1 01. Demon Blade
Tyron Jioni was soundly sleeping in his humble shack in the slums of Danos city. Despite its shabby nature on the outside, it was quite cozy on the inside.
With his meager pay as a herb collector, he could barely eat to his satisfaction. Despite that, he had saved up coin for a long time to be able to afford his current bed. A bed that a middle class family would have.
It was his most prized possession, for a good night's sleep was all he ever dreamt of.
A loud explosion was heard, followed by a small earthquake.
Tyron Jioni woke up from his dreams in stupor, his feeble mind trying to find its bearings.
"That came from outside the city. It's not far from the slums." He thought.
He then started stretching his body as he prepared to go see what had happened.
Tyron figured that if that noise came from two powerhouses fighting, chances were that they would be both critically injured and even K.O'ed each other....and then he could reap some benefits by looting their bodies.
As he exited his shack, he was greeted by gentle moonlight. It was a full moon night.
For just a second, before he put his hood on, his facial features could be seen.
He had the features of an albino. Red eyes, white skin and white facial hair...
He ran past a couple streets and then was faced with the great wall of the city.
With his nimble body, he quickly climbed the wall and soon, he was on the other side.
He looked into the distance and saw a burning forest.
Telling himself that he had to be the first to get there, he ran towards the burning trees as fast as his body could bring him.
When he arrived at the scene, he saw a crater spanning at least a hundred meters in diameter.
Everything that was there prior to the explosion had been pulverized to smithereens.
Deep into the crater was a man wearing a heavily damaged white immaculate armor. In the left hand of the man was a black sword that released a kind of black energy that seemed to be poisonous to the man who held it. On the left hand, dark red veins could be seen throbbing, pumping the dark energy from the sword to the man's body.
Despite the fact that it was poisonous to him, the man never let go of the sword.
Tyron approached the man, being careful not to make any noise.
The armored man had long felt Tyron's presence but didn't want to spook him.
Tyron then started looking for the man's belongings as he removed the armor and taking precautions against the black sword.
"Young man...ho...how would you f...feel if I told you that you are looting a Celestial?" The man's feeble voice was heard in Ciel's head.
Tyron jumped backwards and fell on his behind.
He was scared. So scared that he couldn't even think properly.
"Do not be afraid, little human. I will not hurt you. Not that I can, anyway. Hehe." Once again the same voice was heard inside Tyron's mind.
Tyron tried his best to calm down as he chose not to believe what the so called 'Celestial' had said. What was a Celestial anyway? He was thinking that he could wait a little until the man was fully dead to resume his looting.
The voice said "You're out of luck kid...I've been infected by Demonic Essence. My Celestial Energy will be devoured and replaced by Demonic energy and there's nothing that can be done to stop it once the process has started. I will turn into a blood hungry demon that will lay waste on this part of the galaxy. As I become stronger, this universe will be doomed like the others the Dark Legion had laid waste to..."
"I thought I was saving this universe by killing the Demon Lord,... I even stole his prized sword and killed him with it...but his last attack before he died left me like this...I can still remember his crazed laughter...that madman knew he had won even if he paid the ultimate price for it."
" I never would've thought I would be the one to end this universe...sigh...what am I doing? Rambling in my last hour...pathetic..."
The voice faded from Tyron's mind as the man finally opened his blue eyes.
He looked deeply into Tyron's frightened eyes and then said out loud, " This is your chance to get what you want and then become a hero while you're at it....but there's a small price to pay... hehehe."
Tyron Jioni was confused amidst his fear. He was too scared to even run away.
The Celestial then removed a white ring from his finger and then threw it towards Tyron who caught it reflexively.
"That's all my wealth. Congratulations, you just became the richest man in this universe."
The Celestial then pointed at the sword and used his remaining Celestial Energy to seal it. He asked, "What's your preferred choice of weapon?"
