The four races of the continent had lived in peace for almost 400 years, but that all changed when demon king Hazar invaded the human kingdom with his demonic army.

The demonic army was made up of over 1,000,000 demons from the four sections of the demon kingdom.

The demons in the north lived in mountains, and had huge wings that they could use to fly with. They covered miles of ground in only minutes, but their attacking capabilities were low. The flying demon's best strength was to drop other demons into human territory.

The demons from the south living in a thick forest, very much like the elven jungle. These demons had razor sharp claws for cutting branches and had teeth capable of biting through steel. Their fighting ability was amazing, and just one southern demon could fight on equal terms with 10 humans.

The demons from the east were the closest to the humans. They had tails that could grab things like an extra hand, and they had horns stronger than steel. They made up the majority of the demonic army, and after a battle where they died, the horns would last for many years after the bones disappeared.

The demons from the west were something else all together. Without illumination from the sun, a western demon was impossible to hit. The only thing that could hurt a western demon at night was fire magic, and not even a battleaxe to the face would phase it if a [Flame] was cast near it. The western demons made up less than 1% of the total demonic army fighting force, but that was still thousands of them. When a western demon attacked, the mages were the last hope of humanity while everyone else was slaughtered.

Hero Status: Requested

My name is Brutus Hans, and I am the greatest adventurer to ever live. I learned magic and swordsmanship at a young age, and then left my mountain village to see the world. My father once told me I was destined to have unrivaled strength in whatever task I performed, and my mother told me about my blessed hands, given to me by some unworldly god. For this reason, I was not given the family name, but instead I was given the name Brutus Hans. Brutish Hands.

I traveled inside the mountain range for several years before I met another human being. He was an old man, probably around 80 years old, but he could move even faster than myself. He taught me how to have an even stronger body without weight training, and when I mastered it he taught me his secret technique, the Wolf Fang Fist. He said it came from a far away land and was passed down for thousands of years in his family, but he lost the ability to get back home, so it was mine now. Before he died, the old man taught me the secret to ultimate power. "I lift things up and put them down". I was never able to understand what it meant, but I say it every day.

A few years later I found something amazing. It was a magic to summon creatures from another realm and be able to command them to do my bidding. All I had to do was think about what kind of creature I wanted to make and it would appear, but it seemed to have a random level of power. There was also a secondary magic alongside this one. It only took one word to chant, and it had amazing effects. It was several dozen effects that changed both real world and mental statuses of a living being. The scariest of these was the Charm spell though, which made living beings fall in love with me. It only lasted about 15 minutes, so one second a monster would be cuddling up next to me, and the next it would be trying to eat me.

But are all these powers really worth it? I have traveled most of the human kingdom, and now most of the people I have ever loved are dead. The demon kingdom invaded our western border and, from the reports that I have seen, have killed 70% of the human population. Every town I travel through is a ghost town. Everyone had fled to the eastern border.

I got a notification by way of adventurer guild broadcast that I was supposed to appear before the king in 3 days. It should only take me a day to get there if I use Fly, but why do I have to come? It could be because I am a rank SSS adventurer with the guild, but I have never seen the capital before. I purposefully stayed away from there so they would not see me as some kind of threat.

I will appear before the king in 3 days, and I hope the guard mages stand down when I approach from the sky.

Hero Status: Received

Approaching from the sky was a bad idea. The mages did not stand down, and I was hit by a few spells. It wasn't like I could just kill the mages. I fell down on purpose, but I maintained my Fly spell so that I could stop before splatting against the ground. I was lucky that someone recognized me from the posters and helped me up. Some of the guards got suspicious that I wasn't hurt from falling from so high, but some other guards laughed it off.

"That's the great Brutus Hans for you!"

After that, I was escorted into the palace. It was the biggest building I had ever seen. From the outside, I just thought the ceiling was well insulated, but I was wrong. Giant stained glass windows illuminated the first room to the palace as we stepped in, and it was magical. In all my years and all my adventures, I have never seen anything like it.

"So you are the adventurer Brutus Hans?"

The king was sitting in his throne. He recognized me, but I don't know how. Surely a king has more important things to do than look at posters in the adventurer's guild? The king was a fat man, and on his left side was 2 women. On his right side was 2 more. Only a pig would have more than one woman I say. Porky's size lived up to my expectations of him from seeing his company.

I introduced myself to the king, and then he called someone from the side of the room. He was a young boy, and he didn't even have a sword, so he wasn't a guard. In these tough times, the king still had his servants. The boy listened to the king say something and then left the room. I waited silently for a few minutes and then 4 people walked in, followed by the same boy.

"I am Asura, master of the forgotten and forbidden magics."

"I am Akira, master of all ordinary spells."

"I am Feng, master of unarmed arts."

"I am Kirito, master of blades."

The four people introduced themselves as masters, but I didn't know about that. I was a master in all four of those things, so how good could they be if they only knew one thing?

"The five of you are the last hopes of the human race."

The king believed in us. He continued to tell us about how important we are and how only we have the power to save humanity from the demonic army. To back us up, there is a private army being lead by a young priest. The young priest is only about 35, which for normal priest is young. He has something special about him though, he has a huge mana pool. Somehow it is even bigger than mine. He can't use all the spells I can, but he can cast Heal and Regrow hundreds of times a day. This young priest's name is Ajoras, and he commands the Legion of Holy Swords. Quite the flashy name.

