***
A trail of blue rushes through the air like a shooting star, leaving behind a path of glittering crystals as light bounces off the remnant droplets. The blue trail splits into 3 before joining back into one, colliding with something at the point of fusion. In the middle of the blue trail was a magical girl submerged in water, her left fists is kneaded tightly until the every joint became milky white, its wrinkly creases told of how much tension and stretching her muscles are doing.
On the opposing end was a raised left leg, fiercely clashing with the fist on even ground. No, it may even be on higher ground. Her colour inverted miko dress fluttered violently as if it threatened to tear the world apart. Her jet black twintails had black bells that blend into her hair, they seem to be empty as they don't give off any sound.
Barius spins clockwise in an instant, smashing her right elbow into that raised leg before leaping closer, her left fist tucked close to her arm with her elbow bent, ready to be unleashed. With her leg parried by Barius's elbow, her lower half was paralysed from making a move unless she jumped away with her remaining leg to regain her balance midair.
Unfortunately her arms were exempt and free, she uses her right palm to block and grab Barius's left fist with ease after it was thrown. She attempts to throw her right fist next, but at that point her left leg had already recovered from the parry, so she kneed her torso once more. The air was once again knocked out of Barius's lungs, her eyes bulging with red veins as it stared intently at De Lan's face. Not once did it tear away from her.
Landing on the ground, she had little strength to get back up. But Barius was preparing to make the exchange count, if she simply didn't stop moving, didn't stop attacking, then there was meaning to her efforts. If she kept throwing something out without stopping, and eventually landing a single feeble hit, even that would count as meaning for her. So from behind, she conjures more and more water.
***(Barius)
"Oblivion Magia, different arrangement. Sequence's end"
In an instant, the floor became flooded up to the knees as countless waterfall sized holes open up the space above them, profusely pouring water into the realm. Eventually the grey realm they were in was filled with the waterfalls themselves, a seperate dimension, an Oblivion Magia of water that would slow down the time of its prey.
"How unfortunate, even your Oblivion Magia has no effect on me. My barrier is still active so my movement is unaffected." (De Lan)
That really narrowed down the properties of her barrier. If it could resist the effects of an Oblivion Magia, that meant that it is similar in nature to an Oblivion Magia, in other words it was a spacial defense. It can block off anything with space, spatial manipulation sometimes involve teleportation, meaning that the water that leaks through her spatial barrier isn't really being converted to air but replaced by the air from another space. That is possible, well even if its not exactly correct the effects are the same. So the solution should be the same as well. It all comes down to luck...
With nothing in the way, I could keep accelerating further. But no matter how much faster I go, there still seems to be this insurmountable gap. It was evident as the distance between us constantly stayed the same despite knowing I was getting faster by the second.
No, there was more to this than just speed, if the distance between us stays the same then it means that we are travelling at the exact same speed. So, is she also increasing her Agility like I was? I find that highly unlikely, it was more probable that this was the work of a skill. Even trivial details like these are crucial in battle. The more information I have, the better.
So no matter how much I chase her, I would never catch up to her. No matter how much I stretch out my hand in this vast sea, the image of Ikari and Kaori overlaps with her, as if to mock my entire life of chasing rivals. What exactly was I doing? Seeing things in the middle of battle... This isn't like me at all... I blink once and the scenery returns back to normal. What if I do this...?
I can manipulate the properties of water, I'm sure that was nothing surprising. I can already condense it into a shield or blade, use it to move things and rearrange my wounds to patch them up, increase my blood flow and absorb it through my skin for sustenance. I can also use it to create a magic field or territory that allows me to ignore gravity or air resistance. I have moved the water, moved things within water and finally, I have moved both water and the things withing it at the same time.
Then... Surely, I can shrink it too, thereby shrinking space itself. If I shrink the water, yet her skill continues to create and maintain space between us, the water in front of me will likely disappear and form large air pockets. It would severely slow down my pursuit, it'd be like crashing into a wall. But if I rid of everything between us except for water, it will be as if...
In the end, what is water? There's no way that water can fill every single gap of space, there will always be small pockets of vacuums between the molecules... Yet, we count all of it as water. These insignificant gaps are never taken into account, because they essentially make no difference. We rely on water's state of equilibrium, its own attained state of balance in its existence. [First step to perfection], the very core of my existence and everything else, that is what water is.
Refined technique, aqua leap. As I am essentially the same thing as water, I deconstruct myself here and reconstruct myself in the space in front. I retained my memories and ego as my own state of equilibrium. With the gaps in space between molecules, I can't substitute space itself with water and shrink it. It was impossible after realising that, but I arrived at another solution. To exchange myself with the water in front.
I... I can't tell if I was actually a clone of the previous Barius created by magic... Or if I was the actual Barius that casted the magic... But, if I want to win, I'll have to abandon my humanity. To go beyond is to throw away these fundamental human values and exist in a different realm. Now I am right behind her, I exist in the space right behind her. She has to cast her own skill again to seperate the distance even more, but as it stands she is finally within reach.
