Chapter 101: Gold and the Lion, and—
A giant band of light swept across the sky above the church. It was like a shimmer of dawn that could only be seen at night.
When the golden brilliance forming the band faded, Gilgamesh appeared within, having drifted back slightly due to the thrust of the light. He was surrounded by countless shields—no two identical in carving or pattern—which had completely fended off the strike using these Noble Phantasms.
After the last speck of light dissipated, he suddenly curled one side of his mouth and burst into laughter.
"Haha, hahaha, heh-hahahaha!!"
Because his behavior was so utterly inexplicable, even Richard couldn't help but tilt his head.
"And here I was wondering what it was—nothing but a fake imitating a Star-Legacy, a glimmer of the Stars? You use such a Noble Phantasm against me? ...I see, it all makes sense now! No wonder you'd call a 'Faker' your friend; it's because you yourself are a 'fake.' Birds of a feather among two 'fakes'—is there anything more hilarious than this?"
—As expected of the King of Heroes. His attitude suddenly got even worse. Is the concept of a 'fake' something he absolutely cannot accept? I wonder if he has some unforgettable trauma regarding it?
Hearing the laughter, these were the only trivial thoughts that occurred to Richard. He did not answer, but instead vanished from his spot.
In the next instant, a silhouette appeared in what should have been a blind spot, and another band of light surged forth. It came from below. The result was a pillar of light that soared into the heavens. Even the figure of the King of Heroes was carried higher into the sky along with his array of shields.
Before the trail of the light pillar could even dim, Saber vanished again. A new slash of light struck from a different angle. Then a third, a fourth, a fifth.
An astonishing rate of fire.
Almost every strike managed to arrive before the light of the previous one had vanished. While he was undoubtedly concluding one liberation before initiating the next, to the recipient, it became an unending, continuous torrent of light slashes.
During the first, second, and third strikes, the shield array was only slightly pushed; by the fifth and sixth, the shields were shoved higher into the sky; by the tenth, the shield array began to look precarious, like a leaf in a storm.
While feeling the prana filling his body, Saber squandered even more of it without limit. Moreover, with every strike, he would disappear from his original position to reappear where he could best find a gap in the shield array.
Countless pillars of light shot up from the church grounds and vanished brilliantly, leaving only a person-sized sphere wrapped in shields being hammered ever higher. From an outsider's perspective, it looked like a ping-pong ball being blown into the sky by a typhoon beyond human strength.
"Useless schemes," the King of Heroes muttered, ensuring the shields facing the brunt of the bombardment remained in a state of prana saturation.
The King of Heroes' prana supply was likewise infinite. All he had to do was replace the primary shields with new ones and inject them with prana. Just by doing this, he continuously blocked Richard's rapid-fire combo, though he couldn't stop the momentum. Richard was using this interference and the unending flow of Noble Phantasms from different angles to suppress him, preventing a counterattack while allowing the light particles leaking through the long stalemate to cause a bit of trouble.
Though that trouble was negligible.
In reality, a single mistake would give the truly lethal, dissipating light bands a chance to open a breach, but the King of Heroes was not a man who made mistakes.
Compared to this sham Noble Phantasm, the surge of prana that had flashed in the distance earlier was much closer in nature to the radiance of the Stars.
Because he had been busy shouting at the insolent offender, Gilgamesh hadn't actively grasped its nature, leaving it at the impression of "something like the light of the Stars." But if that meant someone was using the true Star-Legacy...
—That was impossible.
Gilgamesh's insight had long ago seen through the structure of this Holy Grail War. Since the appearance of the True Archer (Alcides), True Rider (Hippolyta), and True Caster, Gilgamesh knew clearly that there would be no second Saber in this war.
Therefore, the possibility of the Star-Legacy being summoned simply didn't exist. Gilgamesh did not doubt his own judgment in the slightest.
For some reason, Gilgamesh found himself greatly annoyed by the word "fake" now.
"I watched the process of it being made with my own eyes"? "Something like the light of the Stars"?
The King of Heroes sensed a subtle dissonance. Following that dissonance was a level of rage roughly 30% higher than his usual temperament.
"I see. So there are bugs scurrying about, doing things behind my back while I wasn't looking?"
Gilgamesh's eyes narrowed, his tone turning cold. Using the Wisdom of Kings to connect all the events, he reached a conclusion. Simultaneously, a killing intent that grew silently and without reason took root. Although it was strange for the King of Heroes, who usually had no interest in rats, to suddenly take such a deep interest in a few bugs that hadn't even threatened him yet—to the point of generating killing intent—Gilgamesh didn't care, as his moods were always subject to change.
Gilgamesh returned his focus. His body was still within the shield array, surrounded by light covering the outside world, hammering the entire array higher like a bat hitting a ball.
"..."
During this process, because Saber below was constantly searching for gaps, the shield array began to leak trace amounts of light particles, causing cracks to appear in the luxurious, gold-like armor. Gilgamesh watched this scene expressionlessly. He waved his raised hand to the side, and at that same moment, countless distortions far exceeding a hundred reappeared.
Every "gate" opened directly in front of the surging beam of light, without exception. Various weapons emerged from the "gates," but all remained stationary, as if manifesting into a giant city wall.
