Elemental Cats

?"Can you stop laughing?"

Toz asked Anaster as he looked into the sky after dispersing the flames and his magic. Unfortunately, it was already too late. The mana storm had once again concentrated around Toz.

"Sorry. Pfft-"

At Toz's request, Anaster did stop laughing. But he only managed to keep a straight face for a second before he coughed out a suppressed laughter.

Toz clicked his tongue.

"I don't even get what's so funny."

"I'm sure you don't. Haha!"

Toz glared at Anaster for a moment before he returned his gaze to the tornado of orange mana. He could feel its power building around him and begin tearing at him. Unlike when the mana storm appeared as a result of the mana he tried to absorb, the mana storm was completely wild now. It didn't want to pour its mana into Toz. It just resonated with the power of fire that Toz emitted and used it to anchor itself to the ground.

However, after the mana storm latched on to him, Toz felt it begin tearing at him, his mana, and his items. Toz felt that he might be able to protect himself, at least for a little while, if he used magic. But he probably wouldn't be able to keep his items, more specifically, the grimoires, intact under the mana storm's assault.

And since Toz could sense it, Anaster could as well. Anaster looked at Toz, finally without laughing, and spoke.

"It looks like we'll have to postpone our fight."

"What? Not funny anymore?"

"It is. But I want to fight and win against you fair and square. If you're targeted by the mana storm, I can just sit back and wait before tapping you with a finger to defeat you. That's no fun."

"Urgh, fine!"

Anaster could sense that Toz was upset about missing out on the information rather than not being able to continue to fight with him, but he didn't mind. Anaster knew that his desire for battle was usually one-sided.

"You know what? If you promise me you'll fight me again sometime, I'll help you move the Fountain of Death."

"What about the information?"

"You didn't defeat me, did you?"

"Tch."

"Well?"

"Yeah, yeah. If we meet in the future, let's fight again so that I can show you something really funny."

Anaster chuckled and walked toward the Fountain of Death before pulling out a grey blanket that looked like it was woven from fog. The blanket emanated an ominous death attribute aura, but when he used his mana vision, Toz saw a few spatial fluctuations as well.

Anaster unfurled the blanket and spread it over the Fountain of Death that had finished absorbing the death storm sometime during their fight. The blanket completely covered the Fountain. And, with a flick of his wrist, Anaster swept the Fountain off the ground like a magic trick. With another flick, the blanket shrunk to the size of an ordinary pouch.

"That's pretty cool."

"I know, right."

With a smile, Anaster chuckled and threw over the pouch with the Fountain of Death to Toz. He didn't want to get closer to the rapidly strengthening mana storm's center. It seemed like the mana storm had gotten revitalized by latching onto Toz, and Anaster didn't want to get roped in as well, so he kept his distance.

"Thanks. Then, I'll see you around, I guess."

With those words, Toz began moving. The mana storm was still latched on to him, but if he exerted enough effort, Toz hoped he would be able to run away from it before using some void magic to shield himself from it. And while he was at it, Toz figured that he might as well make use of the mana storm and bring it to the battlefield and let it wreak havoc on the Tribe of Death's troops.

Anaster saw where Toz was headed and realized what he was going to do, but he didn't say anything about it.

"Right. Before you go."

"Yeah?"

"That over there is a portal."

"So?"

"For obvious reasons, space was supposed to be locked around this plane." 𝓯𝙧𝙚𝙚𝒘𝙚𝙗𝙣𝙤𝙫𝙚𝒍.𝓬𝙤𝙢

"But it's not."

"If you figure out who was responsible for that on your side, you'll get a little closer to the answers you wanted."

"Let me guess. Redire Kingdom?"

Since Lucy had already identified the spies within the Redire Kingdom's troops, Toz quickly realized what Anaster hinted toward with his words.

"Oh. If you already know that much, then there's not much more information to give."

"Really? You can't tell me what they're planning? Or why they're planning it when it looks like the Tribe of Death will win? Or wouldn't they have won if they still had this thing?"

"Toz. Do I look like I belong to the Tribe of Death?"

"No."

"So…?"

"You don't have to be working only with the Tribe of Death. Got it."

With a last glance toward the sky and the rapidly swiveling tornado, Toz spoke again.

"I need to go now. But thanks for the information. See you around. Again."

"Seeya, Stormbringer."

Toz threw a glance backward as he started running.

"Don't go around giving me weird nicknames."

Anaster only chuckled and waved before he returned to the portal.

"I guess it's time to leave. I hope he survives."

With those words, Anaster stepped through the spatial tunnel, which closed shortly afterward.

Meanwhile, Toz started running while reinforcing his body with lightning mana. He quickly realized that he could outrun the tornado if he went all out. So, after making sure that he was just outside its range, Toz maintained a steady pace as he ran toward the battlefield off in the distance.

The battle was still quite far away, so Toz couldn't see what was going on in detail, but he figured that the three gigantic humanoid figures that looked like they were fighting probably weren't signs of good fortune.

He also hadn't gotten a word from the cats, yet, which was certainly more of a priority than the battle. Toz decided to go look for them after dumping the firestorm in the middle of the battle.