"Someone is here," Earnest jumped from the roof of the carriage his hand ready on his sword.
"It's okay, he won't attack us… or at least not right now." I looked out into the village. "He's too curious as to why we're here."
"Who is?" Earnest let go of his sword but was still weary. Taylor stuck close to my side protectively.
"You'll see," I led them further into the dilapidated village. A small fire was lit outside of a surprisingly maintained home. It was clear someone had fixed it and recently. I raised my voice, "It's not nice to hide from guests."
"You're no guest of mine," from the shadows of the house, he appeared. Silver eyes and pale blue hair. From the gaps in his shirt a golden stone could be seen embedded in his chest.
"Demon Lord!?" Earnest gripped his sword again and Taylor stood in front of me her daggers drawn.
I gently pulled Taylor to my side, "We're not here for trouble Caius. I just want to talk."
"And here I thought you wanted to finish the job." He laughed, "Though without your Hero I doubt you'd stand the chance."
"How is he even still alive?" Taylor grit her teeth beside me.
"He's a tricky person," I replied easily.
Caius narrowed his eyes, "What do you want?"
"Let's sit first, this could take a while and it's quite cold here," I made my way to the fire without permission and sat down on a nearby log. "I did bring some food too."
The Demon Lord frowned and sat at the other end of the fire, "Talk first."
"Earnest, Taylor, please sit down. You-, I want you to hear this as well," I looked at Taylor with a soft expression.
"Give me the word and I'll kill him," she eyed the Demon Lord fiercely but sat down. Earnest after some deliberation did so as well.
"So… where do I begin?" I sighed and faced the Demon Lord. "When we fought you realised that I couldn't die didn't you?"
He huffed, "Of course I did. It was the same sensation as my own. We two are the same."
"Wait what?" Taylor spat out in surprise.
"I'll summarise. Whenever I died I would go back seven days, or when I last killed myself. If you're wondering I died a lot. Earnest killed me a lot." At my words, although she was confused she glared at Earnest. "Ah, that was my fault though. In fact you killed me once as well."
"I-I did?" she was shocked. "I'd never-."
"No, I'm thankful for that time," I caressed her head. "But more importantly I lost that… 'gift' or more appropriately I gave it up."
The Demon Lord eyed me, "Why would you tell me that? I could end you in seconds."
"Perhaps, but you want to hear what I have to say right?"
His expression tightened, "Go on."
"I know you Demon Lord Caius Vel Bartar and I need your help."
"You don't know me," he grated his words.
"Really? I know this village is where you were born. Your father died before you could even remember him and your mother raised you alone right in the house behind you. You loved her more than anything else and your life here was peaceful. I know the first time you died was in the forest while playing with your friends at the age of five. At first you had no idea what was going on but somehow you were able to keep living and avoided that fate."
It became harder to say what came next, "I know that at the age of seven humans attacked your village. They killed your mother and kidnapped you as a slave. You swore to get revenge that night no matter what. In fact I even know the name of the man who did it."
"Who?" he interrupted me intently.
"General Elroy of the Empire," I replied tensely. I had even more reason now to hate that name.
"With this I at least won't kill you. You've done your research well, very few could say what you did. In fact I'll even bestow upon you a gift." He stood looking down at me, "What do you need human?"
I laughed, "Sit down, I'm not done yet. I know more about you then just that. On the way to the Empire you died six times from starvation. You only broke the cycle by stealing the food of the other slaves. Sacrificing them for yourself. Even when you arrived, for an entire year living in the slums was a dream for you. Every week was a struggle as you were punished for the slightest reason, even killed for fun. When you finally chose to escape, it took you so many attempts you thought about giving up. In the end you barely made it out through the skins of your teeth, only to die and do it again the next day."
He eyed me with a smouldering curiosity.
I continued, "In the slums you were able to steadily grow. You learnt with each death. How to fight, to steal, to talk, to stand up… to 'survive'. On the outskirts of the Imperial Capital you discovered a wizard's tower and snuck into his laboratory. Each time he found you he killed you like vermin but you'd get back up and go again, learning slowly from the few hours of reading you could make out. Then when you were powerful enough you killed him and took his home as your own.
"After that your life became better or at least in a way. I know what you did in those days, the experiments and lives you took for revenge. Esmeralda, Lin, Argath, Rupert, Leos, Turner… do I need to go on?"
Caius scowled, "I do not regret what I did."
"Really? Because I do," I returned his glare with tender reflection. "You moved on to the Demon Lands and worked hard to unite the tribes. It was the highlight of your life. Amongst your own people you thought you didn't have anything to fear. Oh how you were wrong. They could be just as vile as humans. In the end your acts of diplomacy turned to force and though you succeeded in becoming Demon Lord, even I don't know how much blood was really shed."
"Enough," he spat. "You have proved your point. To know so much about me… what are you? Did that figure in the white room send you?"
