Fate/Spring Tonelico (Fate/Grand Order Redux)

[BlackHadou]

The Faerie of Paradise may not possess memories of Spring. The journey must be nothing but suffering, for only hardship may forge a blade that bears the wishes of humanity. It is the struggle of the sorrowful for a better, brighter future that gives birth to the blade that shall save the planet.

Kicking. Screaming. Begging. Blood everywhere. Torn apart by ones own subjects after betrayals most heinous by those who do not understand. A miserable end at the beginning of the end. A hopeless end. A lightless end. Britain crumbles in calamity and the world shatters apart.

A sad end.

"Isn't it miserable?"

I wanted to save Britain. I wanted to be within a Britain that retained the state of Mystic. I wanted to rule Britain.

Those goals seemed incompatible. Why did I want to save a dead world? Why did I wish to rule a dead world? The dead world dragged me down and drew me towards the darkened, bleached shore of the grudge of the world. It made me remorseless, tormented, almost…

My body was hacked apart. They started at my back and then went to my extremities. Blood and gore and viscera spread everywhere.

I did not have any memories of Spring. It was that very fact that made me decide to forego the forging of the Sacred Armament of the Planet. I chose to use my free will to reject the path the Great Mother of Us All had decided. I was allowed to, wasn't I? For I was merely an aspect of that great will and thus had my own input on the decision. Why should I become the bones that brings salvation to the planet? The planet is unworthy of saving.

No, all Britain needed for it's salvation was me. That was my sincere thought. Yet at the close, it rejected my salvation. The very land itself was rising up, my subjects turning on me and casting me down. The blood in my body boiled and sizzled as my flesh tore and rent. I was merely a sack of unwanted meat to the fae and human within my court at this point. Sooner or later they would tire of the torment, but there would never be an end to it. I was a Faerie of Paradise. I would live on, impotent, useless, even as a bunch of lumps of flesh.

The best case scenario is that they would throw me in the pit. At least then the curse of the world to destroy this land would swallow me up. The Faerie of Paradise did not have the luxury of death. I would never be allowed to rest no matter how many years passed. Not until this Lost World that I had formed collapsed. Not until all my dreams lay in rubble and ruin.

"Isn't it sad?"

My body had lost its strength. With it, my thought clones, one by one, ceased to function. They may have been exact replicas of myself, in action and deed and yes, even thought, but without the energy passing through my throne, it was simply impossible for me to maintain them. A dark part of my rapidly fleeing consciousness pointed out that if I had simply taken to the battlefield myself, I would not be in this situation. A dark, traitorous part of myself.

My eyes burned. I thought they were tears for a moment, but really, it was blood. My eyes had already been put out by random swings of blades. I'm not sure my head was even intact anymore. My mind, desperate to be anywhere else, cast itself to my fading clones, overwriting them. In my final moments, extending to eternity, I desired reprieve. However brief that reprieve might be.

I could see her. The other me. My sister born of the Great Mother of Us All. The other Faerie of Paradise. She was struggling to stay conscious, stay alive. My onslaught had almost been enough to murder her, in spite of our inability to die. Maybe it would be a kindness to do so anyway. I could summon strength enough for this. To smite her down and enforce the shattering of Planet's Will. The Faerie of Paradise had at this point become more like a grudge then anything else. Something the planet did more out of spiteful obligation then anything else. The release of the Monster from the Abyss all those years ago, that thing that I had murdered, showed that even our Great Mother had given up on the idea of forgiving the sins of the fae. Forgiveness was out of the question. Hope was to be abandoned. Salvation was now dead at the deeds of the fae and that filthy human who acted more like a fae then any other.

My eyes found the foreign mage. The form was inconsistent, I realised. I was sure that the foreign mage had been a man in the Lostbelt of Greece, when I'd cast my gaze away, but she was a woman here. No, it wasn't that she was inconsistent, I realised. Rather, the Lostbelt's had as many possibilities as a true history of the world. In the history of the world, whether the foreign mage was male or female was not an important detail, merely that they existed.

And existed, they did. My thought clone took a sharp breath into her lungs. The pain of the real me was blinding, excruciating. They had taken to carving and goring my insides now. For a Faerie, possessing Faerie Patterns caused ones internal nerves to form into a magical circuit. The strong among us would possess working nerves in even the blood, that allowed us to determine what was happening within our bodies. My patterns were a step more powerful, Divine Patterns that were, as a Faerie of Paradise, of the same calibre of the grand dragon that was the model of the Sea of Life.

Much like Albion, I could feel every little thing that happened to my body, even the parts of me that had been carved away. My body had lost over half of its weight. It would not be inaccurate to say that at this point, it was the act of desecration itself that was alleviating the twisted fantasies of the fae within the throne room. They were like cruel, innocent children. They knew not what they were doing beyond a surface level pleasure response. They believed that they were safe, so they lashed out at the one who they feared, even if I had been sheltering them.

The foreign mage was now unconscious. My thought clone had not ceased fighting, but instead continued in her mission to destroy the enemy. Her allies expended, my sister had drawn forth the light of the star to protect them from me. It was in that brief moment that I understood the name born by the other me.

Avalon le Fae was a name we bore as faeries. It described our purpose. It was more akin to a title then anything else. The shape of our magicks, though, showed us for what we really are.

Excalibur. Shining Sword that Promises Victory. Salvation on a breath. The whisper of human hope.

Rhongomyniad. Shining Spear that Promises Victory. Salvation on a breath. The whisper of human desire.

Hope. Desire. Two sides of the same coin. Excalibur would save humans because they hoped to be saved, a miracle that drove back the dark. Rhongomyniad would save humans because they desired to be saved, a miracle that formed in the darkest hour. Both would see humans to dawn in different ways.

Excalibur's eyes met Rhongomyniad's. My eyes, or rather, my thought clone's, met that of little Artoria. She was so young still. Still so very unaware of what it truly meant to be a Faerie of Paradise. She would be hated, despised, cursed by all.

Like me.

But unlike me, she would not break. She was made of stuff so much sterner, because her childhood had not given her a glimpse of a better life. Unlike me, she had been truly alone until the beginning of her journey, and unlike me, she'd been blessed by a wonderful companion of which to lean on in the worst times.

Staring at her, I could only wonder.

If I had a human to lean on in the worst times, could I have done it? Remained firm and strong?

My thoughts betrayed me, for I had a human to lean on. Uther. He was now gone. My sorrow at his passing would be eternal, and-

No. Uther was not a human. Not truly. He was a twisted creation of this twisted world that I had allowed to live entirely too long. He was a breathing corpse of someone who had died at the dawn of meaningful history. The foreign mage was no such fake. She was a genuine article. A friend.

Beryl had never acted as such to me. I saw straight through him, after all. My eyes could see lies. I had grown so used to the lies that I had stopped paying attention.

My inattention had cost me.

"Isn't it disgusting?"

In that final moment, my thought clones magical energy began to expire, and I understood. The source of my woes had always been myself. The other me, summoned by Beryl from the Pan-Human History. The wish I had inherited from her was to Rule Britain. I had always presumed in inheriting that wish that it was a requirement to save Britain. After all, that me had not wished to rule over a bleached wasteland.

It was now, at the close, that I understood. The other me did not truly wish to rule a Britain of people. She had merely been upset that the land of Britain had been destroyed by the Shooting Star so long ago. Her disgust that the land she would rule had been torn away had led to her inventing a circumstance where Britain would exist. She knew it meant her annihilation, but she had been compelled to do it as a Faerie of Mystics.

I had not understood. After all, we had been fundamentally different kinds of faerie. I had thought that I had been charged with inheriting her dream, but her dream had been accomplished just by my surviving of that calamity thousands of years ago. A Britain, ruled by Morgan, drowning in Mystics. The Morgan of that history had been blessed as the 'Faerie of Britain', a ruler. She was not me. She could never have been me. Her driving directive had been to create a Britain ruled by Britain.

Why had she cursed me with this?

What torment she must have felt, knowing that no matter how she acted, Britain's ruler was not her?

I raised my spear, pointed its tip at little Artoria. I could at least spare her the suffering that awaited her. After all, the Faerie of Paradise did not have to be 'alive' to fulfil its purpose, and what would come next would simply torment her. Yet the spell to summon forth one of my twelve divine blades fell silent on my lips. My fingers were clammy, falling loose, and I realised that the thought clone's unravelling was almost finished.

It had only been three seconds since my mind had fled from the pain of my body. I had always been cursed with an over active mind. I had always suffered from thinking far faster then the world moved.

I wanted to scream. I wanted to cry. I wanted to declare the unfairness of the world.

"Please. Use Erosion."

Instead, I begged. Erosion, the dagger I'd inherited from the true history, that this other me had belted behind her hip. The soul severing dagger that would be an end to my torment. A single blow would separate my mind, body and soul forever. Oblivion would be preferable.

I begged for release.

Avalon le Fae's lips twisted into steel.

"You'll never sleep."

"The pain." My words were so short and sharp, but she understood. She understood that I had already been murdered, that she was truly only waiting for news that the battle was won. I needed release, or I would suffer forever.

Kill me. Please. While this body still exists.

The legs and extremities of my thought clone had unravelled.

Oh, how I wish, so sincerely…

I wish that I could…

Maybe the key had always been to leave it all behind. The thought had occurred to me several times. To cast it all away and run. To let Britain suffer for its sins. To let-

"Run away." My sister understood that too, in perhaps the cruelest way. Her fingers reached my fading form. Our patterns lit up in sync. After all, we were the same person from the perspective of reality. In that brief moment, I understood, and understood that she understood. She'd seen through the lie of omission.

I want to die.

I want to live.

I wish to win.

I wish I had run away.

I wanted a memory of spring.

I want what you got.

She did not understand yet. She would not until after the close. After all, she was stubborn, like me. She did not wish to surrender because she followed that pure, bright star that we saw when we closed our eyes. She did not wish to disappoint that star. She did not understand what that star was, not yet, maybe not ever, but one day she would recognise that she had no memory of spring because she lived within her spring now.

The star that was the hope of humans.

The star that was the human's wish to be with her.

A wish that could not be granted but we found beautiful all the same, and if she waited at world's end, she would be granted a miracle. That was the fate of Artoria Pendragon. My fate, and hers.

But I was flawed. I was also Morgan le Fae. As a result, I had no happy ending.

"I-" My voice was already fading. Yet little Artoria's mouth set in determination. I was shocked, but I had no way of expressing it, for I should have realised that my sister would always be able to do the impossible, no matter how insane it was. Her hand interlocked with my fading essence was more then enough, for my 108 ringings of the Bones of Pilgrimage became 114. Her six mere ringings of Pilgrimage joined with my lifetimes of doing it again and again for the sake of obtaining enough power to override even the will of God, hard work that had been unwound so very completely.

"Run away." Artoria's voice was insistent this time. "Run away, and never come back, Tonelico."

Tonelico.

My name. Before I was Morgan. Before I was Aesc. Before I was Morgan again. Tonelico, the name of the little shard of Avalon le Fae that had been taken in by Rain.

My Divine Patterns were no longer mine to control. Artoria was in control. She knew not the Grand Sorcery called Rayshifting. She didn't understand the spell or how it worked. She didn't understand that it was a sacrament that could never be adequately explained, that it was blasphemy against time and space.

She didn't care, either.

Faeries held privilege. We were allowed to live in any time period because our Great Mother did not think of us in terms of when or where. It was for that reason that Morgan's original Rayshift had worked in the first place. But she had not been summoned as a Faerie, but as a hero of humans, and thus had human limitations. She had only been able to send information to the past, to 'herself'.

I existed in the past. Then and now for me might as well be the same, for I am a faerie. I exist in both and neither. Time is linear, and I understand that, but if I cast my mind to the coronation of Uther, the memory is as fresh as if he was laughing beside me right now. Morgan had only sent information back to 'herself'. I would be myself again.

That was the only outcome of the spell that Artoria weaved, without knowing the specifics of the magicks. Without understanding the specifics of the magic, she could not understand the curse she would inflict on me. That I would be marching towards my own personal Armageddon and, when time righted itself at the death of the linchpin tree, I would forget and the tragedy would repeat.

She was unbelievably cruel. So very cruel.

"Sto-"

"Run away, Tonelico. Run away. Whisper of spring. Return to your winter smiling." Artoria was not really who was talking, I realised. Rather, we were talking. Avalon le Fae. Myself. We had linked patterns and in doing so, I was being talked to by the faerie that was us. The Faerie of Paradise, who was the custodian of the Sacred Armament. Artoria's eyes, after all, were not gold. "Run away."

Run away. The words were a lie.

What she really said… was 'live'.

<—>​

Rayshifting without a coffin is impossible. One cannot send back something tangible without one. These are fundamental facts of reality, so that we had been able to ignore this one rule was an incredible feat beyond knowing. I remembered the days of Londinium like they were yesterday. Laughing alongside Uther.

I played through the motions. My mind was reeling in spite of it all. All I could do was play through the motions, for there was nothing else to do. What I had done had broken reality. On a fundamental level, I could see the inconsistencies within the era before mine. They weren't small things either. It was as if the fantasy had cracked and reality seeped through the shards.

Ector must have noticed something was wrong. Totorot had definitely noticed something was wrong. Neither of them said anything about it. It was not until the girl calling herself Mash arrived in our time, that my mind finally understood.

Rayshifting and sending something back in time using the Water Mirror were fundamentally the same spell. However, in order to send a person back in time, one needed to possess the ability to create a fantasy. In the future, I'd forged myself into the fantasy tree, or rather, a descendent seed of it. In doing so, the Lost World's past became a history that I had dreamed of.

To this dream, I had thrown my problems. I had caused myself so many issues. Maybe my entire outlook was the result of throwing my problems into my dreams, allowing them to gnaw away at that dream within me. Each calamity we had faced had eaten away at my own mental state. I had been the cause of my own disasters.

Mash, though, was earnest. She had revealed herself as from the future immediately. I, on the other hand, remained on autopilot. I had called myself Aesc, as I was so used to. I had told her to not speak of the future.

Why did I not act to change anything? Why was I so impotent?

It wasn't until we had attempted to see the depths of the pit that I understood, Mash's body covered in curses. I had not acted because I could not break the script. Even if reality crumbled, because this fantasy was just that, a dream with a predetermined outcome, I could not act in a way that would deny the ending of the play.

I acted to save Mash. My hands ripped the curses free of her body as I worked to save her. In doing so, the script, the dream, finally broke. In his own way, the Beast God had granted me a gift. My breath hitched in my breast, as I realised that Cerunnos was a being that existed on a plane beyond this one. I may be a spirit of the Great Mother of Us All, but Cerunnos was a God. He was an authority above even me.

And so, to Cerunnos, now, then, before all occurred simultaneously. Yesterwhen and tommonever were things he also existed within. Even if the possibility was eternally denied, Cerunnos was blessed with its knowledge.

Tears dropped from my eyes.

Cerunnos granted me what I needed. Free will. The ability to act. To take an action that might save myself. It was a curse, but also a blessing. The curse of the Beast God burned my hands, but that pain brought clarity of purpose.

"What happened?"

Bless little Mash, her first words was to ask what had happened. I just smiled at her, in the citadel of Salisbury. My mouth opened, and I spoke. For the first time in longer then I truly understood, I spoke, and I spoke my own will.

"You descended into the pit. You found the curse that bears down on us." I whispered. "Forgive us our sins." The words brought a hollow laugh to my lips.

"I don't… but I saw something. Huge and with fur."

"Yes. Cerunnos. Our curse. But you brought us something even more important." I answered. "Hope."

"Hope?"

"Yes. You can never go home, after all. Not as you are." My eyes fell on Mash. She did not understand. Her face was so very full of hope. Hope that she would one day go home to see the foreign mage. A hope I both could grant and dash in equal measure.

"Not as I am?"

"… Two paths are open to us. One, I put you to sleep." I mutter. "After all, you cannot exist. Not until…" No, the details were unimportant. "I can save you, Mash. You are maybe the first person I can truly, genuinely save. But there is a cost. A painful cost. Miracles do not come cheap."

"What is the cost?"

"You must walk the path again. Your journey would be erased. You might even feel like a puppet in your own body on occasion. Until you reach that day again in Orkney, you must walk the path, its highs and lows, even if it does not line up with how it went in your memory." I leaned forward, just a little. I was lying. This was not the best path forward for her.

It was the only path to salvation for me.

She was suspicious, rightly so. Yet her hand lifted up and met mine.

And the heroic girl inheriting the spirit of Galahad understood. For her lips started to twist into a smile, and she nodded.

And I saw the truth she had discovered.

She was not saving herself. In fact she was cursing herself to more suffering in ways she was yet to understand. All for a faerie girl she'd barely met.

For Mash chose not to deny me and save herself, but instead to save me.

A faerie who had no spring.

Please.

Forgive me my sins and grant me salvation.

So begs Rhongomyniad( Tonelico) .

[ ] Accursed City of Flames: Fuyuki
[ ] The Mist City: London
[ ] Vengeful Demon's Wail at the Prison Tower: Prison Tower Château d'If
[ ] Silent City Fuyuki: Accel Zero Order

Ritsuka Fujimura is...
[ ] Male
[ ] Female

 

[BlackHadou]

Tonelico Mash Kyrielight Grimr

• True Name: Tonelico
  Encadre:

  
  
  Class: P̸r̷e̵t̶e̸n̸d̶e̸r̸
  Alias: Aesc the Saviour, Morgan, Avalon le Fae
  Height: 170cm
  Weight: 56kg
  Gender: Female
  
  Hidden Attribute: Earth
  Alignment: Neutral Good
  Note: The version summoned is different from the one at the last stages of the Lost World. Here the journey has begun again.
  
  
  Spoiler: Parameters

  Strength: C
  Constitution: C
  Agility: C
  Magical Energy: A+ (EX)*
  Luck: EX
  Noble Phantasm: EX
  *In practice, she might as well have unlimited magical energy, as she expends nothing to remain manifested in the world of the living. While those with physical bodies still need magical energy to manifest in a singularity, her presence is a matter of course.
  
  
  Spoiler: Class Skills

  Divine Construct Materialisation: -
  Subspecies skill of Item Construction. The ultimate expression of power possessed by those within the sea of life. The Sacred Armament that one might become can be created, though these armaments are at the end of the day mere forgeries. In Tonelico's hands, as many as twelve copies of Rhongomyniad can be forged, though to do so safely requires large amounts of time.
  
  In order to deploy all twelve spontaneously, she would have to pay several organs and all of her limbs to supply the necessary energy. Since Tonelico is a Fairie of Paradise, this skill is bootlegged regardless of class.
  
  That is the privilege of the Nameless King that bears the Sacred Armament.
  
  Independent Manifestation: EX -> A+++
  The ability to remain manifest without assistance. The Class Skill of an Evil of Humanity. In Tonelico's case, though, it would be more accurate to describe her as an 'Evil of Fae-kind'. A grudge of spite born from the girl whose earliest memories of love were tainted beyond recognition. Incidentally, the skill borrows anecdotes from her self in the Pan-Human History.
  
  "I offer you not salvation. Only survival. Bow your heads."
  
  In the aftermath of the Londinium coronation, Tonelico learned hatred. She discarded every name she'd ever known and became Morgan for good. That hate is abated now, but the stains remain on her soul.
  
  Incidentally, the effects of this skill diminish as she approaches spring. However, since her abilities rise as her demeanour improves, the demerit is unnoticeable in practical terms.
  
  
  Spoiler: Personal Skills

  Fairy Eyes: A
  The eyes of the fae. A hallmark of Avalon le Fae. The rank is of the highest calibre. Because these eyes are the eyes of the will of the sea of life, it is possible to see through all lies and discern the truth of other people. An absolute vision that qualifies one for the position of Crown Caster.
  
  For Aesc the Saviour, these eyes were more of a curse then anything else. Human thoughts, memories, and even will becomes a tempest that clouds her mind whenever she shuts her eyes. As a result, she prefers to keep her eyes wide open. Using magecraft, the effect can temporarily be sealed, though Aesc only did so to repose.
  
  To Tonelico, though, the little shining light that was the gift of Avalon le Fae is the most important thing in the storm. A blazing ball that she will keep striding towards, watching the blizzard morph into a spring breeze.
  
  At World's End: A
  The pride of the witch. The pride of the saviour. Even at world's end, the body refuses to give out and stubborn pride and ego wins out. Technically, a skill based in the casting of magecraft and sacraments. Tonelico turns the battlefield into a blizzard of curses and rips through the battlefield. Since these spells do not require incantations, they are exceptionally powerful against other mages, turning karma against her enemies.
  
  However, she no longer wishes to make extensive use of this skill. It doesn't discriminate friend and foe, you see. The antithesis of Spring she wishes to reach. Incidentally, as a side effect, even if her skin has been burned away by her Noble Phantasm, she will continue to breathe and fight until the very end. The very end, in her case, is complete dissolution, as the Faerie of Paradise bears to unique burden of surviving even if she is only a drop of blood.
  
  Avalon le Fae: -
  The power of the Faerie of Paradise made manifest. Outside the dream of Faerie Britain, this skill does nothing and remains sealed until her return. One day, the Faerie of Paradise must return to face the music. How she will face that music is up to her.
  
  Deathbound Witch: B
  Skill of Morgan le Fae. Normally, such a skill could not be possessed by Tonelico. Possession of the magecraft of witches, hexes, curses and other mysticism that typically would rot soul and karma. However, the Faerie of Paradise is absolved of such sins, and such does not decay.
  
  Since they rot the soul, the inflict terrible pain and death on the target. Possession of this skills donates one as a potential 'Calamity of the Mors', except Tonelico is the Faerie of Paradise. The source of the power is actually Britain itself.
  
  In the Pan-Human History, Morgan le Fae inherited Britain itself. This dark power is a manifestation of that trait. In certain circumstances, the cursed Noble Phantasm, Rhongomyniad Morgan, can be used.
  
  "… You seriously named it after Morgan? Really? That's kind of tactless."
  
  Yet the energy of Britain is fundamentally malicious to human life, and bears many similarities to grail mud.
  
  
  Spoiler: Noble Phantasms

  Rhongomyniad
  Rank: EX
  Type: Anti-Calamity
  Range: 0-100000
  Targets: 1-12
  
  Spirit Vein Closing Armament.
  
  Immature Sacred Armament. In the original prime timeline, the sacred armament was Excalibur. In the history that can be discerned at present, the sacred armament is named Rhongomyniad. A divine spear that bears the desires of human-kind to survive and live. Their wishes coalesce along the blade of the spear and becomes a radiant edge that pierces possibility and the impossible to grant salvation.
  
