Alice winced under the relentless assault of two bandits, their swords pounding against her.
The blades couldn’t cut through her skin at this mana density, but the impacts still felt like a series of brutal hand chops.

(Ow...! That one's definitely going to leave a bruise...)

Alice wasn't a fan of feeling pain, but she could take it as long as she knew she wouldn't get injured. Moreover, each slash fed her mana armor, making it last incrementally longer. It was truly a peculiar synergy of suffering and empowerment.
Now, offense was a different case. As soon as she had managed to dislocate the knee of the first bandit who attacked her earlier by not parrying his sword, she had lost the element of surprise. As such, Alice's current opponents were cautious and swiftly dodged every attempt of retaliation from her while continuing their barrage.

Still, despite the pain, she found some sort of satisfaction in her role. Since the fight started, she had played a role in taking down three bandits and in saving possibly as many guards. Well, one of the guards was currently lying unconscious a short distance away with serious burns all over his body, but he might have been killed by now without her intervention.
In any case, she was currently monopolizing two bandits who had their focus entirely on her. Most likely, they persisted in trying to take her down because the pained expression on her face told them their sword strikes weren't completely ineffective.

All in all, this gave the guards a much-needed respite, and potentially a chance to recover or regroup to turn the tide of this fight.
Despite his earlier order for Alice to return to the carriage, even Isaac de Vallmont had to acknowledge the fact that at this moment her presence was a tactical advantage. His expression was a mix of concern and reluctant acceptance.

All of a sudden, however, a large projectile met Alice with staggering force, nearly making her trip.

"Gaah...?!" Alice let out, more out of surprise than out of pain. Considering the large surface area, and thus the large shock absorption, this impact hinted at some impressive strength behind that throw.

"So it's not Strengthening magic," said a male voice. "If so, he would have been crushed against your skin."

As soon as Alice realized that what she had received was the lifeless body of yet another guard, she was grabbed by the hair. "Ngh...!"
"And then, there's this strong resistance as I reach you. You're interesting, Missy!"

With only one hand, an imposing figure hidden under a long robe lifted Alice off the ground effortlessly. Most of his face was concealed, except for what looked like a thrilled smile.

(What's wrong with this man...? How strong is he to pass through the armor?!)

From her vantage point, Alice kicked the bandit's chest, but it barely affected him.
"You... You don't pack a lot of punch, do you?"

(How come...?)

With a swift but brutal punch to the abdomen, Alice's breath was forced out, and she was flung across the dirt.

"You took that like a chief! Someone like you would have died, you know?"
"You..." Alice said with a trembling voice, trying to stand back up. "Are you a Strengthening mage...?"
"You can't beat the real deal with your imitation, can you?"

(He's nothing like Rachel... He's more powerful and resistant. This is bad... How is his output so good?)

"I wasn't planning to join the fun just yet, but I believe you will entertain me."

(Taking the aggro from a bona fide Strengthening mage is better than from a couple of normal bandits... Is he sword-proof as well?)

***

Despite her size, even after a series of successive punches from someone who should comparatively be described as a giant, Alice was still standing.
The size of his fists, much larger than the edge of a blade, allowed the kinetic armor to absorb a greater amount of energy, which surprisingly made this man a source of sustenance despite his wielding such a deadly magic type. As such, her strategy was to maintain this status quo until he naturally ran out of mana.
Considering how much energy he was putting in his punches, he wouldn't be able to deliver more than a hundred of them.

(If I know they're coming, I can take them!)

After a while, however, the bandit showed no sign of his mana depleting. If anything, the intensifying pain of each strike suggested he was even ramping up his mana usage in the hope of overcoming her protective spell with increased ferocity. His persisting grin told Alice he wasn't particularly worried about entering a state of mana deprivation.

(... You leave me no choice.)

Using all the accumulated mana she had generated during this face-off, along with some she had been using to strengthen her muscles, she lit up from all sides the long robe he had been wearing.

"Ha...?!"

Even with reinforced skin, he couldn't just ignore this much thermal energy. He stopped attacking and immediately tore off his robe, displaying his shoulder-length blond hair.

(Tch!)

"Goddamn it," he scoffed as he checked the burn he had gotten on his left arm. While patting his partially ignited hair. "So you really were the one who burned my men earlier, huh? Just what is your magic?"
"... Do you really think I would tell you?"
"Alice, get out of here!" Isaac exclaimed, the panic in his voice evident. "He is a Brangett!"

(... Brangett? Where did I hear that na— Ngh...?!)

Just as she was trying to make sense of the Marquis' warning, she was met with a punch much more powerful than the others.

