The shift came before the presence fully revealed itself, but this time it didn't ripple through the space like a disturbance or press down like overwhelming pressure. It arrived quietly, almost naturally, and that alone made it far more dangerous than anything Adrian had faced so far. The environment didn't resist it, didn't react violently, didn't attempt to stabilize against it. Instead, it acknowledged it, as if something deeper than the system itself had accepted its existence.
Adrian felt it instantly.
Not as weight.
Not as force.
But as absence.
The space around him, which had begun responding to his presence during the previous clash, suddenly felt distant, as if something had cut through the connection between him and the environment. The alignment he had built remained intact, the bond still stable, but the influence he had begun to exert—
Was gone.
He didn't move.
Not immediately.
Because this—
Was different.
Behind him, the others felt it too.
