THE MAN WHO KNOWS DEFEAT

"Ivan!!!"

"Gahahahah!" When the light settled nothing was left. The spot where Ivan once stood was singed and incinerated. Freid laughed aloud as the one person who managed to throw his emotions in disarray was wiped away from the face of this earth.

"N-No…" Claire crumbled to her feet. The others turned their glare toward Freid. Yue assaulted the man with an array of magical attacks, cutting off his haughty laughter just to deprive him of the satisfaction he made.

Though unlike the others Yue seemed unperturbed by Ivan's disappearance, her goal was to just distract the foe until he re-arose.

BANG!

Freid's undefended back was left completely open to the explosive device that pierced his back. He was only affronted two seconds before the device beeped and subsequently exploded.

"Gahh!!" He fell over on top of the dragon, flipping himself over to cover his back and face the sky. The dragon, sensing its master's pain, flew high into the air while commanding the smaller dragons to use their bodies to defend them.

"H-How?!" Freid voiced his disbelief. After conjuring a space bending spell he had the confidence to catch his opponent off guard. The only indication of such an act could've been the less than a second time he vanished beneath the shower of light.

That meant Ivan would have had to calculate what exactly happened at that time. Where his opponent vanished, why they vanished, and how they vanished, And those are just things on the surface. Even if he knew how his opponent performed his trick there were no signs of where they would reappear.

In total Ivan only had three seconds to act before getting hit by the beam.

"Easy, I dug down~" Ivan explained nonchalantly.

"...Impossible, you were standing on a single spike sitting out of the lava. To dig down would mean—"

"Yup, I just dove into the lava," Ivan revealed the burn marks on the back of his armor. While his set was made of Azantium this lava wasn't ordinary. Burning wasn't the only thing to worry about even if he was floating on the surface, even his insulated armor was starting to constrict and bend to crush him due to the heat.

He had to use his alchemy just to stop it from melding and enclosing him. It was an act that wouldn't have lasted long as the speed of his alchemy and the time it took for the lava to bend his armor were almost equal.

An impractical way to survive in the lava should he need to travel through it. But even with the five seconds, he was affronted he used that moment to swim behind Freid and use the distraction Yue created to jump out of the lava without being heard.

"Alright, I'll be honest. That little attack of yours truly did catch me off guard. I never expected a space bending ancient magic– though I should've opened my mind to the possibility considering the other magic we obtained…"

Ivan bent his legs, the spike he was standing upon cracking as he stared up at the white flying dragon.

"But in any case, I can't let you leave here with that magic. It'd be a pain if you learned how to use it more comfortably. Though I wanna thank you for opening me up to new possibilities~ So Freid Bagwa, thanks a lot for being a sucker-punching asshole!"

BBZZZZZTT!

The lightning-clad form shot into the air like a propelled railgun shot, seconds before impact the sky glowed with an assortment of spells fired by Yue and Tio. Lessening the load Ivan had to deal with in the air.

Standing was a pain for Freid, but it was what needed to be done. As a warrior and general of the Demon Race, he steeled himself to receive pain for the survivability of his people.

"Begone!" With disregard for the lives of the other dragons, Freid had the white dragon shoot its destructive beam once more. But to his surprise—

BOOOM!

A dragon larger than his own appeared. Clad in black it stood imposingly on its hind legs. Its maws directed toward his attacks. A beam of pure black propelled from its mouth. Of course, this was Tio. Sensing her master's intent to kill the man who was too dangerous to be left alive, she took off the restraints and showed her strongest form.

"I-Impossible! A black dragon here!?" Today was just one surprise after another for Freid.

Meanwhile, Ivan, who had used his airwalk to dodge both of the straightforward beams, had finally made it to the top of Freid's white dragon. He took advantage of the distraction Tio made to close in on Freid.

BZZZT!!!

The tattoos lining Ivan's right arm glowed brightly. Freid, who had heard the crackling, turned around swiftly, jumping back.

BANG!

However, he was too late, the crimson-clad arm touched his right hand and obliterated it in a single second.

"Guahhh!" Freid held the end of his arm before gritting his teeth. He knew that as of now he was outnumbered and out-skilled. To deal with a true dragon and a team of irregularities the best solution would be to run away and recuperate before coming back with what he's learned.

The only problem was that he was locked in from both sides. The true dragon would outpace him with sheer strength. So running away was an unrealistic option to be done successfully. That left the only option being a spatial spell, however for it to get him out of the dungeon he would need a long time to cast.

