*
... What the hell. They've ran all the way here, just for the entire room to get destroyed by the flesh wave. In the end, it simply teleported here... How absurd... How irritating...
With a single wave, black flames break out that engulf the pieces of flesh, burning them to a crisp as fast as they appeared. She readies her rapier, preparing her mind for the final battle. It looks like there's simply no way around it, in the end all she could do was fight.
"Fuu~~~" (Kaede)
She lets out a deep exhale, staring at the origin where the flesh "leaked" through reality and ambushed them from. She got quite tired of it... In the first place, she ran because she was... Afraid. But this looked to be quite different from The Great Disaster she knew. Her nerves were now calm, her underlying fear buried deeply as she heightened her concentration.
Just as her fingers clenched a little tighter onto her rapier, a spread palm pats her back. In fact two of them did. Barius and Kaitmei gave her back a hearty tap with their fingers spread out. They walked forward and strode in front of her as they did so. She knew what they were about to say, but now a different worry was seizing her heart. She could indefinitely hold off The Great Disaster(imitation), but that would be all she could do for them now.
"Leave this to us." (Barius)
"... Looks like there's no longer much of a choice. This is our role" (Kaitmei)
"Huh?" (Kaede)
Why are they acting tough now? Isn't it scary? It's The Great Disaster, you know? It's a global scale catastrophe, it's not something even S grades can deal with normally.... It was something absurd in every way, something that simply defies any scaling through sheer magic quantity and tenacity... It was a force of nature in every meaning, something that is out of people's control.
"... By the way, the other candidates weren't dead. I don't know who started all these rumours, but the ArcMaidens wouldn't just ignore such deeds and allow me to help now, right?
I've always sent them back to the hospital, since they're magical girls they're completely fine. " (Kaitmei)
" I see... " (Kaede)
She felt really bad for constantly operating on that assumption, her little affirmation also helped confirmed things for Kaitmei. In the end, she didn't bother finding out her real name all this time. Unlike Karell who wishes to abandon her previous identity, perhaps Kaitmei...
"What's your name...?" (Kaede)
A poor showing of civility, truly deplorable. But it was better late than never, not that it should serve as any impetus to be late. She makes an effort on the spot to get to know the other's name, it was a disgusting way to confirm that she hadn't looked at Kaitmei as a person before. But in the end...
"It's Levia arylkadia. Remember this great name, a king who fought to the very end and even more." (Levia)
After all, she was also a fellow King candidate. Such a thing that was actually full of risk and low reward. Everyone should know that running for king involved being thrown straight in the middle of this war. In other words, the only individuals that would run for candidacy here... Would be those with a screw loose like Kaede, or someone who was unbelievably patriotic like Levia. Finally understanding the last candidate's motives, she felt like she could leave her back to these 2.
"... As magical girls..."
Not as king, not as a citizen.
"You are the most reliable in the world. Take pride, for you have saved humanity by giving the last stage to me!! Leave it to me!!!" (Kaede)
She lets out a roar, an acclamation of victory. Just solely because they were all magical girls, she will leave everything to them. In turn, they will leave everything to her. Step up, it's time after all.
Her radar picks up a large signal. Right in front of her and inside the throne room, it was practically swallowing everything up in the room, since the teleport gate placed her directly into it when she entered the room, she didn't notice at first. But they were already at the destination the entire time. It was odd to say they were already here, because at the same time they weren't.
The signal...
"It's at the edge of the world, De Lan, come with me. I need some help after all." (Kaede)
"I see it... The demons would call this a destiny, but to us human it could be felt through a mere hunch.
My role seems to end here." (De Lan)
Without explanation, she uses a skill. The world flashes by as if they were flying up a mountain on a jet, stretching the scenery into a dimension of grey. Her first skill was the translocation of territory, using it she was also able to teleport anything and anyone around. It didn't have the action priority nor the firepower that Kanou had, but it retained a high form of utility in being able to easily traverse worlds. Even now, she had simply translocated the vicinity that was in the throne room to preserve her existence.
In the end, this was the edge of the world, a greyish dimension. It would be wrong to call this another world, while it was technically in a different plane or dimension, it was within the universe that everyone else is in. Some might call it a sub dimension, but that would imply that this realm was lower in status compared to the normal world. It was not. This place existed in a different realm, more specifically a different frequency inside the main world that everyone lived in.
In other words, those who have reached the peak, those who have ascended to the point of having an infinite augmentation of their stats were the only ones who were able to create and enter this realm. As they are the ones who have grown inexplicably large in power, the world was now only barely able to contain them.
Think of it like the universe was a container that any being born in it was able to observe, but once that being grows large enough, they are now encroaching the edges of that container that's barely able to hold them in and stop itself from breaking. Hence, this place is the edge of the world.
De Lan's skill was useful in traversing here instantly as this technically counted as another realm even if it was contained within normal reality. Her skill also super imposed the environment of her choice, so she brought a small radius of 2 metres of the throne room with her and the air sitting on it. This allows her to live without disintegrating in this realm.
