Chapter 101: Don’t Poke the Bear
The corridor outside the torture chamber vibrated with the aftershocks of unleashed fury. Sukuna didn’t wait for Adam or Lute to process his command. He shoved Adam hard towards the exit archway, the force sending the First Man stumbling. "Move your fucking ass, Adam!" Sukuna snarled, his voice tight with a primal urgency Adam had never heard before. He grabbed Lute’s arm, practically dragging her off her feet as she stared, paralyzed, back towards the chamber door. The agonized shrieks from inside had stopped, replaced by wet, tearing sounds and low, guttural growls that resonated deeper than any beast’s.
Adam snapped into motion, grabbing Lute’s other arm. Together, they hauled her backwards, away from the horror. Sukuna kept his body angled towards the sealed door, his crimson eyes narrowed, every muscle coiled. They were almost to the intersecting corridor, the sterile light feeling suddenly fragile.
The chamber door hissed open.
Silhouetted against the harsh internal light, framed by the swirling darkness within, stood the nightmare. Ash-gray skin pulsed with veins of molten lava. Massive, leathery wings scraped the ceiling. Ebony horns spiraled towards the vaulted heights. Crimson fire burned where eyes should be. It filled the doorway, radiating an aura of pure, annihilating fury that sucked the air from the corridor. Nythera’s crumpled, ruined form was visible just inside the doorway. The wet tearing sounds continued, accompanied by weak, gurgling whimpers – Abyzoth’s death throes.
Adam froze mid-step, his ancient face slack with disbelief and terror. Lute whimpered, shrinking back. Sukuna didn’t flinch. He planted his feet squarely on the polished floor, shoulders squared, chin lifted. He met the burning crimson gaze head-on. No bowing. No cowering. Just a silent, defiant challenge radiating from every tattooed inch of him. His fists clenched at his sides, knuckles white, but he held his ground directly in the path of the apocalypse.
The monstrous entity tilted its horned head slightly. Those pits of fire locked onto Sukuna. Recognition flickered amidst the inferno? Or merely the focus of pure, destructive intent shifting? It took a single, earth-trembling step forward into the corridor. The air crackled with ozone and the scent of burnt blood.
Sukuna’s voice cut through the suffocating dread, sharp and clear, devoid of any tremor. "Dante." He didn't shout. He stated it. A name. A reminder. "Fucking don’t."
The entity paused. The low growl emanating from its distended maw faltered for a heartbeat. The burning pits stared at Sukuna, unblinking. Seconds stretched, thick with the threat of annihilation. Adam held his breath. Lute squeezed her eye shut. Sukuna remained immovable, a rock against a tsunami of primordial rage.
Then, the impossible happened.
The terrifying aura flickered. The molten veins beneath the ash-gray skin dimmed. The colossal wings shuddered, then began to fold, shrinking, retracting back into the ravaged flesh with a sound like wet leather being drawn tight. The spiraling horns receded, melting back into Dante’s temples. The ashen hue bled away, replaced by the familiar, sweat-slicked, tattooed human skin, crisscrossed with deep, still-smoking sigils carved by Abyzoth’s blade. The crimson fire in his eyes guttered out, replaced by Dante’s own exhausted, pain-glazed crimson irises. He stood naked, trembling violently, covered in blood – his own, Nythera’s, Abyzoth’s. The raw wounds on his chest wept freely.
He swayed. His knees buckled.
Sukuna moved faster than thought. He lunged forward, catching Dante before he could hit the floor. Dante’s weight slumped against him, heavy and limp. Sukuna grunted, adjusting his grip, one arm hooked under Dante’s shoulders, the other bracing his back, careful to avoid the worst of the chest wounds. Dante’s head lolled against Sukuna’s shoulder. His breath came in shallow, ragged gasps.
Dante’s eyelids fluttered. He looked up, his gaze unfocused, finding Sukuna’s face inches from his own. A ghost of his usual smirk touched his bloodied lips, weak and fleeting. His voice was a ruined whisper, thick with pain and exhaustion. "Fuck… that guy." Then his eyes rolled back, and he went utterly slack, unconscious.
Sukuna adjusted his hold, hefting Dante’s dead weight more securely. He glanced at Adam and Lute, his expression grim. "The Annex portal. Now. Back to the Inferno." He didn't wait for acknowledgment, turning and striding down the corridor towards the shimmering energy nexus Adam had indicated earlier, Dante’s limp form cradled against him. Adam grabbed Lute’s arm again, pulling her along in Sukuna’s wake, leaving the chamber of horrors and its lone, dying occupant behind.
The transition from sterile celestial architecture to the Inferno Club’s throbbing heart was jarring. The Annex portal deposited them directly into the VIP section’s private antechamber – a soundproofed bubble of plush crimson velvet, low lighting, and the distant, muffled thump of bass. The thick scent of expensive liquor, cigar smoke, and the faint, ever-present sulfur replaced the ozone and blood.
