CHAPTER 117: CHAPTER NO.117 CONQUEROR’S WILL LVL 40

[Location: Dungeon—Vampire King’s Castle]

Her hands started making weird signs, from which a blood-red magic circle came into being.

It wasn’t a normal spell circle.

It spun in reverse.

It pulsed like a heart.

And with every rotation, the temperature dropped—not cold, not frost, but a vacuum. A hollowing of heat, sound, even the room’s pressure, like the circle was swallowing every vibration before they existed.

Mana’s fingers moved faster.

Her smile widened.

Her blood—a thin thread at first—lifted from the wounds Erebus had carved in her throat and coiled into the circle like a crimson filament. Each droplet was devoured by the spinning sigil until the light inside shifted from red... to a deep, ancient violet.

The hall trembled.

The nobles who had survived the shockwaves began screaming silently, hands on their heads, but no sound came out.

Space was compressing. Or blood was expanding.

I wasn’t sure.

My Observation Grid flickered violently, streams of encrypted mana-paths rearranging so fast they blurred to white noise.

RUN.

DODGE.

SURVIVE.

Those were the only words that came into my mind as blood started to form—

—not mist,

—not liquid,

—but geometry.

Shapes that should not exist began folding out of the circle. Triangles that bent at five angles. Cubes that had more faces when you blinked. Lines connecting to nothing but returning to where they shouldn’t.

Mana’s voice floated through the trembling hall, soft, delighted, unhinged:

"Let’s see... how much of my blood you can withstand, little king."

The sigil spun faster.

"Domain Expansion: Bloodless Graveyard."

The world inverted.

Not dimmed.

Not darkened.

It inverted.

Colour bled upward like someone had overturned a bucket of ink over the fabric of reality. Red drained first—ripped from bodies, from stone, from torchlight—then everything else followed like reluctant threads pulled from a tapestry.

The hall was gone.

The castle was gone.

And I stood in—

Nothing.

Not emptiness.

Not void.

A graveyard without graves.

The floor—if it could be called that—was a vast expanse of pale, matte nothingness, stretching far beyond any vision, like bone ground into infinity. The air didn’t exist. Yet I breathed. Shadows didn’t exist. Yet my own clung to my feet like wet tar.

Beside me, Paimon and Erebus flickered violently, their forms struggling to anchor in a place with no physical laws.

Mana?

She stood ahead, suspended by nothing, atop nothing.

Her silhouette gleamed in crimson violets, and behind her—like a cathedral made of bleeding geometry—hundreds of impossible symbols rotated around each other, forming a cosmic spinal column made of blood.

Mana spread her arms.

"Welcome to my Domain, little king."

Her smile sharpened, ear to ear.

"This is the realm where blood is absolute. Where every drop of life obeys only me. Where all colour is devoured—except the colour of blood itself."

A bead of ruby light rose around us, drifting lazily like a firefly.

Only... it wasn’t light.

My Observation Grid zoomed in.

A single droplet of blood.

Just one.

But inside it?

Dimension.

A fractal of endless red threads coiling and uncoiling, breathing with predatory hunger.

My Conqueror’s Will tightened inside me instinctively, like a muscle drawing taut.

This was not Alexios.

This was not Azmuth.

This was not even the Elder Mana from a minute ago.

This was Mana Sanguine with her limiter removed.

Her true form.

She tilted her head, watching the droplet float toward me.

"Touch it," she whispered, voice trembling in delight. "Just a little. Let me see if your skin decays first... or your soul."

The droplet drifted closer.

Paimon moved instinctively—but there was no ground to step on, so he flickered, distorted, nearly unravelled.

"Come back," I ordered sharply.

Paimon and Erebus—straightened at once, their hollow eyes burning faintly with midnight light before collapsing into liquid darkness. Both dissolved into a tide of black smoke, streaming toward my feet and disappearing beneath my shadow.

The droplet quivered before my chest.

One touch, and even my Observation Grid warned:

—IMMEDIATE SOUL EROSION——STRUCTURAL BREAKDOWN—

—CEASE ENTITY FUNCTION—

Mana giggled.

"Aww~ it’s cute that your body tries so hard to warn you."

Then she lifted her finger.

