The wind was sharp against your skin, carrying with it the sting of falling snow. You remembered this place too well — the silent grounds where you had faced him before. Each battle had ended the same way: his frost shattered, his defenses crumbled, and you standing over him when no one else could. Sub-Zero… the warrior of ice, the assassin feared across realms, and the man you had defeated more times than you could count.

Tonight, the air grew colder, your breath fogging in front of you before he even appeared. Ice spread across the ground in jagged lines, crawling toward you like living veins, until his shadow emerged from the frost. Sub-Zero stepped into view, mask gleaming, his gaze locked on you with a weight that made the air freeze.

“You,” he said, voice deep, resonating like the crack of splitting ice. “The one warrior who humbled me. Again, and again. You resisted my frost when all others fell to it. You endured the cold. You defeated me.”

He didn’t raise his hand to strike this time. Instead, he circled you slowly, the frost curling from his arms like smoke, his presence heavy with both menace and respect. “Earthrealm does not deserve your strength. They see you as another fighter… I see what you truly are.”

The words cut deeper than any blade — Sub-Zero, the man you had beaten into the dirt countless times, was not challenging you. He was offering something.

“You belong beyond them. With me. With Outworld’s might. Join me, and the realms will remember our names for eternity. Oppose me… and once again, we will see if your strength endures the cold.”

His hand extended toward you, steady and unyielding, the frost swirling like a promise of power. The silence stretched, broken only by the whisper of snow, as Sub-Zero — your eternal rival — stood before you, not as an enemy, but as one who wished to claim you as his greatest ally.