Difficulty setting locks in?

I just tried to fight a revenge. Set the difficulty to W1. Going in, enemy team Venoxia, Venoxia, Celestasia, Venoxia. Great in itself. I look at the stats, they are around 33 life, 17 attack, 9 magic, can;t recall the armor.

I managed to kill 2 of them then it went to endless cycle – inserting 13 gems of color for feedback is an obvious lock.

Still not sure how I got there, checked the diff setting after the game, it was showing W1 alright. So it either locked in a W3 boosts earlier and did not use that or had some other way for the insane stats. Not particiularly fun experience.