A gunshot pierced through the corridor, through the gap between the two Jeannes’ heads, and through Chiyou’s left shoulder.
“Meh, I was going for the headshot.”
A figure darted along the same path. Her katana was stopped by an inchoate crimson, which immediately reduced the weapon to nothing. Ushiwakamaru wisely retreated, standing along the French saint and her dark counterpart. The katana was not a Noble Phantasm, so it was a non-issue to spend some magical energy to conjure it anew.
Some steps behind, the Master of Chaldea kneeling on the floor looked up at the long barrel aimed at the space between his eyes.
“Bang,” murmured Assassin with a grin. “You’re dead, shitty Master.”
The two Jeannes looked at the scene behind them with no small amount of alarm. Indeed, for that brief moment, the young man had been at Assassin’s mercy.
Assassin’s grin grew until she closed her eyes.
“I guess we’re even now,” she declared before pulling the musket away and moving forward to face her enemy.
“Little demon,” greeted Chiyou with mocking amusement that poorly concealed irritation. “Looks like you’ve been busy. What’s with that getup? Isn’t that a little too girly for a Wild Hunter?”
“I know, right!?” Assassin pulled at the frilly hem of her dress. “It’s like I’ve become a Cinderella Demon Girl! It’s too weird!”
“What the—!?” Jeanne Alter all but hissed the words out. “Who the heck—”
“Are you slow or something? This is my Starlight Stage now, Dragon Witch, so kindly fuck off.”
“You bitch—!”
“Jeanne!” The Master’s prompt intervention stopped the Avenger. “Let her.”
The Saint of Orleans was immune to
Banner of Chiyou, but lacked the firepower to take on the Beast. The Avenger had Magic Resistance EX which allowed her to retain her senses in front of the crimson light, but her dark nature was fertile ground for Chiyou’s terrible ability.
“Hey, the piece of shit Master back there,” Assassin continued. “That Puppy Rider of yours did a decent job, so do whatever it is you do to praise her.”
Ushiwaka’s eyes, to that point glowing with the dark luster of
Banner of Chiyou, suddenly grew brighter with excitement. Like a dog eager to go on a walk, her head turned from the Master to Assassin and back, her lips upturned in a lovely smile.
“Uh, sure, gladly. Come here, Ushiwaka. I’ll pat your head.”
“Eh!?” Two Jeannes jerked their faces in an expression of shock.
“What’s with this romcom Chaldea…?” muttered Assassin before leaving the young Master and his girls to their antics. “Hey, da Vinci! I know you can hear this! Make sure your summoning system is up and running when I tell you, so get to that! Chop-chop!”
The communication channel opened in her vicinity.
“Don’t get too cocky, Your Grace.”
“It’s not cockiness, it’s telling you what’s good for you. Be grateful for a change.”
With that, Assassin took a further step forward, taking the vanguard position against Chiyou. The Beast, however, was looking over her shoulder at Ushiwaka’s placid joy upon partaking of her Master’s attentions.
“She…she is released.”
“Yes, it is that simple,” Assassin replied. “Your power drove her to act according to her most immediate desire: to be praised by her Master. If she gets her wish, then
Banner of Chiyou completed its job.”
“So it’s like that,” Jeanne murmured before turning to her “sister”. “Then what do you want the most right now, Alter?”
“Tha—do-don’t—that’s none of your business!” The flustered Avenger did not take her eyes off the head-patting.
“So, you intend to fight me, little girl?” Chiyou finally placed her attention on Assassin. “Just because you underwent Readvent, you think you stand a chance?”
“Having a chance has nothing to do with it,” replied the smaller woman while conjuring a second musket. “I’m just taking responsibility for the mess I caused.” She glanced at the ceiling. “Da Vinci! Open us a path outside!”
“Like hell! We can’t let that woman get out—”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake, trust me this one time, pseudo-woman!”
“Master, I’m not very fond of our new ally.”
“Well I hate the whole lot of you,” Assassin retorted sulkily. Then she disappeared.
