Reasons of Evil

by Dennis Jode

  He also needed to protect Gallohall better. Last time, he did not even notice that there were already people inside Gallohall. He only noticed them when they entered the castle, which was covered by a veil of black smoke.

  He tried to spread out the black smoke to cover the entirety of Gallohall, but the amount of smoke wasn’t enough.

  Grimmere summoned one of his subjects. Almost instantaneously, one of them formed right in front of him.

  “How do I create more darkness?”, Grimmere asked the figure.

  “The darkness must devour in order to grow.” the figure replied. After hearing this, Grimmere immediately went to the area where they kept all of their livestock.

  He concentrated all of the black smoke that covered Gallohall into a ball. He then pushed the ball towards some of the livestock. The ball slowly floated towards the livestock, and as soon as they come in contact with it, their bodies look like they are sucked towards the ball. Not a trace remained of any of the animals.

  The ball did indeed grow bigger, but only for a little bit. Grimmere spread out the black smoke around Gallohall once again, and it was still far from being enough.

  He needed to let the darkness devour more in order to grow, but he did not want to invade a kingdom yet.

  The citizens of the kingdom are innocent after all. Despite being told by the darkness that the people it devoured were in peace, his conscience still told him that it was wrong. He wasn’t affected by it much, but he still liked to listen to what little piece of humanity he had left.

  After all, he himself knew that he was something that was already far from human, but he did not want to completely throw away his humanity.

  He gathered the smoke around Gallohall once again, retaining the smoke around the castle. He prepared to go on a journey.

  He gathered multiple supplies and prepared to leave on a journey.

  If he couldn’t devour humans, he should devour something else. Something that could appease his conscience and be populated enough to grow the black smoke by a large margin.

  And there is something that fits all of the criteria above.

  Grimmere brought a small amount of supplies with him and began moving towards the place where large groups of monsters gather. He was on his way to the Demon Lord’s castle.

  Even though defeating the Demon Lord in his previous life caused multiple wars in his previous life, he was still preparing to defeat him. After all, the monsters are not the only threat to humanity.

  He himself was another threat.

  CHAPTER 6

  After almost two weeks’ worth of traveling, Grimmere finally arrived at the Demon Lord’s castle.

  A large area covered in smog. In the smog were the remains of what used to be a large kingdom. One even larger than Gallohall. The trees were all withered and the soil looked clearly infertile. In the far end of the smog was a large silhouette of a castle.

  Grimmere walked in the smog. At first, he felt sharp, stinging pain all over his skin, but it slowly went away after. The smog was so concentrated, it irritates the skin of humans.

  He knew about this beforehand, since he experienced the same situation in his previous life. Before, he felt his life being slowly chipped away the more he stayed in the area, but now, after feeling a bit of pain, he didn’t seem affected anymore.

  He spread out the black smoke to cover himself. Moments later, he was inside a sphere of black smoke. As he moves, the sphere would follow him.

  As he continued walking towards the castle, multiple monsters started attacking him from all directions, but as soon as they approach, the black smoke around Grimmere would instantly reach out towards the monsters and eat away at their bodies.

  The sphere around Grimmere became bigger and bigger as he continued walking while being attacked by the monsters. Thousands upon thousands of monsters charged towards him, but he effortlessly strode through them.

  The amount of monsters seemed endless, but he was hardly having any difficulty dealing with them. He remembered that in his previous life, he was forced to pave a path through the seemingly infinite waves of monsters that greeted him.

  He was covered in blood as he continued casting spells and swinging his sword for multiple days, before being able to enter the Demon Lord’s castle.

  He also wanted to use large scale spells back then, but because of the smog, he knew that he wouldn’t have enough time to cast it. If he did, he wouldn’t have been able to heal himself and would die by the time the first wave of monsters attacked.

  Now, only a few hours had passed, and he was already in front of the Demon Lord’s castle.

  The castle looked eerie. It was made out of stone and covered by moss all over.

  A large wooden door stood in front of Grimmere. The amount of monsters attacking him became less and less, so he decided to retract the black smoke, back to looking like a cloak, but this time, it was seemingly thicker. He cast a spell to increase his physical capabilities and pushed the large wooden door with ease.

  The monsters came rushing towards the open door, which was slowly closing by itself.

  The smoke that covered Grimmere’s body started moving towards the monsters.

  As the darkness was eating away at the monsters that entered, it didn’t even look like smoke anymore. Instead, it looked like a black flame that burned everything in its path.

  The door fully came to a close, and all of the monsters that entered were being eaten by the darkness.

