The roar of the World-Eater was not merely a sound; it was a physical displacement of the atmosphere, a shockwave of despair that rattled the teeth of every living soul within a ten-mile radius.
The blast hit Kairen Zephyrwind like a battering ram made of solid, pressurized air. It tore the ground from beneath his boots, flattened the remaining arena walls into gravel, and sent debris flying into the sky like shrapnel from a grenade.
But Kairen did not fly.
He stood in the center of the devastation, his boots anchored to the bedrock by the heavy gravity of the Root Chakra. He was immovable. A speck of defiant white light in a world of screaming darkness.
The Dragon lunged. It moved with a speed that belied its colossal size, a mountain range suddenly deciding to become a viper. Its maw, a spinning vortex of diamond-hard teeth and void energy, descended to swallow him whole.
It didn't bite. It inhaled.
