#545Chapter 545: Facing Jin Shanshan at the BeginningAI Model: gemini-2.5-flash
Chapter 545: Facing Gilgamesh from the Start
Bazett happily arrived at the church, then was ambushed in a daze, and finally, in a near death state, was directly thrown into the church's basement.
Kirei Kotomine would not spend extra time and effort to move Bazett elsewhere.
This meant that Cheng Tian and his team entered the enemy's main base directly from the start.
In other dungeons, they would likely need to go through great lengths, fighting their way through many obstacles to encounter the BOSS, but here, it was almost like meeting him at the very beginning.
As the overseer of the Fifth Holy Grail War, the church was Kirei Kotomine's stronghold. Besides handling the randomly appearing 'gas explosion incidents' in Fuyuki City and going to the shopping district to taste exquisite Mapo Tofu, Father Mapo spent most of his time in the church, secretly observing and manipulating various situations of this war.
One has to admit, this guy truly had a twisted sense of humor.
Not only did he ambush Bazett, leaving her severely wounded and on the verge of death, stealing her Command Spells and Servant, but he also left Bazett to fend for herself, and prevented Bazett's original contracted Servant, Cú Chulainn, from doing anything but watching.
For this, Father Mapo was probably enjoying the pleasure derived from defiling human emotions, right?
"Can you determine roughly how much time has passed?"
Cheng Tian also saw the scab residue in Bazett's hand and asked naturally.
However, before Bazett could give a corresponding answer, Cheng Tian's head buzzed as he scanned and perceived a humanoid unit, and he couldn't help but feel a sudden disorientation.
"Hoh~~? There are even rats capable of bypassing my perception and invading this location... No, you must have used some special technique to cross time and space? For mongrels, that's quite a skillful operation~"
The next second, a voice with an envious 'arrogance' tag, full of inflections, instantly filled the entire basement.
And Cheng, just by hearing the initial 'Hoh' sound, which undulated like a radio wave, immediately knew who the owner of this voice was.
Not to mention, because his previous focus was entirely on Mapo, Cheng Tian had indeed overlooked that there was also a freeloading golden-haired Servant here.
"Heroic Spirit? You really like this broken place, the church."
Cheng, whose momentary disorientation quickly subsided, rubbed his Heaven's Eye, his face showing no panic.
"Hmm? An unknown entity that clearly knows this King? It seems the value of sealing the all-knowing and all-powerful star has indeed manifested. This is the true essence that only genuine unknowns can bring~~"
"Rejoice, mongrels! Your existence has piqued this King's interest. I shall bestow upon you the opportunity to gaze upon this King's countenance.
Come up."
As soon as his voice fell, the hidden door leading to the upper area, which had been tightly shut, slowly opened on its own.
"Who is this person...?"
Facing this sudden change, Aileen showed no reaction, but Bazett displayed considerable confusion.
Through the memory recall (flashback) during her near-death state, she roughly knew this was the church basement and that the priest was probably somewhere above, but she had no memory whatsoever of this voice.
"Let's go, we'll go together to meet this Most Ancient King, who might not actually exist."
Cheng Tian did not offer much explanation for this, as seeing is believing.
As the backbone, Cheng Tian showed no signs of panic, and naturally, neither did the two girls, his teammates and contracted Servants.
As dark and cold as the church basement was, so warm and bright was the church hall... at least during the daytime.
This was a very standard European-style church interior, with sunlight pouring through the stained-glass windows, illuminating rows of clean and tidy pews.
Although the surroundings were very bright, it was deserted and lacked any worshipers.
Except for a golden-haired man who was lounging, legs crossed, hands spread out and resting on the back of a pew.
Oh? It's Gilgamesh in casual clothes? Which timeline did we jump to?
Seeing the golden-haired Servant's hair, Cheng couldn't help but wonder.
The 'Fate' series originally started as a galgame, and as is well known, such visual novels usually have multiple choices corresponding to different plot developments, leading to various endings.
Bazett theoretically originates from 'Fate/hollow ataraxia', which is a direct sequel to 'Fate/stay night', but her current form of existence is completely different from the original work. The current time point is also genuinely the Fifth Holy Grail War period, which is equivalent to forcibly intervening in the previous work's format.
Additionally, now there are two enormous variables: their own team and the Cat Elf Kingdom. Who knows what path the overall plot will take?
"I cannot pretend I didn't hear what you just said."
The golden-haired Servant said this without even turning his head.
"...Are you referring to the phrase 'might not actually exist'?"
While others were confused, Cheng Tian immediately grasped the essence of it, then unhurriedly moved to an empty pew on the other side of the golden-haired Servant and sat down.
"Heroic Spirit, you should understand geology, right?"
"Slightly."
"A while ago, our country's Sinopec went to the birthplace of Sumerian civilization to drill wells, dozens of them. The result was that even at a depth of about eight hundred meters, it was still a salt-gypsum layer, even more terrible than saline-alkali land."
"..."
With Cheng Tian's explanation, the Heroic Spirit immediately fell silent.
An eight-hundred-meter salt-gypsum layer, more terrible than saline-alkali land, meant that the corresponding land area would be unable to sustain normal life or grow any plants for at least tens of thousands of years. Since no plants could grow, the so-called Sumerian civilization from six or seven thousand years ago would be a pure mythological fabrication.
This news brought by Cheng Tian almost completely negated the ancient heroic epic 'Epic of Gilgamesh' that was passed down among the Sumerian people.
Of course, whether it was fabricated or not did not actually affect the existence of these illusory figures. As long as their spread was high enough, their fame great enough, and they were recognized by the world, then they still had the qualification to become Heroic Spirits.
But then, the Heroic Spirit, who was expected to instantly fly into a rage, reacted in a way that greatly surprised Cheng Tian.
"A very interesting viewpoint, but you are typically using the viewpoint of another world to argue about phenomena in this world, which is a clever trick of changing concepts.
Perhaps in your world, saline-alkali land and salt-gypsum land would indeed indirectly confirm the extent of the Sumerian myth's fabrication, but here, what you need to prioritize is the boundary and difference between the Age of Gods and the Age of Man."
"The entire Uruk city wall was created by this King's divine authority seal; the crops and soil naturally go without saying. Whether it's saline-alkali land fundamentally does not affect the allowance of life... Or are you, a mere insect who doesn't even understand magic, trying to use carbon-14 dating to measure the Tablets of Destiny, thereby denying the existence of the entire Age of Gods?"
The composed Heroic Spirit tilted his head, fingers intertwined, looking directly into Cheng Tian's eyes.
"To deny the illusory with factual information whose authenticity cannot be confirmed, is as foolish as using imagined, illusory content to match reality. This is indeed my mistake, and I sincerely apologize to the Heroic Spirit here."
Cheng Tian was stunned, then took a few steps to stand before the Heroic Spirit, his face sincere.
At this moment, he truly recognized his error.
"To err and to mend is to be praised."
To this, the Heroic Spirit seemingly casually waved his hand, but at the same time, a golden spatial ripple slowly unfolded behind him.
"But your country also has an idiom: 'trouble comes from the mouth!'"
The moment his voice fell, a beam of light shot out from the spatial ripple, flying directly towards Cheng Tian's forehead!