Meanwhile, Aglea was beginning to lose patience, and she interjected, "Alright, that's enough chit-chat. It's time for you to show me what your time and space magic can do. I'm not going to hold back against you. If you're not careful, you could end up being beaten into a cripple by me."

"Likewise, Senior Aglea. I certainly won't be holding back against you," Erwin said as he adopted a serious expression, and it was clear that he was intent on putting up the best fight possible.

The woman on either side of the competition platform were all frantically praying for his safety.

Onean was looking at the competition platform with tightly furrowed brows, while Lana was staring at Erwin with deep concern in her eyes, terrified that the battle would conclude in an ugly fashion for Erwin.

As for Theresa, she was biting forcefully down onto her own lower lip, completely oblivious to the fact that her teeth were drawing blood.

It seemed that the three women could all see that Aglea wanted to have a serious battle against Erwin, and that she wasn't going to be playing any games.

"This will surely be an interesting clash," the emperor said as he turned to Prince Xar and Prime Minister Henry with an expectant smile.

The two powerful officials both nodded in agreement.

The emperor was naturally already aware of Aglea's true identity, but he wasn't going to reveal that information to those two.

Thus, even though Prince Xar and Prime Minister Henry were very curious about her, all they could do was make baseless speculations about her identity.

Seated beside Prince Xar was Sanfesa, and she was looking at Erwin with an intrigued expression. After the villa was burned down, she was unable to find Lucidy's body amid the rubble, so she couldn't be sure if her plan had been successful. However, given her grasp on Erwin's personality, she knew that Lucidy had most likely already perished by his hands.

With that in mind, she cast her gaze toward Onean, and coincidentally, Onean just so happened to be looking her way as well.

Their eyes met, and the two of them exchanged a smile, but there wasn't any hint of friendliness in that exchange at all.

All of the unrest that was brewing on the sidelines seemed to only be building more excitement and suspense for the upcoming match.

With a flick of Gower's finger, a magic fire phoenix spread its wings and rose up into the heavens from the center of the competition platform with a loud cry.

The clash was finally about to begin.

With a wave of Aglea's hand, the bright blue Windage sword emerged out of thin air, and she sprang into action, moving as fast as lightning, far too fast for the naked eye to track.

Before anyone had a chance to react, the blade of her sword had already struck the light shield.

Erwin was wary of Aglea's mind-boggling speed, so he adopted defensive measures in the instant that the battle began.

Even so, the energy that was transmitted into the light shield was already far beyond what it was able to handle.

Erwin let loose a wild roar as he conjured up a miniature light shield on one hand to oppose the oncoming sword, and with his other hand, he used the energy that he had just absorbed to unleash his Finger of Destruction.

A beam of chaotic light was fired directly from his finger toward Aglea's chest.

At the same time, blood was beginning to seep out of Erwin's eyes, ears, and nostrils. It was clear that his body had sustained significant damage in the instant that the light shield was withdrawn.

However, prior to the commencement of the battle, he had already arrived at the realization that an all-out attack approach was the only way he was going to secure even the thinnest sliver of a chance at victory.

Looking at the beam of chaotic light surging toward her chest, a hint of approval flashed through her eyes. He's got the right attitude, at least.

In retaliation, she swept her left hand through the air, unleashing a burst of azure sword energy that clashed with the chaotic light.

At this moment, Sword God Buu was standing atop a certain pagoda in the imperial palace, and upon seeing Aglea's attack, he couldn't help but praise, "What impressive sword energy!"

The burst of sword energy looked as if it were formed by countless azure pythons, and in the instant that it clashed with the Finger of Destruction, it immediately split up into countless snakes that wound their bodies around the beam of light before tearing viciously at it with their fangs.

Erwin's finger was capable of piercing through time itself, yet it had been completely thwarted by Aglea's attack.

However, he didn't panic, and he immediately unleashed his space split technique to open up some distance between himself and Aglea.

"You're not getting away!" Aglea said with a faint smile, and she swiveled around before thrusting her sword through the air.

Everyone was momentarily dazed by the sight of her devastating attack, and Onean and Lana had already risen to their feet in preparation to take to the sky and rescue Erwin.

However, all of a sudden, heaven and earth began to take on a different complexion, and the bright blue sky was instantly filled with dark clouds.

The man standing behind the layer of clouds seemed to be a being who had already seen through the essence of space and time itself. He was looking down on all things with emotionless detachment and apathy, much like the two crescent moons up his sleeve.

Gusts of howling wind blew through the air, and they seemed to have come from a different dimension, threatening to tear this world apart.

Watching the battle from afar, Sword God Buu suddenly stood up at the top of the pagoda, and his hand had already reflexively grabbed onto the hilt of his Carefree sword.

Meanwhile, Aglea's masked face was glowing with anticipation.

