Tonight, Alice joins the hunt.

—On this land, snow means 'sorrow'.

"My companion is waiting for me to save her." Ritsuka didn't stop, continuing to walk in a certain direction beyond Hanyang. "I have to save her."

However, the girl's voice followed him everywhere.

"But you will still die the moment you leave, and the dead can't save anyone."

“I know.” Ritsuka nodded—she felt she had made a nodding gesture. “But that’s not a reason for me not to save her. I have to save her, no matter what. I won’t stop, I will never stop.”

She looked up at the sky; the jade-colored sun still hung high. Within its interior, or perhaps on its surface, she could vaguely make out the outline of a constellation of stars. It looked like a galaxy, a star system, a large spiral galaxy. She thought it resembled the constellation Andromeda, but she couldn't be sure.

She didn't know why she could see Andromeda, but she knew she could see more than just Andromeda. In that instant when the starlight turned, she saw Earth, she saw Mesopotamia, she saw the monster's lair formed by the abandoned battlefield, and she saw herself lying on the edge of the lair, missing three of her limbs, on the verge of death!

She already knew where she was.

This is the realm of the heart, the abyss of the heart—no, this isn't the abyss of the heart, but rather the emotional wasteland beyond it. For some reason, her spirit is connected to the emotions of that Russian princess. Although she doesn't know why the winter maiden chose to stay here and refuse to leave, Ritsuka knows that if she wants to leave, she will definitely be able to escape from here!

She knew she would die if she left, because time here seemed to stand still forever. But even so—

even so--

She found that the moment she took her first step, her figure mysteriously traversed time and space to arrive beneath that lonely icy rock, appearing before the princess.

The princess stared into her eyes.

"Time doesn't flow here. As long as you don't leave, and as long as your friends remain intact at this moment, they will never be harmed. And as long as you don't leave, you will never die." She paused, then asked, "Why do you insist on leaving?"

She asked.

However, Ritsuka did not answer her.

"Are you afraid to leave here?" the girl from Chaldea countered. "Are you afraid to return to reality and let time flow again, Princess Anastasia of Romanov?"

“I am indeed afraid to leave here,” her questioner answered without hesitation. And the instant Anastasia spoke, the snow in the distant sky ceased to fall. “If I leave here, the world will face a terrible catastrophe. Although I don’t remember exactly what happened, I know that the world has already died twice because of me.”

“It’s better for everyone if I stay here. As long as I do nothing, I won’t hurt anyone.” She raised her hand and pinched an ice crystal. “Similarly, no one can hurt me.”

"That's just a simple act of escapism."

“I know,” the princess replied, “a shameful escape, but it’s useful. Especially when you have no idea where you went wrong, but the consequences of that mistake will inevitably be dire—”

"I would rather choose to escape."

“But you will leave eventually.” Ritsuka looked at her earnestly and said, “A thousand years, ten thousand years, a hundred million years, you will leave this place eventually. When you finally decide to leave, everything will develop as you feared. And at that time, you may no longer be afraid, no longer care. Because by then, you will have seen through it all, you will be weary, and you will no longer care about the life and death of the world or the survival of all things. But—”

Her gaze was intense.

"Do you, right now, want to become the person you are in the future when you decide to leave? To give up everything you once cherished and embark on a path that is no different from your present?"

She shook her head and took a step outside.

But the cold reality and death immediately followed.

"I'd rather drown in my current ideals before that happens."

Section Sixty: The Second Cycle - Transcending Good and Evil

When Fujimaru Ritsuka awoke again, she found herself lying quietly atop that familiar stone platform. The blood from the dead sun lion beside her had congealed, and the sun in the sky had shifted slightly, from the near-noon of her unconsciousness to the approaching twilight.

I am still alive.

Not only was he alive, but a faint power was also accumulating within him—a cold power.

"It's merely replacing your body's circulatory system with magic, temporarily preserving its vitality. Your injuries haven't lessened in the slightest. They're just temporarily prevented from worsening."

A familiar voice came from beside her. She turned her head and saw the princess standing by the stone platform, gazing at the setting sun that was already close to the horizon in the far distance—Ritsuka lowered her head, and once again saw her missing legs and hands. No, they were not physical limbs, but prosthetics constructed from cold-attribute magic. Although they could move, they could not derive any feeling from the movements.

"Thank you, Anastasia..."

"No need to thank me. I didn't heal your wounds. I don't know how to heal people's wounds either. I just kept everything as it was. As for what happens next, the choice is still yours."

"but……"

“There are no buts.” The princess turned slightly to the side, holding a delicate doll in her arms. The doll looked almost alive, radiating power even to mortals. “I didn’t allow you to continue living without a price. Fujimaru Ritsuka, I only agree with a small part of what you just said—that continuing to stagnate will eventually lead to corruption. But aside from that, I deny your other ideas.”

"You are not my Master, and I will not sign any contract with you. But before I find my Master, I will witness the final fate of your existence—if you want to save your companions, then go ahead and do so. I will not provide you with the slightest help. And as payment for maintaining your life, I require that you not use any means to heal your body before you succeed."

