A brave man may not live, but he cannot die

Chapter 170 Guaranteed Admission to the Next Round (Part 2)

".well."

A long sigh echoed in the darkness.

All the lights in the Eye of Grindelwald tower went out. As the control core of the world's largest aviation hub, every lever and every button here was connected to arcane mechanisms. These intricate creations, the culmination of the Academy's efforts, were not damaged, but were captured by some higher being. Everything in this space was no longer bound by the arcane matrix, but obeyed "her" will.

Apart from the crystal ball, riddled with cracks and used to operate Grindelwald's Eye, which still emitted a chaotic blackness, it was mana in an extremely concentrated state after being overloaded, like a black hole sucking in a nebula.

"You never know which will come first, tomorrow or an accident." She walked past the immobilized Ankuya, slowly strolled to the porthole in the control tower, and looked down at the battered Lin.

As if asleep, the girl's battered body was curled up. Despite being so magnificent and huge that it could even block out the moonlight, she still gave the impression of a little girl who was less than 1.5 meters tall, appearing so fragile and petite.

Ankua finally saw her face clearly.

It was Barbas, the professor in Grindelwald's history department and the teacher of the most difficult elective course, 'Space Magic,' who was a kind old lady who got along well with everyone and was deeply loved by her students.

But her expression at this moment was a far cry from "kindness." Probably no student had ever seen her like this. Barbas looked at Lin with neither sadness nor anger, as if a scientist was burying a wasted experimental subject.

Only indifference and a faint aversion to "waste" are present, just like Lin's indifference and detachment.

"He said that to me. It makes a lot of sense, doesn't it?" Barbas tilted her head, no longer looking at Lynn outside, but turning to Ankua and saying, "Oh, 'he' means Merlin. Pretty impressive, right? Whether it's a scoundrel like Link, or Merlin, or any other hero, they always manage to say something very insightful. They're all smart people."

"So, how did you manage to mistake Lin, who can't even speak fluently, for a hero?"

She reached out and touched Ankuya's head from afar.

Ankua was able to move freely above the neck.

“...Tiresia?” Ankuya asked in a dry voice.

Even a professor or dean of the academy could not so easily suspend a ninth-order arcane spell that was about to be activated.

There are probably only a handful of arcane mages in history who possess such incredible control and manipulation abilities.

Furthermore, the familiar tone with which she mentioned the two heroes, "Merlin" and "Link," made her identity almost obvious.

Tiresia is one of the members of Link's Demon King Extermination Team and the last elf who co-founded Grindelwald with Merlin!

Don't be so afraid.

Barbas neither denied nor admitted it. Her wrinkled hands touched the crystal ball that controlled Grindelwald's Eye, and the mana that was about to go out of control began to recede like the tide going out.

"When demons and humans were born, elves had already multiplied on this land for countless years. I don't hate demons that much, otherwise you would be dead. Answer my question, servant of the Demon King."

A cold glint flashed in Ankuya's eyes as he heard the sound of the elevator mechanism turning behind him.

It was a purely steam-powered gear system, requiring no arcane drive. Someone's coming up.

But Barbas seemed completely unconcerned.

"If I remember correctly, the Colossus was a powerful spell used by the elves during Ragnarok in the Second Age. Is it really something like that? Lin spoke the language of the hero's world in the Abyss. Why is that?"

Barbas looked at Ankuya with a scrutinizing gaze.

"Records about the Age of Gods are top secret within the academy, and there aren't many of them. Where did you learn these things? You're a human; do you expect knowledge from demons?"

“It’s not only academies that have ancient books.”

"Heh, do you know about the Elven curse?"

Ankuya nodded silently.

"Probably know."

"The curse has no effect on the language of the other world. If we were to describe it in terms of mysticism, all the knowledge the hero brought from the other world cannot be affected by any power. Tsk, too much teaching, huh?"

Barbas seemed to realize she had said a bit too much.

"Isn't Lin a giant weapon? That's a magical artifact, so why is she affected by the elf's curse?"

