The throne room no longer existed.

The world had changed.

Crimson clouds churned endlessly above, thick and heavy like coagulated blood, while the ground stretched into an endless battlefield of swords, embedded at every angle. Blades of all shapes and eras pierced the land, some broken, some pristine, all humming faintly with lingering intent.

Every step rang with a metallic echo, as if the battlefield itself remembered centuries of war.

This was the knight's domain.

A world forged from slaughter, discipline, and absolute martial will.

Lilith stood amidst it, her right shoulder still bleeding beneath torn fabric and scorched flesh. The wound burned, not from pain alone, but because the knight's Blood Domain continued to gnaw at it, trying to draw her blood even now.

She rolled her shoulder slowly, deliberately, forcing demonic energy to seal the flesh while letting enough blood spill to stain the ground.

Her lips curved slightly.

Looks like I need to become serious…

Across from her, the crimson knight advanced again, swinging his massive blade in wide arcs that churned the rivers of blood and forced swords to rise like deadly geysers. Each strike carried centuries of collected killing intent, yet Lilith danced between them, her steps fluid, almost serpentine.

She left behind trails of illusions that flickered in the crimson mist, each carrying fragments of her desire, enough to misdirect the knight for the briefest fraction of a second.

The knight's domain responded instantly. Blood surged into defensive spikes and rotating rings of steel, splitting her illusions apart before they reached him.

The sheer force of his presence made the air tremble, yet Lilith's Throne of Desire subtly bent the battlefield, pulling the steel slightly off-course and creating tiny gaps.

Her eyes narrowed as she studied the rhythm of his strikes. Despite his overwhelming power, his movements were mechanical, almost ritualistic.

He relied on raw force, domain synergy, and precision, but he could not anticipate intent manipulations. After all, he was not truly alive.

She extended a hand, fingers splayed, and the rivers of blood beneath her shimmered. The illusionary Liliths surged forward in a coordinated wave.

Each struck from different angles—some above, some sliding along the viscous ground, some vanishing mid-swing to reappear behind him. The knight slashed and spun with terrifying speed, cutting the illusions one by one, yet each strike cost him a fraction of his focus. Small misalignments accumulated.

A spinning ring of blades descended from above, aiming to impale her. Lilith flicked her wrist, bending the ring mid-air. The swords collided with each other, clanging loudly, and scattered harmlessly, leaving a narrow corridor.

She dashed through it, landing on the viscous ground as her heels sank slightly. Energy from her core propelled her upward.

The knight reacted with lightning speed, vaulting over her trajectory. His blade came down in a devastating diagonal sweep, slicing through illusions trailing her, cutting air so thick with killing intent that it seemed to tear reality itself. Lilith twisted, rolling under the strike, and reappeared behind him in a burst of pink haze from her domain.

Predictable, yet terrifyingly fast, she thought. Her domain pulsed again, subtly altering the knight's sense of distance. The swords he commanded lagged a fraction of a heartbeat, causing him to overcompensate in a swing that left a small opening.

Lilith lunged, claws extended form her hands, using the sword's momentum to flick a strike against his side, just above his hip plate. Sparks flew, metal scraped, but her attack did not penetrate deeply. It was enough to cause small damage and break his rhythm, and that was all she needed.

The knight roared silently.

The air thickened with crimson pressure.

Rings of steel lifted from the ground, rotating faster than the eye could follow, funneling toward her like a living storm. Lilith's illusions flickered in and out, forcing him to divide attention constantly.

She jumped between forms, weaving a complex dance of reality and projection, keeping him guessing.

A sudden downward strike split the air near her shoulder, missing narrowly as she slid under it.

I cannot afford a direct clash, she thought.

She spread her arms wide, and the Throne of Desire expanded aggressively this time.

She was done analyzing his powers.

The battlefield warped further. Blood became denser, steel blades hesitated mid-swing, and the knight's movements, though disciplined, began to feel slightly "off." Aggression lagged by milliseconds, strikes were slightly delayed, and the perfect symmetry of his domain wavered.

He recovered, brute strength compensating for the subtle disruption.

Every step shattered nearby swords into flying shards, forcing her to weave between deadly steel constantly.

A spinning tornado of blood and steel erupted beneath him. Lilith darted along the perimeter, feeling the battlefield's vibrations.

One false step would impale her, yet she moved like water, letting the knight exhaust himself while her intent corroded his focus.

The battlefield groaned under the strain.

