[Rewrite]Chapter 1: The End of the World was Mid

In another place, in the past.

Tap-Tap-Tap

In a dimly lit room, a woman sat in front of her computer, typing indifferently. Her bloodshot eyes locked on a glowing wall of text.

Tap-Tap-Tap

The room was modest. A neatly made twin bed sat in the corner, opposite three monitors that illuminated the worn hoodie and average face of the woman sitting before them. Her unkempt black hair framed sharp but unremarkable features. The only thing that stood out was the deep ruby-red hue of her skin, peculiar by some standards, but in this society, it simply meant she was normal.

Because here, demons were the default.

Tap-Tap-Tap~

Her fingers danced faster now, the rhythm only broken by her occasional snort of disdain. She wasn’t human, but neither was that notable here. The world outside was designed for people like her. Everything beyond demons was relegated to fantasy fiction and imported game lore.

Roll-Screechh~

She rolled her chair back and stretched her arms overhead. Her sweatshirt lifted just slightly, revealing a modest, unimpressive frame that would go unnoticed in most rooms. Not that it mattered—men here were the objects of beauty, not women.

“Hmm. They never learn, do they?”

She clicked her tongue, glaring at the screen where likes, dislikes, and replies flooded beneath her most recent comment. Another daily crusade, the battle of wills fought in the digital trenches of the Tragedy of Heroes fandom.

She leaned in, letting the replies scroll in real time:

[ShotaShieldTav]: The ending was trash. The author just lazily pushed the most rushed, woke bullshit at the end to finish his fame-dwindling saga. The Last ML went from bubbly protag to pure Gary Stu!

[ToryTornado]: @ShotaShieldTav why are you like this…

[SadGlobe:] @ShotaShieldTav ??? Damien had the most development. You just hate that a guy got to be the MC in a reverse-world novel. This dying thread is disgusting as always.

[ToryTornado:] @SadGlobe Don’t engage. She’s unhinged.

[foxGloveFarmer:] Don’t feed the demon, Sis.

[ShufflePerson:] @SadGlobe wait, are you a guy irl? u play any mmos? I play most of the popular ones…

[SadGlobe]: @ShotaShieldTav Damien had more growth in Volume 3 alone than most characters did in the entire series. He was flawed, passionate, and earned every win. You’re just bitter.

[ShotaShieldTav]: @SadGlobe You people will defend Damien no matter what, huh? Man gets every cheat in the book, walks through trauma like a tourist, and you call that character growth?

[SadGlobe]: @ShotaShieldTav He EARNED those powers. You clearly didn’t read Side Volume 5 or the Heavenfall Arc, THATS DEVELOPMENT. Go touch grass.

[ShotaShieldTav:] @SadGlobe "Development"? The man got carried by his teacher, got one shotted by demon lord Shela, fell into a coma, woke up with plot armor, and then picked up traumatized girls like Pokémon. Then what? More gifts, more gear, more girls. Bro, he’s a power fantasy for insecure men who think relationships are loot drops.

The words came quickly, like venom from a long-stored gland. There was no tremble in her fingers, no stutter in her rhythm. She wasn’t angry, no, anger was the domain of those who still hoped. She was past that.

[foxGloveFarmer:] LOOOOL not loot drops 

[ToryTornado:] Let’s not use ‘bro’. You sound like a femcel Tav…

[ShufflePerson:] Reverse harems are cringe anyway. Imagine sharing your man with like 10 other girls. I’d off myself.

[foxGloveFarmer:] Damien’s girls were straight cuckqueens. Not one of them had spine. Like, congrats on your group boyfriend??

Tavja barely registered the chuckle she let slip. One eye twitched. Another reply was forming

[SadGlobe:] Oh, so it’s fine when women have harems but not men? Double standard much? Also, no one in the story had better growth than Damien, not Elf Bradley and def not Shela. Prove me wrong.

