"What do we have here? Someone managed to escape the Spacial Magic?" A male voice suddenly echoed through which immediately caught the citizens' and Elara's attention.
Elara looked up to see a man who looked to be Finral's age with a lean build and was wearing white robes that had what looked like eyes embroidered in a line in front of it. He had blue hair and purple eyes that danced with mischief, but as she looked closer, Elara could see the hidden anger behind them.
"Oooh! And it just happened to be the very person to which I was so anxious to meet too! Lady Luck must be on my side today. Although, I didn't quite expect you to become a Magic Knight." The man said, playfully.
"Who are you!? Are you responsible for the others' disappearance!?" Elara demanded, glaring at the man and stepping into stance, ready to take action if needed. Although, she did internally scold herself for wanting to snort as an image of Luck in a gown and a tiara invaded her mind when the unknown person mentioned 'Lady Luck'.
"Perhaps I am, perhaps I'm not." The man said mysteriously, casually walking on the roof with his hands behind his back. "But to answer your first question, I am Sapphirus. At your service, miss." He added as he stopped to take a ninety degree bow towards Elara.
Still bowing, he tilted his head up and smirked at her with his blinding pearly whites, "If I didn't just absolutely loathe you, I would've courted you already. You are as pretty as she used to brag to me about."
Elara's stance broke and her hand flew up to shield her eyes as she began to ask politely, "Pardon me if I'm being rude but would you please shut your mouth. It's really distracting."
Sapphirus closed his mouth and straightened back up with an apologetic and sheepish look on his face, "My apologies, miss."
"Thank you." Elara said with a small nod.
Funny thing is, Elara doesn't get blinded by anything, but he doesn't need to know that;>
"Now why are you trying to hurt these innocent people?!" Elara demanded going back into a defensive stance.
"Oh, but you misunderstand miss, I haven't hurt anyone just yet." Elara watched as Sapphirus jumped down from the roof and started walking towards her.
"Halt!" Elara exclaimed, her light bow materializing in her right hand, making Sapphirus stop in his tracks. "Don't take another step closer if you know what's good for you."
Sapphirus threw his head back as he laughed, "Oh, you are absolutely adorable, miss. Did you really think that would stop me?"
With one swift motion, Sapphirus brought his hand out and threw a piece of glass towards Elara.
Elara raised her bow and swiped at the glass just as swiftly, hoping to cancel it out but failed, ultimately leading to it grazing her cheek and land a few meters behind her, missing the citizens by a few inches.
Elara fought the urge to wince in pain and settled on bringing her hand up to lightly touch her wound and despite strong resistance, made her flinch a bit. She brought her hand in front of her and watched as a considerable amount of blood slipped down her fingers.
What just happened? Why didn't my bow cancel it out or at least deflect the glass?
Sapphirus chuckled heartily as he watched the confusion on the younger girl's face.
"It's a known fact that some type of glasses reflect light. But there are also some that let's light pass through, or in this case can pass through light." Sapphirus finished with a smug smirk on his face.
At this, Elara was too baffled to even make a comment about his annoying smirk.
Fudge, I'm at a disadvantage!
Upon realizing this, she immediately turned to the people and yelled, "Get out of the streets as soon as possible!"
Some of the people immediately ran at the young Knight's command but most stayed rooted on their spots, still too shocked and worried that some of their most trusted Magic Knights suddenly disappeared out of sight.
Sapphirus, who was quickly getting impatient, threw his head back and groaned as his grimoire floated and flipped open in front of him.
"You heard the lady! Scram!" He yelled as he raised his hand towards the flock of people.
The ground shook as glass spikes suddenly started rising from the ground and rapidly making its way towards the group of people.
Elara's eyes widened in alarm and on instinct, immediately flipped her grimoire open to a certain page.
"Lunar Magic: Lunar Aegis!"
She didn't know if it would work or if the glass would just pass through her aegis but she had to try.
A blinding, giant light shield appeared in front of the people just in time before the glass struck and broke on impact with the defensive spell.
