by Charles Dean
Come on, Darwin. That’s just one hand. What about the other? What if I were to describe how you held that poor girl’s neck in that hand before you squeezed? Should I go into detail about how her eyes bulged out, and she gasped for air before her tiny little frame stopped moving?
Darwin gulped. I . . . I didn’t do that. No. He’s lying . . . That couldn’t be me. I wouldn’t do that even if I was in a rage. He tried to calm himself down as he looked around, trying to find any signs of having fought anything to the death. That’s right. This place is filled with people who could fight back. They wouldn’t just let me do that.
Okay, don’t worry. You didn’t. I’d like to say you did, but where would the trust be if I lied to you? No, you didn’t kill anyone. But I have. But I will. I’ll kill them all. In fact, maybe I should stop sending you these messages and come do it right now?
No, you can’t! Darwin managed to momentarily rip his arm free from Daniel’s grasp as his frustration boiled over, but then Kitchens and Daniel both managed to get ahold of it again.
Can’t what? Kill a few NPCs? Because doing that is your job? Or are you going to pretend like you don’t enjoy massacring the poor, little things? I still have the footage from your little war against the Panda King. I made sure to record it, after all.
I had to kill them, they were going to—
I know that face, Darwin. I know that face all too well. Right now, you’re thinking, ‘I had to kill them to protect Alex and the people from Valcrest!’ But is that really the logic of a hero? You had to butcher thousands of people so that a few hundred could survive the night? If it were fifty thousand, would you still have done it? Would you have killed a hundred thousand? A million? Where do you draw the line in your inhuman rampages?
“Let me go!” Darwin yelled aloud as he pulled against his restraints. Kitchens and Daniel complied after a few seconds and Darwin was able to climb back up and onto to his feet.
“You feeling better now?” Kitchens asked as he patted the dirt off Darwin’s back.
Careful, Darwin. I know where they live. The only reason I haven’t killed them yet is that they don’t know that I killed her. They have no information Stephanie could use in linking me to this crime. Don’t make me kill them too just because you need to slake your barbaric thirst for blood. Remember, I’m just like you: I will kill scores to protect the race I deem worthy.
“I’m not barbaric!” Darwin protested at Charles, leaving Kitchens and Daniels to look at him strangely.
“No-one said you were. This happens. It’s a plagued skill; it’s not you.” Daniels tried to comfort his friend, putting a hand on Darwin’s shoulder.
A disease? Is that what they call it? That’s because they don’t know you like I do. They don’t know that your rage, your hunger, isn’t just some passive ability, but your very being. It’s an integral part of your nature that you sated with games until the first opportunity presented itself, and then you just couldn’t help but feed the addiction and take a real man’s life.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about!” Darwin shouted, continuing to repudiate Charles’s stinging accusations.
“Huh?” Daniels asked.
Minx looked over at Fuzzy Wuzzy, who met her glance and gave a roar before the two turned back to face Darwin. “Fuzzy Wuzzy and I both agree. He’s not talking to you. He’s lost it. He’s talking to someone we can’t see.” Minx raised a finger up to her ear and did the crazy motion before looking back at Fuzzy Wuzzy. “No, Fuzzy, what he’s lost can’t be found.”
I don’t know what I’m talking about? Tell me, why didn’t you just hide? Why did you rush to meet the intruder with the first weapon you could find? How about when you came to Tiqpa? Did you try to reason with your first assailant? Or did you consider letting the Minotaurs kill the girl? After all, three permanent deaths to save a girl from one temporary one . . . Does that feel like a fair trade? Did it ever cross your mind that the legion you butchered was real? You accepted that it was a game so quickly you never considered another possibility. You never thought to question the nature and existence of Tiqpa before slaughtering thousands of people. Or are you going to tell me that, in each of those situations, you ‘had’ to kill, that there was ‘no other way’?
