Tenebrous Wolf
Chapter 94: Hunger For Power

Chapter 94: Hunger For Power

Adrian watched the destruction below with a mixture of disbelief and awe. He muttered:

"I can’t believe this is working. They’re actually killing each other."

Klaus gave a humorless grin. "Told you it was easy."

"I didn’t say I believed you. But still, this is incredible. I didn’t know mind control could be this useful. It’s a little scary though."

Seraphim, standing guard behind them, spoke quietly.

"How long do we have before they realize?"

Morgan’s voice came again, breathless now.

"Not long. Maybe a few more minutes before the spell fractures. I can feel the edges fraying.

Klaus nodded.

"Alright. Let’s move now. Morgan, keep that thing busy and keep them distracted."

"Understood."

The group descended from their hiding place with a sense of urgency. Their boots splashed through the shallow blood pooling along the winding paths, but none of the monsters noticed. They were too occupied with their war.

As they slipped through the carnage-strewn corridors, Klaus couldn’t help but glance back. The pink-lit Carapace stood amidst a pile of twitching bodies, drenched in gore. Its slits still glowed. It was still fighting. Still holding their attention.

He felt a little guilty. No, pity. That was all.

In the end, it was just a creature. If they hadn’t killed it, something else would have.

’What a waste. If only we could harvest its spirit core. Such a pity.’

Truthfully, Klaus only pitied the fact that they couldn’t collect the cores from monsters killing each other. That was the real shame. And judging by the noise of the commotion, more Nightmare Carapaces would soon be drawn to the scene, if they weren’t already en route.

Suppressing the greed bubbling in his chest, Klaus exhaled a heavy sigh and pressed on, running alongside his teammates.

A few seconds later, the pink-lit Carapace let out a piercing shriek as it was surrounded, torn apart and devoured by its own kin. Flesh tore, bones cracked, and its glowing slits dimmed beneath a frenzy of claw and fang.

Soon, even that light vanished, swallowed by the chaos, leaving nothing behind but silence and the sound of wet, shuffling limbs.

† †

Over the next thirty minutes, the group made swift progress toward their destination, far quicker than before.

They stuck to a reliable formula; whenever they came across a large cluster of Nightmare Carapaces, Morgan would seize control of one and then manipulate its mind to attack its kin. The result of that was a predictable, brutal chain reaction. Confusion turned to violence. Violence turned to chaos. And in the madness, the group slipped by unnoticed, shadows moving through shadows.

Morgan’s control wasn’t perfect — it never lasted long — but it didn’t have to. Just enough to spark panic, just enough to distract. Every encounter was a gamble, but so far, the odds were with them.

Adrian glanced at her once, watching as blood beaded along her nose from the strain.

"You okay?"

She didn’t respond at first, eyes glazed, fingers twitching in time with some unseen rhythm. Then, softly,

"I’m holding."

Glancing at her, Klaus looked a bit bothered. As her partner — and Master — he was aware of her weaknesses more than anyone. In the end, he could only give a small nod.

"Good. Let’s keep going. We’re almost there."

They pressed on, deeper into the labyrinth, where the walls bled and the air tasted like iron and rot.

Eventually, the group reached a wide opening from which five paths branched, each gaping like a waiting, monstrous maw. Before they could come out, movement stirred and multiple Nightmare Carapaces emerged from one of the paths, dragging the broken bodies of slain Scavengers behind them.

There were more than fifteen.

The group’s expressions darkened as a grim realization settled in like a fog.

Klaus narrowed his eyes as he took in the grisly sight. Blood dripped from the carcasses, painting long, dark streaks across the ground. Some of the bodies still twitched and nerves fired pointlessly, long after life had fled.

"Hmm. Their wounds still looks fresh. Could it be that those Scavengers were just hunted recently?"

Hearing his muttering, Seraphim turned to him.

"Judging by the steam still rising from their wounds, it seems that is the case."

After a slight pause, she added:

"We need to be careful. If they just finished a hunt, they’ll be more alert."

The Carapaces shuffled forward with eerie grace, dragging the corpses like offerings. The Scavengers were chitinous horrors with massive, crablike bodies and twisted limbs. But now, their shells were studded with barbs, and cruel pincers dangled limp at their sides.

Adrian winced as one of the corpses was dropped to the ground with a sickening crack.

"God, those things are ugly, even when they’re dead."

Klaus darted his eyes between the Nightmare Carapaces. Then, he muttered with a low voice:

"Yeah, no kidding. But something’s off. The fact that these things managed to take down so many Scavengers is not normal. I mean, sure, Scavengers are just Hollows with Shrouded cores, but even so... this feels too coordinated. Don’t you guys think?"

If that was the case, then his earlier suspicion was no longer just a theory — Something was controlling the Nightmare Carapaces.

The rest of the party seemed to arrive at the same conclusion. A grim silence settled over them, heavier than before, their expressions hardening with the weight of realization.

Then, without warning, the lead Carapace lifted its head. The glow in its slit-eyes pulsed brightly once, and at that signal, every creature dragging the corpses froze in place. The silence that followed felt incredibly dreadful.

A moment later, the Carapaces let go of the Scavengers in eerie unison. The bodies hit the blood-slicked floor with wet thuds. One by one, the monsters turned their heads toward the group.

Every single one of them.

"!!"

The party froze.

Not a word was spoken. Not a breath was wasted. The silence was a scream waiting to happen.

At that moment where all of them were consumed by shock and fear, the lead Nightmare Carapace shrieked, and the sound rippled through the open space like a bullet.

