Disclaimer: All characters and settings belong to their respective franchises.

While this confrontation was going on, Caster had made it outside the control room, which was locked. Sensing something was wrong, she punched in the emergency unlock code and waited for the light to turn green. The door slid open, revealing a dim, lifeless interior save for the illuminating light of CHALDEAS. Fearing the worst, she was about to turn on the lights when she heard, "Psst! Caster!"

Her ears perked up, knowing who that hushed tone could only belong to, as she craned her neck to see someone waving at her from across the room. "Romani?" Caster could make out the silhouette of the man standing beneath the global model, eerily casual, one hand on his hip while the other arm beckoned her over. She frowned hesitantly, suspecting that the man might have been compromised by Flauros.

That was until she heard him say, "I was wondering if I should get that extra chair I always wanted."

Her frown slowly turned into a knowing smile. "Hm, no. Wouldn't be the same."

She felt him smile back at her as he continued, "I've mobilized the staff. They should be finished by now."

"Questions later," Caster turned on the light and marched past the rows of consoles to him. "Where's the director?"

"In the infirmary," Romani replied soberly. "Her condition is stable, but other than half of the A-Team, we weren't able to save the others."

Caster closed her eyes and hung her head in disappointment. "I see. What about the bomb?"

Standing much closer to each other, she could see his eyes more clearly, those familiar eyes she had known in a previous life that had been like a stranger's after she first awakened. He was about to answer her question when a loud tremor derailed whatever he was about to say. "What was that?!"

Caster grinned sheepishly. "Oh, that. Uh, we have a lot to talk about." She averted her gaze from him as she added, "Also, we might need to do some repairs later provided we make it in one piece."

Romani blinked. "Huh?"

Caster opened her mouth again, only to be interrupted by another, much louder tremor that shook the entire room. "Make that a lot of repairs."

At this, and approximating the damage that the facility might have just sustained, Romani's jaw flopped open with a gobsmacked, "Huh?!"

Elsewhere…

When Flauros felt the first blow to his cheek, he knew immediately just how much he still underestimated the boy. That he was simply some random Magus that had been brought in as a substitute. Either Zelretch or the Counter Force, he couldn't bring himself to care at the moment as he was fighting for his life.

The boy exhibited not only strength and speed but also an extraordinary fighting ability that seemed incongruous with his age. The experience was both surreal and exhilarating. He had not experienced such excitement for a considerable period. While he was also more frightened than he should have been, he reflected that he had rarely encountered such a stimulating opponent among the numerous worms he had had to deal with. The encounter evoked memories of-

Gohan thrust his fist into the man's abdomen, disrupting his train of thought. Flauros vomited bile forcefully as his midsection was compressed by the impact, subsequently propelling him across the corridor, which was now devastated in their wake. The walls and floors were shattered, exhibiting signs of severe destruction. It was remarkable that the demon remained conscious despite the boy's assault, which was more intense than that of an average Servant.

Gohan appeared above him in midair, and he had only a brief moment to observe the boy's hateful expression, his arms wound back with his hands clasped together, before he was forcefully struck by a hammer blow that caused him to be slammed to the ground. The impact was so great that the entire section gave way to the resulting force. At this point, the green coat, which had previously been pristine, was torn in several places, exposing the right shoulder and arm. The fabric around the area where Gohan had struck was shredded, along with the rest of the coat, reducing it to rags that were barely hanging on.

The young man carefully descended to the edge of the crater, taking a moment to assess the situation while maintaining a sense of vigilance. He had learned from experience that it was unwise to declare victory too soon. Perhaps it would be premature to declare victory just yet, given that he could still feel the man's energy fluctuating. It would seem that the energy in question had not diminished at all throughout the course of the onslaught. As he anticipated, the battered man's form gave off a surge, his head jerking up unnaturally with a crunch of bone. Lev, or Flauros, taunted with a voice that was like torture to Gohan's sharp hearing, "Is that the best you can do? I've had love taps draw more blood than that."

With remarkable speed, Flauros disappeared from the crater's base and reappeared to Gohan's right, striking a right hook that connected with the boy's cheek. Gohan vanished just before he could collide with the corner, and the two of them became locked in a dance that was barely visible to the naked eye, causing further damage that shook the entire facility.

Gohan was taken aback as Flauros appeared to gain speed, narrowing the gap between them in terms of strength as well. Nevertheless, he reciprocated with equal vigor, deflecting and parrying with practiced ease before a sharp pain seized his left shoulder, then his right pectoral. His defenses were increasingly breached with contemptuous progress, forcing him on the defensive. This shift only served to embolden the demon, his smile revealing more and more of his sharp teeth, as if ready to bite into the young man's flesh.

Flauros continued with a left haymaker that Gohan was able to avoid by ducking to the ground and allowing the attack to pass by his head. He then twisted his left shoulder to kick a foot to the man's side. However, Flauros successfully blocked the kick with his right hand. His left hand, not having retreated, manifested a curved scythe, which he swung at the boy's neck. Gohan was forced to tense his muscles and let out a shrill scream that echoed through the corridors, the kiai forcing the man to retreat. The intensity of the raw ki was overwhelming enough to dissipate the blade, but Flauros managed to regain his footing and land safely on solid ground, his feet skidding along the floor until he came to a halt.

