How come the Ace of Cups isn't considered the Holy Grail?

Ayaka Sajou couldn't see the movement of the black mist, so she only saw that after the pale knight's dark mass appeared, the black magician who had led them to the ward suddenly blocked their way, his staff erecting a golden circular magic circle as a barrier pointing straight ahead.

What's wrong!

Has the enemy Servant launched an attack?!

Ayaka Sajou, who hadn't seen the Pale Knight make any move, looked tense. Although she didn't know what had happened, she instinctively pointed her Holy Lance at it.

Even she could see that the dark magician was protecting them, so she had no intention of rushing out to engage in melee combat. She simply kept a watchful eye on the pale knight opposite her.

In You Du's view, the thick black fog that surged in like a tide had almost completely filled the entire ward, and the 'corpse' on the floor had long been submerged in it.

Only the spot where Yuwatari and Ayaka Sajou, protected behind the black magician, stood was like a reef in the endless sea, constantly being battered by the waves.

After a while, perhaps realizing that the black mist could not break through the black magician's defenses, nor could it harm the two people he had blocked behind him, the Pale Knight simply withdrew the black mist.

Even though the Pale Knight itself has no self-will and is merely a mechanical being, currently only instinctively protecting its Master, Tsubaki Kugaoka, it still knows the meaning of "wasting its efforts."

"Hmm? You're done? Then it's my turn!" Seeing the surrounding black mist recede and be absorbed into the dark mass, Yu Du raised an eyebrow, and without saying a word, took out a card and summoned Hope.

It was good that the dark magician stayed behind to protect them. Even with his B-rank magic resistance, Yuuto didn't want to be enveloped by that sticky black mist.

In an instant, a burst of golden light shone brightly, and a huge white-gold holy sword appeared out of thin air, stabbing straight at the pale knight opposite.

Seeing this, the Pale Knight also made his own response. The already viscous black mist solidified again at this moment, turning into a thick wall that fell down and blocked the holy sword.

Although Yuuto was confident that this mere obstacle was like a human body blocking a hundred-ton king in front of Hope, and could be crushed at will, why should he follow the enemy's plan?

Do you really think my Hope is just a sword?

"Activate Super Transform!"

As soon as You Du spoke, the holy sword, under the watchful eyes of the people in the room, suddenly spun around halfway as it hurtled towards the wall with unstoppable momentum.

In the blink of an eye, the platinum holy sword transformed into a human form through a series of complex movements due to its extreme speed, with the part that was originally the blade falling into Hope's hands and becoming his weapon.

Hopper, wielding two swords, took advantage of the Pale Knight's momentary lapse in attention, first slicing through the dense fog the Knight had instinctively gathered, then cleaving its body in two with another strike.

Is the battle over...?

No, not really.

The Pale Knight's body, which had been split in two, seemed to disappear as if it had never existed, and reassembled itself after Hope's blade sliced ​​through it.

"This is... immortality?" Ayaka Sajou blurted out instinctively.

immortal?

Yudo raised an eyebrow as he watched the pale knight, who had been split in two, return to his original appearance.

Perhaps, but more than immortality, he doubted that the one in front of him might not be the true form of this Servant.

Just kidding. He didn't read all those novels, comics, and anime for nothing. Regardless of whether this Servant is immortal or not, the fact that it hasn't even materialized into a human form yet is already quite problematic.

At least Red Hare has half a human form, so how could a Servant be a black, unidentified lump from beginning to end?

Anyway, I've never seen Youdu yet.

The thing in front of them was probably just a shadow or a clone, so they didn't care at all even if it was cut in two!

As for where its true form is, it's probably not too far from this ward. After all, its master is still here. It can run away, but it can't run away from the temple!

Thinking of this, Yuuto decided not to search for its true location bit by bit anymore. He directly took out the various parts of the Z4 version of the Duel Disk, assembled them together, unfolded the folded Duel Disk, and activated the Noble Phantasm.

【Duel Mode Standby!】

[AR image connection complete!]

