"Uwah, this place is abhorrent." Nobunaga shivered, arms crossed. Her eyes warily scoured every inch of manse rising before us. "I feel like a swarm of insects might crawl out of the ground. Say, Master, am I allowed to kill it with fire?"
For a moment, I couldn't answer. This double story mansion was in the same district as mine, and just as, if not more, grand. Laid with dark brick instead of white, it even had the same gabled roof. Except, this one resembled a medieval castle a decent bit. There were proper towers on the corners, and even a subsection built exactly like a round tower meant to hold siege weaponry. A study room, possibly. Perhaps a solar for the Lord. Thick, dying vines clung to the dark stone.
"How can something so majestic feel so disgusting?" I pursed my lips. "Yeah, fine, if we find bugs, you can burn this whole place to the ground. I really don't think this is going to be another Shirou situation."
There was no way the master of such an ominous household wasn't a proper magus. I knew little about the Matou family past their antiquity and their part in the foundation of the Holy Grail War, but I knew that no old magus house was without its hidden skeletons. With magi, those mostly tended to be literal skeletons, belonging to children.
Despite my permission, my servant remained reasonably skittish.
"I'd prefer gaming to exploring this." She murmured.
I breathed warm air into my hands, "Oh c'mon, where's your sense of adventure? Fighting ancient evil is supposed to get you going."
"Indeed, but not when that ancient evil is likely to take one's dignity."
"Well, you should have no problem then."
"Hm?"
"I mean, you don't have any dignity to begin with." I snickered.
She raised a fist, but then inhaled through grit teeth, "Fine. I walked into that one."
"Yep. So are we heading in?"
"You can go on ahead." She rubbed her chin, narrowing her gaze, "I think I want to make some preparations, just in case."
Those 'preparations' most certainly involved explosives, copious amounts of gunpowder, and flames, but eh, I wasn't sure I wanted to stop her. No, I agreed with them. My hair stood on end just from the air alone.
Shrugging, I stepped up to the bell and gave a gentle push.
No answer came.
I tried again.
No answer still.
I glanced at the setting Sun, and raised a foot to kick the front doors open. Just then, I heard the distinct clack of wood against stone. The clack of a cane, I realized. Many magi tended to have those. I held no qualms, even I had one. They just sort of, fulfilled the aesthetic of the nobility.
"You won't find the Matou master here."
The voice came from behind me. A familiar voice.
"Aren't you supposed to be meeting Bazett?"
I glanced at the priest stood beside me with his hands behind his back. At my words, brief amusement flickered through his eyes and his mouth parted ever so slightly in some dogged smile that his own face seemed unused to.
"Her meeting was short." He said calmly, "Her departure was immediate. As a neutral party, that is all I will say. However, again, you will not find the Matou master here."
I raised a brow at the free information.
"I thought you were supposed to be a neutral party."
He merely shrugged his shoulders. "I've recently come to know that the Matou are engaging in… let us say, unsavoury research. If true, I can not abide in silence."
Who did he think he was fooling here?
I scoffed openly. "'Recently', yeah, right. I think you mean it's not useful to you anymore."
Such was standard procedure for the Mage's Association, and I sincerely doubted the Holy Church was any different after my experience with their vaunted members. Kirei Kotomine had been watching over the city for close to a decade now, till Rin came of age. There was no way I was entertaining even the mere thought that he didn't know of these so-called 'unsavoury' activities.
"Take it however you will. I am a servant of the Lord." His expression never faltered. "Perhaps, we might work out a deal?"
He took my silence as a yes.
"As Overseer, I am allowed to… incentivize other Masters in case the rules are broken. The Matou master has been draining civilians for mana to maintain his servant. If left alone, this will surely draw the attention of the public, and then, the First Principle Enforcement Bureau."
I almost laughed. The Clock Tower's Department of Policy could not care less about what happened in this backwater nation they all looked down on… not unless something drew their attention. Ah right, there was that.
