Chapter 515: The Human Instrumentality Begins

Pfft!

Golden Qi pierced through from the eye sockets; the pitch-black giant stood in place, seemingly having stopped moving, but the next moment, as the giant boulder overhead came crashing down.

An incomparably violent roar erupted.

Roar!

Boom!

With a horizontal slash of the axe-sword, the hundreds-of-meters-tall boulder and the already piled-up sand and stone were cleared away in an instant, as if by an explosion.

Between Bai Cangshu and the Berserker, there were no more obstacles.

This pitch-black giant possessed a sensitivity toward enemies that was beyond imagination; not only did he detect that Bai Cangshu had not suffered a fatal wound, but his speed of recovery was somewhat beyond Bai Cangshu's imagination.

Ring!

Golden Qi condensed once more and shot out with a bang, but as expected, it hit Heracles and had no effect at all, being deflected directly.

Is this the 【Twelve Labors】...

In Bai Cangshu's eyes, countless pieces of information converged; the transparent Heart Vortex seemed as if it were about to envelop the Berserker, and this pitch-black giant suddenly accelerated and fell from the air.

Amidst the wild dance of the axe-sword, he delivered a fierce slash.

Bai Cangshu stepped on nothingness with both feet, and the next moment, he had already flown upward like a zigzagging line.

Dance of the Sky!

Bai Cangshu displayed his flight ability; even though the consumption of Qi would intensify, he crossed paths with Heracles in an instant.

Boom!

That slash landed on the ley lines below, and the terrifying vibration began to make the surroundings shake violently, as if an earthquake had begun.

To prevent the ley lines storing Magic Power from being destroyed by the two of them, Bai Cangshu consciously began to fly upward, with Heracles, like a violent destroyer, in hot pursuit behind him.

Bai Cangshu broke through the soil and arrived at the ground of Ryudou Temple, which was over a hundred meters up, only to find that the others had already disappeared.

Bang!

The pitch-black giant arrived on the ground as well.

Bai Cangshu knew he might have missed a high-level hidden quest or hidden plot; why was the Berserker, polluted by Black Mud, hiding there with Emiya Kiritsugu?

Who exactly was the real identity of the blonde woman he saw appear in Emiya Kiritsugu's mind, and was it that Zhu Yue?

These matters would likely be difficult to uncover for the time being as the cave disappeared.

But he no longer cared much.

More intuitive power appeared before his eyes.

Creak, creak...

Bai Cangshu's physique began to expand bit by bit; he utilized 【Life Return】 to consciously begin changing his physical form.

It was not to enhance his combat power, but to... better experience Heracles's state.

Furthermore, in order to experience the feeling of having his reason swallowed by Madness Enhancement, Bai Cangshu proactively removed the 【Killing Intent Seal: Prohibition】 from his earlobes.

Whoosh!

A scarlet Killing Intent Wave rose behind Bai Cangshu like a mountain fire; in Bai Cangshu's pearlescent white eyes, the Killing Intent Wave flickered incessantly like a red dot of light.

"Ha~"

"You have also been longing for an opponent like me, haven't you, Berserker..."

"No, Heracles!"

The pitch-black giant's figure crouched slightly, and the next moment, a terrifying roar echoed between the mountains, countered by that ghastly, maniacal laughter.

——

"Those two guys..."

Tohsaka Rin still felt a lingering fear; even though they had already left that area, they could still hear the sound of that violent force shaking the ley lines.

Without needing to lower her head to listen to the ground, she could feel the tremors constantly being emitted.

Those were two monsters that had completely transcended the category of humanity.

The Heroic Spirit Emiya also frowned; he had quite a few injuries on his body, and this Berserker possessed combat ability that made one feel dread.

It wasn't just the destructive power, strength, and defensive power; even in the techniques of melee combat, he was no match.

Yes, a Berserker who should have lost his reason in Madness Enhancement, and for whom most techniques should be unusable, had used that overly large and cumbersome axe-sword to suppress the dual-wielding Archer, Heroic Spirit Emiya.

"That guy is somewhat abnormal..."

Heroic Spirit Emiya wanted to say something, but he didn't know how to describe it.

