Remarried Empress - Chapter 42: Iron Wall Defense (1)

A Lovecraft- inspired darker, grittier One piece fanfic. A fanfic based on emotion and madness. A fanfic not for the faint hearted.----------------Regret. I have been drowning in it for far too long. I’ve regretted every choice I’ve made, every mistake I’ve carried, every moment of my past. I’ve regretted the present I live, the path I walk. Even my future, uncertain as it may be, has been tainted by regret.But not anymore. I refuse to live under its shadow. Yet, I know the truth—I don’t have the power to escape it completely.Am I not like a flicker of flame? So fragile, so fleeting—one puff, and I’m gone.Regret has burdened me, weighed me down to make me climb the towering wall of greatness. But I press on.It was all I could do. All I ever wanted to do.

Ali Avery was a successful young man adored by everyone. But things were not as they were shown to the life. Shunned and betrayed by his peers... He was hiding among happy facades.

Zhou Peng accidentally travels through time, finding himself in a weakened and sickly body with a shattered dantian, unable to cultivate qigong. Fortunately, the heavens show mercy by bestowing upon him an upgrade system.A waste? That's all in the past...Leveling up by slaying monsters, effortless and hassle-free, he no longer has to worry about cultivating.Killing monsters grants upgrades, and so does killing people. In the eyes of others, the awe-inspiring and prestigious sect masters are nothing but shining golden bosses in his sight...With the ability to upgrade, who am I afraid of? When so-called geniuses encounter roadblocks and fail to breakthrough, all I need to do is slay a few more beastly demons. Of course, sect heads, sect masters, realm lords... are even better.For the sake of my path to divinity, offer up your lives!

Birth rates are decreasing. Hope is vanishing. The world has gone gray.Humanity, drifting in quiet collapse, receives an email.Every person on Earth. Simultaneously.The Aegis Mandate.Disguised as a cosmic aptitude test, it triggers The Incident of Separation—a global psychic cataclysm that erases identities, wipes memories, and divides all survivors into three factions: Law, Neutral, and Chaos. Overnight, cities become battlegrounds. Apartments become dungeons. Ordinary people become monsters—or the ones who hunt them.Ragnar Vhagar was just a loner university student. Now, thanks to a system he didn’t ask for, he’s a newly minted Demon King, locked in a crumbling apartment with goblins under his sofa and a glowing soul crystal next to his frozen peas. His new job? Build a deadly domain, defend it from invading “Heroes,” and somehow level up fast enough to not die.Alongside him is Isabelle Thorne, a razor-sharp warrior of few words and one very sharp sword. Their reluctant alliance, born in blood and snark, evolves into trust—and maybe something dangerously close to affection—as they rise together through the layers of the game-like world they’re trapped in.With each conquered domain and defeated boss, Ragnar realizes the truth: the dungeons aren’t meant to crown a winner. They’re meant to break the players. The Law faction wants control. The Chaos faction craves destruction. But Ragnar? He wants something they’re all too afraid to say out loud:Freedom.In the ruins of Kanta’s ogre stronghold, Ragnar and his misfit warband take their biggest step yet—claiming a kingdom, unifying a fractured system, and preparing for what comes next. The Heroes are watching. The gods are stirring. The world is watching a war.And somewhere deep beneath it all... Ragnar is rewriting the rules.