The glowing crystal bullet met him halfway.
"...NO!"
The fanatic twisted his body with every ounce of strength he possessed.
It was too late. The crystal touched his shoulder.
Crack.
Golden fractures spread across his entire body like lightning racing beneath his skin.
His eyes widened in absolute horror.
"No... No!"
His magma blade shattered into countless harmless sparks.
"What is this?!"
The Collector's expression finally changed.
"...Damn it."
The crystal pendant unfolded in midair. Its surface bloomed open like the petals of a flower.
An irresistible, reality-warping force erupted from within.
The fanatic clawed desperately at the empty air.
"HELP ME!"
"My grandfather—He said I would—"
His voice abruptly shrank. His entire body rapidly diminished.
Normal size... Half...
The size of a child... The size of a doll...
Until—only a tiny figure remained.
The pendant snapped shut.
Click.
Silence.
The tiny fanatic pounded against the crystal walls from inside the transparent prison. His screams could no longer be heard.
The Collector instinctively caught the returning pendant between two fingers.
His jaw tightened.
"...You." He stared down at the newly filled crystal prison.
"You made me waste one."
Without another word, he clipped the pendant back onto the chain at his waist.
The miniature fanatic continued striking the transparent walls in an unseen panic.
He was completely ignored.
The Collector slowly raised his rifle again.
"This changes nothing."
Another empty crystal pendant slid into the chamber.
Click.
His emerald eye aligned with the targeting sight.
"You'll simply replace him."
The barrel pointed directly at Zekai. The trigger moved.
Click.
Another crystal round drifted through the air. Unlike a normal bullet, it didn't spin violently. It floated, almost peacefully.
Yet every instinct inside Zekai screamed: Don't let it touch you.
His body reacted before his mind.
One step. The crystal slipped past his shoulder.
Another shot.
Step. It passed beneath his arm.
A third. A fourth. A fifth.
Each pendant bullet altered its path slightly in midair, as though actively searching for his coordinates.
The Collector frowned.
"...They're missing? No..." His eye narrowed.
"He's reading the firing line."
Zekai himself looked thoroughly confused.
"That wasn't the path." he whispered under his breath.
"It felt wrong."
Every bullet appeared inside his thoughts a heartbeat before it actually reached him.
It wasn't an absolute certainty. It was an array of possibilities.
Dozens of possible trajectories unfolded before his eyes, and his body always chose the safest one.
The Collector lowered the rifle.
"...Remarkable. But prediction alone won't save you."
He reached toward his belt. This time—three pendants slid into the weapon simultaneously.
Click. Click. Click.
Sebastian's breathing stopped.
"...Three at once? No... He's going to completely flood the entire courtyard!"
The Collector squeezed the trigger.
Three crystal rounds separated in midair.
Then six. Then twelve. Each one curved along a entirely different trajectory.
Every single escape route vanished.
The ruined courtyard became a structural cage of glowing crystal.
Zekai stood perfectly still. For the first time since awakening... his heartbeat accelerated.
"...There's no path."
The crimson Arcana interface flickered vividly before his eyes.
"Zzzzsup!"
[ Limited Control Authority Active ]
Control Correction... Available
---
Before Zekai could fully understand the words, his body moved. He stepped forward.
Not away from the incoming threat. Forward, directly into it.
One crystal round passed behind his neck. Another flew beneath his elbow. A third skimmed his hair.
He slipped through the impossible, closing barrage by the width of a single finger.
The Collector's eye widened.
"...Impossible."
Within a single breath, Zekai had already crossed the distance between them. The rifle hadn't even completed its recoil.
The Collector immediately abandoned the long-range shot. He swung the heavy weapon sideways like a combat staff.
CRACK!
Zekai raised his forearm to block.
The impact echoed loudly through the ruined courtyard.
The brute force of the strike pushed him back several steps.
His arm throbbed.
'He's strong... Much stronger than the fanatic.'
The Collector calmly drew a sleek combat knife with his free hand.
"So. You aren't invincible after all."
Zekai slowly lowered his guard, steadying his footing.
"No. I'm not."
His gaze remained fixed on the pendants hanging from the man's belt. Especially one.
Inside that tiny crystal, Aldric Marune stood with his arms folded, motionless, his expression as calm as ever.
'I have to get that pendant... No matter what.'