An opportunity that his enemies of course wouldn't allow.

With his back in a corner, the last thing he could do now was take down these irregularities with him to his grave.

BANG!!!

The whole volcano shifted. A bang was followed by violent shaking of the infrastructure. Rocks and magma fell from the sky as the scenery around the fighters collapsed. It wouldn't take long for anyone within to infer that the whole dungeon was collapsing. The magma rose swiftly.

"Hmph, and here I was hoping you'd just die with a serene look on your face and say some shit like 'I did everything I could for my people, the rest is up to them.' Why couldn't you just live up to that cliche!?"

'..... The Grand Gruen Volcano has been clearly active, and yet it's never erupted. So I suspected that something was pressing the eruptions, I sought for a core, and now I've destroyed it! HAHAHA, sink together with me in this tomb!"

"Tch!"

Choosing to ignore the ramblings of a madman, Ivan rushed Freid once more. No mercy on his mind as he pressed the palm of his right hand into his face. Ignoring the laughter he grunted before activating the alchemy.

SPLAT!

Feid Bagwa of the Demon Army was killed.

Unfortunately, the situation did not allow much time for celebration. With the death of Freid, the white dragon immediately lost its desire to fight. It completely halted its aurora beam before getting swallowed by Tio's black beam.

The rest of the smaller dragons all scurried away in hopes of making it to an exit. With both of their leaders dead, they held no loyalty. Ivan pitied the monsters for a bit before summarizing that by the time the whole dungeon erupted there wouldn't be enough time to evacuate.

He rejoined his group back on the island.

"W-Well, what are we going to do now?" Felis voiced out in concern as the rest of the group turned toward Ivan. But for him the answer was simple.

"What Freid found was a magic that allowed him to transport himself and another through space. I'm not sure what the limitations are for distance, nor the prerequisites to transportation, but we better pray at least one of us is adept enough at using it to get us to the surface. If we can get outside, I can bring out the APC and we could ride out of here~!"

"Alright, what are we waiting for? Let's go!"

They ushered into the stairs leading to the true lair of whoever it was that made this labyrinth. There was a bit of fear that the procedure of bestowing knowledge would take long but luckily enough it seemed the person who made the dungeon was a man of short and sweet words.

[I pray the day comes where people can be free. —Naiz Gruen]

"So cool!" Ivan hadn't even met the guy but he already admired him.

The room was similar to Oscar's, a simple plan room with nothing but those words and a magic circle in the middle. The circle scanned their memories to make sure they completed the objectives assigned by the creator. When it determined them to be worthy of learning the magic, they were allowed to learn the spatial ancient magic.

"So this is space magic huh…" Yue muttered as she looked at her hands. There was nothing there but the magic was firmly imprinted into her mind where she could almost visualize it. Claire, Ari, Felis, and Canis all shook their heads as they could not bring the magic into existence at the level of Yue.

It seemed like they didn't have the property affinity

As for Tio and Ivan, Tio seemed to be at a lesser level than Yue. But she held talent for it greater than everyone else that was aforementioned. It might be because she was already a talented mage or her race as a dragonman had some correlation.

But Ivan—

"Ughh…" He held his head in anguish, Tio and Yue came to his side with worry. He brushed them off before shaking his head and looking off into space.

"I got it…" It was all clear to him. The magic, its formation, with his thought processes he was capable of calculating the spatial coordinates of where he wanted the rift to appear in less than two seconds.

FLASH!

A white light inhibited the vision of those looking at him, and suddenly he appeared on the other end of the room. It wasn't too impressive as the same feat could be reached using sheer speed and the lightning form but this was something he could perform at even greater distances.

"Alright, everyone gather around!"

They only stared for a second before wrapping him in a hug.

"Well, let's hope we don't reappear with our molecules entangled…"

"What?!" The group voiced out their concern before the room was enshrouded in a blinding white light,

The room that had been empty for centuries returned to its silent state, and soon it was filled to the brim with magma and lava.

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Freid ga shinda! Well, there goes our hero. Spatial magic is pretty cool huh... But not to distract from the subject I'm aware this is a big deviation from the main source. I mean Freid as far as I'm concerned is the main antagonist for the series. He's the reason for a lot of hardship in the series and conflicts. So to tell ya the truth, my plans run shallow. Please forgive me for the vagueness.

So anyways folks, thanks for reading. Imma work on that video like i said last time. Well, later... It's time for lunch after all! See you all next time, have a great evening!

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