Elara let out an extremely relieved sigh at that before she started to tell the people to leave once more.
This time, they happily obliged as the impact of the glass on the shield definitely snapped them out of their shock.
As soon as the street was cleared of the civilians, Sapphirus smiled happily, looking like a kid on Christmas morning.
"We're finally alone!" He cheered, which caused Elara to turn her full attention back to him. "Now that we're free from unsuspecting citizens, I can finally go all out in killing you!"
Her light bow started materializing in her hand again as she gritted her teeth, "I figured that it wasn't the citizens you were after considering your pathetic attempt on trying to hurt them."
Sapphirus grinned even more, if that was possible. "Pretty and smart. It's really such a shame that it had to be like this, princess. You would've been the perfect bride."
Absolutely revolted to the core, Elara shot her first arrow at him with so much power that it hit Sapphirus' shoulder before he could even think of reacting.
Sapphirus stumbled back a bit at the force and clutched his shoulder as the arrow disappeared, leaving behind a hole dripping with blood on his shoulder.
"Ouch, that hurt!" The glass mage said as he looked down at the wound. Removing his hand from his shoulder, glass suddenly formed over the wound, preventing him from losing more blood.
"That should do for now..." he said, before looking back up to meet Elara's eyes.
Elara felt a shiver go down her spine at the look he was giving her. It was intimidating and very unnerving.
"Oh it's on, princess."
Sapphirus' grimoire glowed a bright white before it flipped to another page, a huge smirk making it's way onto his face.
"Glass Magic: Dancing Shards!"
Glass shards suddenly started hurtling towards Elara at high speed to which she dodged by disappearing and flashing to another spot.
Just as Elara was about to fire another arrow towards Sapphirus in her new spot, she was taken aback when a shard suddenly grazed her shoulder, ripping a part of her clothing and skin.
She accidentally released the arrow out of shock and missed Sapphirus by a few inches. She turned her head to see that the glass shards that she just dodged were coming at her again, making her flicker to another spot.
But as she did, she witnessed how the shards took a sharp turn and were hurtling at her again.
The shards are following their target! They're like my arrows!
She flickered to another spot again as she tried to find a way to stop the glass shards.
Meanwhile, Sapphirus stood idly by with an amused smile on his face as Elara flickered from one spot to another, getting chased by his shards.
Elara knew that she had her limits, so she really had to figure out a way to beat his magic before that time comes.
She looked around as she flickered, but nothing seemed to come to her head. Until something caught her eye in the most unexpected of places.
The glass shards themselves.
Yes, Elara can't be blinded as her eyes make her physically unable to react to extremely bright light but she can still differentiate brightness. So when a sudden shine or reflection of light caught her eye from one of the glass shards, a thought came fleeting through her head.
That was a reflection! If light reflected on that shard, then that means that those aren't the type of glass that lets light pass through them!
With that thought in mind, the moment she reappeared again, she was in an attack stance in the air, her hand pulling back an arrow before releasing it and hitting a single shard which was thrown off course and created a domino effect on some others it hit.
A triumphant smile spread across Elara's face before she deactivated her bow so she could execute her next spell properly. She landed on top of a random roof and flipped open her grimoire to another page and just as she saw the rest of the glass shards heading straight at her, she casted:
"Lunar Magic: Divine Punishment!"
With that, a barrage of light arrows came hurtling, head first towards the glass shards, successfully hitting every single one and either deflecting them or completely shattering them.
Sapphirus' smile faded upon seeing this. He opens his hand, palm facing down, making a platform made out of glass below his feet.
Just as Elara turned to face Sapphirus after taking down the last of the glass shards, a glass dagger flew right past her head, only missing her by a few centimeters.
After that, she knew that she shouldn't put her guard down. She turned to glare at Sapphirus, her full attention now on him as an arrow-shaped sword made out of light materialized in her right hand.
As Sapphirus threw one dagger after another at Elara while chasing her on the air on his hovering glass platform, she flashed from one point to another, sometimes deflecting the glass daggers when it was too close a call. Though, some of the daggers did manage to pass through her sword.
