Pop.

The first eye burst like an overripe fruit, vitreous fluid spraying across Jack's scaled hand. Kragoth's scream intensified, his entire body convulsing.

Pop.

The second eye followed, and the Pit Master's legs gave out. His three-meter frame collapsed, crashing to his knees on the black ice platform with enough force to crack the surface.

Jack rode him down like a trainer breaking a wild animal, never releasing his grip, never showing mercy.

Blood ran down Kragoth's face in thick streams, mixing with the remains of his destroyed eyes.

The pain had to be incredible. The kind of agony that short-circuited rational thought and reduced even a Nightmare-rank demon to a screaming, thrashing mess.

Jack finally released his grip and hopped off Kragoth's shoulders, landing lightly on the ice a few feet away.

Blue electricity crackled to life around his arms as Thunder Mantle activated, casting harsh shadows across the gore-covered platform.

Kragoth knelt there, blind and broken, his hands pressed uselessly against his ruined face. His breathing came in ragged gasps, each one accompanied by a whimper of pain that would have been pitiful if Jack cared about pity.

"You can't... move..." Kragoth wheezed, his voice barely recognizable. "What... what are you?"

Jack didn't answer immediately. Instead, he walked past the kneeling Pit Master toward where Grimar lay on the ice, still dripping with the blood from Jack's "death."

The greatsword was massive. Two meters of enchanted ice-forged steel, thick as a man's torso, its edge sharp enough to cut through enchanted armor. The weapon radiated cold, frost forming in the air around its blade.

Jack gripped the hilt with one hand.

The sword lifted easily, as if it weighed nothing at all. Jack turned it in his grip, examining the craftsmanship, reading the runes etched along its length.

[Item Acquired: Grimar]

[Type: Greatsword]

[Rank: Legendary]

[Requirements: 250 Strength, 250 Endurance]

[Special Ability: Critical strikes have +10% impressed chance to happen]

[Special Ability: Critical strike damage increased by 1.5×]

"Good weapon," Jack said, his voice carrying easily across the platform despite Kragoth's continued whimpering. "Shame it's wasted on someone like you."

He turned to face the blind, kneeling demon, Grimar held casually in one hand like it was a training blade instead of a legendary weapon that required superhuman strength just to lift.

"You're unfortunate," Jack said, his yellow eyes fixed on Kragoth's ruined face. "Serving Pho. Following orders. Doing your job. I almost feel bad about this."

"Please..." Kragoth gasped, his voice breaking. "Please, I'll... I'll do anything. I'll serve you instead. I'll betray Pho. I'll give you information. Just... just don't..."

"I have a bone to pick with Pho," Jack continued, ignoring the begging. "He tried to have me killed. Sent assassins. It cost me time and effort. So I'm going to make him regret it."

Jack raised Grimar, the massive blade catching what little light filtered through the crimson sky.

"My name is Jack Kaiser," he said quietly. "Soul Warden. And I'm going to tear Pho's empire apart piece by piece, starting with you."

Recognition flashed across Kragoth's ruined face. His mouth opened, blood and fluid dripping from his destroyed eyes as he processed what he'd just heard.

"Soul... Warden?" The words came out as barely a whisper, thick with terror that transcended physical pain.

[Status Effect Applied: FEAR]

[Target: Kragoth]

[Effect: Target takes 30% increased damage from all sources]

The Fear status hit Kragoth in waves.

His body went rigid, his remaining fight evaporating like morning frost. He knelt there, blind and terrified, waiting for death.

Jack swung Grimar hard.

Grimar descended in a perfect arc, the legendary blade singing through the air with the sound of wind over ice.

The edge caught Kragoth's neck cleanly, the enchanted steel parting flesh and bone with surgical precision.

[CRITICAL HIT!]

[Instant Kill: Decapitation]

[Kragoth | Pit Master: DEFEATED]

Kragoth's head separated from his shoulders, flying through the air in a spray of blood before landing on the ice with a wet thud.

His massive body remained kneeling for one impossible second, then toppled forward, crashing onto the platform.

