Dungeon Corpse Stacker: I Absorb Everything to Become Ominous Monarch
Chapter 23: The Harvest of the Pillars

Chapter 23: Chapter 23: The Harvest of the Pillars

The air inside the smoldering crater of Border Sector 0 smelled of ozone, scorched mithril, and boiling blood.

Overhead, the hundred-mile dome of dark violet shadow clouds crackled with silent lightning. The rainy wind had died down, replaced by a suffocating, static-heavy hush that hung low over the pulverized ruins of the Capital Iron Wall.

At the center of the thirty-foot-deep crater, three men lay pinned beneath the weight of Renan’s passive aura.

Commander Thorne’s twelve-foot adamantine frame had shrunken back to human proportions, his obsidian armor cracked into thousands of sharp, bleeding pieces. Beside him, Archmage Zephyr gasped for air through a crushed throat, his cracked dragon-core staff lying dead and grey in the mud. Shadowblade Ren thrashed weakly, his shadow mana leaking from his severed veins like black oil.

Renan stood over them, his sleek combat coat swaying in the heat draft. His dark purple pupils glowed like twin stars in the pitch-black crater.

"You called yourselves the pillars of this nation," Renan said softly, his voice echoing through the minds of the dying Hunters. "You believed your titles made you immovable."

"R-Renan..." Thorne wheezed, blood bubbling over his lips as he looked up with eyes wide with unadulterated terror. "The... the World Council... will authorize a Global Calamity Strike... you can’t... withstand the whole world..."

Renan raised both palms into the open air above them.

"Let the world bring its suns," Renan whispered.

[Target: 3 National-Level Hunters (Thorne, Zephyr, Ren) Detected.] [Initiating Forced Mass Extraction...]

THRUSSH-THRUSSH-THRUSSH!

Three massive, pitch-black shadow spears erupted directly from Renan’s palms, impaling the chests of the Three Pillars simultaneously.

"GAAAAAAAH!"

A synchronized, blood-curdling shriek tore from the throats of the nation’s top three defenders. The shriek amplified through the concrete crater, echoing across the outer district skyline and cutting directly into the live audio feeds of four hovering military drones.

The extraction was violent, absolute, and merciless.

Thorne’s massive physical muscle density was stripped away in seconds, his bones clicking and condensing into thin, withered parchment. Zephyr’s high-grade elemental mana circuits were violently torn from his soul, pouring into Renan’s right palm in a roaring river of blue-gold energy. Shadowblade Ren’s speed and shadow affinity drained into Renan’s left palm like dark crimson ink.

Their hair turned white, their skin hardened into pale ash, and their eyes turned into hollow, empty sockets.

DING! DING! DING! DING!

A cascade of golden-crimson system notifications flared across Renan’s vision, illuminating the pitch-black crater in a blinding crimson light.

[Forced Extraction Successful!] [Target: National-Level Hunter - Commander Thorne Extracted!] [Attributes Extracted: Strength +450 / Vitality +520 / Skill Acquired: Titan’s Undying Domain (Rank-S)]

[Target: National-Level Hunter - Archmage Zephyr Extracted!] [Attributes Extracted: Mana +680 / Perception +310 / Skill Acquired: Meteor Cataclysm (Rank-EX)]

[Target: National-Level Hunter - Shadowblade Ren Extracted!] [Attributes Extracted: Agility +490 / Stealth +380 / Skill Acquired: Dimensional Shadow Step (Rank-S)]

CRUMBLE!

The bodies of the Three Pillars of the Nation collapsed into fine gray dust. The hot wind caught their remains, scattering the ash across the ruined asphalt of Border Sector 0.

Renan closed his eyes, taking a deep, long breath as the massive tidal wave of National-Level attributes surged through his core.

His heart beat with a thunderous, metallic rhythm that vibrated the ground thirty yards around him. His skeletal structure re-aligned, his muscle fibers weaving together with a density that completely transcended terrestrial biology. The passive dark violet aura surrounding his skin condensed into a sharp, diamond-like sheen.

DING!

[HOST ATTRIBUTES UPDATED:]

Strength: 5,730

Agility: 5,370

Vitality: 5,880

Mana: 10,480

Over ten thousand units of raw, unadulterated mana.

Renan opened his eyes. The glowing purple hue in his pupils had deepened into an absolute, dark violet void that seemed to swallow the light around him.

He flexed his fingers. With a simple twitch of his hand, space around his knuckles warped, creating tiny localized vacuums in the air.

FWHOOSH!

Behind him, Shadow General Ignis stepped down into the crater, dropping onto one knee beside three newly formed shadow silhouettes.

From the ash piles of the Three Pillars, three towering dark figures materialized:

Shadow Commander Thorne: A ten-foot titan shadow holding a fractured obsidian shield.

Shadow Commander Zephyr: A floating shadow archmage draped in dark robes woven with blue lightning.

Shadow Commander Ren: A razor-thin shadow assassin holding two liquid-black kusanagi blades.

Along with Ignis and the two thousand eight hundred Shadow Knights, Renan’s army now possessed four S-Rank and National-Level Shadow Commanders.

"My Sovereign," Ignis boomed, bowing its horned dragon visor. "Border Sector 0 is completely secured. The surviving six thousand Association guards have fled into the inner city grid."

