Min-jun's grip on Jack's hand was firm, a steady anchor against the sterile, humming chill of the Chaldea corridors. Her small fingers squeezed his rhythmically—a loose swing, then a sudden tight clutch whenever a wall panel flickered or a shadow seemed to stretch too long. She was still buzzing, her other hand occasionally rising to pat the top of her own head, mimicking the sensation.
"The big pink lady's hand was warm," she murmured again, not for his benefit, just processing the memory aloud.
"It was," Min-jun agreed, his voice low. He didn't need to say more. The echo of that embrace—the sheer, impossible solidarity of it—still sat quietly behind his ribs. Not a disturbance, just a presence. New.
The Director's office doors loomed ahead, imposing and smooth. Jack's skipping steps slowed to a hesitant shuffle. She tugged his sleeve. "Is the shouty lady gonna be mad?"
"Her default setting is 'intense,'" Min-jun said. "It's not personal. Just brace for volume."
The doors hissed open. The room was dominated by the serene, eternal swirl of Chaldeas, bathing everything in an underwater blue glow. Olga Marie Animusphere stood behind her desk, arms crossed. The folded blanket was a soft, incongruous lump on her chair; the empty bento box, neatly closed, sat at the desk's corner. Evidence of a pause, however brief.
Ritsuka was already there, perched on the edge of a seat, his knees bouncing a nervous tattoo. Mash stood beside him, ramrod straight, her shield a silent sentinel at her side. Emiya leaned against the far wall, a study in red and casual vigilance, his crimson eyes taking in their entrance with detached interest.
"Ah! Min-jun! Jack!" Ritsuka's face lit up with relief, his anxiety momentarily overshadowed by greeting a friendly face. "You made it. You look… well-rested?"
Mash offered a gentle smile and a small bow. "Good morning. I am glad to see you both recovered."
Jack, peeking from behind Min-jun's leg, edged forward at Mash's tone. "Master made a big pink lady! She hugged him. Then she hugged me too." She announced it as the most logical and wonderful explanation for their state of being.
Ritsuka blinked. "A… big pink lady? A Servant?"
Emiya's mouth quirked, just a shade. "Busy in the workshop, I see. Care to enlighten us, technician?"
"Later," Min-jun said, meeting his gaze. It was a simple statement, a closed door. Ritsuka and Mash had seen the aftermath in Fuyuki; they knew the shape of the power, if not its name. Emiya did not. That was a conversation for a less crowded room.
Olga cleared her throat, the sound sharp in the quiet space. A faint flush—from stress, the earlier encounter, or the perpetual chill of the room—tinged her cheeks. "If the reunion is concluded," she said, her voice clipped but lacking its usual withering edge, "we have a Singularity to address. Sit, Master Kim. Assassin, do as you please."
Min-jun guided Jack to the chair. She clambered up, tucking her feet beneath her, her paper bag of treasures clutched to her chest. He remained standing behind her, a habit from a life where being ready to move was synonymous with being alive.
Olga didn't comment. She tapped her tablet, and a holographic map of 15th-century France shimmered above the desk. It was sickly, pulsing with crimson distortions. At its heart, over Orléans, the silhouette of a dragon—Fafnir—blotted out the light.
"The second Singularity: Orléans, 1431," Olga began, her tone flattening into a briefing-room cadence. "Historical pivot point. Jeanne d'Arc lifts the siege, turns the tide for France. In this distortion…" She zoomed in on the vortex. "She is executed. And then something else rises in her place. A corrupted entity—a 'Dragon Witch'—commands an army of wyverns and undead, with Fafnir, empowered by a Grail, as its centerpiece. France is not falling to England. It is being consumed by this aberration. Left unchecked, the era collapses."
Ritsuka leaned forward, his playfulness gone. "A corrupted Jeanne d'Arc? The saint?"
"The readings indicate an Alter Servant, yes," Mash confirmed, her voice somber. "A version twisted by the Grail's influence, manifesting as a dragon-wielding caster."