  "Forgive us of our sins."
  
  The phrase is a misnomer. Rhongomyniad requires no forgiveness of sin to deploy. Rather, the sin being forgiven is the misfortune of needing saving. The words are a legacy mantra of something that long ago became unnecessary.
  
  Incidentally, the White Titan was felled with six such spears. It seems that Tonelico is a true genius, deploying as many as twelve at once. However, once fired, the spear is expended.
  
  There exists somewhere a 'true' Rhongomyniad, which is not expended when used. However, as the Faerie of Paradise from a Lost World, Tonelico is not allowed to see it. After all, allowing such a thing into her vision would confirm Tonelico as the future Rhongomyniad.
  
  Such would defeat the purpose of seeking Spring. So says Avalon le Fae.
  
  Around Ronmiant
  Rank: B
  Type: Anti-Squad
  Range: 0-10
  Targets: 13 people
  
  The Bones of Salvation you Pilgrimage For.
  
  The true name depends on the mental state. As Lancer and Caster, it remains the Star of Desire. As Pretender, it becomes the Bones of Salvation. Regardless, they are fundamentally the same Noble Phantasm. The gnarled wooden staff that Tonelico favours is actually severed from the Spear of Selection, and retains a piece of its power. Since the Spear is yet to be corrupted, it retains its original salvation powers.
  
  A tolling of the bells within the mental world of Tonelico. When invoked, the world is overwritten with the state of her mental world. Since Tonelico generally has a stormy inner world, the real world is overwritten with a blizzard that draws out enemy magical energy like heat and delivers it to Tonelico.
  
  For allies, it is a gentle breeze.
  
  For enemies, it is the biting winter's breath.
  
  Technically, she could also use it to protect others, but doing so would force Tonelico to take the damage herself. Since her allies within the area of effect count as 'Tonelico', it is trivial to reinforce their abilities.
  
  However, maintaining the effect is devastating on her allies constitution, and the range is limited. In addition, certain Noble Phantasms that cast light immediately pierce the effect.
  
  Ars Nova
  Rank: ???
  Type: Anti-Magic
  Range: ???
  Targets: ??? people
  
  The Time of Spring has Come, You who may now Rest.
  
  A beautiful thing. A cherished thing. A wish for Spring born by one of the Human's of Salvation bearing the name Solomon. A desire to live long enough to act as a human, a man, a father. A wish that cannot be fulfilled while fundamentally being 'Solomon'.
  
  When the time comes, I know what to do.
  
  An immature Noble Phantasm, but when the time comes, it will show its full splendour. Due to the nature of the Noble Phantasm, it can only be used once, but with it, Beast I the Hope and Beast I the Pity will mirror each other.
  
  And in mirroring each other, they can be defeated magnanimously.
  
  ???
  This Noble Phantasm is not yet available.
• True Name: Mash Kyrielight
  Class: Shielder
  Alias: Galahad, Tam Lin Galahad, Super Kyrielight
  Height: 158cm
  Weight: 46kg
  Gender: Female
  
  Hidden Attribute: Star
  Alignment: Lawful Good
  Note: Technically, she is acting as 'Sir Galahad Squared'.
  
  
  Spoiler: Parameters

  Strength: A
  Constitution: A
  Agility: B
  Magical Energy: A
  Luck: A
  Noble Phantasm: A+++
  
  
  Spoiler: Class Skills

  Magic Resistance: A
  The ability to resist magic. Almost all magic is canceled on contact unless they belong to the high thaumaturgy or high arcana subspecies. Because her faith in her defences is so strong, she does not falter unless the world around her is overwritten. While certain spells that are effective against knights bypass this resistance, only a certain species of faerie has access to such magic.
  
  Riding: C
  The ability to ride animals. In Mash's case, this is inherited from the concept of knight, which is closely associated with mounted combat. All beasts and vehicles can be ridden, though beasts must at least be willing. This does not include phantasmal or draconic creatures, though dragons can be ridden with their consent. However, since a dragon fundamentally 'cannot be ridden', it is more like the dragon is carrying Mash instead.
  
  
  Spoiler: Personal Skills

  Self-Defence Field: A
  A power that manifests to defend allies and territory. The ability to present one as a shield that draws in attacks and presents oneself as the only valid target in an area of effect. Mash calls this skill the Walk of Honourable Transient Snowflakes.
  
  By expending magical energy, it is possible to block anything. Since the magical energy expended is proportional to the damage being blocked, there is a limit to what Mash can block.
  
  Tam Lin: EX
  Adoption of the name Galahad. A power grafted to the Saint Graph and added on top of ones own. The abilities of Galahad are added on top of the original powers displayed. In addition, the parameters are maximised. In this state, Mash displays the absolute maximum power of Galahad possible.
  
  In other words, she has become Super Kyrielight, the Knight of Sheffield! However, since the Shielder class is an aberration, she doesn't seem to gain many of Galahad's personal skills. Unfortunate.
  
  Dual Class: -
  The adoption of a second class. In the case of Mash, she was granted the name 'Galahad', but the Shielder class is an aberration that cannot exist within the Britain of the Faeries. As a result, the skills of the supreme Saber, Galahad, were granted instead.
  
  While her parameters have been improved, her compatibility with the skills Galahad possesses have not yet maximised. As a result, she has not received Galahad's 'Sacred Aegis' or 'Pure Instinct' skills at present.
  
  
  Spoiler: Noble Phantasms

  Lord Camelot
  Rank: A+++
  Type: Anti-Calamity
  Range: 1
  Targets: 1
  
  Now is a Castle of Hope.
  
  The Human Nature Protection Ritual. The ultimate protection granted by one of the Noble Phantasms designated 'the place where the heroes that represent humanities dreams gather'. Unlike the Argo, which can voyage anywhere, Camelot takes the form of the ultimate shield. Technically, it also displays amazing anti-evil abilities, but in this form, is designated the instrument of human survival.
  
  So long as Mash's will remains firm, the walls of Camelot will hold firm. So long as Mash believes she can defend, the shield will never crack.
  
  However, it is a defensive effect focused on Mash. Unlike its fellow Human Nature Protection Rituals, it does not bear the EX rank, for it has a hole within it.
  
  Camelot fell from within, and thus, can be defeated by those closest to Mash.
  
  Red Hangings
  Rank: B+
  Type: Anti-Unit
  Range: 1-5
  Targets: 1
  
  Hilt with Strange Hangings.
  
  The blade of Galahad. Technically, it is thought to be two blades. That of Balin, Red Hilt, and that of David, the Sword of Strange Hangings. Mash insists they are actually the same sword. It bears a long crack in the blade.
  
  A sacrificial weapon. To invoke its name destroys the blade. However, applying magical energy repairs it. A Broken Phantasm that explodes every time it makes contact with the enemy. It actually has multiple other effects, but Mash cannot use them at this time.
• True Name: Grimr the Sage | Setanta of Ulster
  Class: Lancer
  Alias: The One Eyed One, Great God, Damn Rat
  Height: 165cm
  Weight: 56kg
  Gender: Male
  Note: Technically, he is shorter then Aesc. However, Aesc is slighter then him.
  
  Hidden Attribute: Heaven
  Alignment: Chaotic Good
  Note: While his True Name includes Setanta, its polite to just not mention it.
  
  
  Spoiler: Parameters

  Strength: B+
  Constitution: C
  Agility: B
  Magical Energy: C
  Luck: A
  Noble Phantasm: B++
  
  
  Spoiler: Class Skills

  Magic Resistance: A
  Highest grade of magic resistance usually reserved for the most powerful of Servants. In the case of Grimr, a sage who was blessed with the knowledge of magic from the World Tree, the rank is actually low. Rather then resisting magic, unless it is of the highest level, the spell fails to complete. The rank actually should be higher, but… well…
  
  "I can't be bothered."
  
  His sense of duty is low in this form. Human incineration is sort of something that just happened, rather then something he's obligated to fix. His objective is something else entirely. Unfortunately, this also reflects on his Magic Resistance. While it should be of the highest caliber, its rank rapidly depletes when his discipline is absent.
  
  
  Spoiler: Personal Skills

  Divinity: A
  A skill showing one's aptitude as a divine spirit. In the case of Grimr, the compatibility is maximum, but since he chooses to act as 'separate from Odin', the rank has actually decreased. In terms of who he is, Grimr strongly resembles the hero of Ulster in his youth. The form was initially selected deliberately, due to the requirement of anonymity within Faerie Britain. However, now, Grimr chooses the form he initially appeared before Aesc in, instead of the older form that appeared for Artoria. Since Setanta's influence is minimal, it is safe to say this spirit is 'all Grimr'. Whether Grimr bears any resemblence to Odin, though…
  
  "Well… bluntly? He'd have buggered off already. Uptight bastard."
  
  Perhaps its for the best they don't resemble each other.
  
  Protection from Arrows: A
  A skill that protects the user from arrows. In Grimr's case, this skill actually came from Setanta, though it combined with a similar skill that Odin possessed. All projectile attacks can be avoided, even if the user is unaware of them. Grimr uses this skill to display combat prowess far beyond what he should be capable of through creative interpretation of the world.
  
  "A sword swing is just a projectile attack made in melee range."
  
  The logic is akin to a troll, but no one has ever told him it is-
  
  "How can you still say that!?"
  
  Nevermind. His companion is still exasperated at that explanation.
  
  Mystic Eye (Dimensional): EX
  The Mystic Eye of the Great God who hung himself to obtain magic. Normally, this eye actually is removed from the socket. Since Grimr is not actually Odin, but an aspect or shard of Odin, it is rendered as a skill, instead of a Noble Phantasm. In the case of both Grimr and Odin, the Mystic Eye is the right eye.
  
  The ability to see past, future, nowhen and somewhere is granted. A Clairvoyance that pierces through the void even into alternate realities. It is true clairvoyance that can see 'anything that exists'. However, Grimr gets tired whenever he makes use of it. It consumes a truly astronomical amount of magical energy to look beyond the now.
  
  According to Grimr, it actually burns 'possibility' in order to view the world. Since it can only view things that are real, something elsewhen and nowhere must be made real first before it can be observed.
  
  Knight of the Einharjar( Red Branch) : A++
  A skill that shows one is a member of the Knights of the Red Branch. A skill that shows one is a member of the Einharjar. A skill that shows one is noble and pure. A form of charisma that is not for leading a nation, but for fighting alongside others. A noble soul that will fight to the utmost to protect home and hearth, friend and love. God and Country.
  
  Grimr does not care for that last one.
  
  When allies are on the verge of defeat, the abilities increase rapidly. A form of Battle Continuation that actually activates to preserve the lives of others. He will not stop. So long as he draws breath, his companions live.
  
  If Grimr had remained by her side, Aesc would never have been overcome by despair and become Morgan. Uther would still be alive.
  
  Shadowlands Arms Mastery: A+
  A skill inherited from Setanta. The skills and techniques taught by the Warrior Scathatch in the Land of Shadows. A prerequisite for existing as Setanta. If this skill does not exist, Gae Bolg does. If Gae Bolg does not exist, this one does. In this case, though, both exist because of the twisted nature of the Noble Phantasm.
  
  Magic, supreme staff skills, hunting, tracking, knowledge, philosophy. All of these are within reach. Everything except-
  
  "You're joking, right? You can't use a spear!?"
  
  "Nope!"
  
  
  Spoiler: Noble Phantasms

  Gungnir | Gae Bolg
  Rank: B++
  Type: Anti-Fortress
  Range: 1-10000
  Targets: 1
  
  Victorious Declaration of the One Eyed God.
  
  Noble Phantasm of Odin. Noble Phantasm of Cu Chulainn. Prototype and successor. Normally, Grimr could only be summoned with one or another, depending on who is in more control. However, by sacrificing the 'knowledge of how to use a spear', both are delivered.
  
  The spear will claim victory if thrown.
  
  The spear already hit the heart.
  
  It should be Anti-Fortress in scale. It should obliterate entire mountains in the course of its activation.
  
  But…
  
  Since it always hits the heart, the damage is actually minimised compared to its normal use. The damage is set to always be 'Maximum HP - 1'. A curious flaw that causes it to fail to instantly kill if used at the beginning of a fight.
  
  And since Heroes are known for second winds…
  
  "... I'm sorry, one day it'll kill someone the first time I throw it."
  
  Incidentally, luck can also dodge it. Since heroes regularly do the impossible, Grimr laments it honestly could be more useful. Incidentally, it can be used in melee range, but-
  
  "GRIMR THAT'S THE WRONG END!"
  
  Since he gave up the ability to use a spear, he uses it like a staff instead.
  
  Freki and Geri
  Rank: D+
  Type: Familiar
  Range: -
  Targets: -
  
  Sun Eater and Shadowed Moon.
  
  A Noble Phantasm that is always active. Freki is male, Geri is female. Which wolf is present depends on the current time. Freki is present during the day, Geri during the night.
  
  The familiars of Odin, and possessing half of his magic each. Between the two of them, there are 18 runes. Freki possesses the 9 relating to combat. Geri possesses the 9 relating to support. Rather then combatants themselves, they are actually spellcasting aids. The wolf that is not currently present has their runes reside within Grimr himself.
  
  The main use of the Noble Phantasm is actually remotely casting spells. Incidentally, each wolf possesses a rune that can swap them temporarily for the other wolf. It was through this ability that Grimr remotely projected himself into the distance.
  
  "Honestly? I'm not as good as Aesc. She's a genius. I'm just… learned, in comparison. Give her a few minutes and she'll invent an entirely new branch of spellcasting."
  
  Since Grimr struggles making spells, he leaves the construction to the wolves. Incidentally, they do have combat abilities, but they are quite low in comparison.
  
  Ochd Deug Odin
  This Noble Phantasm is sealed.

 

[BlackHadou]

The Faerie of Paradise may not reach for Spring. The Faerie of Paradise may never know Spring. The misery of the Faerie of Paradise reflects your sins. So forgive us of our sins and grant us salvation.

Flinging Mash back into human history was a complicated ritual. Within the tree of fantasy, she had no hope of survival. Within my dream, she had no hope of survival. The coming disaster meant there was no hope of survival for any of us. After all, my window to act was very quickly running out.

Mash was human. Humans had limits to what they would accept. Being within the phenomena of no-when within the incineration of humans that came before the bleaching of the outside world gave me some advantages to work with, but even so, there was a limit to it all.

We would miss Uther's crowning.

…

I can do without seeing that again. I see it in my dreams too often as it is, or rather, my waking nightmares. When did I last sleep? Really sleep? I'm not sure I have. Humans have dreams. I just remember things at inopportune moments.

Maybe little Artoria could explain that better then me. She had a bit more time with a real human, after all. Mash was a real human, true blooded, but my eyes could easily discern that her origin was twisted.

Beryl didn't count. The man had cast off his humanity so long ago that I had to wonder if he had ever been truly human.

We made the journey to the Tree of Fantasy. There was only one place in the land where the grand arcana I was to cast could be done. Mash was wrapped in a great cloak, one I recognised would one day be used by one of my knights. Her body was still wracked with curses. Even my best efforts did not remove them all. Casting my mind back to that day, I hadn't been effective in removing the curses then, either. The Beast God's wrath had clung like a sticky miasma, and had only been banished by the hundreds of years I had allowed Mash to sleep. She would have to carry those curses with her.

"Are you sure?" My voice felt so very tiny as we made our way towards the tree. It loomed on the horizon, massive, spiralling into the heavens. Totorot, dear Totorot, floated on her spinning wheel near Mash's shoulder. She was protective of the girl.

My heart ached just a little. I would be separating them for good, wouldn't I? Could we take Totorot? Was that even possible?

My mind raced through the possibilities, overactive in the extreme as always. In order to bring Totorot into the history of humans, she would have to be engraved in their history. Engraving me there was comparatively quite easy, so long as I placed my name within Mash's shield and granted her the name of a Tam Lin. Mash would take the name Tam Lin Galahad with her back to human history, and I would enact the reverse of the summoning ritual in order to drag me out of fantasy and my own dreams and into reality. It was actually a fairly elegant solution.

Why hadn't the other me considered it?

Right, because I was so obsessed with ruling Britain. I'm not sure why it was such a drive. It was… no, calling it a drive is wrong. It was a spiteful obligation that I was too stubborn to give up on.

"I'm sure. It's the right thing to do." Mash answered. Her lips set into a line. Her armour was gone. The iron burned her skin right now, after all. Her clothes had once been mine, when I needed to hide from others. Tan leather that wrapped around her form in a sort of simple dress. It reminded me of little Artoria.

We were the same faerie, after all. No doubt that played a role in our lives being mirrors of each other.

"If you're sure, Mash. I think cutting down the tree is too difficult. You can barely stand." Totorot's opinion was well known. "Aesc, shouldn't we have at least brought Ector?"

"Ector would not understand why this was so important."

It was a lie. The real reason why I hadn't brought Ector was guilt. I couldn't bare to look at his face, knowing I was about to throw everything about this land away. Yet nothing we did in this time mattered. So long as the Tree of Fantasy survived what we were about to do, then what I was doing was a wayward dream.

I had given some thought to cutting it down and changing history, but…

I actually don't know if it is possible. If I wanted to leave, then I needed something to offer. A peace offering. Perhaps before those from the outside knew they might need it, but I had such an offering. The grand arcana, Rhongomyniad( Spirit Vein Closing Armament) .

They would rightly be suspicious. I just wanted to run away. To be anywhere but here. I couldn't stand to look at this world, knowing my failure was now pre-ordained. After all, by cutting down the tree, I had morphed this hell from an alternate possibility to an alternate history, a singularity. My death in the singularity means I was destined to die at that point. If I somehow survived being betrayed, then I would just die in another way. The only way to avoid the Life Pruning Phenomena was to simply not be present. I needed to be outside the singularity when the moment of my death occurred.

It should be impossible.

I don't care.

I can do this. Clinging to this final thread of hope that Mash had granted me was all I have left.

"I think sir Ector would be more understanding then you think." Mash spoke up. I glared at her. She saw through my lie.

"Not when it comes to grand magic." Thankfully I had a rebuttal. "Remember the last time I used Rhongomyniad( Spirit Vein Closing Armament) ?"

"The last time you decided to sear off your skin, yeah." Totorot's response was blunt and dark. It was the desired response. Mash took the wrong inference from it, but did not question further. Totorot, on the other hand- "Wait, you mean to use THAT!? But you'll-"

"I'll be fine. I've had a few centuries to get better at it."

I hadn't practiced it at all.

Actually. I hadn't perfected it at all either.

Rhongomyniad( Spirit Vein Closing Armament) was the same spell, all the way to the day I died. All that changed was I got lazy and forged a throne to cast it properly for me. Perhaps that is something I should work on.

Rhongomyniad( Spirit Vein Closing Armament) was fundamentally a spell that saved the world. Of course it would be devastating to the caster. It is an imitation of the shadow that would one day be me. The shadow of the Sacred Armament to save the planet. It isn't a real spell in the sense that you can give it to another person. Heck, I'm not sure that I can really use it. In the future, I'd made divine forgeries in order to contain the aria, and used my throne to supply enough magical energy to fire one.

The last time I'd fired it without the throne…

Well, Totorot was right, I'd incinerated a good chunk of my skin and destroyed my right arm. I'm lucky I am made of such stern stuff, and little Artoria was even more durable still, as the Avalon le Fae that had to oppose me. Artoria's body was strong, and her mind was like steel. It was necessary to be the faerie that opposed me.

… Neither of us really understood why we kept walking forward, did we? Or maybe-

Perhaps all of this was a sign that Avalon le Fae would one day find Spring. What a disgusting, treacherous hope?

But it was one I was willing to pursue. If I failed, well, at least I could be reasonably sure I'd get oblivion instead, as opposed to living on forever, even after death. I was not a human. I was not fortunate enough to reincarnate. I would be a bloody stain forever, or worse, become the bones of the world, the land beneath our feet.

It was disgusting.

"You're lying."

I blinked. I glanced at Mash. Her cheeks had puffed up. It was kind of adorable. She was right, though, I had lied.

"It'll be fine, Mash."

"But-"

"I promise." That was enough to assuage her. We were getting closer to the tree at this point. This was not the first time I'd contemplated something like cutting it down. Wryneck and I had tried to do so, rather halfheartedly, some… three hundred years ago, I think?

The day hadn't seemed important at the time. Really, we had just been preparing for the day that I would cut it down. My half-hearted dithering appears to have played to our advantage in this case. If I'd already set in motion its collapse, then we would have no hope. My own conflict in this age over how to proceed, whether to be the heartless king that Morgan's memories had said I would be, appears to have worked in my favour.

A part of me wanted to swing over to Wryneck and ask him to come with us. However, Totorot had an equivalent in human history. It might be possible, if difficult, to save her.

Bringing Wryneck with us would simply designate us all immediately for pruning. If I was bitter, I might consider it the ultimate revenge on the foreign mage, for it would certainly take them with us.

…

I am bitter. I seriously considered it for a moment. Yet Avalon's directive for me overrode that. Live.

"Why Aesc, anyway?" I blinked. Mash's thoughts must have taken a new turn. The tree stretched into heaven before us. It reminded me of a great old ash tree. My lips curled just a little at the thought.

"Just me reminiscing." I answered. "You are probably aware that Grimr and I met some time ago. We travelled together for a time."

"Grimr the Sage. I am aware of him, but…" Mash pursed her lips, her finger touching her cheek. "He's a friend?"

"Hardly. The next time I meet him, we will be enemies, I think." I answered. "But I felt a connection of sorts, I will admit. He…" I paused, before shaking my head. "In truth, he bears the Allfather's Authority."

"Huh? Wait, Grimr is a Servant from-"

"Yes." Don't say it, Mash. "Now give me a moment. I need to think."

"Does Aesc mean anything?"

"Old Ash Tree, roughly. Actually, he used it instead of Ansuz." I answered without really thinking about it, my mind and mouth disconnecting as I considered what needed to be done. Really, all I needed to do was similar to the human history incineration. I just had to take some of the history of my dream and burn it for power. In the process, though…

This place was a Lost World. We were before the cutoff where equivalents could move between here and human history. This would be a complex bit of magic.

"… Aesc doesn't like her original name." Totorot spoke up. "It reminds her of-"

"That's enough, Totorot." I cut her off before she could say it. "… Tonelico."

"Sorry?"

"My name. You'll need it, I think."

