The Fire Elemental Stone
KRAAAAAAAAAASH─────!!!!!
Heaven and earth convulsed. An enormous explosion erupted from the deepest reaches of the cave, shaking the ground as though an earthquake had struck. What met my eyes next was the magic circle carved into the cave mouth shoving the fire element—trying to burst free—right back inside.
So she already had a magic circle engraved there…!
I never imagined she wouldn't be controlling the fire element from the blast herself, but had instead carved a magic circle into the cave entrance. By the time I realized it, stopping her was already far too late.
The fire element forced back inside set off a chain of successive cracks as the fire mana source stone buried underground shattered. And with every sound that rolled out, the trembling of the ground grew fiercer still—from a brief shudder into a continuous quake, swelling until it became a full-blown earthquake.
RUMMMMMBLE─────!!!
"Kgh?!"
Sigrun staggered, struggling to keep her footing on the violently shaking earth. Only someone like her could still plant her shield and stay upright at all—the criminals she'd been fighting had already been thrown flat on their faces. Fortunately, floating in the air as I was, I escaped the earthquake's effects. And because of that, I alone could see the sight those on the ground never would.
"You've got to be kidding me…"
Lava surged up from the crater of Bramante Volcano, painting my entire field of vision a deep, furious red. As if it were truly about to erupt, the magma that had lain deep below began to bubble and boil. Looking at that lava, ready to burst at any second, a curse slipped past my lips before I could stop it.
"Such a shame. I'd already finished preparing to detonate the volcano, you see. Originally I meant to kill every last one of those criminals too… It's a pity I couldn't wrap things up cleanly. Heh heh."
Morana chattered on, wearing a smirk that said she found my expression delightful. Then, as if she had nothing left to do here, she offered me her farewell.
"Next time, I do hope I'll be able to bring you into our order."
Perhaps she simply never believed I would try to fight her in a situation like this—her face, as she looked over Sigrun and me, was thick with leisure.
Hah. Look at her, overflowing with confidence.
I might have let the priests go, but I had no intention of simply allowing her to escape as well. The reason I hadn't used True Name Release from the start was the same one I'd given earlier: the mana rolling off Morana told me she had already set some magic in place. Any spell she had prepared in advance was something I couldn't counter unless I at least knew where it was. That was why I'd held True Name Release—with its limit of only 30.7 seconds—in reserve as a last resort. Even if I used Rapid Pain Suppression afterward and could move my body for another ten minutes, that was only movement. My mana would be almost completely spent, leaving me unable to cast. All the more reason to save it.
But it seemed my thinking had been wrong. As expected, Morana had prepared magic in advance—magic that could detonate a volcano with nothing more than a snap of her fingers.
But is that all?
Beyond that, there was nothing more. Because she had been overwhelmingly stronger than my current self, and because True Name Release was the only means I had of opposing her, I'd saved it as my trump card until the very end…
A hothouse flower who had barely been out of the greenhouse a month, with no real experience to speak of, simply failed to respond correctly. If only I had used True Name Release from the beginning. That regret rose unbidden in my mind. This was the first time I'd faced a situation like this, and my excess caution and tension had made me miss the optimal moment. I regretted it too late, but the past could not be rewritten. All I could do was take this as fertilizer and become a little better than the me of before. Rebuking the judgment I had made wrong, I finally parted my lips.
"…My name is Zelia."
True Name Release
The moment I spoke the skill's activation phrase, my body began to change. My mana circuit, my mana capacity, my elemental understanding—at the cost of immense pain and helplessness 30.7 seconds from now, everything in me related to magic began reclaiming its former glory. My body started pouring out a presence that would not yield even to the volcano before me, shaking the earth and scorching the air. Power incomparable to anything before flooded every inch of me.
"What…?!"
Morana's expression hardened in an instant at the transformation. Sensing that something had gone terribly wrong, she hurriedly moved the hand that had been so leisurely and drew out a teleportation scroll—but that brief span of time was more than enough. Enough for me to neutralize the Morana standing right in front of me.
"Be crushed."
It was not a voice spoken with ordinary flesh. From my lips came a voice that, by the mere act of speaking, seized complete control of the elements—something closer to a spirit's utterance. This was the constantly maintained magic that only a special-grade mana circuit, overwhelming mana capacity, and one hundred percent elemental understanding could reach: Word-Soul.
At that voice, Morana—teleportation scroll already in hand—plummeted straight downward.
"Ghk?!"
As if hundreds of weights had been hung from her body, she crashed toward the ground in a single instant.
THUD───!!
"H-how in the world…?"
Sprawled on the earth, Morana stared up at me with eyes wide in disbelief. Unfortunately, I had no time to answer every one of her questions. My time was limited, after all.
"Stay quiet and unconscious."
With that reply—meaning I had nothing more to say—I clenched my fist, and dark magic that robbed its target of consciousness engulfed Morana's head. Binding her with earth magic as well, I then turned my gaze to the surroundings.
THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD───!!!
"Aaaaagh! Somebody save me!!!"
"Shit, I don't wanna die here!!"
