Chapter 10: Day 2
Separate Mornings, Separate Pasts I
When Ayaka Sajou woke up, her mind was in the midst of distant scenery. It was not as if there was anything interesting to look at; she was racing across a level plain. She could see a forest in the distance.
She seemed to be riding a horse. She could see an armored hand gripping the reins.
A dream?
She realized that the hand on the reins was not hers. Then she realized that she could not move. Her view, however, was rapidly shifting. She guessed that she was sharing someone else's point of view. She supposed that there were dreams like that.
Despite Ayaka's best efforts to convince herself otherwise, however, the dream seemed awfully real.
"Richard!" A voice called out. "Hey, Richard!"
Ayaka's view spun around. There were more than a dozen armored men on horses behind her, and one of them was riding his horse closer. Once the horse had come to a stop in full view, its young, armored rider said:
"We came as you said, Richard, but do you seriously intend to search for it? This legacy of King Arthur?"
"Of course," she — Richard — answered the man's question. "I finally have a clue."
Ayaka experienced the strange sensation of words slipping out of her mouth even though she was not saying anything.
"You mean that drunken minstrel's gossip?"
"Exactly. Truth is cleverly hidden deep within the tales minstrels spin when they're sober. I, however, haven't got the knack of deciphering it. The things they say when they've lost their senses are so much easier to understand."
It was an absurd argument. Ayaka was shocked that such nonsense had come out of her mouth. The way of speaking, however, told her all she needed to know.
Oh, this must be...
They're calling me Richard... Am I Saber?
Ayaka finally figured it out. The outlandishness of the dream made her want to sigh. The conversation, however, was proceeding matter-of-factly without regard for her feelings.
"He only said that it was something to do with King Arthur; we don't actually know what. We have time on our hands, so it's all the same to us, but you're royalty. What is it you want so badly?"
"Oh, anything."
"What?"
"Excalibur would be best, but wouldn't mind Caliburn, or Rhongomyniad, or even the shield he's said to have used in the slaying of the Chapalu. If I end up finding the entrance to Avalon and manage to catch a glimpse of the great king himself or his mage, that alone would make my life worthwhile."
The voice of the man who seemed to be Richard rang out innocently. The young man beside him gave a wry grin.
"If the legends are true, wouldn't Excalibur be at the bottom of a lake in Vivian's arms?"
"Then I shall find the Lady of the Lake and win her friendship. You know they say Sir Pelleas exchanged vows with one of them and survived Camlann Hill?"
"Wasn't he a stray knight they didn't even count as part of the Round Table? He just saw his chance and ran. Anyway, looking for the heirlooms of a hero who might not even have really existed isn't something that royalty should be seeing to personally."
"Surely there are no royals or commoners when it comes to admiring a great legend?"
Somehow, Saber seems more childish than usual. I wonder why.
They called him royalty, but the people around him acted more like good friends than vassals, and Richard did not seem to mind that one bit.
"If we do manage to find King Arthur's treasure, it will mean that all those legends are true. We can prove that those dazzling
chansons de geste really happened on the ground we stand on! We've inherited the land the King of Knights and his men galloped over! That would be enough for me to accept my destiny!"
"So, if they didn't exist, you'll never be able to accept it? You never say anything reasonable," the friend shrugged exasperatedly atop his horse. "What's next? Are you going to lead us on a Grail quest?"
"That's probably a fool's errand."
"Why? What makes it any different from Excalibur or Rhongomyniad?"
"Chrétien told me. The Grail isn't something you can obtain just by seeking it; it chooses its possessor. The knights of the Round Table who went questing after it only managed to reach it because the current of destiny called the Holy Grail sought them out. So, we can't seek the Grail of our own choosing. I'm sure that, if I continue to pursue knightly glory, a fitting reason will eventually present itself."
Richard held forth on fairy tales with an air of perfect seriousness. The proper noun he used prompted a response from his friend.
"Chrétien, is it? Rumor does make him a degraded remnant of the druids who peered into the past..."
"Oh, it's true that some poets, like him and Vace, sing tales of the King of Knights and his Round Table as vividly, and as almost nostalgically, as if they'd seen the events themselves. I wouldn't be surprised if you told me they were faeries who live for a thousand years."
"Well, it wouldn't matter. It wasn't Chrétien you ended up getting your clue to Arthur's legacy from; it was a drunken poet whose name you don't even know in a city tavern. I can't fathom why you believe his tall tales."
"I'm happy with any clue at all. I'm not a king yet. It's important that I study the King of Knights' footprints while I'm still free, don't you think?"
Ayaka could not see them from her viewpoint, but Richard's eyes were probably shining. She could see his childlike expression in her mind's eye as her attention shifted with Richard's viewpoint to the plain. Then, she saw something strange.
"While you're still free? You're practically the lord of Aquitaine already... What is it, Richard?"
"...Something's coming."
It was a dot on the flat plain. The cloud of dust rising behind it, however, announced that it was rushing toward them. At first, Ayaka thought it was a horse galloping across the open fields, but it was the wrong size. Before long, a thunderous noise that seemed to be coming from it reached them, and the knights around her began to panic.
"What is it, a giant boar?"
"A carriage...? No, there are no horses... I've never seen anything like it. Does that thing have legs? How does it run? If it is a beast, I've never heard a bray like that!"
"Look, it's coming this way!"
"What speed! Run, Richard!"
Richard ignored his companions, who had begun to pull on their reins.
"Fascinating..." His voice sounded calm. "It could be a descendent of Twrch Trwyth."
More words I don't know.
Still, Ayaka did not feel particularly nervous. That was partly due to the assurance in Richard's voice. Mostly, however, it was because she recognized the thing making its way toward them, although its shape was a little different from the modern version she was familiar with.
The thing was gradually decelerating as it approached Richard. After a few more bestial roars, it came to a complete stop several meters in front of Richard.
"What is it...?"
The man who had remained at Richard's side until the end stared suspiciously at the "thing." He probably meant to put himself in between it and Richard if the need arose.
"...A carriage made of iron?"
"It's wheels are quite thick. And what's that black stuff? Some kind of leather?"
Hearing the curiosity in Richard's voice, Ayaka had a sudden realization.
Oh, I get it. This must be when Richard was alive... right?
If that was the case, she could understand their funny way of speaking. Ayaka also decided that what she was seeing must be a dream after all.
What a weird dream. I mean, everyone's speaking Japanese.
If this really was the world of the past, then the thing sitting in front of Richard and his friends would be totally impossible. Its body was decorated with steampunk gears, gothic-looking iron barbs, giving it a gaudy and twisted silhouette.
Ayaka knew what it was called.
A car... Must be custom.
Confronted with an automobile that looked straight out of an action movie, Ayaka wondered what mental state she was in to produce this dream.
Well, I've been mixed up with knights and kings ever since I crossed the desert into Snowfield, so I guess I've got my time periods all mixed up...
As Ayaka considered, the situation in front of her began to change.
A banging sound started up on the inside of the car's door. The knights warily drew their swords and surrounded the vehicle.
The next instant, the — apparently poorly fitted — door was kicked open from the inside, and a man emerged. Then, the "car's" windows opened one by one to reveal things that resembled musical instruments, which began playing a twisted, cacophonous tune. Against this backdrop of noise, a cheerful voice rang out.
"Halloo, young manager of Aquitaine and your merry companions! How are you? I'm doing fine, but I surrender. Giving up and all that. So, could you maybe put away those swords for now?"
The man who delivered this easygoing speech with both hands in the air was dressed to rival, or even surpass, his car in sheer outlandishness. He wore gaudy nobleman's clothes whose coloring made him look more like a court jester than royalty. An odd hat was perched atop his head. The gears that adorned the stick in his hand turned with a distorted noise, presumably due to the workings of some mechanism.
The sight of him made Ayaka certain that this was, after all, a dream. Everything else she had seen had seemed like an aesthetically unified world. She had wondered if she might be getting a genuine glimpse into the era when knights had fought on horseback, but the man's sudden appearance had spoiled the effect in a way that seemed simply ridiculous.
"What's this?" The bizarre man continued to the knights who had yet to lower their swords. "Don't you know the words 'love' and 'peace'? Raising both hands is a token of surrender... Or is it in the culture of this period? I could wave a white flag if you like. Well, it doesn't really matter. Anyway, I'm unarmed. Non-hostile. In fact, I have the utmost respect for you — you accepted the trap I set without hesitation and even dragged yourselves all the way out to this empty field."
"A trap!"
"Oh, damn. I went on blurted out that I arranged for the drunken poet in the tavern all on my own. Well, it's no big deal. After all, you did show up here, so my plan was a success! I've done it!"
