"Cough... thanks, Enkidu...."
Rising from the "web" of Chains of Heaven, Ishtar coughed lightly, barely suppressing the boiling turbulence within her divine core. She struck a slightly authoritative pose with one hand on her hip and climbed aboard the summoned Bow-Mount Maanna.
"Ishtar, don’t you have anything that can boost Gugalanna’s Noble Phantasm?"
On one of the few remaining patches of land, a golden-haired goddess with a crown rose from the depths. Spotless and composed, her crown-like headband, crimson cape, and dark ceremonial dress all clearly marked her identity. Holding a twisted silver-black spear with serpentine blades, Ereshkigal frowned slightly.
"This world has been completely altered. The age of gods has returned. Our Noble Phantasms are all being enhanced."
"Don’t speak to this goddess with that lofty tone! How should I know? Father—wait, huh? Eresh, weren’t you only able to manifest in the Underworld?"
"Why are you suddenly up here on the surface, and not fighting for control over the body?"
Looking up at the thunderclouds tens of thousands of ters above, Ishtar finally realized sothing just as she prepared to take off.
"Idiot, have you been knocked senseless by Selene? Haven’t you noticed the environntal changes?"
Covering her face, Ereshkigal launched into a frustrated rant.
"Sigh, I spent all that ti reinforcing the foundation, setting up the Underworld barriers—and it’s all worthless. In this situation, there’s no clear path to victory. We’ll have to rely on Servants wearing the enemy down.... Hopefully Chaldea still has reinforcents."
Then, realizing her own complaint, Ereshkigal waved dismissively at Ishtar with a look of irritation. "Shoo, shoo...."
"Tch, nag! Let it be known: this goddess is definitely more useful than you!"
Beside them, Enkidu’s smile had vanished. With a sorrowful expression, they glanced at the divine beast.
Fighting side by side with the Bull of Heaven again... I wonder how Gil is doing.
"Kingu’s Spirit Origin has vanished. Gugalanna likely won’t be a match for Selene either. Goddess Ereshkigal, we must hold her back."
"But... what about Fujimaru...?" Ereshkigal asked hesitantly.
"All we can do is delay Selene. Keep her occupied until she withdraws. The rest... is up to Fujimaru Ritsuka."
With that, Enkidu and Ishtar exchanged glances and shot up toward the storm clouds tens of thousands of ters above.
"...." Ereshkigal sighed wordlessly.
As for why she wasn’t following them—wasn’t it obvious?
She was the Goddess of the Netherworld, ruler of the realm of the dead and deity of the land. Due to the restoration of the divine era and the transformation of Solomon’s Grand Temple of Ti, she was barely able to leave the Underworld and operate within a few kiloters of the surface.
For Ereshkigal to battle in the upper stratosphere, tens of thousands of ters above ground—it would be suicide.
The farther she got from the earth, the more she would be weakened. Instead of becoming cannon fodder, she might as well stay grounded and wait for Selene to descend.
....
BOOM—!!!
RUMBLE!!!
Thunder and lightning. From an orbital perspective, this was an almost perfect circle, spanning over 400 kiloters, blotting out the sky. The cut between clouds and atmosphere was sharp—a textbook-class typhoon.
And within, if one could perceive the dense magical particles swirling inside this storm, they would see—
A beast as massive as the typhoon itself slowly moving forward in their direction.
Seen through the gaps in the massive typhoon clouds was a creature with golden-tinged bones, like a moving mountain.
Each bone was the size of a vast tropolis. This blue-and-gold interwoven beast was using the rotating storm as its body. It galloped with rising intensity toward the tiny foreign god before it.
Thud! Thud! Thud!
ROOOOAAARRRR——!!
The storm was its fiery blood, the pounding rain its impassioned pulse. Thunderstorms composed the rhythm of its beating heart.
Thunder was its rage, lightning its fleeting glance, and the resounding booms were its howls. Lightning and thunder played out the wild majesty of this beast of the heavens.
Yet that was all. To Selene, Gugalanna’s roar—ant to stir primal fear in all living things—sounded like a whimper from a little puppy.
Had she still been in her Servant form as the Beast Goddess, Selene might have been montarily stalled by Ishtar’s trump card, perhaps even forced into a tough battle.
Crackle~
"The First Trampling Domination—(Bucephalus)!"
Whoosh—!
Squelch!