Sukuna didn't pause. He kicked open the inner door leading to Dante’s private sanctum – a larger space dominated by a massive, low platform bed draped in black silk. He strode in and dumped Dante unceremoniously onto the bed. Dante groaned but didn’t wake, his body a landscape of brutalized flesh against the dark fabric.
"Adam," Sukuna barked, already moving towards Dante’s well-stocked wet bar. "Get water. Cloths. The strong antiseptic shit he keeps in the black cabinet. Lute – fuck off. Find Dythaniel. Tell him what his fucking plan wrought. Then stay the hell out of my sight." His tone brooked no argument. Lute flinched, nodded mutely, and fled the room. Adam, moving with grim efficiency, began gathering supplies.
Sukuna poured two fingers of Dante’s most potent bourbon, downed it in one burning gulp, then poured another. He grabbed the bottle and a clean towel Adam handed him, soaked it in the water basin Adam had filled, and approached the bed. He worked with a brutal efficiency that wasn't gentle, but wasn't unnecessarily cruel either. He wiped away the worst of the blood and grime from Dante’s face, neck, and arms, avoiding the carved sigils for now. The wounds on Dante’s chest were deep, the flesh cauterized and blackened at the edges by the infernal blade, still weeping sluggishly. Sukuna soaked another cloth in the pungent, dark antiseptic Dante favored – something that smelled like burnt herbs and ozone. He dabbed carefully at the edges of the wounds. Dante hissed in his sleep, his body tensing.
"Fucking hold still," Sukuna muttered, though Dante was unconscious. He cleaned the wounds as best he could, the sharp scent of the antiseptic mixing with bourbon and blood. He left them open to the air; stitching infernal sigils carved by a demon lord seemed pointless, maybe dangerous. He cleaned the blood from Dante’s thighs, from between his legs, the evidence of Abyzoth’s violation making Sukuna’s jaw tighten imperceptibly. He worked swiftly, methodically, wiping away the physical remnants of the torture, leaving Dante cleaner but no less broken-looking on the silk.
Finally, he pulled a light black sheet over Dante’s hips, leaving his scarred chest exposed. He dragged a heavy velvet armchair next to the bed, dropped into it, poured another bourbon, and settled in to watch. Adam lingered near the door, silent, his expression unreadable.
"Go," Sukuna said, not looking at him. "Barricade the main doors. Tell the twins. Nobody gets in here until I say."
Adam nodded once and left, sealing the heavy door behind him. The muffled thump of the club’s music was the only sound, a distant heartbeat beneath the silence of the room. Sukuna sipped his bourbon, his predatory gaze fixed on Dante’s still form, watching the shallow rise and fall of his chest, the faint pulse in his throat. Hours bled into the club’s perpetual night.
Dante swam upwards through layers of thick, suffocating darkness. Pain was the first anchor – a deep, throbbing agony radiating from his chest, a raw, bruised ache deep inside him, a general feeling of being flayed alive. Then came the muffled thump of bass, vibrating through the surface beneath him. Silk. His bed. The faint, familiar scent of bourbon, smoke, and sulfur. Home. The Inferno.
He forced his eyes open. The dim light of his sanctum stung. He blinked, his vision swimming before focusing on the ornate ceiling. He tried to move, to push himself up, but a wave of dizziness and blinding pain from his chest slammed him back down onto the pillows with a choked gasp.
Movement beside him. Sukuna. He was still in the armchair, but had shifted forward, elbows on his knees, a half-empty bottle of Dante’s prized Pappy Van Winkle on the floor beside him. His crimson eyes were alert, fixed on Dante’s face. No pity. Just watchful intensity.
"You look like shit warmed over," Sukuna stated, his voice rough from disuse and bourbon.
Dante managed a weak, pained smirk. "Feel… fucking fantastic." His voice was sandpaper on stone. He tried again to shift, wincing. "Water?"
Sukuna didn't move. "Later." His gaze didn't waver. Something simmered beneath the surface of his watchfulness – a dark, restless energy Dante recognized intimately. The aftermath of violence. The proximity of ruin. The raw, exposed nerve of what Dante had endured… and unleashed.
Dante held his gaze. The air thickened. The muffled bass seemed to sync with the pounding in Dante’s skull, or maybe his own heartbeat. He saw the flicker in Sukuna’s eyes, the subtle tightening of his jaw. The unspoken thing between them, forged in centuries of rivalry, violence, and a fucked-up, undeniable understanding, surged to the forefront. Dante was broken, bleeding, violated. Sukuna was coiled, dangerous, vibrating with suppressed energy. It wasn't tenderness. It was possession. Reclamation. A brutal affirmation of existence after annihilation.
"Come here," Dante rasped, the command weak but undeniable.
