"At least fix the wall first!" I yell after her, but she has already completely disappeared into the night, leaving behind nothing but scattered debris and a huge cloud of dust from the destroyed wall.
She really just comes all the way here to blast a massive hole in the room and demand I entertain her before instantly leaving the second I tell her I am too tired.
"Stupid King of Heroes, stupid golden woman, stupid Archer," I grumble angrily under my breath while standing up from the comfortable bed and walking over to the gaping hole.
Thankfully I actually know a spell that lets me fix broken things since it is one of the very basic spells I made sure to learn early on because being able to repair stuff is just really useful in everyday life.
I can use Alteration magecraft to fuse the debris and the dust right back into the wall, which normally is harder to work if the pieces are completely gone, but since everything is still scattered right here on the floor it is not gonna cost me much Od to pull off.
Kneeling down and pressing my bare palm firmly against the cold ground, I focus my mind and softly whisper, "Set," immediately targeting the objects I want to manipulate by fixing my magical focus on all the broken chunks and dust scattered around my knees.
"Alter," I chant next, feeling my Magic Circuits instantly activate deep within my body as bright green lines physically appear across my skin, tracing all the way from my shoulders down my arms before the warm glow pushes right through my palms and into the debris I set earlier.
The scattered rocks and dust instantly catch that green glow and begin actively melting down, flowing and combining with each other on the floor to create a thick and heavy mud.
Now I just need to 'connect' all of this heavy material right back to the jagged edges of the hole and then 'alter' its structure one more time to harden it back into a completely solid wall.
"Hmm~ hmm~" I casually hum a little tune while I am busy trying to put the wall back together, but suddenly my instincts just completely go haywire like something really terrible is gonna happen.
"[Dodge, Rikka!]" a completely familiar voice suddenly yells out right inside my own head.
But honestly suddenly hearing someone randomly yell at you to dodge is way more of a distraction than an actual help, so my body just completely freezes up and I do not have nearly enough time to move away.
Right as I freeze a sudden blur of pitch-black shadow shifts violently in the very corner of my vision while a slender but incredibly dangerous-looking hand wrapped in dark cloth shoots out from the blind spot directly behind my back.
The movement is terrifyingly fast as I feel the chilling air press against my skin while those distinctly feminine fingers reach out to violently cover my mouth and muffle my screams.
But right before that hand can actually clamp down over my lips my entire vision suddenly violently darkens, and the entire world instantly fades to pitch black as my main mind completely loses consciousness.
---
---
---
The exact moment Denial takes complete control, Rikka's main consciousness slips safely back into their shared inner world while Denial instantly projects a sharp knife right into her hand and violently swings it toward the shadowy fingers trying to grab her face.
But the intruder somehow manages to narrowly dodge the deadly strike by quickly leaping backward into the shadows, prompting Denial to immediately spin around and aggressively rush straight toward the enemy after instantly reinforcing her entire physical body with Od.
She fiercely charges at the cloaked woman with incredible speed, and even though she is currently stuck using a tiny eight-year-old body her movements are terrifyingly explosive and precise thanks to the heavy reinforcement magecraft running perfectly through her magical circuits.
The very second she closes the distance she swings her projected knife in a brutal horizontal slice from right to left, but the nimble woman still manages to perfectly dodge the blade again by jumping fluidly forward and gracefully evading the attack.
The masked woman lands completely silently right on top of the heavy mud that Rikka was just using to try and fix the broken wall.
"You are no normal child, I certainly did not expect a little girl like you to have such high proficiency in combat magecraft," the cloaked woman notes in a smooth and calculating voice while intensely analyzing her tiny opponent.
"Hahh, and I was almost at the best part too," Denial sighs heavily with pure aristocratic annoyance because right before being forced to take control she was so incredibly close to finishing the novel where the male protagonist finally gets expelled and all his former party members start desperately regretting their choices.
"Let me guess, you're the Assassin class, aren't you?" she asks with a confident smirk.
Of course the masked woman is not gonna answer her, as her absolute priority is strictly completing the task her master Kirei Kotomine, gave her and that's take the girl that somehow managed to make the King of Heroes interested.
"Playing the cold and silent type? fine by me," Denial scoffs, casually brushing her hair aside. "That just means I can wrap up this little dance of ours even faster and get back to my reading."
Her eyes glow with a mesmerizing spectral rainbow shift, primarily flickering between a deep icy blue and a striking pinkish-red, as her Mystic Eyes of Death Perception fully activate.
The moment those shifting rainbow-colored eyes locked onto her, the masked Assassin felt a genuine chill crawl up her spine.
It was an impossible sensation for a Servant to feel against a human child, but staring into those deep irises felt exactly like looking directly at her own inevitable end.
Those eyes were not just looking at her physical body but staring straight through to her absolute death.
She immediately knew facing this anomaly head-on was a terrible idea.
As an Assassin-class Servant her physical strength and magical parameters were naturally low to begin with.
