Chapter 6: Extermination.
As night broke across Fuyuki, I emerge from my room with newfound determination coursing through my veins. Tonight was the night where my plans came into fruition. Before that however, there was one last thing I needed to do.
Opening a sliding door, my entry into Sakura's room was soundless thanks to Kiritsugu teachings. On the floor, resting underneath a fluffy blanket, lied Sakura's sleeping form. School activities had drained her quite a lot, resulting in her retiring to bed earlier than usual. I crouched beside her while keeping my presence minimal, then induced myself in a state of hypnosis to tap into Unlimited Blade Works' countless armaments. I went through a sea of blades and found what I was looking for atop a grassy hill, shining brilliantly amongst a crowd of colourful flowers.
"I am the bone of my sword." The first line of Shirou Emiya's aria rolled off my tongue, followed by a burst of golden light. Not a moment later, a beautiful blue and golden sheath, the Ever Distant Utopia—Avalon, answered my prayers and appeared before me. It radiated an otherworldly glow that brought safety to those nearby.
It was a copy of course, nothing more than a fake made with modern magecraft, yet despite all that, its essence was near indistinguishable to the original, a near perfect replica of Avalon thanks to me having a deep understanding of the genuine article. Throughout the years, I've pushed my Projection ability to its absolute limits, causing a small patch of my forearm to darken as a consequence, in order to replicate Avalon's full might just for this very moment.
I motioned the sheath forward and merged it inside Sakura's body without a problem. She let out a weak hum in response to the change before slipping back to sleep. The fake scabbard should only last for an hour at best, which was more than enough for tonight's objective—killing Zouken Matou. After giving Sakura the Ever Distant Utopia, I quickly left the abode and headed towards the Matou residence while blending into the night to prevent anyone from spotting me.
A short while later, a weathered manor came into view. Each corner of the structure released a disgusting feel that sent goosebumps all over my body. A Bounded Field encased the whole place to keep anyone from entering, as expected, but it did not prevent me from breaching through as if it was never there. Kiritsugu had taught me many things in the past, one of them was how to effectively bypass a magus' Bounded Field without triggering it, and combine that with a skill of mine, "Presence Concealment", which blurs my existence inside people's minds, I became nigh-undetectable through normal or magical means.
Without hesitation, I went inside the decrepit abode. My movements were swift and utterly muted, eyes going to and fro, analyzing every surface of the way for any anomalies. Zouken Matou's familiars covered the whole house which made my infiltration more difficult, but not impossible. Eventually, without alerting any of the despicable creatures, I arrive at my destination—a stairwell leading down the basement oozing with the smell of decay.
After carefully making my way down the flight of stairs, I was greeted by a sight one could only stare at in absolute abhorrence. Stuffed inside a pit was a bed of phallus shaped worms wriggling in place, eager to violate anyone unfortunate enough to fall on top of them.
Gazing into the gorge of filth was none other than Zouken Matou, not much had changed about him, he still possessed a repulsive air I could not help but hate. I intentionally increased the noise of my heels striking the floor, causing a loud tap to echo throughout the space. The old man turned around after hearing the disturbance, surprise clearly evident on their face as he saw me standing idly by the entrance.
"Hoh? I did not expect a visit from you at this time of day." The worms crawling on the walls stirred, locking their beady eyes upon my lonesome figure. "My, you've grown into a splendid young man since we last met, Emiya Shirou. How's my granddaughter fairing?"
"She's doing way better now, that's for sure," I calmly replied, humouring the old coot. "Answer me, Zouken. Why didn't you do anything to take her back? Surely you wouldn't have abandoned the only heir to the Matou magecraft, right?."
For some demented reason I could not comprehend, magi families would only pass down their craft - otherwise known as a Magic Crest - to one child and left the other siblings to fend for their own. To them, family was no more important than the air they breathed. Sakura was one such victim of this practice and was given away at a young age to become the Matou heir after the previous heir, Shinji, showed not a smidgen of talent in the art of thaumaturgy.
From what I could recall, he would have Sakura lie in that worm infested hole every waking moment of the day all in the name of 'training'. Zouken's familiars latched onto her insides and regularly force her into ejaculating to feed themselves, as the liquid substance was a potent way to recover mana without hurting the ill-fated girl.
He sighed, placing both hands around his back. "I'm getting old, is it wrong for me to leave my granddaughter in good hands until she's old enough to take over the family business? Everyone in town speaks nothing but kind words about you, I knew you'll take care of her just fine."
