Chapter 714: Perfect Synchronization

Before today, Lyra had never once achieved long-distance resonance with Astrid on the level of the soul. Even when treating patients with [Surging Tide of Light] and [Resonance Hymn of the Glorious Cathedral], they still had to clasp hands tightly, like some magical-girl combo move in an anime, fingers interlaced, in order to push soul resonance to its best effect.

Now, not only was there none of the intimate contact they’d shared in the past in bed, there wasn’t even a single exchange of glances. Especially in such a chaotic battle, above the frozen tundra, the air was thick with blood and the stench of scorching, while disorderly elemental tides surged in all directions. If the soul link were interrupted by a spell, the backlash could grievously injure both sides at once.

Hearing Lyra’s voice, Astrid didn’t speak rashly. Only in the next second, after Lyra narrowly avoided the bombardment of Moserria’s lightblade, did Astrid finally respond.

"Keep it short. This is my first time trying it too. I didn’t expect it to succeed so smoothly."

This wasn’t a connection formed by zero-distance contact on the mental plane. It was an internal dialogue Astrid had built by drawing on her repeated resonance experiences with Lyra, using arcane factors to arrange a pathway.

The underlying principle was similar to the mana communication device she had once researched with Charlotte: both relied on mental power to solidify arcane factors and transmit detailed signals. The only difference was that the sender and receiver had shifted from a mana apparatus to living, breathing people.

"We haven’t actually connected minds. We just matched the same frequency, and with some similar experiences, we’ve managed a brief soul resonance."

In spirit and body alike, Lyra held nothing back from Astrid. That was why Astrid could so deftly find the "port" to tap into and speak with her from afar.

"I don’t know how long this link can last. But the good news is that it’s independent, something that stands above most elemental particles. Even arcane factors are only an image of its true existence, not its entire medium."

A scorching wave of light swept past the girl’s hair, leaving a bright line across her sky-blue irises. The sharp knightly longsword burst with dazzling silver radiance at its tip, like a holy spear that pierced the firmament, stirring the endless tide of light before her.

Lyra didn’t dwell on how the long-distance conversation was possible. The exact principle could wait, after the fight, back at camp, in Hoskar City... or even after they’d finished on the bed. In any case, now was absolutely not the time to discuss it. She only needed to understand that this was yet another miracle Astrid had made real.

Lyra forced the "Judgment" about to pour down on her to deviate by a few inches, and the frostland beneath her was blasted into collapse.

"Astrid. What should I do?"

Gazing at the cratered scorched earth by her boots, Lyra spoke in a low voice.

"The one floating in front of you is Moserria, the former God of Light. Brennild awakened him. How to kill him is still unknown, but one thing is certain: destroying the body of the Pope of Light, Hebrew, can shatter the deployed barrier of [Holy Light Manifestation Torrent of Light]."

At the bottom of the battlefield, the regent with silver hair and red eyes stood on the frost, watching Hebrew in the high sky from afar.

"In the time to come, I’ll do everything I can to help you defeat Moserria."

Defeat that God of Light?

Lyra, who had been bearing the greatest pressure since he entered the field, felt her heart tremble at those words. Yet quickly, that wavering self-doubt vanished like smoke, replaced by a rock-like resolve.

From the overwhelming aura Moserria had displayed, and the fact that he still seemed to be holding back, it was obvious: they were not his match.

But if they weren’t his match, so what? They still had to fight to the very end.

There was nothing left to hesitate over.

In Moserria’s field of vision, the pink-haired girl holding his former weapon raised her blade point. Brilliant holy fire surged from the edge; powerful pressure coiled around the sharp blade in a spiral, like a monstrous tide gathering force.

Having only just awakened, Moserria had little understanding of the modern human magic system and no idea where Lyra ranked among her people. Still, judging by her aura alone, she was clearly a relatively powerful "ant" among this group. Her extraordinary affinity for light elements allowed her to wield a magical language far inferior to the divine tongue, yet still produce light spells with roughly one-tenth the power of origin magic at the same tier.

The Great Creator did not reserve its favor solely for its confidants. At times, it also showed kindness to even the most insignificant creatures, granting each of them their own unique gifts.

