"Of course." Medea nodded. "My Workshop has no welcome for barbarians with no manners."
"Come in. I've already prepared the stage for you."
She turned and led the group toward the open courtyard before the main hall.
Across the entire ground of the courtyard, a vast and intricate Age of Gods magic circle had been inscribed, made up of countless runes.
In the air, the dense magical energy had nearly condensed into something physical.
"This is..." Waver stared at the circle before him, shock spreading across his face. "A spatial displacement bounded field? No... something far higher than that! This is... Domain magecraft!"
"Correct." A self-satisfied smile touched Medea's face. "This is a myth-recreation bounded field, built by consuming nearly seventy percent of Ryuudou Temple's magical energy."
"Inside this field, I can weaken Berserker's divine blessing to the greatest possible degree. At the same time, I can attach rule-based damage to our attacks."
"Put simply..."
"...here, we have a real chance to kill him."
Just as she spoke.
A world-shaking roar erupted from the foot of the mountain.
Berserker had arrived!
He hadn't come through the mountain gate at all.
Instead, in the most savage, most direct way possible, he smashed straight through Ryuudou Temple's outer wall and crashed into the courtyard like a meteor out of control!
A roar tore from him, and those mad, blood-red eyes locked onto Saber in an instant.
It was as if, in his eyes, only this old nemesis, the one he had crossed paths with back in the mythic age, was a foe worth facing directly.
"Here he comes! Everyone, prepare for battle!" Waver shouted.
"Saber! Archer! Pin him down from the front!" Rin issued the order at once.
Saber and Archer rushed in from left and right.
The invisible holy sword and the twin black-and-white blades became two streaks of brilliant light, striking the mountain-like giant from two different angles.
A dense, hammer-on-anvil clamor of clashing metal rang through the courtyard.
But the result was the same as before.
Every attack was knocked aside effortlessly by Berserker's rock-like body.
"No good! Ordinary attacks don't work on him!" There was an edge of urgency in Saber's voice.
"Caster! Where's your field?!" Rin shouted back at Medea.
"Don't be impatient. The real show... is only just beginning."
A strange, eerie light flickered in Medea's eyes.
She raised both hands and began to chant the ancient, tongue-twisting incantation of the Age of Gods.
As she chanted, the magic circle on the ground began to glow a blinding purple.
An invisible, crushing pressure blanketed the entire courtyard in an instant.
Berserker's furious movements faltered, just slightly.
"It worked!" Waver cried excitedly. "The field's taken effect! His divinity is being suppressed!"
"Now's the time! Saber!"
Saber understood.
She drew a deep breath and poured the already-scarce magical energy in her body into the holy sword in her hands.
"...Ex..."
But then.
In the very instant she was about to unleash her Noble Phantasm.
A blue figure burst suddenly from the shadows of the main hall!
His target was not Saber and Archer, locked in combat with Berserker.
It was... the utterly defenseless Caster, who was pouring all her strength into maintaining the field!
"What?!"
The sudden turn left everyone stunned.
"Lancer?! You bastard!" Rin screamed in fury.
"Heh heh. Sorry about this, witch."
A bloodthirsty grin spread across Lancer's face. The red cursed spear in his hand carved a sinister arc through the air, thrusting straight for Medea's heart.
"My Master did say..."
"...to wipe the lot of you out!"
Betrayal!
At the most critical moment, the most fatal betrayal had erupted from within Caster's own camp!
And with Caster's magical support gone, the great circle on the ground that had only just activated dimmed in an instant.
The force suppressing Berserker vanished along with it.
A roar erupted, and Berserker, freed once more, turned even more savage.
He let out a bellow, and the axe-sword in his hand, carrying the force to cleave mountains and split stone, came smashing down on Saber, who had left a gaping opening in herself while preparing to unleash her Noble Phantasm!
Danger!
A fatal danger like never before!
Saber had no way left to dodge!
In that split second.
A figure no one expected suddenly threw itself in front of Saber.
It was Shirou Emiya.
He raised both hands, and with all the strength left in his body, he roared out that incantation of "protection" he had practiced countless times.
"...Trace, on."
"...Rho Aias!"
Seven petal-like shields of pure magical energy, shining with holy light, appeared out of nothing before him.
It was the legendary, invincible shield once wielded by Ajax, hero of the Trojan War, capable of stopping a hurled spear!
Berserker's devastating blow came smashing down onto those seven petals of light.
The first petal shattered.
The second petal shattered.
The third petal shattered...
...
The sixth petal shattered.
When the seventh petal, too, was riddled with cracks and on the verge of total collapse.
Berserker's attack was, at last, held back.
But Shirou Emiya paid a terrible price for it.
His body, as though struck by a truck, was sent flying backward, every bone in him wailing under the unbearable strain.
Blood spewed wildly from his mouth.
"Master!"
Saber let out an anguished cry.
And just as everyone's attention was drawn to that brutal sight.
A purple figure, ghostlike, appeared silently at the edge of the courtyard.
Rider... Medusa.
She looked over the chaotic battlefield before her, soaked in blood and betrayal.
Then, slowly, she lifted away the black cloth that had always covered her eyes.
