I'm now happy to say that my original story has been published on Amazon Kindle, everyone! As stated in the AN of the previous chapter, I'll be putting up a message about this as well in my profile page once this is posted.

For any who may want to check it out, the story is titled 'Fading Darkness, Rising Light' and should be available for purchase on any device that lets you read books, including laptops and home computers. And once again, even if you think it's shitty or something, please at least tell me why so I can improve my next novel that much more.

Now onto the chapter!

Chapter 27

With Ryuichi, the magus went on the move yet again. Still with Turbulence activated, he zipped all around the area at speeds that his foe Apophis simply couldn't hope to match. This in turn meant that the second seat in question was unable to do much about defending, let alone do much at all.

Moving like a blinding streak down the street before suddenly moving up into the air and back towards Apophis, Ryuichi ended up striking the man hard in the side with a devastating kick that nearly broke the man in two. Landing on the ground, Ryuichi then turned around and unleashed a flurry of punches at Apophis' chest and midsection before kicking him in the jaw hard enough to knock him into the air.

Apophis could only grunt out in pain from the assault, gripping his Relic tightly enough to still be able to hold onto in spite of being knocked around like a humanoid pinball. "Damn it all! I can't fight back at all!"

As Mari, from the same distance as before, shot him with two piercing arrows that drilled right through his stomach, Apophis couldn't help but surmise his situation.

It was more than a little bleak to say the least. The most serious of his wounds may have healed themselves earlier, but the damage and pain he'd suffered from them still remained behind. Just because his arms have healed doesn't mean he could simply go about swinging his blade properly like nothing had happened. Just because he can run around again at full speed doesn't mean it didn't hurt like hell to do so. And it especially didn't help that his foe was fast and strong enough to inflict the same injuries all over again in record time.

Even as he fell towards the ground, Apophis glared at Ryuichi, who now remained stock still. Even with his new injuries, the second seat channeled as much mana as he could afford into the Devouring Blade and slashed at where Ryuichi stood. Sure enough, what should've been one slash become ten and all appeared from different angles that struck at the same spot where Ryuichi was at.

But as he'd come to expect, Ryuichi easily moved out of the way, sliding right past the simultaneous attacks as if it was nothing.

Because to Ryuichi, with his current speed, to dodge these attacks really was nothing. And also confirmed something he'd suspected. "Just like I'd thought!" he thought with a bit of a 'I knew it!' smirk.

As he moved far away from Apophis and watched the man crashed to the ground, he took stock of what he'd been up to.

From the information Katsu had passed onto them prior to his death, Ryuichi had hypothesized that while Apophis' conceptual ability was certainly a dangerous one, it still had its fair share of weaknesses, weaknesses that Ryuichi will admit he risked harm to try and discover. And he'd been proven right.

From what he's tested just now, he's discovered a few such faults in Apophis' Relic. For one thing, while the blade could strike from multiple angles at the same time, the speed of each blade was exactly the same and said speed was dependent on how fast Apophis swung the blade. So for someone like himself, whose speed in Turbulence exceeded the speed of light several times over, the blades might as well be in slow motion. For another thing, once Apophis swung the blade with its ability activated, its 'target location' was set, so once the blade appeared from multiple angles, they couldn't change direction nor move anywhere else, meaning to hit very fast moving targets was impossible. And lastly, from what he's seen thus far, Apophis could only strike at spots he was capable of immediately seeing, which meant he couldn't just swing his blade and expect it to magically appear far away to kill someone. Such a target would have to be within a certain distance of the Holy Knight for it to be successful.

These are the weaknesses that Ryuichi had discovered. And now he was putting this knowledge to good use.

On the move again, he reached Apophis in an instant, just as the man had swung his Relic yet again. But Apophis had been aiming for roughly the halfway point between the two of them, a halfway point that Ryuichi had long since passed by the time the blade's effect could even take place.

"Shit!" was all Apophis got to say before he was knocked yet again into the air, this time straight up. Ryuichi leapt right up after him and as if to slap the law of gravity in the face, he flitted about through the sky, smacking Apophis around like a beach ball.

Then he backed away to allow his wife to also help out, just in time to see one ominously glowing red mana arrow strike Apophis in the small of his back. Unlike the 'normal' red arrows that drill through whatever they strike, this one had a different property. A much more explosive property to be precise.

Apophis could only scream as the arrow detonated upon hitting him, feeling an immense amount of pain as a large explosion occurred, scorching the entirety of his back and nearly crippling him from the waist down due to where the point of origin had been.

