Chapter 24 - Mars

[Crystal Creation Magic: Laevateinn]

Standing against Yuno and the rest of the Golden trio, Mars summoned a giant crystal sword above himself.

"Give up."

"Not a chance." Breathing heavy, Yuno looked at him with defiance.

"Then die."

No longer wanting to waste words, Mars swung his hand down and let the blade fall towards Yuno's head.

"YUNO!!" Klaus screamed.

Seconds before the blade could hit, Asta burst onto the scene with his giant sword in his hand.

"Asta..." Yuno eyes widened in surprise.

*SWOOSH!!"

Swinging the massive black blade, he sent the upper part of the crystal sword flying.

"What!"

'Is that... a member of the black bulls.' Klaus's mind shook.

'He destroyed my sword...'

Shocked expressions passed through the faces of Mars and the two other members of Yuno's squad.

'How could we of the Golden Dawn not do anything against that diamond kingdom mage, but the moment this slum rat from the Black Bulls shows up he manages to destroy one of his attacks!!'

While Klaus was distracted by Asta's appearance, a crystal clone of Mars's attacked him.

"Watch out!"

*CRASH!!*

"Huh?!"

Using his lightning covered boots to shatter the clone, Luck appeared in front of a shocked Klaus.

"Hey!"

'Another member of the Black Bulls...'

---

"Hey!" Asta called out to Mars. "Are you the one that did this to the Golden Dawn?!"

Looking at the small gray haired boy in front of him, Mars regainned his earlier posture.

"What if I am? The weak will perish and only the strong will remain." While he was saying this an army of crystal clone dolls were summoned to his side.

Looking at the army of crystal clones, stars shone in Luck's eyes.

"Woah!! This looks like so much fun!!"

Hearing him, Klaus gave him a strange look before taking a step away from him.

"On the battlefield, the weak have no place. And I was born to break weaklings like you."

"And I was born to crush arrogant losers like you."

"Huh?"

Hearing a voice sounding out from above, everyone looked up only to see a figure falling to the ground.

"That robe..." Klaus noted.

"Haha, took you long enough to get here." Luck laughed.

"Grim!" Asta exclaimed.

Using Breath of the beast, Grim landed in front of him and Yuno with an audible bang!

"Now then... It looks like someone wants me to crush them."

---

Once the dust cloud had settled, Mars was finally able to see the figure of a black haired young man with bright yellow eyes staring at him with a weird smile on his face.

"Crush me you say? Well then, let me show you the difference between us."

"Asta, Golden Dawn dude, take care of the clones for me, that guy's mine." Not waiting for their response, Grim kept using Breath of the Beast and charged towards Mars.

"Hey no fair!" Luck yelled. "I wanted to take on the boss!"

[Crystal Creation Magic: Laevateinn]

Jumping into the air, Mars threw several more giant crystal swords at Grim, but due to the physical buffs and heightened senses that Breath of the Beast gave him, it wasn't to difficult for him to dodge such giant attacks before closing in on Mars.

Frowning at the fact that he had missed several times, Mars commanded his crystal clones to swarm him. But before they could reach him, Asta and Yuno stepped in.

[Wind Creation Magic: Wind Blades Shower]

Firing off a shower of wind shaped blades, several crystal clones were taken care of.

*BANG!!*

Landing from above, Asta crashed down to the ground and used that big ȧss sword of his take care of several more clones while making an opening for Grim.

"Impudent."

Pointing his hand forward, Mars fired off another crystal sword that was easily dodged again.

'FAST!'

[Second Fang: Rip and Tear]

Summoning out his beast swords, Grim slashed at Mars's crystal armoured covered ċhėst and left two deep diagonal cuts that drew blood.

"H-HE CUT THROUGH HIS ARMOUR!"

After seeing a full powered Yuno fail to leave even a scuff mark on the Mars, it was hard for Klaus to not be shocked by what he was seeing. For them, proud members of the Golden Dawn to be unable to leave a mark on their enemy while two commoners from the Black Bulls were able to do something that they couldn't sent a shock through Klaus's fragile mind.

'Tch, not deep enough.'

Seeing that small amount of blood on his sword, Grim clicked his tongue before spinning around and using his Breath of the beast enhanced foot to kick Mars into the distance.

*BANG!!*

"Hell yeah! Nice one Grim!" Asta shouted after seeing him kick Mars away.

"The next boss is mine!" Luck added and continued destroying clones.

"He actually managed to damage him." Yuno's eyes widened for a second before returning to normal.

"H-How is this possible..." Klaus muttered to himself still unable to believe what he was seeing.

"As much as I hate to admit it, that guy can't be measure using our average means." Noelle stepped up and said.

"Noelle Silva..."

Ignoring him, she continued speaking.

"He's brash, brutish, has no sense of delicacy when dealing with a woman and is way too good a cards to the point that he's probably cheating. But when it comes to fighting, he's really in his element." Seeing the smile on his face, Noelle couldn't help but also smile as she looked at him and her teammates.

Hearing Noelle, the resting Mimosa who had been previously injured couldn't help but feel happy for her cousin.

'You've finally found a place to belong.'

---

While Asta and the others were facing off against the clones, Grim turned to look in the direction that Mars had been hurled to.

"I know that you're not done yet, people of your strength usually don't go down this quick."

As if to answer his provocation, the ground suddenly started to shake as large crystal started to jutt out of the ruins.

*Rumble* *Rumble*

"There you are."

*BANG!!*

Exploding out from the ground, Mars was covered crystals from the shoulders down forming a giant suit of heavy armor that towered above Grim and the others.

"Who the hell are you?"

Hearing the question, the smile on Grim's face grew wider as he looked up at the towering Mars and pointed one of his beast swords at him with a hint of insanity flashing through his eyes.

"I'm the guy that's about to crush your ribs."