Chapter 65 - Ladros

'What the hell was that about?'

Watching Ladros's body fall through the air, Grim couldn't help but wonder what was going on.

"Whoo, you've gotten stronger haven't you Asta." Fanzell came over and praised.

"Aww shucks, I don't know about that." He scratched his head and laughed lightly.

"Hey you!" Grim called out to Mars. "Aren't you that loser from the dungeon that I stabbed a couple of times?"

Pausing his steps, the expression on Mars's face fell when he heard what Grim referred to him as.

"Ahem, I'm Mars, its nice to formally meet you." He greeted.

"Cool..."

"Hey don't greet him so casually!" Asta yelled and jumped in front of Grim while pointing his sword at Mars.

"Don't forget that he injured Noelle."

"I'm not your enemy." Mars defended.

"Its cool Asta." Grim said placing his arm on his shoulder. "I already beat him once so he's no threat to us. Besides, I think even Noelle can beat him at this stage."

"HEY!!" Noelle yelled from the background.

"Anyway." He continued ignoring Noelle's protest. "We have a bigger problem to deal with." He looked towards Salamander.

Following his gaze, Mars and Fanzell's eyes went wide.

"F-Fana..."

"I-Impossible, I heard that she died in one of Morris's experiments." Fanzell mumbled in shock.

Seeing her figure bathed in fire and feeling her mana, memories of their shared past flashed through Mars's head.

"FANA!!" He yelled and tried to reach her.

"Whoa dude! What are you doing!!" Asta yelled pulling him back.

"My head...!! Uargh! What's happening to my head!" Clutching the side of her head, Fana winced in pain as she looked at Mars.

"Fana it me!" Mars yelled struggling to get out of Asta's hold.

"Shut up!"

"Its me Mars! Remember!?"

"SHUT UP!!"

*BOOM!!*

'Not again.'

"Disappear! All of you need to disappear!!"

*BOOM!!*

*BOOM!!*

*BOOM!!*

Igniting and combusting the air around her, Fana's magic started running rampant as that third eye on her forehead started shining brightly and fire engulfed her surrounding.

"She's gonna self destruct!" Finral yelled remembering the whole Vetto incident.

"Dammit!" Vanessa cursed. "This entire place is gonna be reduced to ashes in a couple of minutes.

"Your fault! THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT!!" Releasing even more rampaging mana, Fana's kept screaming at Grim.

'What did I do?'

"Oi Asta." Grim called.

"Huh?"

"Yami stopped that Vetto guy from self destructing by killing him right?"

"What? Yeah but what does that have to do wi-

"It just makes dealing with this situation easier." Switching to [Breath of Flames] Grim took a step forward.

"You're not killing my childhood friend!!"

"Ha?" Frowning at his actions, Grim placed his hand on Mars's bȧrė ċhėst.

[Rengoku]

*BANG!!*

"Don't touch me."

Using the spell to hurl him into the distance, Grim fixed his collar and continued walking towards Fana.

"MARS!" Fanzell yelled as he watch Mars get blasted away.

"Hey! Not cool Grim!" Asta said.

Ignoring him, Grim took full advantage of the fact that he had some fire resistance to close the distance between him and Fana.

"You!! ITS ALWAYS YOU!!" She screamed.

"Is that your final words?" He asked not slowing his steps.

"BURN!!"

Increasing the intensity of the fire, the area was encased in the orange glow as Asta and the others had no choice but to retreat as the heat started scalding them. Even Grim with his fire resistance started to feel the heat turn up as he started sweating.

'So this is far as my resistance goes huh?'

Thinking about it now, it took Yami one hit to defeat Vetto, Grim on the other hand had been fighting Fana for quite a while now and had hit at least over a hundred times and was still no closer to defeating her.

"Please!" Mars's voice rung out from a distance. "*Sob* Please don't kill my friend!" Laying on the floor with smoking emanating from the area the [Rengoku] had hit him, Mars cried out in a painful voice as tears ran down his face.

"..."

Evading her mass fireballs, Grim briefly switched to [Breath of the Beast] to slash through the firewall around her and create an opening.

Not expecting him to actually make it this far, Fana started becoming hysterical.

"STAY AWAY!! STAY AWA-

*BANG!!*

Annoyed by her constant rambling, Grim shut her up by gathering mana into his fist and punching her directly in her third eye.

---

"Holy crap! That actually worked!" Asta exclaimed after watching the flames dissipate.

Standing in the crater with an unsteady standing Fana, Grim watched as the third eye on her forehead trembled violently before vanishing.

'So overloading it with mana works...'

While Grim may have gotten rid of her third eye by transferring a shit-ton of mana through his punch, his punch still packed quite a punch and caused the fragile bodied Fana to fall flat on her back.

'Hmm? Her mana levels have gone back down to normal... That weird familiarity I felt with her is also gone...'

Looking down at the pink haired girl, Grim was surprised to see a girl with gentle eyes looking back up at him.

"..."

"..."

Bored with the outcome, he didn't feel like killing her any longer as he sensed that she lacked the power to even compete with him further. In his eyes she was bȧrėly stronger than Mars, and considering how much stronger he was compared to Mars, fighting her would be beneath him.

---

"How come you didn't kill her?" While Mars and Fana reunited and were questioned by the others, Vanessa went over and stood next to Grim.

"...I didn't feel like she was a bad person."

"She was about to blow everything away."

"Yeah, but looking at that girl standing there now... I can't see someone as gentle as her doing something so extreme."

Looking at the girl who was clinging to the bȧrė ċhėsted Mars, Vanessa couldn't help but agree.

"But what if she didn't change? What would you have done?"

"Isn't it obvious? I would have killed her."

"What?!"

"Don't look so surprised. If I felt like she was even a slight danger to my life, I would have killed her without blinking twice."

"You... You actually mean it don't you."

"Yeah." He nodded before getting up and stretching. "Now we need to go and deal with the next problem."

"The next problem?" Vanessa looked confused until she and the others suddenly felt a fluctuation of mana.

Looking in the direction of the forest, Fanzell froze before screaming "EVERYONE RUN FOR IT!!" as beams of mana rained down on them from the sky

*BOOM!!*

*BOOM!!*

*BOOM!!*