Tyron was in the midst of putting the white ring on his finger. He was so happy that he didn't know if he was still dreaming or not. " A dagger." He answered.
Under the Celestial's usage of Celestial Energy, the black sword started transforming into a thirty centimeters long small dagger.
"Here! Catch!" The Celestial said as he threw the dagger towards Tyron with a hidden devious smile, a huge contrast to his benevolent bearing he was exuding a little while ago.
When Tyron touched the dagger' hilt with his right hand that had subconsciously went to catch it, a strange thing happened.
His right hand couldn't let go...or didn't want to let go.
Soon, veins started throbbing and pumping on his right arm, then his whole body.
Pain... unbearable excruciating pain assaulted him.
The Celestial was madly laughing and one of his eyes was now bloodshot." Hurry up and kill me before I fully transform."
It seemed all the other surplus energy that had been on the dagger had been absorbed by the Celestial before he handed it over.
But why wasn't that energy poison for him. Surely, the Celestial seemed to be dying because of it while Tyron had his strength upgraded instead.
"Demonic Energy is poison to me but to you humans it is a good tonic for cultivation, but there's a price : you slowly become a demon yourself. Soon you will feel that your outlook on life has changed for the worst. You will become a villain in every sense of the way soon as you become corrupted by the demonic energy. If you're not strong enough to rein in your evil urges...then..."
"Now... kill me, ...let's end this."
Tyron hesitated. He had never killed anyone in all his life and now he wasn't sure that it was now a good time to start.
Even with the entire world at stake he got cold feet, despite the little voice in his head telling him to do it.
The Celestial then sighed, " I have to do this myself in the end...and here I thought of an easy way out...but this bloke could've become at least a few levels stronger if he had killed me and let the dagger absorb my blood energy, so that it could feed it to him... Well that's his loss."
"There's no reincarnation for me at this point...sigh"
The Celestial then dug out and crushed his own heart with his hand.
The body and even armor then started to decompose in motes of light that were scattered by the night breeze.
***
Tyron was asking himself what rank he had reached after absorbing all that energy from the Demon Lord's dagger.
He felt drunk with power.
"Perhaps I went from F rank to B Rank. Perhaps A Rank. There's no way the power I feel could be as weak as a C Rank." Ciel said as he felt his new muscles all over his body and flexed them.
He tried to jump with all his strength.
He found himself in the clouds.
His red pupils enlarged as the adrenaline kicked in.
He was afraid that he would end as flattened crepe by the time he reached the ground, but it didn't happen.
The dagger he couldn't bring himself to let go, allowed him to float in the sky. While his body was still bound by gravity, surprisingly, the dagger wasn't. He held on to it and tried to make it descend slowly. Like it had a mind of its own, it listened and slowly made its way toward the ground.
"Fascinating. Is this what those hunters call a Magic Relic? I can fly with it. I wonder what else it can do." Ciel said ecstatic.
When he reached the ground, he grew bold and wanted to find out the limits of his powers before he went to the Hunter Guild to be assessed.
"Fortunately, there's a hunting ground outside Danos city. I heard there's a dragon clan reigning over it...rumors perhaps...but I feel like fighting a dragon tonight...hehe my blood is boiling just thinking about it." He pointed the dagger to the sky and then took off in the direction of the Danos Hunting Grounds.
Unbeknownst to Tyron, there was another being watching his every move, learning everything about him. Hidden inside the dagger, that presence was very weak but it's bearing spoke volumes about its past glory and power.
That presence thought, "Ugh...that Celestial would have never thought that my last suicidal attack that wounded him so badly was my way of hiding my soul inside my sword...he sure proved to be harder to control than I thought...but no matter...Tyron Jioni...oh Tyron...I will let you grow drunk with power while I whisper the Demon Gospel in your ears. In time, you'll become me and I'll become you and this universe will finally be mine. I, the Demon Lord, the Blood Monarch, will finally be in control of the entire Multiverse."
