Awakening Domination System: But I'm a Slave?-Chapter 345: Don’t Resist

Alaric blinked.

The cave was gone. In its place stretched a deep void... saturated with crimson.

"What?" He spun, boots silent on nothing. "What just—"

"Listen to me."

The voice cut through the void like a blade.

Alaric’s head jerked toward the sound.

Brandon stood twenty feet away, but not the way he’d appeared before. Chains wound around him, biting into wrists and forearms, coiling around his torso like iron serpents.

Yet his eyes burned.

"Give up your control of the body." Brandon’s voice was steel. "Now."

Alaric stared. "What are you saying—?"

"If you don’t want to die, do what I say. Don’t resist when I try to take over."

"But—"

Then the reality itself began fracturing, splintering like glass under a hammer.

"I don’t have much time!" Brandon yanked against the chains.

Then the world shattered.

Alaric gasped as the void exploded into fragments and the cave came back into existence.

And the claw descending toward his skull.

Then something hooked into him.

Not his body. Deeper. It sank into whatever made him him, dragging at his essence.

Alaric’s spine went rigid. Every nerve fired at once, screaming at him to fight, to resist, to hold on to himself with everything he had—

Then...

Brandon’s voice echoed in the space behind his thoughts.

"Don’t resist."

Alaric forced his muscles to unclench.

The sensation grew teeth. His consciousness tumbled down, while something else surged past him going the other direction. Taking the space he’d left behind.

And just as the claw was about to crush his head.

Alaric vanished.

The creature’s talon struck stone instead, and the impact cracked through the cavern.

Rock exploded into powder and shards. A crater appeared where Alaric’s head had been, edges still smoking from the force.

The creature’s golden eyes widened. It stared at the empty air.

Then something made it tense.

It spun with speed that defied its bulk.

Ten feet behind it, Alaric stood in a loose stance. His head rolled left, right, vertebrae popping. His shoulders rotated, one after the other, working out stiffness that seemed to have settled into the very bones.

A thin line of crimson traced down from his temple, bright against pale skin.

He sighed.

"It’s been so long since I moved this body myself."

His eyes opened.

Crimson light spilled out, washing over the cavern walls in pulsing waves, like embers given a heartbeat.

Those eyes locked onto the creature.

"You’re an ugly bastard, aren’t you?" The words came from Alaric’s mouth, but the voice was different.

He raised his hand. Red lightning crackled to life around his fingers, crawling over knuckles like living thread.

The air hummed.

The light built, growing brighter, more intense, casting dancing shadows across stone.

Then suddenly... it flickered. Sputtered.

And finally died.

Alaric—Brandon’s eyes narrowed.

He clicked his tongue with frustration. "Tch. The body’s at its limit. Can’t even maintain basic techniques without—"

The creature roared and lunged at him. Claws extended like sword blades. Its mouth gaped wide, teeth gleaming wet in the dim light.

Brandon’s hand snapped through the air in a sharp gesture.

Flames began gathering in his palm.

To a sphere no larger than an apple.

He thrust his arm forward.

The fireball shot and struck the creature’s center mass, and on impact the cavern exploded into light.

Heat washed outward in a wave that sent shadows fleeing into corners. The creature’s flesh bubbled where the flames touched, dark skin splitting and weeping.

The shriek that came from its throat held no words. Only pain.

It thrashed, clawing at itself, at the fire dying on its torso but leaving char and ruin behind. For a moment it seemed consumed by animal panic.

Then its golden eyes focused. Narrowed. Filled with something worse than pain.

Fury.

It lunged again, faster this time. Driven by rage instead of hunger.

Brandon dove left.

The creature’s claw passed so close to his face he felt the air displacement.

He rolled, came up on one knee, and drove his fist into the creature’s exposed ribs with every ounce of force the body could generate.

Something cracked. The creature stumbled sideways, breath leaving it in a huff.

Brandon didn’t wait. He moved like water, like violence made fluid.

Strike to the throat. His knuckles crushed windpipe, and the creature gagged. Knee to the solar plexus, driving up and in, rupturing something vital that made its eyes bulge.

Elbow to the spine, precisely placed between vertebrae, and bone splintered under the impact.

Each hit was surgical and economical. Nothing wasted.

The creature fought back. Claws lashed out in wild arcs. Teeth snapped at empty air. It had size, had strength, had the desperate ferocity of something that knew it was losing but refused to accept it.

But Brandon was faster.

His hand moved.

Shadows erupted from the cavern floor like grasping hands. They wrapped around the creature’s legs, black and slick and binding. The creature roared, tore through them with raw strength, ripping the darkness apart like rotted cloth.

But Brandon was already in motion.

Fire gathered in his palm again. Larger this time. Dense enough that the air around it shimmered with heat. The light cast his face in sharp relief, made the crimson in his eyes look almost black by contrast.

He slammed it into the creature’s face.

BOOM!

The explosion was deafening.

Fire and force combined into something catastrophic. The creature’s head snapped back.

Dark blood sprayed from mouth and nose, painting the cavern floor in arterial patterns. Its golden eyes went wide.

It staggered. Fell to one knee with a sound like a boulder hitting earth.

Brandon’s hand shot forward. Fingers rigid, coated in essence that made them shine like polished blades. They pierced through the creature’s throat with surgical precision.

The wet sound echoed.

The creature’s eyes went wider still. Confusion flickered through the pain. As if some part of it couldn’t understand how it had lost. How something so much smaller had torn it apart so quickly.

Brandon twisted his hand and ripped outward.

The creature collapsed. It twitched once, limbs jerking in a final spasm. Then went still.

Silence filled the space.

Brandon stood over the corpse, chest heaving. Blood covered his hand, tacky and dark. Some of it the creature’s. Some his own from wounds he hadn’t bothered avoiding.

The crimson glow in his eyes flickered, dimmed, like a candle running out of wax.

He stumbled. His hand shot out, caught the wall. Stone scraped against his palm.

"Damn it." The words came out between gasps. "Took too long just killing a pathetic wretch like you."

His legs gave out. He slid down the wall, back scraping against rough stone, until he hit the ground in a sitting position. His head tipped back. Cold rock pressed against his skull.

Somewhere in the depths of his own mind, Alaric floated in darkness.

He could see everything.

But couldn’t move. Couldn’t speak.

That was amazing!