Glasya (glass-e-a)

Glasya appeared as a 9 ft (2.7 m) tall, black-haired figure similar in form to a succubus. She was well-built and of unearthly beauty that remained undiminished by the small horns, large, leathery wings, and forked tail that gave away her diabolical origins. Notably, her skin was of a copper hue, itself not an extremely unusual trait for humanoids, but made prominent by its more metallic appearance. She was adorned with jewels, clothes, and various finery of incredible expense.

Simply drawing close to Glasya was dangerous since she gave off an intoxicating aura that left those anywhere near her weakened and confused. While in this state, a simple glare of displeasure from Glasya could send the victim into unconsciousness and possibly even cause death. Even disregarding her presence, Glasya could cause fear through her words alone, sending enemies running in fear with detailed descriptions of their future torment. She had various powers of manipulation, including charm, dominate and hold monster spells, the ability to polymorph, and illusion-creating capabilities.

Glasya rarely engaged in direct combat against her foes, teleporting away from dangerous situations and refusing to toy with larger groups. When she deigned to do battle, she used her mental abilities to control a particular dangerous enemy while manoeuvring herself. If not simply flying, she could easily teleport herself and her thralls throughout the battlefield, and one of her first moves was typically summoning aid. Though she had a fairly high chance of calling a pit fiend or a few cornugons to her aid, she could summon a small colony of kalabons or a quartet of erinyes without fail.

After luring in her foes with promises of pleasure, Glasya embraced her foes with a touch that drained the body, mind, and soul. Her caress stole the victim's willpower and better judgment away and converted it into life force for Glasya, while also infecting them with a wasting disease that caused the flesh to slough from their bones. Glasya could also fire a finger of death once per day, cast contagion as a spell-like ability and bite her victims to infect them with a poison that had to be neutralised, healed or delayed before they could recover.

Ascension:
Like all archdevils, Glasya had the ability to regenerate over time, but unlike her peers, regeneration would continue to happen even after she was killed. This was possibly due to her relationship with Asmodeus, potentially indicating that she had an innate closeness to godhood deeper than that of the other archdevils. Her prowess in both combat and magic were said to have been significantly enhanced following her rise to power as Lord of the Sixth, and it was rumoured she stole some of her power from the Hag Countess, although she was still among the weakest of the archdevils.

Glasya was known to wield a short sword that combined the properties of speed and virulency. The blade, similar in effect to a dagger of venom, was coated in strength-sapping devil's blood. Later on, Glasya wielded a scourge that shared her sword's speed but was keen rather than being poisoned. She typically resorted to using it when her touch failed, either by using magic to keep her foes still before whipping them or by flying through the air while flaying them alive.

Glasya wore jewellery and finery worth several thousand gold pieces and mostly carried defensive magic items like a cloak of resistance, ring of protection, and ring of invisibility.

In her early days, before her rise, the Reckoning, or even the ancient imprisonment of Levistus, the rebellious Glasya flitted between the courts of various archdevils at a whim. This fanciful trouble-making ended, however, when Bensozia died. Though exactly what happened was shrouded in mystery and conspiracy, it ended with Levistus being sealed in his icy tomb and Glasya becoming primarily Mammon's consort. Something about the events that transpired during this time magnified the hatred that Bensozia had fostered in her daughter's heart towards her father, and it was at this point that she became dedicated to supplanting him.

Reckoning:
Unfortunately, Mammon was a lesser archdevil, a self-indulgent and rather craven lord, and being his consort gave her few opportunities to rise in status outside of manipulating others to do her bidding. The individual archdevils standing in her way were too dangerous to try defeating and would be reluctant to move against Asmodeus themselves, not wanting to risk their own domains or disrupt Hell's delicate, pre-established power balance. Fortunately for Glasya, this uneasy peace was so unstable that only a few pulls would cause the entire thing to become undone.

Glasya appealed to the bitterness of Mammon's seneschal and her own bodyguard Focalor, who resented his foolish and lazy master for leaving him to do all the actual work. Focalor was not only a powerful protector but a reliable source of political information, and at Glasya's urgings, he convinced Mammon that Baalzebul was planning on attacking his ally Mephistopheles. While Mammon wrestled with this information and whether or not to inform Mephistopheles, Glasya went to Moloch's court and recruited his consort Malagard,8 though she wasn't the only one helping on that front. Malagard was co-conspiring with Geryon, the Lord of Stygia at the time and Moloch's archenemy, while the ambitious devils Beleth and Tartach joined the scheme on their own.

Through Malagard, Glasya convinced Moloch that Mephistopheles was planning to attack him, convincing him to inform Baalzebul of the rumours. Baalzebul started massing his armies in response, thus confirming the misinformation that Mammon had, at that point, given to Mephistopheles. With a bit more subterfuge to get the archdevils to war rather than simply posture, possibly involving the murder of Fierna's level-headed mother, Hell's armies marched, and the Reckoning began.

Asmodeus, however, was not unaware of the scheming of his archdukes, and Geryon was acting as his agent during the Reckoning. Just when the two factions led by Baalzebul and Mephistopheles were about to launch into their final confrontation, Geryon blew his horn and signalled their pit fiend leaders against them, thus abruptly ending the conflict. The Reckoning caused dramatic upheaval within Hell's hierarchy, and Glasya was certainly impacted by it. Glasya was forbidden to continue consorting with Mammon and told in clear terms that if she wanted to maintain her prestigious position, she would have to start taking on some responsibilities.

After the Reckoning:
Asmodeus dubbed Glasya the "Queen of the Erinyes", though Glasya initially threw a fit when this happened; the Dark Eight, which was possibly formed or at least rose to greater power around this time, was responsible for dealing with the erinyes, and as their Queen, she fell under their watchful scrutiny, too. Despite this lack of privacy, her new role had many unexpected benefits. She enjoyed her new duties, often spying on her charges while polymorphed to ensure they were doing their jobs, and could personally visit the Material Plane and its many charms at her discretion. The Dark Eight was also incredibly influential, so the other archdevils couldn't attack her without provoking their wrath. Glasya took advantage of her diplomatic skills during this time by recruiting a small army of her own in the event that a chance for a military coup arose.

At one point, Glasya established the first organised crime syndicate in the Hells, her own "coin legions", to help her gain power and wealth. Her followers operated like a thieves' guild on the Material Plane, but unlike their mortal counterparts, had the benefit of Glasya's knowledge of the law. Many of Hell's devils made the mistake of following traditions like laws, despite only the laws having actual penalties for not following them, and Glasya exploited this fact for coin. She had her followers purchase souls in Minauros on her behalf using counterfeit coins she made by transmuting lead into gold; the law on minting coins only specified the material before processing. The coins would eventually revert to their base metal, but by that point, the souls and other resources would already be bought and then quickly sold at a marked-up price.

When this occurred in relation to Malagard's death in 1375, DR was uncertain, but Glasya would arrive at the sixth layer sometime following her criminal activities. Many of the Countess's most loyal servants were crushed or fell to their deaths in the horrific process by which she fused with her domain, and the layer's survivors had to claw their way out of the collapsed earth. Glasya was quick to claim Malbolge as hers; her forces swept the land unchallenged as she rode into her new realm on a luxurious canopy with silken pillows held aloft by winged devils. When her authority was questioned, she presented a letter of authority from her father stating his support and declaring her the Archduchess. Even if the archdevils were willing to risk attacking Asmodeus's daughter, the Dark Eight had been given dominion over much of Hell's military. The archdukes wouldn't risk starting another Reckoning at this point, allowing Glasya to claim her birthright and become a Lord of Hell.