Fuyuki City, along the banks of the Mion River in Shinto.
A cold early-winter wind whipped along the riverbed, but inside a roadside food stall draped in red plastic sheeting and hung with a red *yakitori* lantern, the atmosphere was roaring hot.
If the mages of the Clock Tower were to witness this scene, they would likely gouge out their own eyes and crush them underfoot on the spot.
At a greasy, low folding table sat Gilgamesh, humanity’s oldest King of Heroes, condescending to rest his majestic frame upon a wobbly red plastic chair.
He was dressed in his wildly stylish black leather jacket, holding a large glass mug emblazoned with a cheap beer logo.
On the iron plate before him was a mountain of sizzling, greasy skewers—chicken, beef tendon, grilled chives, and even a pair of grilled kidney skewers.
*Chomp…
gulp.*
Gilgamesh’s brow was deeply furrowed.
He glared at the skewer in his hand, coated in cumin and chili powder, as if scrutinizing an enemy nation’s terms of surrender, before taking a cautious bite.
Spicy!
Intense!
Fat exploded in his mouth, mixing with coarse MSG and cheap spices, shooting straight to his brain!
“What vulgar, filthy peasant offal, utterly lacking in culinary art!” Gilgamesh roared in disgust.
Then, throwing his head back, he took a massive gulp of ice-cold draft beer.
The chilly, fizzy, cheap alcohol washed down his throat, instantly smothering the heat and replacing it with a crude, invigorating rush.
“Vendor!
Ten more skewers of this ‘beef tendon’ stuff!
Add extra of that red powder!” The King of Heroes waved a broad hand, wiped the grease from the corner of his mouth, and barked loudly without a trace of embarrassment.
“You got it, Boss Gold!
Right away!”
Yoru Hayashi, sitting opposite him, gave a perfunctory reply and handed a non-spicy grilled sausage to Sakura, who was sitting obediently beside him holding a glass of juice.
“Big Brother, this is delicious,” Sakura murmured, taking tiny bites of the sausage, her eyes curving into crescent moons.
In this smoky, noisy roadside stall, she felt ten thousand times safer than she ever had in the suffocatingly silent Tohsaka mansion.
In stark contrast to this harmonious trio, Kariya Matou, sitting on the far side, was clutching his head with an expression more twisted than if he had swallowed raw bitter melon.
“Yoru…
you lunatic!
Do you have any idea what you just did?!”
Kariya lowered his voice, grinding out the words through gritted teeth.
“You kicked down the doors of the Fuyuki Church!
You hit Kirei Kotomine with Bajiquan!
That man is the supervisor of the Holy Grail War!
You are openly grinding the rules of the entire Grail War under your heel!”
“Rules?
Rules are meant to be broken.”
Yoru casually bit off a piece of grilled kidney and mumbled through a mouthful of meat, “Brother, you’re far too rigid.
I told you already: Old Man Kotomine and Tokiomi are in cahoots.
If you play by the rules while the ref brings his whistle onto the field to tackle you, how are you supposed to win?
To deal with thugs, you have to be even more of a thug!”
Gilgamesh swallowed his food, crimson eyes flashing with amused approval.
“The rabid dog speaks well.
Worms who skulk in darkness making tedious rules deserve nothing more than to be crushed underfoot.
As for that fake priest, Kirei Kotomine, I find him far more palatable.
The confusion and distortion hidden beneath his mask are ten thousand times more amusing than those fools who parade around in self-righteousness.”
Kariya was entirely rendered speechless.
Staring at these two lawless maniacs who viewed Fuyuki City as their personal playground, he felt deeply that he, the only reasonably normal modern human present, was completely out of place.
…
Meanwhile, at the Tohsaka mansion, a tragedy far more chaotic than any street stall was unfolding.
*CLANG—CRASH!*
A painted vase valued at three million yen—supposedly handcrafted by a European court master—came flying out of the second-floor hallway, smashing violently onto the marble floor of the ground-floor living room and turning into a pile of colorful trash.
“Boring, boring, boring!
This is so damn boring!!”
With a loud *BOOM*, her heavy iron boots slammed through the priceless Persian rug, carving two gaping craters into the floorboards beneath.
“Hey, old man in red!
Are you my Master or what?!”
Mordred scratched her wild short blonde hair in frustration, pointing at a maid who was cowering in the corner clutching a broom.
“Aside from these useless humans who can’t fight for shit, there’s not a single enemy worth hitting in this garbage house!
Isn’t this supposed to be some Holy Grail War?
Where are the enemies?!
Go find all the other Servants right now!
I want to slice someone up!!”
The door to the study opened.
Tokiomi Tohsaka stepped out, pale-faced, bracing himself against the doorframe while his right hand clutched his stomach tightly.
This mage, who spent his entire life striving for elegance, felt less like he was participating in the Holy Grail War and more like he had been locked in an asylum—where he was the sole attending physician dealing with a terminal manic patient!
“Berserker…
I must ask you to calm down.”
Tokiomi took a deep breath and forced a grimace of a smile, trying to use a mage’s reason to appease the raging knight of rebellion.
“The Servants of the Holy Grail War have only just arrived in Fuyuki City.
Now is not the time for an all-out war.
We must lie low, gather intelligence, and strike a decisive blow at the opportune moment.
That is the way of a mage—”
“Bullshit!!”
Mordred rudely cut off Tokiomi’s lecture, grabbing him by the lapels of his burgundy suit and nearly lifting him off his feet.
The Berserker’s emerald eyes flashed with violent red glints, her spit practically spraying onto Tokiomi’s face.
