***
"... Final skill... [Gospel that derides all that belongs, it simply couldn't be helped]." (Arasovi)
This was her first hypothesis, since she physically felt time being corrected into a different state... If a certain stretch of time is regarded as history, then a new form of history was replacing the old one. Thus, Arasovi's final skill is a confirmation of sorts... Of what happened to her initial world, and its own effects. It sets a new history, fixing herself into fate as a 'historical constant', something that could no longer be changed no matter what.
Kaori's body was sliced in half and split vertically. But her body held itself in place without falling apart, even though it was completely damaged and sustained an attack that would kill any A grade and below magical girl, let alone a normal human being. Arasovi hadn't taken a single step, her final skill solves the issue of parrying and dodging. At this grand stage, let alone speed, even infinity has lost its meaning. Essentially here... Everyone has the same speed here, causing the biggest ways of defending oneself to be parrying.
That meant that Arasovi's final skill as a magic that set destiny itself... Can well and truly be called a god killer as it loops around parries. Kaori stood straight even with her body bisected, her gaze fixed onto the frigid expression of the individual in front of her. This magic ended her own world, every world is meant to come to an end, that was simply the nature of everything. This magic was able to bring that forth much earlier in time, bypassing those who guard against the end of the world, such as HuoLi. Surely there were many like her in the other worlds too, but she was still able to destroy each and every one of them before coming here.
Truly a fitting magic for one that ends worlds, a full on independent conceptual advantage that brings worlds to their eventual demise. Grail's existence reminded Kaori of many things, even if there is no answer in sight... She still survived in the end. Even if god said she would die today, there was always a possibility to survive. In this world of limitless possibilities, even the infinitesimal chance that she survives is something worth fighting for.
She survived the fight with Zedicia, she survived Hikari despite the antimagic undoing her transformation. She has fought so many others, what was so different about now?
"Rot and perish." (Arasovi)
Death sweeps over her, a commandment over reality seeps into her senses, the fire in her eyes never stopped burning.
"Fufu... Fufufufu fuhahaHAHAH?!!!!
Did you think this would be the end? Because your skill dictated so? " (Kaori)
"...?!" (Arasovi)
It hadn't been long since they met, but this might be the first time she saw Arasovi flinch. It might have been a muscle spasm born from her irritation, or... It could be a wave of subtle fear. Just some meagre anxiousness, a tinge of uncertainty in her own magic. But more than anything... A premonition that this awful battle would be prolonged.
"Look, even if your attacks take an 'instant' to reach me, they will never reach me. [Idealism of a magical maiden's transient heroism: panta rhei]" (Kaori)
She still had her own final skill to rely on. At the end of everything she went through, she found one last piece of the puzzle, an auxiliary final skill that aided her no matter what due to its effects. It allows her to recognise... Whatever she wanted as a gradient. This allows her first skill to then control it, raise the gradient, lower it, freeze it at zero, almost anything she wanted as long as it was centered around gradients.
"[Premonition of destruction]." (Arasovi)
She set the target of her destruction magic to be Kaori's final skill's control over her final skill's destiny changing effect. However, Kaori simply activated her final skill again. No matter how many times Arasovi destroys her control over the gradients or the concept of gradients itself, Kaori's final skill allows her to recognise them as gradients again and control them with [Hollow calamity]. It wasn't a one time thing, as long as she activated her final skill, it would allow her recognition as many times as she wanted. The keyword being 'allow', so even when arrested from her, reactivation would help recover it.
It was a sort of semi trick. Everyone here is well aware that they don't have to announce the name of their skill to activate it, Kaori had always activated her final skill to cast a sort of pseudo barrier around her that automatically recognises anything as a gradient and stops it in its tracks. It was what happened with Arasovi's final skill setting her death as 'destined history' that would come about no matter what. She sustained the attack that bisected her and regenerated back her body, but her 'destiny' to perish had been halted promptly.
There was a slight time lag that caused this, allowing her to sustain the bisecting attack. Though that was because she was analysing Arasovi's skills and guessing their effects. She supposed that would be its one and only limit. She had to comprehend and be aware of the targets existence before recognising it as a gradient. If she didn't know what Arasovi's magic did, it wouldn't work. That's why the first attack went through. That split moment was all it took for her to almost die.
Rapier in her right palm, she closes the distance for a second round of her calamitous dance. Her body phases through reality, vanishing from her spot and reappearing much nearer. Within a single blink from Arasovi, she had trusted 3 times and spun for a large kick. Just as quick, Arasovi blocked the 3 thrusts with the flat of her blade and slammed her forearm against the kick.
Without stopping, Arasovi side stepped so fast it almost seemed like she vanished in front of Kaori's eyes, who had barely followed her movements at the last second. 3 thrust and 4 slashes was inflicted by Arasovi's great sword, followed up by 3 punches and a single kick. Without hesitation, despite the size difference, Kaori thrusted her rapier straight on into Arasovi's attacks. Each collision caused noisy and vigorous sparks to fly into the air. No matter what attack was thrown at her, it was met with a flashing rapier, causing some cuts as Arasovi's punches were met with a blade.
