The SSS class adventurer is a divine cleric
Chapter 96: A voice like the abyss

Chapter 96: A voice like the abyss

The tyrant’s massive chest heaved, its feathers on the head bristling like daggers, like any bird ready to fight. Its claws flexed, gouging deep furrows into the stone beneath it. Every fiber of its being burned with the injustice of it.

This was the thief who had robbed it of its destiny?

This was the insect who dared claim what was rightfully its own?

Derek met its gaze, his own eyes still flickering with the fading embers of the fruit’s power.

And in that moment, the monster hated him not just for the theft, but for the audacity of thinking he could take what belonged to the strong.

The air between them crackled with impending violence.

It wanted to destroy him.

Utterly.

Back in the ruins.

The fight had settled into a rhythm.

The elephant-like monster lumbered forward, slow and massive. It couldn’t run. It couldn’t jump. But it didn’t need to.

Its hide was thick enough to ignore almost every attack and it only cared about Kaitlin.

She dodged again but barely. Her armor had taken most of the damage, but she was already breathing hard. A bone in her shoulder had cracked from the last hit. Her grip on the Crimson Maelstrom was still strong, though. She hadn’t backed down once.

Sairi barked commands from the side, while the other melee fighters kept the monster distracted from time to time, chipping away.

"It’s not slowing down," one of the gold-ranked rogues muttered. "That should’ve crushed its leg."

Another rogue nodded grimly. "It’s regenerating too fast. Even broken bones are reforming."

Then ’ping’.

Their crystals buzzed at once.

Kaelen’s voice, tight and urgent, came through: "Forest team is under pressure. Derek might not hold. We need help."

Sairi’s expression changed. Calm, but serious.

"Alright. Time to move. Team B, hold the line. Kaitlin, fallback. We’re answering the call."

The teleportation caster stepped forward, beginning the chant that would take her and five others to the forest team and just as Kaitlin turned to leave.

But before the spell could finish, the air cracked.

A low, guttural rumble shook the ruins, vibrating through the cracked stone and settling into the bones of everyone present. The air above them warped, shimmering like heat haze over a desert only this was no trick of the light. The space itself flexed, strained, as if reality were a thin pane of glass about to shatter.

Then came a pulse.

A wave of impossible darkness erupted from the monster’s body, spreading outward in a perfect, swallowing dome. The moment it touched them, the world changed.

Teleportation spells fizzled into nothing, their power snuffed out like candle flames in a storm. Communication crystals died mid-transmission, their soft hums cutting off into eerie silence. The very air felt heavier, thicker, as if the dome had sealed them inside a pocket of suffocating shadow.

"What’s going on?!".someone shouted, their voice edged with panic.

Sairi’s fingers tightened around her weapon, her instincts screaming. "Something is not right."

One of the rogues, a seasoned hunter who had faced death more times than he could count, paled. His voice was a hissed curse: "Shit. We’re locked in."

And then, the monster stopped pretending.

Its massive, elephantine features melted away, flesh dissolving like smoke caught in the wind. Its body contorted, bones cracking and reforming, muscles tightening into something leaner, deadlier. It didn’t shrink in power, It was refinement.

What stood before them now was a true nightmare.

A towering, 20-meter-tall humanoid monster, its frame sleek and sinuous, built for predation. Its skin was pitch black, absorbing the light like a void, and its mouth was a grotesque grin of jagged white fangs, each one longer than a man’s forearm. A thick, serpentine tail curled behind it, tipped with hooked claws that scraped against the stone with a sound like knives on bone.

But worst of all were its eyes.

Glowing red, slitted like a serpent’s, they swept over the group with unnerving intelligence, calculating and amused.

And then it spoke.

"So this is the best humanity has to offer?"

Its voice was deep, smooth, dripping with a calm, almost bored mockery. The kind of tone a god might use when looking down at ants.

The battlefield had gone still. No one moved. No one dared.

Because in that moment, they all realized the same, horrifying truth:

This was no mindless beast. This was something far worse. And it was laughing at them.

Its words rolled through the ruins like thunder, deep and laced with venomous amusement.

"Seventeen Gold Ranks. One Epic."

A pause.

"And yet... you all danced so nicely to my little act."

The words hung in the air, a taunt, a revelation, a death sentence.

Then, like puppets realizing their strings had been cut, the hunters tried to move.

But they couldn’t. And at this moment all of them understood they were screwed.

Muscles locked. Breath seized. Even their blood seemed to freeze in their veins as the monster’s true power unfurled like a mountain pressing down on them.

Its aura, once disguised as a mere peak Gold Rank, bloomed into something monstrous. The pressure crashed down upon them, not like a weight, but like the sky itself had descended to crush them where they stood.

Epic.

No worse than that is a full Epic rank domain.

This was no mere beast. This was a predator that had worn the skin of prey, luring tigers into its jaws by playing the pig. And now, the charade was over.

The monster stepped forward.

Each footfall shook the earth, a slow, deliberate drumbeat of approaching doom. The ground trembled beneath its clawed feet, cracks spiderwebbing outward with every step.

Its jagged maw split wider, a grotesque mockery of a smile.

"Did you really think brute force would work on me?" it sneered, voice dripping with contempt.

The hunters strained, some to attack, some to flee, yet all in vain. Their weapons felt like lead in their hands. Their spells died before they could form.

The monster’s crimson eyes gleamed with ancient power and cruelty.

"You’ve fought more like beasts than I," it mused, tail flicking lazily, as if already bored. "No elegance. No cunningness. Just mindless savagery."

A chuckle, low and rasping, like bones grinding together.

"And you call yourselves the smartest beings?"

Its laughter echoed through the ruins, a sound that promised no mercy, only slaughter.

"How... laughable."