That was when Ryuichi, in a demonstration of almost true flight, moved into position just above Apophis and nailed him in the back of his head with a perfectly executed axe-kick. With speed comparable to an actual lightning bolt, Apophis went sailing back to the ground, hitting hard enough to create a huge crater.

Moving back to the ground, Ryuichi landed gracefully and slowly began to approach the now downed man. His senses remaining sharp while his body remained tense, Ryuichi walked towards the center of the crater with caution. His strike just now had been meant to kill the man, but there have been plenty of cases where the enemy survived, albeit sometimes barely, what should've been a fatal blow. And ancient magus or not, he would be very dumb to simply relax right now, hence his caution.

Originally, he'd wanted to hit the man with Thor's Hammer, but had opted out for a handful of reasons. For one thing, if he'd used it much earlier, there'd have been a real risk of accidentally having teams RWBY and JNPR getting injured from the aftershock, even if he could somewhat alter it to only damage Apophis and nothing else. For another, Ryuichi could sense some sort of innate force trying to counter Naruto's Ai Space right now. How exactly he was able to detect this, not even Ryuichi himself could immediately think of a good explanation… but all that mattered was that he could sense such a force coming from the warehouse, which was close enough for him to not risk using Thor's Hammer. What with how stubbornly this mysterious force was trying to undo Ai Space, Ryuichi couldn't be sure whether or not Ai Space would be able to hold itself together if he were to use such a trump card due to the sheer amount of mana it required to be used.

Nonetheless, as he approached Apophis, he began to think that perhaps thinking of using Thor's Hammer was a tad bit overkill; the man, while still alive, could hard even move.

Apophis, with muffled groans, managed to just move one arm to feel up the back of his skull. A severe fracture, to be sure. He considered himself very lucky to even be conscious still, much less alive. But as he maneuvered his hand about his skull, he could feel the sheer amount of blood that was pouring out of the wound. And that made him nearly panic, for his healing factor would work fast enough to heal him up before dying of blood loss.

The man was dragged from his growing worry when he heard Ryuichi draw much closer. Just barely finding it in him to look up, Apophis could see the ancient magus look down at him with a stoic expression, as if studying him.

"Ha…" Apophis began weakly, chuckling. "Looks like you ancient magi really are monsters when under the right circumstances…" he muttered. He was the second seat of the Holy Knights, his particular Relic surpassing nearly all of the others in spite of its artificial origin. He'd cut down Katsu like nothing, but that was due to having completely taken the man by surprise in addition to the capabilities of his magical weapon. But now here he was, having gone up against yet another ancient magus and found himself thoroughly outclassed in spite of his own not inconsiderate skill and battle experience.

Ryuichi, for the briefest of seconds, looked a little taken aback. He'd been expecting the man to be a little bitter about his current predicament. Instead, he found Apophis looking more amused by this outcome than anything else.

But he remained quiet and let the man on the ground before him continue to mull things over. By all rights, it looked as if Apophis was contemplating something and Ryuichi in turn decided it'd be best to hold back from delivering the finishing blow in case the Holy Knight had something up his sleeve.

Coincidentally, that was more or less what Apophis was thinking on.

All of the Holy Knights had been granted two 'trump cards' by Vidar in their battles against the ancient magus. One of these trump cards was Robotics Space. This was something that Apophis dismissed in using. His Robotics Spaces was simply a large open area that allowed for him to capitalize on his Devouring Blade's abilities, but against Ryuichi's sheer speed and versatility, it wouldn't change things at all for him.

But the other trump card… that was what Apophis was considering. It was a simple enough thing, yet dangerous at the same time. In fact, it'd probably be better to call it more of a last resort than an actual trump card.

The way this last resort worked, it was a special device implanted within them all that could be activated with a key phrase. When activated, it would force every single last drop of mana to the 'surface' of them all, resulting in a 100% increase in all physical parameters. It would even boost the speed of their healing factors as well, up to a 25% increase. However, in doing so, they'd be tearing their own bodies apart due to their artificially enhanced bodies not being meant to handle that much power coursing through it. And this boost would only for at the most five minutes before all of the mana was used up, leaving them near death's door, an unfortunate fact that they'd all discovered when they had first tested this out.

While using such a thing would ensure a faster recovery from his current state, enhanced abilities or not, the properties and weaknesses of Apophis' Relic wouldn't change. And while he'd be able to swing his sword much faster than before, the speed of his attacks would still be that of a snail's when compared to Ryuichi's speed right now.

In fewer words, all such a 'trump card' would do would be simply prolonging the inevitable.

Apophis snorted, no longer caring about his own injuries. No matter how he looked at things, he was pretty much already dead. "Looks like this is it then…" he muttered, his shoulders sagging.