As this process continued, Elara finally found out how Sapphirus' magic worked.
He can only cast the type of glass that passes through her light one at a time. After that, he has to wait before the one he casted either hits or dematerialize before he could cast another. And if all of his attacks are like any of the ones he casted so far, then there'll always be at least a few seconds break in between those pass-through glasses. And that's time enough for me.
Satisfied with her analysis, Elara stepped out of defense mode and switched to offense with an already well-thought and elaborate plan.
Seeing as Sapphirus was still chasing her around, she couldn't exactly cast Supreme Archers but she did manage to think of another way to still execute her plan (even though it was slightly experimental).
Elara secretly let out a dazed smiled as she thought about the midnight spar she had with Luck. After their spar, Elara thought about it more times than she'd like to admit. BUT! She is proud to admit that she thought about the spar not only because of how handsome and cool Luck was then, but also because she wanted to find a way to beat him the next time they have a spar.
Hence, what gave her the idea now.
Letting out a great breath, Elara stopped flashing, landing on a random roof and turning to face the incoming Sapphirus along with his glass daggers, bravely.
Seeing this, Sapphirus was a bit sceptical but nonetheless took the opportunity to attack, releasing glass dagger after dagger.
"Lunar Magic: Lunar Aegis!" Elara casted as she spread her arms out, creating a giant light shield in front of her.
Sapphirus couldn't help but smirk as he saw this. Hasn't she learned anything from these past couple of minutes?
As glass made contact with light, the glass immediately broke but one did manage to pass through and scraped Elara's temple.
Sapphirus grinned in triumph at seeing this, but not even a second later, immediately faltered as he saw Elara's lips curl into a smile despite being hit.
Just as planned.
Because the glass only managed to scrape her temple, it went straight past her and hadn't hit anything directly nor had it disappeared yet. Elara took this as her que and abruptly disappeared in front of Sapphirus' eyes.
Before he knew it, he suddenly felt a searing pain across his back. And as if time had slowed, when he turned to try and glimpse of what happened, he saw Elara casually flying by and winked straight at him before disappearing once again.
As soon as she disappeared, Elara casted a spell, giving Sapphirus no time to recover from the huge gash Elara just gave him across his back before he was blinding by her Supreme Archers, effectively stopping his pursuit on her.
"Release." Elara breathed from where she recently appeared on another random roof.
With that command, the blinding golden figures of the greatest archers that ever lived released their arrows and hit their target in the middle, creating smoke which covered the area.
Elara sighed in relief and smiled.
I won. (੭>▿<)੭⁾⁾
Then just as quickly as it appeared, her smile was gone as she heard a derisive and slightly crazed laugh coming from within the smoked cloud that had yet to clear.
But as it did, and to Elara's great disdain, there Sapphirus stood, in all his glory. His hair was ruffled and slightly burnt, his robes torn in some places and as equally burnt as his hair, you could even see small patches of blood seeping through them, but Elara hadn't cared about those in that moment as all she could focus on was that giant and smug smirk on his stupid face.
"You keep amazing me, Lady Lunate. You truly are as amazing and prodigal as she used to tell me!" He shouted almost manically, spreading his arms wide with a giant grin.
Who is this 'she' he keeps talking about?! Elara thought in deep frustration from both the lack of knowledge she had on who this 'she' was and for the fact that her elaborate plan wasn't able to defeat Sapphirus.
And that rarely ever happens!
"Oh princess... sweet, naive, princess... I'm sorry to be the one to inform you... but the fun's only getting started." With one last sickeningly sweet grin to Elara's direction, explosions started popping up all over the east district as light clashed with glass.
And yes, Elara's curse fueled by frustration had contributed a bit too.
~
As Elara continued to battle the hot new oc the author made, Asta, Noelle, and Leopold had their own huge crisis as they just saw the handsome and feiry Captain of the Crimson Lions being swallowed by spacial magic only to be spat out a few minutes later armless and half-dead.
To be frank, the three were absolutely horrified.
