The clearing was still, save for the soft whisper of wind through the trees and the faint crackle of frost melting under the crimson glow of the barrier. Mizore Shirayuki knelt at the edge of the blood dome, her body trembling, her breath fogging in the cold air. She watched the armored figure standing before the Kraken, and her heart, which had been frozen for so long, began to thaw.
Tsukune raised All‑Black. The blade drank the light, its edge a sliver of nothingness against the fading sunset. His armor caught the glow of the barrier, dark runes pulsing in rhythm with his heartbeat. The Dragon Helm's crimson eyes fixed on Okuto Kotsubo, and the Kraken recoiled as if struck.
"You threatened someone under my protection." Tsukune's voice echoed, cold and final, amplified by the helm he was wearing. "There will be no mercy for you."
Okuto's tentacles writhed, their suckers scraping against the stone. His voice, when it came, was a mixture of rage and desperate bravado. "You are just a first‑year! A jumped‑up bloodsucker playing dress‑up! How many of you dared to challenge me and are now sunk under the Ocean!"
Tsukune did not answer, but the intensity of his Yoki only continued to grow. The air thickened, pressing down on the clearing like a physical weight. Crimson light bled from his body, spilling across the grass, the trees, the very sky above the barrier. It was as if he had painted the heavens in blood, an impossible canvas of red and shadow that made the world feel smaller, more confined.
The Vampire Ghosts lining the clearing began to whisper, their voices rising in a chorus of reverent awe. "The Blood King… the Blood King paints the sky… the Blood King claims his domain…"
Even the Vampire Sorcerers, who had witnessed countless battles in the Vampire Kingdom, paused in their chanting. Their hollow eyes widened, and the lead Sorcerer lowered his staff, his voice a murmur of genuine surprise. "Such pressure… He has grown beyond our expectations. The King's power is no longer a fledgling's flame. It is a torch fire lighting our path."
His twin companions exchanged glances, their hands still weaving the containment spell, but their concentration wavered for just a heartbeat. "Do not lose focus," the female twin hissed. "The barrier must hold. The King's battle is not yet won. We don't need any interference from the mongrels outside."
But even she could not hide the tremor in her voice.
Okuto's skin, if it could be called that, paled. He was a Kraken, a creature of the deep, and his hide was not scales but thick, rubbery flesh, mottled with rough patches that served as natural armor.
Yet even that flesh seemed to shrink from the crimson tide. He tried to summon his own Yoki, to push back against the oppressive wave, but his power felt sluggish, tainted by the darkness that seeped from the armored figure before him.
He had faced many enemies in his years, had devoured students and teachers alike, but he had never felt anything like this. No, he had felt this only once before, when the Headmaster's temper had flared during a staff meeting, a brief, terrifying glimpse of true power.
And when he had seen Nonko Arahabaki, Kuyo, Hokuto Kaneshiro, or other S‑Class monsters that walked the halls of Yokai Academy, he had always kept his distance. But this… this was different.
"You think your little tricks intimidate me?" Okuto snarled, though his voice cracked. "I have been hunting prey since before you were born, bloodsucker. I have swum in oceans so deep that sunlight never touches. I have crushed the life from beings far stronger than you."
Tsukune's head tilted slightly, the Dragon Helm's eyes flaring. "Is that meant to impress me?"
"It is meant to warn you." Okuto's remaining tentacles spread wide, their tips dripping with a dark, viscous fluid. "I am not some mindless beast like Saizo Komiya that you silently took care of. I am a Kraken, a terror of the deep. You would do well to remember your place."
Behind the Dragon Helm, Tsukune's expression flickered. It was subtle, a momentary tightening of his jaw, a slight narrowing of his crimson eyes. But Okuto was a predator, and he noticed.
"Do you think that we teachers don't know?" Okuto pressed, his voice rising with desperate confidence. "We know you were the one who killed student Komiya. It was only because of the Headmaster's intervention that we have not applied the rules and had you expelled."
"I do not know what relations you have with the Headmaster, but it will not save you against me!"
Tsukune finally responded, his voice flat, almost bored. "You are so full of yourself."
He paused, letting the silence stretch, then added, "We will see who leaves this place unscathed."
Then he moved.
One moment he was standing ten meters away. The next, using Shadow Stride, he disappeared from where he stood and appeared in an instant, stepping out from shadows cast by the Kraken's own bulk. He was already inside Okuto's guard, swinging All‑Black in an arc that to the Kraken felt almost impossible to track.
