IBHJ 1411

With time unraveling and the universe on the edge of collapse, Da Vinci constructed a device that could solidify starlight—turning celestial resonance into a physical medium capable of sustaining the Root’s light. At her side, Shiki poured the nothingness into the two Holy Swords. Zelretch layered the Holy Swords with the Second Magic. It was everything they could give.

Artoria stood in the center of it all. One Holy Sword she entrusted to Merlin, who gently lowered it into the Inner Sea of the Planet. The other, she lifted with one hand. Then she reached for the White Shield.

Now fully prepared, she turned to face Zelretch and Shiki.

Zelretch gave a single nod.

Shiki didn’t smile, but her eyes conveyed something close. She lifted a hand and pointed to a corridor of flickering starlight—toward the Root itself.

“The rest of the path,” she said quietly, “you can only walk alone.”

“Thank you,” Artoria replied, and turned.

No more farewells.

No final speeches.

She simply breathed in once, long and steady, then stepped onto the glowing path with the Holy Sword and the White Shield.

She walked directly into the winds of nothingness.

Even with the shield’s protection, her form began to shimmer and thin—her very existence fraying at the edges.

But she didn’t stop.

The two Holy Swords, resonating across infinite space—one in Gaia’s womb, the other in her hands—reacted. Between them, a path of light began to crystallize.

It stretched deeper and deeper—straight toward the Root.

…

The Universe.

Shirou, now barely holding together the weakened frame of the Azure Destruction, slammed punch after punch into the Root Evil.

Each blow carried the weight of galaxies.

Each blow meant nothing.

The Root Evil advanced, consuming everything in its path.

Nebulae. Stars. Memories. Time.

All were swallowed—unified—as it moved.

Then, for the second time, the transcendents acted.

A new symphony thundered from higher dimensions—a harmony of concepts and gods, wills and laws, ancient and unknown.

It fell upon the Root Evil like divine judgment.

And achieved nothing.

The creature did not even blink.

Shirou’s eyes widened in horror as the thing kept moving, untouched, unchallenged.

Gilgamesh screamed—mad with rage—and unleashed cosmic Ea once more. Again and again, he shattered swaths of the universe. He split star systems with raw conceptual force.

Until even Ea shattered in his hands.

Its fragments dissolved.

Unified.

Beside him, the Grail shed her skin and became an angel—burning with hellish grace as he and Mordred made one final charge.

They roared.

They dissolved.

Unified.

Then came the others.

Cu Chulainn. Scathach. Lancelot. Tristan. Diarmuid. Gawain. Arcueid. Morrigan.

Friends. Rivals. Teachers. Legends.

One by one they fell—not defeated, not killed—but erased, absorbed, their light folded into the Root Evil’s expanding void.

“AHHHHHHH—!!!”

Shirou screamed.

He threw himself back into battle, each attack wild and raw and desperate. He burned through everything he had—body, mind, soul.

And it still wasn’t enough.

Even the light of transcendents seemed so insignificant before it.

So overwhelming.

So unstoppable.

So utterly, unbearably hopeless.

…

“Huff… huff…”

Artoria staggered through the roaring dark, pressing forward with the White Shield clutched to her chest. Each step felt like she was peeling away layers of herself—soul, memory, meaning.

The winds of nothingness—not mere absence, but annihilation—gnawed at her, shredding the edges of her form. And then, at last, the White Shield cracked.

In the moment it shattered, she understood.

This shield… it wasn’t merely a Noble Phantasm.

It was a space—no, the space. A preserved sliver of the [true past], forged by the Origin Gaia herself. A sanctuary created for Tethys using the complete super quantum substrate of the Gaia star region. A gift for a dying god, shaped by the Ideal King into something protective. Something noble.

And now, it was gone.

Like the Azure Destruction—Shirou’s other half, born of the same super quantum—the White Shield had served its role. But even the might of Gaia’s total quantum data couldn’t block this. The nothingness of the Root was too pure, too cruel.

The shield was destroyed.

But its remnants clung to Artoria—not as armor, but as a blessing. A final whisper of defiance. It carried her a little further.

Until even that faded.

She was exposed now.

Raw. Vulnerable. Fading.

But she refused to stop.

She couldn’t.

Her steps wobbled, her silhouette grew faint, but her thoughts—those still burned.

‘I have to reach it. No matter what, I have to reach that place.’

Her King had suffered too long. She had seen only glimpses—just fragments of the pain he’d endured. The farewells, the losses, the unspoken regrets. All before he ever became the Eternal King.

And now, at last, he had come this far.

He was right there—within reach of peace, of completion.

And she would not let him fall again.

‘He’s been wronged too deeply… for too long…’

‘I just want him to have a future.’

The thoughts looped like prayers.

‘He’s gentle… he’s kind… he’s stubborn and brave and thoughtful… and when he smiles…’

A tear drifted from her fading eye, scattered by the wind before it reached her chin.

‘When he smiles… why can’t he smile more?’

Her limbs trembled. Her shape flickered. Her name, her memory, her being—all wore thin.

“My King… My King…”

“Shirou… Shirou…”

“Shi…rou…”

She had nothing left. Nothing but his name.

And somehow, that was enough.

At the very edge of existence—where all creation collapsed into abstraction—she arrived.

The wall of the Root.

An ancient boundary, long forgotten by most of the universe, sealed during the primordial war between the Root Evil and the Gaia star region. This wall had stood untouched for billions of years.

Now, one fading knight stood before it.

Artoria lifted the Holy Sword.

She murmured with a fading smile. “Find a good woman who isn’t like me… and please… be happy… Shi… rou…”

Then, without hesitation—

She plunged the Holy Sword into the barrier.

And her body dissolved.

The moment the blade struck, the barrier shattered.

Light surged.

The light of the Root—sealed for eons by the will of the Root Evil—poured out.

It connected to the path of starlight carved between the twin Holy Swords.

It flowed. Roared. Unleashed.

And for the first time in a very long time, the Root itself—untainted, unchained—shone freely across the Gaia star region.