Gohan took a few steps back. "I can't risk getting hit by that energy." He had experience defending against basic and advanced Ki attacks, but he wasn't willing to take a chance with magical energy. Piccolo had once explained to him that ki and magic were not the same thing. While ki could be used to perform some pretty amazing or even downright insane feats, magic was an entirely different beast. Simply put, those with sufficient discipline in the arts could alter certain aspects of reality at will. They could transfigure states of matter, conjure whatever they wished if they knew how, and even bypass the usual ki defenses with relative ease.

Piccolo would occasionally utilize magic in lieu of ki during their training sessions to assess his capabilities. Interestingly, magical energy blasts, despite the defensive ki surrounding his body, would still inflict damage. The training proved beneficial, which was why he was cautious of Flauros' magic, as even to a novice like himself, there was just something…off about it.

Both of them were panting, winded from the exchange. "I can't say that I expected this, Mr. Sūn," Flauros puffed out snidely.

"Yeah," Gohan stated breathlessly. "I'm just full of surprises."

Flauros grinned. "Be frank with me. Who sent you?"

"Your mom," Gohan quipped with a smirk.

"Very smart," the demonic man remarked with a smidgen of respect laced with disdain. "But you won't be able to stop the inevitable."

"Why?" Gohan demanded. "What will wiping out humanity even accomplish?"

"Nothing," Flauros stated flatly, his grin widening at Gohan's incredulous expression. "Confused? It's actually quite simple once you stop to think about it. You must understand the futility of it all."

"Futility?" Gohan repeated, his outrage evident. "There is nothing futile about human life!" He was increasingly reminded of Frieza, of Cell. He could also draw similarities from Turles, the madman not having cared in the slightest about the lives he ruined with the Tree of Might.

Flauros shook his head. "Oh my boy, you simply haven't come to the truth."

The Half-Saiyan's already castigating glare intensified. "What truth?"

"That the human race is out of gas!" Flauros declared with outstretched arms, then made a swirling downward motion with his finger. "It's circling the drain. It's finished! The only thing left is to either start over or not bother at all. I mean, what exactly-"

"Oh, give me a break!" Gohan interrupted, rolling his eyes. "You hear one condescending speech about how worthless lesser beings are, you've heard them all. Been there, done that. Got anything original under all that hair, or are you just overdue for a trip to the salon?"

Flauros was thrown for a fraction by this, before his smug face returned. "Oh? It seems you're not just a wet-behind-the-ears pup, then. Or perhaps 'monkey' would be more apt." He trailed off, eyeing the now conspicuously wagging tail behind the boy.

A grin tugged at the boy's lips at the all-too-familiar slur. "I've heard that before, too. And let me tell you," his grin turned vicious, "the guy who called me that was way worse than you."

Flauros' own grin tightened as he realized the boy wasn't just spouting bluster. "Who exactly are you?"

"Son Gohan," the Half-Saiyan introduced himself with his actual name instead of the Pinyin version, then assumed the stance of his father, the signature stance of the Turtle School. Knees slightly bent, feet parted shoulder-to-shoulder, torso turned sideways in the form of a horse (mǎbù).

Flauros studied the boy, both to shore up any openings and to read him carefully, his curiosity piqued. "Could he be...?" He disappeared without warning, and Gohan spun around with a roundhouse kick that was desperately blocked with both arms before he had the chance to pounce. Another kick forced him to deflect it with one arm, a Gandr already crackling to life from the other to fire, when a flurry of attacks came at him with rapid fluidity. He could see the boy's eyes brimming with a determination that was no longer clouded by anger, and that made for a very dangerous shift in the battle. "I need something to throw him off."

He tilted his upper body and swatted away a fist aimed at his head, weaving the rest of the boy's jabs with increasing difficulty, except for a few glancing blows that managed to hit or graze him. It was unreal how the boy could even move at that speed, and it only seemed to get faster the more he dodged. Was he some kind of demi-human? Some order of Phantasm? He ducked as a flying kick nearly smashed his face in, only to be blindsided by a blow to the stomach—the same spot where Gohan had hit him earlier, grunting from the force. He flew back, but Gohan grabbed both of his ankles and spun like a tornado, slamming him against the walls like a club until he deliberately swung at the last second before letting go, bulldozing a section with the now projectile that was his body.

Gohan did not relent, soaring like a rocket as he followed to keep up the pressure, punching, kicking and uppercutting the vile man until he felt a shift in the atmosphere and realized that they had sliced through the facility like paper, the blizzard outside now pelting him with white powder. Ceasing the torment, Flauros landed like a rag doll on a white bed of snow some distance away, his blood splattering everywhere.

The Half-Saiyan landed a few feet from him, the breath he released fogged by the subzero temperatures. He stared at the man's seemingly lifeless form, the rest of the rags that had been clinging to him completely torn off, leaving his torso bare, his voluminous hair billowing in the strong winds of the storm. Gohan's own clothing was not exempt, albeit more scuffed up than completely shredded.

Gohan kept his eyes on the man, the latter's back to him. His Ki-sense was at its most alert, having closely monitored the man's energy since the beginning of the scuffle, which had now diminished to a low simmer, with only the heavy winds to be heard over the drumming of his heart. He had hoped to nip this whole fiasco in the bud by locating and stopping the mastermind, but alas, fate had eluded him in his failure to save the Master Candidates, and his anger returned at the thought. "I failed. There's no other way to put it." He clenched his fist, his neck and jaw tensing in bridled anger.

His only hope was that there were other survivors besides Caster, unless Lev had poisoned her as well, causing her to perish between the time of their parting and his battle with the traitorous engineer. His thoughts returned to what Caster had told him, that he should strive to move forward, do what he can to make something out of an outcome, bad or otherwise. Easier said than done, but the woman was right that dwelling on one thing would merely leave him blind to everything else.

