Chapter 514 - 514: Stretch him out

Ragna looked down at him from above with calm.

Then he laughed.

It was not a mocking laugh or a dramatic one. It was the quiet, genuine laugh of someone who had found things genuinely amusing in a situation that was not funny to anyone else but him.

"Did you think it would be that easy?" he asked, looking at Silva. "To simply walk away from me?"

Silva felt the rage arrive fast.

It came from somewhere deep

He started moving.

All his clones started moving.

Every one of them, simultaneously, pressing against whatever Ragna had done to hold them in place, the freeze resisting at first and then giving under the collective force of all of them pushing against it at once, slowly, like walking through something that did not want to be walked through.

Ragna noticed it.

He barely let it show. A slight adjustment in his expression.

The weeping angels scattered.

They moved at the speed of light in every direction, spreading across the planet in the space of a breath, each one going to a different point, and Silva watched them go with dread form on his face.

"How long," Ragna said, with the patience of someone asking a question they already knew the answer to, "do you think your world holds before they finish with it?"

The answer was not something Silva wanted to calculate.

She finally broke free as well

The restraints that had been holding her dissolved not gradually but all at once, and she stood in the space they had occupied with

She looked at Ragna.

She looked at Silva.

The hatred in her eyes when they landed on Silva was the clean, uncomplicated kind that had no history behind it, just the simple fact of what he was and where he was from, and she was already moving toward him when Ragna spoke.

"Wait."

She stopped.

"I have created an opening for you," Ragna said. "He is going to stretch his mana thin trying to deal with the angels. If you go at him now, he will have to defend on two fronts simultaneously. He cannot do both at full capacity."

She looked at him for a moment.

Then she looked back at Silva.

She moved to stand with Ragna, and the expression on her face did not change, but the direction of her intent settled into something pointed and ready.

Silva looked at the two of them.

He looked at the angels spreading across his world.

He looked at his clones.

"Make more," he said.

They understood before he finished saying it.

The clones began producing clones of themselves, each one splitting, and those splitting again, the numbers multiplying rapidly, each generation costing something from his divine energy that he could feel depleting in a way that was not sustainable but was necessary. Thousands of copies, spreading outward in every direction, each one rushing toward a different point where the weeping angels were moving, filling the sky and the ground with versions of himself moving at speed toward the threat his world was now facing.

He stood in the space they left behind.

Alone, relative to before.

He looked at her across the distance between them.

Ragna watched from where he stood with that smug expression settled into his features like it belonged there permanently.

"You know what is interesting," Ragna said, to no one and both of them at once, "is that on paper, you have the capacity to defeat even someone like me. A primordial. The numbers are there if you look at them correctly."

Silva said nothing.

"But the numbers do not account for everything you are attached to," Ragna continued. "Every connection. Every person you are trying to protect. Every piece of your world you cannot afford to let go." He tilted his head slightly. "It is not your power that limits you. It is everything you refuse to lose."

She launched.

The speed was different from what he had been dealing with before, the additional freedom she had now that she was not holding anything back, and Silva's entire analytical process compressed into the fraction of a second he had available.

He moved.

Her attack found empty air and she was already adjusting, the fluid transition between one strike and the next containing no wasted motion, no recovery period, just continuous intent translated directly into movement.

Silva met the second strike with his blade and the impact drove him back three steps, the force in it containing massive force.

He held.

She pulled back and came in again, this time lower, the angle forcing him to make a choice between the two openings she was presenting, and he chose the one that cost him less and took the hit that came with that choice, the impact across his forearm leaving a mark that would matter later.

He answered with a full flame arc, the black fire covering the space between them in a wide sweeping motion that she moved through the gap of, the flames catching the edge of her shoulder but not enough to change anything meaningful.

She did not slow down.

He clashed with her and the air trembled, the force pushed him back, he rolled his sword once and unleashed a barrage of attacks and multiple flaming arcs shot out and the same time lightning gathered around his blade, he flapped his winds and closed the distance down, thrusting at her.

She blocked each one with her spear, swinging down and through each one, a small explosion folllwed after each one and created enough covering for him to get close, his blade got close to her, she immediately tried to retreat fast but the lightning did the work, the bolts slammed into her and hurled her back.

Seeing that he had created a chance, he moved to unleash a massive slash but she vanished and appeared right behind him, her spear already going for him.

He sensed her but there was no way to turn in time