Jellal shifted into a combat stance, gathering magic. Seven golden spheres of light materialized behind him, linked by shimmering threads of energy that formed the unmistakable pattern of the Big Dipper.
"Submit to the judgment of the seven stars!" Jellal shouted. "Grand Chariot!"
At his command, seven pillars of celestial light descended from the heavens, converging on Kael's position.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
The destructive force was staggering, each pillar piercing through several floors of the Tower of Heaven like they were made of paper.
"Kael!" Erza cried out, her heart sinking as the explosion engulfed the platform.
"Hahaha! What a fool!" Jellal's laughter echoed through the wreckage. "That magic carries the impact of a falling meteor! He must have been reduced to ash! Hahaha!"
But then, a casual voice drifted out from the settling dust. "Hey, hey, hey... don't go pronouncing people dead without checking first."
As the smoke cleared, Kael stood exactly where he had been, completely unscathed. However, his appearance had shifted. He had now Taken Over the form of Satoru Gojo.
"Kael!" Erza breathed a sigh of relief. She knew Kael was often reckless, but he never acted without a plan. Still, he certainly had a knack for giving her heart attacks.
Jellal's eyes widened in disbelief. "Impossible! That was Grand Chariot! No one takes a direct hit from that and walks away without a scratch!"
"Yeah, I'll admit, the power wasn't bad," Kael said with a nonchalant shrug. "It's just a pity you didn't actually hit me."
"Don't lie to me! I saw it hit with my own eyes!"
"What you 'touched' was the Infinity that exists between us," Kael explained calmly.
Jellal narrowed his eyes. "What are you talking about?"
Kael raised his right hand, a playful smirk on his face. "Come here. Reach out and touch my hand. I'll show you."
Sensing no killing intent or hostile magic power from Kael, and driven by a desperate need to understand the man's magic, Jellal landed in front of him. He slowly extended his palm toward Kael's.
But as his hand drew close, it simply... stopped.
Jellal frowned. No matter how much pressure he applied, his hand remained suspended an inch away from Kael's palm. He couldn't move forward, yet there was no physical barrier. Is this the 'Infinity' he mentioned?
"It didn't actually stop," Kael noted. "Think of it this way: the closer you get to me, the slower you become. Now, as for what happens next... I think it's only fair if I hold your hand, too."
Kael's hand moved, bypassing the slowing effect of his own technique, and firmly grasped Jellal's.
"Wait, no—!"
"Don't be shy," Kael teased, interlacing his fingers with Jellal's. "You're making me blush."
In the next heartbeat, Kael's expression went cold. He wound up his left fist and buried it deep into Jellal's abdomen.
Thwack!
Jellal doubled over in agony, the air leaving his lungs in a sharp gasp. The punch felt heavy—impossibly heavy—reinforced by the weight of Kael's Cursed Energy.
Kael didn't stop there. Still holding Jellal's hand to prevent escape, he unleashed a brutal barrage of straight punches. Each strike landed with the force of a wrecking ball.
"You bastard! Meteor!"
Jellal's body erupted in yellow light. Kael finally let go, allowing Jellal to rocket backward to a safe distance.
"Heavenly Body Magic: Heavenly Beams!" Jellal shouted, waving his hand to fire multiple high-speed beams of starlight. Each one was a concentrated bolt of destruction.
Kael didn't move. He simply held up two fingers, increasing the output of his Cursed Energy.
Whoosh!
The Heavenly Beams screeched to a halt inches from Kael's face before being forced back.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The deflected beams slammed into the massive Lacrima crystals behind Kael—the very structures designed to absorb Etherion. The crystals shattered under the impact, and a massive shard began to fall toward Kael.
"Kael, look out!" Erza warned.
Kael merely raised a hand. The falling crystal froze mid-air, caught in the Infinity around him. With a flick of his wrist, he sent the massive jagged rock hurtling back at Jellal.
"Meteor!" Jellal hissed, narrowly dodging the projectile.
The crystal collided with another part of the tower, and both plummeted into the ocean below.
"You... you're destroying everything!" Jellal's face was contorted with rage. Eight years of labor were being dismantled before his eyes.
"Ah! My bad, my bad!" Kael said, though he didn't sound sorry at all. "I honestly didn't think you'd dodge."
"Heavenly Body Magic: Abyss Break!"
Jellal wasn't interested in banter anymore. Dark stars aligned like a necklace of death, launching a carpet-bombing run on Kael's position. The scale of the attack was far beyond his previous spells.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Kael dashed out from the center of the explosions. While he could block these attacks, maintaining Infinity against such high-output magic was starting to drain his reserves. He didn't have Gojo's literal "infinite" energy; his Cursed Energy was converted from his own Magic Power, and it was finite.
Jellal sensed the opening. He raised his arms high, crossing them as a terrifying surge of dark magic power erupted from his body. A sphere that looked like a miniature black hole formed between his palms.
The surrounding rubble was instantly sucked in and vaporized.
Erza gasped in horror. "The shadows... they're stretching toward the light?! Kael, get back! You can't let that magic touch you!"
Kael flashed Erza a quick thumbs-up. "Don't worry! I might be arrogant, but I'm not an idiot. That thing looks nasty. Luckily, I have something just as dangerous."
Kael brought his hands together, a sphere of intense blue energy condensing between his palms.
"Cursed Technique Lapse: Maximum Output... Blue!"
In an instant, Kael was holding a massive blue orb. This was the pinnacle of attraction—a singularity that reached toward negative infinity.
"Fall into the abyss of eternal darkness!" Jellal screamed. "Heavenly Body Magic: Altairis!"
Jellal fired the black sphere just as Kael launched his Blue.
As the two spheres crossed the battlefield, the floor beneath them simply vanished, erased by the sheer gravitational pressure. When they finally collided, both orbs fought for dominance, their opposing forces of attraction trying to devour one another.
Kael expected one to consume the other. Instead, something far more volatile happened.
The black and blue energies fused, merging into a single, swirling sphere. Then, in a terrifying display of physics, the sphere shrank rapidly until it was no larger than a thumb. The density of the energy was so high it made the very air scream.
"Oh, crap!"
Kael didn't hesitate. He surged to Erza's side, grabbed her, and teleported them as far as he could. Seeing the instability, Jellal also activated Meteor and fled at maximum speed.
Buzz——!
For a fraction of a second, there was silence. Then, the tiny sphere expanded with violent force, swelling to the size of an island in a heartbeat.
VROOOM!
The sphere vanished as quickly as it had appeared. And with it, half of the Tower of Heaven had simply ceased to exist.
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