"So, do you want to tell me what happened between you and Kurogane-shonen?" asks Toshinori politely, as Miyu decides not to look him in the eye "Did you two fight?"

An involuntary gasp is all the confirmation he needed, but Toshinori did not press the topic right away seeing how uncomfortable the newly magical girl was, and waited for her to make the first move to speak. He had learned long ago with Jack that pressing a sensitive topic with an introverted person was not always a good idea, especially when the person in question miraculously escaped death just a few days ago.

Honestly, Miyu did not want to speak. She had run away using the power Sapphire granted her despite the wand's pleas not to, as images of her brother walking away to fight Angelica came back to her mind and overlapped with Jack. She did not want him to disappear as well. She had been found halfway by her 'guardian' as she ran off aimlessly and was shamefully lost.

They had only known each other for a couple of days; he did not need to go that far to protect her, despite the fact that in the eyes of the law they are 'brothers.' Although he had been 'influenced' by All Might and his grandmother to be more active in helping others as he had said, his way of doing things was too extreme. She doubted it was just a matter of altruism, considering some of the looks she gave him from time to time, but...no, it was just an excuse, she knew. The truth is that she hated seeing him fight for her like her older brother did the night before, and she hates even more the idea that he might die to help her.

So she sighs. Why did she phrase it that way? She...didn't want to divulge her past yet. She was not ready.

"...something like that" she admits, not knowing how to feel in this situation.

The last 48 hours had been turbulent, to say the least, and she had been carried away by the course of events, as she had not really had a chance to stop and think about all that was going on. She has yet to get used to her new dysfunctional 'family'.

The skeletal man makes a contemplative sound before nodding.

"Did Kurogane-shonen say something rude? He's never been good at expressing himself, and it's a little hard to interact with him in the beginning" Toshinori informed her "If he offended you, I can try to talk to him and set him straight a little."

[I don't think it's necessary, All Might-san. There were...several misunderstandings. I don't think Jack-sama meant anything bad during the discussion, but it was still troubling to see how insensitive he was to danger and his own safety] says Sapphire, trying to be as vague as possible to avoid making the conversation even more awkward for her master.

Hearing this, the blond man frowns.

"Well...I guess I can see what might have gone wrong then" he says, filling his glass with tea, staring at the liquid with a somewhat distant expression "Are you mad at him?"

"Of course I'm angry with-?" Miyu stops in mid-sentence.

She was, in her opinion, rightly upset with Jack. He had been unnecessarily rash and reckless, as he had judged her in turn in his insistence to fight Archer, using the card without any certainty of what would happen to him. She is angry at that, but much more angry at how little value he placed on his life which he implied it was worth less than her own and how he didn't mind receiving harm if it meant helping her...as her older brother.

Now she also felt a little dissapointed with herself. Why did she take it so hard? She had no doubt that she was right to be angry at Jack for his recklessness, but reasonably speaking, he couldn't have known about her past experiences, right? She had told him nothing but a few snippets that said little or nothing about her life before she came to this world; therefore, she could not have understood why she was so upset by his attitude in the first place.

She felt a little silly for having her lack of judgment now...

"Well, you seem to be clearer now, although I can't really say I'm surprised that it was a little difficult to interact with Kurogane-shonen. In fact, it would have been stranger the other way around" says the middle-aged man, with a somewhat sad smile "When I took him to Might Tower he was...much worse than now. He looked more like a machine than a human being. We tried everything to help him and try to make him feel normal, but...it was difficult. With All Might, we decided to open a research and development section for him, to give him responsibilities and make him interact with his colleagues. Even as a team leader he proved capable, although many left because they considered his standards 'impossible,' but that was not enough."

"...why?" asked Miyu hesitantly, realizing that she really knew nothing about her savior.

"The death of his family in the disaster almost twelve years ago, the loss of his adopted grandmother, the discrimination of society because he does not have a quirk, the people who repudiate him because of his diversity...there are many reasons, which made him act cold and distant toward everything and everyone" the undercover hero replies wearily. "Eventually even the division became a responsibility in which he thought he had to be only efficient. This then shifted to the whole tower, and he began to deal not only with costumes, but also with All Might's health, his schedule, the reports he had to send to the police, his participation in public events...the more he worked, the more he found more deep-rooted problems in the system that he then pointed out to All Might, which he also began to deal with behind the scenes but that's a story for another time" Toshinori interrupts himself, not wanting to start a heavy ideological debate when he should instead be bringing the two teenagers under his tutelage back together "The point is that Jack can be rather careless when it comes to human relations, and he might say things maybe aren't as harsh as they seem. I'm not saying he'll never make a mistake or do something stupid from now on, but try to give him the benefit of the doubt, alright? Before you get mad at him, try to figure out if what he says is what he really means, because he can be a lot more self-conscious than he gives away when he's trying to express himself."

"...Yes. I will" the 13-year-old says, with no small amount of shame.

Neither of them had experience in socializing, but she had jumped to conclusions when Jack's words apparently could have meant something other than what they seemed to mean. She would have to apologize and ask for clarification...

"Do you have a better idea of what you want to say to him now?" asks the skeleton, looking at her with an understanding smile.

Reluctantly, Miyu nodded. It sucked to feel guilty; she had never felt that kind of shame before.

At that point, Sapphire approached Miyu, giving the impression that she was leaning on her for some sort of consolation, but it was actually for another reason.

[Miyu-sama, class card]

Those three words were all she needed to realize that another had appeared. She had given no outward signs that indicated upset, but she knew she had to go now.

"Yes. I...I'm going to apologize to Jack" the young girl says getting up.

"Now?" asks Toshinori puzzled "Don't you want to have dinner first while we're at it?"

