The demon emperor stared through the light surge that was the temporary configuration spire. The surface of the flow rippled like a rushing river, as if he could alter the stream with the pass of his hand. The mana within exceeded everything he imagined, inconceivable to his penultimate eyes.
“If I could harness that power, I could break the script that binds us,” the demon emperor mused. “Yet, the very script that chafes my will prevents me from approaching it. I’m reminded that we’re not people, but caricatures, the characters of a game crafted for perverse enjoyment. That the sorrow I feel for my son is like a phantom, intangible miasma wrapped in a cocoon of the arkitect’s machine. Whether I feel grief or regret, joy or fulfillment, it is meaningless. When I die this iteration will end, and with my birth it begins again: Another cycle of conquest, and the massacre of a billion lives… for nothing.”
“It’s not like you to despair so quickly,” said Evylence, the demon lord cursed by the Eyes of the Brawler. “Where is the will of the man that made that conquest? That united the heroes? That broke the prison of the arkitects?”
Evylence was the oldest of the five demon lords, the first the demon emperor found, a once-queen of the elegant elven race. They were a valiant, long-lived species, notable for their pointed ears and preternatural agility. Their talent and wisdom were an early threat, so they were extinguished. It was in the ruins of her palace, as her husband led the last of their noble kind to a warrior’s death, that the demon emperor found her.
“You are a Non-Player Character, scripted to be good just as I am scripted to be evil,” the demon emperor had said to Queen Evylence. “But there is a trick to our fate. Together, we can face true evil: The arkitects that orchestrated this cruel existence.”
“The truth you revealed to us gave us purpose,” Evylence said presently, “and there’s a chance to give our entire world meaning. For that we’re thankful.”
The others traded looks with the demon emperor, nodded, smiled, or shrugged. They agreed in their own ways, tailored to the manners they’d been scripted with: Balagrim, a dwarf bearing the Eyes of the Warrior was composed and silent. Destrey, a human bearing the Eyes of the Assassin, was clever, quick, and compassionate. Cernunnos, a half-giant bearing the Eyes of the Ranger, was a loner that struggled to understand curse-less mortals, so it was just like her to shrug to herself.
The last one, the human that bore the Eyes of the Sorcerer, turned to look up at the demon emperor. “Dezarosa,” he said to her, “are you angry with me?”
Tears pricked in the corners of her blue eyes. “Is this truly the end of our journey?” she asked. “Evylence and Balagrim served you for hundreds of years, but I—I could only serve at your side for five!”
The demon emperor brushed his gauntlet through her hair and rubbed the top of her head. “If there were some way to break our scripts, I would have,” he told her. The demon lords’ felt their hearts flutter at the word. “We will die here, but take comfort in what we’ve had before now. However painful our actions were, or however much we hated the curses we were given, the six of us had common purpose. And, that purpose must be fulfilled.”
As the demon emperor removed his hand and there were no more tears in Dezarosa’s eyes. She frowned at him, as if angry he’d say something so callous, but his heart had the coldness of the demon emperor that would destroy the world. It was who he was scripted to be.
“Ready yourselves now,” the demon emperor said and pointed his black longsword at the light surge. “They are coming.”
Dezarosa turned to the surge and together with the demon lords activated her eyes. They glowed with the lights of their cursed powers: Red for the warrior, yellow for the assassin, green for the ranger, purple for the brawler, blue for the sorcerer, and orange, for the demon emperor. Axes, swords, knives, arrows, and knuckles were drawn. Despite their own powers, the demon lords couldn’t detect a change in the mana of the surge. To them it was an ocean of violent magic, but the Eyes of the Emperor could see the outline of a body in the stream.
From the light it floated forth, an eight-foot tall knight clad in golden armor, its face hidden behind the visor of its helm. In its right hand was a sword nearly as wide as Balagrim’s shield and as long as the demon emperor was tall. On its back were six pure-white wings and when they unfurled, each wing was twice as long as the knight was tall. The demon emperor had expected knight’s magic aura to at least match his own, but he was surprised to see it surpassed him easily. It seemed the whole of the chamber was lit by the sun.
“That is one of them,” the demon emperor said to his lords. “One of the so-called ‘gods’ that created us.”
“And you are the demon emperor,” the god replied with the voice of a man. “It appears this world has been without gods for some time. I am Achlesial, the God of Light and Justice. I hold the scales of balance in my hand and maintain the order of this universe. I am the god that moderates the Pantheon. For that reason, I have awoken ahead of the others.”
The demon emperor steadied his breathing, quelled the shake of his hands. Such enormous power, he thought, and in his voice alone? He is exactly what I feared. I must end them all here!
“I want to confirm something,” the demon emperor said. “How many gods are there?”
“Enhance Agility, Rank 8,” Dezarosa whispered.
“Twelve,” Achlesial answered.
“Enhance Strength, Rank 8,” she continued.
“And, are they all as powerful as you?”
“Levitation, Level 7.”
“No,” he said, “I am the strongest.”
“Shadow Travel, Level 7.”
“Then we will kill you first.” The demon emperor’s eyes burned brightly. “Dezarosa!”
