The old photograph clenched in Little Zeus's fist flared with an unnatural, pitch-black light. It gushed out like a vortex, swallowing every shred of illumination. Darkness pressed in like a tangible thing; even the seams of space seemed to tear.
When the blackness cleared, only Chen Xiao and Little Zeus stood across from each other. The place felt like a duel ground outside time and space — a locked arena where only raw bodies mattered. Chen Xiao recognized the sensation instantly; it was the same warped field he had once faced against Horse Face.
He reached for his usual tricks — All Things Water, Divine Wind, Dragon's Breath, Invisibility — but nothing answered. The rules here were strict: active techniques were dead. Only certain passives and primal physical gifts could operate. Oddly, Dragon Bone and Moon Shadow still hummed in him, and the Mountain and River Map remained responsive to his will. In short, passive evolutions and some evolved items worked; flashy, active skills did not.
Little Zeus walked forward with slow, satisfied steps, grin wide and cruel. "Surprised, Mad Ghost Butcher?" he taunted. "You can fly, make water, bend space — show me now." His voice dripped contempt. This domain acknowledged only physical prowess, and he was sure his god-tier physique would dominate.
"Do you really think your body is stronger than mine?" Chen Xiao asked quietly, a smile twitching at his mouth. They were barely a dozen paces apart; the air between them felt charged.
Little Zeus's eyes narrowed. "You know nothing of power," he spat. "Within SSS-rank there are nine levels. I stand at the apex. I will teach you what true strength is." He hefted a black war-hammer and lunged — his momentum like a landslide.
Chen Xiao didn't panic. When Little Zeus closed to five meters, Chen Xiao vanished; his afterimage stuttered and dissolved. Little Zeus's face tightened with real fear: the target he'd been tracking simply disappeared.
Then, without warning, a fist like a sandbag struck. The impact cracked like thunder. Little Zeus flew backward; his hammer spun from his grip. The blow had smashed his face in — teeth scattered in a spray of blood — and he hurtled into the abyss of that black arena.
Even so, Little Zeus's physiology was vicious. Mid-fall his features began knitting themselves back together; his regenerative systems were horrific. Chen Xiao pounced. He landed on the man's midsection and began raining blows, fists like pistons, each one aimed to shred muscle and stop regeneration at its source. It was the same brutal method he'd used to fell the Ram Head — relentless, up-close punishment.
Then the jade pendant at Little Zeus's chest flared. A cyan barrier blossomed around him, a hard globe of light that ate Chen Xiao's blows. Chen Xiao's fists struck it again and again. The shield did not flicker.
Little Zeus lay gasping blood onto the black ground, a grin smeared across his face. "You can hit me till your hands bruise," he rasped. "It just fuels me. Wounds are my food. Back out now — once we're back in the world, with the fire seeds and opportunities in hand, you'll be crushed."
Chen Xiao didn't bother arguing. He kept striking. The cyan barrier took blow after blow; it held. Little Zeus, even with his face smashed flat and every tooth gone, laughed like a mad god. The armor and the healing were not natural alone — they were propped by Opportunities, by items or relics that made him near-immortal.
Chen Xiao measured the situation in the rhythm between punches: the barrier was robust, but it was an external construct. If he could find a way to break or bypass it, Little Zeus would not outlast the barrage. If he couldn't, then brute force would only burn time.
"Fine," Chen Xiao thought coldly. "If you want to show me your god-tier physique, come on." He tightened his stance and prepared to probe the shield for weakness.
Little Zeus, delirious with confidence, roared anew and surged. "Come! Let me show you why the King of the Gods stands above all!" His voice echoed in the void as the two charged again, one testing the limits of passive power, the other testing the limit of physical will.
In that locked blackness, time thinned. Seconds stretched. Someone had a minute — sixty heartbeats of nothing but bone and iron and intent — to prove who truly understood power.