Normally, mages only possess one elemental magic attribute in their Grimoires, a limitation as fundamental to magical theory as breathing is to life itself. Yet throughout the annals of magical history, there exist those exceptional mages who appear once in a lifetime—prodigies whose talent for magic transcends all conventional understanding.
These rare individuals are known as Double Mages, whispered about in reverent tones throughout the kingdom. The reason for this awe-inspiring nickname lies in their unprecedented ability to wield not one, but two complete Grimoires, each filled with devastatingly powerful high-level spells that would make even veteran Magic Knights tremble.
'Damn this monster, is she really a double mage?' Damien's thoughts raced frantically as cold terror seeped into his bones.
'Shit, but I've got more important things to worry about right now.' His gaze dropped to his lower body, where the magical ice that had initially seized his legs had now crept upward with alarming speed, covering his waist in its crystalline prison.
The chill penetrated deep into his flesh, numbing everything it touched. At this rate, it wouldn't be long before he was completely transformed into a lifeless statue of ice, frozen for eternity in this moment of defeat. He desperately needed to break free from this magical entrapment before it was too late.
His gaze lifted back to Anita, who stood confidently within her protective bubble. A sinister smirk suddenly spread across her lips as she raised her right hand upward in a fluid motion, still safely protected within the magical shield she had conjured. Damien's eyes widened in horrified realization.
'Oh, for fuck's sake, don't tell me she can launch attacks from inside that shield?' The thought barely had time to form before his worst fears were confirmed.
"Water Magic: Water piercing Ball!" she commanded, her voice ringing with authoritative power.
Instantly, a massive sphere of concentrated water materialized within her shield, pulsating with barely contained magical energy. Before Damien could even process what was happening, the liquid projectile shot forward with explosive force, leaving a trail of mist in its wake as it hurtled directly toward his immobilized form.
Damien stood motionless, unable to dodge even if he wanted to. A grim calculation flashed through his mind—if that attack possessed the kind of destructive force he suspected, it might actually serve a purpose beyond merely causing him pain.
The water ball slammed into him with the force of a charging bull, the impact reverberating through his entire body. The ice covering his lower half shattered explosively, sending crystalline shards flying in all directions as he was propelled backward, his feet carving twin furrows in the arena floor as he slid several meters away.
"Hah," Damien gasped, drawing precious air into his lungs as water dripped from his soaked clothing.
"One problem solved, now..." Without completing the thought aloud, he suddenly launched himself forward in an explosive burst of movement that shocked even the veteran Magic Knights watching.
Every ounce of his remaining strength channeled into his right arm, muscles bulging beneath his torn sleeve as he prepared to deliver what he hoped would be a decisive blow.
'Surely, if my fist can create a hole in an obsidian boulder, I can crush this shield made of mere bubbles!' Damien's mind calculated the odds as he closed the distance between them with frightening speed.
But just seconds before his fist would connect with the transparent barrier, he caught a clear glimpse of Anita through the transparent shield, and what he saw sent ice-cold shivers crawling down his spine.
Anita's face was partially darkened, and her lips were curled upward in a bone-chilling, unsettling smirk that spoke of absolute confidence.
Every instinct screamed at him to pull back, to retreat and reconsider his strategy, but momentum and desperation carried him forward. His fist was already mere seconds away from colliding with the shield, and all he could do now was commit fully to the attack, channeling every last fragment of his formidable strength into his clenched knuckles and then—
BOOM!
The sound of the impact echoed throughout the arena like a thunderclap, causing spectators to flinch involuntarily.
His punch connected squarely with the bubble shield, but to his horror, it didn't even leave the slightest dent or ripple on its perfect surface. Instead, the force of his attack seemed to vibrate through the magical construct like waves through water, and then—impossibly—the vibrations began reversing direction, accelerating back toward their source with doubled intensity.
Before Damien could even process what was happening, an overwhelming force suddenly catapulted him backward with such tremendous power that the air itself seemed to part around his flying body.
He crashed violently against the solid stone wall of the arena, the impact creating a web of fractures across the ancient stonework as his body left a human-shaped impression in the unyielding surface.
"Guh… kueks!" he coughed, blood spilling from his lips as his blurred vision settled on Anita.
'What... what the hell was that?' Damien's mind struggled to comprehend what had just occurred.
'It was as if I took the full force of my own attack, but multiplied...' he didn't understand how it was even possible. Then suddenly his eyes widened as the realization hit him. He had committed the cardinal sin of any combat mage—he had forgotten to pay attention to the precise name of his opponent's spell.
'Bubble Counter Shield,' he realized with bitter self-recrimination.
'Not just a defensive barrier, but a specialized counter-mechanism that not only nullifies all physical attacks but doubles their force and redirects them back to the attacker. Tsk, what a pain in the ass.' Damien's analytical mind worked even as his body screamed in agony.
He decided to look into the shape of his own body. He had multiple fractured ribs, the right hand he had used to strike the bubble shield now hung uselessly at his side, the bones within shattered beyond immediate recovery.
No matter how he analyzed the situation or what strategies he contemplated, he could not envision a path to victory or even survival from his current position. Anita showed no signs of magical exhaustion; her mana reserves appeared as bottomless as the ocean itself. So what to do…?
"Water Magic..." Anita's voice rang out once more as she began casting another spell, unwilling to grant Damien even a moment's respite to recover or formulate a new plan.
