The Demon King, Azreal, sat upon his obsidian throne, the air around him trembling with restrained power. His All-Seeing Eye shimmered crimson, its sight piercing the veil of distance. Through it, he watched a gathering of the Five Great Kingdoms—human rulers cloaked in self-importance and fear—whispering in secret chambers. Their voices were low, their expressions grave, yet their purpose burned clear.
An alliance.
Not out of courage, nor vengeance, but fear.
The Demon Kingdom had long remained withdrawn, indifferent to mortal affairs. Yet the rulers feared what might come. They feared that one day, the demons would rise as conquerors—and fear makes mortals dangerous.
Azreal's lips curved into a quiet, humorless chuckle. "How predictable," he murmured to no one. The laughter echoed faintly through the throne hall like the rumble of distant thunder. To him, humanity was a fragile breed of dreamers and cowards—ever building alliances to guard against imagined gods.
He could have struck first. With this knowledge, he could have unleashed hell upon their kingdoms before they even finished signing their pact. But he didn't.
Because victory without resistance was boring.
*Let them come,* he thought. *Let them try to burn the realm of demons.*
Still, Azreal was no fool. Confidence and arrogance were cousins—one guided by knowledge, the other blind to it. So he prepared for both victory and the impossible: defeat. If that day ever came, someone would have to rebuild what was lost.
A year later, that someone was born—his son, Lucian.
***
THE MAKING OF THE PRINCE
The moment Lucian drew breath, his destiny was written in the bones of the world. He was not born to live. He was born to inherit. He was not meant to laugh, to play, or to dream—his creation served a singular purpose: to become the flawless instrument through which the demon kingdom could rise again if it were reduced to ash.
From the age of five, his existence became a ritual of discipline and pain. Every dawn began with combat drills that stripped his body of weakness; every dusk ended with lessons that carved wisdom into his mind. Strength was not enough—Azreal taught him that raw power meant nothing without control.
There were no festivals, no friends, no warmth. The walls of his training hall were his cradle, and the silence between commands became the only lullaby he ever knew. Lucian was forged to be self-sufficient—a living contingency for the fall of his kind.
His Aura Mastery was molded to precision. His strikes, when they came, were clean—surgical, merciless, inevitable. Each movement was measured; each breath, calculated.
He was a weapon that thought, an intellect clad in flesh, incapable of faltering because failure had never been allowed in the blueprint of his existence.
But his father was shaping more than a warrior.
Lucian learned to read men as easily as he read ledgers. He studied politics, economics, and the intricate webs that bound kingdoms together. He learned how empires rose not by swords, but by words sharpened into daggers. The art of manipulation became his second nature—the ability to bend others without ever seeming to move.
In every lesson, emotion was stripped away further. Connection was a distraction; affection, a liability.
Weakness was exorcised from him. Empathy was a flaw. Hesitation, a sin. Emotion, a chain.
By his mid-teens, Lucian was more than a prince. He was a construct of cold intellect—a being sculpted in his father's image, yet frighteningly refined.
He did not belong to himself; he belonged to destiny. A perfect machine built not for living, but for rebuilding—the last safeguard of the demon realm.
THE WAR BEGINS
16 Years since the meeting, the humans struck. The War of Ashes began.
The first battles were slaughter. Demon blades carved through armies like wind through grass, but for every soldier that fell, a hundred more took their place. Humanity's numbers drowned the battlefield in flesh and fire.
For a year, the war raged. Cities crumbled. Mountains split. The sky itself darkened under the weight of spells and steel.
From his fortress throne, Azreal watched the tides shift. For the first time in his immortal life, he saw the faint shadow of defeat.
It was time for him to act.
THE LAST AUDIENCE
The throne room was silent, the calm before the storm's final roar. Outside, the war drums thundered, and the dying screams of demons echoed through the capital's walls. The great obsidian gates trembled with each distant explosion.
Azreal sat motionless, his crimson gaze fixed upon the boy before him—his creation, his contingency, his legacy.
Lucian stood straight, shoulders squared, expression unreadable. Seventeen years old, yet already colder than any general.
Azreal's voice broke the silence, deep and resonant as the earth itself.
