Nobody really understands magic, and the writers just have to make up shit to fill up the pages at the expense of a logical conclusion as to exactly why one side won and the other side lost.

Reminds me of Bojack Horseman where they’re fighting the improv troop on the boat and they’re literally just making stuff up that’s absolutely ridiculous. I think this can work well when the series establishes the rules and conditions for powers and then doesn’t break those rules (ie pull anything out of their ass). Sadly we only got the most basic explanation of the rules of magic in Demon Lord 2099 so it comes off as a “say wut now?”

That being said, the fight basically boiled down to Veltol surpassing the Familia device and that was good enough for me. I didn’t need the extra nonsense about leylines and wordless casting.