Darwin struggled against the facts, but could offer no defense. Ironically, there was no position open for him to play the devil’s advocate. The issue was cut and dry as far as Darwin could see. He was the foul beast, the philistine who mucked about in murder even when lives weren’t on the line. From the day he was born, he had been killing NPCs in one game or another. He killed creations every day that constantly came closer and closer to mirroring his own level of sentience and right to exist.
“You think it’s a new symptom?” Mclean said as she appeared on Darwin’s left, almost stepping out of the shadows as she fiddled around with one of her knives. “Do you think it’s linked to Hunger, or is it connected to a new skill altogether?”
Should I take it from your final silence, your defeated pose and those slumped shoulders that you have come to terms with your nature? Go ahead, Darwin. Admit what you are. Admit you’re the monster that mothers warn their kids about . . . Except you don’t hide under the bed. You raze the whole town. You leave every living thing left in the streets to be massacred just so you don’t have to put in the effort of raising zombie defenders for your people. After all, that would be too much work, wouldn’t it? Look, your sword is in front of you. Just grab it. If you kill yourself, you’ll be trapped by Tiqpa forever, unable to hurt another soul. Why don’t you prove you have a conscience once and for all and save a multitude with one simple blow?
Darwin took a few steps forward and bent down to pick up his burning zweihander.
“Should we just let him hold a sword given, you know, his current mercury-polished-hat personality?” Mclean asked as she juggled her blades back and forth between her hands.
He’s not wrong. This is all I do. This is all I’ve ever done. Murder things. Sure, it’s a game, but are they any less real than I am at this point? Darwin’s blood raced, and his throat seemed to stop pulling in air as a gulp caught halfway down. Charles was right. There was sense in his words--no matter how badly Darwin didn’t want that to be the case.
“Darwin, can you hear us?” Kitchens asked. “Where is Kass when you need her? She’s known him the longest. She might know if this has happened before.”
That’s right. Kass. Even if I do have to take myself out of the equation, I can do it after Charles is dead. I still have to exact vengeance for what he did to her. I'm not the only monster that needs killing.
Did you know one of those first three Minotaurs you killed had a wife, a daughter, two sons and a dog? Well, I wouldn’t exactly call it a ‘dog,’ but it was a loyal pet that was sure to die in a dozen years, so it’s the same difference, right? You should have seen how happy he was with her. How happy they were with him. But your friend, Kass, she tried to end that and take his life for a little bit of EXP. And what did you do? You helped her finish the job. Was it because she was pretty? Were you hoping she’d flip that skirt up for you if you saved her enough times? Or was it because she was human like you . . . like you thought you were.
Darwin marched towards the portal with his sword in hand. He knew what he had to do, and he knew that, even if Charles proved him to be the worse devil, he still needed to kill the man.
It was the human part, wasn’t it? After all, you’re not some creep who thinks that saving a girl’s life entitles you to a round under the covers. No, you saved her because, in the grand scheme of things, it’s always us versus them. It’s always red team versus blue team, black versus white, and you couldn’t let them win.
As angry as Darwin was, the logic Charles pressed on him was sound. He could almost picture the Minotaur with a little daughter riding around on his horns while his two boys played at being warriors with wooden swords. Even as he began his journey deeper into Mt. Lawlheima towards the
portal, towards his vengeance, he could still feel the weight of his conscience pressing against him, punishing him for perceived and known sins. Charles was right. He really was a beast hell-bent on nothing but base revenge.
It’s actually a shame I have to trap you, to imprison you in this world. If it weren’t for Stephanie’s grand plan to eliminate humanity, you could have gone about your days leveling in Tiqpa and played the part of my little, perfect guinea pig for decades. But no, you just couldn’t enjoy the game as it was meant to be played. You had to play by her rules. You had to build a guild. You had to found a nation. You had to follow her despicable vision and turn good, honest, hard-working people into loathsome Demons.