Her grimoire fluttered open before her, pages turning of their own accord until they settled on her chosen spell.
"Water Ball Parade!" she proclaimed with calm certainty.
The air around her shimmered as moisture was drawn from the very atmosphere itself. Hundreds of water spheres, each the size of a clenched fist, materialized in concentric rings around her protective bubble.
For one breathless moment, they hovered there, like a strange constellation of liquid stars—then, as one, they launched forward in a devastating barrage.
The water projectiles rained down upon Damien's broken form without mercy or pause, each one striking with enough force to crack stone. The sound was deafening, like an endless series of thunderclaps compressed into mere seconds. Horrified gasps filled the air as spectators witnessed the one-sided slaughter...
"Shouldn't we stop this?" Some students murmured, their faces pale with shock at the brutality on display.
"I think Princess Anita is taking this too far. I'll be surprised if he makes it out alive," another whispered, unable to tear their eyes away from the horrific spectacle.
"ENOUGH!" Lucas roared, his commanding voice cutting through the cacophony of destruction. At his command, the relentless assault of water balls ceased their deadly barrage, though Anita maintained her protective shield. She was too experienced, too cautious to lower her defenses completely, even when victory seemed certain. At least not against Damien.
As the mist generated by the countless water impacts slowly dissipated, all eyes in the arena fixed upon the spot where Damien had stood. A collective gasp of horror escaped from hundreds of throats simultaneously.
The section of wall against which Damien was pinned resembled a gruesome work of art, decorated with splashes and stream of his own blood. His body, barely recognizable as human, was riddled with multiple puncture wounds, each one testament to the devastating power of Anita's spell. It was a grotesque and chilling sight that would haunt the nightmares of many witnesses for years to come.
'Damn it, I should have stopped the fight earlier,' Lucas said to himself with gritted teeth as his gaze finally settled on Damien's shattered form, fighting the overwhelming urge to vomit at the sight.
'Why didn't he just walk away when he had the chance?' With urgency, he signaled for the mages who specialized in healing magic to approach, though in his heart, he doubted even their combined skills could heal what remained.
Giovanni, upon witnessing the apparent death of Damien, felt something shift within the core of his being. A primal rage unlike anything he had ever experienced erupted from deep within him. His eyes blazed with an unnatural golden light as waves of unchecked bloodlust emanated from his trembling body.
The ground beneath his feet began to sizzle and melt from the sheer intensity of his uncontrolled mana. He was seconds away from leaping into the arena to exact bloody vengeance for his fallen brother, his mind already envisioning tearing Anita's head from her shoulders—until a sound impossible in its context froze him in place.
Damien coughed.
"What! He's alive!?" gasps erupted from the students, disbelief etched on their faces.
"How can someone with multiple holes in his body still be breathing?" Whispers spread through the crowd like wildfire.
Meanwhile, Damien, whose unfocused gaze was fixed upon the blood-spattered floor beneath him, his entire existence overwhelmed by waves of excruciating pain that defied description, somehow found the strength to grit his teeth in absolute fury at his own weakness.
'Damn it...Damn it all!… why did I regress if I was just going to die pathetically anyway?' Damien asked himself, frustration burning even hotter than the pain coursing through his ravaged body.
'Is this all my life could amount to? Just why, why, why, why, WHY!, WHY!!, WHY!!!' His mind screamed in rebellion against this shameful end.
Then, through the red haze of pain and the blurred vision of impending unconsciousness, Damien's eyes caught sight of something on the floor directly beneath him—the mysterious Black Book that had been with him since his regression.
Damien almost released a grim chuckle. 'Well, I guess someone was sturdy enough to withstand those attacks after all,' he thought with bitter irony.
As he watched, a droplet of his own blood rolled from his chin, tracing a slow path downward until it fell—as if guided by fate itself—and landed precisely in the center of the Seven-Star shaped symbol embossed on the Black Book's cover.
Then, without warning, Damien's eyes widened to their limits as something extraordinary began to unfold before him. His blood, instead of simply staining the book's surface, began to move with purpose, tracing the intricate lines of the Seven-Star symbol with supernatural precision.
As the crimson liquid filled the final line of the ancient pattern, the entire symbol suddenly erupted with an ominous red glow that pulsed like a beating heart.
The book—which Damien had tried countless times to open, had struck with hammers, burned with fire, and submerged in water—all to no avail, now began to open of its own accord, its cover rising slowly as if pushed by an invisible hand.
"The winner is…" Lucas announced, but his voice faltered, unable to finish the declaration.
Damien suddenly felt something wrong with the world around him just now. His gaze drifted to the drops of his blood that had been falling ceaselessly to the floor—they now hung suspended in mid-air, frozen in their descent like crimson jewels.
Simultaneously, all sound in the arena abruptly ceased, as if someone had extinguished every voice at once.
Summoning what little strength remained in his broken body, Damien forced his head upward to survey his surroundings. What he saw caused his heart to skip a beat, shock momentarily overriding even his devastating injuries.
Everyone—the students, the Magic Knight captains, Lucas, even Anita herself—stood frozen in their positions like perfectly detailed statues.
Only then did the impossible truth crash over him—time itself had stopped, leaving him as the sole moving entity in a frozen world.
'What the fuck is going on now?'.