Two Gods lay dead on the obsidian platform.

The ambient energy of the Apex Realm was shrieking in chaotic dissonance. The fundamental laws of reality violently unraveled without their anchors.

Standing near the edge of the cosmic tear, the final ruler of the multiversal battery farm realized he was entirely and utterly doomed.

Chronos the Heavenly Sovereign of Time did not look like a man at all.

He was a towering shifting construct of intricate golden gears, glowing pendulums, and starlight mechanisms. His face was a featureless clock dial that constantly ticked backward and forward.

He looked at the ashes of Karma. He looked at the severed arm of Space.

Then he looked at Arthur Sterling who was casually cleaning a speck of golden blood off his dark coat.

Chronos didn’t scream. He didn’t monologue either.

He slammed his mechanical hands straight onto the glass floor and activated the ultimate forbidden taboo of the cosmos.

"Temporal Lock: Absolute Stasis."

The world didn’t explode. It simply stopped.

A wave of oppressive suffocating gray washed completely over the Sovereign

Summit.

The violent spatial storms froze directly in mid air. The cosmic tear stopped bleeding energy.

Down the platform, Aurelia was frozen mid stride with her spear raised. Lyra was locked in the air with a dagger mere inches from a guard throat.

Morwenna and Sylvia were completely paralyzed. Their vibrant auras muted into a dull lifeless gray.

The sound of the universe died completely.

There was only the deafening rhythmic ticking of Chronos internal gears.

The Time Sovereign stood up slowly. His mechanical joints whirred loudly.

He had frozen the timeline of the entire sector. It was an act that would draw the immediate lethal attention of the Celestial Court Inquisitors. But he had no choice.

The monster in the dark coat was a walking extinction event!

Chronos turned his mechanical head to look at Arthur.

And Arthur looked back at him.

"Grrrr... Crack!"

The loud sound of agonizing physical strain completely shattered the absolute silence.

The gray world trembled violently.

Arthur Sterling muscles bulged massively. They tore the seams of his coat.

His teeth were gritted tightly. His jaw locked in a snarl of sheer unadulterated willpower.

His Dimensional Breaker Physique was roaring to life. It actively warred against the cessation of time itself.

Dark heavy veins pulsed against his neck as he forced his body to move directly through the temporal concrete.

He took a step forward.

"Crunch!"

The gray fabric of the frozen timeline literally fractured beneath his heavy boot!

Chronos staggered backward in shock. His clockwork face spun wildly out of control.

"No! Impossible! You are bound by the flow of causality! You cannot move!"

Inside Arthur’s mind, the system interface was flashing a violent bloody red.

Alarms blared endlessly.

[Ding!]

[System Alert]

↳ CRITICAL WARNING: Host is caught in Absolute Temporal Stasis.

↳ Dimensional Breaker Physique is rejecting external timeline enforcement.

↳ Physical vessel is sustaining catastrophic micro tears.

[Initiating Emergency Protocol.]

↳ Forcing Proxy Bind on Target: Heavenly Sovereign of Time.

An invisible thread shot straight from Arthur. It was entirely immune to the stopped clock of the universe and slammed directly into Chronos spinning core.

[10000x Temporal Mastery Feedback Loop Initiated!]

Arthur let out a harsh ragged breath.

The knowledge of time itself flooded his brain instantly. He felt the flow of seconds, minutes, and eons washing completely over him.

The crushing weight of the stasis lessened. His body violently adapted to the new physical laws.

He didn’t charge the God immediately.

Arthur turned his head slowly. His dark eyes scanned the grayscale battlefield until he finally found Sylvia.

The Arch Mage was frozen perfectly still. Her silver hair suspended entirely in the air.

Arthur simply looked at her from a distance. His gaze held a quiet and deep concern as he took in her frozen form.

"Hold on," Arthur whispered softly into the dead silence of the universe. "I will end this quickly. Then we can go celebrate."

He turned back to Chronos. His eyes turned pitch black as the Primordial Flame ignited in his core. It was entirely immune to the time stop.

"You are on company time, clockwork," Arthur snarled. He raised the Ebonheart

Sword up high. "And I do not pay for overtime."

Chronos panicked entirely.

He raised his hands up. His gears grinded audibly.

"I will age you to dust! Temporal Decay!"

A concentrated beam of localized time shot directly from the God chest. It slammed straight into Arthur.

It was a terrifying attack designed to accelerate the cellular structure of a mortal by a billion years in a single second!

Arthur skin instantly began to grey and wither.

His hair lost its dark luster and turned a brittle white. The fabric of his coat began to fray and disintegrate into ancient dust.

But the system chimed instantly.

[Ding!]

[10000x Feedback active.]

↳ Host is absorbing Temporal Decay insights.

↳ Dimensional Breaker Physique accelerating cellular regeneration.

The aging process halted completely. Then it violently reversed!

For every year Chronos aged him, Arthur absurdly dense pseudo ascended core regenerated ten thousand years of vitality.

The withered skin peeled away entirely. It was replaced by flawless hyper dense muscle.

His hair turned pitch black again. He was regenerating faster than time could kill him!

Arthur laughed loudly.

It was a dark booming sound that echoed right through the frozen world. He walked right through the beam of aging magic completely unbothered.

"You are just giving me a free spa treatment!" Arthur mocked loudly.

Chronos gears sparked wildly. Smoke billowed out from his joints.

He was burning out his core completely. And the mortal wasn’t even slowing down at all!

The Time Sovereign realized he couldn’t kill this anomaly in the present.

The God internal mechanisms violently shifted. "If I cannot kill the man... I will erase the seed!"

Chronos raised his hands up.

The fabric of the gray world tore wide open. It revealed a swirling chaotic vortex of past events.

It was a time portal. It peered directly into the muddy slums of The Mortal Domain decades ago.

"I will kill you as a child!" Chronos shrieked. He dove straight into the temporal stream.

Arthur watched the God jump.

He didn’t panic at all. He just smirked and rolled his neck.

He walked right up to the closing temporal vortex. He didn’t cast any spell.

He just coated his heavy calloused hands in the blistering heat of the Primordial Flame. He grabbed the edges of the time portal and physically ripped it wider!

The universe screamed in loud protest as Arthur casually stepped into the past.

"There is nowhere you can run," Arthur’s voice echoed directly into the vortex.