EVERYTHING (2)

Leonel's eyes went bloodshot, his body shaking as though he couldn't sense his sizzling skin.

"STOP!" Monet roared. "You've done enough!"

Leonel completely ignored her. His muscles flexed, and the flames shattered into scattered pieces.

Monet's eyes widened, but then they filled with a determined light.

"I'm trying not to hurt you! But since you don't want my kindness, fine!"

The scorching heat behind Leonel increased severalfold. It was so powerful that Leonel felt himself catching on fire.

Leonel's fury peaked as he finally looked back.

Monet felt a shock to her soul. It was like something had driven a spear right into it, and fear crept up her spine, almost collapsing her to the ground.

It was at that moment that a second streaking light appeared. Or, rather… a streaking darkness.

"STOP! STOP!"

Mordred appeared between Leonel and Monet, stopping things before they truly became bad. However, the towering rage in Leonel's heart only seemed to burn brighter.

"BREAK! BREAK! BREAK! BREAK!"

Leonel turned back toward the barrier, unleashing barrage after barrage. Nothing seemed capable of making the barrier do much more than tremble slightly, even with the World Spirit, even with Blackstar's help—it was all worthless.

Nothing was enough.

Leonel's soul was quickly dissipating, and an eerily familiar scene was playing out once again. His soul was quickly slipping away, and no matter how hard he tried, it just wasn't enough.

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

Leonel continued to form spear after spear, not caring about the shattering of his wrists or weapons, or the backlash to his soul.

He had made a promise. He had made a promise.

"Em, get out of the way!" Monet barked.

"Can't you see, dear? There's something wrong here!"

"What can be wrong here that the Emperor can't handle himself!? What the hell is he going to do? He can't even break the barrier!"

Mordred's heart shuddered; she didn't have a response for that. Monet wasn't a fool; she had obviously realized that there was something wrong already. No matter how willful Leonel was, he wasn't to the point of acting so unrestrained without any reason at all.

But the problem was that things couldn't be allowed to run like this.

Empires had rules, regulations; they had to balance the will of the people and the will of the nobles. They had to maintain rules when they could, or else if just anyone thought they could do whatever because they had a good enough reason, then it would be the beginning of the end for them all.

The fact that Mordred had stepped into this Palace when she wasn't supposed to was already a huge taboo. Leonel had just gotten here, but he was already putting his wife in danger. This only made Monet grit her teeth all the more, and her conviction to stop this farce was even greater.

Unfortunately, Mordred wasn't moving, and she couldn't bring herself to truly attack her wife. There were just some things that were impossible to come back from in any relationship, and this was certainly one of them.

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

"BREAK! BREAK! BREAK!"

"Em, he's killing himself!" Monet shrieked, her frustration boiling over.

Mordred looked back, and what she saw left her horrified.

Leonel was already nothing more than skin and bone. His clothing had grown so loose that it literally fell from his body, but he hadn't noticed anything.

Every time he struck the barrier, one of his arms would snap out of place, but he would just form a spear with the other and strike again in a relentless assault. He was practically bleeding himself dry.

All the beautiful spearmanship in the world didn't seem to be enough.

High in the skies above the palace, a Constellation had taken shape, as had a Destruction World and ten shimmering Stars. But because of his grandfather's special Edict, they couldn't even break through the range of the palace at all.

In the end, even his Constellation and Destruction World were destroying themselves trying to break through.

Nothing was enough. Nothing was enough.

All he had was a spear. All he had was his bow. But they weren't enough.

"NOT AGAIN!"

BANG!

Leonel's arm snapped back with so much force that his entire shoulder dislocated. In fact, his flesh had grown so sparse and fragile that the skin nearly tore along with it. The tiniest strand of flesh seemed to remain, barely holding it in place.

He cocked his other arm back and swung again, but this time, his wrist was caught—not by Monet, but by Mordred.

Tears streamed down Mordred's face as she kept muttering an apology, but she realized that Monet was right. Leonel wasn't getting anywhere; he was just going to kill himself if he kept it up.

"GET OFF OF ME!"

An unexpected power thrummed through Leonel's body and forced Mordred back. Her eyes couldn't help but widen in shock, not understanding how Leonel's body could possibly still have enough strength to do that. Even if he had been in tip-top shape, he shouldn't have been able to blow her back like that.

Violet plumes of smoke exuded from the edges of Leonel's eyes and came smoldering out from his feet.

His body churned and whined. owns all content.

"BREAK!"

He pierced out again, but the scene was just the same. In fact, it was worse.

This arm didn't survive, being ripped out of its socket from the force of the backlash.

Shattered bits of spear and a hollowed arm went flying into the distance, crashing against the wall.

Leonel's heaving breaths were the only things that could be heard outside of the reverberating boom of his previous strikes.

He lifted up his one lanky remaining arm. Grabbing at the air, the previous injury only began healing enough to pop his arm back into place.

There was a certain devastation in Leonel's eyes, an unwillingness to allow anything to stand in his way.

He unleashed a roar and struck down again with everything he had.