We don't know when this happened. All we know is that probably John recoded this conversation without the demon noticing.

There's no date on the cassette, but we're sure this is at least 5 years before the gates opened. We don't actually know what happened prior to this situation but we can guess John was hunting a demon, leading to both of them getting stuck in basement, where none of them can get rid of each other.

We don't know how but we know the demon had casted a curse onto John so he can't expel her.

This transcript is one of the most important piece of information left for us.

THE UNHOLY PROJECT: ARCHIVE TAPE #08-E

[HEAVY TAPE HISS. THE LOW, DISTANT HUM OF AN UNDERGROUND ROOM. WATER DRIPS SLOWLY ONTO CONCRETE.]

[RUSTLING OF PAGES. JOHN’S BREATHING IS RAGGED, CLOSE TO THE MIC.]

JOHN (Whispering, to himself) …it is 3:14 AM. I can't expel this demon. I'm waiting on…

[A SUDDEN, WET SHIMMERING SOUND—LIKE FABRIC TEARING THROUGH WATER.]

JOHN (Gasping; audibly startled) Woah... what the hell is this?

DEMON (Voice is now smooth, feminine, echoing slightly) Relax, John. I’m stuck here, remember?

JOHN (Voice turns hard, cold) Yeah? You better sit your bitch-ass down before I chop your head off anyway.

[THE DRAG OF A WOODEN CHAIR ACROSS CONCRETE.]

DEMON Come on, John. You know you can’t.

JOHN That’s gonna change eventually. Stay seated before I change my mind.

DEMON Change your mind about what?

JOHN you know I can always kill you instead of sending you back to Hell, right?

Note:

We know that John probably was referring to an ancient, forbidden method. One that few living souls even knew existed. It was a permanent erasure, but it came with a risk of being dragged into an infinite loop in hallways of Hell.

Permament Erasure?

Now we know the permanent erasure doesn't actually kills the demons, it only cages them for eternity in some deep levels of hell.

[SILENCE ON THE TAPE FOR THREE SECONDS, SAVE FOR THE HISS.]

DEMON (Voice drops an octave; serious) Okay, big boy. Let’s not get that dirty.

[THE CREAK OF THE WOODEN CHAIR AS SHE LEANS BACK.]

DEMON (CONT'D) Can I ask a question?

JOHN No.

DEMON Why do you do this?

JOHN I said no.

DEMON I mean, you’ve dedicated most of your life to hunting us, as if we’re at war. But there is no war, John. We demons wander Earth for fun. I’ll admit, some of us are crazy and do crazy shit, but for the most part, nobody even notices we’re here.

JOHN Well, first of all, you do exist, and you're plenty noticeable to me. And secondly, you guys don’t belong here. You cause chaos. You hurt people. But more importantly, you’re pushing an agenda.

DEMON What agenda?! What are you even talking about?

JOHN Listen, you don’t need to play stupid for me, and I don't need to prove anything to you, you’re stuck here with me, and I’m sending your ass back to your big daddy

DEMON Who's big daddy? Lucifer?

JOHN (As John flip the pages of the notebook mumbling "where is this") …Whatever.

DEMON Really, John... you don’t know anything about Hell. You don’t even know who I am. You found me by accident in that church. You didn't even have a name for me on your little checklist, did you?

[THE SEARCHING OF PAGES ACCELERATES. FRANTIC PAPER FLIPPING.]

JOHN (Quietly) So... who are you?

DEMON It doesn’t matter, John. The closest you’ve ever come to understanding Hell is through your books—Dante’s Inferno, the Bible, the Quran. well good job actually.

[PAPER FLIPPING. JOHN IS HEAR MUMBLING UNINTELLIGIBLY]

DEMON Hell is beautiful (she said slowly)

JOHN I bet…

[SUDDENLY, THE SOUND OF WHOOSHING AND WINDING. THE AUDIO BEGINS SHAKING AND THE VOLUME INTENSIFIES]

JOHN (John shout in panic) What are you doing?

Note: Self-Annihilation Act

By cross-examining now we know the demon was trying to perform a self-annihilating ritual to eradicate herself. This ritual is not something any low level demon can do, and it's considered as a great sacrifice among hell's descends as it annihilates the demon. See Self-Annihilation Act for more info.

[THE WHOOSHING CALMS]

JOHN What the hell was that? what were you doing?

DEMON (after a bit of pause, said calmly) You know, I never met Lucifer. He's an angel you know. But we're all demons. We've never been an angel, but he was… he is. He was made by father himself. but we were born with the hatred of him. Hatred of whatever he created. Including you. human.

[SOUND OF JOHN'S FOOTSTEPS WALKING SLOWLY]

JOHN You… shouldn't be saying this to me… who are you?

[SILENCE ON THE TAPE FOR FEW SECONDS]

DEMON We shouldn't have existed. But we do now. Because of you. We existed long before we're born. In pain. In agony. With no purpose. For thousands of years. Until our day comes. The day we're born. All I know is some of us descend to earth. Some stay in Hell. And some… I don't know what happens to them really. But I know all of us serve a purpose.

[SOUND OF WRITING WITH PEN ON PAPER, AS JOHN TAKES NOTE]

DEMON Some of us are simple demons, just a collection of hatred toward you. If they descend to earth they do whatever they can to hurt you, or to make sure you end up in Hell. But some of demons serve bigger purpose. The fight the battle of Lucifer.

JOHN Tell me about the battle.

DEMON (immediately continues ignoring John) You know… hell is not all fire and pain. It is for you, but for us there are beauties in it. To know you're walking the path of Lucifer, to feel his love

JOHN Love?!!!

DEMON it's an honor and a blessing.

Note:

The tape wraps here and we lost parts of the conversation. There's another tape that recorded some rest of the conversation but we don't have any information what has been discussed between these two recordings. By cross-examining we know the demon in this recording is actually Naauha which is a high ranking in Hell. You can read about Naauha here.

This fragment is historically significant as it is the first recorded instance of a high-ranking demon expressing doubts regarding the narrative of the conflict between God and Lucifer. At the time, John was unaware he was speaking to a high-ranking descendant.

You can read the rest of the conversation in part 2, where Naauha describe Hell and talks about her doubts.

As mentioned, she attempted an annihilation ritual during this exchange. This is a slow method, taking roughly thirty minutes to complete. Legends say that when the ritual is finished, Lucifer himself comes and burns the demon out of existence.

NOTE ON USAGE OF AI: I used AI to improve my writing including help finding my grammatical errors, using better wording, and research, as English is not my native language. Also I used AI to generate the cover image, as currently we're in Iran War right now and internet is down in Iran and I have no access to my fellow team mates. I'll update once we regroup.
I did not use AI to come up with the story, or the core idea in any form or shape.

Max