He perked up when a cough reached his ears, causing him to step back a foot in a light stance. He could hear a hoarse, choking laugh coming from the battered man, his hair catching some snow. "It seems that...I really did not grasp how much of a wretch you really are, Mr. Sūn," Flauros grumbled, slowly pulling himself up by his arms. "I suppose... who you are matters little in the end." He visibly struggled to his feet, barely standing straight, his right side hanging down as Gohan studied the bruises and lacerations their fight had wrought.

"You should have just stayed down, Professor," Gohan warned him loudly through the heavy winds, and earned a snicker from the man who was incredulous to still be called by his title. "It doesn't look like he's gonna give up."

Son Gohan…

"Stay down?" Flauros' shoulders shook again, a low chuckle escaping him. "Who are you to speak to me like that? Do you presume to be my better? Some kind of avenger swooping in to save the day? All I see is a brat who-"

BANG!

Flauros was cut off by a Ki blast that whizzed past his head, nearly singing off his right ear and leveling a good chunk of the nearest mountaintop overlooking Chaldea as it made contact.

There was a long stretch of silence save for the still raging blizzard, but that didn't deter Flauros from looking over his shoulder at the resulting destruction, the avalanche of snow and gravel cutting through the storm with an indifferent mound. Even in the biting cold, the demon could feel a sweat coming on from what he had just witnessed. It hadn't been an illusion or a trick of the eye. It was energy. Raw, unfiltered, but focused and would have perforated part of his brain had it been more deliberate than the warning shot it was. The smugness vanished, replaced, not by fear, but by indignance that this…child, this mortal could hold such power. A power that could actually threaten him. He would have dismissed it as mere offensive Magecraft or some of the best Rune Magic he's ever seen, but he was no mere neophyte.

What are you?! He would have screamed at that moment, but he was no worm. He was one of the 72 Demons of Ars Goetia, the very system created to guide humanity before the realization of how foolish and redundant such an endeavor was. He would not be intimidated by a mere ape.

Straightening up as his body began to heal, he turned his gaze back to the boy, his now red eyes gleaming more analytically. Gohan returned his gaze with a glare as cold as the ice, arm raised, palm flat in front of him, where the blast had originated from. Not a word was spoken between them, letting the storm rage that seemed to reflect their conflict. Composing himself, Flauros' grin returned, but it contained not an ounce of the haughtiness earlier. Nor was it one of caution, but something visceral, calculating.

"Hmph, was that supposed to be a warning?" Flauros asked with a twinge of amazement. "Are you perhaps hoping that I prostrate myself to you?"

Gohan did not drop his arm, the energy inside him dancing to be released, and right now, coldly evaluating whether to execute the man or make room to interrogate him for information. Sensing this, Flauros calmly said, "You're curious." He spoke the words with his fake human voice, channeling his Professor Lev persona, which could have been his true identity once upon a time. "You must be quite the studious lad back where you're from." He clasped his hands behind his back, a gesture that should have made more of an academic impression, but was now only jarring to the Half-Saiyan.

Gohan's mouth curled into a snarl. "Like you'd ever tell me."

"Oh, but I would," Flauros said with an exasperated shake of his head. "But information has a price. Nothing is truly free. Not in this world or any other." He took a deep breath, letting the icy air fill his lungs. "What would you offer me for that information, I wonder?" He lifted a finger and traced a line in the air coyly. "Because unless you have something really worthwhile, then no dice. You might as well just get it over with."

"You're just mocking me at this point," Gohan spat back. "I'll try my luck finding the answers on my own, because I have a feeling that this so-called benefactor will show up eventually. The only thing left for you after what you've done is to be nothing but dust scattered by this blizzard."

"It is not a sin to fight for what is right."

Flauros chuckled darkly. "Oh, my boy, you have no idea how many versions of me have perished at the hands of postulant 'heroes' like yourself. And just as many versions of me have crushed such fledglings beneath my toes like the maggots they truly are. You will be no different. This," he spread his arms again, gesturing to all, "will be no different. It's all a tedious cycle that will go on and on until sweet entropy, or existence itself just decides to give out."

Gohan did not allow the man's drivel to affect him. "You're done."

Flauros' smile opened to reveal his monstrously sharp teeth once more, as if in willingness to meet the boy's challenge. "Am I?"

Gohan's breathing would hitch as his senses picked up a rapid surge of energy coming from none other than the man in front of him. Motes of a dark, purplish aura began to seep out of Flauros' body, veins bulging from every muscle contour as they contracted and expanded. The ghastly smile morphed into a scowl as he clenched his hands into fists, his skin darkening in hue. A growl resounded from him, guttural and animalistic, his crimson eyes shining even more intensely with the release of this ominous hidden power.

The cold air around Gohan became thick with barely contained hostility and evil intent, he could even taste the sheer contempt Flauros had not only for him, but for humanity as a whole. He bit back a gag as the energy finally subsided, and the... creature standing before him could only be a far cry from the man he once was.

His musculature had grown only slightly, and he stood much taller at his full height. His skin was now an ashen gray, with an array of odd red growths lined up just below his collarbone, resembling the beads of a necklace. His fingernails were sharper, more deadly, and ready to tear into pliant flesh. His hair was equally ashen as it grew longer, reaching past the base of his spine. A mad grin danced along the demonic man's expression, beyond elated to finally act in his true form. His mouth opened, releasing a misty breath that mingled with the atmosphere, his metamorphosis complete.

