DEMON REALM

Type: Alien dimension

Environment: Bleak, rocky, swarming with demons

Usual means of access: The Black Mirror

Dominant Life Form: Demons

Significant Inhabitants: Unidentified demons

Visitors: Dracula, Taj Nital, unidentified male Black Mirror possessor/user

Significant Locations: Ruins, silvery path, temple

First Appearance: Tomb of Dracula I#4 (September, 1972)

Properties: The demon realm is bleak and rocky with some dead trees.

    It is populated by demons who attack and attempt to slay/destroy anyone who arrives there.

    The demon realm is associated with the Black Mirror, such that beings who enter the mirror to travel across time and space without targeting another mirror in that location exit one of the mirrors in the demon realm. Violent demons are present by the mirror and ready to attack any who emerge from it.

    A silvery pathway exists upon which the demons are unwilling and/or unable to walk.

    The pathway leads to a temple of some sort, which contains another Black Mirror.

    There were also dead pools where bones lie twisted in eternal torment, where living fungi groped blindly for living flesh.

    Eerie lichlights glowed to show the way toward an empty fen where once stood altars to amorphous gods.

History:
(Tomb of Dracula I#4 (fb)) - A 16^th century sorceress bargained with beings dark and demoniacal, and in return she received the Black Mirror, forged in an existence beyond humanity's and composed of materials mystical and hellish.

(Tomb of Dracula I#4 (fb)) - Presumably using the Black Mirror without properly targeting another Mirror, an unidentified man emerged from the Black Mirror in the demon realm, where he was presumably slain.

(Tomb of Dracula I#5) - The newly vampirized Ilsa Strangway instructed Dracula on how to activate the Black Mirror. 

    However, not wishing to live in Dracula's shadow, Ilsa did not tell him of the requirement of traveling to the time/location of another mirror; she intended Dracula to be destroyed by the demons of the demon realm.

    Pursued by vampire-hunters Frank Drake and Taj Nital, Dracula fled to the Black Mirror and spoke the incantation.

    As Dracula began to pass through the mirror's portal, however, he was tackled by Taj Nital, and they both passed through the portal. 

(Tomb of Dracula I#5) - Emerging through a Black Mirror into the demon realm, Dracula engaged the demons that assaulted him, initially invoking Beelzebub and Sathanus, whom he believed they served, to cease their attacks.

    Initially, Dracula redirected the demons to assault Taj, but after considering that he might need human blood to survive in that realm, Dracula rescued Taj and led him across a silvery pathway the demons avoided.

    The silvery pathway stretched past strange and unreal ruins of the demon realm...past dead pools where bones lie twisted in eternal torment, where living fungi groped blindly for living flesh.

    Finally, eerie lichlights glowed to show the way toward an empty fen where once stood altars to amorphous gods.

    Dracula observed a building upon which corpses burned but did not disintegrate; investigating, Dracula found a Black Mirror (including next to an altar and a being in supine position -(on the back) on the altar, dead/alive/undead or otherwise, but nonetheless reaching toward the Mirror) through which he pushed Taj before passing through himself.

    Dracula and Taj emerged in a Transylvanian mausoleum in the late 1890's, shortly after Abraham van Helsing had staked the contemporary Dracula.

Comments: Created by Archie Goodwin, Gene Colan, Tom Palmer.

Demons of the demon realm

• Chthon obviously created the Darkhold and its pages, including the Last Chronicle of Chthon page included within the Cornerstones' mirror.
• It may (or may not) have been Chthon or one of his agents that created the Black Mirror(s)
• Dracula referenced Beelzebub and Sathanus as the masters of the demons in the demon realm accessed via the Black Mirror.
  
• It would seem likely that the demon realm is associated with the demon who created the Mirror(s)
• We don't know much more than the above...

