Silence reigned.
Only three names remained etched on the projection glyphs hovering above the broken dome:
KAIRO VALECAEL SORENFREYA VALE
The storm had quieted… but not stilled.
Too much mana.Too much tension.The battlefield sensed that something far worse was approaching.
Freya Vale stood at the edge of the molten ridge that marked the last crater. Her flames were dimming. Ash clung to her cheeks. Her left arm trembled, singed from parrying Dalron's final blow.
Her phoenix wings were thin now ethereal, flickering.
But her back remained straight.
Across from her, Cael Soren approached with no visible haste.
He didn't cast.
He didn't draw.
He simply walked forward, hands behind his back.
"Kairo," he called without turning. "Do you know what awakens a dormant Mythic Aspect?"
Kairo didn't answer.
Cael continued.
"Not training. Not cultivation. Not even battle."
He stopped five meters from Freya.
"It's loss."
Freya's eyes narrowed. "You son of a"
She lunged.
Her phoenix flame burst to life again in one violent surge a defiant scream of burning pride. She shot forward in a spin, flames spiraling into a javelin of compressed fire, aimed straight for Cael's chest.
He didn't dodge.
He raised one hand and folded space beneath her.
She stumbled. The spiral veered off course.
And Cael struck.
A single palm.
Flat.
Precise.
It hit Freya's gut, and her flame vanished mid-breath.
She gasped crumpling, coughing blood.
Kairo's expression didn't change.
But the lightning koi above him twitched.
Its form destabilized for a moment its outline blurred.
Cael caught Freya by the shoulder before she could fall completely. He didn't let her collapse. Instead, he whispered:
"You matter to him. That's enough."
Then he threw her across the arena.
Freya's body slammed into a stone slab and slid down, motionless.
She wasn't unconscious.
But she wasn't getting up.
"Combatant Freya Vale critical state."
Still, Kairo didn't move.
But the koi swam faster now.
Loops tighter. Color darker.
The air began to bend.
Not spark.
Not flash.
Bend.
Like flame without fire.
Cael turned.
"Are you angry yet?"
Still, Kairo said nothing.
Cael kept walking. Step by step toward the lightning user who hadn't so much as clenched a fist since Freya's last attack.
"Or are you still hiding from what you are?"
Ten steps away.
"Do you even know what's inside you?"
Nine.
"Or are you afraid?"
Eight.
"Afraid the wolves will eat you when they wake."
Seven.
Kairo lifted his hand.
Lightning snapped across his knuckles clean, calm.
But the sound that followed was not lightning.
It was a low growl.
The lightning koi froze.
Its tail curled.
Its body twisted.
And suddenly its shape cracked.
From within the koi's glowing shell, a pair of burning blue eyes opened.
Kairo dropped his hand.
The ground beneath him cratered.
"You wanted them?"
His voice was low, but now the arena heard him.
Kairo stepped forward.
"You can have them."
He raised his left hand.
Blue lightning coiled around it.
But his right hand dripped fire.
Not orange. Not red.
Blue.
And beneath that flame three silhouettes emerged.
Three wolves.
Each one massive, snarling, their outlines incomplete.
But very much awake.
In the skybox, Elira gripped the railing hard enough to splinter wood.
"He's doing it."
One of the Magisterium observers stood from his chair, pale.
"That's... That's not just a Mythic Aspect."
"It's a Tri-Core Evolution."
"That hasn't happened in centuries."
Cael finally stopped smiling.
He lowered into a stance his body flickering with displacement echoes.
"Good," he whispered. "Show me what kind of god you become."