At that, Ryuichi dropped the partial combat stance he had taken up. "…Finally decided?" he asked.

With a weak smile, Apophis looked to him. "I suppose so," he replied. "As a warrior, I can tell when I'm truly beaten. And I can say with only slight annoyance that I've been very thoroughly beaten indeed…"

"Can't say you should've expected anything different; you killed a close friend of mine and for what? Some goal of world-wide peace and advancement?" Ryuichi spoke, a grimace on his face, his stance completely dropped now.

"Ha, maybe so. But try not to mock what my comrades and I believe in… after all, everyone does what they do for what they believe in, yes?" Apophis retorted without energy.

"True enough. But even then, their beliefs and actions don't usually involve wanting to kill a select group of people… nor do such beliefs warrant forcing extreme changes among everyone around you," Ryuichi shot back.

He and Apophis stared at one another, ignoring the sounds of fighting that still continued back in the warehouse.

Holding the stare for a moment longer, the Holy Knight finally looked down. "Whatever you say. Just end it," he said softly. "Better to die by the enemy's hand than to die pitifully of something like blood loss."

Ryuichi looked to the Holy Knight in complete silence. Then, with no words spoken, he moved closer to the man, nearly standing right over him with his right fist raised high.

Then, like a judge about to pass sentence, Ryuichi brought his fist down.

And with it, came the end of his battle.

Back within the warehouse, the battles raged on and a new one had begun. With frightening speed, Daisuke's magical weapon shot out at Vidar and the other three women with him with the intent to seriously hurt them.

But with lightning quick reflexes, Cinder used her recently summoned Relic to swat aside two orbs while Emerald expertly dodged the one that had gone for her. As for the remaining orbs, they all had focused their attention upon Vidar.

"Tch." Vidar, angered and tired mentally from what's transpired this night, simply grabbed hold of Kalma, who was currently defenseless, and used his magical weapon Gjallerhorn to avoid this whole affair. "Transport!"

Just as the orbs prepared to make contact with Vidar's torso, the man and Kalma disappeared, the captain's magical weapon having teleported them well away from the warehouse and from the area in general.

In fewer words, Vidar and Kalma have fully escaped, at least as much as one could within Ai Space.

The orbs missing their mark, they teleported back to Daisuke's side, said magus grimacing a bit in disappointment. "Looks like your boss left ya two behind. How awesome," he drawled out.

Cinder simply huffed in amusement. Emerald, on the other hand, didn't seem to share in this reaction, looking noticeably displeased at it just being up to her and Cinder to deal with this. "You can't always expect the leader to deal with grunt work, you know," the fourth seat replied confidently. She hefted her Kusanagi no Tsurugi into a more offensive position. "I think that the two of us will be enough to deal with you."

"Oh yeah?" Daisuke replied with quirked eyebrows. The smile on his face clearly indicated what he thought of those words. "Nice fighting words, girly, but-."

He was cut off when Cinder opted to take advantage of his lax posture. With a small jump forward, she swung her Relic with masterful precision at chest.

However, Daisuke's way of fighting was far from reliant on his own physical posture and the likes. One orb that had been idly resting in his hand surged with mana and he ended up teleporting out of the way of Cinder's swing and reappeared right behind the woman.

Then with little preamble, he hit her with a good chop to the back of the neck, intending to knock her out with just one blow.

Or at least, that is what is supposed to have happened.

Rather than drop to the floor like a rock, Cinder only stumbled forward a tad bit before quickly recovering and whirling around to strike back at him.

With only mild surprise, Daisuke stepped back, tilting his head back to avoid the sudden swing she took at him. Then silently, he commanded his orbs to strike both Cinder and Emerald right in the sides and promptly teleported the two along with himself outside of the warehouse and up onto its rather expansive roof.

Cinder went on the move, undeterred by the change in venue, and started to attack with a myriad of strikes with her blade. She forwent the usage of her Relic's magical abilities in favor of pure swordsmanship against Daisuke.

This proved to be a very hard thing to properly touch him, since Daisuke all but danced around her with almost contemptuous ease. At the same time, unlike Cinder, Daisuke chose to utilize his magical weapon to his advantage.

Immediately, Cinder found herself beseeched by almost all of the orbs that made up Field Changer. She had to cut her assault short in order to focus on dodging the orbs. Blocking them was simply out of the question due to them being able to teleport her just through contact alone.

