The battlefield was still shaking from the monstrous, many-layered attack that fifty fighters had hurled at Danny. The energy wall—part firestorm, part lightning wedge, part kinetic cannon blast, part spell array—had been enough to vaporize a fortress. Fighters had poured every ounce of power they possessed into that single strike. The sky had warped under the force of it, the ground had bowed, and for one suspended heartbeat, it looked as though Danny had been swallowed in an explosion destined to carve a crater into the world.
But the moment the chapter opens, the truth is laid bare: Danny simply finished turning his head.
The glowing amalgamation of power, screaming forward with enough fury to erase civilizations, halted as if slamming against invisible stone. Light rippled. The air shuddered. The noise cut out entirely, as if the attack had lost permission to exist.
Danny lifted a single hand.
Not to push.
Not to block.
Just… up.
His palm faced the attack. His expression didn't change. His coat didn't ruffle. His boots didn't scrape. His breathing remained as even as if he were admiring a mild sunset.
He exhaled.
A soft, nearly polite breath.
The battlefield shook like a living thing struck across the face.
The entire combined attack reversed direction as though jerked back by a cosmic leash. It roared backward, slamming into the fifty fighters who had cast it with amplified force. Screams tore through the air as the attackers were launched across the battlefield in every conceivable direction. Several crashed through hard-light barriers. Others were flung straight out of the ring. A few struck solid pillars and bounced off them limp as broken puppets.
Dozens of names instantly blinked off the elimination board above the arena.
The crowd reacted in three stages: silence, panic, then deafening madness.
Danny lowered his hand.
The only visible exhaustion came from the battlefield—not him.
A crater formed at his feet from the shockwave caused by his breath alone, but Danny didn't stand in it. The ground had simply adjusted around him, lowering itself in respect—or fear.
Julian screamed through the commentary mic, voice cracking like glass. "HE—HE JUST—HE DIDN'T EVEN—HE BREATHED?! HE BREATHED AND DELETED AN ARMY!"
Jimmy cheered like he'd won the lottery twenty times in a row. "THAT'S OUR BOY! THAT'S THE DANNY SPECIAL! MIC DROP ATTACK DEFLECTION!"
Julian flailed. "WHAT MIC DROP?! HE DIDN'T EVEN HAVE A MIC! HE DIDN'T EVEN MOVE HIS FEET!"
All across the battlefield, fighters froze mid-combat. Even the most hardened veterans stared. Magic circles fizzled out. Battle cries turned into whimpers. A few fighters simply sat down and put their heads in their hands.
One murmured, "That wasn't defense. That was… correction. He corrected our attack."
Another whispered, "We're dead. We're all dead."
The Wolf King was not terrified.
The Wolf King laughed.
A booming, rolling, primal sound that vibrated the stones beneath him. His aura exploded outward in a wave of pressure that triggered the collapse of two nearby platforms.
"YES!" Wolf King roared, claws digging trenches into the stone beneath him. "YES! THAT is the opponent I sensed! THAT is the one worthy to face me!"
He leapt from his perch, not toward Danny yet, but into a cluster of recovering fighters. His claws shone like burning suns as he tore through them. Bodies flew. Armor shattered. The earth groaned under the brutality of his strikes.
Every kill, every motion, every thunderous landing served a singular purpose:
He was clearing the battlefield.
Preparing for his meeting with Danny.
Jake and Swift were doing the opposite—they were fleeing from both titans as fast as humanly, magically, and physically possible.
Jake's voice cracked as he sprinted away across a shaking platform. "SWIFT! DID YOU SEE THAT? DID YOU SEE THAT?! HE UNMADE THEIR ATTACK! HE JUST—HE—"
Swift grabbed Jake by the back of his collar, yanking him away from a collapsing bridge. "YES, I SAW IT! EVERYONE SAW IT! NOW PLEASE RUN FASTER!"
Jake panted. "He didn't even glare! There wasn't even a glare! He breathed!"
