*
My knee smashes her into her gut while the Veil of Determinism smashes her in from above, impacting her flesh with immeasurable force. Of course, she will just walk this off. A battle between gods can not rely on stats, but I wonder why we go through all of this anyway... Perhaps it is an initiation? A form of respect for the strong to show the strength they've accumulated in their lifespan?
I'm sorry, but I'll have to cut this custom short. In the end, I have to finish you off. There's no other way to go about it. Using this rapier materialised in my palm, I will sever your destiny. Being intertwined with humanity's fate, only vanishing from existence after you finishing your job of exterminating humanity... I'll liberate you from it.
I swing my rapier to the right, sparks fly as it clash with her expertly wielded long sword. Using [Hollow Calamity], I reinforce my entire body. Letting go of my blade, I smash her long sword to pieces by gripping with my right arm, then striking at her face with my left. Reigning drill cross punch.
The air around my arm turns into an outrageous black whirl wind that spun like a drill, its jett black hue reminiscent of a black hole captivates those who set their eyes upon it with its perfect light snaring gyrating motion. It was as if after inputting an infinite amount of magic, it evolved into a divine technique that exuded an atmosphere of beauty and elegance.
It was just a normal technique before, and it's not as if the infinite input of fuel was any wasteful when it evolved, in fact the first priority has always been efficiency. Even if technically speaking, a god magical girl no longer needs to conserve their well of magic. There exists romance in a technique's name, and so its beauty as a technique cannot be forsaken. So the first thing that comes to mind, is how aesthetically pleasing it would look at the height of its perfection, and to strive towards it.
Right now, it looks like the entire arm is wrapped in a swirling black drill, due to the force of its existence, it might as well have actually solidified and became glossy because that was how it appeared. Sometimes that was how magic is. The soul may not exist. If it did, soul related magic will interact with the soul. If it didn't, soul related magic will imitate and fabricate it from scratch, to retain all the attributes and properties that people think it has.
In other words, extreme imitation is not a foreign concept in magic. If it manages to replicate every single detail, even if let's say it uses light illusions to project a purple cube, but the light imitates a solid's property of being impermeable, down to the very texture and sensation. Does it really matter if it's real if it serves the same function?
That's why... Real or fake, it doesn't matter a single bit for magic! Kaori, or not Kaori, Kaede or Himei... I am who I am, and I don't need to be any single one person. I can be all of them or none of them, that kind of identity is secondary to a role that is far more important. Saviour of saviours, the one who is a magical girl and boundlessly loves other magical girls, that is who I am.
It feels like my body is light and my fatigue is fading away whenever I thought about magical girls, like some external strength is flowing into my veins and warming my body gently. Like the weight of the entire world was no longer resting on my back... This weight, every single burden... I'll still carry it and thoroughly crush you, Hikari!
I soar through the greyish realm dyed a bright white in my own colour, in an instant my kick connects to its target, but Hikari had already regenerated her entire body and deflected it with her own kick. I twist my feet and sent a second impact into her body which sent her flying backwards, but she relocates next to me and channels the momentum into her long sword. Like a boomerang, she came back and hit harder.
I copy her strategy, slamming my foot into her long sword to launch myself backwards, before relocating behind her with my rapier. In this manner, a cascading exchange of forceful attacks and returning the momentum occured. We draw arcs in the air akin to flower petals, continuously returning to the same point and smashing our weapons together without pause. I grab her wrist and trapped her with my second skill. Then I bisected her body with my rapier before bringing down the Veil of Determinism like a hammer.
They glitter with a dazzling brilliance, the countless stars that lay primordial since the universe's nascence. By tracking history all the way to the dawn of time, regardless if the Big Bang was the most probably theory, my magic will make it real in this very moment with an equally destructive attack. [Idealism of a magical maiden's transient heroism: panta rhei], reverses the gradient of time in an instant and reads the state of the universe with my radar, [Hollow calamity] recreates it from scratch, combined divine technique - Calamitous singularity.
Hikari relocates in front of me to catch me off guard, her long sword pierces through my skull for a quick finish. The technique conjures a small white or in my palm, it was blinding so I held it closed, but there's no need to hide it when my target comes to me like this. I use a palm smash to collide it into her torso.
Without pause, an explosion beyond sound and impact erupted. The dimension was bathed in light so intense it couldn't even be described as white. In fact it was black, everything was moving faster than light and everything that was initially there was blasted away to leave a void. Well, it might look flashy, but I guess this was no different than the Veil of Determinism. It was just uselessly flashy and noisy, the only advantage it would have would be the range, but it weakens as it gets further from the blast point....
It's so uselessly flashy... And it's effect might even be slightly weaker than a concentrated attack like Veil of Determinism, but...
That's why it's so beautiful. That's why I'll repeatedly throw it at her like a kid playing with a bunch of sparklers. These sparklers are extra large though! This... Was the elegance, the beauty that I was talking about. Because magical girl attacks not only have to be powerful, they have to be beautiful. Go! Calamitous singularity x 10! I cross my arms in a showy manner as I shot the white orbs forward, each one exploding in a chain reaction. First 2 erupted, then 4, then the last 4.
