World of Rules

....

Though the crushing aura weighed on him like a mountain.. suffocating his breath, nearly shattering his body.. Di did not retreat.

The knee that nearly touched the ground.. stood firm.

His eyes, wide with the shock of danger.. ignited with a blinding fire of pride and bloodlust.

His prey.. was in his grasp.

And the sound of life.. still echoed in its chest.

He would not allow that.

He would not permit it to breathe while he was being strangled.

His hand tightened.

Skin tore beneath his fingers.

And the bones..

Craaack.

The sound of a neck snapping rang out clearly, like a slap to whatever resistance remained.

The caravan leader.. did not scream.

Did not move.

His gaze froze, locked on the small purple skull that had emerged from his storage pouch.

His mind, even in its final moment, was drowning in shock.

But he died.

Died stunned.

Di didn't grant death time to be dramatic.

Didn't grant it respect.

He didn't hesitate.

Because hesitation.. meant weakness.

And weakness, in this world, is buried.

Without mercy.

He turned to the glowing skull.

Its suppressive aura still screamed through the void.

But Di.. had already abandoned the concept of feeling.

In that moment, he wasn't a man fighting to survive.

He was a beast.. refusing to let its prey be taken.

And any mistake.. any extra breath..

Could cost him his life.

...

As Di struggled under the pressure emanating from the small purple skull, he felt a pain in his consciousness.. like he was being pulled against his will.

And truly, his awareness was ripped into a vision:

The night had not yet fallen,

But darkness had descended.

Not from the absence of the sun.. but from something deeper.

Something older than light itself.. and far more wrathful.

The sky began to scream.

First, it rippled.. then cracked.. then split wide open.

From within, he emerged.

The Sovereign Demon.. Sky-Splitter.

He floated like a forbidden word spoken against the mind's will,

Arms folded behind his back, face turned toward the earth that dared not meet his eyes.

Rage leaked from his body.. not as heat, but as pressure.

As if the air itself melted around him, as if reality was choking.

He gazed down at the world..

Then he spoke.

But they were not words.

They were a sentence.. eternal judgment, wrath that made existence shudder:

"I am he who is not questioned, not measured, not compared.."

He said it with a voice that was not a voice..

It was a linguistic quake, spoken by the tongue of fury itself.

"I am the one for whom existence was created.. to witness my name."

The sky recoiled.

It pulled back its clouds and withdrew, as if ashamed to remain near him.

"The Sovereign Demon.. Sky-Splitter!"

In that moment, the sky tore again..

But this time, it wasn't a tear.. it was a wound in reality.

"I existed before fear.. and I will remain after annihilation."

Then, slowly..

He raised his hand.

A scream shattered everything.

Not from him.. but from the world.

As if the earth itself cried out: "Enough!"

But no one heard it.

Mountains split.

Oceans tore.

Even time.. began to retreat, fleeing from a moment that should never exist.

He did not scream.

The enraged do not scream.

The enraged who know they are the strongest.. destroy in silence.

...

Di staggered within his consciousness, gasping as though drowning in a sea of fear and awe,

But what he saw wasn't an illusion..

It wasn't just some forgotten memory or an image passed down through blood.

He felt it.

Felt how reality itself tore just because that being looked.

The scene wasn't merely an ending..

It was an announcement of extinction.

The sky had been no more than a fragile curtain, ripped open upon his arrival.

The earth.. no more than a gravestone for an era that ended before it began.

"One person.."

Di whispered to himself, as if his voice feared to rise.

"Just one person.. split the sky alone."

His mind resisted, his soul rebelled, refused to believe.. yet he had no other explanation.

This wasn't the power of the seventh realm.. not even the eighth.

"This.. could only be someone from the ninth tier.. the legendary tier."

A sense of danger, deeper than anything he had ever known,

Crawled through his spine,

Shattering every false confidence in strength, every pride sown by past battles.

That being.. was not just "strong."

He was beyond strength.

He was the embodiment of chaos, dominion, and curse..

As if the world itself had been created only to be broken by his hands.

But amid this terror, in the midst of this inner collapse..

A small flame in Di refused to go out.

Desire.

The desire to reach.

The desire to ascend.

The desire not to remain beneath the feet of beings like that.

Even if he burned.

Even if he shattered.

Even if he lost his humanity.

"I will reach it.. even if I must become a demon."

He whispered it like a vow,

Like a cry born from the heart of extinction..

A rebellion against submission.

....