"No, I want to...apologize as soon as possible, and ask for an explanation for his actions" Miyu replies, trying to be convincing.

It was true, but not the whole reason. Should she feel guilty for telling a half-truth to the man who helped her? Living a double life was really hard...

"All right. Shall I accompany you or do you want to go back alone?"

She shakes her head.

"I will head alone."

I felt much more prepared this time. Although I had used the class card only once, time in my reality marble flowed differently, and instead of 15 minutes to me it seemed to have been almost 15 hours, in which Archer had shown me more than a thousand weapons, modified and original, that he had collected during his life as a counter guardian, and it had been a very...enlightening talk. My reality marble had many points in common with UBW, some where it exceeded it by a wide margin, others where it was more limiting.

An example of a common but different point are the limitations on creations. I can reproduce anything as long as it has a design and is based on some metal or metal alloy. This meant that I was not necessarily limited at swords, spears, halberds or bladed weapons like EMIYA. I could even recreate modern firearms, shields, armor, vehicles, mounts, and even divine constructs with ease, however, I could not create things like Gae Bolg, since the material used to build it was the remains of Curruid's skull, even though I had the blueprint used to build it. I had to modify the material of the spear to recreate it, but then it was not even comparable to the degraded version, let alone the original. It's not even worth using it as a broken phantasm, since not only did it not have the same accuracy with the reversal of randomness, but it was also too fragile. Someone with at least D in luck would most likely have gotten away with non-life-threatening injuries, since it lacked the cursed properties derived from the base material.

Paradoxically, I was able to recreate Gungnir since it is made of a metal alloy that contains Uru, a divine metal that originates from a mineral, and bring it what to the power of the original.

The second big difference is cost. In my inner world, I don't waste mana recreating all the things Emiya showed me after deploying the bounded field, because the 'metal' that makes up my world seems to fit whatever I have in mind; therefore, the cost of creations are greatly reduced, almost to zero. The only thing I pay for is the energy required to shape my creation, which is significantly cheaper than projecting a D-rank noble phantasm. Not to mention that since my creations 'exist' all the time in my reality marble, if I connect to one of my armors, I can hypothetically continue to power it by taking energy from them through the Alaya-Vijnana to replenish my mana, since it is a physical connection to the machine, even if not initially designed for that, I can continue to power it. Is that possible because it is fused with nerves, bones, muscles and everything else in the body? I don't know, but theoretically I can maintain it approximately forever, since I can simply keep jumping from armor to armor if it runs out of energy. If the theory is correct, I have at my disposal a reality marble capable of practically self-powering.

These are the key functions things we discovered by analyzing and working in there for hours.

Some of the most important projections he passed on to me are: Aestus Estus, Caliburn, Caladbolg II, Durandal, Excalibur Galatina, Excalibur, Gae Bolg, Hrunting, Joyeuse, Kanshou and Bakuya, Nine Lives and Ig-Alima, Sul-sagana, Tawrich & Zarich, Rule Breaker. With the help of EMIYA, I even recreated a metal version of Rho Aias.

It was amazing what kind of power up had fallen on my head with that class card. Now I just had to figure out how to activate it. EMIYA had absolutely no idea how to help me with that, since the activation chant was a strictly personal thing for the user, so I had to figure it out myself.

Having linked up with Archer's class card without a mystic code had had more positive effects than anything else; indeed, I was pretty sure I had assimilated Mind's eye at least, as well as having a far greater mastery of trancing and reinforcement now. The speed and efficiency of my projections, which were already good in themselves, had been sharply refined beyond what I thought was possible given the blockage I had encountered, but I don't know how much that was due to my lack of talent or Archer's experience. If it used to take me 30 seconds to project a copy of the Astrea, now it took me 5 seconds at most, with the reinforcement going up to a 60 percent increase in its base performance. Archer's skills were skills learned through experience, and our skill set is similar (equal in several aspects); so maybe that was why there were no major problems, but I had noticed after a while the influence it had on me, at least with the class card active. Was it caused by the card or Mind's Eye the attitude I had with Miyu? I had always been rather pragmatic all things considered, but never so...icy? I don't know if that was the right term, but let's go for that.

Perhaps I should apologize to her when she arrives. I currently find myself waiting for them in a random park where the class card manifested itself. Again, the disturbance caused by the short's presence had been felt quite a bit, on another level compared to Archer's, and this is quite troubling in all honesty.

"Jack"

Speaking of the devil, I hear her land as she calls out to me, dressed in her purple magical girl outfit. She didn't seem surprised to see me here, for some reason. Did she expect that I would be able to find the card on my own?

"Yo. Ready for the trial by fire?" I ask casually, as if nothing had happened.

"..." she doesn't answer and looks incredibly uncomfortable for some reason.

Was I wrong to be so casual? She was very upset this afternoon.

"My bad I-"

"I'm sorry!" she suddenly blurts out, interrupting me.

"Wait, what are you apologizing for?" I ask confused, not understanding why she was so hesitant.

"I...spoke Yagi-san about our fight, more or less, and your inability to express yourself as you should most of the time" she admits without much ado, causing my eyebrow to twitch at the indirect insult "I shouldn't have jumped to conclusions, for things I was maybe imagining...so, I wanted to apologize before I took care of the class card."

"You're not exactly wrong about the social part, but did you really have to say it so crudely?" I ask annoyed, sighing as she tilts her head in confusion "Well, maybe there was some misunderstanding; so, we'd better clear it up now before it affects our performance once we get inside."

She nods in agreement.

"...What did you mean before? By what you said this afternoon, I mean?" asks Miyu, wanting to remove any doubt.

"This afternoon? For the class card you mean?" I ask dubiously, receiving a nod of assent "Exactly what I meant, although what I had in mind may have come out a bit harsher than I intended. Archer is a pretty paranoid and pragmatic guy, much more so than I am."