At the man's words, the knights tightened their grips on their swords and began to slowly tighten their circle. The clownish man shrugged.
"Now wait a minute," he said, thumping his stick on his own shoulder, "try to be a bit more broadminded. Even the likes of Alexander III decided to get some fun out of it when a novel, striking and eccentric figure like me popped up before his eyes, you know?"
"Enough nonsense!"
"Wait."
Ayaka saw Richard's arm stop the irate knights.
"What's this about Alexander the Great?"
"Richard! Listening to a suspicious fellow like this is..."
"He is not the King of Knights, whom I adore," Richard addressed the strange man while restraining the friend who tried to stop him with one hand, "but if you name that great king of conquerors by way of comparison, I must hear you out, whatever tall tale you may have for me. Isn't that right?"
Richard then crossed his arms before the eccentric and declared with an air of dignity:
"You may continue. First, who exactly are you?"
The mystery man grinned cheerfully, clambered up onto his custom car so that he was looking down on the knights, and sang out his name in a clear, full voice.
"Admirable listening! My name is Saint Germain! Saint Germain! I don't mind if you pause at Saint, but relax and run it together — Saint-Germain! Yes, Saint-Germain! The hedonist by the name of Saint-Germain has now appeared before a great future king! This is a cause for celebration — or at least it is to me!"
"You dare stand above Richard, knowing he's royalty?" Some of Richard's companions shouted, but they were not exactly furious. They likely understood that Richard did not place much importance on his own status.
Well, all the knights here were talking casually to him, too, Ayaka was thinking when she overheard Richard murmuring something as he looked up at the man making a speech on top of his car.
"Oh-ho... That makes quite a picture."
...
Thinking back to what Richard had looked like when he had started making his speech on top of the police car, Ayaka decided that she was having this dream because that ridiculous act had left a strong impression. The realization did not help her wake up.
"And?" Richard's voice rang loud and clear in her eardrums. "What is Saint-Germain to me?"
At that, with another shout of "admirable listening," the man who called himself Saint-Germain struck an exaggerated pose and began to speak.
"I will be a signpost on your quest to trace the stories of past heroes, an advisor to help you scent ruin, a prophet who announces the end, and at times perhaps a dove with the branch of hope clutched in its beak. That is the role the man called Saint-Germain will play for you."
"You're too greedy. In short, a court mage. Am I right?"
"Regrettably, I am no mage. Nor am I a faerie, an incubus, a hematophage, a traveler backwards in time, or a world-hopping Magician. I am merely an aristocrat and a swindler."
The man who called himself Saint-Germain twirled his stick magnificently as he went on.
"There is, therefore, no need for you to remember my name. I don't mind if you forget it immediately. I'll introduce myself again. I'm Saint-Germain. Saint-Germain, a name you might as well forget. Yes, Saint-Germain! Saint-Germain... The name isn't important; that's the man called Saint-Germain. Saint? Or Germain?"
"Come on, Richard. Hurry and shut him up."
Richard did not move, ignoring his companions, who were brandishing their swords again.
"Wait. If you are a swindler, I'd like to hear how you plan to hoodwink me."
Ayaka could not see it, but somehow she knew that Richard's eyes were sparkling like a child's.
"Ha ha. I'm not the one who's going to fool you. Faced with the world you're about to set foot in — the myriad mysteries that birthed King Arthur — you'll try to fool yourself. I'm just here to assist in that grand fraud. What I mean to say is, best regards, if nothing else. A toast to this momentous occasion, on which you walk into legend."
Saint-Germain got down from the roof of his car, kneeled reverently, and stared fixedly up at Richard's face. Their eyes met. Before Ayaka had time to think, Saint-Germain's lips moved.
"And to you behind the eyes, my everlasting best."
A shiver ran down Ayaka's spine. Instinctively, she understood: the man's last words had not been directed at Richard, but at Ayaka herself sharing his vision. And, as if to prove it, Saint-Germain followed them with a sentence that would make no sense to anyone but her.
"I presume you are peeping from the future, you lifelong stray child."
X X
At that point, Ayaka woke up. Her eyes focused on a gray ceiling and she realized that she was lying on a bed. Her back and palms were slightly sweaty. She could feel her heart beating fast.
"Oh, Ayaka, you're awake? You must have been exhausted to fall asleep with your glasses on."
Turning in the direction of the familiar voice, she saw Saber sitting in a chair beside the bed and reading a book. More books, which had probably come from a nearby shelf, lay on the table in front of him. The book in his hands at the moment was titled The Life and Death of King John.
"I did spend yesterday getting dragged all over the place by a certain someone," Ayaka groused, barely noticing it.
"If you're recovered enough to abuse me, I've nothing to worry about! Still, you ought to rest a little longer for safety's sake. It's not dawn yet."
"...Thanks. And sorry. I didn't mean to grumble."
Ayaka was disgusted with herself for speaking so sarcastically to someone who had helped her out of so many scrapes.
"You've nothing to apologize for," Saber replied with a cheerful smile. "It's true that I dragged you around, and I'll probably go on doing so. Besides, girls who wake up in a bad mood are lovelier."
"...You're certainly positive."
At that point, Ayaka remembered the "dream" she had just had. She remembered it quite clearly, for a dream.
Was it really just a dream?
Her instinct said no, but she was afraid to confirm it.
"Still, there are mountains of books in this house. Nothing but spellbooks in the basement, but there are heaps of histories and novels on the second floor. Hero tales too. I won't get bored."
When she saw Saber, his eyes sparkling with excitement — she supposed he had been reading all night — Ayaka could not keep quiet.
"Hey..."
"Yes? What is it?"
"Do you know anyone called Saint-Germain?" Ayaka was on the verge of asking, but she froze up just before she could get the words out. She remembered the strange man's eyes as she had seen them at the end of that dream and felt frightened to bring up his name herself.
Ayaka decided to try a different proper noun from the dream instead. It was a name she did not know, so her idea was that whether Saber recognized it would settle if it had been an ordinary dream or not.
"Hey... Do you know someone named... I think it was Chréti... Chrétien?"
"Chrétien de Troyes? That takes me back. He was a troubadour at the court of my sister Marie. He recited the legend of the Grail to me more times than I could stand. ...Sorry. I didn't mean to lie, but I just told an untruth. I badgered him into reciting the Grail Quest for me hundreds of times, but I never got sick of it."
"I bet he did, though..." Ayaka's usual, half-exasperated attitude toward Saber took precedence over her surprise that the conversation was proceeding smoothly.
"Still, you've heard of Chrétien? Are you a fan of the Knights of the Round Table too, Ayaka? Aren't they wonderful? Chrétien always said that they were twisted people, however they were as knights, but that's just part of what makes the Round Table the best!"
Ayaka was not at all well informed on the Knights of the Round Table, although she vaguely remembered the name. Based on the delight with which she saw Saber talk about them, however, she was ready to accept that they must really be great heroes. His talk also gave Ayaka a chance to think calmly.
In other words, that wasn't just a dream... was it?
Certainly, now that she thought back on it, it had felt less like a dream than it had like being shown a first person scene in a film. If that was the case, had there been some kind of mystical action? She considered consulting Saber about her "dream" to make sure. Just then, however, there came an untimely knock on the door.
"May I let them in, Ayaka?" Saber asked, closing his book at the same time.
"...I'll leave it to your judgment. I've got no choice but to trust it, anyway."
Saber carefully scrutinized her face, always remaining alert to events on the other side of the door, and nodded.
"As far as I can see, you don't have bed hair or sleep sand and your clothes are in order. It should be fine!"
"Huh? Uh, yeah... It's fine. I guess."
"OK. Hello out there," Saber called at the door. "You may come in."
The knob turned, and the antique door swung slowly open.
"Did you manage to get some sleep?"
In the doorway stood a young man whose face looked young enough to be called a boy. He was dressed from the neck down in a mostly black outfit reminiscent of a special forces uniform which made a disconcerting contrast with his youthful features.
"Umm... Sigma, right?" Ayaka asked, keeping a wary eye on his holstered gun and knife.
In place of an answer, the youth made a dispassionate statement of fact.
"This house is already surrounded."
X X
The same time. In a cheap motel.
A motel built on an unfrequented road. The skyscrapers of the city center were visible in the distance. Near the motel, however, there were few buildings worthy of the name. It was the kind of place you would expect to see warehouses of abandoned materials. Still, even taking all that into account — and even considering that it was before dawn — there were too few cars and pedestrians to be seen. It was as still as if time had stopped.
In that stillness, human figures appeared, seeming to ooze out of the darkness. Nine men and women who looked out of place in their somber suits.
