Chapter 47: Blood Debt

Esabella didn’t move an inch, her hand pressing the token tightly against the silver rod as her eyes completely dilated as she watched Dante absorb the world itself.

The three-minute countdown inside Dante’s mind was running down to the final seconds. Inside the core field, the purple light grew so bright it completely illuminated every corner of the obsidian chamber, forcing Gideon to shield his eyes with his scale cloak.

Dante stood perfectly still, his right hand keeping the invisible Seven-Sins Asura Blade driven deep into the central access node of the sphere. The raw data vectors of the entire floor continued to pour up his arm, violently shattering the error messages in his vision.

[Sovereign Override Complete!]

[External Network Lockout: Erased.]

[Notice: Reconnecting to the Tower Mainframe...]

[System 2: 100x Sovereign Multiplier Triggered!]

A static hum vibrated through the air as the secondary system unlocked. Because Dante had spent his entire survival journey hoarding the unrefined energy of monsters without system to process them, the system didn’t just register them one by one. It dumped the entire massive pool into the calculation matrix all at once.

[Calculating accumulated assets...]

[Target: 32x Defeated Demon Souls (Including S-Rank Captain Akon & S-Rank Calamity Elemental).]

[Evolution Path Forced: 100x Multiplier Applied to all accumulated statistics!]

Dante’s baseline physical stats didn’t just climb; they exploded. Even without checking the numerical values, he could feel his muscle density, his reaction loops, and his sensory lines expanding at a ridiculous rate under the floor’s high gravity.

The invisible sword in his grip underwent a supreme evolution. The unstable heat inside the hilt instantly vanished, replaced by a dense weight that didn’t stagger his arm at all.

crack.

Right at the wall panel, the three-minute timer hit zero. The round black stone token in Esabella’s hand violently shattered into thousands of tiny black fragments, and the silver receiver rod inside the stone wall snapped down the middle, smoking .

The proxy network had collapsed, but it didn’t matter anymore. Dante had already overwritten the floor code. The glowing yellow containment field around the core dissolved completely into air, leaving the purple sphere floating unprotected.

"The transmission line is dead," Gideon called out, his voice shaking slightly as he lowered his hands. "But you did it, kid. The floor signature belongs to you now."

Esabella didn’t look at the broken token pieces at her feet.she looks at Dante . "Dante... your aura just became so incredibly dense. You look like an absolute god standing there."

Dante didn’t answer her. He slowly pulled his sword out of the floating sphere .

Before he could take a single step off the platform, a massive, world-crushing impact hit the front of the vault.

The doors of the chamber were violently smashed inward from the outside, the stone panels breaking into massive flying chunks that crashed across the black sand floor. A massive wall of volcanic smoke and hot ash rushed into the room, instantly turning the air scorching hot.

From the center of the smoke, a colossal figure slowly walked into the light.

It was Warlord Balor.

He stood over five meters tall, his massive frame so wide he completely blocked the entrance way. He didn’t look like the other demons; In his right lower hand, he carried a axe that was twice the size of the one Akon had used, the edge pulsing with a vicious, dark red light.

Behind him, hundreds of armored northern soldiers formed a tight wall, their spears and halberds clicking sharply as they completely blocked every single exit from the chamber.

Balor didn’t march all the way to the border canyon. He was a veteran conqueror; the moment he felt Captain Akon’s energy signature vanish, he realized the surface movement was a calculated diversion and turned his elite personal vanguard straight back to the fortress.

The giant warlord looked down at the two dead captains lying in the sand, then his glowing red eyes shifted toward Esabella, before finally locking onto Dante, who was standing right next to the unprotected floor core.

Balor’s face twisted into pure, murderous fury, his massive jaw opening to reveal rows of long, yellow fangs as a deep roar shook the entire cavern ceiling.

"A human rat..." Balor rasped, his voice vibrating the stone blocks beneath Dante’s boots like an earthquake. "A single human gutter rat crossed my mountains, bypassed my army, and put his filthy hands on my core? And the proud daughter of Vaelorix is standing there like a dog waiting for scraps?"

Dante stood on the elevated platform, looking down at the boss with a completely murderous stare. The newly evolved invisible blade rested quietly in his right hand.

"You talk too much for a giant target," Dante said. "Get out of my way, or I’ll bury you in the same ash as your captains."

Balor’s red eyes burned with a fanatical rage, raising his massive glass axe with three of his hands as his elite soldiers prepared for battle.

Before Dante could step down from the platform,a voice cut through the quiet room.

Esabella walked past him, stepping to the front of the stage. The fanatical, adoring look she had used while watching Dante was entirely gone, replaced by a royal mask of pure hatred. Her eyes burned with a dangerous light that fixed directly onto Balor’s face as she uncoiled the thorn-vein whip from her hip.

"Balor," Esabella said. Her voice wasn’t a scream, but it carried a weight that made the hundreds of northern soldiers at the door instantly tighten their grip on their halberds. "Few year ago, you used a coward’s ambush at the volcanic border to murder my father. You left his squad to burn, took the core, and thought you could hide behind your mountains forever."

Balor let out a laugh that shook the dust off the ceiling pillars, his three hands tightening around the handle of his massive axe.

"The daughter of Vaelorix finally decided to leave her palace," Balor mocked, his voice sounding like grinding stones. "Your father was weak, girl. He trusted a demon’s word in a graveyard where only strength matters. I crushed his core with my bare hands, and I used his skull to decorate my private chambers. What are you going to do about it now? Bow to me, or let this little human rat die in your place?"