With a casual swipe of a subspace spear, Selene tore through the storm, blood and gore splattering as both rider and mount were shredded into a blur of flesh. The proud young knight was now no more than mangled remains.
Within the thunderclouds stirred up by Gugalanna’s rampage, the surviving Servants had long gone numb.
"Well, at least we bought half a second..." one muttered in self-mocking consolation.
Unbothered, as if swatting a bug, Selene’s faint smile never left her face. She remained lofty, sneering at the "little bull" before her. She gently pressed her middle finger against her index.
"Imaginary Transfer—Binding!"
Snap!
With a nonchalant snap, the violet-red light on Selene’s fingers spread rapidly. Within seconds, hundreds of kiloters of space were consud. Reality warped and twisted like blocks collapsing into a spiraling vortex.
"Arrow of Honkai."
Selene then slightly curled her hand and flicked her fingers. A perfect cube floated in the air. It soon began to spin at high speed.
Selene reached back, miming a bowstring. From her gesture erged three fras ford of four crystalline Honkai-energy pillars, decreasing in size toward her. The second-to-last was a twisted dual prism, and the final was a regular polyhedron.
The polyhedron spun faster and faster, becoming a blazing shaft she thrust toward Gugalanna’s skull.
ROOOOARRRR——!!
Sensing Selene’s focus, Gugalanna roared louder. Its giant horns, each the size of a peninsula, crackled with arcs of violet lightning.
From within the thunderclouds, the clash of gold and azure radiated a brilliant glow. The skeletal beast slowly opened its jaws.
INHALE—!
The vast storm, stretching for hundreds of kiloters, was packed with electrical energy. Drawn by Gugalanna, it surged inward, forming a bolt of truly monstrous voltage.
This was a true Anti-Nation class Noble Phantasm!
Blinding lightning outshone all, thunder overwheld hearing. The colossal storm orb of electricity scorched many Servants even before it detonated.
"Fall back now!"
But it was too late. Selene released her grip—
Like dropping a warhead into a calm pond, the resulting explosion defied imagination. Blinding purple light collided with surging lightning, imdiately expanding outward in a terrifying storm of energy.
The nearest Servant unit, engaged in guerrilla delay tactics, was struck by the terrifying aftershock!
Among them: a tear-mole-marked handso man wielding a pair of red and yellow spears, a descendant of the war god Nuada wielding a massive dual spear, a puppet queen once forced onto Egypt’s throne, and a heroic captain who once road the seas....
In a normal Holy Grail War, any of them would have been among the top contenders.
Unfortunately, this was a war of gods!
All resistance was futile. In an instant, bodies, weapons, Noble Phantasms—everything—was wiped away, as if erased by invisible hands amid the crashing light.
The thundercloud spanning 800 kiloters from north to south was blown apart in an instant. Dark clouds for tens of thousands of miles were shredded, the ozone layer torn open.
All color drained from the world. Silence fell.
Then ca a grating tallic screech that made teeth ache—a terrifying shriek that echoed across the entire sky. Massive soundwaves violently shook everything in their path.
Even elite surviving Servants hidden dozens of kiloters away fell to the ground in agony, blood trickling from their ears and noses.
Rip—!
Visibly, a torrent of lightning that had covered the sky was split apart. A streak of violet light, sharp and unstoppable, pierced through the golden and lapis heavens, shooting onward without pause to the very edge of the sky.
Crack crack~!
The enormous body of Gugalanna—made of glazed crystal and forged lapis lazuli—began to crumble, pierced and shattered.
Molten rainbow-colored liquid poured from ruptured and exploded cavities, trickling down its once-majestic skeletal fra and dripping onto the cracked ground below.
Gugalanna howled in pain, fractures widening. In the next mont, the behemoth collapsed, falling into countless mountainous chunks of tal upon the dry ocean floor.
"No way! Gugalanna was defeated just like that?!"
Dodging the falling remnants of the Bull of Heaven, Ishtar was stunned. She had only just been blasted underground, and now Gugalanna was already dismantled?
Her previous boasts now sounded like hot air.
ROAR—! Undying Ar—
Splat!
Suddenly, a large black figure with gold markings ca charging and roared. Selene paled and instantly summoned a cluster of Imaginary Hands to engulf it.
Countless pale-purple arms reached from the void, wrapping around the three-ter-tall figure and wrenching it apart.
Crack!Crack!Crack!
When Selene dismissed the Imaginary Hands, nothing remained but a pile of pulped flesh—no life signs, not even a coherent body.
