CHAPTER 115: CHAPTER 115

The entity moved faster than Satou’s enhanced perception could track. One moment it was across the chamber, the next its void-sword was descending toward his neck. Satou activated Perfect Counter, his body moving on pure instinct to deflect the blow.

His claw met the sword and—screamed in agony as his hand began to unexist. The fingers simply faded away, erased by contact with Nihilus’s weapon.

[HP: 3205/5500]

[Stamina: 46%... 38%... 31%...] - Regenerating

Satou activated Berserker Rage and Blood Frenzy together, his wounded state making him faster, stronger, more dangerous. He struck back with his remaining good hand, claws trailing fire that he immediately canceled—fire wouldn’t work.

Instead, he wrapped his strikes in the Shadow Manipulation, the darkness he’d gained from the fallen hero. Shadows that could cut, that could harm the incorporeal, that existed in the space between light and dark.

His shadow-wrapped claw actually connected with Nihilus’s form. The entity’s armor cracked, void-stuff chipping away.

"YES!" Nihilus laughed, the sound like dying stars. "You understand! Darkness can touch void! Shadow exists in the absence of light, just as void exists in the absence of all things! You can hurt me because you too have learned to walk in nothingness!"

Satou pressed the advantage. He stopped trying to use his elemental abilities—fire, lightning, earth. Those required existence, and existence was Nihilus’s enemy. Instead, he wrapped himself in pure shadow, in darkness, in the techniques he’d learned from consuming Vegeta months ago.

He became less a physical being and more a shadow given form, moving through darkness that was different from Nihilus’s void because it held substance, even if that substance was the absence of light.

The two beings clashed in the space between existence and non-existence. Satou’s shadow-wrapped claws tore into Nihilus’s armor. The entity’s void-sword carved through Satou’s body, erasing chunks of him with each strike.

[HP: 2847/5500]

[HP: 2456/5500]

[HP: 2103/5500]

His Regeneration was working at absolute maximum, burning through stamina like wildfire to replace erased matter. But he was losing ground. For every wound he inflicted on Nihilus, the entity erased two parts of him.

[Stamina: 23%... 18%... 12%...]

I’m going to run out of stamina before I can kill it. I need... I need something more!

Satou activated Shadow Manipulation at maximum output, remembering how Vegeta had used shadows not just as a weapon but as a tool. He’d seen the hero create constructs from darkness, form weapons from nothing but absence of light.

His shadow exploded outward, forming dozens of shadow-tendrils that lashed at Nihilus from every direction. The entity cut through most of them, but a few got through, wrapping around its limbs, its torso, binding it in place for just a second.

One second was enough.

Satou charged forward, both hands reformed now (his Regeneration working frantically), and plunged them directly into the crack he’d made in Nihilus’s armor earlier. He pushed deeper, his claws sinking into the void-entity’s chest, feeling the strange non-texture of pure nothingness.

"Foolish!" Nihilus roared. "You cannot harm me from within! You’ll only erase yourself faster!"

But Satou wasn’t trying to harm it from within. He was trying something else—something desperate and probably suicidal.

He activated his Regeneration in reverse.

Instead of creating matter to heal himself, he forced the process backward, making his hands unmake themselves at the cellular level. His flesh began to dissolve—not from Nihilus’s void, but from his own reversed regeneration—and in dissolving, it released tremendous amounts of energy directly into Nihilus’s core.

It was like detonating a bomb from the inside. The energy release from matter breaking down at the molecular level was massive, and it was happening inside the void entity.

Nihilus shrieked—the first time it had shown genuine pain. Its form destabilized, cracks spreading across its armor like a shattering mirror.

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!"

"Something stupid!" Satou shouted through gritted teeth. The pain of deliberately destroying his own hands was beyond anything he’d experienced. His Regeneration was fighting his own control, trying to heal what he was forcing it to destroy, creating a feedback loop of creation and destruction that was tearing him apart.

[HP: 1847/5500]

[HP: 1456/5500]

[Mental Coherence: 67%... 45%... 23%...]

[WARNING: CONFLICTING REGENERATION COMMANDS - SYSTEM OVERLOAD]

But it was working

. Nihilus’s form was crumbling, unable to maintain cohesion with an explosion of raw energy happening inside it.

The entity tried to expel Satou, tried to erase him completely, but Satou’s shadow-wrapped arms had become anchors, holding him in place through sheer desperate will.

"You would destroy yourself to harm me?!" Nihilus demanded.

"If that’s what it takes!" Satou roared back.

Then Survivor’s Will activated—the unique ability he’d gained that refused to let him die even from fatal wounds.

[Survivor’s Will Activated]

[Death Refused - Continue fighting for 60 seconds despite fatal damage]

His HP didn’t matter anymore. His body was destroying itself from the inside out, but for the next sixty seconds, Satou simply refused to die. He pushed more energy into the detonation, more reversed regeneration, turning his own life force into a weapon.

Nihilus’s protests became weaker, its form losing cohesion. The void-armor crumbled. The void-sword dissipated. The infinite darkness that made up its essence began to scatter like smoke in wind.

"You... actually... did it..." Nihilus whispered, its voice fading. "In all the millennia I have guarded this place... no one ever... tried to kill themselves and me simultaneously..."