He locked eyes with the boy, the crimson color gleaming with the anticipation of beginning the battle anew. "Well?" Gohan just stared back, not saying a word as the demon showed off his transformed state. "I have to admit," Flauros began, flexing a bicep and placing a hand on the muscle, "I've never been this superficial or vain, but I kind of like it. Another gift from my benefactor."

Gohan held the man's gaze. "Did this mysterious benefactor of yours ever mention anything about the Time Patrol?"

Flauros' features flattened. "I see. So you work for those interlopers."

"Not officially," Gohan admitted. "Are you some kind of time-displaced criminal?"

"You could say that," Flauros shrugged, a crooked grin playing on his lips. "I am a time-displaced version of Lev Lainur, who in this timeline managed to kill himself before the identity of Flauros could supplant him. Fortunately for me, I was able to take his place shortly thereafter to avoid arousing suspicion. I must say, disposing of my own body was a fresh experience even for me."

"Why exactly are you here, then?" Gohan asked. "Did you fail in your previous timeline? Wanted a do-over?"

"Oh, on the contrary," Flauros countered, his grin stretching back into a wide, toothy smile, "I actually managed to succeed in destroying the Chaldeans of my timeline, crushing any and all hope of ever reviving humanity. My world is now little more than a barren wasteland, as it should be. It wasn't until I was found by my aforementioned benefactor that I was given the opportunity to do so again. And again, and again, and again! Until all of humanity is wiped out in as many timelines as possible, and even if I fail, I will have already taken as many of these parasites down with me. That's more than I could ever ask for!"

Gohan's rising anger could have melted the snow around them as he was forced to listen to Flauros' uproarious laughter.

There are those who words alone will not reach.

"I understand, 16." Gohan gritted his teeth hard enough to break them, his nails digging into his palms as he clenched his hands into fists. "I won't make that mistake again."

Flauros' laughter subsided with a euphoric sigh, sharing this little piece of himself, strolling through memory lane proving to be more liberating than his transformation, but instead of continuing his monologue, he made a sudden beeline for the boy, slamming his palm flat against his face and sending him hurtling toward the mountain range. Gohan recovered in midair and raised his arms, the ensuing blows rattling his bones as they connected. The sleeves on his forearms were torn like wet tissue, each blow carrying the explosive force of the highest grade missile.

Flauros never lost his smile, his arms a blur as he overpowered the boy. It would seem that the power-up was not just a show of intimidation, a fleeting display of bluster, but had actually increased the demon's already phenomenal abilities, but for his own twisted pleasure, he drew it all out to torture the boy, alternating his blows to avoid anything fatal.

This would soon come to be a mistake.

Gohan, through the haze of pain, timed a single strike from the relentless barrage and grabbed it to swivel out of Flauros' immediate reach and deliver a backfist to his temple, simultaneously surging out his aura to amplify it further as it connected. But Flauros hooked a leg into the boy's thigh and drew back in to deliver a hammer blow to the side, causing Gohan to scream with spittle flying.

The Half-Saiyan surged his aura just short of Super Saiyan, pushed past the agony and swung his arm in an arc to slam the back of his fist squarely into Flauros' face, the seemingly benign blow carrying the force of several sledgehammers and sending him tumbling straight down. Gohan wasn't far behind, tilting his body to descend feet first and picking up speed to drive both into the former human's chest with merciless fury just inches before touching ground, carving a wide crater. But the boy was hardly done, leaping up to stomp on the bastard's midsection, again and again, gouging more of the snow-covered earth. Flauros spewed out gobs of bile mixed with blood, his eyes nearly popping out of their sockets. Pinned down, he forced his body to convulse with rage, releasing his dark aura in an explosive manner that managed to knock the boy back and rip the ground beneath him.

Gohan flew back, catching himself in time to see a beyond enraged Flauros emerge from the deep rift like a demon from hell, crackling with a thick veil of dark aura, his crimson eyes burning with hate as he shouted vengefully, "You damned brat!" The two combatants then clashed in a furious flurry of blows, each strike sending shockwaves that tore the air apart and separated them cleanly from the snow, the very ground shaking from the battle.

This went on for what seemed like an eternity before Flauros feinted with a left hook before sneaking in a right jab that would have pierced the boy's side had Gohan not devoted a sizable amount of defensive Ki to that area. "You're good, boy, I admit -" He jerked his head back from nearly being decapitated by an incoming leg. "But I'm afraid you've miscalculated just a bit." He flew back a good distance, saying all the while, "I do seem to recall you asking me earlier about a bomb. Well..."

A sickening smile nearly split the demon's face as he continued, "In all honesty, I actually debated with myself on how to proceed when I first came here, but ultimately decided, why not stick with what worked just fine? The poison was just an insurance policy in case some unforeseen variable wormed its way into the picture." He trailed off with a hateful glare, an obvious reference to the one in front of him. "Which reminds me." He raised a hand, and Gohan must have realized what was about to happen, because he tried to charge up a quick blast before something in the pit of his stomach stopped him soon after a simple snap of the fingers. "There we go…"

The Half-Saiyan immediately felt something off, a tremor coming on that wasn't from the biting cold, his body weakening at an alarming rate from the fast-acting poison. Was this what truly killed the Masters? He struggled to keep aloft, but every second was like a great weight was pulling him down, and growing heavier still. Flauros watched with a loathsome fascination. "Hm, resilient, are we? Did you honestly believe that I wouldn't have the poison in my system? From all the skin-to-skin we've had, I would have figured you just being a little too eager. Even a single drop is enough to bring down a rampaging pachyderm."

