The scream was heart-rending, inhumanly miserable—nothing a human being should have been capable of making. It was hard to imagine what kind of pain could produce such a horrific cry.
Kenneth struggled in a twisted frenzy, his face contorted into something savage and terrifying. His hands continuously groped, clawed, and scratched at his body, as though he were suffering from unbearable itching—or excruciating pain.
Emiya Kiritsugu stood where he was, unmoved by the tragic sight. He merely removed the spent casing of the Origin Bullet, then loaded a fresh round into his pistol.
No one knew whether that bullet was another Origin Bullet.
Volumen Hydrargyrum had already collapsed into a pool of gleaming silver mercury, flowing freely through the corridors of Einzbern Castle—together with Kenneth's blood.
Drip.
Kenneth fell to his knees.
His pupils had begun to lose focus. His mouth hung wide open, his body swaying faintly as it trembled.
His life was rapidly fading away.
—Thud!
Kenneth collapsed to the ground, falling face-first. Blood poured from his mouth and nose in great quantities, making for a gruesome and horrifying sight.
It was over.
Click—
Emiya Kiritsugu aimed his pistol at Kenneth's head.
With one pull of the trigger, one of the Clock Tower's [Lords] would die here, and the Lancer faction in this Holy Grail War would vanish into nothingness.
But at that very moment—
Whoosh—
Emiya Kiritsugu abruptly raised the submachine gun in his other hand and aimed it at Kenneth's head.
He had sensed it. A certain presence.
"I will not allow you to kill my Master, Saber's Master!"
The one who suddenly appeared before the dying Kenneth El-Melloi Archibald was Kenneth's Servant, Lancer—Diarmuid Ua Duibhne.
"So you really were hiding in the shadows, Lancer."
Stepping back half a pace, Kiritsugu trained his submachine gun on