The silence didn't last long.
It couldn't.
Because even silence feared what came next.
Kaleus moved first.
One step.
Then the world shattered.
The Heart of the Dreaming screamed as two monsters collided—one born of legacy and vengeance, the other an eternal god of the void. The arena twisted around them, stars spiraling into themselves, bleeding starlight across a dying horizon.
Their auras didn't ripple.
They consumed.
Kaleus's cursed blade — black, jagged, breathing smoke — tore through air with every swing, leaving behind burning void scars that bled sound and light. With each clash, the very laws of reality cracked. Matter blinked in and out of existence. Lightning curved unnaturally. The wind dared not touch either one.
And Knull?
He laughed.
Every block, every dodge, was effortless.
"You swing like a war god," Knull mused, sidestepping another devastating slash.
"But tell me…"
"Have you ever fought despair itself?"
Kaleus didn't answer.
His eyes narrowed. His foot twisted midair. He vanished in a pulse — no flash, no buildup — and reappeared behind Knull with a brutal, two-handed arc.
CLANG!
The clash rattled the heavens.
Kaleus roared and followed through, pivoting into a flurry of strikes — overhead, diagonal, lunging, twisting, stabbing. His blade howled louder with every move. The cuts weren't just meant to kill—they were meant to erase.
One finally connected.
SHLUNK.
A deep gash across Knull's ribs — shadow-blood sprayed into the air, sizzling as it touched the ground.
Knull staggered back, hand over the wound.
He looked at the black ichor on his fingers… and smiled.
"You've drawn blood," he whispered, almost reverently.
"But do you know what you've just awakened?"
The sky twisted.
Then went dark.
---
DOMAIN: THE NULL CROWN
A sigil burst open beneath Kaleus's feet — vast, ancient, alive. The void screeched.
Thousands of eyes opened in the air.
Hands. Teeth. Tendrils.
Voices whispered from every inch of space — dead languages. Forgotten truths. All screaming nothingness.
"You've stepped into my soul, Kaleus," Knull whispered from above. "There is no escape here. Only me."
Gravity multiplied.
Bones groaned.
Skin split.
Blood seeped from Kaleus's nose, ears, and eyes.
Knull laughed again, spreading his six void-wings wide. "Break for me. Die for me. Disappear."
Then — hell came.
Black javelins the size of towers rained from the void.
Serpents made of memory and bone spiraled from below.
Spectral hands tried to rip Kaleus's heart from his chest.
And through it all—
Kaleus didn't fall.
He screamed, not in pain — but defiance.
"You're not the only one with a throne."
---
SOVEREIGN ECLIPSE STYLE – FORM III: BLACK STAR DROWNING
Kaleus spun once.
SLASH.
Everything froze.
Then—
The black blade roared.
It expanded, doubling in size, edges serrated like jagged fangs. In one massive sweep, it unleashed a horizontal cyclone of pure void, consuming the spears, burning the serpents, erasing the whispers.
They were gone.
All of them.
Kaleus landed on one knee, blood dripping from his mouth, one eye already swollen.
Knull looked down. Silent.
"Impressive."
He descended slowly, step by step through the air like he ruled it.
"But you're bleeding. And you're breaking."
"I can smell the strain in your soul, Kaleus."
Kaleus stood, cracked neck.
Eyes glowing.
Kaleus raised his blade.
Six eclipses spun into formation behind him
Orbiting. Singing.
NETHER KING – CROWN OF SILENCE
Kaleus's blade pulsed — a long, distorted hum like a dying star collapsing inward. The six eclipses behind him ignited, forming a spinning, vertical sigil — six dark halos aligned around his back, rotating in opposite directions like celestial machinery.
His feet lifted off the ground.
The cursed blade twisted in his hand, unraveling midair into a double-pronged scythe wrapped in tendrils of spectral flame. Black lightning surged outward in perfect circles from his body — warping gravity, bending light. The very fabric of time screamed.
Above him, the eclipses fused into a single, massive eye of silence.
Not metaphorical.
An eye.
It blinked.
And everything stilled.
Kaleus moved.
One flicker.
A void-step.
Then—stabbed forward.
Straight through where Knull stood.
Or had stood.
Because Knull… was gone.
Kaleus's blade pierced only emptiness.
He staggered forward, breath ragged. His body burned, limbs numb, and his vision doubled.
His right eye was swollen shut, flesh blackened from impact. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth. Cracks ran across his ribs, and every breath came like knives inside his lungs.
The sky… trembled.
The Null Crown changed.
---
The void around him pulsed — no longer just black, but deep crimson. Cracks of red lightning tore through the dome overhead. The wind didn't howl — it screamed, like every molecule was being flayed.
Ash rained upward.
The arena stretched, turning into an endless field of shattered stone and floating monoliths shaped like open jaws. The atmosphere was thick, heavy — like tar — choking him.
