Artoria went to sleep.
She was exhausted, completely worn out. After a brief round of questioning, Murata Himeko, the highest-ranking officer of the Supernatural Disaster Countermeasures Office, arranged for Artoria to get some rest.
After all, Artoria was a member of the British royal family, a princess of the Holy Britannian Empire. However little fame she had, in theory she was still an heir to the throne.
What's more, she was now suspected of being an "Extraordinary," so special treatment was only natural.
But for the Supernatural Disaster Countermeasures Office, the night was just beginning. Cleaning up the battlefield, collecting the dead, and reassuring everyone in the office would keep them busy.
After all, having their headquarters directly attacked by a Mystery and suffering significant casualties was a serious blow to morale.
Fortunately, the fact that humans had eliminated the Mystery gave everyone a tremendous boost of confidence. It was incredibly encouraging.
That was undoubtedly good news for Murata Himeko.
Of course, the head of the Strategy Room still had plenty to do. What had happened that night had to be reported. It had been too serious to ignore: the headquarters had come under attack, and more than twenty people had died.
But before that, Murata Himeko needed to carefully review the night's events. An emergency meeting was already underway.
The senior officers of the Strategy Room had gathered in a conference room, where a series of hastily edited videos played before them.
They had been recorded by cameras at the Strategy Room's headquarters. It was only natural for an important organization to have cameras installed throughout its premises.
The Songstress's attack had knocked out the lights, but the cameras had kept working. They were high-definition models with night vision, so they had captured the entire sequence of Artoria's transformation.
From the attack in the hallway during the evacuation, to the sudden appearance of the Maiden Knight, who killed a Songstress, to the Maiden Knight merging into Artoria and turning her into that very knight.
Everything had been recorded. The cameras had also captured Artoria killing Songstresses and rescuing those under attack in various locations, and finally, instantly killing seven Songstresses outside and bringing the terrifying Mystery to an end. The footage was now playing in the conference room.
At last, when Artoria seemed to lose her power and returned to normal, Murata Himeko paused the video and turned to the others.
"Everyone, you've seen what happened. As you can see, the princess of Britain is indeed an Extraordinary—or, rather, she has an Extraordinary side to her! Even she doesn't know how to control this power. So when she returned to normal and we questioned her, she was completely bewildered. She had no idea how to bring that incredible power back."
After hearing Murata Himeko's explanation, the others looked thoughtful. A middle-aged man frowned. "She says she doesn't know how to use her extraordinary powers. Could she be putting on an act?"
Murata Himeko replied, "It's possible, but unlikely. On that note, I wonder if any of you have watched the anime produced here in Yingzhou? A lot of classic shounen anime have similar stories—"
"Powerful forces lie dormant inside boys and girls, but they don't know how to use them. Sometimes they can't use them at all. They need to meet certain conditions before they can awaken and wield the great power hidden within them."
The others exchanged somewhat complicated looks. The middle-aged man who had spoken earlier said, "Director, are you saying that Artoria Pendragon might be like that?"
Murata Himeko lifted her chin. "Judging by what we've seen, it's very likely. I know this is unbelievable. Anyone would find it hard to accept that something from anime could become reality, but reality is reality, and everything that exists has its reason. So why not accept it and work from that assumption?"
"After all, in our increasingly Honkai-ridden world, incomprehensible Mysteries keep appearing. Why shouldn't an Extraordinary girl who defies scientific principles appear too?"
The others nodded almost unconsciously. As members of the Supernatural Disaster Countermeasures Office, they had to deal with unscientific Mysteries on a regular basis, so they were more willing than most to accept things that overturned their understanding of science.
In fact, anyone so set in their ways that they couldn't adapt wouldn't be qualified to sit in that room.
Of course, Murata Himeko was also setting the tone for the meeting. Otherwise, they could debate for hours without reaching any conclusions.
Now that the groundwork had been laid, they could discuss things along the lines Murata Himeko had suggested.
After the emergency meeting ended, Murata Himeko held another video conference, this time to explain the situation to her superiors and share her assessment and plans.
Even so, it would probably be morning before they reached any conclusions.
As for Su Yun, none of this concerned him—not for now, at least.
He was busy finishing the content he planned to show the next day. Since he had used up quite a bit of Fantasy Power that night, he had to adjust the endpoint of the video, too.
But that was fine. The Fourth Holy Grail War had plenty of exciting moments, and there were even more in this modified version.
By the time he finished editing the video, it was past one o'clock. It was already time for cultivation, so he lay down to rest.
Although tonight's unexpected events had consumed some Fantasy Power, they had also brought him something in return. Most importantly, they had proved his plan was entirely feasible, giving him even more confidence in the system he had created.
As it happened, Su Yun had only settled on tonight's game-style controls after testing them out.
The system was certainly capable of letting Su Yun control a Fantasy Manifestation or Artoria while possessing her, just like a fully immersive virtual-reality game in a web novel.
But that wouldn't have worked well at all. Su Yun had never received professional combat training, and with Saber's abilities, neither her speed nor her acceleration were something he could handle.
Su Yun had once spent a small amount of Fantasy Power testing out the fully immersive game experience. It had left him dizzy and on the verge of throwing up.
It felt like being someone prone to motion sickness playing a 3D game—or like an ordinary player spending several hours in a VR game.
If that still didn't make sense, try spinning around quickly on the spot, then add a few extreme spiraling bursts of acceleration. You'd get a taste of what it felt like to control Saber in a fully immersive game.
Su Yun had been chosen by the World Consciousness, which had given him the greatest help it could.
But this world hadn't had extraordinary powers before, so all the World Consciousness had given him was a strong, healthy body at the peak of human ability.
It hadn't given him any extraordinary powers. Thinking he could use those abilities to perfectly control Saber's body was pure fantasy.
So Su Yun, who was good at making and playing games, had ultimately chosen the control scheme he was best at: the one he had used to control Artoria earlier.
The third-person action-game perspective also gave him a great view. He could clearly see enemies attacking from any direction, as if he had God mode enabled.
As a skilled action-game player—especially a veteran of the Souls series—Su Yun was confident that in a third-person action game, he could make the character he controlled fight like a god of war!
Of course, Su Yun couldn't personally take control every time they fought a Mystery in the future. Even if he were the ultimate keyboard warrior, he wouldn't be able to keep that up.
In the future, he would deal with Mysteries by empowering others with extraordinary templates. He would only step in himself to handle especially powerful ones.
"Come to think of it, Lia should be asleep by now, right? Then she should see the gift I gave her in her dream..."
In her deep sleep, Artoria vaguely realized she had arrived on a plain shrouded in mist.
The air carried the scent of the sea, and she could faintly hear the sound of waves.
She looked around in bewilderment. Before long, she spotted a light ahead and cautiously made her way toward it, drawing closer and closer.
As she crossed into the light, the scene before her opened up.
The mist vanished. Birds sang among the flowers on the plain, and the crumbling walls of ancient buildings stood scattered about, as if bearing witness to the weight of history.
Beneath the blue sky and white clouds, mountains rose in the distance, with a forest nearby.
Before the ruins of the ancient buildings, Artoria saw the Maiden Knight, dressed in blue-and-white armor over a dress, quietly gazing ahead.
Her hair and skirt stirred gently in the breeze. Bathed in sunlight, she was so beautiful she looked as if she had stepped out of a painting.
Artoria's heart raced. A wondrous thought surfaced in her mind.
It was—
King Arthur, beautiful as a painting!
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