Sukuna didn't hesitate. He was off the chair and on the bed in one fluid motion, knees bracketing Dante’s hips, careful of the wounds. His hands, large and calloused, slammed down on either side of Dante’s head, caging him. His weight pressed Dante deeper into the mattress. Dante hissed as the movement jarred his injuries, but he didn't push Sukuna away. He lifted his own hands, trembling slightly, and gripped Sukuna’s bare forearms, his fingers digging into hard muscle. His crimson eyes burned up into Sukuna’s, not with defiance now, but with a desperate, feral need.
Sukuna lowered his head. His mouth crashed down onto Dante’s. It wasn't a kiss; it was a claiming. Hard, bruising, all teeth and desperate tongue. Dante met it with equal ferocity, opening for him, sucking Sukuna’s tongue deep, biting back. The taste of bourbon and copper blood filled Dante’s mouth. Sukuna’s hand fisted in Dante’s hair, yanking his head back, exposing his throat. Sukuna’s mouth trailed hot, biting kisses down the column of Dante’s neck, over his collarbone, avoiding the seared sigils but marking the unmarred skin with his teeth. Dante arched, a ragged groan tearing from him, pain and burgeoning arousal twisting together.
"Fuck… yes…" Dante gasped, his hands sliding up Sukuna’s arms to claw at his shoulders, his back. "Need…"
Sukuna growled against Dante’s skin, his hand releasing Dante’s hair to slide down his body. He palmed Dante’s cock through the sheet, finding it already half-hard despite the pain, despite the exhaustion. Sukuna ripped the sheet away. His calloused hand wrapped around Dante’s length, squeezing hard, pulling a sharp cry from Dante’s lips – pain and pleasure indistinguishable. Sukuna stroked him roughly, his grip punishing, his eyes locked on Dante’s face, watching every flinch, every gasp.
"Still works," Sukuna rasped, a dark smirk twisting his lips. "Good."
He released Dante’s cock, his hand sliding lower, fingers trailing through the coarse hair, over Dante’s balls, then lower still, probing between his ass cheeks. Dante tensed instinctively, the memory of Abyzoth’s violation flashing hot and sickening. Sukuna’s fingers found his hole – still tender, swollen, undoubtedly bruised inside. Sukuna pressed a thick finger against the tight furl.
Dante flinched, a choked sound escaping him. "Sukuna…"
"Shut up," Sukuna growled. He didn't pause. He spat onto his fingers, the glob landing directly on Dante’s hole. He rubbed the saliva in roughly with his thumb, then pressed the tip of his middle finger against the resisting muscle. "Open." It was an order.
Dante gritted his teeth, forcing himself to relax against the instinct to clench. The stretch burned, a raw, familiar agony that made him gasp. Sukuna pushed his finger in to the first knuckle, then deeper, burying it to the hilt in one brutal thrust. Dante cried out, his back arching off the bed, his hands scrabbling at Sukuna’s back. Sukuna held his finger deep, letting Dante adjust for only a second before he started fucking him with it, rough, shallow pistons that scraped the tender inner walls. He leaned down, capturing Dante’s mouth again in another biting kiss, swallowing his gasps and whimpers.
"Fucking tight," Sukuna muttered against his lips. "Like a virgin." He added a second finger alongside the first, the stretch becoming a tearing burn. Dante hissed, his nails digging into Sukuna’s skin. Sukuna scissored his fingers brutally, stretching him wider, the friction igniting sparks of pain that blurred into something hotter, darker. He crooked his fingers, searching, finding the swollen, hypersensitive bundle of nerves deep inside.
Dante jolted as if electrocuted. "FUCK!" he shouted, his hips bucking uncontrollably. Pleasure, sharp and shocking, lanced through the pain, short-circuiting his thoughts. Sukuna grinned, a feral, predatory expression. He focused his assault there, rubbing, pressing, fucking Dante open with his fingers while relentlessly attacking that spot. Dante writhed beneath him, caught between agony and ecstasy, his cock leaking precome onto his stomach, his breath coming in ragged sobs. The pain from his chest wounds was a distant throb compared to the raw, overwhelming sensation Sukuna was wringing from his violated body.
Sukuna withdrew his fingers abruptly. Dante whimpered at the sudden emptiness. Sukuna sat back on his heels, kneeling between Dante’s spread thighs. He undid his pants, freeing his own thick, heavy cock, already fully erect, the head glistening. He spat into his palm again, slicking himself roughly. His eyes never left Dante’s, burning with dark intent.
"Look at me," Sukuna commanded, his voice low and gravelly. He gripped Dante’s hips, hauling him lower on the bed, positioning him. The blunt, swollen head of Sukuna’s cock pressed against Dante’s stretched, abused entrance. Dante braced himself, his muscles trembling, his gaze locked on Sukuna’s.
