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The nightmares radicalized Seth; the countless recurring horrors he was forced to face nearly every night as he lay upon his fine bed in the belly of the beast that was Septarsis. The older white-haired male of pale-green skin was not a man who was scared easily. But those horrible dreams were so vivid, so real, and they aligned perfectly with the wide-awake traumas he was forced to endure for all those years. First, it was the Queen of Fire, a wordless specter of a woman who had laid waste and left a trail of burning death wherever she trod. She was the one who would take everything from him. Fool him once…
Then there was Solaria, the one believed to be the reincarnation of the Queen of Fire. She would return all those years later to enact revenge and to finish off unfinished business, for Seth was not allowed to have peace. No… he was to suffer. They all were. The Septarians were no strangers to suffering at that point, for they had watched for centuries the plague of the Butterfly family as they laid the groundwork for such turmoil as they took everything from the monsters, from their land to their food to their lives. The alien monarchy would bring about a new era of suffering in the form of Solaria, and only the acts of a few brave warriors would bring about the end of that forsaken era. Fool him twice…
But he wouldn't be fooled a third time. He would be prepared for the rise of the Queen of Fire should she rear her ugly head again. He waited. And he waited… and waited… but she never came. Centuries passed, and Butterflies came and went, and for a moment, he thought for sure that Star Butterfly, the most recent of the bunch, although a false heir like many before her, would bring about that new era of suffering through her kin, perhaps whoever she had with her lover, Marco Diaz. But then he realized, perhaps too late, as he took the young Ludo Avarius under his wing, that he had taken his eyes off the ball.
Seth loved Ludo and genuinely believed that the young man was his son reborn, the one who would bring about the end of the Butterfly family once and for all, an eye for an eye. Seth would meet his fate, though, in the living realm, the realm of Cerebra, after he had become a god, a minister of death himself. The pitiful fool, if only he had realized that he was part of the game the whole time and that another, a horrible being far more evil than he could imagine, was the one who would bring about the new era of suffering. It was him, the demon known by some as Jupiter, others as Astranalogous, but to most, the ones who never had the opportunity to warn the others, Vadrigar.
Some realities under the divine plan prospered, but others, the ones where he, the living parasite known as Vadrigar, was allowed to flourish, were conquered. He wouldn't come about through the conception of Star Butterfly and Marco Diaz, nor the love of Ludo and his queen, the daughter of Toffee known as Jade, but through the bloodline of the true heir to the throne, Meteora Butterfly. As she grew older, she too would fall in love, a love not found during her first life, with another, and they would bear a child. Unlike most Butterfly heirs, she would produce a boy. His name was Asteroid.
But something went wrong, unbeknownst to them, and from within the womb, young Asteroid was corrupted, a half-breed child of a Mewman (human) and a monster, something much worse than either would take control, and the soul of their would-be child was destroyed before he could ever see the light of day. Neither Meteora nor her lover would ever be made aware that anything of the sort was wrong, that their child was rotten to the core, that his goals had already been set, nor that he would be the cause of their demise.
It would be the Earth Day of June 6th when the child would be born, a warm day, sunny, not a cloud in the sky, and most certainly not a day of omen leering over the poor, unsuspecting parents. Meteora would be given the utmost care. They made sure of it, and even without magic and with a world that had already become too big for them, they would welcome the child with the best of circumstances. After a long and grueling process in which Meteora had passed out from exhaustion, the child had at last been born.
He lay there in the doctor's arms, a baby boy of a pale, lavender complexion with stripes running across his body and a mane of inky black hair, a matching tuft along the tip of his tail. He was a chubby baby with a soft, rounded face, pure and not yet tainted by the spirit within. The young man opened his eyes for the first time to the world, to an audience of smiling faces, and he bore for them a pair of striking red eyes that few would admit made their blood run cold as he stared at them. He couldn't be evil. He just couldn't be.
He had just been born, and it was with that, and their best wishes, that the party would celebrate, eventually parting and bidding the lucky couple adieu. What joy! It was all they could think as they beheld their new son, the love of their lives, and who they would cherish until their deaths. None of them knew what he would become. It's not exactly like Vadrigar had made it perfectly obvious. No. This would be the long con. The boy would act like any other during his first years and even up to the point when he could walk and talk. He would laugh and play, show signs of affection, and present his parents with no ill will whatsoever. He would remain this way for years.
Nobody would ever suspect the young man he would become. Asteroid grew into a fine young man, handsome, respectable, and intelligent. He was popular among his peers, and he was happy. The new world presented to him would pave the way for him to be successful, and most curiously, as the young man had grown, so too would his magical potential. But this was not the only instance of Vadrigar, for across the universe, the demon would pave the way for a new general. For his new general to exercise his power and display his wrath for all to see, the magic had to be reawakened.
