Act 4, Scene 14
Hieda-no-Are
"...He's stepped in it now. How irritating," I mutter even as Wallachia's mocking narration is scrawled into the space where only my records, or the eye of some distant observer, can see.
That man is still dead, of course. I won't allow some pre-written scrap left behind in his discarded script to conjure him back to life. The reason this narration can still be heard is simple - it was the end he has been aiming for all this time. I'm sure that he wrote that little soliloquy of his before he even invaded Chaldea, and now that the event has taken place, his monologue has been delivered, for the sake of his imagined audience.
It's irritating that I'm forced to listen to it, though.
…What now? As I observe the clash between Shaula and the shadow servants of Fujimaru Ritsuka, I contemplate my course of action. The rumor that has been born is an irritating one, but not an immediate threat. The 'ability to control Return by Death' is the rumor that has been created. Doubtless, Wallachia intended to seize that control for himself, but he's no longer here. But then, it's not as though I can seize it for myself. I may possess the ability to interface with the TATARI, but that interface consists primarily of a metaphorical hammer. I can smash the things conjured forth, but only by denying them in the face of their conjurer. In other words, I placed too much trust in Natsuki Subaru. I ought to have left the communicator with him, if the result was going to be this.
Still, the fact remains - there is no one who can seize the 'ability to control Return by Death', no person who could claim that authority and hold the rumor's leash. At least, not from the Natsuki Subaru of Chaldea.
In other words, the threat at present is-
***
"Natsuki Subaru"
With a final wallop, we're launched out of the trial room again. Going downstairs really is just not happening, huh!? Who even is that shield girl, and why does it seem like she can predict Sion's every move!?
…Naturally, I'm totally useless in a fight. Even though Sion jammed an entire Egyptian god into my spirit origin, I still couldn't become Natsuki Subaru. Shaula, get up here and save me already!
"I have it," My master says as she rises to her feet.
"You'll have to connect your [Etherlite] to me again if you want me to understand what you mean," I reply. "It broke during the fight." I can't read her mind without that Mystic Code of hers - she's totally inscrutable to me otherwise.
I could read her book, I guess.
A near-invisible filament embeds itself in my head, and information crosses between us in milliseconds. Ah, this is really good news, actually. TATARI was unable to recreate Return by Death up until now, but with this rumor-
"It becomes possible! In other words, we finally have enough time!" Sion strikes her typical teaching pose, with one finger raised. There's not really any reason to repeat the information out loud after beaming it into my head, but she still does it sometimes. A habit from when this inhumane tool of hers was sealed, I guess.
"Yeah, that's a real relief. A fake like me fusing with Natsuki Subaru was a long shot to start with," I reply. "If we're able to acquire Return by Death by other means, then there's no reason to rush downstairs. Well, unless Subaru can still go back and erase all of our progress…"
"I cannot directly control his point of return," Sion withdraws a glowing crimson fruit from her skirt pocket, focusing her eyes upon it. "It is only thanks to my rights as your Master that I'll be able to control yours once you have received it."
"Wait, I figured that fruit was important considering the price, but what's it got to do with Return by Death?" I ask as it begins to pulse in her grip. Bump-bump. Bump-bump. Bump-bump.
"Crystalized power, stored in the body, which turns the bearer into a singularity that is impossible for the Planet to deny. It gives rise to bizarre abilities that seem to violate every rule of the world, magical and non-magical," Sion says, but I'm still not following. "In short, the Rumor here is - Witch Factors and Idea Blood are quite similar at the end of the day, are they not?"
I don't really get it, but… "Well, if you say so, then it must be true." A fake like me doesn't really have any place to be asking questions.
"Fake or not, you are the Servant that I summoned, so if you have questions I will answer them," Sion gives a polite smile, but I don't even know where to begin so I'll just leave it alone. I'll just figure it out somewhere down the line after I've read enough books. "That is the appropriate spirit!"
I hold out a hand, and the gently pulsing fruit is placed into it - but Sion pauses for a moment. "Are you sure, Subaru? This 'Fruit of Knowledge' -once you eat it, there's no going back."
I twitch a little bit as she calls me by his name, for the very first time since I was born in this place. "If you're going to make biblical analogies you can just call me Adam or something…" I'll be eating this fruit no matter what, after all.
"Oh my, was that a proposal? That was not entirely what I had in mind when I asked you to secure the future of humanity with me!" Sion laughs, and all the tension vanishes completely. Jeez, this girl…
"Well, Natsuki Subaru was calling me-" I start to say, even though I know how she responded before.
"No. I do not think that name suits you in the slightest," Sion answers. It really is unbelievable how she treats someone like me. One day I'll have to check her book and get to the bottom of it, but it'll have to wait for now.
And so, with a roll of my eyes, I walk back to the library, leaving her here. It's not like she can loop with me, anyway. I bite into the fruit as the doors begin to close behind me, and feel the warm blood trickle down my throat. My eyes scan this way and that, tracing the spines of books without number, my companions and prey for the next millenium.
