Chapter 128: For the Dream Within One's Heart
What is the end of the road for a Hero of Justice?
It is the realization that the justice one person clings to and the justice another believes in are fundamentally not the same thing. It is like how the justice of the common people is the simplest wish: for the tiller to have his land, the weaver to have her loom, and the dweller to have his home.
Yet, to the people perched at the top, this is seen as the greatest evil in the world—scattering hard-earned silver to the poor. To realize a justice that everyone believes in is, in reality, fundamentally impossible.
...Unfortunately, by the time Archer finally understood this truth, it was too late. By the time he wanted to turn back, there was no longer a path to return to. That ending—experiencing countless betrayals, being misunderstood by myriad people, and even being betrayed by those he had saved—had long since been deeply engraved into his inner world, impossible to erase.
"I have no regrets. This is the only path. "
"My whole life was... "
Thus, as the surging torrent of magical energy began to boil around Archer, the memories belonging to him were transmitted along with that mana. Under the influence of being the same person, they flowed unceasingly into Emiya Shirou's mind.
To Emiya Shirou, who already understood Archer's past through memories of his previous life, this forced him to witness Archer's life once again through a more visceral sensation, viewing that mental landscape covered by a dim, gloomy sky—
"—[Unlimited Blade Works]!!"
As the final magical incantation was chanted by Archer, world and world were exchanged in that single instant. Archer's mental landscape replaced the reality they resided in. This was a Reality Marble—the grand magecraft closest to True Magic.
"With this, no one can interfere with us."
In this world where only Archer and Emiya Shirou were encased, Archer—who had adjusted the distance between them the moment they entered the Reality Marble—loudly pronounced his sentence upon Emiya Shirou: "And this world is the end of the road for the human being named 'Emiya Shirou'!"
As his words fell, there was no longer a need to spend magical energy on projection. Once Archer paid the cost to open the Reality Marble, the countless blades and Noble Phantasms already stored within [Unlimited Blade Works] and recorded by him were prepared in advance. They manifested throughout the world.
With a single command from Archer, they leaped up one after another, pointing toward Emiya Shirou and lunging forth like a raging tide. There was no hesitation. Nor was there any clashing of ideals with Shirou as there had been in the original Fate/stay night.
"But that makes sense. You would hesitate or hold back in the original because, even while your mouth denied the ideal of a Hero of Justice, it was never because of those betrayals that you truly doubted your actions.
Rather, you never truly gave up on becoming a Hero of Justice; you only doubted whether this path could actually reach a destination."
Was he surprised? To be honest, Emiya Shirou wasn't particularly surprised by Archer's full-strength attack. After all, in the original story, if Archer truly wanted to kill Shirou, he had countless ways to do so. In fact, as the one most familiar with Shirou's condition, he could have completely led Shirou astray with false teachings instead of guiding him onto the correct path and correcting his magical errors.
That was why Archer lost the battle with Shirou in the original story.
Shirou used actual action to tell Archer and prove that the path they walked was never wrong.
But the Emiya Shirou who possessed memories of a past life was not the Emiya Shirou of the original story. Could he still speak such truths to Archer? He feared that with old grudges and new debts added together, Archer's blade would only swing toward him with even greater force.
"After all, from the moment I chose to help Saber realize her wish, in your eyes, I became someone walking Kiritsugu's old path again—someone who still chooses the road of no return, sacrificing the few (Saber) to save the many (Britain)."
As Shirou said this, he suddenly remembered that in Archer's timeline, the other had seemingly also chosen the route of supporting Saber's wish. No wonder Archer was so decisive.
So, was there a need to panic? There was not.
Although the [Unlimited Blade Works] spanning the entire Reality Marble undoubtedly cut off all of Shirou's evasion routes, and Archer—having pulled away early—prevented Shirou from using the power of [Pseudo-The World] to solve the caster through time-stop to terminate the Reality Marble, or from shattering all the incoming Noble Phantasms during stopped time... not to mention his original plan of killing Archer in one strike without exposing too many Stands...
In a way, Archer really had found the perfect method to counter him.
"Do you know, my future self?"
Facing the rain of Noble Phantasms lunging toward him and the situation of being thrust into a desperate corner in reverse, Shirou's tone remained calm and unhurried. "Although I knew
very early on that you—or rather, we—possessed a Reality Marble trump card called [Unlimited Blade Works]...
But as you know, because Kiritsugu didn't want us to have anything to do with magecraft or become magi, I actually don't know much about magical knowledge. What exactly is a Reality Marble? I only understood it literally as a special boundary.
But now, I finally understand...
"—Trace on!!"
"...A so-called Reality Marble, a so-called mental landscape, is the deepest dream within our hearts~~"
[Pseudo-Death 13]!!!
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