“Sorry about that.” Li sat in the dirt of the barren wheat field, watching the midnight skies above. So many stars. Light pollution had made sure the stars never show off their luster in Li’s world, and he never tired of just looking up at nights here and seeing a web of magnificent golden dots spread across the dark canvas of the sky.

“There is no need to apologize, my master,” said Zagan. His voice, when spoken without injury, had an ethereal strength to it. The inflections were powerful but not commanding. The voice was masculine but not overly so. A raspy undertone marked each word, as if some level of permanent static was present. He sat on his haunches beside Li, also looking up, as if at a moment’s notice, he would howl. “The human handled me without knowledge that I was your prized retainer, and it is right that you immediately commanded her to release my great personage. I would have struck them all down for the insult alone, but I am no fool: I sense you require them alive.”

Li sighed. “I need them for the farm. And they’re good people, all of them. They didn’t mean any harm.”

Zagan scoffed. “Humans are but livestock. They may have a shell of goodness, but within, they are ugly and miserable little piles of secrets and sins.”

“Tell me,” said Li. “Do all demons have a strong misanthropic streak like you?”

“Misanthropic? No. We value them highly as food. The ugliness they hide within themselves is a sublime treat. Consumed flesh cannot match it.” Zagan looked at Li, his crimson eyes shining under the moonlight. “And you, master? What of you? What are humans to you? You defend them with your words, and yet I sense they are not true kin to you.”

Li thought about this for a long time. The night breeze filled in the silence, singing a solemn whistle as the grasses rustled. The solitude had put him in a reflective mood and, when coupled with Zagan’s questioning, got him thinking. It was refreshing to be able to talk about himself to a being that knew what he was even if Li himself didn’t truly understand himself.

It felt liberating. It had been more than a month since he had arrived in this world, and though he knew his body was changing, he hadn’t been able to talk about himself with anyone. When he thought about it alone, he never got any answers, but now, there was a chance to know.

“To be honest with you, I don’t know. I enjoy my time with them. I can laugh and smile with them, but…it doesn’t feel quite real,” said Li as he scooped up a handful of dirt. It smelled of rain. “I can be happy for them when they are healthy and well but at the same time, I feel nothing for them when I kill them.”

He let the dirt fall through his fingers. “I understand what they feel, their happiness, their sadness, their love, but I also know how fleeting their emotions are. I know that they are destined to return to the earth whereas I will stand through time immemorial. Nothing they feel or even I feel will last.

A part of me feels so awfully lonely knowing that, but another part of me knows that this is how it is supposed to be. The natural order of things.”

“Ah, I understand now.” Zagan grew solemn upon hearing Li’s unload all his pent-up thoughts and worries. The demon’s eyes closed as his pointed ears flattened.

“There is conflict broiling within you,” he said. “I believed you always a higher being. But you were once human.”

Li arched a brow. “You can sense that?”

“Indeed. Demons are extremely sensitive to the natures of higher beings. That is how I knew to make you my master in the first place. I recognized your greatness.”

“And you don’t think any less of me? Because I used to be human?”

“No. It matters not who you were. The you of now is the master I have chosen to devote my entire being and soul to. Not even the Burning One could command that level of bond from me. Even should you continue to masquerate among the humans, I will listen to your every whim and wish without question.”

“Thanks. It must have been hard for you to give up everything to come to me.”

“There is no need for thanks, master. Gratitude is but a mortal appreciation of loyalty. Among higher beings, bonds of service are not appreciated, they are understood. Let me show you-”

Zagan pressed his snout to Li’s arm and closed his eyes. Li could see the color of the demon’s soul. It flashed into his vision strongly as a raging wall of darkness. A beautiful, pure darkness unblemished by any light. It was an almost gentle darkness, the kind that lulls you into sleep.

“You see now, my master,” said Zagan as he pulled back. “As a demon, my soul is pure. Mortal souls are chaotic mixtures of dark and light. They can profess to be good one day and commit evil the very other. That is why their word means little – they are confused. A promise made by a mortal one day may wash away under temptation the very other.

I may be a being of destruction, but I do not try to justify it as mortals do under delusions of greater good. I destroy for it is part of my nature, and I accept it. I am true to myself and know that when I say something, I mean it.

That is why you know that my word is pure. That my word is true.

When I appeal to the greed inherent in men and allow them to host my being and bestow upon them my power, I do not ever make false promises. They know their souls are forfeit, but their greed overtakes them, nonetheless.”

“I’m sorry you have to explain all this to me.” Li sighed. “You’ll find that I’m not entirely used to the customs of gods and demons.”

“Do not debase yourself by comparing yourself to gods and demons, master. You are an Old One, a being beyond the forces of life that gods are birthed from and the forces of death that spawn us demonkind.”

Li nodded his head in a semblance of understanding.

Elden World lore about his race was interesting, to say the least. In game, players could choose an inhuman race such as elves, orcs, or even half-gods and half-demons. At level 70, these inhuman races could ascend to stronger variants, with elves becoming high elves and half-gods ascending to full divinities.

For Li, the base template for his race as the Treant, a forest spirit that looked like an animated tree.

At level 70, the race could branch out into two ways. One was the path of the Dryad focused entirely on spellcasting, mysticism, and healing.

Then there was the path of the Leshen that Li walked. Unlike Dryads that symbolized the nourishing life of the forest, Leshen were known as sinister spirits that represented the forces of death. As a result, they did not specialize as mere druids, but Eldritch druids focused on bringing pestilence, misery, and death to all.