Daisuke watched in silence as Cinder moved steadily away, moving all across the roof to try and avoid his orbs. Focusing sharply on the Holy Knight, he waited motionlessly for an opening to make itself known and sure enough that is exactly what happened; having to leap to avoid two orbs that went for her kneecaps, Cinder was now all but literally airborne and therefore subject to the law of gravity.

A law that Daisuke didn't really have to worry about.

With one orb still in his hand, he used it to teleport towards Cinder, appearing only a few feet in front of the woman and closer to the ground than she was. "Brace yourself, girly," Daisuke spoke with a bit of a smirk before unleashing a high kick that nearly struck the woman right in the stomach.

Although he was far from the physically strongest of his fellow ancient magi, Daisuke possessed considerable physical strength that no hunter or huntress of this era could truly match. As such, his kick should've knocked Cinder a good few city blocks away in record time.

So it was very much to his surprise when he felt a slight weakness in his whole body as he hit Cinder, who only went flying to the nearest building.

"What the…?" the magus thought before using his orb to teleport back to the rooftop.

"Heh, can't just let you and Cinder fight it out without me," Emerald then boasted, partially to try and keep yourself calm and to bolster her confidence. She had one arm extended towards Daisuke.

Ignoring the sounds of Cinder hitting the building afar, Daisuke focused on Emerald and noted a strange draining feeling taking hold of him. He also noted that this feeling seemed to almost be generating from somewhere.

"Aha…" Daisuke smirked as he bopped a fist into an open palm, as if he'd just made a brilliant deduction. Which he did. "Well isn't that new? You little sneak," he joked.

Emerald was indeed the source of his sudden feeling of weakness. And in conjunction with this, he could feel her own artificial mana reserves surge little by little.

Somehow, someway, the teal haired girl was sapping him of mana and physical strength and presumably adding it to her own.

Emerald grimaced as Daisuke focused his grey eyes on her. "He figured that out fast…" Indeed, Daisuke was right on his deduction. Before her operation to become a pseudo-magus, her semblance had been a sort of telekinetic ability that draws objects towards her, which aided her greatly in her career as a thief. But following the operation, it's been upgraded into something more. Not only can her semblance now draw objects towards her, she could even use it to sap someone of their physical abilities and slowly add them to her for a brief time.

"What can I say, it's just my nature," Emerald then said to Daisuke as she used her free hand to grab one of her blades. "Now let me show you something a little diff-!"

She didn't get to finish nor do much of anything else before Daisuke felt it necessary to cut her off.

Her ability was, for lack of a better word, troublesome. Daisuke could tell that much with just a glance. He couldn't really fathom the exact specifics of Emerald's ability such as the full range of her enhanced semblance or if it can affect multiple people at once, so to that end he decided it was just better to deal with her now.

And unfortunately for Emerald, Daisuke didn't need to do anything physical to fight properly. And also unfortunately for her, she'd neglected to keep track of all of his orbs.

One second she had been boasting to the ancient magus and the next one of his orbs blindsided her and struck her hard in the lower right side of her torso, nearly shattering her hips. This in turn elicited a sudden shriek of pain from her as her concentration on Daisuke broke.

Feeling his strength and mana already beginning to return to him, Daisuke followed up the hit by having the orb teleport her away.

At the very same time this happened, Cinder had finally made a comeback. "Flare Haze Break!" she cried out in a strong voice as she swung her great sword.

She had decided to actually take things seriously. Funneling her artificial mana into her Relic, the instant she swung her blade, flames formed from it and took on the form of a phoenix that roared before surging at Daisuke.

But the man sensed it coming even with his back to it and teleported well away from the rooftop in time for the magical attack to strike where he'd been standing.

Reappearing almost a whole city block away, Daisuke watched as the attack struck the rooftop and exploded into a raging inferno that shot straight up into the sky. Evidently Cinder had some control over what her magical attack affected, for the warehouse remained whole in spite of Flare Haze Break being capable of wiping out four cities at its current output. But even then, from his new spot, he could still feel the heat of the flames almost burning him from afar, his clothes feeling as if they'd catch fire.

Thankfully, the flames dispersed as quickly as they'd appeared.

Unthankfully, Cinder touched down on the rooftop and promptly leapt all the way to where he was at. "Alright," she began as she landed near him. "I believe I'm quite done taking things easy then. And just where did you send my little pawn?"

Daisuke simply smiled. "She's probably enjoying one final moment of scenery."

Cinder's shocked expression was nearly priceless. "What."

Miles up in the sky, Emerald fell at great speeds towards the earth below. Genuinely screaming out of fear, Emerald helplessly flailed her limbs about in some odd attempt to slow her fall.