She will not. Under the Servant summoning system of the prime history, I would be impossible to summon. Even if I was given the Spirit Origin of a servant, it would not resemble any class that they would know. That is simply how it is.

My hand lifted, and I started to gauge the size of a particular branch. It was a long branch, consisting of maybe four hundred years of history. Its incineration would give me enough energy.

"… No. I won't." Mash's answer made me pause. "It doesn't work that way. We often don't know the name when they arrive."

"Know what's name?" Totorot's curiosity was precious. I nodded and tuned them out for a moment. How could I bring Totorot with me? How could I bring…

No. It would be cruel to hunt her down and bring her with me. Like it or not, for the moment, Baobhan Sith was someone I could not save. One day, maybe, I could, but if I saved her now…

There just wasn't the time. If I didn't act now, before my will broke, and Uther's death I knew would break it, then there would never be a chance. I loved Baobahn Sith, but for the moment, I could not save her. Right now I didn't even know where to look for her.

"Right." The words tumbled out of my lips. "I can do it." It was a statement of fact. I knew my measure. This would certainly hurt, but I could do it. I was about to pull a fast one on everyone, even the world, a fast one I could only pull because I was the Faerie of Paradise. The planet acknowledged that I could exist yesternever or tomorrowhen, and such, even if the Lost Belt should be my prison, and that of Mash, it was possible to escape.

In hindsight, maybe I should have sent Mash away when she first arrived, but it would have been so very cruel. Perhaps that in and of itself was an indication that I was not quite Morgan le Fae. She would have done it without a second thought.

"Do it." Totorot repeated. Her eyes narrowed. "Wait, you don't intend to cut it down."

"No. I don't." My patterns ignited. There was no world that this was not going to hurt in. "I'm about to deny the cosmos for about thirty seconds, Mash. Be ready." I paused, glancing at her. Mash simply nodded.

"I… I am ready."

"Not yet you aren't." I drew a deep breath, gently tapping my finger to her breast. "I name you Galahad. Hero and pure. Let this name follow you forevermore. Into yesternever and tomorrowhen." She blinked. Just once.

"Wasn't I… already-"

"An extra blessing never hurts." The blessing itself didn't matter. After all, the real important thing was that I, Tonelico, gave it. Technically, as far as I know, I never actually gave her the name Tam Lin. I'm pretty sure she always had it.

Where did she get it from? A detail considered unimportant in the past, but now-

"Thank you, but-"

"How does that help? One moment. Put this inside your shield." I offered her my staff. "Do I understand your summoning ritual correctly?"

"Well, yes, but-"

"You will be as you were." I continued. I needed to. If Totorot caught on before I finished, this would start becoming trouble. Her small face was covered in confusion as I stepped forward. "But the shield, the Round Table, exists everywhere simultaneously. It is one of the great arcana's of the planet in that way. Anything I do to it here, will be everywhere so long as you remember it."

"You said I'd be like a puppet, right?"

"To a degree. You will be trapped in a script. Wait, bide your time. Let the inconsistencies build. When they get too much, you'll see your chance to break the script." My fingers popped as I stretched them. It was now or never.

"… How will I know it's you?"

"…" That was a good question, I suppose. There was every chance her summoning would hit someone else. She needed something only I could know. Something…

No. I knew what to say.

"I am the faerie of paradise. I know no happiness." I admitted. "One day I will become something else. Something dark, but full of hope. The name of that thing, that is how you will know me."

"Aesc!" Totorot's eyes lit up. Damn. Maybe she was catching on. I had to hurry up.

"Linking Divine Patterns. Tolling the Bones of the World. The time of Pilgrimage has come." I declared. My magic started swirling. Burning. My flesh seared as my body began to churn. Even with my magical energy, my reserves if you would, the spell I was casting was too much. I had to convert part of my very flesh into magic. Three fingers and two toes tore apart at the seems. "Even if the Star remains Distant, continue your march towards that sacred place. Forgive me my sins and let me walk to paradise! Rhongomyniad( Spirit Vein Closing Armament) !"

The world erupted immediately. Twelve lights of green formed around me, lengthening, seizing, as the wrapped and twirled around each other into a great spear of divine magic. Then it fired, and the tree in the distance exploded.

Severing a single branch was easy. It burned as it fell.

"Mash! Stop her!" Totorot was moving, but Mash, blessed Mash, had taken her in her arms. My eyes were burning with tears. It hurt so very much.

"Today. Tomorrow. Yesterday. Never. Somewhere. Somewhen. In the distance. In the star. March forever. Forward and backwards. To the sky that you know. To the Star you will protect. Walk to that precious thing and never look back. Crack. Shatter. Be not. Be!" My will overwrote the will of reality. The cosmos of Britain was denied for but an instant, as I seized the Tree of Time itself, and shook it until I found its roots. In a moment, my mind burned, overloading. This would hurt and I probably was about to do some serious damage to my memory.

But it had to be done. In order to send Mash back to her journey before, I had to walk the path from the very root of the tree. I experienced that magical tracing in about four seconds. From the inexorable march to the day of destiny, to the slaying of the White Titan, to the rise of humans, the fall of Britain, to the frozen land.

Humanity suddenly blinked. For the briefest moment, I caught sight of Mash again, in a city of flame. Facing down with the anchor I was using to find her. The black shadow of Britain formed into the shape of a blade. A hammer of fell energy crashing down on Mash and the Foreign Mage in a burning city.

To complete the spell, all that was needed was a resonance.

"Mash! Deploy your shield!"

"But-"

"Now! Please!" Don't waste this brief chance. I could never succeed in doing this again. The world's will was now on me. If she did not act, then I myself was a target for elimination. If she did not act, the will of the world would likely presume I was an external threat and designate my for immediate destruction. Even being in this hellish dream of my own making would not save me from that, for the world wished to continue living for now.

I heard the shield that was the Round Table crash into the ground. My breath caught.

"That which heals all wounds and grudges! Our glorious distant star! This is the castle of fantasy that holds many paths and wishes! Answer my call! Lord Camelot!"

Mash's scream rang out. The event of neverwhen overlapped with somewhen. The walls of the castle of Lord Camelot overwrote the shield of Lord Chaldeas. The world stopped, and it was like the planet's very breath skipped a beat.

Now was the moment of truth. If the Great Mother of Us All was not aware of me, then she certainly was now, and she was certainly able to destroy me. My patterns were splayed across all of human history. It would be trivial to annihilate me to the very core, to deprive me of even non-existence. To-

Perhaps I should trust in our Great Mother more. She was patient, silently pulling my patterns back across time and space, nowhen and somewhen, until I was back before the tree. Back where I should have been.

She had to know what I intended to do, but she did not betray anything.

"Mash!? Mash! Where is she, Aesc!? Where is Mash!?"

Totorot's voice was loud. But my lips just twisted. Mash was gone. It had worked.

The first step was done.

I did it.

My first steps. Steps so very hard, but I did it. My legs gave out and I collapsed.

"She's back where she needs to be." I whispered. "With her friends, on the outside." There was no point hiding it. This place was now a true dead end. One I wished to cut away myself. My flesh sizzled, but I could only smile like a lunatic. The rush of performing arcana that should be completely impossible, that would never go away. No wonder the Morgan from that history chose to use Rayshifting to accomplish her objective. It was the act of proving that the impossible was easy that drove some of her actions. It was an egotism we shared, in hindsight.

At least my goal actually was supposed to be impossible.

"But… Oh Aesc, your skin. Hold still." I whimpered as Totorot, blessed Totorot, started rubbing my burned flesh with salves. "You gave up fingers this time. How many toes do you have?"

"Only eight." I admitted. "I can't…"

"You will not move." Totorot's face was cross, but-

"I can't. I'm on a time limit." I whispered. "Please, Totorot. If you care, help me. I need to go to the dragon's corpse." The great tunnel. The spiritual tomb. That was the path forward now. I needed to be in that tunnel, or Mash's summoning spell would have no target. I had to firmly not be inside of Britain. Totorot's face was cross. Her hands found her hips.

"After that!? I should take you to Wryneck, he can-"

"Please, Totorot." That would be a cruelty beyond cruelties. My knight's face softened.

"It's important to you." She whispered. "I understand. But…"

My hand, with only two fingers, reached out to her face and stroked her cheek. She was real. She was very much real. Very-

Wait. That was it.

"Come with me." My voice was parched. Hoarse. "Away from here. Somewhere else."

Anywhere else.

That was my wish.

Yet-

Totorot shook her head.

"You will be coming back one day, right?"

My heart broke.

"Yes."

"Then I will wait here until you do." She answered. "That's what you need, right. Besides, I never got to see you in your dress." My breath hitched. I wanted to cry. In that moment, I understood how badly I had wanted Totorot to come with me, yet-

"You will have to wait a long time."

"That's okay."

"You might not remember us." She would one day. But only after we met again. Only after I could return the seed of a forgotten fantasy. Totorot shook her head.

"I will one day, right, Tonelico?"

My name.

She used my name.

She took this seriously.

"Yes."

"Then there's no time to waste. Get up. My wheel can't carry all of you."

I just laughed.

<—>​

I had no idea when I would be called. If I wasn't inside the Spiritual Tomb, then I would miss the call. That would be devastating. I didn't want to think of such an outcome. Totorot was gentle. She let me push so very hard, picking me up when I stumbled. It took us three days to arrive.

We did not sleep.

She let me collapse against the walls of the spiritual tomb. Her face was full of concern. Rather then scold me, she cared for me. She helped me keep eating and breathing. She tended to my scorched flesh and watched over my fading life. I hadn't pointed it out that day, but there was a good reason why this was a one time deal. I knew, when I cast my spells, that I was no longer long for the world.

After all, I was now established as a being from outside. I was designated for removal within the possibility of my own dream.

"Aesc, are you okay?"

A dumb question. What Totorot really meant is 'have you gotten worse?'.

"… I lost another toe." My voice was soft. I was going to expire soon. My right arm had started crumbling. Totorot did not possess the means to save me. I was causing her sorrow, yet… "Soon, Totorot."

"How will I know?"

"I'm not giving up." My voice betrayed the fierce emotion that was bursting in my chest. "It will be sudden. I will be, then I won't be. In that instant, you'll know."

I was the Faerie of Paradise.

I was not allowed to have happy memories.

I cannot have a Springtime.

Yet those painful days where Totorot tended to me. Those, if they had been anything else, those would have been a pleasant Spring. How sad my life is, that…

"I forgive your sins."

The script broke. Totorot froze. Even she had heard the voice of salvation. The world itself stopped for a heartbeat. The Faerie that was me, staring from distant never, glanced back, into fantasy, and suddenly, inevitability occurred.

The cosmos would be denied. I knew that now, for it was now akin to human history and subject to pruning.

The singularity would be conquered. The calamities would be averted. The-

It was like a gentle wind caressed my face.

"See you on the other side." I whispered. "Tam Lin Habetrot."

Habetrot's streaming tears were too much for me to bear.

"I will, Tonelico."

<—>​

Mist. That was the first thing I knew. The second, was that there was a battle happening. The third, was that I was splayed across human history like string. Retrieving myself was easy. My Divine Patterns lit up, betraying the origin of this body as a spiritual vessel for servants, and I dragged all of me from history to here. From within my dream, I ripped free, and became real.

I was not afraid. This was a better path. I will be back, one day.

… Of course I was still in Britain. The stones and bricks around me might be alien, but-

No. I needed to strike. A shadow in the mist. Before it harmed Mash. I could see the foreign mage too. She was younger now. I could appreciate only now that her journey had aged her greatly before her time…

You are forgiven of your sins. Descend, incarnate crown. Avert Incineration.

[ ] Lancer.
[ ] Caster.
[ ] Pretender.

The Incineration of Humanity has begun.
Four Holy Grails Remain.​

 

[BlackHadou]

The city around me did not look like a city as I knew it. The cities of the Faeries were ultimately only imitations. They had no real rhyme or reason to their layout. This was different. The street we were in was lined with light poles, lamps struggling to light and stay lit. The buildings were filled with windows and varied in shape and size. I could see a sign for a bakery nearby.

The mist rolled around me. It was thick, polluted with soot and ash and magic. It was not a natural mist, but rather a fog or miasma that claimed the magic of those within. It devoured their souls and left them rotten husks in the moonlight. It was the miasma of a killer.

I could see the shape within, rumbling and roiling, coiling around to strike again. I could see Mash standing over the foreign mage, her shield hefted in both hands. Her left arm was bleeding profusely and her right was slotted through the strap of her shield. No, it was more then that, her arm was broken. The shield held it in place like a splint.

Her script had broken here. Whatever she was facing, it was not quite what she faced before, an inconsistency on inconsistencies that had finally boiled over. My lips formed a thin line. I was unarmed. Technically, that wasn't a problem.

I was never afraid, after all. I had been slashed, beaten, crucified, burned, executed a thousand different ways and subjected to a thousand different cruelties. Indeed, my death in the close, as Morgan le Fae, the Queen of Britain, had been one of the tamer deaths I'd experienced, I must admit. I did not fear death. Death generally was just an inconvenience.

"Mash, stay back."

My voice barked out before I'd really thought about it. The foreign mage's eyebrow furrowed. Her mind raced. I could see it in her eyes. The foreign mage was not incompetent in the slightest. They were always quite smart, from my musings from afar. They would have to be, level headed and in control, for them not to fall to the temptation to just stab some of the faeries they'd met.

I had been tempted to do so, so very many times. Faeries were innocent, and in that innocence, cruel. There was no point assigning good or evil to a faerie. Either they did not understand such concepts in the first place, or like myself and little Artoria, were above such concepts as the Faerie of Paradise.

My eyes narrowed. My fingers flexed. I realised my right hand still only had two fingers, and I winced. I had not been healed by the transition at all. Dear Habetrot had only been able to do so much for me. While my skin wasn't resembling a crispy corpse anymore, that did not change that my extremities had been burned away in my arcana.

This was going to suck.

"Senpai! Form a contract with her!"

I barely caught Mash's words as the shadow in the mist struck. My hand flicked to the side and ash in the air coalesced into a blade. Ashen blade met steel blade, and in the brief moment that the shadow darted past, I discerned their face.

He was a boy. Small, thin, underweight. In his hand was a wicked curved knife that had chips ripped out of it. A makeshift serrated knife. It looked almost to be self-inflicted, rather then through combat. His form was wrapped in bandages and some black cloth. His pants were too baggy, clearly fitted for an older man. He didn't wear a shirt.

His eyes were gold. His hair silver.

I blinked. The image was gone as he faded into the mist.

"You saw me?" His voice was like a whisper on the wind. If I hadn't caught sight of his form, I wouldn't know if he was male or female. "No, no, no. You're a woman! You aren't meant to see me!"

His voice was terrified. Terrified that I had seen him. Terrified that someone could see him.

"What? But-"

"Senpai, please!" Mash's desperate voice behind me drew my senses backwards for just a moment. In that second, I realised my mistake. I lost track of the boy within the fog.

The fog hid his presence. But I could see him before…

Ah, it was getting thicker. As it did so, my ashen blade faded, turning into little pieces of magical energy that faded in the whispers of light that broke the cloudy sky above. My arcana had been drained of its energy and it had tried to sustain itself by burning up the blade.

Curious.

"Keep an eye out. He's in the fog." I declared. How, though, could I defeat an opponent who used the fog to his advantage?

"He?" The foreign mage again. I glanced at her. Her face was setting in stone. The iron will I'd seen just once was burning just beneath her skin. I could appreciate that. Her will was not something that had been forged over time. It had been an innate quality of hers from the start.

No wonder Mash spoke of her in such delighted tones.

"The shadow is a boy. About four foot ten." I answered. "He's left handed. Watch your right side, Mash, he will likely aim for your arm."

"Got it." Mash's face set in stone, she hefted her shield. The transient distant star that we both served danced like fire over its surface.

"Don't deploy it."

"But-"

"The fog eats magic. You'll exhaust yourself." I was made of far sterner stuff then Mash. The knight blinked, just once. Then she nodded, and the deployment of Lord Camelot ceased, magic returning to its owner. I needed her well. There was no guarantee I could harm this boy.

No. I had to harm him, and decisively. Otherwise, one of us was going to die.

I wasn't expecting to be summoned into a battle. I will admit that. But even if it was a battle, I had my pride.

I was missing two toes and three fingers. The cost of forming twelve blades a second time so soon would be significantly more then that. Maybe if I only made one…

One would probably only need another two toes…

I just needed to take aim. How could I trick him into a single location?

"Motion response. East."

The voice was crackled, like I was hearing it through… something. I wasn't entirely sure what, if I was honest. However, my head snapped to the east in time with Mash. I caught sight of him again in the fog. He was dancing around some sort of metal cart for an opening.

He lunged. I took two steps back. Mash took two steps forward. His blade found Mash's shield. A moment later, he was bouncing into the air like a demented jack-rabbit, having kicked of Mash's shield.

"Dammit! Stop looking at me! I'll use it!"

It?

He had something in reserve?

Of course he did. No warrior ever used everything in the opening blow unless they were sure it'd annihilate the enemy. I was no different. I would rather use Rhongomyniad then reveal my blizzard of curses. Rhongomyniad was safer to use.

"I can't see him." The foreign mage muttered. I grimaced.

"Mash?"

"I can't either, Aesc."

She used my name. Mash remembered me. The script was well and truly broken.

Yet at the same time, it would be tragically cruel. I would have to pull her aside later.

"Right. Cover me." There was nothing for it. Either the fog needed to go, or the enemy did. I was already sick of this game of cat and mouse, and that was before he darted from fog again. I barely escaped his blade claiming my neck. This was not worth prolonging.

"Right! Distant star, myriad paths!" It was a mantra, a phrase used to invoke power. Mash was not born with her powers. Sometimes I forgot that. Words and phrases helped her activate them, like a form of hypnosis. It really was akin to magecraft or sacraments in that way.

Her form blurred just a bit. The third swing of the boy's blade found her shield. Mash had flickered in between him and me in an instant.

Mash was handy to have around. Her talents as a protector, as the 'Knight of Sheffield' as she put it, were top notch. I could appreciate such talent.

"Linking Divine Patterns. Tolling the Bones of the World. The time of Pilgrimage has come." My patterns all ignited. It would cost three toes. The pain was already blinding. I could feel hot tears in my eyes as I expended my own physical body for the spell.

"Huh!? No, lady! No trump cards!"

My breath stopped. My heart skipped a beat. Trump cards? What-

" MARIA THE RIPPER!( Bastard Son Slaughter Re-enactment) "

Blood went everywhere. I'd been disembowelled. The boy's knife was still inside me. I could see his face clearly, eyes gleaming in the light.

"AESC!"

My left hand seized his face. His breath hitched.

Stupid boy.

I am the Faerie of Paradise.

I do not have the privilege of dying. Besides, having my guts on the outside was such a mundane way to die.

"Even if the Star remains Distant, continue your march to that sacred place. Forgive me my sins and let me walk to paradise! Rhongomyniad( Spirit Vein Closing Armament) !"

The cost was my arm, not my toes. My left arm unravelled as the spear exploded in his face. The boy's body burned away in golden magical energy as he desperately expended his strength to keep from unravelling. The divine spear I'd conjured flung into the distance, crashing through several building before it finally shattered on brick and mortar. The fog spun around its path, before finally its resting place became obscured.

My breath was heavy. I stumbled backwards. I would have fallen, if not for Mash's arms wrapping around me.

"I don't believe it. Ritsuka, was that Rhongomyniad?"

"It was, Doctor." The foreign mage… her name was Ritsuka? She was certain. They had obviously seen that before. "Can you identify the Servant's class? My vision isn't getting anything."

"She isn't a proper servant. It would maybe be better to call her a still living hero."

"Like Drake?"

"Exactly. I don't understand. Mash, how did you-"

"Can we not while Aesc is literally spilling her guts on the ground?" Mash sounded frustrated. I just groaned. Its not like my guts had left my belly yet. "Aesc, can you-"

"I'm fine Mash. Just… give me a moment." Mending flesh wasn't hard.

"But your arm-"

"Trivial. I just need time." My breath was coming in small pants. Mash hadn't seen me be wounded or executed before. She didn't realise that this really wasn't that big a bother. It might only take a day to fix, now that I was in a place with proper magical energy and not within the Spiritual Tomb of Albion, a place were reality simply went to lunch. The fog, though, that was annoying.

The fog-

Oh.

"Aesc?" Mash must have noticed my change of demeanour. I just groaned.

"He isn't dead."

"Didn't you hit him with-"

"I know." I just grit my teeth as Mash rested me against one of those metal carts. "He must have more then one body or something. What was that?"

"A servant. I think it's safe to assume he was an Assassin." My eyes went to Ritsuka again. She wasn't the tallest. Maybe a finger length shorter then me, and I was not exactly tall. Her chest was raising and falling in large, rapid motions. A sure tale sign of stress and panic.

Of course she was panicked. That must have been part of what broke Mash's script. I lifted my right hand and stroked Mash's cheek with my index finger. One of only two fingers I actually possessed.

Using Rhongomyniad had stung.

Stung was drastically understating it.

"Who are you?"

I could see him now. A sort of blue image of a man. Given everything was coloured blue, I couldn't be sure if his hair was some flavour of blonde or pink. His face was sharp, though, and the lines on his forehead showed one who'd aged somewhat prematurely.

"I am Ae-" I cut myself off. No. I wasn't anymore. I wasn't in the Britain of Faeries. I was free of that obligation. "I am Tonelico." I corrected myself. "Summoned by my Tam Lin to your assistance."

I left that I had very ulterior motives out.

"Tam Lin?" Ritsuka raised an eyebrow for a moment. Her mind worked like lightning. I could see the gears churning. "That blessing that activated when Mash used Lord Camelot the first time?"

Huh? Wait, she'd worked that out already?

"One and the same." Mash confirmed. Ritsuka nodded. She didn't look too happy about it.

"Right. The one that keeps getting in the way." Her voice was dark. "We wont suddenly forget this discussion too, will we?"

I blinked. So the issue of the arcana I'd used had already presented itself? Mash was so much stronger then I had thought. So much stronger then me, if I was being honest. I would not have had the heart to do it.

"We shouldn't, should we? I mean, a summoning is too big a thing to just sweep away. Its not like its information."

"I'm not sure-"

"It won't." My voice cut between Ritsuka and her 'Doctor'. "Mash cannot tell you anything that would result in her existence being compromised. I am the one who weaved that spell."

"Existence? Then our hypothesis of time travel was correct?" The Doctor's voice cut in. I just nodded.

