Chapter 1

All eyes were focused on Esecleus. Their mouths were wide in an arch, grimly grinning upon having his chest pierced with the sword Vylan pulled out.

Everyone felt satisfaction and elation when they saw Esecleus suffering, blood vomiting out of his mouth, and struggling to get the blade off his body.

"How is he this strong?!" Thought Vylan, his eyes wide open and teeth gnarling.

Vylan was genuinely baffled at Esecleus' strength when the latter easily pushed the knife out of his body.

"Oi, oi, leader. Stop playing around and punish that bastard some more."

His guild members thought that he was playing around with Esecleus, but he was putting his strength into controlling the blade. However, Esecleus was just too compelling for him.

"Haha..." Vylan snapped his fingers. "Of course, I was just messing with him. Who wants more?"

At the snap of his fingers, Vylan activated his "Talent" bestowed by the strange appearances of the threshold and monsters that are trying to occupy Earth and kill all the living things.

He gained unfathomable power, which helped him withdraw the sword from Esecleus' tight grip. After he got full control over the sword, a sudden strike from him occurred at face-checking.

With the sword's durability and sharpness, everything that it tries to cut will absolutely get split in half. But Esecleus was just too quick on his feet and had doubtful reflexes. Why doubtful? Because they don't believe everything they see from Esecleus.

In their minds, Esecleus is the sore loser of the guild, an errand boy they used to tease and bully, without knowing how much effort and time he put into his abilities just to achieve every wish he has in mind.

Esecleus avoided the swing by bending over his upper body, then began to leap back. However, he was surrounded in an instant; his fellow guild members blocked every escape route possible.

"You have nowhere to go, Esecleus. You're trapped here, and this place will be your grave."

Loudly and all of a sudden, Esecleus guffawed when he heard Zaul's words immediately pissed off the guy.

"Kuku, am I really cornered? Will this dungeon really be my graveyard? Foolish of you all to think that I was trapped here with you. It's entirely the opposite, Zaul. All of you dumb fucks are trapped here with me!"

Instead of feeling fear or getting scared of Esecleus' words, they all just laughed at him.

"Ey, leader. I think this bitch hit his head on his fall!"

"Or maybe because our leader hit a nerve, which made him act up!"

They had their weapons drawn out and were pointed at Esecleus. Twenty-four hunters against a lone fellow hunter. In their eyes, Esecleus was nothing more than a cockroach that needs to be crushed as hard as possible or it might crawl back up once again from the dead.

Some of these hunters actually do not harbor ill feelings toward Esecleus. Their weak minds were just influenced by their superiors and they picked up the hatred going on inside their guild.

It's crazy how others who can't decide for themselves get easily influenced by people with wicked minds.

"I want all of you to fuck him up real bad that he becomes unrecognizable!"

A fire bolt, a huge boulder, a sweeping wave, a destructive wind, and a shocking electric charge all came flying in Esecleus' direction at once from all directions.

He was unfazed, always wearing that condescending grin on his face, which annoys every member of the same guild to no end. If they could just peel his face off, they would have done it a long time ago.

"Bastard! Wahahaha! You have nowhere to go!"

"Eat shit, sucker!"

"Die and perish!"

Just when they thought that their magic had hit Esecleus, the five magic spells inexplicably went through Esecleus. It literally went past him and was still flying toward the other end.

"How did he do that?!" Exclaimed everyone.

"Defend yourselves!"

Their healers cast a protective barrier around everyone, leaving them unscathed from their own magic spells.

As the fog of dirt cleared up, everyone made their move, now serious and ready to deal the decisive strike to Esecleus. That one move he did had all of them rethinking their actions.

Vylan, with his huge figure, throttles towards the middle with his shield going to shove everyone that gets in his way.

Zaul, on the other hand, as a mage, raised his staff in the air and a purple magic circle appeared where he supposed Esecleus was.

From the magic circle came crushing a number of ice spikes that all rained down on Esecleus' spot. More and more fog piled up in the air, obscuring their visions, and disabling them from seeing what was happening to their target.

"Don't stop until I say so!"

A barrage of spells and skills were thrown at Esecleus' location. Vylan told them not to stop until the ground began to shake and rocks above them, debris started falling.

"All of you, stop!"

"Did we overdo it?"

They all wondered what was reduced of Esecleus. Anyone who receives and has direct contact with that amount of spells would definitely die. No one would be able to survive an attack enough to massacre a whole city's population.

It was one of the reasons why the dungeon was collapsing. Another cause of it was the awakening of a power beyond human understanding. A power so strong that only the gifter himself would be able to match.

However, it was incomplete, raw, and needed some polishing, for great power comes with great responsibility.

"Blood was shed... but it was not enough. I wish for more blood to be spilled." says the texts floating above them in scary fonts and tinted in red.

Twenty-five was still among the texts. The number of their raid party. And it just went down all of a sudden.

A womanly scream echoed in their ears, their gaze instantly turning towards the direction.

They saw their comrade pointing at something lying on the ground. Everyone saw the butchered remains of their fellow guild members. The death was so brutal that some of them gagged and eventually threw up upon seeing it.

"Wh-Who did this?"

Panic went over their heads, those who were weak-willed. Their immediate reaction was that monsters were lurking around, and killed one of them.

One by one, their numbers drop significantly, and more pints of blood were scattered on the ground.

"What's happening?!" asked Vylan, confused about what is occurring around them.

No one saw things happening around them. Here and there, the bodies of their dismembered comrades dropped dead. Some had their throats slit while others had it worse.

"Find out who is doing this and see if Esecleus is already dead! It can't be that bastard!"

They literally saw Esecleus earlier pull bottles off the monster's blood out of nowhere.

"Only something sharp can reduce them to this state!"

Vylan only realized that the sword he was holding was missing.

"Did he take it?! Fuck! I don't know what's going on anymore!"

His comrades' silhouettes became blurry except for Zaul who was on the other end of his direction inside the magic circle. Behind his co-captain, over his shoulders, Esecleus' face trickles with the blood of his victims, and a wide sinister smile marked itself in his mind.

Esecleus had his hand covering Zaul's mouth with the sword threatening the pitiful co-captain on his neck.

Soundlessly, Vylan read Esecleus' lips.

"Wait for your turn. You will be last."

With the strength of both of his arms, Esecleus broke Zaul's neck, then mercilessly stabbed the dead co-captain's head with the sword. He stomped on his head to pull out the stuck blade, thus further igniting Vylan's raging resentment of Esecleus.

Zaul's bloody body thudded down to the ground, and Esecleus disappeared once again in the midst of the psychological disturbance going on at that moment.

Vylan was wildly looking everywhere and he would see Esecleus' gaze locking with his, and the murdering of his remaining comrades.

For several minutes, only their cries for help and whimpering could be heard inside the dungeon. The explosion of their magic spells, which blindly damages their friends, ends up causing more damage to the dungeon. Sooner or later, they will be buried because of the now huge debris falling from above.

And Vylan could do nothing but watch his comrades get slaughtered by a lone man with a condescending look on his face. The most sinister of them all. A much more terrifying being other than all of the scary monsters he fought in the past. Nothing could be compared to how monstrous Esecleus had become.

"It's time to think about the life you've had, Vylan," began Esecleus, his voice vibrating inside Vylan's head.

Vylan froze on his feet, his legs shaking, and unable to process the scenarios that took place in front of him.

"Revisit the time you have been an asshole, Vylan. I'm sure you'll make a whole ass movie. It is not too late to repent, although your sins won't be forgiven. I shall serve as the judge and punish you for your irredeemable sins."

~