Chiyou was no fool, and the air vibrated as she projected her magical power. The very radiance emitted from her body seemed to gain a certain physicality, and it lashed like tendrils at the ceiling and the walls to contend against Assassin’s high-speed three-dimensional movement. Blood red and violet flashed in the space between Chiyou and the Chaldeas, but a second later Assassin was deep in Chiyou’s personal space.
“Yeah, I’m faster than you now.”
Taking two musket shots on her body, Chiyou was blown backwards. There were no wounds, however, for her aura annihilated the bullets before they could touch her body. Assassin quickly summoned new weapons to press the assault, moving the fight away from the Master of Chaldea, who vaguely heard da Vinci’s instructions leading Assassin to the great outdoors. Without the dangerous presence of Chiyou and her radiance pressing in his mind through the blessing of
Luminosité Eternelle, the young Master could gather his wits and decide on a course of action. Assassin had given them a welcome respite, but he would not bet on her defeating Chiyou.
“Ushiwakamaru, there will be more headpats in the future if you do me a favor.”
The young Rider’s eagerness was endearing.
“Anything you wish, my Lord!”
“Aaaaah!” The two Jeannes complained when the Master brought his face closer to Rider’s, delivering secret instructions in a rather intimate position. The wagging of her tail pissed Alter off for some reason.
“Now, go.”
“Yes, my Lord!”
Ushiwakamaru darted away at dazzling speed, as if aiming to replicate the great feat at Dan-no-Ura. The young Master turned his attention to the twins.
“Alter, please go get Jack and the others. Jeanne, I’ll keep counting on you.”
“Of course.”
“Wha—wait, why am I the errand girl!?”
“Because you can’t protect me from that light,” the Master replied bluntly. “Please, Alter. We can’t go after Chiyou with only the three of us.”
“Tch. Whatever.”
“Take your time!” The Master joked at the back of the dark-armored maiden departing at walking speed.
**************************************
Assassin’s final Ascension, aside of an unnecessarily frilly dress, had adorned her back with strange, wing-like appendages made of some sort of crystal. They gave her a truly magical appearance, but she knew flight was not their purpose. Transmitting her will to the crystals, they began to change, like clay in the potter’s hand, taking the shape of long bovid horns, four of them in total. Those horns resounded on their own, blasting out a solemn sound like a call to battle.
It was impossible to tell who had the advantage outdoors. Their forms were partially concealed by the dark of night, yet simultaneously contrasted with the white snow under their feet. Chiyou was a tank, holding her position while taking musket shots from every direction with growing irritation. Assassin relinquished the privilege of stillness, aware that her mobility and predictive powers were the only things keeping her alive.
The baleful light of
Banner of Chiyou seemed to have become a living being of its own, spreading pseudopods that mostly succeeded at intercepting Assassin’s bullet storm. Whenever Chiyou gestured with either hand, the very space seemed to collapse within itself, breaking down into something intangible and inchoate. However, Assassin never fell prey to this indescribably fearsome attack.
“So it’s really like I guessed, huh!” Assassin taunted without interrupting her high-speed acrobatic assault. Her voice was constantly interrupted by musket fire as she darted around and above the static Beast. “Changing your Saint Graph has consequences, Chiyou! You can no longer project your Banner into the sky! It can only come out of your body!”
“Your point, little weakling?” Chiyou was inured to mockery and taunting. “I just have to roam the Earth to achieve the same result. I’ll get to it right after I break you and then Chaldea!”
“Why do you even have to bother? You cannot be saying you can’t escape from poor little me, right?”
That got Assassin a growl in response.
“That’s right: you can’t. Because you are Chiyou.”
Also, because her horns had that effect: urging those who hear them to just fight, bluntly and straightforwardly, with no consideration of tactics or long-term planning. They had a secondary effect, but the time to rely on it had not yet arrived.
“Silence! You’re being a pest!”
“Yeah, seems I have some talent at that!”
Assassin’s brain ran a mile a second. Not for the first time, she envied the privilege of the strong, who could succeed with little effort. Even Chiyou in front of her, despite having yet to land a single hit, seemed not particularly desperate.
But, I do not regret this. I don’t regret being here, fighting for my life.
She could have given Lilith’s blanked Saint Graph to the Master of Chaldea and told him what to do with it. It would have been the prudent thing to do. But she wanted to finish this crisis herself, with her own two hands. She could call it “taking responsibility”, but she knew she was just being selfish, even placing the entire World at risk just for the chance to be on the spotlight.
