The coastline of Modernia trembled. For the first time since the duel started, Melody stopped walking. She simply stood there barefoot with the Orchestral Violex resting in her hand.
Veneri immediately understood that this was bad.
Melody gently lifted the white violin while rain mist gathered around her figure. Even with her rank lowered to the Fifth Enlightenment, the presence she gave off shifted completely. The casual teacher who teased him and joked with him for decades vanished. In her place stood the woman who once saved an entire race.
The Primordial Bard. The strongest Musicia in history. The one who fought alongside the Nexus Heroes.
Veneri exhaled slowly as sapphire energy spread around his hands.
"I'm beginning to understand why everyone worshipped you."
Melody smiled softly.
"You have only seen the smallest fraction of me."
She rested the violin beneath her chin.
"And before you complain later, remember that I lowered myself all the way down to your level because I care about fairness."
She moved the bow. The moment the first note rang out, a colossal shockwave ripped through the coastline so violently that the sea split apart into towering walls of water stretching kilometers wide.
Five sapphire barriers manifested in front of him. Three shattered immediately. The fourth cracked. The fifth survived for less than a second before the pressure slammed into him. His body was blasted backwards. The force was so strong he broke the sound barrier from the impact. He smashed into the side of a cliff hard enough to destroy it.
He coughed violently. Blood came out of his nose and lips. His ribs were shattered. Body Reconstruction activated immediately, healing him. Veneri slowly stood up while breathing heavily.
"What in the actual fuck was that?"
Melody's voice echoed calmly across the battlefield as she appeared next to him.
"That was one note."
The violin sang again. This time the sound twisted.
The terrifying thing about Melody's Pinnacle Tether was that it ignored conventional restrictions. She did not need spoken language to invoke effects because music itself became language. Every melody acted like Rune Speaking. Now the violin itself had become her voice.
The second note hit and Veneri felt his muscles suddenly become heavier. It was a debuff. He clicked his tongue and immediately summoned Nepenthes runes around him. Geometric sapphire symbols appeared midair.
"Reinforcement."
The rune activated. His body accelerated but another note distorted his hearing. The world tilted violently.
A high-pitched frequency directly hit into his energy system, causing his balance to break apart. Blood leaked from his ears as his knees nearly buckled. Melody sang before he could recover. The moment her voice fused with the violin, the pressure multiplied.
Vibration hit the coastline, cutting through stone formations and sending debris flying into the ocean. Veneri moved instantly using his Plenituse Technique. He vanished into movement, dodging while sapphire constructs materialized around him. Spears, shields, floating barriers, and crystal shards manifested one after another. Melody calmly played another note and every sapphire construct shattered. The sound wave destroyed them before they even reached her.
Veneri froze.
"That is ridiculous."
"You're fighting a woman whose entire existence revolves around sound and rhythm."
Her bow moved again.
"Did you really think projectiles would work?!"
The next sound struck him directly. The vibration bypassed flesh itself. His organs shook violently as blood burst from his mouth. Cracks spread across his bones. His vision blurred.
If Body Reconstruction had not existed, he would have died instantly.
He stumbled and barely raised a barrier before another note landed. The barrier shattered. Chunks of flesh tore apart. Body Reconstruction immediately regenerated it but the process was slower now because of the constant damage.
He gritted his teeth and wiped blood from his mouth. Melody tilted her head innocently.
"You wanted the third understanding."
Another note rang out.
"You must earn it."
The Orchestral Violex glowed. Time literally distorted. Veneri barely reacted before Melody suddenly stood directly in front of him. She had crossed hundreds of meters instantly. The violin rested against her shoulder.
"You have become incredibly strong. Still, not strong enough to defeat me."
She played directly in front of him. His chest caved inward. His legs broke. Blood sprayed everywhere.
The sheer force launched his gigantic five-meter frame across the ocean like a broken doll. He skipped across the sea for kilometers and crashed into the shoreline hard enough to split the land. Body Reconstruction activated frantically but the pain refused to leave.
He coughed again while kneeling. Blood dripped from his lips. His entire body trembled. He looked up at Melody floating far away. The rain evaporated around her with the violin glowing softly in her hands.
She looked almost apologetic.
"You would already be dead seven hundred times over if you were anyone else."
Veneri slowly stood and laughed weakly.
"So that's your weakness, huh?"
Veneri moved vanished as he used the First Plenituse Technique, Viridescence.
The technique had always been terrifying but after forty-five years of rebuilding himself and becoming a First Stellar Mage, it had evolved into something far more monstrous. One moment he stood kilometers away on the island of Modernia, and the next, he was already in front of her floating figure.
