Who is the Ancient Demon God?

Zarathos might not have been as smart as the Demons that came later.

But in every other respect, it was quite powerful.

It was one of the first Demons of the ancient era. It predated Lucifer's fall, predated the birth of Hell, and predated the very concept of "Demons" itself.

It was a being born alongside chaos, the embodiment of the universe's primordial darkness. Before the gods had been born, before light had yet to tear through the dark, Zarathos already existed.

So naturally, it knew far more secrets than Dormammu did.

Now Zarathos was searching for the secret hidden at the End of Time.

It was searching for power.

There were many things at the End of Time. Countless abandoned pieces of "trash" lay scattered through the ruins, objects from pruned timelines. There were broken Infinity Stones, lying there like ordinary colored glass, stripped of the power they held in intact timelines. The purple Power Stone was filled with cracks.

The energy that had once been enough to destroy planets now had only a faint glow left. The blue Space Stone had rolled off to one side, its surface covered in a layer of gray dust; the yellow Mind Stone had shattered into several pieces, each one flickering weakly, as if making one last, desperate struggle.

"Nothing but trash with a pretty shell."

Zarathos kicked away an Infinity Stone that rolled to its feet and let out a disdainful snort.

It stepped over a shattered mirror that might have been a magic mirror from some timeline, able to foresee the future. But the future here had no meaning at all; the mirror's surface could only reflect a distorted, broken image of the void.

Zarathos also strode over Gungnir, broken into three pieces. The spear that had once pierced Destiny