The light of Avalon was gentle yet firm, washing over the ruined earth like a tide, completely purifying and dispersing the darkness surging around Kanjuro. He stood in the center of the light, arms open, his black robes appearing particularly out of place in the holy radiance, yet carrying an eerie tranquility. The ultimate sword pointed at him, containing all of Artoria's will and power; the chaotic singularity condensed at the tip of the blade had been compressed to the extreme, and the aura of destruction made space itself wail.
Life and death, end and salvation, all within a single thought.
Artoria's sword was only an inch away from Kanjuro's heart. Her gaze was as firm as a rock; for Britain, for all the people harmed by Kanjuro, for that torn dream, this sword must fall!
However, just as the blade was about to touch his black robes—.
An image crashed into her mind without warning.
Even if they were false, altered memories, they were still things that had truly happened.
Instead, it was a fragment that truly existed in the depths of her childhood: by a misty forest in the drizzling rain, a black-robed Magician knelt down, wiping the mud and tears from her face with a warm, dry handkerchief. He patiently explained the techniques of generating power in swordsmanship, his eyes filled with a pure gentleness and expectation that she would never see again. That was Merlin, a Merlin who had yet to reveal his true face, the mentor who had given the lonely girl her first guidance and warmth.
Following that were countless days and nights of teaching, his gratified gaze hidden in the shadows during her coronation (recalling it now, that gaze was complex and difficult to understand), and his seemingly casual yet always point-blank advice whenever she was lost... These "good" things that truly existed, which she had buried deep beneath her hatred, were like a hidden undercurrent, breaking through the dam of her will in this single instant.
Her sword... paused imperceptibly.
In less than a hundredth of a second, just a slight flicker of the mind, the devastating power at the tip of her sword experienced an almost unperceivable stagnation.
But for an existence like Kanjuro, this was already enough.
The reminiscent, bitter smile on his face suddenly transformed into a cold and cruel curve of a successful scheme the moment Artoria's sword momentum slightly stalled!
Artoria caught this fleeting smile, and alarm bells rang in her heart! No! He wasn't reminiscing! He was... "eternal night treasury — Lightless Fang!"
Swoosh—!
A razor-thin, extremely dark spiral sword qi shot out without warning from the phantom of the eternal night treasury behind Kanjuro, which should have been suppressed and nearly dissipated by the light of Avalon! This sword qi was condensed to the extreme, discarding all fanfare to pursue only ultimate speed and penetration! It skillfully bypassed the frontal edge of the sword of promised victory, like a long-premeditated venomous snake, accurately piercing the left shoulder of Artoria, which was left relatively thin in armor protection due to her full-scale attack!
Too fast! Too sudden!
Artoria had no time to bring her sword back to parry and could only rely on her combat instincts to desperately turn her body.
Splurt—!
The dark spiral sword qi easily tore through the chaotic magical energy attached to her shoulder armor and pierced through her shoulder! A dark power containing intense erosion and excruciating pain instantly exploded within her body!
"Argh—!"
Artoria let out a muffled groan of pain. The power she had condensed to the extreme instantly lost control and backfired. Combined with the heavy injury to her shoulder, she felt as if she had been struck by a massive blow, flying backward and crashing heavily into the dust. The sword of promised victory fell from her hand and stabbed into the ground nearby, the light on its blade fading rapidly. The distant phantom of Avalon also fluctuated violently, nearly collapsing.
The pressure around Kanjuro lightened. He slowly lowered his open arms and looked at the fallen Artoria. The previous madness or mockery was gone from his face, replaced only by a deep, complex sigh. In that sigh, there actually seemed to be a hint of... disappointment?
"How could this happen?!" In the distance, Irisviel covered her mouth in disbelief, her eyes filled with worry and despair.
Jeanne watched this scene quietly, a hint of realization and faint pity flickering in her violet eyes. She whispered softly, unsure to whom she was speaking: "As expected... she still cannot completely cut it off..."
Kanjuro walked step by step toward Artoria, who was struggling to crawl up. His voice was calm yet carried a soul-piercing power that echoed across the silent battlefield:
"You hesitated, Saber."
He stopped not far from her, looking down at her face, which was pale from pain and the backlash of power.
"At the final moment, you still held that sliver of unnecessary... compassion for the phantom of the past, for me, the mentor who has long since fallen into darkness."
"Hesitation is defeat."
"This is the final and only obstacle that prevents you from... truly surpassing me."
Artoria coughed up a mouthful of blood tinged with dark energy and looked up, her emerald eyes filled with unwillingness, anger, and a trace of flustered embarrassment at having her inner thoughts exposed. She had lost, not because of a lack of strength, but because she had been one move short in the ultimate contest of the heart.
