Arthur lunged to finish the fight, but his strike never reached its mark. His sword slammed against invisible resistance and froze mid-swing. He stared, incredulous, as a hand seized the blade, Ed's hand, catching steel with bare fingers. Even with all the power backing him, Arthur watched as the wolf-man held the weapon with one human hand, calm and unbothered.
A hairline tremor ran through the hilt. With a casual twist and a little force, Ed crushed it. The golden sword shivered, then shattered in his grip like brittle glass. Arthur felt the impact in his bones and leapt back to where Ryan stood.
From the shattered tree, Ed stepped forward into full view. He was no longer purely wolf nor wholly man. Tall and terrible, he wore long white hair that whipped in the battle wind; silver eyes burned with cold intelligence. Patches of white fur clung to his forearms and shoulders, an impossible hybrid of beast and human.
"What did you do with Leo? Where is he?" Arthur demanded, voice raw.
Ed's grin widened, showing too many teeth. "Looks like your leader met ours," he said, amusement curling his tone into malice.
Arthur's mouth opened. "What?"
"And now that he is dead," Ed continued, "I won't waste time." He arched his back and opened his jaws wide.
A beam of blinding white mana struck outward, pure, luminous, and terrible, racing toward them like a spear of daylight.
Arthur barely moved. He shoved Ryan aside with everything he had and took the blast full on.
When the light subsided, Ryan hammered at the dust and found Arthur collapsed on the ground, lungs heaving. The golden wings that had burst from Arthur's back earlier were gone; the brilliant light in his armor had dimmed to a dull glow.
"Arthur, are you alive?" Ryan gasped.
Arthur pushed himself up, grimacing as he drew breath. "He wasn't lying about his full power," he panted as he rose shakily and gripped a newly-formed sword in his hand.
"What about Leo?" Ryan demanded, coughing.
Arthur forced his shoulders square and met Ryan's eyes. "Right now, we have to focus on that monster."
Ryan nodded, face hardening. He gathered himself, closing off to everything but the fight. From this moment on, any mistake would be fatal.
…
Elna and Luciana darted from one door to another, appearing and vanishing in flashes of shadow and blood. Each time they emerged, their attacks struck out, arcs of crimson light, daggers wreathed in energy, only to be deflected by Lecia's effortless counters. The air itself trembled under the collision of their spells.
Then, in the middle of the chaos, Elna froze. Something felt wrong. A sudden hollow ache pressed at her chest, a whisper in her head. Her eyes widened, and before she could speak, Lecia tilted her head slightly, then raised an eyebrow.
The older vampire turned her gaze toward the center of the city. "Looks like your leader is dead."
Both Elna and Luciana stopped mid-step, disbelief flashing in their eyes.
"What?" they said in unison.
"The one called Leo Mantine," Lecia said, her voice calm, almost indifferent, as though announcing the weather. "He's gone."
"You're lying," Elna hissed. Her hands trembled, rage and denial burning through her veins.
Lecia's expression didn't change. "There's no reason for me to lie."
"You're lying!" Elna's voice cracked as she screamed the words and hurled herself forward in a burst of speed.
"Elna, wait!" Luciana shouted, but her voice couldn't reach through the storm of grief and fury that consumed her.
Elna dove through a door, dodging the twisting tendrils of shadow that lashed toward her. Her daggers gleamed crimson as she closed the distance. She was a blur, until Lecia's form flickered, faster still.
With a single motion, Lecia's hand pierced through Elna's chest, the sound of tearing flesh cutting through the silence that followed. Her arm came out the other side, slick with blood.
Luciana's eyes widened, her heart freezing in her chest. In the same breath, she vanished and reappeared in front of her mother, catching Elna midair. With a vicious kick, she struck Lecia's arm, freeing Elna's body, and disappeared into one of Edgarth's doors.
They emerged in another part of the battlefield. Luciana gently laid Elna on the ground.
