[Chapter 35 - A thousand years of torture]

From his inventory, Barko retrieved two long, chained leashes, they were made of dark metal writhing like snakes. With a violent throw, he launched them into the air. They twisted mid-flight and transformed into gleaming, spiked collars, snapping around the highest necks of each beast.

A system screen flashed in front of Shadow.

[Your opponent Boss no. 3 Barko has used an item: Insanity Shackles — These cursed collars multiply strength at the cost of sanity.]

Shadow's grin widened. "Oh… that's going to be interesting."

Above, Eve Harlot was still firing off fireballs, giggling maniacally as she danced through the sky. Below, Frankenstein's Monster held steady, slicing clean arcs through the air with his massive scythe.

But then everything changed.

The aura around the hounds shifted violently—once brutal, now demonic. Their muscles bulged grotesquely, their veins glowing red with madness. Their seven heads twisted and snarled in chaotic unison, eyes rolling back, drool spilling in heaps.

Their movements blurred with unnatural speed.

In an instant, Eve Harlot was swatted from the sky by a thunderous leap, crashing into the ground with a gasp of pain. Frankenstein's Monster barely had time to raise his scythe before being slammed into the dirt by a crushing paw.

"No!" beauty flinched, instinctively stepping forward, but cydal grabbed her arm. He didn't say anything. But she understood it wasn't her battle either.

On the battlefield, both shades screamed as Maw and Rot began stomping down on them with overwhelming power. Each strike shook the earth. Eve shrieked in agony as jaws snapped toward her, and the Monster bellowed in pain as he was driven deeper into the cracked ground.

The tables had turned violently.

And Barko's mad grin returned.

After stomping their prey, the twin hounds Maw and Rot, turned on each other in a frenzy of greed and mindless rage. Each of their seven heads snarled, snapping wildly, until Rot finally overpowered its sibling. With a final brutal lunge, it bit down on Maw's throats, tearing and ripping with feral joy. Then, with a disturbing gulp, Rot devoured both of its own bodies merging into a single monstrosity, pulsing with madness.

The effects of the Insanity Shackles were clear now.

Both hounds had gone fully berserk and merged into a single entity after eating each out out. They reborned as Mawrot now.

Mawrot's speed had doubled. It's movement blurred with chaotic energy.

Eve Harlot and Frankenstein's Monster had no way to dodge or defend.

And so, they were swallowed whole.

Inside the mawrot's belly, the world was a nightmare of rot and acidic bile. The air was thick with toxic fumes, and the stomach's walls pulsed with grotesque squelches. Slime clung to them like tar, and bones from past victims floated half-dissolved in the black muck.

The moment was critical.

Their HPs began plummeting at a terrifying pace.

All around Shadow, red alerts and flickering text buzzed in the air:

[WARNING: Shades' health critical]

[Toxic digestive fluid causing rapid deterioration]

[Immediate action required to avoid total loss]

"This isn't good," Frankenstein's Monster growled, clutching his side. "We should do that."

"That?" Eve snapped in disgust. "With you? Absolutely not."

"Oh, really? You'd rather die than cast a support spell on me to save us both? You know Master is counting on us!"

"The magic requires physical contact... and a kiss from me. Do you truly believe a patchwork corpse like you deserves it?"

Outside the beast, Shadow could still hear their argument echoing through the link he shared with his shades. His eye twitched with annoyance.

"Quit whining, you two. Need I remind you that you're not some cringey high-school couple? I tamed you to fight wars, not bicker like fools. If you can't deliver, I'll reject you."

They both fell silent.

Rejection from Shadow wasn't just being dismissed. It meant becoming mindless, soulless husks, trapped forever in his dungeon of tortured spirits. This dungeon was where they were picked by shadow, it's a realm of the dead, only the dead and tortured souls killed by the system and other players are trapped here.

They knew the price.

Without another word, their hands clasped flesh to flesh, black mist twining around their fingers. Eve's eyes fluttered closed, and her voice echoed like a forbidden chant:

"Ono sa dnats ew ,rehtegoT .rentrap ym ot ti lennahc yam I taht ,htgnerts ruoy em tnarG .eno era ew ,htaed dna dertah fo droL o."

Her voice distorted with power. The chant was dark and haunting.

A glow surged.

Then, the two began to move in tandem in an intimate, chaotic dance. Their bodies moved with hypnotic fluidity, touching, spinning, grinding. Despite the putrid surroundings, they flowed as though performing a sacred ritual.

