The end of the War (1)

Ryukai POV

All of us went through a lot of shit in the past few years. But nothing of that can compare to the current situation. The world as we knew it, is in chaos. On the verge of destruction, it is colliding with another world, we have never seen before. Even though I am someone from the highest race, the race of gods, I can only watch powerlessly.

Everything started when another god named Hiro, came to visit me out of nowhere.

*

I lived my life as a sacred being on the peaceful continent of the spirits, a race, which would never harm someone else without a proper reason. The only downside the Spirits had was, that they mostly lived in seclusion and therefore, they had absolutely no influence in worldly affairs. It saved living there, but on the other side, except for studying some magic as well as training my body, I had absolutely nothing to do.

Luckily the king of the Spirits was a good friend of mine and whenever he had to make a difficult decision, he’d ask for my advice first and would decide afterward. At least this saved me from my boredom.

Hiro told us that an Oracle predicted a grim future for our world and that everyone must work together to prevent that future, the standard quote. Neither the Spirit king nor I were naïve enough to believe a stranger we have never met before.

We obviously asked further questions and it took quite some time to get a hold of the whole story. Hiro told us about an incident at a tournament between the humans and the beastmen. It didn’t seem like a half-hearted story to me and we listened to everything until the very end.

“I’m really sorry, but could I ask you to decide on this as fast as possible. Time’s really short on hand.”

I was really irritated by his behavior. Sometimes, Hiro’s speech would be extremely polite, but it could switch to the complete opposite the next second. That is something that is somehow connected to us gods though because all of us are strange… or crazy.

In the end, we decided to lend a helping hand. I went with Hiro for the time being, while the Spirit king would prepare our army for the battle. The plan was to reunite at a crisis meeting a few years later.

*

After traveling around with Hiro for a while, we somehow ended up as good friends. We were the perfect opposites. I was ignorant when it came to worldly matters and social interaction, while on the other hand, Hiro didn’t have the brightest head. We were a pretty good team, he would do the talking and I would do the thinking.

Hiro told me everything he could think of as important. He told me what he knew about the other races, about the past events and most importantly about the other gods. There were exactly six of us.

From his talking, I could assume that three of us, Hiro and me included, were half normal, two were abnormal and one was completely crazy. I really wanted to meet them all, but I had to wait for the final meeting.

I had already started to fully believe in Hiro’s end of the world stuff after the first few stories when we first met. I trusted him even further after every other I heard from him. While traveling around the world, we would occasionally train together or search for further supporters.

*

Time flew by and the awaited crisis meeting commenced. For me, who hadn’t met with a lot of people, it was hard to contain my excitement. The designated place was a huge castle. Apparently, it was the human race’s main castle. Every leader of the five races, humans, beastmen, demons, dragons and spirits, as well as all six of us gods, were invited to this meeting, an exact number of eleven people would discuss how we should prevent the end of the world together.

When Hiro and I arrived, we were greeted by a handful of important individuals of the human race and they guided us to where the human king was already waiting for us.

"Welcome."

We were the first to arrive and the human king Arthur gestured us to take a seat.

"It seems we were successful in inviting everyone."

Directly after we sat down, Arthur started a conversation. He was referring to the invitations to everyone. While Hiro picked me up, the others were either training or meeting with the other kings.

"Seems like it."

Hiro replied to Arthur and we continued to talk about this and that until the others arrived. One after the other made their appearance. First, the king of beastmen arrived, then another god called Hayate came together with the king of the Demons. Hiro silently introduced everyone he knew to me.

The more people joined the meeting, the livelier it got.

When Hiro finished, I was quite confused. There was the god Takeshi with the surname of Dragon and the god Hayato with the surname of Beast. There are only five races and with Hiro who had Human and me who got Spirit there should only be one spot left, but we were still missing two gods.

"Yo."

While I searched for a solution, a strange one showed up.

"I hope you guys didn't wait too long for us."

Feeling my questioning gaze, Hiro had to laugh before he could give me an explanation.

"That crazy little girl over there is Lucy and she is the little sister of the god who is still missing."

I only saw her for a short time, but if she and Takeshi both went under Hiro's impression of abnormal, what did the crazy one had to be like?

