A lone, glimmering star shone in the void of space, and this was Noah’s target. Within the void, all senses melted together into fluid streams of streaking light. Javelins of lightning blitzed through a tunnel of inertia to impact.

Long-fanged gale winds that had slowly carved a 15-year valley of training carried his fists like flying steel in a hurricane. At peak wind force elevation, Noah’s lightning stabbed through the clouds of his opponent’s faltering defense. The collision point shot a stinging pulse that climbed up through his nerves from each knuckle joint. A clean hit. Success.

A harsh red mist erupted from the fissures in his opponent’s lips like a geyser. A satisfyingly solid hook, but still not enough to seal the knockout. He’d soaked up his share of strikes as well, but just few enough to keep the lights on. Virtual rivers of magma with touch of static slowly dripped down his temples.

Adrenaline swam through the veins of his arms like electric eels, coiling tight and exploding at the carpal bones in a condensed thunderstorm. Time dilated into a series of transparent slides, each one emerging and violently breaking in an instant. No gaps in perception, not a single divider between any individual breath and the next, only an occasional flicker to the light bulb that held his consciousness.

The bitter, metallic tang of blood slowly sidled onto his palette and made itself the dominant flavor. Something just behind his left ear canal crackled with the dull tone of static. Gravity pressured his right knee to buckle with the weight of a bowling ball, coated in needles. Over and over again, in this timeless vortex of endless impact, the marionette of his will pulled his limbs back again for another strike.

A seductive shadow repeatedly beckoned his soul to sleep, and each time, he imagined it banished it to airtight box, buried at the ends of the earth. Nothing could exist but the next step.

Eight rounds, 300 traded connection in less than a tenth as many minutes, no decisive TKO. Even while putting the weight of continents behind every punch to put each other down for good, there was something that he and his opponent could not possibly be more in agreement about on every level.

In both of their brains, ancient mammalian instinct and modern human consciousness alike conspired together to convince their corporal vessel of one undeniable truth: there was no way to see the end of this contest without somebody’s imminent destruction.

In the heat of every physical contest, organized or feral, there comes a certain point that no outside analysis or regulation can possibly reach. Within the pocket dimension made in the heat of vicious point-blank conflict, something incomprehensible and unmistakable lives. It breathes with the rise and fall of oxygen in its chest, bleeds precipitously, and roars louder than life itself.

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