"That's bullshit and you know it." Fury coated my words, turning the atmosphere around us tense as a result. "You just wanted to turn her into a lesser Grail, didn't you?"
He blinked, taken aback by my sentence. "I'm certain not even the Mage Association knows of this, did you figure it all out by yourself? Pretty impressive, I might say. As expected of the Magus Killer's successor." Of course he knew who my adoptive father was, that wasn't much of a surprise to be honest. "I suppose you won't tell me how you came across that piece of information?"
"No. Figure it out yourself." I venomously snapped back. I've known what he precisely wanted since the start—it was to turn Sakura into a vessel for the Holy Grail using a shard of the Grail itself, which would've killed her had it been completed. He merely wanted to use me to break her state of mind even further and accelerate the process. I just wanted to hear it from his mouth, but it seems he won't grant me that wish.
Without uttering another word, my magic circuits hummed to life, causing magical energy to erupt from my body. There was no need to speak of my reason for being here, my apparent hostility towards him was enough of an answer on how this meeting would end.
"Are children nowadays allowed to simply barge into an old man's home and attack them?" He gave out nothing more than an amused laugh in response to my aggression. Then, an eerie grin spread across his face as he spread his arms outward. As if responding to his actions, a loud thump reverberated from behind the walls, making the whole place shake. "As unfortunate as it is, you will die here, young man. Perhaps if you had come here in peace, we could have struck an accord that would benefit the both of us."
The partition behind him suddenly collapsed, revealing a tide of grubs that swiftly moved towards my direction, each of them possessed a pair of wings and a row of sharp teeth that could no doubt penetrate steel in one bite. Fear did not take hold of me, for my will was that of steel.
"Trace on." I chanted. A sensation of warmth welled from within my chest, gradually spreading throughout my entire being, infusing me with newfound strength and vigor.
Next, a new set of apparels manifested into existence; my figure was draped in flowing burnished robes that billow around my form like dark clouds. Adorning my head is a winged helmet of similar hue, its sleek curves and intricate detailing reminiscent of ancient warriors of legend. The entirety of my right arm was encased in armour painted in gold, and my hand wielded a long, curved blade carrying an air of menace and power.
It was a carbon copy of Malenia the Severed's garments, who is one of, if not my favorite character ever. I have not a shred of shame for imitating her style, could anyone even blame me? All I needed now was a healing effect on my blade that mends my own wounds whenever I draw the opponent's blood, and everything would be complete. One day, once my smithing skils were high enough, I'd be able to make it.
Its past is totally empty, being made no longer than 2 months ago with ordinary materials by yours truly. Of course, I have never seen Malenia the Severed, so there was no feasible way for me to replicate her garb including its unique properties and history. My equipment was nothing more than pale imitations of the real thing.
"Interesting get-up you have there, boy." He commented on my peculiar appearance as swarms of his familiars quickly surrounded me from all sides. He undoubtedly dismissed the magical constructs as a whole due to its nature as a Projection, a spell known for its less than practical effects.
I part my lips and responded with: "Time alter—square accel." In my eyes, the movements of the world itself slowed to a snail's pace, yet for some odd reason my whole body remained unaffected by this phenomenon, moving at what seemed to be normal speed. It was the power of none other than the Magic Crest engraved on my left shoulder.
Surprisingly, Kiritsugu had passed down the Emiya family's Magic Crest, a craft known for its ability to manipulate time inside a designated space, onto me before his passing. Though he only possessed a fragment of the Crest due to an incident in the past, the Magus Killer utilized the magecraft to its fullest, breaking through human limitations and moving at such insane speeds that the human eye failed to register even a flicker of his figure.
With a flourish, I raised the blade and lashed out, cutting through the flood of worms with deadly expertise. Each arc it passed was a path of death, resulting in a dozen or so worms being sliced into two halves by the second. To the outside world however, not even a fraction of that time had elapsed.
"Release." I muttered out, disabling Time Alter and returning my accelerated senses to normal. As the effects fizzled out, a rain of invertebrate carcasses fell from the air, creating a circle around me as if an invisible barrier had stopped them in their tracks.
Suddenly, a stiffled grunt escaped my lips as a formless rope tightly wrapped itself around my entire being, before disappearing just as quickly as it appeared. Time manipulation had it own sets of drawbacks like everything else. Using 'square accel', the final stage, should have destroyed me from the inside in an instant, but the punishment was balanced out by the combined forces of Avalon's miraculous healing and my innate endurance.
