The Fairy Armor—a beautiful suit entirely pink in color, elegantly adorned with pink feather decorations near the ears.
Erza had designed this special armor herself, carefully incorporating many rare materials she had collected over the years.
In terms of sheer cost... it was undoubtedly her most expensive armor.
"This armor proudly bears the name of my guild. I do not need to say anything more—you understand exactly what that means, right?" Erza asked.
"The Fairy Armor... so it represents your absolute strongest magical armor, is that it? Interesting." Knightwalker was practically brimming with fierce fighting spirit.
"Come on!"
Knightwalker gathered a massive pink shockwave centered around her spear, the Ten Commandments, while Erza generated a brilliant green shockwave with her Fairy Sword.
As the age-old saying goes, the combatant standing on the left side of an energy clash is usually the one who loses...
"BOOM"
"..."
"My Edolas..." Knightwalker whispered.
She stared blankly at her completely shattered Ten Commandments spear, her entire body trembling in disbelief.
At the same time, the expensive Fairy Armor on Erza's body also began to slowly disintegrate into magic particles.
The sheer destructive force of their colliding shockwaves had completely ruined the mechanics of the floating island.
The massive chunk of land was now plummeting rapidly toward the ground below.
The island's sudden descent caused Erza to stumble and fall to her knees.
"The massive impact from our clash just now caused the floating island to lose its magical buoyancy."
"My spear is broken, but I still have to defeat you!"
Struggling unsteadily, Knightwalker forced herself up to her feet and charged directly toward Erza with her bare hands.
"My armor may be shattered, but I still have some magic power left."
In a flash of light, Erza switched to her Clear Heart Clothing—her classic bandage attire—and summoned the Demon Blade Benizakura.
This was, in truth, her actual strongest armor.
By completely abandoning all physical defense, she focused solely on pure offense with absolute, unwavering determination.
"For the sake of eternal magical power, I absolutely must not lose!" Even though she clearly saw that Erza still had enough magic left to summon a sword, Knightwalker showed no fear at all—or perhaps, she simply had no path of retreat left.
"Your so-called eternal magical power—think about how many innocent lives were violently sacrificed to obtain it!" Erza shouted. "Seizing things by force, threatening and intimidating people, hating others, and even destroying them!"
"That is just human nature!" Knightwalker shot back, remaining completely indifferent.
"You are wrong! Precisely because we are human, we should cherish others even more! We should stand up bravely for those we love! And we must wield our swords to protect those who weep in sorrow!"
Erza forcefully plunged the Benizakura blade straight into the ground.
She actively chose to engage Knightwalker in bare-handed close combat, fiercely determined to knock some sense into her counterpart.
"Can you not feel the deep sorrow of this world, Knightwalker?"
"The depletion of magic power is the real sorrow! It is for the sake of the world that I fight..."
Erza and Knightwalker tightly locked their fingers together in a brutal contest of physical strength—it was a fierce battle of both raw power and deeply held ideologies.
"No!" Erza yelled. "The 'world' refers to the living, breathing people who are still alive in it!"
"Magical power is gradually depleting here! This world is on the very verge of complete destruction! You privileged Mages from Earthland could never possibly understand!" Knightwalker cried out.
"The anxiety, the fear, and the absolute despair of losing our magical power! If we do not obtain eternal magical power, we simply cannot survive!"
"Aren't we both still living perfectly well right this very second?!" Erza countered. "We can easily live even without magical power! Look closely at yourself—you have long since exhausted all of your magical power! Yet despite that fact, you are still breathing, alive, and well!"
"As long as we have a strong, beating heart, we can overcome all fear and terror! That is exactly what it means to be alive!" Erza declared.
"Listen to me carefully, Erza Knightwalker! You need to focus on hearing the voices of the survivors! And it is not just you all striving to live! Mystogan... no, Jellal! Jellal is also desperately trying to help Edolas find a better way to survive!"
'Erza Belserion... is this who I truly am?' Knightwalker looked deeply into Erza's sincere eyes and couldn't help but be profoundly moved by her words.
'BOOM—!'
The island finally crashed into the earth.
"We are completely immobilized... but we are still alive," Erza panted.
Both Erza and Knightwalker lay exhausted and sprawled out flat on the rubble-strewn ground.
"I cannot defeat you," Knightwalker whispered. "I admit that you have won, Erza Belserion."
"What is there to say about winning or losing between us?" Erza chuckled lightly, staring up at the sky.
"We are both Erza, after all."