[Why do you talk as if you have met him?] asks Sapphire with a mixture of curiosity and concern.

"Because I met him, when I merged with the class card" I reply with a shrug, as if it were a normal thing "I already said it this afternoon, remember? When I used the install command we found ourselves in my reality marble talking. Apparently he didn't even know he was called back from the throne of heroes and put in there. Since our abilities are similar, he offered me some tips and tactics, as well as his noble phantasm to use for the foreseeable future."

Miyu stares at me with a blank stare, not knowing how to take what I just said.

[Hasn't he thrown too much important information all at once?!] asks the distraught, panicked wand [Does he have a reality marble?! Is the heroic spirit conscious?! What do you mean Archer passed his noble phantasm to him! They are not things that can simply be given away like a common object!]

"Calm down" I say, feeling a drop of sweat fall from the back of my neck, seeing how the usually calm mystic code had gone into a panic "Anyway, to answer in order: Yes, I have one; yes, he was conscious when we talked in my reality marble, but he doesn't feel anything that happens at the class card and in the outside world; finally: yes, he passed me the noble phantasm he had. From what I found out, my reality marble contains all my creations and projects. Having seen the ones he passed me, I could scan them with structural analysis and recreate them there; so, now I can just project them whenever I want while the originals are inside my soul."

[...Impossible. It is not possible to recreate noble phantasm with gradation air. They are conceptually too heavy and prana-consuming to do, not to mention that the world would have to reject them!] says Sapphire, her voice filled with so many mixed emotions that I'm worried I've broken it somehow.

"Well, normally that would be the case, but this is not such thing for me. My magical abilities are influenced by my origin, the element I am related to and my reality marble. With structural analysis and my version of gradation air I can see and project everything, not only the form and substance of an object, but also its entire history" I reveal to the mystic code "From the process of its creation until it was destroyed. All the techniques used by its users, their specialties, the experience they have accumulated, all their lives. The reason this is possible is because of the nature of my reality marble, which at a glance records the history, composition and design of what I see, and then provides the materials needed to reproduce them. This is the only magic I have been granted."

[...I will need a few moments to metabolize this] murmurs Sapphire, becoming incredibly quiet.

"So that's why you installed the class card?" asks Miyu coming to the conclusion.

"Yes, that was the other half of the reason. I not only wanted to test the install and see if it was safe for you, but also to try to copy Archer's abilities" I confessed without too much trouble. Emiya Shirou had succeeded in Miyu's world, partly because he and Archer were the same person from two different timelines; therefore, in addition to his abilities he had also inherited some of his superhuman abilities. I honestly wasn't sure whether it would work with me or not, and in a way it did, although to a drastically lesser degree "As much as I hate to admit it, if he had had even an ounce of reason yesterday, I would have lost. That Archer doesn't have very high parameters per se, so he compensates with his absurd amount of weapons, strategies and plans usually, which allowed him to easily take on opponents who would normally overpower him. He had no access for obvious reasons to those skills when I fought him, yet I was almost defeated anyway. It was obvious to me since broadly speaking we tend to use similar approaches in the foundations, but he was the fastest way to get stronger for me" I open my armor and go out to pull out Archer's class card, then hand it to Miyu "When you use 'include' only the bow pops up, but during the install you blend in with Archer temporarily acquiring all his skills and the knowledge to use them. I don't need it anymore since merging with him sharpened my skills; so, use it yourself if you need to. With Sapphire you should not be affected emotionally and mentally by the heroic spirit you use as happened to me yesterday, nor should there be any residual effects as there were this afternoon. Keep in mind that when you install it you can stay transformed for up to 15 minutes if you use it in combat before the card has to cool down, and every ability you use affects your body. Using a noble phanstam will require considerable effort even with Sapphire supporting you; so be careful how and when you use it."

The magical girl takes the card and looks at it sharply.

"I didn't understand exactly everything you explained, but I have an idea of your abilities now. Thank you for trusting me, and telling me all this" Miyu says sincerely, with a hint of a smile on her lips.

"We are in this together, whether you like it or not; therefore, I gave you all the information you needed to fight together with me" I shrug, reflexively stroking her head.

"!" she blushes when I do "N-don't, please, it's embarrassing..." she whines.

"Cute" I say with an amused smirk, making her blush even more "Sapphire, do you want to stay over much longer or do you want to start doing your work? We don't exactly have all the time in the world, you know?" I reply at the wand as I reenter Astrea, who was still grumbling to herself. Poor thing, I almost feel guilty now...

[...Parameters imaginary numbers added to the fifth binding variable. Preparing for inversion. Confirmed presence of multiple spaces. Stabilization of reference coordinates completed. Partial reversal of connections to the reflected world] her voice still sounds a little moribund, but at least she was concentrating.

So we moved into the mirror world, but unlike last time, we were not attacked on sight.

I had changed my equipment a bit this time. Having a whole new arsenal to support me, I had prepared a weapon capable of inflicting huge damage with both normal and noble phantasm projectiles. ARC-920 is made from the same material as Archer's bow. I honestly don't know if it was a huge cosmic joke or something, but it is made of E-Carbon, an artificial allotrope of carbon. Besides being lightweight, it is highly resistant to both temperature changes and corrosion compared to existing metallic materials. As a result, it is considered a material with no weaknesses (compared to the rest of terrestrial materials at least). Despite being one of the most advanced materials available, the one used to create the Archer arc is a much more advanced and reinforced version that is up to tens of times stronger than carbon nanotubes, due to a more uniform spin at the molecular level. This can be further improved by applying reinforcement, which makes the material strong enough to allow it to shoot broken phantasm.