There, something beyond human comprehension was playing out. An endless loop of death and retaliation, The progenitor could be seened getting melted or burning into ash, while The Eye God was repeatedly sliced into countless pieces from various angles. It was not something anyone could step into, and the casual morbidity of it ws incredibly disturbing. So much so that even De Lan with her years of being a magical girl couldn't contain her disgust, she desperately suppressed her urge to hurl her dinner onto the floor.
If even De Lan couldn't handle it, could Kaede? She was practically a new born individual... Surprisingly she had some resistance to it... To watching their limbs come off like little plastic toys, smashing those disfigured limbs against each other or flinging one's eyeball into the other's gullet to explode... There was surprisingly a lot of resistance, but she still felt incredibly nauseous at the sight of it all, it was discomforting and a little disorienting too look at.
She felt like her sanity was escaping her grasp and wafting through the crevasses in her tightly closed fingers. Like an imaginary drill was delayering her brain and slowly causing it to die by decomposition. What is going on...? How do they have no qualms with all these disgusting attacks...
But it was also strange, certainly it would have been normal if this was Kaede's first time seeing magical girls fight each other, but surely the Demon King would have looked more disgusting than this with her numerous tendrils growing out of her flesh. She had also seen quite a bit, not to mention... Kaede looks back at whence she came from, there was nothing there, the others were existing in a different frequency of existence after all.
It was messed up, but what Karell did during their first meeting stuck with her. Karell's mines and attacks slicing apart the frail humans, separating their fickle limbs that easily split apart or disfigure into an unidentifiable mush, heads rolling about in a sea of blood as organs flew into the air. People running as fast as their legs could take them, with one person in particular who tripped over a roll of intestines that flew at his legs and tangled them up. A single power slice flew through his head, and his life ended.
Atrocities were widely common, but... After everything, Kaede was a magical girl after all. So if she sees such an atrocity, she would be inclined to prevent it. She unleashes her aura to make her presence known, a sheet of cloudy white proliferates like a tidal wave, first forming a sphere at her centre then extending outwards without any decrease in speed. If they were to enter her aura, it would pretty much cause them to be in her Oblivion Magia.
At this stage, her magic was so potent that even her aura could act as an Oblivion Magia, instantly breaking down any normal person's natural magic defence and giving Kaede the opportunity to use her skills inside their body. But naturally, the others who have reached this space by legitimate means are also of this level.
One has to attain infinite stats. Kaede steps out of the safe environment translocate by De Lan, she could exist in this plane naturally. To be honest, De Lan was completely in fear. Monster beyond comprehension, even if S grades could annihilate a continent or theoretically destroy the earth with all their magic used up, these individuals were on a different league. Simply put, reality was their playground. If she fought them, there was nothing she could do.
So she leaves it all to the newbie, the one who has taken the next step and surpassed her. If she couldn't reach this place on her own, De Lan would help her by using her first skill to affix the both of them to this plane. Though the difficulty would be nigh impossible, she thought that Kaori was strong enough to figure something out having fought the Demon King and survived. Even if everyone in the world calls her a coward for fledding from the Demon King, De Lan wouldn't. To fight and still survive, isn't that the opposite? She's strong enough to live through the tribulations, nothing should deny that. So she will put all of heart and believe her.
Nevertheless, the fact that Kaori could walk into it normally was a big relief. While it was a shock to once again be faced with the fact that her junior surpassed her and became a god magical girl level being, it was also reassuring that unlike the others... This magical girl was on the side that wants to save humanity.
The 2 individuals turned to look at her as her repulsion gradually subsides. It seemed that it wasn't the gore that was causing her mind to go into a state of confusion and overheating or painful delayering, the battle was simply sapping away at her sanity as her mind couldn't comprehend their attacks. But was that really the case? The fact that she was standing right here on the same stage as them, the fact that she didn't completely faint or broke into insanity after watching their battle...
There was definitely no way that she reached her limit right? After all, she hasn't unlocked her final skill either. She then wondered about De Lan, how as she doing fine right now? Did the dimensional translocation also filter the view?
"De Lan. How are you holding up? My head feels like it's about to crack open, but I think im getting used to it." (Kaede)
She cranes her head over, causing a little shift in her relatively more endowed body. Kaori was average to lesser, they might have both been beauties that could turn heads, not that there were any heads to turn. Even if they did, it would be in a different way... Both exuded a different type of charm, for some reason Kaede thought it was important that De Lan could still emanate such a self expression of confidence in this place. It really was extremely scary to watch 2 gods fight and wonder when they'll turn their attention to them.
"Is it really okay to discuss this now...?" (De Lan)
Her black twin tails wavered in the air under the gentle environment of her isolated barrier.
"It's fine, if anything I'm drawing their attention to me with my aura. You won't be targeted, probably." (Kaede)
"Probably... Well, we've encounter this sort of sanity depleting phenomenon before. It's rare, but as ArcMaidens we get exposed to lots of things." (De Lan)
"I see. Humu Humu." (Kaede)
A single swing of her rapier, a high pitch rhythm rings out. Her rapier was holding back 2 awfully conspicuous figures right now... The both of them attacked...?