Zazm and Jahanox descended the stone steps, shadows curling gently around their feet as they stepped into the training grounds. The space was alive with energy—Min-Seok focused in silent meditation, Jennie floating small illusions in the air, Kiyomasa dodging bursts of telekinetic pressure from Miwa. Everyone paused when they noticed the two entering.
Zazm gave a crooked grin and spread his arms. "Hey, miss me?"
Kiyomasa's face lit up. "You're back!"
Jennie nodded with a smile. "It's been a while, Zazm."
Zazm chuckled, brushing invisible dust from his shoulder. "I leave you guys alone for a few weeks and look at this—actual effort. I'm impressed."
Jahanox stood beside him, arms crossed, his usual calm gaze sweeping the room. "Progress?"
Min-Seok was the first to speak. "They've improved. Faster responses. Sharper control."
Miwa tossed her hair over her shoulder, smirking. "Well, mostly me. Not sure about the rest."
Zazm laughed. "Good to know the ego's been training too."
Everyone chuckled—until Miwa's smile turned teasing. "But… isn't this kind of unfair?"
The room quieted. All eyes turned to her.
Zazm raised an eyebrow. "What is?"
Miwa folded her arms, mock-serious. "That you and Jahanox never train. You just watch, comment, then disappear to who-knows-where."
Zazm's smirk widened, eyes narrowing ever so slightly. "We train while training you. That's the trick."
Miwa grinned slyly. "Right. But are you even that strong? Or just good at pretending?"
A moment of silence. Tension and amusement danced in the air.
Jahanox, smiling faintly, stepped forward. "How about we test that?"
Everyone turned to him, surprised.
Kiyomasa blinked. "Wait—test how?"
Jahanox's smirk deepened. Shadows began to rise and swirl around them, gentle at first, then engulfing everything in a soft, velvety dark. "I have a special place in the Shadow Realm."
In an instant, the ground beneath their feet vanished. The room stretched, twisted—and suddenly, they were standing in a vast black-marble arena under a twilight sky. Crystalline lights floated like stars above them.
Jennie gasped. "Where are we?"
Zazm looked around in awe. "No way... Is this the thing you didn't want me to see?"
Jahanox nodded. "Not even the best part of it."
Kiyomasa looked around nervously. "Then what is the best part?"
Jahanox turned to face the group. "You can't die here."
Eyes widened.
He raised a hand. "Let me explain. This arena monitors your condition. If you take enough damage to be fatally wounded, it teleports you out instantly—and regenerates you completely. Even if you're cut in half, you'll survive."
Jennie and Kiyomasa looked visibly pale. Min-Seok's eyes sharpened, absorbing the information carefully. Miwa, meanwhile, was grinning.
"And," Jahanox added, "there's no pain in this realm. None at all. So feel free to go wild."
Zazm clapped once, breaking the suspense. "Alright! Since Miwa questioned us…" He pointed dramatically. "Let's go like this—first match: Jahanox versus all four of you."
The sky cracked with thunder, clouds boiling in slow motion as if even time itself was watching.
The old battlefield stretched far and wide—a barren plateau scorched by the echoes of past wars. Rocks jutted like jagged teeth, wind howling through the empty hollows. In the heart of it all stood Jahanox, arms folded, a faint smirk tugging at his lips.
He didn't move. He didn't need to. His presence alone distorted the air, like pressure building before a storm.
Across from him stood Jennie, Kiyomasa, Miwa, and Caspian—the four Catalysts. Each of them tensed, a fire behind their eyes. They knew who they were facing. Zazm's right hand. The cold blade of their team. The one who didn't lose.
High above, standing on a broken ridge, Zazm chuckled, leaning against a tilted boulder with his arms behind his head. Beside him, Min-Seok—quiet, cautious—watched with a frown.
"Think they'll land a hit?" Zazm asked casually, eyes tracking every movement below.
"They're good," Min-Seok murmured. "But he's…"
"A monster?" Zazm grinned. "Yeah. But everyone needs to get cut at least once to learn how to bleed."
