This name refers to different places in 2 worlds; the versions are not merged.
Hell is, in Antiterra, a single descending plane of guarded circles leading toward the center of the earth, and in Vala, an inverted cone of nine levels built by devils to hold the souls of the Vala universe.
Antiterra
Access and threshold
Hell is one plane “that goes toward the center of the earth”, with entrances near Jerusalem (a zone existing in both Terra and Antiterra) and in the Black Poplars. Of one unnamed city it is said that “this city is in hell”. The approach is marked by a red sky, then “noises, screams, moans”, then darkness. Travelers cross it on ordinary routes; some return, some do not.
One arrives on the beaches of hell, facing a distant fortress and portal, and enters through a portal of flames: voluntarily, carried by the portal, or as a sentence. Against whoever opposes the goddess’s will, a guardian may simply “let you pass and enter hell alone”.
Circles, time and souls
There are nine circles, measurable in miles, plus other layers that must be “opened”. “One cannot go further down without first passing the guardian’s place”: each circle has its guardian. One can rest inside, but one night in hell equals a week, and long stays corrupt the soul.
Inhabitants
The condemned are punished for their deeds; the hostages of hell are held as pledges without guilt. There are paladins of Hell and alarms. Escaped demons are reported to higher authorities and hunted: Baphomet “escaped from hell but hell is looking for him”. Luca de’ Medici disappeared there, dead or held.
The seat of Armagedón is described as a bottomless pit, a volcano, a ziggurat and “maybe a love nest”. In the Babylonian record, the road to hell is “made with a curtain of pleromas”, servants of time, death and eternity. Its look is “kind of generic”.
Conflicting accounts
- Nine circles, or at least seven.
- Whether the “layers” are the circles under another name.
- Whether the Babylonian hell and the nine-circle hell are the same plane.
Open questions
- Which city is “in hell”, and whether by location or condition.
- The circles beyond the first edge, the fortress and the guardians’ faces are not described.
- How a hostage is ransomed; who the “higher authorities” are.
- The threshold of soul corruption.
Vala
Shape
“A cone, inverted in the style of Dante”: a spiral descending toward cold and ice. It looks like “a great cavern” but holds vast territory under “an eternal night, but it is hot anyway”. Nine narrowing circles form “five steps you have to go down”, joined by cliffs with carved stairs, bridges and queues of souls flung toward the bottom. Above the first circle and limbo, the undecided wait in an ante-layer of limbo. Each circle matches a sin: the second lust, the fourth misers and prodigals, the sixth witches, wraths and furies. “There is an ecology in hell”; “for some it is home, for others a disaster”.
Place in the cosmos
There is one Hell, and “there is nothing outside of hell”. It borders the Astral Plane, with “a zone of confusion” at the edge. “The living do not pass here”; its cities have stood “as if for thousands of years”. Vaitopia “does not receive you” if you come from here; access to Sigilo had long been closed. The doors “cannot be crossed in reverse”; the remaining accesses are disused, and one leads straight to the fifth level.
Judgment and weight
Minos judges each soul’s circle. “The law of constant balance is a magnet that pulls you down for your sin.” Living bodies carry a weight on the back (“the law of recess”), and a wind slowly takes life away. Souls are ectoplasmic: intangible singly, able to push in numbers.
Known circles
- Second: whirlwinds and rains of stones in an arena at least a mile across, lit by firefly-like lights. The condemned dance wearing golden animal skulls, since “one of the punishments is shame”; Semiramis, Cleopatra and Helen were recognized there.
- Third: mud, puddles, and “it rains shit”; a 33-meter cliff with a carved stair leads down from the second.
- Elsewhere: hurricanes, fortresses (one 80 feet long) and caves, the only shelter, since “in hell one does not rest”.
- Guardianship can be vacant. Of the fifth: “And who is the current guardian? Nobody.”
Constructions
“The devils made it; the kings in Lucifer hold it.” It was empty until it received the souls of the Vala universe. It has red towers, a coliseum whose giant black mirrors are windows for outside spectators, a two-pillared marble structure, “pits of hell”, and ball-like crystals that keep something inside. Mists, a river and “difficult bridges” lead to Dis, city of politics and revolutions. Hell has “very formal customs”; whoever breaks the fundamental rule finds “the whole damned hell comes looking for you”. Cathedrals alone, according to the guide Tell, “keep their integrity” and “give a light in hell”; Master Kisándal’s funeral was held in one moved there.
Death inside
Whoever arrives dead has had his soul claimed. Whoever dies inside “becomes ash and falls downriver to the next, where he regenerates” — except in Dis, where “there is no resurrection, not even by lantern”.
Conflicting accounts
- The nine-circle cone, versus “it is not divided into levels… this would be America, this is Africa”.
- Exit: impossible “under any circumstance”; or, attributed to Bolivia, “only two possible ways out”; or “the only way out is down”, souls being freed after the nine levels. Theseus was trapped there until Heracles came down for him.
Open questions
- Bolivia’s two ways, and the fundamental rule.
- The river’s name; what the crystals hold; why the fifth circle is vacant.
- Whether an “Inferno of Andes… which is in 1300” is a separate Hell.
- Whether the laws of recess and of constant balance are one.
- Dis and the cathedrals inside; the first, fifth and sixth circles.