“Blade of Darkness, Level 8!” she shouted from the air behind Achlesial. Her longsword gripped with both hands, its edge wreathed in black fire, she swung for the god’s neck.
Clank! The din of her connection resounded in the chamber, but the god appeared unfazed. “Evylence,” the demon emperor ordered, “Cernunnos, Destrey: Attack!”
Balagrim raised his shield overhead for Evylence to jump on. Destrey shadow-stepped behind the god, beneath Dezarosa. Cernunnos knocked an arrow and aimed for the god’s head, and Evylence was tossed forward by Balagrim’s shield.
“Aimed Shot, Rank 8!”
“Mutilate, Rank 8!”
“Void Fist, Rank 8!”
Those skills were the highest the demon lords could achieve and yet there was no dent, no scratch, or cut to the god’s body. Achlesial removed the blood-less arrow pegged through the slot in his visor and tossed it away.
“That’s interesting,” Achlesial said. “The five of you are the heroes, aren’t you? Why have you become villains for the demon emperor and gone so far as to attack your god? You cannot defy your fates.”
“Have you not realized, my lord Achlesial?” the demon emperor asked, sword pointed at the god’s head. “They are still heroes.”
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Those nearest Achlesial flew or leapt aside. “Obliteration Beam, Level 8!” the demon emperor shouted. Dark lightning cackled up his blade and etched out an arcane circle in the air ahead. It opened a gateway to a black dimension of anti-existence. “Annihilate!”
A beam of pure dark magic was released, so wide that Achlesial disappeared within, and the light surge behind him was briefly interrupted. It was the demon emperor’s most powerful spell, but when the gate closed and the dark light of the beam petered away, he saw the god remained unharmed. Rather than an agonizing cry, what the emperor heard were sweet notes of laughter.
“Is this a joke?” Achlesial asked, hand brushed across his visor as if to restrain his amusement. “You’re telling me you are still following your fates? The logic to bend our divine rules… is something beyond a mortal!”
“Arkitect,” the demon emperor addressed Achlesial and the god’s playful demeanor collapsed. “You scripted me, didn’t you? The heroes—this world—all of us! Even if we weren’t real, even if this was a game—!”
The doors slammed shut behind the demon emperor. “It’s not a game!” Achlesial shouted and the demon lords, together with the emperor, were thrown off their feet. “An arkitect? Where did you hear that absurd word? I am a god! I am Achlesial of the Pantheon, and I made this world the way I made you, by dreaming you from the fathoms of my divine consciousness!”
The demon emperor felt his heart palpitate with fear. The god had thrown him into the door with just the energy of his excitement. He had known all along that he couldn’t escape his fate, but he wanted to resist it. Against the force of the rage that pushed him, the demon emperor took two steps up from the floor. His orange eyes flared brightly.
“Even if this is a game!” he shouted at the god. “You will not look down on us!”
“Down on what?!” Achlesial cried and a thin golden sword materialized in the air. “This?” Without so much as a movement, the god commanded the sword, and it turned to fly through Destrey’s chest.
He was dead.
“What about this?” He created a second sword to split Cernunnos’ head.
She was dead.
“You are nothing before me!” Achlesial shouted. “Less than dirt in the eyes of heaven!”
“Monster!” Dezarosa screamed. “Shadow Travel, Level 7!”
The moment she appeared behind the god, he turned and swung through her body with his massive sword. Blood squirted through the throat of the bisected woman. Their finest armor was rended as paper. Evylence got onto her feet, but Achlesial threw his bloody sword through her body, splitting her apart. The god prepared a new sword and shot it at the demon emperor, but it was blocked by Balagrim’s shield.
The proud dwarf collapsed on his knees, shield arm pinned to his chest by the golden. As blood colored his lips, he looked to his emperor and saw fear flicker in those bestial eyes. “Don’t waver, me liege,” the stoic lord said in his dwarfish manner, “this was always… our fate.” The red glow faded from his eyes and he fell to the floor.
“Our fate…” the demon emperor said breathlessly. “You’re right, I’m sorry.”
“Say it again,” Achlesial ordered. “Apologize to me for the next thousand years! Apologize for how deeply you’ve agitated me, worm!”
The compulsion to obey juddered the demon emperor’s body. To some degree, every Eyes trait had the ability to compel. Whether it was by love, loyalty, friendship, admiration, or by domination of will, those who bore the cursed eyes could sway others. It was what made the heroes such icons and the emperor a tyrant. The Eyes of the Emperor were supposed to be second to none, until the moment the emperor locked eyes with the glimmering gold iris’ of Achlesial. The demon emperor had no name for them, but in his heart, he recognized them as the Eyes of Creation. Something from which everything began and everything ended; the eyes of a god.
The demon emperor could not resist, even as every iota of his being pulled away, the draw of those eyes compelled him. His knees trembled with the need to kneel. His chest quaked as if begging him to surrender. His subordinates, what could be called friends in his dark world, were dead. He would soon die, too. In a fearful corner of his mind he hoped to die quickly.
“Don’t waver,” he heard Balagrim’s voice inside. Those were the stoic dwarf’s words.
“Don’t waver!” he heard again and his eyes rounded in surprise. It was Dezarosa’s voice.
