Judging the man seated at the fallen princess's table to be suspicious, Aiden and Godric approached without taking a seat. Instead, they remained standing, their vigilance leaving no room for ease.
"Is everything alright, Victoria?" Aiden asked, his eyes never leaving Isidro.
"Victoria?" Dolores and Pritish echoed almost at once, exchanging startled glances.
"He means... this woman is Victoria?" Dolores murmured in disbelief.
"Indeed, there is a problem," Isidro answered in Victoria's stead. "It hangs directly above us. Though it is not mine... it is yours."
Without another word, he raised his finger to the ceiling.
Before either side could make sense of his cryptic warning, a great commotion erupted through the streets of Bazareff. Drawn by the uproar, Oscar hurried outside the inn. The instant he lifted his eyes to the heavens, he froze where he stood.
"What... is this?" he muttered.
Suspended in the night sky hovered countless colossal pillars of iron, their sharpened tips wreathed in searing flames that bathed the darkness in an ominous crimson glow. Until that moment, the people of Bazareff had mistaken every spectacle above as another part of the festival's grand displays.
Now, however, even the merriest among them could no longer mistake those looming masses of iron for anything but harbingers of ruin.
Only then did the rivals grasp the true danger. In that instant, they understood that the man seated before them was the very enemy their Grand Master had warned them about.
"Aren't your kind supposed to preach love?" Aiden demanded, his fist tightening. "Are you truly going to slaughter all these people?"
"People?" The Saint let out a faint, scornful chuckle. "The moment they abandoned their goddess after her fall, they surrendered themselves to the indulgence of the flesh and rejected the authority of higher beings. These..." His cold gaze drifted beyond the inn toward the terrified city. "...are not people. They are vermin, fit only for extermination."
At his words, the blazing pillars began their descent.
"You two go ahead. I'll deal with him."
With a sharp kick, Victoria sent the table skidding aside before driving a punch toward Isidro. He caught it effortlessly with an open palm.
Without a moment's hesitation, Aiden and Godric vanished from the inn, racing into the heavens to intercept the descending catastrophe.
"Deal with me?" Isidro repeated softly, his lips curling into a faint smile. "How absurd."
His fingers closed around Victoria's fist. With a single motion, he flung her across the room, sending her crashing through the inn's timber wall. The impact shattered wood into splinters. Behind the counter, Miss FishGreens wasted no time diving into a nearby room to seek shelter.
Outside, Lambert had already joined Oscar. As he looked skyward and saw Aiden and Godric soaring ahead of him, he bit down in frustration. They had beaten him to the battlefield.
Aiden unleashed volley after volley of blazing fireballs against the descending pillars, while Godric answered with lightning-infused strikes powerful enough to split stone. Yet every assault broke apart against the colossal iron masses without slowing their descent.
Then the pillars struck.
Each impact shook the earth, crushing everything beneath its weight as torrents of fire burst outward, spreading with the same merciless fury as the one who had summoned them. Within moments, Bazareff—the town once celebrated as the City of Joy—had become a city of grief and ashes.
The air filled with desperate cries. Survivors called the names of loved ones who would never answer, while others screamed in unbearable agony.
Amid the chaos, the Saint of Execution slowly closed his eyes and drew a deep breath before exhaling in quiet satisfaction. To him, every scream was flawless. Together, they rose like a grand Gregorian chant.
Victoria emerged from the shattered remains of the inn without a scratch, Miss FishGreens cradled safely in her arms. The innkeeper had escaped with little more than bruises, though the shock had robbed her of consciousness.
Around them lay the broken remnants of the festival. Most of those who had once filled the inn had perished alongside the ones they cherished. The few who still clung to life did so in despair.
Dolores and Pritish had also managed to survive, though whether they lived or died mattered little to Isidro.
"You butchered all these people simply because they refused to bow to your archaic beliefs."
Sword in her left hand, Victoria advanced with measured steps.
"If you care so deeply for them," Isidro replied, tightening his grip around his spear, "then why don't you save them?"
"I'm no saviour." She lowered her stance, her blade poised to strike.
"But ending you would be a good place to start."
She burst forward in a blur, her sword flashing toward the Saint with relentless precision. Isidro met every strike with the shaft of his spear, each clash ringing sharply through the burning streets.
"Is that all?" he asked, staring her down with unmistakable disappointment. "How could Rannickvol have fallen to someone so feeble? He truly was a good-for-nothing."
Victoria answered not with words, but with power.
Mana surged through her blade, its radiance intensifying as she poured more of her strength into the weapon. The force behind her assault mounted with every strike, driving Isidro steadily backward until he was finally compelled to meet her with equal strength.
The force born from their clash erupted into violent shockwaves, sweeping through the streets and tearing apart everything in their path. Countless wisps of mana scattered through the air, remnants of the tremendous power unleashed by both mages.
Victoria was hurled into the air by the Saint's overwhelming physical strength. For the briefest moment, disbelief crossed her face. Ever since awakening her magic, she had never once been overpowered through sheer brute force.
That fleeting lapse did not escape Isidro's notice.
To the Saint, every opening was a gift to be seized if it brought his enemy one step closer to death.
At his command, countless spears materialized around him before streaking toward Victoria. She deflected the first barrage with her sword, steel ringing against conjured iron, yet the weapons refused to relent. They curved back through the air and came at her again, pursuing her in relentless succession.