An instant later, the ground trembled beneath them as the rest of the creatures answered the call. One after another, guttural howls rose up in unison, creating a dust cloud and sending ripples through the blood pooled on the floor.

The air was no longer still. It surged with motion, hunger and madness.

’Curses!’

Snapping out of his daze, Klaus’s eyes widened in alarm. Panic surged through him like a jolt of electricity, and he shouted with all the force he could muster:

"Everyone, spread out!!"

At that shout, the group scattered just as the Nightmare Carapaces charged forward with terrifying speed and swung their scythe-limb across the air. With a loud noise, there was an explosion of debris following the destruction of the black wall behind their previous position.

Seraphim was the first to engage. She dashed toward the flank with her silver longsword drawn and flashed it in precise arcs, cutting through tendons, severing limbs just enough to slow the rush.

Then, Adrian, who flanked to the opposite direction, spun to meet a lunging Carapace with his spear and the shaft clashed against chitin in a burst of sparks. He drove it deep into one creature’s eye-slit, twisting as the beast thrashed wildly, with ichor spraying across his arms.

Gritting his teeth, he shouted:

"How the hell did these things find our location?!"

"No time for that!"

Klaus shouted back, his voice nearly drowned beneath the rising cacophony. He ducked beneath a sweeping limb, then lunged forward, slamming his Nightmare Gauntlets into the gut of the oncoming Carapace. The talon-like fingers punched through the hardened shell with a sickening crunch. The creature let out a guttural shriek and staggered back, ichor spilling from the wound.

Without pausing, Klaus dropped low and rolled through the blood-slick mud, narrowly avoiding a bone-splintering strike from another Carapace that barreled in from the side. The blow missed by inches, and the creature’s momentum carried it forward uncontrollably, sending it crashing into a stone outcropping in a spray of debris and dust.

Even then, he didn’t slow.

The first Carapace — the one he’d staggered earlier — had recovered. Its eyes blazed with fresh fury as it lunged after him and sliced its limbs through the air at terrifying speed.

Klaus clicked his tongue and cursed. With no other choice, he turned and sprinted the other way.

He was strong enough to crush an Awakened Ghoul on his own, but the equation changed fast when it shifted from ’one of them’ to ’two of them’. After all, he was still a Strider. There was no way he would win in such a scenario.

Meanwhile, the Stalker was defending Morgan against a group of Nightmare Carapaces. More specifically, there were four of them. The humanoid ghoul shifted between attacking and defending. Due to its complicated situation, the creature could not dodge or else Morgan would be caught. As such, it was using its body to feed off the damn abominations.

Even then, the Stalker has its limits. Ichor dripped from the gouges in its limbs, and its ribs showed through torn muscle as it withstood blow after blow.

Morgan, crouched low behind it, trembled as she struggled to maintain her mental grip on the battlefield. Her eyes were wide, unfocused, and blood continued to trickle from her nostrils. The strain was getting to her.

One of the Nightmare Carapaces broke from the pack and lunged around the Stalker’s side, claws raised to carve through her where she knelt.

Morgan’s breath caught.

Then, steel flashed.

Seraphim appeared in a blur, her silver blade intercepting the descending scythe with a crack of metal against chitin. Sparks erupted, and the Carapace screeched, staggering back as she spun low and swept its legs from beneath it with her sword in a single breath.

"You need to move!"

Morgan nodded weakly, forcing herself upright even as her knees wobbled. "I— I can still... hold them."

"No, you can’t," Seraphim replied after barely blocking a crushing blow. "Not like this. We’ll regroup. Let the Stalker cover our rear."

Behind them, the humanoid ghoul hissed low and guttural, driving its claws through the chest of a Carapace and slamming its head into the ground with a ’crack’. Its body shuddered as more of its mass was consumed by damage, twitching erratically — but still, it stood.

Across the battlefield, Klaus was still weaving between enemies, ducking, striking, retreating. Blood — both human and not — splattered his gauntlets. He looked toward Morgan’s position and shouted.

"We’re getting surrounded! Seraphim! Can you clear a path?"

There was slight hesitation before Seraphim’s answered:

"I’ll make one."

Taking advantage of the creature’s momentum, Seraphim twisted her stance and met the descending blow head-on. Her sword caught the scythe-like limb with a resounding clang, and with a grunt of effort, she shifted her weight, using the force of the impact to redirect the monster’s attack. The Nightmare Carapace staggered sideways, momentarily off-balance.

Seraphim stepped back, sliding against the blood-slick ground, and exhaled slowly.

Everything stilled.

Her silver hair settled around her face like a veil as she lowered her blade slightly and closed her eyes. Her lips moved though no sound escaped. To anyone watching, it might’ve seemed like a whispered prayer or a quiet vow.

Then, it began.

The air around her shimmered faintly. Like heat rising from scorched stone, it warped subtly — just enough to hint that something profound had taken root. For a fleeting moment, everything was quiet, unnaturally so.

And then, light erupted.

A brilliant flare surged from her blade, swallowing the dimness in one violent burst. The glow washed over the battlefield, casting monstrous shadows and freezing even the Nightmare Carapaces mid-charge.

An azure flame roared to life, engulfing her sword.

It was no ordinary fire — it pulsed with something cold and grand, flickering as though alive and hungry. Her blade was no longer steel — it was wrath, forged and given form. A flaming sword, radiant and terrible to behold.

On this day, Seraphim awakened the aspect of her Nightmare — and for the first time, she wielded it without restraint.