Ten years since the loss of her husband. Ten long years, alone.

  That said, those were ten particularly fruitful years. Isolated, Lilith had been left alone with her inventiveness and far too many reasons to immerse herself in her work. Something Lucifer only fully grasped upon discovering his friend's immense workshop.

  In an ingenious arrangement, an army of 3D printers supplied the components, which were then brought in and stored via a chain of robotic arms, and Lilith simply had to use them to build. Failed or broken inventions ended up in a skip, where each component found its way back to its storage location or to recycling.

  After two days, Lucifer was still convinced he hadn't seen all the facilities, which were already busy with tests and examinations. Nevertheless, when he had nothing to do but wait, he sometimes talked with Lilith, reminiscing about their many forays into human territory, their shared memories. Lucifer even discovered things about his friend, such as her deal with the Infernal General Belphegor, stipulating that in exchange for access to human patents and materials impossible to synthesize, any of Lilith's inventions that could become profitable would be sold by her colleague's numerous companies. When the Devil's curiosity led him to ask which of these inventions had already spread to humanity, he was met only with the defense of professional secrecy. Feigning shock at this rejection, he provoked laughter from Lilith, but no matter how much he pressed her, the fallen goddess remained evasive about the origin of her inventions.

  While he deeply appreciated his stay with his friend, Lucifer couldn't shake the feeling that he was missing precious hours with Adramelech, trying to regain his former strength. He was probably more demonstrative than he realized, because on the morning of the third day, Lilith allowed him to join her Steward, acknowledging that she didn't truly need his presence while analyzing her test results. She nevertheless made him promise to return as soon as they were completed, which the Devil did before embracing her and leaving the house with a hurried step.

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  For the past ten years, on dark nights or moonless nights, Lucifer would sometimes take flight and traverse the silent night sky, a mere fleeting shape in the darkness. It was his only way to experience the sweet sensation of flying. And despite billions of years spent traversing the earth's heights, he had never lost his taste for it. Reaching the terrace overlooking the void, he nimbly climbed the railing and suddenly spread his wings. He let the mountain wind rush through his wing feathers, sending a thrill of pleasure through him, and then, with a single step, he dropped into the abyss.

  The hundreds of meters of elevation gain gave it the acceleration necessary for the lift of its wings, whose angle it only needed to adjust to fly through the rocky valleys. At full speed, he sped out of the mountains and reached the skies of Hell, flying over its immense central plain.

  Although he had planned to go directly to Adramelech's domain, seeing Pandora at the edge of his field of vision made him change his mind. The Devil hovered over what had been his capital a decade earlier and found it in a far more pitiful state than he had suspected when he went to see Beelzebub. The white marble streets had faded, the abandoned buildings of the fallen had succumbed to vegetation, and in the closed and neglected canals, the water had stagnated to the point of blackening.

  His enmity towards his enemy only grew, and it was driven by this renewed anger that Lucifer withdrew from Pandora.