Disclaimer: I do not own Fairy Tail.
Chapter 67: The Girly Princess & The Vicious Princess! Kusabue's Rage & Risa's Maturity! Battle In The Gunjou Theater! Yukino & Sorano vs. Yuuta & Masako!
Rairakku ran as fast as she could to find Maruberiki, who she deemed as being powerful enough to take down traitorous dark mages. Kyasurin and Matsuba were both traitors to Hexing Enchantress, so Rairakku felt that she needed to inform Maruberiki about how the guild war against Sabertooth needed to be halted for a moment. If Maruberiki eradicated those two spies who were working for the Magic Council, then it would likely be possible for Hexing Enchantress to have a stronger sense of solidarity towards winning the war.
The dark witch ran through Gunjou Town, which had mostly been damaged from various battles that had occurred, and Rairakku reached an area that was close to the right side of the town. She wasted no time with going north to where Maruberiki's new art studio was located, and seeing most of the path to the Tyrian Temple being revealed made Rairakku gasp in shock at what she was viewing from a distance. Rairakku's moment of being defeated by Risa and Rogue was when her dark magic faded away for part of the illusory barrier to be broken, and more of it had been broken when Kajino was defeated.
Although, Rairakku had initially felt the barrier breaking apart after hearing something that sounded like an explosion coming from the Wine Woods. Tsuki and Ayame had been stationed there by Maruberiki, but Rairakku perceived those girls to be the weakest of the top commanders. Tsuki never wanted to fight hard without someone being by her side, and Ayame felt that she could only partner up with Tsuki because of how their different shades of dark magic complimented each other. As Rairakku now ran down the street with a miffed look on her face at how Tsuki failed, she couldn't stop herself from crashing into the front door of Maruberiki's studio.
The artist who had been interrupted from his painting could be heard walking out of the studio, his feet loudly going across the royal purple carpeting in an aggressive manner. Maruberiki looked stern as he quickly opened the door in the same moment where Rairakku took some steps back, and she watched Minerva walk out from another room with a sinister grin on her face. It seemed like Minerva was really hoping to hear great news from Rairakku, but the gothic mage placed her hands behind her back while glancing away from Maruberiki's gaze in a guilty manner.
"What do you want?" Maruberiki asked Rairakku, narrowing his eyes as he frowned at her.
Rairakku responded with a nervous facial expression, having fear in her eyes, "Maruberiki-san, I'm... here to... tell you that we.. lost our fight in the nightclub."
He asked Rairakku with a slightly less intimidating glare appearing on his face, looking more furious as Tsuki was running nearby, "You failed, too? Just like a little brat who reportedly didn't run after a sound-wielding mage?!"
Hearing about Maruberiki receiving intel prompted Rairakku to try changing the subject, sounding more serious, "If you're talking about Tsuki, she was mentioned to me recently by Kyasurin and Matsuba! They likely arrested Kajino at the nightclub, since they're dark mages who actually work for the Magic Council! Maruberiki, they're not on your side!"
This news made Maruberiki widen his eyes in a somewhat surprised manner, but he quickly kept himself relaxed. He looked over in the direction going towards the nightclub for a moment, but then he turned his attention back to Rairakku. She had been given a high position in Hexing Enchantress during this guild war, but Maruberiki examined her wounded body that had burn marks and bruises in several places. If Kajino hadn't been strong enough to beat Sabertooth's mages and he had a weak assistant, then Maruberiki viewed himself as a foolish hero who overestimated the abilities of his own allies.
He glanced past Rairakku to shift his attention to Tsuki, who walked up to the situation while frowning in an ashamed manner. She had been wounded from Kusabue's last attack, and Tsuki had spent the last few hours with trying to not run into that girl. She had sensed Kusabue's magical power in different parts of Gunjou, almost like Kusabue was intent on ending the lives of any mages who encountered her. Tsuki did her best to detect Kusabue's magical power, and making only a small amount of Darkness Magic surround her body allowed Tsuki to pinpoint the green-haired mage's strong spells.
Although, there was still the drawback of the fact that Kusabue had been firing multiple attacks in succession while making explosions occur in different part of Gunjou. That tampered with Tsuki's ability to pinpoint the exact location of Kusabue's magic, as dealing with too many sound waves made Tsuki feel like she was listening to a massive multitude of blasts all occurring at the same time, and Tsuki also felt like she needed Maruberiki's help in dealing with the Sabertooth mages. However, Tsuki started to look a bit scared from seeing Minerva walk towards her with an evil smirk appearing on her face.
"If you disposable dark mages don't want to die, then you should probably rely on these gems instead of your weak levels of power." Minerva calmly explained to Tsuki with a seemingly kind smile on her face, as she pulled out crystals in different hues of purple from the left pocket of her dress.
Rairakku told Minerva in a stern manner, looking miffed as she walked over to Tsuki and recounted the town's culture, "Hey, you can't just take a bunch of purple crystals out of Gunjou Cave! Those aren't meant to be used in guild wars, Minerva-san!"
Minerva responded to Rairakku in a goading manner, frowning at the younger woman with immense disapproval in her eyes, "Well, you can just continue being weak and pathetic. In fact, you'll probably die if those dragon slayers from Sabertooth are following your scent to find out where you are."
Rairakku started to look very nervous at the thought of being killed by the Sabertooth mages, but she attempted to step back for a moment as her instincts were telling her to not take in power from any of the purple crystals that Minerva was holding. However, Rairakku's heart started beating faster at the sight of the royal purple crystal that had royal purple beams of light emanating from it. Rairakku started to watch Minerva lightly open her mouth in a scheming manner, almost like she was easily reading Rairakku's mind by reading her eyes' emotion of being tempted.
Minerva proceeded to make some of the crystals roll over into her right palm, before tightly clenching the remaining crystals in her left hand. She made the remaining crystals be balanced on her hand as her fist changed to being a palm, and Minerva liked how the purple lights illuminated her own face. She smirked in a sinister manner from pressing all of the crystals against Rairakku's body, causing her body to be surrounded by multiple purple auras that all shifted to being eggplant purple as a way to represent Rairakku's magic.
She felt herself have an immense amount of magical power starting to flow through her body, causing Tsuki to gently touch the crystals that were in Minerva's right hand. Tsuki felt herself gain a tremendous amount of magical power, but the side effect of taking in power from those crystals was that Maruberiki quickly built up magical power to strike both of the girls with a lavender aura. Rairakku and Tsuki both started to have an 'S' insignia appearing on their foreheads, and this meant that any refusal to battle would just result in their bodies and souls getting destroyed.
Ten minutes later...
Rairakku and Tsuki walked through the streets of Gunjou, hoping to find any of the Sabertooth mages that they had previously fought against. Tsuki felt that Kusabue wouldn't want to fight her in a situation where she had much more power, even having enough magical power to where she could engulf herself in a wine purple aura. The side effect of this large boost in power was that it made Tsuki take on the form of a woman who looked to be slightly older than Risa, but Tsuki's clothes adapted to where they still fit on her body.
She started to giggle in a calm manner, hoping that she could make her Darkness Magic tear through Kusabue's strongest spell. As Tsuki noticed some dark mages who were badly wounded and bleeding in different craters of Gunjou Town, Tsuki wondered if she was getting close to finding Kusabue. She felt that fight from the Wine Woods wasn't done, since the death of one Sabertooth mage wasn't the same as them both dying. Tsuki tightly clenched her fists, feeling determined to win as she had a sadistic look on her face from thinking that she would get to use her spells to end Kusabue's life.
As Tsuki was walking further down towards the southern part of the plaza, she widened her eyes in a somewhat surprised manner from seeing Kusabue run towards this area with Rogue and Risa slightly behind her. Both of those Sabertooth mages gasped in shock from seeing Rairakku be heavily engulfed in an eggplant purple aura, which was a stark contrast from how Rairakku was wounded and exhausted earlier. All of her wounds from earlier had been healed, almost like Rogue's most powerful attack never even hit her.
Rogue was about to attack Rairakku, but Kusabue gently stretched out her left arm as a way of preventing him from stepping forward. Rogue began to look a bit frustrated at how Kusabue seemed to not want him to intervene, but she quickly dispelled the spell known as Shamrock Sound Radar for the purpose of activating a new spell. Kusabue gently closed her eyes, before making her body absorb the sound waves that came from dark mages casually walking by this fight. Kusabue proceeded to make her palms face each other, and a shamrock green sphere started to appear in between them.
"Strident Nightclub Repetitive Record!" Kusabue aggressively shouted, putting more magical power into her attack to where it had musical notes resembling fourth notes appearing inside of it.
That prompted Tsuki to shout with a fierce look on her face, "Dark Wine Shadow Beam!"
Upon seeing Kusabue loudly clap her hands for the sound to form a turbulent vortex where it almost winds, Tsuki asked aloud in a stern manner, "When did she learn that spell?!"
Kusabue responded with a death glare on her face, as feelings of coldness entered her eyes, "A few seconds ago, I heard the sounds of clapping and vortexes harmonizing in my mind."
Rairakku watched Kusabue's second attack be unleashed from her hands, only to have her attention shift to the sight of Kusabue's first attack getting hit by one of Tsuki's beams. That only made the wine purple beam detonate in a wine purple explosion that was glittery and lustrous, before leaving behind a wine purple orb that floated down to the ground at a slow pace. Right before it hit the ground, the orb was destroyed by the Strident Nightclub Repetitive Record spell exploding in a shamrock green blast that was massive.
Tsuki and Rairakku were surprised by this attack loudly making the repetitive sound of the chorus for a techno song's melody, especially since the sound waves shook up the plaza of Gunjou Town to where the dark witches couldn't keep their balance. Rairakku fell down to the ground, before seeing the high amount of winds in Kusabue's attack travel to her second attack, and the explosion from earlier made Kusabue's second attack shine in a shamrock green color. Its level of power increased, and this spell was known as Sound Bass Chain Vortex.
Kusabue calmly watched the spell continue to grow in power, as it was taking in seismic waves that her first spell repeatedly created for fifteen seconds. That small duration of time actually gave Kusabue's spell enough time to heavily strengthen in power, and it tore through Tsuki's power while the impact only reduced its strength by a slight amount. That didn't prevent the attack from striking Tsuki, resulting in another shamrock green massive blast! The attack had the aftereffect of making deep shamrock green sound waves emerge with the resulting winds that were just shamrock green.
"Well, this is the perfect moment for me to use Sound Soul Wave of Amplitude!" Kusabue stated with a furious look on her face, thinking of her own painful thoughts as she made a shamrock green aura surround her body.
Tsuki asked aloud, widening her eyes in a concerned manner, "Wait, is that...?!"
