Return of the Wolf King

...Are you insane?

You want to add another Phantom Spirit? ...All right, but are you sure your hatred can sustain another?

That Phantom Spirit doesn't hate anyone. It's solely the faded concept of pure self-interest.

Admittedly, that one ability it has is quite remarkable, but aside from that, it's mediocre at best.

It is, after all, a mere scientist. It has a poor physique.

Though that does mean... Very well! This should be interesting. I'll summon it and fuse you at once.

But I should warn you. During the operation, make sure your hatred for humans never stops.

It is the source of your strength.

And so fervent that it could turn on us, your comrades, in an instant...

You have nurtured it, and gone from a Phantom Spirit into a monster capable of killing Heroic Spirits.

So hate. Loathe. Despise. Otherwise, you will never defeat that Master.

Servants are not human. And in this Shinjuku...

...those who live here merely pretend to be.

The only true human here...someone who always forges ahead and never gives up...

...is the Master of Chaldea, Fujimaru.

...!

Get back, Master!

...Here it comes.

Enemy Servant...approaching at high speed! It will enter combat range in ten seconds!

This speed... It's way faster than before!

Huh!? I can't see it!

How about you, Master!?

？！

...It seems it's added another Phantom Spirit. If we're talking invisibility, there are several possibilities that come to mind...

Siegfried possessed a coat or hat or somethingthe Tarnkappe, it was calledthat rendered things invisible...

But I think this is more a case of out-and-out invisibility.

I believe that means we're dealing with the H.G. Wells character. Not that that makes any great difference in terms of the threat it poses.

...Uh oh! Its magical energy is increasing! The Rider of Shinjuku is about to show itself!

...It's changed. It's even more horrifying than before.

It appears its rider has gotten caught up as well. They're practically of one body now.

...Well this is just the freakin' worst.

？！

...Does this bring back memories of Baskerville?

Frankly, no... This is far worse. This creature has cast off any remaining vestiges of the living creature it once was.

Mr. Babbage may be a steel giant, but he is also more human than the heroes or demons of the Age of Gods.

But not them. It is safe to say that they are well and truly past the point of any biological organism.

...

As for the wolf's headless rider... Hessian, most likely.

Hessian...? I don't remember any hero by that name.

A Hessian was not a particular person's name. It was the title given to German mercenaries who fought in the American Revolutionary War.

So then, he doesn't even have a name? Even for a Phantom Spirit, that seems awfully cruel.

Ah, but there is exactly one entity who was famed for being a nameless knight without a head.

He is part of a superstitious tale told every year in America, during Halloween.

？！

That's it! The Legend of Sleepy Hollow!

One of the most famous American fairy tales. The Hessian headless horseman!

But isn't that Hessian rather oddly...passive, Holmes?

Given his behavior up to this point, it seems he's simply allowed Lobo to have control.

Which would seem to indicate that Lobo is the true master and the Hessian a mere rider, as we thought.

Still, having a rider also makes it twice as strong. Perhaps even four times, or a hundred.

Wait! The enemy Servant's Spirit Origin has been altered.

Its... Its class has changed! Its new class is...

Be careful! It's no longer a Rider! It's more ferocious than ever...an Avenger!

...Master, get back. Now!

？！

Master, whatever you do, do not leave our side! You are its only target.

It isn't even paying attention to us while we fight it. You are the only one it wants!

Now I see. Since they loathe humans, they see Heroic Spirits like us as no more than obstacles.

Here it comes! Please keep your defenses as tight as possible!

...Get back!

？！

Th-that was cutting it awfully close, don't you think!?

Indeed. Had Moriarty not called out, you would have perished.

？！

Hahaha, good show, James! But, never mind that for now...

This is impossible!

There's no way we can defeat it here and now! How about you, Holmes!?

It's useless, isn't it!?

Indeed. You and I have both reached the same inevitable conclusion.

In order to get through this dire situation, someone must sacrifice themselves.

...I suppose you're right.

I know it is not a course of action you will like, but I'm afraid it is truly the only choice.

Believe me, I'm not happy about it either! Dammit, if only it were still a Rider!

No. You must not surrender to delusions on the battlefield, Master.

？！

Hmm... Perhaps we should decide this fair and square, through rock-paper-scissors.

I'll use paper, so make sure you all use rock.

Very well, you can stay. If it helps, I shall send you off with the light of my sacred sword.

Frankly, as far as Servants go, I'm ranked down to a point where I'm barely stronger than Master here.

So please don't include me in your count.

Don't worry. Master has already told me how you can manage by disguising yourself as Edmond.

Damn!

Hey, dragon witch.

