The night stretched taut, a black canvas ripped by fury and light. Atlas and Ureil spun above the jagged peaks, their bodies carving arcs through clouds and shadow, leaving trails of energy that hissed and crackled in the cold, thin air.
Each strike that landed echoed like mountains splitting, and each block resounded with a metallic, celestial clang that rattled the bones of the world below.
Torches on the cliffside twinkled like fireflies, tiny and fragile, dwarfed by the storm they could barely comprehend.
Atlas felt it first in his chest, then radiating outward, a subtle shift beneath the pounding rhythm of combat.
Ureil's punches—the blows that had before hammered him into near oblivion—now landed with restraint.
She moved with the same lethal grace, eyes sharp and calculating, but the weight of her strikes no longer sought to harm him.
Each punch was deliberate, almost delicate, a hand holding a knife at a whisper's distance rather than a hammer crashing down.