Rairakku asked Tsuki with a curious facial expression, before looking a bit scared, "What?! What's wrong?!"
Kusabue sternly shouted at Tsuki, feeling more angry, "You killed Kūkiatsu-onii-chan, and you'll experience that same viciousness!"
Kusabue's words made Rogue frown in a somewhat concerned manner while Risa reluctantly nodded in a hesitant manner, and they simply watched Kusabue lower her hands down towards the ground. The sound of her hands waving downward was interestingly followed by shamrock green orbs suddenly falling down from the sky, striking Rairakku and Tsuki at a very fast pace. Those attacks created shamrock green explosions that were large, damaging Tsuki and Rairakku. Since Kusabue seemed to be taking her anger out on Kusabue's partner, Rairakku wasted no time with retaliating.
Rairakku unleashed a spell called Haunting Ghostly Altar, and she made her palms be aimed upward while her hands were aimed in different directions. Rairakku's palms were up while she started moving her left arm up in the same moment where her right arm moved downward. Rairakku's hands moved like a balancing scale while she made the eggplant purple aura of Darkness Magic surround her hands, and eggplant purple flames appeared on her palms. Upon seeing the flames immediately burst into towering infernos, Risa built up magical power while not wanting Kusabue to get hurt.
She activated the spell called Mystical Psychic Screen, and the thought of Rairakku harming Kusabue caused Risa to feel very enraged. She made the dark lilac aura of her magic surround her body while also making a dark magenta aura appear within it, and Risa firmly lowered her hands to make the rectangular shield appear in midair. The shield alternated between the colors of dark magenta and dark lilac, before Risa aggressively slammed her right hand against the shield for it to form a large dome around herself and her friends. Risa proceeded to activate the spell called Dark Magenta Extrasensory Psyche Delusion, and the dark magenta aura joined some of the dark lilac aura as it entered her eyes for them to shift between those colors.
Risa proceeded to imagine that Rairakku's infernos were in a magenta shade of pink, causing the flames to actually change to being that color, and Rairakku looked startled when she threw them at Kusabue. The flames struck the ground to create average-sized magenta explosions, before their aftereffect of making round ghosts rise up from all of the flames caused those ghosts to be magenta with bubblegum pink eyes. The ghosts followed Risa's command of flying up into the sky, which now became bubblegum pink. However, Risa soon saw the ghosts fall from the sky while they were strangely engulfed in a shamrock green aura.
Kusabue wasn't even stretching out her hands while imagining the sounds of those ghosts fearfully screaming actually occurring in reality, and she coldly looked at Rairakku. Despite having deemed that woman as someone who she idolized, the fact that she worked alongside Tsuki made Kusabue view her as an enemy who deserved to be hated. Kusabue imagined the sounds of falling anvils while the sounds were directed at the ghosts, and she thrusted her hands forward to aggressively send the ghosts down at Tsuki.
Tsuki attempted to eradicate the spell by using a spell known as Wine Moon Ring, and she shot out a large ring of Darkness Magic from her left palm. The ring was wine purple with crescent moons on it, and Tsuki aimed it at the ghosts. The collision resulted in a wine purple explosion that was massive, but the sound waves were immediately absorbed by Kusabue for her to fire a spell from her mouth. The spell was called Screeching Meteorites, and it involved Kusabue aiming her head up at the sky. She fired several large shamrock green waves of sound into the night sky, making it become shamrock green from the enormous explosions. She frowned in a cold manner, as shamrock green projectiles were now raining down from the sky while they made high-pitched screeches. Risa quickly covered her ears while looking at the situation in a pained manner, trying to imagine the sky turning back to a magenta color in these moments where she was starting to feel less enraged. However, she soon heard the loud sound of her dark lilac hair tying itself to her wrists.
Risa started to gasp in an alarmed manner, as she felt herself be unable to prevent her Psychic Magic from continuously flowing into her hands. This unfortunately meant that she couldn't stop herself from putting more magical power into the spell, and that allowed Kusabue's projectiles to create massive blasts when they hit her opponents. Rairakku and Tsuki became bruised and bloodied by the attacks, before the density of Kusabue's Sound Magic felt like high amounts of pressure were slammed against their bodies. However, all of the shamrock green smoke slowly cleared up to reveal that Tsuki didn't intend to give up.
"Wine Darkness of Spinning Crescent Blades!" Tsuki shouted with a fierce facial expression, before shooting out several wine purple orbs from her hands.
Upon seeing Tsuki place her right palm against Rairakku's chest and absorb magical power from her for this makeshift fusion spell, Kusabue stated with a merciless frown on her face, "You're using a fusion spell to inflict pain on me, but I'll have to punish you for defying me.
Risa thought to herself with her hair obscuring her concerned eyes, clenching her teeth as she remembered Hiyasu's warning, "Whether Kusabue looks up to you or Lucy as her mentor, there's something you should keep in mind. Great power is dormant in Kusabue, but unrestrained power can lead to corruption."
Kusabue's unrestrained power was certainly leading to corruption, as she activated a spell called Musical Green Flow. This spell simply made Kusabue shoot out eight musical notes from her mouth, some of them being eighth notes while the other half were fourth notes, and all of the notes were shamrock green. They all floated together in a line, almost like they were part of a melody. The musical notes approached one of the orbs, which now had an eggplant purple crescent moon spinning around inside of it. Kusabue's first musical note exploded in a massive burst of shamrock green flames, which coated Tsuki's orb for it to violently explode in a wine purple blast.
The sound of that explosion was instantly absorbed into Kusabue's hands, before everyone heard the sound of Tsuki's flames crackling in a loud manner. Even Tsuki herself wondered why the flames suddenly grew to the size of towering infernos, and Rairakku looked shocked as they became eggplant purple. Their high amounts of sound were becoming much louder to where the noise from some flames bursting outward was strident enough to make Rairakku's ears feel immense pain. Tsuki attempted to cover her ears, but that didn't stop the shamrock green aura of Sound Magic within the flames from drilling into her ears.
Tsuki soon screamed in pain while falling to her knees, before seeing those flames become shamrock green. They all moved to surround Kusabue, who began to use Risa's illusory spell to her advantage. She loudly clapped her hands while imagining the sound of the flames scorching against her opponent's bodies, and the shamrock green flames bounced off of sound waves to land on Tsuki's skin right before exploding with a defeaning amount of sound. Tsuki screamed in pain from this attack that was known as Sound Flame Drill, but she experienced more pain from how those flames left behind flaming shamrock green musical notes.
As she felt the musical notes aggressively burn her skin with an extremely loud sizzling sound resembling food touching a hot stove, Tsuki shouted in a pleading manner, "Stop it, please!"
Kusabue shouted with the voice of a tyrannical queen, sounding furious, "YOU TOOK THE LIFE OF MY BROTHER! MY ENEMIES MUST EXPERIENCE NOTHING BUT PAIN!"
Rairakku asked in a scared manner, falling on her ass as she tried to slowly back away, "What... What about me? Would I die, even though I... wasn't there for that?"
That prompted Kusabue to angrily reply, making more of her musical notes strike the orbs in midair, "I'LL LET YOU EXPERIENCE THE DARKNESS OF MY POWER, MISS RAIRAKKU! DARK MAGES LIKE YOU SHOULD BE AFRAID OF ME!"
As Kusabue's remaining musical notes collided with the orbs for the wine purple blasts to now be obscured by massive shamrock green blasts, Rairakku immediately felt a high amount of sound slam itself into her ears. She immediately felt the sounds of explosions loudly occurring within her ears, causing her to scream in agonizing pain, but Kusabue wasn't done. After absorbing the remaining sound waves into her hands, Kusabue shifted her attention back to Tsuki. As the dark mage was about to try and use a spell, she froze up in fear from gazing into Kusabue's steeled and merciless eyes that were full of vengeance.
Tsuki tried to activate the spell called Dark Wine Mausoleum, which activated when she managed to put her right hand on the ground, but the sight of small wine purple graves rising up from the ground with dark wine auras rising up from them to look like beams only made her experience Kusabue's wrath. Kuabue unleashed the spell called Musical Green Flow again, but Kusabue purposely imagined the sound of her spell duplicating. Several more musical notes appeared in midair, before they went down to aggressively strike Tsuki. However, the spell now had a new effect.
Whenever the musical notes hit Tsuki's body, she would scream in excruciating pain from how the echoing sound of the impact was strong enough to break her bones. She couldn't even stop herself from getting caught in the explosive parts of the attacks, causing her to cough up more blood, and even trying to get on her knees caused some of the musical notes to destroy the bones in her legs. She now had tears emerging from her eyes as she screamed in agonizing pain, and Tsuki now thought that fighting Kusabue again was actually a bad idea.
Rairakku also thought this had been a bad idea for her and Tsuki, since Kusabue was now corrupting Risa's illusory spell by making herself wear an outfit that looked exactly like Rairakku's attire from the nightclub. The shamrock green corset was dark enough to where Kusabue's shamrock green brooch could shine with an ominous glow, and she wore a shamrock green skirt with shamrock green high-heeled shoes. Kusabue even made her hair have dark shamrock green streaks in it while her face became paler, almost looking as gothic as Rairakku, but Kusabue built up more magical power to where she grew to the size of a towering mage.
Kusabue made the shamrock green aura of Sound Magic engulf her fist to where her punches would be very strong, and she wasted no time with punching the spot where Rairakku was standing. Rairakku coughed up some blood while feeling her body start to get crushed by the impact of Kusabue's spell, and Rairakku had to make her Darkness Magic heavily engulf her for the purpose of making it prevent her from not getting completely crushed. As Rairakku watched Tsuki's unused healing spell start to disappear from the battlefield, she cried and began to panic at how she couldn't move her crushed body. All she could do was look up at Kusabue, who now had a vicious frown on her face.
"Now, how many spells of Sound Magic should I unleash to ensure that you'll be dead?" Kusabue asked Rairakku in an intimidating manner, causing the older woman to tremble in fear with a saddened facial expression.
That prompted Risa to tell Kusabue in a stern manner, as she sent Psychic Magic into her feet for the purpose of getting in between her and Rairakku, "That's enough, Kusabue! You've defeated your enemies, and they can't fight back anymore!"
Kusabue angrily shouted to Risa, looking furious as she felt that she needed to kill Tsuki and Rairakku, "RISA, DON'T STAND IN MY WAY! TSUKI KILLED MY BROTHER!"
"I understand that you're going through so much pain over Kūkiatsu's death, but you must not excessively harm your enemies like you're a vicious princess." Risa sternly replied to Kusabue, having a stern and disapproving look on her face like a mentor who was seeing her student be close to setting foot on a bad path in life.
