The sun rose slow.
Soft rays broke through the wide obsidian windows of Dark's chamber, warming his face like a gentle whisper from the sky. He groaned under the covers, eyes half-shut, limbs heavy.
And then it hit.
That one stretch.
That godlike, almost spiritual morning stretch that makes your whole soul leave your body for a second. Arms locked, fingers spread, spine twisting, legs tightening—voice groaning deep from the chest like some ancient beast waking from slumber.
Dark: (stretching hard) Aaahh... fu—ohh yeah...
He sat up, still shirtless, his body carved like divine stone—scars clean, torso calm, his black hair messy as hell and half in his mouth.
He got up, walked to the massive window, and looked out.
The Empire was alive.
Farmers were already working in the golden fields below, hauling luminous vegetables and whispering to crops that pulsed faintly with embedded magic. Builders in the south wing were constructing what looked like a new annex of the training hall—crystal and blackstone slabs rising into the air with arcane lifts and manual scaffolding.
Kids were laughing. Hollows were patrolling. Champions walked with purpose.
Dark exhaled calmly.
Dark: Igor.
No delay.
From the floor beneath him, shadows twisted and opened like dark water.
Rising smoothly from them, kneeling with one hand to the ground, was Igor—the First Champion. His black and crimson armor reflected nothing. His silver hair hung across one eye, and strapped to his back, radiating silent menace, was his greatsword—
God Killer.
Igor: (kneeling) Yes, my Emperor. I am here.
Dark looked over his shoulder.
Dark: Go to the training gym. Wait for me.
Igor: As you command.
And just like that, he vanished—folding back into the shadow like he had never existed.
—
Dark walked to the bathroom, scratching the side of his neck.
He lifted the toilet lid, did his business like a normal-ass man, then flushed with a little sigh.
Dark: (half-awake) World peace... intergalactic rebellion... godslaying duels... still gotta piss.
He washed his face next—cold water blasting the fatigue right out of his skull. The mirror was fogged from the early warmth of the room, but his reflection was clear enough.
Dark: ...Shower.
He muttered to himself and turned the handle.
The water hit like heaven.
Steam filled the room fast. He stepped in and let it soak him completely. His body was clean, cut, perfect. His arms flexed casually as he tilted his head forward, water pouring down his back. Each muscle moved like it was sculpted by war and reborn through fire.
His black hair, normally wild and unruly, straightened under the water. It fell in soft strands over his crimson eyes, still wild, still unreadable—but now more like a blade held by a steady hand.
He looked dangerous.
But elegant.
Dark: (murmuring) Damn... even I'd fall for me.
He stepped out, drying himself slowly, not bothering to hide his pride. He wrapped the towel around his waist, ran a hand through his damp hair again, and stood in front of the mirror.
Godlike.
No need to say more.
—
The training gym pulsed with power.
Dark stepped in shirtless—still drying his hair lazily with a small cloth—wearing black combat pants and bandage wraps on his arms. No armor. Just raw presence.
Igor stood in the middle of the arena.
Still. Ready. Focused.
God Killer, now unsheathed, rested calmly in his right hand. The blade was massive—longer than most men were tall—its edge forged from a black material that shimmered faintly between dimensions. Its mere presence made the runes etched into the ceiling tremble.
Dark cracked his neck.
Dark: (calmly) Don't hold back. Give it everything.
Igor didn't flinch.
Igor: Understood. In swordsmanship... I will not go easy.
Dark grinned—just slightly.
And then summoned Kyuketsu.
The black-and-red katana flashed into existence, humming low like it remembered blood from other worlds.
Dark: Good.
The gym fell silent.
Then, in an instant—
They moved.
The marble beneath Dark's feet fractured as he launched forward, Kyuketsu already drawn, its edge burning with a black-red glow that distorted the air around it. But Igor didn't move. He stood calmly, one hand resting on the hilt of God Killer, his head tilted, eyes dim with silence.
Then—
Igor stepped once.
The world bent.
Dark barely saw the draw. The blade was unsheathed, and God Killer cleaved horizontally in a single, divine arc.
Dark reacted by instinct alone. He twisted mid-air, feeling the windless pressure of the blade graze the hairs on his neck. Even as he avoided the strike, the space behind him split open in a fine line, the very walls of the empire's gym trembling under the graze of that single movement.