"Scan complete," one of them reported to the man in the center. "There are no traces of a ward or of magecraft being used nearby, and no signs of the magical energy being disturbed."
"...Is this really the place?" The report prompted the apparent leader to doubt.
If their information was accurate, this place was the lair of a mage who belonged to the Clock Tower’s infamous School of Modern Magecraft — commonly known as the “El-Melloi School.”
Was it possible that a personage of sufficient stature to be chosen as a Master in the Holy Grail War was lounging around without a single ward in place? They were supposed to be up against a mage, not some poor civilian one had mesmerized into spying for them.
The leader’s long combat experience warned him that they could be walking into a trap. He cautiously revised his plans so that they might produce flawless results in the name of Zugzwang.
Zugzwang was a group of mages formed by the Einskaya family of Eastern Europe. They began as subordinates to the Romania-based Yggdmillennia lineage, tasked with swiftly disposing of any vermin that came sniffing around their overlords. The power of Yggmillennia, however, had withered more than fifty years previously. With the line dissolved, Zugzwang had gone freelance, becoming an organization that handled all sorts of shady business.
As mages, their skills were middling, but they garnered praise for the ruthless efficiency with which they carried out their work. By taking on a wide range of requests from clients ranging to politicians and financiers with no knowledge of the world of mages and their factions, they just managed to keep their heads above water. Just.
As enforcers, they commanded a high price. They were, however, still mages. They would need more than fees to indulge themselves.
Then, opportunity had come knocking. A job offer that promised remuneration an order of magnitude greater than they were used to in addition to deeply interesting them as mages had fallen unexpectedly into their laps.
"Steal a Master’s authority and join the Snowfield Grail War."
Zugzwang had been suspicious at first. Their client, a wealthy mage, had shown them a vision through a familiar — a vision of a battle between two Heroic Spirits and the enormous crater it had left behind — that had left them no choice but to believe. They were convinced that a wave was building in Snowfield that could shake the magical world. It was dangerous, but it was also a golden opportunity.
They had spent a day laying an information network across the city and had finally tracked down a Master's hideout. They had no idea that the information that they believed they had unearthed through their own abilities had been deliberately leaked by a man called Faldeus.
Zugzwang was about to silently walk into Hell, unaware that, to the masterminds, they were foils to measure the strength of their target — Flat Escardos.
"…Start by confirming the target's position. Pawns one through three, take the second floor of the motel. Pawns four through six, the first floor. Pawns seven and eight will accompany me to capture the manager's office. We'll use suggestion to get information from the manager, then dispose of them. Ditto for any witnesses."
A Magic Crest is inherited through a lineage of mages. Zugzwang had deliberately split theirs. Half was embedded in their leader, called the "king." The other half was further divided into eight portions, one in the body of each of his subordinates, called "pawns."
Ordinarily, a Magic Crest split into that many parts would only provide a slight boost to mystical power. Synchronizing all of the pawns' Crests with the king's, however, enabled the king to forcibly raise the pawns' abilities to the same level as his own in exchange for drastically reducing their life spans and the flexibility of their Magic Circuits.
The king was about to bare the Crest branded onto his arm in order to activate that peculiar spell when he saw "it."
"Show the Crests on your arms. I'm going to bring you up to my level. You know the drill."
A man with his face was standing in the middle of the group, talking like he always did.
"What…?"
His voice was raised, but none of the pawns turned to look at him. They must have been suffering from some kind of mystical interference, because they did not even seem to realize that he was there.
In what seemed like nothing so much as an out-of-body experience, the king watched the man who had his face move exactly as he would have, pressing his arm against the arms of the pawns.
This is bad.
Stop! Don't touch arms with him!
The king picked up on a faint current of magical energy, but not in time to shout a warning. Even if he had, would his voice have reached the pawns? Such doubts momentarily flashed through his head. Then, the man with his face spoke.
"Three, two, one… Commence integration."
"Gah…" "Eek?!" "Ugh…"
The next instant, the eight pawns that had linked arms with him convulsed like they had been struck by lightning and collapsed in front of the motel entrance, unconscious. A powerful curse, disguised as the wavelength of the real king's Crest, had been input into their bodies as they synchronized.
The king instantly realized that they were now in desperate straits. By then, however, it was already too late — the man with his face had disappeared. The king felt someone's finger touch the back of his head, and before he knew it, he was lying on the ground as well. The leader of Zugzwang was still conscious, but it took his hazy consciousness several seconds to realize that he was beaten. He could feel the cold asphalt on his right ear. With his left, turned skyward, he could hear a man's dispassionate voice.
"I see. You use some interesting magecraft. I mean, dividing your Crest to make yourself king of your own colony. What a strange coincidence…"
At that point, a carefree voice sounded from behind the strange muttering man, relieving the tense atmosphere.
"Everything OK? Wow! It looks like it went perfectly."
"Perfectly copying memories is difficult, but I can at least read superficial ones and established routines. Of course, with a mage of his caliber, I could reproduce his art completely."
"Ja — Berserker, it's not polite to say that in front of him."
"…My apologies. It seems this man's personality is rather arrogant. More importantly, did you just almost blurt out my true name?"
Berserker. When the mage-
cum-assassin heard the young man — young enough to be called a boy — say that word, he understood. This, apparently, was what had dealt with Zugzwang in one fell stroke — one of the beings that, in the Grail War ritual, were called Heroic Spirits. The king also judged that the boy must be their target, Flat Escardos.
A total failure. They didn't even give us a chance to get started. So, this is a Heroic Spirit.
He also understood that he was about to meet his doom. Could he possibly turn the situation around? He racked his brains for a way, both as a mage and as an experienced hitman. In his present condition, however, it was clear that there was nothing he could do. With the curse gnawing at his body, he could not even speak to beg for his life. Any chance would most likely come when they interrogated him about his employer. Still, without his pawns, what could he do against a mage who commanded this Heroic Spirit?
I see. This is the Holy Grail War… If it encourages greater magecraft of this level, I suppose that, as a mage, I ought to approve of it.
Unable to even take his own life, the king prayed that his death would be as painless as possible. Then, a weirdly carefree conversation reached his ears.
"Well, Master? What shall we do with them?"
"Well, for now, let's tie them up and toss them in the spare room we rented. Although, with nine extra guests… do you think we should rent one more?"
"We can squeeze them in. I'll carry them; you wait here."
"Don't worry about keeping people away; I'll reinforce the ward these people set and use that."
Master and Servant spoke like they were having an idle chat.
The king struggled to roll his eyeballs — which he could just barely move — upward, and saw a young blond man and a man who looked exactly like himself. The next instant, however, the man with his face seemed to vanish, and a large, muscular man, more than two meters tall, appeared in his place. The big man lifted all eight pawns and then reached out a hand for the king, who ended up being carried off with his subordinates.
Several minutes later.
Zugzwang's "king" had been shoved into a motel room. There, he discovered that not one of his "pawns" was dead.
Why is he letting them live? He would only need to spare a few if he wanted to torture them for information. Don't… Don't tell me he's turning human bodies into Mana Crystals, like they say the Scradio Family does?
Recalling the rumors he had heard of that inhumane system made the king break out in a cold sweat.
Now that he looked, there were several other mages lying around the room apart from him and his pawns. He was thinking that they must also be mages who specialized in espionage and assassination when he heard the blond boy knock.
"Hello! Umm… Sorry for treating you all roughly! You seemed kind of murderous, so I had Berserker capture you! If any of you are mages who just happened to be passing by, or anything like that, I'm terribly sorry!"
"…"
Flat Escardos seemed distressed to see that the mages were glaring suspiciously in his direction.
"What should we do, Berserker?" He asked the big man beside him. "They all seem on edge. Could you turn into something that would help them relax? Like a child, or maybe a clown?"
The big man — Berserker — grunted and vanished. In his place, a young girl appeared.
"Whoa! We talked about this! Why do you keep ending up in that bathing suit thing when you turn into a child?"
Flat hastily covered the girl in a nearby bed sheet.
"It just always happens," Berserker replied. "I find being this girl kind of reassuring. I also end up wanting to dissect things, though, so I think it's a bad idea."
"There's nothing reassuring about it! Now please turn back before you dissect somebody or the police see you! See? Everybody's giving you weird looks!"
The mages, who were bound with magically-sealing packing tape, started shaking as soon a they saw Berserker take the girl's form. They did not know why, but they seemed to be shivering with an instinctive, primal terror. Berserker gave a childish grunt, then vanished again, reappearing as a young man whose features marked him as English nobility.
"How about this?" Berserker telepathically addressed Flat.