If only for a few minutes, she would be the main character, with a single last chance to do something of worth.
Yes, that was it.
Now that she understood herself and humanity, she wanted just the single, elusive thing all humans have ever wanted: meaning.
Gripping herself for what was to come, Assassin began calling upon her full powers. It was a matter of time until Chiyou brought out the big guns. Chiyou’s big guns, most likely, could kill her in an instant with or without
Claivoyance, so the only viable strategy was not letting her bring out the big guns.
Assassin’s sight was a superposition of countless possibilities, overlapping at lightspeed into a single image upon Chiyou deciding on her immediate course of action. However, before Chiyou could overcome Assassin’s future sight by simply unleashing an overwhelming omnidirectional attack, the young musketeer raised her weapon and aimed it right at Chiyou’s face.
“
La nuit dans les bois
Hopeless Soul, Fear Your Predator
.”
A moment later, Chiyou had put at least an addition ten meters between each other, all intentions of unleashing Armageddon on Assassin gone together with her calm countenance. She would have taken a moment to collect herself, but there was no way Assassin would give her that mercy. Just like when she was forced out of Chaldea, Chiyou found herself retreating from Assassin’s musket fire, aware that each shot was aimed and delivered with the purpose of making her take a step backwards.
The unacceptable feeling that invaded her a moment earlier gave way to surging rage. Chiyou planted a foot hard on the snow, ready and eager to counterattack—until she caught a glimpse of the mouth of Assassin’s musket. When she caught herself again, she was once more on the run.
“What is…what the…why am I so frightened by that brat!? It makes no sense!”
Chiyou shouted to herself as she ran, pathetically aware that she was running downhill into a forest—the terrain Assassin favored the most. But she could not stop the beating of her heart, the cold sweat on her skin, nor the squirming grip of fright in her chest. She had no reason to be afraid, but this terror was not driven by reason, and it had taken control of her body.
“It makes every sense, fool,” Assassin responded quietly to the Beast’s frustrated cries. She not only ran to match Chiyou’s frightened retreat. She also had to run away from the avalanche triggered by her horns and incessant musket fire.
Her second Noble Phantasm did not simply instill terror on those who saw the mouth of her musket’s barrel. It brought to the surface a primal instinct possessed by all animals. It was a fundamental element of the animal psyche, ingrained within their brains as a foundation for their survival instincts. The activation of that flight instinct could be nullified by
Magic Resistance, a Skill the Beast Chiyou did not possess. Once in effect, however, there was no way to avoid it, just like it is impossible to escape one’s own mind.
On the other hand, this power acted just like the monster in a horror movie: the more the audience is exposed to the monster, the more inured it becomes to its fearsome mien.
La nuit dans les bois suffered from diminishing returns, and Assassin only intended to rely on it until they reached that forest.
She looked up at the night sky and its canopy of stars, and clicked her tongue.
“Come on, Ozymandias, don’t leave me hanging here!”
Three long steps after that, she leapt to the nearest treetop, an instant before a tidal wave of snow and ice flooded the alpine forest. Chiyou found herself free of irrational terror, and extinguished the avalanche with a swipe of her hand, as trivially as pulling apart a cobweb. With that issue dealt with, Chiyou then looked for her opponent, but Assassin was invisible in that forest.
“Hmph. Pointless. I’ll teach you a lesson for your insolence, demon brat!”
Chiyou’s fist struck the nearest tree, which promptly collapsed with a groan. That same groan was mirrored by every other tree in that forest, which fell right along as if they all had taken the same punch.
“Ah, fuck!” Assassin cursed upon losing her footing and tumbling down just like the forest around her. Being one of quick wits, she scurried into hiding amidst the piles of fallen trunks, but she knew she was in trouble.
“You dared make me fear you! Me, Chiyou! I am the Harbinger of Chaos! The Monster at Zhuolu! I am
fear itself!”
“Then look behind you, fear.”
Chiyou would not be defeated by something like a sneak attack. Even if it was unexpected, even if it came from her blind spot, the Beast intercepted the beheading strike with her eldritch, crimson aura.
