Or, why don’t you find another savior?

"Then I can't let your trust go unfulfilled."

Shiomi sighed deeply.

Chapter 42 Nightmare

A desolate wilderness covered with red soil and plants that grow tenaciously in the red soil.

The earth turned into a battlefield, with countless soldiers and machines falling, as if they had just experienced a great war.

Shiomi stood in the center of the battlefield, looking up at the sky.

A person was hanging in the sky, with sharp red magic spears piercing her chest, arms and legs like thorns. Her arms were spread out, and blood flowed from the wounds, staining her entire body red.

Presenting the body of the cross, as a sacrifice to God.

Even though this person had killed countless gods and spirits, he eventually turned into an immortal half-human, half-god being.

Xi Jian knew her, knew her better than anyone else, respected her more than anyone else, and loved her more than anyone else...

Scathach.

His master.

……

Shiomi suddenly opened her eyes and saw the ceiling of her room.

In the darkness, only the electronic devices on the bedside table emitted a dim light.

He felt a slight headache, the feeling of being forcibly awakened from sleep by a nightmare.

He lay there listlessly, waiting for the pain to subside quickly. All that was left was his clear mind, and his hair and body soaked with cold sweat. The lining clothing distributed to employees by Chaldea was very close fitting, so it stuck to his body after being soaked with sweat, making him extremely uncomfortable.

It's time to take a shower.

He tried to get up but found that his right arm could not move. He turned his head and saw Morgan sleeping in the dark with his arm resting on it.

He leaned closer with some affection, and after kissing her forehead, Shiomi carefully supported her body and pulled his arm out from the gap between her neck and the pillow.

When he was halfway through, the quilt covering both of them made a sliding sound. He lowered his head and met Morgan's eyes. She sat up from the bed, still sleepy.

Without the restraints, Shiomi easily pulled out her numb arm, and her magic power began to operate automatically, eliminating the feeling.

"You're sweating so much, are you having a nightmare?" Morgan pushed his hair aside and wiped the sweat from his face with his palm.

"Well, I remembered to take a shower, but ended up waking you up." Xijian laughed distressedly.

"In that case, let's go together. It doesn't matter to me whether I sleep or not. I just want to be with you." Morgan sat up, took off his clothes smoothly, walked naked to a corner of the room, and opened the bathroom door.

After a while, the sound of water being released was heard from inside.

He laughed helplessly, grabbed Morgan's clothes, threw them into the washing machine together with his own, and walked into the bathroom.

After washing off the sweat from their bodies, the two soaked in the bathtub together, with Morgan lazily resting his head on Shiomi's body.

"Tell me about your nightmare," Morgan asked. "Is it about me?"

"No." Xijian pursed her lips and denied her guess.

"That's about her then?"

It was self-evident who Morgan was referring to, and Shiomi could tell from the tone of his voice.

"Ah."

"You are so brave. You dare to dream about another woman while sleeping next to your wife." Morgan sat up slightly, pressing his body with his hips. "Is it because I haven't educated you enough over the years?"

"You obviously never educated me." Xi Jian was at a loss whether to laugh or cry.

She always turned a blind eye to these things and was never too lazy to ask further questions, just like what she had said in Fuyuki during the Fifth Holy Grail War.

There is no need to forcibly reverse things that already exist.

Morgan turned sideways, leaned against the side of the bathtub, and put his hand on Shiomi's chest. His heartbeat was steady and strong.

"So tell me about the content of that nightmare." Morgan smiled. "If it was an ordinary dream, it would be fine. I'm interested in your nightmare. What does Scathach look like in this dream? Or did you remember the horrific experience when you were learning in the Kingdom of Shadows?"

“It’s hard to say…” Xijian sighed.

Then describe your nightmare carefully and in as much detail as possible.

After hearing this, Morgan opened his eyes wide in surprise. "It sounds like Jesus being crucified on the cross, but she is immortal, right? Although she is not as good as you who have touched the power, she cannot be killed that way."

"Being immortal doesn't mean there is no pain." Xi Jian supported his chin with one hand, leaned on the edge of the bathtub, and stared at Morgan's slightly smiling face. "It's obvious that the person who did this understood Master's situation very well, so he tortured her in this way."

