Shirou and the girl were walking through the streets towards the depths of the village together with the little creature.
In the back of his mind, the apprentice magus asked himself the same question over and over again:
Why can't I refuse?
Shirou was not stupid, he was sure that the name Cath Palug was familiar to him from somewhere, and it was clear that this girl had relationships with the dead apostles. Also, if he trusted his instincts, this girl was sure to be someone extremely dangerous.
Most of the ghouls did not approach the trio, and those who did were cut to pieces by the boy.
The redhead observed the state of the town. The further they entered, the more destroyed the buildings were, "Was this the product of what happened thirty years ago?"
The girl nodded. "Yup. It was a real surprise to see the Church and the Association working together, we did not expect it. We believed that they would obstruct each other, but, unfortunately, this was not the case, and in the end, the clash of powers was so strong that they managed to destabilize the ritual," clenching her fists, the girl frowned, "it was a real hassle, you know, we had been preparing that ritual for a few centuries, and it all ended in nothing."
"Nothing!? The mana began to disappear because of that ritual!" the boy screamed, but he soon regretted it, remembering that it was very likely that the person in front of him could easily kill him.
However, the girl did not seem to care too much, although Fou barked in reproach, "Yeah, you're right, it is something that I have never fully understood..."
"What do you mean?" the boy asked curiously, while the girl led him to the basement of a building.
Upon reaching this, the redhead observed a large crack in the ground that led to a series of tunnels.
"The Aylesbury ritual is supposed to involve the resurrection of The Dark Six. They are the original dead apostle, known as The First and Highest System."
"You speak as if you don't know them..."
She shook her head, "I don't know them. They've been in a state of resurrection for countless years and haven't reached one hundred percent yet. Be that as it may, they were supposed to be reborn thirty years ago, but something happened while carrying performed the ritual, in addition to the interruption of the two organizations, and the axis, as well as the poles of the world, were altered."
"Was that what caused the constant depletion of mana?"
The girl nodded. "Who established the ritual of Aylesbury Valesti was Crimson Moon, and it was supposed to be a ritual that would involve the resurrection of The Dark Six, andwith it, the beginning of the reign of the dead apostles over humanity, but instead of that, what happened was that the core of the Earth, what can be said to be its soul, wasinjured."
"So, it wasn't the intention of the dead apostles to cause this disaster?"
"I can't speak for all of us, but for my part, I didn't expect that to happen." As the duo descended into the depths of the earth, they had this strange conversation. For somereason, the girl's attitude had changed, she was now behaving like a pretty serious person, "After thinking about it a lot, I could only come to one possible conclusion, but it's soabsurd that I hope I'm wrong."
"Which?" the curious boy asked.
"No one knows what the true colors of The Dark Six are, but perhaps, for some reason, they decided to launch a kamikaze attack on the planet."
"T-That's crazy…!"
"Yeah, you're right, but it's the only thing I can think of."
"A question..." said the nervous boy.
The girl smiled, "Shoot."
"If the effect of the ritual could be reversed, could the world be saved?"
That question created a deep silence between the two, but suddenly, the girl turned to him. The redhead only knew her for the short time they had been together, but in this short period, 90% of it, the girl had remained extremely cheerful. However, the look she was giving him now was the opposite: this was the look of a tired person, a person who had faced a problem, or something similar, for a long time, and, in the end, she had not found a solution for it, hence, resigned herself to losing.
She had the same look Kiritsugu had when he told him about his past.
"I'm afraid that's impossible..."
"But! What if there was a way!?"
"Anyway, it would be useless..."
Worried, the boy asked, "Why?"
To which she replied, "The current state of the planet is not our only problem."
"What do you mean?"
"That the Aylesbury ritual was carried out is only one of several reasons why our world will come to an end."
"Are there more!? What are the others!?" he asked desperately.
The girl whispered, "The box closed prematurely, the Wandering Star of Predation draws ever closer, and finally, the eight Aristotles have been called to carry out the extermination. Do you understand, human? There is no way to win... It's as if fate itself played against us."
Shirou didn't understand the things she was saying to him. He did not know which box she was referring to, nor did he know which star she was talking about, or what an Aristotle was, which, obviously, was not referring to the Ancient Greek philosopher. But there was something he did understand: whatever these were, not even the absurdly powerful girl in front of him could take care of them.
