Dark Lord learns that he's prophesied to be killed by a man, born in a specific village in a specific day

Ducunt volentem fata, nolentem trahunt.

A man named Herod had this issue.

Self fulfilling prophecies are a thing.

Do you not understand the meaning of the word "unavoidable"? It means that no matter how hard you try, some ridiculous bullshit will happen to save his life.

He can't kill me if I kill myself first! And then maybe get raised afterward.

Double technicality: the living are killed, the undead are destroyed. Undeath here we come!

Horse shit.

I as the dark lord define prophecy. I am the shaper of fate. The bearer of bad news.

I'll have an orc shank that fuck.

You only find out about it a week before birth. That's way too late to establish paternity.

create a grand ritual to erase that day from the space time continuum

there, done- cant have someone born on june 2nd if june 2nd stops existing

>He knows for a fact that the prophecy is 100% accurate and unavoidable
Then he'd just make the best of his life, you double nigger. You know that trying to prevent prophecies that are 100% true and accurate only leads to them being fulfilled, right? Oedipus killed his father and fucked his mother *because* the parents tried to prevent exactly that from happening. In these kinds of stories, the hero rises to prominence *because* the big bad burned down his village in pursuit of the chosen one. The best the dark lord can do is get his affairs in order before he dies, and bank on the slim possibility of the prophecy being wrong.

Create a grandiose gladiatorial arena and every year, host the most spectacular of competitions; a week-long tourney upon which on the seventh day, the prevailing champion will be offered the choice of knighthood and their own fiefdom, or to fight the lord himself in a glorious duel for the throne.

For around 20 years, the Dark Lord will soundly beat the lesser champions who stand against him, and by habit, champions afterwards will nine timea out of time select knighthood. Then the chosen one will challenege him after besting the competition, upon which the Dark Lord can throw off the shackles of civility and duel his fate in glorious combat.

Once the chosen one has the Dark Lord at his mercy, surrender, and offer the throne to him, telling him of the prophecy if he doesn't know already.
>"For decades I have kept up this facade in the hopes that you would come, to face me, as you are more worthy than I."
>"Fate has decreed that you accept my throne, and my surrender, as my only true successor."

If the hero accepts, the Dark Lord will live out the rest of his life in exile, if the hero still kills him, he will die knowing that he fought the greatest duel of his life, and that the kingdom rests in the hands of someone as mighty as he.

Hello, my name is Maze, I'm here specifically to fuck up your plans.

Find something that will resurrection him after his dead. The prophecy will be fulfilled but it don't mean that he will stay dead forever unless the setting don't allow resurrection.

Maze worked for the bad guys, though

So I am unkillable untill that day? "No man of woman born" style?

Fuck you maze.

My name is the dark lord. How bout we cut a deal huh? I shank this kid and you uh... fuck off?

How bout that shit?

Adopt all boys born that day in that village into his newly christened Lord Evil Orphanage.
The boys get a stellar education that is sure to give them a bright future, causing the parents to clamor to give him their offspring, rather than hide it away.
When the day comes that he inevitably dies it will be by the priviliged hand of a spoiled brat that owes every to him and has no real credibility as a revolutionary.

>The chosen one doesn't actually become a great warrior
>He doesn't become a warrior at all
>He becomes a cook
>Dark lord dies of food poisoning

Begin an emergency PR campaign to make himself out to be the good guy.
Granted, a week's notice probably isnt long enough to pull this off. And since he's the "Dark" Lord, the laws of fiction mandate he'll either go about it completely ineptly, or everyone will see through it.
But imagine that being successful. No hero ever killed the greatest humanitarian of our age.

I mean, with that loose of a definition, the Dark Lord should just exile himself and live in a bubble-wrapped germ-ball.
The chosen one could just be a leper, or a whore infected with syphilis, nothing says he has to survive, only that he kills the dark lord.

