Bruno dropped his ax and charged at Ciel with the body clad in Aura.

Instead, he ran into an Illusion, charging into a wall of white cotton that appeared out of nowhere. A wave of Blue Magic washed over Bruno, slowing him enough and leaving him wide-open for Ciel’s follow-up assault.

Ciel reappeared from the opposite direction. He couldn’t use Blue Magic, but the three pieces of the Black Spade gear he wore provided him with the three extra spell-options to use outside his repertoire. He went through both Illusion and Lethargy before the fight even began. Ciel believed he really owed Betty a thank you for this.

Now, time for the spell he could use.

White Magic Rank 3: Bind.

Several javelins of light stabbed into Bruno, impaling through the pile of cotton to reach the man beneath.

Bruno poked his head out from fluffy stuffing.

“Puffy cotton and weak-ass White Magic?” Bruno yelled. “You think this little trick can beat me?”

Ciel snorted, “Those little tricks? Nope. But the cotton isn’t created to beat you.”

Bruno growled, lifting his leg forward in an attempt to carry his body to rip Ciel’s head off.

Then the Black Archangel realized he couldn’t move. His entire body wasn’t responding to him.

“Those cottons are one of my Anti-Aura countermeasures,” Ciel explained. “They are enchanted fiber, soaked in the well of White Mana and lined with runic string meant to amplify a certain property of Bind. You might never notice this but each Mana color has traits they were specialized in. White in particular excels in the property of enforcing order. It can do that by enhancing the user, annihilating the threat, or like now, hampering the chaotic element. The White Mana used in Sanction and Bind is specially tuned to paralyze the movement and activity of energy. That cotton acts like White Mana amplifier and diffracters. The Bind was scattered into subatomic pins which imperceptibly pricked your body. Think of it as several millions of tiny paralytic darts that prevent you from moving an inch of your muscle. Without the ability to move, there is no way for you to summon any percentage of your strength.”

Bruno growled. The Unity Lord wasn’t bluffing. He could feel his mouth turning numb, but Bruno didn’t give up. He began gathering Black Mana lining the air and even the ground with Black Magic. Behind him a haze of Black Mana began to condense.

Suddenly, a flying arrow sailed from Ciel and dispersed the mass of dark energy like a magnet of the same pole repelling each other.

Bruno blinked at the arrow that began circling the area, “What the hell was that?”

“That was a certain preparation I made,” Ciel said. “Yes, imprisoning your movement is a necessity, but it would be too stupid not to account from the Black Mana as well. That arrow circling us is tipped with quartz rich with White Mana; a perfect disperser of Black. It automatically detects concentration of Black Mana above the norm and scatters it.”

Bruno scowled, “Just how many secret weapons do you have!”

“I spent months preparing, Bruno,” Ciel confessed. “I literally lost count of the means I have.”

Bruno made a mental checklist. Physically strangling Ciel wasn’t an option. His Black Magic was gone. His artifact was disabled. This left only White Magic as the final resort against Ciel.

Bruno reached for the power Maximus gave him and fired a Smite.

Ciel lifted his arm, erecting a shield of condensed light to absorb the beam.

Bruno felt himself die a little when Ciel started explaining again.

“A shield specifically designed to absorb White Magic,” Ciel invited the attention to his cloth, or more importantly, the lack of heavy artifact. “Do you think I equipped lightly out of choice? I specifically prepared the Anti-Black and Anti-White weapon to use against you.” Ciel sighed. “Bruno. I picked this fight because you are the Archangel I have all the counters for.”

Ciel decided not to tell him about the reason Bruno picked the short straw for the counter gods. Bruno was an unlucky because Ciel’s most reliable source of raw material — the Cave of Grace — was a White nexus. It was both cheaper and easier for Ciel to create a countermeasure against Black and White mage compared to everyone else.

Bruno didn’t give up. Since a narrow-range White-base attack wouldn’t do the job, the Black Archangel opted to slaughter Ciel with wide-range bombardment. Wrath of Sol or Sanction would kill him nice and well. Thus, Bruno began amassing an absurd quantity of White Mana

It was then Ciel shattered the man’s hope by talking again.

