"What is going on?" Renji thought as he inspected his surroundings. He felt like a spirit—his translucent body floating beneath a blood-red sky, high above a vast army of monsters. Many looked almost human, with only subtle distinctions: elf-like ears, tall horns growing from their skulls, or jet-black eyes. The best way he could describe them was as demons.
At the forefront of this army stood a singular figure. Tall and imposing, his form was clad in dull gray armor. Two long horns jutted from his helmet, and a flowing white mane cascaded down his back. Without knowing why, Renji could feel it—this was their leader. Their king.
Their monarch.
That word lingered strangely in his mind, as though it had arisen unbidden from the depths of his soul. He didn't question it. Not now. His attention shifted as two other great beings entered the scene.
One was a colossal white wolf with glowing red eyes. The sheer hatred and animosity it radiated were palpable, even from where Renji floated. It stood beside the demon monarch, confirming they were allies.
Opposite them stood a lone figure—equal in stature to the demon monarch, but cloaked in a shroud of absolute darkness. His armor did not reflect light; it devoured it. A deep purple aura surrounded him, oppressive and cold. Looking at him, Renji could only think of one word:
Death.
A dizzying sensation overtook him. The world tilted beneath his feet, and when it steadied again, he was now on the ground, looking up at the demon monarch and the other being—whose name, like the first, surfaced in his mind of its own accord: the shadow monarch.
Up close, their presence was overwhelming. Their sheer existence inspired awe and terror. Everything else faded—the army, the white wolf, even the blood-red sky. Only the two monarchs remained, locked in battle.
The shadow monarch's strikes were terrifying. Each blow held enough force to tear through mountains and split oceans. His attacks were simple, brutal, and direct—but when backed by such overwhelming power, simplicity was all he needed.
The realm itself trembled.
But Renji realized it wasn't the shadow monarch's might that caused the trembling.
The demon monarch was vastly weaker, yet the way he fought made the power gap feel almost irrelevant. To an untrained eye, his movements may have seemed savage, reckless even, as he was constantly being pushed back. But Renji knew better. He was a masterful fighter.
From a young age, Renji had taken pride in his combat ability. After becoming a hunter, his confidence only grew. No matter the weapon, no matter the style, he could read and adapt to it effortlessly. He was a genius at battle.
But that genius had meant little in the world of hunters. No amount of talent could bridge the gap between ranks. And now, even with all his skill, he felt dwarfed watching the demon monarch in action.
The trembling grew louder, steady thumps that reverberated in the air.
Every motion the demon monarch made was premeditated. He allowed himself to be struck only by attacks he could endure, and dodged with inhuman precision anything that threatened him. It was as though he could see the future itself, reading the shadow monarch's moves before they happened.
And yet—even that brilliance wasn't enough. Renji could see it: the demon monarch's movements began to slow, while the shadow monarch still looked untouched.
The thumping around Renji grew deafening.
In a final act of desperation, the demon monarch gathered all his energy into one last strike, which the shadow monarch also mirrored. Both attacks were unleashed, destined to decide the battle's end.
But before Renji could see the result, the world froze.
The thumping overpowered everything else—his thoughts, his breath, his surroundings.
That's when he noticed them. Pairs of eyes, distant yet piercing, gazing at him from the shadows. He couldn't make out their forms, but he could feel them drilling into his soul.
A voice whispered:
Fight. Fight till the end. Fight until no one can ever stand in your way. Fight for your very existence. Fight to prove you ever lived.
The thumping... it was his heart.
He looked down and saw a bluish energy pulsing from where his heart should be. Lightning arced faintly across his fingertips.
Before he could examine it further, he felt a sudden pull. He was being dragged away—ripped from the vision.
But just before everything faded, he saw it—through the cracks in the demon monarch's broken helmet:
An expression of glee. And joy.
.
It was complete chaos in the Japanese Hunter's Association. As one of the few nations in the world with magic-detection satellites, they were among the first to notice the enormous concentration of mana that had gathered.
Fearing the worst, many believed another S-Rank Gate had opened. But when a team was dispatched to the location, they discovered something that made no sense—a weak D-Rank Gate stood where the overwhelming readings originated.
Determined to get to the bottom of the anomaly, the Association invoked its authority as a government body and entered the dungeon, which had been registered under several independent hunters.
What they saw inside shocked them.
At the center of the dungeon yawned a vast, gaping abyss—the bottom of which was invisible to the naked eye. Only after one of the archers, using their superior vision, announced that hunters were lying at the bottom, did the rescue team begin their descent.
What they found were corpses—dozens of them. Signs of a tremendous battle were etched across the walls—gouges, craters, and molten debris suggested that whatever had fought here was far beyond any ordinary monster.
But if there had been a battle... where was the monster?
Suddenly, a shout echoed through the chamber—one of the rescue team had found a survivor. A human, barely clinging to life. The team quickly gathered around, pouring healing magic into his body, but it had no effect. He remained unconscious.
Realizing that the dungeon would soon collapse, the squad leader ordered the team to carry the survivor out. His eyes swept over the dead—more than a dozen hunters lay still—and he gave a solemn command to retrieve as many of the bodies as possible, so their families could at least lay them to rest.
His gaze lingered on a dark, sticky pool of blood nearby—a dark red color, almost black, which he was sure was from a monster.
He knelt down and carefully collected a sample in a small vial.
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Author's note:
Next chapter or chapters will be on Thursday.
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You can also say anything that you might want to see in this fanfic, and I would try my best to fit in the storyline. Fingers crossed