"Of a sort. Think of it more like the dinner plate being flipped over. The reverse side cannot do anything that would change the front of the plate." That safeguard was more for Mash's benefit then mine, I will admit. I was not a valid target for removal. The planet would begrudgingly accept my existence now, as someone who may be somewhen and nowhere at once.

Mash had no such safeguard. If she did something that compromised her place in the Britain of Faeries, she would immediately be removed.

"Then you are… a friend?"

"…" I wasn't sure whether to lie or not. After all, Ritsuka and I had bee enemies the last time we'd met. Ritsuka's eyes glimmered, and I think she worked that out immediately. My faerie eyes cut to the very core of her truth, perhaps the first time I'd willingly done so in decades, and within, I found a single word.

Understanding.

No wonder he( she) had been able to command dozens of heroic shadows against the gods of Olympus and Woodwose and Barghest. It was his( her) very nature that had allowed him( her) to do so.

"Say after me." Ritsuka's voice was almost gentle, as she offered me her hand. "I, eighth sword garbed in three words declare. I shall be the sword and the shield of man. I shall keep balance."

My lips curled just a little in response. She could make magic on the fly. A talent, but tempered by the fact she was hopelessly incompetent as a magus. Her Magic Circuit( Patterns) was pitifully small. Her red hair was loosely tied in a ponytail, but it had been severed. As if…

Wasn't that cruel?

"I, the eighth sword garbed in three words declare. I shall be the sword and shielf of man. I shall keep balance. Forgive me my sins." It was a pact of sorts. I was the Faerie of Paradise, though. I wasn't subject to orders and pacts like that. I could ignore them. Yet the link formed and burned almost immediately, and I felt the rush of energy. With it, I understood why Mash seemed to have so much to burn.

Where did Ritsuka get so much energy from?

From the place outside time observing her. Of course, the Doctor must have been observing her existence. So long as he observed her in good health, she would rapidly return to such in short order. Using large amounts of magical energy in short bursts was not an issue because the depleted energy would always correct into a healthy reserve, since that was what those outside observed for her. It was a cunning system that could only be used with Rayshifting.

I did not give the foreigners called Chaldea nearly enough credit. I might be a brilliance that eclipsed any one of them individually, but together…

"We can see the contract. Designation is indeed living hero. Class Pretender. Ritsuka, are you seeing this True Name?"

"I… am." I blinked.

"What?"

"Doctor, what are you seeing?" Mash sounded almost terrified. "Wait, how do I know its you!? I should have asked before! I'm so stupid I-"

"It's okay, Mash." I cut her off. "I am the faerie that will forge the final weapon. The cursed little faerie of paradise. The saviour that is hated and burned you with the curses of Cerunnos. So speaks Rhongomyniad." Mash's face fell. She blinked. I could see a tear.

"It is you."

"Course it is, my little Galahad. All you had to do was call. I came running." Well, not quite. Waiting for the call had felt like torture. In many ways, it probably was classed as such. "Doctor… alas, I'm sorry. I didn't catch your name."

"It's Romani. Romani Archaman."

"Romani." It was a nice name. I recognised it. Mash had mentioned him once or twice as her father. "What is my name from your perspective."

"… Morgan. Morgan le Fae."

…

I was afraid of that. I wanted to howl at the unfairness of it all. Instead I just closed my eyes, my lips setting into a thin, sardonic line, and I let out the air in my lungs.

"Makes sense. Gut's curse follows me even now."

"Gut's? You mean, Beryl Gut?"

"Oh. He was one of yours." I opened one eye. "Truly an unpleasant man. Why do you keep him around?"

"He's been mortally wounded. But nevermind that, how do you-"

"There would be little point going into detail. Just know he summoned Morgan le Fae at some point, and I am paying for it. Any more would jeopardise little Mash's existence." After all, if they knew, Beryl may not summon Morgan. May not…

Ugh. Fantasies made my head hurt. Especially when they interacted with Singularities. Singularities were just periods of disrupted no time. While they existed, the world could not progress, like a question that needed an answer.

Fantasies that had become their own no time, however.

Ugh.

I wasn't even sure what came first. Beryl summoning Morgan or Morgan failing to convince me to abandon my role as Aesc.

How many loops of that Lost World had happened to create enough inconsistencies for me to break the script? I know I'd summarised it quite easily for Mash at once point, but…

Well, it had been the simple version.

"Another thing we'll forget?"

"I don't know. My spell prioritises Mash's continued existence and excises anything that threatens it. My words do not bear exception to that rule. After all, what is her true name?"

"Uh…" Ritsuka blinked. Just once. Her lips twisted into a frown. "Wait, you told us a moment ago!"

"Yes. I did. But you don't remember." Just because the script broke didn't mean the world wouldn't try to get back roughly on track. "Singularities technically have foregone conclusions, especially for me."

"Then you come from the time beyond the end of the world?"

The Doctor was very smart. I liked him.

"I do. Rejoice. Your victory is possible." I closed my eyes again. Oh everything stung. "At least… it should happen. If it doesn't, well, you get to take me with you."

And the entire world, I think. If I died here, I'm not sure what would happen within the fantasy I'd left. Would it pop entirely?

I…

Actually, I'm not sure I care. There was no point worrying about it. I hate humans. I hate fae. I can save neither of them. That was what I repeated to myself.

Yes. That was the truth.

"Still, you called yourself Tonelico." Ritsuka noted. "Is that…"

"My name." I confirmed. My birth name, specifically. "I would rather Aesc."

After all, I chose Aesc for myself. Unlike-

"Doctor, overwrite the designation." I opened my eyes again. No wonder Mash liked Ritsuka so much. Ritsuka was kind, even when the reality of the world worked against me. I was a Pretender. In this history, I did not exist. Thus, everything about Tonelico had become merely something about Morgan instead.

I hated it.

Yet-

"Thank you."

"Don't mention it. We're even for Fuyuki." Ritsuka answered. I raised an eyebrow as she leaned down. "Doctor, can I get another two Command Spells loaded? I'm going to burn some."

"Roger. Keep in mind we only have seven."

"It's fine."

"Fuyuki?" My question just got small smiles from Mash and Ritsuka.

"A story for another time, Aesc." Mash finally answered. "Let's just say you gave King Arthur a fright when you overrode Lord Chaldeas." She pumped her arm with a grin. "Super Kyrielight did well that day."

I understood. I smiled too. The blessing of the Tam Lin I'd given her had long since faded. The spell did, after all, require me to be around to continue granting it. When she arrived back, though, it must have been on full force.

"By the way, adjust your Rayshift temperature down two degrees. Its slowing your realisation time enough that the world has a chance to cull you before you arrive." I noted. Ritsuka's hands, which had been glowing with excess power, stopped. I felt magical energy fill my core, my very being. I immediately did the sane thing and started setting it to putting my ruined corpse back together.

"How did you-"

"… You worked that out just by looking at senpai?" Mash's mouth fell open. I grinned.

I've still got it.

<—>​

Ritsuka possesses three command spells. Overall Chaldea has five remaining.

Section 1 is…

[ ] Knight of Londinium (Saber: Mordred, Assassin: ????)
[ ] One Book, One Pen (Caster: ????, Caster: Nursery Rhyme, ????: ????)
[ ] The City of Steam (Caster: ????, Assassin: ????)

 

[BlackHadou]

Reconstituting my body was not difficult. Not with the excess magical energy that I was granted from the Command Spell. The contract between me and Ritsuka was unusual, to be sure. It was not dissimilar to my bastardisation of the Servant Summoning System. It wasn't a contract to maintain the existence of a Servant, nor was it my contract to maintain the existence of the Fae. It did not make the false real, for the world considered me real.

No, it was a contract between one who needed and one who provided. Initially, I was the one who needed, for I needed magical energy to undo the damage to my body, but really, Ritsuka was the one who needed. After all, she wished to live, and humanity was…

Now that we had a moment, I could start to grasp the situation. In the sky, I could see a ring of light, burning through the fog even though the sky was otherwise obscured. It was a great ring that burned with the light of human wishes, a weapon fundamentally not dissimilar to the Sacred Armament. My eyes narrowed as my senses extended towards it.

No. Not human wishes. Human memory. Human history. Human…

"You never told me about that." I motioned absently to the sky with my hand that now had four fingers. "Is that new, or-"

"No. The ring of light was there the last time." Mash's answer was gentle. "Its name is Ars Almadel Salomonis. The-"

"Some sort of incineration ritual. Its like what I did with the tree on a grand scale." I muttered. "It uses memory? Or history?"

"History." Mash just nodded, leaning down and wiping some sweat from my brow. "You look worse for wear. Are you sure you're okay?"

"I've had worse." I was honestly more upset that my tunic had a nice, long gash in it, revealing my stomach. I lifted up my reconstituted left arm and waved at her. "Plenty of magical energy to fix it with." I glanced at Ritsuka, who was saying… something or other with the Doctor. "I'm sorry. This was very cruel of me."

"Was it?" I blinked. Mash just smiled. "I have the chance to say things that I couldn't say before. I am grateful for it. But…" Her face fell after a moment. "Father can't escape, can he?"

Could he?

Was his death essential to Mash's future existence?

"I don't know." I elected to just tell the truth, slowly drawing my now complete body back to its feet. It was nice to have all my toes again. "You know, missing toes suck."

"Wait, you were missing toes!?"

"Yeah. Burned them at the tree." Mash winced. Maybe I was being callous. "Have you… never lost limbs? Haven't you been doing this a while?"

"No. Never." I winced in turn. That was the statement of a girl who was very lucky. Most warriors did not actually retain all their digits and extremities. Usually they lost one or two.

That was my experience in my kingdom at least.

"You will need to come to terms with that then. Sooner or later you won't be lucky." The look on Mash's face told me she knew that, but only intellectually. I glanced at Ritsuka. "She has, hasn't she?"

"... Yes. Even ignoring last time, Heracles took her left arm." I nodded sadly. "Um… is it supposed to be-"

"Different?"

"Yes." I stared at Mash for a long moment. She didn't look different, now that I thought about it. She should have, she was younger, but no, all that had changed was that the steel wrapping her form no longer had the purple waist cape. "We have, after all, messed with the script. Time abhors a paradox, but by nature of you having an idea of what is coming, you are taking slightly different actions. That butterfly spreads and changes probability, and everything steadily goes of script. Those moments where you can act and everything changes is what I called the script breaking."

"Then fate is real." I just snicker at Mash's response, rolling my eyes.

"In a sense. Its not that you didn't have a choice, exactly. It's that we as living creatures technically have already made all of the choices in our life. That's what it means to be part of the tree of time." I answered. "Singularities try to break free of that by overwriting those choices and introducing paradoxes. Time will try to reshuffle to accommodate the change to a degree, but only until it reaches a period of fixed time. At that point, all important details are equalised."

"Quantum time locks." Mash jumped at Ritsuka's voice. "When all important details are set to the same value. We are familiar with it. Was a bit of an issue in Septem."

"Septem?" I shook my head. "One of the no-times?"

"Yes. We were there about two months ago." Mash added.

"Then you and Mash can ignore time locks to a degree?" Ritsuka sounded almost curious. I shook my head.

"Not quite. Its more a privilege. Mash can re-select any choice she made between when she returned and when she left, so long as she does not invalidate her original choice." I answered. "Normally, if she did so she'd just…" I motioned with my hands. The point was made.

"But your spell protects me." Mash noted. I shook my head.

"It only prevents you from giving away information you shouldn't." I noted. "Nothing says an action you take wouldn't do it. Be careful, is all I'm saying." Really, there probably isn't anything Mash could do, in and of itself, that would immediately obliterate her. Say, plenty, but do, no.

"I will. I'm no use to senpai if I'm gone." Mash decalred, her face set in a line. "But… um…"

She was nervous. Very nervous.

"Is it something here?" I asked. Mash nodded. "Don't bother explaining. We'll have forgotten in five minutes. I'm guessing its something big, something that can't be inconsistent."

"Can you bless me again?"

Ritsuka frowned at Mash's words. She was nervous, but those nerves would be gone in a few minutes as we forgot what Mash said. After all, time would not allow inconsistencies in such a fashion. Mash's own personal timeline would keep her safe. I had to trust in that.

"I name you Tam Lin Galahad. Hero and saviour. Safeguard our futures." I gently placed my finger on her nose. Her body was wrapped in light for a moment, then her cape and waist-cape returned, as Mash was wrapped in the full steel of her knight self, her Spirit Origin conforming to the power of the hero of the fae. "Just remember that is exhausting. I don't have my throne."

Yet it was probably more efficient then just casting magic. Generally, it was easier to just beat a bastard to death then to use magic. Magic took patterns and energy to use, and generally you expended far less dealing with the problem yourself.

Mash being Super Mash was just easier on me, in other words.

"Can you do that to others?" Ritsuka asked. I nodded.

"Technically? Yes. But even my patterns will run out of energy if I do it to multiple people at once." I answered, letting out a long breath. My skin tingled. It was warm. Magical energy generated heat when it moved. As a faerie, I could very easily burn up everything else about me to make more energy too. After all, I was not really 'here', in a sense. Human's were flesh and blood who lived in the world you perceived. I was a faerie and lived in the world behind the veil. My form was always technically made of magic.

I wonder if I could look like something else? I never really considered that.

"The fog is a problem too." Mash noted. "It's drawing the energy away."

"Nothing we can do about it yet." Ritsuka shrugged. "Got a direction for us?" She looked at Mash.

"Sorry, senpai. I don't remember which way we went. Even if I did…" She glanced at me. "You said Assassin was a boy?"

"Aye."

"That's different." Her hands wrung together at that. "Is that important?"

"Probably not." I mused. "Gender might be important for specific people, but only if their children themselves are part of a lock and the father's identity is important. Otherwise, well…" The Assassin was a murderer. One we'd already forgotten the identity of. "Given I can't remember him very well, I think it's safe to say his gender doesn't matter."

"If I just said his name, would you remember it?"

"I'm not sure. Give it a try."

" █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ █ ( Jack the Ripper) ."

Both Ritsuka and I looked at her and shook our heads.

"I didn't even hear it." Ritsuka admitted.

"I heard it. But it's already gone." Still. If Mash knew who he was, then we had a defence of sorts. That we didn't remember it, though, could have been two things.

I suspected rather then my spell, it was actually some characteristic of Assassin that kept us from remembering him. Mash was immune not because she was remembering him, she clearly was not, but because she had met his alternate and remembered her.

"He has a Noble Phantasm for murdering… well, women." Mash continued. "Just… keep that in mind."

"Human women."

"Huh?"

"I already worked out how his curse works. It must be night. It must be foggy. The target must be a female human." It was actually oddly specific. "Why human, I wonder…"

"If I may interject, it also isn't actually night." Romani spoke up, his little blue image flickering in. "It is almost midday. Only one and a half conditions were actually satisfied."

Good to know, I suppose. Letting out a breath, I glanced at Ritsuka.

"Pick a direction?"

"That way." Ritsuka just picked a street and started walking. I blinked.

"Just like that?"

"Daylights a wasting." Oh god. Was she an airhead or-

"Senpai can be like that. She doesn't dilly dally." Mash noted. "We should go, Aesc." She skipped away from me before I could answer. I just let out a groan.

"She reminds me of Baobahn Sith." I muttered under my breath. So very earnest, but…

Well. It was something to keep in mind at least.

<-->
​

"I hate this fog."

I didn't actually hate the fog, per say. I hated the feeling of my magical energy seeping out, like water through a sieve. Mash just rolled her eyes at that.

"No you don't."

"Does she do that often?"

"Quite a bit. Its part of her saviour complex." I winced at that. Mash cut straight to the heart of the issue in a single word. It almost stung.

"My poor heart."

"Your words, Aesc, not mine." Yet Mash's eyes danced. "Or do you take it back?"

"No. I… do that a lot." I admit. It just stung to get my bad points dragged to the light. The Faerie of Paradise was not meant to have such flaws. Our march passed us through the streets, but there were no humans, no civilization. Just rubbish, metal carts, and empty shops.

My nose crinkled.

"Should we have met someone by now?" I asked. Ritsuka nodded.

"Aye." She mused. "I can feel it. Someone is following us."

"Can you?" Strange. I didn't feel any presence in particular. Maybe the fog was getting in the way? I wasn't quite sure.

"Yes." She paused, thinking for a moment. "They have a grudge. Do you look like someone else, maybe? Or-"

"While interesting, I do need to cut in. You have motion coming from the south-east. I would prepare for battle." Romani cut in. I just groaned.

"Battle? You know what they are?"

"Machines. Sort of like a golem." Ritsuka answered, as a shadow formed around her form, an arm wrapping down and around and protectively rasping her shoulders. It was a male form, but at over twelve feet tall, there was no word for it but 'hulking'. His right hand had a great big stone sword in it.

"Should I use the blunt side of my shield?" Mash asked, hefting the great big shield that was the Round Table. Ritsuka just groaned.

"No more of that."

"But senpai, we have to preserve human lives!"

"They are robots!"

"Girls." My voice cut over them in exasperation. I could see the shadows that Romani was referring to. "If you would rather I just deal with it, that is fine."

"..."

"..."

They both looked at each other. Then they glanced at me apologetically.

"No. Keep your strength." Mash declared, stepping in front of me. "Especially since you're… un… armed…" Her face twisted, like a lightbulb going off. "Oh. Oops."

"Oops?"

"Here." Her hand reached into her shield's face, and she pulled forth my old staff. "I forgot I had this."

My mouth fell open for a moment. I'd forgotten about that too, if I was honest. My hand reached out gingerly to take the gnarled root. It was more a source of comfort then something I needed, but…

"Thank you." The shadows shot forward. White monstrosities that vaguely resembled humans. They were discernibly not human, or even robots. They were…

"Those aren't machines."

I almost answered with an incredibly snarky retort. Mash, on the other hand, let out a groan, having turned the small group of them into a messy splay of paste down the street. If I was real, neither Ritsuka nor I really did anything.

My Tam Lin was strong. It made me proud.

"Then what are they? Some sort of… beast?" Ritsuka asked. Mash shook her head.

"An artificial human." She explained. "A-"

"Homunculus." I finished for her. "Patterns wrapped around a layer of flesh and given a prime directive. Simplistic, but effective. They are basically disposable bombs."

"Yeah." Mash nodded. "But… I don't think I remember fighting these here. Unless…"

"You are human."

"What's that meant to mean." Ritsuka's eye narrowed, but I lifted a hand placatingly.

"It's not meant as offence. I remember everything I've experienced because I can't forget. Humans don't have that luxury." I answered. "You might have just forgotten."

"I guess…" Mash muttered. "But-"

Whatever she was going to say was cut of with a scrambled choke. I didn't realise what was going on until Mash's body had yanked me to the side, into the protective shell of her shield. Steel met steel and rang like a cruel bell down the street.

Then something solid smashed the shield and we went flying.

"Mash! Aesc!"

"Shuddup you bint! Of course that bitch got summoned! Turn it back you asshole!"

We bounced across the ground, skidding to a stop. Mash's breathing was normal. Mine, though… I feel like my chest had been crushed. My spine arced as I scrambled to fill my lungs with air. My limbs flailed out of pure instinct.

It hurt. Greatly. That was the truth in my mind.

"Wait, you're-"

"Shuddup goodie twoshoes! Of course you'd side with that bitch!" My gaze finally found what had attacked me. It was short. Maybe my size. Wrapped in steel and red cloth. In its hand was a sword of pure silver, and her body crackled with red lightning. Its helm was crowned with horns. The voice, I recognised it, in a twisted, demented way.

That was the second thing in human history that had hidden its identity from me. This one used my own voice. How twisted was this place?

"Goodie twoshoes?" I asked. Wait, it was referring to Galahad! "It knows?"

"Mash, shield up!" Ritsuka's voice cracked out. The black, hulking shadow was already moving, but the steel figure did not even look. Its sword slung over its shoulder and caught the descending stone blade. Stone and brick cracked, as her foot smashed through the ground to her ankle, but it didn't slow her implaccable march.

"Get out, human." The blade shoved up. The figure spun. Its foot caught the shadow in the chin, and sent it through a building. Then it kept walking. "Morgan. You bitch. Turn London back!"

"Morgan?"

Did it think I was Morgan le Fae?

…

Was it wrong? Was the other me responsible for this?

I forced myself to stand. Mash set herself between me and the knight. Her shield burned with the flames of that distant star.

I couldn't die yet. But that figure. Just looking at it made me think that it may well succeed in killing me.

Wait.

My eye caught sight of its left hand at last, and I realised that this scene was twisted and wrong. It might have been shattered, cracked and smashed, but it had my discarded Rhongomyniad in its hand. The divine weapon had not faded away.

My breath hitched.

"How?" My lips twisted into a snarl. That was almost offensive. Sacrilige. Heresy. My sacred spears should have been unuseable except by… me…

"What. The spear? It's interesting hocus pocus, mother, don't get me wrong. But you know I can use it. Or did your spell not work?"

Mother?

Who was this?

I don't know who they are. Why don't I? Did Morgan le Fae consider them that beneath notice that I didn't inherit it from her memories?

"Who are you?" Something was obscuring them. My eyes could only see a hole in the world where its form should have been. My hand wrapped around the staff. I had to-

"... Fuck you. Was I that unworthy?" The helmet snapped away, folding out of sight. My own face stared back at me. Naked hostility graced every one of her features. Her sword lifted to heaven and erupted in a column of fire.

Oh.

Oh no.

"That's not good."

"No! That which heals all wounds and-"

" Rhongomiant!( Life Hunting Spear Heartbreak) " The girl who looked like me thrust the spear forth. My Rhongomyniad shattered as soon as the stab reached its apex, lancing forward in an arc of light. Mash barely caught it on the surface of her shield before it struck her heart. She hurtled away into the distance.

Two buildings collapsed under the force of her body.

My breath hitched. She was so damn strong.

A part of me wanted to call it incredible. She was not human. She was a Faerie( Dragon) compressed into human shape and wrapped around the possibility of mortality. In a word, an abomination on nature. Yet at the same time, she was beautiful.

After all, I could appreciate twisted existences. I loved Barghest and Baobahn Sith, after all. I offered them that love freely, even if I'd been terrible at expressing it.

I-

" Clarent Blood Arthur!( Rebellion Against my Beautiful Father) "

The column of red fell. Calamity. The end of a nation compressed into red lightning, blood and rage. The magical energy was radiant, so strong that its mere approach was singing the hairs on my flesh. I lifted my head and grit my teeth.