She immediately raised the Orchestral Violex and dragged the bow across the strings. A violent musical shriek caused the air itself to split to waves of sound so dense that the ocean below split apart for kilometers. Countless invisible attacks surged toward him, carrying compressed force powerful enough to pulverize Seventh Enlightenment Divines.
Veneri did not stop. Around him, sapphire Nepenthes Runes rotated rapidly.
They were Silence, Mute, Nullify and Sound Runes.
The geometric runes burned brilliantly as they wrapped around him in layers, consuming vibrations before they could properly reach him. Melody's music still struck his barriers but its effects weakened dramatically the moment the sound itself became distorted.
Her pupils shrank.
"He figured it out already?"
Veneri appeared directly before her. Melody only barely managed to move the violin before he summoned Calimostria. The sapphire glaive manifested in his hand and he swung downward, completing Viridescence.
That was all. A single vertical slash split Modernia in half.
A deep vertical gorge ripped through its center. Forests collapsed into the abyss. Thousands of tombstones tilted or broke as the land separated into two distinct masses. The canyon was so deep it seemed nearly bottomless. The ocean rushed violently into the new divide. The sheer air displacement from the attack was catastrophic. Melody was blasted backwards so violently that she had to immediately play a stabilizing chord with the Orchestral Violex. A low humming note surrounded her body, preventing her from being sent flying into the horizon.
"That slash…"
She looked behind herself. Veneri did not even look at the destruction. Sapphire energy surged around his hand.
A gigantic crystal manifested.
It was beautiful and terrifying at the same time, glowing with blue light as geometric patterns spiraled inside it. When he swung his arm, the crystal shot forward, breaking the the sound barrier nearly three times. His absurd strength of his prosthetic arms made it even faster.
Melody barely crossed her violin defensively. The impact launched her across the ocean like a meteor. Water emerged in towering walls as she skipped violently across the sea before crashing deep beneath the surface. For a few seconds, she emerged, floating calmly kilometers away from Modernia. Her wet dark hair stuck to her face as seawater dripped from her body.
"Honestly, you are terrifying for someone I trained."
Far away, Veneri was already running on water towards her. Massive waves formed behind him as he crossed kilometers in seconds while his white hair flowed wildly through the air. Melody narrowed her eyes and played another note. The sound spread instantly but nothing happened. The attack simply failed. That was when she finally noticed it.
Runes surrounded Veneri in orbiting layers. Geometric Nepenthes symbols rotated around his ears, neck, chest and even the air itself. They shimmered softly with sapphire light while distorting the atmosphere around him.
They were Silence Runes.
Melody stared and scoffed.
"You discovered my Boon and Bane from one battle encounter?"
Veneri finally slowed down. He stopped several meters away, standing atop the ocean as waves crashed around him. He deactivated them temporarily.
"I had suspicions and I tested them."
Melody crossed her arms.
"Go on then. Impress me."
Veneri sighed softly.
"At first, I thought your attacks were direct manifestations from your Music Divinity. That assumption stopped making sense when your attacks weakened depending on how much of your sound I actually perceived."
He pointed toward the ocean.
"When your Essentia Form amplified your voice, the shockwaves only fully manifested once the sound reached me. That was clue one. Your Ascender Form confused me because soul attacks should have bypassed auditory interaction entirely. Yet your attacks still behaved like they required delivery through music. Even though I'm immune to soul damage, I noticed the mechanism."
Melody's lips slowly curled upward.
"And clue three?"
Veneri looked at her violin.
"Your Divine Form."
He pointed at the Orchestral Violex.
"When I moved behind you earlier, your clone reacted before physically seeing me. At first, I thought it was combat instinct. Then I noticed your reactions aligned with changes in sound rather than sight. So I tested it."
Melody tilted her head.
"You weakened your hearing."
"Yes. I used a barrier around one ear and the effectiveness dropped. That confirmed it."
Melody chuckled.
"You ridiculous child. It is true. My Boon is Blessed By Music. I can wield any musical instrument perfectly and replicate any musical sound I understand. My Bane is Listening Problem."
She sighed before she explained it.
"My abilities only function if someone hears them. It does not matter if they consciously listen. Hearing alone is enough. Most people think covering their ears works. Sound still seeps through. Music enters through vibration. It reaches the bones, the body and the air. The only way to stop me is to overpower my sound itself."
She looked at the glowing Nepenthes symbols around him.
"And unfortunately for me… you are a First Stellar Mage with a self-made Runic Language."
The Silence Runes glowed brighter. They suppressed sound itself with frightening efficiency.
"You really are a battle genius."
Then she raised the Orchestral Violex again.
"But now the real fight starts. Don't believe you won that just because you stopped my music. I still have other ways to fight."