Mitsuki's eyes went wide.
There was no time to react. No chance to defend.
To him, in that brief instant, everything was over.
They had lost.
Surrendering at that moment seemed reasonable—but there was someone who would never be capable of surrendering.
Before, he ran from the flames in the cracks of the ground, but now he ran toward the swords. Marco was ready to give it everything. In that fleeting fragment of time, he took the full force of both blades—a cross slash impossible to withstand—from the Lady of Cinder.
His body was pushed back, sinking into the ground. The muscles in his arms burst, his bones shattered with grotesque, wet cracks. The same happened to his legs, but instead of collapsing, he remained standing, holding his sword firmly.
Amazingly, the princess's blades stopped. And there, before her, that young man stared back with eyes blazing with fury. The strength he used to hold the enemy's swords in place made the ground tremble.