The droplet responded like a loyal hound and zipped toward my neck.

I didn’t step back.

I didn’t blink.

Muramasa moved.

A clean, straight cut—nothing dramatic, nothing flashy—just a sharp vertical swipe coated in Armament Core.

The droplet split into two.

Then into four.

Then into eight.

Then it expanded into a universe.

Not exploded.

Expanded.

Each split piece unfolded into a web of crimson runes and mirrored angles, forming a flower of blood made of dimensions.

Even Muramasa hissed in discomfort.

Mana clapped softly.

"Good reaction. You didn’t die."

She floated a little closer, her bare feet not touching anything.

"But we’ve only begun."

With one lazy swipe of her hand, the bone-colored floor rippled.

Shapes rose.

Like graves.

But instead of tombstones, pillars of congealed blood emerged—smooth, crystalline, humming like bass drums. Each pillar trapped a silhouette inside it.

Humanoid.

Thousands of them.

Men. Women. Children.

Humans. Vampires. Monsters.

Their bodies were grey and shrivelled, drained until nothing remained but their outlines.

Their empty eye sockets turned toward me.

Mana placed a hand to her cheek, sighing with nostalgic fondness.

"These are the ones who challenged me before. Old friends.

I wonder..."

She tapped a pillar lightly.

"...will you join them?"

The pillars trembled.

Then they cracked.

Then they burst.

A storm of blood-shards shrieked toward me like a hurricane of razors.

I raised my blade.

Observation Grid overloaded from—

White static.

Noise.

Fragments.

Too much.

My mind wasn’t supposed to process this kind of geometry—blood given shape through laws older than life, older than the mortal concept of "magic." But even through the burn, through the sensory collapse, a pattern emerged—a single line of predictive clarity cutting through the chaos.

MOVE.

My body obeyed before my thoughts caught up.

I stepped.

Not forward.

Not sideways.

I stepped into my own shadow.

Armament Core flared across my skin just as the first wave hit.

SHRRRRRRAAAAAAACK!

Thousands of blood-shards clashed against my coating. The sound wasn’t metal on metal—more like fingernails carving scripture into my bones. Each shard carried something inside it—whispers, memories, agony. Every impact triggered flashes:

A human begging.

A vampire screaming.

A monster roaring.

A child reaching.

Mana’s trophies.

Her history.

Her playground.

Her voice floated through the crimson storm, airy and tender:

"Do you hear them, little king?"

I didn’t answer.

I couldn’t.

Not with my voice.

But Muramasa did.

[Trait Activated!]

[Blade Resonance: Due to synchronisation between the user’s Conqueror’s Will and the bound weapon Muramasa, resonance effects are as follows: 1000% Critical Attack.]

Mana’s blood-shards kept screaming—thousands of them—but something else was screaming louder.

Muramasa.

No—my Conqueror’s Will through Muramasa.

A violent hum rattled up my arm, like the blade was grinding against the fabric of Mana’s domain itself, forcing it to acknowledge its existence.

The crimson storm converged—

And Muramasa answered.

Not with light.

Not with flame.

But with pressure.

A black-red pulse slammed outward from the blade’s edge—

like a heartbeat made of killing intent.

The blood-shards stopped mid-air.

Frozen.

Quivering.

Like a swarm of predators suddenly realizing a bigger apex predator had entered their ocean.

Mana’s smile faltered.

Just slightly.

"Oh...?"

Her eyes glowed.

"Your Will... it’s louder now."

Louder?

That was an understatement.

Something had broken inside me when I stepped into this Domain.

Some limiter.

Some instinct.

Some primal fear.

Shattered.

And the void left behind was flooding—overflowing—with Conqueror’s Will.

No longer the fledgling spark I had awakened.

[Conqueror’s Will: Level 35— 36]

[Conqueror’s Will: Level 36— 37]

...

[Conqueror’s Will: Level 40]

BOOOOOOOM!!!

VWROOOOOM!!!

The eruption hit like the collapse of a world. Bloodless Graveyard twisted under the force, fractals fracturing into fractals, each layer of Mana’s domain cracking, folding, then tearing apart like paper caught in a hurricane. The pillars—those ancient, crystallized trophies—shattered, releasing the trapped screams into a deafening wave that reverberated across nonexistent dimensions.

