Rudy sat on the throne. Ruby walked to his right side, crossing her arms. Maria stood to his left, her hand resting affectionately on the armrest of his throne, looking down at the Underworld she had just reclaid. And Lilim materialized directly behind Maria.
"Listen closely," Rudy’s voice bood, projecting flawlessly to every corner of the massive arena. "Because I am only going to say this once. From this second forward, the Underworld has a Code of Conduct."
Thousands of Awakened thugs, assassins, and smugglers stared up at the spire in terrified silence.
"Rule number one," Rudy stated. "The Ross Syndicate is the absolute law. Maria and Ruby Ross speak with my voice. You do not question them."
He leaned forward, resting his chin on his fist.
"Rule number two. A thirty percent tax on all Dungeon loot, mana cores, and black-market artifacts moving through this sector. You pay it directly to the Diamond Spire every week. Rule number three. No unauthorized territorial wars. No random slaughter. If you have a dispute, you bring it to the Syndicate. If you draw blood without our permission, I will drain yours."
A heavy, oppressive silence hung over the Colosseum.
Finally, a brave soul stepped forward. He was an older rcenary, heavily scarred, wearing a coat made from a B-Rank monster’s hide. He didn’t raise his weapon to oppose. He just looked up at the spire.
"A question, my Lord!" the rcenary shouted respectfully. "If we pay you thirty percent of our blood-money... what do we get in return? The surface Guilds and the Sanctum’s Heroes raid us every month. If we submit to the Ross Syndicate, do you protect us from the Sanctum?"
Rudy looked down at the veteran. "A practical question. The answer is yes. You pay for the privilege of breathing my air, and in return, the Underworld becos a sovereign state. If the Sanctum sends their ’Heroes’ down here to raid your businesses, they won’t leave alive. I am your shield. But I am also your executioner."
The rcenary bowed his head and stepped back into the crowd, satisfied.
But there were always those who confused rcy with weakness.
"Bullshit!" a voice roared from the back of the arena.
The crowd parted as a massive, hulking Awakened pushed his way to the front. He was a Blood-Iron Berserker, covered in tribal tattoos that glowed with volatile crimson energy. He spat on the smooth stone floor and pointed a massive, spiked gauntlet up at the throne.
"We outnumber you ten thousand to one!" the Berserker bellowed, his veins bulging with rage. "You flattened so buildings with a fancy gravity trick! Big deal! I’m not giving thirty percent of my hard-earned cores to so arrogant pretty boy and his two Ross bitches! We take the spire, kill him, and take the won for ourselves!"
A few of the younger, stupider gang mbers cheered, raising their weapons, emboldened by the Berserker’s roar.
Ruby’s eyes flashed with lethal intent, and Lilim’s shadow claws instantly extended. But Rudy simply raised a finger, halting them.
"There’s always one," Rudy sighed.
Instantly, the massive brute was violently yanked off his feet. An invisible, telekinetic vice gripped him, dragging him through the air until he hovered twenty feet above the center of the crowd, completely paralyzed.
The cheering stopped dead.
"You think this is a democracy?" Rudy’s voice echoed, devoid of any emotion. "You think your numbers matter? Let correct that misconception."
Rudy closed his fist slowly.
He didn’t crush the man since that would be too quick. Instead, Rudy isolated the Berserker’s nervous system and multiplied the pain receptors by a thousand. Then, using microscopic telekinetic scalpels, Rudy began to flay him.
The skin on the Berserker’s right arm peeled back with a sickening rip, exposing the raw, pulsing muscle and bone beneath.
The brute let out a bloodcurdling, inhuman shriek. The sound was so full of pure agony that several criminals in the crowd actually dropped to their knees, vomiting.
"Stop! Wait! I yield!" the Berserker scread, tears of blood streaming down his face as the invisible blades moved to his left arm, peeling the flesh away like the rind of an orange.
"You don’t get to yield," Rudy said coldly.
RIIIIIP.
The skin of his chest and legs was torn away in one violent motion. The man was now a suspended, thrashing anatomical model of raw, bleeding muscle, kept alive purely by Rudy’s mana forcing his heart to keep beating.
The crowd watched in absolute, paralyzed horror.
But Rudy wasn’t finished.
"Let your end be the foundation of my rules," Rudy whispered.
He manipulated the calcium in the Berserker’s bones. With a series of wet, horrific crunches, the brute’s own ribcage shattered outward, the jagged bones piercing through his exposed muscles and organs.
Rudy then compressed the man’s entire body—folding his arms and legs backward, snapping his spine, and crushing his torso into a perfect, three-foot-wide cube of mangled flesh and protruding bone.
Through all of this, Rudy purposefully kept the man’s head intact and his brain completely conscious.
With a heavy THUD, the screaming cube of at was slamd down into the center of the stone arena floor.
Rudy fused the bone and concrete together, turning the still-living, perpetually agonizing remains of the Berserker into a permanent monunt right in the middle of the Colosseum.
The muffled, gurgling screams of the living floor tile echoed through the arena.
Rudy looked over the pale, trembling faces of the ten thousand criminals who had just witnessed a god tear a man apart from the inside out.
"Anyone else want to negotiate the tax rate?" Rudy asked.
Not a single soul breathed. Weapons clattered to the floor as thousands of hardened murderers and thieves dropped to their knees, bowing their heads toward the dark throne in absolute, terrified submission.
Maria smiled, her heart racing as she looked at her husband. The Underworld was officially theirs.
Rudy then stood up, turned to Maria and gave her a deep and long kiss. When their lips parted, there was nothing but lust in her eyes.
He did the sa with Ruby and Lilim.
"Alright... I have so things to take care of, so see you soon."
"Bye," Ruby nodded.
"Take care." Maria hugged him.
"See you, daddy."
And then... he disappeared.
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