I create the same multi-layered water blade that could break through even spatial barriers. A new glint lines its edges as it hums in resonance to the magic within my body, I became connected to it on a level deeper than physical touch, my magic continuously flows in and out of it like an extra appendage had been formed on my body. This was it, I thrust the blade straight forward, piercing through the blinding goal that I've continuously reached for many years. I have finally become perfect by using [First step to perfection].
With a technique that contained more depth than before, more whole than it ever has been, it smoothly and efficiently applied the time stop skill attached to it, [Second step to completion], and breaks through De Lan's barrier like paper with its tip. Devising new techniques and continuously improving, I won't ever stop reaching and yearning for this surreal end point known as perfection.
The tip of the blade vanishes, but the outer layer of the blade lines its entire structure without a single gap, I simply take advantage of the gap I've already made in her barrier and push in the rest of the blade's length. At the same time, I extend its length at the base so that it would never run out.
This causes the gap in her barrier to keep widening no matter how many times she makes my blade disappear. Driving it down into a primitive contest of attrition between 2 wells, it became an unrefined competition of who had more magical particles.
She causes the blade to disappear and I reforge the blade at its base to keep going. I pump my entire will and all my body's strength into pushing the blade, sparks flying out of every bit of area on the blade that's clashing against her barrier.
"... Even in this inelegant manner of fighting, you understand, no? I won't lose in quantity as well." (De Lan)
"... Tch, you're right."
But it's all I have, the fruits born from this battle. Yet it still can't measure up to her... I mean, she has deployed this barrier since the start, yet her aura hasn't changed much. At least from what I could observe, she's still completely fine, nearly identical to the start of the battle even. The only proof that we've been fighting the entire time... Is this small improvement in the fight.
"Looks like I'll have to get serious and be on the offensive. After all, you already know how my barrier works, right? " (De Lan)
Swallowing my spit in disgust, I spoke with a grimace to buy some time.
"... Yeah... Your barrier and your replacing ability, it all seemed to be one skill. It's a miniature world, you replace your immediate surroundings with a miniature world. That's why there is a spatial aspect to it, it's a dimensional barrier.
What I'm puzzled by is that the dimensional barrier is transparent and you seem to be observing this world at the same reference point of time as I am. After all, if you made it move any faster, then you would have gone insane from the exponential differences in the observed time between us. Your world may accidentally become infinity faster than the world I'm in, and it seems unlikely for a skill to help you cope with insanity. That would actually be hell.
So I arrived at a single conclusion. "
" That's the most obvious part isn't it? They explain how I can't be perturbed by the environment and continue to move flawlessly. " (De Lan)
" Yeah. Whether your skill was activated automatically or manually no longer mattered. It's activated at every moment, infinitely replacing your surroundings with the air from another dimension at any time... How were you able to fuel this magic since the start... A rough estimate is an infinite amount of magical particles! Yet your well doesn't seem to have depleted at all. "
" Now, why would I tell you that? " (De Lan)
" Suit yourself. "
If I keep this blade inside her barrier even for a moment, I can keep collecting data on her magic until I piece together her magical circuits. Then I can find and stop them in time, preventing the activation of her skill. A sure kill method that would work on any magical girl, prototype technique, Chrono lock.
"... I don't know what ideas you have. But it won't matter. I won't let you execute them after analysing my primary skill this much.
Second skill release, [The highest price is peace]. Now, you should gradually feel that your fate is slowly leaking away. " (De Lan)
... What was she talking about? As far as I could tell, nothing happened. I felt like nothing had changed. I push the blade into her barrier once more, awaiting the moment I could find her magical circuits and disable them. Huh? Where did my sword go...?
If... If I can't kill her anyway, I might as well let her kill me instead. Then I could at least die 'perfect' before facing my comrades. I wonder, what should I even do now?
***
Barius drops her blade the moment De Lan casted the spell, her ultimate weapon that could cut through any material that exists bursts apart into powdery snow as it fades into the dim grey of the background. Her Oblivion Magia had also lost its effects, and after using a second skill there was no more need to worry about Barius cutting her up. So she expands her barrier with her first skill, [That which rule will see] until it encapsulates a large enough area. Then she converts all of it into air, leaving Barius on the ground.
"... I knew you couldn't resist it, I made sure you let your guard down thinking you could win without your final skill... I... I wonder if it's right to feel a little disappointed...
But... My city is under threat by The Eye God you see? So don't take it personally...
What am I doing, talking to a corpse? " (De Lan)
Her second skill caused Barius to lose her will to live, the contradictions between reality and her own mind eventually caused Barius to go insane. Why am I fighting if I want to die? What was I doing? Did I become perfect yet?
De Lan stares in disgust at the corpse laid on the ground, without her magical girl augmentations on, even the mind control magic of De Lan could physically scramble her brain into a mess.