The Asymmetric Recoilless Carbine-920 (ARC-920), also known simply as the Railgun, is a compact channel linear accelerator weapon created and modified to be capable of properly firing even Broken Phantasm as well as projectiles and explosive charges. At 210 centimeters long and weighing nearly 180 kilograms, this portable railgun can fire up to Mk-10 velocities, with a range of nearly 50 kilometers. The ARC-920 uses a pair of parallel conducting rails to accelerate its projectiles. A large electric current flows from one rail into the projectile and then into the other rail; the electromagnetic effects of this interaction accelerate the projectile to immense speed. The rifle requires a short reloading period before firing highly explosive rounds accelerated to an incredible speed. The explosive yield contained in the bullet adds to the kinetic force of the impact. Seeing it, Archer had been disappointed, because the bullets, in addition to having a much higher throw could also go faster if I reinforced the Railgun with magic. I had rather quickly found a way to condense the Broken Phantasm into bullets rather than arrows, which had made it possible for me to increase the magazine capacity from 1 to 4 rounds, which I could fire with a delay of only 7 seconds from each other, rather than the 30 he needed to achieve that shooting power.

This weapon is perfect and anti-theft, because the recoil would pulverize the bones of the idiot who would try to use it (unless he is All Might, or someone with that level of strength, but at that point it would do him no good to use it) and most importantly, it needed a larger energy source than anything most quirks could provide. In addition, it does not have a built-in sight, so if unfortunately someone managed to steal it from me and use it with its restrictions, the thief would still be very limited in its use since I rely heavily on my personal skills with firearms and the Astrea's targeting systems to use it. My maximum range, without external devices or programs to increase accuracy, is only 15 kilometers, so currently I could not even exploit the ARC-920 to its fullest.

However, to carry it I necessarily needed support, so the bit-staves are joined on my left arm to form a shield, while on my back I had an additional back pack to attach the ARC to it and a second container for Excalibur. Since I could not simply carry it around, I had prepared a special case to block its presence and prevent anyone from detecting it. On my right forearm, on the other hand, there is attached a GN-sword with a built-in repulsor, just in case there was someone tonight who could nullify magic in some way, as Gae Dearg does, which would also render my projections useless. I had also replaced the outer armor of the Astrea with one made of E-Carbon, although the frame was still made of titanium with tungsten reinforcements. The new frame will be ready in a day or two at most.

"New equipment?" asks Miyu, looking curiously at the Railgun.

"Yes. Basically, it has to do what Archer does, but much better" seeing how she tilted her head doubtfully, I couldn't help but want to pat her "You'll understand when you use the card"

"Mn" she makes an affirmative sound, deciding to verify it later.

The moment of calm was just a foretaste of the storm, literally. The wind began to howl before turning into a violent blast of air.

[Kaleidoshield deployment!] instantly understanding Miyu's intention, the wand diverts all energy to the prismatic dome that has enveloped us as the typhoon sweeps away everything it encounters.

"Kaleidoshield? Isn't that a bit obvious?" I ask the wand, hearing the name shouted by the wand during activation.

[As Kaleidostick Sapphire, I demand that the names of special moves have at least part of my name in them] immediately denies Sapphire, with some emphasis I might add.

"This is not the time" Miyu admonishes us impassively, keeping her gaze on the eye of the storm, which after a few more moments has finally begun to calm its fury, allowing us to glimpse the figure at its epicenter.

Inside, there is a tall and evidently shapely woman covered from head to full in heavy black armor, obscured by a thick cloud of black mana, holding an equally black chariot spear with blood-red spikes coming out of it.

"Well...fuck" I mutter, seeing the monstrous statistics of that thing, to say the least.

Seriously, what is wrong with this world! If Artoria is a lancer, what happened to Cu Chulainn! Who is saber?! How the fuck do we destroy something like that! No, wait, take it easy. This Artoria for some reason doesn't have its mount; so, it should be easy to get out of its range and stop it from reaching us, especially since we can fly. I can use my Railgun to shoot broken Phantasm at it and keep it away. I am more than sure that we would not even have a chance if it gets close.

"Miyu, let's fly away, now!" I warn her, grabbing her by the arm, the GN condensers humming as I fly like a splinter into the sky, putting nearly four kilometers of distance between us in no time, not even waiting for her to finish manifesting.

"Aren't we going to fight her?" the younger girl asked puzzled a bit dazed by the sudden movement, causing me to shake my head as I landed on top of a three-story house near the park.

The mirror word area is far larger now, for some reason, although I don't know if the cause is Lancer or is coincidence, although I wouldn't believe it even with the evidence in front of me.

"In a short-range engagement we don't even stand a chance. We probably couldn't even scratch it" I immediately deny, while with a mental command the Astrea's mechanical arm hands me the ARC-920.

[This heroic spirit is on a completely different level than last night, please pay attention!] the wand warns us [Jack-sama, do you have any idea who it is?]

I smile a little when I see that despite her attitude earlier, she was actually listening carefully and taking note of my abilities to help us make plans.

"Yes, it's King Arthur in the lancer class, wields Rhongomyniad instead of Excalibur, and in terms of raw power they are almost on par" I warn them, as I plot some Hrunting bullets and load them into the Railgun "The plan is simple. For now I'll use broken phantasms to destabilize her, while you install Archer and wait for me to finish breaking her defense for a direct hit" I say, setting myself well in position and aiming at the enemy "Archer's most powerful shield is Rho Aias, if any hits come our way for some reason parry them with that. When I've finished the magazine use his bow to fire Caladaborg II at her. Don't worry too much about how to do it, with the Install you will have all his knowledge thrust into your head; so, wait for the right moment to finish her off."

"Install!" without questioning my words, she uses the card and her dress changes.

