Chapter 26 - 25: A Show Of Power (2)

As raw power surged through Lillian's body as Ava stared in awe. She had never for one second believed any of the stories Raul told her about her mother being a great swordsman. But now as she stared at her mother she knew that all the stories about her were true ,that her mother had surely reached the peak of swordsmanship. In that instance Ava saw her future self in her mother, deep inside although scared she was rooting for her.

Lillian turned around and saw Deon flying towards them. At Lillian's signal Luna opened a rift the size of a door in front of her and the kids and all of them went through it leaving Lillian to fight Deon alone.

As Deon was approaching, Lillian reduced the temperature around her causing the water in the air to condense and then freeze turning the once sandy terrain into an ice land. "Tier 7 Ice-house, and silent casting as well. I guess that they don't call you the Ice-witch simply as a jest." Deon said as he landed on the icy Lillian had created.

Lillian replied by causing an ice spike to erupt from the ice directly below Deon. Deon tried to fly off the ground to avoid it but the ice spike also increased in height. He decided to to fly backwards but the ice-spike quickly turned into a water limb and chased him as he flew backwards. Deon tried a number of manoeuvres to get rid of it but it chased after him like a homing missile. He decided enough was enough "Reddens iniquitatem flammae" chanted Deon as the tier 4 fire spell 'punishing flames erupted from his palm in the shape of a fist smiting the water limb turning into steam. The steam condensed and fell to the ground as ice.

When Deon turned back to look at Lillian he found that she had disappeared and that the area of effect of the Ice-house spell had increased to nearly 1km. There was now a blizzard in the middle of the south. (AN: the south is more of a sandy, dry, desert-ish terrain. So seeing a blizzard there was like finding a camel swimming in the sea. LOL).

Deon's field of vision was greatly reduced as the blizzard became stronger with every passing second. The snow flakes that clouded his vision were getting sharper and larger as the blizzard progressed, and they began to cut his robes. "Tier 9 Ice-coffin huh, and only one mage is casting it at that. Sorry I can't let this go on any longer or I might actually lose." said Deon as he pulled Excalibur out of a dimensional rift in front of him.

The sword gave out a holy hum as it was unleashed from its scabbard, emitting a golden aura so strong it pushed all the ice shards falling in a 10m radius away from Deon. The glow of the sword reflected of the ice shards forming a rainbow around the sword giving it a pristine yet comforting look. Deon's eyes shone with a golden colour and his body was covered in a divine aura. And although dim a halo was floating above his head.

"Drat another Arch-Bishop. I have to finish this quickly and help Neel before more show up" thought Lillian as she charged at Deon with her sword aimed at Deon's torso. Deon moved out of the way in the nick of time. If not for his increased speed due to the holy sword's blessing he never would've matched Lillian's crazy speed. "You're pretty fast. But not fast enough." said Deon as he lunged for Lillian's neck with his sword. Lillian parried the holy sword and slid hers along the blade of the holy sword using the ice around them to reduce the friction between the two swords.

Deon saw what she was trying to do and positioned his sword vertically to stop her advance. Deon then retreated into the air using the fact that she was incapable of flight to his advantage. Lillian quickly made an ice-pillar shoot up from below her vaulting her into the sky with her sword out stretched to stab Deon in the middle of his stomach. ". Deon saw her approaching and tried dodging but he wasn't fast enough and a line of blood appeared on the side of his ribs. As Lillian was falling back to the ground Deon saw this as his chance and flew towards the falling Lillian aiming to cut off her head with a horizontal slash. Lillian simply smiled and the shards that were falling around her completely covered her. When Deon cut through the ice ball he found nothing. He looked around and couldn't find a trace of Lillian.

"That was close." sighed Lillian as she fell to the ground a few hundred metres from where Deon was. Lillian had used a tier 8 ice spell called Ice-puppeteer to position the ice shards in such a way that the light around her would be reflected causing her to become seemingly invisible. She then reduced the friction in front of her to increase her speed ten fold in order to make a quick escape. However using the tier 8 spell Ice-puppeteer and keeping the tier 9 Ice-coffin spell active was taking a toll on her. Compared to her Deon was full of energy. " I'm running out of mana. I have to finish this quickly." thought Lillian as she thought of a plan.

" Ugh, I'm totally out of my element here, but this won't last long. She's using up too much mana. As much of a mana-house the Ice-witch is, even the greatest mages have their limits." thought Deon to himself as he healed his wound using divine magic. Deon then landed on the icy-ground and began chanting the tier 4 earth spell 'Mother's call', "Reverberata terram.". Tremors spread through the ice and bounced back on every object it touched. It was a form of echo location that could be used to track objects on the ground. "Found you." smiled Deon as he held out the holy sword and it began glowing even brighter giving Deon even more power. Deon then shot off towards Lillian at a speed faster than sound.

Lillian saw Deon heading for her and erected an Ice-pillar in front of her. Deon replied to that buy chanting the tier 4 air spell air vortex ,"Aeris vertigo.". The spell caused a funnel to appear sucking in air on one side of Deon causing him to abruptly changed direction. He then changed the position of the funnel to redirect his rocketing body towards Lillian.. This all happened in the blink of an eye.