"N-No way! You've gotta to be fucking kidding me!" she cried out as she kept on falling. The city of Vale was so far below her that even the tallest of buildings looked only marginally bigger than toy cars from her point of view. The fact that said buildings were beginning to look closer and closer to her only terrified her more by the second.

She simply had no way to survive this. Pseudo-magus or not, a fall from this height and at this kind of speed was going to be instantly fatal.

But what she didn't realize is that she wouldn't have to worry about her fall at all. In reality, all Daisuke had done was isolate her from everyone else.

From far down below, Hanako spotted Emerald up above and capitalized on the moment. With a battle cry, the humanoid magical weapon gathered up an enormous amount of mana and shot out a massive beam of pure magical energy that was comparable to light in sheer speed.

Emerald didn't know what hit her at all before Hanako's magical beam enveloped her entire form before disappearing, leaving behind nothing at all.

Within the warehouse, the battle between Takehiko and Indra continued, the latter remaining on the move as much as possible. "Damn it!" he said for what had to be the hundredth time as yet another one of his attacks was fended off easily by the magus.

That was when Pyrrha and Nora went on the move yet again. Having moved to one particular corner of the room, the latter of the two girls had shifted Magnhild back into its gun form and opened fire on Indra with her explosive rounds. As for Pyrrha, the redhead moved in close and tried her best to tag the young Holy Knight as he tried to dodge all of Nora's shots.

With a little help from Takehiko, Pyrrha managed to succeed in this endeavor. "'Indra's personal gravity is now twenty times greater,'" spoke the self-styled king, King's Scripture pulsing to show that his command was registered.

Sure enough, Indra let out a sudden 'urk' as he ended up crashing to the floor hard enough to crack it, his entire body feeling so much heavier than before. He was then greeted with a hard kick to the side of his face from the P of team JNPR, his head nearly cracking back from the surprise force of the kick.

"Urgh!" His eyes widened in both shock and slight panic as he felt his increased personal gravity take hold of his head, which was now almost fully tilting back.

Fearing that his head would possibly rip off or that his neck would break under the pressure, he used Pyrrha's attack to help himself roll back, narrowly avoiding that fate.

But Pyrrha gave chase, attempting to bash him in the chest with her shield before swinging away at him with her spear. Indra managed to successfully fend off the strikes with Vajra, but only barely; the increased gravity was affecting his Relic as well, making it feel as if he was attempting to swing around the largest of war hammers with limbs made of pure lead.

"Take this, sucker!" Nora exclaimed giddily as she locked onto her much slower target now and fired off three rounds in rapid succession.

Jumping back to avoid the explosions that would soon follow, Pyrrha switched her spear into its gun form and opened fire as well at Indra's sides. As a result of her shots and his increased gravity, the seventh seat hesitated to try and dodge and instead deflected the shots with Vajra before firing lightning blasts at Nora's rounds before they could reach him.

His blasts only barely made it; they clashed with her explosive rounds and resulted in a violent reaction only a yard or two away from him, forcing the Holy Knight to cover his eyes to avoid being blinded by anything.

In his haste to do this, he ended up being totally unprepared for Takehiko's follow up. "Not bad, but try this now. 'Acid!'"

Indra cried out in pain and shock as acid literally just popped into existence and fell onto his arms, quickly burning through his sleeves. But as shocked as he was by this, he managed to rip off his military jacket in short order, revealing the plain button up shirt he wore underneath it.

"Too close…" he thought as he tried to move away, hoping to get out of sight of Takehiko.

Takehiko, realizing this, looked to Pyrrha and Nora. Recalling what he's been told about them and their friends by his fellow ancient magi, he then called out to them. "You two," he began suddenly. "How would you like for me to give you a good boost in power?"

"…How?" Pyrrha inquired as she moved closer to the man, keeping an eye out for Indra who went on the move again. Although his movements have been hampered considerably by the increase in gravity, his speed was still greater than what she and Nora could currently keep up with.

"Mari informed me about you and your friends' current… conditions. Your status as fake magi who've yet to awaken," Takehiko explained as Nora now drew closer as well, keeping Indra busy at the same time by continually shooting at him, keeping him away from them. "Seeing as he's more or less figured out my magical weapon's 'weakness' and you two are much more direct fighters than I am, our key to victory rests with you. I think I can use King's Scripture to forcibly awaken you… but I imagine it'll hurt a fair bit."

Pyrrha and Nora glanced to each other as they processed what he was saying. It was certainly true that this fight was dragging on quite a bit, which wasn't a good thing since there was no telling how the other battles going on will end and when they'll end. It'd be best to end this as soon as possible one way or another, but to do so, it'd require Takehiko seeing if it was possible to awaken the two of them. From the way he talked, it probably wasn't a guarantee that he'll be successful in doing so, but if he was, would they be able to handle the pain of such a forced thing?

