Hela's aura slammed against Soren's like a dark corruption, but she found herself unable to overwhelm him.
And when she saw Heimdall opened a spatial portal for Thor and the others, her fury erupted.
"Kill every last one of them!" She shrieked.
The undead legions surged forward with hollow eyes and clattering armor, flooding toward Heimdall. Their numbers alone could drive any warrior to despair.
"Go!" Heimdall roared.
His sword carved through the first undead warriors that reached him, skulls split. Still the horde pushed forward.
Thor, Valkyrie, and Freyja looked back only once.
They wanted to stay, Freyja especially but they understood remaining would only hinder Soren now. They had to trust him.
"RooargG!!" Hulk barreled into the undead from the side, roaring, buying Heimdall the precious second he needed.
Heimdall swept his sword again, cleaving another wave apart, and then followed the group through the portal.
Their figures vanished, Hulk turned and charged through after them.
Soren watched them go and allowed himself a satisfied smile.
He closed the portal device with a flick of his hand, no more concerns.
Now he could deal with Hela without restraint.
Hela's eyes were bloodshot with rage as she watched her targets disappear. But with Soren standing before her like a wall of divine energy, she had been unable to stop them.
"Hela." Soren called out calmly. "If you abandon your ambitions… I might spare your life."
It wasn't mercy… if she backed down, there would be no more destruction.
But Hela didn't even hear him.
All she saw was red.
With Thor gone and her wolf slain, her fury hit its limit.
Black spikes exploded into existence from every direction. The ground shook as she ripped stones, roots, and entire chunks of earth into the air, shaping them into spears and jagged projectiles.
Countless weapons filled the sky, forming a dome of death that collapsed inward toward Soren.
She was drawing from Asgard itself… its land, its magic, its origin power, she was pouring all of it into a single overwhelming storm meant to bury Soren alive.
Soren exhaled slowly, the space array behind him flared.
A massive spatial barrier unfolded, shimmering like a crystalline veil. The first wave of Hela's attacks smashed into it, then crumbled harmlessly into dust.
Not a single spike made it through.
"Hela, if this is all you can do… then let's end this boring struggle."
The spatial magic circle pulsed with full force.
The defensive barrier widened and Soren's offense followed.
Black holes and spirals of crushing spatial pressure erupted around Hela, ripping apart everything in their path. The world itself began to split along the fractures of their clashing powers.
Hela did not retreat.
As long as she remained in Asgard, she could draw endless power from its core, and she could manipulate Asgardian space itself.
Her control over the realm resonated with Soren's spatial magic, colliding against it on equal footing.
There were no swords and no physical blows… but the destruction was apocalyptic.
The battlefield expanded into a wasteland of torn space.
Entire sections of Asgard were shredded and swallowed by distorted reality.
Landmasses sank, and what once was the golden realm was now a crater-riddled abyss, tens of meters deeper than before.
The undead army didn't stand a chance.
Hela's legions were obliterated into scraps of bone and broken armor that were instantly swallowed by wandering space cracks.
Hela did not care, her rage was absolute.
All she wanted now was to destroy the mortal who had killed her companion… who had defied her power… who stood against the Goddess of Death.
All she wanted… was to kill Soren.
The clash of spatial forces raged on, and even Soren felt the strain of it.
The Space Stone held infinite power, yes, but channeling that power through a fully-activated spatial magic array drained him at a frightening pace.
Only now did he truly understand why the system categorized Hela as Pseudo-EX.
Her raw attack strength might peak at S+, but her real terror came from something else entirely…
Asgard itself.
As long as she stood on its soil, the realm endlessly fed her strength. She could fight forever.
Soren wiped the sweat from his brow. This can't drag on…
"Quick battle. Quick decision."
With that whisper, the second ring on his hand ignited with blinding, emerald radiance.
"Time stop."
A soft command, yet the world answered, green light erupted outward, swallowing the battlefield whole.
Violent energies halted mid-eruption and even the divine power surging through Hela's veins froze in place.
Soren exhaled deeply, relief washing over him… but he had done it.
For all of two heartbeats.
Then he felt… resistance. Tremendous, impossible resistance.
Although Hela was frozen, her connection to Asgard was not. Through the realm's roots she continued to struggle, pulling against the fabric of time itself.
The entire world trembled under her will.
"tch!" A hairline crack split across the suspended space.
Soren's face drained of color.
"Puff!"
The time-stopped field shattered like brittle glass.
Only once since obtaining the Time gem had Soren witnessed anyone break free by brute force.
Hela inhaled sharply, now free, and her gaze locked onto the glowing gems in Soren's hands.
Power… boundless power reflected in her eyes with unmasked greed.
"A marvelous ability," She hissed, "And it will soon be mine."
Soren answered with only a snort.
He had intended to exile her, just as he once did to Dormammu, while she was frozen. But she had broken free before he could execute it.
Pale but unshaken, he steadied himself.
Hela rose into the air, divine aura howling around her like a storm.
But then she heard…
"Oh Hela…" A single sigh escaped Soren.
Yet in that simple sound, Hela felt it a suffocating sense of death.
Her expression changed instantly.
She had faced gods, monsters, armies yet nothing had ever made her nerves spike like this.