The first blow came without warning.

  Darkmoor’s shadow-forged blade cleaved through the space where the System’s head had been, trailing ribbons of void energy that ate through the ancient stone behind her like acid. She ducked under the strike with inhuman grace, her child-like form blurring as she spun away from his attack.

  Moonlight pierced the crumbling walls of the crypt, casting twisted shadows across the blood-stained floor. Dust and pulverized stone floated in each ray of soft blue light, suspended in time as their battle raged. A marble slab dominated the center of the chamber, the wide altar’s surface etched with channels that spiraled toward the edges. Centuries of rituals had stained the marble black. Four silver chains lay lifeless on the surface, waiting for their next victim.

  The chamber, once a sacred place, had become an arena of nightmare and bloodshed.

  “Your form is sloppy,” the System taunted, her delicate voice at odds with the murderous rage radiating from her like a physical force. “I taught you better than this.”

  She danced between his strikes with inhuman speed, her crimson eyes tracking every movement as void-tinged steel carved deadly arcs through the air. Each swing of his blade left trails of absolute darkness that lingered like wounds in reality itself. Where they touched the stone walls, the old rock blackened.

  The System’s laughter echoed through the chamber as she evaded his onslaught. She blurred past him with jilted bursts of momentum, her form flickering like a candle’s flame as she dodged his attacks.

  As much as she knew she had to end this quickly—the Shadow Realm was no place for a Supreme Being, after all—she delighted in tormenting her former favorite.

  It was just so fun to watch him bleed.

  As she floated in midair, the System’s form zipped past him. Here in the Shadow Realm, she couldn’t simply vanish and reappear at will. That divine power, like so many others, was blocked by the very nature of this cursed place.

  But she was far from powerless.

  She darted around Darkmoor, slipping through the air faster than thought, and her small form was little more than a shadow among shadows. One moment she was crouched by a crumbling pillar, the next darting past Darkmoor’s left side, then appearing near the chamber’s far wall. Each movement was calculated to draw his eye, to make him question which threat was real and which was merely an afterimage.

  She giggled again, and the haunting sound echoed through the ruins.

  Darkmoor pivoted in place, his blade held in a defensive stance. His expression remained focused. Controlled. Aware. It was something he had learned from years of training, and an art she had watched him develop over the centuries.

  To survive this long in her beautiful, bloody world, he—like so many others who had leveled as high as he had—knew better than to let down his guard. Losing one’s composure against her, as he knew all too well, meant certain death.

  “You really are clever,” she said, unable to suppress the flicker of pride at her former favorite’s brilliance. “Dragging me into the Shadow Realm, blocking my powers, even blocking the System screens. Don’t you want to know how much HP you have left, my darling? Don’t you want to know how much is left on your Soul Meter?”

  Such was the major disadvantage of this Realm beyond her control, but at least it was a detriment that plagued them both.

  When he didn’t respond, she clicked her tongue in mock disappointment. “You know I hate to do the killing. I leave it to you all to kill each other. But you, dear one, have been up to mischief, and I can’t let you keep messing up my lovely little plans anymore.”

  In answer, he simply glared at her and tightened his grip on his enchanted sword.

  She pouted, and the subtle twist of her lips managed to hide the growing smile at his discomfort. “You used to be more fun, my darling little murderer. Where’s all of our lovely banter?”

  “This ends now.” His voice dropped to a dangerous octave, and the gravelly tone warned of impending doom.

  How adorable.

  “If you insist,” she said with a bored shrug. “Time to kill you, then.”

  As her feet hovered above the ground, she shot around the room in dizzying arcs, taking care to ensure he wouldn’t be able to track her real position. She skidded to a silent stop behind him. With his attention trained on the afterimage she’d left moments before, she shifted her attention briefly inward and summoned the vast power of her favorite attack. Ancient magic, old as the world itself, built within her as she closed in on her prey.

