The foundry was no longer a place of earth and steel. It had become a nexus of impossible cold.
The temperature plummeted fifty degrees in a second, freezing the breath in Vicky's lungs. The rusted iron pillars groaned as frost raced up their lengths, snapping bolts and shattering glass. But the cold wasn't atmospheric; it was spiritual. It was the chill of a void where no life was ever meant to exist.
In the center of the room, the crack in the Heart of the Dragon crystal pulsed like a wound. The hand that had emerged—skeletal, comprised of shifting starlight and absolute darkness—tightened its grip on the reality of Earth.
"Found you," the voice echoed again, vibrating not through the air, but through the marrow of Vicky's bones.
Master Shen, the leader of the Silver Tier council, stumbled back, his face a mask of uncomprehending horror. "What... what is this? The array... it was supposed to bind the anomaly! It was supposed to lock the dimensions!"
"You fool," Vicky said, his voice calm despite the adrenaline dumping into his system. He didn't look at Shen; his crimson-gold eyes were locked on the hand. "You didn't build a cage. You built a doorbell."
The crystal whined, a high-pitched shriek of tortured matter. The hand pulled.
The fabric of space tore with the sound of wet canvas ripping. The crack widened, and the entity hauled itself through. It wasn't the Dark Overlord himself—Vicky's instincts, sharpened by his evolution, told him that immediately. The Dark Overlord was a cosmic entity, a destroyer of worlds; if he fully entered Earth's atmosphere, the planet would already be cracking apart.
No, this was a Scout. An Avatar. A sliver of the Overlord's consciousness pushed through a pinhole in the universe to secure a foothold.
But even a sliver was terrifying.
The creature that unfolded itself from the crystal stood eight feet tall. It had no face, only a smooth expanse of swirling void where a head should be. Its body was spindly and elongated, wreathed in rags of shadow that moved independently of the wind. Long, scythe-like fingers twitched, testing the air.
SYSTEM ALERT: HIGH-LEVEL THREAT DETECTED
Target: Void-Stalker (Avatar of the Dark Overlord)
Level: 45 (Suppressed by Dimension)
Threat Level: Catastrophic
Shen, driven by the desperation of a man watching his life's work turn into a nightmare, screamed. "Seal it! Masters, channel your Chi! Crush it before it fully manifests!"
The four other Silver Tier masters, trained in a lifetime of discipline, reacted instinctively. They thrust their hands forward, unleashing a synchronized barrage of Chi blasts. Bolts of concentrated energy, powerful enough to punch through tank armor, slammed into the creature.
The Void-Stalker didn't even flinch.
It simply turned its faceless head toward them. The Chi blasts hit its body and vanished, absorbed instantly into the darkness like water into a sponge.
The creature raised a hand. It pointed a single finger at the nearest Master.
Pop.
There was no explosion. No flash of light. The Master simply ceased to exist. One moment he was a living, breathing martial artist; the next, his body imploded into a singularity the size of a marble, then vanished with a soft hiss.
Silence fell over the foundry. Absolute, terrified silence.
"Chi is useless against it," Vicky stated, stepping forward. His coat swirled around him as his aura flared, pushing back the encroaching frost. "It eats energy. It consumes life force. You are trying to drown a fish with water."
The Void-Stalker turned its attention to Vicky. For the first time, it seemed to register something other than prey. It sensed the dragon.
PROGENITOR, the voice echoed, sounding like grinding stones. ANOMALY. THE MASTER DESIRES YOUR ESSENCE.
"He can come get it himself," Vicky growled.
He didn't wait. He moved.
Vicky launched himself forward with a burst of speed that cracked the concrete floor beneath his feet. He didn't use Chi; he used raw, physical violence. With a Strength of 56, his fist hit the creature's chest with the force of a freight train.
BOOM.
The Void-Stalker was launched backward, smashing through a heavy industrial lathe and slamming into the far wall. The impact shook the entire building, dust raining down from the ceiling.
But as Vicky landed, he saw the creature peeling itself off the wall. Where his fist had connected, the shadow-flesh was roiling and knitting itself back together.
PHYSICAL FORCE... INEFFICIENT, the creature mocked.
It lunged. It moved with a jerky, unnatural speed, crossing the distance in a blink. Its scythe-hand swept out, aiming for Vicky's throat.
Vicky ducked, feeling the cold wind of the strike pass millimeters above his head. He countered with a kick to the creature's knee, shattering the joint, but the limb instantly snapped back into place. The Void-Stalker grabbed Vicky's shoulder.
The touch was agony. It wasn't just cold; it was a drain. Vicky felt his Chi, his blood, his very life force being siphoned away at a terrifying rate.
SYSTEM WARNING: HP DRAINING RAPIDLY. CHI DRAINING RAPIDLY.
