The Closing Arena
Ravne could not find the words. Instead, she carefully wrapped her hands around my left arm.
Warm, gentle holy power flowed from her palms, quietly coiling around the arm that the runaway mana had left tattered and raw.
The blue light of the mana still raging from the Trigger Needles mixed with Ravne’s soft golden radiance, and the pain that had felt ready to tear me apart eased, just a little.
Ugh… never jab myself more than three times without a high-rank healer around. Lesson learned.
I looked down at the arm as the agony receded and spoke in a low voice.
“Thank you, Ravne. Without you… that could have gone really badly.”
Cold sweat beaded on my forehead with every ragged breath. Ravne wiped it away carefully with her free hand.
“No. I’m the one who should be thanking you. You trusted me… and endured the pain for my sake.”
She tightened her grip on my hand. That warmth seemed to sink into both my wounded body and my heart.
“But from now on, I won’t let you carry every burden alone, Saya.”
In the middle of a battlefield where life and death had brushed past us, we leaned on each other for a moment and simply breathed.
Battlefield annihilation has begun.
The system’s warning rang out, and the ground began to tremble.
From the distant edges of the garden, everything was dissolving into particles of light and scattering into the air.
“Saya…!”
I let out a hollow laugh.
“Haha… won’t even give us a second to catch our breath, will it?”
The garden was devouring itself, herding every survivor toward a single place—the massive crater left by Panir’s meteor at the center.
This had been a cruel colosseum from the very start, designed exactly this way.
Clumsy scouting and ambushes no longer meant anything.
Whether they liked it or not, the remaining survivors would have to face one another on the final stage.
Only one thing was left.
A head-on clash with the strong who still lived.
I forced down the pain in my still-unhealed left arm and adjusted my grip on Ravne’s hand. She must have felt the change in my eyes.
“Ravne.”
“Yes, Saya.”
“Ready?”
With the shrinking boundary of annihilation at our backs, we started running again toward the last battlefield.
The path was far quieter than before.
Between the aftermath of Panir’s sweep, the successive clashes, and the vanishing of the field itself, the weak had already been cleared out.
Only the real ones remained on the battlefield.
“……!”
As expected, new faces appeared before long.
A pair who had been using the narrowing terrain to prey on anyone trying to slip past the boundary.
The moment we showed ourselves, they attacked from both sides.
“Die!”
A sharp blade of sword aura streaked toward my throat while, at the same time, earth-splitting magic bloomed beneath Ravne’s feet.
But I had already locked onto their positions. Instead of dodging, I stepped in even deeper.
“Ravne—the ground!”
“Sacred Pulse!”
Ravne slammed both hands to the earth. A golden wave radiated outward from her, neutralizing the magic. In that same instant, the swordsman’s blade cut empty air as it sought my neck.
I slipped into his guard and drove a bare fist into his gut without hesitation.
“Guh—!”
Using his body as a shield, I charged straight at the mage who was staring in shock from the other side.
“Wh-what kind of dirty—!”
The mage fumbled in panic for the next chant, but it was already too late.
Opponent’s token obtained. Current tokens held: 11
Opponent’s token obtained. Current tokens held: 12
The pair vanished in a flash of blue light.
No wasted motion.
A combination that clicked together as if by pure instinct.
The moment our eyes met, Ravne and I smiled without a word.
The mana I amplified with the Trigger Needles still hasn’t faded.
Under normal circumstances the backlash would have knocked me out cold long ago, but thanks to Ravne’s continuous healing I could still move—even if it hurt like hell.
With the closing boundary at our backs, we prowled the battlefield like hyenas.
We carefully avoided the center where the true powerhouses were clashing and instead picked off the stragglers left exhausted or wounded in the wake of those fights.
Opponent’s token obtained. Current tokens held: 13
Opponent’s token obtained. Current tokens held: 14
Opponent’s token obtained. Current tokens held: 15
…
Opponent’s token obtained. Current tokens held: 19
Every clear chime of the system window sent adrenaline surging through me.
High risk, high return.
An extreme-damage item that put your life on the line.
And offsetting that risk—a dedicated healer ranked among the best in the entire setting.
This is exactly why you have to pull both the right people and the right items.
We had been cleaning the field for quite a while when a sharp metallic clash rang out ahead.
A short scream, the dull boom of clashing mana—it was obvious at once that a serious fight was underway.
Ravne and I stopped at the same moment, as if we had planned it.
I pointed toward the nearest boulder. She nodded silently, and we slipped behind it without a sound.
This was a completely different level—sharp, heavy waves of mana. Not the desperate thrashing of the weak, but the oppressive presence of predators.
The path leading toward the center of the garden, already half-vanished, was pure chaos.
Storms of mana howled; every time blade met blade, sparks lit the battlefield in dazzling flashes.
And right in the middle of that hellscape, I saw familiar golden hair and soft green locks whipping through the air.
…Of course. The protagonists made it.
With a sharp crack, Ricotta’s rapier sliced the air as if dancing.
There was nothing superfluous in her sword.
Precise. Elegant. Lethal.
She deflected her opponent’s blade, slipped into the opening, and aimed straight for the vital point. Perfect swordsmanship that did not shame the reputation of the ducal house known as the Sword of the Empire.
And her partner in that perfection was the complete opposite.
KWAANG—!
Basil’s longsword was crude and rough. There was no fixed form.
He used his entire body as a shield to force open the gaps Ricotta created.
Even when he staggered under an attack he had no choice but to take head-on, he stubbornly held his ground and carved out the chance for Ricotta to deliver the finishing blow.
An mismatched pair—yet a combination so strangely excellent it almost defied belief.
The two of them overwhelmed the remaining survivors as if they had been partners for years.
“They’re incredible…”
Ravne whispered beside me, holding her breath.
I couldn’t look away either.
The picture I had wanted to create.
The scene I had wanted to see.
Watching the two of them fight back-to-back made something warm bloom in my chest.
I had been a little worried after they failed to stop Panir’s meteor, but the original male lead and heroine’s story was progressing just fine.
Yeah. That’s it. That’s how they seep into each other.
At last the final student dissolved into light at the tip of Ricotta’s blade.
Only four people remained on the path.
In the quiet stillness, Ricotta caught her rough breath and brushed her scattered golden hair aside.
Then her grey eyes locked—not on her partner Basil, but precisely on the boulder where I was hiding.
A faint smile curved her lips.
Ricotta stopped in front of us and spoke as if every other existence had been erased, her gaze fixed solely on me.
“Next time I’ll have to teach you how to properly erase your presence as well.”
Her faintly smiling eyes shifted to the hands Ravne and I still held.
“You two… seem to have grown quite close in such a short time.”
Basil noticed us a beat later and turned his gaze.
His eyes slowly moved toward me.
Ravne pressed tightly against my side, and her hand that still had not let go of mine.
Basil’s brow furrowed ever so slightly without him realizing it.
“….”
At Ricotta’s barbed words, Ravne answered with action instead of speech.
She seemed about to release my hand… only to intertwine our arms even more deeply.
With a soft motion she slipped her arm through mine and rested her shoulder and cheek fully against me.
A faint floral scent brushed my nose; her light-purple hair tickled the tip of my chin.
“Yes! Just as the Lady says. We’ve become a very deep pair~”
Ravne’s pure, clear voice left me speechless.
Basil could only stare blankly at the places where Ravne and I touched.
I had expected Ricotta to explode at such an open provocation, but her expression remained oddly calm.
Light-purple eyes and grey eyes simply collided in the air.
Two heroines. One male lead.
And one extra.
An unreadable current was flowing through that place.