For anything to exist, there have to be building blocks that support that existence.
For a building to be formed, there are blocks that are required to form it.
What of the blocks? Well, a single block is formed by adding several materials in order to attain the shape, size, and quality that is desired.
And what of those materials? They also require various elements and compounds in order to be formed.
In essence, all that exist require building blocks. Initially, it starts with simple and physical elements, but the deeper one goes into the components, the more the revelations of the invisible, undetectable begin to unravel itself.
However, no matter the building blocks or Concepts, Aquarius never had a problem with any of them. In fact, she could freely detect, reach, and influence all of them.
She could interfere with areas that would be considered the limit for even the most powerful entities.
A truly limitless entity, only bound by the Unwritten Laws.
And yet…
"What is the meaning of this?"
… It suddenly seemed like everything that had been said prior to this moment was a lie!
Aquarius felt perturbed, seeing as she had just tried to grab Jared a second earlier, and now it seemed like he was nowhere to be found.
No… it was more like he had never been there to begin with.
'An afterimage? No… that's not possible!'
Aquarius knew exactly what she detected! It was Jared Leonard through and through! There was no way to fool her perfect detection.
'B-but if that's the case, then…?!'
She had never been flustered when facing an opponent before. Perhaps it was because she had never fought an enemy that she couldn't have easily defeated with her first move alone.
By simply sifting through layers that no one else could reach, and using that ooportunity to strike her target before they could even suspect it, she was guaranteed any victory.
That was until she met this mere human.
"What did you do…?" Aquarius turned to her far right, her expressionless face depicting nothing short of rage.
Floating in the nigh infinite space, with his hands folded as he stared at her with a confident grin, was the man she should have defeated by now.
"... Jared Leonard?!"
"Why should I tell you?" The young man responded, his golden eyes brimming with light as he spoke.
"I see. So you used the Aether that was absorbed to create a perfect replica of yourself, down to the building blocks."
The instant she said this, Jared's confident demeanor shattered, and his jaws fell in shock
"W-what?!"
"That would naturally be impossible, considering the time and amount of power it would take to achieve perfect duplication. However, since the Aether here is so dense and rich, you were not only able to replicate your physical components, but the total amount of energy you possessed at the start of the exchange."
Silence followed Aquarius' words, and it seemed to surprise Jared to no end. He probably never expected her to understand what he had just done.
That was his mistake.
"H-how did you even…?!"
"Your thoughts are not hidden from me. There is nothing I can not reach." Aquarius spoke with absolute authority as she stared at him.
Seeing him so flustered and powerless made her feel a strange sense of fulfilment.
It felt good!
"As for how I was unable to reach you earlier, it seems you were able to integrate some measure of Space from an alternate source to the barrier you made around yourself. As a result, the more space I bypassed, the more space you generated to further distance yourself from me."
Even though Aquarius knew all of that by reading his mind, there was still something that concerned her about the whole thing.
'How was he able to do all of that while being entirely immobile?'
There was no way he could have detected her actions and calculated the right amount of space he would deploy to stop her. It seemed absurd to even consider that he had ventured into the same conceptual layer that she had.
That left only one explanation.
'An automatic response, huh? His Original Magic: Great Sage's Memoir allows him to generate automatic responses to situations even without his consciousness being able to keep up.'
It all began to make sense to Aquarius at this point, especially with Jared's own memories providing her with even more information.
'His Memoir is in sync with this world's Aether, and since it basically operates on pure Aether, it is not limited by the consciousness or complex processes that intelligent entities have to undertake to perform an action.'
As a result, even though she was in a conceptual layer that no one could reach, with his Memoir being composed of pure Aether, in sync with the world around them, it could still respond to her actions.
Or rather, it could ensure her inaction.
"A smart move, Jared Leonard." Aquarius spoke.
It seemed she had underestimated him too early. Despite not having the advantage of any Arcana or complex Spells at his disposal, he still managed to avoid her victory.
'Not once, but twice now…'
She could now better understand why her siblings took so long to defeat him. Even though she was the most powerful of all of them, she had still fallen prey of his deciet.
However…
"There is a limit to which intelligence can take you." Aquarius declared.
Now that she understood how his abilities fundamentally functioned, he wasn't going to be able to decieve her any longer.
"This time, I will wi—"
"Is that so… ?"
Aquarius suddenly froze, instantly pausing all of reality.
If she had eyes, they would be bulging to their limits, all in response to what had just happened.
'I-impossible!'
Right behind her, almost touching her shoulder, was Jared Leonard!
His lips were curled up to form a smile, and his face was awfully close to hers. His charming eyes and fluttering golden hair… everything about him was so close to her that she felt an overwhelming sense of dread.
At that moment, Aquarius only had one question rush through her mind.
'H-how did he get there?!'
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[A/N]
Thank you all for reading!
Who do you all think is going to win this fight? It does seem like Jared has the advantage, but… I mean, he's up against a Constellation.