  In seconds, the pulse of her enchantments swirled, and she studied the back of Darkmoor’s head. He scanned the room for her, completely unaware that she had already darted behind him.

  The frosty bite of an all-too-familiar chill spread from her core to her fingertips. Death’s Whisper rose in her like a winter tide, each pulse of power leaving icy crystals in the air around her small form. Her fingers danced in delicate patterns, each gesture precise and practiced as she drew threads of darkness from the shadows themselves.

  Magic flashed to life between her raised hands, writhing like living smoke. Tendrils of pure darkness wove themselves into complex patterns, each layer adding to the deadly technique’s power. The very air grew heavier, as if reality itself recoiled from what she was about to unleash. Even the moonlight filtering through the crypt dimmed, as though it were trying to hide from what was coming.

  This was old magic—the kind that seeped from the very ground of the higher-LevelFloors in her vast and sprawling land. It sang through her veins like a frozen symphony. As the power gathered, small arcs of void energy crackled between her fingers, leaving afterimages of absolute darkness that lingered like wounds in the air. Her childlike hands, dwarfed by the growing orb of lethal energy, moved with hypnotic grace.

  In her excitement, she could already imagine his lifeless body hitting the ground. She could almost taste the moment his soul would simply... stop. Death’s Whisper had ended countless lives this way, snuffing out existence with the gentle finality of a candle being blown out, so long as they were caught off guard by the blow.

  Goodbye, my little monster.

  The magic shot from her hands, and to her dismay, Darkmoor peered over his shoulder at the last possible moment. Their gazes met for a fraction of a second.

  It was enough to block the worst of the blow, but he didn’t make it out unscathed.

  The attack struck him like an avalanche. The force of it sent him hurtling across the chamber, his body carving a crater through solid stone before crashing into the far wall. Dust and debris rained down around his crumpled form.

  “Darn.” The word escaped her lips in a hiss of frustration. If he hadn’t spotted her at the last second, he would be dead, and her problems would be over.

  Tsk.

  Darkmoor pushed himself up from the rubble, his entire body trembling with the effort. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth, and his breath came in ragged gasps. It was so silly, really, how these vampires never unlearned the habit of breathing, but their human ways seemed to hold so many of them back.

  It was then that his eyes met hers, and they shook with something that made the System take an involuntary step backward.

  Hatred.

  Raw and absolutely unfiltered hatred.

  His free hand gestured through a familiar pattern, one that made her blood run cold. This bastard was about to hit her with Ghost Strike, and in the Shadow Realm, its power stood a chance of taking her out.

  “No fair,” she pouted.

  The chamber filled with afterimages as Darkmoor’s form split into three identical shadows, each one striking from a different angle. His void-wreathed blade howled through the air where she had been standing a heartbeat before, cutting through reality itself with enough force to slice between dimensions.

  The System rolled to her feet, and her hair caught on the blade’s edge. The strands drifted to the ground, sliced clean off by the blisteringly sharp steel. For a moment, genuine surprise flickered across her face. That had been entirely too close.

  “Your awareness has improved,” she said, genuine amusement coloring her childlike voice. “Though your timing could use work.”

  “You taught me to always watch my back.” Darkmoor spat blood onto the floor, his breath coming in ragged gasps. “Especially around you.”

  Even as he spoke, his free hand never stopped moving. His fingers wove threads of shadow like a spider spinning darkness into deadly silk. The void energy rippled around him in waves, each pulse making the moonlight bend and distort.

  “Yes, you always were such a diligent student.” The System’s smile widened as she began her own intricate gestures. Crimson energy blazed around her small form, casting eerie shadows that moved against the natural flow of light. “I’ve forgotten, my darling little beast, but did I also teach you this one?”

  She clapped her hands together, and the shadows themselves came alive. They rose from the ground like liquid night, forming into razor-sharp lances that hummed with killing intent. Each one bore glowing sigils along its length.

  “No,” he admitted, bracing for impact. “This one’s new.”

