New Eden: Live to Play, Play to Live

943  Horrific Realization n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

Alex looked at David with a perplexed expression.

Even if by logic of time travel, the weaker demon lord would make sense, however sense they could make from actual time travel, he remained unconvinced.

"How can we be sure about this?"

David's brow furrowed in a deep frown as he stared back at Alex.

"What do you mean? It's simple logic. His spell wasn't complete, and too many things about it were forced out of place for it to work properly. Even though the demon lord is bound to have appeared again, it won't be the same, and he will be weaker."

Alex shook his head, his mind looking at the problem differently.

"What if what we sent in time, sorry, what I sent in time, was weaker at first but poses a much greater threat?"

David was confused.

"How could something weaker pose more of a threat?" he asked, his eyebrows furrowing deeper yet again.

"If the first time Zagan traversed time, he came out as himself, but stronger, he would have strived to become a demon lord that rules over everything. One that invades worlds to rule over bigger lands. But what about someone who isn't Zagan?"

David realized he had indeed said that it was a possibility that Zagan's mind hadn't come out on top during this spell misfire.

"The other demons in the ring were all weaker than Zagan. What difference would it make?" he asked, shrugging.

"I'm not afraid of them. I'm afraid of the single other being that Zagan dragged with him. One that was not bound by their ideologies. One that had much grander ambitions in life, that were only crushed by his mortality.

"A mortality that a demon body would have nipped in the bud…" Alex said, his voice quivering.

David thought about it for a second and realized who he meant.

His face darkened.

"Even if it is him that controls the demon body they now share, would he truly be a danger to us?" he asked.

David had never met Solomon. Even if the legends about him depicted him as a mighty mage, and an all-knowing sage, time would have assuredly withered that strength away.

Then a thought occurred to him.

Time. The one element that this spell had given to the transferee.

"Would Solomon even let the demons invade the realms? That seems out of character from an old man who strived to protect the people from the demons in the first place, millennia ago, no?" David asked, his hands getting damp.

"Solomon always held a deep hatred for Gaius. My fear isn't that he is invading worlds for the thrill of it. I think he knows more about demons than most. Solomon might be aware of who created them…" Alex said, his face turning serious.

David frowned at that statement.

"Created them? What are you talking about?"

"So you weren't aware…" Alex said, sighing.

"Aware of what?"

"The demons. They didn't just appear out of thin air."

"I know that, dumbass. Demons are corrupted souls. Evil people, who, upon death, let their impure thoughts take over, and demonized. At least, that is what history tells us," David said, looking at him like he was speaking nonsense.

Alex shook his head.

"That might be true for the demons that appear now. But the first demon wasn't like that. I saw something when the soul remnant of Psyche kept me alive. I think they were memories. And one of them was a memory of Gaius, before he became so bitter…

"A memory of something he tried creating, to impress Psyche. To show her he could be like her."

David's face scrunched up in disbelief.

"Alex, you are saying a lot of things that make no sense. The soul remnant of Psyche kept you alive? You say that like it was inside you… I know she took you under her wing, but that is going too far. You are saying you shared a soul with a goddess…"

Alex huffed lightly.

"Believe what you want. I know what I saw. Gaius created the first demon soul. He was attempting to create a soul, to impress Psyche, and failed. I don't think demons would have ever existed without his intervention."

David shrugged, his face almost mocking.

"So? Even if what you say is true, what does that change? I'm sure that only means the demons can't do shit to him. What does that have to do with Solomon and his return to the past with a demon body?"

Alex looked at him intently.

"That is exactly it. What if Solomon is in control of the demon body? Doesn't that mean he isn't under that rule? What if Solomon is as weak as you think, but is invading other worlds to change that? What if his plan reaches another level entirely?"

David frowned.

"Like what? Kill Gaius? That would give us a favour. And even if that is true, only gods can kill gods. Unless they have god-killing weapons, which, you guessed it, come from gods as well," he said, smirking.

But his smirk vanished as he said those words, and his face paled.

Alex looked at him, knowing he had reached the same conclusion as he already had.

"If Solomon wants to become a god, he wouldn't just need power. He would need followers, and a lot of them. But that still wouldn't make him strong enough to confront Gaius. Unless…"

"Unless he weakens Gaius' power by killing his followers in droves. It would dilute his power enough to make him killable, even from a newborn god…" David interrupted him in realization.

"And, if we believe how Gaius likes to be called, judging from our little knowledge of him, where does he have the most followers?" Alex asked, giving David the last push.

David remembered a conversation he had with Chronos in his last life, when they discussed the gods together. The Chronos of that timeline had a good understanding of how Gaius operated, as he had encountered him once or twice.

Dabbling with time had a tendency to call unwanted attention, after all.

But the words Chronos had told him still resounded in his head.

"Gaius is an arrogant god. He thinks he is stronger and better than all the other gods. Which is why he insists they call him God. He also likes to create worlds where he forces worship of himself onto the masses, giving himself more power. Just like Earth."

David looked at Alex in horror.

"Here. Gaius has the most followers here, on Earth…"