Almost the moment the wall formed, it was swallowed by the light.
Logically, even if they used the prana of these Noble Phantasms to intercept, they would indeed be quickly scattered by the aurora. Noble Phantasms acting in such a monotonous fashion couldn't effectively unify their prana. If all the prana of the Noble Phantasms were gathered, they could indeed surpass this flash, but breaking down prana based on the gaps is relatively simple.
It should have been that way.
However... multiple prana clumps began to stand out within the band of light, fixed in place like reefs. They even tangled themselves around the torrent of light, merging with it, growing massive and flowing back toward the source of the light.
Enkidu (The Chains of Heaven).
Those were golden chains extending from the void in all directions, forcibly huddling that group of Noble Phantasms together while sternly correcting their trajectory. It could already be called a mountain—or a tide—of converged Noble Phantasms.
Then, this golden dragon formed of a mountain or a sea began to descend.
Richard broke into a sweat, watching the mountain fall. Nothing had changed. The King of Heroes still looked down from above, as if he would reside there forever. He spoke with a smile that held both interest and mockery:
"A product of a little extra effort. Don't tell me you can't take this hit, mongrel... no, 'faker'?"
The golden dragon began to roar.
Richard gave a wry smile. Then, when he saw the golden dragon's primary destination change to another location—the church where Ayaka had hidden not long ago—the wry smile turned into a dry one.
"Hey now... that's just cheating."
Abandoning even the last sliver of thought to dodge the golden dragon with god-speed, Richard rushed to the church roof. He swung his sword with all his might, with an intensity that suggested even this unbreakable blade might shatter.
This didn't even pass through thought. It was pure instinct.
Was it chivalry? Richard wasn't sure, and he certainly didn't have time to think. But he felt it was subtly different from the topic he was always talking about.
The sense of exhilaration that had been coiling in his heart grew infinitely at this critical juncture. His heart throbbed like a lion. Overriding all other emotions, the torrent of light also expanded.
In Richard's eyes was the golden dragon, which could eliminate both him and the church beneath him with the slightest lapse. It drew closer and closer.
His consciousness went blank. Amidst the illusion of standing in a clear, white-orange space, the refining flames behind him began to recede. At the final moment, Richard realized once again that he only survived by relying on this sense of exhilaration.
As expected, he was completely different from that King of Knights. The Golden King was not quite correct; he was neither a fake nor the real thing—he simply kept a lion in his heart.
And then, he accepted the fact that, lacking witnesses, he would be killed by the Golden King immediately after blocking this strike. Even so, Saber did not loosen his grip on the hilt he was about to lose hold of.
—I've done so many crummy things already; I'd better stick this one out to the end, right? Actually—is there even a single time I haven't stuck it out to the end?
At that thought, Saber laughed in spite of himself.
The golden dragon, swinging its massive body, expanded rapidly in Richard's pupils. Precisely because he was fully prepared to take the hit...
When he noticed an additional presence beside him, Richard turned his head almost instinctively.
There was a girl. She stood there, holding a sword that shone with a brilliant light—one that could only be described as holy. That was the only information Richard's brain successfully processed at first glance.
"Eh?"
She swung the sword down calmly.
In the next instant, Richard noticed the pressure from the golden dragon suddenly lighten. He blinked, not quite processing it.
A battle skirt fluttered in the air; it was silver. The girl's golden hair shone together with the intense light. Richard should know her—probably, maybe. Her name was Artos, the woman accompanying his friend.
It took Richard two seconds to realize that the longsword erupting with brilliance was the Holy Sword he had never seen in person, yet which had been passed down through countless centuries in the legends he chased. Then, his eyes widened in disbelief.
"You are—...!?"
The light from the sword in Richard's hand died out, its power exhausted. Only then could Richard see clearly: he wasn't the only one using a band of light.
There was another dazzling band of light on the field. From the sword in the girl's hand, it swept through the golden dragon that was less than ten meters away.
The golden dragon appeared to freeze in place. In the next moment, it violently collapsed, Noble Phantasms scattering everywhere.
"Haah!?"
The remaining momentum of the light band went straight for the King of Heroes... specifically, the King of Heroes who had canceled his shield deployment and returned those shields to the treasury after creating the golden dragon.
Although Gilgamesh desperately forced the space to distort at the critical moment, within moments, he was carried back into the flow of light along with his Noble Phantasms.
After the light of the single strike faded, the girl lowered her sword and faced Richard. "Can you still stand?"
Richard stood dazed.
"Artoria Pendragon, arriving for support."
There was no longer any need for secrecy. The King of Knights announced her True Name.
Richard opened his mouth, but no sound came out.
The sound of an object hitting the ground rang out nearby. The blonde man climbed back up from the ground, looking dusty and disheveled. With a look of utter bewilderment, he held one hand to his forehead. Half of his armor was no longer in its original shape, revealing his bare skin beneath. Beside him lay a shattered shield fragment.
Artoria Pendragon showed a faint smile. As if taking revenge for Richard, she retorted:
"That was but an incomplete liberation. Don't tell me you can't take this hit, King of Heroes."
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