Unlimited Power: The Arcane Path

"Leon, I promise you this," Ilyana said. "After this battle, I won't leave your side ever again."

Ilyana hugged Leon, and when their forehead touched each other, she passed some of her memories to him. The last years they had before the first Reset. The time where they raised their kids. Leon frowned when that happened but soon smiled afterward. Somehow, he felt that he had expected something like that would happen. Those weren't the same memories that he once had, but he still felt strangely satisfied in seeing them from Ilyana's perspective.

"Got it," Leon said.

The sense of familiarity between them returned a little. That is right, Ilyana still had that opportunity. She didn't have to fear for more moments where Leon would treat her like a stranger. Even though mana was the energy created by the system's creator, mana itself wasn't something evil that they should reject. They still could use their old abilities to solve problems like that.

Leon looked around and saw the best warriors of the universe. His friends, his family, his allies. Although many of them lost a lot, they didn't lose the will to fight. It was a weird feeling, Leon felt as if things would change forever after that battle, but now he was sure things would take a turn for the better.

"I feel like I have to say something like this," Leon said while looking at his friends. "But I'm not quite sure what it is."

"Well, you already made that joke twice, but you are the type who would repeat it in a moment like this," Hector shrugged. "In a moment like this, you would ask if someone wants to give a speech to encourage the troops."

"I see… Well, I don't think we need one this time," Leon said. "We will win, so we don't need to boost our morale."

"Brother, are you all right?" Amanda asked.

"I'm completely fine," Leon replied.

Leon found his allies when he was in the void and taught them how to create memory energy. Yet, he didn't give them many details in order to not let them use all their memories. That was why they were worried about him. All of them could feel the endless potential of memory energy. Still, they couldn't tell if that was enough to death the creator of the system once and for all, given that they only had no experience in using it in the physical realm.

"Just believe in yourselves," Leon said. "The power of our memories is more awesome than whatever the big guy there can pull this off. Alone, we might not be able to defeat it, but together we can do it. Those can use Mana Creation, use it to protect yourselves, and then use memory energy to attack. You two can focus only on attacking like me."

Ilyana and Tyrselle nodded. Their capacity to create mana was leagues above everyone else, so it would be a problem if they use it and keep strengthening the system's creator. Regardless, after saying that, Leon turned around and faced the creator of the system. All of his eyes were solely focused on Leon.

"Sorry for the wait," Leon said. "As a reward for letting me prepare everyone, I will let you leave once this battle ends. I will give you the chance to leave the universe. You will just have to leave all the mana behind. You said that you need mana to reach the next universe, but I'm sure you will find your own way to do that without it."

"It looks like Ilyana gave you some of her memories, and along with it, you recovered the imprudence of your previous self… Once again, I must thank you for teaching me something new. Thank you, Leon. For letting me experience what is the feeling of being looked down on by ants."

"Well, you are welcome. Although by our perspective, you are not an elephant. Just a massive mass of disgusting flesh and bones." Leon smiled. "If you find God, I hope he doesn't feel the same way we felt when we found you. That would traumatize you, to say the least."

The massive monster raised its arms and then joined all of them together a single time. In the next moment, everyone felt their bodies getting smashed by an invisible force. However, they reacted fast enough to use the memory energy and cover all of their bodies with it. Rather, it was more accurate to say that the energy moved itself to protect them. For the first time since the time the system's creator was found, he showed a clear frown. Frowning while he watched thousands of small beings being protected by what seemed to be a red aura that enveloped their whole bodies while at the same time strengthened them.

"It is just like Leon said," Hector muttered in shock. "This really is one hell of powerful energy. It can protect us even without obeying our will."

"Did I say that?" Leon frowned. "I can't remember it."

Leon 'said that to everyone while they were on the other side, but of course, he sacrificed those memories too. Regardless, memory energy could protect their users because they were the core of the energy. Even though the memories were lost, it didn't change the price everyone had to pay. Unlike mana, memory energy wouldn't decrease after use, and no matter what would protect them.

However, even memory energy had its limitations. Just like everyone had to train for quite a while to obtain certain powers by using mana, memory energy could be the same. So, right now, the only thing everyone and even Leon could do was to use simple attacks.