Crash—
The torrential rain deep in the night grew ever more violent.
Cold rainwater washed away patch after patch of bloodstains on the ground, dyeing the entire staircase a dark red.
"Hah... urgh... AARGH!!!"
At the top of the stairs, a hunched figure let out a tortured roar, a sound that seemed ready to tear apart his vocal cords and lungs, making the listener's scalp tingle.
The voice was filled with unbearable pain—not only physical pain, but mental anguish as well...
Mixed into the miserable howls was intense remorse.
At the top of the stairs, the figure that kept spraying blood tore at his own body with both hands. Every inch of flesh ripped away brought agony so heart-wrenching it seemed to rise from the marrow of his bones.
Pale lightning tore through the black clouds, bleaching the night for an instant—
Only in that brief flash of daylight could one see that the shadow was not tearing apart his own flesh.
He was merely taking off his coat—
But with every bit he removed, the fused flesh was pulled away as though being torn out by the roots. In the more horrifying areas, even the organs and chest cavity beneath were laid bare!
Yet under the man's powerful will, his HP remained above 5% the entire time...
There was only one thought in his mind: survive. Not for himself, but for his family!
The entire tearing process lasted twenty minutes.
To him, those twenty minutes felt like an entire century.
In the end, the black trench coat came off.
But a bloody layer of skin was stuck to the entire coat, while its fabric writhed madly, sucking up flesh and blood like leeches.
In just one minute, it devoured the forcibly torn-off skin completely!
The figure shakily climbed to