"Show you?" Venom echoed the words.
Could he? Has he already been brought to his limits.
The air had started to reek of smoke and sweat.
Ash drifted from the collapsed tavern, curling like ghostly fingers in the cold Ranevian wind. Debris lay scattered across the stone — shattered tankards, splintered chairs, a man’s torn arm twitching near the doorway.
Venom streched his arm again.
His breathing was ragged, blood painting his skin in streaks. Deep gashes ran along his back and ribs, evidence of Lan’s relentless pressure. His axe trembled slightly in his grip—not from fear, but fatigue.
Lan stood across from him, unmarked.
The Devil’s Lie humd in his hand. Still sealed, still dormant... yet it seed to watch, as if waiting for sothing worth awakening.
"You’re stubborn," Lan said. His voice was calm. Steady. It had never risen above a conversational tone through the entire battle.
Venom spat blood to the ground again. "And you’re relentless."
A gust of wind passed between them.
Then Venom roared — a raw, guttural sound that seed to tear from the depths of his soul.
[Titan’s Pulse]
Mana erupted from his chest in a concussive wave. The air buckled. Rubble shot upward, a shockwave blasting outward as veins bulged across his body like molten wires.
His eyes glowed crimson now — beastlike, furious.
He rushed forward.
His axe ca screaming through the air, glowing with unrestrained magic, every swing powerful enough to shatter stone. He didn’t care for defense anymore. Just one clean hit. One final gamble.
Lan’s foot slid back.
He moved, silent as dusk.
Each of Venom’s blows missed by inches, carving long trenches into the earth. He was strong — brutally so — but his rage made him predictable. Sloppy.
Lan twisted under the final swing and slamd his elbow into Venom’s ribs.
A crack.
The brute faltered.
Lan pressed his hand to Venom’s chest.
[Severing Touch]
The pulse exploded, sending Venom flying. His back hit a broken wall, the impact forcing blood from his lungs in a choking gasp. He dropped to one knee, clutching his chest, wheezing.
Lan approached slowly.
The cursed sword dragged through the rubble behind him. No flare of glory. No grand aura. Only death’s quiet breath following behind his boots.
Venom tried to rise. Tried to swing his axe.
Lan’s boot t his jaw in a vicious kick that sent him tumbling onto his back.
Then the tip of The Devil’s Lie kissed his throat.
Still no glow. Still no seal broken. Yet Venom froze. His entire body went cold beneath that rusted edge.
Because he felt it—not in the flesh, but the soul.
That blade knew him.
It whispered.
It told him things he had buried. The ti he let a child be slaughtered because he was too afraid to confront another gang. The ti he watched a dying brother drown in his own blood and chose to take his boots rather than comfort him. The laughs he had faked. The honor he’d pretended to have.
It was all there, in that single point of contact. A mirror reflecting rot.
His fingers went limp. The axe fell from his hand with a dull thud.
Lan crouched, his pale gray eyes steady.
"You fought well," he said. "But I warned you. You need to understand—I am not a thing to be won against, or bargained with. Any action beyond submission is futility and death. Simple."
Venom’s chest rose and fell. "You don’t know what this place is..."
Lan remained unblinking. "I know what it can be."
Silence. Then ca the question.
Low. asured. Final.
"Will you submit... or will you die?"
Venom’s lip trembled. He bared his teeth... and then stopped.
The blade pressed a little harder.
He felt the edge kiss mory again.
And this ti, he saw himself—not as he believed he was, but as he truly had beco.
A man who had survived by stacking bodies between him and guilt. A man who had confused dominance with leadership. A man who feared being powerless so much, he had beco cruel just to feel real.
The truth was unbearable.
And yet...
"...I submit," Venom whispered.
The sword pulled back. The weight lifted.
The tavern ruin went still.
The remaining Mad Vipers, half-dead and bloodied from their clash with the Fourth Guard, fell to their knees one by one. Not because they were ordered to... but because they saw the impossible. Their boss—Venom the Butcher—broken, beaten, and still breathing only because his conqueror allowed it.
Lan stood, blade lowering to his side.
Venom coughed, blood spilling between his lips. "You’re not like the rest..."
"No," Lan replied. "I’m not."
He turned to the remaining n.
"This isn’t the end. It’s the beginning."
He pointed toward the dark horizon — toward the jagged edges of Ranevia, the silhouette of shattered towers and shadowed peaks.
"I won’t beg for loyalty. But if you stay in this land, you follow one rule: you build or you burn. No more feeding on the weak. No more hiding behind knives and blood."
He let the words settle.
Then added quietly:
"Ranevia belongs to now."
Venom bowed his head.
And for the first ti in years, the gang leader smiled — not in mockery, not in violence... but in relief.
Because sothing new had co to Ranevia.
And it wasn’t just strength. It was change.
---
[The Devil’s Lie — 0.1% Unsealed]
New Ability Awakened: Soul Brand — Mark a defeated enemy’s spirit, allowing you to bind them under your command or extract power from their essence.
---
Far above, atop a distant spire cloaked in shadows, a robed figure watched the battlefield through a silver mirror. Her eyes were aglow with flickering runes, her expression unreadable.
"So," she murmured, voice laced with amusent, "the worthless prince has begun to take Ranevia."
She turned to her kneeling attendant. "Send word to the Court of Red Candles. Tell them the anomaly has moved."
The mirror flickered.
Lan’s reflection stared back.
And behind him, The Devil’s Lie thrumd once more.
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