Gilgamesh's eyes constricted to pinholes. His arm flew through air, a fountain of blood trailing in its wake, Merodach still clutched in its grip.
Artoria and I rolled to a desperate halt hundreds of meters behind him, parting soil, debris and felled trees, carving a trench from Gilgamesh to our position.
Blonde hair fell on my face. Artoria lay on top of me, her braid having come undone at some point in time.
Gilgamesh remained still with his back turned to us, his head tilted sideways at his stump, blood dripping down it in a ceaseless deluge.
Artoria got up from above me and stood. I rose to my feet beside her, our shoulders nearly touching with each other.
Sul-Sagana in the sky started to dissolve into flakes first, its heat fading with each breath. All other leftover Gates in our surroundings started to seal themselves shut in succession.
The night, which had been illuminated by those Gates, once again returned to dark.
Gilgamesh finally turned toward us. Two gashes ran across his abdomen. Luminescent red blood spread across his chest from a laceration on his collarbone. His right arm was just a stump now, a severed bone protruding from it.
He didn't laugh or sneer. The golden king stood with his own blood splattered across him, completely motionless. All amusement had drained from his face, leaving behind only a cold, absolute focus. Those red eyes locked onto us, and for the first time, he wasn't looking down.
"Mongrels...no, King of Knights and Izuru Kamukura. You have brought this mighty king to such a state."
His intact hand twitched as particles of gold started to coalesce beside him.
"You should be proud."
A golden portal slowly opened beside him. He plunged his hand inside.
"Both of you have earned the right to face my strongest treasure. Come!"
He pulled.
A weapon emerged from within like a black dawn breaking through—gold giving way to something older, something that existed before light had a name.
It was a cylindrical construct, composed of three rotating fragments, each etched with writings that made no logical sense. Writings that no living language could trace back to. It didn't look like a weapon. It looked like a pillar existing to hold the sky apart from earth.
Even with every Ultimate talent, I couldn't identify it. Trying to comprehend it felt like staring into a gap between stars—there was nothing there for my mind to understand.
"Behold."
His voice carried across the ruined forest without rising in volume. Air itself seemed to quiet, to make room for his words.
"The Star of Creation that Split Heaven and Earth."
Its segments rotated.
Nothing happened.
One second. Two.
Everything was silent. Like the world had forgotten how to make sound.
Then—
A spiralling pillar of crimson black ruptured a hole through the skyline of Fuyuki. Clouds above disintegrated, space seemed to unmake itself, fissures running across the sky like a fragile cloth tearing under tremendous pressure. Tremors raced across all of Fuyuki like a localised earthquake.
For a moment, I just stood there, looking at that pillar.
Then whispers came.
"Not enough data. No trajectory to calculate. No angle to exploit. It doesn't follow any model I can build. For the first time—We see nothing."
Analyst. Uncertain.
"847 to 1 was generous. This is infinity to zero. No gap exists. No combination of variables produces a winning outcome. Our bet was already lost before it was placed."
Gambler. Flat.
"There is no seam. No edge where a single cut could unmake it. It isn't a weapon to be cut. It's... an end."
Swordswoman. Still.
"Luck requires probability. Even one in a billion is something. This is null. The universe doesn't bend here. It already broke."
Luck. Hushed.
All of them. Every talent. Every voice that had carried me till here—
Silent.
Then—one more.
"Even despair cannot find a way against something that existed before it."
Despair. My own voice.
All of them agreed.
Winning was impossible.
Then flashes of future came.
Flash—
Archer's Unlimited Blade Works. A barren desert of swords under grey sky. Medusa inside it, five ribs broken, blood in her eye, turning shield after shield to stone.
Flash—
Medea above her, circles detonating in violet cascades, beams screaming into Noble Phantasms, casting and casting without pause, her magic holding the entire weight of that domain's offensive at bay.
Both alive. Barely.
If I died here, that balance would shatter in seconds.
"Master."
Artoria's voice snapped me out of it.
She looked at me, and her eyes were firm.
"Allow me... to unleash Excalibur, one final time."
Her grip tightened around her sword, ready to unleash her Noble Phantasm without holding anything back.
A glance ahead revealed that even with all of my mana, Excalibur still wouldn't last against something that tore through space-time.
"Not yet."
I spoke.
Her eyes widened, mouth opening to protest. I spoke first.
"Prepare yourself."
She did not comprehend my words.
She would, soon.
I took a step forward.
"Master!"
Artoria's hand grabbed my shoulder. Her fingers dug into my coat, her breathing ragged. She was trying to pull me back, her boots digging down.
Her grip slipped. Another tremor erupted from that weapon's rotation—a shockwave that hurled her back. She screamed, her voice thinning with distance.
I kept walking.
A chain wrapped around my ankle. Burning.
Analyst. "You'll die. Calculation complete. Stop."
I pulled my foot forward. The chain cracked, splintered, fell away.
Another step.
Two chains lashed around my calf—coiling tight, pulling me back.
Martial Artist."Your body cannot survive this. Stop."
Swordswoman."There is nothing to cut. Stop."
I dragged my leg. Both chains snapped like threads.
Another step.
Three more chains. My waist. My chest. Pulling in opposite directions.
Gambler."Zero probability. Our bet is lost. Stop."
Photographer."No frame survives. Stop."
Inventor."No solution. Stop."
