He opened his ears wide, ignoring the screams of agony and the battle around him, his ears open only for Ingolsol.
"Boring..." Came a yawned complaint, as the Dark God reclined in his chair, watching things unfold. "I'm really not a fan of these scholarly types. A tendency to overanalyse. Not artistic flair. I mean, look at the scale of this magic circle that he's drawn up. Bit overkill, where's the fun in that?"
Again, Desebel found herself rolling her eyes. "Aren't you the one that gave him the power to do all this?"
"I did... But not alllllll this. Terribly boring. Despair is more interesting than that. A close-fought battle – there's a sweeter despair to be had there," Ingolsol said.
"I recall you seeming rather excited by the strength difference at first..." Desebel noted.
Ingolsol waved his hand dismissively. "Yes, yes. That was before a whole village suddenly turned themselves into heroes. There's no fun in that. Dying while fighting? That's meant to be an honour reserved for the soldiery.
If everyone's charging without fear towards a so-called honourable death, I'm going to end up getting put out of business."
Again, Desebel found herself rolling her eyes. At times the Dark Lord fell too quickly into his comedy act, concealing his true feelings on the matter. That was part of what made him so frightening, so unpredictable.
"Well, I suppose we need to shatter this, don't we?" He grinned a malicious grin. "Claudia will be crying compassionate tears for them, I'm sure, singing to her little servants about their wondrous sacrifice. But no, these mortals are dirtier than that. A single moment does not clear away the black stains about their heart. Even the ones that they call hero – they don't exist.
Every man is as dark and twisted as the last. They're a tower of cards, held together by the glue of a false belief."
"If they come, then once more, I will make them kneel," Ingolsol said in a deep growl. "Lord of Despair, or so they scorn me, but there does not go by a single day that they forget who I am."
"You would risk it all, merely for light entertainment?" She asked. "All that you had built up, all the time that you put into these things? I thought you had grown an interest in the boy? And what of Francis? You would wipe the board clean in a single sweep? Only to invite the ire of all the Fullguard – even the Dark Gods will not stand by you on this."
"You underestimate them," Ingolsol said. "You all do. Even she does, my beloved – but I suppose she understands them better than the others. The mortals are the seedbed of our powers, you forget that. They all do. If not now, they would have come eventually.
This is my era. Mine and Claudia's. They'll realize that before soon. The mortal world undergoes a grand shift. Only the powerful will be able to keep their fangs. And who am I, pray tell, Desebel?"
"You're the Lord of Des—" Desebel caught herself before she finished her sentence. A gasp escaped her, as she was struck by a realization, and a headache, as though she'd forgotten something important. Clutching her head, she bent over, and forced the words through her teeth. "No... You're the God of Power."
Ingolsol smiled a rare white smile, the fangs of his teeth not at all dissimilar to those of a tiger. For the first time in ten thousand years, another entity had called him by what he truly was.
"ARRRRRRRRRRRRRGHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
A scream rang out across the battlefield, louder than any of the others, loud enough to draw pause to combat, as Beam fell to his knees.
"Beam!" Nila shouted, reaching to grab him on instinct, to pull him away from the monsters that would surely come pouring his way. It was a vain attempt, for there was nowhere to run, but she did it anyway.