Danger.

Real danger.

The old man lifted his staff slowly, almost ceremonially.

Mana surged.

Not just mana.

Something deeper.

To ascend to Rank three, one needs to grasp a law and compress it into a seed.

A Law Seed.

A tiny, incomplete fragment of a greater truth.

Then to ascend to Rank four the law seed had to grow.

From a mere spark into something that could house an illusionary world.

A reflection of that law, a miniature concept of reality born inside the user that could bleed into the outside world.

When that inner world started to influence the real one, that was a Domain.

And right now, before their eyes, the old man was opening his.

The tip of his staff pointed down.

The world shuddered.

It started with the ice.

The vast frozen plain beneath their feet cracked, not in straight lines but in circles, as if some invisible ripple were spreading outward from the old man's position. The sky darkened unnaturally, colors draining out of it until the very air took on a bluish, drowned hue.

From afar, Varun's breath caught.

The light dimmed as if someone had lowered a veil over the sky.

Water seeped through the cracks in the ice.

It did not flow as much as appear.

It was silent, smooth, and terrifyingly calm.

In a heartbeat, the cracks became streams.

Streams became rivers.

Rivers became an ocean.

The entire battlefield dipped, then dropped.

Michael's vision warped. For a moment, he saw the real terrain and something else layered over it, a boundless still sea under a sky of swirling liquid glass.

Then the illusion snapped into place.

The frozen plains vanished.

He now stood on a surface of perfectly smooth mirrorlike water. It reflected nothing. Not his body. Not the sky. Not the outside world.

Just depth.

Endless, crushing depth.

All around him, everyone else hung suspended on that same invisible surface, soldiers, demonic supernaturals, undead giants, and ants alike.

Ruel gagged, clutching at his throat.

"I cannot breathe."

He looked down in panic, expecting water to rise.

But there was no liquid touching him.

Yet his lungs screamed.

Varun's aura flared wildly, fighting a suffocating pressure that did not exist physically but pressed against him all the same.

The old man stood at the center of it all.

His tattered robes moved gently in a non-existent breeze as the water beneath his feet rippled in concentric circles.

"This," he said softly, "is what it means to hold true power."

His eyes turned to Michael.

Ghost roared somewhere to Michael's left, his eight meter frame trembling as cracks spread across his chitin. The ants' collective law burned, but inside the Domain its power was not as wild. The amplification still existed, but something was pushing back against it, dulling its edge.

Beginning's massive body sagged slightly, his knees sinking a fraction into the mirror surface. He forced himself upright with a growl, but even his stone-like skin groaned as invisible weight settled on his shoulders.

Lily's breathing hitched, black blood turning thin and watery as it dripped from her wounds. It dispersed into mist before it could stain anything. Even with her simple mind she knew what stood before her was too much to swallow.

The old man's Domain was not just water.

It carried weight.

Michael felt it too.

A pressure that did not just crush bones but everything.

Trying to force him to kneel.

To accept that in this space only one will mattered.

The old man's.

Michael grit his teeth.

The elder raised his staff again, water and space twisting around him in gentle spirals.

"This much force to use a Domain here," he said quietly, "will cost me years. Centuries even."

His gaze hardened.

"But killing you, boy, is worth that price. The federation cannot have you. I cannot risk you surviving long enough to remember me."

He moved.

The mirror sea beneath their feet rippled.

A tidal wave rose, not from the horizon but from nothingness. It erupted overhead like a wall of blue crystal. Countless blades of compressed water law spun within it, each wrapped in a halo of distorted space.

It did not rush toward the undead.

It fell toward Michael.

Straight down.

Ghost's screech split the air.

He dove, body burning with law energy, trying to intercept. The other ants moved with him, their blackish grey bodies slamming against the descending wave.

For a moment, it slowed.

Only a moment.

The water turned heavier, denser, the weight of an ocean compacted into a single falling curtain. It crushed against their bodies, their chitin groaning as cracks blazed across their limbs.

Beginning lunged from the side, both fists smashing into the wave and splitting it into distorted flows that still sought Michael.

Lily staggered, vision swimming, but still forced herself forward. Her mouth opened slightly as her devouring law tried to drink in whatever parts she could reach. Each gulp shredded her insides even more.

They were all bleeding.

They were all burning.

They were all still moving.

Michael's heart hammered.

In this place, he was not the strongest.

Not even close.

As the wave bore down, his hand tightened on his spear. His mind raced desperately.

How do you fight an entire world that belongs to someone else?

The old man's voice drifted through the drowning silence.

"Struggle all you like," he said. "Inside my waters, everything sinks eventually."

Michael prepared to move.

But something unexpected happened.

The old man shuddered.

His breath hitched.

A cough tore itself from his throat.

Thick black blood sprayed across the mirror ocean.

His pupils constricted.

His knees buckled a fraction.

His control over the Domain flickered like a dying candle.

A ripple spread across the false sea.

The crushing pressure weakened for a heartbeat before surging again.

The old man wiped his mouth, saw the black blood, and hissed.

it.

"What's this?" The old man said in confusion as he sent his senses deep into his body.

"I've been poisoned?"

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