As they walked through the tunnels, the earth shook enormously, and Shirou was afraid that they would collapse on top of them.
"Don't worry, Shirou. The tunnels, and all these constructions in Aylesbury, are reinforced, so you could say that these tunnels are almost a natural bunker", the girl said, noticing the boy's worried look every time the ground shook.
After a few minutes of walking in silence through a network of tunnels, they both reached an absurdly large room.
"This is the room where the ritual was first performed thirty years ago."
Shirou admired the huge cave in amazement, in it was magic circles, glyphs, and runes engraved everywhere, on the walls, the floor, and the ceiling. Almost 90% of what he was seeing, the apprentice magus didn't understand, was too advanced magecraft for him to understand.
"Look, look!" the girl pointed, returning to her cheerful character, "this was where Ortenrosse, Merem, Blackmore, and I gathered to see the resurrection of The Dark Six! Van-Femwas also supposed to have a duty to attend the ritual, but that bum only helped us with the capital and land so that Aylesbury was fit enough to perform the ritual."
The place that the girl pointed to was right in the center of the colossal cave, in that space, a huge crater was present.
The girl then frowned, "Although the event was short-lived. The ritual began to cause strange things that ended with the beginning of premature depletion of the plant's mana. Also, to finish, we were interrupted by the Church working together with the Association," Shirou comically saw how the girl seemed to want to pout, "and, instead of fighting together to complete the ritual and end the organizations, Merem and Blackmore took the opportunity and tried to kill me. Old Ortenrosse didn't help much either..."
Shirou was really surprised, it was as if the girl was used to being tried to kill her, "Are you okay?" he asked concerned.
"Huh?" she exclaimed, surprised.
"I asked you if you were okay. It is not normal to talk about attempts against your life so easily..."
Understanding his bewilderment, she couldn't help but laugh out loud, "I... I had forgotten how much fun humans were." After laughing as much as she wanted while Shiroulooked at her confused, she stopped and just smiled at him, "You can be calm, Merem and Blackmore have been trying to assassinate me for centuries. They don't forgive me for what I did to their little princess."
"Little princess?"
She nodded, "She is the only one other than me who possesses the qualities to bring him back, you could say that she is something like my little sister, although I do not consider her that way. I was born from a combination of two species, although..." she stopped and, making a gesture of thinking, she said, "that would not be entirely correct, considering that one species is derived from the other. The point is, she did something stupid, and, as a consequence, ended up eradicating most of one of the species I'm a part of. Furthermore, she gave a great amount of power to a certain creeping snake, to such an extent that when he got out of control, even I couldn't face him."
"Are your sister and that snake that powerful?" Shirou asked, terrified that such monsters existed in the world.
"Yes, after my defeat, I signed a contract with PM and was ready to defeat the snake, but after I did, it turned out that the brat had already killed him," she said with annoyance and some resignation, "I guess she cleaned up her own mess."
"I see…"
"I was very angry, you know? First, she makes me have to deal with her mistakes, I end up being defeated because of these, and when I get the way to repair the mess she made, it turns out that she had already fixed it. I was so furious that I went to claim her."
"So, the two of you fought?"
"Yeah, we had a little fight, this one went nowhere, but…" a smile of superiority adorned her face, "I kept her hair."
"What?"
She smiled with joy, "I cut it off, and it won't grow back until I give it back. You should have seen Merem's angry face when he saw it. His face was a poem, and he has tried to kill me ever since."
The apprentice magus was dumbfounded at the girl's words, were all the dead apostle ancestors like this? No wait, the girl was really a dead apostle?
After laughing for a while, she calmed down, "But it seems that it is just as I thought."
"What do you mean?"
She opened her arms as if she was trying to contain the entire cave within them, "This is the place where the ritual will take place, haven't you noticed anything strange?"
Shirou analyzed the cave, and that's how he realized, "There is nobody here!"
The girl nodded. "Although all the apostles with the original blood should be gathered here, there is no one. Not even old man Ortenrosse, who leads the ritual, is present."
"Why...?" asked the confused redhead.
"A trap," she said confidently.
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AN: Chapter for the 8th review!