Chapter 21: One punch done
"Well that settles that." I let out a breath and slumped back on the ground.
"...You just showed up again after a few days and that's the first thing you say?" I imagined Shirou in a deadpan expression.
"I was tired, so I hid and recuperated." I shrugged. Not my fault that I felt vulnerable as all hell after using that Elden Lord crap. What kind of shitty ability makes me literally incapacitated after using it? I want a refund.
'You have to admit, it was surprisingly a powerful ability.' Draig commented as Albion hummed in agreement.
'Indeed, but he could probably reach that level of strength if he were capable of using either of our juggernaut drives.'
'Of course he could! And it probably wouldn't incapacitate him as badly afterwards.' The two dragons continued to hype themselves up.
"Yes, yes. You two have such overpowered abilities. Unfortunately you won't let me use them." I rolled my eyes. Not much point in having powers that I can't use.
"Zieg-san, you're talking to yourself again." I heard Sakura's worried tone.
"Relax, I'm just talking to the voices in my head." I waved it off, but judging from the expression on her face. She didn't look convinced.
"Um, Zieg-san. Thank you for what you did." She bowed to me.
"No problem, I was never planning on keeping Medusa anyway." I nonchalantly responded. Originally I used Rule Breaker to take Rider, but I gave Medusa back to her, mainly because the strain of a powerful Noble Phantasm is actually noticeable to me.
In the past, I was more accustomed to only Assassin servants. I never really felt much strain, regardless of whatever Noble Phantasm Jack or Serenity used. But I was truly able to feel the strain on my stamina when I felt Medusa use Bellerophon in the distance.
"No, I meant..." She stopped her words and hesitated, taking glances at Shirou who looked confused.
"Oh, that. Don't worry about it. It was honestly a gamble and I wasn't even sure if it would work." I told her honestly. There was a 50/50 chance that she was going to come out as a vegetable when I used the Rune of the Unborn on her.
"I want to thank you as well. For well... everything." Shirou rubbed the back of his head sheepishly.
"Eh, I did most of this because I wanted to and I had things to gain." I got tracing, along with freaking Rule Breaker! Totally worth it. "By the way, where is everyone else?"
"Rider and Saber seem to be in the dojo for some reason. Illya said she would be coming to visit in a couple days and I haven't seen Archer after the other night though..." He frowned at the end.
"Ah, I actually met him last night. He had an offer for me, and I accepted it" I vaguely said with a small smile. I have learned, that I can turn Heroic Spirits into spirit ashes if they accept.
'Before you get any ideas, I'd rather not meet my younger self again.' I heard the familiar voice of EMIYA in my mind.
Archer ended up finding me in my hiding spot last night. Another reason he accepted the call to this Grail War was that he wanted to help me with my goal. He knew that I had a goal, but he was never able to help me with it in life. So I integrated him into my summoning army.
At first I tried to turn Serenity into a spirit ash when she was dying, but apparently it didn't work since her spiritual core was broken.
'Well that's fine, but you got anything you wanna say to Rin before I leave?' I asked him.
'..No. I've said everything that needed to be said when we parted ways.' He stated with finality. I nodded before standing up to leave.
"Alright, well I just came to say goodbye."
"You're leaving already?" I turned to Saber who had come back with Rider behind.
"Yeah, I'm a man with a goal. Can't stay in one place too long."
"If you need help, we can..." Shirou began before I cut him off.
"No." I stopped him before he could try using the protagonist's ability to talk their way to victory.
"Well, if you ever need a place to stay. You can come back anytime." He sighed, realizing I wasn't going to accept his help.
"Honestly the only thing I could possibly want right now, is ripping Saber's heart out of her chest. But that would kill her, so I am refraining from that." I gestured to the King of Knights.
"What did I do?" She pointed to herself, unsure of what she did to offend me.
"Nothing, it's just I have a need for your dragon core. But unfortunately it would kill you if I were to take it from you." I sighed helplessly shaking my head with a 'what can you do?' expression.
'Oh, so that's why she felt so familiar to me!' Draig exclaimed as if finally realizing something.
'I did notice that she sort of felt like you.' Albion noted as it was supposedly the core of this reality's Draig.
Taking her dragon core would be a nice addition to the body I'm going to build for Draig in the future, but I'm not scummy enough to go all murder-death-kill on an ally.
I looked around to see everyone unsure of how to react to my blatant admission of wanting to rip Saber's heart out.
"Well before I horrify anyone else, I'll be off now." I waved with a smile before teleporting away.
∞
"What the?" I blinked in confusion.
I stopped at the top of a building somewhere near the mage association. Strange, the defenses of the clock tower are impressive, true. But I wasn't planning on invading the clocktower.
Originally I was heading towards the Spiritual Tomb of Albion. Although the portals were closed, I was going to brute force my way through. Theoretically the Clock Tower shouldn't be able to stop me since I wasn't directly aiming for the clocktower itself.
'There's something odd about knowing that my corpse is beneath all this.'
'That's odd? I'm still finding it hard to believe that my heart was inside that girl!'
"The clocktower shouldn't be able to stop me. And Zelretch shouldn't interfere since the amount of material that I planned on taking would be negligible in the long run." I muttered out loud. He shouldn't care about something so trivial as this right?
"Negligible perhaps, but it's still the foundation of mystery that the Clocktower is built upon." My eyes constricted at the man who had appeared from a portal of kaleidoscopic light.
My starry eyes erupted and began to bleed as it tried to delve into the mystery of true magic.
"Oh? Can you see it?" Zelretch gave a knowing smile. He was an old man, dressed smartly in a black expensive suit and cloak. His hand rested on a cane while his other was stroking his beard.
