CHAPTER 124: A DEMON

Riley’s dagger was already in motion. His hand snapped forward with lethal precision, his shadow-coated blade arcing in a swift, ruthless slash aimed straight at the figure’s face.

The shadow aura surrounding Riley’s body pulsed violently, responding as if it too shared his fury.

It surged along his arm and bled into his weapon, coiling around the dagger until it no longer seemed like steel but a living extension of shadow itself.

In that instant, the aura burst outward.

From the blade erupted a thin crescent of concentrated darkness, a blade of shadow so sharp and refined it screamed as it cut through the air.

Its arc gleamed with unnatural black light, a sickle of condensed killing intent, and it streaked directly toward the figure’s face.

The strange figure’s instincts roared to life. He threw his hand up reflexively, palm open, as though to block or parry the attack.

Dark energy gathered across his hand in desperate haste, but it was far too late.

The crescent of shadow ripped through.

There was a tearing sound—not just of cloth, but of darkness itself splitting apart.

The figure’s hood shredded under the impact, the darkness that had been clinging to it unraveling violently like smoke ripped away by a storm.

The chamber filled with a burst of pale, searing light as the shadows parted. For the first time, Riley’s attack had struck true.

The force behind Riley’s shadow blade slammed sent him flying backward through the boss room like a ragdoll.

The air cracked with the sound of impact, and dust rippled out from where his body was hurled across the rocky floor.

For a brief instant, it seemed like he would crash helplessly into the stone wall at the far end—yet, just before the impact, his body twisted unnaturally midair.

With a sharp spin, he rotated like a predator adjusting its stance, his boots slamming against the ground.

He landed with a heavy thud, the ground beneath him fracturing from the sheer weight of his landing.

His head hung low, strands of his hood torn apart, casting shadows over his face.

Drip... drip... drip...

The faint sound echoed eerily in the boss chamber. Riley’s eyes darted toward the source—and then he saw it.

A long, deep, diagonal cut stretched across the stranger’s face, carved by Riley’s shadow crescent.

Blood seeped freely from the wound, warm and thick, sliding down his cheek in red streams before dripping steadily to the stone below.

Each drop rang out like the tolling of a bell, echoing off the walls, filling the silence with a chilling rhythm.

The figure’s body trembled faintly—not from weakness, but from disbelief.

His hand slowly rose, almost cautiously, as if he couldn’t accept what had just happened.

His fingertips touched his cheek, smearing the wet blood against his pale skin.

"...I was cut..." his voice was low, disbelieving, and almost feral. His words cracked through the silence like brittle glass. "...by a... human?"

The hood finally slipped back, revealing his face fully to Riley’s gaze.

Riley’s eyes narrowed sharply, his body tensing, daggers still gripped tight.

For the first time since the start of the fight, the face of the strange figure was fully revealed to him.

His skin was pale, deathly so, as though drained of all life.

From the sides of his head jutted two curved horns, crimson-red, gleaming faintly under the dim light of the crystals.

His mouth parted slightly as he breathed, revealing long, sharp fangs that jutted downward, far longer than any human’s teeth had a right to be.

And along the sides of his neck, patches of black and red scales glistened faintly, rough and sharp, as if they were armor embedded into his flesh.

Though his appearance looked nothing like Riley had ever seen before since he transmigrated to the past, he recognised it.

This might be the first time seeing one in this life, but he had seen similar ones many times in his past life.

The face and appearance of a demon... in humanoid form.

The figure straightened slowly, his expression hidden behind a strange, twisted calm. Then, to Riley’s surprise, he began to clap.

Clap! Clap! Clap!

The sound echoed in the chamber, deliberate and mocking.

Each strike of his hands against one another reverberated with unsettling resonance, as if the room itself was acknowledging the battle.

"Well done... human..." he muttered, blood still dripping freely from his wound, his crimson horns catching the light as his face twisted into a dark grin.

