At the foot of Mount Enzou, Rin Tohsaka stumbled down the stone steps of the mountain path.
She was barefoot on one side, having lost her other small leather shoe during her frantic escape.
Sweat mixed with dirt smeared her small face, but she had no time to wipe it away, only knowing to run forward with all her might.
The scene behind her lingered like an unshakable nightmare...
'Why did Uncle Kirei, who was so polite just yesterday, suddenly try to kill me... Can that poor lady escape... And what about that older sister who suddenly appeared and saved my life...'
These questions caused immense turmoil in her young mind.
"Father... Father..." Rin sniffled, her hands trembling as she reached into her skirt pocket. She frantically pulled out a pendant inlaid with a sapphire, its internal magical runes flowing like a star map.
This was an emergency tool Tokiomi Tohsaka had specially prepared for her, capable of contacting him directly through the family's Magic Circuits.
With trembling fingers, Rin pressed the center gemstone. Magical energy rippled slightly as it lit up with a blue glow.
"Rin?!"
Tokiomi Tohsaka's voice rang out from the other end of the communicator almost instantly.
At that moment, he was stationed at a nearby vantage point, preparing to cast a large-scale spell to support the rampaging Gilgamesh. He never expected his daughter to contact him so suddenly.
"What's wrong? Why did you suddenly activate the communicator? Your presence is very close to me... Didn't I tell you to stay at home?"
Hearing her father's voice, Rin could no longer hold back her tears and burst out crying.
She poured everything out as she ran, "Father! The priest... Uncle Kirei! He captured a silver-haired lady and is going to kill her!"
Though she was somewhat incoherent, every word reached Tokiomi's ears clearly.
"He... he even tried to kill me! He had a masked freak try to stab me!"
"...A red-haired sister saved me, but she can't beat that uncle all by herself! Father, come quickly! They're at Ryuudou Temple!"
Tokiomi's face instantly turned deathly pale, and the wand in his hand nearly slipped from his grasp.
He forced himself to remain calm, but his voice trembled with disbelief. "Rin, what did you say? Kirei... he captured Irisviel? And he tried to kill you?"
As a deeply involved participant in the Holy Grail War, Tokiomi understood Kirei's intentions almost instantly.
Betrayal!
This intelligence gatherer, who had existed solely as a supporting role from the very beginning, was actually trying to turn against him at the critical moment to seize the Lesser Grail!
"Rin, listen to me..."
Tokiomi took a deep breath. "Find a safe place to hide right now. Do not go anywhere near Ryuudou Temple!"
"I am heading there immediately! Remember, do not turn off the communicator. I will use it to track your location."
"Father... hurry..." Rin nodded, crawling into a patch of bushes by the side of the road. She curled her body into a tight ball, waiting for her father's arrival.
With the appearance of the great void in the sky, the magical energy in the air grew increasingly thick.
Ryuudou Temple.
The originally peaceful and sacred grounds now felt so oppressive that it was hard to even breathe.
In the courtyard before the main hall, several corpses of the Assassin clones lay scattered about, slowly dissipating into the air.
On the other side, a pool of dark red blood seeped through the cracks of the blue bricks, soaking Kirei Kotomine's priestly robes.
He lay flat on his back at the bottom of the steps, the horrifying wound on his chest exposed to the air as his breathing grew incredibly faint.
"Damn it... We have to save our Master! Otherwise, we'll all fade away at this rate!"
"It's all your fault! You overused Hundred Personas! Now we can't even take down this little brat!!"
"What do you mean it's my fault! You were split from me too!"
The few remaining Assassin clones gathered together, pointing fingers at each other, though it was completely pointless.
"Hah... Hah..."
Sumire Kamado sat slumped on the ground. The old sword in her hands had snapped in two, and her arm had been slashed open by a dagger.
She was on the verge of passing out from exhaustion.
In their desperate bid to drag Kirei Kotomine to safety, these Assassin clones had fought with ruthless ferocity.
While their individual combat prowess wasn't too difficult to handle, she simply didn't have the strength to face multiple Heroic Spirit Servants simultaneously.
'...It seems I have no choice but to use a Command Spell to summon Mr. Asuka here.'
She had originally wanted to save this power to heal her Servant or replenish his magical energy, but if she held onto it any longer, she would lose her own life...
Having made her decision, the Command Spell on the back of her hand began to radiate heat.
"By the power of my Command Spell, I..."