Jack walked to the corpse, still holding Grimar in one hand. He reached down with his free hand, plunging it into Kragoth's chest cavity with casual brutality.

His clawed fingers found what they were looking for, closing around the first heart and ripping it free.

Then the second.

Both organs pulsed weakly in Jack's grip, still trying to pump blood that no longer had anywhere to go. He stored them in his system inventory without ceremony.

[Demon Heart x2 acquired]

Then he grabbed Kragoth's headless body, lifted the three-meter corpse like it weighed nothing, and threw it over the edge of the platform.

The body tumbled through the air, spinning lazily, before it crashed onto the mining floor far below.

Right next to where Tarvek and the other slaves were working.

The impact was tremendous, the sound echoing through the pit like a crack of thunder.

Ice shattered beneath Kragoth's weight, creating a crater that spread across the mining section.

Slaves screamed, scrambling away from the sudden corpse that had fallen from the sky. Guards shouted, raising their weapons, looking up to see where it had come from.

And there, standing on the elevated platform where Kragoth's command post had been, silhouetted against the crimson sky, stood a figure in black and crimson armor.

Yellow eyes burning like twin flames.

Grimar held casually in one hand.

Jack stared down at the chaos below, his expression unreadable behind his demonic features. Then, slowly, his body began to change.

The black scales receded, flowing back into his armor like oil being absorbed into cloth.

His face returned to normal, the helmet reforming around his head. The demonic transformation faded completely, leaving only the armored warrior.

[Current Stats:]

Strength: 525 (50)

Stamina: 128 (45)

Agility: 155 (45)

Vitality: 135 (45)

Endurance: 140 (30)

Magic: 0

Mana: 400/400

HP: 3,375/3,375

[Infernal Conversion: DEACTIVATED]

[Duration: 60 seconds]

[Cooldown: 5 minutes]

Jack stored Grimar in his system inventory, then turned and walked back toward Kragoth's severed head. He picked it up by its hair, examining the ruined face one last time.

"Proof of kill," he muttered to himself. "Never know when I'll need this."

The head disappeared into his storage.

As Jack left the platform, moving toward the shadows that would hide his exit, he pulled up his system interface with a thought.

'System,' he said mentally. 'Calculate damage. If that strike had hit Kragoth's torso instead of his neck, how much would it have done?'

[Calculating...]

[Base Weapon Damage: Grimar]

[Infernal Conversion: Active]

[Demonhand Multiplier: Applied]

[Thunder Mantle Enhancement: Applied]

[Critical Hit Multiplier: 4×]

[Fear Status Multiplier: 1.3×]

[Total Calculated Damage: 35,367]

Jack processed the number as he walked. Thirty-five thousand damage in a single strike with all his bonuses active and the Fear status amplifying it. Kragoth had sixty thousand HP. That meant even with a perfect critical hit to the torso, the Pit Master would have survived with roughly twenty-five thousand HP remaining.

Two strikes would have been needed to kill him through raw damage alone.

But why waste time and effort with two strikes when one to the neck accomplished the same goal?

It was something Jack had learned over the past year in the tower.

The system showed damage numbers, HP bars, stats that suggested combat was about gradually wearing down an opponent's health pool.

But reality was messier than that.

A precise strike to the heart could kill regardless of remaining HP. Decapitation ended the fight instantly.

Destroying vital organs, crushing a brain, severing the spine, all of these bypassed the neat mathematics of the system and ended lives immediately.

Just as slowly bleeding out could kill even if the damage ticked away one HP at a time. The system tracked it all, but in the end, death was death.

Jack had learned to send a message with his kills. To make them quick and brutal.

No drawn-out battles. No giving opponents time to recover or call for help.

End the fight before it truly begins.

That was how you survived in a tower filled with monsters stronger than you.

Jack disappeared into the shadows of the pit, leaving behind a headless corpse, a terrified population of slaves, and the growing legend of the yellow-eyed demon who'd killed the Pit Master.

'Considering I couldn't use Grimar properly, I wonder how much more damage I would have done if I had the right stats.'

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