He feels a surge of power welling in his legs and charges forward with reckless abandon, the ground erupting under his foot with every step.
Ikari, Daichi, Niko and Akane look on with dread, each one of them paralyzed by fear.
To the group's surprise, Daichi steps forward.
Daichi takes a deep breath before his eyes narrow, he now stands at the front line against Ryunosuke.
"This isn't what Ikari said to do at all," he grasps his wand tightly as the hairs on the back of his hand stand of edge, "but we can't waste any more time!"
'Even though it's scary and I wanna go home so bad, I have to do this or we'll all get caught in it!'
Daichi lowers his wand to the ground, his friends behind him continue to look on at Ryunosuke barreling towards them. In a smooth action, Daichi raises his wand forwards in an arc, a magically strengthened slab of rock rises out from the ground.
As Ryunosuke continues to run, Lyrielle now far behind, he quickly notices the ground rising in front of him, creating a ramp. His expression turns surprised, 'he can do that too?'
'His stomps were powerful enough to create holes wherever he stepped, but he won't be able to directly force his way through this.' Daichi immediately turned to Ikari, "I've bought us some time! What do we do?!"
Ryunosuke tries to lean to the right, however built up momentum from the velocity he's moving at makes it impossible to turn.
'Fuck it! I have to bet everything on this!' He redoubles his efforts and charges forward faster than before.
With a heavy kick, his mana explodes under him and Ryunosuke takes to the sky with both legs now facing forward.
'A diving kick using both legs?!' Lyrielle stands up, her arms limply swing around slightly. She begins running towards him.
Ryunosuke's robe struggles to stay on for dear life.
"AKANE!!" Lyrielle yells with reckless abandon upon getting close enough to see what's going on, although still too far to reach her in time.
Streaks of mana fly around Ryunosuke in a flurry, blocking his vision but he soon feels his feet making contact with something rough.
Daichi looks back up at the ramp he'd created, terrified, he watches as the back of it crumbles.
'Why is this so tough...!' Ryunosuke lands on the ramp, creating cracks on its surface but is unable to break through.
Sharp wind violently blasts away from the ramp, cutting Ryunosuke all over and tearing his robe apart.
He clicks his tongue against the top of his mouth as he tries to dig his right foot into the ramp.
'He didn't break through it?!' Lyrielle readies her palm, aiming it at Ryunosuke, 'I could probably blast it open now with a fireball, but Akane...'
"SHE'S TRYING TO KILL YOU," Ryunosuke is now looking back at Lyrielle, he sees her arms trembling.
"YOU SAW WHAT SHE DID JUST NOW!" Lyrielle takes a step back and screams, "I know she is!" She falls to her knees, "but...!" Lyrielle's tone slowly turns weak.
She suddenly screams at the top of her lungs, "I CAN'T!" Lyrielle takes a moment to ponder, what does she want to do?
How much is she willing to sacrifice...?
Lyrielle forms a single spell from her palm.
A fiery lance sears the air as it travels, nauseating heat waves emanate around it as Lyrielle lowers her arms.
'I'm sorry Akane, Aelrion. I want to be stronger than this... I must be.'
"Thank you Lyrielle," Ryunosuke touches the ramp with his hands and jumps back onto the ground.
'That guy's mana is only a quarter of what it was now. Did Daichi do it...?' Ikari turns left and right, checking the open sides of the ramp protecting them.
All of them except Ikari breathe a sigh of relief, "the air isn't tense anymore, I can use my spells." Akane remarks.
Niko raises her white wand slightly, "I'll get a spell rea-"
They hear an explosion above them, causing everyone behind the ramp to cower.
"Get away from here!" Ikari lifts Daichi up by his arm and they begin to run for their lives, along the way he quickly picks up both Akane and Niko.
As the rocks come plummeting, the group sense something immense building up, they collectively think to themselves, 'he's doing it again?!'
Ryunosuke quickly accumulates mana in his legs, he lightly pushes agaisnt the ground and propels himself upward.
He grabs onto the top of the opening he and Lyrielle had made and hangs there, squinting his eyes as he scowers through a thick cloud of dirt.
As the dirt floating about dissipates, he turns his gaze upward. Ikari has his wand raised high in the air, the same as he did earlier, however his spell seems to have changed.
There's only a single red ray, the color of it appears to be much more potent than before, Ryunosuke notices the ray connecting to Akane.
Suddenly a blast of fire hits him from the rear, knocking him onto the rubble beneath.
'Excuse me Lyrielle?!' He immediately tries to get up as he sees another another orange fireball, it appears like the sun before flying through the open hole above him.
'Is she doing this?!'
He barely manages to evade it by dashing forward on the rubble but the fireball follows in his tracks.
Ryunosuke looks behind in disbelief as the fireball reaches him and erupts into flames.
Lyrielle remains on her knees, when all of a sudden she hears a deafening explosion followed by a sweeping rush of wind that hits her in the face.
Grass rustles all around her as the shockwave dissipates far off in the distance.
'What happened?!' Lyrielle gets on her feet and runs towards the explosion.
Ryunosuke lies on the scorched rubble, "I can't believe that didn't kill him..." Akane stares at Ryunosuke from atop a small hill.
"That was your strongest spell right?" Niko walks up beside her. "Yea." Akane responds in a low voice.
"It seems that did it though, look, he's unconscious. Let's finish this while we have the chance." Ikari points to Niko and Akane, "go grab the princess, our job isn't over yet."