They could restore others, of course, but it always came at a cost, whether it be a health cost or re-distributing the life force of one to another. Their summons, too, became ghastlier in nature, focusing on insects, carnivorous plants, and dire beasts.

At level 100, Li had ascended even beyond the Leshen into an Elder variant. Here, the lore claimed them as beings that not only commanded the forces of life and death, but went even further beyond, becoming Old Ones that laid domain to eldritch powers that rendered mortals insane at the slightest touch.

But what did that exactly mean? All of those descriptions looked perfectly understandable when read from a video game screen, but when that became his reality? Most of the time, he didn’t feel like some alien existence that shattered minds. He thought and acted like a human.

And yet there were times when he said things that came from a part of him that was definitively inhuman. He could be happy or sad or angry, but there were times he knew he felt that he was only pretending to be feeling those emotions, as if he knew that was what he was supposed to feel but that it was all an act.

“You are troubled. Unsure of your nature,” said Zagan. “I know this well, and I can aid you, my master.”

“What are you going to propose?” Li shrugged. “Taking my human side out with some kind of precision magic surgery? Is that even possible?”

“No, but there are other ways.

A comrade of mine, when I was a general of greed for the Burning One, was formerly a human. Upon becoming the general of lust, she ascended into demon-hood, and yet her humanity confused her. She had known love that was pure and just – the loss of that dear love was what drove her to desperately seek demonhood in the first place – but when she ascended into an aspect of purely destructive, primal lust, she found she still yearned for the pure memories of her first lover.”

“So what did you do? Lobotomy?”

“Nothing of the sort. As time passed, she came to understand herself the chaos of human nature. Upon witnessing enough mortal lovers betray each other, she became disillusioned with the idea of pure love. She came to realize that with enough temptation, any mortal can discard their purity and fall to their base urges.”

“Now that’s depressing.”

“It is all a matter of perspective.” Zagan faced the cottage and laid down, his head resting between his black paws. “When you glimpsed my soul, I witnessed the color of your soul as well, my master, and I can offer you a diagnosis, but treatment, well, that will be up to you.”

Li followed Zagan’s line of sight and stared at the cottage too. It was dark and silent, still as death. Old Thane had fallen asleep hard like a rock, the drink getting to him. Li had eased him into bed before getting out the cottage to talk with Zagan.

“Don’t leave me hanging,” said Li. He had an idea of where this was going, but he still wanted to hear it out loud. “Give me what you got.”

“A higher existence cannot peacefully coexist with a mortal mind,” said Zagan gravely. “Sooner or later, your natures will clash, and how can a mortal mind compete with an Elder existence? Soon, words will come from you that you did not wish. Your hands will conjure spells that you did not intend.”

“That’s already been happening,” said Li. He remembered how he had tried to heal Old Thane without even considering what he felt solely because it just felt plain wrong for a lesser existence to question him.

“Yes, and your human nature is clawing to survive.” Zagan motioned his snout towards the cottage. “When a god or demon wishes to experience the chaos of mortal nature, they impart some of their essence into a mortal anchor. Often, this is a flesh and blood body, an avatar.

You have done the opposite. I sense that your human nature has anchored itself to that old man.”

Li rubbed his chin, getting a little dirt on it. “I’m surprised. Among people, he’s the only one I feel strongly about, sure but there are other things that I still hold dear to me. Like this farm. I want to nurture and grow it above all else.”

Zagan shook his head. “Master, you do not yet understand, and I do not fault you, for this must be all very new. To be a higher being is not to lose all that is dear to you. It is simply to lose a human perspective.

Your soul is green. A beautiful, vibrant green that impressed upon me the sanctity of both life and death. This farming, this tending to the land – it is a part of your greater nature. It will stay with you regardless of whether your mortal shell remains within you or not.

But the old mortal, that is a human bond. An anchor that keeps your humanity stable, minimizing its erosion. When mortal, you valued family above all else. You devoted your life and soul to it. Your very humanity molded around the concept of family.

You find family in this old mortal. You see family in his actions, in his valuation of you.”

Li understood what Zagan was hinting at, at what the treatment was. He shook his head, but he was not angry, for how could he fault Zagan for trying to help him?

“I’m sorry, but I can’t have that happen. He can’t die.” Li sighed. “I don’t know how I’ll feel in the future, but that’s just how it is right now.”

“I understand, master.” Zagan’s voice became questioning, but not aggressive. It was calmly directed in the same tone that an advisor would use to respectfully oppose their king’s decision. “But what happens when the aged man knocks against his mortal coil? Grows injured? There are but few years left within him. Soon, his bones will fail him. He will wish he had returned to the dirt. What will you do to maintain your humanity? Will you keep healing him? Resurrect him against his will?”

“No.” Li smiled. “There’s no greater gift a son could give a father than being by his bedside when the time comes. I want to give him that honor as I did for my own father.”

“And after that?”

Li looked at the farm around him. It was still in its infancy. The wheat field was still barren, but with the Myrmeke’s help, it would soon be as fruitful as ever. The berry bushes swayed with the wind, their fruits heavy and full, but there was more space he could fill. The herbs had just started to shoot out a little, the tips of their green stems emerging from little black mounds in the soil.

But there was so much more to do. So much more to make it an oasis of life that would laugh in the face of time and rise when kingdoms fell.

“After that, I’ll have an oath to keep.”