Start with a blitz from the opening move.
When you factor in the Archbishop's advantage, there is no other path.
So Ermes would—in a single breath. To reach Johann, deep within the enemy formation, by the shortest route—
"Formula Replay—'
Seamless Great Eagle
'"
A spell that grants flight. He unleashes one of his trump cards.
His body shoots upward in an instant. To bulldoze past everything blocking the path to the Archbishop, he propels himself to a realm only he could reach from here—
—Before that.
"!!"
A flash of light seared Ermes's eyes.
He twisted his body in midair on instinct, and a split second later, a searing beam grazed past him.
He'd been sniped.
(Of course…!)
But for Ermes, even this was well within expectations.
Even if his precognition was currently imperfect, Ermes remained the one most easily read.
The measures he would take would naturally be anticipated.
Besides, this was'
Seamless Great Eagle
'—or rather, it was Ermes's weakness.
He
could not
handle multiple
Bloodline Magics
at the same time
.
In other words, while he was currently airborne, he couldn't use any other Bloodline Magics. What's more, reproducing magic this complex even restricted his use of Enhanced universal magic.
In short—against an opponent who possessed some form of aerial sniping capability through a Magical tool, like the current Archbishop, he would simply be making himself a perfect target.
If he could ascend to an altitude beyond their reach, that would be another matter—but his opponent would never allow it. At this rate, he would almost certainly be shot down without recourse.
(No choice.)
He immediately shifted his thinking.
This approach was doomed from the start—so be it. He would simply switch to a frontal breakthrough.
With that resolve, he dispelled the magic and planted his feet on the ground—to hide among the soldiers and fight his way through to the Archbishop. The very instant he did—
The ground where he landed blazed with light, and from it, multiple whip-like tendrils of purple thorns sprang forth.
They lunged at him with terrifying speed, attempting to ensnare Ermes.
(
Trap
—!)
It was the same mechanism as that "Divine Punishment" from before.
He used foresight to track Ermes' movements hour by hour, precisely setting up the kind of magical tool that would deliver pinpoint results.
Thanks to that, once again he had sprung his greatest trap the instant Ermes dispelled his magic to land—right at the moment he was most vulnerable—but—
—Ermes was not about to fall for the same trick a second time.
He was no mere mage, after all.
With stunning agility, he dodged the thorns that lunged at him. He kept evading the ones that pursued him relentlessly, then used the time he had bought to begin his chant. And then—
"Formula Replay—'
Fire Heaven Judgment
'"
In a single sweep, he burned it all away.
He spent one of his maximum-power spells without hesitation, blasting away every last one of the set traps—no, he went even further, driving back the surrounding enemy soldiers with the shockwave and forcibly carving out an opening for his next move.
Seizing that opening without hesitation, Ermes began his next chant and pointed a finger at the High Priest, who had drawn slightly closer.
"
Magic Bullet Archer
—
Attribute Enchantment
:
Lightning
"
As if firing a counter-snipe, he unleashed the fastest magic bullet.
His first effective counterattack reached the High Priest without fail in an instant...
"......Ngh."
Another magical tool raised by the High Priest. He was blocked by an orange wall emanating from it.
(......That one's no picnic either, huh?)
It was probably the same type of magical tool Rose had used when fighting Ermes before.
If so, long-range attacks were pointless. As long as the enemy was on guard, he'd do well to assume even the
Meteor Throne
could be blocked.
But there was no time to lament the outcome. Ermes kept up suppressing fire while closing to a distance where he could smash through everything ──just returning to his original plan.
With the highly versatile
Magic Bullet Archer
still active, he resumed his charge... and at the same time, Ermes thought.
──As expected, a powerful foe.
The Divine Punishment, which had been the greatest initial threat, had been neutralized once its mechanism was uncovered... and yet, the sheer abundance of attack methods just displayed.
Of course. The man was the church's number two. It went without saying he possessed numerous useful magical tools gathered from all across the kingdom, and chances were even
Ancient magical tools
were included among them.
On top of that... the High Priest had thoroughly
mastered
the use
of every single one of those tools.
He was there.
.
With rare judgment and a lucid mind. He never let himself get overwhelmed by having too many cards to play, and Ermes could clearly see even in this single moment that he struck the right move at the right time.