Then came the kiss, a deep, hungry and desperate kiss. Their tongues tangled. Lips sucked. It wasn't romantic, it was madness—driven by magic, lust, and war.

Outside, Barko stood confidently, arms crossed, a cruel smirk on his face.

"Heh... Looks like both of Shadow's prized pets are finally done," he said aloud, unaware of what was happening inside the beast.

But then... the air shimmered.

A violent rumble shook the ground. The hound's stomach began to bulge. It grew bright and blinding and then it burst.

Mawrot screamed as its insides detonated in a spray of black sludge and light.

Out of the explosion stepped Frankenstein's Monster, he was reborn. Shadows danced around him in thick black smoke, and his scythe had transformed, now longer, sharper, with a serrated chain trailing behind it like a cursed tail.

Behind him, clinging to his back, was Eve Harlot, she was bare skinned, her glowing skin was radiant with transferred energy. Her arms were wrapped around him tightly, lips curled in a wild grin. Their connection was beyond battle now, it was a pact sealed in intimacy.

Shadow grinned.

"Now that's more like it."

Beauty let out a soft breath, visibly relieved at the sight of Shadow's returned shades.

Randa, on the other hand, was pale, her eyes wide in terror. She didn't understand what she had just witnessed.

Cydal remained silent, his red eyes glinting with twisted interest. A small grin crept across his face, he didn't even realize it.

He was enjoying this.

But it wasn't over.

Barko's fists clenched at his sides. "Tch..." he growled. "You think that's it?"

The beast before them twitched then twisted, its skin stretched over uneven bone and his stomach re-grew, he was completely healed and stitched by wrath and chaos.

Barko bellowed, eyes bloodshot.

"MAWROT! Crunch until even their bones are minced! Leave nothing!"

The monster charged, paws thundering like earthquakes. Frankenstein's Monster crouched low, Eve Harlot clinging to his back like a living battery, her hands pulsing magic into his flesh.

He smirked.

Reaching behind him, he grabbed the tail end of his chained scythe and began to spin it in a deadly arc, he was whirling it like a cyclone of blades, slicing the air with screams of steel.

But Mawrot wasn't foolish.

As it neared, it hurled thick, acidic saliva at them. It splashed across their path, it was glowing green and it immediately slowed them, as if the very air thickened with gluey resistance.

They were trapped. And Mawrot lunged mouths open, ready to mince before chewing this time.

Eve and Frankenstein both were trapped in mawrot's saliva and he was seconds away from eating them whole but Eve harlot had no interest in getting swallowed by an oversized dog twice in the same fight.

Eve's voice rose like a melody of doom:

""!spart live eht morf em esaeler ,darteh enivid hO"

The magic pulsed through the gluey trap and shattered it like glass.

The moment they were free, Mawrot's jaws snapped down but met only the tail end of Frankenstein's fury. He roared, spun, and hurled the scythe forward like a hooked missile.

The chain whistled, slicing the air then crack!

The blade tore clean through Mawrot, splitting the beast into two grotesque halves.

From the sidelines, Beauty gasped, and Randa finally cheered in terrified relief.

But Barko? He fell to his knees, hands over his mouth.

"No—NO! My babies!" he shrieked. "You'll pay for that, Shadow!"

But the twins weren't done.

Mawrot's two halves began twitching again, they were regenerating fast, pulling flesh back together.

Eve's eyes flashed crimson.

She raised her arms, whispered something dark and ancient:

"Lleh ni nrub uoy ot esruc I ,htaed fo etardeh eht yB..."

The spell ignited as soon as the words left her lips.

Both regenerating chunks of the hound screeched, they were writhing and flailing as black fire erupted from inside them, consuming their bodies.

They burned and crumbled to ash.

Silence fell.

Shadow smirked as the battlefield quieted, the smoky air settling.

They had won.

Frankenstein's Monster extended a hand to Eve. She took it.

The two spun once in a twisted, celebratory dance before she pulled him down for a rough, victorious kiss.

Then whoosh!

She set his cloak ablaze.

He yelped.

"Ow… what the hell woman?!"

Eve winked. "Serves you right. Corpses like you shouldn't try to get handsy."

Shadow chuckled from the distance. His arms crossed, expression proud.

He called back his shades and they vanished into the ground like black water with Eve's sinister laughter and clunky sound of Frankenstein's scythe.

"Victory is mine."

Everyone held their breath. The battlefield was quiet but thick with tension. Even the ashes of Mawrot hadn't fully settled. All eyes were now on Barko, who stood slouched and defeated, steam rising from his bloodied body.