"After all these years, I finally get to face a time and space magician in battle!" Aglea was ecstatic as she charged directly toward the pair of crescent moons.

In the instant that her Windage sword clashed with the new moons, time and space were viciously torn apart.

Between the new moons and the peerlessly sharp blade of her sword, a chaotic gash had been sliced into time and space.

The seemingly bottomless gash resembled a gargantuan mouth that was going to devour anything that drew close to it.

A hint of fear and alarm flashed through Aglea's eyes. She knew that if she were to be sucked into that chaotic space, then her life would be forfeit.

However, what immediately came next was a sense of boundless excitement. This was what she had yearned for all along. Having trained in the way of the sword for several decades, she had already reached the pinnacle of this field, but it was exactly because of this that she had been lonely for far too long. She desperately wanted to see what else this world had to offer.

Aglea could feel the energy at her fingertips surging toward the chaotic rift, just as her body itself was also being drawn in.

The more she wanted to struggle free, the worse the situation became.

All of a sudden, bursts of sword intent erupted out of her gray eyes, forcibly severing the fear in her heart.

In that instant, life and death completely ceased to matter to her, and she unleashed an almighty sword strike that threatened to tear through the very heavens!

Dark clouds were tumbling violently amid howling winds, and she was looking downright tiny in the face of the terrifying chaotic space before her.

However, the sword strike that she had unleashed was enough to shake the very foundations of time and space.

The thing that had allowed Aglea to cast aside all of her inhibitions was the thought of the man who had perished 20 years ago.

With his death, she no longer had any attachment to this world.

That man by the name of Perry had once been the subject of her infatuation. There had been many a night where she had laid in her bed, unable to fall asleep as her mind was filled with thoughts of him, but that was all in the past.

This world no longer holds anything that I'm attached to, so let me destroy this world. That was her ethos.

Erwin looked upon time and space with aloof detachment, regarding all things in the world with cold apathy, while Aglea embodied the wild urge to destroy this entire world, and the two wills clashed with the force of two colliding planets.

Aglea's strategy to counter Erwin was to oppose apathy with apathy.

After several decades of near-obsessive training, she had finally shed light upon a secret that no human should gaze upon.

As the tip of her sword came into contact with the chaotic space, all of the powerful magicians and martial artists present looked on with bated breath, wondering what the outcome was going to be.

Right at this moment, a faint sigh rang out from deep within the boundless chaos.

This was something that neither Erwin nor Aglea had anticipated.

After that, the chaotic space vanished in the blink of an eye, and the world returned to normal in an instant.

It was as if none of the events that had just unfolded had ever actually happened.

Erwin and Aglea were left staring at one another with stunned expressions.

Both of them were certain that the sigh they had heard wasn't just a figment of their imagination, so where had that sound come from?

Meanwhile, Sword God Buu heaved a long sigh of relief as he watched the unfolding battle from afar, and he released the hilt of his sword as he sighed, "Thank heavens it didn't manage to come out in the end..."

He was the most powerful current living martial artist, yet his clothes were completely drenched with cold sweat.

He then cast his gaze toward Erwin, and a complex look surfaced in his eyes.

...

Meanwhile, somewhere far, far away in the snow and ice of the north, someone was staring at the sky with an absentminded expression.

"What was that, Your Excellency?" an elderly woman beside her asked with a perplexed expression.

The woman shook her head in response. "I'm not sure, but judging from the situation, it seems to be that child..."

"To think that he was able to reach this level at such a young age. He really does take after you," the elderly woman sighed, but there wasn't any elation in her voice.

The woman also heaved a faint sigh. "I don't know if leaving that book to him was a mistake or not."

"Your Excellency, weren't you hoping that he would go down this path back when you left the book to him?" the elderly woman asked.

The woman stared at the world of snow and ice before her in silence, offering no reply.

"I wonder how he's been all these years." A rare hint of tenderness appeared in the woman's cold and proud eyes. "I am his mother, yet I owe him more than anyone."

"Even when the child was first born, we could tell that his features were very similar to yours. Now that he's a strapping young lad, I'm sure he's become quite the womanizer with his good looks," the elderly woman chuckled.

"I hope he doesn't allow those trivial matters to slow down his progress," the woman said, but despite what she was saying, a faint smile had appeared on her face. "Then again, now that I think about it, it wouldn't be so bad if he had simply led an ordinary life. Unraveling the secrets of time and space too quickly is not a good thing."

"You seem very conflicted, Your Excellency. You want him to master the secrets of time and space as quickly as possible, but you're also worried that he's going through the process too quickly," the elderly woman said with a resigned shake of her head. "I certainly don't envy the position your son is in."

"Perhaps he'll truly begin to resent me once he realizes the gravity of the load on his shoulders," the woman said in a calm and indifferent voice that was completely devoid of guilt or remorse.