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「—Be careful, Your Eminence!」

Creating wind and staying in the night sky, Valeria who had tried to send flame arrows towards the enemies on the ground opened her eyes wide at Dimitar’s sharp voice.

「No way—!?」

That girl came soaring directly this way from Valeria’s blind spot. Just like Valeria had always been doing, the vivid magic crest which had emerged on the girl’s right leg was picking up her small body on the wind.

「Run away!」

Those following words of Dimitar brought Valeria back to reality from her surprise.

「Why do I have to—run away!?」

Raising her eyebrows, she raised her right hand overhead. The red magic crest which ran from the top of her shoulder to her fingertips in an instant was reflecting Valeria’s will and flickering strongly.

She understood that the opponent was an unknown magic warrior who possessed frightening power. She understood that when the girl negated Clotilde’s magic at the beginning. However, she was angry at being told to escape since she absolutely couldn’t win by herself. If it was magic—if it was shooting magic at each other, she wouldn’t lose no matter who the opponent was.

She wanted to make him—not the girl before her eyes, but Dimitar—realised that here and now.

「I’m not conceited! This is a matter of pride! A Dominas of Amaddo running away without having a match with a child whom n.o.body knows about is absolutely unforgivable!」

Valeria stared at the girl and directed her right hand’s index finger at her.

「O, o-o-o… soo」

While muttering something in a clear voice that was quite out-of-place and gave one the impression of a small bird’s chirp, the girl who had tightly grasped a knife in her right hand sidestepped it easily.

「—Eh?」

The girl evaded the red-hot flame which Valeria had staked her pride as a Dominas and shot just by twisting her body slightly.

The flame which had lost its target impacted near Dimitar who was on the ground and transformed the surroundings into a momentary midsummer. From the middle of that dazzling sunlight, the girl who had dishevelled her hair in the hot wind came rushing in like it was nothing.

「—Hi, ii!?」

The girl’s knife accurately extended towards Valeria’s chest. An intense pain ran on the right arm of Valeria who had protected her face at once and tried to put up a rampart around her. The point of the strange-shaped knife slid from the vicinity of her elbow to her wrist, and red blood spurted out in the dark.

「—Ah!?」

Valeria who was stiffening her whole body in pain and shock realised that rain was falling from the front of her body. Before she knew, Valeria was starting to fall.

Perhaps when she tried to use a rampart to defend herself—though it wasn’t in time in the end—her concentration of trying to continue circulating magic power to her right leg was interrupted. Due to tumbling down from the sky because of that, considering that she could escape from the girl’s a.s.sa.s.sin’s dagger instead, one might be able to say that she was lucky.

Of course, if the back of her head crashed into the ground as it was, she’d surely die on the spot because of a blow on the whole body or a skull fracture; even if she was breathing, she’d be easily finished off without being able to move.

When Valeria held her right hand with her left hand, circulated magic power to her right leg again and created a whirlwind, she then directed it at the ground.

「—Tte!」

Since her bottom landed on the ground with a “dosun” and that impact ended with the degree of groaning, one could also probably call that “good luck”. At the least, it ended without

fracturing her neck bone.

Her feeling relieved was also momentary, and the other thieves came attacking there.

「I said to run away, I’ll—!」

A thief, who had pulled out the sword on his waist and came slashing, was blown off in a pose where his body bent with a “gunyan”.

「Dimitar…」

「You did it again…!」

The left arm of Dimitar, who was breathing heavily while saying so, perhaps because of the flame that Valeria had shot just now, broke out in bright-red blisters like it had a severe sunburn. His blouse also had burn marks here and there.

Dimitar, who had nonetheless caused one of the thieves to become incapable of combat with one kick, lifted Valeria up with his wounded left arm and swung his sword.

「Gaa…!」

One thief scattered fresh blood and collapsed again.

「Good grief… with this, you’ve understood that she isn’t an ordinary kid, right!?」

Following the gaze of Dimitar who had shouted as if spitting out, Valeria looked up at the sky too.

The girl, who floated in the empty sky together with the midnight breeze, was looking down on Valeria and Dimitar and holding that knife up.

「! Dimitar! T, that knife’s blade!」

「Messing around with us…!」

Distinct magic crests were emerging on the surface of the wickedly curved knife.

「—Chii」

Dimitar clicked his tongue. Perhaps he had understood immediately as well.

It was the magic which was shot from that knife that had negated Clotilde’s magic.

That was also a kind of “Magic Motion Sword (Furigana: Espada Marefika)”.

「Hey!」

The remaining thieves came slashing at Valeria’s party, who was distracted by overhead, in one breath from every direction.

「Her comrades are still here, aren’t they…!」

Enduring the pain in her right arm, Valeria made her magic power converge in her left hand. Letting the “Tornado (Furigana: Razor)” run in a straight line, it then mowed down the enemies who came rushing in.

「Guah!」

「Gu—」

The thieves who were blown away crashed into the ground and tree trunks, and confirming that they had stopped moving, Valeria then immediately glared up at the girl again.

She already understood the power of the magic that was shot from that knife. If she didn’t cast a magic that was no less on par with it and cancel each other out, Valeria and Dimitar might be burnt pitch black here. She made her entire sensitivity converge to produce a magic of that extent.

However, the magic crests on her right arm completely couldn’t be used, and above all, the pain of the wound hindered her; it took time to the extent that even she was irritated to charge up sufficient destructive power.

「Ku—!」

Beside Valeria who was grinding her teeth, Dimitar thrust his sword into the ground.

Dimitar who had taken a deep breath pointed both his hands to the sky. Those arms were completely covered by ivies of bluish-black light in the twinkling of an eye.

Those weren’t the magic crests for the magic which raised physical ability that Valeria often saw.

They were extraordinarily complex magic crests—for making extra-large explosive flame magic explode—that Valeria was trying to formulate with one arm right now.

「Y… you, that sort of magic—why!?」

She had never heard that Dimitar could use a magic with such a destructive power. She had thought that the offensive magic which Dimitar could use were on the level similar to those that the army’s magic warriors used at the most, and that it was also surely because he had borrowed that sword’s power.

Nevertheless, if it was true that that powerful magic, similar to Valeria’s, could be used without relying on that sword, then—.

「Aren’t you the one who is messing around…!」

When humans got extremely angry or excited, some strange things would be produced inside their heads, and they wouldn’t feel pain temporarily—Valeria had heard said story from Karin. The current Valeria was exactly that way. The strong anger which shook her whole body had numbed the pain in her right arm; sharpening her sensitivity, she accelerated the flow of her stagnated magic power in one breath.

She heard a strange sound of “basun” above her head. That girl must have shot her magic.

However, Valeria wasn’t looking at the girl anymore.

As she fixedly glared at Dimitar’s profile, she made the magic which she had ama.s.sed in her right arm explode together with her anger.