I don't know why she hates me.

Maybe this was my penance for refusing the call.

I don't want to fight her.

She reminds me too much of Barghest.

But if I don't act I'll die.

This weapon can kill me.

This weapon can kill Britain.

There was only one option.

If I dodged, Mash would get hurt. I couldn't bear to see her hurt for me.

" Ronmiant Around!( The Bones of Salvation You Pilgrimage For) " I slammed my staff forth. There was only one option, cruel as it was. The air was filled with ash like snow. The blizzard blew. The blade fell, and I tore at it with every pattern I could direct its way. I could only protect everyone if I drained it of its magical energy.

If it had 10000 units of magical energy, I only managed to eat 1000. All I really did was slow down the descent of the blade.

"SABER! STOP!"

The blade was already falling. I saw a shadow lunge in front of my doppelganger, but his hands could not stop the descending blade. Only slow it down.

This would hurt.

I had eaten about 2000 units of magical energy now. Enough that I would at least survive. This was going to hurt so much.

" Lord Camelot!( Now is a Castle of Hope) "

The shield of the Round Table smashed down in front of me. I blinked. The name had changed. Slightly.

The star I chased blazed into existance. Eternal walls and gates erupted in front of us, forming seven layers of battlements. The falling calamity struck.

The first battlement was incinerated. So were battlements two through four.

Battlements five and six crumbled apart.

The blade finally tore through battlement seven.

Red blade of light smashed into the shield of Galahad, and was held still.

My lungs were about to explode, but I couldn't bring myself to speak or breathe. I was alive, but only because Mash had come to my rescue. Having seen the damage that blade did, no, I'm pretty sure I was wrong. I'd have been killed in that swing. My body had small wisps of black energy leaving it, drawn into the red blade. Eaten away.

I don't know what that is. I don't-

"Get out of my way, Jekyl!" 'Saber' snarled, shoving her compatriot aside and lifting her blade again. "Clarent Blood-"

Whoever had assisted in her creation was incredible. Her patterns could refill themselves with energy from burning light almost immediately. Her blade was already lighting up for a second swing. Already-

"MORDRED! STOP!"

"-Arthur! DIE MORGAN!"

She'd called me mother.

She must have been Morgan le Fae's daughter. Faeries were not meant to have children. Yet-

There wouldn't be a second block. We'd-

"Lancer! Durandina!"

Blood splattered. Ritsuka's command had been absolute. The Noble Phantasm spear of hope had struck before any of us had known what was going on, sticking out of the knights side. She blinked.

"You-"

She swung.

The shadow of a man bearing the spear of hope was incinerated in a single slash, carving away the building behind him as well. Ritsuka panted. Just once, her left hand gripping her right wrist. Blood dripped from her arm, where her arm had exploded.

She was actually talented. She could convert her body into magic.

Very talented.

"... You dare." 'Saber' snarled. Ritsuka's lips twisted into a smug grin.

"I dare. Mordred. Knight of Treachery."

"What of it?"

[ ] "How about we put the weapons down and talk." Ritsuka was in more control then I thought.
[ ] "Lancer. Gae Bolg." Wait, what? Gri-
[ ] "Saber. Stop killing them before they can help us!" The man that was with Saber is… maybe more calm then her.
[ ] "Linking Divine Patterns." Now was my shot.

 

[BlackHadou]

When I close my eyes, I see a blizzard of ash.

It's a violent storm, raging and howling. It fills my ears and my sight with meaningless white noise. It steals my sense of place and drags me down into sorrow. In the distance, I see a small star, burning in spite of it all.

The storm is the world of humans. Their perceptions. Their lies. It makes repose almost impossible.

That storm is what convinced me of the one truth of my life.

I hate humans.

I hate faeries.

I can never see Spring.

Then I met her. Mash. She was human, but she was from outside. Our time together was brief, but then she was gone again. I could have been selfish and kept her to myself. If I had, I might not have transformed from Aesc the Saviour into Morgan le Fae. I might have chosen a different path.

But I chose the correct path.

At least, I believe I chose the correct path.

I am making guesses about what I did in a time I do not actually remember. However, I know what my plan had been because it had occurred to me in my second loop. I'd have sealed her in a Spiritual Coffin in Orkney. So long as she remained Galahad at the roof of our world, she would have been safe. She just had to remain gone until the day of Norwich.

Then the world would let her exist again.

But I digress.

Uther died. Everything I worked for turned to ruin. The world faced disaster. The Great Calamity was coming.

I chose to throw it all away. I chose to be the monster that everyone needed, not the saviour they wanted. Faeries didn't really want a saviour, anyway. They liked the idea of one, right up until the moment came to pass where it was time to own up to ones sins. The faeries refused to take responsibility in much the same way a human child might not. Its not that they did not understand the idea of 'make it right', its that they had no concept of right and wrong in the first place.

Original sin, if you would, was a bitch.

Cerunnos is not exempt. I do not blame him. If anything, I fear him. However, I also am upset with him. There was no atonement for the fae of Britain. They could not be redeemed. It wasn't that they weren't necessarily deserving of being redeemed, Cerunnos simply had not put such a thing in place.

And now he was dead. A dead god fueled by rage. If he had woken, then the world would end.

That was what Morgan le Fae feared. I feared. So I sealed the world in what might as well have been called stasis. Things changed on a day to day level, but at large, faerie society had been the same for two thousand years.

I waited two thousand years. Gathering strength.

Then she came. Little Artoria. My sister( self) .

And it all came tumbling down.

I was granted a second chance. But for what? I'd used all my arcana and genius and just run away. It had seemed like a good idea at the time.

"Let me have happy memories."

That was my greatest desire. Yet I don't think it can be attained. There is no such thing for the Faerie of Paradise.

There is no such thing for me.

<—>​

I am Pretender. I understood the concept now.

I am a still living hero. The planet acknowledged my gambit and let me live. It was so very insane, but the insanity of the logic is what had made it work.

I lived, but I had no anecdote of being Aesc( Tonelico) . Aesc( Tonelico) had not existed in the history of humans. So the world bypassed it all by stapling me to the existence of Morgan le Fae.

From the perspective of the world, I was Morgan le Fae. I did not bear all of her memories, only what she'd deemed important. Several things that were actually important had very obviously been omitted. Morgan le Fae, the true one if you will, was actually the fusion of three spirits. I suspect I only bore the knowledge possessed by one of those spirits. Morgan.

That meant the knowledge of Vivian and Morganna was not mine to know. I intellectually knew of things that Vivian and Morganna might have done. However, the spirit that Beryl Gut had actually summoned was that of 'King Arthur's kind sister'. Not of the destroyer of Britain.

I knew that I had contributed to that on some level.

No. I knew that she had contributed to that on some level.

Sometimes it was difficult to separate where I ended and Morgan le Fae began. It was actually very cruel.

The thing in front of me. It was now something that could be analysed. Mordred. That was what Ritsuka had told me. Morgan's memories only noted her as the Knight of Treachery, the destroyer of Britain. But Mordred's words meant that Morgan was her mother.

Which means Morgan had made Mordred.

They had not had a happy relationship.

That means that…

The Morgan that Mordred had known was probably Morganna. The actual being one refers to, when one refers to the Great Mother faerie called Morgan le Fae. The Avatar of Britain.

I knew of such things only intellectually. I could not put it into better context. After all, I am the Faerie of Paradise.

I don't have siblings, or children, or parents. Yet… Looking at Mordred…

I feel a swelling in my chest. I don't know if it is from me or from the memories of Morgan. Whether it is some lingering affection that I hadn't known about or if it was something else. It was an impossibility and an-

It came back to the core of what I want.

I want a memory of Spring. Of happy days and love.

I want to belong.

That is impossi-

"Saber. Stop killing them before they can help us!" The words of the man who'd interfered were harsh. He was certainly more calm then Mordred. Mordred's lips twisted into a snarl. Her instincts were in overdrive.

I had already deployed Ronmiant Around. I'd exhausted that avenue of defence. My mental limits for the moment had been reached. If she decided to fling around that giant red blade of light again, we wouldn't make it.

She spat to the side. Her blade lifted.

"They aren't our friends, Henry." Her blade rose to the sky. Lightning crackled. It's blade would extend in an edge of light in an instant. It would-

Mordred stopped. Her muscles were like stone. Her attention was on her partner. In his hand was a potion.

"No… You wouldn't."

"Try me, Mordred." Henry, I think his name was. He used her name. Not Saber. Not the class the Human Salvation Ritual had assigned Mordred. They knew each other relatively personally. That was the nature of co-conspirators.

Mash had moved to my side. Her shield hovered over me protectively. Her face was clouded with doubt.

"Can you block another?" I asked. Mash shook her head. I understood why. Lord Camelot was the wishes of humanity to live, turned into the greatest shield. But that shield had fallen from within. Mordred was the blade that had done it.

She was probably uniquely suited to pierce that defence. That we'd been successful in blocking it once had been a miracle. My mental fortitude had run out. I'm not sure I could pull myself together in time to cast more magic.

Yet Mash stood over me. My protector. My-

"GYAAAARGH!" Mordred's howl of rage rang out. Her sword went flying into the distance, smashing through one of those metal carts like paper. "What the hell, Henry!? That-!" A mailed fist pointed angrily at me. "Is Morgan le Fucking Fae! She almost certainly caused our problems here!"

"The Servant Summoning Ritual cannot summon faeries, Mordred." Henry's answer was calm. That potion in his hand teetered a little closer to his lips. My heart stopped.

Wait. It couldn't?

Beryl had clearly s-

…

No. Morgan, as summoned by Beryl, was human. The other parts of her had been left behind.

Which meant summoning Morgan le Fae, Mordred's mother, was probably close to impossible.

"I know that!" Mordred snarled. Her fist smashed a light pole. The light pole bent. "What, do you think she is innocent!?"

"She's a faerie." Henry's answer was calm. "When you put the impossible together, the only solution that fits criteria must be valid." His response was almost cryptic. Ritsuka, bless her, was inching closer. "I would stay your hand. In your state, I don't think Mordred needs her sword."

Mordred did not even regard Ritsuka's presence. Yet I could see the blood clearing away. Her arm was healing at a frankly impressive rate.

"You're fucking demented, Henry." Mordred snarled. "There's no way my mother isn't involved in sending this place to hell!"

"Then we must take the evidence and consider." Henry retorted. "Is that Morgan?"

"Who the fuck else could it be?"

"Any faerie that shares her purpose, for one."

… I like Henry.

Henry was intelligent. That said, I don't think logic was going to stop Mordred. My treacherous body did not wish to cooperate as I stood up. My body ached. My limbs were not okay. I wasn't… hurt, not quite. But I wasn't okay either.

The light of Mordred's sword had eaten something up inside me. It was poison to my existence.

Mordred took a deep breath. A long, deep breath. Then she kicked the light pole. It went flying.

It bounced.

It was actually a pretty impressive kick.

"Say I fucking believe you…" She turned, on her heel, and glared at Ritsuka. "… What, do you think we can trust her? Mother was a piece of fucking work and-"

"If they weren't working to save London, do you think 'goodie two-shoes' over there would be with them?" Henry retorted. Mordred glared at him. For one long moment. A very long moment.

Then her helmet formed back over her head, and she became a hole in the world again.

"Fuck you."

"You're welcome."

"This is a mistake, Henry."

"Then I made it." The potion lowered, and the man turned, straightening his doublet absently. "My apologies for my compatriot. As you can see, she gets a bit ruffled at the unexpected. I am Henry Jekyll. Given the homunculi and helter skelters appear to have attacked you, well, I think the enemy of my enemy is my friend for the moment, don't you think?"

He was completely unruffled. It was like nothing had happened.

Mash slowly inched forward. Slowly.

"Um…"

"Don't worry. Mordred won't bite… well, immediately, at least." Henry continued. "But I doubt this is a discussion for out in the open. If you would follow me, it'd be more comfortable in doors."

"I can agree with that." Ritsuka grumbled, her hands falling to her side as she wearily stepped around Mordred. The knight seemed to not care, just huffing and looking away.

"This is a mistake." She repeated. Henry shrugged.

"That's fine. It's mine to make. Let's go before the fog gets thick. It's getting late."

Wait, the fog gets thick!?

"This isn't thick!?" Mash voiced my incredulity. Yet looking at her, I realised the source of her confusion. This was information inconsistent with her memory.

Henry just nodded.

"Unfortunately. The fog might kill you after a few hours at this time, not that the population dares to leave the house these days." He answered. "In… about an hour? It'll kill you in minutes, servant or not. The fog starts actively devouring magical energy once the sun finishes setting."

I pursed my lips.

"Then it is the ability of that boy." I noted.

"Boy?" Mordred's gaze fell on me.

"The one in the fog. The one that has multiple bodies. The assassin of women." Henry swallowed. His hand went to his pocket, withdrawing a small pocket watch, which he flicked open and stared at.

"I think… we need to get a move on." He said. "It seems we have some information to trade. Especially if you have an idea of what that things abilities are." He closed the watch again. Yet I was sure the mist had gotten lighter.

"No, we should ta-"

"Mordred, we are out of time." Henry's voice sounded almost strained. "Come on. Please. We can discuss this soon enough."

His voice brooked no argument. In the face of that, Mordred finally just gave up, her gaze falling on me.

"If I think for a moment you are involved, I swear I'll gut you."

"… At least be more inventive about it. I've been gutted before."

"… I'll think of something more inventive."

Mordred was incredible. On a fundamental level, I was looking at a work of art, one that set my chest on fire with emotions I'm not sure I was equipped to deal with.

Pity she simply hated my guts.

<—>​

"Ah. That hits the spot."

I was surprised that Mordred had flopped onto a couch, her armour dissolving into… well, I wasn't sure what to call the red garments underneath, and cracked open a can of cider. Within this house, she was at ease. Henry just let out a groan, briefly excusing himself to check something, while we made ourselves at home.

Henry's house was quaint. Larger then a single person had need for, it was clearly designed with a scholar in mind. The library and study that we were within was huge, walls lined with more books then I knew what to do with. One wall was lined with books with a plaque stating 'Dr Jekyll'. Clearly, Henry was a prolific writer as well as a scholar.

My finger traced the spine of one book, retrieving it and popping it open. He was smart. Very smart. Magic concepts as humans understood them fascinated me, yet the way he wrote it, as if from a scientific perspective, was like…

"Um. Mr Jekyll isn't a mage, is he?" Ritsuka sounded almost hesitant. Mordred paused her sculling of her cider, her eye leaving me and finding Ritsuka.

"No. He technically has the talent, if that's what you mean. Otherwise, he would never have been able to forge a contract with me." Mordred answered. "But if you are asking if he is a magus, then he is not. His circuits are too small to be worth noting."

"Circuits?" I paused my reading, peering over the lip of the book. Mordred rolled her eyes.

"Don't play dumb, mother."

"Aesc." I corrected her. Mordred did not give me the time of day, however, ignoring my question. It was Ritsuka who finally responded.

"Magic Circuits are the spiritual organ that allows magical energy to move through the body." She answered. "At least, that's my rough understanding."

"You don't know?" I asked. Romani blue image popped into existence at my words.

"You'll have to forgive Ritsuka. She's a hedge mage, by designation. Not formally trained in modern theory." He answered. Mordred's hand went for her sword for just a moment, before she relaxed again.

"Cool trick. So you have one too."

"Too?" Mash asked. "Then Mr Jekyll has something similar?"

"His radios, yes." Mordred nodded. She mustn't have considered it important information. "He talks with his information network every morning and evening." She didn't say more, just chugging more cider. I returned to the book for a moment. Then I snapped it closed. A piece of paper had caught my eye.

Serial Killer Jack the Ripper strikes again. I picked it up, flipping over the loose leafed paper shaped roughly like a book. I wasn't sure how to interpret it. It was… like-

"It's called a tabloid." Henry's voice was gentle. I blinked, glancing at the man sweeping back into the room. "It's fine. Your face made it obvious. You've never seen one before?"

"I think Murian or Aurora might have had similar in their cities." I admitted. "But I never paid them much attention." The two names of faeries did not ring any bells for anyone but Mash. It wasn't like any of them had the knowledge of what Faerie Britain even looked like. Henry nodded just once, before opening his refrigerator.

"Would you like cider? Mordred has a tooth for it." He asked. "Or if you'd rather, I have some older wine we could crack open."

"What, you'd give them the good stuff?" Mordred sounded almost offended, but Henry just shrugged.

"I haven't had proper company in a while." He answered.

"I'm underage." Ritsuka spoke up. Everyone blinked just once but Mash, looking at her.

"… Underage?" Henry asked. "Wait, you think there's a prohibition on when you can drink? How queer. Suite yourself, would you like some milk?"

"Please."

"I will have your wine." I spoke up. Wine, that was something I hadn't had in a long time. I'd sworn off food entirely after…

Well, it was one way to avoid being poisoned. If I was poisoned now, well-

"Bah. Get me some." Mordred declared. "The white wine, Henry."

"Huh? But tonight we are having-"

"I know mother's preferences." I blinked. Mordred was convinced I was her mother, yet…

"Very well. I suppose we should start with the pleasantries. I am Henry Jekyll, one of London's vaunted scholars. I apologise for my rudeness." I blinked as Henry placed a goblet before me, filled to the brim with wine. Mordred had leaned forward, hands clasping her own goblet, daring me to drink. "This is my Servant, Mordred. Summoned to resolve the crisis."

"Crisis. Smisis." Mordred growled. "Alright. Who are you?"

"I am Fujimura Ritsuka. Master of Chaldea." Ritsuka answered. "Member of the Chaldean Security Organisation. We are here to resolve a singularity before it becomes a point that will destroy humanity." I almost slapped my face as Ritsuka opened her mouth. Did she realise how insane that sounded? That she was basically outing herself as out of her own time period?

"Mash. Demi-Servant and Tam Lin bearing the name of Galahad." Mash spoke up. Mordred's attention went from Ritsuka to Mash. Her eyes danced with understanding.

"I suppose that all means more to you, Mordred, then me?" Henry asked. Mordred nodded.

"Yes." Her voice was unbelievably begrudging. "… Fuck."

"Is that a problem?" I asked. I almost felt smug. Mordred looked at the wine. Then she downed it in one go. I winced. She did that specifically because she knew it'd hurt me.

"… You're a poor facsimile of mother. The fact that wine is still there proves it." Mordred snarled. "I don't hide things from my Master. You-" She pointed at Ritsuka. "And you-" Then Mash. "Are time travelers here to save history. That, I get."

"You mean the sea of life told you." I noted. Mordred nodded.

"It did. You, on the other hand…" Her lip twisted up into a snarl. "Who the fuck are you?"

"Aesc."

"Bullshit." Her response was blunt. "Henry, her class."

"… Pretender. I don't know what that means. Its not one of the seven you explained." Henry noted. "I don't understand. Why is that a problem?"

"It means everything about her is a lie." Mordred's voice was getting irate. I was almost afraid she'd stab me. "Who are you!?"

"I said-"

"TELL ME YOUR NAME, MORGAN!"

Her voice snapped into a roar. My heart skipped a beat. I knew that if I answered wrong, we would fight. Yet I didn't want to fight. I wanted…

Something. Something else. Something…

"… Tonelico.( Rhongomyniad) "

I felt small. This feeling was why I had invented the Tam Lin naming spell in the first place. The Knights of the Round Table were larger then life figures, gallant knights that regularly did the impossible. Mordred was clearly no different.

Yet a moment passed. Mordred closed her eyes. She leaned back.

"… I believe you." She finally stated. Yet now that her voice lacked that emotion, that passion, I felt truly afraid. I hadn't felt true fear in so very long. Now, though, I felt it. I felt-

"… Will this be a problem. If we can't work together-" Ritsuka spoke up. I blinked. Did she really think live and let live was an option at this point? That we-

"It won't be a problem." Henry spoke up. "Let Mordred sulk. She'll work through it."

"OI!"

"Anyway. You have information I need, and I think I have information you need." Henry declared, taking a seat. "I'm going to guess you don't know the situation in London then?"

"No." Mash spoke up. "I'm guessing its been a few days since that fog arrived. We've only been here a few hours." Mordred snorted at that, but Henry just nodded.

"Indeed. Starting from the top, then. London is surrounded by a great wall of fog that has steadily been closing in. The outer edges of the city have already been consumed. That started… about a week ago. Three days ago, the fog breached the city. In another week, the fog will have overrun us all. Every night, the fog thickens and devours the life of those within it." He paused. "For the moment, humans can get by for long periods with masks, but that won't last long."

"That's not all, is it?" Ritsuka asked. Henry lifted a goblet to his lips and took a sip.

"No. You've seen the homuculi. You've probably seen the helter skelters too. The worst part is the wildlife. What little is left have been warped into monsters by breathing in the fog. Generally, if the fog doesn't get you, something else will." He pointed at the paper in my hand. "Then there's that."

"… Jack the Ripper?" I asked. He nodded.

"I believe you now know the identity of the thorn in all of our sides. A shadow that murders women." His voice was dark. Disturbed. I had to wonder if it was disgust, or if he found such a thing beautiful. Maybe it was a little of both. "Jack has been active for four days. If the fog has killed hundreds of thousands, then Jack has only killed several hundred. That was printed three days ago."

"The paper should be a daily thing." Mash noted. "That means-"

"Yeah. The printing presses stopped after it was printed. Whatever blight is killing my home targeted them specifically." Henry muttered. "Its not just the presses. We can't reach the outside world through the fog. Never mind being murdered by Jack, the city will be out of food in a matter of days. Once that happens, it will be bedlam and chaos and everyone for themselves."

"Salted and preserved meals were made often in this era." Ritsuka noted, her hand on her cheek. "So you have more food to hand then a modern city."

"Oh?" Henry glanced at her, but Ritsuka motioned to his refrigerator.

"Those are common when I lived." She answered. "Most people'd only keep about a week of food at most."

"I see." Henry wrung his hands together. "Fair is fair. What is Jack the Ripper's strengths? Weaknesses? How can he be defeated?"

"Huh?"

"Sorry?"

Mash and I expressed our surprise almost immediately. Henry just sighed.

"This is a Holy Grail War. A battle to decide the fate of my home. I have to claim the Grail. I have to undo the chaos. Nothing else matters. To do that, I have to kill Jack." He answered. "Jack's definitely a servant."

And now I understood. Holy Grail War was a concept I vaguely understood.

But…

With Henry's maniac nature, I'm not sure I was okay with sharing everything…

[ ] Share what you know of Jack the Ripper.
[ ] Lie.
[ ] Write in.

