Chapter 276: The Defeat of Kiara
It was a brilliant aurora piercing the blue starlight, a radiance exceeding the speed of light, carrying a conviction even more blinding than the glow as it soared upward.
"This is not fleeing! This is absolutely not giving up!"
Meltryllis was the personification of pleasure, proud as a swan. She had always been a free-spirited, willful girl; even facing an enemy of overwhelming power, it posed no problem in her heart. Even when facing BB, the one who had brought her into existence, she had never backed down—much less for the loathsome Kiara Sessyoin. She would resist until the very end.
But for Gudako, for the sake of reaching a future where this girl could find happiness, she would charge upward again and again, no matter how many times it took, until her Saint Graph shattered completely.
Unlike the previous loop, she had done many things she once never would have done to change the future. Understanding that her and Passionlip's power alone was insufficient to counter Kiara Sessyoin, she had secretly sought out BB. Then, they gathered their forces, enlisting Heroic Spirits who had no direct connection to this digitized space to stand against Kiara.
The Five Meddling Chains (Go-un Hishou). In Buddhist scripture, this refers to the five aggregates and five sensations, representing the human senses: sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch. In Kiara Sessyoin's hands, this skill became a method of seduction through the five senses; once any sense contacted her temptation, the victim would become her captive follower.
Using the rules of the cyber-space, BB utilized "KP" (Kiara Points) to seal Kiara's abilities. At that moment, the space filled with mosaic patterns. The peach-colored aura surrounding Kiara was swept away, and her clothing shifted colors.
Meltryllis and Passionlip launched their combined Noble Phantasm once more. The girl leaped into the air, transforming into a streak of light, her sharp heels kicking toward Kiara.
To wait for this moment, Meltryllis had endured for a very, very long time.
When she first used the combined Noble Phantasm to return to the moment just before Gudako entered this world, she had gone to the church to find the "self" of that timeline. At that point, the local Meltryllis sat alone on the church steps. Having refused to help BB and similarly refusing to absorb any humans or Servants for energy, she was simply waiting to be initialized.
The time-leaping Meltryllis shared her memory data directly. The other responded instantly.
"I understand. I leave it to you. Please, save that person no matter what. I've piled all the hardships onto you... also... thank you. You let me have a wonderful dream..."
The Meltryllis of that time had smiled, calmly accepting her fate. Without ever laying eyes on the girl she loved, she shattered into fragments with a crisp sound.
The remaining Meltryllis immediately set out to find Gudako, who had been separated from her Servants and was being attacked by Suzuka Gozen... and thus, the current events unfolded.
Now! A white rainbow shimmering with a blue halo crashed into the Enemy of Humanity at speeds beyond light. In that instant of rapid motion, the image of the person who no longer recognized her flashed through the girl's mind...
"Yes! Farewell! Even if our held hands must soon part, even if this body's Saint Graph will soon break, only our connected hearts shall never be separated!"
The girl poured her overflowing emotions and everything she had experienced into her strike. With all her strength gathered at the tips of her feet, she emitted a dazzling white and blue light and kicked out.
The Noble Phantasm triggered a violent explosion. Kiara Sessyoin's chest was pierced through, and she was sent flying. Within the massive body of the Demonic Bodhisattva, her heart shattered. Kiara tilted backward, about to sink into the depths of the ocean. Due to her gargantuan size, her descent stirred massive waves and foam even in the deep sea.
"You and I are both monsters born from pleasure, so it's only natural we loathe one another. But why go to such lengths?! What benefit is there for you? You will disappear as well!" Kiara screamed.
"So what? If I disappear alongside the person I hate, it's just barely within my acceptable range. Did you really think that as the heroine, I would leave the final blow to someone else?" Meltryllis countered.
"Meltryllis!!!" Kiara shrieked in desperation.
Meltryllis shouted back: "Kiara! Let me tell you something! A girl's love is hers to protect! Isn't that just common sense for a girl?!"
"How could I possibly understand that kind of 'common sense'?! Don't lump me in with you! This body is useless now! So, you shall become my vessel!"
Kiara cursed in rage. Her long black hair transformed into the tentacles of a Demon God Pillar, extending like snakes to coil around the slender girl, intending to possess her.
"Once I kill Gudako and hide so Chaldea can't find a trace, 'human' desires will remain infinite. I just need to wait a little while, and my power will soon recover!"
"I can't let you do that," a youth's voice came from behind.
Bang! Bang!
Successive gunshots rang out. The snake-like hair was struck and knocked away.
Appearing there was Shirou, who had performed a Pseudo-Servant summoning and changed into a black spiritual outfit. To return everything to its proper track, he had been waiting for this moment.
Shirou's eyes glowed with pure white light, the rainbow vortices spinning within. Having witnessed the battle of a God, he had mastered the correct use of these eyes. Holding a manifested white chain, he appeared high in the air, coiled it around the girl's waist, and retracted it instantly, pulling her back to safety.
"Ah... AHHHHHH! It hurts, it hurts! It's collapsing! My body is collapsing! It's wonderful... no, I can't take it, I can't take it! It won't stop! AHHHH!!! It's not enough! Don't let it end! I want to start over one more time! Because... I'm not satisfied yet, AHHHHHH!"
