But exactly one foot away from the splintered wood of Lencar's mask, the barrage simply... stopped.
The visual was incredibly jarring, aggressively defying all logic and physics. They didn't strike an invisible magical barrier and shatter into a million pieces like glass hitting concrete. They didn't hit a repulsive wind shield and bounce away. They didn't even slow down gradually as if hitting a cushion of dense air.
They simply halted in mid-air, transitioning from supersonic, lethal speed to absolute, frozen stillness in zero seconds flat.
The dozen massive blades hung perfectly suspended in the mist, a frozen halo of pink death. The incredibly sharp, geometric tips of the constructs hovered mere inches from Lencar's face, close enough that he could easily see the complex, overlapping crystalline lattice structures within the pink glass, and smell the ozone of the displaced air.
The massive kinetic energy contained within the spell didn't just disappear. The swords vibrated violently, letting out a high-pitched, teeth-aching screeching whine as they fought desperately against an overwhelming, invisible, and utterly immovable pressure. The air between the tips of the swords and Lencar's mask visibly warped and rippled from the sheer, crushing density of the conflicting magical forces.
But no matter how hard they vibrated, no matter how much they screamed and strained, they could not advance a single, solitary millimeter further.
Lencar hadn't used a defensive spell. He hadn't cast a wall of earth or a shield of wind. He had done something far more absolute, and conceptually far more terrifying to a mage.
He had projected his own newly expanded, Stage 3 Peak mana outward, effortlessly expanding his soul's presence to encompass the immediate ten-foot radius around his body, creating an invisible, suffocating domain of absolute magical control.
Furthermore, and crucially, because Lencar now successfully possessed the pure, unadulterated essence of the Crystal Soul Gem securely locked within his own internal repository, his mana wasn't treating Mars's spell as a foreign attack to be repelled. It was treating the spell as its own.
Lencar's incredibly dense, overwhelmingly powerful mana actively resonated with the exact frequency of the incoming crystal swords. In that localized, ten-foot space, Lencar's magical authority vastly, astronomically outranked Mars's. Lencar hadn't blocked the spell; he had effortlessly, casually hijacked it. He had stripped the Diamond General of his absolute authority over his own constructs, rendering Mars's command over the crystal completely null and void.
Sitting comfortably on his rock, surrounded by a halo of suspended, vibrating death, Lencar tilted his head slightly to the side. He peered casually around the edge of the frozen, razor-sharp blade that was hovering closest to his right eye.
"Well, I have to admit," Lencar said, his voice echoing clearly over the loud screeching of the vibrating crystal. He didn't sound angry, frightened, or even slightly threatened. His tone was dripping with a dry, heavy, utterly unapologetic sarcasm that felt incredibly human, contrasting sharply with his terrifying, god-like display of magical power. "You're certainly lively for someone who was beaten into a bloody, unconscious pulp with bare hands just half an hour ago, and then spontaneously combusted shortly after. I'll give Diamond Kingdom conditioning credit where it's due; you boys bounce back fast."
Across the plateau, Mars's reaction was one of pure, unadulterated, paradigm-shifting shock.
He stood with his right arm still fully extended, his gloved fingers trembling wildly from the exertion of maintaining his spell. He gritted his teeth so hard a thick blue vein bulged prominently on his pale forehead. His pale eyes widened in absolute disbelief as he watched his ultimate, lethal attack casually suspended in the air like a cheap parlor trick.
He strained, planting his heavy boots firmly on the slick rock, digging deep into his newly replenished mana reserves. He poured more and more raw magical energy into the spell, pushing violently through the tether of the synthetic grimoire, desperately, furiously trying to force the hovering swords forward to pierce the arrogant, masked bastard's skull.
"Die!" Mars grunted, the single word forced out from between tightly clenched teeth, a primal, animalistic sound of absolute frustration and failing comprehension.
"Oh, stop embarrassing yourself, kid," Lencar sighed heavily, the biting sarcasm giving way to a weary, almost parental tone of reprimand. He sounded exactly like a man dealing with a particularly stubborn, tantrum-throwing toddler who refused to go to sleep. "It's far too early in the morning for this much exertion, I am freezing, and I have a massive headache."
