The power of the casket of ancient winters erupted like a tsunami; the blizzard that had been dispersed by Mavuika's Fire re-condensed and became even more violent.
Snowflakes became as sharp as blades, the cold wind became as viscous as glue, and even space began to be Frozen and brittle.
"Laufey is going all out." Odin narrowed his eyes.
"He wants to use the original power of the casket of ancient winters to directly rewrite the weather of Jotunheim."
On the battlefield below, Mavuika and Hela simultaneously felt the pressure surge.
Mavuika's Fire domain began to be compressed.
The radius shrank from one hundred meters to seventy, then fifty... The power of the casket of ancient winters was like an invisible giant hand, attempting to snuff out his invading Sun.
The boundary between Fire and ice emitted a harsh screeching sound; it was the collision of two fundamental laws.
Hela had it even worse; although her Death Divine Power was formidable, it had no effective way to block the severe cold, and the power of the casket of ancient winters was Freezing everything.
Her black sword began to slow down, and the thunder on the head of mjolnir also began to weaken.
"Sister!" Hela shouted, a rare occurrence, her voice carrying a trace of impatience.
"This damn thing is Freezing my divine power! We must end this quickly!"
Mavuika looked up toward the highest point of the royal court.
Laufey stood there, his hands holding up the fully opened casket of ancient winters.
What surged from the casket was no longer a beam of light, but a tangible, flowing "Cold"—that was the conceptualized low temperature, the origin of the phenomenon of "Ice."
"I will go deal with him," Mavuika said. "Hela, you clear the battlefield; don't let anyone else interfere."
"By yourself?" Hela frowned.
"Trust me." Mavuika smiled at her slightly, a smile like sunlight breaking through dark clouds.
He no longer maintained his domain, instead gathering all the Fire back into his body.
The runes on the sun-blaze thousand suns sword blade shone to a blinding degree, and the entire sword began to become transparent, as if it had turned into solidified Fire.
Then he moved.
With every step Mavuika took, he left behind a golden lotus of Fire Burning for Eternity; his long hair no longer fluttered but burned upward like Fire, the tips turning into leaping tongues of flame.
He rushed toward the royal court, toward Laufey, toward the casket of ancient winters.
Frost Giants along the way attempted to block him, but within one hundred meters of him, their armor began to Melt, their weapons began to drip, and their bodies began to self-combust.
He was like a humanoid star, carving a path through the kingdom of absolute zero with absolute high temperature.
Laufey saw him.
"Arrogant!" The Frost Giant king roared, aiming the casket of ancient winters at Mavuika.
A blue torrent surged from the casket; it was not ice, nor was it snow, but "Cold" itself.
Wherever the torrent passed, space was Frozen into fragile ice crystals, the flow of time slowed, and even light was Frozen into curved ice prisms.
Mavuika did not dodge or evade, holding the sword with both hands, raising the sun-blaze thousand suns high above his head.
Fire, bright to the point of being almost blinding, ignited from the sword, and after a brief flicker, it erupted into the sky like a solar flare.
Mavuika tensed his whole body, gripped the hilt with both hands, and brought it down violently.
The golden-red sword light of Fire collided with the blue torrent of cold.
There was no sound... or rather, the sound was erased by the two extreme forces the moment it was born.
There was only the confrontation of pure light and darkness, heat and cold, life and death.
With the collision point as the center, the battlefield was divided into two.
On the left was Mavuika's kingdom of Fire; the ice surface Melted and boiled, steam rose into clouds, warm raindrops fell from the clouds, and after the raindrops hit the ground, they bloomed into fleeting flowers of Fire.
The air was filled with steaming heat, and even space seemed to be distorted by that high temperature.
On the right was Laufey's hell of ice; everything was Frozen, time stood still, and even the falling snowflakes were fixed in mid-air as eternal ice sculptures.
Several Frost Giants unfortunately caught in the aftermath remained in their charging postures, turning into crystalline ice statues, with expressions of shock still visible inside.
That was absolute dead silence; even Frost Giants, creatures that lived by ice, were Frozen.
The two domains corroded, compressed, and devoured each other.
A twisted barrier formed at the boundary, where Fire and ice were crazily transforming; a snowflake would fall and instantly Vaporize into steam, the steam would immediately condense back into ice crystals, and the ice crystals would Vaporize again...
Repeating again and again, never ceasing.
Hela stood at the edge of the barrier, her expression grave.
She wanted to rush in to help, but as soon as she took a step, she felt her Death Divine Power become sluggish, as if stuck in a quagmire.
The power of the casket of ancient winters was specifically Freezing the concept of all "activity," and death, essentially the end of life activity, was also suppressed.
"Damn it..." She gritted her teeth, slamming the head of mjolnir into the ground, creating a crack that extended for a hundred meters, but the crack stopped abruptly when it touched the barrier.
She could only watch.
Watching her sister face the Frost Giant king alone, facing that ancient divine artifact.
In the center of the domain, Mavuika and Laufey stood in a standoff one hundred meters apart.
This distance was very far in the eyes of mortals, but at their level, it was equivalent to being face-to-face.
Veins bulged on Laufey's hands, the casket of ancient winters hovering in front of his chest, continuously draining his life force to convert into cold.
His complexion was turning pale at a speed visible to the naked eye, ice-crack patterns appearing on his skin; the backlash from overusing the divine artifact was manifesting.
"Odin's daughter..." he gasped, his ice-blue eyes staring fixedly at Mavuika.
"You are indeed strong, but the casket of ancient winters is an ancient relic of Jotunheim; its power is endless, and you, how long can your Fire burn? A quarter of an hour? Half an hour? When you are exhausted—"
"You will defeat me?" Mavuika replied calmly.
"Perhaps, but Laufey, look around."
His gaze lifted slightly, pointing outside the domain.
Laufey looked in that direction.
Through the twisted barrier, he saw the collapsing Frost Giant battle line.
Although Hela could not intervene in their duel, she was carrying out a more efficient Carnage on the periphery.
The Death Guard and the Valkyrie Legion followed in her footsteps, reaping the Frost Giants who had lost the blessing of the casket of ancient winters in swathes.
Further away, the golden fleet of Asgard had broken through the final defense line and began bombarding the royal court itself.
Ice walls collapsed under artillery fire, the palace was Burning, and countless Frost Giant civilians were fleeing.
"Your kin are dying." Mavuika's voice was as warm as Fire, yet his words were as cold as ice picks.
"Even if you defeat me, Jotunheim has already lost this war."
Laufey's expression was ferocious; he knew that what Mavuika said was the truth. Even if he defeated his opponent, the Frost Giant's defensive line had already crumbled.
War was never a one-person game, and besides, the Asgard side still had the strongest, Odin, who had not yet made a move.
Laufey was silent for a moment, then turned to driving the casket of ancient winters even more frantically.
He was the king of the Frost Giants, the Master of Jotunheim; how could he just admit defeat like this?
Mavuika clearly felt Laufey's desperation, and the pressure suddenly surged.
But there was no turning back now; Mavuika understood that once he showed the slightest intention to retreat, the power of the casket of ancient winters would immediately overwhelm his Fire.
Thus, Mavuika did not dodge or evade, and also began to mobilize the power within his body with all his might.