Below, Jahanox tilted his head. "Well?" he said, voice calm, sharp. "I'm waiting."
The Catalysts didn't respond. Kiyomasa stepped forward first.
With a roar, he slammed both palms into the ground. Fire erupted in a circle around him, twisting instantly into water, then ice, then stone. All six elements danced across his arms, steam hissing from the collision of forces.
Try this!"
He leapt high, a meteor of elemental fury. Ice laced his fists as he came down, spinning mid-air. A twisting cyclone of wind followed him.
Jahanox didn't blink.
In the next instant, Kiyomasa was on the ground, coughing, a crater around him.
"What…?" he gasped.
Jahanox stood behind him now. "Too slow."
He hadn't moved. Not visibly. But the afterimage faded just as Kiyomasa realized what happened.
Miwa didn't wait. Her eyes glowed with violet light as her mind surged outward—telepathy, telekinesis—waves of invisible force aiming to pin Jahanox in place.
"Got you," she muttered.
For a heartbeat, it worked. He froze.
Then he vanished again. Not a blur—just gone.
"Close," came his voice from behind her.
She turned, barely fast enough to see his hand swipe through the air.
BAM. She flew backward, tumbling through rocks, skidding hard before halting with a groan.
"Damn it," Caspian hissed. "Alright."
He rushed in—touching Kiyomasa's shoulder mid-run. A burst of borrowed elemental power surged through him. Caspian's body lit up with flame and wind, his speed tripling. He vanished in a dash of sparks, reappearing behind Jahanox in less than a second, palm crackling.
He struck.
It connected.
But Jahanox didn't move.
Caspian's eyes widened. "No way…"
The copied power fizzled out.
"Borrowed strength fades quickly," Jahanox said, turning slowly. "Especially when it's not yours."
A backhand sent Caspian flying.
Three down.
Only Jennie remained.
She stood still, a soft wind brushing her long hair. Her Catalyst necklace shimmered faintly at her collar.
"Don't even think about it," Jahanox said without looking at her. "I can see through illusions."
"Then maybe," Jennie whispered, "you should stop looking with your eyes."
Her form flickered—then disappeared.
Boom. An invisible force slammed into Jahanox's ribs.
He staggered.
Another strike—this time from the side. A phantom blade of kinetic force raked his shoulder.
His head snapped in her direction, but saw nothing.
Jennie's voice echoed faintly. "You underestimate how real a lie can become if no one questions it."
Then she appeared—phased through the ground like a ghost—and touched his back.
For a split second, he froze.
She'd disrupted the electrical current in his nervous system. Just a second. But enough.
Kiyomasa, bloodied but grinning, rose to his feet. "Now!"
He thrust his hand forward.
A spike of sharpened stone, wrapped in ice and flame, shot forward—
—and pierced Jahanox's side.
Time stopped.
Above, Zazm straightened.
Minos's eyes widened. "They… they got him."
Down below, Jahanox slowly turned, blood trailingdown his side. He looked down at the wound, then at the four who now stood in a semi-circle, battered but alive.
A slow breath escaped him.
Then he smiled—genuinely.
"…Not bad."
The sky trembled.
Then everything exploded.
The stone spike shattered.
Not because of Kiyomasa. Not because of anyone else.
Because Jahanox moved.
A subtle flex of his muscles pushed the spear of rock out from his side. Blood still trickled—but he didn't care. His smile deepened, eyes bright with something almost rare on his face:
Enjoyment.
"So…" he murmured, rolling his shoulders as three faint blue circles appeared behind his back—cooldown rings spinning slowly, a telltale sign he had activated abilities. "You can land a hit when you fight like a pack."
He cracked his neck.
"Let's see how long you last now that I'm having fun."
The battlefield froze for a heartbeat—literally.
Jahanox's aura snapped outward like a whip. A ripple of spatial pressure crushed the air. All four Catalysts instinctively braced.
