With a sharp burst, one of the ice clones was speared and shattered by Hazer's spear!
It was Leon No. 2!
"Wha!?"
Realizing that the opponent he'd been locked in a fierce fight with for several minutes wasn't the real body at all, but merely an ice clone conjured by magic, the manic, slaughter-crazed grin that had just spread across Dix's face froze stiff, and then he fell completely silent.
"Heh heh, an ice clone..."
He bowed his head slightly, one hand pressed to his forehead, his shoulders beginning to tremble uncontrollably...
"Heh heh, hee hee hee..."
"Bwahahahahahahahaha!"
When a person is truly furious, they really can burst out laughing.
Dix snapped his head up, a crimson "D" pattern seeming to flicker faintly deep in his eyes, giving off an ominous red glow.
"Shadow of Sorcery!!!"
"How dare you... look down on me like this!!!!!!!!"
A roar of pure rage, his eyes blood-red, his breath heaving like a beast's.
"Just die!"
He turned and caught sight of his comrades still tangled up with the clones, and could no longer restrain his killing intent, charging straight into the center of the fray with violent momentum.
...
"Damn."
Leon's mouth tightened as he assessed the mistake.
He'd let that rare, vulnerable beauty of Kaguya's pull his attention away for just a moment, his control over the ice clones slipping ever so slightly... and Dix had seized the opening, blowing one apart with a single spear thrust.
Even now, through the fading sensory link, he could still clearly "see" that crimson spear tip driving toward the ice clone's eye socket. The lapse had been brief, but in a real fight it could have been fatal.
"Just as I thought..."
He drew a deep breath, his gaze sharpening again.
A spell like the ice clones, one that demands extreme concentration and precise control, leaves no room for carelessness at all. A single moment of slack could lead to fatal consequences.
As the saying goes, a fall into the pit, a gain in your wit.
This lesson had no doubt struck a heavy bell deep in his heart.
The next time he fought using ice clones, he would never make the same mistake again.
"Leon, how is Kaguya?"
Just then, the goddesses Astraea, Artemis, and Demeter came hurrying over, surrounded by Persephone and the other guards. They looked with worried expressions at the pale-faced, brow-furrowed, still-unconscious Far Eastern lady in his arms, and asked quietly.
Leon gave the goddesses a nod, then briefly explained Hazer and the Berserker's sneak attack, along with the chain of events that had followed.
...
And in the very instant that Leon returned and began to speak...
Margaret and Laurier, who had kept their eyes fixed on the battle the whole time, sharply caught the assassin's momentary lapse of focus at Leon's appearance.
Without the slightest hesitation, the two of them, one in front and one behind, launched a thunderous joint strike almost simultaneously!
Run wild!
The Hurricane Armor ran at full power, and as Laurier chanted the incantation a second time, violent wind force coiled up her arm like a living thing, pouring entirely into her longsword.
The blade rang with a humming vibration!
The next second, Laurier's figure blurred into a streak of wind, accompanied by a shrieking tear through the air...
A single sword thrust straight at the ninja whose mind had drifted!
Burning Hand!
At the same moment, Margaret's thought stirred, and the Flame Calamity Maiden standing at her side answered with a right arm that swelled abruptly into a sky-blotting giant hand of flame, casting a suffocating, scorching shadow over the ninja's head.
And she herself did not pause either, using her newly grasped technique of doing two things at once, the real body launching its own swift attack:
O flames!
Her fingertip locked onto the enemy, followed by a higher, more soaring chant:
A gift of pain bestowed upon my foe!
Karmic Flame Calamity Meteor!
"Hyah!"
Magic surged around Margaret, her slender frame shuddering slightly from the powerful recoil.
The next moment...
A heaven-falling fire, trailing a long, slender golden tail of flame, came crashing down without the slightest hesitation upon the area covered by the hand of flame!
A storm of explosions erupted in a continuous, deafening roar, the violent flames and violent hurricane fused together, and with the roots blanketing the ground feeding the blaze, the three combined to push the destructive power of their joint attack to an even higher level.
"Aaaaaaah!"
A hair-raising scream tore its way out from within the explosion.
...
Karmic Flame Calamity Meteor:
Summons a heaven-falling fire to strike the target.
Fire Magic
Swift-attack Magic
...
"After the flames burn all to ash, the newborn sprouts will keep on growing!"
The emerald-green magic circle beneath Aura's feet flared with dazzling radiance once more. Her ten fingers interlocked, and before the aftershock of the explosion had even faded, countless gnarled roots had already burst from the earth, lunging at the target to strangle it like so many tentacles!
"I'll help too!"
Iri called out lightly, resting her left hand on her right forearm, her gaze sharpening, and far off the mithril eagle let out a cry that pierced clear across the battlefield.
It drew in its wings, transforming into a bolt of cold silver lightning, plunging at blinding speed from high above, its sharp talons ripping through the air to seize the struggling figure within the sea of fire!
"Get the hell... out of my way!!!"
At that moment, a roar mixing pain and fury burst from the churning heart of the inferno.
But a stern figure had already sealed off his escape like a fortress wall.
"You're staying."
Jeanne's voice was calm, but it brooked no argument.
Two figures came smashing out from within the wall of fire.
The two figures barreled out of the blaze, their blades dissolving into countless afterimages in midair, clashing wildly at a speed too fast for the eye to track.
Every collision struck off a crisp, urgent ring of metal, and in this desperate place ringed by flame, roots, and the eagle's cry, that endless clamor of steel sounded especially piercing, and especially... lonely and despairing.
Under Jeanne's fierce main assault and Laurier's swift supporting strikes, on top of the fatal wounds just inflicted by their "Trinity Force," the ninja's movements were no longer precise, his breathing growing heavy and ragged, and even his most basic forms, under the dual torment of mind and body, began to fall completely apart.
This high-ranking officer of the underground organization understood, deep down:
He... wasn't getting away.
Since it was death either way...
"Body Flicker Technique!"
With a bang, Jeanne's sword cleaved through empty air, splitting the ground, a flicker of shock crossing her eyes.
Gravely wounded, his stamina all but gone, surrounded by churning roots and a burning sea of fire, completely confined inside the closing circle, where could he flicker to?
The next second...
The ninja gave his answer through action.
"A ninja puts the mission above all else!"
"A ninja who fails his mission... is worth less than trash!!!!!"
"Aaaaaaaaaah!"
The ninja's figure materialized behind Demeter, the kunai in his hand raised high, his eyes blazing with one last mad ferocity as he launched the most extreme, most resolute killing strike of his life at the utterly defenseless goddess!
"Frost Nova!"
With a sharp crack...