I continued on. Chains groaned, stretched, broke. One by one. Each snap sending tremors up my spine.
Another step.
A chain wrapped around my throat. Squeezing.
Luck. "The universe doesn't bend. It already broke. Stop."
I breathed in despite it. Walked despite it. The chain shattered against my neck.
One more step.
A final chain. Around my heart. Tighter than all others combined.
Despair.
"Even I cannot find a way. Stop."
I looked at the weapon. Its segments still rotating. That crimson-black pillar splitting the sky apart.
I pressed a hand against my chest.
That chain held.
My step faltered. Just half a second. My foot hovering above soil, suspended between forward and still.
The chain tightened. My heartbeat stuttered—skipped—slowed.
Despair."You know how this ends. You've seen it. Every path. Every angle. Why walk toward it?"
My fingers curled against my chest. Nails digging into skin through fabric.
Because—
A breath.
—walking away now would be boring.
I pushed.
The chain creaked. Cracks spread across its length—hairline fractures.
My foot touched ground. Weight shifted forward.
Those cracks widened.
The chain started shattering from inside.
"ENUMA ELISH!!"
A pillar of crimson and black dropped toward me, leaving a trailing void in its wake where reality should be.
I didn't close my eyes.
But—
My surroundings started to flake away, peeling off in chips and shards. The ruined forest, the torn soil, the crimson-black pillar itself, all dissolving like paint scraped from a canvas.
Fuyuki unmade itself in layers. Trees first. Then sky. Then the distant Ryuudou Temple. Each flake drifting upward, silent and weightless, revealing something underneath.
Concrete.
A fountain.
Hope's Peak Academy.
I stood just beside a bench.
Someone sat on it.
Short, brown and spiky hair. Leaf green eyes. A reserve student uniform, tie loose. An energy bar in his hand, half-eaten, looking straight ahead at nothing in particular, waiting for someone.
He turned to me.
"Hey."
Just that. Casual. Like we were the best of friends.
I sighed and walked over, lowering myself beside him.
He took another bite of his protein bar and spoke.
"You've been walking for a while, huh."
I looked down at my hands. They were still bloodied. Whose blood was it? Mine? Gilgamesh? I did not know.
He leaned back against the bench, arms spreading across its top.
"So. Walking toward something that kills you. Every talent screaming to stop. Every calculation saying zero." A breath. "Sounds about right for us."
"...Us."
"You. Me. Whatever." He gestured vaguely. "The guy who sat on this bench wondering if he was ever going to be worth something. The same guy they cut open and filled with everything until there was nothing left."
I looked at him.
He looked back.
And then—I saw it. An identical face. My face.
"I'm not you." I said.
"No." He agreed. "You're not. You're everything I wasn't. Talented. Capable. Certain."
A pause. "But you're also everything I was."
"Which is?"
"Stubborn." His face flashed with a small, tired smile. "Too stubborn to stop walking. Even when it's stupid, especially when it's stupid."
He finished his protein bar with one last bite and crumpled the wrapper. Tossed it toward a trash can without looking—missed. Didn't bother picking it up.
"Say, Izuru. Did you find it? Your hope?" He asked curiously.
I gazed ahead at Hope's Peak and let silence linger.
"I hunted for it. Asked many heroes from legends about it. Fought to find it. Even tried to comprehend it with logic."
A low chuckle escaped me. My first.
"I searched everywhere."
Green spread through my left eye.
"I did not need to."
He smiled.
"From the very beginning. I had my answer."
I looked back into his eyes, saw myself reflected within.
"There is no 'my' hope. Because I am hope."
His smile widened.
"Now, that's not despair talking. That's us."
Silence fell between us once again.
I rose from the bench.
"I guess this is it. Our last meeting. It'll be all you from here on out." He said, gaze rueful.
I turned back to him.
That same ordinary face. Ordinary eyes. The kind that had no talent behind them, no ultimate skill, no probability manipulation, nothing.
Just a guy on a bench.
I opened my mouth.
"No."
His eyes widened.
"I still need your help. One last time, Hajime."
I offered him my hand.
"You will help yourself, right?"
He looked between me and my offered hand.
His own hand came up wordlessly, clasping into mine.
"Sure."
Hajime rose from the bench.
His left eye turned crimson like mine. My left eye was green like his.
He was me. I was him.
He smirked, that ordinary face looking less ordinary by the second.
"Let's go show them what Ultimate Hope really looks like."
...
..
.
***
[200 Power Stones = 1 Bonus Chapter]
[5 chapters ahead on P@tr3on = [email protected]/Not_Aaryan]
...
[Authors Thoughts]
Let's gooo!
Hajime is about to make his first entrance in Fate. That too with Izuru!? Nah man Nah.
I'm the author and I'm hyped myself!!
I just couldn't help it... how can I not give my boy Hajime at least one moment to shine in my story!
...
Ps: Wondering why Medea and Medusa are still being supressed by Archer? Bro is working under Rin's Mana, alongside extra mana from a Command Seal, didn't want to explain in the middle and break the rhythm.
And the reason for Excalibur losing against Ea even with 360 magic circuits at A-rank is simple. Ea works on a higher conceptual authority than Excalibur, When Ea moves, it tears through space-time and reveals abyssal nothingness or primordial truth, while Excalibur is basically highly compressed light, so no matter how much, even an ocean of light cannot fill something bottomless like nothingness.