"What the hell were you thinking?" she shouted, panic and anger clashing in her tone. "You want to…"
Her words died when she saw Elna's face, eyes wet with tears, lips trembling, fury and sorrow twisting together into something raw and human.
Luciana stared at her, stunned. Is this… love? she thought, her chest tightening with something she couldn't name.
A door opened beside them, and Edgarth stumbled out, his face pale but focused. Without hesitation, he knelt and poured a potion between Elna's lips. The liquid glowed faintly as it touched her skin.
High above them, Lecia floated in midair. Two massive wings of shadow unfurled from her back, stretching across the sky like an eclipse. A crimson ring of blood magic spun into existence behind her, pulsating with power.
Her cold voice rolled through the city like thunder. "It's time to end this fight."
…
Under the crimson moon, Leo lay sprawled on the cold stone floor, his chest rising shallowly. Blood poured from the gash that split across him, pooling beneath his body and glinting black under the red light. Every breath burned like fire, every heartbeat felt like it might be his last. He couldn't move. Couldn't speak. But his eyes still saw, and his ears still heard.
Lucius stood beside him, calm, immaculate, untouched by the chaos he had wrought. His silver hair shimmered faintly in the moonlight as he spoke, voice smooth and measured, almost gentle.
"You planned to kill the others while I was still performing the ritual," he said, a faint smirk playing on his lips. "Then, once I was weakened, you would gather your remaining strength and strike me down. Am I wrong?"
He didn't expect an answer from the dying man before him, and Leo could only stare back through a haze of pain and blood loss. Lucius continued, his tone growing colder.
"Unfortunately for you, I found a way to let the ritual sustain itself. Even without me, it will continue, and even if you had somehow managed to kill the other S ranks, which is laughable, you would still be nothing against me."
He turned, and began to walk away. His steps echoed softly through the empty ruined structure.
"Don't worry," he added over his shoulder, voice almost casual. "I've ordered them to finish off your friends quickly. And your sword…" he paused, a faint chuckle under his breath. "I'll be sure to take good care of it."
Leo's vision began to fade, the world bleeding into darkness. The pain in his chest dulled, replaced by an unbearable weight pressing against his heart. His friends… his family… all of them. If he died here, they would all die. Everything they had fought for, all the sacrifices, would mean nothing.
And worst of all, he still didn't have his answer. How did he come to this world?
The thought struck like lightning through his dying body, reigniting the fire within him. He didn't prepare one year to fail like this. Resolve took form in his heart, raw, unyielding, and through that will, power surged. It flowed from his core, through his veins, out into the fog of his domain.
Thunk.
The soft sound of metal striking stone echoed behind Lucius. He stopped mid-step, frowning slightly, and turned.
Leo was no longer motionless. His hand was wrapped around his sword's hilt, the blade's tip buried in the ground to keep him upright. Blood streamed from his lips as he forced himself to raise his head.
"You're right…" Leo rasped, his voice rough and broken. A cough wracked his chest, splattering crimson on the ground. "That… was one of my plans."
Lucius watched, expression unreadable.
"But only one of them."
Leo's head tilted upward. The faint green glow of his eyes darkened, deepened, then burned red, brighter and brighter until it seemed his very soul was alight.
Ding.
Ding.
Ding.
The tolling of unseen bells echoed across the crimson-lit city, deep and resonant, vibrating through the air and the earth alike.
With the Goddess's power coursing through him, the world around Leo began to change. The air shimmered, the ground darkened, and shadows twisted like living smoke. The boundary between reality and his domain blurred until they were one.
His hair, once black, shimmered to silver under the blood moon. His skin cracked with threads of light and darkness intertwining, and from beneath his cloth, silver fur began to spread across his arms and shoulders. His scar already healed. His aura roared to life, half divine, half demonic, a perfect storm of light, blood, and shadow.
With speed that rivaled Lucius from only moments ago, Leo appeared before him, his blade already descending in a blazing crimson arc.
