The team of eight launched a brutal assault on the Archduke and Camilla, whom they had encountered by chance during their journey.
In terms of combat effectiveness, Gudako—or Gudazi—was currently the weakest among them. She had only recently been recruited by Chaldea at the start of the Fate/Grand Order arc and had yet to fully grasp the nature of the world she now found herself in.
Because of that, the shield maiden Mash Kyrielight was assigned as her personal guard.
Meanwhile, the rest of the team split into small pairs, engaging their enemies with coordinated tactics. They managed to hold off and defeat the Archduke, the dragon Fafnir, and the Bloody Countess—Camilla.
This was Reuel's first aerial battle. He met it with full intensity, wielding sword and shield in the style of the Emperor of Mankind, but in the form of a mecha: Strike Freedom Gundam.
From the ground, Richelieu provided constant artillery support.
Naval cannons fired one after another into the sky, striking Fafnir's body and carving burning wounds into his dark scales.
"This lifeform is far beyond an ordinary Servant! Stay alert!"
That warning echoed through the comms channel as Dr. Roman activated his holographic interface, providing real-time support from Chaldeas' control room.
Roman was monitoring the battle remotely, and based on the detected temporal anomalies, he knew one thing for certain:
"Once an evil dragon like this appears, the dragonslayer won't be far behind."
"You should fall back for now and find the dragonslayer to face him…"
"...Siegfried?" Reuel muttered.
In the original plot, that's correct—the only viable solution to counter Fafnir was to summon Siegfried and borrow the power of Balmung or the demon sword Lost Fall. But this time...
Reuel decided to try on his own first.
He wanted to test his own strength before relying on outside help. After all, this was Strike Freedom integrated with Mind Cube technology and Imperium systems—not some bargain-bin model.
He briefly considered summoning the Emperor of Mankind's full arsenal, including the Blade emperor King and extreme psionic support. But then a more important question formed in his mind:
"If I use that now, will it mess up the historical sequence? There are still seven more temporal incidents to correct in the Naruserve world. Hm... think about it later."
"A big sword can slay a dragon," he told Roman over the comms, "so why not naval guns and a Gundam?"
"The times have changed, Dr. Roman."
And with that, he gave a firm order:
"All shipgirls—full barrage!"
Ka-ka-ka—!
The massive assault began.
The eight wing-mounted cannons on Assault Freedom's back flared open. Focused beam cannons launched from all sides, drenching the sky in bursts of radiant energy.
Within 900 seconds, the skies were flooded with a rain of colorful particles carrying devastating intensity.
The DRAGOON system, directly controlled by Reuel's mind, moved independently, locking on simultaneously to Fafnir's weak points.
Each shot carried psionic tracking, landing on vital targets with absolute precision.
The dragon's once steel-like scales were now riddled with cracks, burns, and scorched wounds.
On the Ground
Boom!
The warships surrounding Richelieu opened fire in rapid succession, lighting up the skies with flashes of fire and an unrelenting symphony of explosions. Large and small cannons answered each other in thunderous roars, channeling their full might into the black dragon that howled in pain. His body was scorched with burning wounds—but he still endured. His skin was thick, and his scales, harder than steel.
"Enemies in this world... are far tougher than the last ones,"
Reuel thought to himself as he looked up.
"Of course—they're mystical beings, after all."
Yet in a moment of pragmatic comparison, he realized—this class of artillery would be vaporized instantly by a single shot from Tongmo.
That realization didn't discourage him—it only fueled his resolve.
He immediately activated his entire arsenal system. One by one, energy cannons, guided missiles, and particle launchers came online at maximum output. Fireballs erupted through the sky, engulfing the dragon's massive form that blotted out the sun.
"H-Huh? Is this... some kind of miracle?!"
Dr. Roman was stunned, watching from the Chaldeas screen. He had never seen—let alone imagined—dragon-slaying weaponry from the Imperium of Man being deployed by Reuel.
To Roman, this was no longer technology...
It was magic from a civilization outside of time.
---
Elsewhere on the Battlefield…
Artoria took command and dashed toward Camilla.
The Assassin was clearly not built for close-quarters combat, and within just a few strikes, she was forced back by the raw might of the King of Knights' slashes.
Realizing she couldn't win head-on, Camilla activated her unique skill, concealing her presence and vanishing into the shadows—ready to ambush from the dark.
But waiting in the dark was not silence—
—it was a rain of bullets.
Without hesitation, shipgirl Jeanne d'Arc unleashed her full armament toward the spot where Camilla had disappeared. The nearby houses were reduced to rubble under the thunder of naval guns.
"If ammunition is free in the Imperium of Man," she said casually,
"why hold back?"
Sniper rifle?
155mm naval gun.
"WHAT?!"
A shriek of disbelief came from Camilla, who reappeared behind a crumbling wall, scrambling to escape. Even Artoria, witnessing this chaos firsthand, was momentarily stunned.
"Can a Noble Phantasm even be used that recklessly...?"
To the King of Knights, this was unprecedented madness.
She had seen the genius of Emiya Kiritsugu and the magecraft of Tokiomi Tohsaka during the Fourth Holy Grail War—but those still made some degree of sense: gemstone spells, time manipulation, origin bullets...