>Become benevolent ruler who works for the people
>Make the country prosper at own expense
>Enact wise and just laws and give more liberty and freedom to your people
>The only man who would kill such a beloved monarch would be a true monster
>Evil triumphs in the end!

Attack the Village. During the Attack, fake my own death while taking on a heroic, or at least benign guise.

And then, the waiting game.

Is it really redemption if you do it exclusively to fuck over a guy who's not even born yet, and turn him into a monster?

/thread

Who said anything about redemption?

Tell everyone about this prophecy. Everyone.
Peasants suffering under your reign. Soldiers of opposing kingdoms. Your backstabbing cunt of a vizier. The chosen one himself.
Find every single soul who might have a grudge against you and make sure that they know you'll be killed by this little guy here.
Make a public claim that, if you are going to die by his hand, you at least want it to be a decent death in a honorable combat and not some kind of insanely lucky and pathetic bullshit.
Offer your best swordmaster to teach the child. Give him an education and prepare him to be a just and loved king. Just in case try to avoid spending time with him by sending him on adventures to help people. Spread the news of his achievements far and wide. Hype it up.

Sure, one day he will kill you. But until that day comes, you'll reign unopposed.
You were afraid of peasant revolts? Not anymore. Each one of them would think: "Yeah, I could take up arms and defend my rights. But I'll probably get killed. On the other hand, I could wait a year or two, then Sir Kills-A-Cunt will finish him off and sit on the throne. Yeah, fuck that noise."
Other rulers are going to wage a war? Good luck convincing their military to march against the Evil Lord who can't be killed by anyone but this one guy.
Vizier was planning an assassination? He has to be a madman to try now.

A Dark Lord with the correct attitude will note that he is, de facto, invincible with one fatal weakness, and this one weakness won't even go into effect before at least 18 years (or whatever other way you define a man from a boy).
Pinpoint the guy (or the potential guy if there have been several births in the village that day) (and don't stop yourself at only male births, just in case the prophecy comes from a trans-friendly divinity and you end up blind-sided... "Fool, no woman can kill me. Die now ! " "I am no woman, I was assigned female at birth, that's rather different." ), have a good education and good job offered to him, in adventuring, commerce or diplomacy, make sure he is invested in it, so that it's normal he is sent far away from your presence for extended times. Never meet him in person but write him a letter explaining him what's what and how, when the inevitable happen, you will rather prefer for him to give you a good fight and an epic sending BUT that requires time, preparation and a good reason that he should spend his time developing, all s right, take your time, warn me when you're ready...

As long as you don't meet the guy and the guy isn't ready for the final showdown, nothing else can kill you. Death is inevitable, as for all mortals, but at least you have a pretty good idea of when and how you will arrive at destination, so relax and enjoy the journey.

Well, except if the prophesying divinity of the tricky kind who will meet you in the afterlife after you died in a attempted awesome horse cascade and greet you with "nyahaha, your death was caused by your recklessness that was caused by your obsession with the boy as the source of your death, it's him who killed you, as was prophesied ! ", then fuck it, your life and death is exactly as random as anyone else's. Or, at this point, you can legitimately ask for a re-do to the local overgod because what the fuck.

>"Fool, no woman can kill me. Die now ! " "I am no woman, I was assigned female at birth, that's rather different."
Fuck

Every time a villain is put in this circumstance they always go straight to "burn the village down", but then the hero always escapes and vows to avenge their people. Hell, even if you raid the place before the kid's old enough to walk they end up getting spared by a sentimental assassin or their parents will sacrifice themselves to save the kid. Either way, won't end up well for you.

My plan is to pamper that village as much as possible. Make sure the hero doesn't get the opportunity to hate me.
Of course he'll eventually learn the dark truth and set out to make things right, but I'll've bought myself a solid extra 5-10 years. Not to mention that everyone from outside the village will distrust him, making things that much more difficult.

Meanwhile, I'll spend all the time I have left delaying the hero and just generally living it up.
Very few people have the privilege of knowing their time of death, I intend to make the most of it. Who knows, maybe if I delay the hero long enough I'll end up having lived a full natural life anyway.