[ToryTornado:] @ShotaShieldTav Don’t say it. Please.

[ShufflePerson:] @ToryTornado white knight Tory at it again lol just let her cook. Shela is GIGASTACE tho.

[foxGloveFarmer:] @ShufflePerson stop being a drama goblin lol

Tavja snorted at this rookie SadGlobe. clearly, another weak woke male. The opening he allowed made it obvious. She attacked with vigor.

[ShotaShieldTav:] @SadGlobe you want me to name someone with better growth? The 6th Vainglory, you ignorant cretin. Devil genius of Hellnia. Best written character in the entire saga and the one person who actually had development. Cold. Loyal. Misunderstood. While Damien was grinding XP in bathhouses, Vainglory was surviving betrayal, mutilation, and solitude. He earned his strength. Then what happened? One of Damien’s harem lovers executes him by pure luck, and that clown STILL strutted around like he beat the final boss.

She didn’t even pause to breathe between replies. Her fingers flew. It wasn’t just anger anymore, it was a war of memory. Of meaning.

[SadGlobe]: @ShotaShieldTav Are you talking about that zombie devil from like three chapters? The one Damien’s second lover kills in the dungeon arc? lol what arc? Are you trolling? He was only shown to reveal the origin of Damiens devil heart. He was a plot device.

[ShotaShieldTav]: @SadGlobe Plot device? The man had more narrative density in three scenes than Damien did in three arcs. You uncultured swine. The multifaceted genius that is the cold handsome and unyielding 6th Vainglory is not some side villain. He was the story. He was what the story could’ve been, if the author had the spine.

There was a pause. Maybe SadGlobe was typing. Maybe they were stunned. Maybe they were quoting lore at her like an amateur flinging pebbles at a tank. 

The other replies flooded back, some mocking, some defensive, others just there to watch the fire spread.

Then she saw it.

[ShufflePerson]: Lol yeah, Vainglory got clapped in 3 chapters lol stop coping sis.

Tavja’s hand froze mid-keystroke. The blood in her veins slowed to a simmer. Her jaw tightened. Her pupils dilated.

[ShotaShieldTav]: Clapped? You absolute braindead primordial slime. Vainglory didn’t get clapped, he was silenced, assassinated by the plot to make room for your harem mascot messiah. He appeared in three chapters? No, he haunted three chapters. That’s the difference between a cameo and a curse. You lot can’t comprehend him because you read like toddlers and forget anyone without a swimsuit chapter.

[ToryTornado]: Don’t feed her. She’s terminal.

[foxGloveFarmer]: ngl “haunted” was kind of hard tho

She was instantly triggered, she knew it, felt it, but she didn’t even blink. She was far too trained, too disciplined to fly off the handle completely, no way. She fought with cold, undeniable logic.

She told herself.

 [ShotaShieldTav]: Let me educate you, peasants. Side story 6 part 12: Betrayal of Greed. The 14th Hero Party and their gods made a deal with 1st Avaritia that sealed most devil and demonkind outside Neel for 666 years, trapped in Hellnia. He murdered 3 of the other 6 ruling archdevils to show his cooperation, but Avaritia knew he’d need a special ‘sacrifice’ to solidify it completely.

Enter: Vainglory, the devil with the greatest potential. Betrayed by his own kin to cement a fragile pact. Though Avaritia faked Vainglory’s death, intending to make use of his bloodline down the road, that simp Abigail finds out years later, sent by her goddess to take his devil heart while he was imprisoned and bound in Greeds Abyss, under Avaritia’s unknowing nose.

That’s why Damien got his Devil’s heart. A DEVIL HEART HE BARELY UNDERSTANDS. Not earned. Not understood. Just... taken. YOU THINK THAT’S A HERO’S ARC?

[SadGlobe:] @ShotaShieldTav ??? If Damien was a girl saving a bunch of  helpless guys you would most likely call it godly development and what are you even talking about? The devil heart was a gift from his magic teacher, Sorceress Abigail, and she specifically says she only knows the power, not the origin. Your brain is broken from too many fan fics. Chapter 156.

