NOVEL NEXT Chapter 139: Demonic Frenzy Activated
Jack's fingers tightened around Permafrost's heart.
The organ pulsed weakly in his grip, still connected to the demon's body by veins and arteries that glowed with residual frost magic.
Jack pulled. Slowly. The tissue resisted, stretching like rubber before beginning to tear.
Permafrost's scream reached a pitch that shattered nearby ice formations.
The demon's crystalline chest cracked further as Jack's clawed hand withdrew inch by agonizing inch.
Flesh peeled away from the heart in thin strips, some freezing solid the moment they separated, others dissolving into dark mist.
The sound was wet, meat tearing, ice cracking, glass shattering.
"PLEASE!" Permafrost gasped, his voice barely human. "PLEASE, I'LL…."
Jack yanked.
[-11,329 HP]
The heart came free in an explosion of dark blood and frozen gore.
Veins snapped like cut strings, spraying black ichor across Jack's face and armor.
The organ continued beating in his palm, slower now, frost spreading across its surface as it died.
Permafrost's body became rigid.
His crystalline form began to crack from the inside out, hairline fractures spreading across his chest, his arms, his face.
The light faded from his eyes, but he was still alive, barely, watching as the creature wearing Jack's face raised his heart to its mouth.
Jack bit into the organ like it was fruit.
Dark blood exploded across his chin and neck, steaming in the cold air.
The taste was overwhelming, power and rage and desperation all concentrated into one failing muscle.
He tore another chunk free, swallowing without chewing, his throat working on overdrive.
[Consuming a Nightmare low grade Deathfrost Demon Heart]
[+10 Demonic Essence]
[Current Demonic Essence: 20]
Permafrost's body shattered.
His crystalline form exploded into thousands of fragments that rained down across the scorched earth, each piece dissolving into mist before hitting the ground.
The only thing left of the deathfrost demon was a single heart.
The Nightmare-class demon was gone, reduced to nothing but the blood coating Jack's armor and the memory of his final scream.
Jack stood there, still holding what remained of the heart. Blood dripped from his fingers. His red eyes swept across the battlefield with an expression that held no recognition, no satisfaction. Only hunger.
The rumbling had stopped.
Eight hundred demons stood frozen at the edge of the arena, arranged in a massive semicircle around Jack's position.
Fire demons with flames dimmed to flickering embers.
Ice demons whose frost had stopped spreading.
Basilisks coiled tight with their heads lowered.
Harpies perched on rocks, wings tucked close to their bodies.
They had watched everything.
Watched Jack rip out Permafrost's heart. Watched him consume it while the demon still lived. Watched a Nightmare-class commander reduced to fragments and mist.
None of them moved.
The army that had charged across the ridge with such fury now stood paralyzed, every instinct screaming that the thing standing before them was not prey.
It was the predator.
Jack finished the heart, licking the blood from his fingers with slow deliberation.
Then his head tilted, regarding the assembled demons with eyes that reflected the crimson sky. When he smiled, several basilisks actually retreated a step.
"More," Jack's voice said, layered with something that made even fire demons flinch. "I need more."
Then he disappeared.
Not a charge. Not a leap. Jack simply became a blur of red energy that crossed fifty meters in the time it took a harpy to blink.
His clawed hand punched through the nearest fire demon's chest before it could even raise its arms in defense.
[-8,020 HP]
The demon died instantly, its flames extinguishing like a candle.
Jack ripped his hand free and moved again, already targeting the next creature.
An ice demon tried to raise a barrier but Jack was faster, his Lightning Spear materializing in his grip mid-strike.
The blade punched through ice, through flesh, through the demon's spine. Lightning crackled across the corpse as Jack yanked his weapon free and spun, catching a basilisk across the throat with the return stroke.
[-6,003 HP]
[-6,003 HP]
The army broke.
Eight hundred demons tried to flee in every direction simultaneously, all coordination abandoned in favor of pure survival instinct.
Fire demons launched themselves into the air.
Basilisks dove into the earth.
Ice demons created walls between themselves and the crimson-eyed monster.
Then something massive landed on the northern side of the battlefield.
Fluffy's three heads tilted in unison, regarding the fleeing demons with its giant red stained eyes.
The Cerberus didn't roar, didn't snarl. It simply opened its center mouth and breathed out a wall of blue flame that stretched across the entire ridge.
Demons caught in the inferno died screaming. Those who avoided it found themselves trapped between the hellhound's fire and the monster wearing Jack's face.
