MMORPG : Ancient WORLD

"While I was busy doing tests on those abnormal creatures, knowing it could be a mana disease or very well the work of someone intelligent, I was given a mission by Lady Enigma to keep watch on the barren island,"

"I was also told that the creatures were called the devourer beast and their three development stages and even for what cause they were being cultivated, which was to devourer organic matter and convert that into life force energy,"

"I was made clear that the devourer beats were not transformed because of natural cause, but they were turned into those monstrosities by individuals from a Race of heartless nightmares who grew by devouring life force, and even a few of them were enough to plunge the world into an apocalypse,"

"I kept watch on the island, and in the following few months, I saw those thousands of creature devourer beasts consume all life forms, to the last of plants they could reach, but they didn't stop at just that and moved to consume each other,"

"At the end of three years, Only fourteen creatures were left alive, each having enough brute strength to rival the majority of early-stage elemental Rulers while they had enough vitality to recover from even the most severe injuries,"

"After a total of four years of wait, a single individual arrived at the hidden underground Ecosystem, and all the beasts gathered around him like obedient dogs while I watched in disbelief how that man cloaked those colossal creatures in a layer of a strange dark energy,"

"I stood in disbelief because the man who arrived was the man I saw as a loved one, an individual as close to a son as I could have, the man we all know as Ahrimon."

"I was shaken knowing that Ahrimon was responsible for cultivating creatures that were a bane to life, but I comforted myself with the fact that he might be forced into this situation and didn't share with us because of the nature of it,"

"But I was quickly told by Lady Enigma that Ahrimon, whom I knew, had died long ago and who I was looking at, was no more than a monster,"

"A Monster whose only desire was to live," Elder Ezekiel stated, his voice maintaining its usual calm, and after a brief pause, he went on.

"I was entrusted with the responsibility of observing Ahrimon while Lady Enigma shared her insights with Ahura. Much like myself, Ahura didn't believe that his brother was the monster he was portrayed as," 

"But we knew better to take the words of Lady Enigma lightly, so although we both approached the situation seriously, our methods differed,"

"While I was ready to eliminate Ahrimon if he proved to be a threat to my world, Ahura, who knew much more than me about how much of a threat Ahrimon was but didn't have the heart to take correct measures against his brother,"

"As years went by, I witnessed Ahrimon laying waste to dozens of islands and causing the deaths of millions of creatures. Each time I saw him consume those cultivated beings, gaining strength from their demise, it altered my perception of him,"

"Once, I regarded him as an honorable warrior, a man of discipline and loyalty. However, observing his insatiable greed, the sinister desire in his eyes, and the malevolence and ruthlessness he harbored while devouring those monstrosities, I realized he had transformed into an entirely different man from the one I once knew."

"Over the years, Ahura tried to bring his brother back to his senses by offering him help in his own ways, and when he saw that the situation was not improving, he chose to confront his brother."

"Ahura created a fake situation of how he was being given the mission to kill his brother, and if not completed, he would lose his status as the Ruler, and they had a lengthy conversation which I am not privy to,"

"After the meeting, Ahrimon told us how his new devourer bloodline was like a curse to him as he now couldn't harness worldly laws, and he was constantly experiencing a gradual, relentless drain on his life force,"

"He needed to cultivate those monstrosities to stay alive because even inside the law isolation, he was losing life force, which was getting worse as time passed, so even though he acknowledged that consuming creatures was changing him, he had no choice,"

"Ahrimon told us that he wouldn't kill himself, so to live, he would keep creating farms on isolated islands with just magical creatures until the day he reaches the transcendent Rank and leaves this world and then search the wider galaxy for a cure to his curse,"

"He also told me and other strong individuals that if one day he went rouge and became a threat, they are welcome to kill him and went on to share his weakness and strength,"

"So even though I didn't trust him completely, I kept watch on him while hopping he was not lying, and he truly was the monster that I was told,"

"Time passed, and Ahrimon did as he told us, or so he made it appear, and one day, he asked Ahura to meet him in person as he was planning to enter a solution to prepare for the transcendent trail,"

"I, with Nurvyn, the supreme elder of the Dragon clan, the only man who could stand toe to toe with me, accompanied Ahura to meet with Ahrimon,"

"The island we went to was already cloaked in the barrier that none of us was able to sense as we entered, and on the island, we were welcomed with a sight of hundreds of dark pools that vanished, leaving behind hundreds of elemental Rulers with some of them being the demons and the majority being devourer nightmarish creatures,"

"The demons and devourers rushed to attack me, Nurvyn, while more and more devourer beasts continued to arrive and kept coming at us in waves,"

"We slaughtered them by the thousands with ease, but it was exactly what Ahrimon wanted as the barrier was consuming their remaining soul energy to empower itself that Ahrimon used to unleash an attack directly targeting our souls,"

"Ahrimon tried to reason with his brother, but after the attack, even that fool realized that the brother he knew had died long ago and now before them was just a monster,"

"So after he thanked me for everything and told me to take care, he used his soul as the source to break the barrier and forcefully send me Nurvyn to the Malefis Domain, and minutes later, I sensed his soul disappear, marking his death," Elder Ezekiel spoke, tears glistening in his eyes, and his voice quivering with overwhelming emotions.

After hearing Elder Ezekiel's detailed account of how things went, Alex couldn't help but feel that Ahrimon's story appeared more fabricated than he thought would be possible. 

This realization filled him with a mixture of wild emotions, questions, relief, and a sense of weight being lifted from his mind.

Alex also learned about many major things, with the best being the identity of the entity responsible for picking him as the Ruler and granting him vast opportunities.

The questions placed in his mind by Ahrimon like a poison were still present, but now he held onto a glimmer of hope for finding the answers to them.

But more than everything else, now, his mind was occupied with a question as to why a manipulator and cunning individual who could trick old monsters told him a false story, which could be proven wrong with solid facts.