*
"{Envy}." (Lastia)
She'll grow stronger faster, but her breakdown is also accelerated.
"{Prosperity}." (Eterna)
In other words, there's only one chance. The authority allows her to surpass infinity, there's no limit with the synchronisation. So it comes down to one overwhelming attack that would finish the job, too little and she'll be the only one to die. Eterna didn't realise Lastia could borrow her karma to defy fate. Information manipulation is different, karma wasn't something she explicitly stated she could control with {Envy}.
She poised herself like an arrow, her great sword hummed as it grew pitch black like a hole in reality. A faint ruby red light gently hovers around its outline, like the perceived edges of a black hole. Such starlight gathers around her blade and her muscles tensed even as her existence grew light and weightless. Her body acted as bow, harmoniously moving into the optimal position for a straight forward thrust. Red light explodes around her, like an apocalypse descending onto the land.
Eterna summons a wooden bow, its ordinary look gave off an even more fearsome pressure under these circumstances. Myriad colours shine in a kaleidoscopic array around the bow, decorating the air around her with countless crystalline tones. Her long lustrous blond hair like a field of golden wheat, is brushed under the ensuing gale originating from the bow. Faintly, even Lastia could detect the scent of a 'forest' breezing through the land in a languid manner.
"Incorporating trace elements of divine concept 'Elven great forest'. This is an attack that could finish off even main gods. " (Eterna)
"Counter assimilation, trace elements of divine concept 'Yggdrasil' identified. Integrating into process flow...
She will never let me be alone. " (Lastia)
She flashes a smile like a flower blooming in a tepid dry dessert. It looks like Eterna bringing everything she has to the battle... Accidentally opened up a link to Yggdrasil. This will be her downfall, Yggdrasil is a far superior weapon compared to that archaic elven bow. At least that's what Lastia chose to believe.
"OBLIVION-!!" (Eterna)
"-MAGIA!!" (Lastia)
"Vast sea of trees, origin of culture and meaning." (Eterna)
Cave scratches, cuneiforms, paper, and digital logs, all mediums of messaging. Culture is one's way of life condensed into a message, a message to the world and to the future. Proof of one's existence, proof of existence. Their Oblivion Magias deploy into a two toned sub dimension wrapping around them, ultraspecialised territories where even the rules of their own magic might even change. The birthplace of possibilities, of miracles. It is here that Lastia is reminded, Eterna is also a magical girl. Whatever she can do, Eterna can likely do better.
5 seconds, she's gonna disappear in that amount of time.
"Crystallised omnipresence of life's cradle." (Lastia)
A single scarlet tree rises, dwarfing the trees in the forest summoned by Eterna. Its splendour glows with a violent sheen, as if to project its own colour over all of its surroundings, emanating a singular heavy presence. Information is also a medium, yet the information of {Feed} does not lay it's roots in culture. It does so in existence itself, in biochemical energy, in the motion we call life.
The information of living things are constantly cannibalised, consumed by other forms of life and returning to inanimate information to be assimilated into their bodies. The world tree preserves the information of every world, like a stamp that officiates their existence. Through this, {Envy} acknowledges the existence of the Elven great forest, of others not yet mentioned, of the fact that one is not alone.
4 seconds.
"You won't stop advancing." (Eterna)
"I won't." (Lastia)
2 seconds.
"What drives you, is it really humanity's stake?" (Eterna)
"It's {Envy}. (Lastia)
0.01 seconds.
Eterna fires the beam and Lastia lunges ahead at speeds surpassing conventional measurement. There's no choice, she will have break past the speed of light and even further. There's no need to react, their weapons might meet before their perception catches up, these were their strongest attacks after all.
Clank! 0 seconds left...
Twin attacks vie for supremacy, releasing an unlimited amount of energy into the surroundings. Heat that surpasses the sun, that no living thing should persist in...
'She's still there!' (Eterna)
She ran out of karma, out of her personal information. Her existence should have shattered and been sent into the far reaches of space.
"The world tree disapproved... It formed an array with the sentinels... With the humanity of the present. I'm borrowing their KARMA!!" (Lastia)
"FINE!! I'll let you end humanity with your own hands!!!...!? " (Eterna)
A dirty grin graces Lastia's face, her eyelids partially closed to shield her eyes from the energy outpour of their attacks. Eterna has realised it now... Her own karma was being used too. One's personal existential information, the driving force of life, and their conceptual ties to others and the future, that's karma. The aggregate of her existence, it's being assimilated by {Envy}. With one last push, her sword plunges forward decisively.
Eterna was defeated, her existence was being erased. She was a true warrior who fought to the end. That much, Lastia could admire.
Their silhouettes gradually scatter into dust, their flesh and skin fading into the wind of the rising sun. A new day begins with the return of the sun and the stars.
"... Go back. Arin will be waiting. You guys deserved that much, whether the past matters or not is no longer of consequence to me. You fought for the future, that's enough to pass down my {Prosperity}." (Eterna)
When she finished her speech, her figure abruptly vanished. Not a trace of her remained, not even the soul. In the next moment, Lastia felt an impact to the forehead as the world rushed past her in a blur of colours. When it finally stopped, she was back on a familiar rooftop, back where the whole fight began. The present.
Without pause, something soft and hard smashes into her. It hurt a little but it didn't feel like an attack, it clung onto her and it felt warm too, almost trembling. She hadn't had the energy to resist, but the scent that tickled her nose was one she couldn't forget, even the curse stopped working on trivial details like this after some time. Her voice couldn't help but croak as she called out, her tears swirling into large pools at the edge of her eyes. Floating faintly before the water tension broke, giving a glossy finish to her cheeks as they slid down.
"Arin...?" (Lastia)
She believed she lost her breath, losing control and manually gulping mouthfuls. Her lungs tightened and she hugged back tightly, afraid the figure that was only slightly shorter than her would vanish. Was she really here? Was this really her? She was afraid, more so than ever before, more than when she faced The Calamity or Eterna head on...
"It's me... Tia." (Arin)
A bell chimes with sweet sweet resonance.