Side Story 1: The Final Battle
Today, is one of the greatest turning points in history. In front of me, stood a man with pitch black, light armor and his only weapons were the dark, metallic gloves on his hands. He was the [Hero], the savior of the human race who came to slay me. On the other side, there was me, Eryiameph the great [Demon Lord]. We were currently standing in the throne room of my castle, about to initiate in the final 1 on 1 duel between [Humans] and [Demons]. Whether I stand or fall here, will determine the fate of the [Demon Race].
“Oh great [Hero], are you prepared to meet your doom?” I say a line decided by my advisors. I have no idea why they would want me to say such a thing, but I did it anyway.
“…yes.” On the other hand, instead of a heroic, memorable response that would be quoted in the future, the man is front of me is pretty much a taciturn.
I chuckle to myself, just hearing him speak. This guy was extremely amusing to interact with. Just yesterday, when I proposed delaying our fight to attend my wife’s birthday party, he agreed. Really, what kind of [Hero] would agree to attend the birthday party of his supposed arch-enemy? I immediately took a liking to him after that.
It’s a shame that one of us has to die. There is no possible way to accommodate both the demon race and the human race together in the same world. I raise my spear and take a low stance, ready to lunge at will. The [Hero] raises his fists, keeping a high guard up. Immediately after taking his stance, I thrust forward towards his lower body, which I assumed was an opening. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Before my spear made contact, he raises his right leg and kicks the area right behind the spear head, causing the trajectory to shift slightly. He curves his body, and the spear slides right past him, a paper-thin margin from cutting him. The foot he used to kick defied physics and instantly stomped back into the ground, as if he never threw the kick and only stepped forward. While my momentum from the thrust drives me forward, he throws a left hook aimed at my upper body, and I see hints of magic contained within the attack.
Immediately, I used one of my demon skills, [Inferno Projection], a skill that propels me any direction I need to move to, while leaving behind a figure of fire that explodes. I propel myself backwards, and the punch makes impact with the flames, but instead of exploding into flames, a blast of wind emerges from the attack, forcing me to fly farther back than intended, right into my throne.
I stand from the rubble, about to raise my guard again, but before I know it, the [Hero]’s already in front of me, ready to throw a second punch. This time, with his right fist. I raise my spear in front of me and use the handle to block the punch. Upon impact, the spear vibrates extremely heavily, and yet again, I’m blasted back. It didn’t do much damage though, but it was something beyond what a human should do.
I decide not to think about it for now, and re-engage in battle. I get up faster this time, and thrust my spear forward, predicting that the hero would immediately come towards me again. I was right, and he was forced to dodge the attack, stopping his sprint and leaping sideways. Now it was my turn to put pressure onto him, and I began swinging towards him from every direction, the speed increasing after every swing.
Despite my speed reaching to a point where even I can barely see it, he’s still dodging with minimal movements, and even attempts to throw a few cross counters, which I dodge. When I finally find an opening, I immediately thrust my spear towards his lower right thigh, and it hits. I definitely felt impact, and the leg was blown away by the sheer power of the thrust, but there was no blood coming from the wound.
A shadow flickers in the corner of my vision, and I raise my left hand by reflex, and a kick makes impact with it. It had a lot of strength in it, and there was even magic to strengthen the kick even further, but that wouldn’t be enough to harm me. At least, that’s how it should’ve been. The gauntlets of my left hand begin vibrating powerfully, and it spread all the way to my shoulder. The vibrations felt like the kick he just made being multiplied by over a hundred within my armor. Enduring the pain, I immediately used my wings and flew away to widen the distance between us. Also, he couldn’t reach my with his physical attacks from the ground.
After I put a considerable amount of distance between us, I wait for this unknown effect to subside. When it finally stops, I can hardly move my left arm anymore, and the left shoulder guard was beginning to crack. What is this dangerous armor-piercing attack? No, it’s even worst than that. The vibrations continued because my armor was able to endure it, but my body isn’t able to absorb the same amount of damage my armor can. Therefore, it was an attack that forced the enemy’s high defense to backfire on them, destroying them from the inside.
Why is he so powerful? A human’s level limit is 100, I believe, and I am level 500, which was a demon’s limit. If I hit him even once, that’s a guaranteed death for him. His attacks shouldn’t even chip away 1% of my health, yet that one hit took out a solid 15%. That’s over 50,000 points of damage done to me in a single hit. Is it his trump card? As I think that, I look back over to where the [Hero] was, and I saw two of him. One with it’s leg blown off, and another standing next to him.
I use my [Eyes of Magic Perception], and the world turns into an array of colors, similar to what one would see as thermal vision, except much more clearer. The figure with the leg blown off is completely blue, indicating that it was a being created with magic. It couldn’t be called a simple illusion, because it had physical substance. I know I felt my spear piercing flesh and bone, so it was probably a spell at the highest tier of magic, towards the pinnacle of [Spatial Magic].
