The axe fell like judgment made manifest.

Alex's Emergency Overdrive activated.

The sensation was unlike anything he'd experienced before. Not pain, not enhancement, but release. The suppression that had strangled his essence access since awakening in this arena, the Adept-rank limitations that had kept him operating at a fraction of his potential all of it simply vanished.

**[EMERGENCY OVERDRIVE: ACTIVATED]**

**[Duration: 60 seconds]**

For the second time since arriving in this dimensional rift, Alex felt the true scope of his power. Twenty million essence points an astronomical reserve that dwarfed even Master ranked awakened suddenly became available to channels designed for a fraction of that capacity. It was like trying to force an ocean through a garden hose, and his Adept-rank essence pathways screamed in protest.

But for sixty seconds, he had everything.

His Phantom Step activated with precision that transcended his previous limitations, phasing him through the visible spectrum at the exact moment the Warden's axe would have split his skull. But this wasn't the desperate evasion of someone barely surviving this was controlled, efficient, effortless.

The massive blade passed through empty air, its momentum carrying it into the arena floor with enough force to crater stone.

Alex rematerialized three meters away, and fire erupted from his hands with intensity that made his previous techniques look like sparks. The flames didn't just burn they existed with a presence that pressed against reality itself, fed by essence reserves that could sustain Master-ranked techniques indefinitely.

The Warden's remaining eye widened not with surprise at the evasion, but with recognition of what had just happened. The creature had presided over this arena for three centuries. It knew what Emergency Overdrive meant, knew what it cost, knew that it represented a prisoner's final desperate gambit.

But it had never seen someone activate it with this much essence backing it.

"Thuul-kresh mekthari!" the Warden's voice carried something that might have been respect and warning in equal measure. "Vorthak-zhel nakul keth-mori thurvani!"

**[Translation: "Fire-warrior unlocks true power! But the burning path consumes all who walk it!"]**

Alex didn't respond. Every ounce of concentration was focused on the tactical problem before him: how to defeat an SS-Class entity in sixty seconds before the backlash of forcing Master-rank power through Adept-rank channels destroyed him from the inside out.

His fire manipulation erupted with techniques he'd only theorized about before. The advanced constructs he'd learned from his duplicate the spiral patterns, the geometric matrices now flowed from his hands with perfect execution. Not approximations or crude imitations, but the genuine techniques as they were meant to be performed, backed by essence reserves that could sustain them indefinitely.

Streams of flame lashed out like whips, each one following independent paths that converged on the Warden from different angles. The constructs were fluid and adaptive, adjusting mid-flight to target the creature's exposed joints, its damaged eye socket, the gaps in its scarred hide where previous battles had left permanent weaknesses.

The Warden's axe swept through the flames, but there were too many coming from too many directions. Fire struck home repeatedly, black ichor spraying from wounds that actually hurt. For the first time in three centuries of arena combat, the guardian was being pushed back by a prisoner operating at power levels that matched its own.

**[Time Remaining: 52 seconds]**

The crowd's silence had transformed into something else a collective held breath, thousands of Shadeborn spectators recognizing they were witnessing something unprecedented. Even the Ironhide servants had stopped their duties entirely, burning eyes fixed on the arena floor.

Above them, the Master leaned forward in its throne, and Alex felt the weight of its attention like physical pressure.

The Warden roared, its essence flaring as it entered a combat state beyond what it had shown before. The creature's scarred hide darkened, muscles expanding beneath leathery skin, and the axe in its hands began vibrating with frequencies that made the air scream.

It charged with speed that should have been impossible for something so massive, closing the distance in less than a second. The axe came around in a horizontal sweep that would bisect Alex at the waist, essence-draining power radiating from the blade in visible waves.

Alex's Combat Echo now operating with the clarity that came from unrestricted essence access had already mapped the attack's trajectory. He didn't try to dodge the charge.

Instead, he created a weapon.

The flames in his hands compressed and solidified, taking shape with a speed and precision that would have been impossible before. Not a formless construct, but a spear six feet of concentrated fire shaped into a blade that burned with white-hot intensity. The weapon felt solid in his grip, as real as steel but fed by essence that could sustain it indefinitely.

The Warden was committed to its charge, momentum carrying its massive frame forward with unstoppable force. Alex planted his feet, angled the spear, and let the creature come to him.

The impact was catastrophic.

The Warden's own momentum drove the flame-spear deep into its chest, the weapon punching through scarred hide and muscle like paper. The creature's charge carried it forward another two steps, impaling itself further, before its brain registered what had happened.

Black ichor erupted around the wound as the Warden stumbled, the axe falling from nerveless fingers. It looked down at the spear lodged in its chest, flames spreading from the wound across its torso like infection.

**[Time Remaining: 41 seconds]**

But the creature wasn't finished. With a roar that shook the arena, the Warden grabbed the flame-spear with both hands and ripped it out, black ichor spraying in an arc. The wound was massive a fist-sized hole straight through the chest but the Warden was still standing, still fighting.

It threw the spear aside and lunged forward with nothing but claws and teeth, abandoning all technique in favor of primal fury. If it was going to die, it would take the fire-warrior with it.

Alex could feel the cost building. His Adept-rank essence channels were being scoured by power they were never designed to handle. It wasn't painful yet Emergency Overdrive was sustaining him through the worst of it but he could sense the damage accumulating like cracks spreading through overstressed glass.

When the skill deactivated, when his access was restricted again, those cracks would become catastrophic failures.

He had forty seconds to end this.

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