But Igor was already gone.
Dark's left forearm exploded open before he registered the wound. Skin shredded, bone exposed—blood spraying in thin, arcing patterns across the cracked arena floor.
His regeneration surged.
He gritted his teeth and spun, Kyuketsu sweeping upward in a desperate defensive slash.
This time, he met Igor's steel.
The impact sent a blinding flare of black sparks between them, shadows and light fighting to exist in the same breath. Dark's knees buckled. Igor didn't step back—he walked forward, pressing the blade down into Kyuketsu with a calm, relentless strength. It wasn't brute force. It was precision. Centuries of swordplay distilled into a single, suffocating movement.
Dark: (hissing) You're not holding back anymore...
Igor: (calmly) You ordered me not to.
Dark twisted his hips, pulled back, and dropped low.
He stabbed upward.
The tip of Kyuketsu grazed Igor's ribs—barely—but the reaction was immediate. Igor pivoted with a violent grace, grabbing the flat of Dark's blade with his bare hand and locking it in place.
Blood poured down Igor's palm as the cursed metal seared into his flesh, but he didn't flinch.
Dark's eyes widened—
Igor kneed him in the stomach, lifting him off the floor.
A sickening, wet crunch rang out inside his ribs. Dark coughed violently, blood erupting from his mouth in thick bursts as he flew back across the gym. He landed hard on his shoulder, bones breaking on impact, his vision spinning—but even before he could hit the ground—
Igor was already standing over him, blade raised.
Dark threw up Kyuketsu to block.
The moment God Killer touched the cursed blade, a fissure of energy carved a dozen sharp lines into Dark's shoulder, tearing through flesh and muscle in perfect surgical angles. It wasn't a slash—it was a series of micro-strikes hidden in one fluid motion.
Blood erupted like geysers. Chunks of flesh tore free.
Dark screamed.
But then—his aura exploded.
A pulse of abyssal energy surged outward, hurling Igor backward for the first time.
Dark stood slowly, eyes glowing, body already stitching itself back together—bare skin regrowing in twisted, regenerative knots, bones snapping into place mid-motion.
Dark: (breathing heavy) Again.
Igor smiled faintly.
Then they vanished—both of them—at the same time.
What followed was slaughter painted with elegance.
Their swords collided mid-air, but this time with no defense—just full-on, brutal exchanges. Blade clashed against blade, but also against flesh. Every movement was followed by blood—Dark's or Igor's, it no longer mattered.
Kyuketsu split Igor's cheek open. Skin flapped loose. Dark's right thigh was run clean through—God Killer burst out the back, ripping muscle as it exited.
Blood sprayed in a fan across the air like rain suspended in time.
Still—they didn't stop.
Dark gripped Igor's wrist mid-slash, snarling, and slammed his head forward into Igor's face. Their skulls collided. Something cracked.
Dark reeled—but Igor didn't.
Instead, Igor drove the hilt of God Killer into Dark's solar plexus, and twisted the blade sideways. Not in his hand—in the wound. The metal turned while buried inside Dark's body, grinding against bone and organ.
Dark gasped, spitting blood.
But his hand flared.
He summoned a second Kyuketsu from raw shadow and stabbed it straight into Igor's foot, nailing him to the arena floor.
Igor's eyes narrowed—but his lips curved.
He slammed his knee into Dark's chin, flipping him backward, tearing the embedded sword free in a spray of blood and shadow.
Both men separated, breathing.
Dark's chest was mangled. His abdominal wall had been shredded by the earlier twist, and his jaw hung slightly off its hinge from the last impact. But his eyes glowed with something darker now.
Hunger.
Dark: (grinning) You're really not holding back...
Igor: (still calm) I told you. I am a sword. I will not dull myself.
Dark took a step forward, and the world tilted.
No—the gym bent. Literally. His presence twisted the room like heat warping metal. Kyuketsu lengthened in his grip, reshaping into a heavier, more wicked form—still elegant, but crueler. The red-black aura around it screamed with distortion.
Dark: Let's end this.
Igor: Very well.
They moved.
And this time—reality split.