But right now her combat ability was practically nonexistent because her persona was already split into eighty different personas to prepare for the massive ambush at the banquet between Saber, Archer, and Rider.
With her overall power so severely reduced, her only real advantages left in this fight were her sheer speed and her Presence Concealment.
So instead of rushing forward into a direct clash, her hand snapped up in a sudden blur.
She violently hurled one of her black throwing dirks straight toward the ceiling.
A sharp crash of shattering glass loudly echoed through the wide Einzbern bedroom as the blade perfectly destroyed the main light fixture, instantly plunging the entire room into heavy darkness.
The only illumination left was the pale silver moonlight spilling in through the hole in the destroyed wall directly behind the cloaked Servant.
But plunging the room into darkness did not give the Assassin the advantage she wanted.
In the pitch-black shadows of the bedroom those shifting blue and red irises just floated there, glowing faintly on their own in the absolute dark.
It looked like a terrifying apex predator silently waiting in the abyss, making the tiny eight-year-old girl look incredibly menacing.
"Darkness, I see. Seems like you think you can use the shadows to fight me? Heh, don't underestimate me," Denial says, forming a smug expression and dramatically pointing straight at the masked woman.
Binge-reading way too many trashy web novels and manhwa from Rikka's memory is clearly starting to corrupt her personality, and now her chuunibyou tendencies are fully acting up.
"Now let me show you the true power of my eyes!" Denial declares grandly, channeling more of her internal Od straight into her Mystic Eyes of Death Perception until the shifting colors violently flare in the absolute dark.
Bending low to the ground she fiercely rushes forward toward the Assassin once again.
But this time the cloaked Servant does not just jump out of the way she decided to throwing a black dirk straight at her instead.
And it is not just one or two blades.
It is an absolute barrage of throwing knives flying so fast that even Denial cannot count them all in the heat of the moment.
Forced to abruptly stop her charge, a loud metallic clank rings out as she perfectly deflects the first incoming blade with her own projected knife.
The sharp sound of clashing steel keeps rapidly repeating across the dark room as Denial furiously swats and deflects every single knife flying her way.
But absorbing all those heavy impacts causes her projected weapon to start visibly cracking.
Her projection is completely hollow inside, and the only reason it is even sturdy enough to handle Servant attacks compared to a normal magus projection is the sheer raw power flowing from her EX-quality Magic Circuits.
Using that tiny opening the Assassin bursts to the left at blinding speed.
She keeps relentlessly throwing more daggers as she runs in a wide circle around the pitch-black room, strictly aiming her rapid attacks only at the legs of Rikka's small body.
Realizing the attacks are now coming from every single direction in the dark, Denial aggressively clicks her tongue. "Tch, this tiny body is really holding me back!"
With one final desperate deflection her projected knife completely snaps in half with a loud crack.
Denial immediately lets go of the useless handle and drops into a deep crouch not even a split second later.
"Rise, Formless Earth-Erupt and Enclose!"
Using the lingering Od Rikka previously left inside the heavy mud she instantly commands them.
Instead of trying to fix the broken wall the massive clump of mud moves instantaneously to surround her.
The thick mud swiftly rises and creates a sturdy defensive barrier wrapping around her back and sides, leaving only the very front open.
Heavy thuds echo loudly in the dark as the barrage of throwing knives stabs deep into the hardened mud, perfectly protecting her small body from the Assassin's relentless assault.
Seeing the target she was supposed to kidnap suddenly surround herself in a thick mud wall, the Assassin decides she has gathered enough information.
Even though she is a Servant, continuing to fight is a terrible idea since she is already severely weakened from using her Noble Phantasm to split into eighty different personas.
Taking this chance to escape she quickly sprints toward the giant hole in the wall, fully intending to jump away into the night and report back to her master Kirei.
But the exact moment her feet reach the edge of the hole and all she needs to do is jump, a calm voice suddenly echoes right behind her.
"Alter."
Her movement instantly stops dead as something tightly grabs both of her legs.
"What!?" Looking down in shock she sees that heavy mud is suddenly holding her legs, trapping her tightly all the way up to her knees and completely halting her escape.
"Did you really think I just didn't have enough mud to protect my front?" Denial's voice calls out from the dark shadows of her mud wall, making the Assassin quickly turn her head back toward her.
"Unfortunately for you, everything is going exactly according to my plan!" Denial declares with a smug smirk, looking up as she dramatically stands up from her crouching position.
She then glances down at the broken knife handle she threw away earlier.
It is already slowly disappearing into glowing blue particles since she completely stopped supplying it with her Od.
Projecting another knife would be incredibly easy for her, but the real problem is that using a short blade against a Servant like an Assassin is a terrible idea.
She will just get overwhelmed again because the reach of a knife is way too short.
It is exactly like the very first time Denial appeared to fight Manaka.
Her knife was too short to reach the killing blow, so she only managed to wound her.
