"Congratulations, Arminius," she said. "You are now a Hero."
Arminius blinked, breath catching in his throat. The word hung in the air like an arrow notched to fate itself.
Herina now talked in a more...human tone.
Hero.
Her words clung to him like glue.
Him?
Could he be a hero?
A demon as a hero?
"I'm... the Hero now?" he asked, voice brittle with disbelief.
She nodded.
But before the title could settle, before pride or wonder could take root in his soul, Herina continued with words that shattered the very meaning of what she'd just declared.
"Now," she said, eyes gleaming with unnatural calm, "your one main goal…"
A pause.
A smile.
A sentence that rewrote reality:
"Become the Demon Lord."
Time stopped.
Arminius stared at her like he hadn't heard right. Like the words had tangled themselves in madness and tumbled out wrong.
"What?" he breathed.
Herina's smile remained serene. "You heard me."
"How—how can a Hero become a Demon Lord?!"
"Exactly," she said, folding her arms. "That's the point."
Her eyes glinted with something unreadable. Not cruelty. Not mischief. Something older. Sharper.
"No one can know you're the Hero, Arminius. Not until the world calls you Demon Lord. Not until your name makes the stars themselves shudder. Become the demon lord... In a HEROIC way!"
Arminius stood frozen, the weight of her words crashing over him like tidal waves.
He didn't answer. Couldn't.
Silence stretched between them.
'Becoming the Demon Lord in a 'heroic way'?' he questioned the goddess's sanity.
That's like telling ice to be to be hot like fire.
Herina, as if satisfied at his silence,smiled wider. "Good. You understand."
She raised a single finger.
And snapped.
In an instant, two blurs of light hurtled toward him. He had only enough time to blink until two small figures entered the pillar. No,not entered,appeared.
"Irina! Lupa!"
The small wolf and tiger pups tackled him with joyous squeals, fur shimmering faintly in the lingering glow of the divine realm.
He dropped to his knees and hugged them tightly, unable to hold back the trembling in his hands. Warmth. Comfort. Something real. Something his.
They were back.
She gave them back.
When he looked up, the world was no longer golden and filled with white marble pillars.
It was green,pink,red and every other flower,fruit and vegetable colour you can think of.
The scent of flowers hit him like a slap—fresh, earthy, overwhelming.
They stood in a quiet, sun-dappled garden now. Trees swayed lazily in the wind. Butterflies drifted. A stone path led to a modest wooden table under a cherry tree in full bloom. Birds chirped like nothing had changed.
The size was enormous.
It was bigger than his village by atleast 15 times.
No,more. Much more.
Arminius staggered slightly, almost vomiting from the sudden shift. His senses—still adjusting to divinity— reeled. If he were still human, he would've collapsed.
Herina was already seated at the table, dressed in a simpler white robe, her bare feet brushing soft grass. She looked... almost normal. Too normal for someone who had just shattered his destiny with a few elegant syllables.
A chair sat across from her. Beside her elbow rested a bottle of shimmering golden liquid.
Arminius hesitated, still clutching Irina and Lupa, before slowly walking to the chair and placing the pups gently on the table. They curled into each other like twin flames.
Herina poured the liquid into a pristine white cup, etched with golden flower patterns. She offered it to him without a word.
He stared at it.
"What is it?" he asked cautiously.
"It's Nectar.Drink," she said.
He took it. The cup was warm.
The liquid tasted like nothing and everything—like honey and sunlight, pain and peace, memory and myth. It burned going down. Not in heat, but in truth.
He breathed out slowly, setting the cup down.
And she finally spoke again.
"This is now your home as well," Herina said, rubbing Irina's ears. "Under certain circumstances, you may return here."
"Such as?"
"Simple. If you are one step from death—one breath away from the veil—I will pull you back. This garden will become your sanctuary."
"Can I come here freely?"
Herina chuckled. "You? No. I can pull you in. But you'll still suffer weather, hunger, time. You don't get to skip the world, Arminius."
He grunted. "Didn't think so."
She leaned back in her chair. "However... there is one perk."
Herina snapped her fingers again.
A section of the garden shimmered, then peeled away like an illusion. Behind it stood a tall black gate—ancient, ornate, pulsing with strange energy. Its surface was marked with a thousand glyphs that glowed faintly.
Arminius's eyes widened.
"That's—?"
"The armory," she said with casual reverence.
His heart thudded.
"Can I open it?"
"Eventually. Not yet."
He deflated a bit. "Why not?"
"Because your Veil Art must evolve," she said. "It will grow as you grow. Each time you make a leap in strength, the vault will respond. It will offer you choices—powerful relics, crafted for your hands and soul."
"Wait—so the weapons... choose me?"
"Something like that."
Arminius sat back, dazed. His thoughts raced.
'So that's why the legends always had weapons perfect for them. The 'Hero's Blade,' the 'Saint's Crown'... it wasn't luck. It was design.'
He glanced at the vault again, then back at her.
"Why can't I just take everything inside at once?"
"There are rules even I can't break," she said with a shrug. "The Veil binds gods and mortals alike."