Gohan took shallower and shallower breaths, his alarm growing as his vision blurred, fighting valiantly to maintain his focus. A sharp sense of dread raced faster than the poison took its time with him, his thoughts split between the battle and the aforementioned bomb, which Flauros was only too happy to keep reminding him of. "Well, Mr. Sūn, I really hate to be the one to cut this little get-together of ours short, but I really am a very busy man. Places to go, people to kill. You know how it is." He raised an arm forward, ready to fire his most powerful curse, amplified by his enhancements, but instead of unleashing it immediately, he decided to savor the moment, as if to revel in his success over another Chaldea for the second time.

It was all too perfect. "But the fun doesn't end there, my boy. Oh, no, no, no, it gets better. I decided to cut my losses and just rig the whole damn place with bombs. Not very elegant, I know, but it would be quite a spectacle in this dreary weather, don't you think? Heat things up, as they say!"

Even under the agony he was in, Gohan could only gape in horror and shock, which made the demon even more pleased. "And what positively excellent timing," Flauros chirped practically in glee as he used his other hand to count down, "3, 2...1!"

Earlier…

Romani was at his usual control panel, clicking and punching keys like a man possessed. "There's been a breach in the north wing," he said, bringing up the surveillance of that section on all screens, some of the staff having rushed in and inspecting the extent of the damage done to the facility. "It can only be the one who replaced Fujimaru-kun. What can you tell me about them, Caster?"

Da Vinci, standing next to him, looked at the screens showing the beginning of the battle between Son Gohan and Flauros. "A young man by the name of Sūn Wùfàn, but that is simply an alias. All I can tell you right now, Romani, is that we cannot interfere. The boy is more than he seems."

"Yes, uh, I can see that," Romani agreed, he and the others who witnessed the ensuing battle puzzled as to how said young man could hold his own, let alone display a level of strength more commonly seen among Servants. "Could he be a Pseudo-Servant sent by the Counter Force?"

Da Vinci smiled. "You will have to ask him yourself. For now, what of the bomb?"

"Bombs," Romani corrected her caustically, earning her shock. "Looks like Lev's not going to do it half-assed this time."

Alarmed, Da Vinci was about to ask again when he turned his head to her and added with a confident smile, "Too bad for him, we were ready."

Caster blinked. "Eh? What…do you mean?"

Romani leaned back against the chair and turned to face her. "Caster, it's not just the two of us and Lev who were brought here from different timelines. Nearly half the staff, some of them in this very room, all come from different versions of Chaldea."

The renaissance woman was floored. "But…but how-?"

Romani bit back a snort. "How were we able to keep it a secret all this time? The full story is a bit of a doozy, but for whatever reason, after my victory in the Holy Grail War back in Fuyuki, I received visions of Goetia subsuming my old Servant body, thus beginning the campaign to incinerate the Human Order. However, something odd occurred. A deviation of sorts that I was to later discover. I received additional visions of the future, or rather, multiple futures. Alternate outcomes, ones where we succeeded, and ones where we failed. It was overwhelming, and for a time, I was greatly troubled by such visions, torn over what to make of them and how to go about with the best course. It wasn't until I received the invitation to Chaldea that something unbelievable occurred. The moment I came into contact with the letter Marisbury sent me, a version of myself that must have used my Noble Phantasm merged with my consciousness here."

"But…but that's impossible!" Caster exclaimed. There shouldn't have been any trace of Solomon left in the Throne of Heroes. But then… "Could there have been a loophole?"

"That was my theory," Romani admitted, steepling his fingers, elbows propped on the armrests. "It wasn't that I myself was erased, only my identity as Solomon. Romani Archaman is an entirely separate existence, born of my wish from the Greater Grail. To be reborn as a human."

"But…everything you were was erased," Caster insisted. "Everything."

"Not…nearly everything. That's where the loophole comes in," Romani hypothesized. "We must remember that the Throne of Heroes exists outside the axis of time, so it can reach out and summon heroes from different eras. Even from the distant future, where they couldn't be known in the near present. But it turns out that this is not quite the case. It can also reach out to different universes, timelines. It's possible that the version of me in the Throne system was still preserved as a sort of emergency backup in case I ever went through Ars Nova. Technically speaking, my identity as Solomon should still exist in order to maintain the multiversal balance."

"But, then you…"

Romani smiled. "It's possible that I could be the Romani of your timeline, or one close to it. Who can really know? What I am sure of is that I can no longer use Magecraft."

"You mean…?"

Romani nodded. "I'm fully human now. Whatever the merge did, it also purged me of any Magic Circuits I had left. In other words, I can no longer perform any sort of magecraft, per the decree of Ars Nova." He smiled as he added, "Which is just fine with me, since... that's really all I ever wanted."

Caster, still unable to believe the things she was hearing, asked, "Then, the other staff?"

"That's where it gets a bit more dicey," Romani expounded further, turning back to the panel. "Curious over my own predicament, I played around with the possibility of others, those who went back or were displaced from their native timeline. Just something in the back of my mind that I could look into at my leisure. Imagine my surprise when one of them actually approached me with warnings of what was to come. From there, we went about weeding them out. As it turns out, each of them had previously met their end at the hands of-"

"The Oprichniki," Caster finished. "This is unprecedented."

