Illusion of Whitechapel

I’ll get rid of her here and now, Archer decided, nocking another arrow and immediately shooting it. Assassin didn’t move an inch from her kneeling position beside the corpse. Perhaps she didn’t even understand that an arrow had been shot at her.

It’s better that way, thought Archer. It would be better if she just let it all go like this. All of Assassin’s regrets, hopes and despair would be irrelevant if she disappeared.

Assassin merely convulsed for an instant when the arrow pierced her heart, not even letting out a scream.

Puzzled, Archer of Red approached her. The arrow definitely should have destroyed Assassin’s spiritual core. But she didn’t display any response to it.

There was no sign of pain, or of her body fading away and vanishing.

It was an abnormal sight. Assassin was merely looking up at the sky. Her blank face made it clear that she was no longer capable of fighting.

And yet, Archer of Red felt a chill go down her back and started to feel fear towards something she couldn’t place.

Heroic Spirits were those who had become figures of bravery by conquering fear in all forms. Naturally, as a Heroic Sprit herself, Atalanta understood that well.

She didn’t fear the darkness of the forest deep in the night. She hadn’t feared the giant boar that a god had released on the earth.

She could even laugh and overcome battlefields where a single instant’s decision could lead to death. That shouldn’t have changed in the Great Holy Grail War either.

There was no room for her to feel fear in this situation. She had shot down the enemy, and even if she hadn’t, Assassin was on the verge of death. This was enemy territory, but she was confident that she could make her escape on her swift feet. Even if everything proceeded in the worst possible way and she perished on this battlefield, she would have regrets, but she would accept it.

That was the karma of battle. Any Heroic Spirit had at least that much resolve.

But…

Archer of Red took a step back. No, the thing that conflicted her right now was something decisively different from that kind of fear.

It was the feeling that, just by remaining here, something would end. What was there to fear? Assassin of Black no longer had any means of counterattack.

Just what kind of threat could a Servant, who’s Master was dead and who couldn’t use her Noble Phantasms, pose?

There was no threat. There shouldn’t have been, and yet—

Assassin of Black’s head spun around her neck like that of a doll’s, and turned to face Archer of Red. Archer couldn’t help but think that her blank eyes were beautiful like blue crystals.

Assassin of Black opened her mouth.

“Why?”

After Assassin spoke that single word, a stream of black mud-like mass spewed out from her mouth.

Archer of Red frantically jumped away, but her reaction was fatally too slow.

“This is…!?”

Summoned as Assassin, Jack the Ripper was an amalgamation of vengeful spirits. The unborn children who had been abandoned in the Whitechapel district had merely temporarily materialized by taking the form of a young girl.

Archer of Red’s arrow just now had released all of them from the focal point known as [Jack the Ripper].

Looking like a thick fog, the vengeful spirits attacked the nearest living being, Archer—and completely engulfed her.

—In that instant, Archer of Red saw hell.

Question: What is hell?

Answer: Eternally continuing torture.

Answer: Eternally repeated slaughter.

Answer: Eternally unending despair.

Indeed, each and every one of these can be called hell.

However, there are actually a great variety of hells in this world.

The city of fog, London, the Whitechapel district—to certain people, that place was definitely hell. Just living was difficult, and it was impossible to have a life you could take pride in.

How could there be pride in a world where nine-year-old girls sold their bodies on the street? The stench of the tanning factories and meat processing plants always filled the air, and rats and cockroaches rejoiced in this society. There was no such thing as the ‘strong’ there; everyone who lived there were miserable weaklings, pitiful victims and cruel assailants.

Yes, it was hell.

Hell, this is truly hell. Children, there are children, so many children.

Their eyes are dead. They understand that there is no love in this world. No, that’s wrong, there is love. There definitely is. And yet, I can’t call out to them. I want to help, I want to save you all, and yet my body won’t move.

All the children turned their eyes towards her.