We should decide who the sacrifice will be now, while the Avenger of Shinjuku is out of commission.

Hm? Oh, that? I'll handle it.

...What?

You need someone to keep it here, right? I got this.

You all hurry up and get lost. I can only buy you a little time.

Use it to come up with a plan or a trap or something and take it out for good.

Wait. Should we not decide this more fairly, through rock-paper-scissors?

Shut up, ice bitch queen. I said I got this. You're good with that, right Master?

What, can't even sacrifice your own allies? What a pathetic excuse for a commander you are.

Yeah yeah, I get it, you don't wanna see me die. Too bad. It's not like I care what you want.

？！

I suppose this is motivated by some sympathy you feel for a fellow Avenger, Ms. Jeanne?

Hell no. It's nothing as wholesome as that.

I just hate seeing it running around like some mindless damn monster. ...It should at least have some kinda goal.

So it's up to me to give it a goal. Nothing to do with sympathy. I just wanna give it a real end.

But that doesn't mean you need to die.

Tch. Not like I'm planning on dying. I'm proud of all the shit I've pulled off.

This is true. If anyone can do this, it's someone as impudent and brazen as you.

Right?

Very well then, one word of warning, if I may: watch your feet.

My feet? Uh, okay...

Jeanne d'Arc Alter.

What?

I'm counting on you.

...I said get lost. I got this.

Oh no you don't!

Ahahahaha! You ain't goin' nowhere!

I can read you like a book! Wanna know why? Because you're me!

You hate everything with a passion! You spend every day with an unquenchable fire burning inside you!

You keep killing, and killing, but it never goes away! Not even if you kill the ones behind it all!

So you have no choice but to burn everything down! Cause that might just make this awful feeling go away!

But, spoiler alert: it won't! Not for the rest of your goddamn life!

You won't be rid of it till the day you die! You and I are both beings of pure hate.

We're killing machines, forever moving faster and faster, taking life after life until we finally bite the dust ourselves.

And you don't have any friends or allies here. Or your beloved wife.

So I'll put you out of your misery, Wolf King.

Because those fleeting dreams we see right as we die are all we Avengers have to live for!

...Ow...

Shit... This...this wound's definitely fatal. You just had to get me through my heart, didn't you.

Not even a smile, huh. It's all just hate with you. At least learn to enjoy your revenge, you dumb mutt!

...

...Oh, right. I guess you can't even enjoy that anymore, can you?

Ngh...!

Oh, and one more thing... I'm afraid I'm gonna make sure you stay here a little longer.

La Grondement Du Haine!

Y'know, here's a fun fact about this fire: it's coming straight outta my body. Straight from mine into yours.

...And I bet even a dumb brute like you won't be able to shrug it off!

Oh, I'm sure it won't be enough to kill you...but it'll damn sure slow you down for a while!

Gaaah.

...Geez, did it not even occur to you to ask me to dance? Stupid inconsiderate jerk.

...

...

...

？！

I'm told you fought against various monsters during the Seventh Singularity.

Y-yes, that's true.

In Babylonia, Master and I fought against Tiamat's Demonic Beasts, and against Tiamat herself.

Of course, we only succeeded thanks to everyone else's help.

Compared to that, calling the Wolf King a Demonic Beast is a disservice.

After all, he was originally nothing but an ordinary wolf.

No matter what sort of wolf he may be, he's still a species that existed in 1999. Naturally, he would have had no association with anything related to magecraft.

At that time, there were still some superstitions remaining in the Americas, and while there were no doubt some people who thought of Lobo as the devil, that doesn't make it so.

He was nothing more than an ordinary wolf, a simple animal, a mere Phantom Spirit...

And yet, even as decadeseven centuriespassed, his anger never once subsided.

He continued to despise humans, and eventually gained power intended solely to kill them.

Quite dreadful, isn't it, Master?

Now that things have come to this, we must deal with a mere wolf as though he were a true Demonic Beast.

...Indeed.

There's no possible way anyone would confuse him with a "mere wolf."

Lobo, the Wolf King.

According to Dr. Seton's writings, they were never once able to catch him in a trap.

Quite right, Ms. Kyrielight.

Back then in America, wolves were a tremendous problem for those who kept livestock. Thus, they came to be hunted to the point of near-extinction.

A fine story that is. First people come building their farms in the wolves' territory, then they have the gall to go and nearly wipe them out in answer to a problem they created.

Yet the fact remains that people must keep livestock in order to ensure their own survival.

In our time, the industrial revolution was already well underway. Trains rumbled across the land, and smoke covered the sky.

At some point, our respect for nature turned into defiance.

Defiance?

