A streak of cerulean light tore through Britain’s ash-gray night sky, breaching the airspace above Manchester.
From above the clouds, the Castle Field fortress lay surrounded by the Saxons’ torches, densely packed like an ant colony.
“Master, the defenses along the walls are rather solid. Should we land in the middle of the courtyard?”
Medusa called out over the rush of wind as she held the reins.
Kay tightened the Golden Axe strapped to his back so it wouldn’t sway and, his gaze icy, pointed to the largest section of the wall.
“No. Skip the landing.”
“Yes?”
“That massive main gate wall over there. Ram us right through it.”
A faint smile spread across Medusa’s lips. It was a method that was crude and mindless, yet the most certain and refreshing way to break through—perfectly befitting her Master.
“Understood. Hold on tight.”
Hiiiiing~!!
The Pegasus reared on its forelegs and lashed out violently at the empty air.
At that instant, the Heavenly Steed’s entire body was enveloped in a blinding light of mana, and like a massive magical shell, it began a vertical descent toward the wall.
“<Bellerophon (Bridle of Radiance)>!!!”
The Saxon guards patrolling the ramparts spotted the overwhelming flash and mana waves pouring down from the night sky and looked up in astonishment.
“Uh…? What is that? A meteor?”
“No, damn it! It’s coming right for us! Get clear! Everyone, move—!”
KRAAAAANG!!!
Before any alarm could ring out, Pegasus’s overwhelming charge smashed head-on into the fortress walls, which were several meters thick.
The ground trembled as the steel-reinforced walls and the massive iron gate crumpled like sheets of paper, scattering fragments and dust in every direction. The entire fortress was instantly plunged into chaos.
“They’re under attack! An enemy siege engine!!”
“Arm everyone!”
Saxon soldiers poured out, screaming in panic.
But it wasn’t a siege engine or a large army that emerged from the dense dust cloud.
It was only a single man in rough attire wielding a colossal Golden Axe, and a beguiling woman in black silk with a blindfold across her eyes. Just two of them.
Kay nonchalantly brushed the dust from his clothes and stared at the mark of the Lord of the Magical Realm emblazoned on the back of his right hand.
“Tamamo, Jeanne. Now.”
Fwaaaarsh!
A single stroke of the mark blazed red and vanished.
At the same time, space distorted as blue foxfire and black flames spiraled, and two Servants manifested at his sides.
“Mikon! Deploying the moment I'm called! Ugh, the smell of this dust!”
“Hmph! That was one flashy way to punch through a wall! I just burn them all to cinders, right?”
Kay slid his hand onto the hilt of his blade and surveyed the soldiers with indifference.
“You three, clear these pests out. I’ll find Artoria Alter in the meantime.”
“Don’t worry, Master. Within ten minutes, every living creature in this fortress will be turned to stone, down to the very last ant.”
Medusa slipped off her blindfold. The moment her Mystic Eye gleamed, Kay dashed toward the interior of the fortress like an arrow.
“I’ll burn it all to ashes!”
“Thousands of curses, melt away into the dance of this fox’s spell!”
Jeanne d’Arc Alter’s inferno and Tamamo’s relentless sorcery rained down upon the Saxon soldiers, their screams echoing in a brutal chorus.
Kay cut through the chaos inside the fortress without hesitation.
Any soldier who tried to block his path was sent crashing into the walls with a single punch or kick, knocked out cold.
He didn’t even bother using a weapon. He had handled ordinary soldiers with his bare hands before, so he didn't feel a significant change in his own strength.
Where is she? Where would Artoria be…?
Kay sharpened the senses he had honed in the Magical Realm to track the presence of beasts.
Not long after, he discovered a massive iron door tucked away in the fortress’s deepest corner. Beyond it, a spiral staircase descended into a deep, damp underground.
“An underground prison, huh.”
Kay kicked the iron door down and sprinted down the stairs.
The underground prison was far larger than he’d imagined. Hundreds of ancient iron cells held innocent Britons and soldiers captured by the Saxons, groaning in their confines like caged beasts.