"Is that so?" Knightwalker also smiled, feeling a sudden warm sense of relief wash over her.
...
"Although your strange magic surprised me, there is absolutely no way you could defeat my Dorma Anim!" King Faust shouted from his cockpit.
"Only those with immense magic power are truly qualified to rule the world! This is the inevitable, unbreakable law of this world!"
"You certainly have a lot of twisted, broken logic," Raizel replied calmly.
Faust once again manipulated the Dorma Anim to leap high into the air, forcefully thrusting its giant, mechanical sword straight down toward Raizel.
Standing firmly in place, Raizel swung his left arm downward.
The Grey Sword extended from the Greymon head once again, swiftly sweeping upward to block the giant metal blade.
With a burst of strength, he exerted even more force to violently push the Dorma Anim backward.
"Damn it!" Faust fumed in pure frustration after his failed strike.
The Dorma Anim stomped its heavy right foot against the earth, leaving a massive, cracked crater in the ground.
Using the bouncy recoil, the giant machine charged recklessly toward Raizel again.
Just as the Dorma Anim raised its right arm, preparing to slash at Raizel with its giant sword, the Brave Shield on Raizel's left shoulder instantly reappeared right in front of him to defend.
Clang—!
The Dorma Anim's giant sword struck the Brave Shield head-on, producing nothing more than scattered orange sparks and the loud, ringing sound of heavy metal clashing.
"Its.. ineffective... How is this even possible?!" Faust gasped as the Dorma Anim involuntarily stumbled and retreated two heavy steps backward.
"Faust, this ridiculous farce should end right now," Raizel stated.
He raised his right arm, and the Garuru Cannon extended from the MetalGarurumon head.
The weapon continuously began gathering freezing, blue ice energy inside its barrel.
The temperature in the surrounding air dropped steadily and rapidly as the freezing energy condensed.
The scattered stones and the dirt ground around the ruins were quickly covered with a thin, sparkling layer of white ice.
Even Gray who was busy fighting soldiers in the distance, could clearly feel the sudden biting chill.
"It is so incredibly cold... should I put on some more clothes?" Edolas Gray asked, constantly shivering as he hugged himself.
"What is so cold about it? Do not put on clothes in a fight!" Earthland Gray facepalmed in complete exasperation at his counterpart's weird habits.
..
"This armor is made of anti-magic crystal! Have you completely forgotten?! Your magic is totally ineffective here!" Faust's tone was full of arrogant mockery.
"Maybe I cannot do anything to pierce your shield, but you definitely cannot defeat me either!"
"Supreme Canon!" Raizel shouted as he fired.
An enormous, freezing blast of energy shot straight out of the cannon and flew directly toward the Dorma Anim.
Supremely confident in his anti-magic armor, Faust simply raised his metal shield to block the incoming attack.
"See?! It is completely ineffective! Ineffective! Hahaha—!"
While Faust was laughing maniacally, he suddenly felt the sealed cockpit becoming unbelievably cold.
When Faust tried to manually maneuver the Dorma Anim, he discovered to his absolute horror that the machine would not move an inch!
"How? How is this happening?!" Faust panicked.
He kept desperately trying to control the Dorma Anim with his levers, but the machine seemed completely disconnected from him.
It was totally unresponsive.
"The Dorma Anim is completely frozen in solid ice! How is that possible?" Panther Lily, who was leaning heavily against a nearby tree to recover from his battle injuries, watched the scene utterly stunned.
"Is that... a hundred-meter light sword?" Carla gasped.
She suddenly recalled a terrifying, prophetic image that had left a deep, scarring impression on her mind.
It was exactly because of this vision that Carla had initially mistaken Raizel for the wicked demon who was destined to destroy her hometown.
Raizel's magical power continuously gathered into the Grey Sword on his left arm.
With his arm raised vertically straight up toward the blackened sky, the metal sword began to magically extend, intensely radiating a brilliant, light-attribute magical power throughout its entire body.
Fifty meters... One hundred meters... Two hundred meters... the blade of light grew to an impossible length.
Not only did Carla remember the vision, but Raizel also recalled it, finally understanding the prophecy.
"So, that is how it is," Raizel murmured.
Subsequently, the massive, glowing light sword on Raizel's left arm swiftly swung downward.
Gathering terrifying, unstoppable magical power, the giant sword descended from high above in a single, devastating cleaving motion.
'Be split in two, Transcendent Sword!' Raizel silently added this dramatic line in his head just for himself.