>travel back in time
>kill his mother
>depending on how timelines work, you either won or the dark lord from the other timeline owes you, and could go out and kill your hero

Raise my own kid to take over when I die.
The show must go on.

This gives me a great idea for a campaign. >Everyone of my player will have been born in the same village in the same month that it has been prophesied that the chosen one will be born.
>No one knows which one is actually the chosen one, not even me as DM
>From there it is a competition between the players to see who can be the most chosen chosen one
>subtly drop hints to each of them that they are the true chosen one
>When they finally reach the Demon Lord have some retarded DMPC snipe the kill from them and let it be know that he was the true chosen one all along.

Good end

Buncha amateurs in this thread. Travel to another world where the deity who empowers the prophet has no power. Unleash my evil reign there and let the kid die of old age

>commit suicide

Fuck prophecies.

Fook it, make the boy fight for it. Make a big production out of it too.

You guys are missing the point. We know how we're going to die. Which means anything else we do, no matter how dangerous or stupid, will never kill us.

We go fistfight God.

There are things worse than death.

Which will eventually end when we die. The prophecy says we die, so we can't get caught up in some Prometheus BS either.

Prophesies always end up biting you in the ass with some sort of ironic/self fulfilling twist. I'd recommend you look into a way to be "killed", but not actually die/stay dead through some technicality or wordplay or whatever. Anything you try to do to that village or kid will ultimately backfire horribly even if it makes no sense at the time

Sure, but it doesn't mean it won't last a while. I would rather die than spend ten years bedridden and paralyzed from my neck down.
I imagine there are very few things worse than being paralyzed from your neck down.

How about chained to a rock with an eagle pecking on your liver.

All the fun of being paralyzed + you can still feel a bird eating your liver.

Sounds like quitter talk to me user. Kill his mom and everyone who would contradict you after his birth, then nobody can possibly tell him otherwise.

What if you get sent to Super Hell

>Immediately impregnate all of my concubines
>raise all of the girls to be amazingly beautiful and charismatic
>pick the prettiest and most loyal daughter
>get rid of the rest
>Wait for the chosen one
>When he get there fight him till you are about to die
>Right before you die tell him you want him to look after your only daughter
>Say you only wanted to create a world where your daughter is safe to live even if she is the spawn of a demon lord
>He takes girl
>She seduces him and they get married
>She lives the life of a happy wife and truly falls in love with him forgetting all about her dead father
>she becomes impregnated
>Has son that is now the grandson of the demon lord
>Son becomes over powered by his desire follow in his grandfathers foot steps
>New Demon Lord is born and is stronger than ever because he has the genes of not just the previous Demon Lord but also the greatest hero of his time

Then we fight our way out

I like this one

>Not weaving a spell so your grandson will be you reborn
Amateur hour

Use dark magical powers to create a new race of all female cat girls and ruin the setting forever.

You merely permanently maim yourself and must now live in agony until the prophecy is fulfilled.

kms and reincarnate into the man that is born in the village

Temporal strangers on a train gambit? Nice.

alternatively you are put into a coma and chosen one is just the only person with the guts to pull the plug

Develop a spell that will allow me to switch bodies with him immediately before the fight.

>get rid of the rest

And miss a perfect opportunity for the hero to impregnate all of them and spread both your awesome genes through the land ensuring that both good and evil will come from you ? All of that adapted in the far future into an awesome anime running over 600 episodes ? Are you a fucking faggot by any chance ?

speaking as the dark lord:
I make sure said kid is bullied and has little support, but not so much he grows a thick skin
I make sure he's taught to be kind and never hurt anything
when the day approaches that I'll be killed, I let him know that I know what he's planning, and I welcome release from this pitiful world
I tell him I'd rather have someone that isn't a fucking loser kill me but he'll do
I tell him he's going against his own morals by doing this
and most importantly, I tell him that it's not his own doing, he won't kill me on his own merit and effort, all it is is a prophecy being fulfilled
the kid gets do dejected that after he kills me he either becomes a crazy hermit or kills himself

...