“…To go this far.”
Kay clenched his teeth and tore down the corridor.
At the very end, in a special cell wound tight with thick spell-forged chains, he spotted a familiar silhouette, its head bowed low.
Her black dress was torn and stained with blood.
She had grown a bit since five years ago, but her shoulders still looked small and precarious.
“…Artoria!!”
Just as Kay reached out to wrench the iron bars with his bare hands…
Thud… thud…
From the back of the dark corridor, a relaxed and incredibly flippant set of footsteps approached.
“Holy shit, it was so damn loud out there I thought something happened, but it turns out a little rat sneaked all the way in here?”
Kay slowly turned his head.
There stood a large knight, his eyes slit vertically like a reptile’s, leaning casually with a smug expression.
It was Vortigern’s hound—the Saxons’ strongest knight, Taquin.
Taquin eyed Kay’s rough appearance and the massive Golden Axe that seemed out of place, smirking maliciously.
“Hey, big guy. What brings you to the basement of someone else's castle? This is a place where you don't leave alive unless you're an invited guest.”
Kay removed his hands from the bars and turned fully to face Taquin.
“I came to fetch my sister.”
“Your sister? Ah, you mean that tyrant bitch chained up in there?”
Taquin scratched his chin and let out a scoff. Then, as if something suddenly occurred to him, his eyes widened.
“…Wait. Brother? Hey, don't tell me. Are you him? The man the Pendragons have been searching for—Kay?”
“Yeah.”
At that, Taquin burst into laughter, almost gasping for air.
“Puhahaha! Holy shit! I’ve seen everything now! I thought it was just a legend, but you actually exist?! The guy who carried a baby on his back, cooked meals for friend and foe alike, and was called some bullshit like the ‘Saint of Cooking’ because he threw swordplay to the dogs?! Hahahaha!”
Taquin doubled over, clutching his stomach as he howled.
“Man, this is incredible. I feel like I’ve met a unicorn. To actually see the guy from all those rumors in the flesh.”
“…….”
“No, seriously. A piece of shit like you was actually called a knight? God, as a fellow knight, I’m so fucking embarrassed I can’t even look at you. A cooking knight—what kind of comedy act is that?”
Taquin’s endless taunts and insults poured out.
But Kay’s expression remained as cold as an icebound lake in the Magical Realm, his gaze unwavering.
“…Don’t get it twisted. I am not a knight.”
“Huh? Then what are you? A chef?”
“I am a warrior.”
At that blunt answer, Taquin’s laughter stopped abruptly.
Soon, his face was filled with contempt and irritation.
“Ha, a warrior? A warrior? What the fuck, what era is this? Britain is in the age of knights and magecraft! Is there really some moron left who calls himself a warrior, wearing beast skins and swinging a club?”
Taquin pointed at Kay, sneering.
“I don’t know why people worship those so-called ‘warriors.’ In the end, ‘warrior’ is just a fancy word for a barbarian, isn’t it? You’re just some talentless weakling who could never be a knight even if he died and came back to life, so you jerk yourself off by calling yourself a warrior!”
In that moment, Taquin vanished from Kay’s sight. Using his fairy blood to push his limits, he moved at a speed that no human eye could track.
Whoosh!!
With a rush of wind, Taquin’s blade stopped exactly one millimeter in front of Kay’s Adam’s apple.
“…Heh heh.”
Taquin chuckled softly in Kay’s ear.
“How is it? You can’t even react to my speed, can you? Sorry, but I’m such a brilliant genius that for a slug-like warrior like you, even breathing seems like a luxury.”
He withdrew his sword, took a step back, and folded his arms arrogantly.
“So, what have those pathetic warriors ever actually achieved in Britain? Shall we talk about that great Queen Boudica from centuries ago? What did those Iceni and other British warriors do by charging in with their lives on the line? In the end, weren’t they just barbarians slaughtered like animals by the disciplined ranks and tactics of the Roman army?!”
