The battlefield looked like the inside of a dying star—glowing fissures in the cavern walls, powdered stone drifting down like ash, scorch marks streaking across every surface. Ninety fighters remained, and every single one of them looked like they'd already survived a war. Because they had.
Silence clung to the air for one long, heavy moment.
Swift inhaled that silence, letting it settle deep in his chest. His Half-Silver Dragon senses sharpened the world into something crystalline. The lights overhead shimmered through his faint spectral wings. He felt the heartbeat of the cavern, the breath of fighters across the stone, the lingering mana that hummed like a whisper.
Then he stepped forward.
A squad of five fighters immediately seized on his movement—thinking, stupidly, that they could overwhelm him before he could react. They surged as one, their coordination impressive. Their footwork crisp. Their attacks precise.
It didn't matter.
Swift didn't dodge.
He let the first punch come—a heavy haymaker aimed at his jaw. He raised one hand and caught it, frost coating the attacker's knuckles instantly. The fighter's eyes widened as ice crawled up his forearm. Swift twisted his wrist and snapped the ice in clean fracture lines before shoving the man backward into teleport light.
He pivoted into the next attack. A blade came at him from the left; Swift exhaled, and frost condensed on the blade mid-swing, freezing the air around it. The sword's arc shattered when it hit the ground, leaving its wielder stumbling backward, stunned. Swift gently tapped the fighter's forehead with a claw.
The fighter crumpled and vanished.
Two more closed in from the front. Swift spun, letting his spectral tail—half-formed, but solid enough—whip across their torsos. The cold that followed was sharp, biting, almost serrated. They collapsed together in a heap.
The last fighter tried to flee. Swift flicked his wrist. Frost shot across the floor like a living serpent, freezing the man's shoes to the stone.
Swift appeared beside him in a blur.
"You should have committed," Swift said quietly.
And the fighter teleported out.
Jake hovered nearby, mouth hanging open. "Swift… buddy… friend… terrifying dragon-man… you just—just—just—!"
Swift tilted his head. "Yes?"
"You didn't even break a sweat!"
"I do not sweat," Swift replied matter-of-factly.
Jake clutched his chest. "I want to be like you when I grow up."
Swift blinked. "You are older than me."
"I KNOW, THAT'S THE PROBLEM!"
But Jake didn't have long to panic. Three brawlers fixed their sights on him and charged.
Jake didn't run. He breathed. Electricity crackled up his spine. Bronze scales thickened across his shoulders and arms. His muscles tightened like coils ready to spring.
When the first brawler swung at him, Jake didn't dodge. He blocked with his forearm, sparks flying off the bronze plating.
"Woah! That didn't hurt!"
"Focus," Swift urged.
Jake exhaled sharply, then drove his fist into the attacker's gut. The blow detonated with bronze lightning, sending the man flying into a wall hard enough to crack the stone before teleportation saved him.
The second brawler grabbed Jake's arm—mistake. Jake lifted him clean off the ground and swung him into the third like a thunder-charged club. Both teleported out.
Jake stood there panting, trembling from the adrenaline surge.
Swift's hand landed gently on his shoulder. "You are learning control."
Jake's breath hitched. "Really?"
"Yes."
Jake nearly burst into tears. "SWIFT. LET ME HAVE THIS."
Swift nodded. "You deserve it."
While they regrouped, Shadeclaw drifted across the battlefield like a roaming wolf searching for prey. No frenzy now. No rage. Only calm, sharpened killer instinct.
Three of the strongest remaining close-range fighters spotted him—two armored grapplers and a dual-blade expert—and they decided he looked like an easy target.
They were wrong.
Shadeclaw was a storm made of muscle and fur and lethal precision.
He leapt between their opening strikes, claws flashing with clean arcs. He slashed through the first grappler's chestplate, causing the man to stumble. The second managed to grab Shadeclaw's waist—only to be lifted and slammed into the ground with so much force the stone cracked underneath them.
The blade-user danced back, waiting for an opening. Shadeclaw spun toward him, claws carving the air. The blade struck Shadeclaw's shoulder, but Shadeclaw didn't react. He twisted, grabbed the blade-user by the neck, and hurled him across the battlefield like a ragdoll.