The woman's high-pitched voice echoed through the deep sea before finally falling silent. Under the heavy pressure of the abyss, the heartless colossus sank motionless into the dark.
Though this time had been pleasurable, the woman ultimately didn't understand. Since they were both non-human personifications of pleasure, where exactly did she and Meltryllis differ? If she became an Alter Ego, would she finally understand? Thinking this, Kiara Sessyoin sank to the ocean floor.
On the platform, Shirou opened his arms and leaped up, catching the girl who had been pulled back from the sky.
"Shirou-senpai!" Gudako cried out in delight.
"Sorry, Gudako. I made you all worry," Shirou said with a light smile.
"Put me down! You jerk! Put me down!" Meltryllis, still being held in Shirou's arms in a bridal carry, shouted with a red face. She flailed her small hands—the sleeves of which were tucked up—and beat against Shirou's head.
"I get it, I get it!" Shirou replied helplessly.
Nearby, Passionlip looked on thoughtfully, her face full of envy and expectation as she looked at the youth.
Shirou felt the gaze and gave a strained smile. If it was one ton... that might be a bit too much to carry.
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The battle on this side had reached its conclusion, but the battle in another space-time continued.
"Why? Why was I defeated?" The Demonic Bodhisattva fell, riddled with confusion. Looking at her opponent, the girl with the tea-brown hair, she couldn't understand how she had lost to an ordinary Master and a Servant who wasn't even top-tier.
Hans Christian Andersen, who had been hidden in spirit form, appeared at the final moment to answer his Master's confusion. He looked at the loathsome woman with contempt.
"What? You don't understand? Indeed, you are currently an omnipotent being; against humans, there is no reason for you to lose. However, among all humans, there is exactly one whose life you cannot take. None other than Hakuno."
"You didn't just absorb the Alter Egos; you absorbed BB and Sakura as well. Their power is your source. Therefore, when facing Hakuno, you were unable to exercise your authority from the very beginning. Why? Hah, do I even need to say it? Because those girls who act as your core are resisting desperately from within to protect the one they love."
Kiara struggled to look at Andersen. "How... just for... such a reason? Why... didn't you tell me?"
Andersen sneered at the giant woman. "What stupid things are you saying? You poisonous hag! The only enemy on this planet capable of defeating you exists. I thought you accepted the challenge knowing that, and I was thinking you were quite the fool... I didn't realize you were an idiot beyond stupidity. It's appalling. To think you tried to kill Hakuno head-on with such confidence, never noticing your own weakness."
Kiara curled her body. "If I had known... I wouldn't have chosen to fight. I would have just flicked her into some random domain and destroyed it along with the area. Ah... but that is also a beautiful reason. To be defeated not by a hero, or a savior... but by another 'woman.' Relationships between men and women are truly mysterious; no wonder the Moon Cell finds them troublesome..."
After confirming that control of the Moon Cell had returned to Sakura Matou, Andersen urged Hakuno to leave the Moon Cell core, which was about to restart to purge foreign matter. At the last moment, BB blocked the rapid restart of the core to send Hakuno safely back to the Near Side.
Remaining behind were the remains of Kiara, whose mass was too great to vanish completely, and her Servant—the bespectacled youth with a mature male voice, Andersen. He had refused to fight and had cursed her the whole time, yet stayed by her side even when she betrayed the world.
"Are you saying I was defeated by the love between girls?"
"Aren't you omnipotent? Why ask such a question?" Andersen mocked.
"Even the Moon Cell doesn't understand human emotions. I have possessed more 'love' than anyone, yet I cannot understand their feelings."
"Hmph. Pathetic woman. Whether it's your love or the love your followers have for you, it is nothing but 'seeking.' Those girls, however, learned 'giving.' It's not about getting something from the one they like, but wanting to do something for them."
"Your love is solely about obtaining pleasure for yourself. Your followers only want salvation and the fulfillment of their desires through you. But those girls made themselves look pathetic and covered themselves in wounds for the sake of love. That is your greatest difference."
At that moment, a white portal of light appeared high in the sky.
Long, long ago, there was a boy who longed to be a Hero of Justice. As a child, he met an unreasonable disaster and was saved from the wasteland of a fire by a man. The smile on the man who found him was so joyful—it was as if the man himself had been saved.
The boy saw that expression and felt a joy like the salvation of his own life. Later, in the hospital, he made a promise before other children of his age.
The man had asked him: "Do you want to go to the church orphanage with everyone else, or live with me?"
The tiny hand was placed in the man's palm.
That was the beginning of everything. Under Kiritsugu Emiya's tutelage, he became a magus who wasn't even half-baked. Later, the boy learned that the children saved from the fire who went to the church orphanage didn't leave; they were placed in coffins in a basement by a priest to serve as magical batteries for a certain Servant given flesh by the black mud.
What seemed like the "best choice" was actually the only "correct choice." The boy's life was a plaything of fate.
Weary of it all, he wished to sever the past, even though it was an established fact. Seeing such an expression, the boy couldn't help but feel a longing. He then began a life of endless repetition: killing a group of people, then traveling to another time to kill another.
If human energy were electricity, the Counter Force built the fuse box. When the current swelled dangerously, the Counter Hero—the Guardian—acted as the executor, burning out and breaking specific individuals like fuses to trip the circuit, ensuring the disaster didn't spread to all of humanity.
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