Raven crouched high above the arena, pulling himself into a narrow cavity of the ceiling scaffold. Metal creaked beneath him, but no one below heard. From here, he had a full view of the combat floor—an expanse of scorched plating, ruptured pipeworks, and the dull orange glow of embedded mana conduits.
At the center stood Sentinel AX-Draxos.
A rune-woven brass golem, wide as a boulder and twice as heavy. Its chest core pulsed with a slow, growing light—Raven recognized the tell. When the glow reached its peak, the Safe Zone Burn would trigger, flooding the arena with a mana-draining surge that spared only three circular safe zones.
He also remembered the other cue. When the golem's voice, distorted by time and war code, groaned out the word—
"BURN."
That meant the Directional Blast. Four cardinal beams. No safe edges, no delay.