Kanjuro looked at her with deep eyes. Victory was already in his grasp, yet not a shred of joy could be found in his gaze. Kanjuro held the weakened Artoria in his arms, her weight light and her black armor cold, yet it could not hide the slight trembling of the body beneath and the warmth seeping through the armor. Blood seeped from the wound on her shoulder, staining his black robe and leaving dark red marks on her pitch-black breastplate. Her originally brilliant blonde hair was stained with dust and blood, a few strands sticking to her pale, sweaty cheeks. Her emerald eyes were half-closed, having lost their usual radiance, leaving only exhaustion and a near-resigned silence.
He lowered his head, looking at this face he had gazed upon countless times during his plotting and manipulation. Now it was within reach, fragile as if it would shatter at a touch. He reached out, his fingertips gently brushing away the sweaty hair from her forehead, his movement carrying a nearly gentle cruelty that was utterly inconsistent with his nature.
"Do you know the price of failure, my good daughter?" His voice was low, like a whisper, yet it carried an unquestionable power of control that echoed within this sealed space.
Artoria's body stiffened imperceptibly for a moment in his arms. She did not answer, but only slowly raised her eyelids, her emerald eyes reflecting his deep and dangerous face. She felt no anger or fear; instead, she pulled her lips into an extremely weak curve of bitterness and self-mockery.
Kanjuro did not wait for her answer. He looked up, turning his gaze toward Jeanne, who stood as still as a statue nearby. He said nothing, only casually snapping his fingers.
"Click."
A soft sound, not from reality, but the sound of the laws of space being forcibly altered. The surrounding light suddenly dimmed, and invisible barriers formed out of thin air, completely isolating this area from the outside world.
The ruins of the abandoned castle, the worried Irisviel in the distance, and even the residual energy waves in the sky all seemed to be separated by a layer of frosted glass, becoming blurred and indistinct. The three of them were trapped in a temporary secret chamber constructed by Kanjuro's will.
"Jeanne," Kanjuro's voice was calm and flat, as if stating an established fact, "you come too. Along with Saber, perform 'Magic Replenishment' for me."
Jeanne's purple eyes flickered slightly. Without the slightest hesitation, and without showing any shame or resistance, she simply stepped forward calmly, as if fulfilling a long-destined mission.
She walked to Kanjuro's side and silently took off her silver-white gauntlets, revealing her fair arms.
And in Kanjuro's arms, Artoria's body trembled violently upon hearing the words "Magic Replenishment."
She tilted her head back, gazing blankly at the cold lines of Kanjuro's jaw, her eyes filled with complex emotions—humiliation, realization, and finally turning into a nearly inaudible sigh of endless melancholy.
"Merlin..." Her voice was as light as a wisp of smoke about to dissipate, "you are still the same... I remember in the palace, during those anxious nights before my coronation, you also... seemingly gently comforted me like this, injecting magical energy into me to stabilize my mind..."
Her eyes were misty, as if lost in distant memories—memories that held real warmth, but now appeared to be illusions filled with traps. "Only now... this 'Magic Replenishment' is, after all... different."
She closed her eyes, hiding the last trace of fragility beneath her trembling eyelashes, and spoke no more, as if accepting the arrangement of fate.
Irisviel's figure paced anxiously outside the blurred boundary. She could vaguely see the situation inside but could not break in, only able to fruitlessly beat against the invisible barrier, her heart filled with helplessness and panic... An hour passed in silence and a certain unspeakable tension.
No one knew exactly what happened within that sealed space. There was no fierce resistance, no cries of humiliation, only a suffocating silence, as if it were a silent final ritual, or a desperate, sinking farewell.
When the seal on the space was lifted as silently as it had appeared, light flooded back in.
Artoria had stood up once again.
She stood with her back to Kanjuro and Jeanne. Her black armor still covered her body, though the damage to her shoulder armor was temporarily sealed by a solid mass of dark magical energy, no longer bleeding. Her figure leaned against a nearby half-collapsed stone doorway, her back appearing exceptionally thin and lonely, as if she had exhausted all her strength.
Jeanne stood quietly a bit further behind Kanjuro, tidying her attire, her face devoid of any expression, as if nothing had happened.
Kanjuro still stood in his original spot, his black robe tidy, as if everything just now had been an illusion. He looked calmly at Artoria's back as she leaned against the door, his gaze deep and inscrutable.
"Are you leaving?" he spoke, his voice calm and devoid of emotion.
