"Wooah! He's going all bam, and boom! And look at those explosions! I didn't know he got that strong while over there!" Flat shouted at the top of his lungs, trying to free himself from the rope the rest of them had tied him to a chair with by jumping haphazardly, "And that person he's fighting with is super cool too! He's so glamorous! And look at all those cool weapons! It's like I'm watching an anime!"
As per usual, Flat had started uttering words that no sane person could understand. For a change however, Waver understood every single one. They made his heart hurt and clam up.
Henry, his student, had gone so far his back was no longer visible.
He was fighting so desperately, with such maniacal ferocity that Waver Velvet could not help but recall those insurmountable stars he had encountered a decade ago, in that same city now being laid to ruin.
Yet, beside him, Luviagelita was forcing herself to look. The Edelfelt Princess had been boisterous and loud, making her snide remarks as she tended to. The moment Henry's defense shattered, her face lost all colour. She was watching. Oh, she was still watching.
But, her fists were clenched so tight her knuckles had become white. She had torn her lip by biting it, and Waver could see it was taking all the strength in her to keep on watching.
On his other side, Reines was having trouble keeping her tea cup upright. Her hand simply would not stop trembling. "My dear older brother... what kind of monster have you gotten us involved with exactly?"
Monster... huh?
Perhaps that was right.
No part of his body remained unhurt, blood marred his very form. Waver couldn't even see Henry's face anymore. Just bloody teeth and those damn eyes of his shining as bright as ever.
He was hurting, getting slower, and no longer regenerating, but he was still fighting, madly and with no regard for his life. His student was definitely using mana just to move himself. That was what it had come to.
Yet... not a monster, never a monster. Waver dared not see him that way. Waver dared not see the boy he had taken in, who had clung to him and his classmates so intensely, as a monster.
Never.
Never, he told himself.
He watched him fight the King of Heroes, something no magus, no human should have ever been able to, and all he saw was a student that had certainly outgrown his mentor.
He hoped... that that boy was going to return.
"Henry is... human, right?" Caules muttered.
Waver knew already, that even if he did, no one was ever going to see him that way ever again, not even his friends. Even Gray had turned away, she sat behind him, back against the couch and arms wrapped around her knees.
The girl dared not even raise her head.
"Gray-"
"I can't watch, Professor. I just can't-... Please-"
"I won't force you to."
"Henry doesn't deserve-" Her breath hitched. "Can you stop him, p-please?"
As he watched, Waver's student was leaving it all behind to become the strongest.
What... What was even the point?
Why did he have to go so far to protect those he cared for?
Waver knew. He knew that he was making sure everyone saw him, so that no one would ever again even think of harming those he stood beside without this flashing through their heads.
He watched him drag Gilgamesh's face against a wall before tossing him into the air, a sword impaled through his neck.
And he, his teacher, the one responsible for him, could do nothing at all but sit and watch with a pained face.
-
"I shall... acknowledge you further, mongrel!" The King of Heroes shouted, clutching his bleeding guts. "Just what the hell are you?! How can you still stand?!"
I stood amidst the ruins of homes big and small, in a park that no longer looked like one. My breathing was rugged. My heart was thumping, but growing weaker and weaker still. I felt hot blood seeping from my eyes.
Regenerating was decidedly not an option.
I wasn't even sure I had the energy for it anymore.
"I told ya..." I heaved, swallowing a mouthful of blood, "I'm the strongest."
At least, in exchange for being reduced to this, I hadn't let him fare any better. He wasn't going to win this, not unless he pulled out something absolutely abominable-
"Indeed, you're worthy of drawing Ea, I'll give you that."
"What... the fuck... is an Ea?"
Clutching his bleeding guts with one hand, the King of Heroes held the other out to the side. The Gate of Babylon opened once more, but innumerable ripples there were not, no great number of noble phantasms were primed.
No, only a single ripple of gold took shape beside him.
Then, came an adorned hilt, his fingers wrapped around it magnetically. What he pulled out was a sword that had no right to be called one. An ill-shaped weapon that had no practicality, no conventional way of using.
And yet, the moment I laid eyes on it, every single fiber of being bid me to retreat. I had to run. I needed to run. That was all my mind and heart both had to say.
If I wanted to live, I had to run.
"This is the strongest weapon in my treasury. Rejoice, mongrel, that I have deemed you worthy of it... There are scant few like you."
His strongest weapon... yeah, that sounded about right.
My eyes saw it, I understood nothing. There was nothing to that 'sword' that I could parse or take apart. The pressure alone made my veins burst within my eyes.
When he held Ea aloft, the world cried. Strong winds raged over and tore asunder the very skies. Red lightning reached out for the heavens in bursts, ripping through the earth all around.
It felt like my existence itself was breaking under its mere presence.
What did I have to face that?
Blue?
Red?
Purple?
Maximum techniques?
All the mana I had left?
No, no, the strongest weapon in a jujutsu sorcerer's arsenal was the domain expansion... yet I did not have that.
Gritting my teeth, I looked at my hand, struggling to keep my eyes open.
Emiya showed me how to do it. Medea's bounded fields were so immensely skillful that they cut off the very world. My nature. A Domain Expansion, here, in this world, was meant to overwrite the very texture of reality when brought out.
