DEMON KING'S Love Redemption

Chapter 35

The air within the Chamber of Divine Exile froze instantly—not from the touch of ice magic, but from an existential pressure so heavy the very laws of physics seemed to surrender. The Abyssal Chimera, a beast meant to be the absolute pinnacle of terror in this artificial dimension, abruptly silenced its roar. Its fangs, dripping with corrosive venom, were mere inches from Freya’s throat, yet the creature remained frozen, as if every nerve had been severed by the will of the universe itself.

Freya van Aethelgard gasped for breath. Her lungs felt as though they were filled with shards of glass. She looked into the Chimera’s lion eyes and found something impossible: pure, unadulterated terror. The monster from the depths of the Abyss was trembling violently, its massive muscles twitching as they struggled against an invisible authority crushing it into the earth.

Then, a footstep rang out.

Tap.

The sound was soft, yet the echo it cast across the stone floor of the hall sounded like the tolling of a death knell. Vann stepped forward from the shadows of a shattered pillar. He no longer slouched. He no longer wore the expression of the awkward teenager who haunted the academy’s corridors. His back was straight, unyielding as a mountain ridge, and his head was held with a grace reserved only for those who had once sat upon the highest of thrones.

The aura of darkness overflowing from Vann’s body was no longer a mere mist. The energy was so dense it looked like black oil seeping through the pores of reality. The violet light from the dimension’s fractured sky seemed to be sucked toward him, making Vann the single darkest point in the entire room.

"Enough," Vann whispered.

The voice was gentle, yet Freya felt as if her eardrums had been struck by thunder. The entire room shuddered. New cracks spiderwebbed across the hall’s giant pillars, not from a physical strike, but because the atmosphere around Vann had become too dense for the matter of this dimension to withstand.

Vann stepped directly beside Freya. He didn't even glance at her, yet she felt a paradoxical wave of heat and cold wash over her. Vann’s eyes... those usually calm, dark eyes were gone, replaced by thick, glowing rings of deep crimson. His vertical pupils fixed upon the Chimera as if the creature were nothing more than a speck of dust marring the view.

GRAAAA—!

The Chimera’s snake head attempted a desperate strike, but before its fangs could even extend, Vann merely glanced at it.

Brak!

Without a single hand movement, without a word of an incantation, an overwhelming gravitational pressure slammed the snake’s head into the marble floor. The sound of shattering bone echoed sickeningly through the silence. The stone floor fractured into a perfect crater half a meter deep, triggered by nothing more than Vann’s gaze.

"I told you to be silent," Vann said coldly.

The wordless dominance was suffocating. Freya watched with her own eyes as the Abyssal Chimera—a disaster-level predator—began to whimper like a frightened dog. The creature tried to crawl backward, but every time it attempted to move a muscle, Vann’s mana pressure intensified, forcing it to remain prostrate before its King.

Vann slowly raised his right hand. His slender fingers moved with a lethal rhythm. "You are nothing more than a residue of mana, forced into existence by the filthy hands of men. Return to the void."

Vann snapped his fingers.

Snap.

A silent explosion occurred. The Chimera’s body did not burst outward; instead, it was compressed. The air around the monster warped toward a single central point. In the blink of an eye, the five-meter-tall beast twisted, its bones pulverized and its flesh wrung out, until it vanished completely into a micro-black hole that appeared and vanished in a millisecond.

Silence. Absolute silence. There were no remains, not even a single drop of blood left behind. The hall was suddenly empty, as if the Chimera had never existed in the first place. Only the crater in the marble floor stood as a silent witness to the terrifying power just unleashed.

Vann let out a long breath. His black aura slowly receded, pulled back into his heart, though the pressure in the room did not fully dissipate. He turned, looking down at Freya, who remained frozen on the floor.

"Lady Freya," Vann called. His voice had softened once more, yet a remnant of authority still vibrated within it.

Freya did not answer. She could only stare at Vann with eyes full of horror and disbelief. "You... who are you really, Vann? That power... it isn't human magic. It isn't something that can be learned at this academy."

Vann offered no reply. He looked at the jagged wound on Freya’s shoulder that continued to bleed, and noticed her face growing paler as her mana was depleted. Ignoring her apprehension, Vann stepped closer and knelt before her.

"Stay back!" Freya cried out, trying to raise her broken bow, but her arm went limp. "That aura... it’s the same as the demon that killed my family in my dreams! Tell me, Vann! Are you the same monster?!"

Vann paused. His heart felt as though it were being pierced by a thousand needles hearing the word "monster" from the mouth of the woman he had loved across time. He looked at Freya’s wound, which was beginning to blacken—a sign that the Chimera’s venom was spreading. If he didn't act now, she would be dead within minutes.

"You can hate me after this, Lady Freya," Vann whispered hoarsely. "But for now, let me save you."

Vann took Freya’s trembling hand. She tried to pull away, but Vann’s touch was paradoxically cold yet soothing. Vann closed his eyes. He began to summon his dark mana once more.

A thick black smoke began to pour from Vann’s palm, enveloping the wound on Freya’s shoulder. Freya flinched, bracing herself for the burning agony typical of destructive dark magic. Instead, she felt the opposite.

Vann was performing a feat deemed impossible by any master of magic: the Soul-Corrupted Alchemy. He took the dark mana that formed the core of his soul—energy meant to destroy life—and forced it to vibrate at such a high frequency that its very structure shifted. Through absolute will, Vann transmuted "Death" into "Life."

The color of the black smoke shifted before Freya’s eyes. From deep purple, it turned to a bluish-silver, until finally, it radiated a pure, warm golden light. This energy did not come from the sun or the blessing of a god; it came from the very remnants of Vann’s own life force being pumped into Freya’s body.

The wound on Freya’s shoulder closed instantly. The black venom that had been creeping through her veins was drawn out, swallowed by Vann’s palm. Freya’s pale skin regained its color, and her empty mana circuits were suddenly flooded with energy so pure she felt as though she had just been reborn.

"You... you healed me with dark magic?" Freya whispered, her eyes wide as she stared at her own hands, which now emitted a golden glow. "How is it possible for darkness to grant life?"