Blood Sovereignty surged again, the rivers boiling as the knight drew deeper upon the essence of slaughter etched into his domain. Every sword buried in the ground trembled, responding to his will, rising inch by inch as if the world itself wished to arm him.

His steps were heavy, absolute, each one forcing Lilith's domain to recoil. Wherever his sword passed, desire was split apart, intent severed by raw, merciless force.

This was his nature. A weapon born only to kill, refined through endless war, unmoved by hesitation or temptation.

Lilith retreated, but her expression remained calm.

So this is how far you can push it.

She felt it clearly now. His strength was immense, overwhelming in direct confrontation, but it was also rigid. His authority flowed in straight lines. Kill. Advance. Overpower.

There was no deviation and adaptation.

Her eyes softened, and her domain changed.

The Throne of Desire did not resist anymore.

It yielded.

The battlefield shifted subtly. The blood beneath their feet grew warmer, thicker, carrying faint pulses of emotion within it. The swords stopped vibrating in unison. Their movements became uneven, ever so slightly out of sync.

The knight did not notice at first.

He lunged again, faster than before, blade cutting a path meant to end the fight.

Lilith stepped aside, letting the sword graze past her cheeks. Blood seeped out from it.

Seizing the moment, she placed her palm against the knight's chest.

The moment her hand touched his armor, her domain surged inward rather than outward. Desire did not try to control him. It wrapped around the concept that sustained him.

Blood.

The rivers feeding his strength hesitated.

For the first time, the knight slowed.

Lilith smiled faintly.

Blood remembers.

Her domain seeped into the blood saturating the battlefield, not commanding it, but whispering to it. Every drop carried echoes of fear, rage, despair, longing from the countless beings it once belonged to.

Those emotions resurfaced.

And then her domain started to led them astray, to awaken the desires in their blood, to seize control.

Blood Sovereignty trembled.

The knight roared and drove his sword into the ground, trying to reassert dominance. Swords launched upward again, but this time their formation collapsed halfway, crashing into one another instead of converging on Lilith.

His strength was still overwhelming, but now it was unstable.

Lilith pressed her advantage.

She moved her domain to pressure him subtly.

The blood began to reject him.

The knight faltered as his armor cracked, crimson light leaking from the fractures.

He tried to retaliate, swinging his heavy blade one after another, but his swings grew heavier, slower, no longer perfectly aligned with his intent.

Lilith raised her hand, fingers curling gently.

"Your strength is built on what was taken from others," she said calmly. "Mine is built on what they left behind."

Her domain power rushed inside the body of the Crimson knight all at once.

Desire, regret, hatred, devotion, grief.

All of it flooded the blood fueling his power and domain at once.

The knight froze.

Cracks spread across his armor as the authority sustaining him destabilized. His sword slipped from his grasp, embedding itself into the ground at his feet.

With a final step, Lilith placed her hand on his helm and pushed.

The crimson knight shattered.

His body disintegrated into fragments of stone and metal, scattering across the battlefield as the domain unraveled. The endless swords sank back into the ground, turning to dust one by one.

The throne room returned.

Lilith stood alone, breathing steadily.

Blood dripped from her wounds and stained the floor beneath her feet, but her posture remained composed. She glanced at the shallow cuts along her body, then dismissed them without concern.

They were already healing, and such injuries were meaningless to her.

"So that was the guardian of this place," she murmured quietly.

The ancient throne of swords stood silent before her.

At the end of the stairs, a large sword was impaled into the ground. It was the same sword wielded by the crimson knight. As Lilith observed it, the blade began to tremble.

Then it split.

One sword was clear like water, crystal pure without a single impurity. Another took the form of green-tinted wind, shaped into a blade, its power sharp and restless. The last sword was crimson, its edges releasing faint blood-colored smoke. Even from a distance, the weight of killing intent and the countless lives taken by it were unmistakable.

The three swords rose gracefully from the ground, as if guided by some invisible hand, and hovered in the air before aligning themselves with the throne. The blood-red sword slid effortlessly into the center, while the other two positioned themselves symmetrically on either side.

Lilith narrowed her eyes slightly.

She extended her senses toward the throne, scanning it carefully, and the realization dawned on her.

..Looks like I need two more swords for this dungeon to be completed...

Her expression turned colder.

..And once that happens, I can finally catch Ash Burn....

Just recalling his name caused her gaze to harden, a faint chill spreading through her eyes.

At the same time, through her connection with the demons, she could feel that they were about to reach her.

They were almost here.

***

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