There are three ways to survive as an antagonist in a final battle.
It is meta-corny beyond saving, perhaps even a bit trite to those who think themselves above the rules of narrative, but it actually works with terrifying efficiency.
Did I write these rules myself, you might ask?
No.
Rather, it is a set of principles from a data book given to me by my 'Boss'—a man who is a very meta-sensitive individual.
He is the type who hates common plot tropes with a passion and rightfully believes that those very tropes manifest in real life.
He gave me that knowledge so that I might survive in franchises such as Dawn Romantica after assigning me an unending mission.
My task?
To continuously and brutally kill off the Prophecy Beings of whichever world I am designated to in each unending, specifically focusing my malice upon Trizha Frantzes.
My preferred method of execution is a comprehensive demolition of the soul. I attack her in every conceivable way: psychologically first, then mentally, and only when her spirit is a ragged mess do I strike physically at the very end.
In other words, all I have to do is make her feel so miserable, so utterly wretched and filled with self-loathing, that she might consider doing the job for me.
Then, if she is truly at the point of asking for the end, I give her a very brutal, painful, and agonizingly slow death when she least expects it.
I deny her the mercy of a painless exit.
It is disturbing, I admit, but I find the process intensely satisfying.
After all, I get to paint the walls with her blood and walk away with the relief that she didn't just hang herself like she did in the previous unendings.
I'll be honest; the memory of her taking her own life still traumatizes me in its own weird way.
It's so... unfulfilling.
Why do I do this? Well, the Boss never really gave me a specific list of reasons why I should prioritize these 'Prophecy Beings' when they are the ones out there hunting down anyone related to him—people like me.
He did tell me, however, that staying within this Dawn Romantica unending would keep me safe from those 'people' outside the franchises.
But am I really safe?
For all I know, Dawn Romantica is Fate's favorite playground, a place where the rules are written in shifting sand.
Maybe that's why he gave me the book.
But that's tangential to the real mystery: what is the true reason the Boss wants me to erase Trizha Frantzes from existence with such calculated cruelty?"
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「There are three ways to survive as an antagonist in a final battle.」
「First Way: Ensure that there are no audiences in the background. You cannot allow anyone to remain who holds the potential to disrupt your plans or provide that annoying 'power of friendship' boost. I thought I had accomplished this. I moved to kill Trizha with a multitude of my Emoplotions the moment she tried to interfere. I saw the determination in her face as she lunged into my fight with the Symbol of Loneliness, and I acted. I knew she was fundamentally weak, a secondary character at best, but in these stories, who knows? An iron pipe in the hands of a girl with a look like that can become a weapon of destiny if you aren't careful.」
「Second Way: Make sure that no powerful beings can possibly encounter the battlefield and interrupt the climax. I took precautions here too. I knocked Trizha unconscious and dragged her up to the roof of the Prom Tower, specifically because I knew Founder Yuri Calypso and General Koby Frantzes were roaming the floors below. I've had run-ins with them in previous unendings and I literally almost died. Tsk. Never again. I made sure this rooftop was an isolated stage for my masterpiece.」
「Third and Easiest Way: When the protagonist somehow survives your absolute attack and returns even stronger than before, you must go for the kill immediately. No monologuing. No waiting. Just ending. And this... this is where I failed. I am still not entirely sure why. I was certain that my Emoplotion struck Trizha directly in the face the moment she stepped out of the smoke. I could practically hear her skull fracturing under the force of the blast. I felt the victory. But then her body vanished into thin air and reappeared behind me. When I swung my kick—a strike enhanced by the raw power of my Emoplotion—she caught it. She caught it effortlessly, as if she were stopping a falling leaf rather than a killing blow.」
「And when she held me there, I saw that look. Her eyes... the irises seemed to have vanished into a void of white, yet they were still visibly there, burning with a cold light.」
「They stared at me as if I were the only thing left in the universe, as if she were dissecting my very atoms with her gaze. The veins bulging at her temples were a roadmap of extreme focus, representing a cognitive leap I couldn't comprehend. It reminded me of a legend, a shadow of someone from three hundred years ago, before the Boss sent me on this journey. That person... the memory is cold. I am finally starting to realize why the Boss is so terrified of her.」
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「He is desperately trying to keep an ancient 'distress' from re-happening itself again. But who?!」
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Zackier's mind was a storm of internal conflict as he watched his precision kick held firmly in the small hand of Trizha Frantzes.
He tried to yank his leg back, but her grip was an absolute constant, an unbreakable cuff of flesh and bone that ignored his superior strength.
"Where did she get this ridiculous, impossible strength?!"
Zackier gritted his teeth, his jaw aching from the tension as he attempted to overpower the girl who, only minutes ago, had been a fragile mess of panic.
It was a dizzying transformation.
He looked at her face again; the fragility was gone, replaced by a neutral, almost divine expression that chilled him to the bone.
Out of pure desperation, Zackier snapped his arm up, pointing a finger directly at her chest to unleash an Emoplotion from his sleeve at point-blank range.
But his speed—the speed that had dominated the Symbol of Loneliness—was suddenly insufficient.
Trizha reacted before he could even twitch a muscle, jerking him toward her with a violent pull on his captured leg.
She swung her iron pipe with a velocity that defied her physical build, the metal whistling through the air like a falling star.
The sheer impossibility of it humbled him.
Physical enhancement was not part of her kit.
And yet, the metal was inches from his skull.
Zackier used the ground as leverage, forcing a burst of energy through his trapped leg to barely untie himself from her grip, dashing away in a blur of motion.