I’ll save you! I’ll save you! I was abandoned just like you all in the past. I was saved from that fate! The joy of that, the happiness of that, I’ll bestow it to you all—

She had lost the ability to speak, but even so, Archer of Red tried to appeal to them in her heart. The children merely approached her silently. There was no joy, sorrow or hatred in them. Their cold and inhuman eyes were similar to those of sharks.

Archer of Red unconsciously tried to step back in chilling revulsion, but one of the children grabbed her arm.

The children opened all their mouths at once.

“Join us.”

Smoothly, the child entered inside her skin. Another one grabbed her legs—and penetrated her blood vessels. Others penetrated her nerves, bones, organs, muscles, brain…

Archer of Red screamed.

Her heart was tormented not by fear, but by the despair of the children and herself—

***

Sieg and Ruler, who had been chasing after Archer of Black, were also engulfed in it.

A black fog-like something had surged toward them while they were running through the streets, and engulfed them without giving them
any time to run away. A mud-like substance coiled around their entire bodies, and all their senses were cut off, like when you’re about to fall asleep.

When he regained his senses, Sieg was standing in a strange place.

“This is…”

He was in an extremely cold city covered in fog. A heavy and awful stench pervaded the area. The stench of meat, the stench of entrails, the stench of vomit and human excrement…

This isn’t Trifas, Sieg judged based on his surroundings. The building architecture was completely different, and there were people on the streets. Though the fog smelled slightly disgusting, it wasn’t painful. He noticed that all of senses were dull and muted for some reason, and that everyone passing by him on the street was ignoring him.

He began walking. He limped, unable to feel his feet stepping on the ground, as if he were stepping on a plastic bag.

This is an illusion, or a nightmare—Sieg thus concluded.

The problem was, whose dream was this? It wasn’t Sieg’s; this scenery was completely unknown to him. It wasn’t Ruler’s either. He already knew her true name. No matter how he thought about it, this place didn’t match the era she was from.

A cold wind blew by, seeming to permeate his very flesh and bones, and a crumpled newspaper floated down in front of Sieg’s feet.

He read the text on it—and understood everything.

From Hell—Jack the Ripper

This appears to be Jack the Ripper’s… that is, Assassin of Black’s dream. But where is Assassin herself? She… no, he? Which was it? Strange, there’s no way I could have forgotten that…

“Damn it. All the information about Assassin disappeared again.”

The way Assassin was able to slip away no matter how much they chased after her was truly superb. But this time, this time Sieg wouldn’t let her get away.

Sieg began walking in search of Jack the Ripper—but then his vision suddenly distorted, and an instant later, he found himself in a different place once more.

—Sieg couldn’t deny that, up until that moment, he had held certain illusions about humans.

—He had only gained self-consciousness a few days ago and, even if he had knowledge, he had no experience, so it was hard to say that he had understood how deep the evil deeds of humans went.

—Most of all, the fact that he was blessed with the people surrounding him being Heroic Spirits, those who were heroes in the past, had the biggest effect on his view of things.

—The world is beautiful. How many sacrifices had people made in order to speak those words? Sieg still hadn’t comprehended that.

Laugh, laugh, laugh.

This place is the lowest plane of the world. This is none other than Cocytus, the very bottom of hell. Of course, I don’t know if there’s actually a hell. I know nothing of such things.

Visitors here come to understand just one thing. ‘This place is definitely hell.’ London, Whitechapel, a great human meat processing plant. It’s a nest of Jorougumo where escape if impossible if you fall down into it.

This place is packed with everything within Pandora’s Box, except for hope.

All kinds of disasters, all kinds of despair, continually flux, converge and rain down like dirty mud here.

Prostitutes who are like monstrous creatures both without and within sell their bodies, and shelve the money they earn by selling the life they were born with.

Splat, splat.

Repeat, repeat.

Splat, splat.

Treatment, treatment, treatment, treatment.

Blood flowed in a river. The factories are discharging waste anyways, so it’s no big deal if we increase the protein.

It’s truly no big deal. No problem at all. If you consider the size of the world’s great flow, this is just a little smidge of dirty mud.

Hands protrude from that dirty mud, and monsters are born.

That’s why this place is hell, purgatory, the corrupt city of Babylon where inhuman monsters live.