Miwa leapt back and sent a mental pulse toward Jennie and Caspian. "Stay sharp—he's unlocking something—"
Too late.
Jahanox blurred.
Not a Catalyst blink, not teleportation—just raw speed, enhanced by a burst from the Crimson Dash, a high-speed combat ability with a 15-second cooldown.
He reappeared behind Caspian, grabbed the back of his collar, and slammed him into the ground with a shockwave that cratered the earth.
Before Caspian could even groan, Jahanox vanished again.
Jennie's illusion activated automatically—but Jahanox wasn't looking with sight. He was using Sensory Lock, a technique that reads vibrations, breath, and motion. The illusions flickered uselessly as he strode past them, tracing Jennie's real location by heartbeat.
He appeared beside her and tapped her forehead gently.
She gasped—then dropped unconscious.
"Jennie!" Kiyomasa roared. Flames burst from his palms, swirling into a vortex of molten heat. He punched the earth, launching a wave of erupting fire straight at Jahanox.
The heat distorted everything—but Jahanox stepped forward, unburnt.
The blue sigil-ring behind him flared.
Aegis Skin. A temporary armor of pure force, shimmering faintly against the blast. He walked through it like mist.
He reached Kiyomasa and said softly: "Your power is loud. I prefer silence."
He drove his fist into Kiyomasa's gut. The flame died instantly. A second blow sent him flying across the battlefield, tumbling limp across stone.
Miwa floated above, hands outstretched, voice trembling but defiant. "I'll crush you before you get to me."
Boulders rose. The terrain twisted. Her telekinesis roared to life.
Jahanox didn't flinch.
The gold sigil-ring behind him sparked.
He raised his hand.
Graviton Pulse. A manipulation of gravitational vectors in a 15-meter radius, with a 30-second cooldown.
The air around Miwa collapsed. Her shield shattered instantly. She gasped, crushed downward by an invisible force—slammed into the earth like a meteor.
She didn't get up.
Jahanox stood in the center of the carnage. His coat fluttered in the unnatural wind. His breathing hadn't changed once.
Above, Zazm clapped slowly. "He didn't even use his best stuff. No spatial breaks. No neural pulse. Just three."
Minos finally exhaled. "He dismantled them."
Below, Jahanox looked up at the two observers. His sigil-rings faded, one by one, as cooldowns triggered. He wiped the blood from his jaw.
"This was decent," he said calmly.
The battlefield simmered with dust and scorched stone. The air carried the scent of ozone, earth, and faint embers.
From the sky, two figures descended—one riding on a twisting helix of silver threads, the other simply floating with regal calm.
Zazm landed first, boots kicking up small clouds. His hands were in his pockets. His smile was easy. Too easy.
Then he turned, and decked Jahanox across the face.
Not too hard—but loud. Sharp. Personal.
Jahanox took the hit without blinking. His head turned, jaw tightening only slightly from the impact. He looked back at Zazm, unimpressed.
"You didn't tell me," Zazm muttered. "You can use three powers at once now?"
Jahanox brushed his cheek where the punch landed. "It's not that big a deal."
"Oh, really?" Zazm threw his arms up. "You waltz in like a grim reaper on break time, flatten four of my best people, and say it's not a big deal?"
Minos finally touched down behind them. "He did destroy them rather… elegantly."
Jahanox shrugged. "Cooldowns are shorter too. Guess I'm just getting stronger."
Zazm narrowed his eyes. "Getting stronger without telling your team? You're lucky I didn't send you to the stratosphere just now."
Then—
"Hey…" a voice groaned.
From behind the wreckage, Kiyomasa slowly sat up, groaning and rubbing his ribs. "I feel like I got punched by a freight train…"
A few feet away, Jennie phased out of invisibility, holding her head. "I blacked out… how long was I out?"
Caspian popped up behind a ruined tree, dramatically clutching his chest. "I saw the afterlife. It had tea. Jahanox kicked me through the ceiling of Heaven."
Miwa floated up next, visibly annoyed. "He crushed gravity on top of me. Do you know how rude that is?"