Sukuna thrust.
It was brutal. A single, powerful surge that buried him to the hilt in one stroke. Dante screamed – a raw, tearing sound of pain overwhelmed by blinding, shocking pleasure as Sukuna’s thick cock stretched him impossibly wide, filling the aching emptiness, hammering directly against his prostate. Sukuna didn't pause. He withdrew almost completely, then slammed back in with the same
Sukuna didn't pause. He withdrew almost completely, then slammed back in with the same punishing force. The impact punched the air from Dante’s lungs, his scream dying into a choked gasp. White-hot agony ripped through his core where Sukuna’s cock buried itself deep, grinding against the raw, swollen tissue still screaming from Abyzoth’s assault. Yet, beneath the tearing pain, that brutal fullness triggered a sickening wave of electric pleasure, centered on the spot Sukuna’s cockhead hammered relentlessly.
"Fuck! Sukuna, fuck!" Dante gasped, his head thrashing back against the silk. His fingers scrabbled uselessly against the hard muscle of Sukuna’s back, nails scraping skin. Every nerve felt flayed, caught between the searing pain in his chest and the violent intrusion below, sparking something primal and undeniable.
Sukuna didn’t answer. He set a brutal, driving rhythm. No finesse. Just deep, powerful thrusts that pistoned his thick cock in and out of Dante’s abused passage. Each withdrawal dragged his shaft over sensitized flesh, each slam back in stretched him obscenely wide. The wet, filthy sound of flesh slapping flesh filled the room, louder than the muffled club music. Sweat dripped from Sukuna’s brow onto Dante’s chest, stinging the edges of the smoldering sigils. His hands tightened bruisingly on Dante’s hips, holding him pinned, forcing him to take every punishing inch.
"Feel that?" Sukuna grunted, voice ragged with exertion, his hips snapping forward again. "Feel me fuckin’ own you?" His crimson eyes burned down, watching Dante writhe. "Filling up the space that bastard left?" He punctuated the question with a particularly vicious thrust that made Dante arch off the bed, a broken cry ripping from his throat. Precome leaked steadily from Dante’s cock onto his stomach, a slick trail mirroring the sweat soaking the silk beneath him.
Dante couldn’t form words. Sensation overloaded him. The tearing stretch. The deep ache inside. The sharp flare of his chest wounds. The relentless pressure on his prostate sending jolts of fire up his spine. It was a raw, brutal claiming. Sukuna wasn’t gentle. He was rewriting the violation, marking Dante with his possession, his violence. "S-s’good," Dante managed, the admission torn from him. "Harder… fucking ruin me… make it hurt like you mean it, you bastard!" He locked his ankles behind Sukuna’s back, pulling him impossibly deeper, forcing a grunt from the larger man.
Sukuna’s rhythm stuttered for a second, surprise flickering in his gaze before being swallowed by deeper hunger. He slammed down, hips pistoning faster, driving into Dante with jackhammer force. His head dropped, teeth sinking into the unmarred flesh of Dante’s shoulder, drawing coppery blood. The dual pain – teeth in muscle, cock splitting him open – was a lightning rod.
Dante’s vision whited out. The tension coiling in his gut snapped. He came untouched, violently, ropes of semen striping his stomach and chest, mixing with blood and sweat. His body clenched down on Sukuna’s invading cock like a vice, milking it through the convulsions. A raw, broken sob escaped him as the overwhelming sensations crested and crashed.
Sukuna roared, Dante’s convulsive tightening ripping his own climax from him. He drove deep one final time, grinding his pelvis against Dante’s ass as hot bursts of cum flooded Dante’s depths, filling the bruised channel. He pulsed inside him, his grip on Dante’s hips like iron, holding him impaled. They stayed locked like that, Sukuna buried to the hilt, Dante trembling and spent beneath him, the only sounds their ragged breathing and the wet squelch as Sukuna finally pulled out, his softening cock glistening with mixed fluids.
Dante collapsed back, utterly boneless. Pain radiated from every part of him – the deep internal throb, the fire on his chest, the bite on his shoulder, the dull ache in his muscles. Sukuna slumped forward, catching his weight on his forearms on either side of Dante’s head, his breath hot and heavy against Dante’s neck. The thick scent of sex, sweat, bourbon, blood, and sulfur hung heavy in the velvet air. Dante’s eyes fluttered shut, exhaustion dragging him down into darkness despite the burning pain. He felt Sukuna’s calloused thumb swipe roughly through the mess on his stomach. "Still breathing, Prince?" Sukuna rasped, the question devoid of its usual mocking edge, sounding… raw.
Dante didn’t have the strength to answer. Darkness pulled harder. The last thing he registered was the weight shifting beside him, the dip of the mattress, and a strange, brief sensation – rough fingers brushing sweaty hair off his forehead before the velvet silence swallowed him whole.