Zouken wasn't surprised in the slightest, he had expected some form of resistance from the boy. The old man swiftly responded by sending even more winged worms at the redhead to overwhelm him with sheer numbers while also ordering another batch of familiars he had hidden around the mansion to gather. He had done his research, he knew of what just transpired. 'The Emiya boy shouldn't be able to use that technique for an extended period of time.' He thought, blissfully unaware of what said boy had in store for him.
Brandishing my curved sword, I cut and slice through the sea of flying critters while steadily narrowing the distance between the old magus and I. He showed little to no worry, clearly undermining my abilities. Out of the blue, an explosion of concrete and dust erupted from the ceiling as an amalgamation of worms the size of a car dropped into the scene with a shrill screech, forcing my march to halt.
"Time alter—triple accel." I recited, increasing my overall speed by three-fold. Without wasting another moment, I brought my weapon to bear and delivered a myriad of slashes at the fat invertebrate, dismantling the poor thing in one fell swoop. The boost in agility remained as I continued my rush to my opponent. I twist and twirled, pressing forward like a storm.
As the fight raged on, Zouken unleashed a swarm of winged worms to obscure my vision, creating an opening that he briskly exploited. A dozen of his familiars broke through my defenses and dug their dirty fangs onto my legs, stealing my attention away for a brief moment. With a violent swing, the distasteful creatures were thrown off my legs and quickly met the heels of my boots. The floor shattered underneath the force of my stomps, sending shards of stone flying in all directions. Within that small time frame, the wounds they've inflicted had already recovered thanks to Avalon.
To my left and right, a pair of inflated worms abruptly bursts forth with the grace of a car being driven by a drunkard, their razor-sharp teeth primed and ready to tear me apart. As I was about to cleave the beasts into bite sized pieces, a sea of winged grubs appeared from all sides, enveloping my whole form in a heartbeat and began eating away at my frame.
"Square accel." I whispered then twisted my wrist. In one moment; I was trapped inside a sarcophagus of vile worms, and in the next; each critter popped into a mist of blood as if air itself had denied their existence. "Release." I drew a sharp breath and spoke again. "Time alter—triple accel."
More and more of Zouken's familiars entered the cellar from various entry points and did their best to halt my charge, but no matter how many disgusting bugs threw themselves at me, the results remained the same; I continued advancing without stopping.
Eventually, I managed to breach the wall of creepy-crawlers and honed my sights on the old magus hiding at the back end. Raising a hand, my mana reserves dropped by a large margin as a sleek handgun appeared in my grasp with a shimmer of light. With a tug, the gun fired a single Origin bullet at Zouken's form. Not a hint of concern marred his disgusting face as the projectile flew at him at high speeds. The bullet struck him dead in the chest with a crunch, but the old magus treated it nothing more than a slight annoyance, expecting the hole to fix itself.
As Zouken stood in place, a creeping sense of dread washed over him. It started as a subtle tremor, a faint quiver running through his body, but quickly escalated into something far more sinister. A collection of familiars that made up his muscles tensed and spasmed uncontrollably, as if rebelling against his commands. With each passing moment, it felt as though his very essence was slipping through his fingers, dissolving into nothingness.
A smile went up my face as I saw panic surge through him. Kiritsugu's Origin bullets did more than inflict physical wounds, it also broke down the magic circuits of whoever it hits, taking away their ability to manipulate magical energy and perform magecraft. Given enough time, Zouken would eventually lose his control over his familiars, preventing the magus from reforming another vessel at a later date.
"Trace on." Malenia's hand (the curved sword) vanished from my hand and was swiftly replaced by a peculiar broadsword. Putting strength into my legs, I launched forward with a burst of speed, killing everything that blocked my path like a raging berserker and crossed the distance between him and I in a blink of an eye. Stopping before the man, I rotated my upper body, held the sword high above my head, then executed a swift vertical slash.
Unable to move away in time, Zouken quickly raised a limb to intercept my attack, however it did nothing to stop the blade's sharp edge from effortlessly cleaving his right arm clean off his shoulders.
"Gah!" Suddenly, a piercing pain tore through Zouken's body, sharp and agonizing, as if his very being was being torn apart by the seams. The sensation disoriented him, this shouldn't have been possible, his familiars should have been the one that got hurt as his main body was still beside Sakura's heart, yet he felt as if unseen hands were tearing his soul, pulling him apart piece by piece. He tried to rationalize the strange occurrence, but the boy prevented him from expanding on this thought.