The lower part of her Archer form was the same as Illya's, but the upper part was a little different. Her right arm is uncovered, using her sleeve as a scarf, while her breastplate became a black armored bra with silver trim, leaving her back completely exposed. Her hair is held in a bun with two sticks at the back of her head. Basically a design somewhere between Illya and Kuro.

I do not wait for some further confirmation that she is ready, I pull the trigger and the railgun hums as it absorbs energy from the Astrea through electromagnetism to power itself. As the blackened servant was about to launch itself at us, the first shot goes off. The roof below us cracks from the recoil and a blue-orange flash flashes in the night as Hrunting burns the air and flies toward lancer when it tries to charge.

She was forced to stop to parry the blow. Artoria uses the spear for a lunge, whirling the wind around it. Rhondomyniad's point collided with Hrunting's, a very violent wave ripping buildings and trees for some seventy meters. There was a lot of resistance, sparks flew everywhere, and the projectile even knocked the corrupted servant back a couple of meters on impact before it managed to stabilize; however, mine is a broken phantasm. After a while its power runs out, shattering, even releasing a small shockwave.

This was not a problem, however, because I had enough time to load the second shot, which I fired without hesitation to prevent the Servant from having a chance to recover. The second projectile-Hrunting is again intercepted, although Lancer had not fully recovered from the previous shot. Eventually, the second bullet also breaks, along with the balance of the Storm King.

Only to be replaced by the third, even more devastating projectile. Artoria used Strike Air this time because she was vulnerable. A tornado exploded around her, causing a ruckus. Houses, roads and vegetation were uprooted from the ground for a couple of hundred meters and disintegrated by the air pressure, which effortlessly ground them down. It was not enough to stop Hrunting, which with some difficulty pierced the wall of wind; however, that one and a half seconds had given Artoria a chance to get back on her feet and destroy the oncoming arrow. The explosion threw her off balance again.

I fire the last shot into the magazine without a hint of hesitation, and it was at that moment that Lancer used Mana burst and Protection of the Ends of the World to its fullest capacity. The cloud of black mana ignites violently and stabs Hrunting with all its might. The broken Phantasm breaks more easily and explodes, but at that point her knees give way and she is pushed away.

"Miyu!"

"Mn!" by stringing the arrow she had prepared.

Red lightning bolts burst on Caladbolg II as she finished her charge, only to be fired by my partner without a second's hesitation. The arrow flies toward lancer like a shooting star, who, now helpless, is struck in the chest by the arrow. The place glows white for a few frames before a red dome-shaped explosion illuminates the night. The shock wave, though not very strong, can be felt even from our location, despite the fact that we are almost 4 kilometers away, also raising a large cloud of dust.

[Did we make it?] Sapphire asks, in the form of a heart-shaped pendant hanging around Miyu's neck.

There was a few seconds of silence, incredibly uncomfortable and full of tension, as I zoomed in with my armor cameras to check the enemy's status.

Seriously, I like how I can simultaneously use technology and magic so smoothly, blending them together perfectly. Unfortunately, what I found I didn't like at all instead.

"Really?" I murmur rather uncomfortably, when from what I was seeing.

With all the broken phantasm I shot at her, plus a direct hit from Caladbolg is all we took off her? We had destroyed her helmet, the armor on her right arm, ruined her armored skirt and part of her breastplate, which exposed the underside of her large cleavage. But beyond that? She has no visible wounds; in fact, she was already healing. As with Archer, her regeneration is not exactly instantaneous since a command seal is not used, but it was disconcerting to see her recover within seconds. What's worse, is that unlike EMIYA, Artoria can continue like this for much longer because of her magic core, and it is likely that she will kick our ass if she comes close.

"What's going on?" asked Miyu, realizing that something was wrong.

"We wounded her, but she has already almost fully recovered" I answer uneasily, drawing new bullets to load the Railgun.

[Can it regenerate?] the mystic code asks a little worriedly, and I nod.

"It seems to be an ability of theirs, I suppose? Normally a servant can recover instantly or even resurrect with command seals, but these emanations seem to be able to use their mana to regenerate quickly" I confirm "And unlike Archer, Lancer has fuel to burn again..."

To say at the very least it is on par with my armor in terms of energetic, but unlike me it does not use an alternator to generate mana; therefore, it will take time to exhaust all its power. Unfortunately, something had happened that we did not expect. A spike of magical power and a black wind shook the mirror word, marking the activation of Rhongomyniad. Even with her parameters lowered by a rank, she is still a B++ grade anti-fortress noble phatasm, and she doesn't seem at all intent on holding back, especially when with her skills she seems to have pumped it up enough to tick off an additional '+'. At this distance it shouldn't have been a problem to dodge, and when I moved to do so, Mind Eye literally yelled at me at full volume about the mistake I was about to make. I didn't ask myself many questions, and immediately changed my plan.

"Shields, now!" I order with some panic, seeing her point her spear at us "Rho Aias!"

"Rho Aias" once again, trusting me, Miyu deploys her shield.

Just like that of the nameless servant, it takes the form of a field bounded by seven layers in the shape of an iridescent flower, in reference to the rucola speronella flower that bloomed from Aias's blood as he died. Rho Aias of Miyu, on the other hand, has four petals, appearing right in front of mine.

That was a problem. Rho Aias is an A+ defensive noble phantasm, but due to traicing it is downgraded to B+ (in my case, the downgrade was derived more to the inability to faithfully recreate it in my reality marble, forcing me to use Archer's delimited field which costs me more than normal since it is not made of metal). With such a defense, my bounded field would be able to parry the blows of most spears, as Archer had said, since the petals of Rho Aias have practically the defensive power of a fortress. The problem is that the spear of the Storm King/Lion King is not one of them. If Miyu's also had 7 petals, together we could have almost completely deflected the damage since lancer's noble phantasm is degraded due to the corrupted manifestation even though her stats are almost on par with the original at this point, but her projection loses 35% of defense due to the lack of 3 petals. This will not be enough to stop Rhongomiyad's overwhelming power.

