Chapter 28: The Black Sun
The ground had barely stopped shaking.
Dust hung thick in the shattered cathedral air, glowing with the last sparks of Riya's attack.
Then, Tezcatlipoca smiled.
He didn't move—but the world seemed to tilt.
"My turn."
Tezcatlipoca raised one obsidian finger.
The sky cracked.
A tremor echoed outward like the heartbeat of the earth itself.
Riya barely had time to react.
The god descended like a thunderclap—faster than any divine being had a right to move.
A single blow from his jagged arm shattered Riya's defenses.
Clarent flew from his grip and embedded itself in a wall behind him.
Tezcatlipoca didn't let up.
His foot smashed into Riya's stomach, sending him through a pillar.
As Riya coughed blood, the god landed beside him, crouched like a predator.
"You channel a knight of rebellion huh?" Tezcatlipoca mused, grabbing Riya by the throat and lifting him.
Riya tried to punch him—lightning crackled around his fist—but the god swatted it aside and hurled him into the air.
Before Riya could fall, a black beam struck him mid-air and sent him crashing through the cathedral dome.
Tezcatlipoca floated upward lazily, chuckling.
Riya rose, barely standing.
His armor was scorched, his skin cut and bruised.
Still, he spat blood and growled, "Keep laughing, dipshit."
Tezcatlipoca smiled to that response with too many teeth.
"It seems that I'm going to have to teach you a thing or two" Tezcatlipoca said.
"First Sun: Xibalba."
The world darkened.
A ring of glyphs ignited beneath him.
From them rose a menagerie of two-legged black beasts—jaguar-headed giants, bear-sized snakes, nightmarish hounds.
The god hovered above them like a blasphemous sun.
A smoke rolled forth—thick, oily, burning the lungs and the mind.
Pain and despair manifested.
Riya screamed.
He collapsed to one knee, clutching his head.
The smoke was eating at his very spirit.
"Damn it…!" He forced himself to focus.
"Jeanne…I need you!"
White light enveloped him.
His body shifted again—armor replaced by holy regalia, a flag in hand.
He stood tall even as the smoke bore down.
"O Lord, I beg of you... Grant me the strength to protect those precious to me.
Luminosité Eternelle!"
The flag flared with divine brilliance.
A radiant barrier burst around him, pushing the smoke back.
The beasts charged.
Riya swung the flag like a blade, spearing one monster through the head.
Another lunged. He blocked.
Then a third slammed into him, breaking through the shield.
He grunted, rolled and stabbed it in the heart.
They just kept coming.
He blocked, swung, dodged, screamed.
The flag was chipped. His shield cracked. The divine armor flared dimmer with each second.
"Why... why can't I win...?"
Riya stumbled, panting.
A black beast lunged.
"Does that mean I...will never get to see them again?"
He thought of his family. Their smiles.
He was going to die here.
And then—
The black beast cleaved in two.
A flash of steel.
Muramasa.
"Looked like you were struggling."
A second later, the roar of a Hippogriff filled the air.
Astolfo landed with a grin. Sieg was behind him, barely clinging to the saddle.
"Hope we're not too late!"
Riya stood again. This was not over yet!
Hope returned.
Astolfo flew through the air, spear singing, releasing sonic booms that tore through the enemy lines.
Muramasa cut down ten black beasts.
Maybe more. He stopped counting.
Riya, with his spirit reignited, struck two down with Jeanne's flag, piercing their hearts with divine precision.
They were winning.
Tezcatlipoca growled, lowering toward the field.
"Enough."
He had Enough of this.
But he didn't have time to stop anything.
Riya charged, flag raised high, clashing against the god in a flurry of divine strikes.
From above, Astolfo flew into position.
"Volcano Caligorante!"
His sword split into chained blades of energy, striking from behind.
Tezcatlipoca staggered.
Now.
Now was the moment.
Muramasa stepped forward.
"The convergence of many gathers here... A Tsumukari Muramasa to sever bonds, sever certainty, sever karma.
This is a release from the wheel of fate!"
A wasteland of swords appeared, all shattered into dust—except one.
Muramasa grasped it.
A single slash.
Reality split.
Tezcatlipoca was bisected midair.
"Children of man... you are relentless..."
He vanished.
The battlefield fell silent.
For the first time in what felt like hours, there were no flames, no roars, no cracking earth.
Only the sound of heavy breathing.
Wind swept through the shattered cathedral, carrying the scent of blood and ozone.
Riya dropped to his knees, clutching Jeanne's flag like a lifeline.
His body ached.
His soul burned.
But it was over.
Tezcatlipoca—God of War, of Night, of the black sun—was gone.
Behind him, Astolfo whooped with relief.
Sieg exhaled shakily.
Even Muramasa allowed himself the ghost of a grin.
They had done it.
Together.
They had won.
The former Black Faction's castle now stood silent.
Deep below, they found the Greater Grail.
And Shirou.
Shirou didn't turn to face them.
He stood before the Greater Grail, its glow casting a ghostly shimmer over his back, like a halo not meant for saints.
"You came all this way… to stop me?"
His voice was quiet. Not bitter. Not angry. Just… tired.
"I gave everything. Years. Memories. My own body. For this."
He took a slow step toward the Grail.
"You speak of victory—but I was never trying to win.
I only ever wanted to save them.
All of them.
A world where no child cries alone in the dark.
Where no mother buries her child beneath rubble.
Where no one has to look at a fire and wonder who lit it."
Finally, he glanced back.
His eyes were sunken, burning with belief, and hollowed by loss.
"You call this madness. But you—you let the world burn for the sake of a system that eats its own. I only tried to rewrite it."
He reached out, trembling fingers just inches from the Grail.
"I was so close. Just one more miracle.
One more wish.
And maybe—just maybe—I could've saved everyone."
Suddenly Smoke started to fill the chamber.
Eyes glowed red in the black.
"Hell starts here..."
The mist thickened like a living thing, curling around limbs, clawing at lungs.
Riya's silhouette flickered in and out, barely visible.
Cloaked in Jack the Ripper's Noble Phantasm, he was no longer a boy or a warrior—he was death.
"We are the fire, the rain, the power..."
A whisper, yet louder than a scream.
"Let the slaughter begin."
"Maria the Ripper!"
The world disappeared into red and steel.
A thousand invisible blades danced in silence.
They didn't clang—they whispered, they sang, they tore.
One slash opened Shirou's side.
Another ripped across his spine.
More followed—slicing tendon, splitting muscle, severing control.
He stumbled.
Then another blade.
And another.
A hundred.
Two hundred.
Five hundred.
He dropped to one knee.
Breathless.
Bloody.
Reaching for the Grail, even now.
Riya stepped out of the fog.
Eyes glowing.
A dagger in each hand, glistening with blood and mist.
He didn't speak.
He didn't need to.
One step.
Two.
Then he drove the final dagger into Shirou's chest with both hands.
A gasp.
With a crimson-stained hand, Riya reached in and tore the heart from Shirou's chest.
It pulsed once.
Then nothing.
It was over.
Riya collapsed to the ground, drained.
Astolfo cheered and hugged everyone.
Muramasa scowled.
"Personal space!"
Sieg tried, and failed, to stop the squabble.
And Riya?
He was just there.
Breathing.
Drinking it all in.
He has won.
"Nice"