Ten people. That was the final count I reached. The meeting seemed more like parents picking up their kids because the kings were all grown ups and looked pretty dangerous, while we others were literally still kids.

"Well then let's start talking about the matter at hand."

Out of all the people in this room, the little girl took over and took the lead in the discussion. A little girl taking the lead in a meeting with the highest authorities in the world. Again, what did the crazy one had to be?

"I think everyone has already been informed about the matter at hand, but just to be sure I'll give you another quick overview."

In the end, that was what we all came for. The final goal was to save the world.

"I'll start with introductions. The name's Lucy. Same as those four, I'm a god."

One after another, we started to introduce ourselves.

"Good. Now that we know each other we can continue. A few years ago a certain oracle foresaw the end of our world and to prevent that we finally meet here to discuss how we should act."

A lot of details were skipped due to the shortage of time. It was similar to what I already heard of Hiro.

"Now that that's been taken care of as well, we can finally pick up the last member of this crisis meeting."

As soon as Lucy closed the door behind her, we all went back to small talks. Still joking around, no one could anticipate what awaited us. A few minutes after leaving Lucy wildly opened the door again.

"We've brought him here, so we can continue the conversation from where we stopped."

Followed by two people and an enormous aura, she reentered the room. I was confused once again and Hiro had to do some explaining again.

"The one to the right is Sepp. He has been helping Lucy out a lot in the past few years. The other one is Hikaru."

As always, Hiro's explanations were short and helpful. The crazy one was that Hikaru guy. He only stood there but was already giving off a heavy vibe.

“Ah. Well as some of you already know, that’s my big brother as well as the original nightmare who trained for the past five years in the dungeon.”

Lucy seemed a bit nervous when she introduced her own brother. She was nowhere near her cocky attitude from before.

“I know it’s bold of us to ask you for your assistance, but we are at dire times.”

The demon lord stood up and was the first to take the initiative to talk to Hikaru.

“Don’t worry demon king. I can feel the tension in here. If I add that to what I already know then I understand your discomfort.”

The demon king seemed rather dissatisfied with the outcome of the conversation. The situation turned awkward when no one continued onwards.

“You don’t have to introduce yourself. It’s enough if I know who you all are.”

Silence filled the room once again. Normally, I didn't care, but the situation didn't let us waste too much time.

“So, Hikaru, if I’m not wrong. Do you remember what happened at the beastmen-human tournament five or six years ago?”

I tried to get back on track and we returned to the important issue. With a mocking smirk, he answered me halfhearted.

“If I’m not wrong, Spirit, yes I do.”

“My name is Ryukai, please remember it. I’d really like to hear your thoughts on that matter.”

I didn't let his attitude bother me, on the opposite, it was quite amusing. I tried to fasten the small talk a bit but as expected Hikaru stuck to it.

“Shouldn’t you let us hear your thoughts first?”

Now he did it. He changed the whole meeting to a battle of words between the two of us. At least I could hold my ground when it came to magic.

“Sure. I think it’s something like void magic, but I’m not too sure about it.”

I peeked at Hikaru's expression and then back into the round. As expected, it seemed that no one knew what I was talking about.

“Pfff. Hahaha.”

Out of nowhere, Hikaru started laughing. It took me by surprise and I had to calm down for a second.

“I really like you. You are probably the only one who would currently be able to keep up with my thoughts.”

Even I was at a loss and the room remained quiet.

“Well, I have to admit that you have to be really clever if you came across void magic, but unfortunately you’re wrong.”

He stopped the chit-chat and started to get serious. I was interested in what he had to say.

“What do you mean?”

“If it were normal void magic, there wouldn’t be a need for me to be here and some other people wouldn’t be able to sit here either.”

Hikaru looked at Takeshi for a second before continuing. I don't know the whole story, but it was some sort of grudge. It didn't pick my interest though.

“If it’s not void magic what else could it be?”

“It’s not magic at all. It’s something completely different. I am prepared to face what’s coming. You should prepare yourselves as well.”

Everyone, including me, had a stupefied expression. He said it was not magic and that we have to prepare ourselves?

“The enemy is coming. Not only that, but he’s also bringing a whole world with him.”