051 - Fatal Battle (Part 2)

Olga Marie Animusphere

… Is this her fault?

Considering how quickly the enemy Servants went from diplomacy to violence, there's a good chance that things would've ended like this no matter what. And yet, she can't help but wonder whether the blame rests on her and her ill-chosen words.

But this isn't the time to ponder on what-ifs, not when she can feel the thrumming of adrenaline-loaded blood in her eardrums and the heat of hellish flames on her face. This isn't the time to dwell on how things went and how they could've gone. The first and only priority right now is dealing with the situation, hopefully by surviving.

Compartmentalize now, self-flagellate later.

She takes a glance at the burning battlefield. It's barely been a handful of seconds, but the situation has already degraded into pure chaos that she can't make heads or tails of. Olga is a prideful woman, sometimes needlessly so, but she's not so prideful that she'll refuse to acknowledge it when she's out of her element. Fortunately, the expert is already taking charge.

'Where do you need me, Fujimaru?'

'Delay and annoy, beating them isn't the goal here.' Haku answers immediately, voice clear and confident in spite of the dire circumstances. At least she's taking it seriously.'Just buy time for what Marie and I are cooking.'

'Delay and annoy three incredibly powerful Servants, all of them belonging to Classes with Magic Resistance?' Olga huffs, mind already whirring with thoughts and possibilities.'The day you ask for something reasonable, I'll shoot the shoddy doppelganger in the face.'

'Trust me, this would be easier if I could use Command Spells, but their timing couldn't be any worse if they had a seer writing their lines.' Haku groans in dismay.'I'm not wasting my last one unless I'm absolutely sure I have no choice.'

Bathory is doing her best to hold Lancer back, somehow managing to keep her attention in spite of the obvious difference in skill. Mashu is trying to keep herself between them and the other two and it's working for now, but the situation will become untenable the moment Archer gets bored of pelting her shield and starts moving around.

Haku and Marie stand back, clearly working whatever is supposed to get them all out of this mess. Saber is… Walking.

Olga blinks in incredulity at what she's seeing right in front of her. While the other two Servants fight, Saber seems content with simply walking towards them, sword in hand but carelessly resting on his side instead of holding a stance. It might be due to some demerit of that skill he used to open hostilities, but it sure looks like mockery from where she's looking.

He's not even walking particularly hard!

Her pride flares again, looks like she's found her target.

"Don't underestimate me."

Magic Circuits flare to life with a familiar burn as her mind finally settles into a strategy she feels confident about. The animusphere magecraft is rather flexible in its application and she has been using what she saw in Tohsaka-sensei's Workshop back in Singularity F as a reference for creative combat applications of exotic effects.

Area of effect: A six-hundred feet sphere centered around the first impact point.
…Demarcated

Target: Artificial, Conjured, Silica-based.
…Locked on.

Effect: Enforcement of coordinate displacement through the time-axis.
…Standby.

As Saber continues his casual stroll, it's not long before his feet take him to the ideal coordinates, the point of impact where his first strike collided with Marie's glass barrier and shattered it into ten million pieces, pieces that are now locked on by Olga's calculations.

"[Chrono-Shift: Return]"

From the biggest fragment to the tiniest speck of diamond dust that blew everywhere, every piece of conjured glass starts glowing a soft gold, freezing for an instant in whatever position they were at the time before rushing back to their original position.

This won't rebuild the shattered barrier, there's no component in Olga's spell that would allow the fragments to merge back into a single whole, but they are still ten million fragments rushing back to their previous locations at breakneck speeds. Ten million deadly blades closing in to the spot Saber so carelessly stepped into by his own free will.

Magic Resistance may allow a Servant to ignore spells targeting them, but it won't save them from physical tools animated through magecraft. Even the higher ranks that might simply dissipate minor spells around them will be useless here, the wicked-sharp projectiles already imparted with the kinetic energy they require to become deadly—

The shards smash together in a spectacular fashion, but they fail to draw blood. Or to hit anything at all, because there's no longer anything in their path for them to hit. Between one moment and the next, without even a blink to excuse the event, Saber has simply vanished.

The vicious smirk in her lips is wiped by a worried frown, where did he even–

"Olga, watch out!" Olga is shoved aside by a violent shove before she can even react to the call. More on instinct than anything else, she twists around mid-air to catch sight of Saber, who seems to have materialized right in front of her previous position and is now swinging his sword at a grim-faced Haku. "[Pumpkin!]"

A hefty gun tipped in an impractically large bayonet materializes in Haku's hands, barrel aimed straight at the Servant's face. The trigger is pulled what can't be more than a fraction of second before the sword makes contact, firing a blinding mass of energy that sends the Servant flying back past Mashu's defense.

After what feels like an eternity, Olga's body finally reaches the ground, but she barely registers the impact. Her heart is beating like crazy, her ears are ringing and her brain is barely catching up with the implications of what just happened. She almost died again, to a casual strike from a Servant that didn't seem even mildly inconvenienced by her efforts to hold him back.

If it wasn't for Haku…

A loud clunking noise startles her out of her thoughts, eyes snapping towards the source to see the heavy gun half-buried on the ground and already fading away like Haku's conjured weapons usually do. It's hard to tell due to the ever-present flames, but the thing seems to be smoking out heavily even as it disappears and…

There's the scent of burnt flesh in the air.

'Well, shit.' Haku muses, staring at the heavily burnt palms of her hands.'I'm not pulling that one off again anytime soon.'

'You saved my life.' Olga parrots dumbly, feeling herself incapable of looking away. 'Again.'

'Buying time now, swooning later!'

'R-Right!'

