I strained my eyes as much as I dared to. I tried to find some way to explain this away, to find some reason to doubt what I'm seeing right in front of me.

Nothing.

All signs pointed to this being a reality.

The fog the three were emitting was already a dead giveaway.

My hand twitched, ready to rip open a portal straight the fuck out of here. This was an unwinnable situation, and one that made more and more sense.

Why was the White Whale so difficult to kill? Despite having people like Astrea?

Maybe because there were more than one. That maybe, in the past, a White Whale was killed, but not before others of its kind swooped in and killed those people in return.

"Hikigaya!"

Natsuki shouting almost didn't register, until the kid rode up next to me on top of a black ground dragon. He looked just as pale as I felt. Along with him came the rest of the Emilia camp, Karsten herself, and the rest of her inner circle.

The other soldiers Karsten brought with her were more or less statues. Not that I could blame them. I was more or less in the same situation.

Thankfully, the Whales were just floating there at the moment. I didn't know why, but I wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

"What the hell do we do?!" Natsuki was panicking as he dismounted the dragon. Hah. Guess that clairvoyance of his didn't let him see that there were three fucking Whales.

"Go home." I bluntly stated. My body protested as I opened another portal. I was reaching my limits by this point, but I could handle a bit of pain if it let me, and whoever followed me, out of this shitshow, "There's nothing we can do. Trying to fight those things is suicide of the highest order."

"I-Wha-No!" I was about to step through the portal, whose destination I didn't even consciously know. All I knew was that it led to somewhere that wasn't here, "If we leave now, then these things are all gonna head towards the mansion!"

"Then we evacuate the mansion, and the village, and everyone there."

Honestly, that's what we should have done in the first place.

Between me and Beatrice, we could probably set up portals to get everyone out of there in a matter of minutes. That would have been the most logical solution. We didn't need to fight the damn Whale at any point in time.

I'm a fucking moron for not even thinking of that alternative.

"You people joining me?" I took a glance at the assembled Karsten camp. I had a feeling that I already knew their answers, but I wanted to know for certain.

The green haired woman shook her head, her face a rictus of determination, "I have to decline, Hikigaya. I don't think I need to explain why."

"I appreciate your help, Hikigaya-dono, and I won't disparage your decision, whatever it may be."

"I ain't leaving Wilhelm and Lady Crusch, you knyow that, right Hikiganya?"

"...suit yourselves." I grimaced as I turned away from them. Just as I thought, they weren't going to give this up. They couldn't. As Karsten said, she didn't need to tell me why.

It was simple politics and public opinion.

If Karsten were to return without the head of the White Whale - or at least one of them - she'd essentially be branded a coward by the entire population. Chivalry and bravery, while in no way practiced by a significant part of the knights of Lugunica, was still a very prominent aspect of the kingdom's opinion on said knights.

Karsten portrayed herself as a military leader. Argyle was a knight. Wilhelm Astrea was the Sword Demon.

To run away now would taint that image. She would practically be throwing out her chances to win the Royal Selection.

Her entire purpose would be reduced to less than nothing.

"Subaru? Are you alright?" I let my gaze slide over onto the Emilia camp. Natsuki was on his hands and knees now, bowing onto the ground.

Did he finally realize that this was a fool's errand? Maybe.

"Emilia, grab him and we'll go." I shrugged. If Natsuki was going to be like that, then I see no reason not to just leave.

"NO!" With surprising speed, he tried to practically tackle me, "CLOSE THE PORTAL!"

"What the fuck are you doing?" I groused out with annoyance. His attempted tackle didn't amount to much as I moved to the side. Natsuki whipped his head around, eyes wider than when we'd first seen the three Whales.

"PLEASE! CLOSE THE PORTAL!"

I narrowed my eyes as Emilia, Rem and Ram tried to calm the kid down. The Karsten camp looked on in confusion. I could say I was leaning more on being confused as well.

I didn't peg the kid to be that desperate to win against the damn mabeasts, so there had to be something else going on, right?

Taking a peek through my opened portal, I saw that I had opened it instinctually to my shop. Nothing seemed amiss, to be completely honest. I don't know why Natsuki wanted me to close it in the first place. Was it just to stop me from going through?