Section 2 is…
[ ] The Demonic Fog Laughs (Caster: ????, Berserker: ????)
[ ] From Hell (Assassin: Jack the Ripper, Rider: ????)
[ ] The Man with the Stone (Caster: ????, Caster: Sherlock Holmes)

TRUE NAME REVELATION
Assassin: Jack the Ripper
Status Obscured due to Information Erasure
Noble Phantasms
Maria the Ripper( Bastard Son Slaughter Re-Enactment)
Natural Born Killers( That Which is Unworthy of a Tragic Demise)
A Misty Summer Night( Demon Rotting Mist)

Servant/Master Revelation
Dr. Henry Jekyll and Saber Mordred​

The inconsistencies build and the script breaks. Forgive me my sins and grant me salvation.

 

[BlackHadou]

"Mother, why do you regulate the humans so?"

It was a question that Baobahn Sith( Daughter) had asked in the 'youth' of her current incarnation. It was a question that broke my heart in its asking. Her reddy/grey hair had yet to truly gain its luster. I would have to do something about that.

I cannot save you.

"Why do you ask?" It was a summer day. The air was hot on my skin. My throne room overlooked the great pit where the Beast God Cernunnos( Calamity of Curse) slept. The chamber was made of crystal and marble and precious ores that my magic had shaped to my liking. It was obstentatious, yet I was a remnant of a little desire( dream) I'd possessed while I was still Aesc. Before my will had shattered and my bones had rotted in despair.

Baobahn Sith( Daughter) lifted her hand to her lips girlishly. I saw yet another accessory adorning her wrist. No doubt Beryl had been in her ear again. I should limit their interactions, or she will follow a crueler path then one that will simply see her safe.

Why didn't I act?

I could have saved you!

"No reason. Just… interested why you treat them as anything but livestock."

"Oh? You think they aren't?"

Humans were not livestock. They were never livestock. If I had my way, I would end every human beings life and put them out of their misery. But faeries fed on the dreams and hopes of humans. In a twisted way, I had to sin in order to keep Britain breathing.

The Faerie of Paradise is free of sin.

But maybe I shouldn't be.

"Mother. Don't lie to me." Her accusation stung. Baobahn Sith( Daughter) had seen through my statement for what it was. A deflection. "Human's feed us. They don't feed you. You never once imbibed of them. Why? What-"

I glanced at her. She fell silent. Even if she called me mother, I was still Morgan le Fae. All faeries instinctively feared me.

"Humans have a defence mechanism." I answered. Baobahn Sith( Daughter) listened with rapt attention. Maybe she'd heard such from Beryl already. "In their current state, they have no overriding will. However, to be human is to persevere. To prosper as the underdog. If humans had been the dominant species of Britain, the Great Calamities would already be conquered."

"Are they really that powerful?"

"Unfortunately. It is both a blessing and a curse to be human." I answered. Yet Baobahn Sith( Daughter) just regarded me curiously, as if I was describing a new toy. "You are not to instill despair in the humans. Keep your playing to other faeries."

My instruction was direct.

She disobeyed it. I remember that.

"But they scurry like ants. Their wriggling as you pull them apart is just so-"

"In their despair, they will call forth their heroism. One of those heroes will be Gawain. Another will be Lancelot."

Why hadn't I pointed out Tristan would arrive too? Did I just think he wouldn't answer?

Or…

Did I hope he would come and save Baobahn Sith( Daughter) from herself? She was using his name after all.

"You can defeat them easily, Mother."

"That is not the point. Britain has not stood two thousand years by taking chances. Do not provoke the humans with misery, Baobahn Sith( Daughter) ."

I had used her name then.

I should have kept a closer eye on her.

I regret everything about those days. I had just been so tired. So broken, if I was truthful. My soul was rotting away from shear apathy as I struggled to maintain the Great Summoning Ritual at Britain's heart.

The Throne was a nexus of magical energy, filled with the energy I had taxed from the faeries. That day, I remember, it was about one third full. It never reached my dreams, the point which it might have defeated Beast God Cernunnos( Calamity of Curse) . The day which I could finally rest.

Maintaining the throne was destroying me in those days. It took unbelievable amounts of effort and concentration. I did not repose. I barely ate. As the Faerie of Paradise, I technically didn't need to eat, but doing so was healthy for me.

The issue was my sanity. I was losing it rapidly.

And…

If I had intervened when I saw the signs, I could have saved you from Beryl.

...

Maybe I don't deserve forgiveness.( Please forgive me my sins.)

<-->
​

We spoke of Jack the Ripper well into the morning. Of his form, his strengths, his weaknesses. Now that I could remember his name, now that he had been revealed to me, I could recall the fight in detail. Of his power over mist and his many bodies.

I hadn't truly noticed until I thought about it with the power of hindsight, but Jack the Ripper had been the center of a web of magical energy. It was a nexus of power that went from his core into the fog itself.

"Jack the Ripper is the supposed culprit behind a series of murders that were committed in London in roughly 1888." Romani explained, his shadowy blue form projected onto a table by a little disc Ritsuka had placed upon it. "Details of who or what he was differ depending on who you ask. If you access the Association's records, he was actually killed by a magus by the name of Zolgen and exorcised."

"So the killer would be apprehended sometime around now?" Henry's voice was almost surprised, a mad light dancing behind his eyes. "Wouldn't that mean that he isn't a Servant, but instead lives in this time period?"

"He might." Ritsuka noted. "But our eyes don't lie. You have seen him, right?"

"Yes. My vision tells me he is Assassin." My lips pursed at their words. I kept my thought to myself, but a glance at Mordred told me that she had also had the same thought. It might not have occurred to Ritsuka, and Mash, bless her, was trying to keep up with the inconsistencies of her own script.

There was nothing stopping Jack the Ripper from being active at the same time as Assassin was. Indeed, if a mage got involved in Jack's death, then on some level he probably possessed a mystic, which meant…

Jack the Ripper and Assassin may well be working together as Master and Servant. In fact, I would consider it less a possibility, and more likely then not.

"We know that Jack the Ripper possesses anecdotes of being a wraith. Chaldea's records indicate a variation of him was summoned in simulation. Well, her, actually." Romani continued. "Which would suggest-"

"That the rat doesn't have a defined form." Mordred spoke up. "But we agree he's a he, right?"

"It might be dependent on his Master." I noted. It was merely an explanation. Mordred glanced at me, not out of suspicion or malice, but weighing my words on their merit. Then she chugged her whole can of cider.

"It's not impossible." She noted. "There are certain servants whose class is predisposed towards who the Master is. I've never heard of one whose gender changes, though."

"Probably because he doesn't have a predefined form." Mash muttered. "Demons, other phantasmals based on human thought, even some faeries. They take shapes depending on how humanity perceives them at the time. Maybe this is how Jack the Ripper is perceived right now."

"It's only been one hundred years." Ritsuka muttered. "Can human perception really change that fast?"

"Sometimes it isn't how humans perceive someone, but how they perceive themselves." I spoke up. "Jack the Ripper may have changed his own perception. There is a third option, though-"

"There is no change of perception yet." Mordred finished for me. She truly was Morgan le Fae's daughter. I could see the distaste bubbling on her skin for the discussion of the mystic. However, she not only followed the entire discussion, she gave as much input as I did. "Jack the Ripper looks like that because it is what the actual Jack the Ripper looked like."

"In that case, finding him will suck." Henry noted. "After all, if Jack the Ripper and Assassin look identical and we proceed on the hypothesis of compatibility summon…"

"Master and Servant look identical." I muttered. "Doctor, can you pinpoint where Assassin is?"

"Even if our systems could see in the fog, they aren't so sensitive as to detect a Servant down to the class unless that Servant is inside a kilometre of Ritsuka." Romani answered. "Too much processing power goes towards observing what is happening around Ritsuka, sorry."

"We have no easy way of tracking Jack, then." Henry muttered under his breath. "Unless…" He paused. "I don't understand, though. If he is a demon, how can he be summoned? The Holy Grail should only manifest heroes of human history."

"There are exceptions." Ritsuka muttered. "Anti-villains spoken of in the same breath as heroes can also be summoned. They are fringe cases, but the Grail only actually asks for someone who will fight for the sake of humans. The reason isn't important."

I did not say anything. Ritsuka had omitted important information, but maybe for the moment it was better that Henry didn't know it.

The Human Salvation Ritual had been the fundamental spell I had based the Tam Lin spell on. She was right in that it needed a willing target, and only humans who would save humanity could be targeted. But the spell was filtered through the Holy Grail. As an artefact that actually existed, it could certainly be corrupted.

Nothing stopped a corrupted grail from changing the target from someone who will save humans to someone who would kill humans.

Villains, if you would.

True villains. Not someone like Barghest whom would one day commit great villainy but ultimately sought to do good. Unrepentant villains like Beryl who sought to destroy human lives. But the Grail didn't think this was an issue, because it sought those who would end human lives.

Most heroes, incidentally, fell into such a category, so there was no contradiction. Heroes and villains would be summoned in tandem.

"There's also Maria the Ripper( Bastard Son Slaughter Re-Enactment) ." Mash spoke up. "It's not quite the right name from our records, but…"

"But?" I raised an eyebrow. Mash just fidgeted.

"Well… there are five of us here. Four of us are women." She noted. Mordred's eye snapped to Mash. Her gaze hardened and her face turned stony.

"Say that again. I dare you-"

"I'm sorry! Maria the Ripper is the legend of Jack the Ripper murdering five women!" Mash's voice came very fast. Henry's lips just pursed.

"Then…" His eyes widened. "Oh. Does it work on men at all?"

"There's probably no reason why it wouldn't have at least some effect on men." Romani noted. "Aesc, if you would?"

"It's really a curse." I noted. "Being a man isn't going to save you. At its core, its still a spell that guts a human being like a fish. It just targets a lot of parts men don't have, so those parts of the spell fizzle, so to speak." I wave my hand, lighting a small fire and letting it smoulder to prove my point. "The flame itself can still hurt you, even if the rest of it misses."

"There were three conditions on it. It is night time, it is foggy and…"

"The target is a woman." Mordred muttered. "What a twisted spell." She glanced at me, her lips thinning more and more. "It's a curse though, right?"

"It is."

"... How many times can he use it?" And Mordred immediately struck to the heart of the idea forming in my head. It made me want to smile. She really was incredible. It baffled me that Morgan le Fae hadn't considered her existence worth remembering.

"Given the damage it did to me…" I ran some calculations in my head. Unlike me, Jack the Ripper probably had no way of repairing his spiritual self. I could do it with magical energy. I was a faerie, after all, and my body in the physical world was just a simulacrum of my faerie self projected with magical energy. "At a guess, I think he's used it about nine times. His soul has already begun to rot away under the strain of the curse."

"... The canonical five. Plus the rest in Whitechapel." Ritsuka spoke up. I blinked.

"Sorry?"

"Jack the Ripper has a canonical five victims." Mash explained. "Five victims he claimed, I should say. There were another six victims associated with him but never proven to be him in Whitechapel. Then there's the various other murders that have been linked to him, but-"

"No. That would make sense. If Jack the Ripper uses a curse for his Noble Phantasm, then he probably has a limit on the number of times he can use it before his 'exorcism'." Romani spoke up. "Mind, the age of Jack the Ripper makes it improbable that he could have performed the murders."

"... Why would his age matter?" Mordred asked. "Demons respond to the wishes of humans. Little things like knowledge are nothing. So long as he can be ascribed human shape, he's still a human according to the grail." She glanced at me. "That doesn't explain the fog, though."

"A mystery." I confirmed. Even presuming the fog was some ability of Jack's, that he could cover the whole city with it was… incredible. Even if I wanted to, I'm not sure I could extend my curse over the entire city without assistance. At least, not in my current shape.

"... Jack the Ripper is our greatest threat." Henry muttered. "Maybe the only threat." I got the feeling he was trying to keep information from us, but it was a poor attempt. Maybe he thought we were opposition in his quest for the Grail. Or maybe it was just paranoia.

…

"Have you met the other Servants?" I asked. Mordred glanced at me. She bit her lip for one long moment.

"N-" Whatever Henry was going to say was cut off.

"Berserker. Lancer and Berserker." Mordred corrected herself almost immediately. "At least… I think he was Lancer. He had blue hair and fought with a staff. Henry didn't catch his class. Had one hell of a fluffy dog with him."

I blinked.

Grimr? That sounded like Grimr.

"And Berserker?" Ritsuka spoke up. I glanced at Mash. She shook her head. Lancer's description didn't ring a bell for her. I kept my thoughts on Lancer's identity to myself.

"A man. Looks a bit like a mountain. Shouted GOLDEN from the building tops." Mordred answered. "Drove me nuts, if I'm honest. You can hear him fighting from blocks away."

Mash bit her lip. She recognised that one.

I filed that away for later.

<-->
​

As the Faerie of Paradise, I do not dream. So I watched over the forms of Ritsuka and Mash while they slept. It was all I could do. Henry might have had guest bedrooms, but Mash and Ritsuka preferred to be in the same room.

I watched over them. Like a guardian from paradise. I did not have to be in the room with them to do so.

"Ash Tree, huh?"

I glanced at Mordred. She chugged another cider in a single go. She certainly didn't seem bothered by the amount of alcohol she was putting away.

"Does that offend you?"

"Everything about you offends me on some level." Mordred's voice came out like a snarl. "You wear my mother's face poorly."

"I would have thought I resembled your father more. We share purposes, after all." I retorted gently. Mordred paused. She stared at my face, studying it for a long moment.

Then she grunted.

"That's why I hate your stupid face. You're right. You do look more like father." She answered. "… Why not say everything, then?"

Did she think I'd lied, or-

"About what?"

"I don't lie to my master." Mordred repeated. "But I don't tell him everything either." I frowned at her words. Mordred didn't elaborate for a long moment. "I get it. Knight of Treachery. The disgusting traitor of the round table. But I am on humanities side here. I'll burn it all again if I have to!"

"... Then tell me what you think the problem is?"

"You don't trust me. Still! After everything was said and done! I burned down Britain for you!"

"... Do not misunderstand, Mordred." My voice cut her off before she descended into a torrent of emotion. "I do not know you. I do not remember you. I might remember things Morgan experienced, but she did not consider you important."

Yet she was so very incredible. If Morgan had someone like Mordred, then how could Britain… fall…

"You… you-"

"Wait. Britain burned?" I regarded her fully for perhaps the first time. In doing so, I saw the shadow I'd been refusing to look at.

She reminded me of the insect( Vortigern) . Seething with rage and hate under the surface for something primordial. The only difference was Mordred had already expended that rage and hate.

"You don't know? Some pretender you are."

"... I don't exist in your version of the world. I should have ceased to be some fourteen millennia ago." I answered glibly. Mordred just blinked.

Then she laughed. It was a sad, morose sound that shared in my years of accumulated misery. In that moment, we were two of a kind.

"... I guess the fae are twisted." She muttered. I couldn't agree more. After everything I'd seen, I couldn't call fae anything but. "Father… didn't see me as an heir. Everything about his role was killing him. So I…" She paused. It was a twisted act for a twisted desire. "Fuck it, I don't have to justify myself to you."

I refrained from voicing the thought on my mind.

Avalon le Fae was our twisted dream's version of King Arthur. I'd experienced some of her memories when I rang the Bells of Pilgrimage( Bones of Salvation) . I probably had more in common with Mordred's 'father' then her mother.

But… that seemed pointless to point out.

"What were they like?" The question was idle curiosity. Mordred's hands clasped together.

"They?" She glanced at me. I didn't respond for a long moment.

"... Faeries don't usually have children. Apparently, Morgan had five." I answered. "I'd like to know about them."

"... Not important enough to remember?"

"... If I told you the only one I can name is Gawain, would that answer your question?"

"... Mother was a bitch." Mordred said the words, but I couldn't help but agree with them.

<-->
​

"We have no leads." Breakfast was a quiet affair. That both Mordred and I partook went unremarked on. We didn't actually need food, but it was appreciated nonetheless. Ritsuka was slow to eat. A glance revealed that she was at least a little stressed and couldn't bring herself to fill her stomach.

Watching her force herself to eat was almost painful.

"We have one lead." I corrected. Ritsuka's fork absently picked at her plate.

"Whitechapel." She finished the thought before I'd even laid it out. "Jack the Ripper would be compelled to return there."

"Yes." I answered. "Presuming Maria the Ripper is the curse that anchors him to the world, then he'll always be compelled to return to where it was first laid."

"Would that mean he'd literally return to the scene of the crime?" Mash asked. I nodded.

"It's a compulsion." I mused. "Something he'll have to do at some point. His dreams will be haunted by the crimes until he does so, and it will build and build and build until-"

"But there are nearly a dozen crime scenes." Henry noted. "That's what you said last night." He placed a goblet of juice on the table as he sat down, letting out an exhausted sigh. "I asked Frankenstein if he knew anything about murders in Whitechapel. He couldn't tell me much. If the Mage's Association knows of them, then they are keeping it quiet." He paused. "Apparently a foreign mage entered the city right before the fog rose, though. One that matches your tale."

"Makiri Zolgen." Romani spoke up. "Right?"

"One and the same. He seemed nervous about him. I'd guess Zolgen is some sort of loose cannon?" Henry tucked into his food with elegance, I realised. He was a scholar. A neat scholar.

"That's one way of putting it. Zolgen invented the modern Human Salvation Ritual that you used to summon Mordred. If anyone can game the Grail War, its Zolgen."

"... I see. Then removing Jack from the board is more vital." Yet Henry's eyes were calculating. Calculating, and…

…

He wasn't considering an alliance with Jack, was he?

… Surely not. Mordred was his Servant, after all. They seemed to get along quite well.

"Whitechapel would be a good place to start." Mash muttered. "It would confirm our theory if nothing else. Given the fog, Jack's master would have to have some sort of safe house to not be killed by his own Servant."

"That is true." I mused. "Assassin does not seem like the type to discriminate for his master. If anything, he'd probably do worse to his master if he thought it'd benefit him."

"Maybe…"

Henry worried me. Something was wrong here.

What am I missing? Mash and Ritsuka shared a knowing look. I'm out of the loop here…

[ ] Go to Buck's Row. (Shielder: Mash, Ritsuka)
[ ] Go to Hanbury Street. (Rider: ????)
[ ] Go to Dutfield's Yard. (Master: ????, ????: ????)
[ ] Go to Mitre Square. (Fatal Battle: Jack the Ripper)

You may engage Jack the Ripper if you believe you are ready.

 

[BlackHadou]

The Faerie of Paradise may not have happy memories.

The Faerie of Paradise should never experience spring.

The misery of the Faerie of Paradise reflects your sins.

So forgive us of our sins and grant us salvation.

The system behind the Faerie of Paradise is a cruel, inhumane one. I realise the irony of me, a fae, saying that, but it is the truth. As a system devised by the Mother of Us All, it lacked empathy or compassion. After all, she did not experience emotions and thus was prone to unwanton and unrestrained cruelty in the extreme.

I had to wonder if we just asked, would she grant us mercy and succor? She was want to commit random acts of kindness, such as a faerie in what we would call China in the modern day being granted a chance to live life with her chosen lover. Technically, we weren't meant to understand love or hate or anything like that. In truth, such things should be outside the dominion of the fae.

On a fundamental level, we strayed from our Great Mother's purpose for us, but rather then punish us for doing so, she found beauty in it.

The Faerie of Paradise is one of the planet's emergency systems. A form of 'break glass in emergency', we technically should not be necessary. If the Bells of Pilgrimage( Bones of Salvation) had simply done their job in the first place, we would never have been created. There was no real reason for me to exist in and of myself. I don't have a purpose beyond forging the Sacred Armament to save the world.

Of course, our Great Mother thought that the Sacred Armament would be best served as a weapon that yearned for Spring. Thus, the Sacred Armament must not have memories of Spring. It was that yearning for happiness that drew in the wishes of the Prime Species to live and thus allowed us to destroy their enemies.

…

Yes, this is why I hate Merlin. Merlin's job as the Crown Caster is, in part, to ensure that we never seek Spring. By the time I understood the hole in my heart, I'd already been executed four times.

All according to Merlin's machinations.

I do not hate Merlin. That is not to say that I am fond of Merlin or I like him or anything. I do bear a grudge against him for the misery he inflicted upon me, but I understand why he did it. In the end, Merlin is as much a servant of the world as I am. His service to the Great Mother meant that he did not consider the person, only the end result.

If anything, I would declare he lacks empathy.

The thought occurred to me only as we were leaving Mr Henry Jekyll's house to seek answers to the curse of Maria the Ripper. That Henry was actually not dissimilar to Merlin, except on a much lower scale. His reaction to the idea of Jack the Ripper having access to a limited number of uses of his Noble Phantasm was not to ensure it was not used against his Servant, who it might instantly kill, but instead to…

I can only believe that Henry believes he can turn Jack to his own purposes.

It was very-

<-->
​

"Aesc, are you okay?" Mash's words dragged me out of my reverie. It was only then that I really realised my mind had been wandering. The fog this morning was fairly thin, letting my eyes see about seven hundred meters at most when the streets allowed. On occasion, we passed a man or woman rapidly dashing to some location or another, but for the most part, we were alone.

"Sorry. I was lost in thought." I admitted it. That Mordred was not here did not make me nervous. She could handle herself, after all.

"Something we should know?" Ritsuka asked. I shook my head.

"I was going to ask that. What did Henry say?" The two girl's glanced at each other, then back at me.

"Henry Jekyll is the main character of a novel that would be written in… Uh… eighty-five?" Ritsuka glanced at Mash. She just smiled.

"Eighty-six, senpai. As of current time it should have been out for two years or so." Mash answered. "Maybe Henry was the model for the novel, or maybe it is just coincidence that became true in the decades after the fact."

"... He matches the character, then?"

"Somewhat. There are discrepancies." Ritsuka muttered. "But the core of him is the same. I'm guessing you saw it too, when we mentioned the curse."

"That he was seriously considering an alliance with Jack?" Both Ritsuka and Mash glanced at each other. Mash shook her head.

"I'm afraid it might be deeper." She admitted. "The crux of the novel was Henry's obsession with the nature of good and evil. His life's work culminates in an attempt to alchemically separate humans into the base components of good and evil. In the process, he created an alter ego that… um…"

"Reveled in hedonism." I finished for her. "Wait-"

"I'm afraid the Spirit Origin of Jekyll is that of an Assassin." I blinked as Romani slipped back into existence. "Da Vinci has run some tests, but we fear that he may actually be a pseudo-servant, rather then a Still Living Hero."

