In the cold, timeless twilight of the Umbral Court, Asmodeus assembled his forces. The order from his sealed master, Ganondorf, had ignited a flicker of purpose in the demon's eternal boredom. He was to be an artist of despair, and Ordon Village was to be his canvas. But as he looked upon the legions at his command—the snarling, chaotic Spite-Hounds, the brutish, dull-witted demons of the lower circles, the chittering, cowardly Imps—he felt a profound sense of dissatisfaction.
These were blunt instruments. Tools of simple slaughter and mayhem. They could tear a village down, yes, but they could not unmake it. They could kill, but they could not truly create sorrow. To sever a hero's anchor, one did not just burn his home; one had to poison the very memory of it, to turn its light into a source of exquisite, eternal pain. For this, he required not a horde. He required artists. He needed a legion forged in the very essence of the Master's will.
He retreated to the deepest chamber of his obsidian palace: the Chamber of Unmaking. It was a vast, circular amphitheater, its floor a complex mosaic of silver and bone that formed a great, arcane glyph. In the center, a single, jagged shard of pure shadow, a physical sliver of the Master's sealed power, floated and pulsed with a cold, malevolent light. Chained to pillars around the perimeter were the raw materials for his masterpiece: a dozen Hylian Knights.
They were the last remnants of the patrols that had "vanished" in the fields, the brave soldiers who had stood against the rising tide of monsters and been overwhelmed. They were strong, disciplined, and full of a defiant, foolish courage. Even now, chained and beaten, their eyes blazed with loyalty to their King and their Goddesses. They were perfect. They were symbols of everything he had been commanded to destroy.
Asmodeus stood at the edge of the glyph, his Succubi attendants recoiling from the cold power emanating from the chamber. "The Master's will is a shadow that consumes the light," he intoned, his voice echoing in the vast, cold space. "But it does not destroy it. It converts it."
He raised his hands, his long, obsidian-tipped fingers tracing patterns in the air. The Herald of the Seal, Ganondorf's spectral messenger, materialized in the shadows behind him, a silent, authoritative witness to the ritual. Asmodeus began to chant in a forgotten, guttural tongue, the words a litany of negation and despair.
The great glyph on the floor ignited with a sickly, purple light. The shard of shadow in the center began to pulse violently, and from it, a thick, black, oily substance—the Malignance, the pure, liquid essence of Ganondorf's sealed hatred—began to seep and flow outwards, pooling within the channels of the glyph.
"You have sworn your lives to a fading light," Asmodeus addressed the captive knights, his voice a silken, venomous whisper. "You have placed your faith in a fragile kingdom and a silent goddess. Your hope is a disease. Allow me to offer you the cure."
The Malignance surged. It flowed from the glyph and up the pillars, coiling around the knights' armored legs like living serpents of shadow. They roared in defiance, straining against their chains, their prayers and curses echoing uselessly. The shadow did not attack their bodies. It sank into them.
It was a violation of the soul. The knights convulsed, their screams of defiance turning into shrieks of unimaginable agony. The shadow was not just possessing them; it was devouring them from the inside out. It consumed their memories of sunlight, of camaraderie, of love. It feasted on their loyalty, their honor, their hope. And in the void it left behind, it planted a single, perfect seed: a cold, disciplined, and absolute devotion to the Great King of Evil.
The transformation was horrific. Their gleaming steel armor, bearing the proud crest of Hyrule, began to corrode and darken, twisting into jagged, menacing shapes as if it too were in agony. The Royal Crest, the symbol of the Triforce, bled away, replaced by the blazing, single eye of Ganondorf's sigil. A cold, red light ignited within their helmets, the defiant fire in their eyes extinguished and replaced by the empty, malevolent glow of the corrupted.
One by one, their screams ceased. They fell silent, their bodies hanging limp in their chains for a long, terrible moment. Then, as one, they raised their heads. They were no longer Hylian knights. They were something new. Something terrible.
Asmodeus made a sharp gesture, and their chains dissolved into black smoke. They stepped down from the pillars, their movements no longer human. They moved with a perfect, synchronized, and silent discipline, the fluid grace of a warrior fused with the cold emptiness of the grave. They were the ultimate perversion of a knight: all of the skill, none of the honor.
The demon lord looked upon his creation with an artist's profound satisfaction. He had his elite legion. The Gloom Knights.
He strode to the largest and strongest of them, the one who had been their captain. "You have no name but your duty," Asmodeus purred. "You have no desire but the Master's will. You have no purpose but to create sorrow."
The Gloom Knight captain knelt, its red eyes fixed on Asmodeus, but its loyalty directed far beyond him. "We live to serve the Great King," its voice rasped, a sound of rust and ruin.
The Herald of the Seal gave a slow, silent nod of approval before fading back into the shadows. The Master was pleased.
Asmodeus smiled, a slow, cruel curving of his lips. His boredom was a distant memory, replaced by the thrilling anticipation of the masterpiece to come. He raised a hand, and the very air in the Chamber of Unmaking tore open, revealing a swirling, shadowy portal. On the other side, a dark, moonlit forest of the mortal realm could be seen—the remote hills just a day's march from the Ordona Province.
"Go," Asmodeus commanded, his voice a final, damning judgment on the unsuspecting village. "Begin the unmaking. Leave no stone upon a stone. Leave no soul untouched by the Master's gift of despair."
Without a sound, the Gloom Knight captain rose, drew its now-blackened sword, and marched into the portal. In perfect, silent formation, the rest of the legion followed, their red eyes glowing as they passed from the twilight of the Umbral Court into the world of the living.