On the way back, the wind and snow gradually died down.
Now that Shane was getting more and more used to splitting his focus, he let his mind sink inward as usual.
Assassin's illusion had already ended. It was a shame, but at this point, all he could do was take stock of what he had gained ahead of time.
"Figure out the true name, obtain the power."
That said, because he had spent almost the entire time watching that Heroic Spirit's abilities rather than fighting them himself, Shane honestly hadn't expected Assassin to give him much of a power boost.
After all, the opponent's performance had been… a little underwhelming.
And because the fight had been so direct and head-on, they hadn't even really shown off the eerie, elusive qualities that should define an Assassin.
"Jack the Ripper."
As the name rang softly in his mind, countless overlapping shadows flashed through his sea of consciousness—
thousands upon thousands of infants who were never allowed to be born, or were abandoned at the bottom of the Thames.
They cried, they struggled, and in the end, they twisted together into that small figure holding a dagger.
"So there isn't even an independent concept of 'me' here…"
Rather than a human with an individual personality, this was more like a mass of vengeful spirits made from the abandoned children cast into London's darkest corners.
No wonder her mind had been so chaotic, so incomplete.
Shane shook his head, suppressing the pity that stirred in him, and instead carefully absorbed the feedback flowing in from the Book of Heroes.
Strength: C
Endurance: C
Agility: A
Mana: C
"Just as I thought…"
Looking at the long line of thoroughly average C's, Shane wasn't surprised in the slightest.
Exactly as he had expected, aside from agility, all of her base stats were pretty mediocre—arguably even poor.
"But agility is actually A?"
He rubbed his chin, puzzled.
"Jack's speed in combat didn't feel anything like the oppressive, blink-and-you-miss-it movement Lancer has. So why is the rank a whole tier higher?"
Was it class correction? Or did her talent for fleeing and hiding come with some kind of special bonus to mobility?
"I don't get it… but at least it's an A. That'll still speed up my growth in movement speed and nervous system response."
Shaking his head, Shane decided not to get hung up on that and kept processing the remaining fragments of information.
Because his expectations had been low to begin with, he casually turned his attention to the Noble Phantasms.
And in the next second, one eyebrow rose.
"She actually has… two Noble Phantasms?"
That was an unexpected pleasant surprise.
Neither of them included the "splitting into children" ability Jack had shown earlier, but in a way, the two Noble Phantasms formed a complete, interlocking set.
[Maria the Ripper (D~B)]
Staring at the image of the four ordinary-looking nameless daggers that rose in his mind, Shane's expression sharpened.
Even though this Noble Phantasm took the form of daggers, it didn't actually refer to any specific weapon.
At its core, it was a curse-concept—the historical act of Jack cruelly dismembering women, fused together with the resentment of tens of thousands of infants, then sublimated into a Noble Phantasm.
"Its purpose is to impose the twisted wish of those children—'Why were only we abandoned?' 'We want to return to our mother's womb'—onto a target in the most extreme and violent way possible."
"That's completely insane…"
Shane rubbed at his throbbing brow and clicked his tongue.
To him, this wasn't just killing.
It was more like a grotesque reverse-birth ritual, carried out through violence in order to return to the womb.
Suppressing the discomfort that thought gave him, he continued examining the details.
The reason the second Noble Phantasm was described as part of the same system was because Maria the Ripper needed three harsh conditions in order to be fully activated and display its maximum power:
First: [The Night] — it must be nighttime.
Second: [The Woman] — the target must be female.
Third: [The Mist] — the environment must be covered in fog.
If all three conditions were met, then without the blades ever having to touch the target's body, the Noble Phantasm could ignore conventional defense and forcibly tear the victim's internal organs out of their body, instantly reducing them to a dismembered corpse.
If the Noble Phantasm was forced into use without all conditions being fulfilled, then it would remain a more straightforward physical-damage attack.
Even then, however, every additional condition that was met would raise its power, all the way up to the level of a B-rank Noble Phantasm.
That still didn't compare to Lancelot's Arondight or Senji Muramasa's Tsumukari Muramasa, but it was still undeniably dangerous.
At this point, Shane understood at once.
"No wonder…"
That explained why Mira had almost been hit earlier even after clearly widening the distance.
At the time, it had been nighttime, Mira had been female, and the surroundings had been filled with fog.
Even though Jack had already been in poor condition by then, Shane didn't dare think too hard about what might have happened if Erza hadn't interrupted in time.
As expected, no Heroic Spirit could ever be taken lightly before its Noble Phantasms were properly understood.
"From now on, when I run into Heroic Spirit illusions, I should really try to explore them myself—or at least throw enemies in first and let them step on the landmines."
"Using them as exams for my own people is way too risky."
That realization made Shane break out in a cold sweat. Almost guiltily, he glanced at Mira beside him.
Maybe… he should give her back the film negatives from the camera?
At that moment, the girl was still deeply tangled up in how she was supposed to repay the favor she owed Erza. When she caught Shane looking at her, she shot him an irritated glare.
"Stop looking at me with that disgusting face. I'm already annoyed enough…"
Failing the exam, getting caught by Shane's blackmail material, and then being saved by her rival…
At the moment, the girl was basically a powder keg waiting to go off. Even a passing dog would probably get kicked.
"…"
Shane quietly withdrew his apologetic gaze and sank back into his own thoughts.
"Another thing worth noting: Maria the Ripper doesn't test physical defense—it tests resistance to curses?"
He thought it through carefully.
"A ridiculous curse like this, if used in a real battle without warning, would absolutely ruin someone who didn't know what it was."
"It's basically the textbook definition of a 'gotcha' instant-kill trick."
The only real drawback was that once the information got out and the enemy knew what to expect, the effect would drop off dramatically.
Then Shane shifted his focus to the second Noble Phantasm.
[Darkened Misty Metropolis (C)]
His fingers twitched slightly, and a wisp of illusory fog rose in front of him.
This was no ordinary mist—it was the concretization of late-19th-century London's "fog city" phenomenon, a highly acidic sulfuric smog generated from magic.
"So it comes with a constant pain aura and a blinding effect…"
Shane carefully studied the description flowing to him from the Book of Heroes.
"And it also has the function of driving people away?"
That said, if an ordinary person actually remained inside the barrier, they'd probably die pretty quickly anyway once they inhaled enough of the sulfuric fog and their lungs started rotting away.
Even supernatural beings wouldn't drop dead on the spot, but they would still suffer continuous damage from the corrosive acid.
Not only would spellcasting be interfered with, but all of their movement and performance would be forcibly lowered by the corrosive mist.
What made it even more convenient was that, as the controller, Shane could freely decide who inside the fog would suffer its effects and who would be exempt.
On top of that, the deathly fog could forcibly strip away a person's sense of direction.
To escape it, someone would need either beast-like intuition or some kind of space-jumping magic.
With all of those negative effects stacked together, trying to catch sight of Assassin inside the fog would be harder than reaching the heavens.
"Visual deprivation, constant debuffs, home-field advantage… this is practically the perfect Noble Phantasm for assassination."
As he walked, Shane ran tactical simulations in his head.
"No wonder these two Noble Phantasms form such a complete set. If I use Maria the Ripper at night while this Noble Phantasm is active, then I can always guarantee at least two conditions—'night' and 'mist.'"
"Even if the opponent isn't female, I can still deal very respectable damage."
"As expected of the Assassin class. The dirty tricks just layer on top of each other. It's filthy in exactly the right way."
Shane gave the ability a fully sincere evaluation in his heart.
The underestimation he had felt earlier gradually faded, and a satisfied smile curved at his lips.
"Still…"
"I like it."
~~~
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