• I'd speculate that Dracula has some occult knowledge, and while he fell victim to a trap the first time, he appreciated the nature of the Mirror and its transport sufficiently to avoid being sent back to the demon realm a second time.
• Perhaps this knowledge/ability was short-lived, which is why Dracula did not utilize the Black Mirror in the future.
• Perhaps entering the Black Mirror in the demon realm prevented one from being bounced back to the demon realm and allowed one to travel to a location one wished to be, if only subconsciously.
• Perhaps arriving in the demon realm once prevented one from being shunted back there within a certain time period.
• Perhaps, with proper guidance/control, the Black Mirror could form a portal (with another mirror there, at least temporarily) to any time and place.

• Lich refers to abody,deadorliving; more commonly to a corpse...so, you can speculate what lichlights are.
• The definition of "fen" is low land that is covered wholly or partly with water unless artificially drained and that usually has peaty alkaline soil and characteristic flora (as of sedges and reeds).

Profile by Snood.

CLARIFICATIONS:
This demon realm has no KNOWN connection to:

• DEMON REALM (Vera Gemini, Belathauzer) - alien world composed primarily of solid matter with little open space, physical laws are almost entirely reversed--Defenders I#58
• other demon realms
  

silvery pathway

    Within the demon realm, a silvery path ultimately led from the Black Mirror used for arrival into the demon realm to the one used for departure from the demon realm.

    The demons were unwilling and/or unable to walk on the silvery path.

(Tomb of Dracula I#5) - Dracula rescued Taj Nital and led him across a silvery pathway the demons avoided.

    The silvery pathway stretched past strange and unreal ruins of the demon realm...past dead pools where bones lie twisted in eternal torment, where living fungi groped blindly for living flesh.

    Finally, eerie lichlights glowed to show the way toward an empty fen where once stood altars to amorphous gods.

  --Tomb of Dracula I#5

Note: So...what the heck is the deal with the silvery path?

    For one thing, it was described as a silvery pathway, but it was never identified by name

    Silver is an anathema to demons, vampires, werewolves, and other magical beings, so it may well have been constructed out of actual silver...all we know is that Dracula considered it "silvery."

    See comments for discussion of lichlights and fen.

temple

    From the silvery path, eerie lichlights glowed to show the way toward an empty fen where once stood altars to amorphous gods.

    Dracula observed a building upon which corpses burned but did not disintegrate; investigating, Dracula found a Black Mirror (including next to an altar and a being in supine position -(on the back) on the altar, dead/alive/undead or otherwise, but nonetheless reaching toward the Mirror) through which he pushed Taj before passing through himself.

  --Tomb of Dracula I#5

    Who built the temple?

    Who was worshipped in the temple?
"Amorphous gods" seems a lot like the Great Old Ones associated with Cthulhu.

    What is the deal with that guy on the altar. Living? Dead? Undead? Otherwise? Is he reaching for the Black Mirror, or is he dead and just in rigor mortis?

    The two Black Mirrors in the demon realm would seem to indicate their being different from each other, but perhaps the Black Mirror in that realm was split, with one functioning for ingress and one for egress.

images: (without ads)
Tomb of Dracula I#5, pg. 1 (Dracula and Taj struggle as enter mirror);
       pg. 2, panel 3 (demonrealm, creatures approach fallen Dracula);
          panel 4 (approaching as Dracula stands);
       pg. 3 (close on faces of Dracula and demons);
       pg. 4, panel 1 (Dracula vs. demons; showing landscape);
          panel 3 (cliff structure overlooking silvery pathway);
       pg. 6, panel 2 (Drac and Taj on silvery pathway);
          panel 3 (temple);
          panel 4 (altar & mirror);

Appearances:
Tomb of Dracula I#4 (September, 1972) - Archie Goodwin (writer), Gene Colan (penciler), Tom Palmer (inker), Stan Lee (editor)
Tomb of Dracula I#5 (November, 1972) - Gardner F. Fox (writer), Gene Colan (penciler), Tom Palmer (inker), Stan Lee (editor)

Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.

First posted: 05/20/2020
Last updated: 05/20/2020

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