Walking along the road, Kiritsugu Emiya thought back on the Holy Grail War, which had felt almost like a game, and found it all rather dreamlike.
Now that the Holy Grail was nearly in hand, a flash of insight struck Kiritsugu Emiya's mind—but he failed to grasp it.
Did something go wrong?
Me, Saber, Kariya Matou, Berserker—we were all here.
The contracts were fine too.
Was it Saber?
"Where's Irisviel?!"
Fu Yuan sensed Kiritsugu's state of mind and was left somewhat dumbfounded. Looking around... he realized they had forgotten the most important thing from the very beginning.
"..."
"..."
Kiritsugu Emiya felt rather melancholy. Since when had he become this stupid?!
He suddenly wanted a cigarette, but found none on him.
Still, compared to the bewildered expressions of the others, his poker face at least kept him from looking quite so embarrassed.
"Then should we go back?"
"...Hurry up!"
The group felt somewhat dejected. Einsbern Castle and Ryudoji Temple stood at opposite ends of the city, so what had been the point of walking so fast earlier?!
Einsbern Castle:
After tucking blankets around the two little ones she had finally managed to coax to sleep, Irisviel prepared to rest for a while in the living room. Then she noticed Fujino was still awake.
Feeling somewhat helpless, she was about to soothe another child when Fujino pointed at the forgotten "rb... Irisviel."
Only then did Irisviel sense that immense magical energy. Her drowsy mind instantly snapped awake.
She stared blankly at the Lesser Grail, which was emitting solid black magical energy.
She looked at the Lesser Grail, whose magical energy had already begun leaking, utterly confused.
So... what was she supposed to do?
She had no idea!
"Master, aren't you going to carry it?"
The group gathered awkwardly in the hall. Especially as they watched the Lesser Grail continue to spill Black Mud, they all had a bad feeling about this.
Fu Yuan stared at the sight for a long time. But thinking about it, the original story had not required the deaths of all six for it to manifest either.
"..."
Although Kiritsugu Emiya felt this should not have been his job, Fu Yuan's serious gaze inexplicably made him panic.
As though something was about to shatter.
Perhaps he had already thought of something deep down, but he forcibly refused to think about it.
He walked very slowly, as though that might delay its arrival. Yet the distance was only that short.
However, before he could touch it, his thoughts blurred. When he came back to himself, he was no longer in the living room.
A mass of black matter surrounded him, endlessly radiating resentment.
Yet the attack he had expected never came. Instead, a frail figure appeared before him.
It spoke many words, bringing up many things he had deliberately forgotten. Kiritsugu Emiya wanted to turn around and leave.
But he still harbored hope. Even if there was only the faintest possibility, he did not want to give up.
Seeing how resolute—or rather, numb—he was inside, the figure stopped with its pointless words.
Next came the time for a multiple-choice question.
The scene shifted again. This time, they were at sea, and Kiritsugu Emiya's role was that of a repairman.
Two ships: one carried three hundred people, the other two hundred.
"Fatal holes simultaneously opened in the bottoms of both ships, and Kiritsugu is the only one with the skills to repair them. While repairing one ship, the other will sink. So, which ship would you choose to repair?"
"...Of course, the one with three hundred people."
"After you make that decision, what would you do if the two hundred people aboard the other ship restrained you and demanded, 'Repair this ship first'?"
"This..." Before he could answer, a machine gun appeared in Kiritsugu's hands.
The gun suddenly fired bullets as though it were an automated machine. Kiritsugu could only stare blankly at everything before him. A single bullet pierced through four people, and in an instant, all two hundred were shot dead.
"Correct. This is the true Kiritsugu Emiya." Kiritsugu stood motionless, watching the ship laden with a mountain of corpses gradually sink into the sea. Every corpse on the deck seemed to be someone he knew.
"Then, the remaining three hundred people abandon the damaged ship and continue their voyage on two new ships. This time, one ship has two hundred people and the other has one hundred. But holes once again appear simultaneously in the bottoms of both ships."
Yet the instant he turned away, someone grabbed him. He looked back at their frightened expressions, at their terror of death.
Two hundred and one hundred... one hundred and twenty and eighty... eighty and forty...
"Is this... what you wanted to show me?"
Kiritsugu felt sickened by this childish game and questioned the thing calling itself the "Consciousness of the Holy Grail."
This kind of moral coercion had always been the principle he lived by.
But why did his heart hurt?
"Yes. This is your truth—the answer given by Kiritsugu Emiya's heart, and the wish the Holy Grail, as a wish-granting device, must fulfill."
"No!... No!"