As he ranted, Taquin began circling Kay at an incredible speed.
“What ‘Queen of Victory’! What ‘Warrior’s Pride’! The Celts were the same! Cú Chulainn and those other praised warriors died like idiots! You call that a myth?!”
His afterimages and voice reverberated from all directions as if he were teleporting.
“Even if you pretend to be knights, barbarians who were tamed and ruled by Rome for centuries are still just barbarians! It is only natural that you lose, kneel, and be ruled by the superior Saxons! The era where warriors played the lead is already over!!”
He denied the essence of Britain, shouting that they were all nothing more than savages.
“So you, and that worthless bitch in there, can both just die!!”
Taquin’s afterimages converged into one, and his sword shot toward Kay’s heart like a bolt of lightning.
A perfect blind spot, a high-speed strike that seemed impossible to avoid.
However.
KAAAAANG!!!!
A massive clash of steel exploded, sounding as if the underground prison itself were collapsing.
“…Huh?”
Taquin’s eyes widened, nearly bulging from their sockets.
A strike delivered with all his might, capable of piercing steel armor.
That strike was blocked by Kay’s left forearm.
Kay had simply raised his left arm with indifference.
His powerful physique, combined with the hardening effect of the Primordial Rune, had given his body the hardness of a divine weapon.
Had it been a normal sword swing rather than a supersonic flash, his skin would have blocked it like armor without even needing the rune's hardening.
Scáthach. Have I really become stronger than the powerful knights of Britain?
Don’t be stupid. Only because your comparison is me—you already have no equal among the humans of Britain.
Kay’s forearm, harder than steel, perfectly deflected Taquin’s masterwork blade. Only a shallow, thread-like scratch remained on his skin; not a single drop of blood flowed.
“…What? My sword… was stopped by bare skin?”
In the moment Taquin panicked, denying reality.
“Slow.”
Kay’s low, chilled voice struck Taquin’s eardrums.
To Kay, who had endured hellish training in the Magical Realm—breaking his bones hundreds of times while dodging and parrying Scáthach’s spear—Taquin’s speed was nothing more than the buzzing of a mosquito.
“Y-you…!!”
Taquin recoiled in terror, attempting to step back, but it was too late.
As Kay violently shoved his left arm outward, Taquin’s masterwork blade could not withstand the force and snapped cleanly in half.
With Taquin’s abdomen completely exposed, Kay’s right fist—carrying the explosive power of pure, compressed muscle—shot forward like a cannonball.
KRA-THOOM!!!!
“…Gah?!”
A dull, horrific sound of rupture echoed.
Taquin’s thick plate armor crumpled like paper and was pierced through; Kay’s right fist completely penetrated Taquin’s abdomen, protruding through his back.
Taquin’s reptilian eyes rolled back, turning white.
He couldn't even comprehend what had happened. Without time to cough up blood or scream, he could only gasp with an open mouth.
With a single, crude punch from the "talentless warrior" he had so mocked, the strongest knight of the Saxons died instantly, his entrails spilling out.
Taquin.
He was originally destined to grow into a knight on par with Lancelot.
However, ten years before he would ever meet Lancelot, he overestimated his own genius and was slain by the masterpiece created by a monster of effort—the strongest Godslayer.
Before his genius could even bloom, he vanished from the world along with his arrogance.
“…Easier to cut than tough meat.”
Kay roughly withdrew his fist from Taquin’s corpse.
Nonchalantly wiping the blood on his trousers, Kay didn't give the corpse another glance as he approached the cell where Artoria Alter was bound.
Crunch!
Kay crushed the iron bars with his bare hands and stepped inside.
He stood before Artoria Alter, who was shackled and slipping into unconsciousness.
“…Artoria. Brother is here.”
The most rugged yet tender voice in the world echoed through the underground prison.
“…Bro…ther…”
In her fading consciousness, she gazed at Kay before losing awareness. Kay crushed her handcuffs and chains with terrifying grip strength and scooped her up in a princess carry.
“Let’s go home together.”
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