A reddish-black tornado flies toward us, breaking the speed of sound and crashing into us with alarming force.

"Kuh!?" Miyu is pushed back by the sudden impact, unable to keep her balance, but quickly I move behind her to support her.

"As soon as your shield breaks, uninstall Archer and raise the barrier as hard as you can!" I order, firing up the thrusters to prevent us from being pushed further away, since with the house below id swept away, we were with our feet on the ground and our backs against the wall, literally and figuratively since we were almost at the edge of the mirror word.

"Mn!" again, she agrees without asking too many questions. Not that there is time for that.

Rho Aias' last petal gives way quickly and crashes with mine, making me gasp when I feel the push behind it, even worse than when I grabbed the magical girl. It lasted only about thirty seconds, and Miyu had time to restore her prana thanks to Sapphire before raising a Grade A magical barrier, which obviously could not withstand a direct hit from a noble phantasm.

"Jack-!" she grunts, when after a handful of seconds the blue bubble has begun to crack.

Hearing the warning I reinforced the Bit-staves and with a mental command they disengaged and arranged themselves in the shape of a shield in front of us. The last remnants of Miyu's magical power were exhausted, and the barrier crumbled the last remnants of Noble Phantasm's energy collided with the last defense we had left. I had also modified, like the nanolaminate armor, the coating on my drones, making them magic-resistant, although the absurd power of the corrupted sacred spear was putting a strain on the anti-magic shield, which was beginning to destabilize because of the immense heat it emits, which was beginning to melt the paint. Fortunately, the energy in the lancer attack ran out moments before my defense gave out.

The drones eventually explode and fall to the ground, almost in pieces. If it had been a direct hit, they wouldn't have been enough.

[Miyu-sama!]

I quickly shift my gaze to the girl I was supporting when she suddenly falls to her knees, panting, and I can immediately see her empty energy reserves that were being rapidly replenished by the kaleidostick. Her magical girl's dress ruined and scorched. On her were several wounds in the form of abrasions, cuts and blood here and there. Definitely minor wounds caused by the use of Rho Aias not yet healed because she had directed all the prana she could manage to the shields, since in exchange for the incredible defense she possesses she reflects some of the damage back to the user, as well as requiring mana after casting for every second of use.

I had not suffered any injuries because the damage had all fallen on the Astrea, which, however, had its structural integrity practically halved now.

I look around, seeing that the wake left by the noble phantasm was nearly a hundred meters wide. If I had decided to dodge, with the speed with which the blow came...

A second surge of energy is felt from the same position, causing me to shift my gaze toward our enemy.

[Can she shoot again?!] gasps Sapphire in horror [Miyu-sama, quickly, we must escape! Archer's class card is getting cold, we won't stand a second shot without it, and her wounds haven't healed yet!]

"Kuh!" she tries to get up, but I put my hand on her shoulder and let her sit up. She looks at me confused, but I ignore her.

Did she stop regeneration to feed Rhongomyniad? Her mana production seems to have dropped by a third after using Rhongomiyad, but she had already used strike air three times so far. If Protection of the Ends of the World gave her a boost that dramatically decreased the cost of her Noble phantasm, it is probably because of statistical luck that she did something. We know that she can fire at least twice now, but if she has accumulated so much power after a few days, if we wait even a day or two longer, in addition to recovering she could accumulate even more power and make a second class card manifest as happened in canon with Caster and Saber. We cannot fight a second enemy if we clash with her. We have to end it now.

"If you want to save her, you will accept the sword. Even if it means ceasing to be human by wielding it."

"So that was it, huh" I murmur a little annoyed and bitter as the words of an annoying succubus ring in my ears.

Having reached this point, I am sure that Excalibur's arrival had not been an accident. Since I could not open my reality mable, I had no access to weapons that could match or repel Rhongomyniad, nor could I copy the sacred spear because of the wind surrounding it at this distance. The only one that could do it was Excalibur image, but I couldn't track it out here, since my circuits wouldn't hold the strain even with the Astrea to supply me. She knew we would be dead next time if I didn't have something to defend us with today, and she gave me a hand for this single time, probably.

No, it is much more plausible that Merlin knew perfectly well the Lancer identity, probably the other class cards as well, but she still hadn't told me anything because otherwise I would have prepared in advance and refuse Excalibur. She would surely have dragged me in some other way, but it seems that the holy sword is a requirement for some reason. Now I also doubt that she could not see that threat she told me about, or that she did not know anything about it. Surely she was not lying about the extent of her power, but she was at this point equally sure that she had withheld a lot of vital information to follow her agenda. It is an irritating habit that every single Merlin I have seen have of keeping important information of their prophecies secret...

I open Excalibur's container and grasp it, while activating the trans-am and reinforcing both myself and the Astrea to resist recoil. I knew it would not be enough, but at least I would not die from unfulfilled usage requirements. It would take a minimum of a D statistic in STR, DEX, and END to release its true name, and I fall just short of the minimum threshold.

[Jack-sama what's-]

Ignoring Sapphire's confusionI step out of the circle Miyu was preparing to take us away from here as Astrea begins to direct the raw mana into the sword handle, absentmindedly noticing that it emits a strange buzzing sound and the fae letters on it flash.

As soon as a particle of mana touches the handle, Excalibur's sacred aura floods the surrounding area, exposing its presence to the world once again as I begin to remove the seals.