Just as she was about to chant the spell to summon Asuka, she suddenly heard the hurried sound of footsteps coming from the temple gates.
"Father! It's right here!"
Sumire noticed the little girl she had saved rushing in first and was about to shout out to stop her.
"Who's there?!" The surviving Assassin clones turned their heads in alarm.
Behind the girl, an elegant figure in a crisp suit appeared at the temple entrance. It was none other than Tokiomi Tohsaka.
The wand in Tokiomi's hand flickered with a dangerous light as his gloomy gaze swept across the courtyard:
The collapsed Kirei Kotomine, the weakened Irisviel, the Master of Avenger, and the Assassins besieging her.
His expression darkened even further.
"Kirei... you really did betray me," Tokiomi said calmly, though his magical energy surged uncontrollably in tandem with his fury.
He glanced at Kirei's critically injured, dying body, then shifted his gaze to Irisviel.
The magical fluctuations of the Lesser Grail were already surging like a tempest. Her chest glowed faintly, as if it would burst from her body at any moment.
The situation was far more troublesome than he had imagined.
Upon seeing Tokiomi, the remaining Assassin clones immediately treated him as a deadly threat.
One of them shrieked like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, "Tokiomi Tohsaka! Why are you here?!"
Another voice chimed in with incredulous confusion, "That's impossible! He should be supporting that mutated Archer right now!"
Tokiomi did not answer these pointless questions, unwilling to waste his breath on idle chatter.
He coldly raised his wand, his Magic Circuits activating in an instant.
The ruby at the tip of his wand trembled slightly as the magical crystals within began to resonate...
Immediately after, he retrieved three small rubies from the inner pocket of his suit. They had been meticulously engraved, their surfaces covered in microscopic magical runes.
This was the Jewel Magecraft passed down through the Tohsaka family.
By using gemstones as mediums to store and amplify spells, the resulting effects far surpassed ordinary magecraft.
With a gentle flick of his wrist, he tossed the gems into the air and began to softly chant his incantation:
"Flames, become my form and my shackles..."
As the incantation left his lips, his Magic Circuits lit up with a faint red glow, extending all the way from his fingertips to the gemstones.
The three rubies hovered in the air, rotating into a triangular formation.
The magical structure within the wand's ruby began to oscillate. Magical energy refracted and amplified inside it, rapidly forming a miniature network of Magic Circuits.
"Don't let him cast his spell! Attack now!"
Although the Assassin clones had suffered a decline in strength due to the nature of Hundred Personas, their minds were still sharp.
Knowing full well the terrifying power of the Tohsaka family's Jewel Magecraft, they didn't wait around to be killed. They immediately lunged at Tokiomi like phantoms.
Two circled to the flanks in an attempt to pincer him, one charged straight for his face, and the last one aimed for Rin Tohsaka behind him, intending to take the girl hostage.
Faced with the Assassins' siege, Tokiomi remained completely unfazed. His expression didn't change in the slightest, as if he were merely looking at a few corpses.
"Bestow upon my enemies a harsh cremation!"
The judgment was passed.
Volleys of magical bullets wreathed in flames shot forth, striking the closest Assassin directly.
The clone tried to dodge, but Tokiomi's attack was flawlessly precise. The magical bullets trailed long tails of fire, homing in and curving to relentlessly hound the Assassin.
"Damn it—!!"
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Three consecutive, muffled explosions overlapped almost perfectly!
Black smoke billowed as the clone dissolved into particles of magical energy.
"Attack! Attack together!" Witnessing their comrade being instantly obliterated, the remaining three clones roared and accelerated their approach.
'Fools.'
His right hand, holding the wand, remained perfectly still as he maintained the magical output.
His left hand swept outward with the elegance of an orchestra conductor!
Whoosh—!
A semi-transparent, orange-red barrier forged of flames materialized out of thin air, encircling Tokiomi's flanks and rear.
Not only did this wall of fire block the flanking attacks, but the churning, high-temperature flames directly scorched the opponents attempting to pincer him.
"Ah—Ah!!!"
The two flanking clones completely failed to anticipate this near-instantaneous defensive spell. Unable to halt their momentum, they crashed headfirst into the searing wall of fire!
Meanwhile, the Servant who had tried to sneak attack Rin was directly swallowed by the flames as the wall of fire abruptly rose behind Tokiomi...
In just a single exchange, the remaining Assassins were simultaneously engulfed by the flames, their bodies disintegrating and fading away.