The ruler of the central domain was an ancient being.

  Just like countless other creatures of beyond roaming around the world, it wasn’t aware of how it was born.

  When it had opened its eyes, all it saw was walls.

  They stood long and cold with no warmth present in them.

  Creep. Creep.

  Its long legs would climb them as usual.

  They had a surprisingly strong grip.

  Creep. Creep.

  No matter how hard it bites and scratches, they won’t fall.

  The only light that entered the grand hall was from the top of the stairs. Though it could never climb them. Whenever it tried, the creeping ruler would find itself back to where it started.

  It repeated the act.

  Roam, scratch, climb, destroy.

  Roam, scratch, climb, destroy.

  Then it would happen again. How tedious and taxing would it have been for a human mind? Lucky for the creeping terror, it was a mindless monster. All it knew was the walls and the smell of blood coming from outside.

  Once in a while, prey would come. They would crawl inside, screaming in terror when they saw the ruler. Then came the chase—such delicious prey, soft and warm, unlike the walls. They would call for help, but no one ever came. The ruler would feast, savoring the taste of their flesh as it tore them apart limb from limb. The walls would be painted red for a while, until even that faded away.

  In a sense, the creeping terror had discovered something about itself.

  -Hunger

  This was something every living being knew. But for the creeping terror, it was special.

  It was like a cold and warm feeling gnawing in its stomach every day. An insatiable urge to devour whatever came in its path.

  But the prey was scarce. Too scarce. Days would pass—perhaps years—without a single morsel stumbling into its domain. The creeping terror would press its elongated limbs against the walls, listening, waiting, its many eyes straining toward the faintest echo from beyond.

  It was painful.

  Even for a being of no intelligence, the loneliness it felt was huge. Though it never bothered the creeping terror much.

  It has more important matters to deal with!

  Like climbing on the walls!

  However, the hunger never left the creeping terror.

  The terror grew in size as time passed. The prey came in platters and it ate them.

  It had a lot of patience.

  It waited and waited till something happened.

  The days when it tried to run around and destroy the walls were already gone.

  Now it was bigger—much bigger. The creeping terror had grown thick and powerful, its spindly limbs now muscled and grotesquely elongated, capable of spanning entire sections of the hall in a single stride. The air was thick with the scent of its own musk, a cloying, rotten thing that clung to the stones, mixing with the rusted remnants of old feasts.

  Its body had grown, but so had its mind.

  The creeping ruler has absorbed the hunger it had experienced since birth.

  Maybe that's why—

  It felt another presence.

  A presence similar to itself.

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  Not only because it was strong but because of the whispers, the madness that had crept into its mind since it had turned hunger into a weapon of destruction.

  They chanted words incomprehensible to the mind.

  -War! War!

  They did fill the creeping ruler's mind but couldn't devour it completely.

  It was the creeping terror that had eaten up until now; how could it allow itself to be eaten? However, its capabilities were limited. That was the cost of power.

  The chants felt peculiar to the ruler, but there was not much one could do other than paint the dull wall of its prison in red.

  The existence outside was growing stronger, just like the creeping terror had in the past.

  Furthermore, the feeling of similarity was only increasing.

  This made the ruler decide. That now it needed to do something.

  And yet—

  The creeping terror stilled for the first time in centuries. Its many-jointed legs ceased their restless scrabbling against the stone. The air, thick with the stench of old blood and damp fur, grew heavier as the creature's bulk settled. Something had shifted. Not in the walls, nor in the distant whispers beyond them, but inside itself. A foreign sensation, sharp as a splintered bone wedged between its ribs: recognition.

  And hunger.

  It couldn't grow stronger anymore. Something was suppressing it. As if a mountain had been placed on its shoulders to crush him beneath.

  However, the creeping ruler was no stranger to pressure.

  It was time to make webs.

  Just as it had covered the walls and stairs, it would now cover the creature outside.

  Maybe that's why it started the war. Because it is free.

  The creeping terror, no less insane, the slith-faced monster let its instincts run free.

  The chants became increasingly louder, causing holes in its skull. If this weave of webs worked and the war went on, it might gain the freedom it wanted.

