Celestia’s steps as she left the Bartholomew practice field were light, as if she were walking on clouds.
As she descended the narrow path of the northern mountain to return to Professor Clayton’s laboratory, her face was filled with a smile she could not hide.
The conversation she had just had inside the practice field replayed endlessly in her mind.
Lowell’s voice had been the same as always, but the weight within it had been more than enough to completely upend Celestia’s heart.
Even if he could not remember, even if he did not know why she cherished him, he had not pushed away the kindness she offered because it was warm.
In particular, the words Lowell had shyly added just before they parted had been decisive.
“Celestia, if it’s you, you can stop by anytime. If something difficult happens like today, I’ll help you.”
Each time she recalled that promise, the corners of Celestia’s mouth kept twitching.
She was usually known throughout the academy as a diligent honor student, but at this moment, she had forgotten the eyes around her and was giggling like someone with a screw loose.
When she remembered the part where Lowell had complimented her, calling her pretty, her cheeks flushed again, and she even fanned herself with her hand.
Lowell’s gentle, affectionate words piled up in her chest and blossomed into a soft, swelling sense of relief.
As Celestia descended the walking path, steeped in such rosy delusions, her steps abruptly came to a halt.
Amid the pleasant breeze through the pines, an alien ripple began to mix in.
The low-ranking spirits scattered through the air had suddenly begun moving restlessly, like tangled threads.
“…?”
It was not their usual peaceful whispering.
As if being chased by something, the spirits whirled chaotically around Celestia, letting out sounds close to screams.
Voices without even definite forms pierced sharply into her mind.
Celestia’s purple eyes, which had been loose and smiling moments ago, instantly sank into calm as she guarded every direction.
The silence of the northern mountain was replaced in an instant by an eerie tension, and the spirits’ urgent warnings grew louder and sharper, beginning to shake the entire forest.
Something had gone wrong—terribly wrong.
Instinctively, Celestia clenched the empty air.
The mana of the atmosphere flowing along her fingertips had already lost its peaceful current and was twisted in a grotesque manner.
This was not a simple rampage caused by overflowing magic power.
Like an elaborately honed blade, a sharp killing intent, under someone’s clear will, was forcibly wringing the mana of the mountain range and completing an arrogant tuning.
“…This isn’t simply magic that has lost its way.”
Someone was forcibly drawing in and controlling this enormous stream of magic power.
The reason the forest spirits were screaming and scattering, and the reason the walking path where Lowell’s warmth had lingered was instantly filled with a hellish pressure, was that ominous will.
Celestia’s brow furrowed fiercely.
The soft warmth that had bloomed in her as she recalled Lowell’s gentle voice only moments ago was instantly replaced by cold fighting spirit.
She could not tolerate an existence that dared to defile this peaceful daily life promised with Lowell, the air of the northern mountain that was her sanctuary.
Celestia’s purple eyes darkened deeply, and she explosively released the magic power dormant within her.
[ High-Tier Magic: Scorching Heat (灼熱) ]
The moment her lips parted coldly, an enormous magic circle spread out from beneath Celestia’s feet, geometric lines stretching in every direction.
Tssssss—!
With a chilling noise caused by the mana in the air grinding against itself, a core of purple flame exploded with her at its center.
It was not a flame that simply burned objects.
It was a flame of annihilation that used space itself as fuel.
Like a starving beast, the fire expanded as it devoured in one gulp the impure remnants of magic power clinging stickily to the air.
Kwa-rururung—!
The purple flames that swallowed the area in an instant consumed the murky mana tormenting the spirits and surged upward into pillars of fire dozens of meters tall.
Wherever the flames brushed past, everything evaporated cleanly, leaving not even a scream behind, to the point that even the density of space grew thin.
The forest, which had been crushed beneath a grotesque pressure, was now replaced by the eerie stillness of a vacuum.
Celestia glared fiercely beyond the curtain of purple flames still shimmering like a haze.