"R-run! Just get away somehow…!"
Criminals screamed, desperate to put distance between themselves and Bramante Volcano. Far off, barely visible, was Himrave—soon to be buried under volcanic ash if the mountain erupted. And last of all…
"…"
Sigrun, who had somehow climbed to the summit of the dark mountain and now looked down upon Bramante Volcano with a face full of despair. All of it entered my sight. A single fleeting instant was all it took to take every one of them in. And as I looked around me, I could not stop the thought that rose unbidden.
Can I really stop this?
I had accounted for the possibility of the volcano erupting. The problem was that the fire element bursting free from the explosion was far more vast than I had anticipated.
It might not be enough…
Honestly, until a moment ago I'd been full of vague confidence. But now that I was witnessing a true natural disaster unfold before my eyes, I couldn't bring myself to be certain—certain that I could actually stop this volcanic eruption. No matter that she was the character I had raised, no matter that years of effort had gone into her… could I truly hold back that eruption?
Negative thoughts chained one after another, a loop of doubt that seemed as if it would never end.
…Get a grip.
SLAP───!
I snapped that chain of doubt by striking my own cheek.
Worrying won't create another option anyway.
There was no other choice left to me. True, while under True Name Release I could still teleport away—but that was a last resort only. Before I resorted to that, shouldn't I try everything I was capable of?
Steeling myself, I drew one last short breath and gripped my staff tightly in both hands.
"Huu…"
Seven seconds to subdue Morana and finish thinking this through. And the moment that entire sequence was done, without the slightest hesitation I kicked off the empty air and shot high into the sky—higher than I had been floating before, into the upper air from which I could look down upon the whole of Bramante Volcano. In less than a second I reached the position I wanted. Looking down at Bramante Volcano beneath my feet, I extended my staff.
"O Fire."
The fire elements answered my voice. Watching them, I thought:
If I force it back inside… it'll be a catastrophe just like that…!
Shoving the pressure-driven lava back inward would only trigger a disaster even worse than the eruption unfolding before me. What I needed to do was not force the magma back down, but let it vent naturally outward. More precisely, my job was to scatter this vast fire element currently exploding from the volcano.
But if I just scatter all of it, it won't be much different from an eruption…
Simply blasting the fire element away would only mean I was helping the volcanic eruption happen faster with my own hands. In other words, I had to not only scatter the fire element, but erase it as well.
I need to erase at least eighty percent… Can I do it?
To keep Sigrun, who was here with me, from dying, I had to erase eighty percent of the fire element within that immense magma—by my own power alone. Could I? The question rose for a moment, but it hardly mattered. What I had been given was not a choice of whether I could or could not, but a forced choice that said I must.
"Be gone!!!"
I poured my full mana into it, and with it my will—the will that this should vanish from nature. And as if that will had taken hold, the upper surface of the surging magma began to cool and blacken.
HISSSSS───
Leaving only a thin layer of weak lava beneath, the surface of the upper magma cooled and hardened completely. At that sight, a smile rose to my face before I knew it. But unfortunately, that smile could not last long. Because from beneath the cooled lava—deeper still, and deeper yet—a volume of magma incomparable to what I had just chilled was surging upward again.
"Ghh…!"
My face twisted as I instinctively understood: the magma was rising faster than I could erase it.
"Damn it—like this…"
Like this, I could not stop it. Before I could erase the fire element, the lava would punch through the crater and birth a plume of volcanic ash. That premonition ran up my spine and drove straight through my skull. But when that ominous sense pierced my mind, another sensation arrived with it.
Something… feels like I'm using my power wrong…
Through True Name Release, I had recovered the whole of my original strength. Yet perhaps because this was the first time I was using my full power under True Name Release, some stifled, clogged feeling whispered that I was not drawing out the power I had temporarily reclaimed to its fullest. Why? Why on earth was I feeling this?
As I dug through every doubt swirling in my head, a crimson light suddenly flashed across my vision.
Spark───
The identity of that red light was none other than the glow of the Fire Elemental Stone within the erupting lava—a light that should have been far too small to see clearly, yet shone with perfect clarity. As if demanding that I look at it, that crimson radiance pulled my gaze, and for a moment I stared at the Fire Elemental Stone in a daze. With it came another surge of instinct up my spine. I shut my open mouth and seized hold of my senses.
…It might be insane.
Anyone who saw it would point a finger and call it madness. If my family saw it, they might faint on the spot at how stupid it was. But my instinct, my intuition, the fire element in my heart—all of them were screaming that this alone was the one true answer. And so—
"…I'm going!"
With a brief resolve, I began a vertical dive downward—toward the Fire Elemental Stone calling to me from within the lava surging from the crater. If I could have brought it to me with some other spell, I would have, but every scrap of my mana was already at its limit just erasing the fire element in the lava. So wrapping myself only in the one magic I could still use—the magic that erased fire elements—like a protective shell around my whole body, I dived straight for the Fire Elemental Stone myself.
Erasing every wave of heat that crashed over me, I reached the inside of the crater.
"Reach it!"
I stretched out my hand toward the only key that could break this situation.