I swiftly withdrew my weapon and executed a flurry of strikes at my opponent, aiming to lay as much suffering as I possibly could. To my surprise, the old maggot's injuries mended itself at a pace that matched my swings. I notice that his remaining familiars had forgone attacking me altogether in favour of attaching themselves onto Zouken's current body in a vain attempt to keep their host alive. I wasn't alarmed by this, the blade in my grasp struck one's soul, restoring his body only gave me more opportunities to inflict pain upon him. I swung, again and again, severing his soul's hold over the mortal plane in an act of unfiltered violence. Soon enough, the amount of worms that followed his instructions lessened, leaving him with nothing more than a withering upper body to work with.
"Release." I deactivated Time Alter, ignoring the throbbing pain that came with it, and strode towards the old coot's slumped form.
"You—" He tried to speak, but I cut him off by grabbing his head and brutally pummeling it onto the ground, scraping it across the surface. A few more cuts from the broadsword would have fully extinguished his soul, but there was something else I wanted to do just as a precaution. I took a deep breath before opening my mouth to speak.
"I kill. I let live. I harm, and I heal. None will escape me. None will escape my sight." I activated the only holy sacrament skill in my arsenal.
Due to Zouken Matou's unique existence, he was extremely susceptible to such practices, hence why I went through the trouble of learning it.
"Be crushed. I welcome those who have grown old and those who have lost." A pillar of malevolent light answered my words, connecting up into the sky and bathing the entire basement in an ethereal glow. "Devote yourself to me, learn from me, and obey me." Holy energy swirled, enveloping the area with warmth. "Do not forget song, do not forget prayer, and do not forget me." All across the city, members of the Holy Church took notice of the divine column in the distance and hastily made their way to it. "I give you rest. I will lighten your burdens and make you forget them."
Zouken's eyes threatened to pop out of its sockets. While his body convulsed in reaction to the sacrament, he uttered in disbelief: "What—?" He did not understand where the boy got all of these tricks from. He had watched him from the sidelines since the day he took Sakura away, and concluded that he was nothing more than a kind young man with an inflated sense of justice.
And that sword, the blade that struck his very essence—where did he get it? The old magus knew Shirou dabbled in smithing, but what can a 12 year old upstart magus realistically do with bars of metal? Not once did he even consider the redhead a threat, and now the magus was paying the price for his hubris. Decades worth of work to achieve his goal, gone right before his eyes all because of a child's interference.
His body refused to move even an inch and could do nothing but watch as his remaining frame crumbled into fine dust due to the Lord's light. He'd known that Shirou attended the local kirk, but he never could've expected him to attain such strong connection with the Lord during that short amount of time.
"Did you receive guidance from God, child?" Zouken strained himself to speak, longing wrapped his words for some odd reason. In truth, his corroded soul slowly reverted back to its natural state, allowing memories he'd long forgotten to play in his mind. It brought him back to a simpler time.
Letting his words flow from one ear to another, I continued the rite, "Do not pretend. Retribution for forgiveness, betrayal for trust, despair for hope, darkness for light, and death for the living." White lines suddenly weaved across the old magus' skin, covering his entire form like a web. "Solice is in my hands. I shall pour oil unto your sins and mark you. Only in death will eternal life be given." As the rite neared its conclusion, the holy pillar shone brighter. "You'll find forgiveness here. On my Incarnation I swear——Kyrei Eleison." Following my words, Zouken's soul shattered, torn into a thousand fragments by the light of God, never to walk amongst the ranks of Man ever again.
Now without a master to follow, the left over familiars scurried away from my figure in a panic. The grubs' presence all over the city brought me little concern as once daybreak hits, each and every single one of them would hurl over due to mana exhaustion. Even if a few of these critters somehow survive, they'd have no choice but to cannibalize one another for magical energy to live even a second more, culling their numbers without me having to do anything.
After ending the sacrament, the divine beam gradually dispersed into beautiful motes of light and I rose to my feet. A burst of System notifications appeared, telling me that "Purify" had reached B rank, but I pushed it aside and took another deep breath to calm my bubbling excitement.
"I did it." Just like how Kiritsugu had taught me, I had dispatched my target with extreme efficiency, there was no need to draw the battle out when there was nothing to gain. While the process had some rough edges, it went as well as I had expected. Had the poor bastard taken me seriously from the start, our fight would've ended differently, too bad he couldn't take into account that I had a video game System on my side.
To be honest, it was a bit of an overkill to use a literal God given gift to end him, but better to err on the side of caution. With a near perfect copy of Avalon planted within Sakura, she should be fine even if Zouken did anything with his main body out of desperation.
