The Golem didn't lift its fists. It roared—a sound of pure digital frustration—and pushed harder against the ground.

  The red light that had started at its impact point didn't fade. It spread. It rippled out like oil across water, infecting the obsidian floor. The stone didn't just glow; it dissolved. The solid ground turned into pools of "Null Mana"—swirling vortices of red static and void-black pixels that looked like open sores in reality.

  "The floor!" Gideon shouted, shoving Elara toward a floating slab of granite. "Get to the high ground!"

  Elara leaped, her agility carrying her easily to a hovering rock island six feet in the air.

  Gideon wasn't so light. He looked at the spreading corruption. It was eating the floor fast, isolating the safe zones into an archipelago of floating debris.

  "It's changing the arena," Gideon realized. "It knows it can't crush me, so it's trying to erase the ground under my feet."

  He backed up and jumped.

  Four hundred pounds of armor soared through the low-gravity air. He aimed for a broad platform of slate twenty feet away.

  Mid-jump, he realized he was drifting too high. The local gravity distortion was trying to float him into the ceiling.

  "[Gravity Anchors: ON]."

  HUMMM.

  His weight spiked. The arc of his jump snapped downward. He plummeted like a stone, aiming for the slate.

  "[Gravity Anchors: OFF]."

  He toggled the skill off a split second before impact to avoid shattering the platform. He landed heavily, rolling to absorb the momentum.

  CRACK.

  The slate held, but the Null Zone below was bubbling up, spitting red sparks that hissed against the rock.

  The Fracture, seeing its prey isolated, slammed the ground again. A wave of corruption surged forward, splashing over the edge of Gideon’s platform.

  Gideon scrambled back, but he wasn't fast enough.

  ZZZT.

  It wasn't heat. It was a cold, sickening vacuum sensation, like a leech latching onto his soul.

  [NULL MANA CONTACT ] [ SYSTEM ERROR: MP DRAIN DETECTED ]

  Gideon watched his HUD in horror. The numbers weren't ticking down; they were cascading.

  [ MP: 3,400... 2,800... 1,900...]

  "Dammit!" Gideon finally kicked his leg free and scrambling up the incline of the floating rock.

  The drain stopped, but the damage was catastrophic.

  "Gideon!" Elara called out. "Your lights are dimming!"

  "I know!" Gideon gritted out, checking the blue glow of his armor and sword lines. They were faint, pulsing weakly. He had lost over half his reserves in a single second. "I can't take another hit like that. I'm running on fumes!"

  Elara fired an arrow into the Golem’s eye, the shaft exploding in a burst of shadow mana, but the beast barely flinched. It was fixated on the metal man who had survived its stomp.

  "Damn it!" Gideon gritted out.

  He checked his gauge. 1,200 MP.

  It sounded like a lot, but for this fight it was poverty. If he activated [Gravity Anchors] to tank another hit, he’d burn 50 MP a second. If he used [Radiant Orbitals] to shred the minions spawning from the Null Zones, that was another continuous drain.

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  He was bleeding out energy faster than he could regenerate it.

  "It's too slow," Gideon whispered, backing away as the Golem advanced. The creature moved with a terrifying, disjointed gait—teleporting inches forward with every step. "I can't sustain the spells. I have to drop the lattice."

  "Gideon, you can't block that thing without the anchors!"

  "I don't have a choice!"

  Gideon killed the feed. The glowing geometric lines on his armor vanished. The hum of the gravity field died. The air around him stopped shimmering.

  He was no longer a magical bulwark. He was just a man in a metal suit with a very high Strength stat.

  "Come on, you glitchy son of a bitch," Gideon roared, banging his sword against his shield.

  The Golem charged.

  It didn't use a skill. It used a backhand, a massive fist of stone and static swinging horizontally with enough force to derail a train.

  Gideon didn't try to stop it cold—he couldn't. Without the mass-multiplier, he would be launched into the wall.

  He stepped into the swing, angling his Dwarven Tower Shield to deflect rather than absorb.

  CLANG-SCREECH.

  Metal screamed. The impact was violent, lifting Gideon off his feet. He slammed into the ground, sliding ten feet back, his boots carving grooves into the obsidian. He stopped inches from a pool of Null Mana.

