"So after all that, you called all of us here for this so-called 'work testing,' and it turns out you just wanted us to test a board game?" Morgan complained, even as she carefully adjusted the pieces in the board game Touko Aozaki had made.
"This isn't just any board game," Touko shot back in her usual lazy tone. "It's a tabletop game based on what Aoko went through around the time she first inherited Magecraft. Since most of the important events happened at night, I called it Night of the Magician."
"Back at the Hot Springs Inn, I heard you made a doll modeled after your own sister and used it to attack her and her companions," Scáthach said, holding Aoko Aozaki's piece between her fingers. "And now your bad taste has somehow gotten even worse?"
"Of course it has. I'm planning to give it to Aoko later," Touko said with a smile, delivering something cruel with complete ease. "She's been single all these years. She must be bored. This can help her reminisce."
The only shame was that Aoko wasn't here, so there was no real target for the joke.
"It seems everyone got something out of this Singularity's hot spring trip, in one way or another," Artoria said. She tossed the die, then picked up the piece labeled Soujuurou Shizuki and moved it several spaces forward into the amusement park area.
"Oh, then it's battle time next," Touko said. "Each side rolls a twenty-sided die three times. Add the totals, then calculate the bonuses and penalties."
"Then we compare the totals?" Skadi asked, pinching the Alice Kuonji piece.
"No. Now comes the real highlight."
Artoria, Scáthach, and Skadi rolled their dice. Once the different results were laid out, the pieces on the board suddenly began to move, clashing with one another as if in a real fight.
That was exactly why Touko had asked them to help with testing.
Her board game was a semi-autonomous game powered by Mana.
"Leaving the theme aside, the idea itself is genuinely clever," Morgan said after watching for a moment. "You used the puppet techniques you're best at on the pieces. They look like ordinary tokens, but once the mechanism triggers, they fight as little puppets."
She considered it briefly. "Out of ten, I'll give it a nine."
"Coming from the great witch herself, that's harsh," Touko replied with a grin.
The battle on the tabletop would take a while, so the group gathered around, some standing, some sitting, watching the spectacle while chatting.
"If this Singularity hadn't been resolved properly, Morgan's existence would've been affected, and she would've disappeared, right?" Skadi asked, the board game making her think of what had almost happened.
"Well, since it didn't actually turn out that way, who knows?" Morgan said calmly. History had already been corrected, so there was no reason to dwell on it.
Unless it happened again.
"But if the Servant version of you disappeared in 1999," Scáthach continued, following the hypothetical through, "then my beloved disciple would have suffered afterward, wouldn't he? He might not even remember why you vanished."
"And to figure out what went wrong, he joins the Fifth Holy Grail War and tries to summon Morgan again," Touko added, extrapolating based on what she knew of Shiomi. "But the one who answers is the Morgan from Proper Human History."
Artoria went pale. "The Queen from this side is… isn't that far too dangerous? Even if Tenkei is careful, with them looking exactly the same, he could still be led astray."
"And then… it ends up the same anyway?" Skadi sighed. "A substitute can't replace the real thing."
"But it can be undone," Scáthach said with an amused smile. "And once he realizes that, my disciple would probably keep Morgan from Proper Human History at arm's length, maintaining a relationship of mutual use. A marriage in name only."
"After that he enters Chaldea and resolves the Incineration of Humanity," Touko continued, building momentum. "And then once the Bleached World arrives, for one reason or another, he ends up in the Lostbelt of Britannia."
She clicked her tongue in satisfaction. "And then the reunion goes smoothly?"
"It really does sound like destiny," Artoria said, looking as if she'd just heard a wonderfully dramatic story.
"But wouldn't that create another problem?" Skadi asked, glancing toward Scáthach. "If Morgan from Proper Human History never disappeared, wouldn't it turn into her competing with versions of herself from other histories over him?"
Because their fundamentals were different, Scáthach and Skadi couldn't simply map their own situations onto it.
And from the fragments of the past Artoria occasionally mentioned, it wasn't hard to tell that Morgan from Proper Human History was a far more regret-laden great witch than the Morgan sitting in front of them now.
Gray, one of the living proofs of that contradiction, was also in Chaldea.
"That really does make one curious," Scáthach said, nodding again and again.
"I think… it's better not to be curious," Artoria replied, shaking her head.
At that moment, Morgan slammed her hand down on the table. A stiff, not-quite-smile crossed her face.
"Don't just assume that, as a Servant, I failed to accompany my husband all the way to 2017, and then draw conclusions on your own, will you?"
"My apologies. No offense intended," Scáthach said, realizing the joke might have gone too far.
"No. What I'm saying is that your conclusions themselves are far too crude," Morgan continued evenly. "I've been to Blackmore Village. From the state of that place alone, you can glimpse just how twisted the Morgan of Proper Human History really is. You only considered my husband's situation, without accounting for the other side at all. There are simply too many holes in this line of reasoning. Out of ten points, I'll be generous and give you two, solely for the ending."
Artoria couldn't help laughing. "So you actually enjoy these kinds of hypotheticals too?"
"Or maybe she's a little interested in love as an act of plunder?" Touko said, pushing up her glasses. "If we assume that, at the very start of that infinite loop, the Servant Tenkei first summoned was actually Morgan from Proper Human History—"
"There are even hypotheses like that, completely impossible to verify?" Scáthach said, looking at Morgan. "Suddenly, I feel a bit sorry for the one from Proper Human History. Not only did she lose an important piece, even her bonds and records were taken from her."
"A piece?" Morgan blinked.
It wasn't that she objected to Scáthach's wording.
After all, if the Morgan of Proper Human History and Shiomi could never truly open up to one another, their relationship might well have ended up as nothing more than mutual exploitation and mutual consolation, advancing from one goal to the next.
The problem was that right now…
They were still playing a board game.
A Magecraft board game designed by a puppeteer, where the pieces could engage in real, physical combat on the tabletop.
And at this point, the Mana reaction from that battle was getting a little too intense.
"Oh… looks like it's gone out of control," Touko said calmly, stepping back.
The next instant, the tabletop exploded, and the game came to an abrupt end.
The other four, who all had ways to deal with it, were unharmed. Even so, they unanimously gave it a terrible review.
"I really should've just stayed in the room with him and the kids."
...
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