"Something linked to the English aristocracy of my time. As with the girl, this form helps to put me at ease. It's one of the most prominent theories of my true identity. Hmm… In this form, I have an urge not so much to dissect people as to defile their very souls."
Flat nodded and replied in kind.
"It's possible that you're more stable when your form matches a plausible theory of your identity. Try not to let those urges get the better of you, though."
"If I ever become so irrational, it's likely that my very Saint Graph will change and I will cease to be Berserker. If that does ever come to pass, use a Command Seal to force me to take my own life. Understand?"
"Jack…"
"This is my humble request, Master. I do not wish my identity to be determined so imperfectly."
Flat neither agreed to nor denied the request. He instead addressed the mages in an attempt to dodge the telepathic conversation.
"How about I introduce you? That's Lexarm lying in front of the shower, Kotcheff in front of the refrigerator, and Dikhail in front of the sofa. The person in the corner with black hair bleached blond is Sagara. Then, the nine people who just got here together are, umm…"
Flat asked Berserker, who answered based on the superficial memories he had copied.
"Just call them Zugzwang. They're nine people with a single soul."
"Right! Zugzwang it is, then! We'll be leaving this motel now, but I'll set the seals on all of you to break simultaneously this evening. It would be a problem if you started killing each other or anything like that, though, so I'll keep your Magic Circuits sealed for about another three days."
Seal their Magic Circuits. The words that the boy spoke so lightly caused the conscious mages to furrow their brows. As did his apparent intention to spare their lives.
"Master, will that not leave Zugzwang at an advantage? There are nine of them."
"Oh, yes. In that case, let's put the other four in the room we've been using and set their seals to break thirty seconds earlier. I think that should be enough of a time difference for them to get away if they want."
Hearing Flat's cheerful voice seemed, if anything, to make the scowling mages angry. Angry at the reality that someone who lacked any and all resolution as a mage had rendered them powerless simply by acquiring the weapon known as a Heroic Spirit. That emotion, however, quickly turned around.
Berserker saw the mages glaring at Flat.
"Master," he asked, stroking his chin, "is it really safe to spare them?"
"Do you want to kill them that badly?"
"No… It's true that we are fated to battle to the death — in fact, I almost feel as if I've already killed them several times in the past — but that was likely in a world on a different phase or a sort of tremor in the world. I will obey my Master. Still, is there any reason not to kill them?"
"We won't kill them, Jack. A human life weighs more than the Earth, you know?"
To a mage, such words were appalling. The captives practically trembled with rage upon hearing them. What Flat said next, however, was the trigger.
Until then, they had acknowledged Flat's mystical ability, but still thought of him as "a spoiled rich boy who has Magic Circuits, but lacks a mage's spirit," and "a defective mage who can't even get rid of his human softness." It was his words and the look in his eyes in that instant, that forced them to reconsider.
"Human lives, these people's lives included, are valuable parts for jumping clear of the Earth."
His eyes.
Flat's eyes when he said that were neither the eyes of a mage, nor those of a mere human. They were filled holes, like something had fallen out, or like they saw through everyone.
When they sensed that presence, unlike anything they had ever felt before, all the mages understood: the boy in front of them was no mage. He did, however, not seem to be any kind of monster or puppet; both his body and mind were unmistakably human. Still, the mages' instincts told them that he was looking at a different "destination." They could not comprehend what this man called Flat Escardos saw.
Berserker had felt the same thing in the several days he had spent with Flat, but he had deliberately refrained from mentioning it. He sensed that his Master was not something that could be described in terms of good and evil.
As if to prove that, Flat continued without a shred of good or ill will:
"Wouldn't it be a shame and a waste to just kill them?"
The mages were frozen in fear. Only Berserker noticed that a tinge of something like loneliness flitted across Flat's face as he spoke.
Twenty hours remain until Jack's Noble Phantasm is—
X X
The same time. Urban Snowfield. A back street.
"Humans treat life awfully frivolously these days. I feel kind of sorry for them," Filia — or, to be precise, the thing possessing Filia's body — said, looking around her at a predawn side street slightly removed from the skyscraper district. It had about as much traffic one could expect, but its atmosphere was hardly one of safety.
"…Frivolously?"
The response came from a timid-looking female mage walking behind Filia. Filia shrugged at her faint-hearted demeanor and continued:
"Yes, they're being wasteful, or perhaps I should say they're living fast and recklessly. There's nothing wrong with basking in a moment's pleasure, but why don't they enjoy the moment more fully?"
Filia's gaze rested on a rowdy group of drunken men as well as the hard-faced hoodlums who seemed of a piece with the side street.
"Those children are taking the smoke of strange herbs into their bodies, and those others have the vulgar stink of their victims' blood on them. I've got nothing against them getting drunk on decadence and throwing their lives away, but they could at least go about it more beautifully."
Filia's appearance made her quite conspicuous in these back streets. Her almost translucent pale silver hair swayed. Her red eyes blazed against her snow white skin. Her features were too well-proportioned — to the point of seeming almost artificial — but the vivid emotions now on her face, presumably due to the influence of whatever was animating her body, leant it a human quality.
"Hey there, girls. If you're in this place at this hour, you must bAHBABOBOAHAHBOBOBO."
"You're in the way. I didn't hear any dirty words, so I'll pardon you. Now go away or die."
Rough-looking men had called out to her a number of times. Just one look from her, however, and they collapsed foaming at the mouth. The girl mage walking behind her knew why: the unbelievably dense magical energy that coated Filia had focused to the point that even ordinary humans without Magic Circuits could feel it and directly jolted the hoodlums' brains.
Is it Od? Mana? Some principle that doesn't conform to either concept…?
Sensing the torrents of magical energy whirling around Filia, the girl mage was seized by fear. She could detect that an immense quantity of magical energy was covering Filia. The truly terrifying thing, however, was that it remained within a roughly three-meter radius around her, forming a hemispherical dome of magical energy. What was more, absolutely no energy leaked out of that dome. The girl could tell that the mystical force was circulating, like a miniature star with Filia as its core.
The being in front of her was no mage.
Filia, an Einzbern homunculus. The girl had been briefed about her beforehand. Now, however, she was a being distinct from homunculi, mages, and even ordinary Heroic Spirits, retaining only Filia's outward appearance.
"You too, Haruri," the thing in Filia's form addressed the girl mage, who cowered in the face of the complete unknown. "Self-sacrifice magecraft wasn't uncommon in my age, but at least sacrifice yourself like you're enjoying it. It hurts just watching you."
The girl mage — Haruri — shivered at Filia's words. She felt that her inner self had been seen through.
Haruri Borzak.
She was a rogue mage who did not belong to the Clock Tower, but her skill in witchcraft was first rate. Francesca had found her on the verge of attempting a mystical approach to the United States in pursuit of a certain goal.
Witchcraft demands sacrifice. Haruri was a maverick who invariably offered only her own flesh and blood. She also worked no deadly curses, but made up for it by specializing in reflecting them. Her magical abilities could be said to be of a high order.
Although she took pride in being an accomplished mage and in using magecraft, a certain circumstance led her to maintain a powerful hatred of the magical world. She had accepted Francesca's deal for a chance to destroy it.
If she managed to obtain the Holy Grail, she planned to use its power to render all the concealment deliberately maintained by mage society ineffective. The awareness of the general populace ought to weaken Mystery and leave mages distant from the Origin. She might even wish for the concept of magecraft to disappear.
That was the intention with which she had entered the Grail War, but had been handed the strange fate of being almost fatally wounded by the Berserker she summoned and saved from by the thing that had possessed Filia's body. That was how she had ended up walking along a dangerous side street before dawn.
An accomplished mage had no reason to fear a hoodlum or two. Assuming that they had specialized in combat, a mage of sufficient stature to receive the Clock Tower rank of Pride or Brand would make nothing of a whole gang, or even a small detachment of a regular army. It was even said that an extremely small portion of mages who had mastered the art of combat were capable of taking on the army of a small country alone and barehanded.
Haruri, however, while an accomplished mage, was totally unsuited to direct combat. Using familiars, she might be able to drive off around a hundred ruffians. If she was suddenly knifed from behind in the wrong place, however, even taking the restorative capabilities of her Magical Crest into account, she would have no choice but to accept death.
Ordinarily, her Servant should have acted as her spear and shield. The Heroic Spirit she had summoned, however, was Berserker, and had therefore lost its reason. She was not sure to what extent it would obey her instructions. However…
Haruri stared at Filia. Whatever was inhabiting the homunculus had easily restrained Berserker, treating it almost like a puppy. Although Haruri had succeeded in sealing a formal contract due to Filia's mediation, Haruri could not consider the Servant she had summoned as her own.