He knew what came next.

And he hated it.

Duels had rules. The loser had no say in their fate.

It was up to Shadow now.

Shadow stepped forward, slow and deliberate, his presence was enough to send a chill down even a monster's spine.

"I can't have what I want with you," he said, stopping just a few feet away. "The system still needs you... So I can't lock you away for another five years."

Barko's ears perked. His cracked lips stretched into a small, hopeful smile.

But Shadow's eyes gleamed cruelly.

"However your choice to disobey orders and act on your own?" Shadow tilted his head. "That's treachery. And for that... you're spending a day in my slowest dungeon."

Barko blinked.

"One day?" he scoffed. "You dare insult me with that?! I've spent five thousand years in your cursed dungeons already! What's a single day to me?! I'll crawl back out and rip your spine out!"

Shadow didn't flinch.

"Oh—I wasn't finished talking."

The smirk that followed was so cruel it looked like it was carved from ice.

"You're going to the dungeon... where one day is a thousand years."

The color drained from Barko's face.

And then—

He screamed.

Not like a man.

Not like a monster.

Like a beast being dragged back into a cage it had spent centuries trying to forget.

He lunged at Shadow, eyes rolling white, teeth gnashing. His howls turned to words no one understood, it was a languages long dead, languages not meant for mortal ears.

But Shadow didn't move.

"Time for a nap, big dog."

He Snapped his fingers and tendrils of shadow burst from the ground, slithering like serpents and wrapping around Barko's limbs and throat. They squeezed, not to kill but to contain him.

He thrashed. He roared. But it was no use, Shadow's grip on him was cruel and hard.

The earth opened.

And Barko was pulled down, dragged beneath the battlefield into the cold dark of a prison where time itself was twisted to torture.

His final gaze was wild and frantic. It found Beauty across the field. His yellow eyes welled with tears.

He didn't say a word. He didn't have to.

Once again...

He was being taken away from the woman he called his wife.

Then he was gone.

Swallowed by shadow.

Only his howls remained, echoing faintly as the earth closed over him.

The night had bled into morning, and the skies above Jagger Town lightened but no sunlight came.

As always, the eternal veil of black fog clung to the heavens like a curse, hiding the dawn from the eyes of those below.

Still, despite the darkness, joy erupted in the hearts of two villagers.

Beauty threw her arms around Randa and screamed, spinning her in the air like she weighed nothing.

"We're alive!" she cried, laughing through tears. "It's over, it's finally over!"

The battlefield lay in ruin, soaked in ash and memory. Mawrot was gone. Barko was buried beneath a thousand years of torment. Frankenstein's Monster and Eve Harlot had retreated to the shadows.

And Shadow...

Shadow had already turned to leave.

He had no reason to linger.

His duty was done.

His gaze fell on Cydal, not with pride but disappointment. Like a teacher whose student had failed to live up to potential.

He began to drift into the void of Beauty's shadow, but—

"Shadow!" Beauty stepped forward, hand outstretched. "Wait... Let me thank you. You saved my students."

Shadow's back was still to her as he spoke, voice flat and cold.

"What is this woman talking about?"

He finally turned, his expression unreadable.

"I serve the Creator. I punish players who step beyond their programming. I wasn't showing kindness... it was an obligation."

Then he turned his eyes to Cydal.

And without blinking, he pointed to Randa.

"She's seen too much... Things no non-player should witness."

Cydal's jaw tensed.

"She is not one of you. Erase her memory."

His tone left no room for argument.

Then like smoke caught by wind Shadow vanished, sucked into the darkness under Beauty's feet.

Only his last command echoed behind him, leaving silence... and one impossible choice in its wake.

After the battle with Barko had finally ended, the area around them lay in absolute ruin, trees that were already dead were now splintered, earth was torn and scorched like lava, the air was thick with smoke and the remnants of chaos. But just as quickly, everything began to regenerate. The house mended itself, the shattered ground knit back together, and even the sky seemed to clear with unnatural calm.

The system didn't want ordinary people witnessing its presence, it never did. It only chose targets when it found them interesting. And anyone else? It erased them like mistakes from a chalkboard.

For Randa, it was one bizarre moment after another. Still, she ran to him, both she and Beauty rushed across the broken field toward Cydal. Beauty got to him first and pulled him into a tight embrace, holding him like she'd just gotten him back from death itself.

But Cydal trembled under her touch. His eyes darted away as he gently pushed her back, avoiding her gaze. She couldn't explain why he avoided her. Maybe he just didn't know how to feel.