That Light Knight before him, even in their era, would have been a dazzling talent.

And yet, at this moment, something seemed to have changed. "Hebrew" narrowed his eyes slightly, thoughtful.

Earlier, he had sensed an extremely efficient spell manifest inside the barrier, suspected origin magic used by the gods. But because the sensation it gave Moserria was too cold and damp, he had automatically categorized it as Brennild’s ice-dark composite magic.

Now it seems... perhaps not...

As he thought, the flame-wave gale amassed at Lyra’s blade point erupted, shooting straight toward the Judging Angel seated high in the heavens.

If her enemy were an ordinary mage of the same tier, this strike would be enough to pierce elemental armor, shatter mental defenses, and take the enemy’s life outright. But compared to the Judgment swords and holy-light tides pouring in from all directions toward Lyra, this light spell, wrapped in sword aura, was pitiful in both scale and power, like a firefly beside the bright moon.

Moserria did not move from his spot. He didn’t even shift half a step. From on high, he watched the light spell with cold disdain.

Time seemed to slow in an instant. Every particle of that holy light, every segment of its wavelength replayed in Moserria’s eyes, peeled away and examined.

He hadn’t been mistaken... this magic was unlike any Lyra had cast before...

It was origin sorcery, something that, in this age, only a god could chant.

His gaze swept across. The flame-wave extinguished; the light-traces shattered; the sharp gleaming blade abruptly became gentle motes of light, scattering into the air.

"Such weak mental power, yet you can break through the shackles imposed by the gods through racial will and unleash origin magic."

Moserria fixed his gaze upon Lyra. For the first time, a trace of curiosity appeared beneath his otherwise emotionless expression.

"Sinful apostate, how did you manage to chant it?"

In truth, Lyra, who had completed the origin chant, could not understand Moserria’s words at all. And Astrid, who could understand, had neither the obligation nor the interest to answer.

According to the records in that ancient tome, and the series of atrocities Brennild had committed since awakening, from the very beginning there was only one relationship between them and the gods: hostility. There was no room for reconciliation.

Not to mention that Moserria now was obsessed with reclaiming the holy sword, judging Lyra, the human girl he deemed to have defiled the sacred relic.

"Lyra. Keep going."

"Understood, Astrid."

In the state of soul resonance, Astrid, who could bypass the world’s shackles and chant origin magic, synchronized the incantation, elemental arrangement, and mental output method in full to Lyra high in the sky. Thus, by relying on Lyra’s deep reserves of mental power and her extraordinary light affinity, they could release light-attribute magic, the densest elemental type in the space, and contend with Moserria.

Even if, with great probability, it would still fall short of a high-ranked God of Light, it was the highest combat power they could presently reach.

In her vision, eye-searing light surged forward. Following the cool female voice, Lyra chanted the spell; her battleblade exploded with dazzling holy radiance.

At that moment, the aura of [Sword of Light] skyrocketed. The light swirling around her body even briefly overwhelmed the barrier itself, [Holy Light Manifestation Torrent of Light], forming a visual effect like a light cannon.

Facing the pressure of the light element spreading from Lyra, Moserria narrowed his eyes, feeling a faint sense of familiarity.

So it was this move... Was she trying to provoke him completely?

He raised a hand clad in pure white gloves. In the cloud layer, already dulled from the barrier dispersing vast quantities of elemental particles, a white-bright swordblade suddenly appeared.

Its blade tip was several people tall. Holy light covered its surface; from afar it looked like a translucent wall of light. Its edges were razor-sharp, with roiling flame-waves burning along them.

In the next second, Moserria lightly pressed his hand downward. The Sword of Damocles hanging in the sky split the clouds and shoved aside the air, plunging toward the ground with unstoppable might.

Against Moserria’s attack, feeling the sheer strength of that sword intent, Lyra, clad in light armor, rapidly vibrated her light wings to evade. At the very edge of what could not be avoided, she aimed her fully charged light-cannon magic at the slanted face of the light sword and fired in a sweeping slash.

Origin spell [Moserria’s Sword of Holy Judgment] versus origin spell [Moserria’s Sword of Holy Judgment].

