The battle between the two was a high-speed combat in a realm incomprehensible to ordinary people.
Ryuvius, already proficient in hand-to-hand combat, had his abilities dramatically enhanced upon transforming into a dragon form. Conversely, Yuka boasted a dramatically improved physical capability through layering physical enhancements, disregarding risk. Each strike held lethal power in a fierce battle where even a moment's lapse was impermissible.
Fists flew, clashing with each other in a primitive fight, unexpectedly devoid of the sound of clashing swords typical of a battlefield. Though primitive, Ryuvius had various weapons at his disposal: sharp claws, tough dragon scales, and even black wings and a tail. On the other hand, Yuka only had her fists. This discrepancy was significant.
Nevertheless, Yuka dodged those ferocious attacks, sometimes parrying them with her arms, and seized the slightest opening to land her only weapon, her fist.
An evenly matched offensive and defensive struggle ensued. Each hit was returned with another. Yet, none of those hits were decisive. Although damage accumulated, it never reached either combatant’s core.
During a certain kind of stalemate, it was the less experienced Yuka who moved first.
Ducking under a backfist thrown by Ryuvius, she quickly closed in. As she thrust her right fist with all her might towards the vulnerable Ryuvius, whose posture was open after swinging his arm...
"How naive!!"
A powerful strike from the coiled tail assails her from the side.
"Damn it...!"
Twisting her body from the position where she’d thrust her right fist, she forcefully sweeps it away with a backfist, managing to stay close to Ryuvius even as she was slightly pushed back by the tail.
"Raaah!!"
With a short battle cry, she steps forward, swinging her left fist with all her might.
Thud. Yuka’s small yet powerful strike impales Ryuvius. A groan escapes him as the punch pierces his abdomen, and then, his smile deepens in delight.
"You really don’t seem human with that strength. But it's not enough! Not yet!"
"How tough can you be!"
Exasperated by the unbelievable hardness of the abdomen she’d hit, Yuka launches a follow-up attack. Ryuvius counters, opening his jaws, now brimming with sharply pointed teeth, to crush her.
"Eeek!?"
She narrowly avoids the unexpected counterattack by arching her upper body backward, using the momentum to plant both hands on the ground and forcefully kick upwards.
"Guugh!"
Ryuvius is forced to close his jaw due to a kick from below. But he's not one to end things there.
"Haaah!!"
The black wings on Ryuvius' back strike the air powerfully. Suddenly, a wind, akin to a typhoon, sweeps up Yuka.
"Aaahhhhhhh!?"
With no means to resist the gust, especially after launching her kick, Yuka is swept up like a leaf in the wind.
"You can't move in the air!"
Spreading his ominously dark wings, Ryuvius kicks off the ground, soaring toward the airborne Yuka.
"Uh oh..."
Anxiety builds as Ryuvius rapidly approaches from below.
Yuka has no way of maneuvering in mid-air like Izayoi. While she received a brief overview of footwork-forming magic from him, it's incomplete. Using it successfully in this real battle situation is a fifty-fifty gamble at best.
But if she doesn’t do something, it’s over. Incomplete or half-baked, she has to try.
Suppressing her frantic mind with rationality, she constructs the magical formula in her mind. Creating it won’t be as easy as when Izayoi creates illusions while also using other magic in an instant.
It's precision work that allows no minor mistakes. A half-baked strength won’t create a stable foothold. What she needs is a foothold that can at least withstand her own kick.
In the pressing situation where the distance with Ryuvius shrinks by the second, she finishes the formula when he is less than five meters away.
The invisible foothold she hastily creates is formed perpendicularly to the ground, like a wall.
Kicking off the foothold with a shred of doubt about its strength, Yuka manages to alter her falling direction. While feeling relief, she clenches her right fist toward Ryuvius, who is flying directly at her.
Ryuvius, who was certain she couldn’t maneuver, widens his eyes at Yuka’s movement. Then, Yuka, with her fist clenched, descends upon him.
"Take thisssssssss!!"
A mighty fist, further empowered by the momentum of her fall, cleaves through the air. Ryuvius tries to block it with his arm in the aerial, unsteady position where he can’t deflect the impact. His arm is forcibly deflected, leaving him openly vulnerable.
Yuka pulls back her right fist to strike once more, recognizing a second absolute "Therefore, there was no way to stop Yuka now in her assault against Ryuvius. Even if he had a method to soar through the sky, fighting freely in mid-air without a foothold was something that even the impressive Ryuvius couldn’t manage.
A pale blue light enveloping her fist eventually reached a critical point, beginning to scatter fiercely, sparks of the same color throughout the area.
— Now!
'This is the end!!'
Judging intuitively that her power had accumulated to its limit, Yuka unleashed her fist, which seemed ready to explode at any moment, toward Ryuvius.
'Guooooo!!'
Even though his vision was completely engulfed by the pale blue light, Ryuvius, refusing to just be defeated, stretched out both arms, black wings, and even his tail to intercept Yuka. Probably intending to somewhat mitigate the impact.
However, there was no way that a blow capable of breaking Izayoi’s defensive barrier could be fully caught with that level of defense.
First, the fist made contact with the tail that was positioned most outwardly. Instantaneously, a silent explosion of magical power not only repelled the tail but also blasted away the black wings that were covering Ryuvius.
Ryuvius, who was dragged out from within the black wings, opened his eyes wide as if he were momentarily bewildered, but he soon gritted his teeth, crossed his remaining arms, and braced himself against the oncoming impact.
Yuka’s fist relentlessly pierced through both of Ryuvius’s arms.
In an instant, the stored magical power became a great torrent, attacking both Ryuvius and Yuka.
'Gu, aaaaaaaaaah!?'
'Kuh, damn ittttt!!'
