a clear sight of what was playing. The show being displayed was none other than Naruto.
"Look, look!" Dyo chanted with stars in her eyes. "Look how cool ninjas are!"
Enas decided to add her part and explained, "We were playing a ninja game until Y/n showed up, so we decided to add Y/n to our game."
Y/n exhaled sharply, clenching his fists and narrowing his eyes. "And can you explain why you haven't been sending in your reports?"
Slowly, what Y/n said had registered to the girls and the colour was drained from their faces. Out of all of Lucifer's underlings, Cerberus was one of the demons who had been punished the most due to their disorderly behaviour. The triplets knew what kind of punishments awaited them, and shuddered at the thought. "We may have made a big mistake..."
"You think?" Y/n's face grew into a large, sadistic grin. The triplets shook themselves from their thoughts and faced Y/n.
"Is that why you're here?" they asked.
"Indeed," Y/n replied. "Lucifer has been losing her marbles trying to figure out what you three mutts have been doing."
"What can we say? We were so busy being ninjas that we forgot," they said in sync.
Y/n gaped in awe. He was astonished by the sheer audacity these demons had to make the queen of Hell worry about them while they just played around. "Are you serious right now? Are you genuinely serious? Do you know how much trouble you're causing by not doing your damn job properly?"
Cerberus only shrugged in response.
"For fucks sake Cerberus, you know how important those reports are!" Y/n sighed in frustration as the Cerberus triplets just looked at him with what seemed to be...anticipation?
Y/n brushed it off and slowly trudged towards the pile of pillows and blankets before plopping down, sighing in bliss as his tired legs could finally rest after having to endure the harsh conditions of gluttony and the little spar session they just had. Even if he had just had a nap, he was still tired.
Every action Y/n took, Cerberus watched it, their eyes never leaving him. Soon, after a couple minutes of Y/n resting up and the girls continuing to stare at him, he asked, "Why do you keep staring at me? Is there something on my face?"
The girls shook their heads rapidly, and immediately went back to staring. Y/n found the gesture creepy, and decided he had overstayed his welcome, if he had any in the first place. He stood up and headed for the door. "Well, I've done what I need to, and my gold isn't gonna count itself. See ya later mutts."
He was so close to being free of this headache until Dyo and Tria had moved and were blocking the only way out, still gazing at him. Enas stood at his side, hands interlocked behind her back and a small grin gracing her features. Y/n tried to push Tria and Dyo out of the way to leave, but Enas hugged him from behind and held him back.
"Ladies, what are you doing?" Y/n tried to free himself from Enas' grip, but Dyo had joined in on the hug, wrapping herself around him and restricting his movements.
"You're not going anywhere." Tria grinned maniacally, pouncing on Y/n and locking her arms around his neck. The sin of greed ran around the cave like a mad bull, shaking crazily to try and get rid of the demons who had latched onto him while said demons began laughing like children.
Enas threw an arm up in the air while chanting, "Faster, Faster!"
Not wanting to be part of their antics any longer, Y/n abruptly came skidding to a halt. The girls flew off of the demon and crashed into the piles of blankets and pillows. "Woah!" they cried out.
"What is wrong with you three? What the hell are you trying to do?" Y/n groaned. The sin of greed rolled his shoulder, sighing in content at the sound of the joints popping. The three demon triplets popped their heads out from the pile of pillows and replied, "You can't leave just yet!"
"Nobody but Olympia comes here; it gets so boring!" Dyo complained.
"You will stay here and play with us!" Tria finished.
Y/n shook his head and quickly made his way to the exit once more. "Sorry, but I can't. I'm way too busy counting cash to play with you-" The girls cut him off again by pouncing once more and toppling him over, but this time they began dragging him deeper into the cave with their fangs sunk into his shirt collar.
"You will stay and play!" Enas muffled through the fabric of his collar. Y/n wanted to protest but thought against it. If he didn't entertain Cerberus then there was no telling what they would do. Cerberus was unpredictable and their willingness to achieve what they wanted knew no bounds. Not to mention that if they did do something, then he might be held accountable for it.
Y/n thought back to the gold in his house that was just begging to be counted.
And then he thought about what Lucifer said earlier, about how she'd take it all.
That was a risk Y/n was not willing to take.
Y/n sighed in acceptance. His fate was sealed at this point. It was either refuse to play and risk them doing something stupid while he gets blamed and punished for it, or play with them tom make them happy. "Fine, I'll play."
"Fantastic!" the three said in unison.
"But!" Y/n began. "Only for a few hours, understand? My relaxation time isn't gonna relax itself." Y/n declared, folding his arms.
"Oh yes, we understand!" said Dyo.
"Just as long as we get to play with you, we're fine with it!" Enas hooted. Y/n scoffed at the triplets' happy expressions. Their personalities reminded him of children in a way, which clashed with the fact that they had the bodies of mature women in their twenties. In fact, they were so child-like that Y/n had previously thought they were mentally ill by the fact that grown women, or at least what looked to be grown women, acted the way they did.
"What is it that the three of you want to play anyways?"
They instantly answered with, "Ninjas!"
Y/n immediately wanted to take back his decision, crying out in regret while the triplets pulled up their little masks and began mimicking karate.
――――――――――
In the circle of treachery, Lucifer had just been hung up on by Y/n. She had tried to call him back, but he was either busy or ignoring her. Maybe both.
The CEO of Hell stood behind her tower, where a gargantuan Iceberg laid. The bone chilling tundras of Treachery did little to the queen; if anything, she rather enjoyed the feeling of the cold creeping up on her skin. Lucifer was a mere foot away from the large body of ice, her red eyes glaring. She set her hands on the large block of ice and there they rested.
"Mysterious portals showing up, mortal invading Hell...," Lucifer spoke, eerily quiet. "I have no idea what's happening anymore, but I have the nagging feeling that you and the fly have something to do with it."
A pair of glowing eyes stared back from within the ice.
――――――――――
[Fun Fact Time!]
This chapter's fun fact: The powers of all the Seven Deadly Sins are based on legends from Greek mythology (with some exceptions). As you saw in the chapter above, Y/n has the power of King Midas, who turned everything he touched to gold. Now, I can't tell you the powers of all the Sins because some of that information will be a surprise for later chapters, but I can tell you the abilities of Adonis, Skolar and Modeus and the legends they are based on.
Skolar is one of the exceptions to this, for he doesn't have a unique power that originated from a greek legend. His ability is just the normal power of fire, with the only unique thing about him is him being a simp for Lucifer 50% of the time and the other 50% being pissed off at everyone.
Adonis is based on Medusa, the gorgon. She has the ability to turn whoever looks into her eyes into stone, hence why she wears a blindfold that she can see through, but others cannot. It is possible to resist being turned to stone, but you have to be very strong to resist it. Lucifer and the other Sins have no trouble resisting it, which makes her one of the weakest Sins.
As you can probably guess, Modeus's power has something to do with sex and lust. Her power is based on Eros, also known as the cupid of Greek mythology. Her powers involve releasing pheromones that can drive a person or demon insane with sexual desire, and can also alter the emotions of the victim at will.
And also, if you have noticed, I have been rewriting some chapters to improve them and fix grammar errors. Some changes will be barely noticeable while others you may want to reread to make sure.
[End of Fun Fact Time]