"Fafnir means Siegfried. Means dragon-slaying legends," Emiya mused from the wall, his arms still folded. "Not just a dragon. A symbol. She'll have command over the lesser wyverns, territory advantages. Straight combat will be a meat grinder."
"Hence, a full team deployment," Olga stated, turning her gaze to Min-jun. "Fujimaru, Mash, and Emiya will form the primary assault team. Their objective is direct engagement with the core anomaly." Her magenta eyes held his. "Master Kim. You have a summoned Servant and a functional, if unorthodox, Mystic Code. You are hereby designated operational Master. You and Assassin Jack will Rayshift as auxiliary support. Secure perimeter leylines, handle flanking maneuvers, provide reconnaissance and a fallback point. You are the anchor. If the primary team is overwhelmed, your priority is stabilization and extraction. Understood?"
Min-jun gave a single nod. Orléans. The name had tickled at the back of his mind ever since Romani first mumbled about the temporal coordinates. Now, in the cool blue light of the office, a fragmented memory surfaced—not a mission file, but a ghost from a past life.
Hunched in a dim apartment in Mapo-gu, the glow of a cracked phone screen the only light. Tapping mindlessly through a game. A blonde saint in plate armor. A angry girl in black, breathing fire. Wyverns. A tired knight who talked of sacrifice. It had been a story. A distraction. A thing to tap through while farming for… what were they called? Dragon fangs?
The details were fuzzy, bleached by time and trauma, but the emotional outline remained: a tale of a country burning, of a saint facing her own shadow. He remembered it feeling grand, then tedious, then grand again. A good story. Now, it was a briefing. Now, the wyverns would smell of sulfur and blood, the flames would scorch the air from his lungs, and the shadow of the dragon would be a physical weight.
If it follows that old script… we'll meet her. The real Jeanne. There will be battles in burning fields. Corrupted Servants—a berserker, a vampire. Maybe allies: a sorrowful dragon-slayer, a queen who laughs in the face of ruin. A final throne room, drenched in hellfire.
The thought of returning here afterward—to the hum of Chaldea, to a debrief, to a cafeteria meal—felt suddenly, profoundly precious. A thing to cling to.
A bizarre, unbidden image flickered then: that same angry girl from the story, the one in black, standing in that cafeteria. Arms crossed, scowling at a plate of Emiya's food, muttering insults with no heat behind them. A tsundere dragon-witch in a kitchen apron. The absurdity of it was so sharp it almost made him cough.
Where did that even come from? Focus.
He tuned back in as Olga finished listing coordinate protocols.
"—maintain comms. Romani is on monitoring. Questions?"
Ritsuka raised a hand. "What if… what if the dragon and the Witch are together? From the start?"
"Then you adapt. That is why we have two teams." Olga's gaze swept over them. "Emiya, your versatility is key. Mash, your shield is our fortress. Do not forget that." She paused, her eyes drifting back to Min-jun, and something in her expression softened, just for a micro-second. "Your role is support, but it is no less critical. Chaldea's resources are finite. We cannot afford to lose anyone."
Silence settled, thick with the weight of the unknown.
Min-jun looked at Olga, really looked. Past the sharp demeanor, the proud set of her shoulders, to the faint shadows under her eyes, the way her fingers tightened almost imperceptibly on the edge of the tablet. She was holding this shattered organization together with sheer force of will, a commander on a sinking ship, refusing to let the lights go out.
He spoke before he could think better of it, his voice quieter than he intended, but clear in the silent room.
"Thank you, Director."
Olga blinked, thrown. "For… the briefing?"
"For the assignment. For recognizing my operational status." He paused, choosing his words with the same care he'd use on a frayed wire. "After Fuyuki, you could have sidelined me. Kept me on diagnostics. It would have been the safer bureaucratic choice. You didn't. You assessed the capability and deployed it. That's… good command."