Given the situation their friends were undoubtedly in, the answer was obvious to the two ladies from the start. "Do it!" Pyrrha and Nora replied in complete seriousness to Takehiko.

The man smirked at their response. "You two sure answered quickly enough. I like that," he replied. "Brace yourselves then… 'awaken Pyrrha Nikos and Nora Valkyrie!'"

Indra, having managed to hear a bit of what was spoken, nearly paused in shock before leaping into action. If what Takehiko was saying was true, then he couldn't allow the girls to awaken to their pseudo-magi status. Just fighting one magus, an ancient one at that, was tough as it is. He didn't need two other artificial ones around to make it worse.

"Storm Breaker!" he cried out as he funneled a good deal of mana into his Relic. And from this action resulted a massive bolt of lightning, conjured directly from both of his sais and it flew at nearly three times the speed of normal lightning towards the girls, who had suddenly gone limp when Takehiko had spoken.

But alas, for the young Holy Knight, he proved to be too late on the ball; just as his attack was about to make contact, both Pyrrha and Nora screamed in pain as suddenly a good deal of mana burst forth from their bodies simultaneously, temporarily mixing together with one another to form a sort of barrier that protected them from Indra's Storm Breaker.

This also resulted in a flash of light that forced Indra to look away immediately, lest he be blinded. However, while he managed to avoid being blinded, he was unable to do anything about the disorienting ringing in his ears that resulted from the awakening of the girls.

And then pain filled Indra as suddenly, Pyrrha's shield flew from her arm and struck him across the right shoulder in his distracted state. But as painful and as sudden as that was, he had absolutely no time to react properly as the shield struck him again, maneuvering in the air to turn around and hit Indra's lower back before striking him a third time across the back of his knee, causing him to fall forward.

Pain was all he knew for a moment, but also shock as well; he'd sensed a good deal of mana actually flowing through the shield, enhancing the impact of its attacks greatly and even giving it a sharper edge, if the deep cuts he now sported were any indication.

That was when an explosive round made itself known and spectacularly so. Brimming with mana, the very explosive powder that made up the inside of the round was saturated with sheer power that gush forth upon contact. Where once an explosion with a modest radius of two feet became one of ten yards, Indra would be the first to say that its overall attack power had increased appropriately as well, as he was sent careening back through a wall at breakneck speed.

Takehiko, watching this happen so suddenly and with such speed, could only whistle. "Well now, that went better than expected…" And then he looked to the girls who'd just pulled off this feat and couldn't help but look at them with something akin to respect.

Now standing tall before him were Pyrrha and Nora, looking exactly the same yet feeling so very much different. Their bodies all but glowed with every ragged breath they took, which decreased less and less as the pain ebbed away.

Pyrrha was the first to really take note of the change that occurred within her and as she did so, she recalled her shield towards her. Without so much as moving a finger.

As her shield flew back to her, the redhead's eyes widened slightly. Normally to use her semblance, a fair bit of actual hand movement was needed to accomplish such a thing. But now… now she could feel that things have changed. With but a simple thought, her semblance could be activated and used with far greater potency and speed than before.

But that wasn't all either. "T-This feeling… my body just feels so light!" she whispered in surprise. Never before has her body felt so light and strong. She felt as if she could do anything.

And now Nora up next to notice this. Letting out a yelp of delight, the auburn haired girl twirled Magnhild with far greater ease than she was used to. "This feels great!" And what's more, she could feel that her own weapon has undergone a slight change as well. But what exactly that change, she didn't know. But that only brought an even larger smile to her face. Now was definitely a good time to find out just what that change was.

"Now… let's really break his legs!" Nora exclaimed.

Takehiko simply chuckled. "Then get to it; he's getting back up."

"Yes," Pyrrha replied while Nora let out an enthusiastic 'roger!' in response as Indra slowly crawled his way out through the hole he'd made upon his crash.

Indra could only groan as he did this. His fight had just gotten much harder to get through.

Elsewhere in the warehouse, Lugh could only fend off his attackers in shock as he tried to still come to comprehend what had just happened.

"Eat this!" Ruby, surprisingly boisterous, exclaimed as she charged at the Holy Knight, dragging Crescent Rose across the floor. Thanks to her abilities being enhanced now and Crescent Rose having mana unknowingly channeled into it by its wielder, the high-tech scythe cut right through the floor like it was made of soft butter. Slashing with great speed at Lugh, she succeeded in making the Holy Knight jump back, watching in shock as the whole hallway was nearly cut horizontally in two.