  “That was a trick question, silly goose,” she said with a wry smile. “It’s so new that I haven’t even named it yet.”

  The shadow lances shot forward at her gesture, their tips leaving trails of absolute darkness in their wake. Darkmoor raised one arm, and a battered shield appeared from the air as he accessed Abyssal Armory. The enchanted metal of his summoned shield held against the first three strikes, void energy clashing against itself in a display that sent sparks of anti-light cascading through the chamber. But the fourth lance shattered his defense. He pulled back with barely a second to spare, and the lance dug deep into the rock where his head had been.

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  Again, she pouted. He was taking entirely too long to die.

  “How can a Level 151 be so slow?” she taunted, already preparing her next attack. The air around her small hands began to crystallize with frost.

  “I’m not the only one.” He rolled as her blast coated the rock behind him with a sheet of ice, and as he launched to his feet, new shadows snaked across his blade. The edge of his sword began to sing, a high keening note that made reality itself shiver. “After all, the Shadow Realm does dampen your divine powers.”

  The System’s smile faded, and her voice dropped to an eerie whisper. “Oh, my dear, dear little Darkmoor. Do you really think I need those to kill you?”

  She raised her hand, fingers splayed wide, and the temperature plummeted. Ice crystals appeared in the air, floating in the soft moonbeams, each one containing a perfectly preserved whisper of darkness. The shadows around them began to twist and writhe, responding to power that went beyond mere magic.

  “Always so dramatic,” Darkmoor muttered, but there was tension in his stance as he brought his blade up in a defensive position. The void energy surrounding him intensified, pushing back against the crushing pressure of her power.

  Their eyes met across the chamber—teacher and student, creator and betrayer. For a moment, the only sound was the quiet hum of clashing energies and the subtle crackle of frost forming on ancient stone.

  Then the System laughed, her playful giggles echoing across the walls. “Show me what else you’ve learned in your exile here, my darling little Darkmoor, before I tear it all away.”

  Her form blurred as she launched forward, trailing ribbons of lethal frost.

  The System’s next attack came with devastating precision. Her small hand thrust forward, and suddenly the air itself thickened like invisible sludge. Darkmoor’s defensive barrier of shadows shattered, each shard dissolving into nothing as her power overwhelmed his.

  “Enough games.” Her voice carried a hint of malice as she instantly closed the distance between them.

  Darkmoor tried to block with his blade, but she was already inside his guard. Her palm struck his chest with impossible force, and reality rippled from the impact. He flew backward, crashing into the ruin’s walls. The sickening snap of cracking bones followed. His head slammed against a jagged rock in the wall, and in an instant, he slumped to the cold ground.

  It was the opening she had been waiting for.

  She raised one hand in victory, and at the gesture, the altar behind her groaned to life. Its silver chains sprang into action with lethal grace, answering her call with eager hunger. These weren’t mere shadow constructs like those her former student so often conjured—these were ancient implements of torment, each link forged in absolute darkness and quenched in the blood of fallen heroes.

  Her heroes—her little toys—whom she summoned here to die.

  The chains coiled around Darkmoor’s body and dragged him onto the altar. His back slammed against the marble, and he groaned in pain as they tightened further around him. Each link bore runes she had spent decades carving by hand, their patterns designed to enhance the silver’s toxic effect on vampires and overpower even the strongest opponents.

  Her delightful little chains didn't simply bind—they consumed. Every rune pulsed with hunger as they stripped away Darkmoor’s power. His magic bled into the cold silver, and he grimaced in pain as he faded before her very eyes.

  How utterly lovely.

  A wicked little smile spread across her childlike features as she watched her handiwork. These chains were her masterpiece, crafted specifically for this moment, this betrayer, this ungrateful student who had dared to turn against her. Years of preparation crystallized in this single, perfect moment of revenge.

  “Do you recognize these?” The System asked, running a small finger along one of the chains. “I spent centuries crafting them. Just for you.”