Zazm blinked. "You're all alive?"
Jahanox turned to them, faintly amused. "Don't act like that you're all already healed."
Jennie frowned at him. "You tapped my forehead and I was out."
"Exactly," he replied. "Pressure points. Efficient."
Caspian scoffed. "He body slammed me. Efficient my—"
Zazm clapped once. "Alright, you lot. Pain is a great teacher. Now sit down—we're gonna dissect this."
The five Catalysts grumbled, sat or leaned where they could, still battered but alert. Jahanox stood beside Zazm, arms crossed. His presence alone quieted them.
Zazm stepped forward. "Let's go one by one."
Jennie first. She straightened reflexively.
Zazm gestured. "Your illusions are phenomenal. Still trick even most Catalyst-tier senses. But Jahanox didn't use sight. He used vibration and bio-rhythm tracking."
Jahanox nodded. "I can sense movement without eyes. You were too close. You held your breath at the wrong moment."
Jennie's eyes widened. "That's… creepy and cool. I'll train with longer-range illusion setups."
Kiyomasa next.
"You led with your strongest attack again," Jahanox said flatly.
Kiyomasa lowered his eyes. "I wanted to make sure I hit."
"And if you miss?" Zazm chimed in. "You burn energy. You lose tempo. That fire wave was impressive, but you fought like a cannon, not a warrior."
"I'll learn restraint," Kiyomasa muttered.
"No," Zazm corrected. "Learn precision. Big is fine. But hit where it hurts."
Caspian leaned back, still playing it cool. "I didn't even get to use my copy."
Jahanox raised a brow. "Because you hesitated. You always wait to see what power is worth copying."
Zazm pointed. "Hesitation kills. You're clever, Caspian, but you're a gambler. You can't out-bluff someone like Jahanox."
Caspian sighed. "So... I shouldn't try to trick someone who's boring?"
"I'm not boring," Jahanox said mildly. "I just read people better than you lie."
Miwa crossed her arms. "I had a full telekinetic defense and range control. He still got me."
Jahanox looked at her. "You hovered in place."
Miwa blinked. "So?"
"You made yourself the center of the battlefield. Obvious target. The moment I activated gravity compression, you had nowhere to redirect momentum. You were a fixed pin in a moving system."
Zazm added, "You're powerful, Miwa. But you have to move like you're weak. Float, shift, change layers. Don't be the sun—be the moon behind clouds."
Miwa's brows furrowed in thought. Then she nodded. "Okay. I'll float smarter next time."
There was a long silence.
The team looked around—bruised, embarrassed, but thoughtful.
Then Caspian coughed. "So, uh. We did kind of get destroyed."
Zazm laughed. "Obliterated. Utterly."
Jennie winced. "Don't remind me."
But then, Jahanox spoke softly.
"You all did better than last time."
They turned to him in surprise.
"You moved in coordination," he said. "Tried to misdirect. Hit me twice. Even made me use all three powers."
Zazm nodded. "Exactly. That's progress. You fought well against someone you probably can't beat right now. But you learned. And that's what makes you dangerous later."
The Catalysts exchanged glances. Then slowly, small smiles bloomed.
"I'll train harder," Kiyomasa said.
"I'll refine illusion placement," Jennie added.
"I'll predict before I copy," Caspian nodded.
"I'll float like a ninja," Miwa grinned.
Jahanox looked at them all. "Next time, I might be able to use four abilities."
Zazm chuckled. "Only if I don't ban you first."
---
The air was still, a charged silence hanging over the group as they stood amidst the aftermath of their brutal training session
Despite their bruises, there was a spark of defiance in their eyes. Kiyomasa, still reeling from the devastating training with Jahanox, stepped forward with a determined look on his face.
"Wait, you're just going to leave?" Miwa asked, her voice a bit sharper than usual. She had been quiet, contemplating their failure, but now there was a mix of confusion and challenge in her words. "Aren't you going to fight us too?"