Ryuvius screamed in agony as his entire body was battered by an unprecedented impact. Yuka too, while being battered by a recoil she had not anticipated, desperately endured with spirit and grit.
The torrent of magical power, akin to a massive flood, propelled the two downward like jet thrust, and Yuka and Ryuvius, becoming a single shooting star, began to fall towards the ground with unimaginable speed.
'Ngu, it’s not over yet!!'
In the midst of falling, Ryuvius, trying to escape, moved his repelled tail. However,
'I won’t let youuuuuuu!!'
To prevent him from resisting, Yuka recklessly formed a foothold and kicked through the emptiness of space. The hastily formed foothold shattered into pieces with a single step, but it played its role well enough in accelerating their descent.
Thud! The increased pressure from the acceleration caused Ryuvius’s tail to miss its target, striking empty space.
While letting out a small click of his tongue at having his counterattack avoided, he tried to swing his tail once more —
'— Go for itttttttttttttt!!'
With Yuka’s scream accompanying them, the two crashed into the ground like a meteor.
▼
The place where Yuka and Ryuvius crashed was exactly where they had been fighting, a space where neither humans nor monsters were present.
The moment the two became a single shooting star and fell to the ground, a shockwave as if a real meteor had crashed ran through the battlefield.
A large crater was formed at the point of impact, dust and chunks of earth were scattered, and the surrounding area was engulfed by a dust storm.
Within the center of the crater swallowed by the dust storm, Yuka, her entire body covered in wounds, shakily rose to her feet.
Everywhere in her body screamed in severe pain. In fact, she felt like she was on the verge of vomiting and screaming out at any moment.
The pale blue phosphorescence that had enveloped her body at some point disappeared, and her whole body felt as heavy as lead. Probably, that light had been granting her not only physical enhancement but also a continuous super-recovery. The accumulated fatigue was crashing down on her due to its disappearance.
While barely keeping her consciousness that felt ready to fly away at any moment in check through sheer willpower, Yuka began to walk, attempting to crawl out of the crater.
Behind her, Ryuvius, who had been lying on his back, stirred faintly.
'To think that I, of all people, would lose...'
Ryuvius muttered, somewhat emotionally, having reverted from his dragon form to his human appearance.
'You win, human. Go ahead, deliver the finishing blow.'
Saying so, Ryuvius sprawled out his limbs, waiting for execution like a convicted criminal. Glancing at him, Yuka let out a sigh as if she were exhausted.
'Sorry, but I don’t have the desire to kill you. Once you understand, could you promptly take your monsters and leave?'
'...Really, you are a child who knows nothing of reality.'
Now it was Ryuvius’s turn to be exasperated.
'But, it is I who lost to that child. So, I shall withdraw with dignity.'
Ryuvius, curiously compliant in deciding to retreat, made Yuka knit her brows in suspicion.
'Hey, could it be that you never intended to win from the start?'
Half in doubt, she inquired about Ryuvius’s true intentions.
This demon had proclaimed contradicting things repeatedly. Such as there being no chance of winning, or that revival was impossible. Considering these statements, Yuka's speculation didn’t seem completely off the mark.
To Yuka’s question, Ryuvius responded with silence, merely warping the corners of his mouth cynically.
Yuka briefly wore a complicated expression at his demeanor but loosened up, sensing a familiar presence approaching.
Emerging from the center of the hazy vision within the rising dust was Izayoi, "Soon, this place will be visible from outside. What will you do?"
"What do you mean 'what will I do'..."
Yuka, when asked, glances back at Luvius, who has collapsed behind her. Sensing the meaning behind her gaze, Izayoi lets out a small sigh.
"I'll take care of him. I'll drop him off in the Boundary Forest or something, so don’t worry."
"...Don’t harm him."
"I know. You’re the one who defeated that demon. I have no right to interfere."
Casually dismissing the anxious gaze Yuka casts upward, Izayoi lightly pushes her back.
"Go. It’s a triumphant return for the hero who protected the city."
"Hey, stop with the exaggeration."
"Even so. Considering it’s Lilith we’re talking about, she might be eagerly awaiting your grand return."
Teasingly said by Izayoi, Yuka imagines the scene and significantly cringes her cheeks.
"Just kidding. Be careful on your way back."
With a wry smile, he gently pats Yuka’s head and approaches Luvius, who is still lying on his back. Behind him, a loud squealing voice can be heard, but it soon fades away into the distance.
Izayoi looks down, Luvius looks up. A certain tension stretches silently between the two, glaring at each other. The cause is the hostility from Luvius, similar to hatred.
A hostility that wasn't there when talking to Yuka. It swells up the moment they get close, directed personally at Izayoi.
Izayoi notices the hostility emanating from Luvius. Noticing it, he speaks.
"Let’s talk for a bit."
▼
Suddenly, a meteor appeared right in the middle of the sky above the army of monsters. Right after it fell to the ground, all the monsters ravaging the battlefield stopped moving.
Every monster turned their eyes towards where the meteor had fallen, their figures somewhat melancholic, and the soldiers and adventurers who had been fighting braced themselves, unsure of what was to come.
In front of them, the great army of monsters turned their backs all at once.
"Huh?"
Every human on the battlefield let out a bewildered voice.
The enemies, who had been fighting and killing until just moments ago, suddenly turned their backs and returned to the Boundary Forest. Even though the monsters’ forces should have had the overwhelming advantage, a heavy atmosphere, like that of a defeated army, hung around their retreating figures.
In such an inexplicably bizarre situation, not a single human tried to launch a surprise attack on the retreating monsters. They worried that provoking them might cause them to return.
Humans could only stand there, dumbfounded, as they watched the scene, which resembled a receding tsunami, unable to do anything else.