Chapter 115
Blood scattered in the air, a crimson arc that hung for a moment, then succumbed to gravity, falling on the ground as specks of red liquid that was wiped away seconds later by Assassin's foot sliding on the ground, her body ducking to avoid the black long sword cutting over her head. At the same time, her ship provided support bombardment, an energy blast shooting towards Avenger as she completed the swing.
As casually as trained boxer dodging a punch from an amateur, Avenger flipped the sword in her hands to smack into the wall with the flat of the blade, her feet exerting force at the same time to push her to the side, the blue bolt travelling past her and into the hallways to smash into the wall all the way at the end, illuminating the darkness as it went.
Secret-calibur zipped like a mosquito, stinging the head, hands and legs of Avenger in quick succession, each stab faster than the last. The blade's hum switched frequencies, frequently spiking and dipping as fast as Assassin wielded her weapon. The tip of the blade scraped against Avenger's helmet, before she snapped her neck sideways with lightning speed, then the longsword came swinging at Assassin's side, a move that sacrificed her hands and leg in exchange for landing a grievous wound on Assassin. Faced with such a dilemma, Assassin was forced to fall short of touching the armor with the last two blows to parry the swing that aimed to cleave her in half from the ribs.
In the eyes of Rider, it was obvious who was going to win the fight in the end. Though in terms of raw strength and speed, it was definitely Avenger who was superior, Assassin's technique, if it could be called that, was much more advanced, and with sanity intact, Assassin was slowly able to grasp the base of Avenger's wild, instinctive battling style, though she was far from accurately predicting her moves and completely shutting her down. The wounds were accumulating on Assassin's body, fatigue sinking into her bones, but Rider couldn't see her losing. In the end, Assassin could overturn the battle and emerge victorious, though whether she emerged unharmed was another question.
She stared at the Master of Assassin, plodding away from the two with Assassin's protection, her face dripping with sweat as her feet faltered with every step. Clearly, she was suffering hard under the effects of Avenger's 'attention'.
Though she didn't want to obey the old man, she had a duty to her Master, and as a maid she was obliged to fulfill it as best as she could. Cleaning up everything troubling her Master, including this Holy Grail War, was included in the contract as well.
Manifesting herself, the sniper rifle already fully formed in her hands, she knelt on the ground, one knee on the ground, the other leg with her feet planted firmly to minimize kickback and recoil, while her eye centered on her target with the crosshair, her internal training (instinct) kicking in as her body became perfectly still, her mind visualizing the shot that would pierce Grays body and send her soul to rest. Normally she'd lie down, but for a shot that needed to be fired as quickly as possible, she would rely on her Servant levels of strength to forcefully handle the recoil and instead kneel while charging up the shot.
Without question it was swift, almost as half fast as Billy the Kid's casual quickdraw when he was just fooling around. In less than a second, she was already in position, and the waterspout burst forth from the muzzle, barreling towards Gray.
Assassin and Avenger both sensed Rider's appearance, but while for Avenger it was merely the reappearance of another target, for Assassins it heralded a sudden defeat if her Master was killed.
Her ahoge immediately went rigid, standing straight up like an antenna.
Stepping clear of Avenger's massive swing, she immediately summoned as many portals as she could to block Avenger and her vision, the sudden drain of mana dropping Gray to her knees as she stopped in place. It took a few seconds for the aqua beam to reach Gray, given that Rider had manifested as far away as she could to prevent Assassin or Avenger from attacking her immediately, but it was enough time for Assassin to kick Gray towards the floor, the beam going right over her head while Gray lay prone on the floor.
Rider saw Gray suddenly drop out of her field of vision through the scope, and immediately adjusted her aim accordingly, dropping it lower. Without warning, her scope suddenly blacked out, her eye peeking through it seeing nothing but darkness.
Hastily, she opened both eyes and shifted her body to the side, barely dodging the rapidly spinning thrown sword, Secret-calibur, which just barely missed, shaving away a slice of meat from her deltoid. Then she was forced to jump over a barrage of bolts from the Dun Stallion II, firing through a portal directed down the hallway at her by Assassin. The baseball cap that Assassin had thrown first to obscure her vision slipped off the scope and fell on the floor, unruffled by the blasts sweeping through the space above it.
Assassin had not time to pat herself on the back from the perfect cap throw she had mastered during her lifetime traveling the galaxy. Instead, she was already in the air above Avenger, the portals obscuring her as she jumped, the blue circles forming a wall blocking Avenger as they pummeled her with energy blasts.
*SKRANG*
A wail of shrieking metal echoed in the hall as Avenger's sword tore through the portals, expertly dodging every last blast even in the cramped space she was given. The portals were directly connected to the cannons on the Dun Stallion II, so it was possible to destroy them by stabbing into the portals, as Avenger demonstrated by striking all the portals in an X shape, from the top right to the bottom left, then spinning to perform a wide slash from the top left to the bottom right. Inwardly, Assassin cringed at how much she'd have to fork out to have the cannons repaired, but her body showed no trace of it as she landed on Avenger's back as the portals flickered and disappeared.
The blue scarf looped around Avenger's neck, then it tightened, Assassin pulling it with all she was worth while her feet were braced against Avenger's armored back. The high necked gorget crunched under the fabric of undetermined material, the scarf not breaking even with Assassin tugging it as hard as she could. Rather, Avenger's metal armor was the first to break, crushing Avenger's throat as the thinner metal there crumpled under Assassin's relentless pulling.
Avenger howled, gargled and then became reduced to choking as the armored Servant crashed into the left wall, then the right wall, desperately trying to shake off the person perched on her back. Wildly flailing her arms with disregard to the surroundings, the longsword smashed against concrete, pulverizing it to powder as Avenger stamped her feet against the ground, her body lurching forwards unconsciously while straining to break free.
Assassin weathered the hits, continuing to strangle Avenger with her blue scarf as she jerked Avenger away from stomping on Gray's defenseless body on the ground, doing her best to reposition Avenger away from her. Yet Avenger wasn't so easily leashed. Ignoring the tightening pull on her windpipe, Avenger summoned her strength and raised one leg to crush Gray's head into paste.
Whether it was Gray's conscious will, or Add protecting his owner, it wasn't clear. Whichever the case, the bow in Gray's hands morphed into a great shield, Avenger's sabatons skittering past the smooth surface as the Servant became unbalanced from the unexpected development, her entire center of gravity swerving greatly, allowing Assassin to jerk her forward and control her like a horse to stand in front of Gray, blocking Rider's view of Gray.
With that, Assassin had essentially protected Gray while placing Avenger and Rider in a difficult position, with the restrained Avenger used an erratic meat shield against Rider, while Rider was pressured by the energy blasts from the unpredictable portals while being unable to fire on Gray unless she wanted to get hit. Though she could possibly survive several shots, she was guaranteed to hit either, considering Avenger and Assassin were blocking her way.
Above ground, Zouken left the hypnotized police to deal with the public, while he himself left for the temple to bring his targets to the ruined mansion.