Dimensional Descent

Libli found herself feelling as though she was moving through a swamp. At first, she had thought that Leonel's armor was just a simple change. After all, she could see at a single glance that it was constructed of just a few dozen parts. Compared to the complexity of her Crafts and her Radix Cube, it was sorely lacking. It was almost like comparing night and day.

Due to her innate biases, she had been lax even after it appeared. But, the moment space seemed to solidify, her pupils couldn't help but constrict.

'What is this?'

Her movements slowed by at least half and even though she didn't test it, she felt that even the range of her attacks had been cut by a long measure. If she had to describe it, it was like her sense of distance had been warped, as though one meter was now worth the equivalent of two before.

And yet, while she was suffering through this, Leonel was completely unaffected. In fact, it almost seemed like the reverse to him. For him, one meter had just become half of that. The result was Libli feeling as though she was swimming through water while Leonel was cutting through the air at an unconscious speed.

In a single blink, Leonel was already before Libli, his spear swinging downward with a violent momentum.

Libli still reacted as quickly as she could. Her left arm, the one coated with the more skin-like armor, flashed. Her fingers moved about as though she was forming special seals that her Radix Cube quickly reacted to.

The cube sprung to life, its gears and pumps emitting a wild steam for an instant before it expanded, forming a shield of spinning parts.

BANG!

The shield held strong giving Libli enough time to stretch her arm out to the left. As though she had already predicted exactly what would happen, Leonel's body vanished and appeared right before her fingers, being met with a familiar beam of bronze light.

However, what should have been an instant victory was met by nothing but a cold, heartless gaze. Libli hadn't realized that even as Leonel appeared, the flat of his blade would find a position right below her extended forearm. With just a twist of his wrist, Leonel sent Libli's laser shooting off into the distance, passing well over his shoulder.

Libli's pupils constricted, her right arm whipping toward Leonel and causing the air to shatter and collapse even as barbed bronze chains shot out from their hidden mechanisms, but Leonel had already taken the initative.

The strength of the spatial lock increased. Even though Libli felt that she was spinning her arm as quickly as she could, it was moving at a snail's pace. The result was the activation of her chains being way off and missing Leonel entirely.

Libli still managed to react quickly, her left hand once again forming several quick seals that turned her shield of gears into a royal sword of bronze that pierced down toward Leonel's neck. At the same time, she didn't bother to retract her chains, instead continuing to swing her arm toward Leonel as she used them as barbed whips.

The dexterity with which Libli used her Crafts couldn't be denied and she seemed to have a quick answer to everything. Unfortunately… It wasn't enough.

Leonel's spear had appeared before her forehead, piercing forward with an unquenchable thirst for blood. Libli could feel her life flashing before her eyes…

At that moment, she suddenly understood. Before the abilities of this armor before her, all her contingency plans and clever hidden traps were meaningless. What good was it all if she wasn't quick enough to use them?

BANG!

In the instant before Libli's head was pierced through, a necklace hanging from her neck automatically activated with its own mechanism, shielding her with swirling lights filled with spinning gears.

Still, Libli shot into the distance not much unlike her fiancé, her brain shaking within its skull. Even a Fifth Dimensional existence wasn't immune from concussions.

Leonel's gaze narrowed. 'That shield is at least Sixth Dimensional. I can't pierce through that.'

He rolled his wrist. If not for his Divine Armor, he might have shattered his wrist during that pierce.

'Time to go.' Leonel decided.

In the instant before he killed Libli, he had sensed several auras suddenly pounce toward him. It was clear that they had protectors in the shadow but the spatial warping abilities of Leonel's Divine Armor had caught them completely off guard, stopping them from reacting in time.

Leonel couldn't help but be impressed. Their concealment abilities were actually good enough to hide from his senses. But, now that they had exposed themselves in a panic, worried about Libli's safety, it no longer mattered.

Now that he finally had room to breathe, Leonel quickly took out the Segmented Cube and entered its shuttle mode before shooting off into the skies. However, he had barely made it just 20 meters into the air before a rumbling took hold.

Powerful auras converged toward him from all sides, the greatest of which was at Tier 9 of the Fifth Dimension. It seems they had finally caught up.

'Cutting it close…' Leonel thought with a clenched jaw.

**

Across the Dimensional Verse, another battle was still taking place. However, it was even more one sided than what had just been experienced.

On one side, there Myghell with just a few beads of sweat falling down his handsome brows. They were so few and scarce that the wind quickly wiped them away, making it seem as though they were never there to begin with.

On the other side, there was a beaten and bloodied Aina. Tears and rips littered her flexible armor, matched well by the bloody holes that ran through her body. Large patches of blood stains littered the grass and trees, all signs of location she had once stood in.

Every time she breathed, a crimson fog would escape her lips. It gave her quite a sinister appearance, but only the two of them knew that this crimson fog was none other than Aina's own vaporized blood. Her heart would have collapsed from beating too hard had she not continuously repaired it.

However, even with all of this being the case, Myghell's eyes were drawn to the chip in Aina's mask. It exposed just a bit of her lower cheek, jaw and lip. But, it was barely enough for Myghell to get an understanding of just how beautiful the woman before him was.

Myghell brandished his thin sword, having been forced to take it out sometime within the last half hour. He could tell that as Aina grew more viscious, she was actually rapidly improving. In fact…

BANG!

Aina's aura shifted once more, slamming through a barrier and spilling over into Tier 4 of the Fifth Dimension.

Myghell shook his head. What difference did that make? Tier 3? Tier 4? To him, even such a watershed step was no different from simply fighting a slightly larger ant.

He swung his sword again, ripping a huge gash from Aina's shoulder to opposite hip. Blood sprayed like a fountain, blooming in the air like a flower.