The Demon Lord And His Hero

Rowan arrived late at night when Syryn was already asleep. He slipped into bed only to realise that a redhead was wedged between him and Syryn.

"Hello Rowan," Red said in a whisper. "Why are you late?"

The surprised blond answered honestly. "Duty."

"Is that so?" Red shuffled closer to Rowan so Syryn wouldn't hear them speak.

"What else would keep me busy, Lucien?" Rowan asked with some amusement.

"A late-night orgy."

Despite the inappropriateness of it, he couldn't help but smile. "Of course. I had a wonderful time."

The redhead made a hmph sound. "Take me with you next time."

"Is that what you stayed up to ask me?" The anti mage inquired.

"No. I wanted to ask you what you plan to do with Syryn."

"You mean his demon half?"

"Mmm."

"I don't have an answer for that yet."

"So he continues to battle it till one day he loses to it?"

"The ideal situation would be to satisfy the demon or suppress its urges with a balancing artefact," Rowan replied in a hush.

"Such magic doesn't exist. It sounds too good to be true."

Rowan was silent. It seemed to Red that he was thinking deeply about something.

"Do you know where demons come from? Or how the first demon was born?" Rowan asked the redhead.

Red shook his head. He'd taken it for granted that demons existed as long as humans had.

"Demons come from another plane of existence. Nobody knows how or why they were born."

"Well, what if I told you then that demons once used to be humans?"

"How can that be possible? I don't want to be fed some cliched story about corruption turning humans to demons," Red scoffed. "There are many tales that say the same but I don't buy them."

"But Lucien, don't you think that perhaps there is a grain of truth in the old tales?"

"Maybe," the redhead conceded. "But such a theory only leaves more questions unanswered."

"Let me tell you a tale then, one you've never heard of before. It begins with a human man, a sorcerer who was called Ioran."

"Wait, how old is this tale?" Lucien interrupted.

"Older than the oldest civilisation that has any written record of their history."

"So is this an orally transmitted tale?"

"No. There were no witnesses to Ioran's tale."

The redhead squinted at Rowan. "Are you making this up?"

"I promise I'm not," Rowan smiled at the child.

"But then if Ioran didn't tell anyone about it, and no one saw what happened to him, how do you know about his tale?"

"Shhh, you might wake up Syryn," Rowan whispered. "And you'll just have to believe me, Lucien. Would you like to hear the tale or not?" The anti mage asked.

"Fine, I'll consider it a bedtime story."

Rowan began his story and Red listened.

"Ioran was a powerful sorcerer and the leader to a large community of tribesmen. Every man, woman, and animal feared Ioran's powers because he could change the course of a river, summon lightning from the clouds, and he could even cut down mountains with a swing of his arm."

"What kind of a power is that? How did the mountain get cut down?"

"I don't know. That's what makes him more mysterious doesn't it?"

"I guess," Red replied.

"Ioran should have been satisfied with the power he had but he wasn't. He wanted the ability to raise the dead, to become as powerful as the denizens of the heavens."

"So he wanted to be a necromancer?"

"No, he wanted to raise a corpse into a living person as if it never died. Necromancy can't do that."

"True."

"So Ioran decided he needed more power. He searched high and low for magical artefacts and spells that could aid him in his search for power but he found none. Then one day, he was struck by the realisation that the human soul could be a potent source of magic."

"Of course. I knew it was heading towards this."

Rowan smiled, "tales about demons seldom head in a positive direction. Anyway, Ioran first killed his wife and trapped her soul inside her decomposing body. He spent many days trying to refine the soul into magic but he failed to do so. Ioran knew that the soul would be freed if the body decomposed into a skeleton so he did something else that was so cruel it gave birth to a foetal form of what we now know as a demon."

Despite himself, Red found that he was completely riveted to the tale. "What?" He whispered.

"Ioran severed her soul into tiny little pieces."

"But how?"

"A spell created by the sorcerer in an ancient language that no longer exists as it did in his time. Immortals have tried to replicate such magic but until we completely understand the rules of the ancient language, we will never have powers like that which Ioran held."

It left him with a lot to ponder about but Red saved his questions for after the end of the tale. "He divided her soul, then what?"

"Each soul fragment fought to unite with the others. And in that desire to become one again, it birthed a hunger in the soul fragments that could only be satisfied by the unity of all the pieces."

"So each soul," Red whispered as he figured out what Rowan was implying, "became a demon, driven by insatiable hunger and desire."

"Not entirely a demon but we're getting there. The wicked sorcerer absorbed the fragments but it still wasn't enough. Saving one child, he killed every single member of the tribe that he ruled. All of their souls were fragmented and absorbed till Ioran finally felt he was powerful enough to raise the dead."

"Let me guess, that one child left alive was his guinea pig."

"Yes," Rowan replied, "he slew the child and then laid the body upon an altar washed in the blood of the slain boy. Ioran spoke his words of magic and forced the child to open its eyes. Alas, no matter how powerful you are, the law of the universe is greater. Not even his ill-gotten magic could compel the law. The child did wake up but he was still undead and now infected by the hunger that plagued the souls."

Red's eyes widened. "Is the child-" he forgot they were still whispering.

"Shhh. It's just a tale, right?" Rowan pressed a finger to the child's lips. "This hunger was an infection that even the deities could not afford to touch because even they would not be spared from its effects."

"But aren't they all-powerful?" Lucien asked.

"I can't answer that," Rowan said in a wistful tone.

"What happened next?!"

"Ioran was struck by the wrath of the law. He perished, and then the fragmented souls gathered inside the body of the little boy who held a single fragment of soul that Ioran had put inside him."

"An undead little boy holding the power of so many souls.. but without having to face the wrath of the law. I wonder if that made him lucky or unlucky.."