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1.

Prior to this, Bianca had never once fought with the intent to capture her target alive. Hence why she learned a new lesson today.

Capturing a little pest without killing it turned out to be a lot more difficult than she thought.

After suddenly amplifying his mana several times over, Siwoo pushed his speed to a whole new level.

The speed he was moving at now was nothing like before.

With just a few light strides, he was already breaking the sound barrier, showing off his superhuman velocity.

If Bianca were to try to follow him with her bare eyes, all she would have seen was a blur.

But ‘The Observer’s Eye of Thought’ wasn’t just some Mystic Code that could simply aid one’s aim.

After it was enhanced by Bianca, it became the ultimate observation tool, capable of analyzing every bit of the target’s data and predicting their movements almost perfectly.

No matter how fast Siwoo got or how hard he charged, the Bitege’s Shield linked to the Observer’s Eye of Thought would block every attack he unleashed without any trouble.

Even when he tried to twist his ribbon-like weapon and strike multiple places at once, it didn’t matter.

The shield had the capability to split into up to seventy-two pieces to defend, turning it into a genuinely impenetrable wall.

And whenever Bianca got tired of watching him bleed and sweat while swinging his spear, she’d just wave the Poet’s Fan and push him away, creating distance between them all over again. To her, this fight had already turned into a boring and tedious standoff.

He was clearly pushing his body past its limits.

No matter how versatile mana was, stuffing that much into one spirit body was dangerous.

And using all that mana to enhance one’s muscle to create thrusts that was close to a fighter jet’s charge only added to the danger.

“So reckless.”

Hence why she was flabbergasted. After losing his friend, he somehow lost his mind and all sense of reason like this.

Bianca stomped her heel against the ground once more.

Immediately, dozens white paper airplanes lifted into the air, shooting straight toward Siwoo.

Of course, those projectiles weren’t just regular paper planes.

They were artifacts Bianca had customized to track and destroy her enemies.

The homing projectiles twisted and turned persistently, closing in on Siwoo.

-Bang! Crash! Boom!

But he wasn’t going down that easily.

Seeing him striking down the dozens of paper airplanes with a series of fierce, precise spear attacks made Bianca let out a hum of admiration.

For a witch, his skills in close combat were actually worthy of praise, even though it was rare to see witches fight like that.

It was even more so considering that he hadn’t been a witch for even ten years, and he was already strong enough to beat a weakened Ea.

And she could see that any witch who didn’t have the right countermeasures against him would easily fall prey to his unconventional style of close combat.

It was rather hard to believe.

A mere lowly man dared to challenge the achievements that took hundreds of years for the witches to build.

The thought made her desire to possess her burning even more as her body shuddered.

-Baaaaaang!

“Huu...”

“...Ah”

Bianca suddenly realized.

At one point, he stopped charging in recklessly, even though he seemed like he could do it all day at first.

Rage was a fleeting thing.

And human beings were inherently weak.

Even the kind of fury that could push someone to face their death would fade away in the face of overwhelming sense of powerlessness.

Siwoo, initially blinded by rage after hearing of his friend’s death, had rushed into the fight.

But after their first clash, he must have realized the truth.

That he couldn’t win against her, no matter what.

Unfortunately for him, the moment he boarded his ship, he had already signed his name in the ‘Ballroom Register’.

Since he had agreed to the terms of the contract, there was no more turning back for him, and Bianca had also made sure to let him know about that.

But then, why did he, after realizing the insurmountable gap between them, and knowing that he couldn’t run away even if he wanted to, still pushed himself so hard? The answer that Bianca came to was, he was buying time.

“I’m curious. Are you waiting for someone to come and save you?”

Seeing him remaining silent, Bianca became more certain.

There had been a significant delay between when her communication orb confirmed that he had read the message and when Siwoo actually appeared.

She knew that he wasn’t stupid, so he must have set up a backup plan in case things went wrong.

For example, he could have left a note saying, ‘Please come to X place in about 30 minutes’.

Duchess Tiphereth was currently busy searching for Ea’s whereabouts all across Hongkong, so she could be ruled out, but the same couldn’t be said for the other witches that were close to him.

“How foolish, did you really think I wouldn’t consider that possibility?”

But Bianca had, of course, already thought that far ahead.

From the moment she deployed the Interdimensional Barrier, she had used an artifact.

‘The Arena’s Banner.’

Once a battle had started inside the area of its influence, it wouldn’t allow anyone to intervene until it was over.

It also made it impossible for anyone to observe the barrier from outside.

For Criminal Exiles, it was a basic rule to use an Interdimensional Barrier in such a way.

“You’re wasting your time. No one’s coming to help you through this barrier.”

A brief lull followed the conversation.

Bianca stopped firing the endless barrage of attacks from her artifacts, leaving Siwoo standing there, panting heavily.

Blood was dripping steadily from the tips of his gauntlets.

Just as she expected, the strain of his reckless movements was tearing his fragile skin apart.

“Why don’t you surrender now? I’m sorry about your friend, but... Trust me, risking your own life over a pitiful human isn’t worth it.”

It was a shameless thing to say, especially since she was the one who killed his friend.

But there wasn’t even a hint of guilt in Bianca’s casual suggestion.

At the end of the day, Shin Siwoo was a witch, just like her.

His friend who died, however, was nothing more than a human.

No matter how hard she tried to rationalize it, him risking his life over such a trivial friendship was nothing more than him trying to satisfy his foolish pride. The rational choice here was to swallow his pride and preserve his life.

