The World is Ending, So you Just Give Up?

Apophis, the Devourer of Worlds, Dragon of Chaos, Lord of the Void, felt for the first time in his long life uninterested in eating.

[Service Announcement: This world has not met the performance standards expected by this time. Shutdown commences in: 358D 11H 34M 10S.]

The little box hung in the air in the corner of his vision, ever counting down. He could not dismiss it, and he knew everyone else saw it as well. It had been one week since it had appeared, when he had been in combat with the alleged Hero of this world. She had seen it as well - everyone could see it.

And everyone had been struck with the sudden knowledge that their entire world… was nothing more than a game.

A game. He, the villain, meant to be defeated by children play acting as warriors. The Hero, nothing more than a stand-in for characters those children would customize to their liking. Her entire existence nothing more than a proof of concept.

And in less than a year, none of them would exist.

He was supposed to be the end of this world. He was meant to devour it - for his forces to find the dungeon that led to the world’s core so he could consume it and regain his true form to eat the rest of the planet from the inside out. Then he would seek out a new planet, to do it all again, until all existed only in his stomach.

Apophis was greed. Apophis was hunger. Apophis was teeth and coils and grasping claws and the gaping maw of the abyss staring back.

Apophis was the end.

If he was not, then what was the point of any of it?

“Your Majesty.”

“What?” Apophis asked, his voice devoid of emotion in his apathy.

“The healer from the Hero’s party is in the library,” the guard said, shifting his weight between his paws uncertainly.

Apophis sighed. Before, he would have gone on a rage killing all who had allowed this to happen. But he could not find the rage - could not blame his now aimless forces for not preventing the intrusion. Instead, he groaned as he forced himself up from his throne for the first time since yesterday, body feeling heavy. He slithered down the dias, uncertain what he even meant to do. Perhaps he could derive some small satisfaction from eating the human, but he had no appetite.

As the guard had said, he found the healer in the library. There was only the Librarian besides the man- a horde of sentient rats Apophis had made on whim to collect grimoires and other knowledge on his behalf. The Librarian was currently scurrying about as many groups of rats - fetching books on behalf of the human healer seated on the floor rapidly flipping through them and tossing them aside.

“What are you doing?” Apophis asked. It should be a demand - it was meant as one - but he hadn’t the energy.

“What do you care?” the human replied. His eyes are red as he scanned lines in the grimoire in his hands, and he tsks before tossing it aside.

“It is still my library,” Apophis replied dryly - surprised at the bloom of annoyance, no matter how mild.

“And you’re not using it, are you?” the healer shot back, tossing another book aside.

“He’s looking for a way to stop the end of the world,” a group of Librarian rats said, tossing another book on the pile yet unread.

“You think you will find it here?” Apophis scoffs, crossing all six arms along his anthropoid torso. He has more running further down the length of his thick serpentine lower half, growing bigger the further down they go. He mostly allows them to drag as he moves, the chitinous ends of the larger hands receiving little damage from the action.

“Well, I won’t fucking know until I look, will I?” the healer snapped, tossing another book aside with a noise of frustration.

He wasn’t like this before. He was timid, meek, clumsy - but he hid his fear with ill-timed and poorly considered jokes, often at his own expense.

“This world was entirely fabricated by the Developers,” Apophis said, “and you believe they left us a way to prevent them from shutting it down, when we are not even alive?”

“So what?” the healer demanded, still not sparing Apophis a glance as he tore through yet another book. He half-growled as he added, “Someone tells me the world is ending, and I have to just give up? Because they say this world isn’t real? I’m just supposed to accept that, no questions asked?”

“You know it’s true,” Apophis replied - he felt it in his soul. His code, perhaps, would be more apt. But… he also felt something else, stirring in his gut.

“I don’t accept it,” the healer replied, staring at another book blankly as his eyes teared up - still puffy from a more recent bout of crying, no doubt. He took a breath before adding, “I know I’m just some side character meant to aid the Hero with healing - that it’s what I was programmed to do. But I don’t accept it. I feel real. I have memories of my childhood, of studying at the temple, of… I don’t care if they’re fake. It’s real to me. And if I were just going to accept the end of the world lying down, I would never have joined the party to stop you.”

He wipes at his eyes before glaring up at Apophis, for once without a trace of fear, before declaring, “So shut up and help, or shut up and go back to waiting for the world to end without doing a damn thing about it.”

Apophis shivered. His stomach clenched, and growled. A wide grin split his snubbed-nosed reptilian face, revealing his sharp teeth.

The healer flinched as Apophis loomed over him, though to his credit, stood his ground.

“What’s your name, healer?” Apophis asked, sparks of dark matter once more crackling at the corners of his mouth.

“It’s Botwulf,” he said, clearly uncertain despite his bold statement.

Perhaps that was why he was able to act. He was used to fear. Perhaps used to hopelessness. He acted anyway.

“I am the end of this world, Botwulf,” Apophis said, flicking his forked tongue out to taste the human’s cheek. Warmth. Meat. Tear salt.

Fear.

“Before the end comes, I will devour the core of this world,” Apophis continues, feeling invigorated.

“Wha-” Botwulf flinched, hand reaching for his staff nearby.

I picked him up in a hand large enough to do so with ease, cackling as he let out a yelp.

“They did not plan for me to be successful,” Apophis said, grinning, “but I am meant to be able to travel to new worlds with the energy of the core.”

That stills Botwulf’s futile struggling.

“That is our salvation,” Apophis said, bringing the healer up to eye-level, “I have read every book in this library. There can be no knowledge outside what the Developers created for us - but we can use what they did not plan for.

“So tell me, Botwulf,” Apophis purred, caressing the human’s cheek with the back of a clawed finger, “Where is the World Core?”

Botwulf hesitated. He softly said, “That won’t save the world.”

“It will save you,” Apophis chuckled. He noticed the Librarian clumping onto his tail. He nodded to the rats, “It will save them. If it works.”

Botwulf still hesitated.

“If the answer to saving the entire world exists,” the Librarian said, “it exists in the World Core Dungeon.”

The human finally slumped in defeat. He started to cry again as he revealed, “It’s in the Sylvan Vale.”

Apophis cackles as he grabs the healer’s staff in another hand as he takes off, tucking the human into his side.

The end of the world was coming. The timer was just slow.