Chapter 34: The Price of Power

  Grim ran.

  Every step felt heavier than the last, his heart pounded in his ears, each beat a cruel reminder of what was slipping away, what he was about to lose.

  His breath came ragged, desperate, torn from the depths of his chest. His mouth dry, his hands trembling. Ash—he had to reach her. He had to.

  "ASH! ASH! ASH!" His voice cracked, raw, pathetic.

  He didn’t care. He needed her. Desperation clawed at his throat, swallowing any remnants of sanity.

  He pushed through the chaos, through the soldiers, through the smoke and blood, his eyes locked on her figure in the distance.

  His legs felt like they weren’t his own, like they were carrying him to his doom, but he had no choice.

  He couldn’t stop. Not now.

  He crashed into her, the impact knocking the air from his lungs.

  She didn’t flinch. She stood firm, her arms wrapped around him as if she could hold the entire world together with her strength.

  Her warmth, her presence, her calm—it was the only thing that felt real in a world that was falling apart.

  “Ash... please...” His voice was barely a whisper, broken. “I—I can’t do this anymore.”

  She pulled him close, pressing his head against her chest, her hand cradling the back of his skull, as if she could stop him from falling apart.

  “Grim,” her voice, soft yet unyielding, pierced through the darkness of his mind. “You don’t have to calm down. You don’t have to think. None of this is your fault.”

  Her words struck like a hammer, shattering the glass of his mind, breaking apart the guilt, the crushing weight of his failure. None of this is your fault.

  “You’ve done your best. That’s enough. All we can do now… is keep going. Fight. And none of this will be your fault.”

  She let go of him, her hands on his shoulders, guiding him back to his feet. Her eyes—bright, unyielding—met his.

  "Do your best. Fight. For me. For us."

  And with those words, she turned away, walking back into the chaos.

  Every part of him screamed to follow her, but his body refused to obey.

  His arms hung useless by his sides, his legs like stone.

  He wanted to scream, wanted to fight, but no sound came from his mouth. His body was no longer his own.

  And then, the voice.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  You have already died.

  It echoed in his head, cold, merciless.

  Grim didn’t argue. He couldn’t.

  The flood of rage inside him drowned every thought, every shred of reason. Bloodlust poured into his veins like molten fire.

  He wanted to tear the world apart. He wanted to feel alive.

  Now let me show you how it feels to be alive.

  And then, everything stopped.

  Time fractured, snapped into silence.

  The battlefield fell into an unnatural stillness. The screams faded. The war… it paused.

  Colors bled from the world, leaving only gray shadows in their wake. The smell of blood, the ringing of swords, the heat of battle—all vanished.

  A single crack. A single, deafening thud.

  And then, the world returned.

  But Grim did not return the same.

  His eyes burned—blood red. Not human. Not anything that could be called man.

  They were pools of rage, of something other, something beyond comprehension.

  His mind? Empty. His thoughts? Gone. His body? It moved. Moved like a puppet on strings too fine for anyone to see, controlled by a force older than the world itself.

  He moved through the battlefield like wind—silent, deadly, unstoppable. No hesitation. No remorse.

  With every step, every swing of his arm, every flick of his wrist, soldiers fell. They never saw him coming.

  Their bodies crumpled before they even knew what had happened.

  He tore through them like they were nothing more than paper.

  His blade cut through flesh and bone with such precision that it was as though he was no longer human, no longer bound by the rules of life and death.

  The battlefield darkened with every passing second.

  The sky itself seemed to bleed. The earth soaked in the blood of the fallen, and Grim—Grim was its harbinger.

  He wasn’t a person. He wasn’t a hero. He was death.

  And then, there he was.

  The King.

  The one who had caused all this pain, who had watched from his throne as lives were shattered, as families were torn apart.

  Grim’s body, no—this thing that wore Grim’s skin—surged forward, the armies on the way nothing more than dust in his path.

  They didn’t matter. Nothing mattered.

  In the next instant, he stood before the King, his hand gripping the King’s hair, his fingers digging into the scalp.

  The King’s eyes were wide with terror. His mouth opened to scream, but nothing came out.

  The King’s head—limp, lifeless—was torn from his body and held high by the hair.

  Grim felt relief.

  The armies froze. They stood paralyzed, unable to move, unable to breathe. No one dared to make a sound.

  The battlefield had stopped.

  And in that frozen moment, Grim felt the faintest sliver of peace. The kind of peace only death could bring.

  But then, the voice.

  But there’s a cost you must pay.

  The words sank into his soul, like a knife twisting in an open wound.

  The head dropped from his hands. His body moved again, but it was no longer Grim.

  No. This was something else.

  Something worse.

  Grim’s body—no longer his own—moved through the battlefield like a storm.

  He struck down anyone in his path, friend or foe.

  It didn’t matter. There was no difference. The line between ally and enemy had blurred until it no longer existed.

  It was only blood. Only death.

  And then—the ground trembled again.

  A force—no, a being—crashed into the battlefield with such power that the earth itself groaned beneath its weight. Another, and another. Forces—ancient forces—descended, their power shaking the very fabric of the world.

  Leviathan.

  But it wasn’t time yet.

  And in two other places, two massive circles of power tore through the fabric of reality. Symbols, ancient runes, burned through the air, marking the arrival of something beyond comprehension.

  Grim didn’t care. His world was reduced to red. Red blood. Red bodies. Red hatred.

  The screams, the chaos, the violence—it all flooded the battlefield, crashing together in a cacophony of horror.

  And then, a single thud.

  A deafening, world-shattering thud.

  And the world—everything—fell away.

  Cut to black.

  Grim was gone. And with him, everything else.