Sieg watched.

He watched a very young girl be violated by a large hairy man in order to get her daily food. He watched a young boy knock down the girl with a stick in order to steal her food. He watched the boy have the bread he risked his life to get stolen in turn by a cunning adult, and watched that bread finally arrive meaninglessly in the hands of someone else.

He saw an unborn fetus. He watched the people who had brought it into the world in an unchaste act of intercourse then dispose of it.

Children weren’t killed in this hell. Children were expended.

Thus, light gradually disappeared from the eyes of children. The world, like silk cloth, twined around their bodies, and they were swallowed by snakes without moving an inch.

It was ugly.

It was far too ugly.

If there was some great evil, he could understand. If there was some enormous, wicked villain—someone like that who ruled them, then Sieg would still have been able to hold onto his illusions about humans. But,  this was a system. A bad debt that was created when humans built and developed a city. Or perhaps it was just pus.

No one was blamed and denounced. No one was saved. No, saving anyone here was impossible. The act of salvation itself wasn’t acknowledged by the system.

“Stop it.”

Sieg trembled and kneeled down on the ground. He had been on the verge of death many times up until now, but those times were all cases of bodily death. But the sight of this was killing Sieg’s heart.

“Stop it… Please, I’m begging you, stop it!”

His illusions were contaminated and the scene that should have been beautiful grew faded and dull.

“—Yes. That’s right.”

When he came to his sense, his surroundings had changed once more.

There was thick fog in the air, blocking out all moonlight… It was a truly chilly night. Whose voice was that just now?—Sieg wondered as he looked around, and finally noticed.

Sieg was standing alone on a deserted street somewhere.

“…What’s right?”

Sieg resolutely questioned the voice. He saw a shadow move in an alleyway. He chased after it without hesitation.

At the dead-end of the back alley, there stood a girl in tattered clothing.

For some reason, he knew who she was—she was Jack the Ripper.

“I’ll ask you again. What’s right?”

The girl replied in a strangely distorted voice.

“The world is ugly.”

Hearing a rustling sound behind him, Sieg turned around—and there too stood a girl in tattered clothing. That girl opened her mouth.

“That’s why we wanted to go back.”

“…Go back where?”

Another rustle. This time, it came from above—and walking casually on a building’s wall was another girl in tattered clothing.

“Back inside mother’s belly.”

Another one appeared. Every one of them looked at Sieg with hollow
eyes.

“We wanted to go back.”

“We wanted to go back.”

“We just wanted to go back inside mother’s belly.”

“So why? Why is everyone so mean to us?”

“We wanted to be saved. So why did no one save us?”

“Were we bad?”

“Were we hated?”

Sieg couldn’t give an adequate answer to those questions. The premise of ‘wanting to live’ did not exist for these girls.

The girls grabbed Sieg’s arms. The girls melted while smiling with tears falling from their eyes and permeated inside of Sieg.

“The world—is so very ugly. We know that. Despite that, do you still want to live?”

Those words… dealt the most fatal wound of all to the heart of the boy who did not yet know the world.

***

Ruler had also been sucked into the girls’—Jack’s nightmare. Ruler walked down a road filled with the stench of rotting bodies.

“This place is… England?”

In Trifas, though the architectural style had been that of the Middle Ages, the town itself had a properly maintained sanitation system. But this place was the opposite. The buildings here were modern in style, the kind that Laeticia was familiar with in her memories. But the streets were filled with strife and unsanitary conditions.

This was the city where Jack the Ripper was born. A freezing fog and  a pitch black night. In the midst of that, Ruler walked down the street. Before she realized it, her armor had disappeared, and her holy flag was gone from her hand as well. However, she didn’t feel helpless at all.

She continued walking straight ahead in a dignified manner.

She had a rough idea as to the nature of this illusion. She also understood how to escape from it—no, how to bring it down.

…It meant doing something sorrowful. Even if the end result would be a blessing, someone would have to bear pain in order to achieve it. A person, no, a child, who was the pure manifestation of innocence.