Renan looked south down the deserted, eight-lane highway leading directly into the heart of the Capital’s financial and government district.

Ten miles away, the hundred-story glass spire of the National Hunter Association Headquarters glowed like a giant needle under the artificial city lights.

"Ignis," Renan said softly, his voice carrying across the dark crater.

"Command us, my Sovereign."

"March."

Meanwhile, ten miles away inside the Emergency War Room on the 100th floor of the Association Headquarters.

The room was in total, unmitigated chaos.

Printers were screaming with red security alerts. High-ranking military generals were screaming into satellite phones, demanding air support from foreign allies. Politicians were frantically signing asset transfer documents, trying to wire billions of credits to offshore accounts before the communication lines collapsed.

President William sat at the head of the conference table, his face drained of all color, his trembling hands holding a glass of amber whiskey that he couldn’t bring himself to drink.

On the massive holographic screen before him, the thermal satellite feed showed the nightmare unfolding in real-time.

The Capital Iron Wall was gone—reduced to a three-mile line of burning debris.

And walking through the gap, moving at a steady, unyielding march of thirty miles per hour, was an army of two thousand eight hundred black-armored shadow soldiers. At their head walked the young man in the black combat coat, flanked by four National-Level shadow entities.

"Mr. President!" a panicked cabinet minister shrieked, slamming his palms onto the table. "The Northern and Western Regional Coalitions have formally surrendered! They are refusing to send reinforcement divisions! They’ve locked their provincial borders!"

"The World Hunter Council in Geneva just issued a statement!" another officer yelled. "They are refusing to intervene with orbital strikes while two million civilians remain inside the Capital district!"

President William slowly set his glass down on the mahogany table.

He looked at his personal terminal screen. On it was a file opened ten minutes ago—a file he had hoped never to touch in his thirty-year career.

[PROJECT ZERO: SUBTERRANEAN GATE CORE OVERDRIVE]

"Mr. President...?" the cabinet minister asked, noticing William’s cold, blank stare. "What are you looking at...?"

William’s lips curled into a bitter, manic smile. His eyes were bloodshot, completely devoid of sanity.

"If he wants the Capital," William whispered, his voice trembling with dark desperation, "I will give him a tomb."

William pressed his thumb onto the biometric scanner of the terminal screen.

BEEP.

[AUTHORIZATION CONFIRMED: PRESIDENT WILLIAM] [SUBTERRANEAN CLASS-SS GATE CORE UNLOCKED] [WARNING: INITIATING MANUAL GATE BREAKOUT IN SECTOR 0 PLAZA]

RUMBLE-RUMBLE-RUMBLE!

A violent earthquake struck the entire Capital City.

The hundred-story Association Headquarters building swayed three feet to the left. Across the grand marble plaza directly in front of the building, the concrete street split open in a three-hundred-yard fissure.

From deep beneath the earth, a blinding column of sickly, crimson mana erupted five thousand feet into the sky.

The ancient, sealed Class-SS Subterranean Gate—a gate kept dormant for fifty years by the Association as a secret energy source—was forcibly detonated from the inside.

ROAAAAAAAAR!

A deafening, apocalyptic roar echoed from the subterranean abyss, shaking the glass windows of every skyscraper within twenty miles.

Emerging from the crimson fissure was a creature ninety feet tall—a colossal, six-armed skeletal behemoth wrapped in hellfire and black scales: The Abyssal Calamity King (Class-SS Boss).

Behind it, pouring out of the fissure like an unstoppable river of red flesh, were tens of thousands of Tier-S high-grade abyssal beasts.

President William stood up from his chair, laughing hysterically as he stared at the holographic feed of the monster army flooding the plaza outside.

"LAUGH NOW, RENAN!" William screamed at the screen, tears of madness streaming down his face. "TRY EXTRACTING A CLASS-SS CALAMITY BOSS! WE WILL ALL BURN TOGETHER!"

Two miles away from the grand plaza.

Renan stopped at the crest of an elevated highway overpass, looking down at the thousand-foot column of crimson light erupting from the city center.

The hot wind carried the stench of sulfur, ancient blood, and thousands of abyssal beasts flooding the concrete avenues ahead.

Behind Renan, Shadow General Ignis and the three Shadow Commanders drew their weapons, their crimson visors burning bright.

"My Sovereign," Ignis boomed, stepping forward. "A Class-SS gate breakout has been manually triggered. Over thirty thousand high-grade monsters are flooding the central district."

Renan looked at the ninety-foot skeletal behemoth roaring atop the Association plaza.

Instead of anger, instead of shock, Renan’s dark purple eyes widened slightly—before a cold, magnificent smile spread across his face.

"Thirty thousand carcasses..." Renan whispered softly, his voice cut with absolute, predatory delight. "And a Class-SS Calamity soul."

Renan reached into his coat pocket, pulling out his hand and extending his fingers toward the grand plaza.

[Skill Activated: Monarch’s Domain (Rank-S - Maximum Expansion)] [Domain Area Established: Entire Capital City!] [30,000 Abyssal Beasts Detected.]

"Ignis," Renan commanded, his dark combat coat billowing in the red wind.

"Yes, my Sovereign?!"

"Tell the army to hold back," Renan said, stepping off the edge of the elevated overpass, floating weightlessly in mid-air on his 10,480 Mana pressure.

"This feast is mine."