Chapter 52

Chapter 52: Chapter 52

"Being angry and a new transformation won’t change the outcome," Vegeta said, forcing confidence into his voice despite the pain radiating through his body.

Shadows gathered around him, coiling like serpents ready to strike. "You think rage makes you stronger? I’ve seen it a thousand times. Berserker monsters who think fury equals power."

He formed two massive shadow blades in his hands, the dark weapons crackling with energy. "They all die the same way. Exhausted. Broken. Begging."

Satou didn’t respond. Didn’t move. Didn’t even blink. He simply stood there, his body radiating that terrible crimson aura, his breathing steady despite the transformation ravaging his body.

"Not talking anymore?" Vegeta sneered, taking a combat stance. "Good. I prefer my victims silent anyway. Makes it easier to focus on the killing."

He launched forward, shadow blades raised, moving with the enhanced speed that had made him legendary among heroes. The attack was perfect, honed through years of killing, aimed to decapitate in one clean strike.

Satou moved.

BOOM!

The sound wasn’t from impact. It was from Satou’s leg muscles releasing so much force so quickly that the air itself exploded.

The ground beneath his foot shattered, a crater forming from the sheer pressure. His leg twisted at an unnatural angle, the femur snapping like a twig, the knee joint dislocating, muscles tearing from bone.

But before the damage could even register, his Regeneration kicked in at a thousand percent boost. Bones fused back together in milliseconds. Torn muscle knitted itself whole. Cartilage reformed. By the time his foot left the ground, the leg was already healed completely.

Vegeta’s eyes widened. Satou had crossed fifteen feet in less than a heartbeat, moving so fast that even Vegeta’s enhanced hero perception barely registered it.

Satou’s fist drove toward Vegeta’s chest.

Vegeta managed to raise both shadow blades to block, crossing them in front of his body. "Not this time!"

The fist connected.

BOOM!

The impact sounded like a bomb detonating. The shadow blades, which had withstood attacks from demon dukes, shattered like glass. Fragments of darkness exploded outward before dissipating into nothingness.

The force transferred through the broken weapons into Vegeta’s arms. He felt bones crack—radius and ulna in his left arm, the humerus in his right. The impact lifted him off his feet and launched him backward like a cannonball.

His body crashed through what remained of an earth-built storehouse, the walls exploding outward. He tumbled through two more structures, each impact sending shockwaves of agony through his broken arms, before finally slamming into the ground and rolling to a stop.

Satou’s right hand hung at his side, every bone from wrist to fingertips shattered into fragments. The knuckles were pulverized, the metacarpals splintered, the fingers bent at impossible angles. Blood dripped from torn skin.

The hand healed in three seconds. Bones popped back into place with audible cracks. Skin regenerated, smooth and unmarred. The damage was erased as if it had never existed.

And Satou began walking forward.

Not running. Walking. Steady. Methodical. Inevitable. Like death itself given form.

Each footstep was perfectly measured. Each movement economical. There was no wasted motion, no hesitation. Just single-minded purpose advancing toward its target.

Vegeta struggled to his feet, coughing blood. His arms throbbed with pain, but they were already healing thanks to his Hero’s Blessing. Not as fast as Satou’s regeneration, but fast enough. "What the hell kind of skill is that? That regeneration isn’t normal! Even demon lords don’t heal that fast!"

Satou continued walking, saying nothing. His eyes were blank, empty of everything except rage. He wasn’t thinking. Wasn’t strategizing. Wasn’t even truly seeing Vegeta as a person anymore.

There was only the target. Only the enemy who needed to die.

"Fine!" Vegeta snarled, shadows exploding around him in a defensive sphere. "Let’s see how you handle this! Shadow Prison!"

He thrust both hands toward the ground. Shadows exploded from every direction, converging on Satou from all sides. Dozens of tendrils, each one as thick as a man’s torso and capable of crushing steel, wrapped around Satou’s arms, legs, torso, neck.

The shadows tightened like constrictors, layering over each other until Satou was completely encased in darkness. More shadows rose from the ground, forming a cage around the bound figure.

"You’re strong, I’ll give you that," Vegeta said, breathing hard, blood still dripping from his mouth. "Stronger than anyone I’ve fought in years. But strength alone won’t save you from being torn apart!"

