The ground beneath Jin-Su shattered as he hurtled toward the Eldritch Colossus, his black blade raised high, slicing through the dense, suffocating aura of madness. The creature's grotesque form writhed and contorted in ways that defied all reason, expanding and contracting with unnatural pulses, each twist making it harder to discern where its body began and ended.
[Jin-Su has leveled up: +10 Strength, +15 Agility, +25 Sanity Resistance.]
"What are these, Sanity Resistance?" he muttered, barely registering the new stat as his blade met the creature's shifting mass. The abyssal energy in his sword sliced through several writhing tentacles, eliciting an unholy scream from the monster. Yet, as soon as one limb was severed, another surged forward, larger and more grotesque, moving with relentless fury.
[Warning: Eldritch entities are not bound by conventional laws of matter.]
"Figures," Jin-Su muttered. "Nothing in this world ever plays by the rules."
Althara stood nearby, her eyes gleaming with a glacial, calculating calm. She raised her hands, summoning a deadly hailstorm that cascaded down in sheets, freezing eldritch abominations on contact. The ice shards glinted under the crimson moonlight, sharp and merciless, tearing into the creatures like a storm of razor blades. Yet, wherever her allies stepped, the ice melted away instantly, leaving clear, untouched paths for each of them. Snow fell around them, but instead of obscuring their vision, it illuminated the eldritch horrors, outlining each enemy in eerie blue, exposing their movements in stark contrast.
"Your fate is sealed in ice," Althara intoned coldly, her breath leaving mist as she extended her hand, sending icicles the size of spears hurtling toward the monsters. "You are nothing before the winter's wrath."
As the ice tore into a group of twisted creatures, Althara extended her reach even further, creating a protective wall of frost that wrapped around her allies, shielding them from the relentless onslaught. The hailstorm intensified, yet each step her allies took was unmarred by the cold; it was as if winter itself had bent to her will, choosing only her enemies for its lethal touch.
Kara surged forward, letting out a low, guttural growl that resonated with primal ferocity. It moved with savage precision, using every part of its body as a weapon—its scaled elbows, knees, even its tail—all striking in brutal, calculated arcs. It grabbed an eldritch creature by the skull, its claws piercing deep, then used the body as a battering ram to knock back others before discarding it like a broken toy. "Come on, then!" Kara snarled, amber eyes flashing with savage delight. "I'll tear through all of you!"
A tentacled horror lunged at her from behind, but it spun, the tail slamming into it with bone-crushing force, sending it sprawling as she tore another creature apart with its claws. Fighting like a savage beast, every part of its body a weapon, unyielding and unstoppable.
From the corner of his eye, In a flash, Aelis vanished from sight, moving faster than the eye could follow. Within moments, a dozen eldritch beings fell apart, their bodies sliced cleanly in dozens of places as they dropped to the ground. She reappeared only briefly, an eerie shadow cutting through the battlefield, her twin daggers flashing like quicksilver. She was an apparition of lethal precision, darting in and out of the fray, her eyes a hard, focused green as she struck each target with deadly efficiency. Her enemies laid around her like broken marionettes.
"This is nothing," Aelis whispered, her voice carrying a chill of deadly calm. "I could do this all night."
A dark figure loomed beside Jin-Su as Daemon summoned barriers of shadow that expanded, shielding them from a surge of the eldritch creatures. His left hand gestured sharply, sending waves of arcane energy that blasted back anything that drew too close.
"Another step, and you'll regret it," Daemon's darker voice taunted, cold and threatening. His eyes gleamed with malevolence as he summoned twisted, spectral chains that snaked out, wrapping around the abominations with a sickening hiss. The chains pulled, and the creatures contorted, writhing in silent agony before crumbling into ash. "You cannot kill one of your own! Leave this plane! Vanish from MY sight!" With a flick of his wrist, tendrils of darkness erupted from his outstretched hand, latching onto the creatures. They convulsed violently, their skin boiling as the shadows devoured them from the inside out, leaving nothing but piles of ash.
The lighter side of Daemon whispered, "One weakness: under the left claw, the joint is soft. Aim there…."
"No! Above the head—crush the brain stem!" the darker side corrected, his voice dripping with disdain.
A creature lunged at him, but Daemon's gaze shifted, his eyes cold and distant as he incanted a spell. "Feel your own nightmares devour you!" he hissed, and the creature's flesh began to peel away, layer by layer, as if the shadows themselves had teeth. Its twisted shrieks echoed through the field as it was consumed, leaving only a flicker of dark flame behind.