The blade did not slash. It cut in a perfect, silent stroke that left three tentacles severed at their bases. In that instant he attacked, he activated both abilities that he had gained from training under Silent Swordsman: Blade of Stillness, which boosted the strike if it was silent and still, and Silent Draw, a quick‑draw iaido strike that ignored minor barriers while also boosting the speed of the sword strike. The combination was devastating.
Okuto's expression shifted from shock to disbelief, then contorted into raw, animalistic pain. His mouth opened wide, revealing rows of jagged teeth, and a scream tore from his throat, guttural and inhuman.
The severed limbs fell to the ground, twitching, their dark blood pooling on the frost. Okuto howled, a sound of pure agony. "My tentacles! What did you do?"
He tried to regenerate, to grow new limbs from the stumps. The flesh bubbled, writhed, and then blackened. The corrosive power of All‑Black clung to the wounds like a disease, eating away at the Kraken's regeneration. The stumps smoked, and Okuto's scream turned into a howl of fury.
"Impossible! I am a Kraken! I have survived wounds with my unstoppable regeneration that would kill lesser beings ten times over! What is that sword? What is that? A cursed demonic weapon?"
Tsukune stepped back, watching. His movements were unhurried, almost lazy, as if he had all the time in the world. While hidden by the armor he was now wearing, he was already in his Vampire Form, his now silver hair spilling from beneath the Dragon Helm, crimson eyes glowing with a particular hunger that rarely appeared in his usually calm gaze.
This was the first time he had fought using his true strength since his fight against Gin, and the progress he had made from that eye‑opening clash could be felt in an instant.
The combination of his Shinso Vampiric Body boosted by his abilities along with his Longinus, Annihilation Maker, was working as planned, as if they had become a fully integrated system.
The armor did not scratch or restrict. The helm did not impede his vision. The sword felt light as a feather in his grip, eager to draw more blood, even if this was from a lesser being. He felt like a predator who had finally shed the last vestiges of his prey nature.
He took a moment to admire his handiwork. The three tentacles lay on the ground, still twitching, their dark blood seeping into the frost created by Mizore after she had unleashed her true Yokai form. The contrast was stark: the white frost, the black blood, the crimson glow. It was almost beautiful.
Okuto was backing away, his remaining five limbs curling protectively around his torso. His eyes were wide, his mottled flesh pale. He looked less like a monster and more like a cornered animal.
'It felt too easy cutting his tentacles,' Tsukune thought. 'Is this Kraken that weak, or have I become stronger?'
He did not have time to dwell on the question. Okuto lashed out with another tentacle. He had eight tentacles in total; now only five remained. They came from all directions, thick as tree trunks, fast as striking serpents. Tsukune moved through them like a phantom, appearing and disappearing similar to shadows upon a sun.
A tentacle swept toward his left. He sidestepped, All‑Black flickering out to carve a shallow line across its flesh. Another came from above; he ducked, and the limb smashed into the ground where he had been standing, cracking the stone. A third wrapped around his ankle, or tried to.
Okuto's lips curled into a triumphant snarl. "Got you!"
But Tsukune's mocking laughter echoed from behind him. "Did you?"
His foot was already gone, his body dissolving into blood mist for a fraction of a second before reforming three meters away. Wealth of Power, his unique Shinso ability, allowed him to become intangible, to flow like a river of crimson vapor. It was a trick that had saved his life more than once, and now it made him untouchable to those lesser foes.
Okuto's tentacle closed on empty air, and the Kraken howled in frustration.
Tsukune flowed through the storm of limbs, his sword blurring with the visage of void and shadow. Each strike was precise, efficient, akin to a Sword Master's touch, a lesson learned from hours of sparring with Silent Swordsman.
He did not waste his movements as he had done previously while wielding a blade. When there was no window for striking, he did not overcommit. His Vampiric instincts played out a map of all the vital points of his opponent, highlighting weak spots in the Kraken's defenses.
He let the Kraken's own momentum work against him, dodging and weaving through the thrashing tentacles with a grace that bordered on the supernatural. A tentacle lashed toward his face. He caught it on the flat of All‑Black, the blade's edge biting deep.
The Kraken howled, trying to pull back, but Tsukune held firm. He twisted the blade, and the limb came free, flopping to the ground like a dying fish.
"Four left," Tsukune murmured.
Okuto's eyes blazed with fury. "You bastard! You think you can mock me? I have survived centuries! I have eaten creatures that would make you wet yourself in fear! You are nothing but a child playing with toys!"
He tried to summon more power, to unleash a wave of crushing pressure, but his Yoki sputtered, weak and unreliable.
"You are nothing!" Okuto spat, his voice cracking with desperation. "That ice bitch is nothing! I will tear you both apart and feed your remains to the sharks of the human world!"