"Magic artifacts?" Barbas's eyes held a hint of disdain. "Humans do have some novel applications for mana, but compared to the glory of the Age of Gods, it's not even comparable to learning to walk. How can the Titans be described as magic artifacts? But they're all going to be destroyed anyway, so telling you won't hurt."

"Lin is the Colossus's safety mechanism; as long as she doesn't die, the Colossus won't activate. Before that, she was no different from the other students. As for the strangeness about her, well, Lin is an elf, or rather, a soul from an elf. Do you understand?"

So, what are you planning to do by talking to me about all this?

Ankua sensed that Barbas was waiting for something.

Academy? Vatican?
“Hemer is right about one thing: you are a smart person.” She smiled, a smile so kind and gentle on her aged face, and then said softly, “Some beings do not want to see the Titan. I hid it for over a thousand years, merely fulfilling the duty of the last elf. Since it wants to destroy it, there is nothing I can do.”

"destroyed?"

Ankua glanced at the girl who floated outside like a god without showing any emotion.

If it truly is the legendary treasure of the Elven race, then it is a miracle, like the Root, that arcanists would pursue their entire lives.

It's highly unlikely that one or two ninth-tier arcane spells would kill such a divine miracle.

"They'll be descending soon to destroy the Colossus. Otherwise, if they find out this thing has appeared, ha... I don't want to be enemies with those beings right now. A demon spy carefully planted in the academy should be a good gift to atone for my sins."

He closed his eyes and said nothing more.

"Using the soul as a spell to inscribe arcane magic?" Barbas saw through Ankua's intentions. "Planning to commit suicide?"

She did not stop it.

"Death is more painful than living."

Ankuya slowly opened his eyes.

Death was indeed not a difficult matter for a magician like Tiresia, who was almost a god. Even if her soul was shattered, she could piece Ankuya back together and hand him over. What she and the beings she spoke of wanted was nothing more than the memories of the demon race in his mind.

Whether Ankuya is alive or dead, whether she speaks or not, she will probably find a way to extract it.

“Quinn, stop hiding.” He sighed softly. “This old woman is the wife of the First Hero, the Elf Queen Tiresia, who has lived for over a thousand years and has killed the Demon King.”

The air was deathly silent.

Barbas just smiled and said nothing. "...Remember that story you told me? It's called Jojo's Bizarre Adventure. We want to meet Jotaro of Dio right now. Do you understand what I mean? We can't win."

Barbas shook her head slightly. She had noticed early on that the people who came up in the elevator were using thief's stealth skills to sneak up on her.

“Mr. Quinn, you and Professor Cavendish had afternoon tea with me just a week ago. Are you planning to sneak up on me with a paralysis spell now?”

No one answered her; Quinn didn't know where she was hiding.

"Then I can tell you the result."

"It could succeed, freeze me for a hundredth of a second? Maybe a thousandth? After all, that guy's immobilization technique can even freeze the sun."

Barbas's smile gradually turned cold.

"But you'll die. The price of immobilizing me is something a mere Sequence Eight like you can't bear. Your mental energy will be depleted in an instant, then your soul. You won't even live to see the moment I'm immobilized; your brain will be turned to mush by the immobilization spell."

"The reason I let you go that day was because I thought you might have the potential to defeat the hero. Your departure from this world would save me a lot of trouble. But now it seems that treating Lin as a hero was a terrible investment."

From the pile of corpses—all of whom were control tower personnel—that Ankuya had disposed of, Quinn leaped out with a single somersault.

"Certainly!!!"

He raised his right hand and shouted in Chinese, at which point golden light surged forth!

A hint of displeasure flashed in Barbas's eyes.

Even after all that, are we still going to throw our lives away?
However, she did not dodge; in fact, she was somewhat looking forward to experiencing the long-lost immobilization spell.

She felt a little nostalgic.

However, the expected feeling of a break in consciousness due to being immobilized did not come; Quinn's immobilization target was not her.

