I Got Reincarnated as the Game's Villain24.72%

Moon God

"You said you were once a god, right?" the young man asked, perched atop the clock tower. His amethyst eyes traced the stars scattered across the night sky, his dark purple hair whipping in the wind.

Yes… why do you ask? a voice murmured in his mind, deep and ancient.

"I just want to know… why did you choose to become a demon?" he replied, letting the question hang in the night air.

The silence that followed felt eternal.

…I never chose my path. Just like you, I was a pawn… From the dawn of time itself, I was crafted as the incarnation of evil.

"But… couldn't you have chosen not to follow that path?" the young man countered, eyes still fixed on the heavens as if the stars themselves held an answer.

I did.

"What?" The young man's brow furrowed as he snapped his gaze toward the voice echoing in his mind.

You truly don't understand what this so-called… 'fate' is.

You cannot escape it.

You cannot avoid it.

You cannot change it.

You cannot rewrite it.

Every action you take…

Every choice you think is yours…

It's all accounted for.

There is no way out.

There is no way around.

…And that… was why…

I played right into the hands of fate.

…And so will you.

"So… there really is no way to change my fate?" the young man asked, a bitter smile curving on his lips, a single tear tracing down his face.

…At least, that's what it wants you to believe.

"Huh?" The young man blinked, momentarily thrown off.

In a past incarnation of mine, before I became… this, I was known as the Moon God.

"What…? The Moon God?" The young man searched his mind, trying to recall the tales he'd heard before.

Forget it. That doesn't matter. The point is… I was never truly the Moon God.

"I… don't understand."

You will. It was a lie all along. I killed the true Moon God and took his place.

"What?" The young man shot to his feet, shock cutting through him like a blade.

It's true. I went by the name… Neburus.

"Neburus… but isn't that one of the primordial evils?" He exclaimed, a dawning realization illuminating his face.

Yes. That was my attempt to defy fate, but fate is a patient, insidious thing.

"…I see." The young man sank back down, his mind reeling.

I never truly knew my name, where I came from, or even how I arrived here. But I knew what I was. I was no god... at least not of this world. I was something else entirely… a being whose very existence was bound to one element above all....

"What?"

Time.

—Boom!

"What was that?" His attention whipped toward the distant part of the academy, where a dark forest cloaked in shadows lay, far from the clock tower.

It seems we have… visitors.

"Friends of yours?" he asked, the humor in his voice thin.

…You could call them that.

"Damn it!" He rose, fingers gripping the hilt of a strange katana at his waist. "Where's the useless protagonist when you need him?" He muttered under his breath before drawing his blade.

"*******'s Bloodline," he whispered. In an instant, his amethyst eyes blazed a searing blue, and he uttered, "Eleventh Form: Resonance." With a single step, reality itself seemed to shift, bending as if to accommodate his movement.

Fool. You barely have enough life left, yet you continue to burn what remains.

"Shut up," he murmured, his voice more... arrogant than a while ago.

…

"I always wanted to ask… if I have your bloodline, why doesn't it bear your name?"

…Even I don't know that… yet.

"You said your existence revolved around time. What does that have to do with changing fate?" His tone sharpened, challenging.

There exists a weaver… I know not his purpose, his true name… but I've seen it. He seems to be weaving a reality that shouldn't exist, threading them into being. And yet… I have a suspicion about who he is.

"Is that so?" he asked, his tone biting. "One more question."

What?

"What do you hate the most?"

Aside from fate?

"Yeah. Aside from fate."

Well… I don't know why, but it's someone—someone named…

Aphrodite.

The young man's eyes widened in shock. "No… way."

....

"Ahhhh!" He bolted upright, his breath coming in harsh gasps, his skin drenched in sweat.

"What… what the hell was that?" he whispered, but a piercing pain stabbed through his skull, like his brain was being split in two. He collapsed, clutching his head as the agony finally began to fade, leaving only a dull throb.

"Huh?" He mumbled, trying to recall the vision. It was hazy now, like an image drawn in fog.

[It was a memory.]

"A memory?"

[Yes. A memory of your past life.]

"What? But—ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh!" Another wave of searing pain lashed through him, this time clawing into his soul itself.