"Master, why haven't they started fighting yet? If I were the enemy Master, I'd have already run my spear through his heart."
"Achilles, how many times must I tell you? Don't be so reckless. It makes you prone to falling into traps."
High in the sky, aboard Achilles's Troias Tragōidia, Chiron was using his Clairvoyance to provide a live commentary of the events inside the restaurant below. Beside them stood their two Masters.
"Master, we finally get to fight side by side. Can't you spare me the lecture for once?"
"As long as you still call me 'Master' instead of 'Archer,' I will say what needs to be said."
"Yes, yes, I know. So, Master, what do you make of the enemy Archer?"
"He is cautious."
Chiron's single remark earned nods from Achilles and the two Masters. They then waited expectantly for more, but nothing followed.
"Master, is that it?"
"We haven't even crossed blades, and he hasn't even revealed himself. Did you expect me to start spouting nonsense?"
In life, Chiron had been a Centaur, the Archer of Sagittarius. Summoned as a Heroic Spirit, he now appeared in human form.
As a result, his power was diminished compared to his living self, but he still possessed significant Divinity, making him a powerful, first-rate Servant.
After all, Chiron's father was Cronus, making him a half-brother to the God-King Zeus himself.
"Master..."
"No need to apologize. Just remember my warning."
Of course, Chiron himself was overjoyed to be fighting alongside Achilles again. By blood, Achilles was Zeus's great-grandson, a distant relation. But Chiron had raised Achilles from infancy, making him his foster son in all but name.
Leaving the master and student—or rather, the foster father and son—to their bickering, the atmosphere inside the restaurant had frozen solid after Archer of Red's last words.
But...
"Archer, I know Kirei Kotomine is unlikely to have allies. I'm merely being cautious. Besides, I came here for another reason: I've grown curious about him myself.
"I want to know why he's so obsessed with me."
During the Fuyuki Holy Grail War, Maiya Hisau had been captured by Kirei and brutally tortured before being rescued by the King of Conquerors and healed by Guinevere's Falsification.
Afterward, he learned from Maiya that Kirei's only goal had been to ask what kind of man Kiritsugu Emiya was.
"Kirei Kotomine, to this day, is your question about me still unchanged?"
"Yes. I'm curious about the ideals you held before Fuyuki, and why you changed."
Kiritsugu Emiya almost laughed. Now that the truth was laid bare before him, he finally believed that Kirei's obsession truly stemmed from nothing more than this.
This time, he signaled Archer of Red to produce the lighter again. Only a hand and the lighter materialized to light his cigarette.
It had been a long time since he'd smoked. He desperately needed the taste of tobacco to calm the storm raging within him.
As Kiritsugu sat back down and began to recount his former ideals and the reasons for his transformation...
...back on Achilles's Troias Tragōidia, Chiron had gleaned more from the brief glimpse of Archer of Red's hand.
"Master, are you certain from the intelligence that he's an Archer, not a Saber or another Class?"
"Thanks to Kirei Kotomine's information, we've been able to match all enemy Servants to their Classes. The only remaining slot for that individual is Archer."
"If that's truly the case, then we're likely facing an Archer who is skilled with the bow, but even more skilled with the sword. That's what the calluses on his hand revealed to me."
"A Servant skilled with the bow, and also with the sword?"
"So? Can't quite place who that might be, can you?"
While they exchanged these brief words in the sky, back in the restaurant, Kiritsugu had finished telling Kirei what he wanted to know. Now, it was Kiritsugu's turn to ask why Kirei had been so obsessed with him.
"At first, it was truly just because I wanted to know what kind of wish a heartless Mage Killer like you would bring to the Holy Grail War. Back then, I didn't understand what pleasure was, nor did I know my own true nature."
Five years. Kirei finally understood Kiritsugu's wish. The joy that flooded him was so intense he had to press a hand to his face, the features beneath twisting into a distorted smile.
"I never imagined... that a killing machine like you would harbor such a grand ambition as saving the world. Kiritsugu Emiya, do you wish to become the Lord?"
"No. I already know that's impossible. I've abandoned that wish."
"No, you haven't. You're still active in war zones around the world. You've merely shifted from participating in wars to saving as many innocent victims as you can."
"Kiritsugu Emiya, you haven't abandoned your wish. Instead, you've finally found a more reliable path toward achieving it.
"Slaughter cannot save the world, but spreading the ideal of benevolence can. When more and more people become like you, following the path you've forged, it will bring the world far closer to peace than killing ever could.
"Of course, this assumes the peace you desire is the peace of humanity, not the peace of the world itself."
Inside the restaurant, Kiritsugu Emiya was stunned to be lectured by Kirei Kotomine. But what he didn't know was that these words struck an even deeper chord with Archer.
As a Servant, a Guardian of Alaya, he had performed countless dirty deeds. He had long since concluded that his ideal was impossible, that the notion of an "Ally of Justice" was a childish fantasy. He had even come to reject the naive, passionate self he had been before becoming a Guardian.
"Kirei Kotomine, are you saying the path my Master walks is the path of the Lord you worship?"
"Of course. No deed, no path, can ever be truly unprecedented. The Lord naturally hopes others will follow the path He first walked.
"Kiritsugu Emiya, you are better suited than I to join the Church and become one of its Executors. Shall I recommend you for initiation?"
Kirei Kotomine smiled, seemingly not joking. As he spoke, he understood even more why he had felt a "love at first sight" for Kiritsugu Emiya.
It was because Kiritsugu Emiya, like his Lord, was a martyr willing to sacrifice everything for all humanity.
But... for some reason, after recognizing Kiritsugu as such a person, his thoughts turned to wanting to see Kiritsugu break down and sob, to see him nailed alive to a cross, to personally bleed him with a gun, and then to carve out his heart to see if it was any different from an ordinary person's.
And at this thought, Kirei Kotomine felt the vampiric urge he had long suppressed surge within him, his eyes turning crimson.
"So that's it. What I desire is the blood of a saint. My desire for the Holy Grail is to use it as a chalice for that blood!"
Kirei Kotomine... he truly had been broken from birth.
At this point, Archer of Red no longer needed to urge him. Kiritsugu Emiya instantly activated Time Alter at its maximum level, drew his gun, and pressed the modified single-shot ceremonial weapon against Kirei's forehead. Without hesitation, he pulled the trigger, firing the Origin Bullet within.
From Kirei's laughter alone, Kiritsugu knew reconciliation was impossible.
"Kiritsugu Emiya, Muda muda muda muda! You can no longer kill me! At least, not until that boy named Tohno destroys Roa's main body, you can't kill me!"
His head had been blown apart, his entire body's magic circuits destroyed by the Origin Bullet. Then, Archer of Red had beheaded him, and Kiritsugu had riddled his body with bullets from a submachine gun. Yet, he was still alive. And he wasn't afraid of sunlight.