  Darkmoor struggled against his bonds, but every movement caused the runes to flare with sickly light. Each pulse drained more of his power, leaving him weaker, more vulnerable.

  “You have no idea how long I’ve waited for this moment,” she whispered.

  The System drew a long silver dagger from the folds of her dress, its edge gleaming with moonlight. She placed the blade against his throat, savoring the way his Adam’s apple bobbed against the metal. Even a shallow cut would prevent his natural healing.

  “Where are they?” she asked, all the pretense gone from her voice. “Those humans you squirreled away. Tell me what you did with them.”

  In answer, Darkmoor’s eyes met hers, and something in them made her pause. Not fear. Not anger.

  No, it was something else entirely.

  Something that made her ancient soul ache in warning.

  With a growl of frustration, she pressed the elongated knife harder against his skin. The silver blade bit deep into Darkmoor’s throat. His head snapped back, and crimson blood poured from the wound in steady pulses. Each drop glowed with an inner light as the power she had given him centuries ago spilled across the altar.

  But something was wrong. The blood didn’t fall randomly. It snaked down his neck, down his arms, down the fingers hanging limply over the edge, and it found channels in the metal. The blood followed these grooves like rivers finding their way through soil. Enchanted by the steady stream of her former favorite’s bloodtrail, the System watched it flow.

  Too late, recognition flickered in her devious, deadly eyes.

  In a flash of light, his blood sank into thin lines carved in the floor, lines that had been hidden by dust and shadow. Each groove filled with glowing blood, revealing patterns that grew more complex by the second.

  He was using her own failsafe against her.

  That clever bastard.

  Circles appeared within circles. Hidden runes flared to life. The System stood at the center of it all, watching Darkmoor’s blood feed a spell she knew too well. She had written these very patterns, ages ago, in a time before time.

  But she had never meant them to be used like this.

  The circle was almost complete now. Power built in the air like a storm about to break, and there was nothing she could do to stop it. The System could only watch as her own trap closed around her.

  “What have you done?” she whispered in horror.

  Darkmoor simply smiled through the flood of his own blood, his teeth stained red, and his body shook with slowly building laughter. It echoed through the chamber, wet and terrible.

  Apparently, she hadn’t cut his throat deep enough to stop him from speaking.

  As much as she wanted to cut off his head and end this already, she had to know what he had done to her precious ritual. In a rush of maddening anger, she shifted the chains around his torso and tore open his shirt, knowing what she would find even as she hoped she was wrong.

  Sure enough, runes had been carved deep into his chest. A dull light within them pulsed in sync with the patterns on the floor, each beat drawing more power from his spilling blood. She recognized her own handiwork in their design, but Darkmoor had altered them, twisting them into something new.

  “You always underestimate us.” Blood bubbled from his lips as he spoke. “Those of us you drag here from other worlds are smarter than you realize. Did you really think we wouldn't learn? That we wouldn't adapt?”

  The System gripped her silver dagger tighter, but for once in her long life, she couldn’t speak.

  “You’ve built a hellscape.” His smile grew wider. “But it’s an empire of borrowed power. That means we can take it back.”

  The runes on the floor pulsed faster now, their light almost blinding. The System levitated off the ground, ready to escape the ritual circle before it could close on her, but she only made it three feet before the shadows struck. They whipped around her ankles like chains, solid and cold as winter steel.

  One brutal yank brought her crashing back to the stone floor. Her feet landed hard against the flagstones, cracking them as her bare heels left a small crater, but she didn’t care. Her focus remained squarely on the shadows crawling up her legs, each one burning with unnatural cold as it glided over her skin.

  She tried to step forward. To jump. To escape. To do anything at all to get away from the last moments of the curse he was placing on her.

  Her feet wouldn’t move.

