The moment their attacks collided, the entire arena seemed to freeze in a way that defied ordinary perception. It was not the kind of stillness that came from silence, nor was it the absence of motion that defined the pause. Instead, it was a state of overwhelming tension, where everything—sound, movement, and even time itself—felt compressed into a single, fragile instant.
Aether stood firm, his posture grounded and unyielding, as though his very presence had fused with the arena beneath him. Across from him, Valen stood equally resolute, his composure unshaken and his focus sharpened to its absolute peak. The distance between them no longer mattered, because what existed in that space was not emptiness, but the violent convergence of two opposing forces.
Between them, power clashed without visible movement.