  Grimmere cast a spell to detect any presence within the castle.

  Just like before, there were 13 moving beings. The one at the very top had a very powerful presence, so it was obviously the Demon Lord. The other 12 also had powerful presences. He himself knew how much power each one of these monsters had.

  The difficulty of dealing with each one of the monsters in the castle cannot compare to the almost endless army of monsters outside the castle.

  He started walking in the castle. After a while, he was met with a large iron door. There were huge dents from inside the door, coming from one of the monsters.

  He calmly pushed the door open and sent in the black smoke. It didn’t take long before the entire room was covered in black smoke. A loud scream of pain came from inside the room, but Grimmere couldn’t see what was inside due to the thickness of the smoke.

  After a few minutes, the cries abruptly came to a stop. Grimmere retracted the black smoke. Not even a single trace of whatever was inside the room was left.

  In the back of the room was an incredibly long spiral staircase that went up, which lead towards the second monster.

  Grimmere didn’t have time to individually deal with all of the monsters. He had to get back to Gallohall before the first wave of soldiers started attacking it.

  He spread out the black smoke. The smoke moved up to the next floor and covered as much of the castle as he could.

  The ground started shaking. Multiple cries could be heard echoing around the castle. After the cries stopped, he continued spreading the smoke to the other areas.

  The darkness grew bigger and bigger as it devoured more of the monsters in the castle. Moments later, the entire castle was already filled with black smoke.

  Suddenly, an ominous feeling washed over Grimmere. He looked up and saw something falling from the top.

  He cast a spell that increased his speed and immediately ran back out of the iron door.

  A huge explosion blew away as the falling figure landed in room where the first monster resided.

  A tall, slender man stood in the middle of the explosion. His skin was almost as pale as snow. He had long, white hair. On his head was a golden crown with covered with multiple splatters of blood.

  His eyes were covered by a cloth, which had bloodstains where the eyes should be, and his mouth was sewn shut. On his chest, a large bloodshot eyeball could be seen.

  Underneath it, a sword pierced where his stomach should be. The sword was incredibly long, even longer than the leng
th of a spear.

  Grimmere immediately recognized the man in front of him. It was the Demon Lord.

  The Demon Lord pulled out the sword that pierced his stomach. The scene looked incredibly gruesome,as the pale white skin started getting dyed red from the blood oozing out from the wound. The sword’s length did not help the case, as the wound grew bigger the more he pulled out his sword.

  When he fully pulled out the sword, his internal organs could clearly be seen. If that was experienced by a human, they would surely wince, or even pass out from the pain, but the Demon Lord remained expressionless.

  Moments later, something that looked like thread started erupting from beside the large wound by the Demon Lord’s stomach. His wound was immediately sewn shut.

  This was one of the reasons why the Demon Lord was a troublesome opponent. The cuts he receives gets instantly sewn shut, and he doesn’t feel any pain.

  Before the Demon Lord could make its first move, Grimmere sent a large amount of black smoke to cover him.

  The Demon Lord stood there, his pale skin was slowly getting eaten away by the darkness. Multiple threads started erupting from his body and started sewing the places the darkness damaged.

  Despite being covered by the black smoke, the Demon Lord still charged towards Grimmere.

  He wasn’t even close yet, but when the Demon Lord swung his sword, Grimmere knew he had to dodge. The Demon Lord’s sword had incredible reach. Grimmere tumbled backwards and continued sending more and more black smoke.

  The Demon Lord seemed unaffected, but Grimmere knew that he was taking damage. The Demon Lord continued attacking. He even started using magic.

  Flames started flying towards Grimmere, and the ground underneath him started crumbling. Multiple skeletons started making its way out of the ground, but Grimmere simply covered the ground with the black smoke, which devoured anything that attempted to rise up.

  As Grimmere continued dodging the Demon Lord’s sword, he slowly increased the concentration of the black smoke around the Demon Lord.

  It didn’t take long before the Demon Lord’s pale skin could no longer be seen. His entire body, except for the large eye on his chest, was covered with the dark thread that closed all of his wounds.

  The eye looked even more bloodshot, and even had a few threads that sewed some damage on it. Blood was dripping from the ends of the threads on the eye.

  The eye represents the Demon Lord’s power. If it becomes fully covered, or when it closes, the Demon Lord’s power is completely empty.

  Grimmere was once again astonished as to how much stronger he was. In his previous battle with the Demon Lord, it took him a few days before he could even see the first thread on the eye. But now, it only took a few minutes to inflict multiple wounds on it.

