"Maiya, are you alright?"
"For now. I was far enough away to dodge the blast... but Irisviel..."
Communicating over the radio, Kiritsugu had barely survived thanks to Saber's protection, deflecting the incoming onslaught at close range.
His deathly calm expression rippled only slightly as he processed the situation, then immediately contacted his other partner.
"You!"
Beside him, Saber in her knight's armor glared at him with undisguised fury. She stared at this "ruthless" man, unable to comprehend how he could go to such extremes. To secure a sliver of survival for himself, he had abandoned his own family without hesitation.
"If you have something to say, I suggest you ask yourself why you failed to detect a Servant hidden above during the fight."
"You only reacted after the attack was launched."
"Even you couldn't have protected her in that situation, could you?"
His pupils betrayed a tremor invisible to the naked eye as Kiritsugu turned the question back on her.
Emiya Kiritsugu was a ruthless pragmatist. He would always choose the most rational option.
In that moment, perhaps leaving Saber at Irisviel's side could have saved his wife, albeit with injuries. But that scenario carried its own lethal risk for him personally.
To avoid that danger, he naturally redirected Saber to his own protection rather than gamble on a slim chance of survival.
Cold-blooded as it appeared from the outside, this was simply how he operated.
And he had good reason for his confidence. Avalon, Saber's scabbard, had been embedded within Irisviel's body. Even a direct hit from that bombardment afforded a real chance of survival.
"!"
Confronted with his counter-argument, Saber couldn't form a rebuttal. She had indeed failed to detect the hidden attacker, a genuine dereliction. Truthfully, she had no grounds to blame Kiritsugu.
He had simply chosen the most direct and realistic course of action.
'An aerial bombardment...'
'What kind of Servant could do that?'
The unprovoked assault left Kiritsugu deeply concerned. Such brazen directness meant the attacker had no regard for Saber's cherished code of chivalry.
Yet right now, he needed to confirm Irisviel's condition at the scene. Alive or dead, he required a definitive answer.
If the scabbard was left exposed out there, that posed an entirely separate problem.
But sending Saber to check risked her discovering it. And in the short term, he had no intention of returning that life-preserving scabbard to the King of Knights.
Meanwhile, the enemy in the sky clearly hadn't left yet. He couldn't risk another bombardment by going himself. That level of firepower left no room for survival if caught in the blast.
Every condition tangled together, forming what seemed like an inescapable deadlock.
"Rider, it looks like... nobody actually died?"
Seated in the cockpit, Waver carefully gauged his Servant's expression before speaking.
Hadn't he boasted about the devastating power of this Knightmare? Yet from appearance alone...the results fell short of expectations.
"The Servants, I can understand. But how did that woman survive?"
The display pulled up the feed, and Lelouch's brow furrowed deeply. Legendary heroes surviving was a scenario he had anticipated.
But an ordinary Master shouldn't have been able to make it through an explosion of that magnitude unscathed.
"Her wounds seem to be... healing on their own?"
"That's not healing magecraft. Something else entirely..."
Catching the anomaly, Lelouch and Waver had at least found a thread to pull.
"Rider, Assassin grabbed her and ran. Aren't we going after them?"
Waver watched the figure sprinting away with the woman tucked under one arm.
"Pointless. That strike already put them on alert. Even if we pursued, deploying this machine in the open would be impossible."
After all, maintaining "secrecy" was paramount. Firing on a deserted beach was one thing; shelling in the middle of a city would draw every combatant's ire.
Lelouch wasn't foolish enough to risk being dogpiled for that.
"Chasing alone would be equally pointless. Though Assassin is wounded, it could easily provoke interference from that other observer."
The Servant who had been standing atop a lamppost watching the entire affair hadn't escaped Lelouch's notice. Having emerged from the bombardment completely unharmed, that one clearly possessed extraordinary capabilities of their own.
"Let's pull back for now. Tonight's results are already excellent."
"We identified Saber's true Master and wounded Assassin. That's more than enough."
The Knightmare concealed in the sky began to withdraw. The cloud cover that had masked it gradually dispersed, revealing the pale white moon.
"What?"
"It's over already?"
Gilgamesh stood atop a lamppost, watching the departing enemy with open displeasure. He had barely settled in to watch, and they already stopped fighting. How utterly disappointing.
"Well, whatever. That glow just now..."
"Actually showed this King something rather interesting."
Rubbing his chin, Gilgamesh reflected on the image of Irisviel's ceaseless regeneration. If his eyes hadn't deceived him, that might very well be...
"Assassin, why did you bring this woman back?"
"She's most likely just a decoy planted by Saber's Master."
"Lucky to survive that explosion at all. Quite the tenacious life."
Kotomine Kirei had just finished discussing future strategy with Tohsaka Tokiomi. Returning to his quarters, he found Kenshin had laid the injured Irisviel on the carpet.
Her snow-white skin and figure lay exposed, yet neither man in the room spared it a second thought.
Offering no explanation, Kenshin simply leaned against the headboard, gasping for air.
He had taken the full brunt of that magical energy cannon. Frankly, if not for sheer survival instinct kicking in at the last second to dodge just barely, he would already be dead. Even so, the explosion had severed his right arm entirely. Burns and wounds covered his body.
Under normal circumstances, elimination would have been all but guaranteed.
"These injuries... wait, this is?!"
Kirei glanced at Kenshin only briefly before something about Irisviel's body seized his full attention.
"Something remarkable is concealed here."
Unable to resist, he reached out. His mind clicked into place.
"Mmn..."
Whether a sound of pain or something else, Irisviel remained unconscious, still wracked by the aftershock of the explosion.
"Berserker, what was that just now?"
Sakura, jolted awake in bed by the distant tremor, felt her racing heart settle the moment she saw Berserker sitting quietly beside her.
With his helmet removed, his mature, rugged features were reassuring in their steadiness.
"..."
He offered no verbal response, as though incapable of speech. This Servant could only communicate through subtle gestures and expressions.
"Mm, it's okay."
"With you here, nothing can be difficult..."
For the first time in her life, Matou Sakura felt true security. She smiled softly.
"Oh, I had a dream just now."
"About a hero who kept helping others. Slaying an evil dragon, helping his friends reclaim their kingdom, then saving the world..."
"How amazing..."
[Translated and Rewritten by Shika_Kagura]