Lencar just nodded, his mind already recalculating. That display was a mistake. It paints a target.
He stood on the sidelines, watching the next matches. They were, as he expected, clumsy and short. Most were over in seconds.
Then, it was Asta's turn.
Asta versus a girl with [Water Magic].
She was confident, a member of the Hage church's extended family. "[Water Whip]!" she commanded, a long, lashing tendril of water shooting at Asta.
The crowd expected him to be thrown from the ring.
What happened, instead, was that Asta drew his sword.
THWACK.
The moment the whip touched the giant, black, rusted blade, the magic didn't just splash. It vanished. It ceased to exist.
The girl's eyes went wide. The entire crowd gasped.
Lencar leaned forward, his analytical gaze locked on the sword.
It's not just negation. It's an active void, Lencar's mind raced. My Heretic Mode is a state of being. That sword is an object of pure Anti-Magic. It's a conduit. He's not in 'Heretic Mode'; he's just... Asta. The tool is doing the work.
"MY MAGIC IS NEVER GIVING UP!" Asta roared.
The girl panickd. "[Water Shield]!"
Asta charged, his physique—built through pure, non-magical, insane effort—carrying him across the ring in two bounds.
He brought the sword down.
CLANG!
He cleaved the shield in two. The magic evaporated on contact. He stopped the flat of the blade a hair's breadth from the girl's nose, the sheer force of the impact blowing her hair back.
"I... I give up!" she squeaked.
"Winner, Asta!"
Asta roared in triumph, while Lord Fungen looked physically ill. "A brutish... 'grimoire'. How vulgar. Utterly without mana. Proceed."
Lencar watched Asta sheathe the blade on his back. He's fast. Faster than his size implies. His strength is monstrous. And that sword... it's the ultimate 'No'. My Heretic Mode is a scalpel for toggling my existence. His is a guillotine for magic itself. Interesting.
The tournament continued. Yuno's match was, in a word, beautiful. His opponent, a boy with [Smoke Magic], was instantly encased in a tiny, perfect cyclone and gently deposited outside the ring, unharmed. It was a display of power and, more importantly, control. The exact thing Lencar lacked.
Soon, it was Lencar's second match. He was up against a girl named Elara. She had [Thread Magic], and she had watched his first fight. She was wary.
"Begin!"
Elara didn't attack. She was smart. She cast a wide net. "[Thread Weaver's Snare]!"
She flung her hands out, and dozens of fine, silvery threads shot from her grimoire, crisscrossing the entire arena. They weren't aimed at Lencar; they were aimed everywhere. In seconds, the ring was a web of glinting, razor-sharp wires, just inches from the ground.
The crowd murmured. "He can't move!" "One step and he's cut to ribbons!"
Elara smirked. "Give up. My threads are sharper than steel. You can't dodge them, and your fire magic will just get sliced apart."
She was right.
Lencar stood in his tiny, two-foot square of safe-ground. Fire was useless. Wind would be too revealing. Anti-Magic was a last resort.
A spatial control problem, he thought. She's locked down the ground. So... I'll just have to break it.
He smiled, a cold, analytical smile that didn't reach his eyes. "You're smart. But you've forgotten a magic type."
He opened his grimoire. The page for [Chain Magic] flipped open.
The crowd, which had been expecting another fire-cannon, was confused.
"[Magic-Sealing Chain]!"
A single, thick, black chain exploded from his hand.
"A second magic type?!" Elara shouted, her composure finally breaking.
Lord Fungen sat up in his chair. "Dual-attribute... a commoner?"
The chain wasn't aimed at her. It was aimed at the ground.
It smashed into the dirt at his feet, the anti-magic properties of its creation making the threads around it sizzle and retract.
Elara didn't understand. "What are you—?"
Lencar grabbed the chain with both hands.
The crowd expected a magic battle.
Lencar gave them a physics lesson.
He was in Mage Mode, his body thrumming with Yuno's mana, but he wasn't casting. He was pulling.
His "Mana-Forged 2.0" body roared to life. He planted his feet, bent his knees, and with a guttural shout of pure, unadulterated physical effort, he heaved.
He ripped a five-foot-wide, two-foot-deep crater of earth, dirt, and razor-wire from the ground.
He had, in effect, torn up the floor.
He swung the massive payload of rock and thread over his head. He was a commoner, using a noble's copied magic, to perform a feat of Asta-level brute strength.
"Take it back!" he roared.
He threw the entire mass at her.
Elara screamed. Her threads, which were meant to cut, were now hopelessly tangled in a ton of rock and dirt. The anti-magic chain, still embedded in the mass, neutralized her attempts to cut it free.
The payload of earth slammed into her, a non-lethal, definitive avalanche that buried her and sent her tumbling out of the ring.
"Winner... Lencar!" the Tower Master declared, his voice full of shock.
Lencar stood in the ruined, cratered circle, breathing heavily. He let the chain dissolve. He'd won.
He looked at the magistrate. The man was no longer bored. He was staring at Lencar with a sharp, acquisitive gleam.
Lencar ignored him. He looked at the bracket.
He had won. Asta had won.
The next match was set.
Semi-final: Lencar Abarame vs. Asta.