Fan Fiction ❯ Sons of HEaven ❯ Legend ( Chapter 1 )

Author's Note/Disclaimer: This is the first serious fic I've done in a long time (See: Batman Beyond: Cold Blood, under a different pen name, Mr. Crimson), and it feels pretty good. I just hope it comes out as well. I also don't own Dante, or anything or one that relates to the DMC games as of now. Plus, it's been written to be friendly to those that aren't up on DMC, but as mentioned, this is all based on the idea of "What if it was turned into a movie set before the first game?" Either way this turns out, I hope you enjoy.

The rain was only clear when it fell, until it touched the soiled and bloodied earth where the dead rested from a cause older than time. Inside the fortress where it all came to be, everything was far more explicit. Blood was smeared along all corners, in every room, and without question, on the broken floors, where others still bled until they found peace or malice. Some were even posted on walls by way of sharp weaponry, or hung from the ceiling by any which way they could have. This tainted piece of the world showed the price many paid for freedom, but it would never be as soothing as those who dared to take it away.

Amidst the combined disaster lied the only survivor, who sat on the floor covered in tears, blood, and entrails. He was a stocked male, wearing all black and broken shades, frozen in his place until he found the strength to slay his fear, and stand as best as he could. From each step he took, he found a new reason to lay and die, since the pain bore too great of a burden. Every muscle was fatigued, the arches of his feet ached as if he walked over the sagitate blade of Death itself, and his eyes were blurry and multiplied by what may have been poison from any one of the demons.

As he took careful steps over the bodies of the resistance and their demonic counterparts, his vision only became clear at a point where he could see a man with long, black hair come before him barely stepping over the attrition, wearing a silver trench coat of a unique design. As the man came to his side to help carry him out, the thick male pushed him away with little strength, as the fancy male stood without a piece of shock.

"Why," the man spoke in confusion.

"Because you're weak," the fancy one answered, before he assisted him despite the dark man's struggle. He kept oscillating between states of consciousness, feeling as if he were traveling forward through time, because what could have been a ten minute trod of pain, felt like three long seconds that put a smile on his face, until he was given full awareness of his surroundings. He was now outside and on his knees, where fewer bodies gave way into the mud and weighing rain, if they didn't lied on a broken vehicle, or charred and beaten concrete. The white clothed male, who stood outside with him, seemed untouched by the downpour, as he smiled and spoke with his back to the broken man.

"So, evil triumphs when good men do nothing. What is it when good men do something? A moment like this, that's what. You people, always ready to take part in affairs that are far deeper than the human mind and soul will ever comprehend. I hate to see this end with you this fragile, and after you placed such a delicious display of power against me. Just know that if we meet again, under any circumstance, I won't hesitate to make you see 'Riley'…and I will see you again. You just pray that you see me first, traitor…and run on sight."

He petted the man's head before he walked away, and saw one of his own limp to him a hurry, ready to beg for newfound life. What the amalgamated minion gained for his loyalty was a swift snap of his neck, as the apathetic man walked into the darkness carrying another body over his shoulders. He smiled, as the man in black stayed set on his knees, closing his eyes in whishes that he was still, of all things, alive.

Four Years Ahead…

The business that is known as Devil Hunting is based on commission with both worldly clients, and those that are of a higher existence, the latter being the toughest to gain the flattery and compensation of. Each kill to some in this profession is a chance for them to cleanse their soul deathly weighed with sin. For others, it's an excuse to shed blood that is not their own, even if the victims turned to the darkness were at one point human, or close to the assailant. Others, however, are in it to discover their selves. Somehow, their past is in tune with the monstrosities they force themselves upon from sunrise to set, and there is often no escape from it. It is only because there is always a darkness to everyone's past and present, simply because darkness takes interest in anything the light does, and the light takes interest in everything. That fact holds more iron especially if it's the product of an intimate engagement between the two worlds.

A bustling super market was an afternoon's venture for a man in his late thirties, who looked calm and relaxed in his navy blue business clothing, and pressed white polyester/cotton shirt. He pushed the cart along and picked up every item on his mental list as if he had been in the store enough times to know where everything was. Most of it consisted of meat products and orange juice, and with each time he picked up a new item, he looked over his shoulders, with the feeling that he were being watched by someone far off. He shook away the paranoia once he began to check out the items, while catching the eye of the female clerk. After they threw multiple innuendo at each other, a late night invite to the man's estate was issued and accepted.

The man went onward to his fancy car with a gleam in his eye and a wedding band back on his finger when he entered with items in the back. Once it did, the feeling returned that someone was nearby, waiting for him to screw up to his or her liking. He knew that it'd come to this as this night came on this exact day. Now that it was here, it was only a matter of time to see if his dreams would come to fruition, or a sudden, abrupt divine intervention. Though greed drove him for one, what was still pure prayed for the other.