Lencar slowly, deliberately uncrossed his arms, finally moving from his incredibly relaxed posture. He let his left hand rest casually on his knee.
"I left your newly minted grimoire sitting right next to your hand when you woke up," Lencar continued calmly, completely ignoring the boy's desperate, sweating, vein-popping struggle to push the massive swords forward. "Did you really, genuinely think I would be careless enough to do that without fully preparing for you to throw a violent, homicidal tantrum the absolute second you saw me?"
Lencar leaned forward slightly, the suspended, vibrating blades practically brushing the damp fabric of his hood.
"I'm not some sheltered, arrogant Golden Dawn amateur who relies on pedigree over preparation, General," Lencar stated, his voice dropping into a colder, harder, far more dangerous register. "I don't leave loose ends, and I certainly don't leave my life up to chance."
Lencar raised his right hand from his lap. He held it up in the small gap between two of the violently vibrating crystal broadswords.
He casually, effortlessly pressed his bruised thumb and middle finger together.
And he snapped his fingers.
The sound was incredibly sharp, a crisp, percussive crack that easily cut through the howling wind and the headache-inducing screeching vibration of the magical constructs.
It was a completely unnecessary, highly theatrical physical gesture. Lencar didn't need to snap his fingers to command the magic; he only needed his overwhelming willpower. But the dramatic, human flair was entirely intentional. He was establishing absolute psychological dominance. He needed Mars to understand exactly how outclassed he currently was.
The absolute instant the sound of the snap echoed across the plateau, Lencar issued a silent, overriding command to the domain of mana he controlled.
Cancel.
Instantly, all twelve of the massive, hovering crystal swords lost their structural integrity.
They didn't fall to the wet ground and shatter like dropped glass. They didn't explode outward in a shower of shrapnel. They simply ceased to exist as physical matter. The incredibly dense, diamond-hard magical constructs completely, uniformly disintegrated on an atomic level.
They dissolved rapidly back into raw, unformed, pink magical energy. The lethal weapons turned into a massive cloud of beautifully shimmering, entirely harmless pink dust that hung in the air for a fraction of a second before the morning mountain breeze caught it, blowing it past Lencar's black cloak and scattering it into the mist like falling cherry blossoms.
Across the rock, the sudden, absolute loss of magical and kinetic resistance was catastrophic for Mars's physical balance.
Because the General was pushing forward with every ounce of his physical and magical might against what he perceived as an invisible, immovable wall, the sudden, complete disappearance of that wall sent his momentum pitching violently forward.
Mars stumbled heavily, taking a jarring, uncoordinated half-step, his heavy boots skidding dangerously on the slick obsidian. He barely managed to catch his balance, throwing his hands out wildly to stop himself from falling flat on his face.
He stood there, bent over, panting heavily, his chest heaving inside the pink crystal armor Lencar had made him. He stared down at his own empty, trembling hands in horror. He looked up at the empty space in the mist where his perfectly calculated, overwhelmingly powerful attack had been just a second prior. His ultimate magic had been entirely, casually erased from reality with a single, insulting gesture.
The fundamental laws of combat he had learned in the Diamond Kingdom were currently breaking down before his very eyes.
On the rock outcropping, Lencar let out a soft groan of genuine physical pain that he tried to hide by clearing his throat. His exhausted muscles screamed in protest as he finally moved. He slid smoothly off the jagged rock, his heavy boots landing with a soft splash in a puddle on the plateau. He stood up to his full height, rolling his stiff shoulders backward to relieve the aching, knotted tension in his spine.
"Now," Lencar said, his voice returning to a steady, commanding, and dangerously calm level. He began to walk slowly, deliberately toward the bewildered, completely off-balance Diamond General, closing the distance between them with measured, predatory steps. "Let's put the toys away and have a civilized conversation like two professionals."
Lencar raised his right hand again. The aura of mana swirling around his fingers shifted drastically, transitioning from the pale, structured pink of crystal to a dull, rusted, heavy metallic brown.
"And to ensure you actually behave and sit still long enough to listen to me without trying to blow us both up..."