In the gray-white vision of the Demon King's Eye, the old man, whose appearance was frail and whose temperament seemed frozen in time at the moment of his prime, was like nothingness, nothing at all, undetectable, unobservable, and uncaptureable.

However, Ankua had a thick layer of magical structure on his body that could be observed by the Demon King's Eye. Quinn had never seen such an elegant mana structure before. It was concise, beautiful and full of life. This was the imitation of the immobilization spell that Barbas used to bind Ankua!
The amazing thing about the immobilization spell is that...
Everything that can be seen can be frozen in place!

Without any hesitation, Quinn aimed at the point where the spell connected on Ankuya's chest. He unleashed the last bit of mental energy he had replenished after drinking the potion, and the chains of the immobilization spell hammered into the flowing mana spell like nails, sealing and blocking it at a specific point. Immediately, the entire spell triggered a chain reaction; like a thousand-mile dike collapsing due to an ant hole, it crumbled and disintegrated in the blink of an eye.

Barbas could naturally see the changes in the surgical technique.

She slightly raised her eyes, momentarily lost in doubt. How could this be?

Her imitation of the immobilization spell couldn't simply be fixed at a single point to cause the entire spell to collapse and become ineffective. To do that, one would need an extremely thorough understanding of her spell to precisely grasp the single point of greatest impact. But she had never demonstrated the immobilization spell to anyone, not even Merlin. This was tantamount to directly breaking the spell. How did Quinn obtain this information?
"Hey, what are you spacing out for?"

Ankuya's voice drifted over from afar.

Barbas casually prepared to immobilize the two demon spies again. Ankua had a clear understanding of their own abilities—the two of them had no chance of defeating her, not even a chance to cause trouble.

Suddenly, Barbas froze, her expression shifting from astonishment to seriousness. This legendary magician, who had lived for over a thousand years and twice fought the Demon King, straightened up, and a wand as tall as a person appeared in her hand instinctively.

Before her, the man who had always covered his eyes with white hair lifted his thick hair, revealing his hidden eyes.

Ankua's lips twitched slightly; it was the language of the demons.

"This body and this soul are hereby returned."

"you--"

Before Barbas could finish speaking in shock, she and Ankuya vanished from the control tower in an instant.

All that was left for Quinn was Ancus's hand gesture behind his back—

Those are two fingers.

Two minutes—that's the maximum time Ankuya can hold out.

"Didn't Merlin tell you the story of Jotaro's sneak attack on Dio?"

As he spoke, he quickly ran towards the crystal ball covered in cracks.

Although he learned of Tiresia's existence from the system's future prompts, he was still shocked that the old lady professor was the mysterious person in Merlin's Tomb, including hearing many shocking conversations between her and Ankuya.
But now is not the time to think about that.

According to the system's prompts, only one final step remains to be taken.

The chaotic, dangerous hues within the crystal ball had dissipated, and Tiresia channeled the overloaded mana back beneath Grindelwald's Eye. She didn't know how to operate it, let alone the complex series of actions required to overload and fire—something that couldn't be completed in just two minutes.
but.

"Lin—"

Quinn shouted.

The illusory and heartless figure of the girl solidified once again before Quinn's eyes.

Do you remember what I just told you?

"Based on the scan of the Third Will's memories, it's confirmed that the Human Restraint, Lynn Shiloh, is waiting for your pizza. If this is the way to get the pizza, I can help you. Confirm, recharge Grindelwald's Eye?"

Quinn nodded heavily.

His voice, compared to before, carried a lighter yet more sincere emotion.

"I promise you'll get to eat pizza this time."

Lin's floating figure rippled for a moment.

The next second, the entire tower trembled, and the chaotic overload of Mana black light filled the view. The surface of the crystal ball was covered with tiny, scattered stars, a sign that it might explode at any moment.

"Charging completed."

Quinn took a deep breath—

“Grindelwald’s Eye rotates downwards by twenty-five degrees.”

"fire!!!"

(End of this chapter)