"It's a lucky break, if you ask me!" One of the staff exclaimed from his console. "I'm just sorry Fujimaru couldn't make it."

"Would that be your Fujimaru?" The one next to him, a woman, asked. "Mine was a guy. You?"

"Girl," the man shrugged. "Redhead."

"That's funny," another one from the preceding row began to remark, "mine was a girl too, but she was a brunette and a bit younger."

"Mine was already middle-aged," the woman added.

Caster took in all that was said with bafflement, that there were alternate versions of Fujimaru with such varying differences. "It's something of a pastime we've developed," Romani chimed in. "We each tell our own timelines and compare them to each other, cross-referencing details that might prove relevant or otherwise. It's been both a fascinating and useful way for us to coordinate our movements better."

"Then, how were you able to avoid suspicion from Lev?"

"Suggestion Magecraft," Romani revealed. "Of course, I can't ever do that anymore, so one of the other magi here periodically places it on me. We had to be as precise as possible to keep ourselves and our plans in the dark, and it wasn't as easy as I'm making it sound. We...had to make a lot of compromises, let things play out as normal, but only to the point of avoiding anything major."

Caster hung her head, remembering the deaths of the masters needing to happen. "Wait," she perked up in panic, "what of Mash? Is she…?"

Romani shook his head. "She isn't like us. After all the time I've spent with her, she hasn't displayed any sort of deviation. She's pretty much the same Mash as I knew her. What is a bit different, however, is her favorite food, haha." Another tremor brought them back to the immediate present.

"Holy-! This kid is crazy!" The male staff that spoke first remarked, having shifted the feed to the outside. "Just what in the hell is he? The Fujimaru of this timeline?"

"Unfortunately, according to reports I received from a contact at the Clock Tower, Fujimaru Ritsuka was found dead in their own dorm room a few years ago," Romani revealed soberly. "Before the invitation to Chaldea even reached them." He zoomed in on the scene of the boy and Lev fighting. "Have you spoken to him, Caster?"

Caster nodded. "He is an ally, Romani. On the matter of trust, we can be sure that he means us no harm."

Romani smiled despite his own misgivings, choosing to trust in the words of his colleague who may or may not be his Caster. "Alright. On the matter of the bombs that have been planted all over the facility, you needn't worry." He brought a finger up to his ear. "This is Romani. How is your progress?"

Library…

"Alright," a voice said, "almost...there!" A loud cry of triumph came from a deeper corner of the room, where two of the staff were huddled, one bent over a now defused timer bomb loaded with enough C4 to take out nearly half the library, and it was vast enough to take up much of what was left of the facility for how much it held in terms of books. "Christ, that was way too close!"

One of the employees, a Caucasian woman with short blonde hair, tapped the man on the shoulder, "Well done, Meuniere. Got it in one. And with almost a minute to spare."

Meuniere, a stout blonde man with glasses, panted heavily, "Easy for you to say! I was about to soil myself. Why the hell did Lev plant so many bombs this time? All he ever really needed was one."

"That lunatic must have just wanted to outdo himself this time," said the only other man with them. "Should be all of them, right?"

The woman nodded. "It should. All teams have been sweeping the entire facility for months. We couldn't have missed one."

The man nodded before perking up, his attention drawn to the piece in his ear. "Duston here. We just finished. Yes, that should be all of them. We're in the clear."

Control Room…

"Give Meuniere a thank you for me, Duston," Romani said in both gratitude and relief. "We'll still need to do some more checks to see if Lev has any contingencies lying around. We're not out of the woods yet."

"Romani," Caster began, feeling lighter from her own relief. "How were you able to keep all of this from Marisbury?"

"I didn't," Romani admitted. "Or I couldn't."

Caster gaped. "He knew…suspected?"

"A little bit of both," Romani clarified. "He brought it up with me over tea one day. About a month before his suicide. I…never really could keep much from him."

Caster gulped a lump down her throat. "And…how did he react?"

Romani's face was unreadable. "He just told me he knew and didn't comment on it further." He could still remember the chill that went over him the very second Marisbury Animusphere mentioned it with an unnatural casualness, as if he had just asked him about his day. "He's always been like that, so I didn't entertain him further."

Caster's jaw clenched, unable to ignore the possibility that Marisbury had anticipated such a thing, along with everything else he'd accounted for. He was a despicable man at heart, but he was also one of the most formidable mages of his time. Given his track record, it was reasonable to expect nothing less from the man who had emerged victorious from the Fuyuki Holy Grail War. The same was true for her version. Even though she already had an inkling, it was still a real wonder if there was an actual human being underneath all that cold brilliance.

The sound of the door opening drew their attention, and three people entered, a very healthy but worried Mash Kyrielight flanked by two others. A young woman with shoulder-length hair dyed a cascade of light purple and pink colors. Another was a slightly younger looking girl with dark hair in pigtails. Like Mash, she was wearing a matching pair of spectacles.

"Doctor," Mash stepped forward, swallowing a lump in her throat from the disturbance of the past few hours. "Sūn-kun is... is he...?"

Romani gave the girl a gentle smile despite the situation, happy that he had been able to get Cerejeira and Mao to hide her from Lev before everything fell into chaos. He tilted his head to the screens overhead, showing the battle of two titans in the midst of the relentless blizzard. "All we can do now is watch. We cannot interfere." He said it both to calm the girl and as a warning, for only a high-powered magus would have the slightest chance of surviving the carnage that was taking place at that very moment.

