I looked around me. The hall was medically clean in its Greek beauty. The god had left, taking all the blood-stained DNA samples with him. What a shame. My inner greedy pig had been pulling at my jacket fighting to attract my attention, hinting that the miserable five vials were nothing compared to a cozy wine cellar stacked up with more of the same.

Okay, what next? I checked my virtual to-do list and grinned. Freebies!

There's a time to cast stones and a time to gather them, I said to myself as I reached into my bag for the Soul Stone containing the Hell Hound. I wiped it clean with my sleeve.

"I've taken good care of you. I haven't wasted you stupidly. So please don't let me down."

I placed the stone onto the altar's mirrored black top and stepped back, just in case. In the nick of time.

My ears resounded with a powerful blast. A portal window materialized over the altar, allowing me a glimpse into the depths of the Inferno: it glowed every shade of crimson, lava flowing unhurriedly amid the strangely formed piles of basalt rocks.

Judging by the flames, the atmosphere there was thinner, causing oxygen to burn faster than the weird-looking Hell flora could produce it. Air gushed into the portal, trying to level out the pressure and pulling in everything within its reach. Like myself, for one. It was a good job the portal had a short-impulse structure. Had it lasted a bit longer, I'd have had every chance to enjoy the afterlife sooner than expected.

It all finished very quickly: with a double popping sound, the portal opened then closed again, with me clutching at thin air, my back a strangely convoluted shape. Talk about a lucky miss.

I switched my focus to read a new quest message:

Quest completion alert: Hell's Temptation. Quest completed!

Reward: Access to quest Hell's Temptation II.

Oh. My inner greedy pig opened and closed his mouth, speechless with indignation. Hadn't he had enough freebies? They kept coming faster than we could sort through them. A new quest was a very good thing: the further the unique chain of quests took us, the heftier the prize at the end of it. Consider the lost stone an investment, I told my greedy alter ego before closing the message. Underneath it, I discovered another one:

Congratulations! You've learned a new skill: Portal to Inferno.

The connection between a necro wizard and an imprisoned soul is so great that the stone that holds it becomes a flashing beacon calling him. The portal, this smoothed-out fold of matter that covers the rupture to a different plane, cannot conceal from you the crystal's true light. From now on, you can always open the portal leading to the dark depths of Inferno and keep it open for as long as is needed.

Ingredient: a Soul Stone of a level identical or above that of the caster.

I tipped the crown onto my forehead and scratched the back of my head. Curiouser and curiouser. The uberness of the skill directly depended on the degree of the portal's inaccessibility by the usual means. A quick Wiki check showed that no such means existed. Only the planes' respective bosses could occasionally drop portal scrolls; even less occasionally, you could receive them as rewards in some truly mean quests. These kinds of skills only existed as fandom rumors and vague official hints. It couldn't be otherwise, considering the frequency with which a few top guilds raided their respective planes. Having said that, the answer to the question was now right in front of me, so you never know, I might one day lead my guild against some Infernal Arch Demon's castle. Not today, of course, not even next Friday. But it was good to know I had that option if I needed it. I could also earn a quick and quite hefty buck on the side as a gate keeper for some serious customers. This I could also keep in mind as a potential and relatively kosher money spinner.

So where was the promised access to the new quest? I stole a look around, then tapped the altar with a sacrilegious finger. Hell Hound, hello?

A new gust of wind forced me to spread-eagle in an attempt to keep my footing on the slippery floor. Once the artificial tempest subsided, I ventured a look around. The hound stood not far from me, looking quite the worse for wear. She was heaving, her back streaked with blood, holding one paw gingerly in front of her. In her teeth she held a still warm lump of flesh, its severed muscle fibers twitching. She downed it in one forced gulp, spat out a bloodied clump of hair onto the white marble and limped toward me, her glare unkind and unpromising. Her pack—or should I say, whatever was left of it—froze in a thin line behind her back. Three were rather in a bad way—males, as far as I could tell by their impressive size and wide chests,—and over a dozen females of various sizes and ages, each of them holding a puppy struggling half-heartedly in their mouths.

The Hound approached, her neon glare burning a hole in me. A familiar voice resounded in my head,

"Thank you for doing what I asked of you. And doubly so for laying the soul stone onto the First Temple Altar. Its sacred power alone allowed me to survive and save the remains of my pack who were already cornered at the nest's lower level."

"What happened? Why were you attacked?"

"You weren't in a hurry, were you?" she gave me an accusing look. "In the land of the Inferno, it's survival of the fittest. Our hunting grounds are poor. Even the best of our trackers can only find fresh meat but once a week. So once our pack had lost its leader, everybody and their grandmother were after our hunting grounds. I was nearly too late to help—and still my attack from the rear had surprised the enemy and allowed me to break through to rejoin my pack—or rather, the third of it that's still left."

She raised her hackles, her voice accusing. Obeying her non-verbal command, the other pack members stepped forward, baring the deadly needles of their fangs under their threateningly shaking lips.

"Hey, wait!" I recoiled in a rush to activate the shield and locate the new ability that gave me 30-sec immunity. "It wasn't a pleasure cruise for me, either. First I was in jail, if you remember, after you'd left me there. Almost as soon as I was released, I got kidnapped and jailed again. I tried to restore the temple in the City of Light's catacombs which was how I found this altar fragment that allowed me to restore the First Temple. Which I did precisely two hours ago! So what's your problem? Had it not been for me, you'd still be pining away on that chain, looking at the world through prison bars. As an alternative, you might have become a zombie hound serving some Necro summoner," I dropped by way of a hint.

She squinted at me, her intentions unclear—they could have been political as well as gastronomical. Then she tilted her head toward the pack, growling. The hounds stepped back, dropping to their skinny backsides. Their thin ratlike tails, covered in fine armor scales, still brushed nervously across the floor.

Finally, she made up her mind and raised her head to me, her stare hypnotic. "We need a new home."

New quest alert: Hell's Temptation II.

The remains of the once-powerful pack of Hell Hounds have been forced to abandon their nest and are now looking for a new place. Help the creatures of Inferno to find a new home.

Reward: up to you. The Hounds are strong. It's not often they accept somebody's superiority. Whatever happens, do not corner them. Even a rat is capable of attacking a man who's cut off its escape routes.

For your information: The divine particle reacts at the first sign of aggression that targets its bearer and dissolves in his aura granting him a near-absolute immunity. You can now enjoy maximum protection from mental control spells.