Asmodeus is the first devil and first traitor, lord of pacts and of devils, highest in honor of the Nine. One of the powers that sustain the world — “Asmodeus is part of creation” — he moves part of the conflict of Antiterra.
| Type | Entity (great devil, infernal prince) |
| Seat | Ninth layer of hell, shared with Mephistopheles; territories of Váthor |
| Spanish entry | Asmodeus |
Forms
He is “gigantic and colossal”, with three faces and three mouths; before one lies the Stone of the Apocalypse. His other form is the serpent, “the biblical animal that eats everything”, coiled around the spine of Sigil at the bottom of hell.
What is met and fought is “really a shadow”, a manifestation; the Stone was taken “from some manifestation”. His helmet is recorded falling from the sky into desert ground. His mark is the seal, “the sign of Asmodeus”, stamped on contracts.
Seat
His own place is the ninth and deepest layer of hell, shared with Prince Mephistopheles; there he is “locked away” — though the voice that says so corrects itself: “Not even. Not even.” He also rules Váthor, given him by Geryon. No one signs an infernal contract after him.
Pacts and power
- He rules by pact, forcing deals on mortals even indirectly: “the one who led you to make a deal with God is Asmodeus himself”.
- He would rather “be dead, destroyed, defeated, but have kept the pact”, and makes pacts be kept.
- He made war on Lucifer and won by the number of his armies and devils.
- He cannot be killed: “no, they cannot kill Asmodeus”.
- He devoured Alatea (or Letea) when she attacked Arian in the Plane of Positive Energy, and so learned that the cell was the vault.
- He offered the Horsemen of the Apocalypse the Stone in exchange for letting Joxotot enter.
- After a defeat, he “said enough, I want no record of it”.
As serpent he entered the Plane of Positive Energy, violating its taboo, and proposed the egg to Arian; Graz’zt and the vault-cell are tied to that episode.
Role
He “worked as a kind of plug at the bottom of hell”; in his absence others compete to take hell. He wants chaos, orchestrates the planar invasion and stirs revolts in cities. He is said to oppose the demons if they try to take the devils’ territories. The Lord of the Labyrinths is his great enemy, yet Asmodeus is also named as the labyrinth’s tracer.
Antiterra is his one limit. He dislikes it, “as if he doesn’t understand it”; he tried to control and dominate it, and “there is something he cannot control and dominate”.
His brother
The Book of the Damned opens with his story and that of his brother, a forgotten entity older than the abyss, “whom no one recognizes”.
Conflicting accounts
- He is locked in the bottom of hell.
- He is absent, and conspirators aim to take hell before he returns.
- He is destroyed, immolated with Alien and God in the Apocalypse, stripped of divine essence and turned into “a bomb on its way”.
- The hand that struck him with the Rod of Infinity was Arian’s, or Sune’s (or Zunen’s).
Open questions
- Which defeat he erased, and who inflicted it; his brother’s name.
- Where the bomb is headed and what it will destroy.
- What Antiterra holds that he cannot control.
- How a manifestation differs from his true form; what the seal looks like; what became of the helmet.