He saw her breath catch. The flush on her cheeks deepened from pink to rose. She looked away, her fingers fidgeting with the tablet's edge. "It was a logical allocation of assets. Your performance metrics were adequate. Your unique… abilities present a tactical variable. It would be inefficient not to utilize it."
Min-jun didn't relent, not cruelly, but with a quiet insistence. "Maybe. But logic doesn't keep people alive. Judgment does. You've kept this place running. You've given us a foundation to fight from. That matters. So, thank you."
The effect was immediate and profound. Olga's shoulders, perpetually braced for impact, lost a fraction of their tension. Her chin lifted, but not in defiance—in something closer to acknowledgment. The blush was now a full, warm crimson, but she didn't try to hide it. She absorbed the words, let them sink in, and for a moment, she wasn't just the Director of a ruined organization; she was a person whose work had been seen.
Ritsuka watched, wide-eyed, as if witnessing a rare and fragile ceremony. Mash's smile was small but deeply approving.
Olga waved a hand, the gesture less dismissal and more a flustered attempt to regain equilibrium. "Y-yes, well. Sentiment doesn't adjust coordinates. Get to the Rayshift chamber. Da Vinci is waiting."
Min-jun nodded. As he turned, Jack already tugging him toward the door, Olga's voice stopped him.
"Min-jun."
He glanced back.
Her eyes met his, and the vulnerability was still there, but overlaid now with steely resolve. "Be careful. All of you. I am not in the habit of repeating myself. Return intact."
"We will," he said.
In the corridor, Emiya lingered, letting the others walk ahead. He watched Min-jun's back, the easy way Jack swung from his hand, the steady, unfussy rhythm of his stride.
The feeling that settled in Emiya's gut wasn't suspicion. It was recognition, old and weary.
He'd seen that type of gentleness before. The kind that wasn't soft, but solid. That offered praise not as flattery, but as simple, factual acknowledgment. It was a disarming thing. It bypassed defenses because it carried no obvious agenda, just clear sight. He'd used to be like that, a lifetime ago. Before he learned how that very clarity could become a chain, how seeing the good in people could make you responsible for the pain that inevitably followed.
The kid had no idea. He'd just handed the proud, isolated Director a piece of genuine validation. She'd hungered for it. And now that seed was planted. In a place like this, under this pressure, seeds like that didn't stay dormant. They grew into complications, into attachments that could cloud judgment or fracture when things went to hell—and things always went to hell.
Trouble, Emiya thought, the ghost of a wry, tired smile touching his lips. The earnest ones are always the most dangerous. Not because they meant harm, but because they made you hope. And hope was a luxury heroes couldn't afford.
He pushed off the wall and followed, his footsteps silent. His job wasn't to intervene. It was to watch, and to be ready when the fallout came.
The Rayshift chamber buzzed with urgent, pre-mission energy. Da Vinci directed technicians with cheerful severity. Romani's face was on the main screen, a little less gaunt, offering last-minute checks.
"Remember, find the real Jeanne if you can! She should be a key ally!"
Olga's voice came over the intercom, firm, the momentary softness sealed away once more. "Establish a foothold. Resolve the Singularity. Do not engage the core anomaly recklessly. Dismissed."
Min-jun helped Jack into her Coffin. She arranged her knives with solemn ceremony before lying back.
"See you in France," he said.
"We'll win the stabbing contest," she replied, utterly serious.
"We will."
He settled into his own Coffin. The lid hissed shut, enclosing him in familiar, cold dark. The hum of the spiritron converters rose to a whine, vibrating through the alloy frame.
In the stillness, the fragmented memories of a digital Orléans played one last time against his eyelids—not as a guide, but as a ghost. A story he'd once consumed. Now, he was stepping into its pages, and the story would not care if he knew its plot. It would burn, and bleed, and be real.
Ritsuka's voice, slightly muffled, came through the comm. "Everyone set?"
A chorus of affirmatives.
The light built beyond his closed eyelids, a crushing, brilliant pressure.
The whine peaked.
And the world dissolved into the spin