[You begin the one-on-one duel trial against Shadow Yuser.]
[Do you wish to start the battle immediately?]
"Is there anything left to hesitate over?" Gawain muttered, and his hand reached for the "Confirm" button.
But before he pressed it, the display suddenly shifted and a line of text popped up:
[Queen's Calendar, April 2018: Clan Leader Woodworth of the Fang Clan led his army outside Gloucester to confront the Great Calamity—Beast Calamity Bagster. His forces were nearly annihilated, and Woodworth himself fell beyond Gloucester's walls.]
"Ah?"
Reading those words, Gawain sprang up from the bed, eyes wide with astonishment and confusion. "How can this be? Has Bagster's power grown to this level?!"
He knew full well how difficult Woodworth was to face. It wasn't merely a matter of challenge level: that fellow was a pure "hexagonal warrior" whose durability stat was terrifyingly high—like fighting an enemy with a health bar that just wouldn't drop. In Gawain's first simulation encounter with him, he truly felt the despair of being utterly outmatched.
Although this time, thanks to a certain wealthy patron's heavy investment, Gawain himself was much stronger than before, even so, facing Woodworth's monstrous power would still be immensely stressful. In fact, as an enemy he might even be tougher than Shadow Yuser: Yuser, though disgustingly strong as a mechanic-driven foe, still had a normal-difficulty health bar; but Woodworth was basically a walking HP monster.
That's why, when he earlier heard from Nokhnarei that Woodworth's army had been defeated, Gawain assumed only the army had fallen, not Woodworth himself. But now the simulator's broadcast proved he'd been wrong.
Gawain was intimately familiar with this kind of system bulletin: aside from personal events of simulator characters, only truly major incidents are broadcast to all players in this way. Naturally, there's virtually no chance of error.
As that line of text appeared, the scene on the display also shifted to outside Gloucester.
And there, everyone at last saw the current Bagster: still in that colossal canine-beast form as Gawain had seen in Manchester—its massive body like a black mountain, exhaling thunderclouds and flames, shrouded in thick, dark smoke. Merely its presence radiated extreme heat, igniting all flammable matter within its domain. Its already enormous frame now seemed yet larger by several notches; countless black dogs Gawain had once fought in the Welsh forest swirled around it like a protective swarm, tearing apart every non-Canine creature within sight.
Before it, the Fang Clan's army—struggling for two days to delay it—had reached their limit and could no longer hold. They began to collapse into rout:
"Defeated… we're defeated!"
"We can't beat that monster!"
"This is pointless! Continuing to fight only means dying in vain!"
"Retreat! Retreat! That thing is the Fang Clan's curse!"
Such panicked cries echoed around Woodworth, maddening him. Once a rout begins, it's hard to halt, and soon it engulfed the entire force. Seeing his Fang Clan fairies scattering in disarray, Woodworth, abandoning any lordly dignity, raged aloud:
"You fools! You call yourselves soldiers? Soldiers supported by Britain all this time? Then you should fight to the death here—how dare you flee from the enemy!"
"Damn you, worthless trash! Attack! It's because you lot are so useless that Her Majesty holds me in contempt! That fairy knight has stolen military power from Britain!"
No matter how he cursed, he could not stop the rout. Even executing fleeing soldiers made no difference. Then, when he seized one Fang fairy soldier and hoisted him as if to crush him like a chick, that soldier shouted back:
"Stop ordering us to charge! You talk a big game, yet you hide behind us like a coward. With a leader as weak as you, how could we ever win?!"
"Bastard! You want me to throw myself into the fire?" Woodworth roared, mouth agape.
"But isn't the truth that someone who only shouts 'Charge!' from behind is far less inspiring than one who rallies troops by leading the charge?" The fairy, knowing his own life was nearly over, hurled back defiantly.
His words struck Woodworth silent. After a two-second pause, Woodworth tossed the fairy aside and said despondently:
"Fine, go then. I should have known… No, I always knew: dust, no matter how thickly piled, remains dust. In Her Majesty's Fairy Kingdom, armies exist merely to give you worthless creatures positions. How could I have expected anything of you? Have I become naive myself?"
"Lord Woodworth…" The fairy had spoken in a fatalistic mindset, but seeing Woodworth spare him and show utter disappointment, his despondency vanished, replaced by fear and reverence.
"Go—remember this before you flee." Woodworth stepped forward; his claws elongated, and the tailored suit he wore strained and tore as his body subtly swelled.