“You expect me to hide like a rat in the sewers?!
I am a Knight of the Round Table—even if I rebelled!
You dare suggest I lurk in the shadows?
Old man, believe me when I say I’ll chop a coward like you in half right now and go find my own fights!”
“You—!”
Tokiomi shook with rage, the Command Seals on the back of his right hand glowing faintly.
He desperately wanted to use a Command Seal right then and there to order this damn rebellious brat to slit her own throat!
But he couldn’t.
Goldie had already been snatched away.
If he lost Mordred now, the Tohsaka family would be completely knocked out of the war.
He had to endure!
Just as the tension reached a boiling point and Tokiomi’s stomach ulcer threatened to perforate, the specialized magical communicator in his pocket rang.
Feeling granted a divine pardon, Tokiomi hurriedly slapped away Mordred’s hand, straightened his crumpled tie, and stepped aside to answer it.
“Brother Tokiomi!
Disaster has struck!”
Risei Kotomine’s frantic voice came through the communicator, accompanied by the faint creak of church pews being set upright in the background.
“Master Risei?
What happened?
Why the panic?” Tokiomi asked, a sudden foreboding rising in his heart.
“The thief who stole your catalyst!
Just now, he came…
he came straight to the church with that golden Servant!” Risei’s voice trembled.
“He kicked the church doors to pieces, injured Kirei, and…
and that golden King of Heroes pointed his Noble Phantasm right at my head!”
*BOOM!*
Tokiomi felt his head buzz as if struck by a sledgehammer.
Swaying, he stumbled back two steps and collapsed onto the sofa.
“He…
he raided the church?
With the King of Heroes?!”
Overwhelmed by intense humiliation and rage, Tokiomi’s voice rose to a shrill, raspy pitch.
He had assumed that even if the thief who stole his catalyst managed to summon Gilgamesh, a Servant as arrogant as the King of Heroes would never obey some untrained hedge-mage, and would likely turn on his Master on day one. Enjoying the story? Read on at novelping . com.
And what had happened?!
Not only had the King of Heroes not turned on him, but the thief had led him to the church, wrecked Tokiomi’s backing, and essentially extorted protection money from the referee!
It was a resounding slap across the face that traveled across half of Fuyuki City to land squarely on Tokiomi Tohsaka!
“Not only that,” Risei twisted the knife from the other end of the line.
“That maniac gave me a message for you.
He said…
he said to wash your neck and wait, because as of today, he runs Fuyuki City…”
“*Pfft—cough cough cough!*”
Tokiomi felt a sudden metallic sweetness in his chest, nearly spitting up a mouthful of blood.
“Fine!
Fine!
What a magnificent lunatic!”
Tokiomi’s eyes turned blood-shot, his features contorting completely as every shred of aristocratic upbringing was cast into the stratosphere.
He lunged to his feet and smashed the communicator to pieces!
“Berserker!!” Tokiomi whirled around, bellowing shrilly at Mordred, who was still systematically wrecking the sofa.
“What?
Screaming like you lost your soul, old man?!” Mordred snapped back in annoyance.
“Didn’t you want someone to slice up?!
Weren’t you complaining about being bored?!”
Tokiomi raised his right hand, the bright red Command Seals flaring with blinding light.
He practically ground his molars to dust as he issued the order: “I authorize you to attack!
Go find that Master with the golden Servant!
Chop off his limbs!
Rip off his head and bring it to me to use as a chamber pot!!!”
Feeling the unadulterated, murderous rage radiating from her Master, Mordred blinked in surprise, then parted her lips into a cruel, thrilled grin.
“BHAHAHAHA!
Now that’s more like it!
Why didn’t you just say so in the first place?!”
*BOOM!*
Without bothering with the door, Mordred launched herself forward, shattering the massive French window of the Tohsaka living room and charging toward Shinto with violent mana bursting from her frame.
Leaving Tokiomi Tohsaka standing alone in the ruined, trash-strewn living room, shivering in the cold wind.
…
“Achoo!”
Sitting at the roadside stall chewing on beef tendon, Yoru Hayashi suddenly let out a loud sneeze.
“Who the hell’s talking trash about me?” Yoru rubbed his nose and turned to Gilgamesh, who was on his third mug of beer and currently scowling at a clove of grilled garlic.
“Old Gold, that’s enough.
Don’t eat too much of that stuff or you’ll get internal heat.”
Yoru settled the bill, stood up, and stretched, his eyes glinting with mischief.
“Timing-wise, all the big players should have landed in Fuyuki City by now.
That Lord Kayneth from the Clock Tower has probably checked into a hotel with his green mop head, right?”
Yoru suddenly remembered something and slapped his thigh, turning to Kariya Matou.
“Brother, I remember the first night I brought Sakura to get a room, we stayed in the penthouse luxury suite at the Hyatt Hotel, right?”
Kariya nodded.
“Yeah, you paid for a whole week upfront.
What about it?”
Yoru grinned broadly.
In the original timeline, that rich sucker Kayneth had rented out the entire top floor of the Hyatt Hotel to turn it into his mage workshop just to show off his aristocratic stature!
Now that Yoru was occupying the best suite on the top floor, where was Kayneth going to stay?
This was going to be a direct head-on collision!
“Let’s go, let’s go!
Back to the hotel!
There’s gonna be a great show tonight!”
Yoru scooped up Sakura, who was still sipping her juice, and dashed off toward the Hyatt Hotel, leaving a bewildered Kariya and Gilgamesh to follow.
An ultimate battle royale in Fuyuki City was about to kick off on the roof of this five-star hotel in the most bizarre way imaginable!