Zazm paused. He raised an eyebrow at her, a smirk tugging at the corner of his lips. "Fight you?" he mused. "Against me? I don't think you're ready for that." He waved it off dismissively, as if the thought were laughable.
Kiyomasa took a few steps forward, shaking his head, "You're underestimating us. Sure, we're no Jahanox, but we can land a hit. If nothing else, we can at least try, right?"
Caspian nodded in agreement, leaning in. "Yeah, you might be a powerhouse, Zazm, but we've got some tricks up our sleeves too. Don't count us out just yet."
Jennie smiled, her voice bright despite the weariness from earlier. "We're not that far behind. You've taught us well."
Zazm's smirk widened, the glint in his eyes turning more mischievous. He snapped his fingers, and in that instant—time froze.
Each of them stood still, locked in their positions, unable to move, as if the world itself had come to a halt.
Zazm walked leisurely towards them, tapping his fingers against his chin. "So, you think you can land a hit? You think you can surprise me?"
He approached Kiyomasa first, tapping his knuckles lightly on the man's head with an amused chuckle. "You really think you can touch me?" Zazm moved on, giving Caspian a playful tap on the skull. "What's your plan, copycat? You think I'm going to make it easy for you?"
Next was Miwa, whose expression was frozen in a fierce, determined look. Zazm's hand hovered above her head. "You'll have to do better than that, Miwa. Telekinesis? Not a chance."
Finally, he stopped in front of Jennie, who was standing with a soft smile despite being frozen in place.
Zazm reached out and lightly tapped her forehead, laughing quietly to himself. "Pretty nice, Jennie. But you didn't think I'd be that easy, did you?"
With a flourish, Zazm snapped his fingers again, and the world resumed.
The Catalysts blinked, the feeling of stillness vanishing as time restarted.
Immediately, Caspian pointed at him. "Unfair!" he shouted. "Ban that power from the game! You can't just freeze us! What the hell is that?"
Miwa was equally upset. "Zazm, that's not—that's cheating! You can't just freeze time during a fight!"
Zazm's smirk only deepened. He held up a hand, silencing them. "Alright, alright, I'll show you what I mean. But first…"
His eyes narrowed, and with a wave of his hand, he activated Nexus's Gaze.
The fabric of reality around him shimmered for a split second, a subtle ripple in space and time that no one could quite put their finger on. The air felt thinner—more fragile.
Zazm turned to Kiyomasa, his voice casual. "Alright, Kiyomasa. Let's see what you've got. Hit me."
Kiyomasa blinked, his eyes darting between Zazm and the others. "Are you sure you—"
"Yes. I'm sure," Zazm said, his tone unbothered.
Kiyomasa hesitated for only a moment before conjuring a massive ball of fire, an inferno of pure heat, swirling and crackling with violent energy. With a shout, he threw it towards Zazm.
The fireball soared through the air, glowing bright, but when it was mere inches from hitting Zazm—
It vanished. Disappeared. Like it had never been there at all.
Everyone stood in stunned silence.
"What—?" Miwa breathed.
"I—I don't understand," Jennie whispered, her mind trying to process what she had just witnessed.
Zazm tilted his head, casually glancing at Miwa now. "I don't think you're convinced yet. Go ahead, try something."
Miwa's brow furrowed, and with a flare of her telekinesis, she raised several boulders, hurling them all towards Zazm in a swift barrage. She expected at least some impact—some kind of resistance.
But once again—they vanished. As if they had been erased from existence itself. Just like the fireball.
Everyone's eyes widened, disbelief painted across their faces.
Zazm chuckled, his hands in his pockets as he turned back to the group. "Space-time is malleable. I can manipulate the very fabric of it. Your attacks aren't vanishing—they just don't have anywhere to go. They flow along with the ripples they can't just flow anywhere."
There was a brief pause as the group processed this, the weight of his words settling over them.
"The attacks aren't gone. They just follow the changes in space-time. Every attack has a path—I just make that path dissapper."
