SSS Ranked Shadow Monarch: Summoning Infinite Shadows-Chapter 258: Door

Aren kept moving forward, and not long after, he saw something take form inside the fog, a door. Its black metal surface blended with the fog, but the blood red glowing crystals at the center gave some light.

It was marked in a symmetrical manner, with exactly the same pattern on either side. It looked like an abstract drawing of an angel kneeling, both facing each other.

"We’ve found it," he muttered.

Athena walked to his side, her eyes lingered on the door, then she looked at Aren. "Do we go through?" she asked.

"Yeah, we should, but I have a few questions," he muttered and turned around, looking at the fog behind them. "What is the correlation of this place to what’s behind the door?"

"I find it hard to believe that these angels would make a trial that doesn’t function well, everything has at least had some sort of reliable connection," Aren said. He took a few steps away from the door.

"But this one, it had werewolves in a fog, where did the wolves even come from? What’s their connection to the Angel’s call trial?" Aren paused. He looked at the door for even longer, then all of a sudden he raised his hands and slashed, unleashing a claw strike.

It ripped through the air and hit the door, cutting deep into the metal, but the metal healed up almost instantly, and nothing happened.

"Hmmmm, I thought for sure something might happen," Aren said.

"What did you expect to happen?" Athena asked.

"I’m not sure myself," Aren replied. "I guess I’m overthinking things." He said and then approached the door. Athena followed behind. He placed his hand on the door and pushed it in, and instantly the door opened, and in that very moment, his shadow sense picked something coming from the door.

Very quickly, Aren pulled back, pushing Athena out of the way as well, as dark arms extended from the door. They were twisted and lean, looking like they had been sucked dry, their nails were extremely long.

Aren and Athena looked at the arms as they flailed around, trying to grab them, and when it couldn’t grab them, it started changing. The door shifted form, twisting and turning until what stood before them was a towering ten feet tall monster with four elongated yet muscular twisted arms, powerful humanoid legs that cracked the ground just from standing there, and an elongated tail.

At the center of this monster’s chest was the same crystal that had been on the door, it pulsed with energy as it slowly sunk under the skin of the chest. This monster didn’t have eyes, but there seemed to be two large holes on either side of the head, acting as ears.

"I should have believed my gut," Aren muttered as he looked at this monster.

He still had no idea what was happening here, but one thing was for sure, he needed to deal with whatever this was right now.

RAWRRRRR, the monster let out a thundering roar and then attacked, swinging its hands at Aren.

Aren pulled back fast and evaded the attack. He looked up at the monster and then rushed ahead. It punched from above, he moved to the side, evading the attack as the two fists slammed into the ground and cracked the floor.

’Its attacks seem pretty slow, I can handle that for sure,’ Aren thought. He scanned around with his eyes to attack, but then suddenly the monster twisted its body, swinging its hands backward at Aren so fast it moved like a whip.

Aren saw the attack coming, he pulled his hands up to block the attack.

BAM

Aren was thrown back through the air, gritting his teeth hard.

"Tch, it packs a punch."

He landed on his feet, skidding across the platform, dust rising as he moved.

"I can’t follow its movement like I normally would with shadow sense," Aren complained. He charged again, rushing ahead fast. He unleashed a claw strike.

The claw strike slashed into the monster, blood gushed out, black as night, but the wound healed instantly. It leaned forward and let out a roar, then charged at Aren.

Aren attacked with another claw strike, but this time the monster crossed its arms and somehow hardened them. The attack slammed into its crossed arms, it was pushed back but it didn’t cut through.

"It blocked," Aren said in shock, realizing that this monster was adapting to his attacks.

The monster dropped its hands and was about to attack again, but a force ripped through the air and slammed into the head of the monster, so hard that it shattered a huge chunk of its head.

The monster staggered to the ground, slamming hard.

Aren looked at Athena, she had unleashed her eyes of chaos, the two eyes pierced through space and had attacked the monster.

"Nice work," Aren said. She gave him a nod in return.

Aren looked to the monster again, it was self-healing, and was now rising from the ground again.

"I’m not allowing you to do that," Aren said. He stepped forward and his shadow domain spread, covering him, Athena, and the monster.

Inside the domain, shadow tendrils burst from the darkness, they wrapped around every limb of the monster and began pulling.

RAWWWWWWWWWWRRRRRR

It roared, filled with anger, trying to escape from the binds of the tendrils, but it couldn’t. Another tendril shot from the ground and wrapped around its neck.

"You are a pretty fascinating monster," Aren said, looking right at it.

"I think I want one of you." He finished, and then the shadows of the domain immediately started consuming the monster whole.

After it was done, Aren deactivated his domain, gaining a new shadow, and something else was there as well, another door, only this one was a normal wooden door with no crystals on it.

Aren looked at the door. "So I had to destroy the monster to get the door. Even then, I don’t understand what’s happening here."