Walls shattered in their wake. Time stuttered.
Their blades collided with so much force that light bled from the impact—blinding light, yet no heat. Just pressure. Gravity peeled upward around them, chunks of stone lifting from the floor into the air. The floor was long gone. There was no "arena" anymore. Only destruction.
Dark drove Kyuketsu downward, slicing into Igor's left shoulder—his blade dug deep, nearly severing the arm. But Igor retaliated, ignoring the wound, and spun behind him, dragging God Killer across Dark's spine. Skin opened. Blood burst in rhythmic jets. Flesh folded back like a peeled fruit.
Both staggered, panting, drenched in their own gore.
Dark's knuckles tightened around Kyuketsu, his fingers slipping over the blood coating the hilt. His right eye was nearly swollen shut, and bone jutted out from his shoulder where Igor's blade had carved straight through the joint and torn the muscle apart. His regeneration was kicking in—aggressive, violent, frantic—but it couldn't keep up. Not anymore.
Igor stood tall despite the gaping wound across his chest, his body soaked in a blend of Dark's blood and his own. The flesh beneath his ribs had been pierced, and the side of his jaw was fractured, dangling slightly off hinge.
Yet his eyes never lost that calm. That dangerous stillness.
Then something changed.
His head tilted. The pupils in his silver eyes constricted.
And shadows erupted from beneath his feet.
They didn't swirl. They didn't rise like smoke. They marched—climbing his limbs like an army reclaiming its general. Wet slaps echoed as tendrils of living darkness surged up his thighs, chest, shoulders. The blood coating his skin didn't fall—it thickened. Hardened. Formed edges.
Armor began to forge across him in real time.
Jagged, ancient plates curved along his ribs, pressing down over his abdomen like they'd always belonged there. The plates weren't symmetrical—they pulsed, flickered, shifted. A blood-soaked gauntlet locked into place over his right arm, etched with worn markings that glowed faintly like forgotten oaths. On his back, a violent swell of shadow bloomed and spread into a flowing mantle—tattered at the edges, as if torn in battle long ago. It billowed unnaturally, despite the absence of wind.
Then the helmet formed.
A split helm crowned in violent horns folded down over Igor's head, blood still dripping from beneath it, sizzling against the cursed steel. Only his eyes remained visible—burning silver through the slits, glowing faintly like the embers of something ancient and unkillable.
He looked like death.
Not the concept. Not the metaphor.
The executioner.
The Knight in Blood Red stood reborn.
Dark's pulse stuttered. He recognized it instantly. That was the form Igor had worn when they first met—when he rose from that cathedral's frozen depths and nearly cleaved Dark in half without blinking.
Dark: (grinning, breathless) So that's what you were hiding...
Igor's voice came from within the helm—warped, deeper, and cold as frostbite.
Igor: (calmly) I only draw this form for Emperors.
He raised God Killer, the massive longsword trailing crimson vapor as it lifted.
Igor: (coldly) Or those bold enough to dream of becoming one.
Dark's eyes narrowed. The air shifted.
And then—
Igor moved.
The earth beneath his feet shattered in a pulse of shadow and raw pressure. Not with a sound. With absence. The grass wilted. The light dimmed. All presence vanished, and all that remained was motion.
Igor appeared in front of Dark mid-swing—God Killer descending in a wide, brutal arc aimed straight for Dark's left clavicle.
Dark barely reacted in time. His arm shot up, Kyuketsu howling in protest as it parried the strike. Metal met something beyond metal.
The collision tore the ground open.
Literally. The stone foundation beneath them split into jagged trenches as the force of the impact sent shockwaves spiraling outward. Trees in the distance cracked in half. Air warped. The friction from their weapons meeting didn't spark—it combusted, momentarily igniting the space between them into a twisting spiral of red and black flame.
Dark was flung backward, skidding across the training arena, his boots digging trenches into the stone floor.
His lungs were burning.
And Igor hadn't even followed up yet.
Dark: (grinning, wild) Oh yeah...
Dark lowered himself into a crouch, licking blood off his lips as Kyuketsu morphed into a jagged cleaver—adapted for brute force.
Dark: Let's fucking dance.
To Be Continued...
End Of Arc 6 Chapter 9.