Abernathy in Biddlecombe, England, having first killed the original Mrs. Abernathy and taken on her appearance. At the last minute, just as the Great Malevolence and his armies were about to take over the Earth, Mrs. Abernathy’s plans were foiled by a small boy named Samuel Johnson, his dachshund Boswell, and an inept, although well-meaning, demon named Nurd, the Scourge of Five Deities. The Great Malevolence blamed Mrs. Abernathy for this, and as a result was now refusing to meet with her, causing her much humiliation and not a little concern for her future.

All clear? Good.

The Great Malevolence still wasn’t quite sure how his plan had failed, and he didn’t care. For a moment he had glimpsed a hole between dimensions, a possibility of escape from Hell, and then that portal had been closed just as he was about to leave his dreary kingdom behind. All of his bloodied hopes, his shadowy dreams, had come to nothing, and the closeness of his triumph had driven him insane.

This is not to say that he wasn’t nuts already: the Great Malevolence had always been madder than a bag of badgers, madder even than a colony of bats trapped in a cookie tin. Now, though, he had passed into another realm of craziness entirely, and significant portions of Hell had been filled with the sounds of his wailing ever since the portal had blinked out of existence. It was a terrible sound, that cry of rage and sorrow, ceaseless and unvarying. Even by the standards of Hell, it was very annoying, echoing from the Great Malevolence’s lair deep inside the Mountain of Despair, through tunnels and labyrinths, through dungeons and the bowels of the odd dragon, until at last it reached the doorway that led from its hiding place into the dreadful landscape beyond.

The doorway was most impressive, intricately carved with terrifying faces whose expressions were ever changing, and horrific forms whose bodies intertwined, so that the very entrance itself seemed to be alive.