"These readings are insane!" One of the staff watching the battle closely said, her eyes and fingers flickering over the display, her throat drying up at what should have been impossible for mere mortals. "It's like... it's like those two are Servants." She did not, or could not, ignore the tremors that continued to shake the facility, fearing that it might be torn down anyway, despite their efforts. "And... it's only getting higher. H-Higher. It won't stop." She could already feel the system heating up from her fingertips, the air conditioning only accentuating the difference in temperature as the scanners had been flashing red for some time now. This was unlike anything she had experienced in her previous timeline.

Even Romani, who knew Flauros to be no pushover among the Ars Goetia, was stunned to find himself pitted against a child much younger than Mash. Who was this boy? The building rattled as the shockwaves intensified, the battle reaching its climax as the two went head to head, trading a barrage of blows far too fast for the naked eye to follow. The scanners blared loudly past the deafening point, some going haywire, sparks and broken glass flying.

"At this rate, they'll be cutting a straight line through the entire valley," Mao remarked more to herself, drawn to the fight as everyone else was, trembling with excitement and fear.

The lights of the room, and perhaps the rest of the facility, flickered, sounds and instruments singing a violent symphony in tune with the isolated war that was currently underway. By now, Romani had noticed that not a peep had spilt out of Caster, and he turned to her curiously before being shoved out of the chair, the woman watching the battle with both ravenous fascination and vigilance. "Some things never change, I guess," the good doctor groaned as he picked himself up from the ground. Da Vinci was typing away at the terminal furiously, eager to analyze everything down to the minutest detail for study.

The screen just kept flickering, but she ignored it, knowing that the system she had helped to improve would hold, but for how long she could hardly bring herself to care when there was a subject ripe for dissection right in front of her. "Uh oh," Romani panned a glance at Caster as he was fixing up his coat, "are we sure that all of the bombs have been dealt with?"

Romani inched closer to the terminal, pushing hard against the now seated Da Vinci in retaliation for her jab. "That should be all of them," he replied, hiding his concern as Flauros began to make a very telling gesture. He tapped his earpiece and said to all channels, "Brace yourselves!"

Mash was instantly flanked by Cerejeira and Mao, protectively shielding her with their bodies, with the rest of the staff equally prepared for the worst.

Back outside…

Flauros could not hide his joy, the sheer anticipatory euphoria of his success washing over him. As soon as he hears the cacophonous melody of fire and mortar rise to a crescendo in the sky, he would relish peeling the skin off the wretched simian that had dared to challenge him. Any moment now, a holocaust that would signal the end of all things will bathe them in black smoke and fire, plunging them into a hellish paradise of smoldering death.

"Glorious," Flauros thought to himself in glee. "Absolutely glorious!"

"..."

Flauros blinked not a minute later, noting that the only heavy noise that reverberated was the blizzard once again beating down on them. A tiny miscalculation on his part, but not for long.

"..."

…Maybe his timing was a wee bit more off than he presumed.

"..."

…Okay, maybe now.

"..."

…Anytime now…

"..."

…Come ooonnnn!

Flauros craned his neck to look back at the... still standing facility, his sharp hearing trying and failing to pick up anything that even sounded like an explosion. Not even a 'pop' tickled his ears. He slowly floated to the ground, Gohan having descended first, and turned to face what was supposed to be his masterpiece. "No...way..." He took a step forward, as if hoping that would do the trick of setting off the bombs, stomping closer to see if what he was seeing was real and not some illusionary bounded field. "Th-There's... supposed to be an explosion..."

The demonic man's shocked face slowly gave way to rage, an ugly twist to his already grotesque features, his teeth grinding audibly through the barreling winds. "There's supposed to be an explosion!" Hyperventilating profusely, he drew in a long breath and boomed to the very heavens, "WHERE IS MY EXPLOSION?!"

"Heh...ehehehehe..." Flauros perked up and snapped around to find the now hunched Gohan, the boy's head down, his shoulders shaking as he continued to laugh breathlessly. "It... looks like it was your little plan that went up in smoke in the end, Lev."

Pure hatred now radiated from the demon, both at the boy and at the realization that he had been made a fool of by the very humans he had so enjoyed destroying. It wasn't until a grin crept across his face that he remembered the course of this little skirmish. "I wouldn't sound too sure of myself just yet, Mr. Sūn. Are you even coherent right now?" He unfolded his arms as if to point out the respective states they were in, with him still standing strong while the boy could barely lift his head. "I guess I shouldn't have expected much from a piddling guttersnipe, a mere ape by any other name." He brought his hand forward, preparing his strongest curse as before. "Oh, well, not that I can't just finish them off myself. More fun that way. And you?" A black ball of energy crackled to life against the flat of his palm. "An impressive display, but ultimately fruitless. I would have liked to watch you succumb, but my patience has been tested enough for one day."

Gohan did not answer, his bangs covering his eyes as a smile slowly crept across his lips. Flauros saw this, a confused grin on his face, and was forced to ask, "Any last words?"

Gohan's tail twitched and he bit back a chuckle as he was only too happy to comply. "Yeah." He let out a cough, his throat itching from the biting cold. "Poisoning me may have been the worst mistake you could ever have made."

Flauros blinked, his grin unwavering. "Come again?"

Another cough before the boy continued, "You see, it all has to do with my biology. I'm actually half-human. The other half? A race of aliens with an uncanny ability to adapt to deadly, almost life-threatening conditions. They actually grow stronger after close brushes with death."