"Thirteen seals, decision start" I whisper, as figures appear around me. I felt like gazes on me, watching me, waiting to judge me "Bedivere, Palamedes, Lancelot, Mordred, Galahad, Gaheris, Kay"

"This is a battle against a being stronger than me. Approved."

"The battle must be one-on-one. Approved."

"The enemy must not be an elemental. Approved."

"The battle must be one against evil. Approved."

"...The battle must not involve personal gains. Approved."

"The battle must not be against Humanity. Approved."

"The battle must not be inhumane. Approved."

If I had to be completely honest, I wasn't sure Galahad would answer the call. I'm a rather selfish and greedy person in many ways, I don't care about almost anyone besides a few people and I tend to do things just for my own whims practically, but I had also decided to take part in this hunt because a lot of people would have died if I hadn't. I wanted to defeat Artoria in order to protect Miyu, since I didn't particularly care about strangers I had never met, but it was also a necessary thing for the reform plan I was preparing for the society. so if I didn't defeat Lancer here, there was a very real risk that a second class card would wake up, and at that point we wouldn't be able to stop them. The mirror word would not have been enough to hold back both Lancer and Rider, if the order in which they manifest is the same. I was navigating a gray area, and Galahand must have decided that I was still within parameters because of the situation, despite my initial hesitation.

"Sacred sword, release!"

The blade glows gold, and the fairy letters glow as the limiters are removed, surrounding it with a faint energy that dances like a flame around the sword. I raise it above my head as hundreds of thousands of lights emerge from the ground around us and are absorbed by the sword. I feel the maximum charge reached in just three seconds, a column of light erupts from Last Phantasm.

"Ex-"

After an initial stunned moment, Lancer emerges from her tranny and releases her Noble Phantasm once again. This time, I was not nervous seeing the black tornado approaching. My mind is calm, confident that I can pull this off.

"-calibur!"

I swing the sword downward, and the blade of light slices through Rhongomyniad's black cloud with almost no resistance, making its way toward the enemy. With her remaining mana, she could not maintain a strength fight for long, especially once released the truly named Proto-Excalibur, which unlike Artoria's Excalibur did not amplify its power, but used its own depending on the limiters released. The Astrea has about 700,000 mana units available thanks to the Alternator, I had used almost half of that to release seven restrictions and the sword's real name, which already at six can use its classic anti-fortress attack. One thing that immediately jumped out at me in these few seconds was that with each restriction removed my sword's power doubles.

Having literally almost twice the power of Rhongomyniad, Excalibur's light unstoppably continues its advance by picking up speed and mowing down the corrupted servant. The shockwave emitted by the crash wipes out everything around us, while the immense heat emitted by the light heats the ground to the point of creating a whole new canyon as it sends fiery debris flying everywhere. Eventually, an exploding column of light emerges from it, in shaking heaven and earth with its force.

Eventually, Excalibur's power was too much to handle, and the mirror word collapses, shattering and bringing us back to the real world.

The deafening silence has been replaced by the murmur of the night, when the space around us finally settles back into place.

"The mirror word...?" asks shocked Miyu, looking around to make sure she is not hallucinating

"Are you okay?" I ask a bit stiffly actually, as I tried not to give the impression that I was using Excalibur as a crutch to lean on "Note to myself, watch out with such expensive weapons, my circuits still feel it" I murmur a bit painfully, feeling the effects of the usage on my sore body.

Using mana had never been a problem before, but in the middle of the battle, projecting Rho Aias I had felt my magic circuits overheat as they never had before. They seemed on the verge of burning my arm from the inside out, since technically I was limited to taking power from the reactors through the physical link between me and the armor and then using it myself, but the amount of power used was ten times more than I could even produce. When I used Excalibur? It felt like my body was going to tear, not because of the circuits, since the sword seems to be able to absorb mana from any source it touches to unlock the seals, so even from Astrea, but because of the absurd recoil. Now it is no surprise that Artoria could not use hers with one arm, it is simply insane the strain it puts on the body to use it. The Astrea's Frame took so much damage despite the fact that I had boosted it with reinforcement to reach the parameters, it looked like it was going to fall apart.

"Oh, sure I heard it too, guys" I see Miyu stiffen when an unfamiliar voice speaks from above us "Are you okay? Your magical girl partner doesn't look good. What were you guys up to at such a late hour?"

I look up, to see who it is, and find a magical girl in pink floating above us, with a curious look on her face. She is a beautiful girl; she looks in her late teens with black hair tied back in two tails and blue eyes. She also has a rather slim body despite her big breasts, about 5'6". She wears a pink magical girl's dress with white hints here and there, like on the sleeves, collar or hips, along with thigh-high pink and black stockings.

"Ah, shit..." I couldn't help but curse. With everything that had happened in the last 48 hours, all that was missing was her...

"Language!" she admonishes me with a frown, before shifting her gaze to Miyu, who had taken a defensive stance when I cursed, realizing that she was technically not an acquaintance of mine "Nice to meet you . I am the Maou Shojou Serafall Leviathan . Call me Levia-tan " she introduced herself by doing a cute pose.

Unfortunately, Miyu not being of this world does not recognize her, even by hearsay.

"Who?" asks the real magical girl completely unconcerned and in the dark, almost tripping the satan of external affairs.

"Mnn? How strange, you were fighting what I assume was a class card in the mirror word, right? You have Ruby-chan's sister, yet you don't know about the supernatural?" asks Serafall skeptically.

"!"

[...do you know about nee-san?] inquires Sapphire hesitantly, speaking up after her sister was mentioned [How did you meet her, and where is she now?]

"Come on, don't be so suspicious Sapphire-chan! Actually Ruby-chan asked me to help her collect class cards" Serafall announced bluntly "She crashed a couple of days ago into my hotel actually."