Fujimaru Ritsuka carefully examined her hands and feet, which looked like a solid mixture of ice and snow. Their properties were equivalent to prosthetics that would not cause any rejection reaction. If she covered them with boots and gloves, they would not reveal any flaws—they had paralyzed the nerves connecting her hands and feet, or rather, created nerves for mimicry, so that the severed areas would not produce pain under inappropriate circumstances.

Not only her hands and feet, but also her internal organs, were covered in a spiderweb of icy veins crawling within her body. These veins had glued together the kidneys, liver, intestines, and stomach damaged in the previous battle with the Sun Lion, restoring them to a semblance of intactness and ensuring the smooth flow of internal substances—however, they were merely glued together, not truly healed. This icy magic had deceived her body, making it believe that her internal organs remained perfectly intact.

For both ordinary people and magicians, injuries of this severity would be fatal. Anastasia's magic merely kept Ritsuka in a near-death state without altering it.

In other words, she can recover her strength by eating, but neither the food nor the medicine she consumes will repair the internal organs that her body perceives as functioning normally. The only way to cure her is to expel Anastasia's magic, but once Anastasia's magic is expelled from her body, her dying body will instantly deteriorate, and Fujimaru Ritsuka will die.

Ritsuka's first thought was the 'Perfect Repair' of the young Medea. But she immediately remembered that all the Servants at Chaldea had been sent back, and she couldn't possibly summon Medea without a Relic.

Moreover, she roughly understood Anastasia's meaning.

"This magic will last until I rescue Mashu, right?"

“Yes.” The princess gently stroked the doll in her arms. “Since you deny my immutability and my concept of 'stagnation,' then I will make this 'stagnation' a crucial support for you to fulfill your own aspirations. Once my theory is verified, this power will naturally no longer need to be maintained. Leaving your body will be only natural.”

“What if I die before that?” Ritsuka asked.

"What do I care if you live or die? You are neither my Master nor my ally."

“What if I manage to heal my injuries before then?” Ritsuka continued. “Miss Anastasia, will your magic kill me then?”

"No. Because there is no contract or agreement between you and me. I am simply keeping you alive and making my demands. Whether you accept or insist is entirely up to you. I will only observe you until you are healed and rescue the people. Once you are healed or rescue the people, you will have no value or meaning to me."

"I see." Ritsuka nodded and stood up. She bowed deeply to the princess, but the bow was avoided. In the end, she could only manage a slightly self-deprecating and awkward smile.

Why the self-deprecation? The self-deprecation stemmed from the fact that she had just thought she had convinced Anastasia.

Why was it embarrassing? It was embarrassing because she realized she actually had such arrogant thoughts.

Anastasia wouldn't offer her any help other than 'stagnation,' so naturally she wouldn't accept any gratitude or thanks from her for any reason. Realizing this, Ritsuka moved her body, quickly mastering the use of these ice prosthetics thanks to her extensive experience in that icy world.

Then, she activated her magic circuits, using her renewed strength—now that she no longer needed to repair her body—to recreate a dagger and a campfire. She then quickly removed the edible parts from the sun lion's body and roasted them over the campfire, obtaining a cooked meal before her strength ran out.

She didn't bother to survey her surroundings, because it was unnecessary and she didn't have the energy for it.

She remembered what Tomoe Gozen had told her in the previous cycle: not to damage the monster's brain. So, although she killed the sun lion, she didn't touch or cut that obviously tender, edible part.

She ate quickly, the rapid eating warming her body. During the meal, she politely asked the princess if she would like some, only to be met with a predictable refusal.

Does rejection make people feel frustrated?

Sometimes it happens, but not when I'm mentally prepared.

The experiences of the past few hours helped Fujimaru Ritsuka dispel her previous misconceptions. She quickly learned how to deal with the coldness and even hostility of Servants. After all, she wasn't Flora, unlike Flora who had no choice. And because she knew Flora, and by referencing Flora's behavior, she quickly developed a set of behaviors that would at least prevent escalating conflicts.

About fifteen minutes later, Fujimaru Ritsuka had regained enough strength. During this time, she tried to reconnect to Chaldea's communications several more times, but the result was always the same: nothing.

There's no other way; I can't rely on anyone else. From now on, the only one I can depend on is myself.

As the sun completely set, she used the simple materials around her to make a torch—a simple magic catalyst that even a novice magician could use—and then she began to explore everything around the nest.

She knew she couldn't rush things, because she had nothing in her hands, and recklessly rushing into the area covered by that thin mist would be tantamount to suicide.

She knew Anastasia wouldn't help her, even if she knelt down and begged, even if she tried every means to threaten or seduce her—she knew that doing so would only incur Anastasia's disgust and contempt, and at that point, even her 'stagnant' state would be stripped away.

But that doesn’t mean she won’t do anything.

As the sun completely set, she stood on the nearest high point, holding a burning torch. And as the moon rose, the entire scene outside the nest came into her view.

This is a battlefield, a vast, fierce battlefield, and one where the victor has already been decided.

