Of course, Headmaster Kaineth had considered the possibility that he might fail to capture his runaway disciple, allowing him to escape and wreak havoc elsewhere. He had even considered the possibility that the runaway disciple possessed terrifying talent and might kill the headmaster himself.
As a genius, recognizing the situation and analyzing both friend and foe were basic skills. One had to consider the worst-case scenario in everything. Whenever his fiancée was absent, Professor Kirei had always been calm and dependable.
But Headmaster Kaineth soon received a report from a logistics disciple. "Headmaster, your Yitian Sword was stolen by an outer disciple. Yes, that disciple you thought highly of—the one with exceptional ingenuity but utterly heartbreaking talent."
Without question, this had exceeded Kaineth's capacity for thought. Then again, aside from a certain rebel, who would dare oppose the Clock Tower and a Lord? Perhaps there were such people, but they were all genuinely important figures and renowned powerhouses. Kaineth had long prepared defenses against them. If they wanted to trip him up, they had better prepare to have all manner of Mystic Codes smashed into their faces.
And then his Holy Relic had been stolen by a student. All of Kaineth's precautions had been aimed at formidable external enemies. He had never paid any attention to insignificant nobodies, much less guarded against a disciple whose aptitude was atrocious beyond belief.
By the time he realized what had happened, Waver had borrowed money from a classmate, taken a plane, and made his escape!!!
At that moment, Kaineth understood an old proverb from the Eastern nation: no matter how carefully you guarded against outsiders, it was impossible to guard against thieves in your own house.
Kaineth could not help recalling the disciple he had once trained as an heir. That bastard had also silently left the Clock Tower with a sum of cash and several Mystic Codes. What was even more infuriating was that he had not even taken the Moon Cell Essence assigned to him by the El-Melloi School.
He had abandoned the school's supreme factional Mystic Code and quietly departed with only the little trinkets he had devised himself and some cash. There was no question about it—he had been drawing a line between himself and El-Melloi. He had betrayed the school, and naturally, he had betrayed Kaineth as well.
Life should be perfect. It had been so in the past, and it would certainly remain so in the future. That was a sacred, inviolable "promise of life." To Kaineth, this was beyond doubt.
An accident such as betrayal by an heir should not exist in "Kaineth's life." It was chaos he could never tolerate, an insult and blasphemy against God's order!
But as though replaying a recording, he had once again been betrayed by a disciple. Though this was merely an insignificant student, it was like someone taking a small knife and stabbing an unhealed wound all over again.
Double betrayal, double the joy. After receiving this gift from his student, Professor Kirei laughed in the classroom for two hours before heading to the combat training grounds of the Department of Modern Magecraft and beating three golems to pieces. He used no Mystic Codes, only his fists.
The facts proved that Kaineth's talent for martial arts might have been absurdly high. His exposure to boxing had been limited to watching a certain disciple practice, yet when he struck the training-dummy golems, his bearing was no less impressive than that of an old master who had trained for decades. He used all sorts of advanced combat techniques with effortless ease, leaving the recordkeepers beside him utterly dumbfounded. Perhaps they had witnessed a fake Lord of Magecraft.
The scene shifted to a hotel in Fuyuki City. A blond man who was rich but not handsome stood on the hotel's top floor, gazing out over the night view of the entire new city. This was practically the highest point in the whole district, and he could see a great distance.
"Lord Kaineth, there are no signs of Servants nearby." A deeply magnetic male voice emerged from the void as the hero of the Lancer class respectfully reported the results of his reconnaissance.
"I see." Kaineth clasped his hands behind his back, fingers interlocked into an inverted pyramid. From a behavioral perspective, this gesture made its user appear calm and collected, strengthening his presence.
Of course, in the eyes of those who disliked him, it was undoubtedly the sort of pose that begged to be punched. Someone had once suggested that Kaineth change it, since it drew a fair amount of hatred. But Kaineth believed the wailing and resentment of defeated dogs would have no effect on him, so he had never abandoned the habit.
Specks of golden light gathered behind Kaineth. Before long, a valiant warrior stepped out from the void. He was a handsome man, holding a crimson spear in his right hand and a yellow short spear in his left. Without question, he was a warrior who had once rampaged through myth, fought fiercely, and earned tremendous renown.
Diarmuid Ua Duibhne, the foremost warrior of Ireland's Knights of Fianna, hailed in Celtic mythology as "unmatched in the world," was a hero who had once slain nearly four thousand warriors of the Land of Faeries in a lone battle within the fae realm.
And now, this warrior, renowned even within Celtic mythology, knelt on one knee and respectfully awaited his lord's next command.
Turning to look at the Knight of the Lance who had sworn loyalty to him, Kaineth felt somewhat moved. After being stabbed in the back by his students, he understood just how precious a loyal subordinate was.
Though the timing of the summoning had been wrong, preventing him from summoning Lancer under the Saber class and causing his strength to decline from the level he had possessed in myth, Kaineth believed his magecraft could make up for that flaw.
"Lancer, find a suitable location and release your mana. Draw out the other Servants." Without much hesitation, Kaineth issued the order. "Proceed according to plan. I will support you from afar."
The Servant would confront the enemy head-on while the Master remained hidden to observe the battle's progress. The main purpose was to test the participating Servants, though if the opponent proved mediocre, they would simply kill him.
"As you command." The Celtic hero saluted his Master, Kaineth. There was not a trace of hesitation on his resolute face. He swiftly transformed into spirit form and vanished from reality.
After testing the Servants in this Holy Grail War, he would pay a visit to the local family and the Church. As a magus, Kaineth instinctively detested the people of the Holy Church and looked down on provincial landowners, but in order to deal with his two unworthy disciples, it was necessary to make contact with those factions and obtain the relevant intelligence.
The most important reason for coming to the Far East was to deal with his unworthy disciples. The second was to defeat every enemy, return in triumph, and meet his beloved fiancée as a hero. The tall, lean man gazed into the distance, his deep blue eyes revealing a tenderness utterly at odds with his identity.
As for The All-Works Cauldron, he would pass. There were surely no fewer than eight hundred, if not a thousand, things in this world bearing the name Holy Grail. To find the genuine Holy Grail, one would probably have to search the headquarters of the Holy Church. Many magi wanted to do that, but only a rare few truly suicidal fools dared attempt it. Kaineth felt it was better if they died, lest they drag down the average intelligence of magi.
The Holy Grail here was undoubtedly a cheap imitation created by Far Eastern magi according to some ritual. Kaineth held no expectations whatsoever for the magecraft of the Far East.
Before you continue