"Is this really the frail girl who stood on death's doorstep when we first met?" Pritish asked in disbelief from the corner of the street.
"I can't believe what I'm seeing," Dolores whispered. "How could she have become such a... monster? What happened inside that cave?"
"You two."
Without even turning his head, Isidro cast them a sidelong glance.
"Yes, Master!" The two women straightened immediately.
"I shall reduce this profane town to ruin and slaughter every pagan within its walls. Begone from my sight. You are of no use to me now. Find some means to survive, for it would be troublesome to pass judgment upon this city while sparing the two of you. Should you perish, your blood shall rest solely upon your own heads."
Dolores and Pritish lowered their heads and departed at once.
***
Elsewhere in the heart of Bazareff, Aiden, Godric, Lambert, and Oscar worked tirelessly to rescue the townsfolk while quelling the fires that devoured the city with aquatic spells. Their efforts came to an abrupt halt, however, when a colossal dark wolf emerged through the smoke.
Andromed had arrived.
"A werewolf?" Lambert muttered, drawing his wand.
"Master," Oscar said respectfully, never taking his eyes off the beast. "I don't believe it is a werewolf. There is no full moon tonight. It is more likely a mage with extraordinary mastery over Ophisis."
"Werewolf or not..." Aiden cracked his knuckles, a grin spreading across his face. "It's going down, here and now."
"Perhaps," Lambert replied with a smile. "But I'll be the one to bring it down."
"Huh?" Aiden shot him a puzzled look.
"Don't get carried away, Lambert." Godric summoned a sword into his hand. "There's no glory in dying here. Look at that beast. You can't defeat it alone."
"I know my own limits better than anyone, Godric."
Lambert spun his wand between his fingers as he strode toward Andromed.
"Besides, Oscar will be fighting at my side. As for the two of you..." He glanced over his shoulder with his usual composed smile. "You wouldn't call yourselves gentlemen if you left that woman to face that man alone. You've both felt it, haven't you? He's no ordinary mage. Go. She needs you more than I do."
For a moment, Aiden and Godric exchanged glances before silently reaching the same conclusion; he was right. Without contest, they shot toward Victoria's battlefield.
"You'd better not die, you noble weirdo!" Aiden shouted over his shoulder.
Lambert laughed.
"Who do you take me for?"
With a flourish of his wand, the shattered stone, splintered timber, and twisted debris scattered across the ruined streets rose into the air around him.
"I am Lambert Normandie... the most elegant mage in all of Utopia."
His smile widened.
"And one day, I shall become its greatest."
***
The iron spears continued to return again and again, no matter how Victoria deflected them. Growing weary of the relentless masquerade, she shifted her approach. The fallen princess drove her sword into the ground and invoked "Reich."
The spell erupted outward in violent shockwaves, shattering the encroaching spears into fragments of dissipating mana.
"Not bad," the Saint murmured.
Yet Victoria was far from finished. With her blade now overflowing with mana, she surged forward and unleashed a relentless flurry of slashes toward Isidro.
He did not remain idle.
Instead, he met her head-on, stepping directly into the path of destruction. Spinning his spear with fluid precision around his body, he deflected each strike with exacting control. The surrounding air, nearby houses, and even the ground itself were torn and fractured by the force of their exchange.
Steel and spear clashed in brutal succession, yet the advantage remained with the Saint. With a sudden motion, he kicked Victoria's blade aside before driving a cataclysmic "Reich" directly into her abdomen.
The impact was devastating. She coughed up blood on the spot.
Ordinarily, her body would have been sent flying by such a blow, but Isidro did not allow it. He seized her by the neck, lifting her into the air and tightening his grip as she bled.
"I intended to kill you on sight," he said coldly, "but I have changed my mind. You are the only one who may know what transpired back then. Killing you now would be a waste. I will lock you away… and extract the truth myself. Submit, woman."
Victoria struggled against his grip as radiant magical inscriptions began to seep from his hand into her body. Her vision blurred.
"What… is this?" she thought faintly, her eyelids growing heavy. "I'm losing consciousness…"
Just as darkness threatened to take her, a sudden surge of heat tore through the air, followed by a sharp crackle of energy. Isidro's grip loosened instantly.
Victoria gasped as she dropped free, drawing in a ragged breath before she could even understand what had happened.
Aiden and Godric had arrived.
As their reputations foretold, the Flame God stood wreathed in blazing fire, while the Lord of Storms was engulfed in crackling lightning.
Together, they struck Isidro with overwhelming force, sending him hurtling through several houses until he crashed into the town wall.
"We left you alone for a moment, and you're already on the brink of death," Aiden teased. "Pathetic."
"Shut up," Victoria replied, wiping blood from her mouth.
"We merely pushed him back," Godric said, handing the fallen princess a sword. "The real battle begins now. Show no mercy if you wish to leave this place alive."
The three mages released their mana in unison, the air itself trembling under their combined presence.
From the ruins, Isidro rose once more. Blood dripped from his nose and mouth, yet there was no trace of anger in his expression. Instead, something far more dangerous settled there—delight.
His ominous aura swelled.
"Do not disappoint me," he declared, his voice heavy with bloodlust. "Make sure you dance long enough… before I claim your filthy heads."