Chapter 14: Elric: I have Admiral Tom!
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Looking at Tom and Elric Bradley flying through the air, perfectly silhouetted against the glowing moon, the three onlookers were dumbfounded.
For a brief moment, it felt as though time had frozen.
However, their airborne grace lasted only five seconds before they began plummeting back to the ground at an unnaturally rapid speed, as though they had decided to completely ignore the laws of gravity. Their descent accelerated far beyond what should have been possible, as if the gravitational constant had been momentarily rewritten.
"Bang!!!!!!"
With an earth-shaking crash, the pair collided with the ground, the impact so immense that it seemed to make the entire mountain tremble. The three onlookers staggered, feeling as though the ground beneath them was unstable.
In reality, however, the shaking was merely an illusion—a trick of the perspective or perhaps the shock of witnessing something so absurd.
But for Tom and Elric, the force of the impact was no illusion. A massive, bottomless crater had been left in the earth, its edges perfectly shaped to match the outline of Tom holding Elric mid-fall.
"What… what is going on?" Waver stammered, staring at the pit in utter confusion. The events of the Holy Grail War were becoming increasingly incomprehensible to him.
The two combatants, who had been moments away from clashing, also turned their attention to the pit.
"Maybe… it's a Servant?" Alexander ventured, though his tone betrayed uncertainty.
A few seconds later, a blue, furry hand emerged from the depths of the pit, clawing at the edge to pull itself up. The hand belonged to none other than Tom, who was still holding Elric with his other hand. Despite his stubby legs, the determined cat began climbing out of the crater with surprising strength.
"It's coming out…!" Waver whispered nervously, swallowing hard and instinctively taking a step back.
He couldn't help but recall the sheer magnitude of the impact. The entire mountain had seemed to shake when they landed. Even now, he could feel the lingering vibrations in his legs.
In stark contrast, Alexander's apprehension quickly gave way to excitement. His confusion melted into an eager anticipation for battle. He even started to step forward, seemingly unable to resist the prospect of engaging with this unusual entity.
But when Tom finally crawled out of the pit, Alexander froze mid-step, his brows furrowing as he stared at the creature before him. "A… cat?"
"That massive crash just now was caused by this cat?!" Hephaestion exclaimed, the sight before her igniting a burning sense of bewilderment. She had initially assumed the man was a Servant riding the cat, which, while strange, was still within the realm of possibility in the Holy Grail War.
However, as she observed Tom clawing his way out of the pit before even attempting to pull Elric up, it became painfully clear who the subordinate was in this dynamic.
She had seen it with her own eyes—Tom and Elric had fallen from the sky at supersonic speed, crashing into the ground with tremendous force. The crater they had left was evidence of the sheer violence of the impact. Yet here was Tom, unscathed, casually pulling Elric out of the pit as if the crash had been nothing more than a minor inconvenience.
As Tom finally dragged Elric out of the hole, Hephaestion's gaze shifted to the man. Despite the impossible nature of their fall, Elric showed no signs of injury. He stood there, brushing off dust as if he had just stumbled during a casual stroll.
Hephaestion's mind raced. She had a solid understanding of the durability of most magi. For a human to survive such an impact, let alone walk away unscathed, was unthinkable. Even the strongest magi she had encountered couldn't endure something like that.
"That man… is quite capable!"
"Hah… hah… damn it… I'm still alive!" Elric Bradley gasped as he sat on the ground, his legs still weak from the ordeal. His thoughts raced back to what had just happened. For a moment, he had genuinely believed that his life was over.
He glanced down at himself—miraculously unharmed. It was only thanks to Tom that he had survived such a catastrophic landing. If he'd been an ordinary person, he wouldn't be sitting here trembling. No, he'd have been reduced to a smear on the ground.
Then again, what ordinary person could accelerate to such insane speeds from a mere height of a few dozen meters?
"Tom…"
At the sound of his name, Tom visibly stiffened. The blue-gray cat began to tremble, cartoonish lines of fear radiating from his body. He clasped his hands behind his back, awkwardly smiling while avoiding eye contact, his entire body shaking with guilt.
Seeing Tom's reaction, Elric sighed and waved it off. "It's fine."
Pulling himself to his feet, Elric suddenly became aware of three pairs of eyes locked on him. The once-tense battlefield had gone eerily silent as the three onlookers stared at him with various degrees of astonishment.
Elric's heart sank. He realized he had… stumbled into the middle of a battle. Worse still, it seemed his dramatic entrance had not only interrupted the fight but had also drawn everyone's attention squarely onto him.
Despite his experience as a former haunted house staff member—someone well-versed in theatrics and unflinching under scrutiny—Elric found himself uncharacteristically panicked under the weight of their gazes.
All he'd wanted to do was follow the lightning in the sky, sneak a peek at the ongoing battle, and wait for an opportune moment to swoop in and reap the benefits. If the fight had been too intense, he would have simply turned tail and fled.
Now, he was the center of attention.
Taking a deep breath, Elric quickly ducked behind Tom, using the cat as a shield as he cautiously observed the figures before him.
Though their appearances blurred the line between two-dimensional and three-dimensional beings, their identities were unmistakable. Their clothes gave them away immediately.
The man and woman who had been about to clash? The young conqueror, Alexander the Great, and Hephaestion, his trusted general.
As for the trembling figure perched nervously on a horse—medium-length hair and wide eyes filled with terror—it had to be Waver Velvet. His outfit matched perfectly with the depiction in the original story.
Alexander's voice broke the silence, his booming tone full of excitement. "What a fortunate day to meet not one but two legendary heroes!" His gaze was locked on Elric with fervent enthusiasm, his battle spirit reigniting.
Elric felt a bead of sweat form on his brow. The mountain-shaking landing had clearly impressed Alexander, and it seemed the King of Conquerors was itching to test his strength against this new arrival.
Waver, however, was less enthused. Seeing Alexander's posture shift toward battle readiness, the young magus was horrified. "Hey, hey, hey! Are you kidding me?! You still want to fight after all that?!"
"Of course," Alexander replied with an eager grin. "I came to this war to fight, after all!"
To Alexander, Hephaestion's unwillingness to face him had been disappointing. But this new arrival, who had flown in spectacularly and survived an earth-shaking crash without so much as a scratch? Now this was a worthy opponent!
Elric's mind raced as he watched Alexander take a step forward. He had no time to explain or de-escalate. The conqueror's intentions were clear.
Panicking, Elric turned to Tom. "Tom, get ready! We're in for it now!"
Tom gulped, his trembling ceasing as he squared his shoulders and stepped forward.
"Tom… go!!!" Elric shouted, bracing himself as the battle he had hoped to avoid was now inevitable.