Dio watched the T-rex-like creature flop around like a giant, angry chicken that had forgotten how legs work.
He staggered back, breathing hard.
The green gas still hung in the air, sinking into his lungs, making his head spin worse with every breath.
His knees finally gave up on being useful, so he sat down right where he stood.
The stone floor felt cold, but his body was burning from the inside.
He kept his eyes on the monster, waiting for it to charge again, but it couldn't.
It tried….oh, it tried, but its broken jaw dangled uselessly, and every movement made it collapse again.
That punch he threw… it wasn't normal.
Even Dio knew that.
A normal human shouldn't be able to hit something that big and crack its jaw like it was a cheap toy.
But he didn't have time to think about that.
His head was too foggy, and the poison was eating at him like he owed it money.
"That's what you get… you perverted lizardy," Dio muttered.
His voice came out slow, heavy, like the words were dragging themselves out of his throat.
His eyelids felt like they weighed bricks.
The pain in his back kept growing, sharp and hot.
It crawled up his spine, settling near the top, right below his neck.
The pain was so strong it almost felt like someone had pressed a glowing iron brand into him.
He wanted to look. He wanted to know what was happening to his back.
But he couldn't move.
His fingers were numb, his legs were numb, even his heartbeat felt lazy.
Everything around him started to blur, monster, stones, light, all melting into one messy picture.
Dio let out a shaky breath.
He wasn't sure if he was passing out, dying, or both at the same time… but whatever it was, it was coming fast.
But Dio didn't give in just yet.
He refused to die sitting like some weak side character.
He tried to stand, but his body disagreed in the loudest way possible.
His legs shook like wet noodles, and every muscle felt like it had fifty boulders glued to it.
Still, he pushed.
He grabbed the wall beside him and dragged himself up inch by inch.
It was slow, painful, and honestly pathetic, but he made it.
He stood there.
Barely.
But he stood.
And this moment would've looked heroic.
If he wasn't completely naked.
Wobbling like an old man.
And with his most precious part swinging freely in the dungeon breeze.
A tragic hero and an accidental comedian, all in one package.
But he didn't care.
He placed his bloody right hand on his waist, trying to look cool even though he looked like a drunk gladiator who'd forgotten his armor.
He turned his head, his eyes drifting to the small hatchling he'd thought had died earlier.
He opened his mouth and spoke, hisvoice came out rough, tired, but steady.
"Son… your father kept his promise of avenging you," he muttered.
For a moment, the poison, the pain, the nakedness, none of it mattered.
Only that tiny body on the ground and the strange, stupid promise he'd decided to keep.
A small tear slipped down Dio's cheek, stubborn and hot.
He didn't even bother wiping it away.
His voice dropped to a whisper as he stared at the little hatchling.
"Don't worry, son… your papa will join you soon."
He let the words hang there for a heartbeat, then forced himself to look away.
The T-rex thing was still kicking around on the ground, thrashing like a headless chicken that hadn't gotten the memo yet.
It made the whole scene look strange, tragic on one side, stupid on the other.
Dio tried to walk toward it.
Tried to lift his foot and set it on the monster's head for one final badass pose before death.
But his body said no.
Hard no.
His legs buckled the moment he took a step, and he almost folded like wet laundry.
So he changed plans.
Fine. No dramatic foot-on-head pose. He'd settle for one last insult instead.
He lifted his left arm. Slowly. Shakily.
His fist formed tight, knuckles white, veins twitching.
He glared at the giant lizard with the eyes of a man who had nothing left to lose.
"You perverted lizard," he sneered, words slurring just a bit.
"Now you can't suck anyone's dick…"
He let that hang for one glorious moment of disrespect, then, because even dying men need proper punctuation, he raised his middle finger.
"Fuck off."
His vision snapped to black.
His knees gave out.
He fell backwards like a dropped plank, hitting the stone with a loud, final thud.
Dust puffed up around him as he sank into the cold ground.
The dungeon fell quiet. No more roaring. No more fighting.
Only the weak, broken whimpers of the wounded creature echoing through the space.
Dio still breathed, but it was rough, uneven, like his lungs were trying to remember the instructions.
Even so… somehow… there was a small, satisfied smile on his lips.
He looked like a man who'd lost everything and still managed to win the last joke.
The creature's whimpers slowly twisted into something darker.
Its body trembled, not with fear, but with rage so sharp it looked like it was cutting through its skin from the inside.
Its remaining eye turned bloodshot as veins spread across it like cracks in glass.
The jaw Dio had shattered still hung at a wrong angle, swaying loosely, bone and muscle refusing to play along.
But pain didn't matter anymore.
Rage ate the pain, chewed it up, swallowed it whole.
It stood.
The first thing it looked at was the hatchling.
There was no warmth.
No grief. No pity. Only a cold, twisted hatred, as if the small creature existing at all was an insult carved into its bones.
Then its gaze crawled toward Dio.
That hatred magnified, doubling, tripling, blazing like a wildfire.
It wanted him erased, eaten, chewed, crushed, none of those in any particular order.
ROARRRR!!!
The sound was monstrous, a roar born from fury alone.
Dust shook from the ceilings. Stones cracked.
Even the air seemed to recoil.
It decided the order of things.
Eat the human.
Then kill the hatchling.
It dragged itself forward, each step uneven, its jaw swinging like broken meat, its breath hot and rotten.
The green gas had finally faded, but the damage was done.
Dio's body was tinted sickly green, veins dark, skin pale and cold.
He looked like someone already halfway into the afterlife.
The monster loomed over him, a low rumble vibrating from its chest.
It opened its mouth wide, ready to swallow Dio in a single bite and finish the job.
Its teeth slowly descended.
And then—
A cold voice cut through the air, sharp and emotionless.
"Skill: Chains of Light."