Shadows

(Can I confess something to you all? I don't really like Hazbin Hotel; in fact, I kinda hate it. The show, at least, I really like the characters and setting, but I really can't get down with the show, aside from my glorious king Adam. 

(James POV)

"Welcome to the shadow realm, my esteemed guest."

I looked at the silhouette in utter confusion. How the hell did I even get here in the first place? Did she bring me here through my shadow? "Why, my guest, you catch on very quickly.". Did she just read my mind?

"No, I didn't, my guest." She says, making a teapot and pouring it directly into her mouth. "But, it's very surprising how I can't, I can only read your shadow. You see, the shadow is a reflection of the soul; the soul holds all thoughts and feelings inside of it, being aided by the brain or the equivalent in whatever has a soul."

"Your shadow holds all emotions you consider negative. Doubts, dislikes for things or people, hate, and depression. Yet what intrigues me about you is how I can only read your reasonable doubts about me. Interesting." The silhouette puts the teacup down and just starts to stare at me.

"Dude, you can't just bring me here to a whole new realm and just start dumping info on me like that. A 'hello' or 'My name is.' would have sufficed, dude." I say, looking at the surprisingly curvy silhouette… Am I really that damn down bad?

The silhouette looked at me in a tiny bit of surprise as she put down her teapot. "I apologize for that, my guest. You may call me Roo, the Root of All Evil." With her name mentioned, that entire room creaked under an invisible pressure, as if her mere name bent reality. "Wait, wait, wait, hold the phone. You're telling me the literal embodiment of evil itself has called me down here?"

After my question, Roo simply smiled before her form gained more presence. Instead of a shadow, she became more like me, an inky black figure, except way curvier. Her breasts and privates were covered up with black censor bars, saying, No Peeking.

"Why, yes, I have called you here." She says, "You see, that power you have of making beings from your shadows directly establishes a line with me directly, the ruler of the shadow realm." While she was talking, she made a teacup and gave me a cup of tea.

"That Alastor overlord also has a shadow ability, yet I can't even communicate with him, much less call him here like you." I take a long sip of the tea. "Though, perhaps that's because of your unique status as a transmigrator, isn't it?" I immediately spit out my tea all over the table and looked at Roo in shock.

Roo looked unimpressed at me, and with a snap, the tea I had spat out was completely gone. "Yes, I suppose that wasn't exactly a small thing to drop in casual conversation," she says, rubbing her arm in embarrassment, making the teapot float beside her. "Yeah, bro, no shit. How the hell did you even know that!?"

"You see, my guest, whenever a portal is formed, it briefly passes through my realm, not for long though, a picosecond at most, yet I sense all of them." She rubs her finger along the brim of my teacup that I had sat down on the table. "So imagine my shock when a soul, a human one no less, was transported into hell, somehow less than a picosecond."

My hands trembled with this knowledge, knowing that someone or something had tracked me down and proved there were 'gods' here, people that are way above my level of power that could basically do anything without me knowing. It made me feel worthless… Like, no matter what, my fate and entire being were determined on the whim of some being way stronger than me.

My hands trembled as I looked at Roo. "So why the hell did you call me here then?" Roo either didn't know or didn't comment on my insecurities as she spoke without a care in the world. "I'm sure you're familiar with the concept of gods choosing someone to represent them, like those chaos gods of Warhammer 40 Thousand, right?"

I gave a small nod and blinked. She disappeared from my sight as I looked to my left and saw her in a chair right beside me, putting an arm around my shoulders in an almost friendly gesture. "What I want to do is make you my champion."

I say nothing for a minute before asking. "...Why do you want to do that?" She looked at me, and for the first time I could see the shape of a face; unlike her previous silhouette form, she only had a mouth that was curled up into a smile that was just a tiny bit too big for her face.

"Why, you ask? It would be so interesting; think about it. The embodiment of evil sponsors a random mortal who transmigrated here? That just sounds like a ripe idea for the TV you mortals watch." Even without me blinking this time. She directly disappears from my line of sight and appears back in her chair on the other side of the desk.

"So, how about it, my dear guest? Would you like to take the deal?" I look down and clench my fists, contemplating my options. "What if I said I needed more information and time before I agreed?" Roo's smile dropped back into the nothingness her mouth was before. "That's fine. I won't end you because you wouldn't want to be my champion."

She knocks on the table twice, and it transfigures into ten recognizable symbols. Dogs, frogs, snakes, antlers, and a tiger. All symbols for the ten shadows. "For you, my soon-to-be champion, I will enhance these shadow creatures, along with the energy you use to summon them."

"Aren't you the ruler of this shadow realm? How are you going to enhance my cursed energy?" My question makes her mouth reappear and gives a smirk. "Do you really think the embodiment of evil can't help you with energy that's negative?" Yeah, that was kind of a stupid question.

"Super stupid question."

"..... Please don't do that again." The literal embodiment of evil starts to pout like a child. "Fine…. So are you going to be champion or not?" I rubbed my chin, deep in thought. "... Can I get like a month in time before I answer?" Roo shrugs her shoulders. "I'm the embodiment of evil; it's not like I'm going away anytime soon; take all the time you need."

She snaps her fingers again, and the floor starts turning murky, like sludge. "Just go into your shadow and think about me when you're ready to talk. You're welcome for the free healing, by the way." But before I could ask what she was talking about, I had already slipped into the shadows, only seeing the slight smile on Roo's face before resurfacing.

-Scene Break-

When I resurfaced from my shadow, I saw the now-familiar red skies of hell along with my divine dogs beside me, questioning looks on their faces as they saw me. "Sorry I checked out there for a bit, guys… You know what, I think I have enough cursed energy to just keep you guys out indefinitely."

To put it into BS numerical terms, I have about 2000 units of cursed energy; normally divine dogs use up 500 every 10 minutes, and I regenerate 350 a minute. However, with the six eyes, I can reduce the amount of cursed energy that divine dogs take up from 500 to only 5. The six eyes are truly overpowered bullshit, heh.

I swiftly got up and stretched all four of my arms and led my dogs into the hotel with me, patting their heads with my lower arms while walking. "Hey, Charlie." I walked into the hotel and called out to Charlie who was asleep on the coffee table before waking up, wiping her drool off of her face.

"Oh, y-yeah, what's up, Ja—" I hold up my two dogs and present them to her. "They don't need food or water, and they don't poop or pee or anything like that. Can I please keep them?" Before I could even blink, Charlie was already on her knees, petting and putting her face into my dogs' fur.

"You're good boys, aren't you? Good, good boys. You're so darn fluffy!" I looked at the dogs, and it seemed they were enjoying it, so I didn't stop Charlie's antics. "Of course you can keep these guys; where else would they go?"

I gave a small smile and started to shrink down into my normal form, reverting my extra arms back in and closing my stomach mouth. "You guys can track my scent, right? If you want to sleep in my room, just sniff me out, okay?" The dogs let out satisfied whines and went back to being pampered by Charlie.

I walked up the stairs to my room, thinking about my training. 'From what I can tell, I haven't even scratched the surface of Jujutsu as a whole, I only did domain amplification against Alastor of all people. I'm not expecting a domain after only a few days, but I definitely need to start training more. I'll start by accessing my inner domain by meditating. Isn't that what all the protagonists do?"

When I got to my room, I was greeted by Amery and Nifty in a yelling match about who would take my right side tonight because it's "the warmest side.". 

But before I start training, I'll take a little break first.

(After this chapter, I'll definitely put in some filler.)