“Ushiwakamaru!”
“Puppy!” Assassin greeted from her hiding spot.
Ushiwakamaru did not prolong the clash, what with the strongest among Greek heroes charging into the decimated forest, his obscenely large axe poised to smash the young Rider—and by proxy, Chiyou—into the snow.
“What—” was the only word Chiyou managed before the axe came down with explosive power.
**************************************
Berserkers were the ideal targets for
Banner of Chiyou. Upon looking at the red light, their Masters would lose all control over them, and the Servants would abandon themselves to their
Mad Enhancement. Chaldea was no exception, and its Berserkers became beasts capable only of attacking whatever entered their sight. There were those special cases—rank EX—, but those only became more dangerous when whatever restraint their Master’s support set upon them was smothered by their own maddening urges. This was the reason Siegfried was currently engaged in a deathly battle against a draconic creature formerly known as Kiyohime.
While Kiyohime seemed a hopeless cause by this point, the Master of Chaldea saw a glimpse of a possibility in the others. If they could no longer be controlled, their rampage would then be directed. If they could only attack whatever was closest, they would make sure the closest was Chiyou. Ushiwakamaru took that direst of roles, and for her heroic effort, head pats.
“Fuwaaaan~”
“There, there.”
Muuu…senpai…
The Master of Chaldea ignored Mashu’s nuanced utterings. Ushiwaka earned it, and he did not particularly mind. From his spot at the exit to the Animusphere complex, he gazed into the distance, where he could hear the thunderous sounds of impacts and see the rising, growing surge of tentacle-like outgrowths of crimson light. He then checked on Jeanne d’Arc, whose blessing of light protected him and those with him from the power of that light. Was it really her Noble Phantasm, or merely an effect of her saintly presence? There was no point in dwelling on that.
“Are you sure we shouldn’t be doing anything else?” said Jeanne Alter, who seemed to be struggling with the urge to run into the snowfield and join the fight.
“Yes,” a new voice spoke in his stead: The King of Magic’s Queen, Naamah Alter. “Let that child do her part. She has earned it.”
“So I’m the only one who doesn’t know yet who she is,” murmured the sole male. Jack the Ripper clung to his waist, unsubtly poking his belly with a dainty finger.
“Oh, is that so?” responded da Vinci with clear mirth in her face. “Well, you heard our Master, Your Highness Naamah. May I, or do you want the honors?”
“I believe this time is my right and privilege, fair da Vinci.”
The genius stood back with an exaggerated reverence, allowing the queen in black to stand next to their Master. But Naamah did not speak quite just yet.
**************************************
“So the shitty Master is actually capable of something after all!”
Wearing a wicked grin, Assassin summoned a new musket. From Chaldea’s successful plan, she had gained both time and distance, and she intended to make good use of them.
“Initiate Noble Phantasm,” she murmured, her face losing all trace of expression and her voice becoming flat. “Verification of the seals, started.”
She did not retreat so far as to lose sight of Chiyou. Even if currently engaged against multiple Servants, it was more of a free-for-all than anything else, so they could not be counted on to defeat her.
It was her responsibility and her ambition: to create the path towards Chiyou’s defeat.
“Verification of seals one to four complete. Adjusting Noble Phantasm rank to D+.”
Chiyou noticed, even with Herakles breathing on her neck, Cu Chulainn Alter hopelessly trying to impale her, Erik Bloodaxe leaping at her from her blind spot and Caligula raining punches even as his fists were eaten away by her Noble Phantasm: the all-destroying aura capable of unraveling the foundation of all existence. How could she not notice that the pathetic horned Assassin had all a sudden doubled her power output?
“You…maggots!” The crimson aura surged out in every direction, Herakles the only one capable of reacting in time and getting out of the way. Cu Chulainn possessed
Battle Continuation, but the other Berserkers were basically torn apart within a red tornado of utter annihilation.
“You!” howled the Beast, her crimson tendrils wriggling forward towards Assassin. “What are you doin—gah!”
“Verification of seals five to eight, failed. Awaiting input for Retry,” murmured the horned girl.
