Every Successful Man Has Someone Behind Him...

If anyone had been most affected by those words, it had to be the silent Saber. She turned her gaze aside—those were the very words Kiritsugu Emiya had used when arguing with him.

"It suits you well, Shirou Emiya."

"So, how about making it your epitaph?"

Rimuru wore a wanton smile as he turned into an afterimage. The next moment, he appeared at Shirou Emiya's side, mercilessly materializing Gan Jiang and Mo Ye before bringing them down.

Trace On!

In the next instant, a trace of magical energy blossomed around Shirou Emiya's arms. With a bang, he summoned identical twin blades and knocked the attack away. Even so, numbness and searing pain shot through his arms.

The gap in strength... was enormous!

Yet Rimuru casually used the momentum to rotate his blades. In an instant, the rebounding force vanished, transforming instead into a reverse-handed backstab that thrust straight at him.

Damn it! My arms... I can't react in time...

Watching the silver blade descend while his arms remained numb, Shirou Emiya could only rely on his bodily agility. He flashed aside and twisted away.

"Oh?" Rimuru let out a quiet sound of surprise.

Clearly, the other side had undergone emergency training with him as a hypothetical opponent.

But unfortunately.

Rimuru narrowed his eyes. The next moment, the entire world seemed to freeze before him. Great Sage had already gathered the opponent's various attributes, displaying them across his retinas.

As blurry afterimages accompanied Thought Acceleration, rapidly simulating the opponent's next move in an instant, Rimuru moved at a speed the other party could not possibly react to and arrived behind Kiritsugu Emiya.

"!!" Shirou Emiya's pupils instantly widened. Agonizing pain flooded his senses. With a wet slash, blood sprayed from his shoulder as Rimuru's blade carved down from it, leaving a