She turned her gaze upward, and there it was, following them. The eerily robotic Heroic Spirit, like a cross between a mechanical spider and a lion, had not even dematerialized. It was crawling along the sides of buildings like a giant spider straight out of a movie. And yet, Haruri could sense nothing like magical energy from it. It did not seem to make noise, either, and there was no sign of panic on the part of the people inside the buildings it crawled on.
"Don't worry," Filia, swelling with pride, told a doubtful Haruri. "His presence and form are completely isolated. I've made it so that only you and I can see him."
Filia spoke off-handedly, but Haruri, who understood what a feat that was, felt a renewed fear of the being in front of her. A full day had passed since their meeting, and Haruri still had no idea of her true identity or objective.
Although the wounds she had suffered in summoning Berserker had healed thanks to Filia, Haruri had holed up in her workshop in order to repair her lost Mystic Codes and damaged Magic Circuits and, most importantly, to gather information on the area. At some point during that Filia had disappeared. She had returned during the night, grumbling that she had spent the day "observing all sorts of countries out of curiosity," but that they were "kind of boring for how flashy they are."
"Although," she had added, taking Haruri's hand and dragging her outside, "there are a lot of things I could praise them on, compared to my time."
Haruri was unassertive and had difficulty speaking up, but gathered her courage to ask:
"Umm… Where are we going?"
"To where the other Servants are, obviously."
"What?"
Haruri was dumbfounded. The sight seemed to confuse Filia.
"You're fighting a Holy Grail War, aren't you? I'm just giving you a little hand to help you win. My goal matches yours anyway."
"…Are you planning to march into another Master's base?"
"Yes, right up ahead. The place with the rows of grimy factories that have nothing but size going for them. Although I'd honestly rather steer clear of any place that reeks of so much smoke."
Whatever was inhabiting Filia let out a little sigh, then looked up at the dawn seeping across the sky and muttered to herself.
"I can't stand to let
my garden get filthy… I'll have to wash it off soon."
X X
The same time. The police station.
Orlando Reeve, the head of the Snowfield Police Department, had cut off sharing his senses with his Servant, Caster. He did not use his Servant for reconnaissance and he felt no need to provide Caster with information from his end. Consequently, the chief of police never viewed his Servant's mental world or memories in the form of dreams and considered such things unnecessary.
He had summoned the "fake" Caster, Alexandre Dumas, père, who was currently engaged in the production, or falsification, of Noble Phantasms at a remote site. Because they did not share senses, they could not communicate telepathically. Generally, they contacted each other by phone.
A day had passed since Assassin's attack. The chief and the other members of the police faction were finally getting back on their feet, when a new disorder erupted. News of the epidemic affecting pets and psychological disorder that caused people to suddenly declare that they could not leave the city which were causing a panic throughout Snowfield reached the chief's ears. He was under pressure to sort through data, both as one of the masterminds of the Grail War and as a police officer tasked with preserving public order.
He was still in the middle of that when his cell phone alerted him to an incoming call from Dumas.
"Hey there, bro! You picked up quick! Pulling an all-nighter?"
"Something like that. I haven't had a decent night's sleep since I summoned you."
"Ha! If you've got time to complain, why not summon Hyppolyte Durand too while you're at it? He built my place, you know! …Of course, it's somebody else's these days. The Chateau de Monte-Cristo. Ever heard of it?"
"Of course. It's now a monument to you."
A mansion that was almost a small castle in the Ile-de-France region. The opulent mansion on the banks of the Seine, which Dumas had poured his whole fortune at the height of his success into building, could be described as an index of the author's splendor at his peak.
"Yeah, I looked it up and it was a real surprise. Who'd have thought that the house I sold off when I hadn't got a sou'd still be around in this day and age, much less end up as a museum of me!"
"You have the enduring fans of your work to thank for that."
"You've got that right. I don't know about including a portrait of my mistress, but, hey, works, house and mistress are all out of my hands now. I guess they were worth making if somebody can get a kick out of them."
"Works and house aside, modern values don't think much of having mistresses."
"Well, anyway," Caster continued, ignoring the chief's sarcastic interjection, "my friends took the calling my writing studio on the grounds there the 'Chateau d'If,' if you can believe it. It's not very nice to call the room where a writer shuts himself up to focus a prison island, but I bet my efficiency would go up a lot there."
"…I hope you're not suggesting we shuttle Noble Phantasms back and forth between this city and France."
"Honestly, it's more than a hundred and thirty years since I kicked the bucket. I expected you'd have come up with at least one machine to transport things instantly by now."
"Instant transportation between here and France wouldn't even be magecraft anymore. That would have one foot in the realm of Magic."
At that point, the chief was struck by a sudden thought.
"…Still, you must have had quite an attachment to that book to name your own house the Chateau de Monte-Cristo. Or did people just decide to call it that on their own?"
"Who knows? I've got a feeling I had it called that as an insinuation aimed at somebody, but they never came to complain in my lifetime. Doesn't make much difference now, does it?"
It was rare for Dumas to avoid a subject so openly. The chief was exasperated, but he decided to go along with it. He repented dragging the small talk on too long.
"So? What are you calling about?"
"Hey, a few of your guys got their Noble Phantasms smashed up fighting that bloodsucker, right? I've made plans to fix 'em."
"That's lucky. As always, the courier…"
"Stop right there. I don't need any couriers. There's somebody I want you to send instead."
The chief furrowed his brow at Dumas' suggestion.
"…I assume this isn't your usual request for a woman."
"Yeah. Bring that police force you picked out, Clan Calatin, over to my place. It doesn't have to be all of them, but as many old hands as possible. Oh, and include the ones with broken Noble Phantasms. Same goes for the boy who got his hand eaten."
"…"
His Servant's proposal gave the chief pause. He had made Dumas' existence common knowledge among Clan Calatin, but he could not immediately decide whether he could allow them to meet in person. A few days earlier, the chief would have deemed it unnecessary, and Dumas had shown no desire to meet his men. Under the present circumstances, however, he did want a change.
"…I believe you told me that you don't require assistance to produce Noble Phantasms."
"That's right. It wouldn't make the Noble Phantasms any stronger. And to hell with compatibility when it comes to plain old humans. Fine-tuning for the user's not my job."
Before the chief had a chance to ask, "Why, then?" the flippant Dumas gave his answer.
"I'm just a spectator this time. I'm doing the bare minimum for you to cover my ticket fee."
"…?"
"Only… as a spectator, if there's an actor I take a shine to, I want to show my favor by picking 'em out a bouquet or two."
The chief mulled over Dumas' words for a short while, then heaved a big sigh. After a few more seconds of silence, he made up his mind.
"…Alright. But they're my officers before they're mages. Promise me that you won't do anything to their Magic Circuits or their minds."
"I'm not some mage like Eliphas Levi or Paracelcus, you know? Do you really think I could pull off something that tricky?"
"Leaving aside that opinions are split on whether M. Levi was the kind of mage the Association would acknowledge… The basis of producing a Noble Phantasm is grafting a 'legend' onto a weapon. You're not talking like a man who can manage 'something that tricky.'"
"…Well, there is a chance that I might mess with their destinies. You'll have to let that much slide. I'll do my best to make sure I twist them for the better."
The chief was about to give the shameless Dumas some candid advice, but he resisted the urge and quickly ended the call.
"…Sorry, something just came up. I'll contact you later to let you know when I'll be sending my people over."
"Haha! No rest for you, huh, bro? Better keep some stomach medicine on hand! Man, it's crazy how many kinds there are these days! Take care of your stomach, OK? Later!"
After hanging up, the chief glance to his side. His personal secretary, also a member of Clan Calatin, was standing there, holding out a report.
The chief nodded wordlessly, then re-read the document. It said that the Einzbern homunculus that had appeared in the city was acting in concert with a mage Francesca had brought — with the Master of one of the true Servants. What worried him most was their reported destination.
The chief had been informed in advance about the Masters that Francesca and Faldeus had brought in to be their pawns. Cashura, who was supposed to summon Saber, had died at Assassin's hands. The magecraft-using mercenary Sigma was only in contact with Faldeus. Doris Lusendra, the scion of a clan that commanded reinforcement magecraft and were said to have discarded even the concept of humanity, was also outside the police surveillance net. The result was that Haruri, who they did have under surveillance, was of extreme importance to the chief.
Her acting together with the Einzbern homunculus, however, was troubling.
Is she being brainwashed or threatened…? No, considering Haruri Borzak's origins, it's possible that she made a deal and changed sides.
Haruri herself was not a powerful combat mage, so she would not present too great an issue. He would need precautions against deadly curses and the like, but such threats were not exclusive to her, so he already had layers of countermeasures in place.