And furthermore — precognition.
Seeing the trap that had just been set, Ermes was now certain. For the Archbishop — this situation still fell within the range of his foresight.
Fractures were surely beginning to show. Yet despite that, the Archbishop's grasp of Ermes' actions still remained terrifyingly precise.
(...No, that's not it.)
It wasn't just that — and with that thought, Ermes continued his charge while glancing to the side.
There, under Liliana's command, soldiers who had gained the ability to wield Bloodline Magic through her spells were fighting with extraordinary overall power —
— and the knights of the Northern Alliance had already begun to respond to them properly.
Their recovery from the shock was clearly far too fast. That meant only one thing.
(...He had read it all, the Archbishop. Even if he couldn't foresee Lady Lily's actions, he could at least predict what kinds of tactics and magic would come flying out.)
Even if Liliana's own precognition was impossible to replicate, he could conjure something like shadow puppets from other sources of information. On top of that, he drew on deductions born from the Archbishop's own experience.
Even when his precognition was stripped away, he didn't panic. He never fell into the trap of relying on precognition alone.
And so, Archbishop Johan. Thoroughly, relentlessly, to a degree that bordered on mad —
— he tried to bend everything to his will.
......
Board game.
That was what it resembled, Ermes thought.
With his intellect, his abilities, his magic — with everything at his disposal.
That man forced them into the role of "pieces on his board."
And the truth was, he possessed everything he needed to execute that vision to perfection.
Unlike Aster — who had achieved this not through bloodline but through sheer ability and talent, a born ruler.
Even Ermes was still nothing more than a puppet on a palm before him, one more plaything on the battlefield.
(—Bring it on.)
And yet, on top of all that, Ermes declared silently within his heart.
That era ends here, too. The groundwork to bring it all down had already been laid. Cracks were already beginning to show.
Even if he could read him now, that wouldn't necessarily hold forever. Even the slightest uncertainty was more than enough.
Just as he had declared from the very start… if they could stop him, then let them try.
With that resolve renewed once more, he fixed his eyes on the Archbishop and resumed his charge.
—From there on, the front line became utterly ferocious.
Multifaceted, layered tenfold and twentyfold. They anticipated his moves, got ahead of him — a barrage of first-sight-kill traps that would end you the instant you let your guard down. Attacks brimming with killing intent lunged at Ermes without a shred of mercy.
Traps laid in perfect anticipation of his perfect reading of the situation. In truth, each one was handled with precise use of magical tools — more than enough to kill Ermes ten times over.
…And yet, Ermes—
"—Next."
Deflected every last one.
"That one I saw."
Half-hearted sniper shots were all burned away. The overwhelming volume of attacks was dodged entirely through sheer agility.
Traps involving poison or hallucinations were detected the instant they triggered — or before they could even activate — and either blown away by the wind or sealed behind a barrier.
Moreover, every trap he evaded taught him their tendencies, allowing him to preemptively counter even faster.
"That too, I already know."
As if the only answer was to never let his guard down for even a single instant — not if a single instant's lapse meant death.
He countered, adapted — and as the ultimate show of it, he even went so far as to deliberately step on a trap only to crush it before it could activate.
Magical tools, in principle, could not surpass Bloodline Magic.
Therefore, if one wanted to produce overwhelming firepower with them, the only real option was basically what Ermes had done this time — a brute-force quantity assault.
Against Ermes, though, that was a losing strategy.
His strength lay in his adaptability. To pour everything into such a straightforward numbers game against someone like him was practically asking to be countered.
By the latter half, there was not a single trace of uncertainty left in his movements.
The traps, which should have grown ever more ferocious in number… had become nothing more than a stalling tactic as far as he was concerned.
And so, just as he had declared.
Ermes, having fought his way through every trap and the deadly storm at full force —
"Is there… anything next?"
Finally arrived at a point where only a few dozen steps of distance remained — close enough to see the Archbishop with his own eyes.
Naturally, he was not unscathed. Countless small wounds covered his entire body, and the amount of blood he had lost was far from negligible.
However — only those emerald eyes remained undimmed. With a fierce gleam, they locked firmly onto the figure of the enemy he had to bring down.