Chiyou’s intent to attack Assassin was interrupted by Frankenstein’s masterpiece and X Alter, the normally-quiet girls roaring like furious beasts. They did not last long, their weapons briefly and barely protecting them from extinction at the hands of the blood-colored tentacles.
Assassin charged forward.
“Why are you even—”
The redhaired musketeer darted unimpeded across the crisscrossing tendrils surrounding the Beast. Those she could not dodge, she haphazardly blocked with conjured muskets. Her own attempts are filling Chiyou’s body with bullets were neutralized all but effortlessly.
“---fighting on their side!?” Chiyou shouted, her voice finally displaying clear irritation. “Don’t you detest humans!?”
“Damn right I do!” admitted the girl. “They’re stupid, reckless, self-centered; the epitome of selfishness! They’re all shit! This world would be better off without them!”
Assassin backflipped, firing a shot at a fallen tree. The force and angle of the shot flung the trunk upwards until it stood almost vertically. Assassin used it as cover when Chiyou released a new omnidirectional pulse. The Beast-class Chiyou screamed something incoherent in return, gathering tendrils into a drill-like structure that shot towards the evasive Assassin. But the girl had already fired her musket at the returning Herakles, grabbing his attention and making him charge at her instead, all the while maneuvering to make him stand in between Chiyou and herself. The Greek demigod intercepted Chiyou’s attack, which annihilated his weapon and blew him away as if weightless.
“But humans have taken hold of this world! They’ve taken hold of their fate! I can accept that now! They no longer need supervisors like me, or scourges like you!”
“Ha! That’s a loser’s mentality!”
“And losers are what we are! Just like the gods, we are losers who no longer belong in this world! Humanity will be judged by humans themselves!”
“Speak for yourself, brat!”
Chiyou gathered her crimson aura for a new omnidirectional, unavoidable attack. Assassin clicked her tongue.
Suddenly, the night ceased to be such, when a new star filled the firmament with golden radiance.
“What the—!?” Chiyou hissed, shielding her eyes with a gauntleted hand; such was the intensity of this new, unexpected sun.
“Yes!” Assassin shouted, but her voice was drowned by loud, boisterous, laughter.
“Behold,
Mesektet
The Solar Ship of the Dark Night
! Gaze upon its gross incandescence, and despair!”
“Ramesses the Second!” growled Chiyou. “Like you can even stop me—”
Neither Ozymandias’ obnoxious laughter nor her own rage prevented Chiyou from catching the words coming out of the pathetic Assassin still daring to oppose her.
“Verification of seal eight, successful. Adjusting Noble Phantasm rank to D++.”
Assassin’s magical energy output increased by another 100 percent. That was something Chiyou could not ignore. A musket floated above her, but it was the musket in her right hand—the one she had not fired since the Berserkers attacked—which glowed with barely-restrained power.
“Verification complete. Noble Phantasm ready for deployment.”
Chiyou looked at the glowing musket, then at the girl. Then her eyes widened in realization and gazed upwards, at the flying ship far away in the sky.
“Don’t tell me…!” Chiyou gasped upon realizing Ozymandias never had any intention to fight her. “His position in the sky!”
“Yes,” interrupted the girl.
A gem-like, crimson third eye glowed on the center of her forehead.
“
The Sun is in Sagittarius.”
**************************************
“Assassin class. A forest huntress, carrying a musket. Well, a bow or even a crossbow would have also suited her. I would have expected her to wear green, based on the associations to her legend, but I guess the color scheme is based on her true form. A hunter with demonic traits who manifests her full power when the Sun is in Sagittarius. Really, the answer should be obvious by this point.”
The Master of Chaldea ignored Jeanne Alter’s unabashed laughter and da Vinci’s holier-than-thou expression.
“Well excuse me for not figuring it out. Spit it out already.”
“I do not need to,” insisted Naamah Alter. “It is somebody you had already met before. Twice, even. I believe you first fought her in London…?”
**************************************
“…so what?” Chiyou eased down, crossing her arms under her breasts. “It’s still a weakling’s Noble Phantasm. It will be turned into nothing, just like all your other attacks.”
“This one will definitely hit,” countered the girl with the certainty of one who pronounced a natural law.
