The Forever Champion isn’t going anywhere.
Athena defended her ROH Women’s World Title against Thekla at the STARDOM New Year Stars event and “The Fallen Goddess” added a new victim to her list of defeated names. Thekla was not an easy challenger. It didn’t help that her H.A.T.E faction did everything that they could to make sure she left the event as the new world champion.
But Athena has been champion for 750 plus days and it was gonna take a little more than some interference to end Athena’s historic title run. The ROH star hit her signature O-Face finisher to get the three count.
This whole feud began when Athena rejected Thekla’s request for a world title match earlier in the month. Unhappy with the ROH Women’s World Champion’s response, Thekla interfered in the international four-way women’s match at Wrestle Dynasty by pulling the referee out of the ring. Athena had the match won until that moment.
Once she realized what was going on, Athena got into a little argument with Thekla and Momo Watanabe took advantage of the distraction by clocking Athena in the face with a baseball ball. That led to a fiery backstage confrontation between Athena and Thekla; where she accepted the STARDOM wrestler's challenge.
Athena gave props to her STARDOM challenger and stated to come find her in the US if she wants a rematch. This effectively ends Athena’s time in Japan. The 36-year-old enjoyed working overseas and Athena even expresses that her time in Japan reignited a fire that was missing lately:
“I am very sad to go because I love Japan, and I love STARDOM. It’s very difficult for me to leave because I’ve had so much fun here, and it has reawakened my passion, not only as a fighting champion, but as a wrestler who’s been doing this for almost 20 years. Normally, in America, no one sees me cry, never. I’m tough. But this is very special, this is my dream, and I finally got to come here. Hopefully, I can come back and compete in front of the most amazing fans, with the most amazing women from around the world, so STARDOM, you will see me again. The Fallen Goddess, the American Joshi, the Minion Overlord, the inspiration to every women’s division, but most importantly today, I finally lived up to my nickname of the American Joshi. Thank you, STARDOM. Thank you, everyone. I will see you again soon."