Yes. A willful defiance, where our sole goal was to triumph over our "opponent" by any means necessary.

For us, nature was something to be fought... But in time, our technology grew to surpass it.

But by then, once-common animals had disappeared, and nature was on the brink of annihilation.

At some point, we looked around and realized that we had long since left it in the dust.

Having finally come to our senses, we began going in the opposite direction, to try and preserve nature.

In that sense, one could say that Wolf King Lobo was a casualty of that time.

？！

Quite right! My apologies for that somewhat tedious tangent.

But that was the moment that Lobo became our enemy; a painful truth you will need to bear the weight of.

I thought it would be best to help you acclimate to its weight now, but I see there was no need.

You know, Holmes, at times you strike me as a perfectly dastardly villain yourself.

I know, right?

Hahahaha. I believe you just might have a point, Ms. Altria.

But, that doesn't matter now. We still need to figure out what to do about the Wolf King.

Not because he is our enemy. Nor even to repair the Singularity.

...May I ask what you mean by that?

Pain? The Wolf King, you mean?

I doubt you would understand, Moriarty.

What would I not understand!?

？！

You are the head of a villainous organization.

You know what you do is evil, yet something akin to instinct compels you to do it nonetheless.

Of course, I am no different. I do evil so that order may be preserved.

That doesn't necessarily mean that I fully understand. But the Dragon Withat woman mentioned something the other day...

Hatred and revenge are what keep me alive. Even so, my heart still groans from the strain at times.

Why?

It's not the last gasps of a dying conscience or anything as trite or cheesy as that.

It's a simple matter of the heart's acceleration. We run at full speed all the time in order to satiate our revenge.

We keep going faster and faster. Half-assed hatred won't cut it. Half-assed revenge is a waste.

Now, when we take revenge on someone who REALLY deserves it...

That's the point when we realize we can never stop. That our bloodthirsty heart will never be satiated, even though it should have been... The cracks start to show, and all we want is more.

Forever and ever... Into eternity...

Yeah, I know there aren't too many Servants in this class. But more of us have been popping up lately.

So tell Master that if we ever happen to run into one, you kill them good and dead.

Don't just defeat them.

Killing them is like freeing a bird that's fallen to the ground, and will never fly again.

So tell him to do whatever it takes to make sure they're dead. Tell him to show no mercy.

？！

...Now I see.

Of course, I understand hatred as a motive for crime. I thought I understood Avengers as well.

But it seems my understanding was surface-level at best.

...All that said, the problem is the Wolf King.

Let us say that top Servants from all classes, including myself, were to challenge him together.

What do you think he would do once our victory drew near?

Run away, most likely.

Fortunately for him, and unfortunately for us, he has nothing in the way of pride.

If he senses he is at a disadvantage, he won't hesitate to run.

Living things are optimized to prioritize their survival. That's doubly true for beasts of instinct.

No matter how driven by hatred he may be, he is still a wolf.

So the first order of business is to ensure he cannot run away.

Um, what about leading him somewhere indoors?

I measured his energy when he charged. Sadly, there aren't many walls strong enough to contain him.

You'd need something like a fallout shelter, tens of meters underground. Anything else and you'd have a hard time.

Master... In Seton's book, how did they eventually defeat the Wolf King?

I'll send you a digital copy from the library immediately, Master.

It's a very sad story, so please try to read it right away!

Indeed. They used the body of Lobo's beloved wife, the white wolf Blanca, as bait in their trap.

？！

But now that he's an Avenger, I can't imagine he'll fall for the same sort of trap twice.

Ah, Da Vinci, you only say that because your knowledge of this Shinjuku is limited.

...Indeed. In this place, the power of stories is far greater than you might think.

Here, tales of Heroic Spirits can be as much of a weakness as Achilles' heel or Siegfried's back.

Their manner of death as depicted in their stories is of utmost importance. That knowledge can be as powerful as a Conceptual Weapon.

I see. In that case...

That would mean the Wolf King's weaknesses are animal traps, and his wife, Blanca.

I imagine you could find what you needed in Shinjuku to make the right sort of trap, but...

...Indeed. There is no Blanca here. No white wolf to be found.

Without her, Lobo would never fall for any trap in the first place.

After all, Seton only resorted to her because poison, camouflage, and everything else failed.

Hm?

Why, Cavall II, didn't you eat just a moment ago?

We're having an important discussion now. Go wait in the corner like a good boy.

...

...

...

Um...

What is it? Why are you all staring at Cavall II?

？！

Very white.

White indeed.

Totally white.

W-wait, hang on. Please tell me you're not all thinking what I think you're thinking...

N-no. You wouldn't!