A line of a dozen muskets came into existence above her head.
“You can make more than two—!”
“A gods-damned Sengoku tyrant can. Why not me?”
She disappeared, closing the distance with high-speed movement at the same time the line of muskets unleashed a lead barrage. Chiyou’s aura protected her, but she noticed a vaguely spherical object from the corner of her eye and instinctively lashed at it with a crimson tendril.
The Heart of a Foreign God exploded in a burst of dark energy, and even Chiyou had to inch away from the countless curses pouring out. And that was really it.
“This is the perfect shot, from which none can escape! Fear not the face of your hunter, but the foolishness that made you my prey! I am the Duke of Hell, the silence of the dark woods, and the howling of the storm! I, alone, am the Wild Hunt that marks your end!”
Other than her fleeing from
La nuit dans les bois earlier, Chiyou had not taken a single step since they made it outdoors. Even when assaulted by the maddened Berserkers of Chaldea, she had been an island of stillness, neutralizing all threats with her almighty power of unraveling. Finally,
finally, Assassin had made her move.
And Chiyou slipped.
She had stepped into a tiny pool, near which rested an unnatural blue flame melting the snow—the flame from a broken Ghost Lantern. At the same time, Assassin’s four floating horns resounded again.
“Ah—”
That was the sound Chiyou made when she realized she had been played. Utterly and thoroughly. It came with the awareness that
she had just willingly removed her aura.
Assassin had long figured out the workings of Chiyou’s annihilating aura. It was obvious Chiyou had great control over it; it was the reason the aura was not constantly eating away at the very air around her, or why she did not sink into the Earth as the ground under her feet was destroyed. But her Noble Phantasm was Anti-World. Her ability to limit its all-destroying scope came from a Skill, which had just been temporarily nullified by Assassin’s own Skill,
Horns of the Four Kings. Because Chiyou did not have the intention to unravel the entire scene around her, she had instinctively, unhesitatingly, dismissed her aura.
And there she was, that girl, kneeling; her musket aimed and her finger on the trigger. And Chiyou glowered in rage as she realized that the girl could have done this from the very beginning. That this whole, protracted battle was solely to—even lifting her feet off the ground was so she could—!
“This is it, Chiyou! My final shot, with everything I’ve got!”
Not just her musket, her entire self glowed with magical power. Her blood-red third eye glowed balefully; the merciless judgment of a demon god.
“DAAAAAAAAAAAAMMMNNN YYYOOOUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!”
**************************************
“The demon god of darkness, and of the things that lurk in the dark forests at night. Escorted by four kings, whose horns announce both the beginning of the hunt and the end of all strife. A helpful yet unkind demon: it gifts humans with magical secrets and treasure, but also castigates their poor judgement, their insolence and their wickedness,” Naamah recited, her voice clearly tinged with a dash for ancient fondness. As for the Master, his growing understanding was only matched by his growing disbelief.
“Demon
of the Wild Hunt, eighth among the seventy-two. That’s who she is.”
**************************************
Time dilated around her. An instant became an eternity. Focus beyond flow. Mind without mind. However, she was not a master swordsman. This was not an achievement born of supreme skill, but a natural condition of the self.
Detached from the whole she had belonged to, she was remade into a form to match legends carrying her name. A Phantom. A Hunter. Thus, she only knew the hunt. She was called “Demon Hunter”. This referred not to “one who hunts demons”, but “a hunter who is also a demon”.
A demonic nature, not only in the literal sense, but in the popular sense created by folklore and religion. That demonic nature, a power evolving beyond its purpose for three millennia, was now dedicated exclusively to the purpose of the hunt.
The hunt was a performance. The decisive shot was almost irrelevant. It was in the creation of that perfect moment for a perfect shot that the hunter revealed its cruel, merciless brilliance. That was the best way to describe this battle: a performance, twisted and cunning, to create the ideal moment in which Chiyou lost her footing.
No longer mere and crude “incineration”. At this moment, for this very moment, she was the apex predator.
“
Predation Ceremony: Barbatos
Starlit Wild Hunt of the Demon Hunter
!”
Originally Posted by zikari8
commence!edgy bloodbath of killersAll-Cain Grail War
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