"Disgusting illusions... Hmph, Merlin's disciple, are you."
"You've certainly inherited that fellow's nauseating style of mischief!"
Leaning on her staff, the silver-haired witch coldly surveyed her surroundings, her voice dripping with sarcasm and displeasure.
"How dare you interfere with the dispute between me and that detestable red dragon. Have you decided how you wish to die?"
"Well, thank you for the compliment. As for death, I'm sorry... I have indeed been killed many times, but no matter how many times I die, I will always resurrect. There is only one person who can truly kill me~"
"However, that probably won't be you, hehehehe~" François Prelati, a.k.a. "the Horizontally-Flying Princess," chuckled. She and Morgan were not unacquainted.
As an ancient being, a fallen deity, she had appeared in many eras. For example, during Jeanne d'Arc's time, she, in the guise of the boy François, personally orchestrated Jeanne's death. It could be said that she was instrumental in Jeanne's burning at the stake.
And in the era of Britain, as Morgan said, she, as a disciple of that British court magus Merlin, learned Merlin's illusions from the teachings of many lake spirits.
It just so happened that the Fairy Queen Morgan before her, another aspect of her existence, was the Lady of the Lake, Vivian, who granted King Arthur the sword from the lake and her blessings.
Although Vivian at that time had no interest in this twisted, fallen goddess, she was aware of her companions' entanglements with this disciple.
"Is your reliance that divine immortality?"
She disliked her other aspect, even finding Vivian somewhat repulsive, but Morgan and Vivian were two sides of the same coin. She understood Prelati's meaning and why, and dismissed it with a sneer.
The creature before her was one of the most ancient goddesses—the Canaanite goddess Baal, the lord of heaven. But later, with the rise of Christianity and the Jewish dominance in the Canaanite region, various incidents led to this noble goddess being belittled and slandered. Eventually, her divinity gradually weakened, and she was even given the title 'Beelzebub, Lord of the Flies.'
A noble, holy goddess who deeply loved humanity eventually became an enemy of Christianity, degraded by their slander into a demon lord of hell who brought plague and disease, misfortune and disaster, and was reviled by all.
But even so, François still retained a faint divinity and that immortality belonging to a god.
Even if she died, she would be resurrected. This was the highest form of divine immortality, equivalent to that of the Mesopotamian mother goddess Tiamat.
Immortality like Charon's only lasted for a short time, while immortality like Prelati's meant that even if she died, she would be reborn again one day.
It was indeed very difficult to deal with, but by no means impossible!
"If you can do it, I would be somewhat looking forward to it."
"Berserker, deal with that fish-eyed man first!"
Morgan ignored Prelati's provocation. Although she did have the ability to eliminate this creature, it would take too much time. The top priority was to first deal with that fish-eyed man who was constantly summoning sea demons. To catch a thief, first catch the king. She knew that the human-skin book was this fellow's reliance.
Raising her staff, a vast amount of magical energy pierced through the black mist. The resulting shockwave of mana directly locked onto the figure within the black mist, making it extremely conspicuous in this fog that obscured magic and vision, as if it had been marked.
With a heaven-shaking roar, Berserker charged towards the figure with explosive speed.
"Oh my... this is really..."
Prelati was somewhat troubled.
She had originally tried to use illusions to conceal Gilles's whereabouts. Normally, it would be impossible to find a target in this fog covered by the Prelati's Spellbook, but against a top-tier magus like Morgan, who was also very familiar with Merlin's tricks, she was easily seen through.
"I have no choice then... In that case... I'll just have to let you sacrifice yourself, Gilles."
"Gomen-nasai, Gilles~ My dear friend~ This should be what you were hoping for, right?"
"Hohoho, of course, my friend!"
"Let these who blaspheme my saint feel the wrath in my heart! Defile them with blood and bone, defile that unjust god! Ahhhh! My holy virgin! I will be with you!"
"Come, Prelati's Spellbook! Devour me as a sacrifice! Me, everything in this city, will become an offering to you!!!" Gilles de Rais—the former Marshal of France, who fell into depravity after Jeanne's death, slaughtering children and women just to defile the god who failed to save the saint and to make him punish himself, the anti-hero Bluebeard—held the book bound in human skin and loudly proclaimed something.