One side in the battle was the monsters, who suffered a crushing defeat and were forced to leave mountains of mangled corpses scattered across the ground, with no survivors. The other side, whose identities were unknown, emerged victorious, leaving not a single body behind.

"This should be the Blood Temple, the lair of the Beast Goddess." Ritsuka noticed a building ruin that had been blasted to pieces but still had a few bricks and stones remaining. She quickly discovered that all the wounds on the fallen beast corpses were penetrating, burns, or torn apart by explosions. There were almost no marks from swords or teeth.

"The other side should be an army, a powerful army. Their average combat strength is probably close to that of modern armored forces in the 21st century, and even surpasses them in some aspects—although I only glanced at them. But I didn't see a single limb or weapon other than a monster... It's an overwhelming match."

Ritsuka sighed softly.

"It is the goddess of Immanet and her army."

She roughly understood what had happened.

Just a few, no, a dozen hours ago. While she was still wondering why Tomoe Gozen hadn't come to greet her as she had in the previous cycle, Tomoe Gozen was actually marching under the command of the goddess of Imanithia towards the Blood Temple where the Beast Goddess resided.

It was a one-sided war, because Fujimaru Ritsuka had witnessed the goddess, whom he had never met, wrestling with Tiamat, the creator goddess, and gaining the upper hand. Ordinary god-level Servants couldn't even get close to the core before being easily defeated. And if such a goddess were to participate in this battle, then the battle would inevitably end with unimaginable speed.

"The Goddess of the Beasts failed, but she didn't die; instead, she fled somewhere to the outside. That period should have coincided with the time when I and the Knights of the Round Table were trapped in the City of Mist... I really wasn't lucky." She sighed, abandoning the idea of ​​scavenging usable supplies from the beast's corpse.

She noticed that all the monster carcasses she could see had their skulls opened and brains removed. This, combined with Tomoe Gozen's warning in the previous cycle, revealed a terrifying truth: the monster brains likely originated from captured Sumerian citizens, and the Imanitic possessed the means to transform monsters, or rather, monsters reduced to their brains, back into humans. In other words—

—To kill monsters and eat monsters is to kill people and eat people.

A wave of acid gushed from her stomach, and she felt an urge to vomit. But before she could do so, a sudden flash of inspiration struck her!

"No, that sun lion... wasn't transformed from a human!" She covered her mouth, making muffled protests through her nose. Since the Imanitecs had won a resounding victory and had the leisure to dissect and remove the brains of all the monsters, there was no way they wouldn't have noticed this sun lion that came from the west, from the monsters' lair!

Moreover, this sun lion wasn't as intelligent as a real human! It couldn't even see through Fujimaru Ritsuka's hasty setup and traps!

Yes, that must be it. The war between the Imanitecs and the Blood Temple has been raging for ages, and since the Imanitecs possess the means to transform magical beasts into humans, there's no reason the Blood Temple wouldn't respond accordingly. Therefore, using livestock as raw materials for creating magical beasts is an inevitable strategy. And it is precisely for this reason that this Sun Lion is weaker than its kind, and that it managed to survive the Imanitecs' pursuit!

What a coincidence! A magical beast that wasn't 'man-made' miraculously survived the battlefield. It hurried eastward, and after getting far away from the main battlefield, it happened to find a weak human.

It's such a coincidence, so incredibly coincidental, that it's almost frustrating.

She sighed helplessly.

She finally learned the whole story of what had happened to her, but of course, she didn't harbor any resentment or hatred because of it. She simply learned one thing: that even if she went to Imaniticum now, she would not be able to see Tomoe Gozen and that goddess.

She turned her head, and the princess's figure appeared on a small slope about a hundred meters away—she wouldn't help her, she wouldn't even give her a chance to get close. And naturally, seeking the help of this powerful servant wouldn't be something that could be accomplished with gentle words as usual.

There's no other way; it seems there's only one path left to choose from.

That is—heading to Uruk. And to Kusa, east of Uruk.

Chapter Sixty-One: The Heaven of Star Knowledge

The Buddha is about to pass away.

If a sentient being could look down from a point a thousand light-years directly above the Milky Way and capture all the changes in the galactic center in real time, then it would witness a breathtaking spectacle unseen for millennia.

It will witness the dimming of the galactic center, and with it, a dazzling galaxy rapidly expands at its edge. This is the manifestation of the true god, a projection of the Andromeda Galaxy. And the projection is rapidly approaching the size of the real object. The gravitational tides caused by its growth are even distorting the structure of the galactic center itself, altering the shape of that brilliant sphere with a radius of tens of thousands of light-years.

Time has little meaning. Because time is merely a measure. In a battlefield where the four fundamental dimensions are in complete chaos, and all things are reduced to utter confusion, a single second on Earth might represent ten thousand years in the vicinity of the galactic center battlefield. This could even allow the true form of a celestial being, resembling an angel, to grow from a scale of several light-seconds to a colossal form spanning several light-years.

But how much of this time was wasted in a meaningless way?

One million years? Ten million years? One hundred million years?

Or perhaps it's an even greater 311 trillion years, equivalent to an immeasurable eon of time.