Looking at his bloodstained hands, Kiritsugu screamed.
"This isn't my wish! I wanted there to be another way... so I could only rely on a 'miracle'..."
"Isn't this the miracle you wished for?"
"Don't joke with me! What kind of miracle is this?!"
"It is a miracle. The wish you long for but cannot accomplish by yourself will be realized on a vast scale beyond humanity's capabilities. If this is not a miracle, then what is?"
Five people remained, all of them the most important people in Kiritsugu's life. Yet he still had to choose: save two, or save three.
He pulled the trigger with a despairing scream, shooting Emiya Kenshin in the face.
Natalia Kaminski's brains splattered everywhere as well.
"You want to... descend upon this world and do this... to all humanity? Is this how you intend to fulfill my ideal?"
"Precisely. Your wish is the form best suited for the Holy Grail. Kiritsugu Emiya, you are simply too suited to the title 'All the World's Evil.'"
Of the remaining three, should he save one or two? Kiritsugu gripped the knife hilt with trembling hands. His tears had already run dry.
With hollow eyes like those of a ghost, Kiritsugu tore apart Maiya Hisau's body.
Again and again, he brought down the dagger.
And just like that, only two people remained in the world.
There was no need to weigh them on a scale anymore.
Equal value that required no calculation.
This was the final hope, bought with four hundred and ninety-eight lives.
Having done all of this, Kiritsugu finally let out a breath. He seemed like a walking corpse, surrounded by the warmth of a furnace.
In a nostalgic, peaceful, warm room, his "wife" and "daughter" smiled. In other words—this was the peaceful world he had sought.
Outside, Irisviel watched Kiritsugu in deep concern, while Fu Yuan folded his arms and closed his eyes.
No more fighting, no more hurting anyone.
A perfect paradise.
"You're back, Kiritsugu."
With a face full of joy, Illya wrapped her little arms around her father's neck.
In the northernmost city, beneath the falling snow, there was such tranquility. A bloodstained life had ultimately arrived at warmth too unimaginable to hope for.
If this peaceful children's room were the entirety of the world, then there would never be any disputes or entanglements.
"—Right? Do you understand now? This is the wish the Holy Grail has granted for you."
Everything that remained was happiness.
On this planet where everything had been destroyed, the last three humans should be able to live happily together forever like this.
"...We can't go look for walnut buds anymore..."
Outside the window was no longer a vast field of white snow, but only Black Mud swirling into a vortex.
Gazing at the sight, Kiritsugu murmured to himself. At that moment, Illya smiled and shook her head in his arms.
"Mhm, it's okay. As long as Illya can be with Kiritsugu and Mama, that's enough."
Stroking the head of his beloved daughter, Kiritsugu's tears spilled from his eyes.
"Thank you... Daddy loves Illya the most too. That much, I swear, truly..."
His hands did not stop moving.
As though they were no longer controlled by his brain, as though he were a programmed machine, Kiritsugu pressed the muzzle of the Contender against his daughter's tiny chin.
"—Goodbye, Illya."
The girl's head burst apart with the gunshot.
Chunks of flesh tangled with silver hair clung to Kiritsugu's tear-soaked cheeks. (Silver hair, that's right. It was affected by Magic Illya earlier.)
"What have you done?!" Kiritsugu pinned down his wife, who had lunged at him like a demon, and wrapped his hand around her slender neck.
"The Holy Grail... is something that should not exist..."
No matter what was inside that shell, Irisviel's personality, which coexisted with the body, was still real.
The despair and pain of having her daughter murdered, along with the hatred toward the husband who had killed her daughter, were unquestionably Irisviel's true feelings.
Kiritsugu looked straight at her, accepted this fact, and tightened his grip around his wife's neck with all his strength.
"...What are you doing... why reject the Holy Grail, and us... my Illya!... Why would you do this?!"
"—Because, I—"
The voice squeezed from his throat was hollow, like wind blowing through an empty void.
There was no sorrow, no anger.
Of course. Kiritsugu Emiya's heart was already empty.
He had abandoned the miracle he sought, and given up the gains entirely contrary to his original intentions.
There could no longer be anything left in his heart at this moment.
"I will—save—the world."
Only one thing remained: the conviction he had carried through to the end.
But why did those words sound so hollow?
His trembling hands snapped the woman's cervical spine.
Once again, the scene changed.
—A hallucination that had invaded the deepest layers of his mind; looking back, he realized it had lasted only an instant.
An unrealistic dream should be over by now...
Listening to the ideals he had spoken of before, Fu Yuan did not quite know what to say.
Before you continue