There, the source of the magic power that continued to flaunt its immense presence while twisting the atmosphere lay hidden.
There was no longer any trace of the giggling girl in her eyes.
Only rage burned there, aimed at the intruder who had touched a domain that should never have been violated.
“There you are.”
Her low, sunken voice rang coldly through the air as it scattered into ash.
In the silence that had become a vacuum after the purple flames swept through, a figure beyond the burned air slowly wavered into view.
It had pulled a pitch-black robe down over itself to the tips of its head, hiding its body, but the cold blue eyes gleaming brightly from within that deep darkness could not be concealed.
The instant Celestia met those grotesque eyes, goosebumps rose over her from instinctive revulsion.
The magic power pouring from him was not a flow one would expect from a living being.
It was stained with terrible malice and impure remnants, like a foul-smelling mist rising from a rotting swamp.
“…Ominous.”
With Celestia’s short, chilling declaration, purple flames once again rose from her feet like snakes raising their scales and stretched out in every direction.
Her magic power was explosively swelling, as if it would devour the enemy at any moment and leave not even ash behind.
Grrrrrr—!
A low vibration, as though tearing through space, resounded throughout the entire mountain range.
Behind Celestia, a massive shadow rose like a great mountain.
Emerging through the lingering afterglow of the purple flames was the enormous wolf with fur mixed in silver and gray, the high-ranking spirit Celestia commanded—Silver.
Silver’s usual noble and composed bearing was nowhere to be seen; his hackles stood on end as he bared sharp fangs at the robed being.
In the spirit beast’s eyes lay unprecedented vigilance and fear.
“Celestia, be careful! That one is dangerous!”
Silver’s heavy voice struck directly against her mind.
Never before had a high-ranking spirit, possessing dignity comparable to a divine being, sent such an urgent, screaming warning.
“The power lurking inside that creature’s flesh is directly defying the providence of life. That is not mere killing intent, but an abyss that gnaws away at every existence around it. Even facing it is dangerous!”
Even at the high-ranking spirit’s desperate warning, Celestia did not avert her gaze.
Rather, as if answering Silver’s advice, the purple flames swimming around her began expanding more violently, crushing the atmosphere.
Without saying a word, the opponent slowly raised a finger toward Celestia.
At that single, monotonous movement, the taut flow of magic power wrapped around Celestia’s entire body was thrown out of alignment at once.
Snap.
A strange sound, as though a thread had been cut, burrowed into her eardrums.
At the same time, the countless low-ranking spirits that had been screaming while guarding Celestia’s side vanished as if they had been a lie.
No—it was not only the spirits that had disappeared.
The trees of the northern forest that had been burning in purple flame moments ago, the dirt beneath her feet, and even the sunset above her head.
Every scene was eroded into black darkness, as though ink were spreading across it.
“What is this…?”
Celestia’s eyes wavered with bewilderment.
In an instant, every direction was covered in absolute darkness where not even an inch ahead could be seen.
In the silence that seemed to paralyze her senses, only Celestia and Silver, growling low beside her, existed.
This was not a simple illusion spell.
It was an ultimate art close to “world creation,” which overlaid reality with a unique domain belonging solely to the caster, among the highest order even of advanced magic.
Within this abnormal space, which could not even be maintained with any ordinary amount of magic power, Celestia felt her own mana being pressed down heavily, as if it had sunk into a swamp.
“Celestia, get ahold of yourself! Control of the space has completely passed to him!”
Silver roared in a voice mixed with panic, but the opponent simply floated like a ghost in the darkness and opened his mouth.
The voice flowing from inside the robe was distorted so grotesquely that even its gender could not be guessed.
“Celestia Avelon.”
When the deeply hidden surname even she had lived while forgetting flowed from another’s mouth, Celestia’s complexion turned pale.
Like a judge pronouncing fate, he calmly continued.
“That person gave you sufficient opportunities. Opportunities to prove the noble power flowing through your body. But you refused to become that person’s sword and chose instead to hide yourself within a worthless peace.”