Manic laughter bursts out of my mouth, before it was briskly shot down. 'Celebrations can come later, I need to get back home first.'
Upon emerging from the Matou mansion, I was immediately confronted by a group of men dressed in dark vestments standing idly by the foyer. A myriad of expressions donned each of their faces as they stared at my appearance, the most prominent being shock and reverence. Thankfully, the winged helm covered the majority of my facial features, preventing them from determining my identity. However, I have no doubt they eventually would with enough time, given that red hair wasn't really that common around here.
As for the members of the Church, they could not help but gawk at the red-haired boy's blinding figure. A strong amount of holy energy continuously radiated off of him, flooding the entire area with warmth and mellowness. A weak glimmer accompanied his every step, as if a messenger of God walked right beside him. Truly, a mark of the Lord's chosen, they all collectively thought. The bearded man, the highest ranking cardinal in their group, took a step forward and presented himself with a small bow. "Good evening young man, I am Ivan Williams, a member of the Holy Church. May I ask what has happened here?"
"Good evening," I nod my head slightly, but refused to announce my name, "nothing too serious, I can assure you. There was merely a force of evil that needed to be taken care of," I spoke the truth, yet remained vague on the details. "Now, If I may, there's a place that requires my immediate presence. Have a good night."
I quickly went into motion to vacate the area, but the man known as Ivan Williams raised his arm as I was about to walk past him, halting my stride. "A moment, please. Would it trouble you to tell us your name?"
"I am nothing more than a simple man of the Lord. Hopefully that would suffice," I spoke calmly, fully knowing my answer would not satisfy even a quarter of their curiosity, before speaking in a whisper, "Time alter—square accel."
The following phenomena left the priests frozen in astonishment. As if blessed by the Lord himself, a pair of malevolent wings made of pure light hovered behind Shirou's armour before he vanished with a flash of light, leaving the starstruck clergymen abandoned on the Matou residence. After his disappearance, they quickly went into action, some tried to follow the boy but lost him after a single turn, while others stayed behind to investigate the place, later finding an unconscious boy with a head of blue hair and took him into an infirmary.
I swiftly left the scene while supressing my presence to seamlessly blend into the surroundings, fully ignorant of the events that just transpired behind me. While weaving through the familiar streets of Fuyuki, a translucent screen appeared before my eyes, saying something about gaining a new title. I pushed it aside for now and placed my attention back at my current task. Soon enough, I arrive back home and dematerialized my equipment, then quietly entered Sakura's room.
My heart skipped a beat when I saw the young girl squirming in her bed while donning a face of discomfort. I dropped to the ground and took her into my arms, hoping to soothe whatever pain she was going through. As I gently embraced her, Avalon registered my touch and went into overdrive, producing a golden glow from within her chest as it did its best to fix whatever damage Zouken's remaining familiars inflicted on her.
Sakura's hair colour shifts into a darker shade of purple for some odd reason. Seeing as how Avalon wasn't reacting to the change, it was probably nothing harmful. As time progressed, Sakura's breathing returned to normal, her spasms stopped and her face now sported one of comfort. Seeing this, I released a breath I was unconsciously holding and gently tucked her back into bed, then opened the System menu to check on something.
[Title 'Saint' has been acquired]
"What?" I muttered in surprise. I checked its contents and found out what it did; the title provided me a major experience boost in everything that's related to holy energy. It acted similarly to [Sword Incarnation], except it's for divine sacraments instead of swords. It was most-likely generated due to some misunderstanding created by my ability to utilize the Lord's gifts, but you wouldn't see me complain about it. A power up was a power up.
And with that, I caressed Sakura's hair one last time and left her alone to recover.
----
As the morning rays shone through the windows, Sakura stirred from her slumber and sat upright right while rubbing her eyes. Relief washed over the young girl as she scanned the whole room, realizing that she was still inside Shirou's home and not her grandfather's.
It had been many years since she'd left that place and was offered a new home, but Sakura still felt as if it was a dream. Dread kept a firm hold over her mind, she was deathly afraid that the times she has spent with Shirou was all but a lie created by Zouken to torment her even further. She doesn't want this to end, hoping this moment would last forever. But, she knew it wouldn't last, like always. Her uncle had already tried and failed in the past which lead to his demise, what's to say this would go any different?