Judging from the lingering magical pressure in the air that no traps remained, Ermes took his stance.
Of course, he could not afford to let his guard down even now. It was the Archbishop — there was no doubt he still had at least one or two hidden cards up his sleeve, even from this point.
The greatest concern was the Archbishop's Bloodline Magic, whose full extent was still unknown — the magic of brainwashing. Now, of all times, as he closed in on the Archbishop, he needed to remain maximally vigilant.
…But that, of course, was no reason to hesitate in charging forward.
It was an undeniable fact that he needed to end this quickly — for the sake of Liliana and the others, who were buying him this time.
Thus, without hesitation. Ermes surged forward, determined to sprint through the last stretch of road leading to the Archbishop at full speed──
And then.
The Archbishop sneered.
In that instant.
Ermes's movement stopped.
"──Wh—"
Forcibly and suddenly halted in his tracks.
The Archbishop hadn't done anything to him. Ermes's vigilance was focused entirely on Archbishop Johan — if the man had made a move, there was no way he wouldn't have noticed.
Yes. That was precisely why. At the same time, he was made to understand.
He turned around — no, he was made to turn around. Forced to fill his vision with an existence he could not ignore, the one who had stopped him in his tracks was...
"──Hi there."
Nina von Frodit.
It was nothing other than her charm magic, which boasted overwhelming power against Ermes.
She, as always, wore a lovely smile on her face — and had sealed Ermes's movements with it.
──Too soon.
That should have been the very first question he should have harbored.
Nina was supposed to be held back by Salar. Even granting that she wasn't suited for direct combat, she was a Dual aptitude wielder with considerable magical ability, and on top of that she had a favorable elemental matchup. Given Nina's current inability to go all out, that should have bought more than enough time.
That assessment couldn't have been wrong. Salar was not the type to let her guard down, and no outside reinforcement had come from another direction either.
Then there was only one reason Nina had broken through Salar in such a short window, caught up to Ermes — who had been charging forward virtually unimpeded — and stopped him.
──
Nina
Went all out.
That was only because she hadn't held back even slightly when facing Salar.
Then came the next question. Why did she do that? What reason could there be for her — who should have been hoping for their victory — to take such action?
That answer was made clear almost immediately.
Ermes — who had already been forbidden from looking at anything other than Nina — observed her, and noticed that the chain-like pattern on her neck from their previous encounter had vanished.
And above all, the slight yet decisive transformation in her magic power told the whole story.
From those clues... even as his thoughts — already beginning to tingle with a slow, sweet numbness — worked toward the answer,
Nina, with a soft, gentle smile — a lovely, bewitching smile that would steal away his thoughts entirely and captivate his very being —
"I love you, Elle-kun."
With a honeyed voice, a confession so sweet it melted everything. And then, with words meant to utterly steal away his consciousness,
she declared.
"—
so
,
I'm going to kill you
?"
Nina is
being brainwashed
.
.
That was the conclusion.
The reason Nina had taken such action, the reason she had ended up in this situation—there was no other possibility.
The Archbishop's brainwashing magic, whose full scope remained unseen.
When it bared its fangs, it hadn't been aimed at Ermes.
Ermes had spoken about the Archbishop's magic before.
"In the first place, mind-altering magic isn't that convenient to begin with. It shouldn't be possible to drastically alter a person's perception or consciousness."
That's right—the third characteristic of mind-manipulating magic: "It cannot significantly alter the target's nature or personality."
Ermes had said that the Archbishop's brainwashing magic somehow bypassed that limitation.
If so, then by the same token...
The first characteristic of mind-manipulating magic: "It essentially doesn't work on those who possess magic of the same type."
—Why could he be so certain that one couldn't be bypassed?
That miscalculation was the fatal mistake made by Ermes and the others.
As if to say exactly that, the Archbishop laughed before the scene unfolding right before him—the future that had been invisible to Nina but visible to him, now coming to pass with perfect precision.
"...Do it."
"Okay."
Without a shred of hesitation, Nina nodded at the Archbishop's command.
And an utterly merciless, lethal blade descended upon Ermes, who could barely move.
Next time, it'll be Nina's chapter. Stay tuned!