Extra's Path To Demon King

{Warning: There will be some brutality in this Chapter and the Chapters that follow}

***

Vargas, the old assassin-butler of the Nomrad household, stood silently in the shadow of the ruined estate. He had dedicated nearly his entire life to serving the family, from his vibrant youth to his old age.

He had witnessed the house’s most illustrious era, back when Lord Damien Nomrad terrorised the entire kingdom with sheer power and a vicious personality. In those days, no rival house dared to raise their head against the Nomrad name, for the tyrannical pillar of their lineage was an absolute deterrent.

Then came the dark period when the mighty Runic Sage was no more. The surrounding noble houses turned into hungry wolves overnight, eager to tear the fallen titan to pieces and claim its territory.

Daniel Nomrad, Damien’s son, was forced to step up and handle all the hostility coming from every direction. The safe umbrella of the Nomrad house was gone, leaving him to face the relentless political and physical storm entirely alone.

That was the beginning of the darkest, most desperate era for the Runic family. Daniel was neither a natural-born Runecaster nor a powerful enough Seeker to deter the dastardly wolves seeking revenge for past grievances.

The situation reached a harrowing breaking point when Myra was brutally killed, and young Axel fell into a deep, unending coma. That was a truly devastating time for the household, a period when Daniel Nomrad was only moments away from completely losing his mind.

Despite knowing the likely suspects behind his wife’s death, Daniel could do nothing due to his own powerlessness. He was forced to swallow his burning rage, clench his fists in secret, and endure the bitter humiliation day after day.

He endured it especially for his son. Daniel did not care about his own life anymore, but his son was still in a deep coma, holding onto a faint chance of waking up and living a normal life.

He could not cross that fatal line to throw his life away by pitting himself head-to-head against their insidious enemies. A single reckless move would have cost his comatose son his remaining thread of life.

Eventually, that agonising self-constraint paid off. His son Axel Nomrad woke up from the coma, awakened his latent Runecaster talent, and most importantly, awakened the Legendary Runic Eyes previously possessed by Damien Nomrad.

Through Axel’s hands, slowly but surely, the Nomrad family rose back toward its near-peak prominence once more. They reclaimed their lost prestige, and their enemies began to tremble again.

However, the sight that Vargas now saw with his own eyes escaped beyond his wildest imagination.

The young heir to the Nomrad household had turned out to be an insidious demon in truth. The once-bright young master with sparkling eyes and a clear heart had become the most vicious race roaming the continent in pursuit of power.

The dark path had worked all too well. That demonic power had allowed Axel to slaughter all his enemies in the most brutal fashion possible, but it had also done something far worse to his identity.

It had turned Axel into something he was not, something he was never supposed to be in the first place.

The atrocity now being committed by Axel felt like too much, even for an old assassin-butler who hated the Duskers with all his passion and heart.

It was not merely the physical torture being done to Ken Dusker that unnerved Vargas to his core. It was how the demon was pulling the strings, moving each piece on the board with absolute detachment.

The cold, sadistic nature behind the demon’s actions chilled Vargas to his very soul.

Axel had made a righteous, honourable father turn dark. The man who had only ever fought to protect his son had now become a relentless torturer, hacking away at the child of another.

He was brutally butchering the son of his once closest friend, painted in the blood of his fallen enemy.

Axel made a mother watch her own son being tortured, healed, and tortured again, repeatedly and endlessly. He kept going until her voice broke, her tears ran dry, and her spirit shattered into useless pieces.

He also displayed this cruel performance to his demonic followers, demonstrating the awaited wrath for any who dared to defy him, betray his trust, or go against his absolute rule.

There was Madness to his Method...

And Method to his Madness, both at the same time.

Vargas wore a deeply bitter, hollow expression on his weathered face as he watched from the cold shadows.

The Nomrad House would have no more enemies once the Dusker House was completely vanquished. The Nomrads would stand matchless in prestige and strength within Suncrest or even beyond its borders.

But what would be the point of it all then?

The young master of the house was not himself anymore. He had paid a price far too great for that demonic power, trading away the very warmth that made him human.

Axel remained completely unaware of the thoughts crossing his loyal butler’s mind. He focused solely on healing Ken and observing the Duchess’s agonising reactions.

"WAHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

At one point, her unearthly, shrill screeches grew far too loud for the Runecaster’s liking. Axel let out a quiet, annoyed sigh.