Shadeclaw stepped back, letting the teleport beam whisk them away.
He didn't even pant.
Jade, watching from afar, laughed. "Look at 'im! Wolf King's gonna love seein' that one."
Shadeclaw's ears twitched at the comment, but he didn't turn. His focus was razor-sharp.
Far across the cavern, Ember Claw and Tundra Lynx moved like two predators drifting along the same hunting grounds. They fought separately, but their instincts still synced.
Ember Claw spun in a blaze of orange fire, igniting a fighter's gauntlets until they overheated and forced the man to teleport out. Meanwhile, Tundra Lynx froze a spear mid-thrust, then spun around the attacker in a blur of ice-chilled air.
An archer tried to ambush Ember Claw—
Tundra Lynx speared the ground with a shard of ice that erupted upward, knocking the archer off balance.
Another fighter attempted to flank Tundra Lynx—
Ember Claw's flames drove him backward.
Their eyes met briefly.
They shared a nod.
Then they parted again, drifting toward new prey.
Mira appeared next.
Or rather—she did not appear. She simply existed where four assassins had intended to corner her.
They'd planned this strike perfectly.
They were wrong.
One assassin lunged—
Mira stepped aside and tapped his wrist. He collapsed, teleported.
Another tried a choke-wire from behind—
Mira ducked, elbowed him in the throat, and walked away before he hit the ground.
The third and fourth attacked from the shadows—
Mira flicked her fingers. Something shimmered. A heartbeat later, both fell with no understanding of how they'd lost.
Mira dusted a speck of stone from her glove.
Someone whispered, "She's not human."
Another replied, "Then what is she?"
Mira didn't answer.
Sedge Hat, meanwhile, had become an agent of absolute chaos. Five fighters attempted a coordinated takedown on him—surrounding him, cornering him, leaving no escape.
Sedge smiled like a child who'd been given markers and a blank wall.
"Oh, good!" he chirped. "An audience!"
He dropped three metallic beads. They bounced. Split. Multiplied. Spun. Ricocheted. One flew up, hit a stalactite, triggered a rebound explosion that sent another bead into a fighter's boot. The boot exploded— harmlessly—but enough to launch the man into the air and straight into a teleport beam.
Another bead pinged off a shield, ricocheted behind a defender, and detonated just enough to knock him unconscious without killing him.
Sedge looked delighted. "I LOVE when everything works out!"
Jimmy howled with laughter. "HE'S UNHINGED!"
Julian nearly fainted. "HE IS A PUBLIC MENACE!"
At the battlefield's center, Giga-Ronin faced six fighters who had decided "maybe if we all attack at once, he'll go down."
He did not go down.
The lightning user struck him first—Giga absorbed it like recharging a battery. A spear thrust hit him next—he caught the spear, snapped it, and used half of it as a club. A hammer slammed into his back—Giga staggered half an inch, then backhanded the hammer-user into a teleport beam.
Fire users, martial artists, duelists—none could bring him down.
Jake whispered, "Swift… that's not a man… that's a disaster."
Swift nodded solemnly. "Correct."
One by one, fighters fell to teleport light.
The scoreboard flickered as eliminations surged:
90
→ 86
→ 81
→ 77
→ 73
→ 70
A heavy silence followed.
The survivors stared at each other across a battlefield littered with craters, broken stone, scorch marks, and thin cracks of frost and flame.
Swift exhaled slowly, frost drifting from his breath.
Jake wiped sweat from his brow, electricity crackling faintly across his arms.
Shadeclaw lifted his chin, bloodline dominance radiating from him like heat.
Ember Claw cracked his neck.
Tundra Lynx's breath frosted the air.
Mira faded into the shadows once more.
Sedge Hat jingled another bead with a sinister giggle.
Giga-Ronin simply rolled his shoulders like a titan resting between battles.
And Jade cracked his chi-charged arms again.
CH-CHNK.
Danny watched from above, expression unreadable.
Wolf King grinned like a beast who saw something worth killing.
The mana lights shifted color, signaling the transition into the final rounds before the Top 50.
The next battles would be harder.
Heavier.
More personal.
Only the strongest would make it any further.
Fighters Remaining: 70 / 500