The moment the Points Leaderboard refreshed, the stunned silence snapped—then the whole planet erupted.
"WHAT THE—THAT POINTS SPIKE IS INSANE!!"
"Over 32,000… my god, that's a straight-up liftoff!"
"Raven Shaw is built different!"
"They said every 1,000 points upgrades the chest once… how far does 32k+ push it?!"
"How far doesn't matter—#1 is locked!"
"Bro… that's a twenty-thousand-plus gap. How do you even lose from here?"
"When everyone else is crawling around a few thousand, Dragon Nation is already at thirty-thousand… this is illegal."
Dragon Nation's entire population was basically on fire.
How could they not be?
Their points were already past 32k, leading the Eastern Isles by a ridiculous margin.
The only "regret" was that Raven Shaw's kill didn't trigger any resource manifestation, and maybe because it wasn't tied to a rated resource, she didn't even get a chest—just points.
People whined for a few seconds…
then immediately remembered the final settlement and went right back to celebrating.
But outside Dragon Nation?
Pure jealousy.
If it was a gap of a few thousand, other countries could still pretend they had hope.
But now?
This was a mountain range.
So the global comment sections instantly turned into a protest march.
"Why are they getting that many points? The Will of Blue Star is biased!!"
"I demand a recalculation! Dragon Nation's points are invalid!"
"Cheating! This is cheating! Where's the sportsmanship?!"
"Brother… you can't say 'cheating' without at least a decade of brain clots."
"I want to immigrate to Dragon Nation…"
"Same. Let's form a team and apply together."
"Foreign competitors: trash. Dragon Nationcompetitors: godlike."
Even Dragon Nation's top brass were buzzing.
"Thirty-thousand points… how many upgrades is that?!"
"That's over thirty upgrades—does it jump straight to an SSS chest?!"
"This feels way too easy… is this really the Divine Domain: Forbidden Zone?"
At the head of the table, Elder Long stayed calm.
"Easy?" he said flatly. "Who dares call a B+ beast 'easy'?"
The room quieted a little.
And just as everyone started circling back—again—to Raven Shaw's identity…
someone blinked at the screen.
"…Huh? Why did our points just go up by another two thousand?"
"Wait—look at Adrian Vale!"
All eyes snapped to Adrian Vale's livestream.
Divine Domain: Forbidden Zone — A Few Minutes Earlier
This was the exact moment one of Adrian Vale'sRinkaku speared through Nolan Mercer's thigh.
For a heartbeat, Nolan Mercer didn't even understand what happened.
Then the pain arrived.
Late—
but absolute.
"AAAAAAAAA—!!!"
He finally looked down.
His leg was… skewered.
His face twisted into something ugly.
But Adrian Vale?
He didn't react at all.
That black sclera, that red pupil—his kakugan—watched Nolan Mercer's collapse like it was a boring documentary.
Nolan Mercer's rage came first, before fear could fully take root.
"You—!! You DARED hurt me?!" he shrieked, veins popping. "You livestock! You meat-pig! HOW DARE YOU—!!!"
SHNK!
Another Rinkaku speared through his other thigh.
Nolan Mercer's scream snapped into a higher pitch—pure panic.
Adrian Vale still didn't speak.
He didn't need to.
Everyone watching could see it clearly now:
This wasn't a fight.
This was… a procedure.
In the studio, Sienna Blake wiped sweat from her forehead and forced a laugh—half horrified, half relieved.
"Watching a sadistic killer get… treated like this…" she muttered, "…why does it feel weirdly satisfying?"
Captain Cole didn't blink.
"Returning pain to the one who loved giving it," he said coldly. "Against trash like that, this is mercy."
Dr. Hart coughed politely.
"Reminder to viewers: don't imitate anything you see here," he said dryly. "Otherwise, it's the death-penalty speedrun."
Derek Vaughn stayed painfully quiet.
Mostly because a certain slap from earlier still burned.
You Were Having Fun… Let Me Have Some Too
Adrian Vale finally spoke.
His voice was calm—almost lazy.
"You were having a lot of fun earlier, weren't you?"
He tilted his head slightly.
"Can you let me have fun too?"
Nolan Mercer's eyes were bloodshot with fury.
Even pinned and bleeding, he still thought he was the predator.
"I'M Nolan Mercer!" he howled. "You think this scares me?! I'll— I'll—"
He didn't finish.
Because Adrian Vale moved.
SHK—!
