Jacob activates First Step of Mephistus, his silhouette blurring into a series of jagged afterimages. He weaves through the legs of a massive, multi-eyed behemoth, his sword flicking out like a serpent’s tongue.

  Activating Diavolo Hypercut thrice, he applies Bleed, Shadow Plague, and Cinder Rot.

  [Cinder Rot]

  [Description: every time the target uses mana, their body overheats from within and takes fire damage proportional to mana spent. If they stop using mana, the damage slows, but the rot persists longer.]

  The behemoth lets out a gurgling roar as its mana circulation begins to sludge under the weight of the Shadow Plague. It tries to compensate by drawing more mana to its limbs, but that only triggers the Cinder Rot, causing the creature’s internal organs to bake under the heat of its own energy.

  “Now, Iskara! Hit the one with the glowing chest!”

  Iskara doesn't hesitate. She unleashes a punch empowered by one of her new Skills.

  “Crimson Execution.”

  Iskara's body glows a deep red and her punch creates a terrifying blast of pure Mana which tears apart the monster's chest.

  “You're making them much weaker,” Iskara notes, her voice carrying a hint of genuine awe. She pivots on one heel, kicking a smaller monster into the path of Jacob’s blade. “But there are too many! We're being surrounded!”

  “Not for long,” Jacob mutters. He slams his foot into the ground.

  He has been accumulating so many debuffs that, finally, he can use one of the Skills that he got when King Baalrek was still with him.

  He channels his mana, focusing on the web of afflictions he has woven.

  “Tribulation of the Damned!”

  The effect is instantaneous. The afflictions—the bleeding, the rot, the fevers—all detonate at once. The damage is calculated based on the sheer number of debuffs each monster carries. Most monsters around them explode in a shower of gore.

  Jacob breathes heavily, his forearms smoking from the sheer output of mana. He turns to Iskara, who stands amidst the carnage, her Golden Sight slowly fading.

  “I told you,” Jacob says, a bit of grit in his voice. “I've gotten a bit stronger.”

  Iskara looks at the shattered remains of the Intermediate Diamond monsters. She looks at Jacob, then down at the dark power she still holds in her pocket. For the first time, she feels the weight of a choice she hadn't expected to make.

  * * *

  The Iron Monsters' Peak regenerates Jacob and Iskara's health and Mana, allowing them to heal.

  “The monsters might take a while to climb up,” Jacob says, sitting and then pointing at the obelisk made of purple crystal. “This charges up during these breaks. Look at the monsters.”

  Iskara turns toward the distant monsters and sees them dematerializing and becoming light that slowly, ever so slowly, splits into small particles and float toward the obelisk.

  “The more it gets charged, apparently, the more the monsters become feral and they try to get to it. It's because if they break them, they get the power of the obelisk.”

  “The monsters here are already very strong. Do you have to face the monster that absorbs the obelisk?” Iskara asks.

  “Yeah,” Jacob coughs a little. “If a monster managed to get to the obelisk, there's a good chance of dying, honestly. I mean, maybe I could whittle it down if it's not too terrifying, but essentially, the longer we go on for, the higher the chance that a monster might break the obelisk and kill us both.”

  “The trial becomes harder and harder with time passing, then,” Iskara comments, looking up at the cloudy sky.

  “Pretty much,” Jacob tells her. “The longer we go, the more monsters will come after the obelisk. The more monsters come after the obelisk, the harder it will be to keep them away from it. And, for now, the monsters are first trying to eat us and then, they might want to get to the obelisk. But, as time passes, they might just start running at the obelisk, trying to destroy it. The power in the crystal is bound to, sooner or later, send them in. a frenzy.”

  Stolen novel; please report.

  “If they reach that frenzy state,” Iskara says, her eyes narrowing as she studies the shimmering purple crystal, “your 'tinker' strategy won't work. You won't have the luxury of time to dance around them and apply your curses one by one.”

  Jacob nods, his expression sobering. “Exactly. That's why I need to be proactive. The next wave is coming soon, and the Mana density is already spiking. I can feel it in the air—it’s getting heavier.”

  He stands up, the ground beneath his boots still warm from the recent detonations. Far below the plateau's edge, a low, rhythmic thrumming begins. It isn't the sound of climbing; it is the sound of a stampede.

