All the magma, all the heat, all the destructive power.
Stopped simultaneously ten meters from Tso Lan, unable to advance another inch.
As though they had struck an absolutely smooth, absolutely solid wall.
Magma slid off both sides of the barrier, surging down and scorching the ice and ruins below.
Tso Lan stood at the center of that barrier.
His clothes were clean, and he was completely unscathed.
Even the air beneath his feet had not warmed in the slightest.
Akainu's torrent of magma lasted several seconds.
Then it ran dry.
His arms returned to flesh and blood, his forehead covered in sweat, his chest heaving.
But he remained suspended in midair, staring fixedly at the figure standing motionless behind the barrier.
"Why..."
"Why can't I hit you?!"
"Even defense should have its limits!"
Anger was eating away at his reason, bit by bit.
Then he saw that face.
Pale blue skin, blood-red eyes, four arms, long, pointed ears, and that long tongue extending from the corner of his mouth.
"The way you look..."
His voice carried a disgust that verged on uncontrollable.
"Ugly! Twisted! Grotesque!"
"You're no Demon!"
"You're a monster! A deformed monster that doesn't even count as human!!"
Akainu's voice echoed across the battlefield.
Wangchuan's blood-red eyes narrowed slightly.
An exceedingly ancient, exceedingly profound emotion surfaced in his gaze.
He slowly withdrew his outstretched hand.
The barrier vanished.
But his aura changed.
From elegance to indifference, from indifference to solemnity.
"Thou hast incurred gravity's wrath."
"And gravity..."
He raised his right hand again.
This time, he aimed his hand at the sky.
More precisely.
He aimed above the sky, beyond that azure planet.
"Never forgives any living being."
His fingertips moved slightly.
As though plucking an invisible string.
It was an enormous meteorite.
Then.
A hand reached