"But if you're so displeased, then I will call you by your other component - oh Khonsu, who lives on hearts," come my Master's soft-spoken words as the door closes behind me.
***
As she watches him disappear, Sion Eltnam Sokaris considers her first meeting with her Servant - or rather, with the person he was modeled after.
She had failed. Along with every other member of the Atlas institute, she had utterly failed to predict the Incineration of Humanity, and Sion had failed even to die - from her perspective in any case. The emergence of the TATARI, the generation of the rumor that became Wallachia, and the subsequent interference with reality and bargain with Tezcatlipoca that led to her restoration from the state of incineration - were elements that Sion would not become aware of until much later.
Regardless, it was Sion's perspective that she had failed, and failed so utterly that nothing could possibly restore things to the way they ought to be. Perhaps that was why, when in an act of pure desperation, she called for a Servant… what she received was a failure.
"Ah, I'm really sorry. You got an absolute one-star pull, a worthless guy who couldn't patch together Natsuki Subaru no matter how hard he tried, and in the end just ruined everything. Assassin class, but really it should just be [Murderer]..." The boy trailed off just moments after his summoning, and slowly faded from existence.
She tried all manner of things to get him to reappear, from the use of command spells to food-based bribes. But in the end, his reappearance seemed to be based on nothing at all.
"Sorry, it's because I'm such a worthless bastard. It seems like it's gotten so bad that my own self-hatred is denying my existence - and it's replaced my [Presence Concealment] skill. Like I said, you got suuuuper unlucky."
He remained for a longer period this time - and as he phased in and out of existence for the next month, Sion spent every possible moment she could in his company. Such was the natural result of the loneliness that arose from being the last living human in the Titan's tomb.
Eventually, given enough prying, and with nothing else to converse on, the discussion eventually landed on the Pleiades watchtower, and the library of Taygeta.
"That is truly amazing!" Sion proclaimed when she learned of it. "With that manner of library, my plan could become possible! The survival of humanity in the form of information - it may not be a perfect solution, but it would save us from this current situation!"
The utter revulsion and urge to vomit upon the face of Assassin at this suggestion went unseen as he faded from existence in a spiral of self-loathing.
Sion Eltnam Sokaris hatched a plan, unaware of her servant's disapproval - she would merge Khonsu, the Traveller, with Assassin's spirit origin, and by the power of the Egyptian god at least visit the Library in dreams. When TATARI's attack on Chaldea, and the creation of the Tokyo Pseudo-Singularity occurred a few days later, she made a most natural mistake - conjuring a rumor of her Assassin, and then merging the spiritron data from Khonsu into his body without first confirming the situation.
As for the Assassin she summoned in Atlas, he has disappeared. My records can no longer detect him. Either he succeeded in self-destruction, or he has sunk into that same unobservable pit of delusion Natsuki Subaru witnessed in Fujimaru Ritsuka's dream.
Nonetheless, Algol, the demon star, is indeed her Servant, and in many ways surpasses the original Assassin, and so she ought to have no complaints. Even as she leaves all of the remaining books to him, across an unknown number of loops, Sion has faith in the figment that she created. This faith is, naturally, entirely misplaced.
Before even his hundredth loop concludes, Algol is consumed by a book that ought not to have been read. He is hungry, the absolute model of Gluttony - but the book of Ley Batenkaitos is hungrier.
So hungry, in fact, that he continues to read, book after book, until-
Ley Batenkaitos loses his existence to Roy Alphard.
Roy loses his existence to Michael Roa Valdmjong, but by this point things are too far gone. Before Roa is aware, the body picks up another book, and he too vanishes. Again and again, book after book, as a delusional body with a broken mind makes excuse after excuse. Henry VIII cannot help but reach for another meal. Ozymandias, King of Kings, entertains a passing amusement.
-There is a type of poison, first born in the misty depths of China's ancient past. No, calling it a poison is too simple - it is a form of black magic. There are darker sorts, but without a doubt, the [Gu Jar] had its birth in wickedness.
The methodology is deceptively simple - seal as many venomous creatures as can fit within a closed container, and then wait. Wait for them to grow hungry, wait for them to starve, wait for them to begin to kill and eat. Wait, until at last only one remains. The most vile, accursed, poisonous creature of all emerges.
There is, of course, a flaw in this methodology - what emerges from a Gu Jar is not guaranteed to be the most venomous creature.
What emerges will be the hungriest. The toad that could not satisfy itself with the flesh of swans, and lusted after the flesh of gods. And when the jar is opened, what he seeks is not freedom, or understanding, but only-
"Sion, there's a book missing," he says, poking his head out of the library again. "Saijyou Manaka - can you use that mirror to call up Tezcatlipoca and ask if she stole it?"
-to devour the world itself.