"Then he possesses his alter ego?" It was the thing he was famous for, after all. Romani nodded, just once.

"The Spirit Origin is missing a giant chunk of it. I think its not only likely that Jekyll and Hyde existed at some point, but that the transformation has already begun." Yet that seemed like too easy an answer. If Henry was really Hyde, and would turn on us, it would make our decisions far too easy, for there was a clear moral decision to make.

My experience told me that life refused to be so kind to me.

"That's not how it went, did it?" I asked. Mash shook her head.

"No. I want to believe Henry is our friend, but…" She fell silent. I had to wonder how bad her script had broken, for her to be so afraid to even attempt to use the gift of foreknowledge. "Not after Okeanos."

"Okeanos?"

"The last Singularity." Ritsuka explained, as we stopped in the middle of the road. "Well, this is it."

Buck's Row. It was a long thoroughfare that made its way down and down and down. It felt in some ways that it would go on forever.

Forever and ever.

Until the end of the road. It was like I was staring towards my death knell.

It reminded me of the streets of Salisbury. That day, Some five millennia, nine centuries and give or take three decades ago.

My first death. They hung me initially. Then they quartered me. It took a long time for me to put myself back together after that one. I actually missed the next two calamities while I did so. I'd almost given up on the faeries then and there.

The Faerie of Paradise may not know happiness.

"This place is cursed." I muttered. "I can smell it."

"You can? What does it smell like?" A lesser person may have interpreted Ritsuka's response as sarcasm, yet her eyes were earnest as she turned her attention to me. I bit my lip.

"Misery. Misery and sex." I answered. "… What were Jack the Ripper's victims like?"

"Women. Exclusively." Mash answered. "They were almost all prostitutes who had fallen on desperate times. Given Jack's Noble Phantasm, I think we can presume that he has a grudge against them." She paused, pursing her lips for a moment. "Mother."

"Mother?" Ritsuka and I both spoke as one. Mash shuffled uncomfortably, as she started walking forward again, no doubt to the crime scene.

"Jack wanted her mother. I remember that." She answered. "I hope you remember that. I wonder if the boy is the same?"

No trump cards. That was what Jack had said. Stop looking at me. That was the other thing he'd said.

I'll use it.

"... What if Maria the Ripper is not what he said he'd use…" I muttered. "But… something else…"

"Aesc?"

"Just a thought. I need to see more before I can work it out." Yet all the pieces were very quickly moving into place. Jack the Ripper, stripped of his protections from being remembered, would not last long. Now that I had found out his identity, I could not forget him.

That was the benefit of my eyes, and because I anchored him in the world, his ability to be forgotten would not work. The key had always been to learn of him from a source that isn't Mash. Cause and effect.

…

It was so inconvenient, though.

As we marched down the road, though, we found the crime scene. It was still surrounded in chalk. Prepared for investigation, even. The outline of where the body should have been was stained with blood as well.

"... What day is it, Romani?"

"The sixteenth of September." Romani's response was enough for Ritsuka, who just stared at the scene. Mash bit her lip.

"This is wrong." She whispered.

"What is wrong?"

"This happened two and a half weeks ago if history lines up." Mash answered. "Yet… the scene is…"

"Fresh." I finished for her. "All that's missing is a body." I stepped into the cursed space. The air smelled of soot and tar. London was a modern city, but even with the advent of better methods, it still was drowning in oil lamps and otherwise. I leaned down, my finger tracing the blood on the ground. It was still wet.

I put it to my mouth. Still fresh, even.

"Aesc! What the hell!?" Ritsuka's exclamation brought me back to reality. The girl looked like she was about to retch on the streets. "That was a person!"

"And?" I stood up from the blood-splatter. Really, all that was missing was a curse. Which meant…

Oh.

Oh. That was interesting. And incredible.

"Mash! How many victims did Jack have?"

"Uh… generally its accepted he killed eleven, but-"

"No, victims! Jack didn't kill all of his victims!" Suddenly, that I was merely gutted made sense. It probably would have ended up lethal, to be sure, but my end should have been messy enough to call me discernibly dead. Jack had botched at least one of his kills. When Maria the Ripper replicated the kill through it's curse, it had failed to do the job properly.

Just like Jack had when he'd committed the actual murder.

"I… Father, can you tell us?"

"The Association has limited references to Jack the Ripper. Human history does not recall any failed murders from the time. That doesn't mean they didn't happen, but at the time London was a mess." Romani answered. "Medical records are iffy and the media controlled the flow of information on Jack. While we can discern things after the fact, that misses the nature of the moment."

My mind raced.

Jack's curse had one other issue. One…

"I'm an idiot." I snarled. "It's in the name! Assassin's a copy-cat!"

Bastard Son Slaughter Re-Enactment( Maria the Ripper) .

The Noble Phantasm wasn't the original. It was a re-enactment. Damn it, it was things like this that…

*Clap*

*Clap*

*Clap*​

"I gotta admit. I thought you'd figure it out sooner." I slowly turned on my heel. The fog behind us slowly receded. A dramatic entrance for an over-dramatic person. They were a little short, probably approaching my height, with bl-

I pointedly ignored him, turning back to the crime scene.

"Senpai, get behind me!"

"Woah, woah, woah! I'm not the enemy! Geez, gimme a little… WAIT A MINUTE! STOP IGNORING ME TONELICO!"

Grimr immediately lost his shit. I didn't want to even look at him. Of course he could cross over from the other side. He'd originated on this side to begin with, so the act must have been trivial for someone like him. My lips were forming a firm line and I could feel my cheeks puffing out at the mere idea the insufferable rat had descended to-

"Wait… You know Aesc?" Ritsuka's voice was nothing but suspicion. "Don't take another step, or-"

"Pretty lady, I invented Gae Bolg. There's no point summoning it to skewer me. You really need to work on your choice of shadows." Grimr retorted dryly. "… Sorry. I crossed a line, didn't I? Stop ignoring me, please?"

I did not want to talk to Grimr.

Crossed a line, yeah, that was one way of putting it. If he hadn't I-

"Aesc?" Mash was between us. Like a protective shield. My Tam Lin. The first Tam Lin. Well, mostly, she was the first person I used the ritual on.

I'd developed the ritual with Grimr, though. And-

"... I'm sorry. If I'd let you go through with it, you'd never forgive me." I spun at his words. The insufferable rat, how dare he!

"What makes you think I forgive you now!?" I snarled. Grimr's face was boyish. Soft. Exactly as I remembered, not as he was that day at Camelot.

"Because I came in this form." Grimr answered. "I want to help."

"Then disappear!" My grudge against Grimr the Sage was not common knowledge. After all, he had accompanied me at the beginning of my journey, and I sincerely wished to just stab him for just…

Ugh!

"... Wow. I didn't think you'd hold that much of a grudge."

"Two thousand years, Grimr! I searched high and low for two thousand years! And to find out you'd offed yourself on a damn tree!" It was difficult to contain my rage. The emotion was bubbling over, red hot rage that I wasn't sure I'd ever actually experienced before in such intensity, yet the young man just leaned on his wooden staff. It was then I finally got a good look at his eyes.

One was red. The other looked like a rainbow reflected back at me. His right eye.

"I'm sorry, okay. It had to be done."

"To save humanity."

"To save humanity." He agreed. His staff tightened in his grip. "He might not know of me, but I knew of him. In the end, I had to do what let us win."

And won he must have, I guess. I have no knowledge of what happened after I fell. I didn't want to know, either.

"Why are you here?" I growled. Grimr stared for a long moment, then he closed his eyes.

"The Great Mother called. I agreed to check a few things for her. That's all." Grimr answered. "My job for her is done, so… I'm free to play hookie now."

Hookie. Is that what he called this? Hookie!?

"Forgive me, but our instruments are detecting Cu Chulainn near you." Romani's voice cut in. "The spirit origin is Lancer. You might-"

"We see him, Doctor." Ritsuka hissed. Lancer. That was Grimr's class. I figured it'd be Saber. He used a sword the last I saw him. "He's right in front of us."

"Odd. He should be two or three streets away, not-"

"... You bastard. You didn't even come in person!" I snarled. "How far away are you cowering, Grimr!?"

"Well… I'll admit I expected to get stabbed…" My eyes narrowed. The little- "You look better then last time, though!"

"Stop trying to butter me up! I will feed you a frog's entrails!" I wanted to stab him with Rhongomyniad. Grimr just sighed.

"Yeah, that's why." He muttered. "Fine, I get it. I'm not welcome. So let me part with some advice and bid thee adieu." He took two steps back. Two steps towards nowhere and no when, and- "You're right. Assassin is a copy-cat. Finding his identity is a dead end, for he isn't real. If you want the truth, look to the dragon's corpse."

Dragon's corpse? I don't understand. Why would I want to go to Albion's corpse? That wasn't even near here!

Another step back, and-

[ ] Grimr disappeared, his job done.
-[ ] Continue examining the crime scenes. (Master: ????, ????: ????)
-[ ] Head to Mitre Square. (Fatal Battle: Jack the Ripper?)
-[ ] … Dragon's corpse? "The Association." (Caster: P, ????: ????)
[ ] "Wait!" … Grudge or not. Mad or not. Grimr was still a dear friend. (Lancer: Grimr the Wise)

 

[BlackHadou]

The first time I met Grimr was in my second century. I had thought I'd finally found the very idea of Spring at the time.

The Faerie of Paradise may not know Spring.

In my twenty-fourth year, I averted my first Calamity. Perhaps the most dangerous one I have ever fought, if I was honest. He appeared out of nowhere one day, a man wrapped in insects and wreathed in terror. It was a terrible battle that spanned the entirety of Britain.

Initially, I had struggled to ring the Bells of Pilgrimage( Bones of Salvation) . In much the same way as little Artoria, I was not taken seriously by the six Clan Heads. They were A-Rays one and all, creatures of the Great Mother of Us All who had been sent to fulfill the purpose of salvation. They had become damaged, however. Impotent, if you will.

None of the Clan Heads from my youth still remained when I met Mash. Actually, I think the leader of the Wing Clan had changed twice in that time. Anyway, the only clan that had granted me their blessing was the Rain Clan, who had raised me. Those days were beautiful…

Unfortunately, I can see lies. Everything that might be good for me turns to ash, for I can see the falseness of the statement. The very words feel like sickly blood to me, bubbling and crawling beneath my flesh.

The Rain Clan had loved the idea of a Faerie of Paradise. They loved the idea of peace and harmony between the six clans. They loved the idea of never raising a finger against another.

All idealic. The Rain Clan was a clan that refused to move, and thus stagnated. The Rain Clan believed that they should receive blessings abundant for raising the Faerie of Paradise. They thought that by raising me, it absolved them of the need to provide, to sustain, to grow.

The Fae of Britain struggled with that idea. Growing was a human idea. The faeries could not grow on their own. Like the great Mother of Us All, they were a reactive species, only changing in response to outside stimuli. We are not like humans, we do not overcome things for the sake of making life easier. We react to things that make our lives harder. But since we don't comprehend 'maybe tomorrow might be easier', we never strive for more.

The leader of the Rain Clan in those days was a faerie bearing the name Tamlin. I named the ritual of the True Naming my knights after… him? Her? I'll be honest, which it was changed on the fly. In true human history, Tamlin was a mortal man, but within my Britain, they had been a faerie that believed in peace. They were kind, don't get me wrong, but they had also stifled me.

"Since we raised the Faerie of Paradise, surely we will be revered."

"Since we protected the fledgling Faerie of Paradise, surely that will win us accolades."

The motivations of the Rain Clan had always been two faced. That was the nature of Fae.

I never told them I could see their lies.

Anyway, when the Calamity of End arrived, I was young. I had only rung a single bell. I was not prepared to face him. I would later learn that I, myself, had hurled him back in time. Perhaps it was proof that I was my own worst enemy. Morgan le Fae caused the vast majority of Aesc the Saviour's problems.

Orkney was ravaged first. Then Norwich. Then Glascow.

It was a struggle to rush ahead of him. A race, if you will. I had to ring the bells before the Calamity could destroy them. Unlike Artoria in the end of the days of Faerie Britain, I was successful. I did not have to deal with the missing Mirror Clan bell.

The battle was long and hard. When I see an insect, I see the Calamity of End.

He did not hate me. He was a man who could speak no truth. He spoke in only lies. So said our Great Mother of Us All.

But he was the only one who was so truthful, back in those days. My eyes see lies, yet he did not lie to me. His name was Vortigern( The Calamity of End) . Eventually, I slew him with Erosion( Penetrating Blade of Gold) . His mind, body, and soul were ripped apart and hurtled into the abyss. At the time I'd foolishly thought that would actually be the end of Britain's attempts to destroy us.

I was foolish. Morgan's memories did not arrive until after I'd defeated Vortigern for the first time. Really, it was actually the second time. Vortigern had been hurled from the future to the past. It was his second time manifesting, or at least, that's what he told me.

His curses clung to my flesh like tar. I struggled to breathe. My lungs wanted to evacuate from my body. I returned to the Rain Clan for succour, foolishly.

Tamlin took me in. But I could see the cruelty beneath their honeyed words.

"Why is the Faerie of Paradise injured?"

"Why isn't she showering us with accolades? We raised her!"

"What an ungrateful child, making us provide more for her."

Yet it didn't matter. The clans did not appreciate my continued existence. The Rain Clan was invaded barely three days after I arrived. Vortigern's curse was too much and I was slaughtered with the Rain Clan. My throat was torn open and my body desecrated. I lived on as bloodstains and garbled chunks of meat for too long.

It took so long for me to pull myself back together. In that time, my memories as Morgan arrived. If they had not, I probably would have given up then and there. When I finally reconstituted, I was alone. The Rain Clan had been dead for over two centuries.

Even though they did not deserve it, I cried. I mourned. Their corpses remained in the streets, bloody messes that had never decayed or disappeared. Orkney remained a city of sorrow and would never recover.

I met him three days later. I was still burying bodies.

He strode into bloody Orkney, staff in hand. His lips lit up with a kind smile. He dried my tears.

"You called?"

I hadn't specifically called for him, but in my wails I'd begged for a friend, a companion. An ally.

Grimr was that to me. In that moment, he was absolutely radiant.

<-->

​

"Wait!"

It didn't matter if I was mad with the rat. It didn't matter if I was still nursing a grudge over him ditching me for a pretty faerie and never showing up again the next day. It didn't matter if he was somehow still an insufferably smug boy. I could feel the crimson spear hiding in his staff. I could smell his illusion. I could…

It didn't matter. I didn't want him to disappear again.

The Faerie of Paradise may not know Spring.

But much like the first time I'd laid eyes on him, my heart skipped a beat and I thought, maybe, just maybe, I might know a taste of what Spring was like.

"..." Grimr paused, having turned half on his heel already. He took one look at me, then at Ritsuka and Mash. Then his eye went back to me. "Wait, huh? What, can't get enough of m-"

"Shut up or I'll turn you into a frog!" My blood quickened. Of course he immediately tried to get a rise out of me. "You insufferable puppy! Why!?"

"..." It was such a loaded question.

Why? Why had he abandoned me when I needed him most? Why had he chosen to kill himself? Why?

Because the Great God within him had told him it was the path for victory. His power and abilities were needed by his older counterpart, and-

"Aesc?" Mash's voice was gentle. "… Cu Chulainn. Please leave." Her voice turned cold. Like steel.

"... Yeah. I probably should."

My cheeks were hot. I wasn't sure what to do. I didn't want him to go. I wanted it to be like the very oldest days. Aesc and Grimr, saving the land. Those were maybe the days I could have tolerated the most, yet they felt so long ago and far too short. So-

"Please-"

"... I'll be at the British Museum." Grimr noted. "It's around Regen Park. But only for a day."

One day. One day and he'd be gone.

Grimr was not a heroic spirit. He was not a Servant. He was a divided spirit, not unlike me in truth. If he disappeared, then he would be gone for good. The image of the boy wavered for a moment, then vanished like a reflection on the water.

I wanted to wail. But I didn't. It was the moment I realised that in honesty, I did not have any real tears left to give. My face was hot but that was it. No streams trailed my cheeks.

To have unlimited tears was a gift only for humans. I am not human.

"You okay?" Ritsuka's words were kind. She settled down next to me, her lips thinned into a line. "You know him?"

"Yes. His name is Grimr the Sage. Please don't call him that name again, Mash." I shivered as I forced myself to stand. My body did not want to cooperate. I wanted so many things, yet they seemed out of reach. Out of…

"... He was cruel." Mash's voice was close to a snarl. "The Dragon's Corpse? That… ugh. What would we want with Albion's corpse?" I blinked. She was more knowledgeable then I thought on that. As if-

"While I appreciate that your studies are going well, Mash, can someone please explain what I'm seeing?" Romani's voice cut in. "I'm pretty sure whatever just happened caused reality to decide it was lunch time. The Singularities observed in America and Jerusalem just moved a few years."

"... How!?" Ritsuka hissed. But I understood.

"The script cracks and breaks." It was a morose way of putting it. "The more you rely on the future, the more it tries to change."

"Sorry?"

"Another time, Doctor. I'm sorry." My gaze fell back on the crime scene. What an awkward place to- "Wait."

"What is it?"

"... Natural Born Killers( That Which is Unworthy of a Tragic Demise) . I knew it. I've seen a similar spell before." It was almost identical to Vortigern's stupid- "None of them are the real shape."

"Are we talking about Jack?" Ritsuka asked. I nodded.

"It's a Noble Phantasm for anonymity. Damn it, I got soft." Natural Born Killers was like a demon or a faerie. It's form changed to suit its user. "We're back to square one."

Well…

No. We weren't.

Grimr's words already took on new meaning. It wasn't a last hope for me to come and meet him. It was an invitation. An invitation to come find him. To find the truths that he'd already uncovered and to offer his hand.

The truth was that I just needed a moment to compose myself.

"... Maybe we should visit another crime scene?" Mash asked. I shook my head.

"Where is Regen Park?"

"... I don't think you should-"

"Of course he never says what he means! I should feed him some of his precious damn cheese!" My cheeks puffed out in frustration. Oh Grimr was insufferable sometimes. "He figured out who Jack was! Or at least… something about Jack." My words finished lamely.

"And he couldn't just tell us?" I rolled my eyes at Ritsuka.

"It's Grimr."

"I don't get what that has to do with it."

"Grimr is a shard of a certain Norse God who decided to hang himself." I answered. "Think of him as that god in the shape of a faerie and garbed in mortality. Or…"

"He doesn't act like Cu Chulainn at all. He was wise and-" Oh Mash you sweet summer child.

"To quote him, he's playing hookie." I admitted. "Grimr's sense of duty is… well, he hates having to do anything. He's like a free child who works out of obligation. He'd rather just go fishing."

Fishing with Grimr. Now that sounded almost like fun.

"... You aren't making a good case for him." Romani admitted. I glanced at the blue image of him.

"You say that, but his blessing has been dripping off Mash and Ristuka since I arrived. You've met him before."

"Huh?"

"Tam Lin Freya. The gatherer of heroes." The spell had been weak. Very weak. The ward had been wearing off from the get go. "… You didn't know?"

Ritsuka's eyes narrowed.

"... Oh he's good. Why didn't he just say so?" Ritsuka grumbled. "Cu Chulainn! He was Grimr!"

"Senpai?"

"Ritsuka?"

"What, no one thought it was odd that Cu Chulainn was summoned as a druid, but was wearing a metal breastplate? He wasn't a druid at all!" Ritsuka's palm slapped her face. "Ugh. How is it that your fingers are in the past too?"

"... My worst enemy might be myself." I admitted. "This wouldn't be the first time I've done something that's boiled over in the past."

"One day very soon you are going to need to explain." Romani noted. I just chuckled.

"Mash knows the story too, you know."

"I did tell it." Mash just huffed, her hands on her hips. "But they forgot the next morning. Back in France. I think you have to tell it for it to stick."

Maybe. My spell on Mash was the epitome of caution. But it wasn't perfect. I glanced back to the crime scene one last time. That crime scene, so fresh yet stagnant and…

"..."

I did not vocalise the thought in my head. There was one thing we were missing. One thing vital.

I was almost sure I knew what it was, too.

I just needed it confirmed. That the person we were confronting was, at best, part of a person.

"... Where do I buy cheese?"

"Sorry?"

"I'm shoving it down his gullet."

<-->
​

Rubble. Ruin. That was the British Museum in Regen Park. The building itself had been ripped apart. Yet I could also feel my blood quickening. Melusine's( Albion) smell was permeating in the air. It was like-

"... Albion made it underground." I muttered. I pitied the great dragon, the phantom that swooped across the ray horizon. She had died attempting to rip back to the sea of life after the age of mystics had well and truly ended.

In Faerie Britain, Albion's corpse had collapsed on the surface. Here, she had managed to claw into the earth. We are above some part of her body.

"You refer to the Spiritual Tomb Albion?" Ritsuka asked. I glanced at her. Then I nodded.

"Albion is actually the primordial one. The origin of all dragons and really, all life on earth. We are all made in her image." I answered. "She was the model of all life forms. We are all derived from the shape she took in some way."

"She?" Ritsuka just raised an eyebrow. "Isn't Albion a boy's name?"

"..." I bit my lip at that. "Well, I guess. Melusine always adopted the form of a girl, but I suppose to Albion, the idea of gender is obsolete. She has no mate nor does she have any equal. To be able to match her is to be able to move continents."

"You speak like you know Albion personally." Romani noted. I shrugged.

"More like her…"

"Her left claw, specifically. But that's a story for later." My gaze found Grimr, sitting on top of a smashed statue. His staff was in hand and by his side was a small, white puppy. "Go on, Setanta. Sit."

"... Do you really have no dignity?" I snarled the words out. Grimr almost jumped.

"Wha-"

*Plop*

*Bounce*

The wheel of cheese in my hand smacked him straight in the forehead, bouncing off the ground. I crossed my arms, glaring at the insufferable brat.

"No dignity or shame at all! You named the dog after your image!" I hissed. "How could you!? Are you even brave enough to say it to his face!?"

"Course I am! Show me that blue bellied dog and I'll call him puppy to his face!" Grimr retorted, eyes full of fire as he leaped from the statue. I winced. Around his shoulder's was a jacket just a little too small for him. I recognised that jacket.

"Where-"

"What? I'm not heartless, you know." He swept it from his shoulders, offering it to me. It was almost the exact same as my jacket, from so long ago. The jacket I'd shredded twice over using Rhongomyniad. "Sorry. It's not quite the right size. My memory isn't as good as yours."