Unlikely.

The sheer terror I could hear wouldn't make sense otherwise.

I stepped through the portal, keeping it open for now. Natsuki's words filled me with the slightest bit of paranoia, which, considering that everything he'd said would happen, had happened, I should likely take more into account.

The Whales still weren't attacking, so it was still safe. I don't know why they were being wary now, but it worked in my favor.

My shop was just as I had left it, the traps that I had set were still in place.

Nothing stood out.

And that only increased my wariness even more so.

Through the portal, I could hear Natsuki scream at me to get away. To join them back near Flugel's Tree and close the portal.

My heart started beating just slightly faster. There was a foreboding feeling that I couldn't quite place. Even more so than against the Whale, I could feel that I was in incredible danger.

"HIKIGAYA!"

There was the slightest lull in noise. As if the world itself had ground to a halt, heaving a breath.

I took that moment to sprint through the portal. Just as the front door blew open.

"Insolence! To think, my humble, modest self would have to-"

I could barely hear the frankly insane tirade that was being broadcast throughout the entire shop. I could hear bits and pieces of it, about how 'lucky' I should consider myself to be to witness his 'humility'.

There was no doubt about it. From the small black book he held in one hand, the sneer on his face, the absolute loathing that I could see, who this was was never in question.

The Archbishop.

The very same one that Natsuki warned us about.

He walked forward.

I closed the portal with a grim smirk as he fell into the pitfall I had made.

The small portal near my ear that I had kept open this entire time registered that he had fallen to the bottom, and was now ranting even fucking more.

A split decision.

I expanded the entrance and placed the exit on top of one of the Whale's heads.

A blast of white.

…

"Well? What's it going to be?" I asked Natsuki, who was being supported by Emilia, as the kid stared up at the Whales with his jaw wide open.

Honestly, I didn't have it much in me to pull open more and more portals. I was already on fumes, only adrenaline keeping me running at this point.

The kid, in his infinite wisdom, started pointing at me, and then at the Whales, "You-that guy-"

Oh great, he's devolved into doing charades.

"Natsuki, I have no idea what you're trying to say. Have you tried using your words?"

With his eyes still wide as saucers, he looked straight at me. He looked like he'd seen a ghost.

"I…No, not the time." Well what'd you know, for once, I agree with him.

"I-I have a plan, for killing the Whale. But you all need to trust me." Never mind, I don't agree with him.

"Not one to burst your bubble, except that there's three of them." I lied. I wanted to burst that bubble. Karsten's sudden snort was an indication that she caught that one.

We needed to hurry this up. Whatever that top Whale did, spewing that fog upward, didn't feel like just something it did for the hell of it.

"No, there's only one. It's just split apart, but that's just weakened it on an individual level." I followed whatever it was that he was pointing at, to the eye of the main Whale, "Look, Wilhem's damage he did on the first one carried over onto the others."

Well. I'll be damned.

It really did carry on.

"That's great and all. Care to tell how that's going to help?" And it was, great that is. That meant that, overall, it was still just one Whale. Except, you know, we still had to deal with them in the first place, and the rest of the hunting party were on their knees crying into the dirt.

"We only need to kill one of them, the main one floating at the top."

…

I watched as Natsuki and Rem rode on the ground dragon, across the massive tree. I stood next to the mages that operated the artillery as Karsten gave a speech to motivate them. Well, that 'speech' was more 'insulting them because look at weak-ass Natsuki doing this shit while you're just sitting there'.

I can see why she's a military woman there. She's almost as bad as me when it comes to actually motivating people.

Still, it did the job easily enough.

Two of the Whales came for us. Karsten managed to drive them off, a swing of her sword causing a blast of magic so strong that I wondered just why the hell she didn't do so beforehand.

The reminder that the Whale's hairs disrupted magic came up in my mind. And yet, as I watched the blast of magical energy cleave through the air and into the beast, I realized something.

Natsuki said that these things had split their power into the three of them. That meant that they only had a third of the durability that the single Whale had.