A terrifying magical energy reaction began to brew, making all the Servant teams frown. Morgan also frowned tightly.
This evil... unsettling magical energy...
"You bastard!"
If she really let this guy complete the summoning, it would probably be a real pain to deal with.
"Fool, do you think I'll just watch you complete your magic?"
She tapped her staff, chanting a magic spell.
As an aspect of the Lady of the Lake, Morgan was particularly skilled in water-attribute magic. However, due to her personality and preferences, it had evolved into ice-attribute magic. With her staff as the center, a spreading sheet of ice began to cover the surrounding area, freezing tall buildings and cars. Thorn-like ice spikes began to converge towards Bluebeard's direction.
The magically-infused Arondight and the ice spikes attacked Bluebeard from two directions, almost upon him.
Prelati looked terrified:
"No!"
But in the next instant, her expression became one of extreme pleasure. "Just kidding~"
"It's too late!"
"The Prelati's Spellbook is a Noble Phantasm that can autonomously activate grand magic. Once started, it cannot be stopped. If Gilles were using it, there might indeed be some flaws, but with my assistance, the moment the sacrifice was made, everything was already complete!"
"Come forth! Let me see what it is! My friend!" the girl cheered.
A surge of evil magical energy erupted. Bluebeard's body exploded, and the flying flesh and blood gathered together, finally...
...condensing into a huge, terrifying eyeball that made one shudder at the sight of it.
The huge eyeball floated thinly in the air, with blood vessels visible behind it. Its evil, strange pupil scanned the land, its eyes filled with greed and tyranny.
"Master! A really big eye appeared... so scary!"
Seeing the eyeball through the magic mirror, and even feeling that the eyeball was watching her, Miss Illya's face turned pale. She hid behind [Illya] and began to tremble.
Irisviel was also afraid, but after glancing at Miss Illya, who chose to hide behind [Illya] instead of her, she felt her pride as a "Mama-chan" was a little hurt. Feeling a bit sour, the displeased Irisviel suddenly had a flash of inspiration and stood in front of [Illya].
"..." Watching the trembling Illya and Irisviel, who was also clearly scared but trying hard to act like a brave Mama-chan, [Illya], whose view was blocked, was a bit speechless.
If you're that scared, don't put on a show!
But... this eye looks so familiar...
[Illya] stared at the eye, feeling that the more she looked at it, the more it resembled a certain pixel-art, side-scrolling, open-world game boss.
But it was completely different from that weak big eye.
Just by hovering there, it exuded an inexplicable sense of pressure, instilling fear.
This was the effect on a specially-trained homunculus like Irisviel; it was undoubtedly a very high-level fear magic.
If an ordinary person saw it, they would probably faint directly or even die of fright.
And not only that.
After a sharp screech...
Numerous smaller eyeballs of varying sizes appeared, the largest of which was the size of a washbasin.
These eyeballs began to spread through the skies of Fuyuki City.
[Illya] frowned, noticing that the magic formulas arranged in the magic workshop to resist external enemies were weakening at an astonishing rate.
"...It absorbs magical energy?!"
Those eyeballs seemed to have the property of absorbing magical energy and life force...
And it was probably because of this property that these eyeballs were particularly fond of targets with a large amount of magical energy, which was why they directly targeted the 'Illya residence,' a magic workshop.
—Of course.
Ozymandias's great pyramid couldn't be spared either.
It was even targeted as the number one priority because it was connected to the leylines.
"Insolent!"
Ozymandias, who had also noticed the problem, was enraged.
His temple possessed an EX-rank Anti-Purge defense and should have been difficult to breach.
But these eyeballs had really hit the temple's weak spot.
Maintaining the great temple required a massive amount of magical energy, and while the eyeballs couldn't breach the temple, they could absorb its magical energy by constantly ramming into it.
"How dare you defile the pharaoh's brilliance! Atone with your death!"