I took it regardless, wrapping it around my shoulders. It certainly made me feel better.

"Right, out with it."

"What!? Just like that?" Grimr clutched at his heart. I rolled my eyes.

"Nevermind. I'll discover it myself then." I strode past him, looking at the museum. It was completely ruined. "Within here, I suppose?"

"It was, yeah."

"... Trivial." I clapped my hands together, before sweeping forth my staff. As its tip crossed the ground, a ritual circle ignited, burning into the concrete and mortar. "Last chance, Grimr."

"You know I can't do that." Grimr retorted. "Feeling better?"

"... Much." And I did. There was no need to actually say it. Grimr had waited for me. He was willing to follow me.

To the Far End of the World.

I could feel fire from my extremities running through my veins. For the first time in a very long time, Spring felt like it was something I might be able to reach.

"Uh, Aesc… What are yo-"

"Quiet, Ritsuka. Let the witch work." Grimr cut in. I rolled my eyes.

"Just a bit of hocus pocus." I answered. "Linking Divine Patterns."

A Singularity was No-Time. Time did not really exist here because there was no continuation, no cause and effect. Singularities themselves were holes in history where cause and effect did not apply. They were a little unique, in that sense.

So all I needed to do was reflect the state of time prior to now in the Singularity. It was easy. The inconsistency was engraved in its very existence.

Compared to the miracle I'd burned centuries to perform, this was child's play.

"Wait-"

"I don't believe it. That shouldn't be possible."

"Done." The entire process of overwriting the museum with it's previous state took less then a minute. Rubble lifted into the air, brick and stone reknit, fires roared back into existence and then were unmade with the crackle and whimper of their birth. The museum stood before us in its imperial glory. One and a half days. That was as far as I needed to go back.

"Incredible." Ritsuka looked like she was struggling to breathe. I blinked. The look on her face was one of awe and… adoration?

"Senpai, please. Aesc isn't a-"

"Please! Teach me how to do that! I don't care if it takes decades!" I felt for Ritsuka. I really did. After all, her body was filled with small little Patterns( Magic Circuits) that struggled to move energy around. I put a finger to my lips.

"Later."

Yet my mind was already supplying ways around it. The idea of having a student… that made me feel…

"We don't have long." Grimr noted. "Jack will know we did that."

"So you know Assassin's identity?" Mash asked. Grimr shook his head.

"Not that Jack. The living Jack." He answered. "Your mystery murderer."

"How?"

"Because he did it." He slung his staff over his shoulder. "Still, glad to see ya still got it, ya old hag."

"Shut it, whippersnapper." I snarked. Grimr's grin was mirrored on my face. His puppy let out a small growl as he stepped forward. A moment later, Freki( Geri) stood in his place. Tall, majestic, easily the size of a horse. "Alright. No delaying."

Time was of the essence. I wanted to know what Jack's deal was before he could do something about it.

He'd certainly already sent his servant this way. Almo-

"Wow."

"INCOMING!"

"What?" I spun at the exclamation. In the distance, I could see a column of red light. It crashed down on a giant… thing. I didn't even know how to describe it, except for some sort of-

"THAT'S AWESOME!"

"Senpai! Focus! Not the time for your mecha appreciation!" I wasn't quite sure what a mecha was. It looked kinda like a horse, actually. Grimr let out a growl.

"Well crap. She noticed."

"Who?"

"Saber."

The pieces were falling into place in my mind. It was like-

No. Grimr wouldn't just tell me.

I'd have to discover it myself.

[ ] Dive into the Spiritual Tomb. If something would be in this place even after it's destruction, then its in the tomb. [Caster: P]
[ ] Search for the Library. Information was most likely there. Grimr could see anything that physically existed, after all. [Master: ????, Barbatos]
[ ] Follow your instincts. Follow your half formed hypothesis. If this place was essential, it was who was here, not what. Where was the person here who was alive. [Fatal Battle: Mordred, Knight of Londinium, Master: ???? Command Spells -1]

TRUE NAME REVELATION
Lancer: Grimr the Sage
Skills
Magic Resistance: A
Divinity: A
Protection from Arrows: A
Mystic Eye (Dimensional): EX
Knight of the Einharjar( Red Branch) : A++
Noble Phantasms
Gungnir | Gae Bolg( Victorious Declaration of the One Eyed God)
Freki and Geri( Sun Eater and Shadowed Moon)
Ochd Deug Odin( Great God Carved Seal) ​

Battling Mordred will change the flow of this singularity. Have you learned what you want to?

 

[BlackHadou]

The Faerie of Paradise may never see Spring.

The Faerie of Paradise will see Spring.

My third century was maybe the best years of my life. It was the only time I can think of where I felt free. The faeries of Britain believed that I had died, and thus, no one looked for me. That I could not die would never even enter the back nigglings of their minds.

Grimr was kind beyond measure. He was a young man, this was true. Perhaps travelling with one as young as him was improper. However, he followed my half thought out whims without protest. Maybe he had the same instinct to save people I possessed.

It was enough to make me question if I was truly 'Morgan le Fae'. The memories of my 'true human history' counterpart bounced about in my head like a curse. The knowledge that the other me had her very purpose stolen from her by her father was almost unbearable. Yet at the same time, I found her hate for King Arthur sad.

…

Yet as time went on, I grew to share in that hatred. Now that I think about it, I really do resemble my sister more then I did Morgan. It is enough to make me want to cry, but I have no tears left to give.

"Grimr… can I ask you a question?" It was a Spring day when I finally worked up the courage to ask. We had been hunting mors near Salisbury at the time. He paused for only a moment, glancing back at me, before his attention returned to the sky and the north star we were chasing.

"Sure."

"Does the name 'Morgan' mean anything to you?"

That Grimr was not from Faerie Britain was an open secret between us. I did not ask him of the world outside, and he obeyed my instincts without question. That was our unwritten rule. Yet I was stepping past the line. It had been a decision weeks in the making, one I'd wrestled with again and again, yet-

"Lady Morganna, the witch of death." He answered. His face looked almost sad. "I know of her, yes. Her technique in the past was adopted as the basis of my mentor's teachings." He kicked a foot, looking almost listless at the thought. "Why?"

"What if I told you my true name was Morgan?"

"So what?" My throat stopped. It was like a lump was within it that I couldn't get past. Like-

'My true name is Morgan.'

"... I-"

"It doesn't matter. Who do you want to be?" In a single sentence, he'd cut to the heart of the matter. It was then I realised that it wasn't that he was disregarding my fears, its that he thought they weren't going to come to pass.

"... Aesc. The Saviour." I wanted that so dearly with all my heart. To protect my people and deliver them from their sin. To…

In hindsight it was so foolish. Yet Grimr just smiled.

"Then let's do that. Don't dwell on sad things."

But my little dream was the saddest thing of all. It was trampled on repeatedly before the century even turned. My thoughts turned bitter and my love turned to hate.

The Faerie of Paradise may not know Spring.

But now I…

<-->
​

The British Museum was surprisingly damaged on the inside. Everywhere you looked, there were overturned exhibits, tables, books, statues. It was like a bomb had gone off within it. Initially, I thought I hadn't turned back time enough, but as I opened my mouth-

"It's meant to look like that." Grimr confirmed. I nodded. I could hear Mash bringing up the rear. That shield in her hands made her quite heavy, and the cracked and decrepit ground struggled to bear her weight. Ritsuka, on the other hand, looked just a little lost.

"I don't get it. You turned back time, right?" She asked. I nodded, pursing my lips.

"Its sort of like turning back time, yes. It's similar to the Curse of Regression that you would associate with the undead. I didn't turn back time so much as force it to resume its previous form. To the layman, there is no difference."

"Not to disturb your false modesty." Grimr's voice was almost teasingly snarky. "But it is a liiiiittle more impressive then that."

"It really isn't. It only worked because this place has no proper sense of time. The world can't reject the changes I made because there's no proof that this isn't its current state."

"... Aesc, that makes no sense." Mash just looked queasy. "Doesn't that mean you could just… unmake a person?"

"No. You existed in a specific state within the Singularity. I can only change your form to something else that you were in this Singularity." Grand arcana like that wasn't really hard. It looked impressive, but its usefulness was actually quite limited. I sniffed the air, and immediately caught the stench of magic and other things.

"That…"

"In a word, it's incredible. I'm not sure any Caster we've encountered can do that." Romani's voice rung out. I paused for a moment, glancing back at Ritsuka, and by extension, the doctor.

"Surely you have?" I wasn't the most impressive witch in human history. I didn't even exist within it. Yet Ritsuka shook her head, her finger on her chin.

"Medea couldn't. Neither could Virgil, though that might be unfair to her." She mused. "Grimr was…"

"Don't look at me! That stuff is way beyond me." Grimr exclaimed, waving his arms defensively. "Don't get too many high expectations! Aesc is on a completely different level."

… Was I really that strong? That seemed weird to me.

"If I may." I blinked as the image of Ramani shifted, and a new form appeared. This one was a man, pale skinned and gaunt and wrapped in too many cloths. His hair was a dark brown, and his beard could have used a trim. "It's likely to do with your friend's origin. I get the same readings from her as I did from the sacred spear in Fuyuki."

The very mention of my purpose turned my gaze stony. I turned on my heel and started walking.

"Wait, Aes-"

"Ouch." Mash sounded alarmed, while Grimr just whistled. The new form winced at my sudden rejection.

"Was it something I said?"

"Yes." Grimr did not sugarcoat the truth. "There are some things you don't say to a faerie, you stumbled on one on accident."

"What did I say!?"

"... Just leave the talk of the Sacred Armament alone." Grimr's voice was soft. "Aesc. Calm down."

I didn't want to calm down. My stomach felt like it had something white hot within it. I wanted to run, to move, to find something anything to do.

Why won't anyone accept me?

"I want to see her." My words were very small, but at the same time, I think my meaning was clear. Grimr just nodded. His gaze was soft, and his hand gripped his staff a little tighter.

"Sure. Let's see her." He agreed with me gently. "Do you want me to lead, or-"

"I know where she is." I could feel her body. Even dead, she was the strongest thing on this planet and it just wasn't even close. That was the simple truth.

"She?" The strange man seemed confused for a long moment, before light reached his eyes. "Oh. The tomb."

"Uh… Da Vinci, can you elaborate?"

Wait, that was Da Vinci? I remembered Mash calling her a girl. I turned, and really looked, and the truth revealed itself immediately. In that moment, I felt sorry for Da Vinci. I truly did. A human being who felt like an alien in his own skin. He was only comfortable putting for a simulacrum of himself. One that reflected who he felt he was.

I bit my tongue. It was not my place to comment on it. I could vaguely recall the companions Ritsuka had at the close in Camelot. One of the girls I didn't recognise must have been Da Vinci's new body. I could barely remember the incident. I'd been seeing it through the eyes of my thought clone, and the information had not properly transferred before my death.

"Albion. The Dragon of the Event Horizon. The Association never really worked out if it was a he or a she, but from context that's all you could be referring to." Da Vinci was smart. I appreciated that. Ritsuka was surrounded by talented people. Mash and Ritsuka were truly blessed.

"She predates such things." I answered dryly. "It's just her preference."

"Then she has no sex?"

"Of course not. She predates almost all life on the planet. You might find some of the fish were older." I retorted, rolling my eyes. Grimr just chuckled.

"Albion is the first being to reach the skies." He explained. "The skies were created by the planet as a playground for her, as the planet's favoured creature."

"Yet she died when she failed to get back to Avalon." Da Vinci muttered. I shook my head.

"She chose to die." I retorted. "Her job had finished and her successor anointed. Albion deserves a rest one day too." I had to wonder if I was the same, in the end. That my greatest reward with Artoria's birth was in fact the right to die, knowing that my task was now concluded.

… I found the very thought sad.

"Chose to die? Wait, are you saying-" Ritsuka, on the other hand, was quickly becoming horrified, her face covered in fear.

"Albion is one of the planet's chosen. To us, death is an inconvenience. We aren't actually allowed to remain dead. If Albion was needed, she would be alive a moment after her death." I answered. "What's wrong?"

"... Does that extend to the Dead Count Ancestors( Bones of Salvation) ?"

…

"You've met them, I see." My voice was bitter. How could I not be, for in Faerie Britain, they were the reason I was even necessary in the first place. It was so very-

"Just one. He looked like Woodwose." Mash supplied. "His name was Heat."

"Yeah. They all have names like that." Grimr noted. "It also extends to the twenty-seven great vampire threats, too. Any spirit born of the planet for the purpose of executing a function of the planet has such a power. So does that lazy bastard in Africa, though he does it a different way."

"Huh?" That was a new one to me. I glanced at Grimr. He just looked away.

"What, I can have opinions too."

"The Crystal Spider. One of Chaldea's duties is permanent observation." Romani was back, his hand under his chin. "Still, lazy bastard is not how we would put it. We would rather it sleep."

"If he'd wake up from his nap when asked, well, you wouldn't have a human incineration." Grimr, on the other hand, remained bitter. "He's terrible at paying his rent, but our great mother is too nice to just kick him off."

I didn't point out that the Visitors from Another Star( Aristotles | Ultimate Ones) were called with the express purpose of executing humanity should they ever threaten the Great Mother of Us All. Why would it have awakened unl-

Oh.

Oh Grimr…

If the Visitors from Another Star( Aristotles | Ultimate Ones) had acted, I would never have existed. In a small way, I was grateful for his laziness.

"I… never thought of it that way."

"Its best you don't think about him, honestly."

I put the words of Grimr out of mind. The halls seemed to melt away as we descended. It was easy to find the path down. After all, the stink of magic gave way to something pure as we did so, to the point where the wood and concrete parted into stone and dirt, and we caught sight of pieces of crystal.

"Its pretty." Ritsuka's breath was heavy. I paused after a moments thought. Pretty, yes, but-

"You can't breathe."

"I'm fine." Ritsuka's protests were futile. I closed my eyes. My patterns lit up with fire. This one would be a long spell.

"Ritsuka, your lungs can't handle this." Da Vinci's voice cut in. "You are just a human."

"I can handle it!"

"It's fine." I let out a breath. My very being ate the ether( grain) from the air. After a few moments, Ritsuka's breath started to normalise.

"How-"

"... Call it the privilege of the Faerie of Paradise." I muttered that under my breath. "Let me know if it gets uncomfortable."

"Faerie of Paradise?"

"The time is coming very soon where you are going to have to explain that." Romani noted. "That sounds really important. Faeries sent from the planet have jobs."

"They do." I agreed.

"So what is yours?"

"Isn't that the question." My voice turned dark again. Moody even. Too many complicated feelings welled up in my chest. I wanted to-

"Not now." Grimr declared. He was playing peacekeeper, but how long could that last, I wonder?

The thought was driven from my mind as we came across her. It was a small cavern. Really, the part of her we found was some part of her talon, rather then the rest of her. I could appreciate how big Albion actually was, given I had talked to the aspect of her left fore nail more then once.

Albion, the Event Horizon, had tried to tunnel back into Avalon. I wasn't quite sure why. She must have known it was futile, that the inner sea was sealed from this side. Without the Great Mother of Us All's assistance, such an attempt was futile. It was doomed to fail from the very outset.

Yet…

My attention was not on the massive talon that was larger then any building that I'd seen or built. No, it was on the form before the talon, a man with dark hair garbed in a white robe, surrounded by a magic circle and messing with what looked like chemicals and instruments. My blood boiled at the sight.

That was Melusine's( Albion's) body. No human had the right to touch that.

"Paracelsus von Hohenheim." Mash's voice was dark. One filled with bitter memories. Grimr's breath sharpened, and Ritsuka's muscles tightened.

Yet…

I moved far faster then them. My form darted through the cave, my feet tapping down shortly behind Paracelsus. He hadn't noticed us, or maybe, couldn't notice us through the thick ether( grain) in the air.

"Desecration is not a particularly attractive trait." I spoke up dryly. The man, to his credit, did not jump. Did not move, even, except to monitor the sort of compass in his hand. He did not say a word for a long moment, until finally, the device snapped closed in his palm.

"It is here that I can think for myself. Consider it a recluse." He answered, slowly standing and turning sideways to look at me. "The Master of Chaldea. The Shielder. Two I don't recognise. Interesting."

"Professor P." Ritsuka's voice was bitter. They had a history, that was all I could surmise. Paracelsus nodded at that, as I examined his flesh. It was dark, almost like a gray, now that I was looking at it. His fingernails were red, and his eyes golden. "You look worse then last time."

"I will admit that you did a number on me in Okeanos." The man answered softly. "Good job with that, by the way." He was far too amicable. Far too-

Mash's shield rose.

"Why are you here, Paracelsus?" Her voice was demanding. Grimr raised an eyebrow, and I realised mine had risen too. The magus just chuckled.

"I see. So a faerie and the last human walk into a tomb." He mused. "I apologise, Great Mother. This must be confusing for you."

"Don't call me that." My voice was like acid. Paracelsus' eyes narrowed.

"Then should I call you the Bones of Fo-"

"Speak another treacherous word and I will silence you for good." Grimr's staff had twisted in blood, bone and gore into a wicked spear. Paracelsus, however, simply went silent, glancing back at Albion's talon.

"... I see I have struck a nerve. I was unaware a faerie could deny their purpose. So you are why the spear-"

Whatever happened, happened too fast. Grimr struck. The world flickered. Something bright erupted from Albion's corpse. The bone spear that always killed stopped an inch from Paracelsus' heart.

It was held between two almost fish-like fingers, almost like fins.

" Saoirse( Albion) , it's okay." Paracelsus' voice was soft. "I would go so far as to say you are currently thwarting my plans."

"I refuse."

I felt myself smile in spite of myself. Even if the shape was a little different, she was nothing if not obstinate. My hands found my hips as I leaned forward, examining the faerie before me. The dragon in faerie form, if I were to be specific.

She was more like a fish this time. A mermaid in possession of great wings, scales hardening into plates like armour. Her face remained soft, and her hair was still that radiant white. Where once she walked on the ground, now she floated in the air.

She probably didn't actually need the wings in truth.

"I-" I lifted a hand. Grimr's pulled back his spear, it's form twisting back into that ashen staff of his. Saoirse stared at me for a long moment, in sympathy and in pity.

"You won't find anything here." She noted. I shook my head.

"I just wanted to see you."

The dragon faeries face softened for a long moment, as she flipped over Paracelsus' head and took her place at Paracelsus' side.

"And see me you have. Do you feel better?"

"A bit." I nodded absently. "Who is your friend? Besides a name that means nothing to me."

There were several looks. Between Mash, Ritsuka and Paracelsus himself, between Saoirse and Paracelsus, between Romani and Mash.

"I am the Herald of Sea." Paracelsus finally spoke up. "One of the servants of the Evil of Humanity. I seek the end of humanity through human incineration. I was summoned through space and time for that purpose."

"He also keeps an eye on Flauros." Ritsuka's voice was dark. Paracelsus gave a dark chuckle at that.

"Kept. You put an end to him already."

"He'll be back." Mash sounded sure, but Paracelsus just shrugged.

"Maybe, but not before I bow out, I think." He answered. "I am tired, Ritsuka, Mash. Very tired." His hand reached down to the sword of crystal at the edge of his circle. "And now the time has come. The close is here."

His fingers curled around the blade. I could feel magical energy building. Mash was moving. Grimr looked alarmed.

I could see the exasperated look in Saorise's eyes.

" Ars Arcanum Para-( The Time of Beginning Has Come, He Granted Power over All) "

"Enough of that." Soairse had slapped her tail just once, and the sword went flying across the cavern. "I'm sorry, your highness. He really is a bit silly. A lot like Percival in that way."

"... I see." I just let out a long breath. "His journey has been long." I almost pitied him. His arm had broken in the swing of Saoirse's tail. There was no chance he could resist us in a fight. Yet- "Why him?"

"He kept me company." Saoirse answered. "Told me stories. Pretty stories. Nice stories." She paused, glancing at me directly in the eye. "The cave in trapped him, but I suppose that is no longer a problem."

"No."

"... He serves the enemy of humans. You probably should kill him."

Saoirse spoke the truth. Yet even as she spoke, Ritsuka bit her lip.

"The Grail War, is it your doing?"

"... We tried to use it to our advantage. Jack the Ripper proved… uncooperative. I didn't realise it was possible to resist Master's command." Paracelsus answered. "We did not do our research, Barbatos and I. We are paying for it now, our best laid plans undone."

"Barbatos?" My question was direct. Paracelsus nodded.

"One of the seventy-two great demons. Another of Master's servants." He answered. There was only one conclusion to draw from that. That- "Yes. My Master's name is Solomon."

My patterns lit up. Rhongomyniad was in my hand.

"You read minds." I snarled. Paracelsus nodded.

"A power of my Master." He answered. I almost didn't hear him, so busy was I throwing up every ward and enchantment against such I could think of. His lips twisted into a small smile. "Alas, an impasse. If you kill me, Solomon will know everything."

"It can't be. Solomon wouldn't." Romani's voice was disbelieving, but Paracelsus just chuckled.

"Believe what you wish." He answered. "But you have no choice. I can only be myself here. Outside of here, I am a cursed being, filled with grail mud. I am your enemy."

Enemy.

Grail Mud. The cursed blood of the planet. The planet's malevolence given shape and form. It would be easier to just call it the planet's grudge against those that might hurt her. A grudge that…

… Maybe.

[ ] Leave Paracelsus in Saoirse's care. It's not like he can leave.
-[ ] Head to the library. Your curiosity was sated. [Master: ????, Barbatos, Archer: ????]
-[ ] There was a living human here. Find them. Before someone else did. [Fatal Battle: Mordred, Knight of Londinium, Master: ????, Archer: ????]
[ ] Put Paracelsus out of his misery. [Beast I: Paracelsus, Saoirse]
[ ] … What was some more hocus pocus? I can take it. [Ritsuka, Caster: Paracelsus, Beast I: Babbage, Pretender: Morgan le Fae] (Independent Manifestation)

BEAST OF HUMANITY ADVENT​

Beast I Sub-member: Paracelsus of Sea
Skills
Independent Manifestation C
Monstrous Strength: B+
Curse of the Elementals: A+
Alchemy: A+
Noble Phantasms
Ars Arcanum Paracelsus( The Time of Beginning has Come, He Granted Power over All)
Ars Nova Hohenheim( The Time of Ending has Come, He Who Sacrifices All)
​