The wind swept across the forest and continued forward. As it crested the hills and flowed into the gentle rolling plains of Albedo, the honey colored grass swayed gently. Stalks of grain cast about in search of fertile ground to start their pattern of rebirth.
As the wind moved forward, the grains fell by the wayside. Crushed and destroyed, burned here and there, the scent of fire on the air. There were numerous corpses scattered about. Man and demon, beast and titan, hundreds of thousands of creatures were embraced in the throes of the God of Death.
A faint shimmer rose just above the piled corpses. The last wisps of the souls of the departed. Usually, these souls would depart into the afterlife in an instant after death. But on this battlefield, the souls rose up in Hatred and fought each other again in reckless abandon. As if their hatred of their enemy was so powerful they could not even rest in death without tearing the tendons from their bodies.
Such was the powerful aura of the God of Hatred. Even being within one hundred miles of a battlefield involving him was enough to turn best friends into mortal enemies, lovers into murderers, and mothers against their own newborn babes. Truly a despicable God who should never have existed, but such was the nature of Gods.
If you didn't want a specific God to exist, there was thought to only be one way to destroy them. Eliminate their faith, or Concept if they required no faith. In the case of the God of Hatred, it was clearly impossible to eliminate the Concept of Hatred from this world.
As the wind crossed over the myriad bodies covered in ichor, it started to rise. There was a massive rift in the ground spouting fierce fiery lava. However, this isn't what forced the wind to rise.
As if a monument to his sins, the God of Hatred had pulled a mountain from the very plains that the battlefield took place upon. It towered thousands of meters above the plains, as if a crude gesture to the peaceful savannah around it. The top of the mountain was a polished flat surface, and as the wind blew across this plateau, a scene that had never happened before in history unfolded.
Arioch had been born a greater demon of Malice. He had thrived in the 9 hells and 7 purgatories before his celestial manifestation was born. Hatred. Arioch fully embraced his celestial manifestation and the power of hatred over seven hundred billion years ago. He had slaughtered billions of races, crushed stars in his palm, and ate galaxies for nourishment. He was the epitome of a tyrant and destroyed anything that inconvenienced him, and many things that didn't.
So how was he in this predicament? How had he been forced to such a point? And by nothing more than a disgusting human?
Arioch's frame could take whatever shape he wanted, but somehow he had been confined into a form he had not felt in hundreds of billions of years. He was a 10 foot tall muscular demon with wickedly curved horns atop his head. His blood red skin was carved deep with eldritch runes and bulged with muscles. His face was uncomfortably handsome, and the crown of fire that hovered between his horns gave him a majesty that could not be ignored.
He had two massive blades, one in each hand. Each sword was wickedly curved on one side with jagged teeth on the back, and a full 7 feet long. The hilt of each sword had an eye in it and the black blades glowed with blood red runes all the way to the tips. They were his ego swords, made carefully by him eons ago from the very flesh and soul of his two closest brothers. What a beautiful source of Hatred that had been, destroying the ones who were closest to him.
Yet now, he lay on his back with his arms severed and his own swords stabbed into his chest, still held by his own arms. He had lost 6 of his 7 hearts, his left eye completely shattered by an earth shattering blow, and blood pouring out of his face in many cuts and gashes. Strangely, his pearly white teeth seemed undamaged, and despite all of his injuries, he wore a smile.
Above him with a foot on Arioch's chest and fists clad in brilliant mithril gauntlets the shape of a lion's head with the mouth open, a specimen unlike any other human he had ever seen looked at him with a face full of rancor and ferocity.
The man standing on his chest was gloriously built, rippling muscles showed underneath his torn orichalcum armor, and his silver hair seemed to flow in the wind as if it were as filled with animosity as the despicable human was. His electric blue eyes seemed to pierce into Arioch's soul and see every secret of his. Despite this, Arioch coughed some blood and laughed as if it was no big deal.
"Hahahaha what glorious Hatred. You were so close and yet, so far away!" Arioch coughed another bloody mouthful of his organs.
"Arioch. Today is the day this world forgets the very concept of Hatred. You will cease to exist, and all Hatred shall be gone as well." Azrael spoke firmly with eyes blazing in conviction.
"Ohh, what a beautiful concept. Kill me, the source of all Hatred in the world, and the world will never know Hatred again! Hahaha, only someone with such a lofty ambition could ever be worthy of becoming my crowning glory. When I have made your skull into my Imperial Crown, your very bones into my Throne, and your entire family line into my personal squad of Death Sworn, I will definitely be ready to challenge Death, Famine, and Pestilence to unite the 9 Hells! HAHAHAHA COME!"
Azrael frowned. He had gathered millions of the most powerful beings in the cosmos to assault Arioch when he attempted his Ascension to become a Prime Evil. Nothing and no one were left but Azrael. Arioch had been at his weakest in the course of epochs, yet he had still fought Azrael to a standstill for 13 days. Yet, he was fully crushed in the end. How did he still have such confidence?
Azrael decided to not ruminate over such things. Once he killed Arioch, Lord of Hatred, this world would change for the better. No more would have to suffer like he had…
With a quick flick, the Lion mouth of his left gauntlet pierced into Arioch's chest just below the sternum. Its teeth latched on and ripped out a pulsing purple veined heart that bled drops of liquid mana. Every drop spilled on the surface of the mountain and sizzled.
Arioch's eyes widened before his body shuddered and relaxed. He coughed blood again, and his eyes began to glaze.
"It has begun. With my final breath I do hereby pronounce that Hatred in this world shall be eliminated when the man who has killed me has forgiven the one he hates the most."
A low rumble shuddered as a purple divine light flowed out all around Arioch. Arioch's final breath rattled and the world shook.
A Divine Decree? Azrael frowned. He knew that the final breath of a God who embodied a Concept would contain a decree. That decree could change the will of the very fabric of the world. Yet, 'he decreed that all I had to do was forgive the one I hate the most? I hate him the most!'
As Azrael frowned in confusion, he suddenly felt a piercing pain in the back of his skull. He felt a massive amount of information pour into his head. Every word and decision he had made in his life, every thought and form of motivation he had. Every form of suffering he ever felt. He saw his entire life condensed into little characters on a blue screen.
His entire life. Written at the hands of another. Every person he had lost, every soul who had sacrificed for him. Every enemy who had ever raised a blade toward him. He saw all of their wills completely ignored, their actions and words completely dictated by the words that appeared on this little blue screen.
Azrael suddenly heard a voice "Yes, your entire life, everything about you including the moment you killed me, was decided by another. All of your suffering and pain. Your lost loved ones…even her death…were all at the hands of the God who put your life onto that blue screen. Would you like to switch places with him? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA"
Azrael's mind blacked out with pain. He felt groggy and something was pushing on his face. When he opened his eyes, his face was covered in a faint blue glow. On the screen before him he saw the words "The Epoch of Hatred."