To all those coming here from the fanfic itself, thank you for giving me your time. For those still unaware, welcome and I hope this sparks your interest. I want to talk to you all about this insane little thing I’ve created, “Dragon Me to Hell”, a labor of love in multiple ways and a means to break myself out of a creative rut. One that had been incredibly liberating and enjoyable. I didn’t think writing this story would feel this good, but it does and I’m loving every second I’m participating in it. I want to use this time to talk to you all about WHY this story is happening, WHAT it is about, HOW it came to be and other questions I suspect you no doubt have. So, let’s get started.
What Is “Dragon Me to Hell?”
Besides being a pun based on a lesser-known Sam Raimi film as an excuse to make the main character a dragon in the story? Well simple enough. “Dragon Me to Hell” is a story that asks the question of what would happen if a good person, or at least relatively good, ended up in Hell. Specifically, the Hell as depicted in Vivziepop’s “Hazbin Hotel” and “Helluva Boss” series.
The story follows one RJ the Dragon, a freshly fallen sinner that does not believe he belongs in Hell. Especially given how awful everyone is to each other down here. Believing there has been a mistake he seeks for a means to escape Hell. Only to discover he has landed in the underworld at the worst possible time, Extermination Day. After experiencing the worst sides of Heaven and Hell in a single day, it seems like getting out of his damnation is hopeless... until Charlie Morningstar quite literally runs into him.
As the story unfolds, RJ has to discover what it means to actually redeem oneself. He will experience the Hellaverse, starting from Season One of “Hazbin Hotel” onwards. Encountering a lot of the same obstacles we saw during those episodes, as well as a host of new ones. This essentially means it’s an adaptation of the plot of season one, as well as a small rewrite.
RJ will make friends of both series staples as well as original characters, contend with enemies he does not always intend to create, and simply survive long enough to get the handle of this whole dragon thing. He’ll be challenged, he’ll struggle, more often than not he will not always win, but he’ll grow and change through all of it. And with any luck, he might just discover a few things about himself, perhaps enough to be worthy of not just redemption but also love. The latter of which is very deeply tied to the former in fact.
That’s the general gist of the story, but if you have read it, you’ll know that it leans very heavily into comedy. Maybe more so than my other works. Similar to the humor of the Hellaverse, yes, but mostly with my own spin. So why there is drama and there are stakes, we will still be having fun along the way as our neurotic dragon protag takes on Hell, one slapstick gag at a time. He won’t be a punching bag all the time, but he will not be the luckiest of sinners down here.
I feel this is more than just an OC Inserted into the main plot of the source material though. I think it’s something that not only expands the world of the Hellaverse, but also enhances its core themes. About finding the good in the bad and trying to bring it to the surface. It’s therefore become a lot more personal to me and much more relevant over time. Which leads me to the next question.
Why Are You Doing This?
The short answer is, I was seriously not doing well at the end of last year. I had been creatively and emotionally spent. With Remnants wrapping up soon, I was desperate for a new creative outlet to better express myself. I had been writing Remnants for so long that I was simply exhausted. Not of the story, but just of how much I had been focusing on this one single piece of work. I needed an out. I needed something different.
And the more I thought, the more I tried to think of said out, the harder it seemed to be. And I started seeking comfort in other things, primarily characters and shows, to better make sense of things. And one of those characters was Charlie Morningstar, a beacon of optimistic sunshine in a show all about self-improvement and belief in yourself. That you can change, and you can be better. Charlie’s story touched me deeply and her character was absolutely everything I want in a protagonist. Kind, generous, but determined and resolute in their beliefs.
I won’t lie; I became immensely attracted to Charlie. Very much so. And I decided I needed a way to get that out of my system and onto paper. To just feel like I had a small connection to a character that had fast become one of my favorites. Quickly, though, as I was writing out what was supposed to be a silly way to get a crush on a fictional character worked out, I realized that this meant more than that. This was becoming very personal, reflective, thought provoking, and, more importantly, fun. I was having so much fun writing it that I did not want to stop.
I quickly decided that I needed to go bigger than before on this. I needed people to see this, and I needed to make the effort to get them to see it. To make this project one of my best. It was so creatively liberating and enjoyable, that I simply had to share it, but moreover, I needed it to spark my imagination and reinvigorate my writing.
So yes, this started out as essentially a means to break out of a writing funk and to explore a silly crush I had on a fictional character. But I knew essentially what I was writing here, and I was determined to not make the same mistakes or fall into the most obvious of traps. So, I looked at my writing on this story as an experiment more than anything. And as with any experiment, there were parameters. This leads us to the next part of my statement, the rules I set out for myself.