Her expectations had climbed steadily, and after such a grand "feast," this little "dessert" hardly registered. She turned toward the direction where Spirit Origin signals were most densely gathered.
Even heroes immortalized by history, seasoned warriors of countless battles, felt their resolve falter in the face of this overwhelming slaughter.
They simply could not win. All their vaunted accomplishnts, experience, and skill were aningless in the face of this gulf in power.
A clever trick only works if you have the strength to wield it!
"Don’t give up! There’s still a way!"
A sturdy, resolute man with short black hair held a brown-red longbow. Facing his demoralized comrades, he offered a firm, encouraging smile.
"Fujimaru Ritsuka hasn’t given up! We, who are rembered by history and honored by future generations—how can we surrender?!"
Drip—
Spreading his arms, he drew the bow, chanting a sacred hymn with urgency and solemnity.
"O’ most radiant and holy Lord—"
Instantly, his muscles tore, blood soaking his armor. Golden flas poured from his bleeding flesh and flowed down onto the beast’s spine beneath his feet.
"Grant us wisdom, dignity, and strength, O’ Lord of Heaven."
"Bear witness to my sincerity, my conviction, and the full extent of my strength."
As blood mist burst from his body, his muscles and bones groaned under the strain, twisting visibly.
"Look upon this, foreign god. Witness my actions, my end, and the divine offering I shall beco (Stella)."
"My, sacred—"
Rip—!
Abruptly cut off.
"Oh my~"
His crumbling body suddenly began to regenerate, now marked by creeping Honkai corrosion patterns. The great Persian hero realized in horror—he had lost control of his body.
"The most radiant and holy Lord? Are you referring to ?"
Before him stood a being radiating a chilling, invisible pressure. Crimson eyes shimred with brilliance, and her stunningly beautiful face blood like a moonlit flower, noble and elegant.
Yet her gaze held haughty disdain, viewing all life as ants beneath her feet. In every gesture, this goddess exuded a blend of grace and cruelty, impossible to read.
"Arash, was such a prayerful hymn ant to ask for my rcy?"
...
"At that size and speed, if she collides with Earth, she could split a tectonic plate."
In Chaldea’s control room, Da Vinci was soaked in sweat. Ever since losing contact with Fujimaru Ritsuka, she had been consud with anxiety. Finally, after frantic efforts, communication was restored.
And the first thing she saw—Ishtar’s Bull of Heaven dismbered.
A technician reported, "Arash—deceased."
"Damn it! No matter what we throw at her, even divine weapons and the greatest of heroes... they’re all powerless against her."
Even Da Vinci couldn’t hide her fear.
Every ti they seed just one step from defeating Selene, she would inexplicably grow stronger. Yet the difficulty was always finely tuned—just enough to keep the illusion of hope alive. As they pushed forward, believing they were close, the gap would widen once again.
It’s maddening. The more Da Vinci thought about it, the more despair she felt. This endless chase, this false hope—it was terrifying.
It was as if Selene continually dangled salvation before them. The more they struggled, the deeper the abyss beca.
"Her words, even her emotional expressions—it’s all intentional. She’s guiding us to push beyond our limits, to give everything we have," Da Vinci said with certainty.
Was she simply savoring humanity’s despair when their best wasn’t enough?
Where is the good in you? Why haven’t you shown it yet?!
But thankfully, Da Vinci thought as she looked at Selene’s flickering image on the screen—
Wait! No—!
That feeling again.
That sense they were just one step away from victory. Was there another phase?
Doubt overtook her. She no longer trusted the image of Selene fading away.
"Really, it’s a nightmare here, and it’s just as bad there. Trouble everywhere."
Clang!
"Da Vinci-chan, how’s the situation?"
The tal hatch opened. Romani reappeared. After taking ti to collect himself, the anxiety on his face had lessened slightly.
"Romani... have you made your decision...?"
But Da Vinci—who knew him better than anyone, who had long suspected his true identity—saw the sorrow, determination, regret, and guilt hidden beneath his gentle expression.
As if rembering sothing, her eyes widened.
"Don’t tell ... she was after you from the start?"
Romani didn’t answer. He stepped forward and stared at the screen—at the now-transford ’Solomon’ and the battered, nearly kneeling Fujimaru Ritsuka—murmuring with nostalgia and pity:
"Ten years... Ti really does pass in the blink of an eye."
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