“—Even so. Nothing will start unless she is killed.”

After she took a single breath, Ruler’s eyes were filled with strong determination. Her resolve was as sharp as a blade and as hard as steel.

There was a young girl in one of the back alleys. She glared at the holy maiden Jeanne d’Arc with eyes filled with despair. The girl’s killing intent was that of the weak—but Ruler glared back at the girl without flinching. She released her own killing intent, which a hero would normally never direct at a despairing, victimized child.

The little girl was so shocked she retreated back a step. Ruler questioned her with a cold-hearted voice.

“What’s wrong, Assassin of Black…? No, the girl who used to be Assassin of Black. The girl who held the name of Jack the Ripper, who wasn’t really anyone. Do you intend to run away?”

“…Why aren’t you scared?”

“Scared? Why is there a need to think of you as frightening? All of you are merely sorrowful victims.”

At those words, countless children appeared all around Ruler one after another. Their faces were each unique and yet they somehow had a sense of sameness. Every one of them was dirty and had eyes filled with a dark light.

This place was unmistakably the hell of this era. These children were the embodiment of it in human form.

No matter how heartless someone was, they would falter, feel fear and shudder if they were pushed down here. This place was the inner
world that embodied of Jack the Ripper’s Origin. A miniature garden of darkness that took form as Assassin was dying, filled with human
ugliness.

“Great Holy Maiden.”

“Lady Angel.”

“Save us, save the pitiful, so pitiful Jack. Save us. Save us, help us, gives us your hand. Please, please, please—”

The children crowded around Ruler and clung to her with desperate expressions on their faces.

If she’s a saint, then she can save them. If she’s a saint, then she’ll definitely grant them salvation. No, even without being a saint, as long as she was a decent human being, this was a situation where she should feel something for them.

And yet, Ruler did not quiver as she stood at the center of them—in fact, there was not the slightest tremble, sympathy or even pity on her face.

The holy maiden spoke harshly to them.

“—I cannot do that. I can save children who’ve lost their way and I can purify souls that have lingering regrets by praying. However, Jack the Ripper alone cannot be saved by me.”

The children froze.

“You have all already been included as part of ‘his’ legend. The murderer known as Jack the Ripper is already both anybody and nobody. Do you all truly understand that the people you killed were victims of Jack the Ripper? You know neither their names nor their faces. You only sought your mother’s face and killed them in the process, right?”

Jack the Ripper killed at least five prostitutes—

Jack the Ripper gouged out their organs—

Jack the Ripper sent a letter to a newspaper company—

Jack the Ripper is a doctor.

Jack the Ripper is a member of the Royal Family.

Jack the Ripper is a painter.

Jack the Ripper is an ordinary person that can be found anywhere.

All of these were lies, and all of these were true. Now that all kinds of rumors, gossip and guesses had become jumbled together, trying to grasp her identity outside of being Jack the Ripper was an unimaginably difficult act.

She was anybody and nobody. She was nobody and anybody.

The problem was—that the number of possibilities was close to infinite.

Because of that, the Anti-Heroic Spirit Jack the Ripper included all the possibilities in this world.

Most likely, the Holy Grail had tried to call forth a ‘Jack the Ripper’ that embodied all of these possibilities.

“That’s right. You all have all been made part of Jack the Ripper. You might have been forced to become part of him… But that’s why, even if I can kill you, I can’t save you.”

“—No way…”

“No—”

“We, we—”

Unrest ran through the children. Though they sought salvation, they contaminated everyone they came across. They truly were evil spirits. Though it was only vaguely, they understood their own end.

This holy maiden’s prayers weren’t salvation for them—

“…It seems you finally understand. I’ll commence destroying you all now.”

Her prayers were a Baptism Rite for completely annihilating their existence.

“The Lord’s blessing is deep, His love is eternal and constant.”

“Why… Why are you…!?”

“This is natural providence… You should already understand. You have all been transformed by your inflated hatred and the despair of the people you killed. Not one of you can be separated from the concept of ‘Jack the Ripper’ anymore.”