"War is for the strong alone. Those who stand behind shouting 'Charge!' are simply unqualified trash."
"Elegance ends here. Now you worthless lot, watch and learn why I alone am the Fang Clan's leader."
"W-why?" the fairy asked meekly.
"Ha! Because I am the Fang Clan's strongest warrior!" Woodworth laughed uproariously. Purple mana radiated from him, shredding his suit to reveal a powerful body cloaked in white fur. Even the nearby listening fairies were flung back by the force of his aura.
"I've had enough of these formalities," he snarled, staring at the approaching Beast Calamity like a black mountain. His bloodshot eyes bared his fangs:
"Curse or calamity, I am your clan's master! When you face me, you should cower and kneel!"
With that roar, he leapt forward on all fours like an arrow loosed. His overwhelming mana spread outward, and as he charged the black dogs advancing toward him—and indirectly Bagster itself—those Fang soldiers who had been fleeing turned to watch: their leader running headlong into the invincible calamity. In that instant, seeing his strong silhouette, they felt a flicker of hope.
Then they saw Bagster raise a front paw larger than a house and slam Woodworth into the ground. At that moment, the air fell into a deathly silence. As the Fang soldiers' courage crumbled and they prepared to flee again, a keen-eyed fairy noticed the giant paw trembling slightly.
A roar of mana burst upward: Bagster's massive paw was being pushed up from beneath by something. There, the Fang Clan's strongest warrior was roaring:
"Didn't you hear me?!"
He smashed Bagster's paw away with a single blow, then stomped the ground to drive it deeper, his own form flickering like a dark shadow as he launched himself toward Bagster's head.
"I said: Kneel before me!"
His claws slashed, carving a gruesome wound across Bagster's face; blood gushed like a fountain, staining half its body red. Then Woodworth raised the other claw high, condensing a huge sphere of purple mana.
"Kneel!" he bellowed, smashing the sphere into Bagster's enormous face.
The explosion thundered; mana waves radiated outward, most striking Bagster's head, forcing it down into the earth and gouging a pit far larger than the one Woodworth had made earlier. Seeing this, the previously demoralized Fang fairies erupted in frenzied cheers, their eyes burning with fanatic devotion to Woodworth—unaware that had he shown this strength from the outset, they could have avoided such heavy losses. Or perhaps they realized it but, in their worship of strength, deemed it inevitable.
"Ha! See? Fairy knights? Calamities? Fang Clan curses? All meaningless before my absolute power!" Woodworth stood atop Bagster's head, laughing madly:
"Your Majesty, do you see? As long as I live, you need never fear any calamity! I will handle everything! Fairy knights are useless—if Britain's sky fell, I would lift it for you!"
But Bagster responded only with a roar.
"Still want to struggle, dog?" Woodworth sneered, conjuring another mana sphere and striking Bagster's face again. This time, the effect was less dramatic: Bagster's head turned, but it charged back, headbutting Woodworth and flinging him through the air.
"What…? Why has Bagster suddenly grown stronger?" Woodworth, regaining posture mid-air, glared at his claws, expression darkening: "No—it's not just that it's stronger; I've… I've grown weaker!"
Only now did he notice pale-colored smoke seeping from his body toward Bagster.
"Damn it! That bastard can even absorb my mana?!" Because his mana reserves were immense, he hadn't noticed the drain until he'd lost a third of it. At that realization, Bagster struck again: Woodworth caught the blow with far more difficulty than before, his posture no longer so unassailable.
"Damn it, I was careless…" Realizing the danger, Woodworth's ears drooped. He scanned for an escape route.
Yet at the sight of Gloucester in the distance, he abandoned that thought.
"You worthless lackeys!" he roared at the watching Fang fairies.
"If you want to flee, do it quickly! Go to Gloucester and tell that foolish lord Murien: if he wants to live, he'd better haul his baggage out of Gloucester!"
"Yes, yes!" Under his fierce glare, the remaining Fang soldiers fled toward Gloucester in terror.
Then Woodworth turned back to face Bagster's crimson eyes:
"Come on, then! Let me show you who truly rules the Fang Clan!"
Before Bagster could charge, hundreds of black dogs surged toward Woodworth.
"Huh? Sending your lackeys to me—trying to feed me to them?" He cut them down easily: blue and purple-black blood and flesh flew everywhere.
"Pathetic—wait?" Suddenly Woodworth froze: "Purple-black blood? Why…?" He scanned the fallen bodies and saw grotesque creatures that looked like decaying corpses whose flesh had rotted away yet bore black-dog features. Mixed among ordinary black dogs, they were hard to notice at first.