"Good grief, masks are already falling," the Strengthening mage said in a light tone. "This is a bit too soon for that. No one here has some kind of communication magic, right?"

(Ah, Brangett. He's from the family of that noble kid who targeted me. It's no wonder that he's got so much mana...)

"Let's end this quickly," he added. His grin from earlier was still there but, now that his entire face was displayed, she could see obvious contempt in his entire expression.

(So it's an assassination attempt, disguised as a bandit attack. Can I even bring him down...?)

That made this man a member of a marquis family, with a considerable mana pool.
Alice doubted that this sudden increase in power meant he was getting desperate and significantly burning through his reserve. His smile told her that he still had some leeway.
On the other hand, Alice would no longer be able to tank his punches with the current mana density of her armor.

While she could redirect the mana she used to strengthen her muscles and instead increase the density for the time being, she was afraid it wouldn't last much if he felt like putting all his strength into his next attack.

(Ah, dammit!)

Instead of taking head on the blow from the tall mage, Alice dodged to the side. He might have been more powerful and resistant than Rachel as a Strengthening mage, but he was not as agile. As such, even with a mere imitation of her nemesis' magic, Alice was faster.

(I'll have to bid most of what I have! I should have done that from the start...)

At the same time she stood back up, Alice gathered her entire armor around her arm and threw the mana upward, in the direction of Hiphus.

Adopting a high risk-high reward strategy, Alice betted on both the power of the zenith and her ability to evade her opponent. The slightest mistake would cost her her life but, considering how much she had wagered, only thirty seconds would be enough for her to recover an entire mana pool's worth of mana. From then on, the amount generated each second would cover any expense, allowing her to maintain her mana armor at maximum power while the spell was still growing. She could even make that amount converge directly on her opponent to significantly reduce his mobility by messing with his motion.

While she shivered at the idea of explaining this large-scale and taboo spell to the Vallmonts —and potentially to a higher authority considering the attackers' identity—, it was still better than hiding her full potential and dying because of that.

Frowning at the giant shadow projected on the ground, the Strengthening mage eventually looked up and saw a growing twenty-square-meter black mass in the sky. "... Did you do that? Just what is going on? What are you planning?"
"... Who knows?"

Seeming unsure about his next course of action, he went straight for the kill by lunging toward Alice, who once again threw herself to the side.

"Aren't you just buying time...?"

Contrary to what his muscle-brain magic type suggested, this man pretending to be a bandit displayed a good awareness of his surroundings. He was able to perceive the state of the battlefield and realized the information he had had beforehand no longer matched what he was seeing. He seemed a lot less eager to fight her than he was a mere minute ago.

Alice's opponent threw a last glance at the black panel, and his expression betrayed an incoming change of strategy.

(This isn't good... I am going to lose the aggro?)

The Strengthening mage eventually sighed and hurled himself at Alice who evaded again but, as she had feared, he didn't stop his course and ran toward the carriage Alice came from. Because he was in this deadlock and felt this mysterious, expanding threat lurking in the sky, he had seemingly chosen to prioritize carrying out his assassination mission.

(C-crap! I need to stop him...!)

Alice promptly stood up and urged down the mana present in 'Ortu Solis'. Before she had the time to cast a simple kinetic-to-mana conversion, however, she felt a sharp pain and fell to her knees.

(U-uh? Was I just... slashed?)

In that moment of carelessness, as her focus was only on the most important threat and she had no armor protecting her, she had overlooked the presence of other bandits who might still try their chance at hurting her even though she had been able to remain standing while fighting their real boss.
The feeling of her back heating up was accompanied by a wave of dizziness that washed over her, a sign of an impending loss of consciousness due to the sudden decrease in blood pressure.

(A vasovagal syncope now of all time...? But... Someone has to... stop that guy...)

As her eyes were slowly closing themselves, she received a concerning feedback from the mana that was on its way to her target, and her heart rate dramatically increased.
The surge of adrenaline and the subsequent fight or flight response partially countered the effects of the syncope and got rid of her lightheadedness, making her brain function almost as well as before. As for what that feedback was about, it was essentially a confirmation of the imminent casting of a spell she had inadvertently cast while she was falling unconscious.
Or at least it must have been the case, because she would never do that in her right mind.

(No... That can't be happening. Not like this.)

Unable to react in time, all Alice could do was watch as the Sword of Damocles, ominously hovering over the world, fell.

On the Strengthening mage's way to the carriage, the descending, invisible mana converged right in front of him into a levitating basketball-sized sphere, which became impossibly black. Instead of passing through, however, his large body was sucked into the sphere completely.

A heartbeat later, an immense wave of mana that would later on affect the entire world escaped the edges of the death sphere.