But he had indeed felt a huge sense of strangeness and discomfort from Tao Baibai.

He had never heard of an Assassin-class being able to fight a Berserker head-on, let alone the fact that he seemed to be suppressing others on the scene.

Moreover, Tao Baibai's previous actions were also quite bizarre.

Looking at it now, rather than saying that mysterious Master was arranging Tao Baibai's actions, it was more like this Heroic Spirit was initiating everything himself. Whether it was gathering them all together and saying they were to jointly resist some powerful White Face, he had never seen the appearance of the White Face.

He had only heard Saber and the others say that Gilgamesh had indeed appeared.

According to current Intelligence, Gilgamesh was not a Heroic Spirit who appeared in this Holy Grail War, but rather a Servant who had survived to the end of the previous Holy Grail War.

"This Holy Grail War has problems..."

Tohsaka Rin had naturally noticed this point as well; up to now, it seemed that not a single Servant had died.

Under that Tao Baibai's arrangement, they had not killed each other and had all been gathered together, as if... waiting for something.

Tohsaka Rin and Heroic Spirit Emiya ran quickly down the mountain and soon saw Emiya Shirou and Saber waiting at the foot of the mountain.

And also that... Emiya Kiritsugu.

At this moment, this man with vacant eyes was leaning against the rain and mist, not getting too close to the others.

Suddenly, Emiya Kiritsugu seemed to sense something, and the few of them simultaneously turned their heads to look toward the city.

Right there, a massive explosion suddenly occurred.

A giant mushroom cloud, like a scene from the end of the world, erupted from the center and swept toward the surroundings.

That high temperature could be felt even from dozens of kilometers away.

"Is that... a nuclear explosion?!"

Tohsaka Rin did not know how to speak at all, her tone trembling.

Emiya Shirou, meanwhile, subconsciously looked toward his adoptive father.

Emiya Kiritsugu watched that patch of Heaven; the next moment, a massive magic circle appeared, the explosion slowly contracted inward, and even the surging shockwave shriveled back.

Some kind of extremely advanced Thaumaturgy was being cast...

"Perhaps, it is not Thaumaturgy..."

Emiya Kiritsugu clutched his heart, inexplicably feeling that some special person or existence resided there.

"Shirou, you wait here with Saber for a moment, I will go take a look..."

"I want to go too!"

Not waiting for Emiya Kiritsugu to finish, Emiya Shirou interrupted his adoptive father with a firm tone; he did not want to lose his adoptive father again, did not want to be unable to find him again.

Furthermore... at this very moment, he was not without power.

Having said that, he looked at the blonde lady Heroic Spirit; he trusted Saber with all his heart, he accepted his own powerlessness, but he still had to carry out his Justice in his own way.

He absolutely would not accept waiting here and letting others face the danger.

The Hongfa youth raised his hand, the scarlet Command Spell on the back of his hand blindingly bright, and he said to his adoptive father with a smile:

"I am, after all, Saber's Master now!"

"The Master of the most excellent Servant!"

Saber looked at the youth who was completely different from Emiya Kiritsugu, and her gaze softened quite a bit.

Clang.

She thrust her sword into the ground and stood in front of Emiya Shirou.

Heroic Spirit Emiya watched the youth's actions, his eyelids drooping; perhaps it was precisely because of this that he wanted to... kill himself...

The group returned to the city area, moving against the large crowds of people fleeing for their lives, arriving at the location where the explosion occurred, watching amidst the intense Magic Power scattering about.

A massive golden-red suit of armor lay in ruins in a shopping street, with a huge hole in the chest, containing only bloodstains inside.

And in front, outside the massive Barrier, a short-haired woman merely swung her blade once, and the Barrier that had shrouded several city blocks shattered with a crack.

Revealing the Hero King inside, who was covered in Black Mud and constantly twisting.

And in the sky above, rings of translucent force fields, resembling the most regular hexagons, completely isolated a white-robed young girl in the air.

She was covered in blood, her throat had already been slashed, yet she was still smiling at this moment.

At the feet of the Hero King, a large amount of things like Ripple began to spread toward the surroundings, and some kind of characters were flowing within those Ripple.

(End of chapter)