Night had finally come for what was planned, as the man came home with more items of an occult nature, with sheer joy that his wife was out of town, and he'd be inside his next mistress. As he exited his car with bags in hand and a beaming smile, he sensed it again, only it was stronger, and understandingly darker, as if the force he felt was behind it couldn't wait any longer for him to finish his deed. No longer with a sunny façade, he took small steps to his front door, as he looked all over the area, anticipating someone rushing towards him with a murderous mindset. Instead, there were only crickets and fireflies, if not the house music blaring blocks down, which had bass rifts as fast and sporadic as his heart rate. With shivers that quickly came and went, he placed the key into the socket, while questioning why such frigid air came from the bottom crack of the door.

He opened the door without stepping in, just to see if anything looked wrong at first sight. As the door hinged all the way to the opposite wall, he was glad to know that no one awaited him behind it. Still with careful steps, he entered his home, and took full effect of the cold air within, quickly chilling his blood and making his jaw vibrate. His eyes focused on anything he could allow himself to find that was indecent in his house, but everything seemed in place, save the fact that his air conditioner was in the shop.

As his senses came back to him from a brief loss of clarity, he began to hear something that sounded like a slow, bellowed breath that shook the house to a soft shaking. From there, he took blunt notice of how much his thin shirt added little protection from the icy air, to the point where he had no choice but to drop the groceries at the same time he focused on the living room in fright. Surprisingly, it wasn't the sword embedded inside the middle head of his three-headed guard dog that got his attention. The man noticed that second to the person that possibly owned the weapon, who sat mostly in the darkness, but was lit by a window to his right enough to make out a red trench coat and a tuft of white hair.

"You must be Brandon Corvo," the man in red identified with a calm voice. Brandon nodded, "W-w-who are you?" "Let's just say that someone up there's on your side," the shadow replied, as he stood up and revealed himself in more visible light while taking his sword out the dead beast. The man's jacket was entirely red, its design sleek and techno-gothic, for lack of better words. His face was handsomely structured and, though youthful, had the markings of someone that had seen more tragedy than any one person could ever bear. Brandon, however, was about to have it easier by premonition, though tonight he almost lost something that can't be returned so easily. Then again, as the white haired man looked deeply into his soul, he realized that, in essence, Brandon lost that long ago. All he did was shake his head and viciously take Brandon by the arm outdoors.

"So you were looking to get rich by making an offering to a Polgara demon," the man asked, tightening his grip on Brandon, as he continued, "you should've done your research, kid." He threw Brandon out his grip, once they were fully across the street, as he looked up and down the male. "Why's that," Brandon asked, ready to swing, but felt the action would be futile. "Polgara demons don't answer anyone's wishes immediately. Once they switch dimensions, they first answer their stomach's when it comes to sustenance. They love human meat. So much that it's hard to pull one away from its feed until it's too late. Unless…you knew that. Is that why the cutie from register five's about to see you?"

Halfway into his speech, Brandon noticed a slender, familiar figure coming from inside the house, as it held a red container that leaked of a clear fluid. More than praying that the woman wasn't holding and pouring gasoline, he prayed silently and deeply that the woman holding it wasn't his wife.

It was.

"I knew you were onto some Demitri Maximoff, hocus pocus shit," she screamed, which somehow made the tanned brunette hotter, "but I didn't think you'd actually go an' do it! That, and you cheated on me, on this!" She waved her hand across her body, and audibly continued, "What do fifty women got that I haven't done to you? I can play games too, motha' f--…oooh, I'm gonna' enjoy this, right here!"

She dropped the canister, which Brandon confirmed to be for gas, as she took out a Zippo lighter and threw it on the liquid path. As it went on its way, she smiled towards the white haired male and wanted to make love to him right there in front of her easily proclaimed ex. To hold herself back in case future debris halted the event, she only spoke in a sultry voice.

"I can't thank you enough, mister…"

"Dante," he spoke softly with a glance to her, "and don't thank me yet, Cara. The best part's coming up."

Once the fire reached its set destination of more inflammable items inside the stove set to leak gas, the entire house was soon enveloped in the flames and explosions that were meant to be. Moths raced out their homes and stood wide-eyed at the heated event, not one noticing the trio across the street. Though it seemed all over in the mind of Cara, Dante sensed otherwise, which made him run towards the house, just in time for the Polgara demon to accept its sharp, swift, and multiple rewards.

Moving its last before it was stabbed in the neck, no one that looked didn't know what to make of the brief fight, except the one that ended it. Cara, who looked ahead declaring her single status, watched one hot thing deserving the other, ready to show the most explicit PDA she could to the unique and enigmatical detective. As for Dante, he looked deeply into the fire, and smiled at multiple things at once. Among them all, was the feeling that he was on the right path to find what all life hopes for. Happiness, if not for their own being, then for those that were robbed of sharing it with him.