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At the end I just told them I heard everything. I've been rather angry about this topic in specific… Because they've known about this for a while yet they have hidden it from me and the rest of my friends for very long.
"So you heard everything…" My mother facepalmed. "Zephy and your friends are still sleeping, you're up quite early today, dear."
"I wanted to eat breakfast, I'm pretty hungry but now that I am here I want answers." I said with a serious tone of voice. "Why have you been hiding this from us? I bet that Gray guy was also behind the Abyssal Eyes at Eastgrain, right? And also what happened in the Amazon Forest where we had to run away from! Did he also orchestrated that? Did he stole the God's relics?"
"We've been hiding this for your own good." My father said. "We thought that if you were to know that there were heroes that… would fall this low, you might begin to see us as failures. Maybe… Maybe we were wrong, I guess."
"We were afraid to tell you the truth." My mother said. "You were still very young back then, it could had impacted your mentality too much, we wanted you to grow up while developing a sane way to look at life, so you can see the kindness and good heartedness of people first, before you were to know about those with dark hearts, that would only grow darker."
"Hah… Fine, I'm not like going to get angry or something." I sighed, as Nephilim brought me several pieces of cake and my familiar started eating breakfast at my side. "So I'm assuming Gray is a hero like you? He was your friend too? But why did he became such a psycho?"
"Well, he was always someone… twisted." Arafunn sighed. "Gray was an orphaned young human boy that used to be the slave of a corrupt duke's family. He was mistreated and tortured through his childhood. This made him become… different."
"When he awakened his Magic Talent, he escaped and once he grew strong enough, came back to that family and massacred them all." My mother sighed. "We encountered him several years after those events, where he had become a wandering sorcerer."
My parents continued explaining me more about Gray, he was very unique compared to every other hero due to his terrible past. However, despite his way of being, he never disrupted the pace in which they grew stronger, nor refused to help them in any events either.
He fought together with everyone, and over time, he opened his heart more and more, becoming friendlier with everyone. His magic was the strangest of them, it seemed to be related with his own soul, which was a "Gray Soul" according to my mother.
"His soul was the origin of his powers, but also the origin of his curse." My mother sighed. "Gray is perhaps the strongest Necromancer and Warlock we've ever meet in our entire lives. And still, he might be the strongest in the world… Yet the power to control souls and the dead came with a price."
"His curse drained his life and youth accordingly to how much he used these powers." My father sighed. "Over time, as the years went by… Gray slowly started aging much faster than all of us."
"He was always smiling and laughing at our side, not bothered at all by the curse." Shade said. "We once tried to find a cure, we tried many times yet… it was impossible."
"When the war ended, Gray looked incredibly different than when we first meet him…" My mother sighed. "I always felt regret that my own magic was unable to bring back his youth, to bring back the strength he slowly lost just for the war, just for this useless cause we all fought for, which feels so pointless now…"
"Maybe he also felt the same than us, and realized he was tricked." My father said. "Perhaps this drove him to his madness."
"He also had great empathy with the demons, much more than us. While we cared more for our people and families, as he had none, he channeled all of his affection and empathy to the unfortunate." My mother said. "We admired his kind soul, and how he decided to stay in the demon continent to protect everyone. We had even considered going to visit him soon…"
"Life gives a lot of twists." My father sighed, recalling Gray. "Perhaps after all these years separated, he thought we replaced him for someone else, maybe he harbors hate and resentment against us for not staying with him back then…"
"Hmph, but now he was all young and handsome." Arafunn said. "He most likely was the one that got the relic in the amazon tribe, and absorbed its powers. Before we were to separate, we found out that divine relics made by the gods and left behind by them in their ancient ruins had the power of rejuvenation and to heal any curse or disease, yet they also harbored dangerous powers that could drive someone mad or transform them into monsters."
"I guess he didn't care anymore and started using them until he was healed." Ninhursag assumed. "But now, he had surely become something else… He was no longer a human. The presence he gave off, and that hidden power within his soul… He had grown twisted, monstrous. The only presence I can compare him to is… The otherworldly True Demons."
"He kind of reminds me of Celeste…" I said. "Maybe because of this, he was also able to convince her back then while leading the Abyssal Eyes. Ugh, but I feel like he alone can't be the only person behind this."
"Oh, not at all." My mother said. "If one thing may remain the same today is that Gray was always na?ve and could be easily convinced by others that had their way with words."
Yeah, I had also assumed the same thing, there's another mastermind behind his actions.
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