But before Goenitz could even stabilize himself—
Maki Kagura's voice of final judgment, carrying the authority of the divine, echoed between heaven and earth!
"Yata Mirror... by the name of Maki Kagura, I release your true power!"
"Seal this sinner who brings calamity... forever within the endless world of mirrors!"
"Ura Style 185: Foundation of Zero—Final Form..."
"—Light of Yata!!!"
The instant those words fell—
An ancient bronze mirror, radiating a soft halo, slowly emerged from within Maki Kagura!
It floated into the air and expanded against the wind!
In an instant, it transformed into a massive divine mirror over ten meters in diameter!
The next second, a beam of genesis light—so brilliant it could shame the sun and moon, brimming with the power of sealing and purification—burst forth from the mirror's surface!
It struck the Divine Apostle still tumbling through the air with perfect precision!
"AAAAAHHH—!!!!!"
Goenitz finally let out a howl of pain and terror!
He felt his body, his power, even... his very soul!
Under that "Sealing Light," an irresistible, terrifying force was dragging him relentlessly toward that massive divine mirror that gaped like a black hole!
"No... I can't...!"
"I absolutely cannot... be sealed here!"
He struggled frantically, releasing every last drop of his divine power without reservation!
He tried to resist that devouring force capable of swallowing everything!
But just as he was about to be completely sucked into the mirror world—
Something unexpected happened!
Crack—!
A subtle sound, like glass shattering, quietly rang out.
A tiny crack had appeared on the mirror's surface—which should have been perfectly smooth and flawless!
And that supposedly "invincible" Sealing Light instantly weakened by thirty percent because of that flaw!
"Ha... hahahahahaha!"
After a brief moment of shock, Goenitz burst into manic laughter!
He laughed so hard tears nearly streamed down his face!
"So that's it... so that's how it is!"
He looked at the sisters, whose faces had gone pale with shock and disbelief, and smiled—a smile of surviving certain death and boundless mockery!
"Your Yata Mirror... is damaged!"
"Hahahaha! Heaven truly helps me!"
"With this pathetic sealing power that can't even tickle me... you think you can seal ME?! Keep dreaming!"
He roared and began forcing his way free from the now "weakened" Sealing Light!
"How... how can this be?!"
Maki Kagura stared at that glaring crack on the mirror's surface, and despair finally appeared on her usually gentle, serene face.
She knew... she had lost her gamble.
She had done everything she could.
Perhaps... humanity's fate truly ended here.
But at this moment of "despair" and "reversal"—
A flippant, irreverent voice brimming with confidence echoed in the sisters' ears, shattering the suffocating silence.
"Sigh, honestly. Dropping the ball at the crucial moment—guess this Final Boss has to personally patch things up for you."
Everyone turned toward the voice. Somehow, Cloud had appeared behind the Kagura sisters.
He looked at the dimming Yata Mirror with an expression of exasperated disappointment, shaking his head.
"Seriously, Chizuru, your family's divine artifact has terrible customer service. Something this important has a bug, and nobody thought to fix it?"
"Wh-what are you saying?" Chizuru was both angry and anxious. Now was hardly the time for jokes!
"What am I saying?" Cloud smiled mysteriously. "I'm saying... it's time to witness a miracle."
With that, under the sisters' utterly astonished gazes, he slowly extended his hand.
Light flashed in his palm, and from thin air appeared a small, irregularly shaped fragment of mirror, radiating an ancient aura.
The fragment's size, shape, and unique energy signature matched perfectly with the most prominent crack on the Yata Mirror's surface—as if they were meant to fit together!
It was the Yata Mirror Fragment that Cloud had won long ago from the System's gacha wheel—the "trash" he'd been keeping as a last resort!
"This... this is... a fragment of the Yata Mirror?!" Both sisters gasped in unison, their eyes nearly popping out. "How... how is it in your hands?!"
"Oh, this?" Cloud maintained his utterly casual expression and launched into his "bullshitting" mode.
"Back in the day, when I was just a hot-blooded youth with dreams, I traveled the world doing good deeds."
"One time, in a cave, I bought a martial arts manual called Palm of the Buddha from a dying old man for three bucks. He threw in this shiny little trinket as a bonus. I didn't think much of it—just used it as a razor. Who knew it'd turn out to be such a treasure?"
The Kagura sisters: "..."
Every conscious fighter in the arena: "..."
This explanation had so many holes, nobody knew where to even begin.
You call that "acquired during travels"?
That's literally the standard opening template for orphan protagonists in web novels!
Of course, Cloud wasn't about to tell them that this fragment was actually something he'd gotten by spending several thousand Source Points on the System's gacha wheel, pulling it from the "Divine Artifact Accessories" category as a "Better Luck Next Time" consolation prize.
At the time, he'd known this thing would come in handy someday.
"Alright, stop spacing out." Cloud ignored everyone's "are you insane?" looks and flicked his finger.
The Yata Mirror fragment transformed into a streak of light, flying precisely toward the mirror.
Click.
A crisp sound rang out—so pure it seemed to transcend a thousand years.
The fragment merged perfectly with the mirror's surface.
...
Get 20+ chapters ahead on - P.a.t.r.e.o.n "RoseWhisky"