Thinking he had distracted Tsukune with his tirade, Okuto lunged, all four remaining tentacles aimed at Tsukune's chest. They moved in a coordinated strike, each one aimed at a different vital point.
Tsukune did not flinch. "You are so boring."
He raised his hand, and a wave of crimson energy erupted from his palm. Another Shinso Vampire ability he had awakened as his Blood Purity increased, signaling that his transition into a full Shinso Vampire was coming to an end. Hemomancy. The power to shape blood, to command it, to use it as a weapon.
The blood wave was not a simple blast. It was like a living thing, a tidal surge of crimson that responded to Tsukune's will. It curled around the Kraken's tentacles, pushing them aside, then slammed into Okuto's chest with the force of a freight train.
The impact lifted him off his feet, his tentacles flailing uselessly, and he crashed against the barrier with a sickening crunch. The dome shuddered, and the Sorcerers grunted, pouring more energy into maintaining the spell.
Okuto slid to the ground, dazed, his body smoking from the contact. He tried to rise, but his limbs would not obey.
"This is not all I have," Tsukune said.
He did not let up. He shaped the blood into sharp daggers, a dozen of them, each one aimed at the Kraken's vulnerable flesh. The daggers hovered in the air for a moment, glistening, then shot forward as he rushed to close the distance. They struck true, piercing the thick hide, drawing more black blood.
Okuto screamed, thrashing, but Tsukune was already there.
"Argh! You little leech!" Okuto bellowed, his voice raw with pain and fury. "These are just scratches! I will heal and then I will crush you!"
You might think that a Kraken's skin and flesh were resilient, akin to a scaled predator, but you would be surprised how easily the blood daggers punched through it as if it were paper, each one leaving a weeping wound. The black blood seeped out, mixing with the frost on the ground.
Tsukune fought like a true vampire, using every tool at his disposal. His Upper‑A‑tier Agility, honed by months of training, allowed him to dance between the Kraken's attacks. His Vampiric Senses tracked every movement, every twitch, every shift in weight. And when an attack came too close, he simply dissolved into blood mist, reforming behind the Kraken or above it or beside it, always just out of reach.
"Stop running!" Okuto bellowed, his voice raw. "Face me like a man, you coward!"
"I am not a man," Tsukune replied, his voice cold. "I am a vampire. And you are prey."
Okuto could not land a clean hit. His tentacles swiped through empty air, passed through crimson vapor, or were deflected by the black blade. He was fighting a ghost, a phantom, a nightmare given form. And he was losing.
His desperation grew with each passing second. He realized, with a chill that had nothing to do with Mizore's frost, that Tsukune was the kind of being he feared most in the supernatural world. A monster. A true monster, wearing the face of a student.
In his pitiful attempts to fight off Tsukune's dominating attacking combinations, he left himself open. A Sanguine Spear materialized in Tsukune's left hand, jagged and crimson. He hurled it at the Kraken, and the spear punched through two of Okuto's remaining tentacles, pinning them to the ground. The Kraken howled, trying to pull free, but the spear held.
"Two left," Tsukune said.
Okuto, desperate, focused his regeneration on the pinned limbs. The flesh around the spear began to knit, slowly, painfully. The spear dissolved into blood, and the tentacles, though damaged, were no longer impaled. They began to reform, the stumps swelling, new growth emerging.
"See? You cannot kill me, vampire!" Okuto roared, his voice trembling between defiance and exhaustion. "My regeneration is absolute! I will outlast you! I will wear you down!"
"That is fair," Tsukune said, watching the process.
He studied the fallen limbs and made an observation. The tentacles destroyed by his blood abilities were already regenerating, the flesh knitting together, the stumps swelling with new growth. But the ones cut by All‑Black remained blackened and withered, the corruption spreading slowly up the stumps. The Necrosword's curse was far more potent than he had realized.
'Good to know,' he thought. 'If I ever need to put down something that won't stay dead, this is the tool for the job.'
While he was in his Ghoul Form, amplified by the gear he had created using Annihilation Maker, he felt a quiet confidence settle over him. If he fought the moon‑powered Gin again, he would not be on the backfoot for the entire clash.
No, he could even overpower him by using the combination of All‑Black's corrosive debuffing and reinforcements along with Alucard's Mail, the Castlevania Dracula Black Cloak and the Dragon Helm, which had an effect that could be drawn from the Evil Dragon King, Nidhogg.
'Gin would be nothing but a warm‑up now,' Tsukune thought, a cold satisfaction curling in his chest. 'That fight was a wake‑up call I needed, and it seems I am getting closer to my goal for Yokai Academy.'