Risa maintained her facial expression of disapproval, and she watched Kusabue start to have a puzzled look on her face. From Kusabue's perspective, a vicious princess was a strong woman who could easily defeat the enemies who harmed her or the people who she cared about. Kusabue didn't want Tsuki to possibly kill Risa or Rogue, as she already felt traumatized from seeing Kūkiatsu die in front of her. She didn't have large surges in power until the end of the fight, and Kusabue believed that she was using that power to prevent other dark mages from harming her and her friends.
Despite Kusabue's reasons being understandable, Risa was frowning from witnessing the implications of Kusabue's excessive attacks. She didn't intend on stopping her rampage, even making pain be dealt to the gothic woman who she idolized more than Risa. Risa started to frown in a stern manner, thinking back to that first day where Kusabue saw that poster of Rairakku. Risa turned around for a moment to see that the woman who appeared to be so intimidating in the photos was now bloodied and bruised, even looking scared.
That felt like another lesson for Risa to teach Kusabue, since a vicious princess who went out of her way to excessively harm other people would probably find herself frozen with fear in a situation where she would be facing a stronger opponent. If Kusabue obtained more power just for the purpose of being powerful, then all of that power would corrupt her into being like a tyrannical princess. She certainly looked like a tyrant, frowning in her gothic attire as she felt like her enemies deserved to suffer until she would stop attacking them.
Risa started to fully keep her eyes on Kusabue, who was now glaring at her in a berserk manner. That caused Risa to close her eyes for a moment, remembering that day of when she went berserk against Kyoko in Parmanie Town. Even though Risa severely damaged Kyoko to the point where the evil princess died from her injuries, Risa couldn't stop herself from wanting to excessively harm Kyoko with her remaining magical power. She was stopped by Yukino, who then let Lucy restrain Risa before commanding her to stop thinking that she needed to escalate the situation past a point of no return.
"Kusabue, I was using regular pink and magenta-colored Psychic Magic like a girly princess before I accessed the dark magenta form of it. I may have been somewhat weak, but pushing through my trauma and having friends beside me allowed me to realize that a strong and girly princess can be much stronger than a vicious and berserk princess." Risa explained to her with a somewhat calmer facial expression, thinking back to the past.
That prompted Rairakku to interrupt their conversation by building up magical power and weakly stating, "You're... wrong.. about that last.. part."
Kusabue angrily asked Risa, as she created a shamrock green ring of musical notes in between her hands, "Don't you see that our enemies want to harm us?!"
She wasted no time with firing the ring of musical notes down at Rairakku, and this attack was known as Ringing Musical Blitz. The attack struck Rairakku as soon as she made an eggplant purple flame weakly be thrown at Kusabue, and the ring of fourth notes created a massive shamrock green blast. Rairakku screamed in agonizing pain while the large blast made a screeching noise that sounded like someone's ears were ringing, and the intense waves of sound followed Kusabue's thought of them sounding like musical notes being played on a piano.
That caused those sound waves to form more rings of musical notes, and Kusabue thrusted her right hand forward for one of those rings to strike Tsuki. It ended up striking her, creating a shamrock green blast that was massive while the sound waves that struck Tsuki were making smaller explosions occur within the blast. As Tsuki was struck by all of the attacks, she coughed up more blood and screamed in excruciating pain. The sound waves were harshly pressing against Tsuki's body, before Kusabue moved her right hand to make some of the sound waves press down on Rairakku's body.
Since Kusabue felt vengeful enough to even harm the woman who she idolized during her revenge against Tsuki, Risa felt like she needed to jump in front of the next ring of musical notes that Kusabue threw down towards Tsuki. Risa was engulfed in the massive shamrock green blast, causing Rogue to look worried, but not even hearing her scream from taking that attack made him observe how the somewhat smaller explosions didn't even bother Risa. She simply endured the full brunt of Kusabue's attacks like a powerful queen, even being protective by not letting Tsuki and Rairakku get hit by this attack.
The two dark witches were still badly wounded on the ground while Kusabue manipulated Risa's illusion spell into creating images of menacing and thin shamrock green ghosts letting out screams of terror during their moments of flying through the air at a rapid pace, and Kusabue decided to unleash her spell called Musical Cannot Shot with a high amount of magical power. She absorbed the sounds of the explosions while stretching out her hands, and Kusabue loudly sang the eight notes of a musical scale. That resulted in a shamrock green beam being fired from her mouth, and the beam was much larger than its normal size while several light green musical notes appeared within it.
Kusabue aimed the attack down at Tsuki, only for Risa to apply Psychic Magic to her feet at jump up to a high altitude for the purpose of intercepting the attack. Risa was caught in the massive shamrock green blast that had been powerful enough to even shift to being light green with slightly smaller shamrock green explosions occurring inside of it. Upon seeing several drops of blood fall to the ground to where they were forming large puddles, Rogue wasted no time with making the black aura of Shadow Dragon Slayer Magic surround his body.
He started running towards Kusabue for the purpose of trying to restrain her, feeling angry as he watched Risa's body heavily hit the ground for the impact to create a crater in the cobblestone. As Rogue was about to unleash a spell called Shadow Dragon's Raven Breath and hit Kusabue with a massive beam of black shadows, he stopped at the last second from seeing Risa immediately get up. Despite how Kusabue still had Risa's hair tied around her hands to make the Dark Magenta Extrasensory Psyche Delusion spell persist, Risa still had control over her own mind.
She simply imagined herself being heavily engulfed in a magenta pink aura that healed her wounds, along with making her clothing from the nightclub now be changed into a magenta pink coronation dress that had a light pink brooch on the left side of the area slightly above her breasts and a bubblegum pink brooch on the right side of the area slightly above her breasts. Both of the brooches on her chest area had four hot pink orbs swirling around in them, and Risa's sparkly dress had a sash across her waist. The left half of the sash was dark magenta, and the right half of the sash was dark lilac.
Risa looked down at the sash for a moment, liking that it went well with her plain pink flat shoes, and she shifted her attention up at Kusabue. The young girl looked enraged at the sight of Risa being in her way, and the expression in Kusabue's eyes informed Risa that Kusabue felt herself to be weak if she couldn't kill Tsuki. Since Tsuki seemed worried about Kusabue's most powerful spell earlier, then Risa rightfully assumed that Kusabue already ended the life of Tsuki's partner. Not only did that explain Kusabue's rage towards Tsuki, but it also explained why Tsuki's spells weren't very cohesive with Rairakku's magic.
"Whether or not I idolize a vicious princess, I don't want to be a weak mage who can't save anyone! I don't want that to happen ever again!" Kusabue sternly stated to Risa, as she loudly clapped her hands to send several shamrock green sound waves down at the Sabertooth mage.
Risa responded with a confident smile on her face, as she threw an Esper Ball up at the sound waves for it to create a massive pink explosion, "Kusabue, it's time for me to be your mentor again. In fact, I should teach you that a kind and girly princess becomes very strong when she protects people from excessively being hurt! In fact, the girly and kind princess even gains enough strength to where a vicious princess can't defeat her!"
Risa asked Kusabue in a calm manner, smiling softly as she imagined the sound waves turning pink during their moments of falling in between the two girls, "Kusabue, didn't you think I was cool and fashionable when we went shopping together? When I fought Yaeko, didn't you think I was a cool ally with lots of flair? Why don't you show me how cool you are, kid? Isn't that better than getting revenge and going berserk to where you'd permanently go down a dark path?"
Upon looking into Risa's kind and compassionate eyes, Kusabue could only let more tears emerge from her eyes. She couldn't intimidate Risa with any of her spells, no matter which attack would be used, and Kusabue could even hear Risa's thoughts of how she was a kind and confident princess who had already defeated Rairakku. Kusabue idolized both Rairakku and Risa almost equally, but the fact that Kusabue harmed both of her idols for the purpose of revenge only made her start to look regretful.
Wanting to be like Rairakku didn't mean that Kusabue could rightfully harm Rairakku, as the gothic woman herself was only being Tsuki's ally without having contributed to Kūkiatsu's death. Kusabue recalled how her older brother didn't excessively harm Yaeko or Kaisui, almost like he wanted to show Kusabue that one important part of a battle was knowing when the enemies had been defeated. Rairakku and Tsuki were both bleeding on the ground, heavily bruised and battered with several broken bones.
They were probably thinking that they would die from the pain in their ears, which were still ringing. Tsuki couldn't even weakly cover one ear with her hand, and the moment where her hand lightly hit the ground made Kusabue realize that her enemy couldn't withstand another attack. Risa deemed the battle to be concluded, meaning that Kusabue won from how her opponents were unable to battle, and seeing Risa maintain her smiling face only made Kusabue's mind hear the sounds of how she was happy from shopping alongside Risa.
Kusabue told Risa in an apologetic manner, looking saddened as she imagined the sound of herself returning to normal size, "Risa-san, I'm so sorry! I'm very sorry for excessively hurting my enemies!"
As Kusabue ran up to Risa and tightly hugged her, Risa replied in a kind manner with a small smile on her face, "I'm glad you're learning to become a morally better mage, Kusabue."
Kusabue imagined the sounds of Risa's hair unbinding itself from her wrists, prompting her to calmly tell her friend, "Risa-san, can your spell be beautiful and help me show you that I'm cool?"
Kusabue glanced at some eggplant purple roses that were in the northern part of the plaza while they had been planted on some lavender grass, causing Risa to look over at them in a confused manner. They hadn't been part of her illusory spell, only giving off a faint scent from the winds that blew through the area, and the flowers smelled very sweet. As Kusabue walked towards Tsuki, the dark mage felt herself not have enough power to maintain the amount of Darkness Magic that would've made her continue with looking like a grown woman.
Tsuki reverted back to looking like she was around Kusabue's age, and that just made her feel more fearful about what Kusabue what do now. She tried her best to start crawling away towards Rairakku, who was injured to the point where she could only scowl at Kusabue while lightly turning her head to face her. She watched Kusabue make some Sound Magic surround her hands, before the shamrock green aura surrounding them left her hands for the purpose of hitting the flowers. As Kusabue imagined the sound of more eggplant purple roses starting to bloom, she ran bck towards Risa with a small smile on her face.
When Kusabue was right beside her, Risa used her remaining Psychic Magic to change the illusion that her opponents would witness. The sheer sight of the magenta aura engulfing her hands only made Rairakku and Tsuki both close their eyes in a terrified manner, not wanting to experience anymore pain. Rairakku didn't want to die here, especially since her low level of power could probably be sensed by Maruberiki and Minerva. She didn't want them to end her life and make it end in misery, but she joined Tsuki in trembling at Risa's next illusion.
