The Infernal Realm

    Almost every culture in the known universe has a name for the place carved out by those cast out from or who cannot stand higher realms. The cackles and screams of those Below have filled mortal nightmares ever since humanity evolved a brain to think and a mind to imagine. Ever since he first crawled out of the oceans, Man has had the nasty feeling (s)he is on metaphorically rather thin floorboards.

As meaningless as such metaphors may seem when referring to planes of existence, "down", implying an incline, is accurate. Hell has a treacherous suction to it, both literal as well as metaphorical. Those without the grace to "ascend" the incline are dragged down into the abyss, where the fires within burn all claimed by it, endlessly. It is a place of infinite suffering, without mercy, and without hope.

No really, we mean this. It's been used as an expletive by an increasingly-sceptical humanity for centuries. That alone should be a clue as to just how bad we're talking. Saying "X is Hell", or making amusing comments about tech-support desks or muzak-filled waiting rooms, doesn't really cut it when presented with the reality — which is that Lucifer and his hordes really do not like humanity, and this is where they get to take out their frustration. In graphic fashion. If nothing else, there's few things quite so effective as an informative slide-show of Gehennan travel photos to make people reconsider the whole "soul-selling" thing.

Board psychologists note the tendency, reflected in the above paragraph, for flippancy when referring to Hell is probably a healthy defence mechanism - akin to morbid humour for medical personnel. Even the watered-down reports circulated in public contain enough traumatic detail to seriously scar minds. Those unlucky enough to be "granted" a glimpse of the Adversary's realm have nightmares for years. The thought of that becoming manifest, on Earth or elsewhere, has galvanised millions into action.

To dismiss it as "merely" an abode of infinite suffering, however, is to miss the industrial powerhouse the demons have at their command. Effectively a world all its own, Hell ruthlessly employs the one major resource it has to prosecute its war on the rest of Creation — damned souls. The fires of Hell burn Damned fuel, and so do the blast furnaces and forges, where luckier souls slave over endless assembly lines — the ones who don't end up bound into the warped objects they create, that is. Endless internecine warfare between the various principalities and realms means few such factories last long, but there are always more damned to rebuild them elsewhere.

The only structures with any permanency Below are those under the Adversary's own aegis — His fortress of Dis, at the malignant heart of the "city" of Pandemonium. With all creative thought firmly quashed, the city resembles a gothic nightmare trapped in the Middle Ages, inspiring mortal visions of Hell for centuries. The ultimate refuge for those as far from God as it is possible to go, the blasphemies committed there are literally unimaginable to human minds.

So how do we know about this? Well, exactly how Infernal Intelligence smuggle out their reports is one of their most closely-guarded secrets. Most Boardies assume a few sympathetic colleagues of their redeemed allies act as double agents (and those to whom having the enemy know their rivals' secrets puts them ahead...merely look the other way). Chaotic as ever, even Hell has a few cracks information can slip through.