Avoiding the Isekai Pitfalls
As I had RJ allude to in the intro to this story, DMtH borrows a lot of its DNA from the very popular Isekai genre. Expecting those very similarities to crop up concerning my plans for the story, I wrote them into the plot, morphing RJ’s tale into a more satirical take on the tropes associated with Isekai narratives.
For those who don’t know, Isekai is a narrative genre, found primarily in Anime, but also a few Western works, about a protagonist finding themselves trapped in another world. More often than not they are sent there by some form of magic, or they are killed and reincarnated there, most of the time by a truck hitting them. They then discover they have some cool new abilities, generally associated with a very basic understanding of an RPG system. They’re plopped into, what is usually, a fantasy world setting and forced to overcome some great obstacle that impedes either their escape or their means towards a comfortable lifestyle.
I have a very love-hate relationship with Isekai. In truth, I like a good deal of Isekai-like stories. For example, Digimon is an Isekai, at least in a very loose sense. However, a lot of Isekai stories are frankly... terrible. They are little more than very trashy power fantasy and wish-fulfillment stories, with protagonists who are largely blank slates for which the audience can project themselves on. They follow some down on their luck loser, whose life is shit, then they get to go to another world and become super awesome as fuck and get a dozen girlfriends while having superpowers that essentially make any conflict entirely pointless. No bad guy can beat them, obstacles are easily ignored, girls throw themselves at him with the intent to have his babies.
At best these stories are fucking boring and bleed into each other so much. They run on character-based morality, where the protag is always right and everyone else is just stupid and wrong. Or they’re a bully, who is also stupid and wrong. They never really have to struggle. Their weaknesses are actually secret superpowers. Everyone who thinks less of them is a short-sighted moron, etc.
The worst of these stories actually maintain these power fantasy tropes when the character is not a blank, bland slate of pure goodness. But in reality, a fucking bastard who will justify slavery because, I don’t know, a girl falsely accused him of rape and that suddenly means he has no choice but to make a racoon girl have a tattoo on her body that he can use to force her to do anything. Oh, he doesn’t use it to make her have sex with him, but he refuses to remove it. In fact, being enslaved makes her super awesome! So, it’s good she has no real free will!
Shield Hero is a fucking garbage story, is what I’m saying.
Isekai in general is rife with these sorts of problems. Too many anime and manga series read the same. The protagonists are either bland slates of cardboard or unlikable douchenozzles who get everything handed to them either through generic nice guy bullshit or just being a dickhead to people. Both characters annoy me, but at least the former aren’t hateable assholes who make you wish more people bullied them at the end of the day to teach them to fuck off their high horse. So, if I was essentially doing an Isekai, I wanted it to be different.
I made a specific set of rules to follow for RJ’s story. Number one being, he had to fuck up. He had to mess up. He had to get tossed around. He could not be all powerful and instantly win at everything forever from the word go. No super cheat exploits, no getting around his weaknesses in a few episodes, no easily resolving any conflict by being either super badass or pure lucky. RJ had to be a loser in life and his afterlife.
Isekai stories that have an RPG System and basically skip progression are the bane of my existence. RJ would not have that. He has to progress; he had to build himself up from rock bottom. No easy answers, nothing handed to him. He has powers, but he doesn’t know how to use them. He has a means to get better, but he has to figure them out. And moreover, violence will not solve all his problems, nor will being a nice guy. He needs to grow, he needs to learn, and to do both of those he needs to fail. He needs to get help from others and accept when he is wrong.
So, RJ is a loser who has to learn how to NOT be a loser. He’s an actual underdog, not a lame ass instant winner who thrives in the world he’s plopped into. He has to encounter challenges. No overpowered abilities, no secret cheat skills, and he is allowed to be wrong. If this makes him a punching bag at the start, so be it, because it’s more satisfying to see him fail and THEN win later, than to just have victory handed to him.
Another rule of mine was to not force RJ into any scene where it doesn’t make sense for him to be. Every interaction has to be justified. He cannot take over as the main protagonist of Hazbin Hotel. Charlie is the hero there, not him. So, RJ is less a direct heroic protagonist and more of a supporting hero protagonist. He will have his own adventures and trials, of course, but this isn’t really his show and the writing reflects that. I would best describe him as a Roadie more than a proper rockstar. He’ll be around, he’ll do his job, he’ll try to help someone else look good and achieve their goals, but he’s not really out for himself.