To their surprise, Risa's illusion made everyone be in a plaza that was now like a meadow. The lavender grass seemed to fill the entire plaza with several eggplant purple roses accompanying other flowers that were in different hues of purple, and there were even wine purple butterflies slowly flying through the plaza. Rairakku weakly got on her knees, looking just as surprised as Tsuki from seeing how everyone was now in a plaza that was surprisingly brightened. Rairakku looked up to see the pink sky, which resembled the stories told in Gunjou about a sky's alleged appearance at dawn, and Rairakku had to cover her eyes from seeing the light pink morning sun that replaced the Gunjou Moon.
The Gunjou Moon wasn't part of Risa's illusion, but this allowed Rairakku to open her eyes again. She could not only see the morning sun, but the dark witch also felt its warmth descending down on to her body. She'd only ever felt the moon's calm weather or its coldness, as the amount of Darkness Magic keeping the moon in the sky prevented the idea of morning from ever being possible in this town. Additionally, the dark mages who had been near the plaza were also illusions to Rairakku from how everyone seemed so happy and cheerful from celebrating the start of dawn.
Rairakku started to have tears in her eyes from wondering if Risa's illusion of beauty was something that other people experienced outside of Gunjou. Rairakku had been someone who only cared for shades of purple and darkness, being a model who chose to pose with no effort while she wasn't even filled with passion for being a disc jockey. Still, she gasped in awe at Risa from thinking that she fought so hard in the nightclub to possibly show Rairakku a future where the town of Gunjou would no longer perpetually be in darkness.
That caused Rairakku to scowl a bit, thinking that Risa was giving herself a new and unreasonable purpose for existing. Even if the pink-haired mage managed to beat Rairakku, that only made Rairakku believe that Risa was thinking that she and Kusabue could defeat Maruberiki. Rairakku began to think about how her leader was much more powerful than any of the top commanders, as he could built up massive amounts of Darkness Magic in quick surges, and his spells were feared by Rairakku. Even though she had a fearful look appearing on her face, seeing Risa continue to confidently smile only made Rairakku express shock in her eyes from how she refused to get rid of her confident smile or her coronation dress.
"You seriously think that you can defeat Maruberiki, even if his skills are on a far different level than mine?" Rairakku asked Risa in a stern manner, ignoring how much pain she had been in at the moment.
That question prompted Risa to state in a humble manner, as she sternly locked eyes with Rairakku, "If I'm able to hit him a few times before one of my strong teammates lands the finishing blow, then that's good enough for me! As far as I'm concerned, my job is to help my friends defeat him!"
Tsuki asked aloud with a puzzled look on her face, still feeling like she was in tremendous pain, "Friends? What... are... friends?"
"You've never had a friend before?" Risa asked aloud with a curious facial expression, as she briefly saw a glimpse of Kusabue looking remorseful.
As Tsuki weakly shook her head from left to right as a way of signaling that she never experienced anything such as teammates actually being her friends, Kusabue calmly ran over to the eggplant purple roses that were behind Tsuki. Kusabue started to pick some of those flowers, before going back to Tsuki. She helped the young girl sit up for a moment, noticing that her hat had been extensively torn during the fight. As Tsuki felt Kusabue remove her hat, she watched Risa's illusion world make a duplicate of the hat quickly appear on her head.
That hat was gently touched by Kusabue, who chose to put some of the eggplant purple roses on to Tsuki's hat as if she was putting them in her hair. In fact, Kusabue felt like the hat could look even better by sending her Sound Magic into the rose petals for them to move in accordance with her thoughts of reforming themselves into several cute bows. Tsuki winced in a pained manner while gently touching the front part of the hat, feeling the makeshift bows seem like they were created from the fabric of actual bows.
Tsuki started to giggle in a happy manner, liking that her very first friend was someone who she encountered during a guild war. Although, Tsuki's happy smile shifted to being a worried frown from realizing that she couldn't declare herself as someone who surrendered to Kusabue. Not only would surrendering make Maruberiki be driven to end Tsuki's life, but she also wondered if it would even be possible for dark mages to be friends with people in legal guilds. The Sabertooth mages seemed like they would be willing to befriend her, since Risa called for a ceasefire.
"If you were friends with me, wouldn't you dislike Rairakku and other dark mages for possibly not liking that?" Tsuki asked Kusabue with a curious look on her face, before she looked a bit saddened.
Kusabue replied with a calm smile on her face, "You can be my friend, even if Miss Rairakku may not like that. Even if you were my friend for five minutes in this illusory meadow under the dawn's morning sun, I'd feel so much happiness in that short life instead of having a life of misery."
Tsuki asked Kusabue with a puzzled facial expression, having never heard the meaning of a certain word, "Happiness? What's that?"
Rairakku interrupted that conversation by sternly asking Risa a different philosophical question, feeling like it needed to be answered, "Even if you were to make Gunjou be changed into what you believe is the right culture for the town, why fight so hard in a guild war where you could possibly die at the end? Why not just run home and live longer?!"
Risa calmly walked up to Rairakku with a soft smile on her face, before answering hers and Tsuki's questions with a calm explanation, "Well, everyone eventually dies. Since that's a fact, I could care less about when it happens. Life isn't about how long you exist, and it's actually good to think about what you accomplish while you exist. Just like Kūkiatsu and Kusabue, I want to prove that my existence isn't meaningless. Whether it's fashion or fighting, giving myself goals to accomplish helps my life have happiness and meaning."
Risa continued to calmly speak, "Until my first mentor came along, I felt that my life had no purpose. By giving myself an important purpose now, I can strive to make sure that my actions significantly carry on towards creating a bright future that I try to foresee. If my physical body isn't part of that bright future, my will would be passed down to other people who share my goals. In that sense, my spirit would shine bright like the morning sun and be alive. Rairakku, you could probably feel more alive when you're dancing or modeling if you just put some passion into it."
Risa's speech made Rairakku display the facial expression of reluctantly agreeing with her speech, since the psychic mage did seem to have wisdom in what she was saying. Rairakku started to feel like she had questions that even Risa couldn't answer, as Rairakku wondered why she still felt like crying from seeing this illusion of a morning sky for the first time in her life. She had usually felt that there was nothing wrong with the dark and depressing nature of Gunjou Town. Well, that had been true up until Minerva came along and manipulated Maruberiki into letting her be his right-hand partner.
As Rairakku thought about Minerva, Risa lacked enough magical power to maintain the illusory spell that prevented Minerva from detecting the high amount of magic that was coming from the plaza. The purple-haired woman emerged from a royal purple energy wave that appeared in between Risa and Rairakku, Minerva's hands emerging first for the purpose of trying to aggressively crush their faces, and Minerva fully came out of the energy wave with a sinister smile on her face. She aggressively threw Rairakku to where she crashed into a nearby building, and Minerva threw Risa at Rogue with a high amount of her brute strength.
Rogue quickly caught Risa in his arms, and he wasted no time with using Shadow Drive to reach Kusabue at high speeds. Rogue proceeded to eat the shadows of the aura that surrounded Kusabue's hands, and the shadow dragon slayer gave himself more magical power. Rogue felt that this was necessary, since he turned to glare at Minerva with a stern look of displeasure on his face. Rogue disliked the fact that Minerva left Sabertooth after they lost the Grand Magic Games, and it now seemed that she was still in her unchanged ways of being a vicious winner by trying to kill mages when they had low amounts of magical power.
Rogue refused to let Minerva have the chance to attack Risa, and he unleashed the spell called Shadow Dragon's Raven Breath. Rogue shot out a large black ball of shadowy energy from his mouth, He watched Minerva create some purple energy waves in her hands while the energy of her Territory Magic swirled around in the counterclockwise direction. Minerva's energy waves glowed for a moment, allowing her to warp Rogue's attack to where it landed right in front of her instead of striking her directly.
Minerva watched the attack create a large black blast, even hearing somewhat smaller black explosions occur inside of it from how the shadows of the plaza's debris were also triggered to explode, and Minerva simply narrowed her eyes in an arrogant manner at how Rogue had become stronger. He actually used that attack as a smokescreen for slyly activating Shadow Void, and Rogue shot out a black sphere from his left hand. He watched the sphere go through the black blast, before it struck Minerva.
She was engulfed in the black orb's darkness, before the sphere went down into its own shadow. Rogue got to hear the explosion occur, causing him to smile in a confident manner. However, Rogue's smile quickly changed to a look of shock from seeing Minerva's energy wave warp to being right in front of him. He ended up being hit by Minerva's attack, which created a large royal purple explosion, and he could only open his eyes for a moment to faintly see Minerva reappear in front of him. She proceeded to make two large energy waves appear on her hands while making them have the properties of containing excessive amounts of heat, and Rogue began to aggressively punch Rogue.
Minerva repeatedly struck Rogue's body with her scorching-hot punches, resulting in him coughing up blood while he was burned on several parts of his body. As Rogue panted heavily, Minerva made the energy waves in her hands change to have the properties of titanium. She had been somewhat bruised from Rogue's sneak attack, and training in Hexing Enchantress for several months allowed Minerva to gain that durability. She proceeded to gently make the energy waves touch her chest, allowing them to get absorbed into her body, and Minerva gently touched her abdomen with one hand to feel that it was like tempered titanium.
"You're still as weak as you were in the Grand Magic Games, Rogue. I'll be happy to endure more of your pathetic spells." Minerva told Rogue with a frown of disgust appearing on her face, before smiling in a rude manner.
Upon seeing Risa look angry at how Minerva was treating Rogue, the woman who wore an elegant purple dress asked with a calm smile on her face, "Oh? Did that idiot Sting make you be my replacement after losing the Grand Magic Games, you pink-haired piece of garbage? Didn't the news reports of the Grand Reverie Icy Frigid Tour say that you have powerful pink flames, yet you couldn't melt the spikes before that idiot Juvia got impaled? Actually, aren't you an idiotic psychic for not foreseeing that event?"
As Rogue motioned with one hand for Risa to not interfere, Minerva turned her head to ask him in a disrespectful tone, "Are you angry at me, Rogue? Since it seems that you didn't even fight until now, isn't it sad that I think you're just acting tough when Risa can't protect you? Don't you recall the days of when you and Sting acted subservient towards me and my level of power?"
Rogue chose to not respond, only narrowing his red eyes in a stern manner as he ran towards Minerva. She watched him unleash the spell called Shadow Dragon's Slash, which made a black aura of shadows surround his right hand, and Rogue attempted to slash at Minerva's face. She didn't even step back, letting him see at close-range that the impact against her skin felt like tiny knives barely being able to even scratch her titanium body, and Minerva closed her eyes for a moment. She proceeded to take out some of the crystals from the pockets of her dress, and Minerva squeezed the handfuls of gems to make their auras rapidly go into her body.