  That's why—

  Everything that the new presence brought was harrowing.

  *

  The crystal blood spear shot at a terrifying speed.

  Even the innumerable eyes of the creeping terror saw the flame-tipped spear approaching, but it was unable to stop it.

  Boom.

  The fresh mural over the ceiling turned black, instantly catching fire along with the terror above.

  The spear burned through decades of calcified webs in an instant, its crystalline tip pulsing with veins of liquid light. The creeping terror shrieked—a sound like grinding tombstones—as its many legs convulsed, scraping furrows into the stone. Molten strands of its own hardened silk dripped onto its carapace, smoking where they landed. The stench was unbearable: charred chitin, boiling hemolymph, and beneath it all, the iron-sweet reek of spilled rot.

  The slit-faced one was powerful, unquestionably stronger with war-tinted madness than the creeping terror with its limited view could ever be.

  However, the creeping terror was vicious.

  Snap!

  Snap!

  The sound of strings snapping one after the other could be heard clearly across the grand hall, accompanied by a sharp sneer.

  Thud!

  The slit-faced one suddenly jumped back as something fell from above.

  It was charred and grotesque-looking after its flames had burned everything above.

  "Grrrr"

  The slit-faced one growled as the black charred lump began to twitch on the floor and disintegrate like a cocoon.

  From inside, countless crooked legs covered in a dark oily liquid broke free in a heartbeat.

  Countless crooked legs covered in a dark oily liquid emerged in a heartbeat.

  A sudden attack changed the course of the entire fight!

  The creeping terror couldn't win a direct fight. That's why it decided to sacrifice a portion of itself after witnessing the slit-faced one do the same before. While it did not grow stronger, it did gain enough momentum to launch a fatal strike.

  Crack!

  The oily legs slammed into the slit-faced one's torso before it could react—not with brute force, but with the precision of a thousand needle-thin joints twisting inward, piercing flesh like wet parchment. The creature howled, its war chants dissolving into wet, gurgling screams as the terror's limbs burrowed deeper, seeking organs, bone, and the hot pulse of veins. The hall shuddered with the impact, ancient dust raining from the ceiling as the two monstrosities crashed to the ground in a tangle of thrashing limbs and ichor.

  The strike seems to hold the essence of hunger itself.

  War was a disaster; similarly, famine was a disaster led by it as well!

  The grand hall again started to repair itself as if nothing had happened.

  The creeping terror's limbs retracted, slick with gore and something thicker—something that shimmered like oil under the dim light. The slit-faced one twitched, its warped figure caved inward where the terror's strike had landed. Yet it wasn't dying.

  It was growling with pain and pleasure mixed together in a hideous tone.

  This time the creeping terror didn't wait; using all the strength its body had left, another white-web storm took place, filled with hunger at its core.

  The unbearable pain again spread to all.

  The slit-faced one with a final roar retaliated, and a wave of blood flame washed over the floor. The more it bled, the stronger it got.

  Boooom!

  Thud!

  The slit-faced one collapsed with a wet crunch, its body folding in on itself like rotten parchment. The creeping terror didn't move. Couldn't move. Its limbs—those that remained—twitched feebly beneath the tattered remnants of its cocoon, a pathetic shield of half-molten silk and its own clotting ichor. The bitter taste wasn't just a metaphor; its maw dripped with the acrid aftertaste of defeat, a venomous bile that seared the stone where it fell. Years of patience, of slow growth, reduced to this: a broken thing curled in the shadows of its own ruined hall.

  Tak—

  Tak—

  The footsteps were wrong. Too light. Too even. Prey didn't walk like that—not unless they'd come to die. The creeping terror's remaining eyes rolled sluggishly toward the sound, their lenses cracked, their vision swimming with webs of ruptured capillaries. Silver. That was the first thing it registered: two pinpricks of silver, brighter than the spear's flame, brighter than the vanished sunlight. They hovered just beyond the hall's threshold, flickering with something worse than mockery. Amusement.

  "Let's finish this, shall we?"

  Asher declared, now ready to put his life on the line.