The strong faced a one-in-four draw; the weak faced a seven-in-ten draw.
Those who obeyed could enjoy a brief period of peace. Those who defied them would leave neither bones nor blood souls behind.
This was the iron law of the Kingdom of the Dead, the blood tax every living thing not yet under the King of Withered's banner was bound to pay. Even bloodless beings had to offer up their souls and Source Matter, feeding the kingdom's ceaseless, ravenous hunger.
Blood was kindling. Blood was flame. Blood was power. Blood was currency... In the Kingdom of the Dead, precious blood alone was the only standard. Everything else was dust.
Drawing blood as tax and seizing souls as tribute—such brutal rule was already a rare kindness in hell. But over such a long span of time, what an immense quantity had this far-reaching "kindness" accumulated?
Even the Kingdom of the Dead's tax collectors and jesters could not sort through a number that astronomical.
But now, those empty numbers had become something tangible, laid bare before everyone.
Endless blood flowed from the depths of the Kingdom of the Dead, becoming a flood that reached in all directions from hell—up to the Present Realm, down to the abyss. Wherever the river of blood reached became the King of Withered's territory.
Everything operated beneath the will of the Supreme Dead.
And countless hordes rode those endless crimson torrents toward the Present Realm.
In an instant, they crossed a vast distance.
The king himself had brought war's declaration to the war. From that moment onward, an unavoidable war had arrived before everyone.
At that moment, across the Endless Sea, blood-red waves rolled while a thousand sails raced one another.
Even the dormant Leviathan was suppressed by that terrifying power. The Naglfar Fleet's might operated