(Poor Leopold :< I couldn't even begin to imagine how it would feel like if this happened to my brother)
The three ran towards Fuegoleon's body and Noelle immediately reacted quickly by tearing a piece of her clothes to wrap over the fallen Captain's wound to stop the bleeding once she she saw that he was still alive through his still intact grimiore.
"Leopold, help me!" She screamed at the frozen male when she saw that the said grimiore was slowly starting to disintegrate.
Though her attempts were futile as Leopold couldn't hear anything in his moment of shock. "Fuegoleon..." he whispered, mortified.
As Noelle kept screaming at the poor boy for help, the violet haired male with an eye patch who was partially at fault for the captain's downfall spoke without a single speck of remorse on his voice.
"That's what you get for talking down to me earlier!" He said right before be summoned some of his magic and threw the vulnerable cub hard towards a wall which cracked under the sudden weight and pressure.
Noelle gasped and looked from Leopold to the attacker with slight nerves, "A magic blast..."
The dude with the eye patch grinned before slowly making his way towards the purple-eyed royal and the half-dead captain. While doing so, he was remembering what the Crimson Lions' Captain said to him only a few minutes ago.
"What you lacked to overcome adversity...
was a righteous heart."
"A righteous heart?! I've always been true to myself! Keep yappin' in the next world, Fuegoleon Vermillion!" He said as he continued his strides. Though, he abruptly stopped when a voice suddenly rang in his head, "We've completed our mission."
He looked up towards the owner of the voice who was standing on top of a building. "We're leaving before the other Magic Knights come back, Rades."
The green haired male, who was on top of the building and was also apparently the reason behind the Spacial Magic, raised his hand towards 'Rades' and opened up a portal below him.
"Hold it... right there." A weak and strained voice spoke which caught both males' attention. They both turned to see a severely injured Asta, who was stubbornly on his feet and holding his heavy sword by his side.
"Asta, wasn't it?" Rades asked, "I'll eventually kill you and make you into one of my toys." He declared.
"Look forward to that, you little brat!"
Asta didn't reply as he started running towards Rades, dragging his sword behind him to gain momentum.
"Asta!" Noelle yelled in alarm and worry for the albino haired Knight.
Asta ignored his friend's yells as he concentrated on the escaping male.
This distance... I'm not going to make it. He thought as he ran, blood trailing behind him.
"Don't!" Noelle kept yelling. If you move any more while you're bleeding that much... She thought, worriedly.
But Asta was stubborn, so of course he did not stop. Not yet! He thought. The Captain of the Crimson Lion Kings just taught me... I need to think calmly.
How can I stop him?
So in his moment of realization, he did the only logical thing he could do in that moment and threw his other sword at the Spacial Magic, successfully cancelling it.
Not giving up is my magic!
And my sword can...
Cut through magic!
"What?!" Both Rades and his ally stood in shock at what just happened.
With no other way of escaping now, Asta was able to land a swipe at Rades and cut his cheek in his moment of shock.
"Ow! What the hell are you doing, you little shit?!" He cried out in pain.
"Not good..." The Spacial Magic user mumbled and once again tried to open up a portal below Rades, only to fail once again at the touch of Asta's sword.
"You have the nerve to say that after hurting all those people!?" Asta exclaimed, enraged. "This... is pain!" He yelled as he straight up punched the guy right on the face.
"This is what you did to innocent people as you laughed about it!" Asta continued, landing another punch on Rades.
"Stop!" Rades said as he stumbled back by the force. "Getting hurt and bleeding are signs of being weak! Those who lack magic should just get their asses beat by those who are more powerful!" He yelled as he summoned another one of his magic, flame-like, purple stuff.
"Especially... pieces of trash like you who don't have any magic!" He said throwing the purpledl stuff.
Asta swung his sword and nullified the magic almost immediately, making Rades even more nervous.
"I'm here to make sure... that doesn't happen!" Asta yelled as he butted his head with Rades' successfully making the guy stumble back by the force of it. "And... Even those without magic can become the best! I'm going to prove that by becoming the Wizard King!"
