The resting period brought a moment of rare quiet.

  A gentle ambient glow hung over the field of moonlit stone, and the seven Sovereigns who had emerged from the first round undefeated found themselves drawn together—either by curiosity, caution, or the gravity that power exerts upon itself.

  They did not sit in a circle, nor speak with any pretense of unity.

  But they lingered close.

  Close enough to acknowledge one another as equals, for now.

  ---

  Lord Caelthorn, tall and cloaked in skyblue feathers, was the first to break the silence.

  “The Arena isn’t what I expected,” he said, his voice smooth, accented in the way of the high peaks. “It tests more than might. It tests refinement.”

  “Or cruelty,” said Lady Virelya, the plague-marked Sovereign. Her voice was gentle, but laced with something rotten. “The System delights in watching us suffer one another.”

  “No,” replied Lady Azaneth of the Phoenix Crucible. “It delights in watching what we become.”

  Selene remained silent, standing slightly apart. Her presence was a quiet constant—calm and unreadable.

  Ferin, the cryptborn wraith-lord, gave a soft, dry chuckle. “We’ve all become something already.”

  Galric, the drake-armored sovereign of Emberreach, crossed his arms. “Most of us had to. The weak died early. We’re the survivors.”

  “Speak for yourself,” Azaneth muttered. “I did not survive. I ruled.”

  Silence again. Then Virelya’s eyes flicked to Selene.

  “And what about you, First Sovereign?” she asked, voice like drifting mold. “You haven’t said much. Do you think the System made us better?”

  Selene’s gaze was calm. “The System didn’t make us anything. We made ourselves. It only exposed what was already there.”

  Caelthorn nodded. “Well spoken.”

  Galric snorted. “I prefer action to philosophy.”

  And then—

  A voice, smooth and sharp as a scalpel, cut the air.

  It was Lord Dain of Bramblemark. The wild-lord.

  He had been quiet until now.

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  “You say that,” he said, eyes narrowed at Selene, “but you’re not like us.”

  Selene turned her head. “Aren’t I?”

  “You’re not even human anymore,” he said. “You traded that away the moment your Fae turned on the system and made it change for you.”

  The others fell silent.

  Selene’s gaze was unreadable.

  Dain didn’t stop.

  “You’re the anomaly. The System twisted to accommodate you. You're not a ruler. You’re a monster wearing a crown of balance.”

  The air chilled.

  But Selene did not raise her voice.

  She only stepped forward once, her staff resting lightly in her hand.

  “You call me a monster,” she said. “But I did not twist the world. I aligned it. I took the chaos and made it coherent.”

  She stared at him with eyes that glowed faintly gold.

  “And if that frightens you… then perhaps you were never meant to lead.”

  Before Dain could respond—

  The glyphs above them shimmered.

  A tone rang out, cutting the tension cleanly.

  《Round Two: Initiating》

  《Match 4: Selene of the Court of Balance vs. Lady Virelya of the Dying Glade》

  Selene turned without another word.

  And vanished into the light.

  ---

  The new arena was a half-rotted garden of thorn-laced trees, with pools of stagnant, black liquid and decaying statues crumbling in slow motion.

  Lady Virelya stood across from her, arms folded. Her robes trailed green spores. Her smile was serene.

  “This place is my breath,” she whispered. “I do not need to kill you to win. I only need to outlast you.”

  Selene said nothing.

  The System’s tone rang:

  Match Start.

  ---

  The air shifted.

  Spores ignited around Selene instantly—tracking motes of virulent essence spiraling toward her body.

  Selene raised a hand.

  “Equal Exchange.”

  A ripple passed through the field.

  The spores struck— But half of them turned, redirected into the nearby trees.

  Their energy neutralized, split equally among the living things in the arena.

  Virelya’s eyes narrowed.

  She flicked a hand. A stream of Mournbound shot from the earth—skeletal, fluid plague-creatures hissing with acid breath.

  Selene stepped aside, twisting on her heel.

  “Weighted Pivot.”

  The moment they charged, the ground beneath them shifted—tilted just enough that their momentum caused them to crash into one another.

  They burst like infected blisters.

  Virelya snarled softly. “You can’t dodge everything forever.”

  “I don’t need to,” Selene murmured.

  She lifted her staff.

  “Counterpoise.”

  The next wave of poison blasts bent mid-air—striking the source that cast them. Virelya flinched as her own plague energy seared across her left arm.

  She staggered.

  But Selene wasn’t done.

  She closed her eyes and murmured,

  “Judged Equilibrium.”

  The Arena itself responded.

  Every corrupted growth. Every diseased tree. Every bubbling pool.

  For three seconds—

  All were purged.

  The plague was equalized.

  Converted into harmless wind and shimmering dust.

  Virelya hissed, stepping backward.

  “You… corrupted my domain.”

  “No,” Selene said.

  “I rebalanced it.”

  ---

  Virelya rushed her, sudden and desperate—pulling a dagger of crystallized infection from her sleeve.

  Selene didn’t move.

  Until the dagger neared her heart.

  Then, she whispered one final invocation.

  “Balance Tilt: Return.”

  The momentum inverted.

  Virelya was yanked backward, her own lunge betraying her.

  She slammed into a pillar of decayed stone and crumpled.

  The light of the arena pulsed.

  《Victory: Selene of the Court of Balance》

  《Awarded: 3 Victory Points》

  ---

  Selene stood still.

  The arena dissolved into fading spores and silence.

  Then she vanished, returning to the central platform.

  No cheers.

  No smiles.

  Only silence from the other Sovereigns.

  They had seen what she could do to decay itself.

  And perhaps, now, they finally believed—

  She wasn’t clinging to balance.

  She was tilting the world with every step.