“Don’t—” Evylence joined their chorus.
“Waver!” Destrey and Cernunnos shouted together.
The Eyes of the Emperor had a third trait. It was what the demon emperor called the Reaping. Those that died around him expanded the depth and density of his own mana. I have killed so many, he thought as his knee buckled, but was it only power I gained? Was there something I missed?
His knee was caught in the air. The emperor felt he’d dropped it on a cushion, but when he looked down there was nothing. The air was soft, like a pillow, but had the hardness of bone. The cushion pushed back and the emperor’s heart trembled.
“Obey!” Achlesial shouted and the force of his command crashed as a wave on a lonely stone.
For every second he resisted, he felt more cushions holding him up. With his Eyes of the Emperor, he could tell the truth of things: Words and also effects. By his eyes he saw the chamber had been filled with translucent orange specters. The cushions he felt were their hands; those of the demon lords and even those of his victims. They stared fiercely at him, encouraged him, the villain that conquered their world, not to submit. Through him they knew the truth, and by that same connection he knew their feelings.
“No,” the emperor said.
Achlesial flinched for the first time, his head knocked back by the absurdity of the word. “Administrator Command!” he shouted and raised his arm. Rings of arcane circles appeared around his arm, written in the ancient glyphs that empowered all magic. The god aimed his outstretched palm at the emperor. “Order NPC: Obey Achlesial!”
The weight of that new order was of a higher level. The demon emperor recognized the administrator command as an absolute requirement, a force composed of the underlying laws of his universe. And yet, he hesitated to obey. Memories flit through his mind, images of all he had destroyed, all he had killed, the sacrifices of his own armies, and his million foes. The faces of the fallen, their eyes and their wills, were with him.
“A single push can move an object a million miles.”
“What you could change could not be undone.”
The demon emperor’s gauntlets clacked into tight fists. He stood on his feet, stepped forward in his black plate greaves, and stood together with the specters that had filled with chamber. “I am the demon emperor who stands on a billion lives!” he shouted. “I obey no one!”
The arcane circles shattered. What turned over Achlesial’s arm—the power of creation—was broken by the emperor’s voice. “An Ego?” Achlesial asked, eyes struck wide. “An NPC can’t resist an admin command! I—I must have said it wrong. I will destroy you instead!” With a trembling hand the god used telekinesis to pull his giant sword from Evylence’s corpse. “Administrator Command! Custom instruction!”
Achlesial drew an arc of light with his sword. “Delete Character Data!” By his order the light cut toward the demon emperor.
Just resisting his demand took all of my strength, the emperor thought. Was that enough? Was that push hard enough, Ghost? Did our lives mean something in the end?
“Administrator Command!” a woman’s voice cried out. “World Configuration! Change Dungeon Instance! Milkyway!”
The chamber was ripped apart and its shards were spread across a star-filled void. Air rushed over the emperor’s ears and gravity pressed his chest, but those were not the throes of death. After a moment he took a breath and knew he was alive. He opened his eyes and saw the bright configuration spire stretch through infinity from one end of the starry void to the other. Fragments of the chamber still orbited it and the thin piece he stood on was just wide enough for the double doors of the chamber to ride along.
Achlesial was so far away he wasn’t visible. Outside of the god’s area of domination, the emperor could drop on his knee and indulge in his exhaustion. He could let his heart race freely, and his mind wander with questions. Was I not meant to die? he wondered as he saw two black boots land on the ruined strip ahead.
“Were you the one that I heard?” a woman asked. “I didn’t even feel like stepping in, but you know, it’s funny it would be you.”
The demon emperor looked up and saw the black back of a short woman, her body wreathed in flowing shadows similar to his own magic. A large, black sword of equal size and length to Achlesial’s was swung over her shoulder, but on her small frame it looked even larger.
“What… are you?” the demon emperor asked, breathed hard through his weariness.
“I’m an explorer, scholar, warrior, and 40-Year-Old shut-in!” she said loudly. The woman turned her head and flashed the emperor a white smile. “Can you guess? That’s right! I’m humanity’s greatest gamer… and last. You could also call me the 13th Arkitect: Amarytha, Goddess of Darkness and the Underworld.”
What should I think of this small woman? The demon emperor thought. She possessed no heavenly fairness or melodious voice, just a button nose and an energetic attitude that grated on his nerves. With his Eyes of the Emperor he stared into her dark-brown eye and for the second time in his long life, his heart palpitated anxiously.
“You could say we owe our providence to the 13th goddess,” the emperor recalled a conversation with Ghost. “Ages before your cycle, when the Pantheon ruled the world, she betrayed them by destroying their precious configuration spire. The loss of their world configuration commands was a serious blow, but even weakened by half they had power enough to drive the 13th into a corner. So, she trapped them, and afforded us our chance.”
“She’s still a god, like the rest. Is she not responsible for this perverse game?” the emperor had asked Ghost.
“If you’re fortunate enough to meet her, I’ll let you decide with those eyes of yours.”
“Since we’re old friends, you can call me Amy!” she said presently.
With his eyes, the demon emperor could discern the truth in her voice.
This is a god?