Which I feel is more endearing than just having him drop into the story of Hazbin Hotel’s first season and instantly solve every problem for Charlie. Because he wouldn’t be able to. Especially not with rule number 1 hanging over everything. RJ is just another sinner in Hell, no different than anyone else. He’s the hero of his own story, but he is not the hero of what is rightly Charlie’s story. She still has to overcome the obstacles she is faced with, and RJ will help, as he will with every other character he meets, but he won’t be the answer. He’ll have his own obstacles to deal with, of course, but a key factor in all of this is how he learns and grows through interacting with the world. Not dominating it.
So, Charlie will have a prominent role, as will Vaggie, Angel Dust, Alastor and everyone else outside and inside the hotel. RJ will comment on them, he’ll do his best to help, but he is not allowed to run roughshod over them. He has his story, they have theirs. He plays a part in it, but he isn’t the most important person in Hell. He just finds himself next to a lot of them.
A third rule, which was mostly incidental because it was technically a stylistic choice, was RJ’s appearance. I wanted him to be a dragon for more than just the obvious pun in the title, or even the fact that I love dragons. I wanted him to be a dragon because it was different. Every Isekai out there has the hero drop in as they are. A normal human who does human things. A few take a different track, a skeleton overlord, a puddle of slime, a spider, or even a vending machine. But I wanted mine to be firmly in the category of “He’s not some hyper handsome masculine figure.” He’s a goofy looking dragon. Maybe he gets better looking, who can say. But he is not meant to be this sexy badass. No, too many isekai protagonists who are “losers” look too handsome for that title. I don’t want RJ to be ugly, but if he looks like a goober it offsets the expectations that he’d get any sort of special treatment.
He also needs to be a dragon and be stuck as a dragon. Because too often, when a dragon is protagonist in any story, they find some ridiculous means to just make him not a dragon. Oh, he has a human form now, he can walk around like a normal person, how makes it easy! No. RJ is stuck in Hell; things aren’t supposed to be easy. Therefore, I made him a Wyvern dragon which comes with its own complications. Namely he’s got big ass wings on his arms and if he ever covers them up, he’ll be unable to use them to fly. And it’s also awkward when he walks, because he’s basically a lizard-bird.
Again, all of this is to make him struggle and to have him EARN being awesome. Which leads into one last rule which will become very relevant in time. Isekais have a tendency to go overboard with the wish-fulfillment and have the male hero attract a ton of hot girls to him... just because. While romance will play a role in this story, I have made it a very huge rule that this is slow burn and, more importantly, to not make this a harem. Not in the typical harem dynamic at least. As will be shown in due time, this is going to be a far more complicated, messy, difficult to get right relationship dynamic. One that is intensely explored over time and, most importantly, is a constant struggle concerning trust and hard work.
Nothing is easy. And that is the cornerstone of how I write this. This is not wish-fulfillment. This is not a power fantasy. This is a serious-minded comedic story, as much of an oxymoron as that sounded. We will be lampooning Isekai, we will be tearing apart its conventions, we will not be falling into the same traps seen there. I don’t want this story to be like them, for my own sake. I could not write this thing as effectively if I felt I was doing something that went against what I felt was good storytelling. And in my mind, a lot of isekai is simply not good storytelling. This thing means too much to me to water it down with a bunch of tropes from a genre that is in desperate need of a revamp because of how over bloated and stale it’s gotten.
So, yeah, if you have concerns related to that, know that I am already aware of them. And if you don’t want me to take shots at your favorite Isekai... well, I probably will regardless.
What Does This Mean for Wormhole Chronicles?
For those who don’t know, Wormhole Chronicles is the name by which my Halo/Mass Effect crossover goes by. It is semi-popular, at least as popular as a fanfic can get on the internet when it has a TVTropes page of its own. It is several published works in by now and set to continue on to a sequel adapting the plot of Halo 2. None of that has changed as a result of DMtH’s publication. The fact I needed a break from writing my sci-fi epic to create a goofy comedic cartoon in text form because I had the hots for a demon princess, does not change my resolve to continue work on the Wormhole Chronicles.
It’s still coming out, trust me.
I simply wish to have time to work on something ELSE besides this one story. Because frankly, being tied down to a single setting, a single genre and a single set of characters was the reason Remnants took so long. I let myself get bogged down in it. And when I did, I just burned myself out. My hope is having something besides Halo and Mass Effect to constantly focus on, I’ll be able to take breaks from it and come back refreshed and ready to write more in frequent spurts.
