"Shut up, you bastard!"
Lethe answered with her fist.
Golden divinity erupted around her body as holy power surged through her limbs, sending cracks racing across the floor the moment she kicked off the ground. Whatever patience she'd managed to preserve throughout the conversation had finally reached its limit. Considering who she had been talking to, the fact that it lasted this long was honestly impressive.
The punch tore through the air with enough force to pulverize stone.
Not surprising, considering who Lethe would eventually become, but seeing it firsthand was still a different experience. Most first-year students would've struggled to react at that speed. Lethe, unfortunately for everyone around her, was not most first-year students.
Several violet threads tightened behind Knox.
Instead of retreating, his body was pulled sideways through the room as though an invisible hand had grabbed him by the collar and thrown him away from danger. Lethe's fist missed by mere centimeters before slamming into the wall behind him, creating a crater large enough to make any architect immediately reconsider their career choices.
Knox glanced at the damage.
Then he looked back at Lethe.
"...You know, walls have feelings too."
"They won't after I'm done with you!"
The reply earned him another punch, then two more for good measure.
Unlike most priests, Lethe showed absolutely no interest in standing at a safe distance while casting spells. Every attack was direct. Every attack was aggressive. Every attack carried enough force to make people question whether she had accidentally enrolled in the wrong department.
Knox had to admit it was refreshing.
Several threads stretched throughout the chamber, connecting walls, pillars, and sections of the ceiling. Some remained visible. Others were nearly impossible to notice unless someone knew where to look. Every movement Knox made added another strand to the growing network, gradually transforming the room into a battlefield designed specifically for him.
Lethe caught the movement immediately, her fist smashing the first thread apart before it could reach her ankle. Another descended from above and met the same fate, while a third tried slipping around her blind spot only to be destroyed just as quickly.
The problem was that the threads kept coming.
At this point, the fight was beginning to resemble an argument between an engineer and a demolition expert. Knox built things. Lethe destroyed them. Neither side appeared willing to compromise.
Several wires attached to the ceiling suddenly tightened, launching Knox forward at terrifying speed.
The abrupt acceleration caught Lethe off guard for the first time since the battle began. Before she could properly adjust, a kick slammed into her guard and launched her backward across the room.
The impact echoed through the chamber, sending Lethe skidding several meters before she finally regained her footing.
The moment her feet stopped sliding, she charged again. She didn't bother checking the floor, the ceiling, or even the threads still scattered throughout the chamber, keeping her eyes firmly locked on Knox as she rushed straight toward him.
Knox stared at her for a moment.
"...Do they teach self-preservation at Efnel?"
"Do they teach you how to shut up wherever you came from?!"
A vein visibly throbbed on Lethe's forehead.
Several meters away, Hamiel watched their exchange with growing concern, though her attention gradually drifted toward the widening cracks spreading across the chamber walls and the dust continuously falling from the ceiling.
At this rate, the building was going to lose this fight long before either of them did.
The cheerful priestess glanced between the two combatants before finally voicing the thought she'd been holding in.
"...Why are they arguing like an old married couple?"
"I heard that!"
Hamiel jolted at Lethe's furious shout.
"Hiii! I'm sorry!"
Hamiel immediately regretted speaking.
The battle probably would've continued like that for a while longer if not for a third participant finally deciding he'd seen enough.
Moses had watched the entire exchange in silence, carefully following every movement from the moment the fight began. By now, however, whatever curiosity he'd initially felt toward the masked man had steadily worn thin.
His fighting style was certainly effective. Threads controlled the battlefield, careful positioning kept Lethe from gaining a clean advantage, and every trap seemed to have been prepared several steps in advance. Under normal circumstances, Moses would've had little difficulty acknowledging the skill involved.
Unfortunately, the masked man had also spent the entire fight running his mouth.
That made appreciating his abilities considerably more difficult.
A faint radiance spread across Moses's body as blessings reinforced his muscles and sharpened his senses. The divinity surrounding him remained subtle compared to Lethe's explosive presence, but the pressure steadily increased with every passing second.
Knox caught the change immediately and finally pulled his attention away from Lethe.
His gaze met Moses's for the first time since the fight began.
The grin beneath Knox's mask never disappeared, and his relaxed posture remained exactly the same. Still, as he studied the priest across the chamber, a subtle edge gradually crept into the air around him.
Moses seemed to sense it as well. His expression remained as cold and composed as ever, though the increasingly dangerous glow gathering around his right hand left little doubt about what he intended to do next.
Knox's eyes lingered on the gathering energy for a moment before returning to Moses.
The grin beneath his mask widened.
Finally.
Someone who looked like he might actually play along.
He'd finally started treating the battle seriously.
Moses had finally begun treating the battle seriously.
A brilliant radiance gathered around his right hand, growing steadily brighter until the entire chamber was bathed in its glow. There was no weapon or spell projectile taking shape within the light. The energy remained concentrated around Moses's bare hand.
