Forbidden Love Chapter 4 (Patreon)

Seven Deadly Sins parody: Patreon Reward

Chapter 3 

Chapter 4 Stigma

The balance was upset, so to speak. The demon king sent waves of demons to attack human settlements, only for them to be turned away. In kind the Goddess clan have trapped demons and sought to kill them, only for their captives to get released. Goddess, Demon, and Human life loss numbers were down. Conflicts were being settled with as little blood shed as possible.

Their great war was being disrupted by a third party.

Elizabeth had formed a new group working to end the war. She gathered strong members to lead. Mael and Elizabeth served as leaders from the Goddess Clan, Drole served as the leader from the Giants, Gloxinia and Gerheade served as leaders from the Fairy Clan, Meliodas served as the leader from the Demons.

They were given the name Stigma by both the demon clan and goddess clan. They were seen as a disgrace as they were trying to end the war and unite all the races together. While some fairies and giants were willing to help, Gloxinia and Drole also suffered ridicule at the notion of living alongside demons. It was a hard topic to grasp.

Even Meliodas was seen as an oddity than an example of potential unity.

The demons saw Meliodas as a traitor, not realizing he was doing this for them. They didn’t have to fight and die for the Demon King’s whims. He was after the power of Chaos, in kind the Supreme Deity was trying to “protect” Chaos from falling into the wrong hands.

As Meliodas saw it, neither side should have Chaos’s power. It was best left in the world to do its thing. Demons didn’t have to have it, and Chaos was strong enough to protect itself so it didn’t need the Goddess Clan to protect it.

Mael was also starting to see the pointlessness of this war. People losing their lives for what?

The goddess clan saw Elizabeth and Mael as deserters, while still holding some respect many of the angels didn’t follow. Most believed they’d come to their senses eventually. Stigma’s goal was impossible, and sooner or later Meliodas would reveal his true nature. That’s the narrative Ludociel tried to preach anyway.

Until they gave up on this “nonsense” they were not allowed to return home in the divine realm. It wasn’t a problem as they had a new home already.

Their base was in the Fairy King’s Forest. The area had some protection thanks to the Sacred Tree. Stigma was granted an area to stay and gather their forces. They took in people who lost their homes and villages to the war.

Mael knew why, his brother Ludociel was gassing humans up, using them as pawns for the angels. He was using Hope aka Scam Light, casting a light on the seeds of fear and distrust of demons and helping grow mighty trees of hatred. It made humans loyal to the goddess clan, willing to fight and die for them. Those “blessed” by Ludociel were attacking demons which made them targets, and thus lost their homes and families.

The demons retaliated on those that attacked them, so the human pawns were losing their “castles”. While the angels were leaving them to fend for themselves, even with the boosts of power they got from Breath of Bless, there was still tons of collateral damage.

It was made all the harder when the shock of loss broke them free of the brainwashing spell and they looked to the Goddess Clan for hope and answers, but were given just pretty words. That their sacrifices were for the greater good.

Seeing it from another side broke Mael’s heart to see things get so bad. His brother was looking down on all the other races, seeing humans as disposal pawns, fairies as insects, vampires as parasites, giants as dirt, beastmen as mere animals, and demons as beasts.

Because of how the angels were treating other life, Stigma was gaining more members, even Vampires and Beastmen were joining up. There was some irony that Ludociel thought Mael and Elizabeth were using Hope to turn people to Stigma, but it was actually how the angels treated the other races that caused the turn.

Any race that sided with the demons was seen as an enemy of the goddess clan, but siding with the goddess clan didn’t grant much safety or protection from the demon’s wrath.

So it felt like a lose lose situation, because many didn’t agree with what the demons were doing but had no choice but to sign up with them. At the same time, many didn’t like the Goddess clan’s attitude or how they went about getting what they wanted but didn’t want to be labeled a traitor. With the creation of Stigma there was another option, another side to stand on. One that was getting results!

Ludociel’s tactics were too extreme, he was willing to burn villages to the ground, if the people happened to treat a sick or injured demon. It seemed his brother sleeping with a demon only increased his hatred. In his eyes there were no innocent demons. All of them were a potential threat of corrupting an angel, corrupting everything!

He thought their little group would fall and crumble given time, but they only seemed to grow stronger! War efforts on both sides were being halted and pushed back. With both sides not gaining ground, morale was low.

No one was willing to fight a war that wasn’t going anywhere.

-x-

Nerobasta served Ludociel some tea. “Ugh...not again!” He banged his fist on the table nearly causing the cup to spill.

“Sir?” The pink haired woman was taken aback.

Their newest plot was to force a confrontation between the angels and the demons. “How can my brother do this? Doesn’t he understand I want this war to end!?” Ludociel wanted the holy war to end, just not in the same way as Mael. He saw the end of the war as completely eradicating the Demon Clan, not coexistence. “We can’t end this unless we purge that filth from this world.”

“Lord Mael has lost his way.” Their recent plan was brilliant, to force confrontation between the clans Ludociel had used his grace to capture various demons in a flash and imprisoned them. This included Rajine, Derieri’s sister, killing a family member of the commandments would be sure to set them off.

If they went berserk the Goddess Clan would be fully justified in killing them. That was the plan...but…

Mael used Divine Wisdom and saw through his scheme. Together with Meliodas he showed up to where they were being kept and used his own grace Sun, to melt their prison. The demon prince helped send them off without a fight. Gloxinia helped treat their wounds, Drole monitored their thoughts with his magic eye.

So many of them thought they were gonna die, but instead they were allowed to go back home. “All our hard work and they ruined it!” He drank some tea to calm down.

“This may hurt things going forward, if more of the commandments defect and join Stigma because of this they’ll have greater force to stand in the way of the war efforts.” She had been spying on them and keeping track of their numbers.

“Ugh!” His hand balled into a fist. “Damn it all, how could this have happened!?”

“I have a theory about that.” She brought over some documents.

Ludociel raised a brow. “What’s this?”

“I’ve researched several demons that had connection to Meliodas, this demon came up!” Ludociel looked over the document and there was a picture of a pink haired demon.

“Who is this?”

“Gowther of Selfishness one of the Ten!” She explained. “He has powers that let him invade other’s minds and manipulate the memories and thoughts of others.”

“What?!”

“It’s possible Meliodas worked with this demon to manipulate your brother. It would explain everything, how they are able to gain so many followers, how Lord Mael and Lady Elizabeth would turn against us.” Ludociel read over her report. “Everything falls into place!”

He shook his head. “No, as much as it pains me to admit. I thought the same, so when my brother made that declaration. I cast Divine Concentration. Had he been under any mind control I’d have sensed it and been able to break it. No…” He laced his fingers in contemplation. “That bastard Meliodas did something far worse, he corrupted Mael and turned him against us. The fact it was done without magic or manipulation makes that demon far more dangerous and deserving of death.”

The arch angel shattered his cup and made Nerobasta recoil in fear. Ludociel finished the report and smirked seeing some names on it. “Fufufu…”

“Lord Ludociel?”

“Oh yes Stigma is quite welcoming isn’t it, humans...such gullible creatures so helpful…” His face twisted into an inhumane smirk. “Sigma will destroy itself from the inside out!”

Upon the list of names was a man named Rou.

This man was living a simple and humble life, until his village was burned to the ground, family, friends, even his love was taken away. He would do anything to bring them back...anything…

And so a poisonous weed was taken in to the Fairy King’s Forest...

Ludociel’s plan worked and Stigma’s noble goal would crumble.

To be continued Cursed! The Holy War’s End?