He skidded across the rooftop, landing several meters away, his breath coming in sharp, ragged gasps.
"That swing was too precise! It was fast—blindingly fast! I don't want to admit it, but she almost ended me right there. I could only dodge it because I predicted the arc, not because I was faster!"
He hissed the words to himself, his fingers trembling with a mix of rage and mounting fear.
He watched as Trizha slowly rotated the iron pipe in a casual arc around her body.
The lingering smoke from the battle seemed to follow the weapon, forming a ghostly trail.
Zackier wouldn't accept this.
He dashed toward her again, his knife raised high.
He would test her.
He had to know if this was a fluke.
He swung the blade in a vertical arc meant to bisect her, but his target was no longer there.
She moved with the fluidity of water, sidestepping the blade so effortlessly that Zackier felt as if he were fighting a ghost.
She never took her eyes off him.
Not for a second.
She held the iron pipe with both hands now, settling into a low, terrifyingly stable stance.
Then, she swung.
The horizontal strike was a blur of silver.
Zackier threw up his forearm in a desperate block, calling upon his own physical durability.
The metal clashed against his arm, and despite his strength, he was sent staggering back in a fraction of a second.
He was off-balance, his guard blown wide open.
Trizha didn't hesitate; she raised the pipe and brought it down in a crushing vertical swing.
This entire exchange had taken less than a single second.
Zackier's instincts saved him.
He triggered a miniature Emoplotion to propel his body backward, clearing the zone of impact by a hair's breadth.
The pipe slammed into the rooftop, cracking the reinforced concrete like it was porcelain.
He realized in that moment that a single direct hit wouldn't just hurt—it would annihilate him.
It wasn't just the raw power; it was the terrifying precision and efficiency with which she wielded it.
As he fell back, Zackier managed to catch his balance on his right foot.
He immediately generated another mini Emoplotion at the back of his left heel.
"From the very second she reappeared without a single scratch, I've been trying to piece this together! The invisible eyes, the bulging veins, the focus that feels like a physical weight! She is evading attacks that should be unsurvivable! Not once, but twice!"
Zackier's internal monologue was becoming a frantic scream.
He propelled his left foot forward in an enhanced kick, a strike aimed at her neck with the force of a high-speed projectile.
"That creepy, unwavering stare... she hasn't looked away once! I bet she's so obsessed with my face that she won't even see the kick coming from below! My foot is moving faster than a jet engine! There is no way she reacts to this!"
He was wrong.
Again.
Trizha's gaze remained locked onto his eyes, ignoring the lethal limb flying toward her throat.
Yet, as if she possessed a separate mind for her limbs, she raised her right arm.
She blocked the enhanced kick with the back of her wrist.
Zackier's eyes went wide.
He heard her mutter something—three words—but the first word was lost to the sound of the impact.
It sounded like "...Environmental Connectivity."
Then, he saw it.
There was a 'dent' in her wrist where his foot had connected.
It wasn't a bruise or a break.
The flesh had deformed as if it were made of polished chrome, a physical dent in a metal shell.
"A dent? And did she just say... Environmental Connectivity?"
The disbelief was a cold weight in his stomach.
A subconscious block?
A body that reacted like metal?
He scrambled to regain his composure, taking a defensive stance.
He couldn't let his arrogance blind him.
He had been preparing for this.
"The subconscious block, the metal dent... it's all unrealistic, irritating nonsense! But it doesn't matter. Because while I was testing her in close-combat, I was busy with the real trap."
He threw his arm back, spreading his fingers wide.
Suddenly, multiple planted Emoplotions—born from the second variable of his Alterlity's Reverse Causality—materialized in a perfect circle around Trizha.
They surrounded her, humming with volatile energy.
"I've been planting these the whole time! I was testing her capabilities, yes, but I was also preparing to wipe her from this rooftop if she proved too difficult! I needed information, and now I have enough!"
Zackier gripped his knife tight, holding it against his chest in a thrusting stance.
He glared at Trizha, who stood in the center of the looming explosions with that same unreadable, focused expression.
"I doubt I could ever fully research this absurd power if I kill her now, but it's a waste I'm willing to accept! I'll use what I've learned to prevent this from ever happening in the next unending. That is the outcome I will force! And if she somehow survives these explosions, I'll be right there to follow up while she's still in a cooldown! I'll strike again and again! I won't let her breathe! I won't let her rest! I will overwhelm her until there is nothing left to fight!"
But the words died in his mind. Zackier's jaw dropped.
Trizha moved.
In one fluid, circular motion—a swing that went from the ground to the sky—she swept her iron pipe through the air.
She didn't even look at the traps.
With that single motion, every single one of his second-variable Emoplotions was snuffed out.
They didn't explode; they were simply annihilated, erased by the wake of her weapon.
The sight was so absurd that Zackier's frustration boiled over into a silent scream.
His plans were being treated like toys.
He was forced into his final gambit.
He drew his arm back, generating a powerful mini Emoplotion at his elbow to act as a thruster.
He propelled his arm forward in a "Hundred Propelled Thrust," the knife becoming a blur as it aimed for her near-invisible eyes.
In his mind, he would repeat this thrust a hundred times a second until her defense crumbled.
But Trizha, standing in the center of his storm, had a different perspective.
To her, Zackier had been moving in slow motion since the moment she drew her first breath of new life.
He was a statue trying to move through molasses.
She would prove it now.
She would show him that she could come back to life a hundred, a thousand, an infinite number of times—as long as her focus remained absolute.
The iron pipe began to rise.
Zackier's world was about to end.
Trizha's counter-attack is imminent, and Zackier is finally realizing he is outclassed.