Zazm explained, a small but knowing grin curling at the edges of his lips. "You hit me, and I can bend the flow of time around it. It's like redirecting a river—if the river is made of your energy."
Kiyomasa's eyes flickered with awe. "You can literally make attacks disappear..."
"Exactly," Zazm nodded. "That's why I can bend space-time like that."
Miwa bit her lip, her usual brashness momentarily subdued by the immense complexity of what Zazm had just shown them. "But… how? How can you control it like that?"
Zazm's eyes twinkled, the Nexus's Gaze still active as he casually leaned against a rock. "I control the weave of reality. The space between things. In the simplest terms, I can bend how the universe flows around me. It's not a matter of strength, it's a matter of precision."
Caspian, ever the curious mind, raised his hand. "So, what's the weakness? What makes you vulnerable?"
Zazm smiled, a faint edge to his expression. "If I overextend, I can't control it. If I let the flow become too complex, too tangled, it might tear. But that's the thing—you have to learn how to flow with the current without breaking it."
The team was silent for a long moment, processing the information. Jennie, her eyes alight with understanding, finally spoke.
"So… we need to get better. We need to train smarter. Focus on precision—and learn to fight the current, right?"
Zazm gave her a slow, approving nod. "Exactly."
Jahanox, who had been silent up to now, spoke from behind the group, his arms crossed. "He's right. The battlefield is fluid. If you don't adapt… you'll drown."
Zazm laughed lightly. "And we'll drown together if we don't keep swimming."
The air still trembled from Zazm's display of power. Dust swirled gently across the scorched training field, and the group of Catalysts stood in stunned silence, their minds racing, their breaths still short from awe and adrenaline.
Zazm brushed his fingers through his messy hair, a lopsided grin stretching across his face. He turned to Jahanox, his tone low and charged with excitement.
"That wasn't as fun as I hoped," he said. "How about you and I go next?"
Jahanox's serious eyes lit up with a rare glimmer of anticipation. His lips curled into a cold, eager smirk. "I thought you'd never ask."
Everyone froze.
Miwa's mouth fell open. "Wait—you two? You're gonna fight each other?"
Kiyomasa stepped forward, his expression concerned. "But—wouldn't Zazm just bend space-time again? Wouldn't he just make all of Jahanox's attacks disappear like ours?"
Zazm let out a soft chuckle, walking into the middle of the field. His coat fluttered behind him, and his eyes gleamed with the energy of the Nexus's Gaze still faintly shimmering. "Oh, you think it's that easy?"
He turned toward the group, lifting a hand. "Sure, I can bend space and time… but it's not some magic on-off switch. It takes mental pressure—clarity, calculation. And when you're fighting someone like Jahanox…"
He glanced back at his friend, who was now rolling his shoulders, stretching slightly. "...It's not like I'll get a chance to breathe."
Jahanox cracked his neck once, then again. "You'll need more than a few cheap tricks, Zazm. I can use three powers now. At once."
The group collectively tensed.
Caspian whispered, "This is going to be insane."
Zazm raised his hand. With a flick of his wrist, a glowing blue rift opened in space behind him.
Jahanox clenched his fist, and the air around him pulsed as his body shimmered with three overlapping auras. One for speed. One for energy manipulation. One… unknown.
"Let's make this one count," Jahanox said coolly.
---
Zazm raised a hand mid-combat, his laughter echoing across the battered field. "Wait, wait—hold on a second!"
Jahanox stopped mid-charge, one eyebrow raised. "What?"
Zazm squinted at him. "You're using energy manipulation, right?"
Jahanox blinked. Then his eyes widened. "…Oh."
The realization hit them both.
Zazm slapped a hand to his face, laughing even harder. "You weren't even supposed to use the big guns!"
Jahanox exhaled sharply through his nose, managing a rare grin. "Guess I got caught up."
"How long is the cooldown on that one?" Zazm asked, brushing back his coat.
"Twenty-six years," Jahanox replied flatly.
They both paused.