The problem was what Heroic Spirit she had summoned. Data on the Masters had come down from "above," but it had not included who would summon what Heroic Spirit. He supposed that, from the higher ups' perspective, even Clan Calatin fell within the category of expendable pawns.
The chief did, however, at least have a firm grasp on where the Masters he needed to be most wary of had made their hideouts. He was able to infer that Haruri and the Einzbern homunculus were heading for one of them.
"The industrial district… Are they planning to make contact with the devil of the Scradio Family?"
X X
The man called Bazdilot Cordelion made a conscious decision not to dream.
He employed self hypnosis to put his body into a light sleep and his brain into a deep sleep for mere minutes at a time. It was a measure that enabled him to remain active for long periods, as well as to move immediately as he woke should an enemy appear.
Short-term sleep utilizing the deconstruction of consciousness was a simple spell, widely used even by amateurs. Although, as the deconstructing one's consciousness was something like temporary suicide, only a limited number of mages made frequent use of it.
Bazdilot heard that there were magecraft-using mercenaries who employed a number of additional sleep spells for various purposes. He, however, fundamentally disliked dreams, and therefore refused to allow himself REM sleep.
That was what made Bazdilot suspicious.
From a certain moment onward, he was conscious that he was "dreaming."
A sunset-stained sea spread out around him. He dreamt that he was riding on an enormous ship that made a show of parting the white-capped waves as it advanced across the water's golden surface.
Almost immediately, however, he revised that thought. This was no dream; it was a shared memory phenomenon composed of information and magical energy that were not his own.
His point of view was significantly higher than he was used to. Looking down, he could see a blond man who began speaking to him with haughty grin.
"Hm? You want to know why I don't fear you…? Why even ask something so obvious? It's because I am a sage possessed of wisdom to surpass even the gods, of course."
Most likely, these were the memories of the Servant he was supplying with magical energy — Alkeides.
Cool-headed observation told Bazdilot that the man was speaking some ancient language of the region around the Aegean Sea. Possibly due to the modern knowledge bestowed on the Heroic Spirit, or possibly due to his own influence through the pass that linked them, however, his brain registered it as the language he ordinarily used.
The owner of the memory — presumably Alkeides — stood on the deck of a ship whose construction was too magnificent too seem ancient. A number of people were visible in his vicinity. Even in the shared memory, Bazdilot could tell that every one of them was cloaked in magical energy of an almost frightening intensity. If the average human shared these memories, Bazdilot thought, that alone would be enough to cause them mental disruption.
"You see, humans are fundamentally brainless. The fools choose a fool to lead them and act the king, so the country is never at rest, wars break out and the people starve. That's precisely why a person like me has to seize power and glory."
As far as "power" went, however, he could not sense as strong a presence from the blond man making a speech in front of him as from the others, although the man did seem to be under some kind of divine protection. When Bazdilot sharpened his senses and carefully scrutinized him, the man almost seemed to be cloaked in magical energy that resided in the ship itself.
"Even the people who fear you are all hopeless fools. Because they're fools, they can't understand the monster you are. They try to use you without understanding you, so they fear you even as they sing your praises as a hero. What a vulgar bunch. They're no different from ignorant savages offering sacrifices and toadying up to a man-eating wolf that's not even a monster, let alone a messenger of the gods."
The man delivered his words in a clear, resonant voice. He spoke not so much as though he was drunk on his own words as he did as though his words were the one and only, blindingly obvious truth.
The reactions of the people around him were varied. Some nodded along with shining eyes, while others flashed grimaces that seemed to say, "He's at it again." Near the bow, a female archer with a bestial air was eyeing the blond man with undisguised suspicion. The man either failed to notice her look or deemed it beneath his notice, because he kept talking.
"My country — the country I'm going to make — will be different. I will give every citizen an education. I'll build a school in the city better than that stable and lend my knowledge to everyone. They'll all be able to read and write so that they won't be taken in by unscrupulous merchants. Of course, they'll never equal my wisdom, so I'll have to compensate for what they lack."
A real talker.
Bazdilot continued to listen to the man's speech, although it made no strong impression on him. Alkeides, the original listener, had lent an ear to the lengthy monologue in silence.
"I'm going to be king, after all; I'm prepared for that much labor. As long as everyone obeys me, I'll give them suitable compensation and a prosperous land. A land where everyone feels safe. In that land… Listen to me! In that land, no one will look at you and be afraid!" The blond man proclaimed, spreading his arms wide and cutting off Alkeides, who had been about to say something. The gesture almost seemed to say that his words were the world itself.
"Because as long as you're my man, my friend, my property, everyone will understand you."
X X
At that point, Bazdilot regained consciousness. Around him spread the usual, dreary expanse of his workshop beneath the meat processing plant.
Bazdilot noted that he was seated in a chair. Then, he took out a pocket watch and confirmed that exactly five minutes had passed since he had begun sleeping.
After a brief silence to consider what he had seen, he slowly voiced his conclusions.
"I see. So, that was the captain of the Argo."
At that, a portion of the space in the workshop writhed, and a dense mass of magical energy materialized in human form.
"What do you mean by that?" Alkeides asked his Master.
"Your memories encroached on my sleep. I assume due to the path of magical energy that links us. I saw an arrogant brat on a boat spouting nonsense about his utopia."
Bazdilot made no attempt to conceal what he had seen or the impression he had formed of it. Alkeides sank into silence for a while, then stifled a chuckle as he shook his head, apparently reminiscing about the distant past.
"…His utopia? I doubt there's anyone else who would make such a dubious speech aboard ship."
"A worthless man. In this day and age, people like us would use him down to the bone marrow, then throw him away — just an easy mark who doesn't know his place. Why would a hero of your caliber haul oars for a man like him?"
Bazdilot dispassionately gave Alkeides a character sketch and a question based on what he had seen. Alkeides' response was immediate.
"That man was a vulgar clown with all the weaknesses and twists of human nature in him. Nor can I deny that he always told his companions that he was the one who could make the best use of them. That earned him cold looks from Atalante."
Atalante.
Hearing the name of the huntress said to have been one of Alkeides' shipmates on the Argo, Bazdilot surmised that she must have been the woman in the scene he had just witnessed.
"…But that told of the same dream equally to me, who was feared as a monster, and to the queen of Lemnos, and even to monsters on the shore that understood human speech. He was aiming to be a king, not a god. Although, I doubt he made a distinction."
It was a harsh assessment, but there was no sign of scorn in his voice.
"He was a pitiful man who forgot the teaching of our mutual teacher Chiron and became obsessed with his own desires. Still, there was nothing false about the wild tales he spun."
Alkeides expounded on the man who had been the Argo's captain with the deliberate tone of a man describing a dream he had once had.
"That man, smeared with dirt and avarice, was the most human human I ever saw. If I had to lose, I wouldn't want it to be to the curses, thunderbolts and hellfire that the gods sent my way. I would want my soul to be scorched by the never-ending greed of a man like that — of a human."
"…You sound almost like you're hoping for it."
"Of course I am. But after I've taken my revenge."
Then, almost incidentally, he began to reminisce about the glorious ship he had crewed — the Argo.
"That ship was a true den of thieves. It shone brightly, but underneath it was a whirlpool of ruin, greed, treachery — all the karma to which human beings are subject. I doubt there was anyone onboard who couldn't kill me, the captain included. And vice versa."
"It sounds like you're awfully attached to that boat."
It was a half-sarcastic remark, delivered in a perfect deadpan. Alkeides neither confirmed nor denied it. He matter-of-factly told the story of that captain's end.
"In the end, that man lost everything. I hear that he perished crushed by the corpse of the ship where we shared joys and sorrows… although that may have been that fickle ship's one genuine act of mercy."
Seeing Alkeides deeply moved by his story raise doubts in Bazdilot's mind.
He's awfully talkative. I wouldn't have thought he'd be anxious to talk about the past…
Alkeides answered those doubts by grasping his bow and lightly planting its tip on the floor. Alkeides' bloodlust swelled, sending a cold, sharp shiver through the air of the workshop in step with the expanding ripples of sound from the impact.
"I've said this much so that I can justly convey the meaning of what I am about to tell you. I would not want it said that I deal out death without reason, like the outlaws who call themselves gods."
"…What do you want to say?"
Even in the face of Alkeides' naked bloodlust, Bazdilot remained unperturbed.
In the midst of pressure so intense that it might break an ordinary human's body even faster than it broke their spirit, Alkeides lowered his voice and gave his Master a "warning."
"It may be true that he was an incurably arrogant fool who didn't know his place, but even so… he was my friend. You were not on that ship, and I will not permit you to insult him so casually."
