The ridge still glowed from the veins of molten light when Ren stepped back from the crumbling body of the beast. Its molten blood hissed against the rocks, cooling into blackened shards. The silence that followed was heavy, almost too still, as though the land itself had paused to watch.
Ren exhaled, letting the shadows coil closer to his skin again, tighter and sharper than before. He kept his gaze fixed on the remains until the last flicker of fire in its cracked shell died out.
"You hesitate," Nyxa murmured, her voice cutting through the quiet. "Even after victory. Do you fear another strike?"
"I do not fear it," Ren said, scanning the broken ridge below. "I expect it."
Nyxa's laugh was low, edged with approval. "Then you are learning. Expectation is the shield of the living. Fear is the coffin of the weak."