"Lucian, it seems the Demon Kingdom might fall."
The prince didn't flinch. "Then you have failed."
A flicker of amusement crossed the king's face. "Perhaps." He leaned forward, chin resting on his fist, studying the heir who mirrored him too well. "Tell me, what is the role of a king?"
"To rule," Lucian answered, unwavering. "To be absolute. To ensure the survival and prosperity of his nation."
"Good." Azreal's smirk vanished, replaced by a solemn weight. "And the role of a prince?"
"To prepare for the day he must replace the king."
The Demon King rose, his full height casting a vast, suffocating shadow. "Then consider this your throne now."
With a wave of his hand, runes ignited across the walls, casting an eerie glow. A powerful seal took form—one that would trap Lucian in a timeless dimension, shielding him from the destruction that loomed.
Lucian understood immediately. "So, this is your final command?"
"Yes." Azreal's voice was iron. "You were never meant to fight this war. You were meant to win the next one." His tone lowered, dark and resolute. "We are demons, Lucian. We do not beg. We do not regret. We endure."
Dark tendrils wrapped around Lucian, pulling him into the abyss. His expression remained calm, his voice level. "And if you are victorious?"
Azreal's gaze softened by the smallest degree. "Then I will break the seal myself, and you will awaken to a world where our enemies are ashes beneath my feet."
Lucian nodded once. There was no fear, no sentimentality—only duty. He was his father's son. Built to obey. Built to conquer.
The last thing he saw before the darkness consumed him was the Demon King turning toward the battlefield, his figure igniting with divine flame.
Then—nothing.
AWAKENING
Time held no meaning in the abyss. A moment and a century felt the same. There was no hunger, no fatigue. No sensation at all. Lucian did not age. He did not dream.
He simply was.
Until—
A crack.
The seal shattered.
Lucian's feet touched earth again, and for the first time in a hundred years, the world pressed down upon him. The air was different—thinner, emptier. No demonic aura, no presence of his people. Just silence, stretching endlessly over a land that had long since forgotten its rulers.
The kingdom of his birth was gone.
He slowly opened his crimson eyes, taking in the desolation around him. The wind carried faint echoes of the living—distant cries, the clash of blades, the whimper of despair.
"So… Father lost?" His voice was soft, steady, unshaken. "I thought it wasn't possible."
There was no sorrow in him. No anger. Only comprehension.
Then, slowly, his lips curved into a faint smirk. "How disappointing… and how convenient."
For the first time in his existence, Lucian was free.
A low, rasping chuckle echoed.
*Easy for you to say,* came a voice within Lucian's mind, ancient and dry as dust. *That damn Azreal knew the timeless dimension wouldn't affect me.*
Lucian turned slightly, eyes settling on the figure that is materializing on his shoulder—Malphas, his eternal companion. A being of black mist taking a humanoid form. Embellished with a faint, golden crown, and a cloak of deep yellow tatters drifting around him like living smoke. His presence carries both regality and dread, as if the darkness itself had learned to wear a crown.
Malphas' golden eyes gleamed with quiet irritation.
Lucian regarded him with mild amusement. "A century with nothing to occupy you? How dreadful. You have my deepest sympathies, Malphas."
The spirit narrowed his gaze. "Are you mocking me?"
Lucian's smirk deepened. He felt it then—a surge of something ancient awakening within him, resonating with his soul.
"What is this…?" His voice dropped to a whisper. "A power inherited by every Demon King… and a Divine Offering from the Demon God." He closed his hand into a fist, energy spiraling around him like a storm restrained. "Demon King's Covenant. And… Cognitive Shield."
Malphas tilted his head, golden eyes glinting. "It's time for you to rebuild the Demon Kingdom. What's your first move?" His voice held a trace of excitement, like a predator catching the scent of prey.
Lucian's expression smoothed into calm determination. Then, his gaze sharpened, crimson light flickering in his pupils.
"I sense several auras nearby." He turned toward the horizon, where smoke rose faintly above the dead plains. "How curious."
He stepped forward, the wind coiling around him like a cloak. "Let us pay them a visit."
And so, the prince took his first steps into a world that had forgotten demons—a world about to remember why it should have feared them.