The setting sun gradually sank below the horizon, its afterglow scattering blood-red remnants across the heavens.
On the vast, desolate wilderness, knights led by thirteen figures stood in sequence, their gazes converging on the millennium-old fortress weathered by wind and frost, and on the aloof figure standing before the gates of the Holy City.
"Mystery will not fade. The world will return to my grasp, and Britain will enter eternity with me."
"I summoned you because your strength is necessary to the plan."
"Even if I alone can annihilate the enemy, I cannot carry out the Selection. I need knights who can serve as my hands and feet."
"—But."
"I understand that this course of action is incompatible with your beliefs."
"Whether you choose to obey me, leave me, or join forces here to defeat me."
"Give me your answer by sunset. That is all the time I can wait."
The King looked at the knights, her gaze quiet and impassive, without the slightest trace of distraction or ripple. It was merely a declaration of this land's future fate.
And behind her stood the hall of God, the gate of Heaven!
On the wilderness, the Knights of the Round Table gathered here stood for a long while, silently meeting one another's eyes before gradually walking toward the camps they had chosen.
"Sir Gawain, I believe the King's decision is correct. Britain is collapsing. We have sustained this millennium-old kingdom, yet we too are gradually decaying. Only with the King does the nation become whole, and only the King can grant this world salvation and lead us into the Ideal Homeland of eternity."
The red-haired knight standing atop the gentle slope gazed at the land of exposed rocks and utter devastation, and at the lifeless fortress gradually sinking into darkness, murmuring