“I wouldn’t do that,” Ciel warned, summoning several stakes in his hand.

Bruno felt something else shaking. Those things were the spiders attached to him.

Ciel began circling Bruno, nailing those metallic stakes in a six-pointed star formation with Bruno at the center.

“Those spiders are powered with special power sources — holy stones.” Ciel slowly unveiled his grand design. “Stones which are put under a special constraint which operates once the artifact deactivated. Under that device, the stone would absorb White Mana and increase the volatility of its structure. To put it simply, it began sucking White Mana in the area when it was attached to you before exploding under a certain threshold.”

Ciel clicked his finger, and the stakes placed in a six-point around Bruno lighted, creating a hexagonal cylinder with Bruno inside it.

“And that is a special containment formation I created,” Ciel cracked his neck. “I had to reverse-engineer the one Xia took back from her run in with the Military Police. Anyway,” the Lord pointed his finger at the spider, “do you have any last word before being incinerated inside a contained explosion of White Mana?”

Bruno roared in an attempt to escape out, but Ciel beat him to it. He didn’t take a chance.

White Magic Rank 4: Smite

The beam of light from Ciel’s finger hit the spider on Bruno’s shoulder. The holy stone inside the spider hit the critical capacity and exploded with volatile White Mana.

Mechanical spiders hanging from Bruno erupted in a chain-explosion. The disintegrating light expanded, roasting Bruno in a way his Aura couldn’t nullify. Burned in light, Bruno howled from inside the hexagonal cage which trapped the light inside like a glasshouses. The geometrical barrier turned into a furnace of white hexagon.

After one psychological eternity, the blaze died revealing the body resembling a charcoal with all notable features burned away. His eyes and mouth were reduced to a hollow socket. The dead body of the Black Archangel fell to the ground without a chance to even fight.

Bruno’s defeat was the exemplar in the peril of underestimating your opponent. The fourth-strongest Archangel specialized in slaughter, Black Magic, and ruthlessness were destroyed in the combination of preparation and trickery. Nine times out of ten, Bruno’s Aura and his mastery of Magic would have put up a masterful fight against a warrior.

Sadly, for the deceased Archangel, Ciel was no warrior; he was a tactician. When he committed to a serious battle, it was when he was sure he had a back-up for his second back-up plan. He studied his enemy to best maximize his leverage and handicapped their strength. For Ciel, his true battle was knowing his enemy and enacting his plan. It took time to find the knowledge, resources, and time for him to fight like he knew best.

Now, with all the cards, Ciel could claim victory before the battle was fought.

…

Bruno’s defeat hadn’t gone over quietly.

Apolline was stunned at the familiar Aura dissipating into nothingness. “Bruno died?”  She couldn’t believe it. “How?”

Betty was grinning ear-to-ear, “Ah, the peril of taking Ciel lightly. My man might be a bit feeble on the brawling side, but when it comes to making plans he is unequal.” Betty couldn’t help but boast a bit more. “You think Ciel managed to get me as his wife as a fluke? Get real, he is still the Unity Lord.”

On her Pegasus, Apolline readied her spear, “Betty, you should better prepare yourself.”

A crimson ball of flames emerged from Apolline's hand.

Red Magic Rank 3: Flare

The ball of flames then dissipated to nothing.

Blue Magic Rank 5: Null

Apolline’s lip twitched. As expected, she was getting outclassed by Betty in a magical dogfight.

It appeared she must settle this in a melee, but first she needed to make sure Geneva knew they just lost Bruno.

Apolline pulled out a flare gun.

…

At the opposite end of the camp, a battle raged.

Xia must admit Geneva hit like a truck. Each pluck of her harp sent a massive Aura-enhanced sonic blade, cutting the very land itself. Getting hit by those attacks gave her bruises even through Ciel’s artifact. Adding another level to the difficulty curve was the bio-energy attack falling down from the sky and the forest growing from below.