His blue eyes flashed within the darkness.
As if savoring Celestia’s fear, he slowly approached and added,
“No further self-indulgence will be permitted. Now, so that you may fulfill the role you were originally meant to undertake, I shall personally assist you.”
The moment his words ended, the darkness on all sides became sharp thorns and began pouring down toward Celestia and Silver.
However, the world of darkness created by the opponent’s arrogance paradoxically transformed into the perfect arena where the great calamity known as Celestia could run wild without restraint.
The true magic power she had usually suppressed out of concern for the massive damage it would cause to the academy facilities and surrounding forest finally slipped its reins and began to rampage.
When Celestia once again explosively released the mana within her, cracks like shattering glass began to spread through the space filled with absolute darkness.
The brilliant purple radiance surging up from the ground violently pushed away the darkness that had spread like ink and dyed the world anew, while the atmosphere trembled as if screaming.
[ High-Tier Magic: Meteor Crash ]
With a small gesture from Celestia, the empty darkness tore open, and an enormous dimensional gate appeared.
What emerged from beyond it were gigantic fragments of stars wreathed in blazing purple flame.
Even if this was an imaginary world created by the caster, Celestia’s magic power forced its way through the sky as if mocking its laws and summoned a constellation of ruin down to the earth.
Kwa-rururung—!
With an overwhelming roar that shook the entire space, dozens of meteors poured down toward the unidentified being.
The world that had been darkness on all sides now burned dazzlingly with the purple flashes Celestia emitted, and even gravity twisted as every destructive energy concentrated above his head.
She looked down with expressionless eyes at the world filled with her light.
Now that she no longer needed to worry about causing damage to her surroundings, within this sealed space she was no different from a god presiding over death.
The high-ranking spirit Silver also responded to Celestia’s explosive magic power, transforming his form to a grotesquely enormous size.
Silver’s shadow now expanded beyond the mere shape of a wolf until it filled the sky, looking down oppressively at the unidentified being like a predator trying to devour this world itself.
His silver mane now held purple lightning as it radiated a ferocious force, and his massive gaze constricted the being’s breath, leaving not a single place to hide in the darkness.
Celestia’s eyes were no longer clear purple, but dyed a deep violet that blazed as if it would burn away everything.
The killing intent aimed at the intruder who had dared to dismiss the modest daily life she wanted to enjoy as an ordinary student, the gentle future Lowell had promised her, as self-indulgence and tried to trample upon it, rang out as a frictional scream tearing through the air.
“Who are you to give me opportunities?”
Amid the pouring purple radiance, Celestia’s shadow wavered grotesquely and began seizing sovereignty over the space.
The world of darkness he had created had already been consumed by her magic power and transformed into a vast purple execution pyre.
“I never gave you bastards permission to run your mouths about who I am or what my surname is.”
Celestia murmured coldly, as if suppressing bottomless rage.
The purple flames swirling around her now took shape, becoming sharp blades aimed at his limbs.
Beneath the feet of the enlarged Silver, Celestia advanced toward him one step at a time.
Wherever her footsteps touched, the laws of the space he had constructed screamed and collapsed.
Celestia’s attack was utterly ruinous.
Even an existence capable of wielding high-tier magic, possessing the nature of magic power that made even the high-ranking spirit Silver wary, could do no more than barely defend itself before Celestia’s true power.
If he had observed the strength she had shown at the academy until now and prepared accordingly, then it had been a clear miscalculation.
Because she was far too kind, she had always suppressed her strength so her opponents would not be hurt and so her precious academy would not be destroyed.
The price of touching Celestia’s reverse scale was by no means light.
Celestia quietly gazed at the opponent beyond the wavering purple flames as he endured while coughing blood.
In contrast to the violently boiling magic power, her voice had sunk low and calm enough to send chills down the spine.
“This worthless world you worked so hard to make will end up becoming your grave.”