Knox's eyes narrowed slightly as he followed the gathering radiance.
Hmm? Now that I think about it, wasn't his signature skill touch-based?
Before Knox could dwell on it any further, Moses moved first.
Unlike Lethe, who treated every problem as something that could be solved with sufficient force, Moses advanced with a clear objective. Brilliant divinity gathered around his right hand as he closed the distance, his expression remaining as cold and unimpressed as ever.
Knox immediately abandoned any desire to find out what that blessing actually did.
Curiosity was important.
Remaining alive was important too.
Several violet threads wrapped around his left forearm, intertwining into a dense layer that resembled a gauntlet woven entirely from wire. The moment Moses's palm reached him, Knox stepped forward instead of retreating, meeting the incoming strike head-on.
BOOM!
Divinity and violet threads collided violently. Dust exploded outward while cracks spread beneath their feet, forcing several nearby necromancers to stumble backward in alarm. For a brief moment, neither side gave ground.
Moses frowned as he felt his blessing fail to take hold. His palm had never actually reached Knox's flesh, with several layers of reinforced wire packed tightly between them to absorb the contact.
"Heh, a cheap trick."
Knox tilted his head.
"I prefer 'creative problem solving.'"
Moses's expression remained flat.
"Enough talking."
Several threads immediately shot toward the priest from different directions. Moses twisted his body and avoided the first two before slapping the third aside with a burst of divinity. The wire snapped instantly.
Unfortunately, Knox had never intended for that thread to land the attack.
The severed strand curled around a nearby pillar while another stretched toward the ceiling. By the time a third anchored itself to the floor behind Moses, the web of threads had already spread across another section of the chamber.
Moses's expression gradually darkened as he began to recognize the pattern.
Knox had been leaving something behind with every exchange. Threads that missed, threads that broke, even those Moses had dismissed after avoiding them... all of them remained scattered throughout the chamber, quietly connecting to the walls, pillars, floor, and ceiling.
Piece by piece, the battlefield was taking shape around him.
The realization left a bitter taste in Moses's mouth.
Before he could examine the growing web any further, a golden blur suddenly rushed in from the side. It was Lethe, charging straight toward Knox without the slightest intention of slowing down.
Apparently, waiting for her turn remained a foreign concept.
Her fist tore through the air toward Knox's head while Moses attacked from the opposite direction, forcing the masked fool into a narrow gap between both assaults. For the first time since the battle started, Knox couldn't simply focus on one opponent.
The smile beneath Knox's mask widened as several wires snapped taut at once, pulling him backward at tremendous speed.
He slipped between both attacks by mere centimeters before a dagger suddenly appeared in his left hand. The blade spun once between his fingers before striking outward, not toward flesh, but toward the exact point where Moses intended to step next.
Clang!
Moses abruptly halted his advance.
A split second later, Lethe's fist tore through the exact space Knox had occupied moments earlier.
For the first time since the battle began, Lethe and Moses stopped long enough to stare at each other.
"Move."
"You were in my way!"
Knox watched the exchange for several seconds before laughter finally escaped him. The sound only seemed to irritate the pair further.
Several meters away, Hamiel slowly buried her face in her hands.
"Stop fighting, both of you!"
"Shut up!" Lethe snapped.
"Noisy," Moses added coldly.
Hamiel immediately regretted speaking, but before she could properly recover from the double rejection, several loose strands of violet wire suddenly changed direction and raced straight toward her.
Her eyes widened.
Unlike Lethe, she couldn't simply punch them apart. Unlike Moses, she couldn't casually destroy them with brute force. The cheerful priestess immediately raised her trumpet as radiance gathered around her.
A soft melody echoed throughout the chamber.
Unlike the explosive sounds produced by Lethe's attacks, the music felt strangely gentle. Tiny spirits of light emerged around Hamiel, fluttering through the air before intercepting the incoming threads. Small bursts of radiance erupted as wire and spirit collided, forcing the strands away from their original path.
"Ohhh."
Knox blinked.
"That's actually pretty useful."
Hamiel puffed out her cheeks.
"Of course it is!"
Her response came much faster than Knox expected.
For the first time since the battle began, all three members of Efnel were actively involved. Lethe kept the pressure on him from the front, forcing Knox to constantly adjust his position, while Moses patiently searched for any opening she created. From behind them, Hamiel supported both while disrupting the threads whenever they spread too far across the chamber.
Their movements gradually began to complement one another, and Knox quickly picked up on the difference.
Up until now, he'd mostly been fighting three individuals who happened to share the same objective. Once Hamiel properly joined the battle, however, their movements gradually began to connect.
They were still rough around the edges, with plenty of hesitation and more than a few gaps between them. Even so, for the first time that night, Knox could see the beginnings of something resembling actual teamwork.
The smile beneath his mask slowly widened.
Much better.
Now, let's see how long you can keep it up.