"It's just a nightmare after all, don't take it seriously." Morgan comforted Xi Jian seriously, "You said that she can never leave the Shadow Kingdom, and she will stay there until the end of the world."

"Yes, that's why the meaning of this nightmare is so puzzling." Shiomi pondered, "And the place where Master was executed was not the Kingdom of Shadows, and there was also that strange battlefield."

Morgan then raised his hand from his chest and put it on his face: "The red soil, and the tenaciously growing prickly pear orchids and cacti... I remember when I first took Sakura and Kallen to the United States and drove on Highway 50, we saw this kind of scenery along the way."

"...Huh?" Xijian finally came to his senses.

The fifth singularity is estimated to be around 1783 and is located throughout the United States.

"No, wait a minute, it's true that the world is now burned by the Magic King, but the Kingdom of Shadows——"

"You want to say that it is outside the world, so it is impossible?" Morgan lowered his eyes, "But there is no way to prove that the Shadow Kingdom can remain unscathed in this situation."

"Although I was originally planning to go to the fifth singularity, I have no choice but to go now." Xi Jian held his forehead with his hand, "Do you want to come with us?"

"No, the sixth singularity is very troublesome. It is clearly a singularity from the 13th century, but its human basic value is difficult to measure." Morgan smiled playfully, as if he had found something worth destroying, full of villainy. "I would like to see what the sixth singularity is like to deserve the same out-of-specification rating as my country."

"Your competitive spirit is so strange, Queen of Winter." Shiomi couldn't help but joke.

Morgan shook his hand and stroked Shiomi's lips. "No one can tell if the Magic King will appear again. If he finds that he cannot kill my husband this time and chooses to kidnap him, then I will have to lead the children alone to complete the remaining singularities, and then go to where the Magic King is and rescue you."

"You have been deeply poisoned by this era." Shiomi really wanted to ask which morning drama this was the plot of.

At this moment, Morgan suddenly came forward and said, "Even if it's a nightmare, you dare to dream of another woman by my side. I need some compensation."

"It's already this time..."

"Erase the aftermath of the nightmare with a sweet dream, otherwise the day will be very hard."

In her cold and seductive voice, Shiomi kissed those lips and hugged Morgan tightly in the warm bathtub.

Chapter 1: Heading to the Fifth Singularity ()

After various preparations, the time has come to start the soul transfer again and head to the new singularity to begin the repair work.

At the last operational meeting before departure, Olga Marie anxiously confirmed with Shiomi:

"Is this...really all right?"

The plan of Shiomi Tianxi to go to the fifth singularity alone was eventually rejected by everyone, and it was changed to at least one Master accompanying him.

And the one who ended up with Shiomi Tsuyoshi was Kallen.

"Because Mary, Sakura and Gray are all important fighting forces, the third singularity that you are going to this time needs to take into account situations similar to the fourth singularity. Although the Magic King may not appear again, the seventy-two demons under his command may take this opportunity to change their mode of action. If you are slightly lacking in strength, you will be caught in a dilemma." Shiomi said.

Relatively speaking, Kallen is not a combat magician. Her fighting methods all rely on the magic costumes made by Shiomi. The magic she is good at tends to be auxiliary and healing. She is a support-type master.

"Karen, I'll leave Dad to you." Sakura said seriously.

"Does this man really need someone to take care of him?" There was a hint of teasing in Karen's smile.

Shiomi ruffled Kallen's hair and said, "You've really grown up and are no longer polite. How can you call me 'this man'? I'm so sad..."

"Stop crying, it's scary." Kallen said with a smile and complained about Shiomi's fake crying.

"Tsk..."

This trick didn't work at all, and Shiomi's expression changed quickly.

"But if we destroyed one demon god in the second singularity and one more in the fourth singularity...that means there are still seventy demon gods left of the Magic King?" Ritsuka asked, guessing as he recalled the three singularities that had been repaired.

Morgan turned his chair around and looked at everyone. "It's meaningless to keep counting like this. Even if it's not the Magic King, but other excellent magicians, if their familiars or spells are damaged, they can easily repair them."

