The drums were no longer just sounds, they became the heartbeat of the world itself. Each beat struck like lightning, shattering bones and crushing hearts. The air was choking with blood, so thick that every breath felt like drinking from a coagulated sea.
Ashen stood in the middle of hell, his body cracked, his blood flowing like a black river. His three chains trembled behind him, the five-star blood frenzy burning like a vortex of fiery blood. But in front of him stood the distorted copy.
Its face was half melted, with cracked black bone shining underneath. A twisted smile stretched across the other half. Its body was wrapped in a dense bloody aura, similar to his but corrupted, like a broken imitation.
Behind it stood the four distorted beasts, tall and looming, their teeth shining under tongues of bloody fire, their clubs dripping with black blood, striking the ground in the same rhythm as the drums.
"Ashen… I will tear you apart just as your clan was torn."
The distorted copy spoke with Ashen's voice, but twisted, like thousands of screams forced through one throat.
It attacked first. Its steps were heavy as stone yet fast as lightning. It raised its right hand, and the aura gathered to form the Bloody Bear Fist. But it was imperfect, its edges deformed, fingers fused like shattered bones.
The fist came down like a thunderbolt on Ashen's chest.
Ashen raised his own hands, his fist covered in the true Bear aura. The collision exploded into a storm of blood. The copy staggered back one step, but Ashen's chest split open from within. The strike had rebounded on him with savage force, a deep wound bursting blood.
"Damn it… every wound to it… reflects on me!"
But there was no time to think.
The four beasts charged all at once.
The first smashed its club onto his shoulder, shaking his bones.
The second sank its claws into his side.
The third dropped from above, its fangs shattering his collarbone.
The fourth crawled like a spider and bit into his leg.
Ashen roared, his body staggering, but he exploded with the Rune of the Blood Crocodile. Scales covered his body, his defense doubled. The blows bounced back slightly.
The copy did not wait. Its three chains lashed out like twisted serpents. They were not sharp like his, but warped, bleeding black blood that corroded the air.
The chains clashed in the air.
Three against three.
The explosion of blood energy tore the arena apart.
Both were wounded in the same instant… but Ashen bled more.
Every time he struck the copy, blood erupted from his own body.
Every time he defended, his bones felt like they were breaking.
And in the middle of the chaos, illusions crawled in.
He saw his mother's body torn to pieces before him.
He heard the screams of children from his clan being dragged by their hair to the altar.
He saw his father, chest pierced, staring with dead eyes.
The noise mixed between the drums and the cries of the dead.
"Ashen… you failed us."
"Ashen… you left us to die."
"Ashen… our blood is your eternal curse."
His knee struck the ground.
His blood poured out like an ocean.
His head hung low, as if he was finally breaking.
The four beasts turned slowly toward him, closing in like hungry wolves.
The copy stood still, its smile wider than ever.
"It's over… you cannot escape yourself."
But in the depth of the darkness, another voice rose.
It was not an illusion. It was not the cry of his clan.
It was something ancient, rooted in his blood.
A savage roar tore out from within him:
"If you are my reflection… then I will tear my reflection apart with my own hands.
I will not die like a slaughtered rat… I will die like the beast that drowns the earth in blood!"
His eyes blazed like embers.
The five-star blood frenzy exploded at full power, his body surrounded by a bloody aura like a storm of falling meteors.
His blood ignited, scattering like tongues of liquid fire.
Ashen rose again, his eyes filled with madness that defied death.
The first beast rushed in, its club crashing down like a meteor.
Ashen wrapped the first chain around his arm and roared.
His iron fist with the Bear's power shattered the club, then smashed the beast's skull. Black blood splattered through the air.
The second beast dug its claws into his chest, but Ashen did not retreat.
His chains pierced its belly, draining its blood until it collapsed like an empty shell.
The third leapt from above, but Ashen exploded with the Rune of the Sky Leopard.
His legs burned with the Leopard's aura, his body became bloody lightning.
He vanished and reappeared behind it, kicking with 12,000 kilograms of force. Its spine snapped like a dry twig.
The fourth clung to his leg, fangs sinking into bone.
Ashen gripped its skull with both hands and pressed down.
The bones shattered under his grip, black blood bursting like a fountain.
Ashen's roar shook the arena:
"Hahahaaaa!! More blood!!"
But even as his body staggered and his blood poured like a waterfall, the copy still stood.
Its black chains trembled, its smile grew colder.
"Well done… but I am still here."
It raised its hand and unleashed the distorted Bear Fist again.
Ashen met it with his own. The collision exploded in a storm.
This time both bled.
But Ashen's body shook, his chest tearing open with a new wound.
The chains clashed again, a bloody nightmare repeating itself.
Every strike he landed… returned to him double.
His body could not take it anymore.
His knees slammed against the ground.
The four beasts were corpses scattered in the mud.
But the copy… remained without a single scratch.
Ashen gasped, his chest rising and falling.
His blood flooded the ground beneath him.
His eyes still burned with madness, but his body could barely hold itself up.
He raised his head with effort, and saw the distorted copy standing before him, its chains trembling, its smile twisted.
"You killed these beasts, but I am the wound that never heals. I am your mirror, your eternal regret, your fear of existence. I am your inevitable end, your everlasting curse."
The drums pounded, faster and stronger.
The whole arena trembled.
And Ashen, on his knees, smiled with a grin filled with madness that defied death itself.