A flash of dark red.
Nolan Mercer's raised index finger… vanished.
A clean cut.
The severed finger hit the ground with a soft, wet sound.
Nolan Mercer froze—then the pain hit and he started screaming all over again.
Adrian Vale sighed, like someone dealing with a loud neighbor.
"You're really noisy."
And the scariest part?
His control was terrifyingly precise.
Even something as thin as a finger—he could take it without damaging anything else.
Now even the Eastern Isles viewers couldn't keep pretending.
This wasn't "Nolan Mercer killing Adrian Vale."
This was Adrian Vale playing with Nolan Mercer.
Still, they coped the only way they could—by lying loudly.
"Let Nolan Mercer go!!"
"Fight fair! Stop using underhanded tricks!"
"If you hadn't sneak-attacked his legs, you wouldn't be so arrogant!"
But the truth was already sinking in.
And it was about to get worse.
Tokyo Ghoul… Recreated
Nolan Mercer spat threats through sobs and broken breath.
Adrian Vale looked down at him and asked softly:
"You asked me earlier, '1000 + 7 equals what?'"
A pause.
Then Adrian Vale's voice went flatter.
"So now tell me."
"1000 − 7 equals what?"
Nolan Mercer's pupils shuddered.
That question—those numbers—weren't random.
Everyone who knew understood immediately.
Adrian Vale wasn't just punishing Nolan Mercer.
He was recreating it.
Recreating the original.
And then—
CRACK.
Adrian Vale snapped his own finger sideways.
Bone-breaking. Clean. Casual.
Like it was nothing.
The sound alone made the audience's scalp go tight.
He stepped on Nolan Mercer's chest, pinning him down like a bug under glass.
Around them: severed fingers, puncture wounds, blood pooling into the dirt.
Behind him: four Rinkaku swaying in the air, silent and hungry.
Adrian Vale looked like something that crawled out of hell and decided to wear a human face.
People watching through a screen still felt cold.
"Holy… suddenly Eat-Stream Adrian Vale feels so gentle when he's with Raven Shaw…"
"This is insane…"
"…and it's so satisfying. Don't stop."
"Call him properly—Bro Adrian."
"BRO ADRIAN!!"
"BRO ADRIAN!!"
A wall of "BRO ADRIAN" flooded the chat.
Nobody seemed to remember—
he was only nineteen.
Nail Extraction
Adrian Vale's gaze drifted to Nolan Mercer's hand.
Then he spoke, as if thinking out loud.
"You just reminded me of something…"
"I don't want anything stuck in my teeth later."
Nolan Mercer's face turned pale.
Before he could even process what that meant—
two Rinkaku moved with surgical coordination.
They didn't cut another finger.
They caught a nail.
And then—
RIIIP—!!
Adrian Vale tore Nolan Mercer's fingernail out.
Not cleanly.
It came out with blood, tissue, and a disgusting strand of almost-connected flesh.
Nolan Mercer's scream tore through the forest like an animal being skinned alive.
He shook so hard his whole body spasmed.
This pain wasn't like losing a finger.
This was the kind of pain that crawls into your brain and lives there.
For the first time in his life—
Nolan Mercer finally understood fear.
He couldn't even form words anymore.
Just broken gasps.
"Ha—! Hiss—! Ha—! You… you…!"
Adrian Vale didn't care.
He asked again, evenly:
"1000 − 7 equals what?"
CRACK.
Another snap—Adrian Vale breaking his own finger again.
Like a metronome.
Like a timer.
Nolan Mercer was sobbing, panicking, mind collapsing.
He realized it at last:
If he didn't answer—
Adrian Vale would keep going until there was nothing left of him.
He forced his brain to work through the pain.
1000… minus 7… equals…
His lips trembled.
Then he blurted it out like he was begging for his life:
"993!! It's 993!!"
And right as the answer left his mouth—
RIIIP—!!
Another sickening sound.
Another nail.
Another scream.
The livestream chat went dead silent for a fraction of a second…
then exploded.
Because everyone finally understood:
This wasn't "torture."
This was the real thing.
The kind that turns a human into a whispering, shaking shell.
And Adrian Vale—
wasn't stopping yet.
◇ BONUS & SUPPORT ◇
◇ 1 bonus chapter for every 10 reviews — drop a comment!
◇ 1 bonus chapter for every 100 Power Stones.
◇ Read 60 chapters ahead on P@treon → patreon.com/StrawHatStudios