Hero Status: Reclaiming

We have been on the front for a year now. There are no breaks, and there is no rest. The Legion of Holy Swords has a wagon for the other heroes and myself to ride in when not fighting, so the bumpy road is the only time we have to sleep.

Fighting with the other heroes is quite the honor. It has become apparent that even though I am a master at everything they can do, they are the best. Each hero is better than me in their own field, but I can help with any task that needs to be done.

The land hasn't been pillaged too bad. It looks like people will be able to move back in a few years once the farms are restored. I wonder where my family is, if they are still in the mountain village or if they fled from the advancing demonic army. I just need to kill more demons and make the kingdom safe again.

Hero Status: Regretting

I don't want to be here. We have been fighting for almost 4 years now. Every day there is another battle, and every day I must exhaust my mana using Resurrect on people who died. Mana is a scarce resource, and we don't even have enough to heat the baths anymore, not that I can remember when I last took one that is.

"If you've got time to bath then you have time to battle, now get back out there."

I'm one of the 5 heroes dammit, I should be able to do whatever I want. If not for the demonic army retreating so much, then we would already be done this war. There is some kind of secret weapon that the demons are using at night, and it kills thousands of us without making a sound. Someone is always on watch duty, and only fire magic makes the strange weapon stay away. Mages that could be battling during the day are having to save their mana for at night, but we need all the help we can get on the battlefield.

Those other heroes though, we are quite the team. Akira is quite the guy. Sometimes I think he is a 5 year old kid because he will just start laughing and snort out something incoherent. Feng knows a technique like the Wolf Fang Fist, and he called it a martial technique. I don't know about that, but I kept the phrase the old man told me secret. Kirito is the best swordsman I have ever seen. My lightning-tiger style is just as fast as my lightning spell, but he can still dodge it. Not only is he good at swordsmanship, but Kirito is perhaps the most knowledgeable person I have ever met. He even tried to teach me additional math to what I already knew, but I don't see how being able to divide two numbers that are over 3 digits long will help me.

The hero Asura... I don't like him. He thinks he is better than the rest of us, and he loves to show off his summoning magic, something that I won't do anymore. Asura told me that summoning magic uses the souls of dead monsters and humans alike to fuel the spells instead of mana. He also said it was because I can't see the souls that I use that the magical beast I create have random levels of power. Asura once mentioned something about my soul, and how it was abnormally powerful, but I didn't understand what he meant.

The legend in my mountain village did not say anything about the soul, and even the scriptures I learned summoning magic from had nothing about them. In any case, I will never use summoning magic again. May the dead rest in peace, and hopefully I will one day too when this war is over.

Hero Status: Rejected

I don't want to fight anymore, but it is all I know how to do. One of the men was passing around a prostitute to brighten our spirits, but I just couldn't do it right. When my body touched her's, I just wanted to strangle the life from it.

I don't want to be a hero anymore. The king said I would be given a generous track of land in the reclaimed lands, but after almost 6 years of killing hundreds of demons every day, I have yet to see anything I would want to call mine. The burned villages are worse than I could have imagined. In almost every village, every town, every single population center, there is a pile. Next to the pile are several tables and benches, as if large amounts of demons gathered there. The pile is made from human bones. I know exactly what happened there, and It only beings more rage.

I want to kill. I want to destroy. I want to end it all.

"The only good demon is a dead demon. Do your part and kill at least 1,000 demons today Brutus!"

They say this to me, and all I can do is accept it. I am only here to kill demons. But I save some... Saint Ajoras, as the troops have been calling him, has been requesting that we spare any of the demons with a majority of fur on their bodies, fluffy tails, cat ears, and are female. It does not happen often, but we bring them to him, and I know exactly what he does with them.

I kill. I destroy. I am the bringer of the end. I cannot do what Ajoras does. I cannot touch something without killing it. I cannot coexist with a demon without killing it. I cannot coexist. I can only kill.

It is not just me either. Akira doesn't laugh anymore. We were walking to get some food when we both saw a bug with 6 antlers on it's back like a deer. Akira used to find that funny and try to play with it. That time, he stepped on it after giving it a glance.

Feng has been telling me it is our responsibility as the strong to kill the weak. We were given power from God for a reason, and it was just as the general told us. Our power was meant to kill demons. To Feng, there was no other option.

Kirito has changed the most. He used to tell us things like the reason a particular plant has only 5 leaves was so that the pollen spreading bug that most often feeds from it can get a better grip. Stupid shit like that. Now he tells us about the major states a demon will go through the instant before they die when their neck is cut. He did not learn this from a book, he learned it from first hand experience.

Asura... he loves it. He loves to fight, and he loves to see the souls of demons leave their bodies.

I have learned why the 5 of us are in this hellhole. Akira has magical eyes. He can draw something in his field of vision, and then his chant will make it happen. His lighting can make huge curves, something not even I can do. Feng reached something called the heaven realm. He doesn't say much about it, but if it had to be quantified in terms of power, it would be "leaps and bounds" above everything else. Kirito has a very strange ability. He can slow time. When he wills it, everything around him will slow to 1/8 speed. I feel the worse for Kirito, because when he kills a demon he sees them die 8 times slower than everyone else.

I wish I never had to see another demon die, but It cannot be avoided. They have to die, because I have to kill. I have to kill, because they have to die. It is a never ending cycle of me killing and them dying.

If we don't finish this in another year; maybe just once, I'll try it the other way around...