"Hmm," I scratched my head. "In a way yes but it was at my own volition. Simply put, I'm you. Well a version of you from a different world."
"Do you think me a fool?" an outrage marred his face.
"How else would you explain it? I even know the feelings you had, though I'd rather not divulge that much. I even had the same ability as yours to cheat death."
"Impossible," he shook his head. "Magic cannot go that far. Only something like the Goddess could…." He realised.
"Figure in the white room is a real prick sometimes but you have to admit she knows a lot."
He settled down, "How?"
I felt a tug on my sleeve. Taylor stared at me with uneasy eyes, "Rain… you're joking right? You can't be him. You're here now!"
I squeezed her hand to calm her, "A lot happened to me. What I'm about to say is what happened when I was the Demon Lord. My life as Caius beyond this point."
"You know the future?" Caius asked.
"Not quite," I smiled wryly. "I'm pretty sure our lives deviated as soon as the Hero arrived in this world. For one, when the Hero came to kill me…," I faced Taylor, "you were already dead. So were Ronalt and Marley. I never met you. Lara... was a different person by then and she came at me with the intent to end my life. In the end I was trapped and almost had my soul broken, barely escaping by faking my death as you did Caius.
"After that I came here to recover. Thus why I knew you'd be here. The problem lies in what happened from there. I swore to get revenge on Lara for destroying all I had built. The same intentions I know you have now, but I couldn't. The Empire was able to control her mind and turned her into a killing machine. The Kingdom was destroyed as if it were nothing. The Demons soon after. So I made a bargain with the Goddess. She would send me to the Hero's world, to a time before she was all powerful, and I would kill her." I laughed dryly, "That didn't go quite as planned.
"As a price I gave up all my talent in magic and like the Goddess promised I arrived in that world… but I was reborn as a baby. When you cross worlds like that your memories don't come back instantly. Instead long story short, I became her best friend, took on the name Jane and by the time I remembered who I was, I didn't care. I wanted to protect her and never let her be summoned."
"So that's why you and Lara are so close…," Taylor mumbled beside me.
"Yeah it got really weird when I started to remember."
"But why are you here now?"
I faced each of them in turn and sighed, "Because I failed again. The summoning happened and Lara was taken away from me. I made another bargain with the Goddess to come back to this world and I was born as Rain. My payment was my existence as Jane… the only reason I remember my time from then is because Lara broke through it somehow. So here I am now. Once I was you Caius, once I was Lara's best friend, and now I'm asking for your help to save her."
"I'm finding this hard to believe," he clenched his jaw.
"Need a hand with that?" I offered my palm to him. "Don't worry it should work because it's you."
He reached out warily and as our hands clasped the memories of my life passed to him. Not all of them, just the important ones. Even for him that amount of information at once might fry his brain. It wasn't like he'd became me either. He lacked the key to make them his, the experience of it. For him it was like reading a scarily nostalgic book.
As we let go he stared at his hand, clenching and unclenching it, "I see…. So the Empire are currently doing the same to La- the Hero now."
"Yes. As you saw I faced them in the Palace. I watched, Earnest, Ronalt and then even Taylor die. Then she crushed me and broke my soul. I really did think that was the end but the Goddess gave me one last chance. I need you Caius. You're the only being strong enough to hold against her."
He stood up, "This-this is a lot to take in." His voice was softer than it had been before, it was clear my memories were having an impact on his mind. "May I have a moment?"
"Don't take too long."
"Of course," he went inside the house behind him. Even now it was a tender sight to see.
The fire was dying down and absentmindedly I threw more wood to it. Sparks and cinders flew into the air wrapping around the smoke. My heart had been laid bare.
Earnest suddenly cackled a laugh, "Well this certainly does explain a lot. Your skills with the sword, the way at times you seemed to know what was to happen."
"Yeah, it wasn't like I was learning from scratch. I was just remembering what I had forgotten. Sorry if that disappoints you."
"No, if anything it has just made me respectful to the ways of this world. The Goddess is an amazing being."
"If you met her you'd be disappointed," I chuckled. Taylor beside me had been silent for a while now. Though she was still quite close the distance between us felt further than ever. It was the ordinary reaction.
Her face turned to me abruptly, a pleasant smile on her lips, "So I fell in love with an old man."
"Ah… it hurts if you put it that way, all my lives so far have been pretty young." A nervousness I hadn't felt in a long time assailed my chest, "Are you- are you okay with that, with me?"
"I wasn't your first time was I?"
"Well as Rain you were," I wasn't sure how to answer that one.
"Then I'll have to work harder to make it so you can only remember me," she reached for my hand and gripped it. The force warmed my heart.
"Thank you Taylor. I love you… really, more than anyone in my lives so far."
She shuddered, "Ah, if you say that you're going to get my nerves running. Think we have time?"
I couldn't help but laugh. She was just like usual and I held her closer, "Try again later."
"I will." And so together we waited.