Vicky roared and activated Blood Fire.
Flames the color of arterial blood erupted from his body, an explosion of supernatural heat that bypassed physical resistance. The Void-Stalker shrieked—a sound like tearing metal—and released him, stumbling back as the crimson fire clung to its shadow-form, burning holes in the darkness.
"That hurts, doesn't it?" Vicky snarled, rubbing his shoulder. The wound was already closing, his Dragon's Blood regeneration fighting off the necrotic effect.
Master Shen and the three remaining Silver Tier masters were huddled near the exit, their courage broken. They watched with wide eyes as the "vampire" they had planned to trap fought a monster from their worst nightmares.
"We must flee," one Master whispered. "We must seal the foundry and—"
"If you leave," Vicky said, not looking back, "it kills everyone in this city. The crystal is the anchor. As long as that crystal stands, the door is open. It will keep pulling through until it can bring the rest of itself here."
The Void-Stalker recovered, the Blood Fire slowly flickering out on its skin. It seemed to grow larger, feeding on the ambient fear in the room.
RESISTANCE IS FUTILE. THE HARVEST IS INEVITABLE.
It raised both hands, and the shadows in the room began to lengthen, turning into spikes that shot toward Vicky from every direction.
Vicky dodged, weaved, and shattered the shadow-spikes with his fists, but there were too many. He was being corralled. He was Level 31. The enemy was effectively Level 45. The gap was closing, but the attrition would kill him. He needed a decisive blow. He needed to destroy the crystal, but the creature was standing right in front of it, guarding the anchor.
He needed to stop holding back.
"Shen!" Vicky shouted. "Do you want to live?"
The old Master looked up, trembling. "Yes!"
"Then buy me ten seconds. Throw everything you have at it. Don't try to kill it. Just distract it."
Shen looked at the monster, then at Vicky. He saw the burning golden-crimson determination in Vicky's eyes. He made a choice.
"Masters! Formation!" Shen yelled. "Bind it!"
The three remaining Masters, driven by the fear of death, rallied. They moved into a triangular formation, channeling their Chi not into blasts, but into chains of golden energy. They threw them.
The chains wrapped around the Void-Stalker, burning into its shadow-flesh. The creature roared and thrashed, snapping the chains one by one, but the resistance held. It was slowed.
That was all Vicky needed.
He took a deep breath, centering his Chi. He reached into the deepest, most primal part of his new soul.
"BLOOD DRAGON TRANSFORMATION."
The air in the foundry detonated.
A shockwave of red energy blasted outward, knocking the Masters off their feet and throwing the Void-Stalker back a step.
Vicky's body erupted. His bones cracked and lengthened with the sound of gunshots. His skin hardened into hexagonal scales of obsidian and gold. His face elongated, jaws widening, fangs growing into serrated daggers. Massive, leathery wings exploded from his back, shattering the nearby machinery as they unfurled to a twenty-foot span.
In three seconds, the man was gone.
In his place stood a monster. A ten-foot-tall hybrid of gothic nightmare and draconic majesty. A creature of pure violence.
STATS UPDATED (TRANSFORMATION ACTIVE):
STR: 224
SPD: 216
END: 216
The Void-Stalker paused. For the first time, the Avatar of the Dark Overlord felt something akin to hesitation.
Vicky—or the dragon that was Vicky—didn't speak. He roared. A sound that shattered all the remaining windows in the factory complex.
He moved.
At SPD 216, he was invisible to the human eye. He was simply a blur of red and black.
He slammed into the Void-Stalker.
There was no contest. The Void-Stalker's strength was formidable, but against the physical might of a Blood Dragon, it was like paper meeting a shredder. Vicky's claws, reinforced with Blood Chi, tore through the shadow-matter of the entity's chest.
The creature shrieked and tried to phase out, to turn intangible.
Vicky grabbed it by the neck. His grip was absolute.
"NO," Vicky's voice boomed, a distorted, draconic rasp. "YOU DO NOT LEAVE. YOU DIE."
He opened his maw. Blood Fire gathered in his throat, compressed and superheated to the point of becoming white-hot plasma.
He unleashed it point-blank into the creature's face.
The Void-Stalker dissolved. It didn't just burn; it was unmade. The Blood Fire, fueled by the essence of a dragon, scoured the void energy from existence. The creature thrashed, screamed, and then evaporated into nothingness.
Vicky didn't stop. He turned his gaze to the crystal—the Heart of the Dragon, the anchor, the open door.
The crystal was pulsing rapidly, trying to maintain the connection to the Dark Overlord. The crack was widening.
Vicky raised his fist. He channeled every ounce of his remaining Strength, every drop of his rage.
He struck the crystal.
CRACK.
