Kael's smile wasn't wide, nor theatrical. It was small, restrained—but there was something about it that didn't fit the atmosphere. Not because it was out of place, but because it carried a certainty that didn't need to be sustained by anything else. His words still hung in the air when the entire hall seemed… to react.
Not with movement.
But with pressure.
There was no visible explosion of energy, no flash, no abrupt manifestation. What emerged was more subtle—and, precisely for that reason, much more disturbing. Kael's presence, which until then had been dominant, began to expand gradually, like a tide that rises slowly, but without the possibility of receding.
The magic circles no longer shone brightly.
They didn't need to.
The air itself began to feel heavy, not only difficult to ignore, but difficult to bear. It was as if every particle within was being compressed, rearranged, forced to acknowledge something beyond the natural structure of that space.
Exelia didn't move.
