It just seemed too good to be true.

That single thought was at the tip of the tongue of the Head Oracle of the Intercontinental Association for Biological and Magical Research. After all, their seemingly perpetual, unified mission of finding a way to biologically enhance the respective species of the members of the Association seemed to finally meet its end-goal.

With heavy steps, the Head Oracle took his place at the head of the table, representing their Division in presenting their most recent, and most alarming finding. He had called the High Council on short notice— an unprecedented act for its members was always on the move, directing the Association’s efforts toward their battlefields, research, and preventing the world from collapsing in upon itself.

The only reason he was able to call upon them was that he swore upon his household name that this would be paramount to their ultimate goal. He coughed and started his presentation. After a hundred years of silence, the gods have given them their final Ultimatum. Allying themselves with all of the other remaining gods, they would summon the last of their powers, conjuring a being of absolute power.

They said that this being would destroy them. This being would lay waste to the blasphemous creatures that would dare turn against their creators and seek for themselves the divinity of the gods. The Demon Lord.

The Head Oracle paused for a second. He laid his eyes upon the 13 deathly members of the High Council. Humans made up the grand majority of the world’s populace, but they were a ragtag bunch of species. A savvy-looking Elf with soft, slightly upturned eyes, a Werewolf in smart glasses and a pure white lab coat, a Naga scrolling through her papers and simultaneously typing rapidly on her laptop, and most curiously the newest member of the High Council, the Head Oracle thought, an Angel with darkened wings.

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To protect the order that the Association tries so hard to keep, not much information about the members of the High Council is divulged. Not even to their Head Oracle, he thought. Among them, he was most familiar with the Head of Public Affairs, the only human member of the High Council. But he knew better than to think that one of the leaders of an organization as colossal as this would be free from spiritual and bodily modification. We’re all freaks, here.

The Head Oracle knew that it was not for fear that they were silent. No, he knew that they were indifferent. After all, the majority of them had been the figureheads that had started the Holy Wars hundreds of years ago. And they had won every single time. They weren’t scared of the gods. Not anymore.

But the Association had long since turned their sights from researching and experimenting on divinity, knowing that they had learned all that they could from them. Even the gods, they had learned from the last Holy War, were mortal. The Head Oracle swallowed, wiping the sweat from his brow. He knew that what he would say next may very well shake the Association to its core.

The Demon Lord was immortal. With a thunderous boom, the room shook. The marble conference table had almost shattered, with cracks spread out to its edges. One of the High Council members, a Minotaur, had stood up. His fist encased in an ornate adamantine gauntlet was shaking and his breathing erratic. The minotaur looked around, scanning the faces of the other Council members. They were all thinking the same thing.

Looking back to the Head Oracle, he nodded and sat back down. The Head Oracle continued. As powerful and vengeful as they may be, the cornered gods’ powers were not without their limits. A Chosen One would one day appear in their midst, someone born with the fate to slay the Demon King and end their reign of terror. The Head Oracle ended his presentation, knowing that this meeting was already as good as over.

The High Council was listening to him purely for formalities now, and they had already decided what the Association’s next prime objective would be. One of the High Council members, their Halfling de facto leader, was the first to open her viciously grinning mouth.

All in favor of helping ourselves to the Demon King’s immortality, and detaining the so-called “Chosen One” until further needed, raise your right hand.