"Y‑you're insane… all of you are insane!"
The last man standing from the ambush staggered backward, eyes wild as he stared at the carpet of bodies. "Who dares try to assassinate someone that strong?! And you idiots dragged me in—!"
Shock. Raw, bone‑deep fear.
They'd come convinced Shura was at most newly C‑class. Twenty D‑grade players on Second Stage should have been overkill.
Instead they'd run headlong into a butcher.
And now they understood why.
Whispers cracked between clenched teeth.
"He's… an ability user!"
In Samsara Space, abilities are rarer than Devil Fruits—much rarer. Devil Fruits have flaws: seawater, Haki counters, element constraints.
But Abilities come clean: no built‑in kryptonite, and the only reliable counter is—another ability.
Worse? Abilities can't be traded. You earn them through dungeon clears. Almost no one does.
Why not a Devil Fruit? Because Fenric was only on Second Stage; the Tower's One Piece line (where Devil Fruits drop) doesn't open until Third Stage. Sure, you could buy one—if anyone insane enough to eat a top‑tier Devil Fruit ever put it on consignment.
His telekinetic control—the blades, the lifted water—wasn't low‑grade. Even if it were a Devil Fruit, it would be an ultra‑rare type no one would part with.
Their "easy bounty" had just turned mythic!
"Run? Where exactly?" Fenric's voice cut through the panic.
With a thought. Blades rose. The few who'd tried to bolt were pinned in red arcs of steel—throats opened, bodies dropped.
He left one alive: the same big man who'd been screaming at everyone a moment earlier. Both his hamstrings had been sliced; he couldn't crawl, let alone flee. He froze as Fenric walked over.
"S‑Shura God! Not me! I didn't want to—It was the Great Demon King! He organized us! He—he was the contact who—"
"Which one?" Fenric asked.
The man, shaking, pointed at a corpse face‑down in a spreading pool of blood.
Fenric's mouth twitched. Great Demon King, huh? Small‑timer with an oversized ID.
"All right," he said. "Question, answer. Lie, and you end up like them."
"I'll talk! Ask anything!"
"You took the job for the Devil Fruit bounty One Leaf Knows Autumn posted?"
"Yes!"
"One Fruit. Nearly twenty people. How were you splitting it?"
"It was his! The Demon King's! We were just promised low‑tier special items as compensation after."
"Then how'd you know I'd pick this dungeon tonight?"
"After One Leaf Knows Autumn issued a reward, the Great Demon King began to organize manpower and gathered those of us who are also on the second floor. Every night, we squat at the entrance of the Samsara Tower in batches and see you. Whoever spotted you pinged the rest."
'That makes sense.'
Fenric nodded. Puzzle pieces clicked into place.
"You've been cooperative," he said.
Relief flooded the man's face. "T‑then you'll let me—"
"Let you?" Fenric raised a brow. "Did I say that?" His tone cooled. "I said you wouldn't die like them."
The blade flickered. A clean puncture through the skull. The man never felt it.
Fenric glanced at the slender throwing blades still humming in the air. Commander Wu did good work. I'll have him forge a batch more when I visit the Great Wall again.
The blood smell thickened in the cramped living room. The ambush force was gone—erased before the nightmare mission had truly begun.
Fenric turned to leave when a gust slithered through the room. Not a draft. Cold. Bone‑needle cold.
Even with his boosted physique Fenric felt the chill slide under his skin.
Clack! The living‑room window banged open. Outside, the clear night convulsed—thunder split the sky; rain sheeted down in a sudden white wall and hammered through the frame into the room.
Fenric stopped and smiled faintly. Right on cue.
A true killer doesn't need to stand before you. She can enter through memory, drown you in illusion, squeeze until your heart stops. Humans die helpless before ghosts… but ghosts don't frighten me.
His eyes burned bright.
Hum—
Armament Haki washed across him, skin to sole—full‑body hardening in an instant.
"Auntie Renée," he called into the rain‑dark room, voice steady. "Since you've come, why hide?"
Only Fenric stood there—and yet the room answered.
A woman's voice floated up from nowhere—thin, high, mournful, soaked in age and grievance. Cantonese opera, warped by blood and resentment.
"Lang is joyful—his concubine breaks…"
"Month to month my grievance grows—meeting hard, parting harder…"
"Abandoned wife rues too late—does Phoenix still recall our vow…"
"…no mother, no father, orphaned—who pities me…"
"…did you know I coughed blood, a long sickness…"
Notes bent and shivered off the walls. The old aria Selling Flesh to Raise an Orphan should have been tragic; but in that voice it curdled into something that crawled beneath the skin.
Most Samsara players would already be scrambling for doors—or slicing their own arms to stay awake.
But Fenric just listened.
Heart of the Brave. Fear lines couldn't hook him now.
"Enough theatrics," he said, eyes narrowing. "Is this what passes for style, Auntie Renée?"