Upon rising to her feet, she immediately noticed that the worms inside of her was awefully silent. Usually, they would wiggle and crawl, giving her a sense of formication (the feeling of insects crawling in, on or under your skin) at every waking moment, but for some reason she could not feel any of those dastardly creatures, as if they had disappeared. She didn't give it much attention though, they'll probably awake later and continue like normal.
Reaching the dining room, she quickly spotted Shirou sitting down by the table, a heavy atmosphere circled the boy like clouds during a storm. Witnessing this side of him that she's never seen, a tinge of nervousness spread across her body.
"Oh, Sakura. Come here, I have something to tell you." A cold hand grasped her heart as she heard him speak in a weighty tone. Had he gotten tired of her? Disgusted by the filth that befouled her person? She hesitated, stopping just before entering the room. Seeing her odd behavior, Shirou worriedly asked: "Is something wrong? Do you need some help?"
She regained a fraction of her wits back and replied with a stutter. "O-oh… it's nothing." Sakura shuffled her way to the desk and sat down beside him, her fingers digging into her thighs as she waited for him to start. Did her grandfather do something to him? Maybe he threatened Shirou to give her back? She quickly tossed those thoughts away, Shirou wouldn't do something like that, right? She prays that's not the case.
"Sakura," the redhead looked directly into her eyes, "you don't have to worry about Zouken anymore. He's dead, I killed him," he decided to speak the truth without beating around the bush. The redhead said it with such conviction that she almost believed it to be true.
Whatever was brewing inside Sakura's head could not even compare to what Shirou had just revealed. She stilled, thinking she heard wrong, but Shirou made it abundantly clear that the man known as Zouken Matou had perished not too long ago by his own hands.
"But…but how?" The young girl squeaked out in denial. She knew what her grandfather was capable of to some extent, so it shouldn't have been possible for Shirou to do anything to him, yet he claims to have gotten rid of Zouken? It confused her more than anything. She fervently hoped that nothing harmful happened to him, otherwise she might just lose the only one who gave her joy.
Shirou then went on to explain what had transpired last night while excluding the gruesome details of course, and told her that he had been preparing for this moment since they day they met. By the end of his account, Sakura's mind whirled like a hurricane. Then, she realized why the worms inside her stopped—they had vanished along with Zouken's death.
A choked breath escaped the young girl as tears slowly formed in her eyes. She doesn't deserve any of this, there was no reason for Shirou to go that far for someone like her, yet he did for no other reason than he cared. She felt happy to say the least, yet guilty for dragging Shirou into her problems.
"I-I'm sorry," she sputtered out, a stream of tears rolling down her cheeks. "I didn't want to drag you into–" she paused due to a hiccup, "–how can I even thank you for this… I don't even have anything to—"
Shirou pulls her into a tender hold, cutting her words off. "Hush. Don't apologize. You deserve this much, Sakura. Just continue living your life, whatever makes you happy makes me happy as well."
Sakura wrapped her arms around the boy's neck in response, slamming her whole body onto his as tears resumed to flow from her eyes. For the next hour or so, the young girl refused to let go of Shirou as if afraid something would take him away from her. This is fine, right? If whatever she did made him happy, then he wouldn't mind staying with her for a while, no? In her mind, she made a silent vow to never leave the boy's side, no matter what the world threw at her.
Deep within her soul, a being of pure darkness screamed, its shrill cries reverberating across the space it inhabited, thrashing as if showered in molten lava. Nothing answered the creature's shrieks until a loud crack sounded from across its blackened form. Suddenly, the thing was split into two distinct entities: one made of raw hate and wrath, while the other emanated joy, love, and a hint of obsession. It even had a form of its own, which was eerily similar to Sakura's physical appearance.
The two opposing existences stared at one another for a moment until the former was abruptly banished out of the vast emptiness by an unseen force tinged with a shred of divine into the material plane—right inside the Matou manor's ruined basement.
"You finally made your appearance. You kept me waiting, you insolent cur," a man with golden hair spoke. He exuded a kingly aura no one could reject, forcing anyone to kneel with just a glance from his penetrating gaze.
As the beast of enmity roared in response to the man's presence, a series of chains emerged from brilliant portals behind the golden-haired man and swiftly enfolded the creature, binding it to the ground.
"Although you are only a fraction of it, under my care, you'll become an adequate weapon to extinguish this era's blight," he declared in a haughty voice.
END.
Author's Notes: Uh, yeah—Didn't plan much ahead when I wrote the fight scene. Oops?
I'll be writing notes every chapter from now on because I can.
Also, I've been playing a game called Supermarket Simulator, and it's quite addicting.