Flauros stood stunned, his grin disappearing with every word he heard, unable or unwilling to believe what anyone else would have dismissed as utter nonsense. "I see that the poison has now robbed you of your senses. Anyone can see that you're not fully human, but do you expect me to take seriously that half of you is alien? Up in the stars?" He chuckled with condescending amusement. "If that were even remotely true, you would have been rejected by Gaia by now. Even Alaya wouldn't spare you."

"Alaya…" Gohan muttered, the mention of the name jogging something buried deep in his mind.

…a flash of-

Teal eyes rose to bore into the demonic man before the color returned to the normal black, followed by a crackle of what could only be electricity, with more arcing across the boy's figure. Flauros saw this but didn't budge, ready to fire his curse, but even he began to sense a change in the air. Gohan lowered his gaze, down to his right palm, which took on a familiar golden hue.

Chaldea…

More alarms flashed red all around, their instruments blaring hysterically. "What the hell?!" One of the technicians shouted in utter shock, his fingers reverberating with feedback as the system short-circuited in its commendable effort to measure the alarmingly rapid power surge. "These readings are...! I can't even make sense of it. The sheer amount of raw energy...it's unbelievable! I've never seen anything like it."

Everyone in the room hung on the man's every word, finding it hard to believe that someone so young could possess such power, let alone use it with a mastery that belied such age.

The man continued to input commands, intent on mitigating the damage by shutting down the remaining sensors and other key systems that could compromise the grids. The emergency generators would then kick in, much of it concentrated in the infirmary where the surviving Masters were being tended to. "Where the hell did this kid even come from? He's giving off enough energy to power Chaldea a hundred times over, with more than enough to spare."

Romani swallowed, he and Caster unable to tear their eyes away as the boy began to glow strangely, sparks of electricity radiating from the young man's form.

Outside…

Flauros' eyes began to widen slowly, his hand still primed to fire his curse but finding an invisible pressure stifling his attempt, his eyes fixated to the now bewildering sight of the boy staring back at him with a blank expression, but he could see, see an unshakable resolve shimmering behind such deep dark pools. Shimmering...teal?

Kkkhhhhhh…

The boy's voice echoed, the air around him shifting heavily, a palpable tension that Flauros could feel hitting him, seeming to spread to the rest of the terrain where the snow no longer fell. Blinking, Flauros flickered his gaze all over and found something even more baffling.

The wind…had stopped.

It was as if someone had flipped a switch and the blizzard calmed to an almost eerie stillness, but soon it was broken by the crack of thunder as the sky grew darker and darker, flashes and whips of lightning snapping like beasts at imaginary prey down below. Shocked, Flauros looked down and saw that the snow was melting, boiling...sizzling, with an even more palpable pressure beginning to press into his lungs, causing his breath to thin.

All the while, the air around Gohan grew thicker, a golden glow now completely surrounding his body, his hair billowing even though there was no longer a strong gust. It was as if nature itself had given in to the mysterious youth like a command, and the earth began to tremble beneath their feet.

The interior of Chaldea was only slightly less chaotic than it already was, all scanners shut down while the feed was kept alive, the entire battle broadcast throughout the facility, allowing all to witness what should have been impossible. Magus or not, they could only watch in stunned silence, the breathtaking spectacle a worthy contender for all the incredible things they had bared witnessed to in their previous timelines. For those who had come from the Lostbelts, it was like a Divine Spirit had ascended among them this early in order to dole out righteous punishment for the traitor that was Lev Lainur, the one man who had been a contentious plague in their lives in nearly every timeline.

Flauros' composure wavered, his confidence being chipped away the more he could feel the palpable power that was now emanating from the mortal before him.

Gohan's aura churned as he began to channel it in a familiar pattern, more streaks of electricity fizzing and sputtering around him. His eyes, usually dark pools filled with warmth, now bored coldly into the man who had entrenched himself as an enemy, someone who, if allowed to live, would only spell doom for those unfortunate enough to bear his evil. "Like I said…poisoning me was probably the worst mistake you could have ever made in this fight, Professor," he said with a mocking condescension of the once esteemed title, "because through it, my body was able to adapt. You can cut me, burn me, crush me in any manner you please, I'll only rise from it a lot stronger."

Flauros' anger returned. "Keh, what nonsense! You're just a brat! A halfwit monkey who just lucked into power. I am a Demon God! I am beyond you, beyond any mere human. I will obliterate your kind to usher in something that actually isn't a waste of breath for anyone."

Gohan glowered in contempt, replying with seething indignation, "So that's your reason? You just want to replace humans with something you think is better?"

Flauros spat back, "Not think! I know what's much better than humans! Weak, worthless, corrupt and fragile! I can't even believe that such imperfect, corruptible beings could even come into existence and rule over those they see as lesser beings. The mere thought of it makes me want to puke every damn time I have to think about it! In truth, they're not even worth the dirt they step on."

Gohan's anger flared, the golden aura intensifying as it began to illuminate the area around him. "If you truly believe that, then you will never be able to understand humanity or any other race. I come from a world where beings can shatter planets with the flick of a finger, wipe out a civilization in the blink of an eye without a second thought, and yet people like me keep fighting to live another day. And why is that? Because we're weak enough to want to live. It's because human beings are so flawed, so weak, that we come to understand how it is to live, to fight and struggle to survive, and to change. We start out from nothing, and build from there, always moving forward no matter what, no matter how hard it can get. Does that sound like a worthless species to you?"

He flared more of his energy, his eyes now an intense teal, motes of aura staining his hair gold. "Let me show you what you believe a worthless species can really do!"

SHWEEE!