In an instant, the surrounding ward scene flickered with gibberish, like a faulty television screen.

Accompanied by a 'zzzz' sound, a string of green code characters appeared out of thin air, cascading down like a waterfall and completely erasing the walls and ceiling of the ward.

In the blink of an eye, the surrounding scenery changed drastically.

As if everything before had been an illusion, Ayaka Sajou, upon regaining her senses, was shocked to find that they were no longer in the hospital room, but standing on a street in the center of Snowfield City.

Ayaka Sajou still vaguely remembered this street; the shopping mall where she went to buy clothes today was on the street next to this one.

You Du is still by her side, while the black mass opposite them is trembling incessantly for some reason. In addition, two figures, one large and one small, suddenly appeared on the side of the street not far from them.

Sajou Ayaka looked over curiously, only to discover that the two people were the little girl lying on the bed they had seen when they entered the ward, and... the 'corpse' lying in front of the bed.

So he didn't die after all?

When Ayaka Sajou saw the man standing next to the little girl, she couldn't help but widen her eyes in surprise.

The man, looking rather curious, gazed around the street with the little girl beside him. When he saw Yuwatari and Ayaka Sajou standing in the middle of the empty street, he walked over, smiled, and raised his hand to greet them.

"Oh! Little girl, you're one of the Masters participating in the Holy Grail War, aren't you?"

Immediately afterwards, Hansa, the overseer of the Holy Church who had just said goodbye to Jack after his transformation and then used some tricks to enter Tsubaki Kanaoka's hospital room, was instantly knocked down and pulled into a dream. He then asked Ayaka Sajou in a friendly tone, as if he were talking to a friend.

"Um...who are you?"

Feeling uncomfortable at the visitor's overly familiar manner, Ayaka Sajo hesitated for a moment before cautiously asking about Hansa's identity instead of answering immediately.

"Ah, sorry, I haven't introduced myself yet..." Facing Ayaka Sajou's wariness, Hansa waved her off without a care and confidently revealed his identity to her.

"I am Hansa Serbandis, the overseer of this Holy Grail War and an agent from the Church of the Holy See."

Good evening, Caster's Master.

Chapter 275 Dreams really do contain anything.

Ayaka Sajou: "?"

Hansa: "?"

Seeing that Ayaka Sajou's previously tense face suddenly froze after his greeting, and then she tilted her head slightly to show her confusion, Hansa, not understanding what was going on, also copied her action.

What's wrong?

Is there anything wrong with what he said?

Hansa's gaze swept over the black magician standing beside Ayaka Sajou, and over Yuwatari and Hope the Emperor who were confronting the Pale Knight.

The three characters have distinct art styles, so only one of them is likely the Servant of the girl in front of him, while the other two are probably familiars summoned by that Servant.

Hmm... there's one wielding dual swords, one wielding a staff, and one carrying nothing but a strange device on his arm...

It's pretty obvious who the Servant is at a glance, right?

So here's the question: which class of Servant is most likely to be able to summon two seemingly powerful familiars so effortlessly?

Hansa believed the answer should be obvious.

After all, they are currently engaged in battle with enemy Servants, but Yuwatari is not holding any weapons and does not seem like a berserker who has lost his mind. Caster is the most likely candidate!

But the doubt on Ayaka Sajou's face didn't seem fake... Could it be that he really encountered those less likely situations?

Hansa was puzzled, and Ayaka Sajou didn't immediately believe him either.

The overseer of the Holy Church… she had heard Yuuto mention this before; it seemed to be the person responsible for cleaning up the messes caused by the major disturbances they, the Masters and Servants, had made. He had also mentioned the characteristics of such people…

"What excuse did you use to cover up what happened at the animal hospital in Xueyuan City today?"

Just as Hansa was lost in thought again, Ayaka Sajou took advantage of his distraction and suddenly asked a question.

"Natural gas explosion!" Hansa answered casually without even thinking.

That is indeed the supervisor.

Ayaka Sajo relaxed slightly, leaving Hansa somewhat unsure of what she was thinking.