That made her scoff, quoting scripture in front her? This normie? She just sighted the evidence and it was brushed over without a single glance, was he disabled? She felt her teeth creak with this obvious attempt to sweep for his king. 

Or was it pure dissonance?

She couldn’t tell, and she didn’t care.

[ShotaShieldTav:] @SadGlobe You uncultured swine, you are saying that BECAUSE you didn’t read the side story, this story is lost on some bottom feeding gigolo like yourself. How do you even get around during the day without assistance? How are you even typing right now? As I thought, 2D guys are indeed a cut above the rest. Mouth drooling macho wannabe’s, the lot of you Damien defenders.

Tavja leaned back with a satisfied sigh, another bot slain with ruthless precision. Now to convert the masses watching. She placed her hands on the keyboard ready to reel in the baited with the hook of her obscure side story reference and IQ questioning insults. The bane of internet intellectuals. 

There was another pause in the thread. And the pendulum swung, from heated discourse to mindless mockery. The memes soon followed.

[foxGloveFarmer:] yap yap yap.

[ShufflePerson]: Lol still three chap clapped.

[SadGlobe]: Oh my god. I’m arguing with a fanfic-tier Vainglory simp who thinks three chapters of moody glaring is character development.

[ShufflePerson]: She wrote a 40k fanfic of Vainglory dying but slowly.

[foxGloveFarmer]: Send link

[ShufflePerson]: no lemons tho

[foxGloveFarmer]: Oh nvm

[SammySummoner]: Nah, Damien literally trained for months in the Frozen Spirit Temple arc. He almost died like three times.

[JellyOfCringe]: Cope. He was born strong and he didn’t earn anything. That’s why he got culled. Damien earned his gifts.

[foxGloveFarmer:] lol She mad mad.

[ShufflePerson:] Nah she just Vainglory-pilled.

[ToryTornado]: Vainglory was also 16 when he died btw…

[SadGlobe]: Oh cool, so you’re a pedo-necro-fanfic enjoyer. Guess I wasted my time arguing.

[foxGloveFarmer:] lol

[ShufflePerson:] I cant lol

[TonyTornado:] I told you, she’s been posting this garbage in every {Tragedy of heroes} forum after the release of the final chapter…. guess ‘ShotaShield’ isn't a joke lol… I don’t even think she cares about the character story, just the fan fics of him.

The comments stung. Not because it hit home, but because it was lazy. A cop-out. An escape hatch to avoid the intellectual curb-stomping she had lined up next. Tavja leaned back slowly, her hands trembling with restraint. 

She wouldn’t get baited, she was a soldier, Vainglory’s strongest warrior. She would finish her mission smoothly.

He didn’t need screen time. He just needed readers with eyes.

She took a deep breath and let her fingers fly.

[ShotaShieldTav:] Nonsense. He wasn’t dead, he had his wishes stripped during the dungeon arc on top of having his organs harvested so technically he was around 680 years at the time, plus devils have the Ancestral knowledge ability so age really doesn’t mean anything when you think about it. 

Now allow me all to educate you on the intricacies of this long forgotten character, he may have died halfway through the story during that arc, but the reason he died and why that specific party member killed him all has it’s meaning in the story, The MC Damien doesn’t even use his power meaningfully after he gets the heart. Hell, that gigolo doesn’t even know how to use it. We have to go back 700 years in the story's history to explain it. So it started off with…

…

…

After finishing her internet sermon, and hyperlinking her fanfic, blog archive, and obscure Vainglory analysis podcast, Tavja finally leaned back into her chair.

“Idiots,” she muttered. Her voice was hoarse from disuse.“Why did they even bother reading the story?”

The argument had already spread to other threads. Quote chains. Screenshots. Memes. 

No one cared.