"Help me investigate their wrongdoings. I will reward you with a command seal."
"You know the head of the Matou can probably hear this conversation?"
"I tend to care little for what filth thinks."
"An Executor calling someone filth. Crazy."
He shrugged his hands. "So?"
"Yeah, sure." I nodded.
Not for the command seal, I cared little for that. No, Kirei was giving me free reign to rain down hell on the Matou, strip them for all they were worth, and end the line entirely. There was no way I'd ever turn down such an opportunity.
"Very well. Let us begin."
As I watched, he reeled back his fist and smashed it into the gates. They gave away immediately. The hinges burst, and either gate flew past the front yard with such force that part of them ended up buried in the wall.
I whistled.
Kirei hummed, putting his hands behind his back once again.
With a snap of my fingers, the bounded field around the compound crumbled in on itself. The master of the house still gave no real reaction. A terse silence settled upon the house. I rubbed the sole of my shoe against the paved path leading up to the front door.
This was getting boring.
I raised my fingers. Amongst crimson flashed and howling winds, Red formed atop them.
Just then, I saw critters. Disgusting critters numbering in the hundreds. They burst out through the dirt in the yard and crawled onto the concrete, leaving slimy trails. I narrowed my eyes for a closer look, and immediately regretted my curious folly.
They looked like dicks. There was no other word for it. Slimy, disgusting phalluses with sharp, frothing teeth at the head and two antennae at the tail end. I didn't want to, but I imagined that his experiments on humans likely had something to do with those bugs going inside them.
Bile rose to my mouth, I forced it back down.
The nasty creatures crawled atop one another, around each other, slowly they rose to resemble a remotely human creature. A blink, and a small, shriveled man stood in their place. He looked less human, and more like old, blotted skin stretched over a malformed skeleton. I could vividly make out every bone and vein in his body.
"Thank you, God. He's wearing clothes."
He wore a black robe over one of those green yukata things. I was 100% certain that I'd be actually traumatized if I saw this creature naked.His eyes were pure black, marked only by white pupils that studied me a while before turning to Kirei.
"What is the meaning of this, boy?" He held both hands over his walking stick.
"Zouken Matou." Kirei raised his head, "It is as you see. Your existence can no longer be tolerated."
Before he could open his disgusting mouth-hole, I fired Red. It instantly blew through half of his skull, then erased a good chunk of the mansion behind him.
The half of the head that remained laughed eerily as the rest formed once more.
"Gahaha… what brought this on, boy? As I recall, we were getting along just fine."
"You've been draining civilians with reckless abandon."
"A flimsy excuse!" The old creature scoffed.
"Indeed. You simply disgust me. Your magecraft, and what you do to your own grandchildren, disgusts me from the bottom of my heart." Kirei placed a hand over his chest. His words rang hollow. Sure, they sounded nice and all, but I could tell he didn't mean them in the slightest. Zouken even laughed at his altruistic declaration.
The old man put both hands over his walking stick, "So, I'm finally getting in your way, is it? Fine. You'd be an issue for my wish too."
"What wish?"
"The Holy Grail, of course, isn't it obvious?" He stared at me with a dead face. "You, youngster, why help him?"
My answer should have been a 'good' one, like Kirei's, like maybe Shirou's. But no, my immediate decision to end his existence was not based in cold-hard logic, nor in a bleeding heart that could not tolerate evil.
No, he was a magus. There was no need for such things.
Besides, even if he wasn't one…
Clearing my throat, I pointed a finger at him.
"Those bugs are disgusting."
I glanced at Kirei. He simply nodded.
"Let us end his pitiful and hideous existence."
Zouken laughed at him.
Distantly, I heard the clink of steel chains, the thud of hurried steps and a gasp.
Then, the very ground burst.
-
Hope you enjoyed.
You can find 7 chaps ahead at patre0n.com/Bleap