  The Demon Lord continued attacking, but the difference in power was already as clear as day. The black smoke that covered the Demon Lord became thicker and thicker, and the eye on his chest started getting covered by threads faster and faster the more the fight went on.

  After a few hours, the eye on the chest of the Demon Lord was completely covered by the thread. The Demon Lord stopped swinging his sword and stopped casting magic.

  The thread that covered the Demon Lord started becoming undone. The eye on his chest was closed, and underneath the thread, the interior of his body was exposed. His bones and had innards could clearly be seen being eaten away by the black smoke.

  As the thread that sealed his mouth became undone, he expected to hear the same words that he heard from the Demon Lord the first time he defeated him, but what happened next was something that was completely out of Grimmere’s expectations.

  As the Demon Lord’s body was slowly being eaten away, he took off his crown and raised it towards Grimmere.

  “You are next in line.” the Demon Lord said.

  Before Grimmere could ask anything else, the remains of the Demon Lord’s body turned into dust, which was devoured by the black smoke.

  The crown fell to the ground and rolled over towards Grimmere.

  As if it was instinct, he immediately picked up the crown.

  Suddenly, multiple voices started flowing through his head.

  “You are worthy.”

  “The world is in your hands.”

  “Maintain the balance of the world.”

  The voices all said similar things, but there were too many of them. Grimmere’s head felt like splitting. His head was processing all the information that came from the crown without his control.

  Moments later, the voices came to a complete stop. Grimmere immediately knew the truth of the world.

  The world was repeating a vicious cycle.

  The thoughts he had before was true.

  Humans are naturally evil by birth.

  They were made to act for their own self benefit. If left alone, they would ultimately end up destroying themselves.

  And so, the world required another force to maintain the balance, and that was the Demon Lord.

  In the face of peril, humans would join hands and face the enemy together, but as soon as the threat is removed, they would revert back to their roots. Only in a stalemate would the world find peace.

  But peace is not what the humans want. They want freedom.

  Once in a while, a human would be given the ability to break free from this vicious cycle. The other humans would use the chosen one to grant them the freedom they have always wanted. They would call the special human their hero.

  The stalemate between the humans and the Demon Lord will be broken by the hero, and the humans will start destroying themselves once again, but the hero will always be burdened by the weight of his or her sin, after seeing the humans eliminate themselves from the world out of greed.

  The hero will find a way to repent for his sins, and will give birth to a new world, and the hero will then try to fix the mistakes that he or she did before. After that, they learn the truth of the world.

  And now it was Grimmere’s turn.

  He has to be the one to keep the peace.

  No one in this world could oppose him. He did not know that the most peaceful times that humanity could have was when the Demon Lord was alive. He still felt regret from his actions in his previous life, but now, he finally had a chance to redeem himself.

  Letting him spill blood himself would be better than letting the humans do it to themselves.

  All he had to do was stay alive, and the world will be at the most peaceful state it could be. All he had to do was take all the hatred from the humans, to avoid them from showing each other hostility. He just needed to show the humans a reason to fear him.

  He put the crown on his head and made his way back to Gallohall.

  He was now the one that maintained the world’s balance.

  The birth of the new Demon Lord.

  “We’re all waiting for your signal, Your Highness.”

  A large army of soldiers were tensed up, preparing to invade Gallohall.

  “As soon as we get out of this forest, Gallohall will be in our sights.” the general told the king of Ravengard.

  The king nodded. He had a big smile on his face. He knew that they were the first one to assemble an army, so if the attack succeeded, everything in Gallohall would belong to him.

  “Let’s not waste any more time. As soon as we see Gallohall, commence the attack.” the king told the general, who bowed and commanded the rest of the army. The king sat nonchalantly on his horse.

  As they continued marching towards Gallohall, they noticed that the area around them slowly turned eerie.

  The luscious greenery that was around them just a few moments ago turned into a dark and desolate place. The trees around them showed signs of withering, and there was a dreadful feeling washing over the entirety of the army.

  The area became more and more devoid of life the further they marched.

  After a few hours, they were supposed to have Gallohall within their sights, but what greeted them was
completely different.

  Where Gallohall’s walls once stood was a thick black smoke swirling around the area. It looked like a large black dome.

  “W-what the hell…?”, the king couldn’t help but be shocked at what he was looking at.

  They continued moving closer. When they got close enough, they could see small gaps within the swirling smoke. Inside the black veil, there were crops and livestock.

  The residences looked untouched, but there was nobody inside, except for what seemed like shadowy figures moving around.