The warzone she left behind still buzzed on her third monitor, but she didn’t bother refreshing. She already knew what would be waiting: denial, smug gifs, and unread replies from people whose entire analysis boiled down to ‘lmao he got clapped.’

They didn’t understand the nuance. They didn’t care about the structure, the foreshadowing, the metaphorical weight of betrayal. They didn’t even remember the names of characters who didn’t take their shirts off or have their pants bulging.

She scoffed, “Degenerates, porn-sick idiots, and worst of all… e-scholars.”

To her, they were pagans.

Apostates.

Heretics.

She tabbed out and looked at her monitor wallpaper, the best depiction of Vainglory she could pay for, her truth, her Caged God. She spent quite the sum for this digital work. A vibrant image with small animations.

She gazed at it… in admiration.

He stood atop a battlefield hill, armor broken, shirt slashed open at the collarbone, posture wounded but unbroken. A ruined skyline behind him. Ash drifted in carefully-rendered flakes across his shoulders. The animation cost her 4,600 credits.

She’d pretended it was ironic.

“It’s just art,” she’d muttered “Cinematic silhouette. Apex framing. True, uncorrupted masculinity as narrative archetype. I like the composition, not the abs.” she coped.

She definitely didn’t stare at the beads of blood at the corner of his lip. Or the way his eyes held that ‘I die so you don’t have to’ look that smoldered back at her.

It wasn’t a shallow pinup of her male fantasy, it was art, reverence. In the cleanest form.

She shook her head, shaking away the peculiar heat rising to her face. She tabbed back into her open pages.

It wasn’t a sob story.

It was just hers.

And if the world outside her four apartment walls didn’t understand her frustration with how her favorite story was butchered, then so be it.

With a sigh, she leaned back in her chair, and rolled her neck. Her cracked voice crept out into the stagnant air.

“…They really gave him everything and still made him dull.”

The monitors reflected in her tired eyes. There he was, Damien, plastered across every wiki, every fan art thread, every blog. She could recite his story from memory and still feel nothing. But Vainglory…

He had died early, yes. But with meaning. Betrayed, dismembered, forgotten. His death birthed a chain of betrayals that shaped the second half of the series. His heart, the literal core of his mythic lineage, had been plucked and handed off like a trophy. And no one seemed to care.

Except her.

Tavja’s fingers slowed as she opened one of her own blog posts. 6,000 words. Ten theories. Twenty comments. One like.

She smiled faintly. The first smile of her day that contained a semblance of warmth.

“Don’t worry king, I’ll remember you, Vainglory.”

She stood up deciding to make some much needed breakfast. Arguing through the night always fueled her typically low appetite. Moving to the kitchen down the hall.

She moved on autopilot. Eggs in the pan. Bread in the toaster. Juice in the cup.

The sizzle of the yolks gave her a backdrop to think.

“Great story. Terrible ending.” She muttered.

That wasn’t just her opinion, it was a universal constant, like gravity or the corruption of major political parties.

Tavja had spent a long time deep-diving into the web novel Tragedy of Heroes. Some called her a shut-in. She preferred the term engaged fantasy historian. She wasn’t afraid to leave her apartment. No, she just had no interest in the pantomime outside.

Society, to her, was like a bad stage play. Predictable plot, wooden dialogue, and no real exit.

The issue wasn’t that reality was fake. It was real enough. It just felt… somewhat unconvincing.

The rules. The posturing. The performative career climbing. All of it drained her.

She knew what she was. Average. Mildly clever. Not beautiful. Not ugly. Above mediocrity but beneath potential. A purgatory-tier existence. The only thing above her was effort, and she didn’t see the point.

Climbing required charisma. Networking. Luck. Smiling at the right people and laughing at the wrong jokes. And in the end?

More money?

She didn’t need more money.

As a remote software dev, she made good coin with very little time investment. Weekly tasks knocked out in a couple days, leaving the rest of the week open to...well, this.