Jin-Su barely had a moment to process their coordinated assault, but his body moved on instinct, precision guiding each step. Without conscious thought, he raised a hand, summoning a spirit phoenix—a blazing, ethereal bird of pure energy that streaked across the battlefield, diving into the masses of creatures and igniting them in torrents of blue and silver flames. Beside him, a massive wolf, larger than a building, materialized, snarling as it charged forward, crushing the eldritch entities beneath its colossal paws, each swipe of its claws obliterating anything in its path.
He didn't stop there. With a wave of his hand, another spirit manifested—a horned lion with a mane of flames, leaping into the fray and tearing through the abominations with unparalleled ferocity. The creatures fought at his side, a silent testament to his power, but Jin-Su himself remained in the thick of the battle, his sword cutting through enemy after enemy as he moved in perfect sync with his summons.
"Don't think you're handling this alone, Jin-Su!" Althara's voice echoed as she raised her hand, summoning a frost-laden mist that wrapped around the advancing monsters, slowing their movements. The cold sharpened, needles of ice piercing their flesh as they struggled forward. "I'll cover the left flank," she added, a determined glint in her eyes. Wherever she stepped, the ice parted, guiding her allies as they maneuvered through the chaotic battlefield.
"Am I hearing fear?" Kara's voice cut in with mocking disdain. It lunged forward, headbutting an abomination with brutal force, its spiked elbows tearing into another. "Weak! I thought the eldritch had strength. Come face the true beast, cowards!"
In a flash, Aelis appeared at Jin-Su's side, her breathing steady despite the frenzied assault. "We'll clear a path to the core. Just say the word," she murmured, her voice barely a whisper before she vanished again, leaving a trail of fallen horrors in her wake.
Then, a massive tear opened in the sky above them, a crackle of raw, cosmic energy that sent a pulse of dread through the ground. From this portal emerged a colossal figure, one that made even the previous monstrosities pale in comparison. Cloaked in shadows, its form seemed more suggestion than substance, its face an abyss that absorbed all light.
Nyarl'thagas. The name vibrated through their minds, an unspeakable power that twisted reality around it.
[System Recognition: Name – Nyarl'thagas. Class – Eldritch Monarch. Level – ???]
Daemon's face went slack, eyes wide with a terror he could no longer hide. "Nyarl'thagas… A Monarch-level entity here?"
Nyarl'thagas's eyes—or where eyes should have been—focused on Jin-Su, as if peeling back layers of existence to stare into his very soul. "A Void Monarch…found....come ," it intoned, its voice a thousand layered whispers. "You have to be us in Abyss, Jin-Su."
The recognition struck him like a thunderbolt, pieces of half-formed memories surfacing, clouded in shadows. This thing… this being was tied to him, somehow, like a secret etched into his very existence. Had he known Nyarl'thagas…how did he know it...?
"STOP IT! Do you want to invite it in?" Daemon's lighter voice screamed, his hand trembling as he tried to steady himself.
The darker Daemon only chuckled, a low, sinister laugh. "Let it come. Embrace what you are. Power doesn't come without sacrifice."
As Nyarl'thagas raised its hand, reality itself seemed to crumble under its influence. Shards of the sky and ground twisted, warping as it pulled them into itself, creating a whirlpool of dark energy.
Jin-Su took a deep breath, his body steadying even as his heart pounded. "If I'm the Void Monarch, then I'll take control of my fate."
[Warning: Sanity at critical levels. Eldritch Monarch entities may cause irreversible mental corruption.]
Ignoring the warning, he tapped into the raw essence of the void, his sword erupting with an even darker power. A new, terrifying clarity settled over him—the abyss wasn't just his prison. It was his domain.
Nyarl'thagas's twisted mouth curled, a disturbing parody of a smile. "Yes… let the abyss into us, Jin-Su. Let's be us."
But Jin-Su narrowed his eyes, a fierce determination blazing within. "No more. Not this time."
With a roar, he unleashed his power, a surge of darkness expanding from his sword, consuming the air and wrapping around Nyarl'thagas. For a brief moment, the Eldritch Monarch staggered, caught off guard by the force of Jin-Su's assault.
Nyarl'thagas's laughter reverberated through the field, a haunting melody that dug deep into their minds. "Our strength is impressive." it sneered. "But us cannot be you forever."
The words struck a nerve, a crack forming in Jin-Su's resolve. He could feel the void tugging at him, the pull to surrender, to merge with the darkness that had once claimed him. But he knew that if he yielded now, there would be no coming back.
[System Alert: Abyssal Monarch Evolution detected. Will you ascend? Yes/No.]
Jin-Su stared at the prompt. Around him, his allies fought in sync, a fierce and unspoken unity binding them together, each giving their all against an enemy that defied comprehension. And the choice remained his, a final decision as reality itself unraveled around him.