Riley scoffed, his voice sharp and filled with bitter contempt as he muttered under his breath.

"...A demon."

The word cut through the still air like a blade.

The strange man’s eyes widened, his head tilting ever so slightly as if Riley had just said something that wasn’t supposed to be possible.

The dripping of his blood-filled silence stretched for a moment longer, and then he chuckled—a low, dry laugh that rumbled from his throat.

"You know what I am..." he said slowly, as though savoring the weight of those words.

His voice carried a mixture of amusement and menace, echoing faintly against the chamber walls.

Then, he stopped speaking, his lips curling upward into a smirk so vile and twisted it almost seemed unnatural. His blood-smeared face only made the expression more unsettling.

"That’s interesting," he continued, his tone dripping with mockery.

His hand rose deliberately, fingers brushing against his chin as he tilted his head to study Riley. "No human... especially a player... should be able to recognize a demon."

Riley’s frown deepened. His jaw clenched tight, his teeth grinding audibly together. His knuckles whitened around the daggers he still held, his patience thinning with every arrogant word from the figure before him.

’Of course I do,’ Riley thought, his mind cold and sharp, his fury boiling beneath his calm exterior.

There was no way he wouldn’t recognize a demon. Not after everything he had endured in his past life. Not after the endless blood, the screams, the despair they had carved into the world.

The sight of those crimson horns sent a chill stabbing down his spine, twisting like an icy blade through his chest.

For an instant, his vision blurred—not because of weakness, but because of the memory that surged within him unbidden.

He remembered his first encounter with a demon.

It hadn’t been like this. Not at all.

Back then, he was lying half-dead on the floor, drenched in his own blood, lungs burning, body broken and trembling.

Terror had swallowed him whole, making it hard to even breathe as the shadow of that monster loomed over him. His heart had nearly stopped, not from injury, but from sheer fear.

That encounter ended with him almost losing his life in the worst way possible...

The image seared into his memory—the demon’s clawed hand plunging down toward his chest, rending flesh and bone as though they were paper.

He remembered the searing agony, the sensation of his ribs snapping apart, and the horror of feeling his own heart nearly torn from his body.

Organs ripped, life almost snuffed out in the most grotesque and excruciating way imaginable.

The phantom pain of that day still lingered within him. Even now.

Riley’s grip tightened on his dagger until the leather bit into his palm. The phantom memory of claws tearing into his chest burned vividly in his mind, but he forced it back, swallowing the fear and feeding it into his resolve.

This time... it would be different.

He would make sure of it.

He would never again allow an encounter with a demon to end the way his first had.

He refused to relive that helplessness, that despair of lying broken while his life was torn from him piece by piece.

He would make sure that none of his encounters with demons ever ended like that. Not this one. Not any that followed.

His eyes hardened, a cold gleam flashing in their depths. He was determined to win this time. To fight back, to carve his own fate with blood and steel.

He would not be reduced to an extra in someone else’s story, nor a weakling discarded by the cruel tides of the world.

That was how it had been in his past life—powerless, nameless, forgotten. But not this time. Never again.

The demon tilted his head, lips curving once more into that vile smirk as he broke the silence.

His tone was light, almost casual, but carried an underlying malice that pressed down like a suffocating weight.

"Why don’t I introduce myself first?" he said, his voice mocking, as if humoring a child.

A low chuckle rumbled from his chest.

"That way... we won’t be strangers anymore." His eyes glowed faintly, an eerie crimson shimmer that only made his smirk more unsettling.

He raised a finger to his chest, almost theatrically, and leaned forward slightly.

"Well, my name is—"

[Lunge]

Before the name could even leave his lips, Riley’s body exploded into motion.

His muscles coiled and released like a drawn bow, his figure blurring forward with vicious speed.

The ground cracked under his sudden push-off, and in an instant, his dagger was aimed straight for the demon’s throat, cutting through the words before they could be spoken.