It was a direct threat. Bazdilot judged that, if he made another disparaging remark about that captain, Alkeides would turn on him without mercy.
"I see. Understood. I won't apologize, but I will promise never to bring up this subject again."
After a brief silence, Alkeides extinguished his bloodlust and turned his back on Bazdilot. Watching his back, Bazdilot understood why such a trivial conversation had traveled along the path of magical energy into his own consciousness. As far as the man called Alkeides was concerned, the time he had spent on that ship must have been one of the few times he had been treated as a human, rather than as the child of a god. The only other candidates were his infancy and the time he had spent frolicking with a wife and children who were fated to die. Those traces of Alkeides the human, standing out like stepping stones, must be all now gave him form.
How twisted, the man who had done the twisting thought without a shred of sympathy. He etched the exchange into his memory for future use.
Maybe that captain really was a hero.
Bazdilot revised his evaluation of the blond man he had seen in his dream slightly upward. He was considering his future plans when the communication equipment in his workshop registered call from the meat processing plant above ground.
"…What is it?"
The subordinate mage on the first floor answered Bazdilot's frosty tones with almost a scream.
"It-it's the Einzberns! An Einzbern homunculus is here, and…"
That was as far as the subordinates got. There was an intense burst of noise and the call cut off with a sound like a person collapsing to the floor.
Wordlessly, Bazdilot rose to his feet and turned his eyes to the stairs that led above ground. Alkeides appeared to have noticed that something was out of the ordinary as well.
"…There's only one presence," he muttered, bow in hand, "but it seems as though there's more than one of something."
Perhaps it was a hero's intuition, or perhaps it was something to do with his mind's eye. Alkeides suspected that the diminutive presence he sensed and whatever had defeated Bazdilot's men were separate entities. To prove it, he could soon hear the clangs of two pairs of feet descending the stairs.
What appeared in the workshop several seconds later was a woman with the distinctive pure white skin and pale silver hair of a homunculus and a girl — apparently a mage — who seemed to be trying to hide behind her.
At that point, Bazdilot and Alkeides understood. The reason that neither of them could detect even a trace of the presence of the woman who appeared to be an Einzbern homunculus was that she was forcing her magical energy to circulate only around herself.
Faced with a dome of dense magical energy with a radius of several meters, Alkeides wordlessly set his hands on his bow, while Bazdilot spoke with a look of imperturbability.
"An Einzbern doll, right? What do you want here?"
In contrast to Bazdilot, who kept almost all emotion out of his voice, the homunculus spoke with cheerfulness and a gentle smile on her face.
"Oh, look how muddy you've gotten… You've half-stopped being human, haven't you?
"In that case… I don't suppose you'll mind if I kill you along with that warped Heroic Spirit there."
X X
That dim world was filled with the presence of dense forest.
All around, giant cryptomerias rose skyward like buildings. The deep shadows of their leaves blanketed the earth, as if to say that they would not permit any new buds to breathe.
Amid the gloom, a deeper shadow fell. It had the color of dark earth. In reality, however, its insides were filled with dense magical energy and the radiance of life. Inside that clump of earth, which wriggled like slime mold, a number of "words" were being repeated. To be precise, they were not even words; they were lumps of "will." The newborn dirt clod was soaking in what sort of entity it was.
Pierce, and sew fast.
You are the all-piercing spear and the linchpin that will sew fast our truth — the world's truth.
You have the knowledge you need to become a perfected doll and the obligation to do so.
Our first and last mercy, thrown to warn against the hubris that walks the earth.
Remind the race of humans of their role. You shall guide them.
Pierce, and sew fast.
But first, learn.
You have a need to know.
To know what humans are.
In the forest of Enlil, Utu birthed a human who was "complete."
Look, speak, and pattern your form after its.
Then will Ninurta grant you a share of his power.
Before we hurl you into the woods of Uruk, you must be with the "person" that Utu reared.
Become perfect. Become a doll.
You are the lump of earth that will imitate all life.
Converse with humans.
Pierce, and sew fast.
The numerous words reverberated from the world itself into the dirt clod's core. The clod simply existed in the shadows of the forest and searched as the words commanded.
It must know humans. It must meet the "complete" human that Utu was said to have raised.
Then, when the air of the forest grew colder, "it" appeared before the lump of earth. The voices within the clod swelled, and it instinctively understood that this was the "complete human."
The "thing" — "it" could be called neither he nor she — that the mud became aware of as it simply spread through the forest raised a cry—
A cry of perpetual hate and unending resentment for the whole world.
X X
In a forest.
"What's wrong? You sounded like you were having a nightmare."
Enkidu gently stroked the back of his Master, the silver wolf, as it slowly opened its eyes. Seeing the light filtering through the surrounding trees, it rubbed its head against Enkidu in relief. After it let out a number of barks, Enkidu's face grew clouded and he addressed it in tones of heartfelt apology.
"…I see. That must have been a memory from before I was born. I'm sorry for frightening you."
Enkidu quietly closed his eyes. Then, recalling an age that was now long past, he murmured, half to himself:
"Utu and the other gods — all except Ishtar and Ereshkigal — genuinely believed that 'she' was a 'complete human being.' Actually… If I hadn't met Shamhat and Gil after 'her,' I probably would have believed it too."
The silver wolf let out a gentle keening, as if to comfort the sad-eyed Enkidu. Enkidu flashed the wolf a smile. Then, looking up at a starry sky slightly different from that of his own day, he spoke of the fate of the gods.
"At that point, it was probably already too late to stop their parting with the people of Babylonia."
X X
Crystal Hill Hotel. Top floor.
"Humph… This still falls far short of my chamber in Uruk."
"Really? But it's so beautiful," Tine Chelk exclaimed in surprise.
"Naturally; it came from my treasury," her Servant, the King of Heroes, declared in a tone of mild displeasure. "All my furnishings are of the highest quality. But the atmosphere of this time fails to counterbalance my treasures. To begin with, this quantity is hardly sufficient. A room such as this is too cramped to properly display the grandeur of Uruk."
The hotel suite that the King of Heroes surveyed as he spoke looked nothing like it had a few hours earlier. Although Alkeides' attack had shattered the window glass, it was still the most luxurious room in Snowfield. The furniture and bed were both of the highest quality. To Tine, used to living in an isolated desert settlement, they were things from another world. Nevertheless…
The previous evening, once the King of Heroes had finished his lengthy recital of the building of the walls of Uruk and moved on to expounding on how perfect the city of Uruk had been, he had announced his intention to redecorate. He apparently had doubts about whether Tine and her subordinates could fully comprehend the wonders of Uruk as things stood. After ordering Tine's black-suited followers to "move all the furnishings into the corridor," he had produced Babylonian-era decorations from his own treasury.
Tine stared wide eyes at their beauty.
The unrolled carpets made her imagine she was walking on clouds. Glittering tableware the likes of which she had never seen were arranged on a table that appeared to have been carved out of stone. Even the design of the numerous gold ornaments, which one mistake could easily send over the line into bad taste, harmonized with their surroundings. They contained a simple beauty like fields of golden grain condensed.
…The King of Heroes' normal armor is glitzier than any of this stuff, one of the black suits thought. Then, realizing that it was more than their life was worth to say that out loud, they broke out in a cold sweat and forced the thought down into their innermost depths.
As for jewels, even the numerous lapis lazulis — not an especially rare stone — that appeared from the King of Heroes' treasury were unlike any that Tine had ever seen. The surfaces of the stones, enveloped in almost transparent indigo, were flecked with glittering crystal reminiscent of white-crested waves. They made her hallucinate that an ocean was sealed inside them and that, if she split them open, it would gush out to birth stars and life. If the King of Heroes had told her it was so, Tine might have believed him.
And the King of Heroes complained that, even adorned with enormous jewels of such beauty, it still "fell short."
"Perhaps I ought to begin at the beginning by having a royal palace — no, a city — constructed. What are your thoughts, Tine?"
"We, who are not people of Uruk, could not dare to walk the streets of such a city."
"Nonsense. Whether one is a person of Uruk has no bearing on whether one stands on its paving stones."
The King of Heroes looked down at Tine and dismissed her words out of hand.
"From my perspective, all are equally mongrels. High or low birth makes less difference than a sheet of gold leaf. Those I recognize as people of Uruk are those with the will to clear the wasteland themselves."
Then, perhaps recalling Uruk's inhabitants, his face softened.
"There was even a mongrel who rose from tavern wench to high priestess and shouted at me until I rebuilt the country, if you can believe it. I shall never understand her faith in that thoughtless goddess Ishtar, but that was how one of my people ought to be."
