Diarmuid cackled wildly. "Honor? What rubbish! Hahaha!" To him, so-called knightly honor was now worth less than dog shit. He shot toward Hinako like a blazing meteor.
Even as an Alter, Diarmuid kept his sharp eyes. It took only a glance to see Hishiri was the leader here. So to take down the army, you had to start by killing the king.
Salter moved to intervene, but a cackling Medusa blocked her path.
"Hinako senpai, watch out!" Kiara yelled.
But Hinako stayed eerily calm. Seeing the spear thrust coming, she effortlessly sidestepped it with a slight shift of her foot. His technique was like an open book to her.
"Hmm, not bad." Diarmuid chuckled darkly. "But let's see you dodge this!"
His spears were a relentless torrent, raining down swift as blossoms in a storm, vast as the crushing ocean. Hinako bobbed and weaved like a leaf boat, always a breath from capsizing.
Yet Diarmuid's strikes never landed.
Hinako saw through every attack - each route, every trajectory. She would dodge at the last second, always seeming a hair's breadth from disaster.
This only made Diarmuid strike more frenziedly. But he still couldn't touch her.
Naturally, Hinako was no UO-level monster like Arcueid, but as a True Ancestor who'd lived countless years, she could easily read his attack patterns.
Comparing them was unfair in the first place. After all, the only one who could ignore Shirou's complaints and barrage him with annoyance until he had no choice but to give up was Arcueid.
Hinako was plenty skilled, not that the others could tell. To them, it was Diarmuid frantically attacking while Hinako narrowly dodged by luck alone, again and again.
Seeing Hinako under Diarmuid's frenzied attack, Kiara watched worriedly.
No—I can't just stand by while Hinako senpai gets hurt! Even if Teacher Mordred scolds me later, I have to help!
Just as Kiara resolved to activate her power, Hinako reached out and grabbed Diarmuid's stabbing spear.
With fury on her face, she spoke with eerie calmness. "You actually dared to cast a charm spell on me!"
Hinako's face twisted in rage. Her grip on the Crimson Rose tightened.
Crack! The spear snapped apart in her hand.
Diarmuid shouted, "Impossible! How could a mere Master destroy my Crimson Rose?" Shock and disbelief were evident on his face. This was beyond anything he could have expected!
There was actually a Master who managed to destroy his Noble Phantasm!
Suddenly, Hinako stepped forward, clenching her fist. She smashed it straight into Diarmuid's head.
Boom!
A terrifying noise like cannon fire thundered.
Time seemed frozen as everyone stared in shock. Even the fight between Salter, Medusa and Moriarty had stopped.
Then, a round, bloody head rolled off the neck, landing on the ground like a soccer ball, bouncing twice before coming to a stop.
Thud! The now headless body toppled over, still gripping the golden spear and the snapped half of the Crimson Rose.
Hinako gritted her teeth furiously, rage contorting her face until she resembled a devil from the depths of hell!
In that moment, everyone present, even Salter, couldn't help but swallow hard.
S-So terrifying! Kiara trembled all over. Her senpai was so scary!
Silence fell, broken only by the faint glow of Diarmuid's severed head on the ground, as if it would dissipate at any moment.
Hinako's fists remained clenched, the residual anger still visible. She was already extremely annoyed at being chased and attacked. She could barely endure it, but using a charm spell was unforgivable. What woman could tolerate that?
Besides, given Hinako's temperament, it was already unbelievable she had endured this long.
"Retreat!" Moriarty shouted.
Tsk! Medusa glared at Salter, then followed Moriarty, retreating alongside Hundred-Face Hassan.
They came aggressively, but fled leaving a comrade's corpse behind.
"You pissed me off and still want to run?" Hinako looked every bit a man-eating tiger, her expression extremely irritable.
Normally she could endure provocations, or at least keep up appearances. But when provoked past her limits, her true nature would be exposed completely.
However, as she stepped forward, she suddenly recalled something. Hinako glanced back at the novice team she was leading. Sure enough, Kiara and the others were watching her.
Crap...she had forgotten about them!
Cold sweat ran down her neck.
"Ahem." She coughed. "Did you guys see anything just now?"
Ayaka and the others hurriedly shook their heads. "No, no! We didn't see anything!"
Kiara asked strangely, "Huh? Didn't we just see Hinako senpai smash that Servant's head open and..."
She trailed off when she felt a chill run down her spine. Why did she get the feeling she was about to be killed?
Kiara shrank back nervously.
...
Caught off guard, Moriarty hurriedly ordered a retreat.
However, they didn't go far. First Medusa placed her Noble Phantasm, Blood Fort Andromeda, nearby. The others spread out around the surroundings, preparing an ambush.
Medusa looked at Moriarty. "Archer, will this really work?"
"Of course," he replied. "This Master has great power. According to the information provided by the Grail, she is definitely a veteran from Chaldea with a lot of combat experience and wisdom. So they will definitely pursue us since they must be thinking of us Alters as mindless puppets. We just need to lie in ambush here and wait for them to come over, then launch a surprise attack. Remember, later focus on attacking the Master who killed Lancer right away. You can ignore Saber and the others. Kill her first, and finishing off the rest will be easy."
"As expected of you, Archer. Even in defeat, you can still calmly think of ambush tactics. I'm sure Berserker would be very pleased if he knew of this." Medusa nodded in approval.
"If I could earn the praise of that king, it would be worth it," Moriarty said.
The two of them, along with the others, lay in ambush around the Blood Fort Andromeda, devising various tactics.
Like spiders who had set up intricate traps, they waited for their prey to wander into their web!
...
Hinako looked at the five wide-eyed newbies - Kiara and the others - and couldn't help but worry.
They had seen her. Carelessly, they had seen her secret.
What now?
If exposed, the peaceful days she had managed to obtain so far would disappear again right?
What to do?
Should she silence them? Hinako clenched her fists tightly at the thought.
"H-Hinako senpai, that was incredible!" Ayaka clapped and looked at Hinako with both cold sweat and admiration.
"That's right. To defeat an enemy Servant with one punch! You really are amazing. No wonder you were on the A-Team." Someone else chimed in.
"Yeah, that was awesome!" another piped up. "Was that some kind of special reinforcement spell? You're so strong senpai!"
The newbies gazed admiringly at Hinako.
Huh? They thought it was a spell?
Oh right, to them she was a magus after all.
Pushing up her glasses, Hinako said nothing, maintaining an aloof and cold demeanor.
"Aren't you going to pursue them?" Salter looked at Hinako, asking in a somewhat cold tone.
"No. They're retreating so openly, it's clearly an ambush." Hinako replied.
She was lying, of course.
The real reason was if she pursued them now and her identity was exposed in battle, what would she do then?
Whether there really was an ambush or not...that thought never crossed Hinako's mind.
Right now she just wanted to get back to Chaldea fast and find her Servant.
"Right," Salter nodded curtly. "You seem capable, but listen - if you want to destroy this anomaly, you should bring more reliable people instead of leading these rookies to their doom."
Hinako raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"
Salter's expression grew solemn. "I'm a Saber summoned by the Grail of this connection point as well. And due to my own reasons, I wasn't controlled. But listen, the guardian of this connection point is Berserker - the Eternal King!"
Kiara Sessyoin: "!"