The moment I got home, I went about examining the full extent of the damage. Unsurprisingly, the conclusion I drew was that the war was now, more or less, incapable of continuing. At least within the confines of the city. Way too many eyes.

"So… now what?"

That was the question I was left to ponder as I closed the tab for the latest news article. At this point there was nothing new for the news to report. Ideally, there wouldn't be anything for them to report from now on either, at least from the viewpoint of the mages, I'm sure.

In theory, this was a good thing for me. I had Caster; I had the late game on lock. Saber and Lancer couldn't fight in the city, and Lancer had no command spells at all to fall back on now either. Archer couldn't shoot without someone seeing the streaks of red light in the sky, surely. Assassin was just sitting around waiting for the final two, and Rider…

Sure, Rider had an army to deploy still, I suspected, but… what use was an army if you can't actually deploy it? No way in hell could Rider both summon an army and keep it all hidden.

Saber, Lancer, Archer and Rider all slowly fade away…

…Then it came down to who would outlast the other, Caster vs Assassin? Unless either Caster left the labyrinth, which was unlikely, or Assassin both found and delved into the labyrinth, which I suspected was also unlikely. I had no idea how many command spells Assassin's master still had, but better to assume it was all three still. That left me down one on him, but… Caster doesn't seem worried at all about outlashing the competition, and we do have control over five of the seven leylines, in theory…

"…We've won?"

That was the logical conclusion, no? I do nothing and I just… win? That… sounded right. Certainly, that was how most late game situations went to the control player; respond to your opposition, but otherwise, do nothing.

Do nothing, and win.

…Not a very climatic way to win, but the control game typically wasn't. A pity this was effectively the end of me being able to see magecraft and speak to mages. It was going to come to an end eventually, but… well, I had hoped it'd go out on a bang! Witnessing something truly beautiful. Unique. One of a kind, even! This… this was victory, and it was beautiful, but… it wasn't… exciting…

It wasn't very entertaining…

…It wasn't very… fun…

Fun…

"Only concern was if anyone found the labyrinth, but even then, I'd assume Caster could deal with it somehow. The labyrinth was his territory, after all; no way he'd lose with the home field advantage, surely! …Surely not…"

…Unless…

…if Rider finds the labyrinth; takes the fight to us...

Under any other circumstance, I'd consider it foolhardy, but if Rider and the priest were determined enough, and Rider couldn't fight in the city…

Then, could they? Well, of course they could. But rather, would they?

"…Maybe."

…Especially since down within the labyrinth, out of sight from the prying eyes in the city…

…Rider could call forth his army.

…Could Caster and the labyrinth repel the might of Rider's entire army?

"…Best to have something prepared to deal with it, just in case…"

Yes, of course that was best, but figuring out the optimal play wasn't the issue. The issue came down to getting Caster to actually do something about it. To beat back an army, we'd need either an army of our own, or a superweapon of some kind. I wasn't sure about a superweapon, but Caster could create an army.

…If he actually decided to do so or not was another matter entirely…

"…Something I should discuss with him tomorrow" I sighed, opening up the multiple files of notes.

…I wanted to. A part of me wanted to. Just… release it all. Let the whole world know; whether or not they believe it be damned. All of this… this beauty… forever out of sight, out of reach, of the vast majority of us…

It truly wasn't fair.

If God was real, he was unworthy of my devotion.

Now, what was it that Assassin's master had said? Something about the lesser grail? Either what it was or where it was? …Something like that; the specifics don't matter.

"Let's see here… what do the Einzberns have to say on that again…?"

…Sadly, not much, other than the fact it was required for the Holy Grail War. Actually, I couldn't truly say that for certain; there was still lots from the texts to be deciphered. I really should have gotten on that a lot earlier. At this point, it just wasn't practical to sit down and try to crack the cipher. Or ciphers. Whatever.

I suppose I could get to work on them now; lots of time coming up, what with waiting for the war to finish playing out. But my wish made it obsolete, didn't it? Once I supplanted the root, I'd know all there was to know; no cipher could stop that. So, what was the point? Doing all that work, just for it to be redundant a short while later…

…That wouldn't be fun at all.

I just couldn't do it. No matter what I tried to do or think about, my mind just wandered back to a single subject: Rider. The war was won, according to every variable. Except for Rider…

"Definitely something to bring up with Caster tomorrow" I concluded, turning off my computer and crashing out of my chair onto my bed.

Sorry kids, but I could only do so much. Your lives are spared, but your dreams… your dreams will be crushed. It was simply… inevitable. This war was mine. This grail was mine. All the beauty of humanity was mine to witness.

"Heh… good game, kids" I muttered to myself as I closed my eyes.

"Good game."

A/N

Five whole days, and I only have this to show for it?! What?!

Yeah, I know. Sorry, but I was moving back into my place this week by the university, now that winter break is over and my uni has announced that we are looking to go back to being in person come February. So yeah, that took time. Also, I got a new keyboard over Christmas, which is great; needed one badly. Only thing is, it's mechanical. Now that I'm back to having roommates... well, out of curtesy, I've lost a bit of my nightly typing time, so things will either be a bit shorter or take a bit longer from now on, for the next while. …Probably.

That, and honestly, this was always going to be a small tidbit anyways; just wish I'd had it out a day or to ago for y'all.

Oh, and don't think I don't see you, spike of UK readers. Don't know what brought you all here, but all the same, welcome aboard this shit show xD

Anyways, I welcome all questions, comments and concerns, and I'll see you all in the next post o7