Swift pointed at Danny from a safe distance. "That's not a man. That's a terrain hazard with opinions!"
A shockwave from Wolf King's latest strike sent them both stumbling before Swift caught Jake under the arm and hauled him to higher ground.
Elsewhere, Sedge Hat watched Danny's display with the calm, satisfied expression of a man who had just seen his most accurate fear confirmed—and then exploited.
"Perfect," Sedge Hat whispered. "Everyone's stunned. Which means no one's watching me."
He activated three traps simultaneously.
A pillar snapped at its base and toppled over onto a squad of dazed warriors. A gravity shard detonated, lifting a cluster of fighters skyward before ejecting them off the field. A rebounding platform launched two over the edge with comedic timing.
Sedge Hat bowed deeply toward Danny. "Thank you for the opening."
On the far side of the arena, Shadeclaw cursed under his breath as he tore through an overeager brawler with a sweeping slash. His claws gleamed with residual energy, each movement precise and instinctive.
"Jade!" Shadeclaw snarled, slashing another fighter's weapon in half. "Don't look at Danny!"
Jade spun into a defensive roll, parrying two strikes at once. "I'm not looking at him!"
Shadeclaw pointed his tail accusingly. "You were tempted!"
Jade retorted, "Everyone was tempted! He defies logic!"
They unleashed a coordinated combination—Shadeclaw knocking an enemy's stance off balance, Jade finishing with a clean cut. They moved like veterans used to fighting in tandem, carving a path through the distracted battlefield.
Craterfist slammed the ground with enough power to create a miniature landslide of rubble. Ember Claw launched spiraling flame whips that fused two fighters together. Giga-Ronin absorbed Danny's reflected shockwave and redirected it like an artillery strike. Tundra Lynx created a frost ridge that sent three fighters sliding into the abyss. Mira-the-Silent flickered behind fighters, tapping their pressure points before vanishing again like smoke.
Danny, meanwhile, was just standing there.
Just… standing.
As if waiting patiently for the arena to finish processing what had happened.
Jimmy shouted into the mic, "OH! OH! DANNY IS JUST—HE'S JUST STANDING THERE! HE'S SO COOL! SO DEADLY! SO—SO—"
Julian shoved him. "STOP CHEERING! THIS IS HORRIFYING!"
Jimmy lifted a finger. "Look! Look at the waffle!"
Julian blinked. "Not again—"
The waffle sat calmly on the commentary booth desk.
Warm. Golden. Runes faintly rotating like a mystical halo.
Jimmy leaned in, whispering, "Hey buddy."
The waffle emitted a gentle whommmp. Lights flickered. A soft ripple passed through the monitors, briefly distorting the elimination board.
Jimmy smiled. "Nice."
Julian screamed. "WHY IS BREAKFAST INTERFERING WITH THE ELECTRONICS?!"
Then the waffle vanished again.
Danny finally resumed walking.
Just walking.
Each step sent visible ripples through the battlefield. Builder bots scrambled to keep the terrain stable, chirping in alarm as the environment warped in unnatural ways. A whole section of floating platforms tilted sideways like a ship at sea. A lava river abruptly reversed direction. A gravity well flickered in and out of existence like a dying star.
Danny wasn't doing any of it intentionally.
He was simply too strong to exist quietly.
Wolf King landed on a floating slab nearby, claws extended, aura burning like an inferno. He watched Danny walk with the rapt attention of a predator watching a rival predator reveal its full size.
"Soon," Wolf King growled.
Danny stopped.
Slowly, he looked up at Wolf King.
Electrified silence washed across the battlefield.
A lone fighter stumbled between the two titans, confused, dazed, bleeding from the ears.
Danny and Wolf King both turned their eyes toward the unfortunate soul.
The fighter fainted instantly.
The crowd roared.
The arena trembled.
Every fighter on the battlefield felt it:
The collision between Danny and the Wolf King was coming.
And the world was not ready.
Fighters Remaining: 438 / 500