Of course, life would not give such a simple story.
A year passed. The party strayed deeper and deeper into demon territory as they got stronger and more confident. They didn't realize they walked right into a trap.
The knight died, allowing the rest of the party to escape.
The boy who had just gotten back from another day of slaughter saw the four survivors return with grave injuries. He gave a look of sorrow and betrayal, then ran off.
"... I'm a terrible person," he spoke out loud when he was alone.
No one answered him.
"When I first saw them, I was relieved. My father... he was still alive." He tried to smile but couldn't.
"But the knight was gone. And then... 'Why wasn't he the one to die?' That thought ran through my head."
"I'm a terrible hero for wanting my father to live. I'm a terrible son for wanting him to die."
He always thought so pessimistically these days. Although it was difficult to not be depressed in these circumstances. It was unfortunate that the priest wasn't secretly listening nearby. Only I could hear him.
"Hey."
I could not speak.
"Hey," he called out a little bit louder.
"Hey!"
"Answer me why don't you?!"
I could not. I was not allowed to.
"Why won't you say anything?? You're always yapping in my dreams!!"
It was because those were the only times I could speak to him.
"Say something damnit!!"
The priest's swearing seemed to have rubbed off onto him as well.
"Aren't you a god?! Why didn't you do anything?!!"
There was nothing I could do.
"Why did you let her die? Why did you...? I... I thought we might have had a chance. But now..." His eyes shone with despair. "Now... there's no hope."
I would have to correct him later. But there was a more urgent issue that made me wish I could talk to him.
A lone boy shouting in the woods was bound to attract attention, and not the good kind.
A squad of demons came up behind him.
There were at least fifty. Perhaps on a good day, if he had set up a proper ambush, the boy alone could handle them. Right now, he was woefully unprepared.
Furthermore.
"God... god... god..." The demons spoke haltingly as they repeated the foreign word.
"God... god..." One demon's eyes gleamed with a spark of primitive intelligence. "God... hero... hero..."
Soon all the demons began chanting. "Hero... hero... hero..."
That snapped the boy out of his stupor. He turned and stared at the demons, then fled. He finally lost them in the forest after a few hours. Upon returning to camp, the priest saw him and grabbed him.
"Where the fuck have you been??!" He shouted at the boy.
"I... They..." the boy stammered.
"Do you have any fucking idea just what is going on?? Look!" the priest gestured angrily at the forest.
The boy turned around. Even before he saw it, he smelled it. The forest was burning.
He closed his eyes and suppressed the fear that welled up inside him.
"... We have to run."
"What?"
"Run. Retreat. The demons know there's a hero now."
"Shit, how did-"
"It was my mistake."
"Shit, what did-"
The boy opened his eyes, and the calmness in them gave the priest chills. He swallowed his questions.
"We have to get stronger. To do that, we have to survive. That is why now we have to run."
...
"We will not run," the boy's father stated strongly. "The western front needs protection more than ever."
The priest tried to interrupt, but the boy stopped him with a gaze. The boy stared at his father calmly. "Father. How are your injuries?"
"Don't worry, I'm mostly recovered," he rolled his shoulders a few times while smiling. "In a day or two I'll be as good as new."
"Father. Please, spar with me."
He blinked. "Huh? Why do you ask?"
"Please."
The swordsman's instincts gave him a slight sense of unease, but he shook it off. "I guess, if you really want me to."
The boy led his father to an empty clearing free from prying eyes. It was a painfully one-sided battle.
"Father. With a rapier I can beat you in three moves. With a long sword I would only need two. With a dagger, I can kill you with a single stab. With a ranged weapon, I can end the fight before you even get close."
"What... Who... are you?"
He looked at his father who could no longer recognize the boy standing in front of him.
"My name is 'hero.'"
"That's not possible. I saw your attributes with my own eyes. You were clearly..." His voice trailed off as the attributes window changed in front of his eyes. Skills that he couldn't see before started appearing.
"Weapons Mastery. Unarmed Fighting. Aura of the Swift. Unstained by Blood. Everlasting Will... You... Just what have you been doing?"
"Father. I am probably the strongest person at the western front. Trust me when I say this. If we stay here, we will die. We have to retreat. If we go back to the capital and fortify it, we can buy some time. That is the only way we can survive."
He turned around and left his father kneeling on the ground behind him.
...
The demon king ordered attacks the northern, western, and southeastern fronts simulatenously. They were taken easily. Everyone fled to the capital. The luckier ones managed to make it in before the gates were closed for good. The others were trapped outside as the demons began to surround it.
They screamed for the 'hero.' Everyone knew that a 'hero' existed, or at least that the demons believed he did. They searched for him, desparate to find a ray of hope for salvation. However, there was not a single trace of him.
"Shit." The priest and the female mage were the only ones remaining with the boy who had now turned 11.