These two stories will not impede the other. I have written so many chapters of DMtH at this point that I have a fairly safe buffer period that I will be using to help keep myself ahead of the game and fluctuate between projects. I’ll be adding on more to it soon, but rest assured, something from the Wormhole Chronicles will emerge during this year.
In other news, you can expect the Chronicles themselves to start being published on AO3 in due time now. With corrections and additional changes to better streamline things and fix the continuity between the works. They’ll also be properly collected, and numbered, so there will be no confusion as to when each takes place in the timeline. I think that will be appreciated by all. I’m not sure when this process will start, but it will do so in due course. Thank you for your patience.
What to Expect from “Dragon Me to Hell”
There’s a lot of very mature themes in terms of content for the Hellaverse. A lot of them involve sexually explicit ones. SA and other forms of non-consent being among them. I want to make it clear that this is a very touchy subject and you can expect me to warn you if it ever gets too much in terms of a disclaimer before the chapter itself. We won’t shy away from this sort of thing, but we will be respectful. And I will attempt not to show SA directly, nor make light of it. I know Hellaverse has a controversial stigma around the subject, and while I disagree with how people have portrayed it as being disrespectful, I intend to address the concerns fully and directly when able.
That said, besides the rampant violence and uptick in swearing, yes, there will be sex scenes. Not a lot though and their level of explicitness will depend on the content itself of the scenario. I don’t feel comfortable in over doing these. It wouldn’t be appropriate, and I feel it would potentially veer into things become more porn than actual story. There will be sexual content regardless and you should be prepared for that.
There will also be a lot of very personal stuff here, as expressed. Maybe more often than most of the time. I would ask you take that into account when asking questions or leaving reviews, as I cannot answer anything I won’t be comfortable with. At the very least, I hope you’ll be respectful of my boundaries there.
As stated, the comedy content levels are very high here. This is a comedic story, more so than usual for my writing. I like to think I am at least somewhat funny, I’ve had other people claim I am. If you’re looking for something more serious minded, this is probably not going to be that exactly. There will be a lot of gags, a lot of jokes, and you will probably find some not as funny as others, but I hope there will be a good deal you do find funny.
I should also mention that this story is a music, much like its source material. I could try to explain around the song numbers. I could find an excuse to exclude them. Writing songs in text form, sans the melody or soundtrack, is always a fraught experience. However, given the songs from the series are so well known by now and I am giving the information what certain songs are, I feel confident in breaking this writing rule. So yes, there are song numbers in here. Some of them will happen where you expect. Others will be switched up with new lyrics and verses when needed. It would be ideal if someone remixed the songs to match the new lyrics and such, but I’m not holding my breath on that. Just look up the songs when appropriate to help you follow along, at least a little.
You can expect RJ will not get along with everyone. I’ve already shown he is not particularly a big fan of one Angel Dust. I want to make this clear for everyone that this is not a commentary on the characters being good or bad. It is just realistic to show that this protagonist has certain values and beliefs that will clash with others. It does not mean I am calling these characters badly written or even bad people, but in RJ’s perspective he has problems with them, and he will make that known if he is able and willing to do so.
I will be keeping the story as close to canon as possible. But some things will likely change. Not to benefit the characters or make things easier or even because I disagree with something. Most of the changes are organic means to enable the story to progress properly. Namely, that some events may be changed, some relationships that have yet to be established in canon may be alluded to, and certain characterizations/motivations will be expanded upon. Please try to keep that in mind when I address this stuff in the story, as I am more than aware what inserting a character like RJ into things can do to the plot.
In light of that, you can expect things to be majorly expanded in terms of content. “Hazbin Hotel’s” first season covers six months of time, but we only have eight episodes concerning it. In light of that, you can expect there to be a significant gap between episode adaptations and original plots. Especially after a certain point. So, it will be a while before we are back to the main story plot of the season at that juncture. But the tradeoff is, RJ will be pairing up with a gaggle of original characters and the franchise canon regulars for a lot of those chapters. So, there will always be an interaction with someone from the show, and it will always strive to present them in their best light. Or at least, give them a chance to take center stage for a while alongside RJ.
