The battle escalated from a skirmish to a natural disaster.
Lencar found himself acting as the linchpin of the defense. While Yami occupied Licht, the fallout from their clash was threatening to bury the rest of them.
Calculated trajectory, Lencar thought, his eyes darting left. A stray Light Whip slashed through the air, ricocheting off the wall and heading straight for the unconscious Marie.
"Wind Magic: Gale Palm!" Lencar thrust his hand out. The blast of wind didn't stop the light, but it knocked the debris in front of it, creating a makeshift shield that absorbed the impact.
"Nice save!" Finral yelled, cowering behind a rock. "Man, Yami is going all out! I've never seen him this serious!"
"He has to be," Lencar replied, his voice tight. "Licht is faster. Yami has the power advantage, but if he misses once, he dies. He's forcing Licht into close quarters to negate the speed difference."
Asta, meanwhile, was evolving in real-time. "Raaaaah!" He charged Valtos, reading the spatial mage's Ki.
"Stay back!" Valtos screamed, opening a portal directly in front of Asta's face to blast him point-blank.
I feel it, Asta thought. The tension in his mana. The shift in space.
Asta slid on his knees, passing under the portal, and slammed the pommel of his sword into Valtos's gut. The spatial mage gasped, doubling over.
"Ki makes you predictable!" Asta shouted, following up with a flat-blade smack to the side of Valtos's head, sending him crashing into the mud.
"One down," Lencar noted. "But the big one is still the problem."
Above them, the air shrieked. Licht was injured. Yami had managed to land a shallow cut across Licht's cheek, and the leader of the Eye of the Midnight Sun was losing his composure.
"You... dirty... humans!" Licht roared. His mana flared, turning the cave white. He wasn't aiming at Yami anymore. He was aiming at everything.
"Light Magic: Ray of Divine Punishment."
It wasn't a laser; it was a bombardment. Pillars of light rained down.
"Too many to block!" Gauche yelled, shielding his eyes.
"Lencar!" Yami shouted, busy holding back the main assault. "Do something useful!"
Lencar didn't hesitate. He knew he couldn't stop a wide-area bombardment with his current reserves, but he could redirect it.
"Composite Magic: Thermal Updraft!"
Lencar slammed both hands onto the superheated glass floor. He combined his fire magic with the residual heat of his previous spell, creating a massive, localized column of rising hot air. The density of the air changed instantly.
Light refracts when it passes through different densities. The pillars of light hit the turbulent, superheated air and bent, curving away from the group and slamming harmlessly into the walls.
Yami grinned. "Smart kid. Refraction."
Yami seized the opening. He launched himself into the air, using Mana Zone to step on the ambient mana itself.
"Dark Magic: Dark Cloaked Dimension Slash!"
Yami swung. The darkness didn't just cut the air; it cut the dimension itself. The sheer destructive power aimed to bisect Licht instantly.
Licht's eyes widened in genuine fear. He couldn't dodge this. It was too wide, too heavy.
"Master!"
Valtos, despite his injuries, forced a portal open. He appeared in the air between Yami and Licht, grabbing his leader.
"Spatial Magic: Displacement!"
Yami's slash missed by a millimeter, shaving off a lock of Licht's white hair. The two villains reappeared on the far side of the cavern, near the exit.
Licht was panting, clutching his arm where the dark magic had grazed him. His face was twisted in pure, unadulterated hatred.
"I will not... be defeated here," Licht hissed. "Not by a dark mage. Not by filth."
He began to gather mana. All of it. The cave started to rumble. The light around him became so intense it was painful to look at. He wasn't casting a spell to fight; he was casting a spell to erase the map.
"He's going to blow the whole mountain!" Finral screamed. "We have to run!"
"We can't outrun light!" Gauche yelled back.
Yami clicked his tongue. "My Dimension Slash has a cooldown. I can't fire another big one yet."
Lencar analyzed the buildup. Licht is charging a high-density photon blast. If that hits, we're vaporized. We need a mirror. A big one.
He looked at Gauche. "Gauche! The mirror!"
Gauche looked at Lencar, then at the massive ball of light forming in Licht's hands.
"I can't reflect that!" Gauche panicked. "It's too big! My mirror will shatter!"
"Not if you focus it!" Lencar shouted, running toward him. "Don't try to stop the whole thing. Focus on the core! Mirror Magic reflects based on the angle of incidence. If you match his frequency, you can bounce it!"
Licht released the energy. "Light Magic: Wrath of the God."
A beam of light the size of a train tunnel roared toward them.
"DO IT, GAUCHE!" Asta and Lencar screamed in unison.
Gauche gritted his teeth, thinking of Marie. I won't let her die!
His grimoire flipped to a new page. His eye glowed with a desperate light.
"Mirror Magic: Full Reflection!"
A giant mirror appeared. It wasn't enough to cover the whole beam, but Gauche angled it perfectly. The core of Licht's attack hit the glass.
CRACK.
The mirror fractured, but it held for a split second. The beam of light hit the surface and bounced. It didn't just stop; it reversed.
The massive blast of light shot back toward the cave entrance, carving a new tunnel through the ceiling and blasting into the night sky like a beacon.
Silence returned to the cave.