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There was one more thing Chloe hadn't said out loud.
That Iskandar was too strong, her Servant was too weak, and a joint broadcast only had so much viewer attention to go around. If he kept taking all of it, what was left for her?
She'd been at the top of streaming long enough to understand the mechanics better than most. Strength wasn't the metric that mattered. Content was. Show effect. Execution that left an impression. You could be terrible at the game and the audience would still remember you — as long as the moment was good enough.
This was the first step of her comeback.
Bad luck, running into her in a weakened state. Nothing personal.
She'd take what she needed.
Before Northern Star could finish the word "why," the guillotine came down.
Northern Star's stream went black.
Iskandar roared.
It didn't help. Against most heroes, the black lily's restraint effect could be broken through — the right stats, the right skill, enough raw force applied at the right angle. But the lily's design had a specific counter built into its targeting logic.
It was designed to suppress kings.
And Iskandar was, without qualification, a king.
The black mud churned. The vines tightened. Iskandar fought against both simultaneously, and the effect was the same as a man struggling against a current that adjusted its force to match his output — the harder he pushed, the more it held.
[Chat]:
[Outraged]: she just — she just killed her own teammate with a guillotine
[Disgusted]: talks all high-minded about "victory" and then stabs the person who trusted her in the back without a word
[Deflecting]: it's not a real Holy Grail War. she could have talked to Northern Star. suggested it. asked.
[Someone_Defending_Her]: my wife did exactly right. Iskandar's army was already gone, better to let her Servant absorb the power than waste it
[Response]: remember to stand in line behind the first guy and push when he runs out of energy
[BANNED]: [Notice: User "ChloeNo1Fan" detected making inappropriate remarks. Account banned for 96 hours.]
[Honest]: the truth is a sharp knife
[Also_Honest]: still calling her your wife after this? what is that
The black mud had him to the knees.
Iskandar swung the Cyprus sword with everything he had.
The Flying Hooves Thunder Ox responded — the sacred beasts surging forward with their full electrical output, hooves throwing off arcs of divine lightning that hit the mud around his feet. Divine lightning, the kind that carried Zeus's authority in its charge.
The black mud recoiled. It didn't like light. It didn't like clarity. It dissolved in patches under the sustained electrical assault, and the vines — tough as they were — met Iskandar's wrist strength applied at full capacity and found that they had a limit after all.
He tore free.
"To lay hands on someone who trusted you with their back—" the Cyprus sword came up, "—you are genuinely evil."
"Don't lecture me." Chloe's expression didn't change. "Marie — take him."
The Servant who had been managing the guillotine and the mud and the vines while Chloe maintained eye contact with Iskandar stepped forward at that instruction — or floated forward, more accurately. The presence was wrong for a Caster in the conventional sense. Too elegant. Too composed. The black that touched her looked applied rather than natural, as if it had been put there over something that didn't want it.
Her voice was formal and absolute.
"You don't need to tell me anything, arrogant King."
The black lily at her feet expanded.
"Cannot love anyone. Cannot forgive anyone."
The guillotine reset overhead.
"Bring disaster to all — to every tomorrow's loser."
The mud surged back.
"Noble Phantasm — release!"
"[Vae Victis]"
"Tragedy's Cycle: Black Flower Funeral Procession—"
"Everyone. No one can be forgiven."
[Chat]:
[Vae_Victis]: "woe to the vanquished" — that's the Noble Phantasm name. Marie Antoinette.
[MARIE]: CHLOE CORRUPTED MARIE ANTOINETTE
[Context]: okay everyone stop. Max needs to explain this. because this is a lot.
Unlike Victor, who had wasted his account on pure ego, Chloe had done her preparation.
She'd run the entire story mode before the event. She'd played co-op to get familiar with the mechanics. She'd read guides. She'd accepted every arrangement the guild had given her, including the ones that required her to smile at people she despised and agree with things she found repugnant, because all of it was in service of getting back to the position she'd lost.
Back to the top bracket. Back to the daily viewer counts that translated directly into income without any additional effort. Back to being the person people talked about when they were naming names.
Her account had been prepared for her — purchased and configured specifically for this event. The strongest natural pull on it was Siegfried, roughly 80% probability. A formidable Servant by any metric.
The guild had looked at this and decided: black mud corruption.
The reasoning was simple. Corrupted Servants had better show value. A transformed Noble Phantasm, an Avenger's rage, the visual drama of something beautiful becoming something terrible — it was better content than a clean, powerful Saber winning efficiently.
Chloe had agreed immediately.
She'd chosen Irisviel as her player character — healing-focused, same logic as other players who understood the class synergies. The Holy Relic she carried had been specifically selected to produce black mud through the All the World's Evil mechanism.
So when the summoning circle resolved and Marie Antoinette materialized — Caster-class, the historical queen of France, wearing an impractical swimsuit that the Moon Cell had apparently decided was appropriate given the context, expression open and warm and genuinely happy in a way that shouldn't have survived the summoning process—
Chloe hadn't let her finish introducing herself.
Three Command Seals. All of them. Instantly.
The black mud didn't wait for a reaction.
Whether it was Marie's smile that triggered something, or her warmth, or the specific quality of her presence that didn't carry a single gram of resentment toward anyone — whatever it was, Chloe hadn't hesitated. All the resentment that had been accumulating for months, the fans who hadn't understood her, the bosses who'd decided one emotional incident was worth ending a career over, the platforms and guilds already calculating her replacement value—
None of that was Marie's fault. Marie had never done anything to anyone.
That hadn't been a factor in the decision.
The mud went in. Marie screamed.
Avenger: Marie Antoinette [Alter] emerged.
[Chat]:
[Processing]:
[Someone]: she corrupted Cake
[Cake_Reference]: she summoned the most genuinely nice Heroic Spirit in the entire game and immediately used three Command Seals to corrupt her
[Three_Command_Seals]: she has zero Command Seals left. she burned all of them on the corruption.
[Strategic_Note]: zero Command Seals means no emergency options. no rescue pulls. if Marie Alter turns on her she has nothing.
[Iskandar_Right_Now]: Iskandar is currently in the middle of a Noble Phantasm called "no one can be forgiven" with a guillotine overhead and black flower mud everywhere
[State_Of_Things]: Chloe has: no Command Seals, a corrupted Avenger with no particular reason to spare her, and a battle against a Conqueror who just broke free from the mud once already
[Counter]: she also has the guillotine. the mud. the vines. and Iskandar is still weakened from the lily effect.
[Both_True]: both things are true simultaneously
[Watching]: Max hasn't commented yet. he's watching.
[What_Is_HE_THINKING]:
[End of Chapter 172]
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