Minerva started to grin in a disturbing manner, as the 'S' symbol started to appear on her forehead. That made Rogue step back for a moment, looking concerned as he had seen that same insignia on the foreheads of Tsuki and Rairakku. However, it seemed like they only took in the power of one crystal to amplify their own levels of power. Minerva made herself become much stronger to the point where she made multiple energy waves swirl around on her palms at once, and she slammed all of them against Rogue's chest.
He screamed in pain from feeling the intense power of those explosions, wincing in pain from how they felt like hot meteors slamming against his body. Rogue watched Minerva frown in an angered manner while she fired a much larger energy wave from her right hand, and this energy wave struck Rogue for the purpose of simply putting him in a dome of bright purple light. He was quickly harmed by light purple beams that came down upon him from within the dome, the beams feeling dense as they violently exploded around him.
Minerva fiercely told Rogue with sternness in her eyes, as she fired more energy waves into the dome, "You mages of Sabertooth are just pieces of trash! You refuse to fear the power of Hexing Enchantress, and you've had your heads in the clouds! You belong on the ground, you vile piece of filth!"
As the blasts in different shades of purple quickly faded away to reveal that Rogue was heavily bruised and bloodied, he thought to himself in a pained manner, "I can't... lose here. Risa's done so... much for... me. I need.. to fight hard... to protect her."
Upon seeing Rogue suddenly get teleported towards Minerva for him to repeatedly punch and kick him with tremendous amounts of power in her attacks, Kusabue thought to herself in a concerned manner, "Rogue-san, I cannot let you die! I won't let anyone else precious to me end up dying!"
Kusabue had slightly kept her hands off of the ground during Rogue's fight against Minerva, and she wasted no time with absorbing all of the sound waves from Minerva's strong punches. The last strong punch from Minerva sent Rogue rolling across the ground, before Minerva warped over to him and aggressively kicked him up into the sky with her left leg. Minerva watched Rogue be sent up towards the Gunjou Moon, ignoring that he made one of his hands be engulfed in a black aura. He made his palm aim down at the plaza, resulting in the shadows of the buildings lunging upward like they wanted to grab Rogue.
When one of the shadows lightly touched Rogue's hand, he became engulfed in a black orb of shadows. Other shadows were quickly going towards the orb, coating Rogue in a large sphere of shadows. He inhaled a high amount of air for a moment, resulting in him inhaling all of the shadows. Rogue instantly felt more energixed with the black aura engulfing his body to where high amounts of magical power urrounded his hands, and Rogue was glad that he had unleashed the spell called Shadow Dragon's Black Shield.
That defensive move may not have healed Rogue, but it at least gave him the opportunity to use Shadow Dragon's Raven Breath again. Rogue shot out the spell from his mouth while aiming directly at Minerva, and the attack had more power in it than last time. That didn't stop Minerva from making a wisteria purple energy wave surround her left hand, and she ended up blocking Rogue's attack. It created a black blast that was massive, all of its sound waves being absorbed by Kusabue, and Rogue started smiling as he had a plan.
He proceeded to unleash the spell called Shadow Dragon's Roar, which made Rogue fire a black vortex of shadows from his mouth. He watched the attack head towards the black dome, prompting him to quickly activate Shadow Dragon's Raven Arrows. Rogue aimed his hands at the shadow of his own attack, causing eight raven black projectiles to emerge from it. They all had spearheads, and Rogue's projectiles went towards the dome. Rogue moved his hands around in a quick manner for them to all converge on his attack, however.
As soon as the vortex of shadows was visible to Minerva in the moment where the black dome faded away, Rogue's projectiles aggressively came down on it to create black explosions that were very large! As Minerva stepped back, Kusabue absorbed all of the sound waves into her hands. She started to look at Rogue in a puzzled manner, wondering why he tried to deceive Minerva with a combination attack that wasn't intended to hit her. The explosions struck the ground, allowing Kusabue to absorb the sound waves pertaining to the ground breaking apart.
This prompted Rogue to unleash a spell known as Shadow Dragon's Lunar Underground, and he aimed his head up at the Gunjou Moon. Rogue proceeded to shoot out an onyx black orb of shadows from his mouth, and aiming it up at the town's moon allowed the moonlight to shine upon Rogue's spell. The light that touched the orb produced several thin black shadows on the ground while the onyx black orb started to change its shade to become charcoal black, and the shadows that were produced from this spell quickly slithered into the ground's crevices.
They stayed down there for almost thirty seconds, before propelling up towards the orb in the form of several thin midnight black vortexes. When these vortexes of shadows touched Rogue's orb, it absorbed them and became much larger. The orb even became midnight black, before it darkly shined in that color. Rogue watched the orb stay in midair, but simply snapping his fingers at Minerva caused the orb to descend down towards her. She kept her eyes focused on the orb, ignoring its suspiciously enormous shadow forming around her body.
"What?! Why am I immobilized?!" Minerva asked aloud with an angered facial expression, feeling her legs be restricted from moving.
Rogue explained with a stern look on his face, "When light touches this spell, any shadows from underground are exposed while anyone in their vicinity is immobilized!"
Upon seeing shadowy black flames rise up from the large shadow, Rogue added in a calm manner, "Oh, and this spell also generates black fire if any explosive spells are immediately used beforehand."
As Minerva saw the flames grow to a high height, she widened he eyes in shock from realizing that Rogue combined those spells earlier to deliberately create a large explosion. Those shadows hadn't produced any flames, but Rogue purposely prevented the attack from hitting Minerva for her to be confused enough for him to activate Shadow Dragon's Lunar Underground. Rogue watched the orb rapidly strike Minerva, creating a massive blast that was midnight black and charcoal black while Minerva didn't even scream in pain.
Some of the blast's shadows went over to Rogue, engulfing him in charcoal black and midnight black auras. He proceeded to watch all of the smoke be in the plaza, before letting several thin midnight black beams appear on his fingertips. Rogue applied these new auras of Shadow Dragon Slayer Magic to his feet, allowing him to run at extremely high speeds as if he was using his shadow-related version of Kaze's Feather Dance. Rogue swiftly went up to Minerva, and he stabbed several parts of her body with his shadowy beams.
This spell was called Shadow Dragon's Rough Silk, and Rogue smiled confidently as he differed from his evil self by using it for a good purpose. Rogue's shadows were strong enough to impale Minerva's body, resulting in her being more bruised and bloodied. As blood emerged from her wounds, Minerva started to have feelings of rage in her emerald green eyes. She scowled at Rogue, who was smiling more confidently than he had ever done in the Grand Magic Games, and seeing him prepare to end the battle only made Minerva tightly clench her fists in anger.
"I'm not losing to Rogue! I'm not bowing down to him! There's no way that I'll be defeated by filth and trash such as you!" Minerva exclaimed in a fierce tone, charging up purple auras of her Darkness Magic to where they surrounded her at a wide range while immediately appearing.
As Rogue saw Minerva's eyes lose their pupils in this moment where the insignia from earlier glowed brightly, Minerva told him in a demonic-sounding voice, "I... I will not lose my lust for power! I am... Minerva, goddess of wisdom! Bow down... and die."
The purple auras started to quickly spiral around Minerva, who folded her arms while starting to smirk in an evil manner. She let her skin change to being royal purple, along with her hair, and Minerva's skin soon changed to being amethyst purple while her hair matched that color. Minerva's fingernails became much longer by her teeth became fanged and shaper like a demon, and her shoes were torn through by her feet becoming clawed like she was a wild beast. Minerva's lust for power only strengthened with her anger, but all of that anger forced her to lose control of herself.
Minerva proceeded to become the mere husk of a dark witch, before making two waves of energy form in her hands. The energy waves were royal purple, and Minerva slammed them against Rogue's chest at blinding speeds. He screamed in pain while royal purple blasts occurred, and Rogue coughed up blood from how the properties of Minerva's waves crushed his body. Minerva proceeded to kick him in the stomach, before striking him in the face with several powerful and loud punches that were coated in energy waves.
Rogue could only scream in excruciating pain from how it felt like Minerva was crushing his body with the immense pressure of her magic, and he slowly stood up to see Minerva quickly hit him with a massive energy wave. This attack surrounded Rogue in a massive amount of Heather purple and boysenberry purple lights, which all slowly became lavender, and the density of all the lights in this spell started to make Rogue feel like his body was being ripped apart. He soon felt all of the light exploding around him, the explosions feeling like heat from the hottest depths of a volcano that was filled with magma, and the shadow dragon slayer was engulfed in powerful blasts.
Rogue stated in a pained manner, not wanting to give up as he struggled to stand, "Minerva, I... won't die here. I'm not going... to let you win."
Minerva responded evilly, smirking as she was corrupted enough by her power to feel like killing him, "Well, then I'll just have to end the meager lives of you and your friends."
Before Minerva could unleash several energy waves that were part of the Territory Explosion spell, Kusabue fired a shamrock green beam from her hands. She watched the beam hit Minerva for her to be engulfed in a shamrock green dome that had loud sound waves bouncing off of it. The sound waves were Kusabue's strident and echoing screams, causing Minerva to cover her ears in a pained manner. Kusabue put more strength than usual into this spell, making the sound waves be dense to where they rapidly bounced around while gaining more momentum and loudness.
Minerva fired several energy waves at the barrier, wanting to activate Territory Explosion, and she warped all of the sound waves to be outside of the barrier. That prompted Kusabue to make the attack explode in a massive shamrock green blast, only for Minerva's energy waves to explode in royal purple flames that gained more heat and power from the explosion. Minerva humored Kusabue by letting her skin be more burnt and charred from that attack, along with getting more bruises, but the density of her own explosions seemed to overpower Kusabue's Sound Magic.
The shamrock green smoke was obscured by the royal purple clouds, which were much larger, and Minerva decided that she needed to end this fight. She fired a large energy wave from her right hand, the territory magic being in an Eminence hue of purple, and Minerva aggressively threw the wave at Rogue. Before he could build up enough magical power for the Shadow Dragon's Roar attack, Rogue felt Risa run up to him with Psychic Magic surrounding her feet. She pushed him out of the way at the last second, allowing herself to be caught in the Eminence purple blast instead. As Risa could sense its dark and poisonous energy, Risa didn't even scream as she stretched out her hands to absorb the dark magic.
As Minerva's eyes turned back to normal, she exclaimed with a startled facial expression, "What?!"
Risa replied in an evil tone of voice, as everyone started to see a dark lilac aura surrounding her body in the moments where the blast faded away, "Well, it looks like you put too much dark magic into your attack. I had to open my mouth, just to swallow down all the rest of it."
