The air inside the null-field dome was thick, cold, and dead.
High up above the action, Jax Sterling screamed through his mic.
"Folks, I am losing my mind!" Jax's voice blew out the frequencies of the stadium's spatial arrays, echoing over the thunderous hum of the arena.
"The null-field is active! Zero abilities, zero umbralis, zero shortcuts! Four of our top-tier prospects are pinned down like sitting ducks behind those basalt columns."
"Because they're smart enough to know when they're outgunned, Jax," Nadia Varas interjected, her voice laced with intense focus.
She leaned into her comm-array, her fingers tapping rapidly against the live tracking feeds. "Those automated sentinels are firing heavy armor-piercing kinetic rounds at close range. Without defensive abilities or physical reinforcement, standing in that open corridor is suicide."
"Except someone didn't get the memo!" Jax roared, pointing wildly at the central projection deck.