A Reality Marble.
My true nature... what was my true nature?
It was not Infinite Void.
I was not capable of bringing that out. I wasn't even capable of ripping out my own legend... but I knew the mechanism. I had seen it happen. I could rip that bit out of myself by force, break it down, construct a bounded field around it, for only a smidge of time, and bet it all on that.
"Have you lost your words when faced with inevitability, mongrel?"
The world cried.
I raised the fingers on my one hand, forcing regeneration on the other to bring them both together. The blow back was immense. My very blood jerked under the pressure, protesting against what I was doing with it after what Gilgamesh's noble phantasms had done to it.
"Let me tell you of the beginning." He declared, "Heaven and Earth split. Nothingness congratulated Creation... and my sword cleaved the world."
I heard his words, and reached deep into myself.
"Mortar of the stars... heaven's hell is the eve of creation's celebration!"
My true nature was that of a never-sated hunger, breaking apart and devouring all that it could get hands on.
All the mystery in the world was mine to have.
I wanted it.
That was my truth.
Ah, what a selfish truth! What a freeing one!
"Domain expansion-"
The truth of the world wavered.
"Enuma-"
Reality groaned.
"-Elish!"
"Gorging Void."
-
When the hungry darkness that swept towards the heavens and the immense destruction unleashed as an answer cleared away. Both Gilgamesh, and Henry stood where they were, untouched, unharmed, as they had been before they unleashed the greatest weapons they possessed.
So, what had happened?
Had the two attacks cancelled each other out?
Unthinkable.
Did their eyes deceive them?
Had one surrendered?
Had someone intervened?
The possibilities were innumerable. All of them could not be farthest from the truth. The simple truth that had either of them then there fought another besides each other, they would have surely met a terrible end.
Henry's domain could not stop the path of Enuma Elish, a weapon capable of tearing apart the very fabric of the reality it was imposed upon. His fate was set in stone.
At the same time, the path King Gilgamesh gave Ea had been a linear one. The domain had stretched out around that path. And, no matter his standing, the King of Heroes was there then a heroic spirit. A being composed of mystery. His body was not capable of withstanding a void designed to break mystery down its base. His fate was surely set in stone.
The clash had been mutually assured destruction.
Then, why were neither of them dead?
The answer was infuriatingly simple.
That was, for these individuals who prided themselves as the strongest, any who decried such was meant to be trampled down, not at all worthy of facing the best they had to offer.
0.2 seconds from mutually assured destruction, Gilgamesh had whimsically decided against giving Henry the satisfaction. 0.15 seconds from mutually assured destruction, Henry had unknowingly decided the same.
Had they there then not fought one another, but instead someone else, they would surely have suffered a terrible defeat.
"For you, my most insignificant treasure is enough, mongrel!"
"You don't deserve a domain expansion, you golden git!"
After much struggle, when Henry raised his hand to cast Red, his own arm cracked instead. He had pushed himself too far in this battle... yet even through that, had he not decided to rip his nature out of himself by force, surely he would be better off.
He realised this immediately.
His body could no longer keep up.
He raised his hand once more, deciding that a single spell was enough. Just one more. That was all he needed. When he snapped his fingers, his eardrums burst.
His body was no longer capable of supporting his whimsy.
"You pushed yourself too far and I acknowledge that you pushed me as far as well." He raised a trembling hand, "Die in peace knowing that."
No one was capable of pushing him this far... except for Henry.
And yet, when the King of Uruk called out for his treasury, the air did not ripple with the resplendent gold that heralded its opening. Nothing came. He tried again, nothing.
Again. Nothing. Again. Nothing.
The Gate of Babylon would not open.
When Gilgamesh's eyes widened, a mad cackle broke the silence the two of them had then there imposed. Blood poured from open wounds as Henry raised his head and laughed as loud as he ever had.
"It worked, didn't it?! Your damn sword was undecipherable, but I've already taken apart your existence, ya git!" He laughed and laughed, "I've disabled your access! If you want to kill me, you'll have to do it with your hands."
Then, he stopped, and stared at the King of Heroes dead on.
"And I realised while we were fighting earlier, y'know? Unlike the rest of them... you're not much of a fighter."
For perhaps the first time in his life, the King of Heroes was forced to come to the dirt, and pick up again a noble phantasm he had already fired. He pointed it at Henry, breathing ragged.
"Be that as it may... I am still a heroic spirit."
"You are... You are a heroic spirit... but that body of yours-" He choked on his own blood, "-Ain't up to par."
In the end, it had come to this.
A fight.
A fight with no powers.
A brawl one could find in an alleyway.
The King of Heroes rushed at him, blade held with both hands. Unlike Gilgamesh... Henry was, indeed, accustomed to such things. He threw himself to the side to avoid the King's flimsy swing, and then used all he had to punch him back.
His fist found his foe's chest. He felt the flesh, and then his fist ripped right through, crushing his heart.
"Oh... right, human... body."
"You-...!"
Henry grinned a half-grin. "Bastard got me good."
-
From here on out, I advise against going to the patreon entirely except to show support. There's only 3-4 chapters after this left to the story. The immediate aftermath, the end of the Fuyuki Grail War, his return to London, and the finale. Those last two bits will also probably end up as one larger chapter than two.