"No... that's not it..."
Artoria backed away in panic. She wanted to argue, but found she couldn't get out a single word.
Because deep within her, in that most secret corner she'd never dared to touch herself, this man was cutting her open, mercilessly, bloodily.
"Now, I'll give you one more choice."
The "merciful" smile returned to Seiji Fujiwara's face.
"Option one: accept this correct world. You will go on as the eternal king of this false country, basking in the love of all your people, forever."
"Option two: reject it. Then you'll return to that cold, cruel reality. Back to the failed ending where your country perished long ago and everything you did meant nothing."
"Tell me your choice."
He pressed her.
Pressed her to crush her last, intangible ideal with her own hands.
Artoria's body shook violently.
She looked into Seiji's eyes, eyes that seemed to see through everything.
She knew that no matter how she chose, she had lost.
Lost completely.
A long time passed.
That taut will of a "king," the last pillar of spirit that had held her up for a thousand years, in this moment...
collapsed utterly.
Crystalline tears slid silently down her pale cheeks.
Slowly, she closed her eyes.
She gave up all resistance.
-
"This... this is... a Reality Marble?!"
Even Medea, learned as she was, couldn't hide the shock on her face.
World-rewriting grand magecraft!
This unremarkable Archer actually possessed such a terrifying ability!
Even Kojirou Sasaki stopped his attack, scanning his surroundings warily. On this wasteland, every single blade gave off the aura of a Noble Phantasm.
Yet Seiji's face held nothing but fanatical admiration.
"What a magnificent sight... a barren graveyard of swords, built from countless ideals."
He even rose to his feet and clapped lightly.
"It's... so beautiful."
Archer paid no mind to his ravings.
The instant he deployed the Reality Marble, he had already pulled two of his most familiar short swords from the ground, one black and one white.
His figure became a streak of red lightning, hurtling straight at Medea, who stood frozen by the spectacle.
"You first, witch!"
In the world of Unlimited Blade Works, his speed, strength, and projection ability were all amplified to their limit.
But just as his blades were about to touch Medea...
A purple figure cut in front of him like a phantom.
It was Rider, Medusa!
In her hand she held a chain that glinted with cold light.
"Your opponent is me."
Medusa's voice was icy and without a trace of feeling.
-
The real world.
In the vast cavern beneath Ryuudou Temple.
A pleased, everything-going-to-plan smile crossed Seiji's face.
He could "see" it.
Within the cauldron of black mud, Artoria's proud soul, the soul of a "king," had completely abandoned resistance.
Like a fortress that had fallen.
"Good."
He murmured his approval, like a craftsman appraising a work nearing completion.
"Then let's begin the final dyeing."
His mind stirred.
The once dead-still cauldron of black mud began to churn again.
This time, it was no longer violence and chaos.
It was like an army that had received its sovereign's command, beginning, with great efficiency and purpose, the most thorough erosion and remaking, from soul to flesh, of that holy body sunk at the bottom of the pool.
"Nngh... ugh..."
An unconscious, pained moan escaped Artoria's lips.
Her Saint Graph was being forcibly flooded, stretched open, and reshaped by an immense, malice-laden magical energy.
The silver-white armor of pure magic that symbolized her glory and her duty began to creak under the strain.
Pitch-black lines, like veins, crept out from the seams of the armor, spreading rapidly, swallowing that holy silver-white.
Breastplate, vambraces, greaves...
The color of the armor was shifting before the eye, from the "silver" of light to the "black" of despair and emptiness.
The once ornate, intricate engravings turned vicious and aggressive.
The edges of the skirt armor sharpened like blades.
"Not enough yet."
Seiji's brow lifted slightly.
He could feel that a force was still stubbornly resisting the black mud's erosion.
His gaze fell on the golden holy sword that lay quietly beside Artoria.
Excalibur.
The Sword of Promised Victory.
This divine weapon, forged by the planet and carrying the "Hope" of countless humans, was at this moment giving off a gentle yet steadfast golden glow, like a small but unbreakable fortress guarding its master, making its last stand.