My wrist is flooded with sparkles as I drew my rapier and spun my entire body for a wide slash. She parries it with her long sword, but it felt so exhilarating, so ecstatic to fight without any restrain! Who cares about efficacy?! I'm a god magical girl, I can take some attacks on the level of a big bang just to fight in style! So I spun awkwardly like an amateur ballet dancer, I guess I was just having fun...? My legs slid across an imaginary surface in this groundless dimension as numerous cuts barely keeping up with my regeneration shower my body.
But I'm not a stationary target, the spinning motion unexpectedly made my body tough and hard to cleave even for her full powered attacks. Her blade drives deep into my skin, slicing out chunks 10 cm deep at once, but it was nothing compared to losing a limb and not even a speck when measured comparatively to my regeneration. My injuries disappear in a flash as I swung my foot into the air, striking her cheek with a layer of black coloured magic coating my foot.
I don't have to kill her with a single hit, I pushed my leg down and spun again, and again and again. Smashing so hard into her skull and even striking her as she tried to teleport away. Each time she ran, I would meet her with a foot to the neck or cheek, caving in her bones and shooting blood out of her jaw like a fountain. Then she grabbed my foot, swung my entire body and smashed me against her knee...
"You... You think this is a game? I'll show you!" (Hikari)
I bring up my arms, but she effortlessly smacks them away and rains relentless punches. This time I was the one barraged by both her fists and legs in a never ending chain of attacks. Her knee to my gut threw me into the air before her elbow striked me back down, followed by a high kick that shot me like a rocket. I was basically a pinball. To end it, my body spiked up like a porcupine. Rapiers arose from my body and skewered her up. My face was coated in my own blood, but the white of my eyes managed to peak out at her.
In the end, it was something silly like this that will end the fight. The conditions for unlocking my final skill were as follows, achieve SS grade in magical girl effectiveness, return Kaori's ego to her own soul and body. With some external help, recognise charisma or fate as a gradient and manipulate it. And finally, save Himei's heart. Recognising something that usually cannot be recognised as a gradient, something lofty and intangible like fate or charisma was one of the most important steps. [Idealism of a magical maiden's transient heroism: panta rhei], it's the ability to recognise anything as a gradient, to sense and manipulate its values.
So now, I have to sever her destiny. Specifically, Hikari has multiple destinies. The first was to be the Demon King, the second was be The Great Disaster. The rapier already skewering her exploded inside her body into a mass of more rapiers. Rend her destiny as The Great Disaster. There is no need for any technique, I'm not even slashing down a sword with my hand, because the rapiers are already inside her.
... Shit.
"KUHURGH?!!?!" (Hikari)
She vomited a large volume of blood before vanishing. Her destiny as The Great Disaster, essentially that was the effect of her final skill, to embed herself as a natural law into the universe, a law that exterminates humanity and prevents it from being. But without being a law, she lost her absolute power that allowed her to match god magical girls. The past demon kings weren't as powerful as her, so there might not even have a need for god magical girls to take them down...
Well, I don't really know much of their situation. Using my final skill to understand the state of the past, it's like having a video recording of the past few thousands years to watch, but 80% of the screen is pitch black and hard to decipher. It's not impossible, but I don't think it's right for me to peak like that. It's like how everyone is worried that if god existed, they would be watching every miniscule bit of their lives. This oppressive feeling of being monitored isn't something I want to enforce.
I only want to use it to save magical girls. Oh, and I guess humanity as well. I retreat from the edge of the world, back into the real world. Hikari layed, sitting on the ground with blood dripping down her lips continuously. It might be never ending. I basically severed her powers as a god away from her, even if her regeneration could keep her alive, her soul would bleed eternally.
"You did it, fair hero. You annihilated the last of the demons and their greatest dynasty.
Nah, you are unfair as hell... You're not even a hero... Your attributes are not anti-demon... You don't have such abilities, you just brute force... Yourself... Into this role... " (Hikari)
The blood never stopped flowing down her lips, dying them a scarlet red. But her tears began to mix in as they fell from her cheek. Her blood was thick and viscous, they must make her lips feel uncomfortable.
" Of course I'm not a hero. I'm a magical girl! But you, even if I save you, you won't stop right? And you've already taken many lives...
I'm fine with saving you even if I cannot forgive you. But nobody else is fine with it. And this conflict has to end anyway. I'm sorry. I can't save you, because I couldn't make you change your mind of your own accord.
.... Bye bye. "
" Bye. " (Hikari)
She closes her eyes but leaves with a smile. The Veil of Determinism, restricted to the space around her, disintegrates her without leaving anything behind. I could... I could easily turn back time in this small pocket of space and bring her back... But... Would it even be the real her, or a copy made by magic? And... I don't think it would be right to defile her honour after death. Really. Goodbye. A single life budded over the scorch earth where she died. A single almond blossom, simple hope.