Alucard stood amidst the fading remnants of the abomination he had slain. Its decay left no corpse, no blood—only a foul presence that clung to the air like the stench of something rotten and ancient. Shadows still curled at the edges of the ruined village, as if reality itself had been damaged by the monster's existence. The wind had ceased. Even the crows and vermin had fled.
He sheathed his blade slowly, his mind racing.
That thing... it was not from this world.
Not even from this plane.
Alucard had encountered many horrors during his reign as Demon King—undead behemoths, cursed spirits, even ancient dragons—but never anything like this. It hadn't bled, hadn't moved in any pattern he could read. Its form had changed with every glance, as if the mind couldn't truly comprehend it.
He knelt, pressing a hand to the ground where it had fallen. The stone was scorched, but not by fire—it was something else, something alien. The edges of the impact crater shimmered faintly, distorting light like a heat haze.
It warped reality just by existing.
Alucard had only read about such creatures in forbidden tomes locked deep beneath his palace's old archives—grimoires penned by mad prophets and heretical mages. They spoke of things that should not be. Entities from beyond the known cosmos. Beings not bound by time, space, or mortality.
Eldritch. Abysmal. Outerborn.
There were many names, but they all pointed to one truth: these things were intrusions into the world, mistakes in creation that slipped through cracks in reality. And they brought madness wherever they went.
Alucard rose, his crimson eyes glowing with newfound resolve. This was no random occurrence. The markings in the village, the pull of distorted mana, and now this creature—it was a pattern. A summons. Someone, or something, had intentionally brought this abomination into the world.
And he had a sinking suspicion who.
The Demon Queen.
It all made sense—the accelerated growth of her power, the unnatural aura that tainted the mana flowing across the continent, the strange war tactics that no longer resembled demonic strategy. She was delving into things no mortal or demon should.
He remembered something the ancient demon in the forest had said: "Her strength feels... wrong. As if it was borrowed from a place no soul should touch."
The signs had been there. He had ignored them.
Not anymore.
Alucard turned away from the village and began walking. The horizon burned with the setting sun, casting long shadows that stretched like claws across the ruined land. But he didn't look back.
In the days that followed, he passed through more forgotten settlements—many of them completely collapsed, not due to war, but something else. People hadn't just been killed. They had vanished. Erased. As if reality had rewritten itself and removed them.
In one town, he found a diary nailed to a shattered wall, still intact despite the decay.
"We heard the song again last night. It came from the well. The children said the shadows were talking. Then Maren disappeared. She was screaming, but her mouth was sewn shut. Gods, what have we done?"
He closed the diary and burned it.
There was no doubt anymore.
The Eldritch were leaking into the world. Slowly, subtly. But they were coming.
The Demon Queen was no longer just a ruler seeking to crush the humans. She had become something more dangerous—someone who believed she could control the uncontrollable. But such power always came with a price. One that would not be paid by her alone.
The world itself would suffer.
And Alucard? He had seen enough of war and ruin. But this... this was different. This was an infection spreading across the fabric of reality.
If I don't stop her... no one will.
Still, a question gnawed at the back of his mind.
Why?
Why would she turn to such madness? Did she seek destruction? Or was she trying to protect her people in the only way she believed possible? Was it desperation? Power-lust? Or something else?
Alucard's thoughts were interrupted by a change in the wind.
He looked up to see a massive spire rising in the distance. Jagged obsidian towers gleamed like glass against the crimson twilight. He had arrived.
The Demon Capital—Noctis Regnum.
But before he entered the heart of demon civilization, he knew he needed answers. Not from spies or scouts—but from the source.
He needed to confront the one being who might understand what the Demon Queen was tampering with.
A forgotten god.
One of the Old Ones.
And they dwelled not in castles or cities—but in the Wound, the place where reality itself bled.
But first, he would rest. Prepare. Reflect.
Because the deeper he ventured into the truth behind this war, the more he realized...
This wasn't just a battle between humans and demons anymore.
This was a battle for existence itself.