"Hmmm..." he muttered, watching her absentmindedly mash Irina and Lupa's faces against her cheeks, squishing them like living plush toys. The animals gave no complaint. Only soft, delighted growls.
Arminius blinked.
"Can they stay here?"
She looked at him.
"At least... until they're grown. Strong enough to fend for themselves."
Herina smiled again—this time, less divine, more human.
"I was going to keep them here anyway."
Relief washed through him. He exhaled and leaned back in the chair.
The breeze moved gently through the cherry blossoms. Irina and Lupa slept beside the now-empty cup. The grass beneath his feet felt real. The sun on his skin felt warm.
But the weight on his shoulders?
Still crushing.
A Hero pretending to be a Demon Lord.
A soul tethered to divinity, yet fated to walk among monsters.
He looked at Herina. "...Why?"
She tilted her head.
"Why what?"
"Why me? Why make the Hero... the villain?"
Herina's smile faltered—just for a breath, barely long enough to notice, yet unmistakably real.
She turned her gaze to the side, her fingers lightly brushing over Irina's fur as she paused to gather her words.
"The title of Hero," she said slowly, "was never bound to a single race. It was never meant to be owned."
Her voice was calm, but behind it, something deeper churned. Something heavy with age.
"I did create humanity," she admitted, her golden eyes lowering. "But even I must acknowledge their sins... their flaws. Their pride, their cruelty. Their capacity to betray the very light that nurtured them."
She looked away now, eyes distant, fixed on something only she could see—perhaps a memory, or the burden of a truth too vast for mortal minds.
"I suppose..." she said, voice barely above a whisper, "you could see this as a mother punishing her children. Even if it is harsh... even if it breaks her heart."
Arminius didn't respond.
He couldn't.
The words settled in his chest like molten iron—searing, unmovable. They wrapped around his soul like both a curse and a commandment. A divine contradiction. A demand to save the world… by becoming the very thing it fears most.
Then, Herina stood.
She extended her hand toward him.
Light surged from her fingertips, divine and radiant. It spilled into the garden like a golden tide, and the world responded.
Each flower in bloom turned a vivid shade of gold, their petals shimmering like forged sunlight. The surface of the stream glittered like molten jewels, as if the water itself had turned to liquefied amber. Even the birds—once chirping in idle melody—sang louder now, their songs ringing like hymns in a temple touched by grace.
Herina stepped forward, her voice echoing with divine resolve.
"Arminius," she said, "do not be afraid."
Her light enveloped him—not burning, but warm, like the first breath of spring after a long winter.
"For you are my champion. My Hero. The Chosen One."
Her words struck like a bell in the heart of the cosmos.
"You shall unite the world—not against a Demon Lord, nor against any single race, kingdom, or banner. But against something deeper. Something older. Evil itself."
She paused, and her voice deepened—not in tone, but in truth.
"You shall become the Demon Lord."
His breath caught in his throat.
"But do it as a Hero."
The words clung to him like sacred armor. They wrapped around his heart like fire and ice, whispering purpose into every broken piece of his past.
Just days ago, he had been nothing—a failure, an outcast, a smudge on humanity's story. Weak. Worthless. A stain.
And now…
Now he was something more.
Something dangerous.
Something needed.
Herina returned to her seat beneath the cherry blossom tree, the divine aura slowly receding. Her soft, knowing smile returned—not the distant smile of a goddess, but something almost... motherly.
"You're currently in your astral form," she said, brushing a stray petal off her lap. "Your physical body is being rebuilt as we speak."
She poured herself more of the golden liquid and took a sip before adding, "You'll need to stay here. For maybe a week."
Arminius looked up at her, brow furrowing.
"If you created all of humanity in a single month, like the sacred texts say," he asked, "why does building one body take you a week?"
She let out a small, tired laugh—a sound not of mockery, but of old exhaustion.
"Because," she said, setting her cup down with a soft clink, "Your body. A body with such a twisted connection to The Veil is very hard to rebuild. Also....I am no longer at my full strength. My power has diminished... not over centuries, but over millions—perhaps billions of years."
She exhaled slowly.
"My connection to the Veil—the source from which all divine power flows—has weakened over time. Eventually, the Veil will reject me. It will cast me out like spoiled fruit. And yet... humans will still whisper my name with reverence. Still praise me as an almighty being."
She looked down at her cup, watching the golden liquid swirl inside.
"But I am no longer all-powerful. Not all-knowing. Not omnipresent. I am little more than a glorified Spirit Sovereign now. A remnant of what once was."
She pressed her hands against the teacup, fingers tense.
The cracks in her divinity—hidden beneath layers of light and might—had finally shown.
Arminius sat silently, eyes tracing the lines of her face. Not with judgment. Not with pity. But with understanding.
'A Spirit Sovereign is still absurdly powerful…' he thought. 'But for a being like her to admit weakness... That means something.'
He looked toward the golden vault again, still pulsing gently in the garden's corner, and then back at Herina.
So this was his fate.
To become a lie that would save the world.
To become the monster so he could kill the true evil hiding behind the masks of men, gods, and kingdoms.
End of Chapter-7