The Most Necessary Evil

Disclaimer: I am not Victar! I am merely crossposting his stories onto this site after obtaining his permission. With Victar's site being closed with the rest of AOL, I am posting his Mortal Kombat stories to Wattpad to archive them. This story was written by him, and all credit goes to him.

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"He's a necromancer. He works with souls. When he needs one, he takes it, and does what he will. Do you understand what I'm saying? Does that mean anything to you? Would you like it if your life was snuffed out one day, with no warning, and for no crime, just because someone needed your soul, the way you might need a yard of cloth? What sort of person does that...?"

-S. K. Z. Brust, "Athyra"

THE MOST NECESSARY EVIL
by Victar (vctr113062@aol.com)

[date, 15th century]

They call me "immoral," but I'm not. Not really. And even if I were, I'd be no more "immoral" than they are, the sanctimonious hypocrites. They are lacking in perspective. My one goal is quite modest; my methods, no more unscrupulous than anyone else who considers the end to justify the means.

All I want is to go on living.

Well, I would like to get out of this confining Earth Realm, and back to the outer planes; but beyond that, nothing else. I've no interest in glory, riches, fame, or power; which is to say, outside of the power I need to remain alive. Is it such a terrible thing to want to live? Everyone wants to live! The whole lot of them want to live at least as badly as I do! They all look down upon me, with their lofty scorn and their self-righteous indignation, but I know that they secretly envy me, every last one of them. They resent me because I've succeeded where they have failed. I've kept my youth for over half a millennium, whereas the toughest of them withers away a trifle more with each passing sunrise. Any one of them would sacrifice a hundred thousand human souls to be in my place! They have no business passing judgment upon me!

The way they carry on, one would think that no one has ever died in their precious Shaolin Tournament before. So what if I always take the life and soul of any fool who challenges me to mortal combat? Why do they think it's called "mortal" combat, anyway? I may derive some minor enjoyment from the satisfaction of a little necromancy well-wrought, but I practice the magic itself only because it is necessary. I need my victims' vital and soul energies to appease the gods who grant me my "conditional" protection from death. It is nothing personal.

I did enter their Tournament fairly, by means of its longstanding open invitation to warriors around the world. I earned the title of Grand Champion entirely on my own merit. It isn't as if the Tournament's laws forbid the use of sorcery in single combat! Its laws don't mention sorcery at all. They are honor-bound to let me serve in the place of the Grandmaster I killed. They have no grounds for complaint and no right to protest!

Nor can they compel me to leave. I do like the thought of settling down here, as a Grandmaster. Never does too much time pass before once again, some brash idiot decides that my existence offends him, challenges me to single combat, loses, and pays the price. It is much easier to wait for the sheep come to me, oblivious of their impending slaughter, than to exhaust myself preying upon wild flocks. My existence is so effortless that at times I miss the earlier days, when hunting down souls posed more of a challenge.

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I'll kill him.

Kung Lao, that cretin, that son of whores, that disease-carrying excrement, I swear I am going to KILL HIM! He will pay with his soul, the souls of his family, the souls of his friends, the souls of his animals! I didn't lose to him; he tricked me!