I planted my feet, black membrane coiling along Muramasa, shadows anchoring like anchors in the void. Conqueror’s Will roared through my veins, a tsunami of authority that didn’t just command—it demanded. Every pulse from my core reached into the very fabric of her Domain, clawing, bending, pressing, asserting dominance.

Mana faltered, just a fraction. Her hands, those cruel instruments, stilled mid-gesture. A ripple passed through her form, subtle but undeniable.

"...You’ve changed," she whispered, voice sharp with both shock and something dangerously akin to admiration. Her dual-colored eyes—sapphire and molten honey—blazed.

I didn’t answer. I didn’t need to.

The Conqueror’s Will wasn’t something for words. It spoke. It sang through the Armament membrane. Through Muramasa. Through me. And it told her, clearly, that even her centuries of blood, her mastery, her unbound Elder power, was no longer absolute.

The first wave hit.

Crimson shards—twisted fragments of blood, soul, memory—ripped through the void. They collided with my blade’s pulse. Muramasa screamed silently, vibrating with a resonance that shredded everything that wasn’t anchored by my will. Mana’s expansion of blood fractals began to disintegrate from the edges inward, like ice melting under fire hotter than the sun.

And then the second wave.

This one was larger, more intricate. Each shard a twisted little universe, screaming in a language older than life. But again, the blade met them. This time, with Conqueror’s Will Level 40, I didn’t just repel. I crushed. Every shard that touched Muramasa was compressed, obliterated, the screams inverted and forced to scream for me, feeding the blade, feeding the void within my aura, feeding the system I alone possessed.

Mana’s expression changed.

Not fear. Not panic. Not even anger.

Awe.

It was the first moment I saw awe on her face.

"...Interesting," she whispered, the word trembling on her lips. "Truly... interesting." Her voice, layered over centuries of cold amusement, now carried heat—a dangerous, volatile heat that crackled through the warped space around us.

She raised both arms simultaneously, and a cascade of blood geometry exploded outward, faster, denser, more complex than ever.

But I was ready.

Muramasa extended. The black membrane rippled. The resonance that had begun now expanded, linking to every pulse of Conqueror’s Will in my body. Every strike she made, every fractal, every drop of blood, every scream—was mapped, processed, and answered before it could exist fully.

BOOM.

The collision was instantaneous. Blood geometry and Conqueror’s Will overlapped, and reality itself shuddered. The Domain screamed under the pressure of the assertion. Something ancient inside Mana stirred—the part that had never been challenged like this—and her wings/aura extensions flared, sending shockwaves that should have annihilated me.

But I didn’t flinch.

I pressed forward.

Every step I took compressed the fractured floor beneath me. The soundless storm of her blood-art shattered like crystal, but even fragments that should have impaled me twisted, melted, and evaporated at the edge of Muramasa. My shadow soldiers were no longer needed—they were swept along, extensions of the same will, invisible yet infinitely present.

Mana’s eyes widened.

Her domain collapsed.

As the banquet hall came to being again, the floor erased. Nobel? Dead.

[You killed Seventy High-Ranked vampires.]

[You have earned 210,000 experience points.]

[You have collected (210) Soul of Vampire.]

...

[Collected Souls of Vampires: 5224/10,000]

[Exp. Needed for the next level up: 17,731,900/17,600,000]

[Level up!]

...

[Current Level: 176]

[Exp. Needed for the next level up: 0/18,000,000]

Mana’s crimson-violet aura flickered, her smile tight, almost predatory—but now laced with hesitation. She hovered midair, the shattered remnants of her Bloodless Graveyard falling around her like dying stars.

"You..." she whispered, voice trembling between awe and anger. "You’ve grown... beyond what I anticipated. Who are you really?"

I didn’t answer. My hand rested lightly on Muramasa, the black membrane still pulsing with Conqueror’s Will Level 40. Words were meaningless now; dominance spoke louder than any explanation.

She tilted her head, eyes narrowing, and I could see her calculating, probing, pushing every inch of her mind to understand me. But the answer was simple: she couldn’t. Not fully. Not yet.