“You dwell in the deserted wasteland, not knowing the path to your proper place.”

They were all molded together as one into ‘Jack the Ripper’.

Not a single one of them even had a name of their own. They were not recognized as individuals by the world.

“Hunger, thirst, the soul withers.”

“No! No, we, we are—!”

“Then do you all have individual names?”

The children’s breathing halted. That was a forbidden question. These children, who had been thrown away while still a fetus, had no names. Even if humans had names, mere cells did not.

“Speak His name and be saved. Speak the name of the One who will guide you to your proper place.”

“In that case—”

Ruler slowly held out her right hand. At that moment, a shout rang out from somewhere.

“Stop… stop, Ruler…!!”

“Archer of Red…!?”

Ruler was shocked as she saw Archer of Red glaring at her with an arrow nocked on her bow. Her right arm was tainted black and it was clear that she was being possessed by an evil spirit.

“What are you doing, Archer!? Your right arm—”

Archer interrupted Ruler’s words by shooting the arrow.

“Shut up! Right back at you, what are you trying to do!? They’re children! They’re merely children, innocent souls. They aren’t evil! They’re victims, pitiful souls that were crushed by the system of the world! Why are you killing them!?”

The evil spirits reacted to Archer of Red’s words and gathered behind her all at once. They probably sensed a strong will to protect them from her.

Ruler had no weapons. In the first place, this was an illusionary world. Nothing would be settled no matter how much they tried to kill each other here, and the arrow Archer had fired had no effect either.

…That bow and arrow were Archer’s will. A pure and simple will of retribution that declared she would kill Ruler if she killed these children. Does she feel sympathy for them? thought Ruler as she glared at Archer— and was glared at in return.

“Archer, you should also understand as a Heroic Spirit. Those children cannot be saved. For them to live only results in increasing the number of their own kind. In the first place—returning their souls to a peaceful place is an act of kindness.”

Without any hesitation, Archer of Red fired another arrow. The steel arrowhead pierced the ground’s stone paving. Archer was sorrowfully earnest, and yet fatally mistaken.

“What kindness!? Saving others is the duty of a saint! Maid of Orleans, for what purpose did you wield a flag instead of a sword on the battlefield!? It was in order to not kill, wasn’t it!? In order to not bloody your hands—”

“—Is that what you think, Archer of Red?”

Ruler spoke in a cold voice. It was a blade-like voice that was so sharp it even overwhelmed, for just an instant, the huntress who had run through battlefields.

“Since I didn’t use a sword, my hands weren’t bloodied? Ridiculous. —I participated in those battles. I decided to fight. From that instant, it was the same as if my own hands were stained in blood. Don’t take me so lightly. I will not hesitate to destroy those children!”

Those words angered Archer of Red from the depths of her heart, and she shouted as if snarling at Ruler.

“Then, then. You aren’t a saint…!”

“That’s exactly right, Archer of Red. Everyone called me a saint, but I myself have never once thought of myself that way.”

Archer of Red’s expression turned shocked. If she was a saint, it was possible she could save these children. Archer might have thought that.

“This place is the world of these children’s memories, merely an illusion created by their residual thoughts. Do you intend to continue
letting them suffer eternally in this vague and ambiguous world!? Please, move aside.”

Though visibly in anguish, Archer of Red firmly remained where she stood.

“… guh… I… refuse! If I, if I abandon these children, then who will love them!? You said you would return their souls to a peaceful place,  Ruler. That’s merely extinguishing them, merely murder! I—”

Both Archer and Ruler’s words halted. One of the girls hiding behind Archer’s back stepped up to Ruler. What a vast and lost expression—like a puppy thrown out into the wild, Ruler thought.

“Hey.”

In response to that voice of appeal, Ruler bended down to her knees and met the child’s gaze. Regardless of the reasons, what Ruler was about to do was unmistakably a ‘sin’. At the very least, she mustn’t avert her eyes from it.

“Yes, what is it?”

“Are you… okay with killing us?”

Those words pierced Ruler’s heart like a sword. She clenched her teeth—and endured it.