"What a... noisy sword."
Seiji's expression cooled.
"Full of naive, impractical ideals."
"Its master has already given up resistance."
"So what right do you, a mere tool, have to talk back here?"
[System command: Lock target Excalibur core concept... Protection.]
[Executing Concept Pollution protocol!]
[Implanting distorted concept one: the object of protection, revised to Seiji Fujiwara alone.]
[Implanting distorted concept two: the method of protection, revised to eliminate all enemies that pose a threat to Seiji Fujiwara.]
A more domineering, more unreasonable power of "kingship," belonging to Seiji, struck precisely through the medium of the black mud, slamming into the core concept of that golden holy sword!
A low hum tore through the air.
Excalibur let out a wail!
That brilliant golden light, the light of "Hope," began to flicker violently, brightening and dimming like a candle guttering in the wind.
A layer of pitch-black filth, clinging like maggots to bone, began to spread madly from the hilt toward the blade!
The gold retreated step by step.
The black advanced step by step.
It was a war between "ideal" and "reality."
A slaughter at the level of concept itself, between "protect all living things" and "protect one person."
In the end...
When the last thread of gold was wholly devoured by that domineering black.
The entire holy sword shuddered hard.
All its light vanished.
In its place was a deathly stillness, a bottomless black that seemed to swallow every ray of light.
Across the blade, countless ominous lines of dark-red magic surfaced, pulsing like veins.
The shape of the crossguard turned more savage.
A magical pulse, larger, purer, and more concentrated than before, radiated from the blade.
Having cast off the heavy, sweeping burden of "protect all living things," its power grew more focused instead, more... lethal.
It was no longer a "holy sword."
It was the most terrible "demonic sword," wielded only to enforce the will of a single man.
The moment the holy sword fully fell.
Artoria's tightly shut eyes snapped open.
Those green eyes, once as clear as the sky after rain, were now replaced by a cold, utterly emotionless "gold."
A color like gold itself: cold, noble, yet hollow.
Every trace of confusion, of pain, of struggle had vanished from her face.
In their place was an absolute, deathly "nothing."
Like a precision-made doll that had just had its program set.
Slowly, she rose from the pool of black mud.
The viscous black mud slid off her pitch-black, savage armor without leaving the faintest stain.
Her hair, once dazzling as sunlight, had now shed all its luster, fading to a dull, ashen flaxen.
The only thing unchanged was her snow-white skin, skin that looked as if it had never seen the sun.
Black and white.
Forming the most extreme, most arresting contrast.
Full of a fallen, forbidden beauty.
She reached out and grasped the demonic sword that had turned equally black.
Sword and master, in this moment, achieved a brand-new synchronization, one steeped in an ominous aura.
"How does it feel?"
Seiji's voice, carrying a thread of amused laughter, echoed through the cavern.
"...My... king."
The black King of Knights turned her head slowly and "looked" at the man standing on the bank with those cold golden eyes.
Her lips moved faintly.
And spoke the first words of her "rebirth."
"I have come in answer to your summons."
Her voice had lost all rise and fall of feeling, like the purest ice.
"...I ask you. Are you my Master?"
-
Hearing this familiar yet jarringly wrong question.
The smile on Seiji's face grew brighter.
"No."
He shook his head.
He walked slowly to the edge of the pool of black mud, reached out, and crooked a finger at the black King of Knights standing in its center.
"I am not your Master."
His voice carried an irresistible authority, the authority of an "owner."
"I am your... king."
"And you..."
"...are the sharpest sword, belonging to me alone."
In the cold golden eyes of the black King of Knights, a glimmer seemed to pass.
As if she were comprehending this brand-new "definition."
The next second.
Without hesitation, without question.
She stepped forward, treading across that black mire, walking step by step until she stood before Seiji.
Then...
A wet thud.
She dropped to one knee.
She lowered that once-proud head that had refused to bow to anyone, laid the black demonic sword in her hand flat across her knee, and offered it up with both hands.