"I'm just glad you're okay," Beauty said, tears barely held back in her eyes. "Your arms... they were completely gone. Thank God you've got that regeneration ability. I remember how often that came in handy when you were a little kid, always running off and hurting yourself playing in the forest…"

Cydal didn't respond. He didn't have to.

Beauty let out a light laugh, trying to shake the unease. "Well, there's no point standing here. We should go back to the house now that it's, y'know, magically restored." Her voice still held disbelief. The fact that an entire house could rebuild itself was just another unreal detail stacked on top of everything.

Randa stepped closer to Cydal, concern written all over her face. "Are you alright?" she asked softly.

He didn't answer at first. Instead, his thoughts drifted specifically, to what Shadow had warned him about. Randa, a normal human, had seen too much. The system... it was no place for someone like her. She could be tortured, broken, or used however the Creator wanted. Just being near it put her in danger.

Cydal turned to her slowly with no emotions in his eyes. He cupped her cheek gently, his fingers trembling against her skin.

"Goodbye," he whispered.

The moment the word left his lips, a light shimmer passed over Randa's eyes. Her memory of the night, everything she'd seen with cydal, everything that had happened was gone.

She blinked, confused. Her head tilted slightly as she looked around the place and didn't see anyone. It was already morning now.

"Ehh?! Did I space out again?" she mumbled, rubbing her temples. "How did it even turn morning...? And—where's Cydal?"

She spun in place, looking for any sign of him. But he was nowhere to be found.

Beauty sat quietly just outside her door, her eyes distant, filled with a hollow sadness.

"He's gone," she whispered, more to herself than anyone else.

But the memories hadn't left her. They returned clearly now, everything that had happened.

After Cydal erased Randa's memories, he had turned to her, to Beauty.

"Look after her," he had said.

She had pleaded. "Wait, why are you leaving? Just stay here. You don't even have a place to go. I don't think the monsters are coming back…"

But he shook his head, unmoved. And she broke—because she remembered.

"Don't you remember anything at all?" Her voice had cracked. "You were left alone in that forest for five years. I searched every single day. I didn't leave a single stone unturned. I called your name until my throat gave out, prayed and ran all over the area looking for you until I passed out from exhaustion. I didn't care if you hated me, or didn't remember me as long as you were safe… I would've been happy."

Tears streamed down her face as her voice trembled through the confession.

"But now that you're back… it hurts. Hurts so much not to be able to hold you like my little Cydear anymore. Not to bathe you, feed you, care for your smallest, silliest demands. I was your mother..."

But instead of warmth, her words were met with fire.

Cydal's expression hardened, his voice sharp. "Why can't you just let it go?" he snapped. "I don't care what you feel, alright? Why are you making this harder on yourself?"

His tone cut deep.

"I have too much to take care of. I don't have time for silly little memories that happened ages ago, or for getting involved in other people's lives. Just like last night, because I listened to Randa, I became a target for someone else's problem. That's what happens with you people every time. Problems!"

He stepped back, voice lowering but still cold.

"To me… this is all just a distraction."

Then came the final blow.

"I don't want you involved in anything I do anymore. If it wasn't already clear… that timid, innocent 'Cydear' you loved died in that forest five years ago."

His eyes were deadened. "Who I am now… is not him."

And with that, he left.

Not just physically but with words so final, she could still hear them, echoing in her skull like a cruel curse.

Her fists clenched. Her chest burned.

The memory overwhelmed her until she couldn't hold it in anymore.

With a scream of fury, her entire body shimmered in a surge of raw emotion. She turned and struck the massive boulder beside her with everything she had. It shattered into fine dust under her glowing fist.

She stood there breathing heavily, her tears mixing with sweat and rage.

Randa had since recovered and returned home, unaware of anything that had happened that day.

But Beauty... she didn't rest. She couldn't.

She made her way deep into the forest, the same one that had taken Cydal from her. And now when began to train, her body moved with reckless purpose.

"This is all Barko's fault," she growled. "He took everything from me. And now he's back… tomorrow he'll be free again, and stronger than ever."

Her voice grew louder with each word.

"I have to be stronger. I've grown too rusty, too soft. If I can't destroy Barko… I'll never be able to face Cydear again."

She moved through the woods like a storm, talking to herself in blind fury. Trees cracked and snapped as she passed. Boulders exploded into fragments.

And she didn't even realize the destruction she was leaving behind.

To be continued