There was also the Divine Ox —Taurus.

Xia flew in the air dodging a cut of sonic winds. She heard the swishing of the air from behind and turned to see the Divine Ox. The bull was rushing at her while being coated in greenish Bioenergy.

From above the angelic forms of Geneva scattered countless energy bomb into the air, and rained in down as a waterfall of devastation.

But Xia — and her [Strategist] — were ready.

Slamming the hilt of her sword toward the bull, Xia activated the [Deific Wing]. Compressed Mana, in the form of vibration-wave, canceled the Divine Ox’s charge, knocking it away. Meanwhile, the White Mana at her fingertips drew a crack in the air.

White Magic Rank 6: Wrath of Sol

Showers of stellar White Mana sailed from the crack like meteors, smashing against the bio-energy bomb.

Using the clash as a distraction, Geneva rocketed toward Xia at subsonic speed, casting the Green Magic.

Green Magic Rank 5: Time Cycle 

Xia, knowing what was coming, immediately bid a retreat.

Geneva spelled managed to catch the helm of her hood, lightly damaging it.

“Trying to destroy my new clothes,” Xia growled, flying away to put as much distance between them as possible. “That is nasty, Geneva.”

Geneva wasn’t embarrassed about her tactic, “Your artifact will make or break the fight, targeting it isn’t even a question. Those clothes might be able to resist some artifact destruction, but it wouldn’t be enough for you to fight at close range!”

Geneva fired another green bioenergy from her hand, as she engaged in an aerial dog fight with Xia.

The two women chased each other across the sky. Geneva cast a Nature Wonder, manipulating the plant below them to form a giant whip. The whip cracked at Xia, breaking the very earth with its movement.

Xia effortlessly gathered the huge White Mana through the ability of [White Blessing] and wiped away the whip and the surrounding landscape with a blinding Smite that lighted the night sky. Before she could combo the attack, Geneva’s summon — the Ox — returned.

Taurus the Divine Ox had returned from getting blasted with an airquake and charged at Xia from above.

Xia blocked the Ox descent with her blade, but its momentum was akin to an arrow fired by the constellations. Both the Ox and the Princess of White turned into a blur of motion, smashing to the earth like an anvil from the sky, kicking up dust and debris in a towering geyser.

Xia broke out from the dirt, picking on the familiar signature of green bio-energy Taurus was going to fire at her.

Sadly, Xia beat the Ox to the quick-draw—courtesy of good old [White Blessing].

White Magic Rank 3: Bind

The giant javelin of light skewered the divine bovine, snuffing its attack and locking it from moving.

With her mind actively keeping tabs of the fight with [Strategist], Xia knew Taurus was just a distraction.

Out from the dense thick wood crafted by Green Magic, the Archangel emerged with a ball of bio-energy. Inside it was the energy of the storm compressed into a furious size of a palm.

Xia, knowing that the attack couldn’t be taken lightly, activated her glove’s Holy Blade function and powered up the next slash of compressed Aura as an air-quake.

[Deific Wing], glowing with white light, swung forth. The arc of light eclipsed the night sky, cutting a track across the ground. Geneva met the attack with bio-energy bomb in her palm.

Green and white energies meshed. The aftershock ignited the air. Trees, rocks, dirt flew from the raw force being unleashed. Eventually, the white light overwhelmed the green in massive surges of power.

Xia observed the massive trench and leveled lands created in the collision. Dust floated to the sky and piece of dirt and rocks fell like rains.

Geneva walked out from the dust. Her body, bloodied from the clashes she lost, was rapidly repairing, rendering the damage mute. Green Mana from the surrounding natural lives trickled to the Archangel, aiding her recovery.

Xia knew they were in a stalemate. Geneva’s artifact destruction stopped Xia from going into melee and unleashed the strong attack to kill her. Xia might be stronger and better, but without the decisive blow, Geneva could heal from her attack.

Something was needed to break a stalemate.

That something came in the form of a flare shooting toward the skies.