What she revealed was a pair of... eyes that could turn all things in this world to stone, glittering with an ill omen...
...Mystic Eyes.
A horror born of the mythic age, one that made the very soul tremble, spread out from her body.
It was a kind of... absolute "curse" that could turn all "life" into "dead matter."
"The Mystic Eyes... of Petrification?!"
For the first time, true, heartfelt terror showed on Waver's face. The cigar perpetually pinched between his fingers fell to the ground, and he didn't even notice.
"Damn it! Why does it have to be that monster!"
The Mystic Eyes of Petrification were, even among all Mystic Eyes, of the highest tier, ranked at "Gold," below "Jewel" and "Rainbow."
In essence, they were no longer "magecraft" but something close to the authority of a "god."
Any existence with a magical rank of C-minus or below would be unconditionally and utterly petrified the moment those eyes saw it.
And even a Servant of Saber's or Archer's caliber, though not petrified outright, would have all their bodily functions drastically "degraded" the instant the Mystic Eyes caught them, as if mired in a swamp.
"...Everyone! Don't look into her eyes!"
Waver roared with all his strength.
But it was already too late.
Lancer, closest to Rider and only just coming down from the thrill of his sneak attack, was the first to fall victim to the Mystic Eyes.
He managed only a startled "Whoa," and his proud, panther-quick body began to petrify before everyone's eyes, climbing up from his feet.
In the span of two short seconds, he had become a lifelike gray statue, frozen in a combat stance.
"Lancer?!"
His Master, the robed man who had stayed hidden in the shadows of the main hall, Souichirou Kuzuki, let out a cry of disbelief.
But before he could react in any way.
Rider's gaze had already turned to him.
Souichirou Kuzuki, though a killer with peerless mastery of hand-to-hand combat, was in the end nothing more than an ordinary man.
He couldn't even get a scream out before he followed in his Servant's footsteps and became a cold statue.
In the blink of an eye, the Lancer pair, so arrogant only moments before, were wiped out completely, in the most pathetic and helpless way imaginable.
"..."
"..."
The entire battlefield fell into a deathly silence.
Everyone was stunned by the sudden, overwhelming display of power.
And Rider, having done all this, did not stop.
Those golden, dazzling Mystic Eyes, empty of any emotion, turned slowly toward the great wounded-beast figure that had just dragged itself up from the ground.
...Berserker.
A roar erupted, and the moment those Mystic Eyes caught him, Berserker's massive frame stiffened violently as well.
A gray, rock-like texture began to spread across his skin.
His movements grew more sluggish than ever before.
"It worked?! Petrification works on him too?!" Joy lit up Rin's face.
"No... that's wrong!" Seiji Fujiwara's voice came suddenly over everyone's communication channel, calm as ice.
[System Analysis: Berserker's Noble Phantasm, God Hand, is engaged in conceptual conflict with Rider's Mystic Eyes of Petrification!]
[Berserker's divinity is being forcibly lowered by the Mystic Eyes' effect! But at the same time, his powerful Magic Resistance is resisting the encroachment of petrification!]
[Conclusion: Petrification cannot kill him outright! At most, it can imprison him... for ten seconds!]
"Ten seconds?!"
"That's enough!"
Saber's voice came from not far away.
She looked at her Master, the boy who had been gravely wounded protecting her and had nearly fallen unconscious, and in those emerald eyes a fire of fury and resolve burned like never before.
Slowly, she raised the holy sword in her hands.
This time, there was no hesitation.
She connected the faint magical pathway between herself and Shirou Emiya, the one brimming with the conviction of "protection."
She poured all of her conviction, all of her glory, all of her fury into the blade in her hands.
The invisible Invisible Air slowly dispersed.
What it revealed was that legendary golden sword, forged from the stars, the symbol of "victory" and the "ideal."
"...Ex..."
A radiant light began to gather along the blade.
That light was more dazzling than the sun in the sky.
That light seemed ready to turn the whole of the night bright as day.
"...calibur!!!"
Together with the girl's clear, unwavering cry.
A vast golden torrent, made of pure "Hope" and "conviction," burst from the blade, and with unmatched force, it swallowed the great figure still struggling against the petrifying power in an instant.
There was no violent explosion.
Only... a silent, total "annihilation."
When the light faded.
At the center of the courtyard, all that remained was a vast, bottomless crater.
That arrogant, undying mad warrior, along with his twelve lives, had been utterly evaporated beneath the light that represented the "ideal world."
Not even a trace of ash was left behind.
The battle was over.
In a way... none of them had ever foreseen.
And Seiji Fujiwara, watching the screen as those points of light representing Lancer and Berserker winked out one after another, then looking at Saber cradling the unconscious Shirou Emiya with worry written all over her face, and at Rider, who had put her blindfold back on and stood silently to one side.
A demonic smile spread across his face... everything according to plan.
With invisible threads, one by one, he had drawn them all onto this stage.
He had made them slaughter each other, made them betray each other, made them... cripple each other.
Now.
On the chessboard, the pieces that stood in his way had all been "cleaned" away.
What remained was only... his few adorable "heroines."
...
...