"That's right. The so-called 'Seventy-two Demon Gods' are themselves a kind of ritual, a concept. They always take the Seventy-two Pillars as the prerequisite. As long as they consider themselves to be demons, there must be Seventy-two Demon Gods around Solomon." Romani affirmed this statement and gave a more precise explanation.

After all, he is the real person, so of course he knows this clearly. After sighing in his heart, Shiomi asked again: "So unless Solomon... or the man who calls himself the Magic King is defeated, the 72 Demon Gods will exist on this planet, right?"

"That's understandable."

Romani frowned slightly, but still had a smile on his face to hide his inner uneasiness.

Afterwards, everyone was divided into two groups and began to prepare to go to the third and fifth singularities.

"But there are also singularities in the United States. The history of that country must be very short, right?" Karen said.

"But one thing that cannot be denied is that this short history has extended to the present day, and the influence of the United States cannot be ignored." Shiomi held his arms up, smiled bitterly and shook his head, "So I am more curious about how the fifth singularity was formed."

The core of the first singularity is Joan of Arc, a key figure in ending the Hundred Years' War between England and France.

The core of the second singularity is Nero, the fifth Roman emperor.

The fourth singularity is located in London. As a shadow lurking in human history, the importance of the Magic Association is indisputable. The reason why it was in the late 19th century was that the Industrial Revolution was booming at that time, and the technological changes it brought about had a great impact on the world of magicians. Many of the young families in the Clock Tower today appeared during that period.

Even whether to recognize the Industrial Revolution itself is one of the reasons for the current confrontation between the democrats and aristocrats in the Clock Tower.

The third singularity is located in the Atlantic Ocean during the Age of Discovery, which is also easy to understand.

This also makes Shiomi concerned about the existence of the fifth singularity.

1783 was the last year of the American Revolutionary War.

Thinking of this, he raised his head and said, "Could it be that... in the fifth singularity, North America lost the War of Independence?"

“It’s hard to say. Singularities are distortions of history.” Kallen didn’t know the answer, so she could only answer this way.

"Then let's go and confirm the situation there with our own eyes." Shiomi encouraged Kallen with a smile.

Then, he adjusted his breathing gently, recalled the previous nightmare about his master, and entered the basket for the soul transfer.

Will the Master really be in the fifth singularity?

What exactly does that nightmare suggest to me?

For the magician, the prophetic meaning of dreams is more prominent than for the average person.

"Anti-summoning system, activated.

Begin the soul particle conversion.

There are 3, 2, 1 left until the soul transfer begins...

The whole project is completed.

Start actual verification, Grand Order

A familiar broadcast voice sounded, the dormant fluid filled the basket, and the whole person's consciousness sank into the deep sea.

Opening his eyes again, Shiomi saw that he and Kallen appeared in the sky again as expected. There was a wide forest below them. Looking to one side, he could see that the forest gradually became sparse, and further ahead was a red wilderness with sparse phalaenopsis, cacti and other cold-resistant plants standing on it.

The first time is new, the second time is familiar. Shiomi reached out and grabbed Kallen, pulling her in and holding her in her arms.

"If you're scared, close your eyes. We're about to land."

He held Kallen horizontally, adjusted his posture in the air, and then his descent speed suddenly slowed down. After slowly passing through the treetops, he landed in the middle of the forest.

"Okay, it's all right now."

He gently put Kallen down, letting her stand steadily, then reached out and picked up the leaves hanging on her silver curly hair.

"It's a little boring." Kallen said, "I thought I would see my dad screaming."

"what?"

"I heard from Sakura that when your soul particles were transferred, they appeared in the sky, which is different from the situation over there." Kallen's mouth curled up and a happy smile appeared.

“……” Xi Jian was speechless.

"Just kidding..." She turned and walked a few steps to check the surroundings. "When I'm with Dad, I'm always happy. Even when facing the crisis of the destruction of the world."

"We are family after all." Xijian picked away the grass debris hanging on her shoulders.

"My family..." Kallen nodded vaguely, "Contact Chaldea first and tell mother about the situation here—"

Before he could finish his words, the sound of machine guns and a series of roars were heard outside the forest.

"It looks like establishing contact will have to be delayed."

After Shiomi signaled to Kallen, the two of them moved towards the edge of the forest, one in front of the other.