The sound was deafening. The artifact shattered into a million pieces of dull, grey dust. The dimensional rift screamed one last time—a sound of frustration and hunger—and then snapped shut. The cold vanished instantly, replaced by the smell of ozone and burning dragonfire.
The silence that followed was absolute.
Vicky stood in the center of the ruin, his chest heaving. Smoke rose from his scales. He slowly, painfully, willed the transformation to recede. His bones shifted back, his wings retracted, his scales melted away into skin.
He fell to one knee, naked amidst the wreckage, gasping for air. The transformation drained stamina like nothing else. He was exhausted.
But he was alive. And he was hungry.
He looked up. Master Shen and the two surviving Silver Tier masters were huddled against the far wall, paralyzed with terror. Outside, the battle had ended, and Elias was dragging in the broken bodies of the Bronze Tier adepts who hadn't been killed outright.
"Bring them," Vicky commanded, his voice raspy.
Elias dumped three half-dead Bronze Tier adepts onto the floor next to the Silver Masters. They were bleeding, their Chi shattered, their bodies broken.
Vicky stood up. The fight with the Void-Stalker had drained his reserves. He needed to replenish. And more importantly, he needed to assert his dominance.
He walked to the nearest Bronze adept, grabbed him by the hair, and lifted his head.
"Your organization tried to cage me," Vicky said softly. "Now, you fuel me."
He bit down.
It wasn't just blood. It was Chi. It was life. The rush was intoxicating. The Bronze adept convulsed and went limp.
+10,000 XP
Vicky moved to the next. And the next. He drank from the Bronze adepts until they were husks. Then he turned to the Silver Masters.
"Please..." Shen whispered. "We can serve you! We have knowledge! Connections!"
"You have something better," Vicky said.
He spared Shen for interrogation, but he grabbed the other two Silver Masters. They screamed as he drained them, their decades of cultivated Chi flooding into his system like liquid fire. It was potent. It was pure.
+50,000 XP
+50,000 XP
And then the system notifications began to cascade, stacking with the massive reward from killing the Avatar.
QUEST COMPLETE: THE SILENT THREAT
Objective: Dismantle the Silent Dragon leadership.
Rating: S (Catastrophic Threat Neutralized)
REWARDS:
XP: +300,000 (Avatar Kill + Quest Reward)
Item: Fragment of the Void (Remnant of the Avatar) - Stored in Inventory
Reputation: "Slayer of Shadows" (Intimidation +50% against Void entities)
Stat Boost: Essence of the Masters Absorbed (+10 to All Base Stats)
LEVEL UP!
LEVEL 32 ACHIEVED
LEVEL 33 ACHIEVED
LEVEL 34 ACHIEVED
LEVEL 35 ACHIEVED
LEVEL 36 ACHIEVED
LEVEL 37 ACHIEVED
LEVEL 38 ACHIEVED
TOTAL STAT POINTS GAINED: +21 (3 per level)
BONUS STATS ABSORBED: +10 STR, +10 SPD, +10 END
Vicky closed his eyes, feeling the power settling into his bones. It was a massive jump. He had gone from a rising threat to a devastating power in a single night.
He allocated the 21 new stat points evenly, maximizing his balance.
+7 STR
+7 SPD
+7 END
He opened his eyes. They glowed with a terrifying intensity.
"Elias," Vicky said, his voice strong again. "Take Shen to The Vault. Burn the rest. We're done here."
He walked out into the night, the new power thrumming in his veins. The FBI was coming, but it didn't matter. He was miles ahead of them now.
END OF CHAPTER 44
VICKY THORNE: STATUS
Level: 38
XP: 10,500 / 120,000 (To Level 39)
Tier: 2 - Advanced (Vampire Knight)
Race: Progenitor - Blood Dragon Hybrid (100% Purity)
STATS:
STR: 81 (54 base x 1.5 from Dragon's Blood) (37 Start + 7 Level + 10 Absorb = 54 Base)
SPD: 79.5 (53 base x 1.5) (36 Start + 7 Level + 10 Absorb = 53 Base)
END: 79.5 (53 base x 1.5) (36 Start + 7 Level + 10 Absorb = 53 Base)
Chi: 120/120 (Blood Dragon Chi - Expanded by Levels & Absorption)
Special Skill: Blood Dragon Transformation (Active: x4 to base STR, SPD, END)
INVENTORY:
Fragment of the Void: A crystallized shard of the Void-Stalker. Cold to the touch. Radiates faint, dark energy. Unknown properties.
FACTIONS/THREATS:
Silent Dragon: Destroyed. Leader Shen captured.
FBI Paranormal Task Force: En route to the Steelworks.
The Dark Overlord: Aware of Vicky. Connection severed.
Unknown Supernatural Factions: The massive energy flare has alerted the entire region.