At that moment, the pitch-black mass that had been trembling incessantly after Yuuto unfolded the Duel Disk and changed the surrounding environment slowly stopped trembling and began to be slowly shaped like a lump of clay by an invisible hand.

Extend, stretch, separate into limbs...

The black mass eventually transformed into a 'knight' resembling a skeleton, completely covered in pale armor, exuding an ominous aura. The extra black mist on his arm condensed into a duel disk of the same color as the armor.

Now he truly has become a pale 'knight', just as the literal meaning suggests.

Because there is no mount, the word "knight" needs to be put in quotation marks.

"Ah! Mr. Black has turned white!" Kugaoka Tsubaki exclaimed in surprise after witnessing the entire transformation of the Pale Knight.

From that moment on, she knew that she should probably start calling "Mr. Dark" "Mr. White".

Just after the Pale Knight transformed into human form, the usual information rush finally arrived, causing Hansa to cover his forehead and feel dizzy.

Although more than 70% of his body has been replaced with 'sacred' prosthetics, his brain is still the original!

On the other hand, perhaps out of consideration for her status as a patient, Yuwatari's Noble Phantasm was used to instill information in her in an unexpectedly gentle way.

At least judging from Ayaka Sajou's appearance, she didn't seem to be feeling any discomfort.

"Wow...that was really something..."

As an agent of the Holy Church, even though, according to Hansa, he himself was not as powerful as a single finger of the members of the burial agency, his will was still beyond the reach of ordinary people.

It only took him a short time to endure the throbbing pain and sort out the information that had suddenly entered his mind.

However, even after figuring things out and understanding the meaning of that information, he still felt like he was dreaming...

Haha, using card games to decide the outcome of battles between Servants in the Holy Grail War? Goodness, why don't you just use card games to rule, destroy, or save the world?

Oh right, he was indeed pulled into Tsubaki's dream by that Servant.

That's fine.

Realizing that he had not yet escaped the dream, Hansa accepted the additional settings in his mind.

After all, you can really have anything in your dreams.

He looked at Youdu and the Pale Knight with the newly acquired information. The latter stiffly raised his arm and uttered hoarse words intermittently.

"D...DU...DUE..."

"It seems this must be your true form now? I didn't expect it to be in a dream... Oh well, let's go!"

Seeing what he meant, Yuwatari raised his hand in unison, retracting Hope and the Dark Magician. The Duel Disk on his arm lit up and unfolded, and he spoke at the same time as the Pale Knight, whose speech was halting as if he were adjusting to his own vocal cords.

"DUEL!" ×2

【Yoto LP: 4000】

Pale Knight LP: 4000

Although her mind was filled with many things, Tsubaki Kugaoka still couldn't understand what Yuuto and the Pale Knight were up to, and stood to the side feeling somewhat lost.

"Then, I'll make the first move!"

Yudo, who had the first move, took out one card under the watchful eyes of Hansa and Kugai Tsubaki.

"First, I need to activate this card's effect from my hand! If I have no cards on my field, this card can be Special Summoned directly from my hand!"

"Come forth! [Different Heat Servant - Ascended Sage]!"

After a cool hum, a warrior clad in purple and light gray armor bursts out of the card image, wielding a scepter, accompanied by a card appearing on the field. A shattered purple X symbol floats behind him, like a pair of mechanical wings.

[Different Heat Servant - Ascended Sage]

【4 stars】

[Warrior/Light]

[Defense: 300]

"When I have only one Level 4 monster on my field other than [Feverish Servant - Armed Sage], I can also Special Summon [Feverish Servant - Armed Sage] from my hand!"

A new card appeared beside the Ascended Sage. The red warrior on the card calmly flew out from it. Apart from the four spider-like limbs he wore, the bright red armor only covered his upper body and knees.

He held a long-handled weapon that resembled both a spear and a staff, and carried several different weapons on his back, including a greatsword and a trident.

【Different Heat Servant - Armed Sage】

【4 stars】

[Warrior/Light]

[Defense: 900]

So that's how it is; he used those cards to summon his familiars...