"Such a person…"
"She was not unique. All the people of Uruk struggled desperately to live, but none of them considered that hardship. Although there were those who depended on and revered me, there were no crooked people whose only skill was flattering me. Anyone who would conceive such a scheme would die a dog's death in the wastelands without even a need for me to judge them. That was the kind of age the people of Uruk lived in."
When the King of Heroes, bathed in the rays of morning light that streamed in through the windows, reached that point, he turned his gaze to Tine. Perhaps she was using some form of magecraft, because she was wide awake and tense despite not having had a wink of sleep.
"I permit you to retire," the King of Heroes addressed Tine in tones of mild displeasure. "You were born human; be natural when answering the demands of your instincts."
His words were of appreciation for a subordinate and stopped just short of saying that he saw through her spell.
"B-but Your Majesty! For me to indulge in indolence while Your Majesty labors without sleep would be…"
"Then this is a royal order: rest. It shames a king to work even a temporary retainer to death."
Still, Tine hesitated. The King of Heroes wiped all expression from his face and stated:
"I believe I already told you: you may offer me your life, but I have no need of an immature soul."
"M-my humble apologies!"
When he had seen Tine vanish into the bedroom after repeatedly expressing her gratitude, the King of Heroes turned his attention to her black-suited followers who remained in the room. Tension ran through them at this behavior from the king who ordinarily acted as if they did not exist.
"You have labored hard as well. It must be a burden to revere an immature girl as your lord."
"O-of course not. We would never…"
The King of Heroes narrowed his eyes at the first man's forced smile.
One to start.
Gilgamesh, who had witnessed a great multitude of humanity as a hero, a tyrant, a wise king and a Heroic Spirit, instantly recognized the man as a traitor. He did not, however, point out that fact, or even telepathically communicate it to Tine.
Ten rats, I would say… but there will be more.
Smirking inwardly, he began to roll a cup on his palm, reflecting the morning sunlight.
Well, no matter. They are Tine's followers, not my vassals. It is for her to judge the traitors, or to fail to notice them and be stabbed in the back…
If you claim that you are not a child, mongrel, show me the state of your mind. As your king, I shall take my time weighing its true worth.
Then, he spoke to himself in a voice that reached no one.
"Mongrel, if you are merely the child I took you for, drift in your dreams for the present.
"Even your nightmares must be better than reality."
X X
In a dream.
Kuruoka Tsubaki awoke basking in the rays of morning sunlight that streamed in through the window.
"Good morning, Mr. Black!"
The black giant that blocked out the ceiling squirmed happily at her call.
Outside the window, little birds sang. In the garden beyond them, cats and dogs frolicked without fighting.
"Morning, Tsubaki. Breakfast is ready."
The door opened and her mother appeared. The smell of cooked bacon wafted up the stairs.
"OK! Morning, Mom! I'm coming!" Tsubaki replied with an innocent smile.
It could be called an ordinary, uneventful day for the residents of Snowfield. The curtain rose again on the everyday life that Tsubaki craved more than anything else.
"I thought so! Everybody must have been on a trip."
Once she was done eating breakfast, Tsubaki went for a walk while playing with the animals and noticed that the city had changed since the day before. Cars now occasionally ran along the avenues and a scattering of people could be seen throughout the city.
Tsubaki had spent most of her time cooped up in her house and knew few people apart from her family. Even so, the fact that people had vanished from the city had at first made her feel nervous and afraid. Remembering that, she thanked "Mr. Black," who walked in the shade, again.
"Thank you, Mr. Black. Without you, I'd be scared and hungry. I bet I would've died."
The black shadow just wobbled in response to the young girl's words. The black mass wavering in the shadow of a telephone pole on an unfrequented street looked like nothing so much as the product of a horror movie, but Tsubaki grinned innocently at it and seemed to trust it completely.
Tsubaki herself did not understand why she had so readily accepted the black grotesquery. Despite her youth — no, precisely because of her youth — there would have been nothing strange about her following her instincts and embracing fear. For some reason, however, Tsubaki had never felt afraid. It was as if she sensed that she could be safe with the thing. And, because she never questioned that fact herself, there was no one to consider the affinity between her and the black mass.
Not until that day, that moment.
"Hey, can I pet your dogs and cats too?"
Tsubaki was surprised at being spoken to so suddenly. When she hurriedly spun around, there stood a boy she had never seen before. He looked a few years older than Tsubaki, although from an adult perspective they would both be considered young children.
"Umm… Yeah. Sure!"
Tsubaki, while hesitant, cheerfully accepted the boy. She had not noticed that the moment he appeared, the black shadow — Pale Rider — had swelled up as if it was guard, then returned to its normal size in apparent relief as soon as he smiled at the boy.
The boy, on the other hand, did remark the wriggling black mass, but let out a sigh of relief when he saw it relax.
Thank goodness. It's determined that I'm Tsubaki's friend. That was close; even I can't perfectly predict the actions of a system-type Servant, the boy thought as he stroked a dogs cheek and flashed Tsubaki an innocent grin.
"Jester."
"Huh?"
"My name's Jester Karture. Pleased to meet you."
XX
A mage's workshop.
In a dim workshop, a mastermind and her Servant lay happily munching sweets on a bed, totally unaware of two children's chance meeting in a girl's dream.
"Mmm… These are good. Let me try some of those, too."
"Eat too many and you'll get fat," the girl — Francesca — warned.
"No, I won't; I'm a Heroic Spirit," the boy Caster — Francois Prelati — laughed boastfully, tearing open a bag of sweets.
Francesca responded by puffing out her cheeks.
"Must be nice. I wonder if I could become one too. Do you think, if I did something incredible now under the name Francesca, I could become a Heroic Spirit?"
"I think you'd probably just be integrated with me. Actually, you now and the you the Throne copied as a Heroic Spirit would be different entities who just happen to have the same memories, so wondering if you could 'become' a Heroic Spirit is already messed up. Although, I do hear of exceptions who get summoned into all sorts of different eras while they're still alive."
Prelati's words caused Francesca to tilt her head in puzzlement as she munched on a Japanese pastry called dorayaki.
"I wonder if Artie's one of those. Not that it matters, since she didn't turn up this time. And I just know it would've made a great jab at our masters if we'd gotten to bully her, too."
"I see… You might be right. I hear she had a rough time at the fourth in Fuyuki, but it doesn't seem like our masters went to help her."
"They probably figured they didn't have to. They couldn't if they tried, anyway. It'd be one thing in Britain, but there isn't enough Mystery left in the world to get them across the ocean from that lake. For that, you'd have to peel the world's texture off or… Oh?"
Although the content of their conversation was inscrutable, the pair exchanged words with the air of a chat between a young boy and girl… Until the image on one of the countless monitors around them caught the boy's eye and his hand froze midway to another bag of sweets.
It was one of the images showing views of the locations of the mages who were Francesca's pawns — the one showing the industrial district that contained Bazdilot Cordelion's workshop. On the screen, one of the factories' smokestacks slowly collapsed, and an unnaturally large, grotesque silhouette was visible in the ensuing dust cloud.
"…What's that? A giant monster? The big spider from the Cave of the Crystals?"
The boy Prelati sat up on the bed and watched with interest. The giant grotesquery and Alkeides appeared to be engaged in combat, and serious destruction was beginning to ripple out into the industrial district.
"The spider won't wake up yet. It could be the cursed cat of Britain."
"It doesn't look like a cat or dog to me. Did somebody summon a giant or the king of the Picts?"
At that point, Francesca discovered a familiar face running away in a corner of the picture.
"Haruri?"
Francesca could not see clearly at that distance, but, the next instant, it looked as if the giant, monstrous shape moved to shield the girl from flying rubble, blocking every piece. When she realized that the pawn she had prepared was, for some reason, allowing something to rampage in Bazdilot's workshop, Francesca was glued to the screen with an ecstatic grin on her face.
"No way. For real? Wow, way to go Haruri! I only brought you in to fill out the roster, but you summoned up something amazing! Is that really
that Heroic Spirit? That aside, isn't there something off about that amount of magical energy?! Oh, my organs ache! I love girls who defy expectations like that! You're the best! I've got to give you a hug and treat you to cake or something later!"
Francesca was breathing heavily and her cheeks were flushed. Her boy-shaped Servant, in contrast, protested his Master in a somewhat peeved tone.
"Hey! I can't see the screen."
Then, people greeted the dawn.
A dawn that, for the participants in the Holy Grail War, marked the beginning of full-scale conflict.
A dawn that, for the ordinary people of Snowfield, marked the beginning of destruction.
Originally Posted by Gold Experience
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