Rogue asked aloud with a concerned facial expression, seeing Risa have dark lilac hair and dark lilac eyes to match her aura, "Risa, are you all right?"
"I'm feeling my magical power come back in full force, Rogue. Of course, that also can be said for my vengeful and malicious thoughts of maiming Minerva for almost killing you." Risa responded to him with a lustful smirk on her face, before giggling in a sadistic manner.
Risa proceeded to pick up some shadows from the cracks in the ground, before holding them up to the light of the Gunjou Moon. The moonlight merged with Risa's dark lilac aura, causing the shadows to become purple right before she shoved them into her mouth. After easily swallowing them, Risa's aura grew much larger to where Minerva started to tremble. Minerva began to break out in a cold sweat, her thoughts shifting to how the dark lilac magic seemed like Risa had been blessed by Violara's witchcraft, and Risa gave Minerva a glare filled with immense feelings of hatred to where dark lilac flames were starting to cover her hands.
Risa dashed up to Minerva, before striking her in the chest with a fiery punch. The punch caused Minerva's eyes to be blinded by a sudden burst of moonlight that came from the impact right before the flames burned her body in a spiraling dark lilac burst of fire! The flames charred Minerva's skin, along with badly bruising her, and the beams of moonlight were actually dense enough to drill through her skin. As Minerva bled from this attack, the sight of Risa's appearance made her gasp in shock at how Violara seemed to have only told her a half-truth the other day.
Violara may not have hypnotized Risa into becoming her servant, but convincing her to embrace being a dark witch was like a form of manipulation. Minerva even groaned in frustration from thinking that Risa would gladly assassinate her if Violara ordered her to do it, and she felt that it was necessary for her to teleport back to Maruberiki. He probably wouldn't mind that she left Tsuki and Rairakku for dead, as Minerva viewed them to be of no further use to her. In fact, Minerva smirked at Rogue and Risa in her final moments before warping away while she wondered if the last pair of top commanders had been defeated.
Meanwhile, in the Gunjou Theater...
Yukino and Sorano walked into the Gunjou Theater, a place with several pastel purple chairs that were in front of a dark purple wooden stage. The stage had two mages simply standing across from two other mages, and Yukino recognized the girl with the staff as Lila from Mauveria's path. Lila fought alongside a girl who had her red hair become purple from charging up a violet aura of magical power, and she simply wore a dark purple witch's robe that seemed to come from the theater's costume department.
Both of the girls fired light purple beams of Darkness Magic at the two warlocks, only for them to forcibly make themselves dodge the attacks like they were following a script. One of the warlocks was a man who had short pearly purple hair with two dark purple dots bordering the left and right sides of the 'S' insignia on his forehead, and he wore a pastel purple dress shirt with neon purple jeans that matched his neon purple sneakers. The man's accomplice wore a dark purple shirt underneath his lavender blazer, and the deep mauve tome in his right hand went well with his torn jeans that were electric purple. His shoes were studio purple, looking ragged and dirty as if he was a just a sidekick to the other warlock.
The warlocks were actually putting on a performance of a play called Warlocks of the Midnight Steeple, and the cardboard midnight purple church in the background had a large neon purple bell in its center. The bell was loudly rung by one of the mages working on the play's production, but they rang it in a bored manner as the warlocks lazily laughed. They didn't even seem to be taking this theatrical play very seriously, since the warlock with the book proceeded to shoot out a studio purple ball of dark magic from his right hand.
It immediately struck Lila, resulting in a studio purple blast occurring. Lila screamed in pain while falling to the ground, and her teammate ran towards the two men. The one who held nothing in his hands proceeded to create a pastel purple sphere in between his palms, smirking arrogantly as the moonlight shined down from the studio purple skylight to boost the power of his attack. He proceeded to throw the orb down at the ground, watching it spin towards the dark witch on a pastel purple stream of lights that were in that specific hue of purple. The dark witch screamed in agonizing pain from being hit by the attack that created a pastel purple blast, and seeing her also fall to the floor made the warlock have arrogance in his eyes.
"Just like with all the other performances of this play's script, no one can defeat the evil warlocks. Maruberiki-san will be glad that I'm having fun as an actor." The man with pearly purple hair stated to his partner in a calm manner, before grinning in a comical way.
The other warlock responded nicely, before looking a bit bored, "Until those girls get up, we can just stick to the script and stand here with no passion in our eyes. It's merely just life imitating art when the performer is as strong as the character."
Sorano stated to Yukino with a facial expression that displayed her feelings of displeasure, "They weren't even acting like characters in a play. There was no passion in that performance whatsoever."
As some of the depressed dark mages slowly clapped their hands to applaud the two warlocks for easily winning that fight, the curtains came down on the stage for a moment. Some of the set pieces were quietly dragged to the backstage area of the theater while others could be heard entering the stage on wheels, and the stage lights even went off for about ten seconds. Sorano started to slightly smile, feeling like she could use that time to run down the ramp of carpeting that led to where the seats were located.
She ran over to the front seats that were near the stage, taking notice of how they were unoccupied. She sat down in the seat that was on the left end of the row while Yukino ran to that row, and Sorano gently grabbed her hand for them to sit down together. The two women watched the curtains rise up from the bottom of the stage to reveal that the two warlocks simply sat down in some violet-colored leather chairs that were in a room that had the large bell from earlier near the window where a fake Gunjou Moon sent its light into the scene, and the lavender cobblestone floor was above a spiraling deep purple staircase.
As the two warlocks simply stuck to the script of reading their books until the two alleged adventurers would get back on stage, Sorano started to smirk in an amused manner. She didn't think that this play was funny to watch, but she couldn't resist laughing at how bad it was. From her perspective, many jobs that involved theatrical plays wouldn't just have the characters sitting there in a bored manner until the other actors felt ready to come on the stage. If this play was going to drag out until Lila and her teammate were healed enough to perform their lines, then Sorano felt like the script needed to be rewritten.
"The two warlocks must now face the Sabertooth mages who arrived to battle them." Sorano told the two men with an arrogant smile appearing on her face, as she got up from her seat.
That caused the mage with pearly purple hair to respond in an irked manner, "What?! This is an artistic play, yet you are improvising and ruining my script?!"
Yukino spoke for Sorano while starting to have a serious look on her face, "We're actually improving the play, since the battle will be one that the audience never saw before."
Yukino got up from her seat, before walking up the wooden steps that led up to he stage. Sorano giggled in a confident manner while following her sister, and the two siblings watched the warlocks easily jump down from the set piece that had been elevated. The warlock with pearly purple hair was named Yuuta Osorubeki, and his teammate was named Masako Grimm. Yuuta started off this fight by leaping backwards for the purpose of unleashing a spell called Pearl Glitter Smog, and he proceeded to shoot out pearly purple smoke from his mouth.
The smoke was extremely glittery while it started to become neon purple under the actual light of the Gunjou Moon, and the first moments of it engulfing Sorano and Yukino were where the glitter started to detonate in neon purple explosions. That was followed by Masako jumping up into the air to unleash a spell called Moon Blades, and he made his arms go past each other for them to form an 'X' symbol. As his body became engulfed in a studio purple aura, he sent the aura down towards the smoke. The aura proceeded to rain down upon the battlefield, almost like it was several sharp blades of Darkness Magic.
That caused Sorano to send magical power into some coins pertaining to her Angel Magic, and she activated a spell called Holy Shielding Wings. Sorano's body glowed in a light blue aura for a moment, and she watched two large and feathery wings start to appear in midair. The wings stretched downward on the left and right sides, forming a barrier that surrounded Sorano and Yukino while they saw the studio purple blasts occurring on the wings. As some of the smoke reached her feet, Sorano started smirking at how the wings began to glow.
The wings of this spell started to have some of the feathers float up into the air for the purpose of forming a ring, and Sorano would use that as a bit of magic for an upcoming fusion spell. She proceeded to send her Angel Magic into three coins that were all marked with the number 40, and Sorano activated a spell called Angelic Lake. She raised up high into the air for them to be aimed at two large crevices of her shield, and Sorano fired the beams up at the ring. The beams started to glide around on the ring, before breaking off into smaller attacks.
They stayed on the ring, which titled towards the antagonists as it began to rapidly spin in a clockwise manner. The small beams that were on it started to grow larger and duplicate, before firing themselves off of the ring like they were bullets from a turret gun. The high amount of bullets rained down towards the antagonists like water heavily falling into a barren lake, and Sorano watched the beams have enough density to where they created white explosions that broke through some parts of the stage.
Yuuta and Masako both screamed in pain, before the smoke cleared up to reveal that they were durable enough to only sustain minor injuries from the fusion spell. Despite being durable, their screams of pain and angered facial expressions seemed very forced. They screamed as if it was part of a script, almost like they were just pretending that they were actually dark mages. Yuuta proceeded to unleash a spell called Pearly Dark Blossoms, and he put his right hand under his lips as he blew out several pearl purple bubbles from his mouth. They floated through the air like cherry blossoms, and they shined as a way of signifying a boost in power when the moonlight touched them.
As the bubbles floated towards Sorano, Yukino had a stern look on her face and pulled out Libra's golden Zodiac Gate Key. Libra was immediately summoned in front of Yukino, who wasted no time with getting in front of her and moving her hands downward as a way of silently telling Libra how to shift gravity. Libra activated her Gravity Magic by moving her hands downward in a psychic manner, and she made a purple ball of Gravity Magic be created in midair. The sphere started to have a wave of Gravity Magic surrounding it, and Yuuta's projectiles were attracted to it.
"What?! Why is she going off script?!" Yuuta asked with a shocked look on his face, expecting that he and Masako would easily win.
Masako responded to him while looking serious, "Yuuta, we'll also have to improvise!"
Yukino told Libra in a calm manner, as she sent more magical power into some coins pertaining to Icy Fimbulvetr Magic, "Libra, let your sphere absorb those attacks for the level of gravity to increase."
That prompted Libra to kindly respond, "As you wish!"
Libra moved her hands in a psychic manner for the sphere to shift around in a circle, causing the gravity to also shift around in a circle while Yuuta's projectiles were pulled into it. They caused the plain purple sphere to grow much larger, before it became a pearly hue of purple. The attack was sent back towards Yuuta while releasing a strong amount of gravity that made a plain purple aura engulf Yuuta's body, and the aura contained a high amount of Gravity Magic to where Yuuta was pushed down to the ground.
That occurred only mere seconds before Libra's large sphere struck Yuuta to create a massive pearly purple blast, and he was sent flying into the air. As Yuuta activated a spell called Pearly Beam and shot out a slow-moving beam from his right hand, Masako unleashed a spell called Ghostly Stitch. This spell made a studio purple ghost surround his left fist while the ghost was rectangular and thin with dark purple eyes that looked snobby, and Masako acted as he was throwing a punch towards Yukino.