The temple slowly opened, revealing the Dendera Light-ball at the top. The enraged Mr. Sausage was already planning to use the full-power giant light bulb to level the entire Fuyuki City along with that big eye.
However, a large number of eyeballs approached, and the giant light bulb instantly dimmed.
"Pure magical energy attacks will run into this kind of predicament," [Illya] sighed.
That big eye was practically a killer of Servants... no, it should be said, a killer of the magic system.
Although it didn't have any anti-magic properties itself, it would directly absorb the magical energy from magic formulas and magical creations. Without magical energy, the magic system was just a rootless duckweed.
In this regard, it was undoubtedly a thorough 'enemy of magic.'
That Mr. Sausage's compatibility with this thing was at rock bottom.
Once entangled, he would be unable to exert his power.
If it were Mr. Gilgamesh, it might actually be easier to handle.
"Illya, we have to go deal with that eyeball."
"Eh... o-okay..."
Although Illya was a little scared, seeing the eyeball's rampage, she mustered up her courage.
However, Ruby and Irisviel had some objections.
"An enemy like this, Illya can't handle it, can she?"
The eyeball's characteristic was absorbing magical energy, and the absorbed magical energy would be used to multiply the eyeballs.
If they let a high-mana unit like Illya charge in, it would be like delivering takeout to the enemy!
"In that case, Illya might be latched onto by that big eye and turned into a tool for birthing small eyeballs!"
"I don't want that... eyeballs... even tentacles are better than something that bizarre..."
"So Illya likes tentacles too?"
"There's no way I'd like something like that!" Faced with Ruby's harassment, Illya was on the verge of tears.
To this, [Illya], holding a cup of hot tea, was extremely calm.
"It's fine, Illya doesn't need to be afraid of this."
"Eh?"
"Alright, I'll explain when we get there. That country bumpkin is almost here, we need to create an opportunity for her."
"I'll use transfer magic to send you to the scene directly."
"There's something that convenient?"
"Then why did we have to run around on planes?"
"If you rely on that kind of thing, wouldn't life become very unreal? Efficiency-ism is absolutely forbidden, be careful not to end up like Kiritsugu."
"Alright, we can talk about anything when you get back. We're off~ Let's go!"
"Wai—"
Miss Illya wanted to say more, but the next moment, magical energy surged, and the surrounding environment changed in an instant.
Thud.
"Why from mid-air?!"
With a thud, Miss Illya clumsily got up from the ground, complaining with teary eyes. To this, [Illya]'s tone was evasive: "Er... ahem~ It's probably because of the magical interference, causing a little deviation. But it's fine, you can fly, can't you?"
"At least give me a heads-up! Ouch!"
"Just let Ruby heal your butt, the jewel Mystic Code is still very useful for small functions like this... Also, a reminder, those little eyeballs seem to have noticed you~"
"Eh...? Eh—?!"
Coming to her senses, Miss Illya looked up and saw a small eyeball staring at her. The next moment, her face turned pale as a large number of eyeballs began to surround her.
"No! Don't chase me!"
"Because your mana is so abundant, in their eyes, Illya is as tempting as a piece of meat swarmed by flies. Hmm, Illya is very popular."
"I know that already, I don't want to be liked by something like this! I'll be sucked dry!" Miss Illya, being chased all over the place, shrieked at the top of her lungs. "Master! Help, help, help!"
"Just release that card."
"Ruby, Dream Summons!"
"Oooh!"
"Eh, it seems the mana isn't draining anymore."
"After all, the Firefly armor itself absorbs all magical energy and converts it into pure destructive power and firepower~"
"After using this, all your attacks will be converted into pure heat attacks, which is perfect for dealing with this type of enemy."
"The original suitable candidate was Kiritsugu's Servant's Noble Phantasm... but those two seem to be having some trouble coping on their own, and their Noble Phantasms have been 'sealed,' so I can only have you do it."
"Oh my..."
While explaining to Illya, [Illya], noticing something, spoke in a subtle tone:
"She seems to have arrived~"
As if on cue...
An angry shout echoed through the night sky.
"Giiiilles—!"