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO-" a horrified scream that could make Cthulhu wet shakes the 5-star hotel violently, along with the entire neighborhood.

"Come on So-tan, we can be real magical girls together! Imagine miracle Levi-tan and magical kaleid Ruby fighting evil together! Everyone will love it!" the Satan enthusiastically says, seeing her sister desperately trying to snatch the kaleidostick from her hand.

"Yes! I look forward to cooperating with you, So-tan, Levi-tan!" replied Ruby cheerfully "It's amazing though, who knew there were other magical girls in this dimension?"

"Ah...ahah..." the laughter of the mentally scarred Sona draws the attention of the other two presences in the room "Y-yeah, it makes sense now. This must be a horrible nightmare. There is no other explanation. If I kill myself now I can definitely wake up!"

"NO, SO-TAN!"

"After that So-tan had a nervous breakdown and I had to put her to sleep to keep her from committing suicide!" concluded Serafall, as if there was a happy ending in what she said.

Miyu, Sapphire, and I look at her like she's crazy, and honestly, doubt is really forming in my mind before I shake my head and accept that this is simply Serafall. There is no point in trying to give some things logic, I would simply end up losing my mind otherwise. Not to mention that I am moderately sure (or rather, I want to hope) that her attitude is just an act to seem nice or stupid to people and make everyone let their guard down.

"Thank you for finding me" replies Miyu immensely grateful, looking at me as if I were the Messiah.

[I will have to apologize to this 'So-tan' when I meet her. Nee-san can be...too enthusiastic sometimes about her passions] murmurs the wand in Miyu's hand, who was still on the defensive.

"To answer your question from earlier: Miyu was introduced to magic yesterday, while I know the most basic things since my grandmother ran a home for yokai, although I haven't interacted with almost anyone until now besides a few elders who needed a hand with something at the temple. This is the first time I've met a devil in person" I confess, in a sense telling the truth. After all, I know the supernatural from hearsay, and while I had read and seen things about her or devils, it was really the first time I had seen Serafall in person "So...you haven't told us what you're doing here. Is your sister still with Ruby and was she looking for class cards?" I ask curiously, bringing attention back to the subject, hoping to get another ally soon, considering how everything almost went to hell tonight.

I didn't want nor could I rely solely on Excalibur to get me out of trouble at this point. It is an absurdly powerful weapon, but now that I know that being in the mirror world does no good if I use it and everyone can hear it, if word gets out that I have something like that on my hands I would have every single faction and Kokabiel at the very least tacking my ass down, since in the canon he stole almost all the shards to try to cause a war, and an additional artifact that powerful will only fortify his plan for chaos. Right now, my most powerful weapons are Caladborg and Hrunting as broken phantasms until I can figure out how to use my reality marble, and as I found tonight, they are not always enough to defeat a weakened servant. If that had been the real Artoria Alter she would have decimated me in two in less than 5 seconds probably.

Until Ruby finds a magical girl to help with, even someone as weak as Sona would be a help, because let's face it, until Saji recovered all the pieces of Vritra and her peerage received the artificial sacred gear from the Grigori, she lacked any shade of sufficient firepower to put 80% of his plans into action without outside help, unless conditions were heavily in her favor. Not to mention that she still should lack at least half of the pieces she had at the beginning of the canon.

Which leads to the second problem: Is Musutafu the replacement for Kuoh/Fuyuki? Will the events of DxD take place here, or is it a coincidence that Serafall is in the city where the most important school in Japan is located? I don't believe in coincidences, and if I had to calculate the odds, I am more inclined to think that Sona and Rias will come to study here, and that Serafall was in town to enroll them, as well as make arrangements with the local factions to avoid messes during their stay.

"As nice as it would have been, unfortunately not. When she woke up So-tan refused to leave the room until Ruby left to find another partner" she comments a little disappointed, who for some reason really expected Sona to have indulged her sister with all her magical girl bullshit. It makes me wonder if this is also part of the character she has built up, or does she really believes it "Anyway, I'm here to enroll her in school, since she wanted to attend one in the human world. How about you guys? Are you in Musutafu just for class cards?"

"No, we live there" I reply seemingly normal, but internally annoyed by all the problems that would come in a few years with the Maou's confirmation.

"Mnnn, okay, how about meeting tomorrow at my hotel? I've made arrangements with the Yokai and Shinto faction so that they wouldn't cause trouble for So-tan and the devils who are coming to study during the new school year; so, we might as well do it with the magus in the area as well" she says, nodding to herself for some reason "Anyway, how about we continue the conversation tomorrow? Sapphire-chan's master looks pretty rehearsed from whatever happened tonight, while Robo-chan looks like she's about to collapse at any moment. I wouldn't want to keep you up too long, you look like you really need to rest."

"That's fine with me. What do you think Miyu?" I ask the real magical girl, who had meanwhile retrieved Lancer's class card.

"...I agree. Better to avoid any misunderstandings from the start" she agrees wearily.

"Well, then it was a pleasure to meet you my friend magical girl ! You too mysterious mechanical helper ! See you tomorrow !" after greeting with a cheerful pose, she takes off and leaves.

"...See, this is how you fly."

Miyu's eye visibly twitches, before giving me the flattest expression I had ever seen on her face.

"She didn't tell us where to meet, how do we find her?" she asks, pretending to ignore the comment from earlier.

"There are only 7 5-star hotels in Musutafu, I will check their occupied list and meet you tomorrow afternoon" I reply with a shrug.

"Not in the morning?" she asks tilting her head in confusion.

"Do you already want to skip school from the first day? Wow...I didn't think you were such a rebellious magical girl."

My dry humor is completely ignored as Miyu realizes that the weekend is over and she has school tomorrow.