  “They’re coming all at once this time,” Jacob mutters. He doesn't wait for them to reach the top. He closes his eyes and activates Infernal Well. Deep within his core, a reservoir of dark, volatile Mana surges upward, flooding his veins.

  “So, your master taught you how to get a good Class,” Iskara comments, walking alongside him toward the edge of the plateau. Is that all you got from Baalrek the Mad?”

  “I'd like for you to call him King Baalrek,” Jacob says, looking at her. “The stories about him are false. It's much more complicated than what your people know about him.”

  Iskara doesn't say anything and turns her eyes away from him.

  “And by the way,” Jacob comments, putting a hand over his face, “no, that's not the only thing he taught me. This Trial will help me train a Skill he passed down to me but that I still struggle to fully control.”

  Iskara turns once again toward him, frowning. Before she can say anything, a scary aura erupts from Jacob.

  * * *

  “Domain of Ruin and Bones: Reverse,” he announces.

  A shockwave of grey energy explodes from him, expanding in a sphere that coats the mountainside. The jagged rocks transform, replaced by a landscape of bleached white ribcages and crumbling obsidian pillars. The very ground the monsters are climbing becomes a graveyard. But then, a moment later, it reverts and the energy rushes back into Jacob, making his body tremble.

  Bone-like tattoos appear on Jacob's body, with his face being covered by the dark lines and body of a skull.

  The transformation is violent. Jacob’s spine arches as the power of the domain, compressed and inverted, forces its way into his marrow. Iskara watches, her breath catching, as his muscles ripple and swell with unnatural speed. His shirt tethers at the seams, unable to contain the sudden explosive growth of his frame.

  The bone-like tattoos.... they glow with a sickly, necrotic radiance. His biceps and shoulders broaden, becoming dense with cords of iron-hard muscle.

  What is that? He just used a DOMAIN?! And then he... he absorbed it?!

  Iskara's mind fails to compute what she just witnessed.

  A Domain is not something anyone at their level should even be remotely capable of. It's unheard of below True Diamond. The only reason True Diamond is called True Diamond is because it's the hard-coded threshold one needs to reach in order to learn a Domain. It boggles the mind how Jacob could, first, control a Domain, and, second, possibly integrate it back in its own body.

  Wait. This is a known technique, Iskara's eyes suddenly widen. My family has been after this technique since Baalrek the Mad passed away! He was renowned to be the greatest practitioner of Primordial Magic.

  Jacob’s eyes, now two pits of burning embers, lock onto the first wave of monsters reaching the summit.

  “Those are Iron-Shelled Ravagers,” Iskara realizes, looking at the monsters, distracted for a second. “Those are Advanced Diamond Rank monsters. Already? This is too much, Jacob.”

  But Jacob, this time, does not smile.

  “After me,” he says.

  This time, his sprint cracks the ground he's standing upon.

  There's no dance-like pattern in his movement this time.

  As the first Ravager lunges, Jacob meets it head-on. He catches the monster's massive, bladed limb with his bare, tattooed hand. The sound of obsidian grinding against his magically-hardened skin is deafening. With a roar, his swollen muscles bulge to their limit, and he snaps the limb like a dry twig.

  “Black Burns,” he mutters.

  Where he touches the monster, the obsidian begins to char and crack from the inside out. He isn't waiting for the sword to apply the debuffs; his very touch is becoming a conduit for ruin.

  Another monster tries to flank him, but Jacob doesn't even turn. He activates Embrace of Darkness. Tendrils of pure shadow erupt from his back, thicker and more predatory than before, lashing out to pin the surrounding monsters to the ground. They scream as their vitality is ripped away to fuel Jacob's escalating physical stats.

  “Iskara! Don't just watch!” Jacob shouts, his voice booming with power.

  Iskara shakes off her shock, her jaw tightening. If Jacob is willing to tear his own body apart with the weight of a reversed Domain, she cannot afford to be a spectator.

  “Don't get cocky, Jacob!” she shouts back.

  She draws a deep breath, and her internal Mana circuits begin to scream. She isn't just activating a Skill; she is calling upon a lineage of blood and starlight.

  “Crimson Night!”

  The sky above the plateau, already choked with gray clouds, suddenly hemorrhages. A deep, bruising violet-red wash sweeps across the firmament, blotting out any light and turning the world crimson.