If they could be saved, she would have already saved them. If they could be helped, she would have already helped them. But she couldn’t.

Ruler understood that it was something she was unable to do.

“Even so. Even so, we must all move forward.”

Ruler bit her lip hard, causing blood to flow out. The instant they saw that, the agitation and fear of ‘Jack the Ripper’ disappeared.

“No… no, stop… please stop…!”

The children hiding behind Archer of Red walked up to Ruler one by one. Archer of Red tried to pull them back—and as if rejecting that, the children slipped through her arms.

“—It can’t be helped, huh?”

“Yes. It can’t be helped. May you all find peace.”

Like cats that realized their end, the children took Ruler’s hand without running away. Archer of Red understood then. It couldn’t be helped.

The death of these children was inevitable, a fact that couldn’t be overturned.

Most of all, these children had rejected her—so she couldn’t move. She could only watch as a spectator in this illusionary world.

“He satiates the thirsty souls and satisfies the hungry souls with good.”

The chant solemnly and smoothly began extinguishing the children’s existence. This wasn’t the normal second death of a Servant, but a literal erasure. They were being removed from the axis of the cycle of rebirth, and they would no longer be summoned as ‘Jack the Ripper’ in any other Holy Grail War.

It was both salvation and not salvation. Becoming a Servant meant gaining a second life, but to them, this was effectively their first life. Holding hands with each other, the children stared at Ruler.

“Give salvation to those who suffer and are bound in iron within the deep darkness.”

They were disappearing. They weren’t ascending to heaven, nor sinking into the darkness; they were merely dissolving into the world like mist.

“Ah—”

As she chanted, Ruler didn’t let her grave and solemn expression break at all. If she cried, the children would know that she was saddened by their death, and they would probably leave behind lingering regrets in this world. That’s why Ruler remained standing there firmly like steel. “Now, let your shackles be broken, and be freed from the deep darkness.”

“We don’t want to die—”

She nearly crumbled at the children’s whisper—but she didn’t allow her posture to break. Without the slightest tremble, she simply continued ‘disposing’ of the children dispassionately.

“Grant salvation to those who have fallen ill from acts stained in sin and who are troubled by injustice.”

The children began disappearing one after another, and at the same time, the nightmarish London also began disappearing.

This place was reconstructed from their memories, so if they disappeared, this city’s existence would inevitably be rejected. And then, everything was in darkness. There was only one young girl left. She stared at the holy maiden with pure eyes.

“We’re going to disappear?”

“Yes. That is natural providence.”

“Is that so? Yeah, that’s right. We can’t return anywhere or be anywhere. We spun in circles, ran in circles, and weren’t able to reach anywhere.”

After murmuring that, the girl laughed and then asked a final question.

“—Are you sad?”

“…No. You all are merely returning to your proper place. There’s nothing to be sad about.”

The holy maiden replied in a hard voice.

“So, I won’t cry.”

The holy maiden didn’t cry. She covered her heart with a thick shell, and calmly crushed the children underfoot. She had no right to feel sad. As someone who wasn’t judging their sins, but simply couldn’t allow their existence—she had no right to mourn.

“A song of joy for the just, and silence for the unjust.”

She recited the holy words.

The little girl, without smiling or looking sad, accepted it with empty eyes.

“——Pax Exeuntibus: Grant peace to these departing souls.”

“…How sad.”

Leaving behind those words which pitied the holy maiden, the final girl vanished—and the fog cleared away. Ruler’s knees didn’t bend or
collapse. She didn’t cry, and she didn’t let out a single sob. She did not show any pity or compassion for the children who weren’t even allowed to live.

Sympathy simply called forth victims. If she lost herself in it, everything would be wasted.

She had killed with her own hands the victimized children who sobbed out ‘We just want to go back’. It was no one’s fault and no one could be blamed; it was simply an act of murder carved in sin.

Blood flowed out from her tightly clenched lips.

Ruler had personally tasted the heavy karma of humans just now.

Even so.

Even so, she didn’t let her heart be crushed.

- Vol 4 Chapter 1