For long, it had been dead, a realm of fallen magic, a blackened realm of nothingness where the magic itself had become tar, and a terrible demon would tread from outside the universe and reawaken the magic. It was he, the man dressed in black, with a long mane of flowing black hair. He would place his palm into the soup, and with it, he would give the universe a supercharge. With the wand reawakened, it was time for Asteroid to embrace his true destiny, and one day, as his parents were asleep, he would place his hand into his mother's drawer, a place where she had kept the Butterfly family wand, should something strange ever occur to reawaken her power, and he would draw the wand.
With newfound energy, the wand reshaped itself in his hand to a long, golden scepter marked with a spinning star on top. He gazed at the scepter with wild wonder and a flash in his eyes as it gleamed in his hand from the resurgence of power. That is when he heard it, the voice, the cool whisper of a deep hiss along his pointed ear. He could have sworn for a moment that it said: "awaken". His mother had stirred from the soft noises in her bedroom, and she rose, rubbing her eyes and turning on the lamp, startling the young teen in her room.
"Honey? What's wrong?"
She asked with a soft coo, a groggy mumble to her tired voice. The young man turned to her, a look of concern on his face.
"Mom? What's this? I could hear it… It… called to me."
Meteora rose from her bed, her look of perplexity never leaving her face nor her gaze from its direction as she lifted the covers and slipped onto the floor, little more than her nightgown covering her otherwise bare body, and she approached her son.
"It's… the family wand."
She muttered as she tried to remove it from his hand. Reflexively, or at least implied, he drew the wand close to his chest, and Meteora recoiled somewhat in what appeared to him to be fear. Realizing how ridiculous his behavior was, he relinquished the weapon to her, and she took the wand within her soft, though claw-like hand and the wand transformed once more into a thin, black rod with a circular head and horns on the end, a little tail coiling around it, the form it hadn't taken in years, not since she was a little girl. She stared at the weapon as Asteroid gazed up at her with a somewhat a look of shame on his face, rubbing his forearm.
"What's the matter?"
Her human husband asked in a murmur without so much as rising from his slumber.
"Nothing… Don't worry about it."
And with that, Meteora darted her eyes toward the doorway, quietly signaling to Asteroid that she wished to take the conversation into another room. He followed her into the narrow hallway and toward his room, where he sat on the bed, and she sat beside him, holding the wand out to him. She explained with a sigh.
"A long time ago, our family held the key to very powerful magic, and through this wand, we could control it… wield it. We were able to do some pretty crazy things with this little stick."
Asteroid's red eyes bore into her, and she turned to face him. His expression was filled with intrigue as he interrogated her further.
"What happened to that magic?"
Meteora gulped and stared at the curious weapon once again. Asteroid leaned in, pointing toward her cheeks.
"What are those marks on your face?"
He said, prompting the young woman with the lavender curls to rise from her son's bed and gaze into the mirror, only to notice that a pair of pale blue clubs had returned to her complexion. She felt her face with her soft hands as she returned to her son, her heart beating rapidly as she contemplated the implications. He stared up at her, and she swallowed, slowly approaching the bed once more. She nodded as she sat down, twirling the wand in her hand as she detailed.
"As I was saying, we used to have magic. But then it became corrupted, and we had to shut it down."
But then that begged the question.
"Well, who started it back up then?"
Meteora sat there in quiet contemplation, weighing the possibilities. She didn't answer right away, but then shrugged.
"I don't know. But… back in the old days, the wand was to go to the current heir to the Butterfly family."
She turned to him.
"That would be you. If things still were the way they were back then, you would be getting the wand on your fifteenth birthday."
Asteroid turned away from her. She sensed he felt as though he was unworthy, and she sensed a lack of confidence in him, a humble trait they'd raised in him since birth.
"But… I suppose you've been such a good boy… and things are different now… and you're mature enough, I think, that perhaps you should get it early."
He turned back, facing her, wide-eyed.
"You would teach me magic? Now?"
He said, his voice soft and calm but filled with childish wonder. Quietly, she nodded.
"Yup."
And so, she placed the wand softly into his palm, and it transformed back to the form it took with him, and then… he blanked out. Asteroid's world became black as he sat there on his bed, a bed floating in a black void of nothingness. Asteroid rose from the bed with his wand and stepped onto the floor. The floor caked his bare feet in a thick, viscous black tar, and he peered around only to find that he was surrounded by nothingness.
"Welcome…"
A voice called from the darkness, a smooth, deep voice, one he recognized somehow, but he didn't know where from. He found the voice somewhat familiar, as if it had always been with him.
"Show yourself."
He said… Nothing.
"Show yourself!"
He commanded toward the darkness, raising the wand and standing in battle position, the wand whirring and glowing a bright red before him. From the darkness, he could hear the slow click of a pair of leather boots along a floor. Then, from the darkness, out stepped a man with his arms folded behind his back. The man was dressed all in black, and his eyes burned as red as crimson. They flashed as he made eye contact with the young man before him, and his eyes flashed as well.