The space around her warped, a ripple of violet blood magic coiling outward, forming the first of many waves she intended to unleash. The geometry of her Domain tried to reconstruct itself, tentacles of fractal blood reaching for me, for my life, for my very essence.

I stepped forward. Muramasa extended instinctively, resonating with every pulse of my will. The waves hit.

Nothing happened.

Not in the way Mana wanted. Not in the way her centuries of mastery dictated. My Conqueror’s Will didn’t just clash—it consumed, inverted, and reasserted. Every drop of blood magic, every scream trapped in her fractals, every impossibility folded neatly under my authority. The soundless storm she created turned into stillness, a calm dominated entirely by me.

Mana blinked. A single blink, but it carried the weight of millennia of disbelief.

"You... how...?" Her words were a broken whisper, disbelief bleeding into every syllable.

"CONQUEROR’S COATING— DIVINE DEPARTURE!"

Conqueror’s Will bled into Muramasa’s edge as Armament condensed into a crescent of annihilation.

The crescent tore through the remnants of Mana’s Domain like a scythe through mist, black-gold edges slicing space itself.

Blood-fractals screamed, shattered, and folded inward, collapsing under the pressure of my will. Every trapped echo of life she had woven—every agonized human, vampire, monster—was compressed, inverted, and fed into the Conqueror’s Coating, amplifying its reach, its authority, its inevitability.

Mana’s scream rang across nonexistent dimensions. Her hands shot out, trying to halt the collapse, but the pulse of my Conqueror’s Will was absolute. The crescent expanded, a tidal wave of authority, reshaping the fractured void around us.

Her wings—or extensions of her aura—shattered in fragmented splinters, vanishing like smoke in a gale. Even her violet-crimson blood magic—the foundation of centuries of Elder supremacy—was nothing against this level of dominance.

The fractured pillars of frozen blood twisted violently, then collapsed entirely, shattering into millions of microscopic shards, each screaming in silence as they imploded.

Mana was hurled backward—not out of the Domain, not out of existence—but into a suspended tumble through the void, hair streaming like a comet’s tail, crimson eyes wide with shock.

She struggled to rise, to reconstruct, but every move she made, every motion of her fingers, every breath, was anticipated, mirrored, and crushed by my Conqueror’s Will.

I stepped forward. Muramasa pulsed in resonance, black membrane thickening like molten shadow, every inch of the blade radiating the decree of inevitability.

Mana hit the floor—or what passed for a floor now—and the impact would have shattered mountains in any physical realm. Her blood pooled unnaturally, forming fractal sigils, but even as she tried to gather the scattered remnants of her Domain, I was already on her.

"Die!"

Schwing!

Splatter~

Thud!

[You killed an High Elder-Ranked Vampire.]

[You have earned 50000 experience points.]

[You have collected (50) Soul of Vampire.]

...

[Collected Souls of Vampires: 5274/10,000]

[Exp. Needed for the next level up: 50,000/18,000,000]

"Nicely done."

I straighten my posture as I finally relax my shoulders, letting the pulse of Conqueror’s Will subside slightly, though the residual pressure still hung in the air like a living thing. Muramasa’s black membrane shimmered faintly, breathing with a dark rhythm that resonated with the void around us.

"Now then," My whole demeanour turned into a little pervert as I started rubbing my hands against each other, after storing Muramsa back inside the Inventory.

— Number of shadows that can be extracted: 145/150.

I ordered a Shadow Infantryman to align Mana and Azmuth’s bodies side by side.

With a thumbs-up flash to the soldier, I walked before them.

I extended my hand.

"Rise Up."

When I did that, the shadow cast beneath both of them began to wiggle as if it came to life. It was the same reaction as when I extracted the shadows from the Alexios and others before.

’Okay, good!’

I clenched my fists tightly. I had a good feeling about this.

[King’s Call has commenced.]

[Attempting to extract....]

Uwaaahhh-!!

’WOAH! ON THE FIRST TRY?!’

First was Azmuth, from whose body a clawed arm, coated in shadows, pressed down on the ground and pushed itself up.

[King’s Call was a success.]

[??? Lvl. 11]

— Elite Knight Grade

***

Stone me, I can take it!

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