If her weapon had just been longer she definitely could have killed Manaka the first time they met.
But now that is completely impossible because Rikka already views Manaka as a very close friend, so this body will naturally resist and refuse to move properly to attack her anyway.
So Denial finally decides it is time to completely change her weapon of choice against the Assassin.
[SYSTEM - APERTURE OPEN. AKASHA DISCOVERY COMMENCING.]
A cold mechanical voice echoes clearly inside her mind as Denial uses her direct connection to the Root.
[QUERY REGISTRATION - 'KATANA']
[FILTERING RESULTS… ACCESSING HISTORICAL BLUEPRINTS.]
Everything happens in just a split second because the information she pulls from the Root is impossibly fast.
[DATA RETRIEVED. OVERWRITING LOCAL REALITY.]
[MATERIALIZE: KUSANAGI NO TSURUGI!]
But right before the blade can form, her head suddenly feels like it is being violently crushed.
A massive throbbing pain strikes her skull, and she instantly realizes that if she continues the projection her tiny brain is literally going to explode.
[ERROR!! DIVINE CONSTRUCT DETECTED. PROJECTION IMPOSSIBLE WITH CURRENT BODY! CIRCUIT MELTDOWN IMMINENT!]
[SEARCHING ALTERNATIVE… REPLICA FOUND!]
[USING REPLICA — MATERIALIZE - KUSANAGI NO TSURUGI: KATASHIRO!]
[DOWN-SCALING MEMORY ASSET TO MATCH SPECIFIED USER MASS.]
[PROJECTION - START.]
Her entire network of Magic Circuits begins to violently glow beneath her skin as she slowly raises her right arm and the intense projection finally starts.
The heavy air inside the Einzbern bedroom violently shatters.
A terrifying storm of raw magical energy erupts from Denial's raised right hand.
Even though the Akasha forcefully downscaled it to a Katashiro a mere replica fitted for her tiny body the blueprint she pulled directly from the Root still belongs to a Divine Construct.
It is the mythical blade born straight from the severed tail of the great calamity god and eight-headed dragon, Yamata-no-Orochi.
As the physical form of the blade begins to synthesize, a suffocating, almost draconic pressure fills the dark room.
It feels exactly as if a massive, unseen serpent is physically crushing the atmospheric Mana around them.
Black and silver winds violently swirl around Denial's small arm.
Crackle! Spark!
Violent arcs of overcharged Od flash like lightning across the pitch-black bedroom as a pristine, divine double-edged longsword fully materializes in her grasp.
The sheer weight of the sword's existence causes the very walls and floor of the Einzbern castle to visibly vibrate, making the trapped Assassin stare in absolute, frozen horror.
Meanwhile down in the castle's central courtyard, the Banquet of Kings is peacefully underway.
Rider sits proudly in the center heartily laughing as he holds a wooden dipper of wine.
Saber sits formally across from her with a stoic expression, while Gilgamesh leans back with her usual absolute arrogance, casually swirling the glowing red wine inside her priceless golden goblet.
"Now then, let us continue to discuss what makes a true kin—" Rider starts to say, but his booming voice instantly cuts off.
A massive, unnatural ripple violently distorts the Mana around them.
It is so heavy and suffocating that the night wind itself seems to completely stop flowing.
This is not the normal Prana of a regular Servant.
It is unmistakable the signature of a Divine Construct violently forcing its way into the world.
All three Heroic Spirits instantly freeze in place.
The wine in Gilgamesh's goblet completely stops swirling.
Without saying a single word to each other, Saber, Rider, and Gilgamesh simultaneously turn their heads.
Their sharp, serious eyes completely lock onto the exact same direction.
The Magical Energy lines snapped together, and the weapon completely solidified inside the dark mud dome.
She reached out, her small fingers wrapping tightly around the hilt with her right hand.
The moment her skin made contact with the pristine white ritual cords of the grip, a heavy, rhythmic pulse of compressed shadows erupted from the steel, sending a chilling shockwave through her arms.
The weapon she held was a flawless, downscaled replica of the Chokutō a type of sword created long before the curved katana was ever invented.
It was perfectly straight, featuring a dual-edged blade that tapered into a brutal, triangular point.
The metal itself was forged from a dark, mirror-polished steel that seemed to actively reject the moonlight, possessing a deep blue-black hue like volcanic obsidian.
Running down both razor-sharp edges was a faint, wavy grain pattern that resembled a crawling serpent.
There was no cross-hatched cloth wrapping or modern guard instead a simplified bronze casting of a swirling storm cloud sat just above the hilt, and a single, uncut magatama bead dangled from the pommel.
The blade did not shine instead it drank the light, bleeding a faint, warping heat-shimmer of pure darkness that made the air inside the cocoon drop to a freezing temperature.
"Heh... Rejoice, You have the supreme honor of being the absolute first to be devoured by the calamity dragon slumbering within my right hand."