What had felt like almost an hour for the pirate as his thoughts sped up and he lost all connection to reality was no more than at most a few minutes.
After confirming how effective his magic had been by calling out to the pirate, Toz had wanted to see how long he could hold it for or if the pirate would escape his control. But even when leveraging the surrounding darkness and shadows, Toz couldn't hold on longer than a few minutes without completely draining his mana. However, it wasn't for nothing that the magic cost so much mana.
The pirate had been completely swallowed by the darkness and didn't react no matter what Toz did. The pirate's body froze in shock after the pirate was covered by a film of complete darkness, and he had lost connection with his body and senses. Aside from a few trembles and shakes, the body stayed in the position it had been in when Toz first enveloped the pirate in magic.
And the pirate's body stayed in the same position, in a partially completed lunge forward, even after Toz cut off the pirate's head. When Toz felt like he wouldn't be able to sustain his mana consumption any longer, he decided to finish the fight once and for all. And when the pirate couldn't muster any resistance, Toz's sword swept through the pirate's neck with ease, lopping his head clean off.
Toz only looked at the corpse for a few moments before dashing off to check on the situation with the other pirates and, more specifically, how it was going for the cats. Although he wanted to take a minute and go through how strong and effective his magic had been, it wasn't the time for that. All of the cats were up against two pirates each, and Toz hadn't sensed anyone below the medium levels on either ship.
While Toz was confident that the cats would be more than fine, he couldn't help but worry a little bit. But since there were two people who couldn't defend themselves against the pirates, Toz decided to go there first and check on them. He had asked Lucy to watch over them, so they would most likely be physically fine.
And putting Joan's and Joshua's well-being aside, the house would serve as a great place to regroup and share the results of the pirate confrontation.
On the way to the center of the island where Lucy, Joan, Joshua, and possibly the remains of a few pirates should be, Toz pondered on the magic he had used against the pirate leader. The mana cost had been sky high, which wasn't weird considering Toz was effectively turning the pirate leader's world into darkness. There was also the fact that the pirate leader was at the seventh level and had a great natural resistance to magic, so Toz had to use more mana to make up for the difference in levels.
However, even if the magic drained all of Toz's mana, it shouldn't have been that easy for him to put the pirate in a state where he didn't even notice a sword prodding his belly or someone shouting in his ear.
The only reasonable explanation that Toz could reach was that he had somehow inadvertently brought forth and awakened the real power of darkness, even if only partially. Although it couldn't quite be called a spell, in his attempt to replicate the infinite darkness of the Void, Toz had managed to stir the darkness mana he used into a more powerful version of itself.
With his experience from learning the Fireball spell, Toz knew that he hadn't awoken the mana entirely, but if he continued developing his magic, he was sure that he would be able to rouse the darkness mana from its dormancy.
But that would have to wait. Even if Toz ignored the ongoing pirate invasion, he didn't have enough mana to use any magic.
While it had taken Toz some time to move the pirate leader around and make sure he wouldn't notice that they were headed to the edge of the forest, it only took a few moments for him to reach the center of the island where the house was located.
And the first thing Toz saw when he arrived at the clearing with the house, worktable, and food storage was a couple of unconscious, possibly dead pirates. Their eyes were rolled back, showing only the whites, and there were traces of froth around their mouths. Since there weren't any external injuries, Toz could easily determine that they were victims of Lucy's mind magic.
Toz sensed the presence of Joan and Joshua inside the house, chatting with Lucy, so he entered.
"No problems here?"
Joan hadn't noticed Toz's arrival or him entering the house, but since Lucy and Joshua were busy being praised and praising, she answered Toz's question.
"No. After the pirates appeared, Lucy told us to cover our eyes and then settled everything after only a few moments."
"That's good. I'm gonna go ahead and check on the others, but the situation is over now if you want to leave the house."
Although Toz didn't know if every pirate had been defeated, he knew that they wouldn't be able to do anything to Joan and Joshua even if they were alive.
After Toz checked up on Lucy and Joshua as well, the three of them left the house.
Joan had spent almost a year fleeing from the flames of war, so she wasn't affected by the pirate's attack and calmly went back to her work at the worktable full of enchantments and fabric.
Although Joshua didn't have the same mental fortitude as Joan, he looked at things differently. The two villains had been defeated only a few seconds after their appearance. Any previous doubts Joshua had held about Lucy's power were gone in a flash.
Toz went back into the forest. While he could wait for Nil, Mindle, and Scrael to return and tell him what happened, Toz wanted to see the state of the pirates for himself.
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