Darkness.
A total eclipse of sense and soul. It devoured everything—sound, time, meaning. Agony so profound it stripped meaning from pain itself. The world was reduced to screams that could not be voiced. A primordial scream of existence twisted inside out.
And yet—Klaus crawled.
Blood seeped from his sockets, oozing in sluggish rivers down his ruined face. His eyes—raw, red, trembling—glared forward, unblinking. He clawed at the frozen marble of the temple floor, fingers broken and nails split to the bone, dragging his twitching carcass forward like a demon escaping damnation only to chase deeper madness.
He no longer knew how long he'd been moving. Hours? Years? Centuries of agony collapsed into a singular moment. But that didn't matter. He had reached her.
That was all that mattered.
The petrified body of Serka lay before him—still, statuesque, beautiful in her ruin. Her expression had been frozen at the apex of terror, her lips parted in a silent scream. Her eyes were wide, glazed, helplessly locked onto the grotesque form crawling toward her.
A wet chuckle bubbled from Klaus's throat, something between laughter and choking. His lips, torn and dry, stretched into a ragged grin. He looked like a corpse possessed by glee.
"Ah… Here we go again," he whispered, voice trembling with a maddened delight. His words slithered from his mouth like serpents soaked in honeyed poison.
With trembling hands, he clasped Serka's throat. His breath was ragged. Each inhale stabbed his lungs like glass shards, but the smile never left him. It had calcified there. A permanent etching of lunacy.
He lowered his face to her ear, and his voice was cold silk soaked in blood.
"Hope's corruption is truly divine, isn't it? It frees you—frees you from guilt, from shame, from the chains of morality and silences the screaming conscience. But freedom without direction… is the cruelest prison of all. That's what you are, Serka—free... so gloriously free and that is why you are lost."
Her body trembled as if in answer.
Klaus's grin widened. Unnaturally. Bones cracked as his jaw split further, the skin tearing at the corners. Flesh opened like fruit beneath a blade. His mouth dislocated—revealing not human teeth, but a jagged mosaic of onyx fangs, each one hungry and misshapen like a predator carved from nightmares.
He looked less like a man and more like something masquerading as horryfing abomination.
When he spoke again, his voice no longer sounded like it belonged to a mortal tongue. It echoed unnaturally, layered with countless pitches, scraping and grating—like a whisper in the ear of a dying god.
"Life… is not just suffering. No. Life... Existence is… a joke. A cosmic theatre of absurdity and meaninglessness, and I—" he hissed, clawed fingers tightening, "am the laughter echoing in its halls."
His fangs glistened, his gaze luminous with amethyst fury, and yet, clarity burned behind the madness. An eloquence drawn not from peace, but from complete surrender to the chaos within.
"Striving for greatness will eventually force you out of comfort. For comfort is the enemy of progress and true growth lies beyond familiar. Tough battles are inevitable for those who dare to push forward. For only through struggles does one sharpen their resolve and find their true strengths. Cowering from unknown only ensures the chains of unfulfillment. While embracing it leads to discovery of one's true potential and the life that fear kept hidden... That is what life is. That is my life."
His face was inches from hers. Then—
With a sudden, savage snap, his jaws closed on her lower jaw. Bone cracked. Flesh tore. Blood gushed into his throat, painting his already ruined face in deeper crimson.
Serka tried to scream, but no voice came. Only a gurgle, wet and pitiful.
His fingers—no, claws now—raked down her chest, slicing flesh like parchment, peeling it aside with methodical cruelty. He reached in, warm steam rising from the wound, and pulled her heart from the cavity in one slow, deliberate motion. It beat once in his hand, before he sank his teeth into it.
Wet, fleshy sounds filled the void—chewing, crunching, the slick tearing of sinew. The floor scratched beneath him as his claws dragged. Darkness wrapped around them like a funeral shroud, and still the sounds of slow consumption echoed within.
Alone in the dark, the monster feasted and laughed.
[You have slain Ascended Human, Serka Of Red Sect.]
[Your Spirit Becomes Vaster.]
[Devourer Gained New Ability, "Blade Eater"]
_____
Outside the desecrated temple, silence hung heavy over the battlefield. The clash of steel and screams had faded, leaving behind only smoldering remnants of a brutal, one-sided massacre. Hemera, wings soaked in divine flame, had slaughtered two Ascended War Maidens and then turned her wrath to those locked in combat with the cohort. With her arrival, the tide had turned—brutality met with precision, fury with fire.
But it was Hassan who had heralded the end. The dark knight descended like judgment incarnate, moving with surgical cruelty. Sunny, Effie, and Kai could do little but watch as he carved through the War Maidens with eerie detachment, their proud forms reduced to broken, bleeding dolls. There was no contest—only execution.