They had watched the boy who starved, begged, and slept during the day, and who snuck out the city to become a hero in the night. They saw him fight desparately against fearsome enemies in the darkness, putting his life on the line again and again. They saw him grow strong enough to kill demon nobles with a single blow. But it still wasn't enough.
That was how strong the demon king was.
The girl finally spoke up.
"I think it's my turn."
"Fuck no." The priest protested.
"Yes it is." She had an oddly serious expression.
The boy turned to look at her blankly.
"Boy. I'm sorry." She didn't want to say too much. She had seen the life slowly fading out of his eyes as he lost everyone he cared about. His father stayed behind at the western front had died within a week. Her foolish brother used his spells to kill thousands of low level demons trying to swarm the capital before being beheaded by a group of nobles.
"A few months. That's probably how much time I can give you. The demon king is cautious. He won't try to take the capital unless he is absolutely sure he will succeed. The hordes of low level demons are just to wear us down while he builds his army of stronger ones. If I kill a few of those damn nobles, I can buy you time. So... You better not fucking die."
She left. The priest looked at her leave, but remained for a bit longer.
"I... will go with her. She won't head out immediately. She might seem rash and impulsive, but she's actually quite good at calculating." He laughed mirthlessly.
The boy nodded dully.
"Hey." The priest glared fiercely at the boy. "She's right. You can't die. Even if the capital burns around you, even if people scream your name as they die, you must survive. Don't blame yourself for not saving them. It's not your fault. If you have to blame anyone, blame us. We're the ones who ordered you to live no matter what. So live, you got that?"
He nodded.
"Then, see you."
The boy watched the only two people in this world who knew him, truly knew him, leave him. He felt their sorrow, their fear, their pride. Then he felt nothing but emptiness.
...
The capital burned, and the boy still could not act. He slipped into the palace and got closer to the king.
The king had long since wanted to flee, but there was nowhere he could go. The only place safe from demons were within the palace walls.
Then the day came that even that was not safe anymore.
The demon king pushed open the doors to the palace and strolled in. The king watched him with trembling eyes.
"Good to see you, brother," the demon king smiled.
(Author's note: I would have ended the chapter here but I promised so I will continue)
...
His name was 'misfortune.' I was the one who chose the name, but that was not what caused this tragedy. Every possible future I saw for him was tragic. He was destined to live a life of 'misfortune,' because his younger brother was full of 'avarice.'
If, no matter what I named him, he would suffer, then I should give him a name to acknowledge his suffering. That was the only way I could lament his 'misfortune.'
When he was fifteen, he fell prey to a plot of his younger brother. He was supposed to have died, but a demon saved him. Rather, he ate the heart of a dying demon and became a demon himself. Then he bided his time, amassing strength and growing his followers.
That why he was a demon king. It was not that he was the strongest. It was because he knew how to use his people. That was why he couldn't be killed.
Thirteen strongest demons surrounded him at all times. They obeyed his every order without question, and they killed everything within a certain radius of their king regardless of how harmless it seemed.
The demon king was cautious, but he wasn't flawless. No human could be.
His flaw was his trauma. The betrayal he felt from him brother. The hatred that grew every day in his demonic heart. They clouded his judgement. They made him lower his guard when he faced the one who made him a demon.
He smiled as he watched the one who once pretended to look up to him cower in fear before him now. He wanted to make the greedy king suffer just as much as he had suffered. He saw a boy hiding in fear behind the king. He made his servants bring the boy to him.
He looked indifferently at the boy. He saw the boy's tear-stained face. He saw the emptiness in his eyes. He saw the boy whisper his name. Misfortune.
"Yes. Misfortune. That was the name given to me. Fitting isn't it?"
The boy stared at him. The demon saw a trace of an emotion in his eyes. It was an emotion he hadn't seen in a long time. He was intrigued.
He made a mistake, getting distracted in that moment. It allowed the boy to pierce him cleanly with a knife through his forehead. The boy didn't stop there. He pulled out more knives, stabbing them through his neck, his heart, his stomach, his major arteries, and five other vital points before the demon king's guard attacked him. He barely held them off, then ran away.
That was how it ended for most. A demon king who planned meticulously for revenge but failed because of a momentary lapse in focus. A hero who could do nothing but watch as thousands of civilians died.
The boy clung to life for another two years. He slowly killed the lesser demons and the land became inhabitable again.
He passed away when he was 15 and returned to me.
I was not satisfied with this ending.
- You were a hero who was born too late.
I did not like the broken boy in front of me.
- You saved my world, but there are countless other worlds out there similar to mine.
That was why I gave him a job.
- Help them.
The boy who was kinder than everyone, who had chosen to sacrifice everything, and now was an empty shell who only knew how to kill until he died.
- Kill these people. Then they will be reborn as heroes.
I would let him kill until he healed.
...
There was a picture in the 19 year old's pocket. It was the picture of an irrelevant person.
The 28th target. Today was the last day to kill him.
- So, what is your choice?
(Fin)