The wind swept harshly through the shattered courtyard. Neither man moved.
Containment officers finally reached the perimeter of the ruined courtyard.
They stopped dead in their tracks. No one dared to cross the fractured ground. One young officer quietly raised his weapon, but a veteran officer slowly pressed the barrel down.
"...Don't. We'll only get in their way out there."
The younger officer looked toward the chaotic center of the battlefield.
"...Then what do we do?"
"...Watch. And pray the kid doesn't stumble."
Both fighters waited for the other to make the first mistake. The next exchange would decide everything.
The silence lasted only a heartbeat.
Then—both of them moved at once.
BOOM!
The Collector vanished behind a cloud of shattered concrete dust.
His rifle wasn't designed only for long-range combat.
He swung it with practiced precision, the reinforced stock crashing toward Zekai's temple.
Zekai leaned backward. The stock sliced cleanly through empty air.
The Collector immediately transitioned into another strike. No wasted movement. No hesitation. His combat knife flashed toward Zekai's ribs.
Clang!
Zekai caught the blade with his forearm guard. The heavy impact numbed his entire arm.
'He's adapting...'
The Collector's expression remained unchanged.
"It simply lets you survive."
Zekai didn't answer.
He wasn't even sure if that statement was true.
All he knew was that every movement around him unfolded into countless branching possibilities.
Every choice... every step... every attack... his body instinctively selected the single option with the highest chance of survival.
The Arcana screen flickered briefly in his vision.
[Control Correction Active]
Calculating...
The text vanished before he could read any more.
The Collector's eyes narrowed.
"...You're distracted."
He suddenly jumped backward. At the same time, his left hand swept across the pendants hanging from his belt.
Three crystal rounds detached simultaneously. Instead of loading them into the rifle, he threw them directly into the air.
Click. Click. Click.
The pendants burst open mid-flight.
From each crystal emerged a swirling ribbon of Grave Energy that wrapped around the battlefield like translucent chains.
Sebastian's face changed instantly.
"...Those aren't bullets. They're anchors!"
The glowing ribbons spread rapidly across the courtyard, severely restricting movement.
The Collector calmly raised his rifle again.
"I don't need to hit you. I only need to leave you with nowhere to run."
The rifle clicked. Another sealing round floated toward Zekai. This time, the glowing ribbons forced his movement into an incredibly narrow corridor of space.
Zekai's pupils contracted.
'Left... dead. Right... dead. Forward...'
A tiny opening appeared. It was less than the width of a hand. Without thinking, he stepped.
The sealing round brushed past his shoulder.
The glowing chains snapped shut instantly behind him.
The Collector's calm expression finally cracked.
"...Again. You're seeing the spatial opening before it even physically exists."
"No..." Zekai whispered. "I just... can't stop moving."
At that exact moment, a roar echoed behind them.
"I'M NOT FINISHED!"
The sealed fanatic's ally—no. The miniature fanatic remained completely imprisoned. Instead, another secondary explosion erupted where his residual magma had ignited the collapsed debris.
The distraction lasted only an instant. But it was enough.
Zekai's eyes locked onto Aldric's pendant.
'Now.'
He lunged forward.
The Collector reacted immediately, his rifle coming up to intercept.
Too late.
Zekai's hand reached the chain around the Collector's waist.
The metal links snapped apart.
Dozens of pendants scattered across the broken concrete.
A chorus of high-pitched, glass-like crystal chimes echoed beautifully yet ominously across the ruined courtyard.
The Collector's lifelong composure instantly disappeared.
"...Don't touch them!"
Zekai ignored him. His fingers closed around the crystal.
Every pendant hanging from the broken chain suddenly trembled.
The frantic thumping stopped. Instead, tiny hands pressed reverently against the crystal walls.
A horned beast slowly knelt.
A silver-haired woman quietly smiled.
One ancient, armored warrior bowed his head in a solemn military salute.
Deep inside another glowing pendant—something enormous and primordial began to laugh, a soundless vibration that seemed to shake the air itself.
Even the volatile, swirling darkness became completely, deathly still, flattening itself against the bottom of the glass.
Silence spread across the battlefield.
The Collector's emerald eye widened.
"...Why..." he whispered, his hands trembling in mid-air.
"...Why the hell are they responding to you?"
✦ End of Chapter 40 — The Relic Collector Vs Zekai (Part 2) ✦