The silence dragged on.

Bianca watched Siwoo with a bit of anticipation.

Watching a man who held such noble beliefs break down and compromised on his beliefs was something she found thrilling.

The very thought of this so-called warrior of justice turning into a pitiful slave of desire, reduced to little more than a pet under her control, made her quiver in delight.

“Takasho was a good guy.”

“Hm...?”

“He didn’t deserve to die like that.”

Bianca let out a deep sigh at his answer, disappointed by his stubbornness, as it dashed her hopes.

“Humans die for stupid reasons all the time. How long are you going to cling onto such weak emotions? You’re a witch too, no? Since you are, you need to start thinking rationally.”

The words she spouted actually wasn’t meant as a jab or provocation.

It was genuine and sincere advice.

For witches, there was nothing more valuable than magic.

The only emotions that mattered to them were ambition, curiosity and desire. Every other kind of emotion was just extra. Human weakness, morality, and ethics were merely weak social constructs, made by the powerless to protect what little they had.

Witches were beings that transcended humanity, hence why the rational thing for them to do was to leave those chains behind.

“No. You’re wrong.”

But, in Siwoo’s eyes, while he knew that witches were different from humans...

They didn’t age, they were immortals, and they were fanatics who dedicated their lives to magic...

But, that wasn’t all it was about them. After all, he knew of an apprentice witch who was struck with fear at the possibility of losing her mother.

An old witch who got deeply worried for the daughter she’d have to eventually leave behind.

A witch who blindly trusted him like any ordinary lover would act.

Twin witches who approached him without any prejudice, and even an evil witch who mourned her dead young apprentice for the rest of her life.

“As for you... You’re just...a monster...”

“...So stubborn.”

Hearing his words, Bianca didn’t feel particularly disappointed.

This just meant that he was that limited in capacity.

A man like him could easily be broken. All she needed to do was to shatter his limbs and overwhelm him with endless, blissful pleasure until he gave in.

She failed to break him down with words alone, but that wasn’t the only way she could utilize to break someone.

Meanwhile, Siwoo checked his body’s condition.

He had pushed his physical enhancements far beyond what his spirit body could handle.

Every muscle in his body screamed in pain as if wrung dry, and his joints felt like they might melt down, like an engine straining beyond its limit.

Still, he gripped his spear as if it was a harpoon.

He twisted his body, adding rotational force, and hurled the Red Branch with everything he had. It flew like a comet, leaving a red trail in its wake.

Throwing away the most powerful weapon he had...

In front of Bianca, who could easily take it for herself, could only be seen as an act of desperation.

-Wooooosh!

The Red Branch, shooting forward like a beam of light, came to a sudden stop before the Bitege’s Shield, hovering horizontally in midair like an arrow stuck in a target.

“Well, it’s over now, right?”

Bianca sneered, amused at how easy the fight had been, turning her gaze back to Siwoo.

But then, she saw it.

Even after witnessing the overwhelming difference between their powers, there wasn’t an ounce of despair in Siwoo’s eyes.

“No.”

The Red Branch responded to an external shock, releasing a fierce distortion field.

Throughout the battle, every collision had steadily stored energy inside the ribbon wrapping around the branch.

Siwoo didn’t avoid charging at Bianca or take a defensive stance because he thought it was pointless.

All this time, he had been using up a tremendous amount of mana, mental strength, and focus just to keep the distortion field that was itching to go wild under control.

The cursed Mystic Code, awakened from devouring 1,200 human souls.

Siwoo could only control about a quarter of its true power.

Unlike the Red Knight, he couldn’t even manipulate the distortion field freely, let alone utilizing its barrier.

However...

What if he used the built-up impact to intentionally trigger a runaway surge?

“This is just the beginning.”

-Woooooooong!

The ribbon that had been keeping the ‘distortion’ of the raging Red Branch under control was torn off.

At the same time, the barely-contained distortion field and red barrier began to flood out towards their target.

“W-What the hell...!”

It was like shaking a bottle of soda with Mentos inside, tightly sealing it, and then tossing it at someone.

For the first time during this whole fight, Bianca showed a confused expression as the Red Branch unleashed its distortion field and barrier indiscriminately.

While this alone wasn’t enough to break through the Bitege’s Shield...

The distortion field had an antagonistic nature to artifacts, just like an EMP burst towards electronic devices.

Bianca had to see her artifacts begin to malfunction and lose control, prompting her to take a step back for the first time.

Of course, Siwoo didn’t just wait around.

Seeing Bianca caught off guard, he conjured a sword and charged into the swirling storm of distortion and barriers, trusting in the three clovers.

His body felt like it was being torn apart.

The intense distortion field was like uncontrolled nuclear radiation to his spirit body.

His vision swayed, like being hit by a blast of the radiation.

His balance and sense of direction seemed to melt away, and a scorching pain engulfed him as two of the clovers disintegrated in an instant.

Periwinkle’s clovers were also artifacts.

It meant, they weren’t completely immune to the distortion field’s interference.

“This is absurd!”

Bianca tried to pull out another artifact as she backed away from the storm of the distortion field.

But, at this point, even her Observer’s Eye of Thought was temporarily paralyzed.

So, there was no way that she could know that he had taken a suicidal route, charging straight toward her. Because of this, she was too slow to react.

-Boom!

Siwoo’s strike, fueled by every last bit of his strength, came crashing down toward Bianca.