With a simple swipe of his fingers through the air, he directly cut off the Duchess’s tongue.

SWISH!

Blood instantly filled her entire mouth, and an unbearable wave of agony rushed straight to her brain.

Incapable of uttering a real scream, she began making muffled gurgling noises as blood dripped down her chin. Her already broken mind was chipped away even further, plunging her into dark delirium.

By now, Ken’s body had been repeatedly butchered to a near-death state almost fifteen times. Every single time, Axel had healed his first thrall back to perfection.

This was one of the new abilities he had unlocked after becoming a complete Ancestral Demon.

By using a portion of his own demonic energy along with the life force of the thrall, he could repeatedly heal his demon followers from catastrophic damage.

However, every time the Dusker heir was healed, a chunk of Ken’s own life force was consumed in the process.

Axel wore an annoyed expression as he noticed the psyche of both mother and son had almost completely broken down. There were no more reactions coming from either of them, as if they had turned into hollow dolls.

With a scowl, Axel turned toward the blood-soaked Patriarch. "Father, let me do it."

Daniel, who had lost himself entirely in the ruthless melody of torture, froze suddenly. It was as if he had just snapped out of a dark, suffocating trance.

His silver runic armour was smeared heavily in the dark blood of Ken Dusker. Even the element of light radiating out from the divine metal seemed almost tainted by the violent acts he had performed.

Daniel looked at his son for a long while before slowly stepping back, yielding his place beside the broken body.

Axel looked down at the lifeless, unmoving Ken Dusker lying on the ground with icy, black eyes.

BANG!

BANG!

BANG!

BANG!

The demon began smashing his fist onto Ken’s shattered body with immaculate, heavy force, cracking the marble structure underneath.

Coating the tips of his knuckles were sharp, spiked tendrils of demonic energy wrapped in flickers of blackened flames. These flames could burn anything down to absolute shreds, bypassing external defences entirely.

And since Axel was the very source of Ken’s demonic bloodline, every action he took against his first thrall tore directly at the boy’s soul rather than merely causing physical damage.

This fresh wave of incinerating pain instantly jolted Ken Dusker’s damaged psyche back into full consciousness.

Unadulterated horror flashed in his pupils once more, as if he were being subjected to this harrowing torture for the very first time in his life.

Compared to the catatonic pain of his very soul being ripped apart, Ken realised his previous physical beatings might as well have been a period of peaceful respite.

This new wave of agonising screeches tearing from the Dusker heir also woke up his broken mother.

Bloody tears fell continuously from her eyes. All the lingering defiance nestling within the heart of the Duchess was shredded into a million pieces.

She began to beg. She began to plead with her most earnest heart, over and over again in her mind.

She knew the demon could hear her mental voice crystal clear, finding nothing but cold amusement in her utter misery.

She was like a red candle that had reached the very end of its wick, running out of fuel and fighting with one last burst of pure desperation.

Yet, her harrowing demise had already been written by the strings of a predestined fate a long, long time ago.

Axel stopped the torture on Ken Dusker’s soul, leaving his body a mangled, scorched mess of smashed flesh and shattered bones.

With one last deep look, he placed his hands flat against Ken’s bloodied body.

The instant he made contact, countless wriggling red veins, almost like worms, appeared all over Ken’s body.

They slithered slowly upward toward Ken’s forehead, gradually forming a Seed of Sin that glowed with unnatural light.

The process sapped away all of his demonic powers, his remaining vitality, and even his core foundation as a Seeker.

The pain accompanying the extraction was perhaps the most disturbing thing imaginable, a catatonic agony that no living being should ever experience, whether good or evil, regardless of it.

Axel was forcibly extracting a part of Ken’s very soul itself.

The red, wriggling veins moved from Ken’s forehead into Axel’s waiting hands, completing the extraction.

As he did so, Runic texts from Prime Nexus materialised directly before his eyes:

[You have extracted the Demonic Bloodline of Ken Dusker]

[You can absorb back the bloodline unto yourself or bestow it upon your demonic followers.]

[Ken Dusker is no longer your Demonic Servant]

[Ken Dusker’s foundation has greatly deteriorated; he has fallen to become a 1st-phase seeker]

[Ken Dusker’s Life force has been exhausted.]

[His soul has been severely wounded.]

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