Her flesh was carved into with clean slices that decorated the sight of her fore arm. Countless attacks intersected in the frenzied rush, at once there were too many overhead swings by Arasovi with her greatsword to count, followed by an equally innumerable number of rapier thrusts. Their blades clash twice followed by a roundhouse kick by Kaori, Arasovi raises her knee and eats the impact with her leg without batting an eye. Her black dress had numerous little cuts, but they mend themselves without anyone noticing.
Arasovi throws multiple thrust forward with her great sword, Kaori slams her rapier onto their flat side, producing momentum that throws herself forward and closer. She then pulls her arm back and throws some slashes with her rapier. The greatsword was drawn back, blocking the slashes before an arm rises around its edge to throw a punch. Arasovi's knuckles smashed into Kaori's torso, breaking her ribs and sternum.
The bone fragments pierce into her flesh, causing internal bleeding to allow blood flow into her lungs and up her windpipe. But she took the attack head on with a smile and threw her left fist right as the great sword was relocating to make the next attack. He left fist smashes into Arasovi's face, knocking out a bunch of teeth and warping her gums into a mess. One of her eyes also began to bleed.
Right as Arasovi was about to land her right fist in retaliation, her rapier had sliced it off at the wrist. There was no rest, within a single instant packed thousands of exchanges and then even more. Their blades collide loudly at every opportune moment, as if playing some sort of rhythm game. Left and right, their weapons begin to lose shape and vaguely start to resemble mere sticks like fallen tree branches. Though Kaori's rapier was always more of a straight pole, so it wasn't so obvious. A greatsword with a more defined shape would have more noticeable changes than a rapier that was already a stick before.
Kaori throws a straight kick right after, met by Arasovi with a similar kick. Their bodies fly apart, but soon again met each other head on. Kaori thrusts her blade forward... But narrowly miss to the side, while Arasovi thrusts her great sword straight through her heart. The destruction magic begins acting on her body and destroying her cells rapidly. Her spiritual body and soul as well, it was getting eroded away.
By synching her mind with the world through extending her radar over the entire universe... And grabbing ahold of everything in it with [Hollow calamity], she had unlocked her calamitous dance earlier, which allowed her to effortlessly pass through anything that could be conceived as a part of the world. However, Arasovi is anything but a part of the world, she's an alien from another dimension. This was a result of Kaori becoming over reliant on her final skill, she intentionally used it against Arasovi s final skill but forgot to continuously ward off her second skill, the authority that pins misfortune and sin.
Arasovi used her destruction magic to destroy the last of the resistance brought about by her last skill, plunging her authority in and causing Kaori to miss her attack by a wide margin. Focus, this will test the hypothesis over Arasovi's final skill... What she knew currently was that it sets whatever Arasovi wants as a 'historical constant', an event that likely persists through all worlds. This might create a new Arasovi in the other worlds via its existing matter, or it physically sent Arasovi from another world to here.
By sending her own world to an early demise, she can cause that event to be constant for every other world as well, but that magic is resisted by the world itself and its inhabitants. She has to at least kill all the god magical girls in that world first.
However, since her skills are geared towards killing god magical girls, she has also gathered many allies in the same class as her. Though, it's fine. Everyone who was summoned here knew the difficulty of the task, but still answered the call anyway. If needed to, their objective can change from 'eliminating the enemy' to 'holding the enemy off until Ledia can come eliminate them'. There was no need to rush things.
"...???" (Kaori)
She couldn't pass through the greatsword to escape. Her body was rapidly being eroded as her regeneration was being overwhelmed. Arasovi's destruction magic removes the last of her final skill's resistance to her third skill, setting 'perish' as her new destiny. In the end even her precious final skill could be destroyed just as easy as that, her magic that she adored so was overturned with simple 'destruction'.
Approximately most of her body was gone, all that remained was her right eye as black light dissolved anything it covered, like a slime slowly devouring its prey. The destruction magic was too efficient, in an instant she was down to her right eye... This was only because the last of Kaori's resistance concentrated at one point and delayed the destruction of that point for a mere instant. But it was enough.
A brilliant glow burst forth from that eye blinding everything in its surroundings. The entirety of the grey edge of the world was flashed with a fiery white, like a hallowed land where the afterlife took place. Concentrate... Concentrate even more, bring out the entirety of your soul and then even more... First her combat dress materialised, and then her flesh. Her body actively bit back at the destruction magic even as she was being dissolved by it, her entire being was fighting back, resisting. When the light faded, her entire body had returned.
She was now outside of the greatsword's range and overcoming the destruction magic with her sheer regeneration, to the point the destruction magic no longer existed due to not being able to carry out it's function... It fizzled out having failed its job. In the same moment, she swung her rapier and dispelled all magic in the surroundings. The authority, the destiny alteration, the destruction magic, everything was cut with a single slice.
A large gash appeared on Arasovi's torso, causing her upper half to slide across it. Her regeneration was staved off by Kaori's final skill. She copied Arasovi's style of destroying the other side's magic, and in a single moment she cut all of it up. Arasovi's body split in half, her blood floating into the void in discrete globules. Without much lapse in time, Arasovi recovered her bottom half, but was promptly sliced apart again. She blocked the next rapier slash with her great sword once more and set Kaori as the target for destruction, her final skill was used to guarantee the magic's success.
But Kaori cut it all apart again.