"One."
He said.
"We are one."
The man lowered the wand to his side, almost involuntarily, as if commanded internally by some mysterious force.
"Who are you?"
The young monster boy with the black hair asked.
"I am your master."
The man responded as he came to an abrupt halt mere inches from the boy. Asteroid closed his eyes, flinching as the man moved, as if somewhat afraid… Rightfully so. And then, the man placed his palms on Asteroid's shoulders, smiling down at him with a sideways smirk.
"I have come to reclaim that which was lost so long ago… A piece of myself… You, young Asteroid."
He turned, walking away, placing his arms behind his back once again and peering over his shoulder between the long, scraggly strands of black hair nearly dragging along the muck.
"You will be my conqueror, my general. You will not heed the advice of your mother, for she has lied to you. Follow me, and I will lead you down the path to unlimited power. Grant me now… the use of this body, and I will unlock for you your unlimited potential. That wand… It will be the symbol of your dominance. Wherever you go, it will mark your commandment. With the Butterfly wand, you will command them all. Do you trust me?"
The mysterious man asked, extending his hand toward the young man, reaching out toward him with his blackened nails for a truce. Asteroid stared for a moment. Up to this point, he had always had Vadrigar within him. From birth, it was always part of his destiny to rule. He could see the visions of the man in black within his dreams, the call to something greater. He'd never spoken about these dreams with his parents. None of them knew. But it all made sense now. He knew. It had always been his destiny. And so, the young monster took the hand of the mysterious stranger, sealing his fate and becoming one with the demon known as Vadrigar.
The half-monster king felt the power of the demon flow through his veins, and an elation for turmoil swept over him, unlike any happiness he had ever felt before. Asteroid would slaughter his family: mother and father, grandparents, aunts and uncles, and friends alike, and for all the blood he drew, he could shed no tears, only laugh at his destruction as he wielded the Butterfly family wand, the royal scepter in his hand, and with a power unlike any other, he would destroy them, town by town, city by city. The foolish mortals had no idea that magic could be reawakened. They had no clue that it could be awakened and wielded solely by the last royal heir to the Butterfly throne.
The terrible demon, Vadrigar, whispered sweet curses into his ears, filling him with secrets the mortals could not interpret. He would expose all attempts at intervention, for without magic, Vadrigar was indestructible. The militaries of the world sought to intervene against the giant monster, to levy upon him tanks and military ballistic missiles. All attempts proved futile. Asteroid the Conqueror would level those countries, leaving in his wake the dead and the thralls of Armageddon. The world itself would become a barren wasteland as people turned on one another, blaming each other for this apocalypse, and with little more to do but watch as the world was set afire, the demon king cackled from his throne.
Still, questions were left unanswered, and that did not sit well with him. Flash forward another fifteen years, and so much turmoil had been caused that the world lay in waste. The cities, once filled with life, both Mewman and monster, lay in ruins, buildings crumbling to the ground, the outskirts a desert wasteland filled with bones and the remains of what was once civilization. They tried to resist him, the man with all the magic and all the power. Between the wand, the natural growth magic of his heritage, and the powers of the demon Vadrigar, nothing could stand in his way. Asteroid was ruthless, slaughtering his mother and father in cold blood with his magic, reveling in the power before going out and taking down all the other threats.
His sights were on Star and Marco, and with his might, he would slaughter them. None could stand in his way, not even all the armies of the world. They would suffer. He would rule them all, building with them, his monuments of death, towers of bone and mud, their skulls, his ornaments, his empire of death, the world. It took him fifteen years, and no matter what they threw at him, they couldn't stop him. He would amass a following, and they would be his disciples, just as had been prophesied. They served him as he sat atop a throne of death, gazing outward into the wasteland as the red sky greeted him daily. He had fulfilled his role in destroying the combined Mewman-monster Earth. That would be his practice.
It had taken a long fifteen years to take them all, but with the deed accomplished, Asteroid was once again approached. From a red portal, the man in black advanced. He was met with brutes, large, cumbersome oafs with crude weapons, and he was threatened with violence, the mooks unknowing of whom they had faced, and the man, with ease, dispatched these minions, tearing them inside out with mere telekinetic magic, splitting their bones along the ground before him. Vadrigar trod up to the throne, his thick, black heels crunching the dry, arid dust beneath him as he peered up at the man on the throne, and once again, their eyes met. He smiled, and Asteroid smiled back.
"What brings you here, master?"
The conqueror asked, much to the confusion of his remaining underlings.
"We have work to do… my general. They are coming for me… and I require the use of my generals."
The conqueror rose from his throne, spitting onto the ground beside his throne and gripping his scepter tightly.
"Who threatens my master?"
He asked, a deep grit to his voice, coming from a mouth that had since grown a long, black beard. Vadrigar smiled as he responded, the two heading back to the portal.
"The white mages."