The army that had numbered eight hundred was now a panicking mob with nowhere to run.
High above, Corvin shrieked and dove.
The great raven descended on a cluster of harpies attempting to escape through the sky, talons ripping through wings and throats.
[-1,560 HP]
[-1,560 HP]
[-1,560 HP]
Jack tore through the demons like they were children.
His Lightning Spear carved through bodies in wide arcs, each strike killing two or three creatures simultaneously.
When demons tried to attack him, their claws and magic dissipated against the red energy coating his body.
When they tried to run, his speed let him catch them mid-stride.
A group of fire demons combined their flames into a massive inferno that should have melted steel.
Jack walked through it without slowing, the red energy around him burning hotter than their fire. He emerged on the other side and killed all seven in less than three seconds.
[-6,670 HP]
[-6,670 HP]
[-6,670 HP]
An ice demon managed to catch Jack's arm in a prison of absolute zero. The frost lasted half a second before the red energy vaporized it.
Jack's clawed hand closed around the demon's face and squeezed. The skull collapsed with a wet crunch.
[-6,670 HP]
His Crimson Recovery ring pulsed continuously now, converting the carnage into healing. Every kill restored health.
Every drop of blood became fuel for regeneration. The passive health drain from Demonic Frenzy was meaningless, he was killing too fast for it to matter.
Basilisks tried to attack from underground, bursting up through the stone beneath Jack's feet. He didn't dodge.
His Lightning Spear punched down through the earth, electricity racing through the stone and frying every creature hiding in it.
Six basilisks died simultaneously, their bodies convulsing as thousands of volts coursed through them.
[-6,003 HP]
Corvin killed another harpy overhead, his beak tearing through its throat mid-flight.
The corpse tumbled toward the ground, joining dozens of others that littered the scorched earth.
The great raven felt nothing through his bond with Jack, no fear, no concern, no hesitation. His master was in a frenzy, and Corvin's purpose was absolute: kill anything that threatened him.
The demons were dying too fast to count.
What had been an army of eight hundred was now scattered groups of survivors, all trying desperately to reach the ridge's edge. Some made it a dozen meters.
None made it further.
Jack appeared among a cluster of ice demons who had grouped together for protection. His spear whirled in a circular arc as he spun that caught all five across the chest. They died before their bodies hit the ground.
[-6,670 HP]
A fire demon tried to self-destruct, gathering all its remaining energy for a massive explosion.
Jack's hand shot out and caught it by the throat, red energy flooding into the creature's body and snuffing out the flames from within.
He crushed its windpipe and moved on before the corpse finished falling.
[-6,670 HP]
Fluffy was herding demons back toward Jack, the hellhound's three heads working in coordination to drive survivors toward the center of the killing field.
Any demon that tried to escape past the Cerberus was caught by one of those massive jaws and torn apart. The hellhound wasn't even swallowing them anymore, just killing and moving to the next target.
The crimson sky seemed darker now, choked with ash and the smoke of burning demon corpses.
The air stank of blood and burning flesh. The scorched earth was slick with ichor in a dozen different colors.
Jack stood in the center of it all, his armor completely soaked in blood that wasn't his own.
His Lightning Spear dripped with gore. His clawed hand opened and closed rhythmically, as if searching for the next throat to crush.
Then, from above, something descended.
S landed on the western ridge with the casual grace of someone stepping off a curb.
He still held his partially eaten tangerine, though it was looking rather withered now. His red eyes swept across the carnage with obvious approval, taking in the bodies, the blood, the sheer scale of death.
S dropped the other 4 demons off, so all the injured could be together.
Luminarch struggled to his knees, his dual-colored eyes widening as he took in the battlefield below.
The killing was still happening. Jack had just caught another fire demon, his clawed hand punching through its sternum.
Corvin shrieked from above as he dropped another harpy corpse. Bodies were everywhere, hundreds of them, and the slaughter showed no signs of stopping.
"What..." Luminarch gasped, blood seeping from the spears still impaling his body. "What is he?"
S took a bite of his tangerine, chewing thoughtfully as he watched Jack kill three more demons in rapid succession. "What he is doesn't matter. What is he becoming? That's the interesting part."
He turned to look at Luminarch and the seven other broken nightmare demons at his feet. His smile widened, and the expression held genuine warmth that was somehow more disturbing than any threat.
"You're an offering to the new Soul Warden."