I watched as a torrent of white fog came right at us, ripping the very earth with it. Karsten split it entirely.

"Increase the power when you shoot those night banishers of yours."

"Sir?" The mages looked at me in confusion. I rolled my eyes as I grabbed one of the shells I had made. As I did so, I removed the strengthening across all of them, my hand passing through them discreetly.

"You heard me. Load."

As confident as I was in the crude shells I had made, they were still just hunks of metal. They would've shattered had we fired them. That was why I had strengthened them in the first place, to make sure that they reached the target, and actually dealt damage.

Now? With these things as weak as they were?

There was no need for that. Not when the alternative was much better in this scenario.

"Lower aim, wait for my signal."

I needed to time this carefully. I only had a couple of the artillery with me, the rest circling around Flugel's Tree, following Natsuki's insane plan.

One of the Whales came rushing down, mouth open to devour us.

"Wait for it."

I could see the tension on the others. Karsten was ready to burst into action, along with Astrea. My eyes met theirs as I shook my head.

Just a bit more.

There.

"Fire."

The boom of two artillery pieces firing next to me wasn't one that I wanted to get used to.

The satisfaction of seeing the shattered pieces of shrapnel impacting the inside of the Whale's mouth?

Priceless.

I watched with a smirk as the Whale came crashing down. With a combination of its durability being down to a third, it being as close as it was, and being shot in its mouth, I had no doubt two bursts of countless metal shards, superheated by magical energy, would hurt like all hell.

It crashed on its side, and in an instant, the various knights that couldn't do anything before rushed in, swords and spear a flurry of blows. They hacked away at the vulnerable mabeast as much as possible.

I'd expected Astrea to be with them, leading the hacking and slashing. Instead, I found him looking at me with more than a measure of respect, before his eyes drifted back up to the one Whale that mattered.

"Load."

…

Unfortunately, it was not enough to kill the second Whale. It had managed to get up, weakened, and fly to relative safety.

The two of them were cautious now, circling around us and spewing fog as much as they could. These were met by Karsten's sword, dispersing any and all of them.

They would still try and charge us every so often, only to be met with more shrapnel as I worked with the remaining two artillery.

After what seemed like forever, I could spot a sudden massive ice spear launch up towards the sky. There, right on the Whale's horn, I could spot a figure. I snorted in disbelief.

I knew the kid said he could lead the mabeast to where we wanted it, but this? This takes the cake.

I saw him jump and almost immediately, the Whale dove right after him. I could honestly say that it was unlike anything I knew of it. It had been cautious before, stalking us while its duplicates did all the work for it. Now though, it acted like a rabid animal, chasing what I could only assume to be Natsuki.

A gust of wind pulled the figure out of the air, right before the mabeast impacted the ground.

And following that, a blast of energy from Karsten, aiming for the tree.

The signal.

The remaining artillery, having been waiting near the roots of the massive tree, fired into it.

The trunk was severed into two. The weight of Flugel's Tree came falling down. Right onto the Whale.

As the sunrise hit us, and the copies of the monster faded into nothing, we collectively approached the fallen tree.

Astrea reached it first.

There, the White Whale sat immobilized. Astrea didn't waste time.

Slashes, stabs, cleaves. Nothing was off the table as the normally composed butler raged. The Whale groaned in pain, and yet, with the Tree on it, it couldn't do anything.

"Sleep for eternity, monster." All punctuated by one last stab into the top of its head. One whose impact I could feel the sheer vitriol and anger its wielder felt.

"Theresia…" At this point, I don't think that Astrea even knew we were here, standing as he was on the Whale's corpse, staring into the rising sun. He held a hand to his face, and for a moment, everyone was silent.

"I…I love you!"

Theresia van Astrea. The previous Sword Saint. And Wilhelm's wife that had allegedly fallen to the White Whale.

"The White Whale, the scourge of this land for four centuries, has fallen!"

A fitting end, I suppose.

…

A/N: If you like what I do and want to support me, check out my P-atreon at P-atreon•com(slash)Almistyor.

And a special thanks to: FireRogueWolf25, brutalcrab and Tassimo.