  [HEALTH: 1,850 / 2,700 ]

  He scrambled up, gasping. His shield arm was numb.

  The Golem didn't let up. It followed with an overhead smash.

  Gideon rolled, the stone fist crashing where his head had been. He lunged forward, thrusting the Conductive Bastion Blade into the Golem’s knee joint.

  CRUNCH.

  He felt the blade bite into the stone, but it was like stabbing a mountain. He twisted the hilt, using his strength to leverage the joint open.

  The Golem stumbled, but it swiped down with its other hand.

  Gideon caught the blow on his shield, but his stance was broken. The force didn't just hammer him into the dirt; it launched him backward. His breastplate buckled inward with a sickening crunch of dwarven steel, and he tumbled directly into the swirling red vortex of the Null Mana pool he had narrowly avoided moments ago.

  [ HEALTH: 1,200 / 2,700 ]

  [NULL MANA CONTACT ] [ SYSTEM ERROR: MP DRAIN DETECTED ]

  Gideon gasped, coughing blood inside his helm. He looked down. The golem had . His reserves plummeted. [ MP: 1,100... 750... 400... ]

  "Gideon!" Elara screamed, abandoning her cover to sprint toward him.

  "Stay back!" Gideon roared, coughing blood inside his helm. He forced himself to his knees, then out of the corrupted puddle. "Keep shooting! I can take it!"

  He stood up, swaying. He looked small against the towering mass of the glitch.

  "I can take it," he lied.

  The Fracture was learning.

  It stopped pounding the shield that wouldn't break. It stopped trying to crush the metal man who refused to die. Its burning white eyes shifted, scanning the arena for the source of the stinging pain in its flank.

  It locked onto Elara.

  She was perched on a floating island of slate, pinned against the far wall by a widening pool of Null Mana. She had nowhere to jump. Her quiver was half empty, her chest heaving as she drew another arrow.

  The Fracture didn't roar this time. It simply moved.

  It ignored Gideon completely, turning its massive, stony back to him. It lunged toward Elara, closing the forty-foot gap with terrifying speed, its arm drawn back to deliver a killing swipe.

  "Elara!" Gideon screamed.

  He tried to run, but his armor was heavy, his legs sluggish from the battering he’d taken. He watched the Golem’s claws extend—three blades of corrupted obsidian aimed at Elara’s unarmored torso.

  She raised her bow, but there was fear in her eyes. She knew she couldn't dodge.

  Gideon looked at the distance. He looked at his HUD.

  [ MANA: 210 / 3,550 ]

  He had enough for one spell. One move.

  He didn't hesitate. He didn't calculate the survival odds.

  "[Photonic Displacement]."

  FLASH.

  [ MANA: 60 / 3,550 ]

  The world dissolved into light. Gideon materialized instantly in the path of the Golem, standing precariously on the edge of the slate platform, directly between the monster and the dark elf.

  He didn't have time to raise his shield. He didn't have the mana to activate a barrier. He just stood there, arms wide, shielding her with his body.

  SHRIIIP.

  The sound was nauseating—like a saw blade hitting a steel pipe.

  The Golem’s claws didn't just strike Gideon; they tore through him. The corrupted obsidian sheared through the front of his breastplate, slicing through the dwarven steel.

  Blood sprayed into the air.

  [ CRITICAL HIT TAKEN ] [ HEALTH: 450 / 2,700 ]

  The force of the blow lifted Gideon off his feet and slammed him backward into Elara. They both crashed onto the stone, sliding dangerously close to the Null Zone edge.

  Gideon gasped, a wet, rattling sound. His vision was swimming in red warning lights. He tried to push himself up, but his chest felt like it was on fire. He looked down. Three deep, jagged gashes ran from his shoulder to his hip, exposing the glowing, damaged machinery and the bleeding flesh beneath.

  "Gideon!" Elara scrambled out from under him, her hands hovering over his chest, terrified to touch the ruin of his armor.

  "Run..." Gideon wheezed, blood bubbling past his lips. His Mana bar was grey. His Health bar was flashing rapidly.

  The Fracture loomed over them, casting a long, glitching shadow. It raised a fist to finish the job.