All of it was still within reason.
But now?
"This... is beyond reason."
The legendary ahoge queen couldn't comprehend the sight of someone firing a ship-mounted naval cannon on land.
In her era, a navy was still oar-powered boats and warhorns—not this.
"Is this... magic?
A weapon...?
Or some kind of Noble Phantasm?"
She genuinely wasn't sure anymore.
"NOBLE PHANTASM!"
With giddy excitement, shipgirl Jeanne d'Arc mimicked the iconic call of FGO heroes and activated the torpedo launchers on her ship rig. She hopped slightly into the air and shouted:
"FIVE 533MM MAGNETIC TORPEDOES!!"
Five tiny projectiles launched from the tubes—
—but in mid-air, they curved and instantly transformed into giant magnetic torpedoes six meters long, igniting bright red trails as they screamed toward the target.
They ripped through the air and slammed into Camilla's hiding spot with devastating force.
The remnants of the house simply vanished from the map.
"...???"
"What the hell kind of Noble Phantasm is that?!" Artoria finally couldn't take it anymore, frustration plain on her face—along with a hint of jealousy.
---
Outside the City
Meanwhile, after taking the Impaler's Noble Phantasm to the face, the two armored carriers—Formidable and Dafeng—wore far more serious expressions.
"Uhh, I think our opponent's a vampire. You think… garlic and crosses might work?" Formidable scratched her head, clearly unsure.
"Unfortunately, I didn't bring any," Dafeng replied coldly.
"So I'll just use carrier-based aircraft instead."
Her eyes narrowed toward the Archduke, standing in the distance.
Hundreds of fighter planes began to hum and rise, filling the skies like a swarm of deadly hornets.
"Commander-sama, may I use hydrogen bombs...?
Or perhaps... a nuclear warhead?"
Dafeng's tone was almost cheerful—maybe because she was in a good mood.
Reuel had just fulfilled his promise to her.
And now... she wanted to have a little fun.
"If we want to exterminate pests," she added with a thin smile,
"which one's more effective?"
Reuel broke into a cold sweat the moment he heard their plan:
a hydrogen bomb crafted by Akashi from Azur Lane, and a nuclear bomb built by the Adeptus Mechanicus.
Even one nuclear warhead from the Mechanicus was the equivalent of an Exterminatus-class atomic weapon—enough to erase an entire Hive City in the Warhammer universe.
Its destructive power was unimaginably horrifying:
Radiation that lasted for centuries, yields reaching into megatons, and all of it wrapped in sacred dogma, consecrated through rituals, then detonated with religious fear of the Machine God.
"STOP!! Use conventional weapons only!"
Reuel shouted at the two shipgirls, panic creeping into his voice.
"Gudako and Mash are still here!
They won't survive a hydrogen bomb—let alone a Mechanicus-grade nuke!"
While still mercilessly pounding Fafnir with overwhelming force, Reuel turned briefly toward Dafeng—
—who was, of course, requesting explicit permission to carry out the bombing.
Yanderes will always be yanderes.
They'll always reach for the most destructive option first.
And yet…
As her commander, maybe he should be there when the button is pushed.
"Dafeng understands!"
She replied with a beaming smile.
She and Formidable raised their hands and, in perfect sync, gave a downward sweep of their palms.
"Target locked."
"Commencing tracking protocols."
Fighter planes and dive bombers roared skyward, slicing through the clouds and heading straight for Archduke Vlad.
Wave after wave of bombs and torpedoes were dropped without mercy.
One-on-one combat wasn't standard doctrine for shipgirls.
They excelled in fleet-scale warfare and large-scale battles.
But that didn't mean aircraft carriers lacked dueling capability.
The guns mounted on carrier-based aircraft weren't toys.
A 20mm autocannon could shred a human body into pulp.
Heroic Spirits might be superior in raw individual power, but the relentless aerial strikes launched by carriers like Dafeng and Formidable hit with brutal strength and deadly precision.
Archduke Vlad had no anti-air systems.
In other words—
he could only accept his fate.
Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang—
If Heroic Spirits had weapons or artifacts as their Noble Phantasms, then shipgirls had their rigging—their combat gear.
In terms of destructive effect?
There was no difference.
A single shipgirl could obliterate an entire carrier battle group.
Even aircraft deployed from rigging-based carriers could level a city, perhaps even a nation.
It's no exaggeration to classify their power as anti-fleet, or even anti-city Noble Phantasms.
Explosion after explosion tore through the skies.
The rumble of machine guns, the roar of missiles, the wail of jet engines—it all combined into a relentless storm of firepower.
It felt like a full-blown modern high-intensity war had broken out…
…right in the middle of a medieval fantasy world.
Ten Kilometers Away
Far in the distance—over ten kilometers away—English and French troops were still battling with swords and slingshots.
They looked up.
Their eyes widened.
The sky above them was now lit by mushroom clouds.
Confusion and horror spread across their faces.
"W-What is that?! A Backfire? A dragon cannon?!"
"Since when did their weapons get that strong?!"