Hell — A desolate, fiery dimension full of ashes, dust, lava and rocks. All of them in harmony and unison create natural wonders big and small — crevices, spires, bridges. For some, it may even remotely look like a paradise due to its beauty. However, it's most important role is more than obvious — punishment. Really bad ponies end up there and are almost instantly blessed by the questionable pleasure of having one or a dozen demons to look after them. Most of the time, they are also politely asked to do chores for said demons. The demons themselves are neither cruel or kindhearted but nevertheless insist that their 'guests' work five hours a day, four days a week. Some evildoers give in and do as they are told by their new caretakers, some rebel and are left alone, while others insist that that they want to join the ranks themselves, despite that being impossible. Yet, despite how complex the whole system is, one thing is unaccounted for — lack of souls. Contrary to popular belief, those things start off bright like stars and get darker and darker until they fade away, leaving to parts unknown.
The reason for that? Ever since Twilight Sparkle and her friends started doing good deeds and punishing bad ones, everyone in Equestria became generally less prone to doing bad things. This in turn spread all across the bordering kingdoms and their neighbors like a disease, effectively making sure almost no one does evil. What once was an artist who had many, many commisions going on, is now barely able to pay the rent. There's no one to build new obsidian castles for the archdemons, no one to sweep the floors and most importantly, no one to tell jokes. Without either of those things, Hell cannot function properly and because of that, is currently running with only basic features and free healthcare for the 'guests'. No one knows how free healthcare works for souls, but demons insist it's a good idea, even though they have no idea how to carry it out.
To discuss these matters, an emergency meeting was scheduled, with invitations sent to all archdemons who took care of a circle of Hell. However, due to only two circles having any sort of business to talk about, only two archdemons arrived to said meeting while the rest lollygagged about in their huge, yet untidy and boring obsidian castles. Also attending the meeting was the Beast himself, who, for whatever reason, chose not to be named by his two, other well-known names.
He had arrived much earlier than the two and spent his time waiting by playing cards. He wore his favourite and signature dark red suit, with a sligthly off-coloured tie. His eyes were gray and dull, having no easily distinguishable irises. The horns on the top of his head were twisted in a spiral, with his face being red as a brick. To add up to his intimidating looks as a wannabe lawyer, a ball of fire was almost always present in the middle of the two horns, reminding others of his status. After two hours of lonesome cardplay, the two archdemons finally arrived and sat down at the very end of the conference table.
"Oh, you're here! Wait a second... There's only two of you?" he asked, eyes racing across the room. "Where's the rest?" He already knew the answer, but nevertheless wanted to hear it from his inferiors. After a few seconds, the two archdemons started arguing as to who was supposed to answer that, much to his annoyance. With a flick of his hoof, the Beast teleported to a seat beside one of them, having the most annoyed and tired expression a demon was capable of, with one of his hooves propped against his head.
"No, I'm not saying anything to the boss!" argued Greed, eponymously named after the circle he was in control of. "Last time I told him something bad, he insisted on a private tea party. A tea party! In Hell! Do you even know how embarassing that was?!" The 'boss' kept staring at them, his annoyance changing into a slight smile. Were they really so oblivious to his presence?
"Oh, yeah?" let out Anger, also named after the circle he took care of. "Last time I told him something that wasn't good, he forced me to listen to his poetry. That's one eternity of my life I know I won't be getting back any time soon!" Greed stroked his beard, thinking. Anger had a good point, though. Neither of them wanted to be punished and in a flash of bright ideas, both of them got the perfect solution.
"Demons & Dragons!" they let out in unison, each of them taking out their boards and their respective champions. "Whoever wins gets to inform the boss!" Greed was only intrugued at first by Anger's offer, but now it had caught his attention. "Deal!" With that said by Greed, they arranged the board and started playing. The beast kept staring at them, occasionally looking at his watch.
"Isn't the D&D convention next week?" He let out, finally letting them know that he was there for the last ten minutes or so, listening. Startled, both of them jumped in suprise, scattering everything they had in their hooves across the room.
"Oh, hey boss, we didn't see you!" let out Greed, with a worried smile on his face, still frozen in his jumpy pose. "So... What's the emergency?" Both of the archdemons sat down at the table properly and the Beast's face immediately became serious.
