ok but also the meta-narrative implications of asmodeus’ perspective on creation
because he might not be lying! in fact i don’t think he is! when he says “yeah but lies and betrayal and pain make the nice things more beautiful by contrast!” i think that’s genuinely how he sees things!
because the world is a piece of art to him. the world is a narrative, something he and his peers built to entertain themselves. putting in pain and misery is like… well, frankly, it’s like when you make a d&d character and dump a bunch of trauma into their backstory because that’s what makes the story interesting. and it’s not evil because it’s not real, it’s not like you’re hurting a real person, it’s a story and stories need conflict!
and so, pull back a minute, and we see the structure of the show we’re watching - we are watching a tragedy. we are tuning in each week to see how the world ends. we know all these lovable characters, all their cute kids, are going to be destroyed. and we watch, because that’s interesting.
that’s what humanity is, to asmodeus. the people who suffer, they’re not real people, not like him and the other gods and the primordials, they’re just the things they made to tell a good story and how dare they get all uppity and complain that they don’t like the story he’s given them to live out!? they’re just pieces of the great work of art that is creation!