If he was taken aback by that, then Ren's sudden charge from behind him left him almost stupefied. Although not as fast as Ruby now was, Ren showed himself to be much more physically capable now than he ever was before.

Opening fire with Stormflower from behind, Lugh managed to turn partially and deflect the shots with Areadbhar, but somewhat barely. To his consternation, it looks as if Stormflower had been changed by Ren's awakening, the shots' speed now enhanced by mana.

"How troublesome!" Lugh thought as he then blocked a wild swing from Ren, who had hoped to now get in close and slash him with one of his gun's bladed edges. Kicking the green-wearing teen away, Lugh then focused back on Ruby, who was coming at him yet again.

As he and Ruby proceeded to clash, from the sidelines, Blake and Weiss tried to quietly attend to Jaune. Who, as it turned out, was managing to hold himself together admirably enough. "I-I'm fine… well, as fine as I can be…" the blond teen muttered through the pain, trying to force himself to stand now that he was no longer in immediate danger, having been given first aid by Blake.

"No. You're not," Weiss said to the teen firmly, but not unkindly. She may not be particularly fond of his antics often times, but he was still a friend. "Just stay still."

"…Done," Blake said, fully tending to his wound, having rolled up Jaune's shirt to create a makeshift bandage. "Try not to move much. It'll only aggravate the wound." She spoke with a tad bit of worry; already, the bandage was slowly soaking through with blood. "…We're going to have to get you to Professor Namikaze to fully heal you."

"But…" Jaune muttered, gesturing to the scene before them, Ruby and now Ren working in tandem against Lugh. Having awakened, the two of them proved to be much more physically impressive than before, though they seemed to have some trouble still against Lugh. Ruby took a heavy swing at Lugh with the back side of Crescent Rose, only to overshoot and end up hitting nothing. As for Ren, the man tried to shoulder slam the Holy Knight, only to misjudge his speed and end up falling a bit short, enough for Lugh to slash him lightly across the cheek before elbowing him in the side.

"Stop!" Weiss hissed to Jaune, seeing him unconsciously try to move towards the three fighters. "You're way too injured to even stand, much less try to fight!"

"Then what about you two?" Jaune asked, looking to Weiss and then Blake with narrowed eyes. "Lend them a hand!"

"We will once we know you're going to stay down for now and focus on recovering!" Weiss nearly yelled back at the stubborn blond.

Jaune looked ready to yell back in response. He wanted to yell about how much he couldn't afford to simply sit here out of the way while they took on Lugh. He wanted to yell about how much he felt compelled to try and aid them against Lugh, his own safety be damned. Just how could he let them do all the heavy lifting while he had to take it easy now just because of one wound? How come he had to sit around after having barely done anything against Lugh while the others had to keep fighting to keep up the pace?

There was simply so much to say, yet Jaune managed to bite his tongue, holding back the words that threatened to spill forth. "…Alright," he eventually managed to say, his voice little more than a hoarse whisper now.

"Good." That was all Weiss had to say to him now before looking to Blake. "Now let's go."

Nodding, the cat Faunus gently moved Jaune aside, away from the hallway where the battle was taking place before she and Weiss took off, eager to join the fight.

And as they threw themselves into the ensuing struggle, immediately heaping bullets and Dust attacks and more upon the fifth seat, Jaune could only look on from where he leaned up gingerly against the wall. And as he watched his friends slowly continue to lose ground again to Lugh, his heart quivered from both frustration and worry.

And for what felt like one time too many to the blond, he had to sit on the sidelines yet again while his friends were on the frontlines.

Whilst this occurred, Vidar watched from afar in growing anger as the battle raged on, the warehouse being increasingly destroyed with every passing minute.

Kalma, who was there by his side still, could only look on in worry, her captain's anger all but palpable by now. She could only imagine how upsetting it was to him to see the ancient magi winning the struggle tonight.

Little did she know, it was more than just tonight's current events alone that was getting to him right now.

"I hate to say I told you so… but I told you so," Surtur whispered into Vidar's head.

"Enough!" Vidar replied briskly under his breath, low enough to avoid having Kalma hear. "Ever since Cinder and I began to transport our equipment to safety, you've been whispering haughty commentary into my ears!"

"Well then what do you expect me to do?" Surtur replied in frustration. "It's not as if I have a body to fight in anymore. That ship sailed long ago!"

That made Vidar clench his teeth under his mask, almost to the point of hurting his gums. "I'm well aware of that," he tried to reply in a calmer state of mind. "But even then, you could simply lend some of your power to me for now to have helped out."