As dawn broke across the horizon, no one stood to challenge him. Those who hadn't been butchered knelt in chains forged from darkness itself, their faces contorted by terror. Something about the knight had pierced their resolve, broken their spirits. What he had done—none could say—but the fear he commanded was absolute.
Hemera descended, her fiery wings folding as she landed beside Hassan. Their expressions were blank, but unease simmered beneath the surface. Klaus had severed their link to protect them from the madness, but something had gone terribly wrong inside the temple.
A figure watched from afar—the Saint. Though she, too, was a creation of the Nether, she recognized the chasm between herself and Hassan. He was the First Son of the Underworld. the Duke and Judge of its eternal darkness, the most beloved creation of the Daemon of Destiny. She, by contrast, was a mere stone saint. And though pride usually anchored her soul, before him, she bowed in silence.
Sunny exhaled a shaky breath. It was over. The cursed temple, its congregation of zealots—it was all done. They had rescued Effie, and they had survived. And yet, as he gazed at Hemera and Hassan, a chill burrowed into his spine. They weren't like shadows, nor like Mordret's cursed reflections.
His thoughts were broken by the sound of laughter.
It was not joyous. Not sane. It clawed at the soul, dragging every head toward the temple's gaping maw.
Footsteps followed. Something scraped.
Then, from the darkness, Klaus emerged.
He dragged the corpse of Serka behind him—not by her hair, but by her own entrails, which looped grotesquely around her neck like a noose. Her body was a ruin. Flesh gnawed down to bone, ribs exposed like the bars of a cage. Her jaw was missing, neck torn apart as though by a rabid beast. Her heart, lungs, and liver—gone. Devoured.
Klaus trudged forward, vacant amethyst eyes staring into nothing. They bled, fogged and hollow—he was blind.
He took a bite from Serka's heart as if it were fruit, his teeth sinking into it with manic detachment. Then, with a sudden jerk, he hurled her body into the air. A crimson spear bloomed in his hand and shot forth, piercing her skull and nailing her corpse to a crumbling stone pillar.
Her body dangled there, a grotesque effigy. She looked more like a revenant than a corpse.
Klaus staggered, each step labored, disoriented. Hemera rushed to his side, wings aflame. Blessed fire engulfed him, searing and soothing all at once. Under her ministrations, his wounds closed and his sight returned, if dimly. His mind, fraying at the edges, quieted... Barely.
Once steady, Klaus turned to Hassan, ignoring the others.
"Did you complete your task?" he rasped.
Hassan dropped to one knee, the picture of devotion. "I would never fail you, my lord. They're safe."
Klaus's shoulders sagged with visible relief—only to tense again as his gaze fell upon the shackled War Maidens.
"Why are they alive?"
Effie bolted toward him, wrapping her small arms around his blood-soaked frame. The image was surreal—an innocent child clinging to a blood-drenched monster.
"You beat the Elder?! That's insane! You really did it!"
Klaus barely blinked. His voice, devoid of patience, cut through her glee.
"Why are they still breathing?"
Some distance away, Hassan raised a dome of darkness, secluding a section of the battlefield.
"By her request," he replied coolly. "Though I opposed it, I awaited your decision."
Klaus made a slicing gesture across his neck with his thumb.
"Kill them. I don't need prisoners."
Kai stepped forward, his voice trembling.
"K-Klaus… They surrendered. They're asking for mercy."
Klaus blinked slowly, as if failing to comprehend.
"Mercy? What mercy did they show the children they slaughtered?"
Effie leapt in front of the remaining War Maidens, arms spread wide.
"Wait! They might help us. We can use them!"
Klaus's expression twisted, irritated.
"Help us?"
He raised his hand like a pistol, index finger outstretched.
"Bang."
A crimson orb blasted from his fingertip. The head of a bound War Maiden exploded, painting Effie and the others in gore. Brains and bone splattered across the dirt. Blood rained in a fine mist.
"They can die for us."
He strode past the frozen Effie, eyes gleaming with disdain. One of the surviving War Maidens snarled through gritted teeth.
"Kill us and curse will follow you. My comrades will show no mercy!"
Hassan's blade of darkness flashed. Her body split in two, the pieces falling without grace and he whispered coldly.
"Your comrades are dead."
Klaus raised his hand again. More crimson orbs erupted, detonating skulls like fruit under pressure. The battlefield became a slaughterhouse. Craters formed from the impacts, blood soaking into the soil.
"Spare none," he commanded casually. "Purge this land of filth."
And Hassan obeyed. One by one, the War Maidens were cut down, their last screams swallowed by the silence of dawn.
A silence that felt like judgment.
***
What? You thought he would spare anyone? Well, nope. Anyway, i released new auxiliary chapter. If you are curious about appearences of Klaus, his spirits and his siblings, you can check it out! Well, at least that's how i imagined them!
Thank you for all your support and enjoy :)
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