That caused her to see the studio purple ghost grow in size when it was under the moonlight, before it split into seven longer ghosts that all lunged at her. Yukino proceeded to activate a spell called Freezing Spin. Yukino focused the light blue aura into her left fist, causing a large drill of ice to form on it. Yukino simply used her right hand to take out a coin that was marked with the number 50, and gently placing that coin against her ice drill caused it to grow five times its original size. The ice drill spun much faster, creating more frigid winds of Icy Fimbulvetr Magic, and Yukino watched the ghosts immediately start moving at a slower pace.
"Turning the tide in your favor, I see! You're more of a mage than an actor!" Masako told Yukino with a somewhat impressed smile on his face, as he could see that she was effortlessly being a mage.
Yukino asked Masako in a somewhat curious tone, "Why are you trying so hard to be an actor? If you were a good actor, wouldn't you be able to fight like a strong mage?"
Masako retorted with an offended look on his face, feeling insulted, "Don't try to philosophically imply that I'm acting in bad faith by pretending to commit to the choice of being a mage!"
"We have no choice in the matter of trying to be mages who work under Maruberiki-san!" Yuuta shouted with a fierce look on his face, as he watched his beam start to hit Masako's ghosts.
This allowed them to form a spell called Pearly Purple Stitch, and the beam started to make the first ghost be surrounded by a pearly purple aura. That led to the beam going through the ghost while Yuuta's attavk doubled in size, and the attack bent downward. It grazed the next ghost, before growing and hitting another ghost in the chain line, and the ghosts themselves started to have high amounts of heat emanating from them. They melted down into the beam, resulting in it becoming surrounding by fireballs.
The fireballs were all propelled at Yukino in the same moment where the giant beam also went towards her, but this prompted Sorano to unleash a spell called Angelic Snow Dance. Sorano aimed her hands up at the ceiling for her to shoot out a giant white cloud from the space in between her palms. The giant white cloud went up into the air while large light blue wings protruded from it, and the wings began to start flapping. They generated a high amount of freezing-cold wind, which had high amounts of light blue snow in it.
The wind and the snow even descended on to Yukino's body, causing her to be engulfed in a light blue aura while the drill on her hand grew much larger in size. Also, the drill itself was surrounded by icy wind to the point where it moved much faster. This also allowed Yukino to throw much faster punches with the drill on her hand, and she proceeded to punch all of the fireballs that came towards her. They created studio purple blasts, but the intense coldness of the drill caused the studio purple burst of flames to become an icy statue of blue flames.
The statue of flames was aggressively punched by Yukino, who saw the frigid flames become an icy vortex of fire. Sorano decided to merge her magic with Yukino's Icy Fimbulvetr Magic, and she unleashed a spell called Angel's Winged Enhancement. Sorano proceeded to shoot out several light blue angelic wings at Yukino's attack, and the angelic wings glowed brightly as they touched the flames. They strengthened Yukino's attack to make it be much more powerful, and Yukino watched the spell collide with Yuuta's large beam.
The collision resulted in a massive pearly purple blast, which came before a massive light blue blast, and the aftereffect of Angel's Winged Enhancement fusing with another spell caused several small feathers to float down to the ground. The light blue feathers were attracted to Sorano's magical power in the moment where she made the light blue aura mainly be concentrated into her hands, and Sorano proceeded to activate a spell called Angel's Winter Blades. The feathers went into her hands, before Sorano had a confident look on her face.
She proceeded to unleash her spell in the form of two light blue feather dusters, which had dark blue handles, and the giant feather dusters had small amounts of snow falling from them. When Sorano made the feather dusters blow wind towards Masako and Yuuta, the heavy winds were accompanied by Yukino aggressively punching the air with her drill-covered fist. The icy winds strengthened Sorano's attack, even being cold enough to where the winds started to freeze the entire stage. Yukino proceeded to take out three coins that were numbered 30, 40, and 50 while activating a new spell, and she watched the snow from Sorano's winds start to grow in size.
Yukino activated a spell called Icy Fimbulvetr Fang, and she made her hands form a fanged mouth. She interestingly aimed her hands at Sorano, who waved the feather dusters at her. That made icy winds go towards Yukino's hands, causing them to become frozen in ice while large icicles started to emerge from it. Yukino jumped up into the air, before slamming her fanged mouth down on a pile of a snow. That caused the snow to grow much larger, before several light blue wolves with angel wings emerged from the snow.
"Have you changed the play's script to where you'll try to defeat the villains, or are you just playing around?" Masako asked in a joking manner, thinking that Yukino's spell looked ridiculous.
That caused Yukino to reply with a confident smile on her face, "You're really pushing your luck, if you underestimate these wolves."
Sorano thought to herself in a calm tone while looking at Yukino in an impressed manner, "Yukino, you've certainly become a very powerful wizard."
Yukino watched the winged wolves fly towards Masako, who attempted to counter the spell by activating an attack called Spooky Slash. This spell made a studio purple aura surround his hands, and Masako proceeded to aggressively slash the air in front of him. That caused a jagged studio purple blade of Darkness Magic to appear in midair, and Masako slashed the air three more times to make more studio purple waves of dark magic appear. Masako pushed his hands forward, causing the blades to go towards the winged wolves.
When one of the wolves crashed into an energy wave, Yukino watched that wolf gently bite the energy wave for it to become light blue. It started to change into being sky blue, before exploding in a sky blue blast. That caused large pieces of hail to fall from the cold explosion, prompting another winged wolf to ram into the hail. When it touched the hail, the wolf and the hail detonated in a light blue blast that started to become sky blue! That blast contained a high amount of frigid air, which froze Masako's energy waves.
The energy waves were also blown back towards Masako, causing him to be harmed by the attacks. They created an enormous light blue explosion, which was followed by the aftereffect of Masako becoming frozen in ice. This ice was much denser like a powerful fusion spell, and Masako was also frozen to the point where he couldn't even move his face or his limbs. Yukino smiled in a satisfied manner from seeing the dark warlock be frozen, and that only left Yuuta as the final top commander to be defeated.
"Masako, I don't have a choice in not choosing to help you! Just wait for someone else to come on stage and help you!" Yukino stated with an irked look on his face, before building up magical power.
Sorano responded in a confident tone, "Sorry, but this is the final act of the play."
Sorano proceeded to unleash a spell called Angel's Turbulent Mausoleum, and the spell caused the feather dusters in her hands to disappear. They were soon replaced with light blue orbs that had light blue wings, and the orbs began to fly out of Sorano's hands. They aggressively went up to the skylight, before ramming through it to make several shards of glass start to come down on the stage. Some of the glass nearly hit Yukino, who stepped back for a moment to see that the two orbs were intercepting the light of the Gunjou Moon.
They both started to brightly glow in the moonlight, before growing larger from the high amount of cold air that rose up from the damaged stage. The frigid winds caused the angelic orbs to have a hue that was a fusion of celestial blue and pale blue while they glowed lightly, and their wings started to blow the air back down into the theater. The winds made ice form on the glass, which reflected the light off of the glass and the ice for large blue bursts of light to occur. They blinded Yuuta's eyes, and he quickly built up magical power.
As Yuuta hastily fired a spell known as Hallow's Shield for him to quickly be surrounded by two round ghosts that shifted on which one had the expressions of happiness and sadness displayed in their dark purple eyes that were large, Sorano's orbs daintily floated down towards the light. Upon making contact with the light, the orbs glistened much more brightly while they moved at faster speeds. They even became icier from the cold air surrounding the light, and the dense orbs swiftly charged towards Yuuta. He may have been surrounded by two ghosts constantly floating around him in a clockwise circle, but the heavy wind current of cold air slowed their movement just enough for the orbs to reach him.
Yuuta screamed in pain as he was struck by the attack, and Sorano's orbs created a massive blast. The blast was in a mix of pale blue and celestial blue while the high amount of magic in the attack damaged Yuuta's body, and the attack also made Yuuta's ghostly shields become frozen by its icy winds. The frigid air also blew out towards the audience members who had been watching the battle, causing several of them to have pale blue and celestial blue frost forming on their bodies. Those dark warlocks and witches shivered from the coldness, but they weren't feeling hotheaded enough to fight Yukino and Sorano.
The two women watched all of the blue clouds of smoke slowly fade away for them to see that Yuuta was bruised and bloodied by that attack, and he started to become frozen in a thick layer of ice. He was quickly immobilized, frozen like Masako, and both warlocks being out of magical power during this moment meant that they were unable to continue fighting. Since Yuuta and Masako could no longer battle, this meant that Yukino and Sorano were the winners of that fight. In terms of being characters in a play, they were also happy to portray themselves as the heroes who suceeded in their task of defeating the villains.
Yukino smiled nicely at Libra, before letting the black-haired woman go back to the Celestial Spirit World in the same moment where Sorano chose to politely bow towards the audience members. They were all in shock for a moment, finding it somewhat difficult to believe that two of Maruberiki's top commanders had been defeated. However, Lila had a somewhat happy look on her face from feeling like this rewritten theater play rightfully needed an applause for the actresses. She gently clapped her hands, prompting some other audience members to also start cheering.
Some of them even threw bouquets of pearly purple roses on to the stage as if they were intended for Yuuta, and the dark mages truly respected Sorano for committing herself to the role of being a heroic and passionate wizard who needed to defeat the villains. The warlocks were the last pair of top commanders who had been obscuring the route to the dark goddess, and taking them down meant that the path would truly be clear. Although, the sight of two other mages rushing into the theater made the situation of possibly beating all the commanders become more clear to Yukino and Sorano.
"Ara, ara! The last two commanders have been defeated." Kyasurin stated aloud with a pleased smile on her face, before chuckling in a disturbing manner.
Matsuba responded with a calm look on his face, "Maruberiki now only has Minerva as his last line of defense."
That prompted Yukino to state aloud, looking somewhat worried as she wondered about what her former teammate had been doing, "Minerva-sama..."
Yukino had heard several explosions occuring outside earlier, thinking that Minerva was the type of woman who planned on firing sneaky attacks to defeat the Sabertooth mages. Sting and Lucy would likely sense those attacks and be prepared to battle against Minerva, but that thought only made Yukino worry about the rest of her teammates. She and Sorano actually waited outside the Gunjou Theater for as long as possible, thinking that the strongest warlocks or witches were planning to ambush them if other top commanders were busy with fighting against opponents.
When Minerva even proved that she wouldn't ambush Yukino for a fight, this only made Yukino wonder if the mages in different territories of Gunjou Town even had a cohesive strategy that would've helped Hexing Enchantress achieve victory. The dark mages from Gunjou Town's nightclub didn't run towards the theater to protect it when Yukino heard sounds coming from that specific area of the town, and it seemed like the pairs of top commanders formed different groups without having much strategy in place.