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A valkyrie told me about this the other day, about a legendary spell that only exists in legends. The perfected illusionary spell, [Phantasm]. There was no other explanation for that figure next to the [Hero]. As I keep my distance from the [Hero], and examined him, I see mana gathering in front of him. I turn off my [Eyes of Magic Perception], and watch what exactly he was doing.
I guess I’m learning a new fact about the [Hero] now, and it’s that not only is he powerful in close combat, but he can use the largest arsenal of magic spells I’ve ever seen. First, a blast of extremely cold wind was released by him, and covered the entire throne room in ice within a few seconds.
Next, a huge burst of light filled the room, and a heavy bolt of magic power strikes me right in the chest. To be precise, it was a large bolt of lightning, which was powerful enough to completely destroy my chestplate. Fortunately it didn’t pierce through, something like that would’ve mortally wounded me if it hit my actual body.
Right after, a heavy force pulls me down towards the ground, and slams me deep into it. The ceiling of the throne room began to collapse, and most of the debris was coming towards my direction.
This is a bad situation for me, so I guess I have to use ‘that.’ I gather mana within my body, and just before the debris hit, I recited a single word.
“Mode, Devil.” Instantly, flames erupt from my body as red, runic markings began to carve themselves into my body. My skin blackens and hardens, and small line cracks run through them that makes them seem scale-like. The wings I had also received markings, the edges became extremely sharp. Two horns protrude from my head, and the transformation was complete.
[Mode: Devil] is a skill I obtained upon becoming a [Demon Lord], and it made me undergo a transformation that heavily increased my physical and magical defense, along with enchanting my strength and speed. I wasn’t able to stay in this form for long though, at max I can last two minutes. Therefore, I must defeat him within that limited frame of time.
All the debris that was about to hit me completely melted from the flame wave I released upon transformation, and most of the room was now destroyed. The afternoon sun was exposed to both the [Hero] and I, facing each other and waiting for the other to make a move. I couldn’t afford to wait like this though, and the [Hero] knew, so he began to gather mana in preparations for stopping my next attack. This will most likely be the exchange we’ll make.
I flap my wings once, and that was enough to propel me forward at the speed of sound, allowing me to reach my opponent in less than a second. With my spear in my right hand, I thrust it at his neck, and it pierces, but there was no blood. Another [Phantasm]. I immediately turn around to see if I was able to strike again before he landed his attack, but instead, I find myself surrounded by several more [Phantasms], all who began sprinting circles around me at high speeds, prepared to strike at any opening I give.
This will probably be my last stand, so I’m going to make it where it’s either I kill the [Hero], or drag him to death with me. One of the [Phantasms] circle behind me, and makes the first strike. The final stand starts here. I thrust the blunt end of the spear behind me, hitting the illusion straight to the neck, killing it instantly. Two more try to take advantage of me temporarily focusing my attention on the surprise attack, but I quickly spin the spear around me and slash at the two illusions.
One more came head on, and dodged my first thrust, ducking under and trying to hit my abdomen. Instead of pulling back the spear to try for another attack, I straight up kick the [Phantasm] and send it flying with it’s head bent a complete 180˚. There were only two remaining, and they both come at my from both sides. One of them was the real one, and there was only two, so I should be able to eliminate both of them before they hit me. I raise the spear and thrust it at the [Hero] coming from the left, and released a spear made of dark magic, which instantly killed it. There was no blood, so that means the one to my right was the real [Hero].
I turn around and began to swing to the area I thought the hero was going to be, but he wasn’t there at all. He completely disappeared from the right side. Suddenly, I feel an extremely heavy impact from behind, much heavier than the kick from before. Even though my magic and physical resistance increased, the strength of this attack was at least 10 times stronger than the previous, and the vibrations were so powerful that I can feel my bones breaking, organs bursting, and muscles tearing from it.
This is the end for me. But I’m not going down alone. Gritting my teeth and bearing the pain, I turn around and thrust the spear with my remaining strength, which hit the [Hero] who had a surprised look on his face. I smirked at him as I fell to the ground, the vibrations getting worse. Before my lungs were crushed though, I was able to say some final words to the [Hero].
“Got you, you teleporting bastard.” My lungs burst immediately after this, and I can no longer speak. Soon enough, my heart will be crushed by these heavy vibrations, but I was able to hear the [Hero] reply before I died.
“Good job.” What a thing for him to say, even though he was about to die as well. Though I can kind of understand how he'd be feeling after this. I bet he's even smiling right now, glad that everything's over even though he's about to die. If I could, I would be chuckling to myself right now, but unfortunately, my time was up.
Soon enough, I feel a heavy pressure on my heart, and the pain immediately disappears. In fact, my entire body went numb. This is what death was like? It was only a few moments later I would find myself reincarnated with the appearance of the [Hero], and as a female as well.