"What is this? What are these things—damn! What's happening to my body?!" He looked at purple-black veins spreading over his arms, face paling: "Mors poison? But that's impossible! As a Return-Aling, I should be highly resistant… and there shouldn't even be any Mors around here—"
His gaze landed on the decayed black-dog corpses he'd torn apart.
"Why would black dogs carry Mors poison? Their origins are entirely different—!"
"Indeed, mixing them took me considerable effort." A voice sounded from a clearing behind Woodworth. At hearing it, Woodworth's eyes widened:
"Damn it—Beryl?! You madman, what are you doing?"
From over a thousand meters away, Beryl laughed:
"What? My lord of Oxford, why speak so formally? I just wanted to borrow a few spare parts from you—heart, liver, that sort of thing. But since I doubt you'd lend them willingly, I'll extract them from your corpse later."
"You fool! Before that, I'll kill you myself!" Woodworth roared.
"Oh? Is that so?" Beryl chuckled with growing arrogance: "But my lord, apart from a nobody like me, have you forgotten anything else?"
His words barely fell when Bagster's massive body lunged again, its paw smashing Woodworth into the ground.
"Damn it, damn it!" Woodworth struggled to escape, but Bagster's mana absorption and Beryl's covert application of Mors curse—spread via kills—rapidly sapped his strength. As he burst out of the tide of decaying black dogs, the purple-black patterns covered much of his body. Yet Bagster's looming shadow already enveloped him again.
"Damnit—" When that giant paw fell this time, Woodworth could not hold it; he was driven into the earth, blood spurting from his mouth and nose. Bagster continued relentlessly, each strike driving him deeper, until Woodworth could no longer move. Only then did Bagster pause—but it did not consume him. Sniffing beside Woodworth, Bagster recoiled at the foul stench of the curse, then turned toward Gloucester, whose ruins lay eerily empty.
As Bagster took a few steps, a tug at its tail caught its attention. The massive beast looked back to see Woodworth, battered and bloodied, clutching its tail, refusing to let go.
"I cannot… let you go." Though his body was nearly destroyed, Woodworth held on:
"Gloucester… I must… defend Gloucester. Whether it falls to someone else matters not, but I cannot let you, of the Fang Clan, destroy it again. I must… atone for that mistake."
Before he could finish, Bagster unleashed a torrent of mana from its mouth, pounding him again. Even this attack, akin to a heroic Noble Phantasm, failed to make him release his grip.
"I will not… let go…"
Boom—another blast.
"Your Majesty… Your Majesty is gone…"
Boom—third blast.
"So at least…"
Boom—fourth.
"I will protect…"
Boom—fifth.
"Britain… that belongs to Your Majesty…"
Boom—sixth.
Despite unparalleled will, Woodworth saw no miracle. When Bagster unleashed a seventh hellfire breath, Woodworth finally lost all strength and loosened his hold on the tail. Bagster then proceeded toward the empty Gloucester. On the battlefield's wreckage, Beryl emerged, cautiously isolating the area, then drew a prepared dagger and plunged it into Woodworth's chest, extracting his heart.
"Oh ho! Just as I predicted—but seeing it in person is still astonishing. After so long, the Mors poison hasn't reached the heart? Truly the lung of the planet, such resistance and endurance." Holding the bloody heart, Beryl laughed, then bit and swallowed it.
But at that moment, he noticed Woodworth's fingers trembling slightly.
"No way… that vitality… even cockroaches would die of disgust!" Beryl frowned and raised his hand toward Woodworth.
For those watching the display, the scene ended there. The Queen's heirs viewing this might react with indignation, fury, or silence; the perspective remains at this moment. Before Beryl's hand could strike, a primordial, ominous sensation, as if watched by a primeval beast, washed over him. Though he didn't know its source, feeling it, he turned and fled toward the empty plain at his fastest pace. Only when his figure vanished did someone silently appear beside Woodworth's broken body.
"...Your Majesty...?" A faint voice escaped Woodworth's lips as he lay dying. He could sense the other's presence only through some subtle bond, for all his senses had been destroyed by the earlier blasts. In his final moment he whispered:
"...Don't touch me… I am… tainted by Mors poison."
The figure remained silent, then gently closed Woodworth's sightless eyes.
"Rest now, Woodworth," she said softly.
"Even if this was but a dream, your fur remains beautiful."