People into demons? Is he talking about NPCs or actual people like Valerie? How is it even possible to turn someone into a demon just by having them play a game? Darwin’s doubt as to whether or not that was even possible gave him a momentary reprieve from the self-hatred that Charles was injecting into him with every word. No, it doesn’t matter why. “No matter what the reason, he has to die.” His thoughts switched from an inner monologue to an open declaration as his face continued to redden. “He has to die.” Darwin reassured himself one last time as Mclean, Daniel, Kitchens and the others walked behind him in his march towards the portal.
“Do you think he even knows we’re here?” Mclean asked Daniel, not even bothering to talk about Darwin in hushed tones. “I mean, if I were to pants him, would he even react?”
“Can you actually pants something with a bathrobe?” Minx tilted her head and looked as if she were trying to find the boxers.
“No, I mean his boxers underneath the bathrobe,” Mclean specified.
You have to kill me no matter what? So harsh. So violent. Even if you agree with me, you can’t alter the action you must take? I’d try to argue with that thinking, but, by your own mouth, you’ve admitted that logic is pointless. I expected as much. I already knew you were nothing more than a mindless beast. I already understood that your kind can’t change. They’re all built from the same program. Immortal, yes, but flawed and capable of terrible variance. It’s an insult that you and Stephanie would ever want to press that immovable script onto a superior race. You should have just stuck to doing what you were so good at: protecting humans from monsters.
Kitchens scowled at Darwin then glanced back at Mclean. “There will be no taking off of his boxers with my daughter around!”
“Relax, Pops,” Minx assured him. “I already checked, and he’s not wearing any boxers for her to pull down.” From the grin on her face, it was hard to tell if she didn’t know how upset that would make Kitchens.
“Wait, where is he heading? That boss was already cleared,” Daniels asked as Darwin trudged determinately towards the room that once housed the great dragon of Mt. Lawlheima.
I guess I really am an unchanging beast bred with one purpose. Darwin continued his march towards his goal when he caught sight of an apparition. It was the king, the one who had first welcomed him to Tiqpa, standing in front of him and fidgeting with his crown.
“The problem is gone now, isn’t it? My champion killed them, and the problem is gone. He just killed them all, and it just went away . . . All you have to do is kill . . .” the odd shade of the king said as Darwin passed him.
“How would you know? Did he show you!” Kitchens fumed louder than an opera singer at the climax of a performance. “Did that pervert take off his robe in front of you?”
“Not yet, Dad, but here’s hoping,” Minx said, continuing to laugh to herself from atop Fuzzy Wuzzy.
Those glazed eyes. I know that look from Eve. What did you see, Darwin? What appeared?
Before Darwin could even guess what he had seen, the image he had passed was once more in front of him, still playing with his crown.
The apparition spoke again: “Am I really a monster? Does doing what is necessary count as an atrocity? Or is it the fact that I took pleasure in doing it that makes me a monster?”. Darwin’s head followed the image as his feet slowed and he listened to what it said. Darwin’s companions were behind him, those who had been with him almost every step of the way, but this man in front of him felt more like kin than any of them--and the king’s questions felt like they were coming from Darwin himself than the man in front of him.
“Qasin . . .” Darwin mouthed as the apparition vanished as quickly as it had appeared, never second-guessing how he knew the name.
Are you having a vision? I thought those were impossible for males. I thought only females had them and only when they came of age and manifested their demonic callousness.
No sooner had Charles asked than Qasin once more appeared in his ghostly form. His hand was no longer adjusting his crown but grasping his sword. Darwin perplexedly stared at the king.
“I will kill them and spare my people,” Qasin said. “I will murder them so that my men will never have to die for petty politics again. If I kill enough of them, my kingdom will never see its armies march to their deaths again.” The king sounded more sure of himself this time, his voice now steady like steel drawn before a fight.
“What’s he looking at now?” Daniel asked in a tone that made one think this was a spectator event, and he didn’t actually expect an answer.
“It feels good to kill,” the ghost-like apparition said, his voice wavering again as he stared at his sword hilt. “It feels so good.”