My eyes pulsated and I felt like I was going to vomit from all the 'answers' towards the 'mystery' that assaulted my being. I found myself on my knees, my eyes still filtering all of it as I panted uncontrollably. "Fuck!" I forcibly shut my eyes. Blood was still dripping down to my cheeks.
"Well those are some interesting mystic eyes you have there." He noted with some intrigue.
"Fuck off." I stood back up slowly to avoid shaking. "Gonna take awhile to process all that." I groaned, eyes still shut. I looked towards him, without opening my eyes.
"Alright, what do you want?" I finally asked.
"Why don't you step into my office, we have much to discuss." I could imagine him smiling like a businessman.
∞
Zieg found himself sitting down in front of the Second Magician's desk. He had taken a moment to physically heal his eyes, but turned off his Primeval Sight.
"Before we begin, any requests on beverages? I'll see if I have what you want in my collection." Zelretch asked before taking a seat at his chair.
"Oolong Tea." Zieg responded immediately without missing a beat.
"You know, you didn't seem like a tea enthusiast to me." He noted oddly surprised.
"Oh no, i meant this." The young sorcerer pulled out two glasses with ice.
Zelretch watched silently amused as the younger mage mixed Vodka and whiskey to get the color of oolong tea.
"There, oolong tea." Zieg smiled, raising his cup up. The Second magician looked at the glass of 'tea' in front of him for a moment before an amused smile graced his lips.
"Cheers." They toasted before downing the drink.
"Now, I'm here to make a deal with you." He began, his hands folded.
"Really? Over something like this? You're kind of being real downer, you know that?"
"It concerns the foundation of the Clocktower."
"All I was going to take was 100kg at most. I'm pretty sure no one would miss it, what with all the excavating the clocktower does anyway."
"Excavation has been halted for the past decade now."
"And that still hasn't stopped people from trying to sneak out a talisman or two every now and then."
"Regardless. I am willing to make a deal with you. I will offer you 500kg and a piece of it's core."
"...Continue."
"In return, I want 5... no just 4 Holy Grails."
"That's too much."
"Really? I doubt it'd be difficult for you to steal them."
"It's not about difficulty. If it was, then you wouldn't be asking me for this. Don't think I don't know about the karmic weight that I would be taking on for 'taking' these." Zieg Narrowed his eyes dangerously. "I know the reason you have to use others is because you yourself are constricted with certain restraints. Otherwise you wouldn't have remained injured as you are now."
While Zelretch looked fine appearance-wise, he could tell that the man wasn't as fine as he looked.
"You know about the karmic weight involved?" Zelretch had a calculating eye about him.
Zieg already knew about this from past experience. If he were to receive things from birth or the universe via reward or system, then that's all fine. But if he were to go to one of DXD's infinite realities and do something like take Issei's Boosted gear for himself. Then he could do so, but he would also be taking away a person's 'destiny'.
The Fate that was taken away, wouldn't just be from Issei himself. But from that entire reality. If you take something away as an outsider, it is recommended to give something back to avoid such a karmic tie.
If you don't, then the Karmic weight doesn't just simply disappear after your death or that reality's end. No it follows you across lives, aslong as the omniverse still exists, then so too will this conceptual weight.
"Of course I do, I'm an Aversis..." All of a sudden Zieg's eyes glazed over for a moment.
'Holy shit that's a lot of information.' Draig commented, but Zieg didn't hear him as he continued to stare off in a daze.
'You think he's broken?' Albion seemed concerned.
'I wouldn't be surprised.'
Zelretch quietly watched the young man go through some sort of episode in his own mind. After a couple minutes, Zieg finally twitched and his eyes returned to normal.
"Ah..." Was the first words he let out, before pointing accusingly at the grinning Second Magician. "You bastard, you did that on purpose!" Zieg exclaimed annoyingly.
"And? Will you accept now?" Zelretch smiled, taking out his own liquor and refilling the two glasses.
Zieg narrowed his eyes at the offending glasses for a moment. "Fuck it, meta knowledge is back anyway." He picked up the glass and toasted in agreement.
"Wonderful. So you should have no problem taking on all that karmic weight." Zelretch grinned joyfully as his plan had worked.
"Anymore would be just a drop in the ocean, makes no difference in my case." Zieg sighed, he felt older and more grouchy. "But first I have a certain truck driving asshole to punch. I will work on your grails when I prepare more."
"Take your time, I'm in no rush." Zelretch waved him off as the white haired mage who now remembered EVERYTHING left to punch someone.
∞
In some random bar.
A blonde haired man with gray eyes was chilling with the random patrons of the supernatural world. Drinking magically corrupted liquor and smoking magically pulsating blunts.
"This... this is some gooood shit." The man known as Gold Aversis lazily slurred out as he felt like he was seeing shit.
Which was why he didn't react when reality literally shattered and a white haired man stepped out the crack.
"YOU!" Zieg pointed an enraged finger at the man who was high out of his mind.
"..Me?!" Gold pointed to himself in confusion. If he were in the right state of mind, he would be running away at this moment. Unfortunately he wasn't.
"FUCKING TRAITOR! THIS IS THE RETRIBUTION OF AN ELDEN LORD!" Zieg's body erupted with the shine of an Elden Lord.
He immediately appeared in front of Gold, his fist cocked back and ready.
Gold Aversis's entire jaw shattered on impact, Zieg's fist unhesitatingly plowed it's way through with a vengeance and sent him flying to another dimension.
"That's one down." Zieg breathed out in satisfaction. He took out a list, and crossed off the truck driver that ran him over. Now he only needed to punch Odin.
Gold Aversis woke up some time later in the hospital.
That is why you don't do drugs.
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