After taking care of that one lizern, Noele and Vinny looked over the edge of the rooftop down to the ground.
"...Holy crap."
Dozens of lizerns swarmed the school, breaking the glass and entering, while students were flailing water, fire, dirt, leaves, all sorts of elements to repel the lizerns.
Plenty of corpses were on the grass, but when one was killed, two more came from the forest!
The teachers also arrived and were aiding the students in attacking the lizerns, but there were just too many.
Vinny shrank back as she retreated from the edge.
"Vinny? What are you doing?"
"I'm hiding!" Vinny was raising a few walls surrounding herself.
"But, we gotta help them!"
"They can help themselves!"
"What about your friends?"
"...They're stronger than me, at least."
"You still need to go and help as best you can!"
"..."
"...You told me you didn't want me to pity you, right?"
"..."
"Well, what you're doing right now... is pitiful."
Their conversation came to a standstill.
After a moment of silence, the rooftop doors suddenly opened.
"Noele!"
Megna was sweating as she leaned against the metal door.
"Megna? What are you--"
"Watch out!"
Noele jumped to the left as acid landed on where he was standing a second ago. The acid bubbled, disintegrating part of the cemented ground.
"Another lizern?" Noele turned around. "--!"
The swarm of lizerns covered up the bright sunlight, dozens of shadows setting on the rooftop.
Megna widened her eyes. "What the heck? Why are there so many?"
"Everyone downstairs must've stopped repelling the lizerns!" Noele thought of the dire state that his classmates could be in right now.
"On my way here, many students were rushing inside the building and barricading the windows. I guess the lizerns had nowhere else to go but here."
As they were talking, Vinny came out of her makeshift room and headed for the door.
The lizerns started their attack. They swarmed together and spat out the acid!
Vinny set up a three-layer wall and blocked the acidic jet coming towards her.
The acid penetrated up to the third layer, barely protecting Vinny.
"Tsk..." Noele grabbed a rock. He threw it towards the lizern swarm.
"--! What are you doing, Noele? Come back here!" Megna reached her hand out.
Noele ignored her as he treaded back onto the roofless rooftop. He grabbed some more rubble and threw them towards the lizerns.
The lizerns' attention moved from Vinny to Noele.
"Run, Vinny!"
Vinny ran to the door. Seeing Noele distracting the lizerns for her, she bit her lip.
She stopped running for the door and raised some spikes, attacking the lizerns as well!
"What the heck are you doing?"
"I'm not pitiful!" Vinny dodged and blocked the acid that came her way, throwing back a few spikes.
"Heh, that's more like it!" Noele grinned. He grabbed the spikes that missed the lizerns and threw them again.
Megna widened her eyes. The spikes that Noele threw... Their trajectories were bending left and right!
'Not good! His mana is intensely leaking!'
She took out the water tumbler mixed with a Mana Suppressing Pill and ran to Noele.
As she avoided the rain of acid, she recalled Alexis's words when she first commissioned the pills.
"These Mana Suppressing Pills... they are like taping holes in a dam. Once the water starts leaking, it's only a minor problem. However, once the tape gets removed—the water starts bursting out!"
And Megna could tell... The pill was about to taper off.
Five. Four.
"Noele, hurry! Drink this water!"
Three. Two.
"Huh? Later!"
One.
Megna pulled Noele's hand...
Boom!
A pillar of light burst from Noele, jetting towards the clouds!
The pillar was separated into each color of the elements, coiling with each other like snakes as it rose higher and higher.
As it reached the clouds, the lights dissipated and faded throughout the atmosphere.
Noele breathed slowly. "What... What is this?"
'...Shit.' Megna inched back and let go of Noel's hand.
"This, is this mana?" Noele's breathing became frantic as his heartbeat quickened.
Vinny was stunned as she kept her gaze on Noele. Mana was visibly leaking out of every pore on his body.
The lizerns, which were disoriented from the sudden brightness, saw the intense amount of mana coming from Noele and felt unbearably attracted to him.
"...Noele, run! They're your target now!" Megna decided to think about what to do next later. For now, they needed to get out of this situation.
Meanwhile, Noele was feeling drunk in his newfound power. Megna's words didn't reach his ears.
'Why does this feel... so natural?'
As the lizerns headed towards him, Noele laughed.
"Ha. Haha. Hahaha! Hahahahaha!"
He pointed his palm towards the approaching lizerns. All of a sudden, a stream of fire shot straight through the swarm, burning them all in one go.
"This... feels amazing!"
Megna watched as a twister formed beneath Noele's feet, bringing his body along as he floated. He pointed both his palms outwards as he headed to the swarm of lizerns.
One palm gushed a jet of high-pressure water, slicing through any and all lizerns that came in contact with it, while the other spouted flames that burned the winged reptiles to a crisp.
In a matter of seconds, the army of a hundred lizerns was whittled down to tens.
He floated over the edge and down to the ground, where there were tons more lizerns attacking students. The lizerns on the rooftop followed the insatiably appetizing mana coming from Noele, ignoring Vinny and Megna.
On the ground, the grass was already scorched black. Teachers and students of all classes and grades came together to fight off the lizerns. Felum, Felly, and Carra were among the bunch.
"It's because of your impatience!" Felly shouted as she poured water on a lizern, before turning it into ice.
"I'm sorry about that! But who was the one who kidnapped me in the first place?!" Felum sprayed his flames on the approaching lizerns.
"You were the one who decided that it would be a good idea to light up a massive fire on yourself!"
"How would I have known it'd attract lizerns..."
"Did you not listen to Ms. Delle?!"
All of a sudden, the lizerns stopped attacking them. Instead, they all flew upwards.
"What's going on?" Felum looked up. "!!!"
Everyone else looked up as well. All of their eyes widened in disbelief.
Someone in the air was... singlehandedly taking care of all the lizerns!
On his feet: the element of wind, keeping him afloat. On his hands: the elements of fire and water, attacking the lizerns. Around his body: the element of earth, protecting himself from any oncoming acid.
"A Master Multi-Elementalist!"