Then burst out laughing
Even from the distance, Miwa, Kiyomasa, and the others could feel the tension break momentarily. But then Jahanox rolled his shoulders again, and the atmosphere changed once more.
"Fine," Jahanox said, extending a hand. "No more reality, no dimension manipulation. Let's go with the classics."
Zazm's smirk sharpened. "Good. Let's make the world shake with those classics."
The fight resumed.
Zazm blinked out of space, appearing instantly behind Jahanox, attempting a sweeping kick imbued with compressed quantum force. Jahanox responded with enhanced reflexes, grabbing Zazm's ankle mid-air, flipping him upside down—
But Zazm opened a fold of space below himself, slipping through it like water and reappearing above, slamming both feet downward.
Boom.
Jahanox skidded back, caught the blow with crossed arms, and then activated raw speed enhancement—no cheating, just velocity.
They blurred into motion, two streaks of light crashing across the training grounds, demolishing chunks of rock, warping the air with every strike.
Zazm would vanish, appear a meter away, twist space to dodge—Jahanox would respond instantly, closing the gap with a single stride and delivering a full-powered punch enhanced by physical augmentation.
Crack!
Zazm was thrown through a crumbling tree, skidding to a stop.
"Now that," he said, rubbing his jaw, "was solid."
He stood, eyes glowing with the Gaze again.
Zazm reached out and snapped the very fabric of space behind Jahanox, pulling him backward with reverse gravity. Jahanox dug his heels in, but the pressure pulled harder.
Zazm then opened a small stasis bubble mid-pull.
Jahanox shot toward it—
—but stopped inches before hitting it.
He activated friction negation, redirecting the inertia with a twisting spin, and dashed toward Zazm midair.
Their fists collided mid-charge.
The impact rippled through space. The sky dimmed briefly as the air bent around their strike like a black hole forming.
On the ground, Jennie muttered, "This… doesn't even feel like a fight anymore. It's like two storms clashing."
Kiyomasa nodded silently. Caspian had sat down, stunned. Miwa's hands were clasped, eyes wide with sparkling fascination.
Back in the air—
Zazm teleported mid-teleport, a double-layered fold that should have torn his own body apart, but he threaded the quantum layers together, appearing right above Jahanox and sending a wave of force downward—
Jahanox activated terrain manipulation, shooting a pillar of rock straight into the sky to meet Zazm, and then rushed up it, kicking off with tremendous force.
Zazm snapped the pillar in half with a gesture, bending the trajectory of its fall toward Jahanox—but Jahanox froze mid-air, not by power but by using air density manipulation, and let the stone slam beneath him instead.
Then he came down like a hammer.
Zazm raised both hands—and the entire battlefield warped.
The space rippled like a pond, and Jahanox's descent slowed, floating like he was trapped in a dream. But it wasn't enough—Jahanox surged forward with brute power and broke through the bend, forcing Zazm to parry manually.
They exchanged a flurry of blows, each punch disrupting time and each dodge tearing rifts in space.
Sweat beaded on their brows.
Breaths were shorter.
Then Zazm flung himself back, spinning mid-air and opening a portal that dropped him above Jahanox this time. Jahanox reached up instinctively—
And Zazm stopped time for one heartbeat. Not a normal time freeze, a time freeze so strong that it froze the entire shadow dimension.
In that frozen instant, Zazm whispered, "I'll owe myself for this," and landed a clean palm to Jahanox's chest, releasing a directed pulse of compressed space.
Time resumed—
BOOM.
Jahanox was flung backwards—hitting the ground and skidding deep, carving a massive trench across the field.
Zazm dropped, panting.
Jahanox lay there for a moment… and then sat up, grinning despite the dust and bruises.
"That… was the best one yet."
Zazm laughed breathlessly. "I could say the same."
They stood, facing each other, battered but still smiling—not as rivals, but as living legends, warriors bonded not by victory but the sheer joy of the battle itself.
Silence hung in the air like suspended ash. The battlefield was scarred—trenches carved into the ground, chunks of rock floating in warped air pockets, time-warp ripples still echoing faintly through the space.
