IBHJ 1377

"What a pathetic excuse for an invader."

The commander of the golden fleet narrowed his eyes, lips twitching into a contemptuous smile as the Tiamat starship accelerated toward them.

"He dares charge us head-on? In our territory?" He scoffed. "End him."

"At once, Commander."

The order pulsed through command channels like a neural spark, and the star-scattered fleet came alive.

Space lit up.

BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.

A storm of beam fire erupted from every direction—colossal, blinding lances of energy converging on the Tiamat ship like the jaws of a mechanical god. Each beam was capable of piercing a planetary core, and together, they formed a radiant net of death.

"It's finished."

The commander spoke with absolute finality. He wasn’t alone—across the fleet, other golden giants had already turned away, confident in their calculations. No ship, no pilot, could survive within that hellstorm.

Except—

"What…?"

His voice caught. His gaze snapped back to the screen.

"Commander!" one of the tactical officers shouted. "Target is still moving—it's—it's evading!"

It shouldn’t have been possible. The energy web had less than a fraction of a second between pulses, the gaps so small even photons struggled to pass through cleanly.

But the enemy starship—

It danced.

Weaving through annihilation with impossible grace, it cut through the barrage like a serpent in open water. Thrusters fired in bursts, its hull rolling, dipping, twisting—threading the needle not once, but again and again.

A silver phantom in the mouth of death.

"This..."

The word left the commander's lips before he even realized it. Around him, every golden giant pilot stared in disbelief.

"Could that ship's computational core surpass ours?" someone muttered.

"Is it possible… has a more advanced civilization already emerged out there?"

The thought chilled the commander's spine.

"Cease fire!" he barked. "Capture that vessel—intact!"

"Understood!"

The golden fleet obeyed in perfect synchronicity. Their weapons fell silent as they broke formation and curved through the void like hunting hounds, moving swiftly to encircle the Tiamat starship.

Inside that very ship, Shirou let out the breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.

He didn’t show it, but his whole body was tense. His palms were slick with sweat. Dodging that last volley had been like threading a fighter jet through the eye of a needle—at hypersonic speed. One error, one misjudged vector, and he would’ve been vaporized.

But he hadn’t been alone.

He had the blessing of countless Rider-class Heroic Spirits guiding his instincts—

—and the full computational support of Tiamat’s embedded system.

He had survived.

[M-Master, I think they’re trying to capture us!]

Chibi Tiamat’s voice rang out in the cockpit, high-pitched and nervous.

"Capture me?"

Shirou’s eyes narrowed as he looked at the golden ships sweeping in from all sides. His lips curved, "There’s no one alive who can pull that off."

He leaned forward in his seat. "Tiamat—engage combat assist mode."

[Yes, Master—!]

The golden fleet drew closer, but in their numbers lay their weakness.

Too many ships.

Too little room.

And now?

They weren’t firing. They were trying to corner him.

That was their mistake.

With the reflexes of a racing god and systems sharpened by AI assistance, Shirou gripped the controls—and dove into the golden formation.

The Tiamat starship surged like a silver spear, spinning, twisting, threading through impossibly narrow gaps. Its movements blurred into something that no longer looked mechanical, but organic—like a dragonfly skating through falling meteors.

The golden ships scrambled to follow—but they weren’t meant to operate this close together, not without coordination.

One clipped a wing.

Another overcorrected.

Then came the chain reaction.

BOOM—BOOM—BOOM—!

One after another, golden vessels collided, detonating in radiant bursts of light across the black.

Starfire blossomed in brilliant color—

a deadly fireworks display, unintentional and beautiful.

Inside the cockpit, Shirou’s eyes were focused, unblinking.

The flame of challenge burned bright in his chest.

On the command ship’s bridge, tension rippled like a live wire.

"Commander," the deputy said, voice tight with urgency, "the invader’s system is clearly more advanced than ours. If we don’t resume weapons fire—he might actually break through. And if the Emperor learns we let that happen..."

The commander didn’t respond at first. His gaze stayed locked on the screen, jaw clenched.

"I’m well aware," he said at last. "The weak don’t survive. That’s the law of the Void."

His teeth ground together as he watched the Tiamat vessel glide effortlessly through the formation, mocking them with every maneuver.

"Unbelievable..." he muttered. "A material civilization with a starship AI beyond ours—actually exists."

It defied everything they knew.

No such civilization should exist. Not one capable of humiliating their fleet.

Certainly not one run by a human.

It wasn’t possible.

In a galaxy where only transcendents and the Emperor’s will held meaning, individual ability meant nothing. Strength was measured in cold numbers—energy output, data throughput, system control.

Technology was the only truth.

And that truth had just been shattered.

The enemy’s vessel had outmaneuvered their best formations. Not with overwhelming firepower, but computational superiority—dodging, feinting, slipping through gaps no ordinary system could even recognize.

"I wanted to capture it."

The commander’s voice dropped, cold and grim. "Offer it to the Emperor for analysis. But that luxury has passed."

His eyes hardened. "Transmit my order—destroy it. Burn it to atoms."

"Yes, Commander!"

The fleet shifted instantly. The golden vessels, still scattered from their failed encirclement, flared to life and resumed their attack with more violence. Lances of destructive energy lit the void, converging again on the silver phantom.

Inside the Tiamat cockpit, alarms flared.

[M-Master! They’re opening fire again—!]

Shirou smirked, hand already tightening on the controls.

"Why panic?" he said calmly. "This is more my style anyway."

Tiamat watched Shirou's smile flicker across the cockpit display and felt a moment of genuine confusion.

This... human—this material lifeform—had computational ability far inferior to even the lowest-tier autopilot systems in the Golden Universe. And yet he smiled.

Why?

Where did this reckless confidence come from?

What Tiamat didn’t know—what no system could quantify—was that Shirou wasn’t relying on raw processing speed. The blessing of Rider Heroic Spirits had sharpened his reflexes and granted him a pilot’s instinct honed through legends of chase and flight. But that alone couldn’t let him outpace golden warships designed by civilizations millennia ahead.

No.

What gave Shirou the edge was something no machine could replicate.

Shiki’s Root Connection.

A tether to the Root. The source of all causality.

He wasn’t calculating trajectories. He was bypassing them entirely.

He knew.

Connected to the Root, Shirou’s mind didn’t need to run simulations or probability trees. His consciousness moved a step ahead, sensing the intentions of his enemies before their commands had even reached the fire control systems.

That was the terror of Root-based skills.

Where calculations ended—omniscience began.

Where limits ruled—the impossible was allowed.

BOOM—BOOM—!

Energy beams screamed past his hull like comets, but Shirou’s movements were fluid, even casual. With courage drawn from a thousand death-defying legends and hands guided by the silent whispers of fate, he slipped between kill zones with ease. To the enemy, he was a ghost—impossibly agile, maddeningly untouchable.

On the command ship, the golden fleet’s commander watched in silent horror—then exploded.

"Impossible!"

He slammed a fist into the console.

"Even if their system surpasses ours—it can’t surpass us by this much! There has to be a limit!"

He practically snarled the words.

"This can’t be happening. Where did this civilization come from? When!?"

There was no answer.

Only the mocking dance of a single silver ship, dancing through fire.