Date A Mysterious Being

Chapter 25 - Strongest Wizard

Ngah...!"
It felt like something was shredding the tissues of his muscles in the hand that held Sandalphon. And then a fiery heat assaulted his arm, and he very nearly dropped the sword. But the tendons in his poor hand were healed in the nick of time.
Shidou kept fighting to take down the Wizards somehow and move forward in the building, forcibly healing the physical damage from handling Sandalphon with the blessing of Kotori.
He was forcing a power beyond human potential to yield to him by using a power that existed in a realm beyond human knowledge.
But there was no way his human body could endure this cruel cycle indefinitely. The Wizards kept coming, and the healing flames gradually lost ground, unable to keep up with all the damage the Angel was doing to him, until at last, he ended up with his back against the wall.

"Ngh..."

He didn't have the strength left in his arms to raise Sandalphon. He was barely even holding on to the sword, and yet the bones and muscles of his entire body shrieked in agony.

Shidou gritted his teeth and looked around.
Three Wizards with guns at the ready. Coming up behind them, another five Wizards. A total of eight human beings surrounded Shidou.

"You've given us a bit of trouble, hm? But it's over," one Wizard said, holding up her gun.
Shidou suddenly felt like he couldn't breathe.

"Ah! Gah...!" Most likely, the Wizard was blocking his nose and mouth with her Territory. Or else lowering the concentration of oxygen around him. Apparently, an ordinary human was easy pickings for a Wizard at close range.
He tried to fight, but his legs and arms were very heavy, and he dropped to his knees.

"Ngh! Aah! Aah!" His vision blurred, and his mind grew hazy. "Toh...ka..."
But just when he was about to be swallowed by the encroaching darkness, he heard the wall behind him cracking, and in the next instant, the windows lining the corridor shattered. Pieces of glass rained down on their heads.

"Whoa!" The Wizards were stunned.

But that wasn't the end of the weirdness. A powerful wind rushed in through the broken windows and lifted the three Wizards helplessly into the air.

"Wha...?! M-my Territory, it's-"

Shidou felt the temperature around him drop abruptly. It was as if he were suddenly inside a refrigerator.
And it seemed that this was not a hallucination produced by his fading consciousness. He could hear the Wizards ahead of him screaming.

"Th-this..."

"My Territory's freezing?! R-release your Territory now!"

"R-roger!"

The pressure bearing down on him and his trouble breathing vanished as if they had never been.

"Huh?" Blinking rapidly, he looked around at a corridor that was transformed from mere seconds earlier.
The Wizards were panicking. Windows overhead had shattered, and they were being attacked by waves of cold. They were still looking at Shidou threateningly, but it was clear they had no clue what was going on.
Soon, however, Shidou at least understood everything.

"Hmph. Hoooow pathetic." Miku stepped through a broken window into the corridor, dressed in her shining Astral Dress. At the same time, she did a little dance. "Gabriel. Solo!"
A long, slender silver cylinder appeared. It was apparently one part of that massive pipe organ. The tip of the silver pipe bent in Miku's direction.
It looked exactly like a mic stand.
"-!"
Miku turned toward it, and the voice she produced was so beautiful that anyone would automatically listen in ecstasy.