She didn’t party. She didn’t travel. She didn’t splurge. Her savings account was fat and purposeless. A bank vault of “what ifs” she never intended to cash.

Fame? Influence?

Absolutely not. She could barely tolerate being perceived. Why the hell would she want to be admired by strangers? Influence just meant more responsibility and less time alone. To her, in this society, it was more like torture than a dream come true.

Love? 

That one was trickier. In another life, maybe.

But Tavja’s romantic track record had been a dumpster on fire since she was sixteen. Her taste in men had been surgically dismantled by a combination of early heartbreaks and late-night feminist media grinds. At one point, she fully leaned into misandry. Loudly, proudly, painfully. The worst part?

She believed it.

Swallowed the podcasts whole. Quoted femosphere ‘facts’ like scripture. Donated to creators who sold her anger back to her in sterilized language and pastel infographics.

And when the veil lifted, around age thirty? When she realized they were just running a business built on emotionally bankrupt women?

It was too late. She’d already gotten comfortable with solitude.

Now? Relationships felt like social taxes with no benefits. And she wasn’t in the mood to pay.

She flipped the eggs with a sigh and peeked at the toaster. The toast looked doomed.

‘Now what?’ she wondered, feeling a little empty.

Tragedy of Heroes was finished. And with it, one of the only things she looked forward to.

The novel had started with such promise. Eight unique heroes from different backgrounds, clashing with calamities, confronting gods, building legacy. Tavja had followed every arc, memorized every side story, argued every plot twist. She adored how each character’s fall felt inevitable.

But then came the finale.

Only one hero left standing. Damien, the dullest golden boy in the lot. The poster child for “what if the story just gave up halfway through and picked the safest ending possible?”

He sealed magic. Sealed history. Sealed all intrigue.

A world of endless mystery turned into another Earth rock with a keyboard and no spell slots.

‘Bitter doesn’t even cover it.’

As she sat, she noticed something.

The office door, her old sanctuary.

Slightly open.

That was odd. She hadn’t been in there since she quit her last part-time job.

“Maybe I should work that job again? It was… something?”

Her eyes lingered on the doorknob longer than they should have. For a moment she felt… nothing. No curiosity, no unease, just an absent sort of calm, as if her mind skipped across a surface it wasn’t allowed to break.

“Nah, it was boring… pretty sure.”

Inside, the faint outline of an old wall rack caught the light from the kitchen, metallic, grid-shaped. Something like a weapons mount, or maybe just a weird art piece she'd bought online.

Probably.

She blinked and shut the door with her foot, never questioning why the lightbulb in that room had never worked, or why the back wall had a pressure seal welded in behind the drywall.

She laughed quietly to herself.

‘Damn. If I lived in a world like that…’

Magic. Devils. Gods. Danger. Power… Him.

‘At least I’d make a better ending.’

BUZZ BUZZ

The sound made her jump slightly. She glance at her face down phone. Spam? She had no friends that texted her this early…or late? Her mind drifted again.

‘One where actual powerhouses matter. Where the gods don’t rig the board just to crown a himbo with cheat codes. And wreck the world in the process.’

BUZZ BUZZ

‘I wouldn’t waste potential like that.’

BUZZ BUZZ BUZZ

‘I’d do it right.’

DING

Toast popped.

Her phone buzzed again.

Frowning, she flipped it over.

‘Hm? Unknown Number?’

Curious, she picked up a fork in one hand while checking her messages with the other.

[Unknown]: I agree with you.

[Unknown]: It was a disappointing display.

[Unknown]: The chosen heroes never had what it truly takes to lead this world.

[Unknown]: But maybe you do, demon girl of another world. lol. Good luck~ 

Tavja blinked. Her thumb hovered over the screen.

“…Huh?”

She looked up just in time to notice she’d stabbed her fork too far down the toaster.

Pain followed.

BZZZT

A flash.

A jolt.

Then nothing.