"Mhm, I could've done that… but with Fenrir around? You really feel lucky enough to potentially take him on in our current state?" Surtur questioned, delivering the mental equivalent of a smack to the face to Vidar.

"…Tch." Vidar had to grudgingly admit that Surtur had a fair point. "Fine then… time to retreat for good."

"About time you did something practical," Surtur retorted before his presence receded for the time being.

Vidar seethed on the inside, holding back the anger that was ignited by the man's words. But he held himself back; no need to start yelling and scare Kalma. And as it was, he should consider himself lucky that no one has noticed him or Kalma yet. He supposed it was because the entirety of the ancient magi's attention was focused upon the warehouse and not the area that lied past the warehouse's 'backyard.'

"It's time to cut our losses, Kalma," he spoke to the young girl, trying to sound as calm and as kind as possible. He must have failed, because the young girl hesitantly nodded in response, barely making a peep. "Gjallerhorn… don't fail me now…" he muttered before waving his left arm out towards the warehouse.

"Mass Transfer!"

Far above him, circling the earth slowly was Gjallerhorn in all of its glory. Once it had been a relatively simple looking magical weapon, having had the appearance of a simple telescope that had also doubled as a short staff. But over the years, thanks to all of the tinkering Vidar has done to it, it now looked far different, having taken on the form of an actual satellite. Roughly half the size of Vidar himself and being a sleek silver in color, the 'eye' of the 'satellite' was actually the lenses of Gjallerhorn itself. In response to Vidar's command, the magical weapon peered far down into the world below, its vision piercing through Ai Space and locating the very people that Vidar wished to transfer.

Whirring with mana, Gjallerhorn let out an ear-splitting shriek as it worked its literal magic.

And it showed far down below.

"Wha-?!" was all Ruby had to say when Lugh's entire being seemed to be basked in a bright light before fading away, the Holy Knight nowhere to be seen.

This occurred for the others as well. Morgan and Mercury, both of whom had been silently looking around the entire warehouse to locate Vidar found themselves teleported away, with only the Holy Knight herself being the one to notice this. Cinder, who had been about to try and dodge Daisuke's next attack in the form of Scatter Lance, blinked and smirked as the familiar glow of her master's ability took hold over her. Daisuke could only blink dumbly as his target vanished before his attack could make contact.

Within the warehouse, Indra was the next to disappear, blinking out of the area just as Pyrrha and Nora had proceeded to unleash another attack upon him, one that completely missed its mark as he vanished. "Damn it all! What just happened?!" Takehiko growled as he saw this happen, having been about to launch an attack of his own against the young seventh seat.

Next and last was Heracles, who had just blocked a powerful blow from Miki before trying to take a shot at Yang, his fist swinging past Miki and right at the blonde brawler, who had moved closer to attack him.

But just as his fist had been about to land on Yang's face, he stopped with wide eyes as the glow overtook him. The first seat then chuckled. "Well, well, I suppose it's time to finally retreat…" he muttered with a bemused smirk upon his face. He'd been enjoying this little 'warm up' quite a bit. A shame that now he and the others were being teleported away before things could really continue. But alas, it was to be expected; this was far from the end of their plans, after all. "Looks like we'll have to settle this next time, Brynhildr. I look forward to it already."

"Wait!" Miki yelled in response. She didn't know what exactly was going on right now, but she was able to pick up instinctively that the Holy Knights were retreating at any rate through a means she and her comrades didn't know of. Rushing forward, she swung Svafrlami hard at where Heracles now stood stock still, but watched as her blade futilely passed through thin air, the man having vanished for good a mere microsecond before her blade could cut him. "Damn it…"

Slowly, she looked to Yang behind her and saw the blonde looking every bit as confused and frustrated as she herself felt. Then looking to the other side of the large room, she could see Takehiko and Pyrrha and Nora sporting similar expressions as well.

She proceeded to hold her magical weapon limply, no longer feeling the need to hold it so tightly and in such a battle ready stance. As she did so, Miki had to keep a rather uncharacteristic growl to escape her throat.

The Holy Knights had gotten away.

Their little operation to take them all down had been a failure.

And that's that for now. The next few chapters will be serving as a sort of 'down time' for the characters to rest and rethink everything, both the protagonists and antagonists. At the same time, this will be building up to the next 'arc' of sorts. How long exactly said arc will be, even I'm not sure, but it could very well take up a few chapters, maybe more depending on how I decide to break up the material. But at any rate, you can expect more action soon enough.

Take care, everyone. Until next time!