As she hurries back to her feet and forces her mind to get back into the game, she can't help but mentally kick herself at the same time. She's supposed to chastise Haku about hurting herself again, not flinch and stutter like a blushing schoolgirl!

Stupid Sexy Haku…

Elizabeth Bathory

Fighting a natural disaster with a spear is a dumb thing to do. Even if the natural disaster has a human shape, it's still a dumb thing to do. Even if the natural disaster is using a spear of her own, it's still a dumb thing to do.

Elizabeth would love to say she's barely surviving because Lancer is toying with her. Honest! She doesn't mind her opponents toying with her, she even encourages it! So, if the natural disaster would stop fighting her with all she has and take it easy since Elizabeth is so obviously outmatched, that would be grand!

She can't even lose elegantly because there's nothing elegant in being run over by a human-shaped semi-truck!

For how long was she supposed to buy time, again?

"Hieeek!" Elizabeth screeches in a panic, barely avoiding getting beheaded by tilting her head so Lancer's spear would glance against one of her horns instead. Her cute purple ribbon was lost in the process, though. "Hey! I liked that ribbon, damnit!"

"Don't worry!" Lancer answers with a wide smile on her lips, throwing a stab at Elizabeth's leg at the same time. "I'll make sure to send you to meet it back in the afterlife!"

It doesn't even sound like mockery! What's with this earnest muscle-brained battle-junkie!? And dodging the stab saved her leg, but doomed her skirt. It gets a huge tear all through the side and she needs to tear off the hanging piece so it doesn't get in the way. What's with everything attacking her clothes lately? She barely got her dress back after the attack of the perverted tentacles and she's already suffering clothing damage again! Is this an ecchi series and nobody told her? If she wanted to wear a microskirt she would be wearing one already!

The next swing from Lancer is a brutal two-handed strike that sends her flying and would've split her in half at chest-height if she hadn't managed to block with her own spear in the last minute. On second thought, please keep going for her clothes!

Unfortunately, Lancer seems to be just as interested in raising the PG rating of the fight as she was in toying with her, that is to say, not at all.

'P-san! I'm going to die!' She complains while frantically ducking under Lancer's attempt at giving her a non-chuuni excuse to wear an eyepatch.'I'm really going to die!'

For her efforts, she's rewarded with a knee strike on her chin that nearly makes her eyes tear up and sends her flying straight up. Only, it turns out that Lancer can fly even faster and is already waiting for her up there, spear held with both hands for an overhead swing. Elisabeth somehow manages to blink through the tears just in time to see it and block again at the very last second, but the impact shock is still enough to leave her arms feeling like jelly.

'Just a bit longer, hang in there a bit longer, Eli-chan!' Is P-san's unhelpful reply.'We are almost ready on our side!'

Given the circumstances, Elisabeth is desperate enough to take that non-answer as good news but, unfortunately, that's when the ground decides to be a jerk and slam into her. Ground, cold, hard, unforgiving ground. The ground seems to hate idols and— Oh, wait, the ground did nothing. It's Elizabeth who collided with it. Because Lancer is an overpowered maniac. Sorry ground, this one isn't your fault. Is that meanie Lancer's fault!

In fact just give her a moment to figure which way is up

Then a moment to find the meanie and pose dramatically…

There, thank you for waiting!

"N– Not yet! I'm not done yet!" She announces as dramatically as she can manage while covered in dust, wearing torn clothes and leaning into her spear with what's probably two broken arms to keep herself uptight. "The Performance Must Continue!"

"How persistent! I don't mind that in an opponent. But you're not fit to stop me anymore, you're not even in any state to–" The meanie cuts herself off to tilt her head away from the hooves of a crystal horse, before backhanding the thing into oblivion and resuming the conversation like nothing had even happened. "Distract me so your allies can exploit the opening anymore. I believe it is time we put an end to this."

"Indeed, Lancer." P-san's voice comes from somewhere vaguely behind Elizabeth, making her traitorous heart beat with hope in spite of the circumstances. "It's time enough."

"Oh, are you personally taking to the field? It's always convenient when the enemy general actually has the guts to fight me in person." Lancer asks, the vicious grin on her lips growing wider to reveal sharp white teeth. "And don't think I missed what you did to Saber. I can't wait to see what else you have in store."

"Yeah, I don't have any more hands to burn to the bone, so it will definitely need to be something else." P-san chuckles sheepishly, drawing Elizabeth eyes to the nasty-looking burns on both palms. When did P-san get these? What happened while Elizabeth was busy!? "But I think there's a bit of a misunderstanding here, this won't be a fight."

"Oho? Confient, are we?" Lancer challenges, looking, of course, even more eager than before. "I don't dislike that in my opponents."

"Indeed! I'm very confident in my ability to run away."

"Eh?"

"[Earth and Metal Sign: Emerald Megalopolis]"

All around them, five enormous emerald walls rise from the ground, keeping the enemy Servants outside.

Status Window Updated:

Pumpkin (Akame ga Kill!): A special kind of artifact called Teigu, hailing from a faraway land. Pumpkin is a hefty, shape-shifting gun with the adaptability required to fit various circumstances. It's real power though, is the ability to escalate in response to the danger of the situation. The more desperate the circumstances, the greater the destructive output it can generate.

There was once a nigh-unstoppable Demon Lord with the power to freeze time on a whim and kill off entire continents. It is sad that Pumpkin, and Pumpkin alone, was capable of stagger its stride before its eventual demise at the hands of a nameless hero.

Emerald Megalopolis (Touhou Project): One of the masterpieces of a certain library witch, said to have mastered alchemy and hold all the knowledge in the world. Jewel-like walls surge from the ground to impede the opponents in quick succession. The buildup is quite slow, but it can keep the enemy suppressed for a long time.

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