Although, this only made Yukino start to widen her eyes in a somewhat worried manner. This fight against dark mages who had very little passion seemed like an easy victory to Yukino, but the battle seemed almost like it was too easy for her and Sorano. That started to make Yukino put a finger to her lips for a moment, as she felt some anxiety at the thought of Maruberiki not really caring if his top commanders ended up being defeated. His massive amount of power was worrisome to Yukino, since he seemed stronger than all of the top commanders, and she honestly dreaded the thought of Maruberiki possibly referring to all of them as his disposable pawns.
"Sorano-nee-sama, we need to find Lucy-sama. We need to find her as quickly as possible." Yukino stated with a grim look on her face, thinking that Lucy was recklessly heading towards the location of the dark goddess.
That prompted Matsuba to interrupt Sorano in a calm manner while walking towards the edge of the stage with Kyasurin by his side, "It wouldn't surprise me if she goes there while being out for blood. It may just be my love for killing, but your friend fighting hard in the Spectral Tower was just as fearsome as that little green-haired girl who seemed like she wanted to tear Tsuki into several pieces. In the latter's case, I didn't expect her rampage to be so berserk."
Sorano asked Matsuba with a puzzled look on her face, wondering if she and Yukino needed some information, "Are you talking about that little girl named Kusabue? Didn't she go off to one path with Kūkiatsu? If she's on a rampage and determined to beat up dark mages, then are you trying to say she's avenging Kūkiatsu?"
Kyasurin spoke for Matsuba, tap dancing as she disturbingly had a gleeful look in her eyes, "Kūkiatsu... is dead. Ara, ara. That may surprise you, but Kusabue-chan's bloodlust and dark expression even made me want to run far away from her. Although, you may like that she killed Ayame."
Upon hearing that Kūkiatsu was dead, Yukino immediately put her hands over her mouth while a look of shock entered her hazel eyes. Kūkiatsu being dead personally affected her, since he and Kusabue felt like they needed to help her out in that fight against Harui of the Green Meadow's Five Groves, and the two siblings even included Yukino in their personal desire for eliminating the dangerous perfumes that were being produced in the research lab. Yukino felt that Kūkiatsu was glad to accomplish the goal of getting rid of the perfume pandemic, but it had also been important to find the head botanist.
After finding Gardenia, Kūkiatsu probably felt that his new goal was to help Lucy get her body back at any cost. Everyone else had that same goal, but Yukino never wanted anyone to die in the process of helping her friend get all seven legendary rings. It had been bad enough that the retrieval of the third ring came at the expense of Kirie dying while Yukino was brainwashed by Kanata, and Yukino truly did still feel guilty of letting herself fall into that type of darkness. At the same time, she sternly looked at Sorano during this moment where she thought that Minerva was still letting herself fall into darkness by supporting Maruberiki's desire to please the dark goddess.
Meanwhile, near the harbor of Gunjou Town...
Minerva teleported to the harbor of Gunjou Town, feeling like she needed to hide behind one of the warehouses as she was bruised and bloodied. She didn't want Rogue's nose to detect the smell of her blood, as that would make Risa be led to her location, and Minerva's charred body was damaged to where she felt that this was a good time to rest before going back to Gunjou Cave. Getting more purple crystals of Darkness Magic from there would allow Minerva to continue strengthening her magic, and she hoped to become dangerous enough to defeat both Risa and Violara.
The dark witch who watched over the Heatherberry Swamp certainly meddled in Minerva's goal of using power from the dark goddess to annihilate all of the Sabertooth mages, since Violara never even disclosed to Minerva that she had a hand in amplifying Risa's magical power. If that amplification of Risa's magic never occurred, then she wouldn't have been able to absorb Maruberiki's magic. Minerva always perceived Maruberiki as being much stronger than Violara and Mauveria, even if Maruberiki had informed her that a dark witch fully giving up her soul would allow that witch to be blessed with strong assortments of dark magic.
Minerva started to have an irked look on her face from feeling like this guild war would reach the point where she would have to offer up her own soul to the dark goddess, since Minerva felt that Risa and Rogue were more powerful than what she initially thought about their levels of strength. They would probably be terrified if Minerva gained a massive surge in power that came at the cost of sacrificing her own soul, as Minerva's immense feelings of anger and sadism would only drive the dark goddess towards being more insane than before.
As long as the goddess blessed her with much more power, Minerva wouldn't mind if Miko offered up her soul to the dark goddess. Quelling her madness wouldn't stop Minerva's own thoughts of ruling over the town of Gunjou, as the defeated top commanders had already proven themselves to be like pawns. Minerva even thought about forcing Rairakku to fight Tsuki in a battle to the death when Hexing Enchantress would emerge victorious, since that would probably send a message about how their consecutive losses in this guild war wouldn't be tolerated.
"Hey, it seems like the path is finally cleared up!" Sting stated aloud in a confident manner, causing Minerva to go in the shadows between two other warehouses for her to see the blonde-haired dragon slayer standing on a nearby tree branch.
Miko added aloud in a calm tone, feeling pleased, "This means that you can now go to the Tyrian Temple, Lucy-sama! Not only would the ring of the dark goddess be there alongside the goddess herself, but the scrolls of the dark arts may also help you!"
Minerva slowly walked towards the group from behind in the same moment where Lucy nicely replied, "Getting that seventh ring will be the best moment of my life, but we can't just disregard Maruberiki. After all, he may be intent on killing us."
Lucy's remark only made Minerva smirk in a somewhat impressed manner, as she really thought that the green-haired girl would recklessly try to attack Maruberiki right now. He and Minerva both had enough dark magic to sense that the illusory route to the dark goddess started having its magic power weaken in the moments where Ayame perished and Tsuki fled from Kusabue, so the most foolish mages would've assumed that a weaker barrier could've easily been torn through by using powerful spells.
However, the fake street's image could only be maintained by the auras of Darkness Magic being kept up by the mages who wielded different shades of purple dark magic, and every defeated commander signified more parts of the barrier getting removed. Minerva did recall how Rairakku showed up at Maruberiki's house without Kajino by her side, which only made her lightly scoff at how Maruberiki seemed like he didn't even put much passion into choosing the eight commanders. Minerva felt like they were no longer necessary, especially since they didn't willingly want to use the crystals from Gunjou Cave.
Instead of getting power from the depths of the cave, they all seemed to enjoy being under the Gunjou Moon. Minerva didn't care for the moon itself, as she believed that the area floating near it in midair wasn't for anything special. Everyone besides her seemed to deeply respect the lore behind Gunjou Town's moonlight, almost like they viewed the moon as something sacred. That also applied to Miko, who was about to walk away with Lucy while Sting jumped down from the tree. Upon remembering how Sting talked about the white light in his spells purifying his enemies, Minerva felt that something similar needed to be done with her dark magic.
"Miko, it appears that you're finished with sightseeing in Gunjou. Although, your friends from Sabertooth aren't exactly a pleasant sight for me to look at." Minerva told Miko in a calm tone, walking towards her with a feigned look of boredom on her face.
Sting asked Minerva with a stern facial expression, subtly getting in front of Lucy to protect her, "Milady? What in the world do you want? Haven't you and your friends given us enough trouble?"
Minerva replied to Sting in a disgusted manner, as her eyes showed displeasure from seeing him, "I could ask you the same question, Sting. Although, I must say that you certainly are bold for creating an army out of several pieces of garbage."
As Lucy was about to defend Sting, Minerva told Miko in a kinder manner, "Miko, the path to the Tyrian Temple has been revealed for you. I'm pleased to inform you that the dark goddess is waiting in the depths of the temple for you to speak with her. Of course, the waning Darkness Magic is only fueling her anger to where she may make dark mages become hostile enough to kill you. Therefore, offering up your soul to her is the only way to stop Maruberiki from carrying out her orders."
Miko responded with a calm look on her face, nearly resigning to that fate, "Minerva, I... I still haven't even talked to Maruberiki, but..."
Lucy interrupted in a stern manner, looking displeased as her presence annoyed Minerva, "If Miko offers up her soul, then she'd only become a witch! If that's what you want, then I'll just take down that goddess for her madness to end!"
Lucy's words only made Minerva roll her eyes in an annoyed manner, as she felt like Lucy was now showing the same kind of arrogance that led to her own defeat at Minerva's hands during the Naval Battle in the Grand Magic Games. Minerva felt that Sting and Lucy were just being disgustingly arrogant, having so much confidence in getting the seventh ring and defeating Maruberiki. Minerva still believed that Maruberiki could decimate Lucy with his powerful spells of Darkness Magic, as his punches were likely stronger than any attack she could use if she had the ring of the dark goddess.
Minerva started to have a slight frown on her face from recalling that Maruberiki wasn't able to wear the legendary ring, but that was only because he couldn't find it. In fact, no one in Gunjou Town had been wearing a legendary ring. No one had been able to use Darkness Magic without learning their magic from the crystals, books, or some scrolls and Minerva had only seen the strongest warlocks and witches be as brave as her in the task of going to the Tyrian Temple. Maruberiki may have entered that temple multiple times in Minerva's first few days as a member of Hexing Enchantress, but he never spoke of any enemies guarding the treasures there.
In fact, Minerva recalled how she and Maruberiki found a purple book in one area of Gunjou Cave that had been under the Tyrian Temple. There were treasures in that place, as well as under it, and there was even a rumored path up to the floating area that was under the Gunjou Moon. Minerva seemed interested in exploring all three paths during the process of seeing if Miko would give up her soul to the dark goddess, but the sight of her own blood still dripping from her wounds made Minerva slightly pant to where she needed to warp away from the Sabertooth mages as a way of letting them have the chance to escape. Even if they left Gunjou Town again, Minerva felt like Sting and Lucy were just giving her enough time to form a strategy where she could annihilate everyone when they were at their fullest levels of magical power.
How was Chapter 67? Feel free to tell me your thoughts on it. Risa managed to stop Kusabue from killing Tsuki and Rairakku, but that didn't stop them and Rogue from having to deal with Minerva trying to attack them when the group was weakened. Although, Minerva's choice of viewing Tsuki and Rairakku as dispensable may end up being a bad decision in the end. Also, Sorano and Yukino defeated the last pair of top commanders for the path to the Tyrian Temple to be revealed. Although, the fact that all the battles occurred in the same day means that the protagonists have to leave Gunjou with feelings of exhaustion. However, that may give them a bit of time to possibly get a new ally. By the way, this is the tenth part of the Mauve Darkness Arc! I'll update soon. :)
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