When I was young, I was visited by a carousel of spiritualists and intellectuals. They examined me, performed their rituals, but no expert or charlatan could explain my birth. It was up to me to investigate my own nature. My Father, the Duke, allowed me whatever books I wanted, and soon I asked for more; feathered books, ancient tomes, and still-older scrolls. I think he indulged me because it kept me in my cage, so from behind the bars of my pad-locked chamber, I was free to wonder at the nature of the world and myself. There was a darkness in me, of that I was certain, but I hoped to overcome it through disciplined learning.
I held the belief that it could be surmounted until my encounter with Ghost. I had been mistaken from my very inception. I was not born, I was made. I was an NPC; the next antagonist of a story repeated a trillion times. Ghost offered his cryptic instructions and left. I was abandoned to wonder again about my existence. My ‘life,’ my curse, the deaths of my family—which haunted me—and my violent nature were elements of a game. I let my grief flow into the morning, until I had no more tears to shed.
What tragic fate, I thought. All of my hope was for nothing, and all hope across the world, be it for newly-weds or newborn babies, was also pointless. In a few years, I would become what Ghost predicted. I knew it was true. I would bury the world in corpses and turn its water red with blood. I knew I could not prevent it, but I had to turn it. I had to push and give purpose to the dream I had awoken in.
For the next two years, from the age of 8 to 10, I was dedicated to learning about myself as an NPC. My crucial task was to explore the extent of my binding scripts, what I understood as fate or destiny. Since I didn’t know what encounters were meant to happen, I had to guess. By wandering with no destination, it was inevitable that I would encounter my first black out. My vision turned dark, my thoughts stood still, and when next I woke, I was surrounded by corpses. I’d killed a mob of underworld types, thieves and gangsters. Those that survived had submitted to me by the compulsion of my cursed eyes, what Ghost called the Eyes of the Emperor. I spent the next day locked in the room of the former ringleader, wondered to myself what had happened. I concluded that it was a part of the story and whatever orchestrated the game had forcibly moved me to my fate. That was the power of a script.
There was a knock at my door. I told the visitor to leave, but the door lock unlatched itself. It was my second meeting with Ghost. He knew about my encounter with what he called the Director. He said I couldn’t avoid plot points, key moments of my story that defined my character. I asked him for a list of the rest, but he was reluctant to continue.
“The demon emperor’s background isn’t a children’s story,” Ghost had said. “It’s dark thing and if you hear it, you may regret your decision.”
“Do I look like a child to you?” I asked, reptilian eyes fixed on his face. “We both know I’m an NPC. If you want me to play along, I’ll need to know everything. What I will do and what I will become.”
Ghost made a wide smile, but he wasn’t happy to hear my commitment, he had planned all along to tell me. He just liked to tease me.
Armed with foreknowledge of my plot points, I tested against them. When I was meant to be somewhere, I chartered a ship on a month-long journey to another continent. Five-hundred miles away from port and my vision goes dark, and I awake to find months had passed. I started hiring assistants to watch me when the black outs happened, to keep notes on my actions and behavior. By their observations the scripted version of myself was wasteful and cruel, and while I had no memory of my black-out episodes, my scripted self was aware of me.
For a time, I felt powerless to stop my evil caricature. However, I had insight that my other self lacked. It was clear to me by descriptions from my observers that he was intelligent, but not educated. The scripted version of myself was likely written to have given up on studying tomes after the fire that destroyed my first home. It was my education that inspired a novel idea, one week before I was scripted to destroy a certain town. I sent forth my raiders and ordered them to evacuate the village. Then, the day it was scripted to fall, we rode out and destroyed it.
I didn’t suffer a black out. Ghost had been careful with his words and told me exactly what the script instructed. Destruction of the buildings satisfied its conditions. I realized then what Ghost had meant by pushing and altering fate’s course. Little by little I could change the sum of my own script, even if my end was predetermined. I felt a small hope when I watched the village burn, but I knew that the hardest condition, the most dreadful, would require many lives. The demon emperor was meant to kill one billion people by the end of his conquest. One village was spared, but many had to fall.
However painful it was; however terrible it was, I told myself it had to be done. Yet, as the bodies piled, I felt it wasn’t enough to preach in my heart the necessity of my vile massacres. I felt I had to do some good for the survivors. I invested in governance and balanced my enormous strength on the battlefield with an equal legislative might.
That was how I created a modern capital, Darigon, where my magic powered every facet of life. Magic-light street lamps lit dark streets at night, magical aqueducts that produced limitless fresh water, and magical fires that heated plumbing throughout the city. My generals organized a force of political knights that kept my well-defined districts free of crime, and I went so far as to open schools and academies, enormous public bath houses, and public parks for art and greenery. I even allowed a congress of lords, elected by the noble class, to propose laws for the city and the realm.
I was feared and hated. The rebellion that ended my life was proof of that, but strangely, I was revered as well. There were no gods in our world, so after a time I was considered a force of nature. The citizens of the Demon Empire didn’t blame me, like they didn’t blame a monsoon for its torrential rain. They clung to me as I conquered the world and clutched me even harder when I snuffed the last free kingdom. As I rode down the avenue with my army and the throngs celebrated my final victory, I nearly deluded myself into thinking that my world was a better world. No hunger and no war, no deep poverty or severe illness. I had brought peace and prosperity to the entire world. Even if I had killed so many, was I truly a villain?
It was then that I saw that boy for the first time. He was a former prince, captured in my last siege. From far away I could sense the magic that swelled within him, and I could feel his hatred and fear. It brought a strange smile to my face.
Few could detect the full extent of the aura I unleashed, fewer still could sense it painlessly, but he held the balcony and stared me through. I liked the look in his eyes. It reminded me of what I really was. Not a wise king or enlightened dictator, not a savior to the NPCs of that perverse world, but its villain. I was the demon emperor. I could not save the world from its creators; I could only avenge it, and spite them.
My life, all its pains, its tragedies, and horrors, culminated in resisting the god Achlesial. It took one billion NPCs to deliver one word and deny that god the satisfaction of dominating my mind. I thought that was enough, but then she appeared: Amy, the arkitect, an avatar of the god Amarytha. She was someone I was sworn to resist, but one look with my Eyes of Emperor confirmed her words were genuine; we were not enemies, but old friends.
Amy took it on herself to fight in my stead, and I felt hope I had long denied myself. If it was in her hands, those of a heroine, perhaps my centuries old wish could come true; my world could be saved from the tyranny of its makers. That feeling didn’t die with her defeat. In my final moments I was blessed with inspiration. Words Ghost had said so long ago felt true for the first time: That we could make anything of failure. I took up Amy’s sword.
I would fail like the hero I wanted to be.