"Gentlemen, as you may have noticed," A graph appears nearby out of nowhere as the Beast speaks, showcasing the number of souls in each circle of Hell. "We are running out of souls. There simply aren't enough crimes committed to give us the work force we need. If we do not find a solution quickly, chaos and disorder will follow. I would have discussed it with all nine of the archdemons, but the rest don't have any 'business' anymore." Greed and Anger gazed at various parts of said graph, with the latter occassionally having a cross-eyed expression.
"How much time do we have?" Asked Greed, as his circle still seemed to have many, many souls to carry out chores.
"Weeks, a month if we're lucky," explained the Beast, now showing them the numbers from the previous year. "Depends on how much hours per day the souls will work. In theory, we could reduce their work to a mere one hour per week and give them shifts. This would buy us a whole year, but it doesn't solve the source of the problem — Equestria. If the kingdom keeps on being good, there'll be no one to maintain Hell and most importantly, there will be no jokes." Anger gasped in horror.
"No jokes?!" he shouted. "I already had to last a day without one! The horror, the horror!" Unlike his one eternity younger colleague, Greed was more calm when it came to such things. After all, his numbers were still in the green, as ponies were still rather greedy, or at least, some of them were. Who would have though they'd risk their lives for a bunch of colourful rocks?
"What will happen then?" asked Greed out of curiousity. "What will happen to Hell?" The Beast had a look of worry on his face, looked down at the ground and then back at Greed.
"In a sequence of events that are already set in motion, first will come chaos, disorder, despair and at the very end of all of that, Hell will fall," The Beast explained. "However, unlike those before me, I do not believe in fate and won't just leave it like that. I... I will call upon the Forbidden Scroll and use it. Desperate times like these require desperate decisions." A wave of skepticism hit the archdemons, as they started to question the sanity of their boss in their heads. It was called like that name for a reason.
"You want to open a portal to Equestria?!" let out Anger, unable to comprehend what his superior was planning to do. "After what happened last time?!" The graph next to the Beast disappeared and he held out a scroll of unknown origins, which gave off an ominous, red light.
"Invasion into the mortal plane is our only choice," explained the Beast as he opened the scroll. "If Equestria can't give souls to us, we'll have to take them by ourselves. First we'll ask for them, then we'll start saying please. This time, it hopefully won't end up with half of us getting trapped on the moon." The two archdemons stared in disbelief at one another and one of them coughed.
"What if that won't work?" Asked Anger, skeptical about the whole invasion plan.
"Well," started the Beast. "The basic response to that is to shoot up to the sky, explode in a red nova and colour everything from sky to ground red across a wide area. That'll show 'em." The two archdemons were quite doubtful at how the plan sounded, but at the same time, they had no plan of their own. Despite an insane amount of luck that was required for the plan to work, they had no other choice and eventually, they gave.
"We should have signed that merger contract with Tartarus..." Muttered Greed and sighed, reluctantly agreeing on the plan.
"Shut your face," responded the Beast angrily. "Hell is a kindgom, not some lousy prison, mind you. We don't need their help." With that said, the Beast opened the scroll and begun reading. A small red dot appeared on the table and soon expanded into a medium-sized, reddish portal. Odd whipers were coming from it, as well as occasional bursts of lightning.
"Anger, Greed," he turned to them and climbed onto the table. "I'm going on a trip to make sure Equestria fears the forces of Hell. You two will train every capable demon of fighting. Broken fire spells, bad jokes, horrible poetry — teach them everything you know. When I get back, I expect an army to be waiting for me. Afterwards, I will open the portal properly..." Since the two archdemons had no choice, they nodded in approval as their boss stepped through the portal. Afterwards, the portal closed.
"So," started Anger. "How do we evil?" Greed just facepalmed and sighed at his colleague's endless stupidity, lamenting that he has to work with the lowest of the low. Afterwards, both of them cleaned the meeting room by carefully collecting their D&D playthings and then left. With that behind them, Greed and Anger begun devising a plan, which meant that Greed started writing something down, while Anger started singing like a drunkard, asking Greed to 'carry him home'. Then, after hours and hours of planning, Greed, with the minimal assistance of his dumb assistant, begun gathering demons from all circles of Hell. The preffered form of training? Freestyle bad poetry. He was hoping the Equestrians would run screaming due to how horrible it was and give them their kindgom as a peace offering. A ridiculous plan, but hey, theoretically, it could work.