"Yes."
Irigal's voice was uncharacteristically heavy with pity. ["She was never meant to be born here, but the concentrated Ether leaking from that rift forced her into existence far too early."]
Wayland's expression remained guarded, though the girl hadn't moved a muscle. She just stood there, staring with those vacant, blood-red eyes. "What do you mean by 'rift' and 'Ether'?"
["Ether, simply put, is highly concentrated prana. During the Age of Gods, the atmosphere was saturated with it, but in the modern era, it's become incredibly thin, surviving only in a few rare, secluded locations. I'm not entirely sure what that rift is, but it's undoubtedly a source of massive amounts of Ether."]
["Fairies require an immense amount of magical energy to form. Because of this, natural fairies are almost non-existent in the modern age; most 'fairies' encountered today are artificial creations bred in a magus's workshop, essentially nothing more than familiars. A natural fairy in a place like this would normally take centuries to form--if it managed to form at all. I've checked the surrounding space; it's highly unstable, suggesting that rift appeared only recently. There are traces of a bounded field on the exterior, but no Ether is actively leaking out now, which means the Mage's Association has already discovered it."]
"So you're saying... a rift appeared, leaked Ether, and forced a fairy to manifest prematurely in this specific spot?"
Wayland summarized the situation, then gestured to the surrounding filth. "Then what's with all this garbage?"
["That is the poisonous fruit of industrialization."]
"And how does it affect her?"
["It poisons her mind. Naturally formed fairies are typically benevolent beings, but she's been soaking in toxic waste for years. Her reason is gone; she's been reduced to nothing but evolutionary instinct. Those two ghosts you encountered were likely resentful spirits of the river, awakened by the Ether's surge. Unlike a fairy, they couldn't absorb high-purity prana directly, so they sought out weak magi to 'cultivate' resentment and gain the strength to ascend. They never expected a fairy to form and turn them into snacks."]
"So, in short, I'm in a lot of danger and should probably start running."
["...In short, you should purify her."]
"Purify? I'm not some exorcist from Tokyo, a shrine maiden, or a high school protagonist. I don't know how to do that."
["Master... do you really want to forfeit your rewards?"]
Irigal offered a deceptively sweet smile.
Wayland let out a long sigh. 'I knew that reward sounded too good to be true.' "Fine. I guess I'll have to perform a 'physical purification' then."
"Reinforcement!"
Wayland breathed the word, and his newly mastered Level 1 spell flared to life. A faint light enveloped his hands and feet.
"Haste!"
He shouted again.
A pale yellow spiral of air manifested at his heels, and his entire body felt light as a feather.
"Projection!"
A slender, Chinese-style longsword materialized rapidly before him.
Wayland took a sharp breath. Releasing three Level 1 spells in such quick succession left him feeling slightly winded.
Detection, Water-Repelling, Reinforcement, Haste, and Projection--this was the fruit of his labor over the past few days. Five carefully selected foundational spells.
Detection and Water-Repelling were necessities.
Reinforcement, Haste, and Projection were the core of his future combat style. He had already decided to become a frontline-capable magus.
Based on everything he'd seen of the Fourth and Fifth Holy Grail Wars in his past life, a 'pure' academic magus was virtually useless in a direct confrontation. Regardless of raw power, the moment a magus was closed in on, it was usually game over. The Holy Grail War rarely allowed for static, long-range skirmishes; most battles were sudden, brutal encounters. And even if you managed to set up a defense, someone like Kiritsugu Emiya would just blow up your building and be done with it.
The river water suddenly shuddered as the air bubble surrounding Wayland expanded and contracted. He launched himself forward like a cannonball.
Gripping the hilt with both hands, he skipped any pretense of finesse. He leaped high into the water and brought the blade down in a heavy, vertical slash, the force of the blow parting the water around him.
There was no sensation of cutting through flesh. The blade was held fast, a sharp hissing sound echoing through the water.
Wayland glanced at the sword; its edges were already beginning to dissolve. He let go of the hilt instantly. As his body sank, another blade manifested in his right hand, and he lunged straight for the fairy's throat.
The resistance was staggering.
Wayland felt a massive recoil vibrate through his arm, as if he'd struck a diamond. Not a single mark remained on the girl's skin, but his projected blade was already warping under the pressure.
'Irigal, does she have a weakness?'
Wayland kicked off the riverbed, putting several meters of distance between them.
["The eyes and the mouth!"] Irigal shouted back.
"Got it."
Wayland launched himself into the fray once more.
The fairy, likely due to her lack of reason, appeared sluggish. She instinctively raised her arm to block the next strike.
This time, Wayland didn't let go. Instead, he flooded the blade with prana, slowing the rate of dissolution.
Using his left hand, he flung a burst of prana into the water, projecting a second blade that drifted momentarily in the current.
Using the resistance of his right-hand sword as a pivot, he kicked upward. He spiraled through the water, clearing his path with a twist of his body. Materializing a fresh blade in his right hand, he channeled every ounce of his momentum, weight, and prana into a single, desperate thrust into the fairy's open mouth.
This time, there was no resistance. The blade tore straight through.
Wayland let go of the hilt, grabbed the sword he'd left floating with his left hand, and performed a backflip in the water. He slammed his left palm against the fairy's forehead, driving the blade through her left eye. Without skipping a beat, he projected a final blade and drove it deep into her right eye.
Wayland gasped for air, a sharp, tearing pain erupting in his right arm--the warning sign of severe prana exhaustion.
The fairy's body convulsed before falling still. Her form began to grow translucent.
As she faded, the vacant expression on her face seemed to soften into one of relief. She dissolved into the water, leaving not a single trace behind.
For a reason he couldn't quite name, Wayland felt a pang of sadness.
["If you hadn't done it, the Mage's Association would have found her in a few days anyway. Their fate for her would have been much worse. Those old fossils would have been delighted to slice a wild fairy open for research,"] Irigal said, her voice unusually soft in consolation.
'Let's go.' Wayland didn't want to dwell on it.
["Wait. She left you a gift. Don't you want it?"]
'A gift?'
["It's too dark to see clearly. Use your prana to scan the area where she vanished. Do you feel it?"]
Wayland blinked, and soon located a tiny black grain pulsing with magical energy amidst the sludge.
'Is this... a seed?'
He rinsed the grain in the water. 'Why would a fairy leave a seed behind?'
["Because she was originally a plant-based fairy. The only reason she took a humanoid form was due to the influence of those ghosts."]
'If this seed is planted and grows... does that mean she isn't really dead?'
[Translated and Rewritten by Shika_Kagura]