"Take it then, child. You’ve earned it through sheer insanity. Take my power. Take my purpose. And when you face that champion who awaits you... show him what it means to face one who refused to accept defeat."

Nihilus dissolved completely, its essence scattering into the void.

But unlike before , unlike with all the creatures Satou had killed in this dungeon—this was different. Nihilus wasn’t dispersing naturally. Its essence was scattering, yes, but not disappearing. It was trying to return to the dungeon itself, to reconstitute, to reform.

It would take centuries, maybe millennia, but eventually Nihilus would return. That was its nature as the dungeon’s eternal guardian.

Unless someone stopped it.

Satou’s hand shot out, and his shadow exploded outward like a living thing. His Devouring ability, which had consumed nearly two thousand creatures over seventy days, reached out and seized the dissipating essence of the Void Incarnate.

"No," Satou gasped through bloody lips. "If I’m taking your existence... I’m taking all of it."

The essence fought back. This wasn’t like devouring a corpse or even a living creature. This was trying to consume a fundamental concept—the embodiment of void itself, a being that existed partially outside reality.

Satou’s Devouring ability screamed in protest as it tried to contain something it was never designed to hold. His shadow writhed and twisted, turning from dark gray to absolute black, then to something even darker—a void within a void.

[WARNING: Attempting to Devour Conceptual Entity]

[Extreme Risk of Soul Corruption]

[Mental Degradation Imminent]

[Recommend Immediate Abort]

"I... REFUSE!" Satou roared, pouring everything he had left into the devouring. His consciousness was fracturing, his sense of self beginning to dissolve as Nihilus’s essence fought to consume him from within even as he consumed it.

For a terrifying moment, Satou couldn’t remember his name. Couldn’t remember why he was fighting. Couldn’t remember anything except endless void, eternal nothingness, the cold embrace of non-existence.

Then a face flashed through his mind. Lyra, smiling at him on their date.

Another face. Kelvin, calling him "big brother."

Jessica, healing his wounds with gentle hands.

Urgak, trusting him to lead.

The elder goblin, sacrificing himself so Satou could live.

I am Satou. I fight to protect them. I exist because they need me to exist.

His sense of self snapped back into focus like a rubber band, and with it came absolute determination. His Devouring ability surged, no longer trying to contain Nihilus’s essence but to integrate it, to make it part of himself rather than keep it separate.

The void-essence stopped fighting. As if recognizing something—perhaps respect, perhaps acknowledgment—it allowed itself to be consumed.

[Nihilus, The Void Incarnate - DEVOURED]

The moment the last of Nihilus’s essence flowed into him, Satou’s entire body convulsed. His Regeneration went into emergency overdrive as his physical form tried to adapt to containing void-essence within flesh and blood.

His cells restructured themselves. His bones became denser, infused with traces of void-matter that made them harder than steel yet lighter than normal bone. His blood darkened, taking on a faint purple-black hue. His scales, already iridescent from the dragon essence, now had veins of absolute black running through them—void-stuff integrated into his very being.

The notifications came in a flood:

[Nihilus Essence Successfully Integrated]

[WARNING: Your nature has been fundamentally altered]

[You now carry the Mark of the Void]

[New Abilities Acquired:]

[Void Manipulation (Legendary) - Control the absence of existence itself. Create pockets of void, erase matter from reality, step through non-space]

[Existence Erasure (Unique) - Your attacks can now partially erase their targets from reality. Wounds inflicted resist normal healing as the damaged area must be "rewritten" back into existence]

[Void Body (Passive - Mythical) - Your body partially exists outside normal reality. Reduces all incoming damage by 40% as attacks struggle to affect something that’s only partially "there." Grants immunity to reality manipulation below Legendary tier]

[Conceptual Resistance (Legendary) - Resist attacks that target concepts rather than physical form. Near-immunity to instant death effects, soul attacks, and existence-based abilities]

[Nihilus’s Authority (Unique - Sealed) - Fragment of the Void Incarnate’s true power. Currently sealed due to insufficient level. Unlock conditions: Level 100, Mental Coherence 100%, Void Mastery Complete.

[ Void-Touched: Your presence naturally suppresses lower-tier magic and abilities]

[ Reality Anchor (Enhanced): Cannot be erased, displaced, or removed from reality by any means below Divine tier]

[ Abyssal Regeneration: Can regenerate even from conceptual damage by pulling matter from the void]

[ Eternal Hunger: Your Devouring ability passively absorbs ambient mana and essence]

[Floor One Hundred Complete]

[Nightmare Dragon Defeated]

[Nihilus Devoured]

[+100,000 EXP]

[Level Up! Level 45 → Level 50 → Level 55 → Level 60]

The notifications continued, but Satou couldn’t read them. His Survivor’s Will duration had ended, and his body finally acknowledged that it should be dead. He collapsed, his reversed Regeneration finally stopping, the normal healing process taking over.

His Regeneration worked frantically to repair the catastrophic damage he’d inflicted on himself. Arms that had been dissolved down to bone slowly regrew muscle, then skin. Internal organs that had ruptured from energy release were reconstructed piece by piece.

Then Satou suddenly fainted from the exhaustion.