Then he looked up.
There he was.
High above — standing atop a floating obsidian fang, surrounded by curling streams of blood-cloud and void.
Knull… had changed.
His armor — now rippling, molten black with sharp crimson etchings — glowed like fresh scars. His body was larger, more distorted, his eyes two burning coals that pulsed like twin stars. And in his hand:
A jagged, hell-forged spear that looked like it was carved from pure agony — twisted, alive, breathing smoke and blood.
The red sky behind him boiled.
Knull smiled.
"sigh… Honestly. How hard is it to kill one man?"
Kaleus coughed blood, chuckling weakly.
Then straightened.
"Depends on the man," he muttered. "But if you're struggling with me… might be time to reevaluate your god-tier resume."
Knull's grin widened — amused, but unbothered.
Kaleus's tone dropped.Cold.Serious.
"What's your endgame, Knull? You could've erased me by now. Why drag this out?"
The air quieted.
Then—Knull spoke.
Voice deep. Commanding. Eerie.
"When this Grendel is complete…
When I find its missing… parts…"
He lifted the twisted spear, pointing toward the horizon.
"It will come for me.It will free me from my Thal'Zuun.From my cage."
The floating monoliths pulsed with black light.
"And then—" he stepped forward, slowly descending, "I will finish what I began."
"I will rid my dark kingdom of this invasive light once and for all…"
His gaze locked on Kaleus.
"And I will start… with Earth."
The void warped.
Not from power. Not from dominance.
But from stalling.
Kaleus stood—bloodied, barely breathing, the cursed blade trembling in his hand. Above him, Knull hovered like a nightmare made flesh, his monstrous form illuminated by the pulsing crimson of the nullified sky.
Kaleus didn't move. Didn't strike.
Instead, he asked:
"Why my son?"
Knull tilted his head, amused.
"Why Vorun?" Kaleus pressed, voice strained. "Of all the vessels in this endless pit of filth and rot—why him?"
Knull's grin widened.
"Because your son asked for it."
The words struck harder than any blade.
Kaleus froze.
Knull descended slowly, darkness spiraling around him. His voice was casual, cruel:
"He was broken long before I arrived. His past? Tainted. His pride? Shattered. You weren't there, Kaleus. Not when the world forgot him. Not when he begged the void for strength."
He paused. Chuckled.
"But now you're playing daddy again? How charming."
The grin turned into a sneer.
"You left him to rot. Now you wear guilt like armor. But it doesn't suit you, old man. You're a relic. And your son's just... what was left in the cracks."
Kaleus didn't respond.
Because he couldn't.
His breathing faltered. His vision blurred.
"I can't keep going like this..."
Kaleus clenched his teeth. The cursed blade glowed faintly in his hand, its pulse slowing with his heartbeat.
Then—
"I have to summon him."
He raised the blade.
Knull's expression shifted to curiosity.
"Hm? What's this? A gamble? A prayer?"
Kaleus didn't answer. He took the blade—and rammed it into his own chest.
SHHHLUNK.
Blood erupted, spraying upward like a crimson fountain. His legs buckled, but he stayed standing.
Knull blinked.
"...Desperate already? I was hoping you'd last longer."
Then— a sound.
Low. Deep. Unholy.
The sky ripped open.
A beam of black and red energy cracked downward like a wrathful lance from hell itself. The light was not light—it was pressure. It flattened the air. Crushed the ground. Trees in the distance caught fire from the heat of it.
Kaleus stood still, his body twitching, the cursed blade still embedded in his chest—blood trailing like roots down his armor.
Then—
Symbols ignited beneath him.
A massive pentagram tore across the battlefield, drawn in burning crimson ink and etched with outer rings of ancient demonic script.
The center held five symmetrical spear-point stars
Circles layered around each, inscribed with runes and fractured sigils
The corners bled shadow-fire that shimmered with malicious purpose
Jagged fangs lined the outermost circle, like a mouth yawning open
The ground cracked.
A voice echoed from the chasm below:
"I smell sacrifice."
And from that abyssal gate...
He rose.
A silhouette first—broad, tall, inhuman.
Crimson skin, coiled with black markings. Two faces merged into one, one laughing, one frowning. Four arms, one pair folded across his chest, the others loose and twitching. Crown of horns, each twisted like blades of obsidian. Eyes? Six of them—all vertical, all blinking at once.
The aura alone tore wind into knives.
He looked like a devil—but moved like a king.
"At last," he growled, cracking his neck,"you call me forth again, human."
Kaleus's blood ran down the summoning circle. His voice came low. Calm.
"I offer my left hand... and my right eye."
The devil paused. Then smiled.
"Accepted."
He turned—
And locked all six eyes on Knull.
"Who dares mock my pact-bearer?"