In the most humble, most complete posture.
She offered everything to her new master.
Her loyalty.
Her power.
Her existence.
"...As you command."
Her cold voice rose again, but the title had been corrected.
"My... king."
"Haha... hahahahaha!"
Watching the scene before him, Seiji could no longer hold back and broke into a hearty, exultant laugh.
To take a noble, stubborn, idealistic hero-king and, from spirit to flesh, from conviction to power, shatter her completely, utterly... and remake her!
To make her cast off her ridiculous name.
To make her discard her heavy past.
To turn her into a killing doll that existed only to enforce his will: the most perfect, most powerful, most obedient of all!
This thrill of stamping the "sacred" underfoot, then staining it with his own color!
It was ten thousand times more exhilarating than conquering those mortals in his last world!
[Ding!]
The system's chime sounded, right on cue.
[Congratulations, Host! Core target Artoria Pendragon successfully remade!]
[Target has been transformed into a brand-new form: Saber Alter (exclusive to Seiji Fujiwara)!]
[Conquest progress: 100% (fully complete)]
[Final reward settlement in progress...]
[Settlement complete! Congratulations, Host, on receiving the final reward... the permanent ability Heart of the Dragon (False)!]
[Ability description: The Host has obtained a vast magical core derived from the bloodline of the Red Dragon. Your total magical energy increases by 500%, your magical recovery rate increases by 1000%, and you exert an absolute, conceptual-level suppression and dominance over all Heroic Spirits of the Dragon attribute!]
A vast, scorching power erupted within Seiji's body in an instant.
He felt his Magic Circuits had been swapped out for an inexhaustible, roaring, surging nuclear fusion reactor!
In this world, his greatest weakness, his magical energy, had been completely patched.
"Good! Very good!"
Seiji savored the surging power within him with satisfaction.
He bent down, reached out, and gently pinched the small, delicate chin of the black King of Knights before him, forcing her to lift her head and meet his eyes with those hollow golden ones.
"From today on, you are no longer Artoria."
"And you... are no longer Saber."
He admired the girl's expressionless face, lovely as carved white jade, and spoke slowly in a wicked tone, like a god bestowing a name:
"Your new name is... Alter."
"You are my collectible number one."
"Have you remembered it?"
"...Yes."
The black King of Knights named "Alter" answered coldly.
In her eyes there was not the slightest humiliation or resentment.
Only... absolute, total "obedience."
The will of her "king" was her everything.
Looking at his most perfect masterpiece, Seiji's heart filled with a satisfaction he had never known.
But...
He knew this was not the end.
This was only... a beginning.
The Holy Grail War was not over yet.
There was still one most magnificent, most ancient "collectible," waiting somewhere in this city for him to "hunt."
"Alter."
Seiji released her and slowly straightened up.
"Stand."
The black King of Knights obediently rose at once and stood at his side like a silent statue.
"It's time..."
Seiji's gaze seemed to pierce through the thick layers of rock to the city above, draped in the colors of night.
The corners of his mouth split into a savage grin full of bloodlust and possessiveness.
"...to greet our final guest."
The very moment Seiji finished naming his new collectible.
A thunderous roar split the air!
Like an earth-dragon turning over, like the wrath of the heavens!
The entire cavern beneath Ryuudou Temple, no, all of Mount Enzou, began to tremble violently, madly!
Dust rained down from the rock walls, and the immense magical energy in the air was churned into a raging vortex.
A terrifying aura, vast enough to suffocate, ancient as if from the very dawn of creation, brimming with supreme majesty and divinity, descended like an awakened primordial beast over the skies of Fuyuki City!
The mere descent of that aura forcibly stained the sky an ominous gold, as if the whole world had been pulled into the domain of a king who tolerated no equal!
"This... this feeling... impossible..."
Medea, standing behind Seiji, had lost all the color from that usually composed, lovely face; it had gone white as paper.
Her body trembled without pause from the instinctive fear of a "god" branded deep in her soul, and even holding herself upright had become unbearably difficult.