Reality screamed.
The fissures spread like wildfire, each crack in space-time spawning more tears in the fabric of existence. Vlad stumbled backwards as the ground beneath his feet began to dissolve into geometric impossibilities—triangles with four sides, squares that curved into themselves, angles that hurt to perceive.
[DIMENSIONAL COLLAPSE: 34%]
[CRITICAL SYSTEM FAILURE IMMINENT]
[EMERGENCY PROTOCOL REQUIRED]
The Devourers' roars grew deafening. Through the largest World Crack, shapes began to emerge—things that shouldn't exist in any there universe. Writhing masses of shadow and hunger, tentacles that moved through eleven dimensions simultaneously, eyes that saw through time itself.
They were coming through. All of them.
"System!" Vlad shouted over the chaos. "How do I stop this?"
[REALITY ANCHOR REQUIRED]
[RECOMMENDATION: SUMMON EXTINCTION-CLASS ENTITY]
[WARNING: UNTESTED PROTOCOL]
[SURVIVAL PROBABILITY: 12%]
Twelve percent. Better odds than he'd had in the Final War.
"Do it."
[INITIATING FIRST SUMMON]
[ACCESSING VOID REALM DATABASE...]
[SCANNING FOR COMPATIBLE ENTITIES...]
[MATCH FOUND: ABYSS HOUND - CLASSIFICATION: APEX PREDATOR]
[WARNING: ENTITY HOSTILE TO ALL LIFE]
[BINDING PROBABILITY: UNKNOWN]
The system's interface flickered, unstable from the dimensional collapse. New text appeared, written in what looked like flowing blood:
[EXTINCTION SUMMON: ABYSS HOUND]
[INITIATING...]
Power ripped from Vlad's core, draining him like a broken dam. His knees hit the fractured ground as energy poured out of him in visible streams of crimson light. The air in front of him began to tear—not like the chaotic fissures spreading around them, but with surgical precision.
A doorway. A gateway to something that makes the Void Realm look welcoming.
[POWER DRAIN: 47%]
[COMPLETE SUMMONING]
[ENTITY MANIFESTATION IN 3... 2... 1...]
The doorway split open like a wound, and hell walked through.
The Abyss Hound wasn't a dog. It wasn't even close to anything that had ever lived. It stands three meters tall at the shoulder, its body a writhing mass of midnight-black muscle and bone that shifts between solid matter and pure shadow. Six legs ended in claws that carved gouges in reality itself. Its head was a nightmare of too many eyes and too many teeth, each one glowing with the light of dying stars.
And it was angry.
[ENTITY STATUS: UNBOUND]
[HOSTILITY LEVEL: MAXIMUM]
[RECOMMENDATION: RUN]
The Abyss Hound's multiple eyes fixed on Vlad, and he felt his hunger like a physical weight. This thing didn't just want to kill him—it wanted to erase him from existence, to devour not just his body but his soul, his memories, his very concept.
It pounced.
Vlad threw himself sideways, Elena's enhanced reflexes barely keeping him alive as claws the size of swords carved through the space where his head had been. The creature's passage through the air left trails of absolute darkness—not shadow, but the complete absence of light, matter, and possibility.
"Bind!" he screamed at the system. "Why isn't it bound?"
[BINDING REQUIRES DOMINANCE ESTABLISHMENT]
[CURRENT POWER DIFFERENTIAL: INSUFFICIENT]
[HOUND POWER LEVEL: APEX CLASS]
[YOUR POWER LEVEL: EXTINCTION CLASS (INCOMPLETE)]
The Hound landed and spun toward him with fluid grace, its multiple eyes tracking his movement with predatory intelligence. Saliva that looked like liquid void dripped from its massive jaws, each drop eating holes in the ground where it landed.
Vlad activated his first Extinction ability.
"Reality Forge!"
The world around him bent to his will. Gravity reversed, pulling the Abyss Hound toward the fractured sky. The creature roared in fury, a sound that shattered windows three blocks away and made Vlad's bones vibrate.
But the Hound simply refused the change in gravity. Its claws were found purchased in empty air, and it used the reversed pull to launch itself at Vlad with twice the force.
[REALITY FORGE: INEFFECTIVE]
[TARGET POSSESSES REALITY IMMUNITY]
Shit.
Vlad rolled desperately as the creature landed where he'd been standing, its impact creating a crater twenty meters wide. He tried Void Walk next, attempted to phase through dimensions to escape.
The Hound was waiting for him on the other side.
Claws raked across his chest, tearing through his enhanced skin like paper. Blood—his own blood, black with power—sprayed across the broken ground. The pain was beyond description, not just physical but metaphysical, as if the creature was tearing at the very concept of his existence.
[CRITICAL DAMAGE SUSTAINED]
[HEALTH: 23%]
[INSUFFICIENT REGENERATION]
Vlad staggered backwards, one hand pressed to the gaping wounds across his torso. The Abyss Hound stalked toward him, taking its time now. It could smell his weakness, could taste his approaching death.
This is how it ends. Killed by my own summons before I can save anyone.
Elena's voice whispered in her mind, her memories flowing through their shared connection:
"Power without understanding is just destruction waiting to happen."
Understanding. What did he understand about this creature?
The Hound tensed to pounce, muscles coiling like loaded springs. In that moment of perfect stillness, Vlad saw something in his stance. Something familiar.
It's not just a predator. It's a pack hunter. And right now, it thinks I'm prey.
But what if he wasn't?
Vlad stopped backing away. Instead, he straightened to his full height, black blood still streaming from his wounds. He meets the creature's multiple gazes with his own, not as a victim, but as something else entirely.
As competition.
"You're not the apex predator here," he said, his voice carrying harmonics that made reality shiver. "I am."
The Extinction Protocol flared into life around him. Not the abilities—those were just tools. This was deeper. This was the fundamental truth of what he'd become when he'd touched Elena's heart.
He wasn't human anymore.
He was the thing that killed universes.
The Abyss Hound paused mid-leap, its eyes widening. For the first time since manifesting, it looked uncertain.
[DOMINANCE CHALLENGE DETECTED]
[ANALYZING...]
[BLOODLINE RESONANCE CONFIRMED]
[EXTINCTION BLOODLINE RECOGNIZED]
Vlad took a step forward, power radiating from him in visible waves. His wounds began to close, black ichor sealing the tears in his flesh. His eyes blazed with the same light that powered dying stars.
"You know what I am," he said. "You can smell it on me. The scent of endings. Of final darkness."
The Hound's multiple eyes blinked in sequence, a gesture that looked almost... submissive.
[HIERARCHY ESTABLISHING PACK]
[DOMINANCE TRIAL: PASSED]
[BINDING INITIATED]
The creature's form began to shift, its nightmare anatomy flowing like liquid shadow until it resembled something closer to an enormous wolf. Still terrifying, still capable of ending civilizations, but no longer actively hostile.
It approached Vlad slowly, each step deliberate and careful. When it reached him, the massive creature lowered its head and dropped to its belly, six legs folding beneath its body in a posture of complete submission.
[SUMMON BINDING: COMPLETE]
[ABYSS HOUND STATUS: LOYAL]
[PACK BOND ESTABLISHED]
The Hound's voice resonates in Vlad's mind, not words but concepts, emotions, and absolute certainty:
Alpha recognized.