...

The hero only killing him as an act of mercy does seem like the sort of ironic twist these things are known for

I kill myself just to fuck with Destiny

Creative!

I have my minions continue to beat/stab/burn me until I am 100% dead.

>Find a way to elevate his consciousness to another level so he actually understands you "ruined the setting forever"
I like it.

What if the hero comes to stop you from doing that because it looks like you're doing some evil voodoo shit?

Ever since the day the frail peasant chosen one was slain by the dark lord immediately after he cast his unknown spell the peasants have stopped listening to the vain hope of the prophet's words. All is well however because the dark lord has strangely become much kinder.

Turns out the hero became your most dedicated minion after losing all his memories and traveling back in time.

You seem truly dead to all but you endure.

...

>Jump into a volcano before the boy is born
>Scream I AM NO PAWN OF FATE'S as the lava consumes you
>Wait for the universe to try and retcon this into a successful prophecy somehow
>Worth it.

Literally the bible

prophecy states that if conditions X are met Y happens which causes Z

i prevent conditions X from happening

so no Y

so no Z

a hero cant stop me if there is no hero

>As you get closer to the edge you're getting attacked by birds, slowed down by massive winds, and somehow have your foot pinned under a rock
>Just in time to die on the given day by a botched attempt by the hero trying to rescue you

>Laugh in hell
>Suddenly realizes that your child is evil and thus realized he could rule alone
>Screams as you suffer eternally

coolest idea

There is a 100% chance that you will fail to kill the hero or erase his existence. You are going to die, most likely be compressing time right up to the point at which the hero cuts your head off.

>prophet collects his payment
>it's the third tyrant he has managed to assasinate with omnious talk

What if with all your time mingling you didn't realize you were actually that boy who at one point was sent to the past and by erasing his birth you erassed yourself, thus completing the prophecy ?

Yeah that turned out just great for Herod didn't it...

How do i do a DARK LORD in 19th century style Not!Europe?

If it's 100% accurate, then free will is a lie, he is not good, I am not evil, and all of existence is a bad cosmic joke.

adopt him
set up a succession document that requires him to kill the dark lord to claim the throne, and requires him to do give the same treatment to whoever is prophesied to kill him, or his eldest child if there is no prophecy, or a random child if neither case occurs
you'd end up with a bunch of dicks looking to literally stab each other in the back in order to have a claim to power, screwing over their family, and making people their family just so they can screw them over
congratulations, we've just created the evilest dynasty to ever rule fantasyland

Based prophet.

You are the Rotschild elder. Done.

Are you the sith?

Retire.
Appoint a successor to continue ruling, preferably one who can at least pretend to be nice and just.
Take up a hobby and live in the countryside.
By the time the hero catches up to me I'll be a harmless, wizened old man and they'll probably feel so awful about the whole affair that they'll regret it the rest of their life

Get a phylactery, get killed, respawn, laugh in lichdom.

That's assuming a lot of things in broad strokes. What if only prophesies remove free will, and that one was imposed by a greater being entirely because the dark lord was such a cunt? That could still imply free will existed outside of that bullshit

I dont want him to be a straight up cunt though. Whats a good motive for conquering the continent? maybe i can make him like Churchill or Hitler, not!europe ihas just finished not!ww1

>kill the hero
which i never did

i prevent the prophecy from being fulfilled by removing one of the precepts on which it is based while never interfering with the actual contents

i know my birthday and place of birth, i have memories of my childhood? i was born?

im not sending anyone in time- im making time skip a day.

>killed
thats fine, ill just respawn in like a week. being a lich has its perks

Removing free will removes the capacity to do good or evil. It's a puppet show for whatever being is narcissistic enough to be doing it.

I would shank you if you were my dm

you're like that autistic kid at every elementary school who refuses to let anyone give their original character a weakness or point out that some other fictional character is stronger.