Lucius raised his hand to block, but the impact drove him back several meters, his boots carving lines into the stone. When he finally stopped, his gaze dropped to his wrist. A thin scar marked his skin, and a single drop of blood rolled down his hand before falling to the ground.
When his eyes lifted again, the calm amusement was gone. His expression hardened, sharp and cold.
For five heartbeats, the two leaders stared at each other across the crimson expanse, their mana filling the air, distorting the world around them. Then, without a word, both moved.
They vanished, reappearing in blinding flashes of light and shadow. Leo's blade clashed with a sword formed from pure blood in Lucius's hand, each collision echoing like thunder. Every strike split the air, each shockwave strong enough to level a fortress.
The two figures became streaks of red and black lightning, disappearing and reappearing across the battlefield faster than mortal eyes could follow.
After deflecting one of Leo's blood slashes, Lucius leapt back and raised his hand. A single drop of his blood floated upward, glowing like a crimson gem in the air before twisting and stretching, taking the form of a serpent born from blood itself. Its scales shimmered like liquid metal, its eyes glowing a deep scarlet that pulsed in rhythm with Lucius's heart.
The serpent opened its massive maw, a low hiss echoing like a storm, and then it lunged forward. The air rippled from its speed.
Leo didn't move. He raised one hand, and a circle of magic, vast enough to cover the entire building, flared into existence beneath him. In the next instant, the weight of a mountain descended. Gravity thickened, pulling the serpent down with crushing force. The blood creature hit the ground with a deafening impact, splattering and flattening against the stone.
The glowing circle pulsed once, then began to shrink, fast. In less than a heartbeat, it compressed to the size of a single man, locking around Lucius. The pressure multiplied, the air itself groaning under the spell. Gravity increased a hundredfold.
Yet Lucius stood unfazed. His expression didn't even flicker.
Before he could shatter the spell, Leo moved again. The gravity field shimmered, its sigils twisting, transforming into a Shimmering Dome. A second later, a magic circle flared inside the dome.
An Explosion Trap detonated.
The blast erupted upward, a column of crimson fire piercing the night sky.
Then, crack, the sound of shattering glass rang out, and Lucius stepped out of the fractured dome. Flames licked across his shoulders, but he brushed them off as if they were dust. Behind him, the blood of the fallen serpent rose again, this time splitting into a thousand spearheads.
Lucius took a step forward, and a hundred spears shot forth like lightning. They slammed into Leo's Shimmering Dome, bursting into crimson mist. Those that pierced through struck his Blood Aura, sizzling against it before dissolving.
Leo stood his ground, silent, until one spear whistled past him, only for it to morph midair into Lucius himself. His blood sword was already descending.
It struck Leo cleanly through the head and chest, only for his body to liquefy into blood and splash across the floor.
From that pool, dozens of figures began to rise. A tide of blood phantoms, each one with Leo's face, surrounded Lucius in a slow, deliberate circle. Their eyes glowed red, their smiles eerily calm.
Lucius tilted his head slightly, his tone half amused. "I almost forgot you were an illusionist."
A few meters away, the real Leo stood, his sword still lowered, watching silently.
"You know," Lucius continued, his voice casual, "I did a lot of research on you after that last fight. But I could never find out what you are… or why that rule didn't affect you."
Leo's tone was calm, even mocking. "You'd better stop searching, unless you want to meet a very powerful being."
Lucius smiled, thin and sharp. "When I'm a god, I'll be a powerful being."
Leo returned the smile. "Even if you become a god, you'll still be nothing against him."
For a moment, silence hung between them, then Lucius's expression darkened. "You know your friends are probably dead right now."
Leo's smile didn't fade. He lifted his gaze to the crimson moon above. Only a few minutes had passed since he activated his domain. Then his eyes dropped back to Lucius, his voice steady, confident.
"No worries," he said softly. "The sound of the bells has already reached them."