He clenched his fists, and the shadow tendrils began pulling in different directions. This technique had once ripped a demon duke in half, torn limb from limb by overwhelming force applied from multiple angles. Vegeta had never seen anyone survive it.

The shadows strained. Pulled. Tightened.

Satou’s muscles bulged beneath the bindings. The Orc’s Might skill, amplified five-fold by Devourer’s Wrath, flooded through him like molten steel. Power that exceeded the physical limitations of his body, strength that should have torn him apart from the inside just by existing.

He pulled his arms apart.

The shadow tendrils stretched. Then stretched more. Their material integrity beginning to fail.

"What?!" Vegeta’s eyes went wide. "That’s impossible! Nothing can break through Shadow Prison!"

SNAP!

The first tendril broke. Then another. Then three at once.

Satou ripped through the remaining tendrils like they were spider webs. His skin tore where the shadows had gripped tightest, deep lacerations opening from shoulder to wrist, from thigh to ankle.

Blood poured from dozens of cuts. His left arm dislocated from the strain of pulling against the bindings, the shoulder joint separating with an audible pop.

The wounds sealed within seconds. The blood flow stopped. The arm popped back into place with a meaty thunk.

And Satou took another step forward.

"No, no, no!" Vegeta backpedaled, shadows gathering around him desperately. "Stay back! Shadow Spike Forest!"

The ground between them erupted. Hundreds of shadow constructs, each shaped like a massive spike ten feet tall, burst upward in rapid succession, creating a forest of deadly points aimed directly at Satou.

Satou walked into them without slowing.

The first spike impaled him through the abdomen, bursting out his back in a spray of blood. The second pierced his thigh. A third drove through his shoulder. More struck his chest, his arms, his legs.

Within seconds, Satou’s body was a pincushion of shadow spikes, held aloft by the constructs piercing him, blood running down each spike in rivulets.

"Finally," Vegeta gasped, relief flooding through him. "Even a monster can’t survive—"

Satou’s hand moved.

He grabbed the spike piercing his chest and pulled it out. The shadow construct dissipated the moment it left his body, the hole it had created already beginning to close.

"What?!" Vegeta’s voice cracked with disbelief.

Satou pulled out another spike. Then another. His body healed each wound instantly, the regeneration so fast that by the time a spike was fully removed, the entry and exit wounds were already sealed.

He walked forward, casually removing spikes as they impaled him, like someone walking through hanging vines and brushing them aside.

Vegeta stumbled backward, his earlier confidence completely shattered. "This isn’t possible. You’re not possible!"

BOOM!

Satou moved again, his explosive movement shattering both legs this time. The right tibia snapped in three places, the left femur fractured completely, his ankles shattered from the force.

They healed before he landed.

His fist caught Vegeta in the side of the head.

BOOM!

The impact sent Vegeta spinning through the air like a top. He saw the world tumble around him—sky, ground, sky, ground—before crashing face-first into the earth hard enough to leave an imprint of his features in the dirt.

He rolled to his feet, spitting blood and teeth. His jaw was broken, hanging at an angle. He pushed it back into place with both hands, feeling it reluctantly knit back together.

"Alright, you want to play rough?" Vegeta snarled, though the sound was distorted by his healing jaw. "Let’s play rough! Shadow Clone Massacre!"

His shadow split. Then split again. And again. Within seconds, there were fifty Vegetas surrounding Satou, all of them solid, all of them real enough to attack.

"Each one can kill you!" Vegeta’s voice echoed from every direction. "Let’s see you handle this!"

All fifty clones attacked simultaneously from every direction. Shadow blades, shadow spears, shadow fists. An omnidirectional assault with no gaps, no safe zones, no escape routes.

Satou didn’t try to dodge.

He moved forward and punched the nearest clone.

BOOM!

The clone exploded into shadows. But so did Satou’s arm, every bone from shoulder to fingertip shattering from the force of his own punch.

It healed.

He punched another clone. BOOM! His other arm shattered. Healed.

A clone stabbed him from behind with a shadow spear. The weapon emerged from his chest. He reached back, grabbed the clone by the head, and crushed its skull. His ribs broke from the spear piercing them. Healed.

Another clone came from the left. Satou kicked it, his leg breaking in four places from the force. BOOM! The clone dissipated. His leg healed.