And sure enough, she could see the faint silhouette of Orphelia, her knees on the ground.
“Whoa! Orphelia is still alive and well, though she’s taken considerable damage! She’s down on her knees!”
Her Le Wolfe uniform was torn apart here and there, her exposed skin red and swollen.
Even so, her expression betrayed neither anger nor pain nor frustration. Rather, it was dominated by quiet resignation and sorrow. But for the briefest of moments, a glimmer of faint, unvanquished desire seemed to flash across her face, contradicting her usual emotions.
“…That was good, Julis,” she began in a calm, slightly hoarse voice. “I’m impressed. The strength of your destiny…and its opposition to mine here and now…there must be some meaning behind it. So please…don’t let this be the end.”
“…?!”
Julis was speechless.
“You, your destiny—they’ve pushed me to this. So you’ll have to take responsibility until the very end. Now, shall we continue?”
Orphelia stood up unsteadily, fixing Julis with her crimson gaze.
“H-hmph…! You’re in no state to talk like that,” Julis said. “I’m well aware this applies to both of us, but I think you’ve already reached your limit. There’s no need to keep pushing yourself, right…?”
“Limit…? You say the strangest things, Julis. There is no limit to my—to Orphelia Landlufen’s destiny.”
No sooner had she finished speaking than a thin miasmic tendril rose from Orphelia’s feet, gently grazing her neck.
“Ga ra Tuul.”
Orphelia’s body trembled, tensing up.
“Ah… Ah… Aaah…!”
Her eyes widened, and she glanced overhead, sobs spilling from her mouth as blood foamed up from her throat.
“What…? What are you doing, Orphelia?!”
Without responding, Orphelia seemed to grow weak, before turning bloodshot eyes on Julis. Blood vessels and veins were visible all across her body, pulsing violently.
“Orphelia! What was that?!” Julis cried again. Orphelia merely shook her head weakly.
“…You know what they say,” she began at last. “How something can be both poison and medicine? Just like how toxic plants have been used to make healing tonics. That was a technique to force my body to keep moving, even if it kills me.”
By the time she finished speaking, Orphelia was no longer staggering. By all appearances, the damage that she had sustained earlier was gone—in fact, she seemed to be gaining yet more strength.
“…Th-that’s insane! Cut it out, Orphelia! Why are you…?!”
Julis cried out as rage welled up inside her, but she shut her mouth as soon as she saw Orphelia’s face. Swallowing her words, she bit her lip so hard that she drew blood.
To anyone else watching, Orphelia’s expression must have looked the same as ever. Resignation, grief, lamentation were all there, covering it.
But to Julis, and only her, there was something more.
“If you want to stop my destiny—”
“…Yeah, I know. I know.”
How many times had she heard those words?
But now she understood.
All this time, Orphelia had been telling her to stop this.
The tears in Julis’s eyes were the result of her own ineptitude. She looked down, wiped them away with the back of her hand, and reaffirmed her resolve.
“I’ll stop you, Orphelia. I’ll crush that stupid destiny of yours.”
“Do it, Julis. If you can,” Orphelia responded quietly.
Julis was already covered in wounds.
Her injuries wouldn’t keep her from moving, but crucially, her prana was running out.
What should she do?
She didn’t need to think very hard to know she had only one option.
I’ll have to use my Queen of the Night again…!
But that was something Xinglou had expressly forbidden.
“Do you hear me? Once you’ve used that technique, you need to give yourself at least a full day’s rest before trying it again. Otherwise, your body won’t be able to endure it. If you don’t obey this warning, that one-night flower of yours will wither without ever opening its bud.”
In other words, if she tried to use it again right away, it would inevitably fail.
And if it failed, that would mean certain death for Julis.
But I can’t give up now…!
Julis took a deep breath, made up her mind, and drew on her prana.
Even if it meant crumbling to dust, if she couldn’t save her friend, what else would she ever accomplish?
Her most treasured partner—that day, he had told her that he would do anything in his power to protect her, to be her strength.
Julis wanted to do the same for Orphelia.
“Bloom—”
But just as she was about to convert the prana coursing within her, her body was enveloped in raging hellfire.
“Gaaarrrggghhh!”
She hadn’t activated Queen of the Night—a breakdown had occurred in the conversion process.
“Wh-what’s going on here?! Riessfeld’s burning up, literally!”
“…Her prana is out of control. This is bad…”
While the scorching flames burned her body, Julis fought desperately to bring her prana under control, but nothing was working. Her fire resistance seemed to be doing nothing, and she had to stop breathing to keep from inhaling the flames.
A-at this rate…!
“I’m sorry, Julis… But I won’t show you any mercy…”
Staring at her opponent, Orphelia solemnly wove her miasma into a potent arm and swung it down. If she let herself get crushed, Julis knew it would be the end of the line.
“Gah… Argh…!”
Even so, she focused her attention exclusively on her prana. She would fight it until the very end.
And then—
Wh-what…?
All of a sudden, her consciousness was flung into a void.
Below her was a huge blue planet.
And around it, innumerable stars.
She was floating, she realized, in distant space.
No… It can’t be… This place…
She understood at once.
This was the world known as the other side.
A galaxy overflowing with mana.
A universe in which gods existed.
…!
And she could tell that a being of incomparable immensity had sensed her, despite how tiny she felt.
But before the entity could touch her consciousness, Julis was dragged back to her own reality.
She gazed at the miasmic arm about to drop down and crush her, as though time had stopped.
Her thoughts were still in chaos.
She vaguely comprehended that a hole had opened up in her mind for the briefest of moments, connecting her to the other side. The hole had been quickly closed, but thanks to that, her consciousness was safe.
And through that momentary encounter, she had reached an intuitive understanding of the true nature of mana and prana. She knew the breath of God, the essence of all things.
I can do this now.
She would pay the price for it, but that was okay.
If it meant winning this match, the sacrifice would be worth it.