Dirga narrowed his eyes, muscles tensed.
The black head of the Cerberus snarled low, pawing at its bruised jaw — where Dirga’s hammer had connected with a crunch that would’ve shattered most monsters.
But it was also angry.
With a growl that split the air, the Cerberus began to charge again. Its three heads bared their fangs in sync, saliva hissing on the ground like acid. Every step thundered across the arena — the sheer weight of it shaking the floor like a coming quake.
He shifted his stance, breath sharp.
He extended his hand and pulled.
The air around the beast bent.
The center of gravity Dirga created — just beneath the monster’s chest — collapsed inward like a tiny star.
The ground buckled under Cerberus’s weight. All that forward momentum — speed, mass, rage — was yanked downward like a meteor being sucked into a well.
The impact was cataclysmic. A shockwave erupted, sending dust and chunks of stone flying outward. The earth groaned and split as the Cerberus slammed into it with its full colossal weight, body crushed into its own force.
Dirga staggered from the recoil, his eyes blazing.
He clenched his jaw, hands trembling as he held the gravitational pull.
This is it. End it now.
But then — he felt it.
They had arrived — like shadows in pain’s wake.
Dirga’s body twitched as the first bite seared into his side like liquid fire. The second tore through his collarbone. The third dug into his thigh.
It was like being stabbed with needles dipped in molten acid. His body spasmed, breath stolen. His vision blurred — not from exhaustion, but from the sheer sensory overload.
"GRAAAAHHHH!" Dirga’s roar echoed across the arena — a sound torn between fury and pain.
Still — he didn’t stop.
The Cerberus writhed in the gravity trap, bones cracking, claws scrambling for grip — but Dirga held.
Even as the fourth bite lanced through his ribs, the fifth into his forearm, the sixth into the base of his neck — he held.
Every heartbeat was a hammer strike in his veins.
Every breath — a blade across his lungs.
But then—something snapped.
A sudden jerk in his limbs — the power slipped.
The Crimson Core flared in his palm, but his mind — overwhelmed by pain — could no longer focus. His grip on the gravity wavered.
The Cerberus roared and shoved upward, breaking free. Its massive frame sagged, blood dripping from the crushed impact points — but it wasn’t dead.
Dirga fell to one knee, teeth clenched, body slick with sweat and blood.
He ripped the mosquitoes from his skin one by one, crushing them mid-air with flicks of his telekinesis — each pop of death a burst of fury.
He panted, chest rising and falling like a furnace.
But even through the pain...
Because Cerberus was hurt.
And that meant Dirga had a chance.
At least — that’s what he thought.
Until the beast growled, low and guttural.
The ground trembled again — but not from its steps.
Each of its three heads lit up — red, blue, and black — pulsing with energy. Fire. Ice. Shadow.
And then — with a burst of light like a hellgate rupturing — they split.
The Cerberus didn’t just channel the elements.
And now... it had spawned them.
Three new beasts stepped forward — hulking, familiar... but different.
These were not the hounds Dirga fought in Round One.
These were their evolved forms.
The red hound’s breath shimmered like molten steel.
The blue’s body was coated in spiked ice armor.
The black melted into the shadows like a living nightmare.
Dirga’s eyes widened. "Sasa... you bastard. This was your plan all along."
There was no answer from the devil. Only silence and danger.
The three hounds charged.
In an instant, he dropped into a wide stance and slammed his palms together.
A shockwave of telekinetic force erupted from Dirga’s body — invisible, but deafening.
Like a mine detonating point-blank.
The entire arena shuddered.
The three hounds were blasted back, flung like broken dolls, colliding into the stone walls with thunderous impact — cracks spiderwebbing across the pillars of this infernal place.
Dirga stood amidst the dust, his chest rising and falling like a war drum.
Blood traced rivulets down his ribs, sweat soaked through his shirt. But his eyes... they burned.
But he needed Cerberus to become one again.
"Maybe if I wound them..." he muttered, breathless, "they’ll fuse back."
Right on cue, the red and blue hounds began to merge — their bodies glowing, spiraling into one. A beast of twin fury — flames and frost united.
But the black one? It dove into the arena’s shadow like a predator slipping beneath dark water. Gone from sight. But not gone.
The red-blue fusion reared back, their twin heads drawing a breath — and exhaled.
A beam surged forward — purple, unstable, a hellish fusion of fire and ice.
Shadow tendrils snapped up from beneath him — binding his legs like iron manacles.
From below, eyes gleamed in the floor’s reflection.
The black hound. The ambusher.
"Shit—" Dirga hissed.
The Crimson Core shifted, warping in his hand with a hiss of living metal — becoming a broad tower shield.
He slammed it down in front of him.
The twin-breath struck.
The shield trembled violently — buzzing, screaming, vibrating with searing heat and icy burn. Flames licked around its edges; ice cracked along its face. It was too hot. Too cold.
Dirga roared, voice raw —
The impact pushed him back, but his feet stayed locked to the ground — held there not by strength alone, but by will and telekinetic anchors.
A blur from beneath — the black hound surfaced for a finishing blow, its massive jaws snapping open beneath him.
Dirga’s shield morphed again — shifting into a brutal spiked slab.
He slammed it down like a guillotine — directly onto the rising skull.
Blood geysered from the crushed snout, the black hound’s body going limp, melting back into shadow.
Only the fused hound remained now — and it howled, both heads shrieking into the sky with fury and grief.
Dirga, panting, didn’t hesitate.
The shield morphed once more — this time, into bandages.
They wrapped tightly around his right arm like living tendrils — stitching themselves into place.
The bandage snaked outward, wrapping around the monstrous Cerberus in a whip-like coil — binding its limbs, pulling it toward him.
The Cerberus resisted, claws tearing into the arena floor, but Dirga’s eyes narrowed.
He shifted his stance.
And shifted the center of his gravity into his fist.
"Punch Style: Collapsing One Point," he whispered.
With a roar, Dirga pulled.
The beast hurtled forward — sucked into a singularity of force centered in Dirga’s waiting fist.
The air turned to glass and shattered.
The gravity field sucked in everything nearby — stone, fire, blood, heat — and then—
And Cerberus was gone.
Ash. Vapor. Nothing remained.
Only Dirga, panting, his right hand trembling slightly as the Crimson Core returned to its default form — a warm, silent dice in his palm.