Rades gritted his teeth, looked up, and started yelling at his friend in slight desperation. "Valtos! Do something!"
Valtos scoffed and said in annoyance, "If I could, I would've by now."
That anti-magic is more troublesome than I'd imagined. Valtos thought as he looked at the albino haired Knight.
"Looks like we're going to have to take care of him first." He said, opening his palm upwards and summoning a portal.
Noelle, who went back to trying to keep Fuegoleon alive when she saw that Asta wasn't giving up, finally looked back up to keep up with the situation, only to find out that Valtos was trying to sneak an attack on Asta.
"Asta, look out!" She yelled, once she saw a spacial portal open behind the short male.
Asta gasped and looked behind him, but it was too late as Valtos was already about to fire his magic at him.
Just as he was about to do it, flames came spiraling at him at the very last second, making him jump aside, the surprise attack he was planning to do, failing almost instantly.
Valtos looked down to where the fire came from and saw Leopold, who just recently came back to his senses, panting and internally scolding himself.
"How can I be panicking? I always need to remain calm..." he said to himself, before standing up straight and yelling to his unconscious brother, "Right, Fuegoleon?!"
"Leopold!" Noelle yelled, extremely relieved about the boy's return.
"This isn't good... We can't afford to lose Rades, too." Valtos mumbled to himself as he saw the situation him and his comrade were in.
"D-Damn you all! Get away! Stay back!" Rades yelled, fearfully backing up as Asta and Leopold started cornering him.
"Pathetic." A voice suddenly came from nowhere, making the others look around in alarm.
"We received orders from Master to come here, and look at you..." the voice continued speaking, "You're struggling against this lot. How pathetic."
A mysterious gust of wind suddenly came from nowhere and encircled the group, and not a moment later disappeared only to be replaced by cloaked figures surrounding them. All of which had three eyes going down in a line in the middle of their robes.
Such piercingly cold magic... Noelle thought as she looked around at the hooded figures.
There are five new enemies! Leopold worried as he examined the situation.
Meanwhile Asta was dealing with other stuff, I was only scratched...but thanks to the curse, the bleeding won't stop. If I lose more blood, I'm in trouble.
"No one asked for your help!" Rades ironically said to the hooded figures considering how him and Valtos clearly need it earlier.
"Aw, you should be thanking us." A playful voice came from one of the hooded figures. "If we hadn't arrived, you definitely would've been captured and dissected alive."
"And if you're gonna be dissected, I want to be the one to do it." The hooded figure added, creepily moving their fingers as if eager to do it now.
"Shut up!" Rades retorted. "Anyway, it looks like the tables have turned!"
A weird laugh suddenly came out of Asta, making Rades draw his attention to him.
Everyone present stood in shock when the boy suddenly cut himself with his swords.
"Asta!" Noelle gasped in shock.
"You..." Leopold couldn't even seem to finish his sentence.
"Now I can keep fighting!" Asta said in determination as the curse that was previously casted upon him by Rades came flowing out. "Please watch me, sir!" He said to the still unconscious Captain.
Rades seemed to be the most astonished amongst all of them though. This brat... He struck himself with his own swords to get rid of the curse? Unbelievable... He's so stupid!
"Wow, he's fun. Can I dissect him later?" The playful voice spoke again, suddenly extremely interested in Asta.
"Quiet." One of the other hooded figures replied.
"Boo. You're such a spoilsport." She said in dismay, although she proceeded to open her right hand and started gathering her mana in it right after.
The others did the same, all pointing towards the group of young Knights in the middle.
"All I've ever faced since I was born... was adversity. No matter how many come at me, no matter what happens," Asta said as he got ready to fight them all, "I'll blast them all away!"
"All right! Come at me!"
"It seems he's lost his mind in the face of our numbers." One of the hooded figures said.
"Whatever. He's about to die anyway." Another one replied.
Just when the hooded figures were about to release their magic, another figure landed roughly on one knee just barely missing Asta, creating a pool of dust around them.
"That bastard, how dare he!" A familiar voice exclaimed indignantly as they got back on their feet.