Darwin found himself mouthing the second line out loud as Qasin said it before the ghost vanished again.
You know, those visions opened my eyes too. They showed me what kind of monsters you are, what kind of evil lurks inside your blood. They showed me why I can never let Stephanie win, why I can never let humanity turn into your kind.
Qasin appeared again, this time his knuckles noticeably whiter from gripping his sword too tightly. “This is why killing has always been the answer. The blade doesn’t lie; it tells only one truth.”
The rushed words didn’t make sense. The context was lost on Darwin, but the truth seemed to resonate within his heart as he listened to Qasin. The king’s grip on his sword loosened, and he stared right through Darwin. “Let him think he is right. Our champion will destroy him,” he said before vanishing again.
I was his champion, and it may have just been proclaimed by him without my consent, but I never denied the title either as he threw me to the battlefield. And I did do it . . . through violence. I saved the Humans of that land from the White-Wings, from certain destruction. It may have only been picking the winner and loser, but it was still a choice, an action that saved them. Darwin started to feel more confident in himself as he felt the king’s words echoing through him.
After all, it was those visions that broke my sweet Lilith. Those visions that tricked her into killing her best friend, twisting her into depression. It was those visions that made her into what she is today, and you want to take part in pushing that fate upon all mankind?
As Darwin nearly finished his march, he came across another vision of Qasin, this time standing right at the entrance to the stairway, blocking his path. “When a problem rears its head, Darwin will slay it. That’s how great men solve their problems. They eradicate them.” Qasin unsheathed his sword and took off his crown.
As Darwin stood in front of the man, not able to move around him, the king extended his blade and crown until Darwin grabbed them. As Darwin instinctively put the crown on his head, his eyes met the king’s again, and he found himself speaking in sync with Qasin as he said one more line before vanishing: “The blade doesn’t lie; it tells only one truth.”
“Uhh . . . Did you guys just see him randomly get a crown and a sword?” Daniel asked.
“Yeah, they just kind of appeared out of nowhere. Is that even possible? Did he have them in his inventory this whole time?” Kitchens said with a shrug.
It seems it was more than just a vision that has occupied your attention and distracted you from your supposed goal of killing me. Let’s hope that, now tha
t you have your pretty trinkets, you will finally do what you always do: try to kill someone. I don’t think we need to establish again that that’s all you abominations are good for. Come on now. I’m waiting for you.
Darwin needed no more encouragement as he sprinted down the stairs that lead to the portal room.
That’s a good boy, Darwin, but we can’t have uninvited guests, now can we? After all, I’m still trying to keep my identity a secret.
Darwin barely heard the shocked voices behind him. He could make out Daniel’s muffled complaints as he likely yelled, “What the heck? Where did this wall come from?”
So he’s going to make it a one-on-one? Figures. They always make you build up a great team, get comfortable with a combination, and then separate you from them just before a boss fight, Darwin laughed to himself. His earlier self-doubt had melted away almost instantly when the crown touched his head, and Qasin’s sword entered his hands. He gripped the blade tighter, almost chuckling at the name: Steel Clemency. Is it implying that I’m forgiving the people I kill, or forgiving myself for killing them? It doesn’t matter though. “Come, my steel brother. It seems our journey has yet to end.” He smiled as he spoke lovingly to his new sword.
“It’s about time you made it here.” Charles was away on a laptop at a desk that was conveniently placed to the side of the portal. “I was beginning to think you’d stood me up on our first big date alone,” he laughed.
“You didn’t have to kill Kass, you know.” Darwin held out his blade, readying it as he faced off against Charles. He cautiously approached the other man, edging closer, inch-by-inch. He wanted to charge in and slash Charles, but something about the whole situation felt off. He wanted me here. He wanted me alone, and I came. I need to kill him, but what does he have planned? Darwin’s eyes darted left and right as he tried to find a clue as to what trap Charles had laid. He didn’t come here unprepared, did he?