Artoria did not turn around, only slightly tilting her head to reveal a small portion of her still-pale profile.
Kanjuro continued, his tone carrying a strange, seemingly sincere allure: "If you are willing to stay... I can continue to be your 'Merlin'. A Merlin belonging only to you. Forget the responsibilities of a King, forget the hatred of the past, just like... when we first lived in seclusion by the lake."
His words were like the sweetest poison, painting a dream of discarding all heavy burdens and returning to a pure past.
Artoria's body leaning against the doorway seemed to sway slightly. She was silent for a long time, so long that it felt as if time itself had frozen.
Finally, she shook her head extremely slowly, yet with absolute firmness. She did not speak, but that gesture of refusal already said everything.
She took a deep breath, as if to completely exhale all the residual scent belonging to him from her lungs. Then, she straightened her spine, and though her steps were still somewhat unsteady, she stepped out of that "door" which symbolized the final connection between her and him, one step at a time, firmly and without looking back, heading toward the ruins and the unknown glimmer outside.
Kanjuro did not stop her, only quietly watching her departing back until that black figure completely vanished into the shadows of the broken walls.
The isolation of the space was lifted, and the glimmer of the outside world and the desolation of the ruins returned to view, also reflecting Artoria's lonely and slightly staggering back as she walked away alone. She walked very slowly, every step seemingly carrying a thousand-pound weight. Her black armor glinted darkly under the sparse light, and at the wound on her shoulder forcibly sealed by dark magical energy, there were still faint, unstable fluctuations of energy.
Jeanne walked quietly to Kanjuro's side. She didn't look at him, but instead cast her gaze toward that increasingly distant and lonely figure. She gently leaned her head against his solid chest, feeling his steady heartbeat beneath the black robe and his bottomless source of magical energy like a silent, deep sea.
"Are you just letting her go like that?" Jeanne's voice was very light, carrying a hint of subtle inquiry that broke the silence between them.
Kanjuro's gaze still hadn't shifted from the direction where Artoria had vanished. He naturally put his arm around Jeanne's shoulder, his fingertips unconsciously stroking her silver-white pauldrons. His reply was calm and indifferent, as if stating a fact that had nothing to do with him:
"She doesn't have much time left." His voice was low. "Emiya Kiritsugu's spiritual pulse is severed, and his life force is like a candle in the wind. The contract connection between them and the magical energy of the command spells are rapidly fading. Forcing her to stay would be nothing more than witnessing a predetermined wilting."
He paused, his tone devoid of any emotion, as if making a cold summary:
"Let her be alone... for a while. This is the loser's... final dignity."
That being said.
After saying those seemingly decisive words of letting go, Kanjuro's arm around Jeanne slowly loosened. He looked down, meeting Jeanne's violet eyes that seemed able to see through everything, and in them, he saw understanding and a hint of faint helplessness.
He didn't explain, nor did he need to.
In the next moment, his figure vanished silently from Jeanne's side like a drop of ink merging into the shadows, leaving behind only a faint, almost imperceptible ripple of dark aura.
Jeanne stood there, looking in the direction he had vanished, then glanced toward the path Artoria had taken, sighing softly. She knew that while the man spoke of "dignity" and "quiet," his actions betrayed his words. He ultimately couldn't... let go... Amidst the ruins of Fuyuki City, Artoria supported herself against a crumbling wall, trudging forward with difficulty. Waves of sharp pain radiated from her shoulder, and the magical energy within her was in disarray due to the backlash. What weighed even heavier on her heart was that the connection with her master was becoming extremely weak, like a kite about to snap its string. An unprecedented sense of weakness and... loneliness enveloped her.
She didn't know where she should go, or where she could still go. Britain had long since become a distant past, and the bonds of this world were about to break. Perhaps, dissipating in a corner known to no one was the final destination for her, this failed King.
Just then, an extremely subtle yet impossible-to-ignore "presence," like silent footsteps, maintained a distance that was neither too close nor too far from her.
Artoria paused in her tracks. She didn't look back, only closing her eyes wearily. She felt that dark aura that followed her like a shadow, familiar enough to be etched into her soul, and her lips curled into an extremely bitter arc.
He... followed after all.
He clearly said he'd let her be quiet, yet he wouldn't even grant her this final, defeated solitude.
She leaned against the cold, broken wall and tilted her head back, allowing the sparse rain mixed with dust to fall on her face, unable to distinguish if it was rain or something else. Behind her, within those shadows, Kanjuro stood silently, like a guardian, yet also like a supervisor, and even more like a silent... companion. Before the destined end arrived, he chose this way to witness the final moments of his "most perfect work."
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