CHAPTER 281: EXTINGUISHED HOPE

Everything was dark. An oppressive feeling and a cold that cut straight through to the bone overwhelmed Dxxxx.

He opened his eyes, hoping to see something — anything — but the darkness was absolute. Then came the pressure, like the air itself was being sucked out of the place, leaving him breathless.

As he found himself engulfed in that darkness, a strange sense of familiarity crept in. And with it... a deep, silent terror began to consume him, mixed with a feeling of disgust and helpless despair.

He tried to piece things together, to figure out where he was. Failed.

Tried to remember how he got there. Failed.

Tried to remember who he was... his name... anything... but he had no answers. His mind was a void. The word "amnesia" surfaced, but even that felt foreign.

With every passing second, the anguish in his chest grew, accompanied by the creeping feeling that something terrible was getting closer...

**ROAR!!!**

The confirmation came in the form of a monstrous roar — a sound so grotesque it felt like it came from the bowels of the Earth.

The ground trembled beneath him with the sound of approaching footsteps — footsteps like a mountain on the move. His whole body froze, and a pure, primal panic hit him so hard, even the idea of dying started to sound... comforting.

But he knew, deep down in his bones, that running was useless.

The roar and the footsteps drew closer through the darkness, leaving him breathless and shaking.

Then, two crimson lights appeared: abyssal eyes, locked right on him.

The monster stepped forward. Its massive body started to rise out of the dark. It looked like it was made of countless tiny runes pulsing with a faint yellow glow. It was huge — a four-legged creature with three sharp horns and a long tail.

It didn’t look evil, or even angry — just like a force of nature, a supreme entity staring down at an annoying little ant in its way.

And he...

Right then...

Distant memories — like an old dream suddenly coming back — flashed through his mind.

He saw himself as a child living in a small town with a medieval vibe, almost like a clan or tight-knit family. Everyone treated him well, always calling him "young master" whenever they saw him. He had no parents, but everyone there looked after him, and he never lacked anything.

Until the day he turned ten — that’s when everything changed.

A strange dream began to haunt him every single night.

It was a sinister, gut-wrenching nightmare, where he’d face a merciless beast. Every night, he’d run, terrified... but no matter what he did, he always ended up caught by the creature.

And every time, it would crush him... break him... twist him... rip him apart. The pain was so vivid, so real it was unbearable. And yet, he never died. He’d always wake up eventually.

He tried everything. Asked everyone for help. But the dream never stopped. And as the years passed, trapped in this unexplainable torment, his mind slowly began to twist.

Eventually, he realized: the creature only wanted one thing... submission.

During the day, he could still be himself, still live... but the creature wanted him to give in completely. It wanted him to vanish — to lose even the last piece of himself.

This boy’s fragile mind was warped in ways no one could imagine. And in the days he looked for relief from that agony... he did things he could never undo, falling deeper into the abyss.

Back to the present...

His gaze shifted as he stared at the figure in front of him.

He still didn’t know exactly who he was, but he knew those memories were real — and his. He could feel it, instinctively. Both those memories and that creature came from a distant past that had haunted him for a long, long time... and now, they were back.

Then...

"You miserable piece of shit..."

A rough voice escaped his throat.

The fear vanished. An endless hatred and burning bloodlust filled his eyes. It was something he’d felt before, recently — but without knowing why. Now, having found the source, the feeling exploded a thousand times over. (Chapter 58)

The creature in front of him kept staring, but something shifted in its eyes. It had noticed the anomaly.

"I was scared... I tried to run, like before..."

The word ’before’, once spoken, felt like a key that unlocked something in his mind. Suddenly, new memories flooded in out of nowhere.

They were memories of a young boy named Darian, who, at just ten years old, awakened a terrifying, unnatural power. He was sure—that was him too.

Two different lives — but both so twisted they could easily lead to the same end.

He had ’family’ in both, and each time, they had tried to help him. But when he was Darian... he hadn’t let himself be twisted.

He’d learned. Chose to isolate himself from the world. He feared people, but even more than that, he feared himself. He didn’t want to hurt anyone—not his family, not anyone.

And now...

"You wanna get me, you bastard?!" Darian’s words were spat out, loaded with a fury that seemed to come from the depths of his soul. "Come on... I swear I’ll be the hardest, most annoying, most terrifying little ant you’ve ever tried to crush!"

A new kind of certainty — cold and relentless — took root in his mind.

He wasn’t the same weak person who had once been consumed by despair. He had learned from his mistakes.

The fear from before had turned into burning rage. Hate came surging in as obsession; the thirst for blood and vengeance merged into one dark feeling, blazing in his chest like hellfire.

The creature before him — his worst nightmare, his sworn enemy — had become the fuel for this new flame.

The beast’s expression shifted. That tiny figure that once looked insignificant now radiated a dangerous energy.

Before, there had been a white light coming from one of his fists, and black from the other. But now...

...the white light started flickering, trembling, and then—it went out completely. Like hope itself had been snuffed out.

Quickly, black lines, like cracks across glass, spread all over that small figure, wrapping him in a web of shadows.

The black power that had been contained in one fist swelled and expanded, engulfing him entirely. His whole being turned darker, like he had become something evil.

What had once been just a tiny ant... was now the embodiment of pure malice — a force that radiated darkness. The creature felt the danger rising from that being... now, he was like a newborn predator.

"DIE!"

Suddenly, like he’d completely lost his mind, that tiny ant turned his fangs to the sky and attacked.

**RUMBLE!!**