  These weren’t ordinary shadows. They had been crafted from her own power and twisted by Darkmoor’s spell to cage their creator. They held her fast while the ritual’s light built around her, trapped at the heart of her student's final betrayal.

  “This won’t work,” she warned him, but her voice shook with uncertainty.

  “It already did,” he countered, taking a ragged breath as more blood spilled from the wound in his neck. “You’re cursed, and it’s one you’ll never break.”

  “What do you want, then?” she said through gritted teeth.

  “Stop summoning heroes from Earth,” he demanded.

  “Or?” she prompted.

  “Or one of those you summon will be the one who can finally kill you. You won’t know who it is until the second before you die.”

  Before she could stop herself, the System’s eyes widened with terror.

  Darkmoor cackled, still sputtering on his blood, and his eyes squeezed shut as he lost himself in his laughter, as she had done so many times before.

  Rage transformed the System’s porcelain features into something entirely other. Something old. Something terrible. Her crimson eyes blazed as she pulled on the magic rooting her to the floor. Bit by bit, second by second, she clawed her way toward him, grimacing with the raw effort it took to fight her own magic. Her silver blade caught the glow of runic light, and she raised it over her head as she finally reached her prey.

  The weapon sang through the air in a perfect arc, and once it hit its target, its razor-sharp edge trailed droplets of blood.

  In the second before he died, Darkmoor’s eyes snapped open and landed squarely on her. His crooked smile never faltered, even as the blade severed flesh and bone. His head toppled off the altar, those defiant eyes still fixed on hers as it fell. The wet thud of skin hitting stone echoed through the chamber, and yet somehow his laughter remained, reverberating off the walls as if the very stone had absorbed the sound.

  His headless body went limp in the chains, and his blood now raced faster than ever through the carved channels in the stone. The runes on his chest flared one final time before the light faded, leaving black scars carved deep into his skin.

  He was finally dead.

  The damage, however, was done.

  The circle was complete. The System could feel the curse taking hold. She could even feel reality bending around her as Darkmoor’s final spell began its work.

  She stared at her former student's headless corpse, watching his blood soak into the ancient stones. Each drop carried a piece of power she had given him, now turned against her in ways she was only beginning to understand.

  For a time, she debated his final warning. Perhaps it would actually work in her favor to stop summoning heroes to her domain. Perhaps she had enough power. Perhaps Floor 7 had enough essence in it to survive the final stage of her plan.

  No.

  She shook her head to rid herself of the thought. It was a fool’s wish, after all, and she would not let this heathen stop what had to be done.

  She was so close—too close now to quit.

  “What a waste.” Her eyes scanned the bastard’s corpse, and she sighed in disappointment that the Shadow Realm blocked her from consuming the essence of someone at such a high level. It was all part of his trap, she realized now, to even deny her a final meal.

  As the System stared at Darkmoor’s headless corpse, his blood slowed. The shadows’ grip on her weakened more as the supply of his magic faded, and a smile crept across her face when a devilish little thought took root.

  Oh, her dear student had been clever. The Shadow Realm sang with his power now—locks and barriers she couldn’t break, secrets she couldn’t reach. His death had sealed them away from her forever.

  But he had made one critical mistake.

  She looked down at the ritual circle, still pulsing with stolen power. The ritual would force her to summon the one who could kill her, sure, but it couldn't control what happened after her prey arrived.

  Heroes were such fragile things, after all. So easily shaped by circumstance. By pain. By carefully orchestrated tragedy.

  “I’ll make your little soldier dance for me,” she warned the corpse. “Just wait, my precious little monster. They’ll dismantle everything you built to defy me. Every barrier. Every sanctuary. Every creature you protected from my grasp.” Her smile widened. “And they’ll do it while thinking they’re saving the world.”

  The shadows holding her seemed to pulse tighter, as if Darkmoor’s lingering power understood her intent. But it was too late. The spell was cast. The ritual’s effects were in motion.

  And the System had quite a bit to do before her ultimate hero’s arrival.