Zazm and Jahanox stood at the center, shoulders rising and falling with slow breaths. Dust swirled around them like a natural curtain, the aftermath of storms having clashed.
Then
"WHAT WAS THAT!?" Miwa's voice broke the stillness, high-pitched and full of chaotic awe.
She ran toward them, eyes practically sparkling, arms flailing wildly. "Did you just… Did you just bend a mountain and make it fly in reverse gravity?!
And then you Zazm you paused time, and Jahanox did you redirect gravity using your skin friction?! What even are you guys!?"
Kiyomasa followed at a calmer pace, but his fists were clenched, his eyes burning with excitement. "That was insane. Insane. I couldn't even follow half of it. I mean—Zazm, you teleported twice in a teleport, and Jahanox just ignored that like it was nothing!"
Jennie was wide-eyed, stepping closer with hands clasped behind her back. "You guys weren't even fighting to hurt each other. You were having fun at that level?"
Caspian had both hands on his head. "That wasn't even a fight. That was… an exhibition of divine chaos." He pointed at Jahanox. "And you—you burst through a space-bent stasis field! You weren't even using dimension manipulation!"
Zazm chuckled, brushing dust off his shoulder. "Yeah, we had to hold back a little. I banned the big ones no reality breaking, no creating worlds or deleting them, no freezing him in time, and some others. Just the basics."
"Basics!?" Kiyomasa barked. "That was the most unbasic thing I've ever seen in my life!"
Jahanox remained composed, but even he cracked a faint grin as he folded his arms. "I was only using enhanced strength, speed, energy manipulation, and a few passive boosts. I didn't even touch conceptual erasure."
Miwa blinked. "Con-what-now?"
"Don't ask," Caspian said. "We might all stop existing if you say the wrong word."
Jennie tilted her head, genuine curiosity shining in her gaze. "How many abilities were you using at once?"
Jahanox shrugged. "Three, maybe four. But light ones. Not the ones with decade cooldowns. Energy manipulation's on cooldown now anyway—twenty-six years."
"Twenty-six years!?" Kiyomasa exploded.
Minos spoke, "Hey just curious but how would you counter if Jahanox used something like reality manipulation?"
Zazm tilted his head and smiled a little, "He can't use a power like that for more than a minute or two, since it's too strong but yeah well during that time, I'll simply disconnect myself from the space time fabric."
Minos asked confusion etched on his face, "Disconnect yourself?"
"Yeah reality manipulation would also work on space-time fabric, well it can go beyond but not at his level."
Miwa sat on the grass, arms flopped behind her. "Okay, I need a century-long nap and a scientific journal to process what I just saw."
Jahanox looked over the group. "You all did well earlier. Especially when you caught me off guard."
Kiyomasa perked up. "Seriously?"
"Yeah," Jahanox nodded. "Jennie's illusions got me to drop guard. Kiyomasa's elemental shift forced a close-range clash. Even Miwa's mental pulses made me delay reaction by milliseconds. That's all it takes."
Miwa lit up like a lamp.
Zazm walked over and added, "You're improving. But remember—you won't win with power alone. It's about precision, intuition, control. The strongest powers mean nothing if they can't land."
Kiyomasa looked thoughtful. "So you're saying we don't have to match you in strength?"
"You never will," Jahanox replied bluntly.
"But you might outmaneuver us," Zazm finished with a wink. "Especially if we're distracted or holding back. Which we almost always are."
Caspian folded his arms. "And when you're not?"
Zazm's smile turned razor-sharp. "Then I hope you left a will."
The group laughed nervously.
Jahanox turned away, hands in his pockets. "The real fights are coming. Learn from this. Because next time…"
"…it might not be for fun," Zazm said, voice trailing into seriousness. "It might be for survival."
The wind blew across the cratered field, carrying the faint hum of energy still lingering in the air.
And for a moment, everyone stood together not as teacher and student, not as weak and strong but as Catalysts.
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