I want to take this moment to speak of Vivienne Medrano and the Hellaverse in general, as well as all the cast and crew who make it possible. I have no intention of making something better than their work, nor do I do any of this in an attempt to steal their thunder. That is not my intention. This story is labor of love for me, and I treat it as such. Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss are both amazing shows and I’m incredibly impressed with, not just their animation, but the ability for Viv and her team to be able to get something like this made. I know it’s hard for an original, creator owned work to become such a success. So, in light of that, I like to think all I’m doing is adding onto that by connecting myself to this wonderful world they have created.
I truly am inspired by what they have accomplished, and all of what I write with this story going forward is dedicated to upholding their work. I have no intention of running over it or taking it as my own. And I say this, specifically given the context of why I made this story, concerning my love of a specific character who is in a committed relationship, to better stress that point. I’m not here to steal or take anything away from these two wonderful shows. I merely am using the tools provided to craft my own story within it. And I encourage all of you to support the wonderful teams behind both series as much as possible.
In the same vein, if any of you are interested in creating your own art based off this story, go nuts! However, in light of the concerns I have for the glut of AI content that is saturating the net these days, I’d ask you to not use those tools. Moreover, I’d appreciate it if you did not use spambots in an attempt to convince me to work with you. If you’re interested in actually making something out of my scribblings, put pen to paper, in whatever sense that means, and show me you’re serious. All I ask is to be properly credited. Other than that, I have no expectations.
I say this because I took considerable effort to make this story as good as it could be. In light of that, I have a few other words to share concerning those people.
Messages of Appreciation
First and foremost, I’d like to thank my editor, Crow, for all their help over the past few months polishing this story. He has been incredibly enthusiastic, as a fellow Hellaverse fan himself. And his passion is what has helped spur this project on. I couldn’t have done a lot of this without him. Honestly, I owe him a degree of co-credit, especially for a lot of sequences, scenes and even lyrics he helped clean up. While the story was my idea, my baby, and my personal project, he fully respected my vision and was instrumental in approving it.
Thank you, Crow, for being the good friend I needed through all these years.
I will also extend a great deal of thanks to two artists, both of whom I commissioned work from for this project. First is ShatteredInk, who crafted the pose pin up of RJ I am using for my AO3 avatar. It was a delight to work with them to bring him to life. I have drawn a significant amount of RJ art over the past few months, but frankly, Shattered’s was better than my sketches. I’m just happy it turned out as good as it did in the end. Hopefully we can work together again soon.
The second artist I want to highlight is the one who did the cover, Ciphy Master. It was an exhaustive search to find someone willing to do my cover art for this story. But frankly, I’m glad it resulted in me finding Ciphy, because they did a fantastic job! I couldn’t have asked for a more professional and stalwart artist if I tried. And if I ever need their services again, I would glad ask them for help.
I would highly recommend in the meantime that you look both of them up. You can find them easily enough on reddit. Just write down their names, u/ShatteredInk and u/Ciphy_Master, and look them up if you have any artistic needs. The proliferation of AI has made regular, actually talented artists, harder to find as they get pushed out by corporate dipsticks who want to make the act of creation cheaper, sloppier and bereft of imagination. Support original artists, human creators. If nothing else, you could at least show them greater appreciation given all the blood, sweat and tears they put into the work they make.
Teases for the Future
Thank you all, for your time in reading the story and this little mission statement. I greatly appreciate it. Over the next few weeks, you’ll be seeing a slow but steady roll out of chapters, both on FF.Net and AO3. AO3’s chapters will come out first, but you can expect FF.Net to be updated soon after. I’ll also be including a link to my AO3 profile so you can more easily access it.
RJ the Dragon has a lot of crazy things coming up. At the time of this writing, he’ll soon be participating in the events of Hazbin Hotel’s first official episode where he and Charlie meet Adam. It’s also the first time we’ll be adding on to and remixing an official song from the series. So, looking forward to your thoughts on that. We will also be meeting Sir Pentious again, and we’ll see how he gets along with RJ in contrast to the other sinners. We’ll also be exploring more about RJ’s headset, currently fused to his skull, as well as his draconic powers. And we’ll definitely be talking about whatever exactly is going on between him and Charlie, you can count on that.
Beyond that, I don’t want to say much, but suffice to say, these first nine chapters are going to be very informative about how things will progress. I look forward to hearing everyone’s thoughts on them over the course of the next few weeks.
I am so incredibly humbled by the response to this story so far, even if it is a little small. I fully believe that only big things are set to come for all of this though. I am excited to see how it all works out. I hope you understand now why I believe in this story the way I do, and I hope now you do as well.]
As always, leave a review, share it with your friends, and look for the next chapter to be dropped on either hosting site very soon. Be seeing you!
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