The former was a fabricated sword-shadow of holy light. The latter was the ultimate sword intent erupted by the Sword of Light, after acknowledging its master, together with light-element particles.

When the two swords collided, blinding radiance burst within the barrier, enough to blind ordinary people. Ice melted; sand and stone exploded upward. The shockwave rippling out from the center even made space itself tremble.

Many mages at a distance, unwilling to intrude for fear of being caught in Moserria’s stray damage, instinctively narrowed their eyes and used incantations to mitigate the impact of the sword-aura aftermath. Meanwhile, Astrid, maintaining soul resonance with Lyra, almost one-hundred-percent synchronously experienced that indescribable impact.

In human-built magical theory, body and soul are bound as one, inseparable; the body affects the mind, and the mind acts upon the body.

In that instant, Astrid felt sweetness rise in her mouth, like blood stuck at her throat. Her organs seemed to have been knocked out of place by a high-speed collision; her heart rate skyrocketed, hammering against her chest. The force Lyra could endure, Astrid might not be able to, after all, the Empire’s eldest princess had lived a pampered life since childhood, lax in training. Her biggest daily exercise was strolling the garden, truly delicate and precious.

Her red eyes narrowed slightly; her slender, upturned lashes trembled. Astrid forced herself to steady her mind. Her smooth legs, wrapped in black stockings, struggled to stand straight as she confirmed she could still sense Lyra Blackley’s presence.

Within the vision of mental power, that small-framed knight had cut into the Holy Judgment Sword above. It was only a tiny notch, yet enough for Lyra to slip through.

A thunderous roar erupted. The Holy Judgment Sword, still more than half intact, crashed down to the ground, carving a gigantic crater into the frozen wasteland, one that would not naturally recover for years to come.

Between dust and light, Lyra’s wings pierced the clouds. She lifted her left wrist and gently wiped away the blood she’d bitten from her lip. Her right hand gripped the holy sword, and then she streaked through the hazy realm built of light and shadow at high speed.

The holy sword continuously amassed sword aura. In Lyra’s vision, the only thing left was Moserria suspended high in the sky, still emitting a glaring, stabbing radiance.

Up to now, Moserria had only been casting magic, never displaying any other close-combat ability.

As the current master of [Sword of Light], Lyra did not believe the sword’s former owner had been some fragile caster who couldn’t wield a blade. But in the face of his sustained magical bombardment, even with Astrid’s help and a temporary grasp of origin spellcasting, it would be hard to gain any advantage in such high-intensity exchanges.

If this continued, her mental power would eventually run dry. And judging from the situation, the greater probability was that she’d be burned to ash by Moserria’s magic before that happened.

Better to rely on the holy sword in her hand, and meet him blade to blade.

Sensing Lyra’s movement, Astrid, whose tacit understanding with her lover was nearing the absolute peak, immediately grasped the pink-haired knight’s intent. Facing Lyra already closing in at high speed, Astrid offered no objection. She simply trusted her choice unconditionally, and gave the greatest assistance possible.

Two different hearts chanted the same spell. The spell performance on the level of the soul reached perfect synchronization. In the next second, the slender holy sword of light pierced through the clouds, arriving within half a meter of Moserria. False sunlight poured over Lyra’s head, making her cherry-pink hair even softer and brighter.

"Clang..."

A crisp collision rang out in the high sky. Lyra’s blade struck the light shield before Moserria at point-blank range. In less than a fraction of a second of resistance, the stainless holy sword, carrying the origin-magic enhancement from Astrid’s chant, split the golden cocoon of light in one slash.

And there was another point: the body Moserria currently inhabited was not the divine vessel that had once judged enemies on the battlefield, invincible in its advance. It was the Pope of Light Hebrew, at the level of a peak tier Arcanist mage.

Which meant that on the level of physique, without mental reinforcement, Moserria’s speed and strength were inferior to Lyra’s, who was only at the level of a novice Crusader.

That was the greatest trump card that made her dare to fight at close quarters.

Her wrist snapped with force. The Sword of Light stopped less than half an inch from Moserria’s throat.