Shinji Matou at Your Service

The so-called new hope doesn't just refer to Shinji and Arcueid teaming up to kill Zepia, thereby completely severing the influence of the Idea Blood: Hemonomic Principle.

Vampires turn others into their thralls by injecting their blood into them after sucking their blood. The blood injected by the vampire into the victim is the Idea Blood: Hemonomic Principle. A vampire's power is closely related to their blood, and the quality of the blood directly affects the strength and transformation speed of the new vampire.

With Zepia's death, the vampire blood within Sion would lose its power and vitality. Although this wouldn't completely stop her transformation into a vampire, it would buy her more time. This was the first point.

The second point, and the source of Shinji's confidence that Sion wouldn't refuse him, was the presence of the last True Ancestor, Arcueid.

How did the Dead Apostles originally come into existence? True Ancestors, when they sucked blood, created degraded versions of themselves, the first Dead Apostles. Subsequently, Dead Apostles began to turn others, and Magus studied and replicated this process. The origin of Dead Apostles lies with the True Ancestors, specifically their blood. Obtaining the blood of a True Ancestor might cure her vampirism.

However, for the past eight hundred years, True Ancestors either died or entered eternal slumber. The only active vampire princess had accumulated just one year of activity over those eight hundred years. Sion had no hope of finding her. No one knew how happy Sion was when she witnessed Arcueid's descent.

There were also concerns. The power of a True Ancestor surpassed that of the Night of Wallachia. Could she gain the cooperation of such a being? Fortunately, the guardian knight of the True Ancestor, a magician named Shinji Matou who seemed very close to her, wanted to talk. If she could seize this opportunity—

"Since Mr. Matou knows my situation, you should know what I want. Since you're willing to talk to me in this manner, I must have something you want as well."

"Miss Sion is so frank, I should also show my sincerity."

As Shinji spoke, he reached out and pinched Arcueid's nose.

"Wake up, wake up."

"Mmm... so sleepy... the sun hasn't set yet, let me sleep for ten more..." Arcueid mumbled like she was talking in her sleep. For the Earth's beloved daughter, not breathing was no issue.

"Ten minutes?"

"Ten hours..."

"I'll just take ten minutes of your time, wake up!"

"Not even... one minute..."

"Then your dinner and midnight snack are gone."

Helpless, Shinji had to use his trump card.

"How could you..."

Arcueid occupying Touko's bed finally opened one eye, halfway.

"Alright, alright, Shinji is so annoying. Just ten minutes."

"Ten minutes plus an extra meal tonight."

"Deal."

"Can you see what's happening to her?"

Shinji pointed to Sion.

"Yes, bitten by Zepia, transforming into a Dead Apostle."

Although she only glanced briefly, Arcueid sharply grasped Sion's state.

"Can you turn her back into a human?"

"Impossible. A human who becomes a vampire can't revert to being human, just like time can't be reversed—"

"That's not necessarily true."

Touko suddenly interrupted, instantly attracting the attention of two, no, one and a half vampires.

"Oh?"

"What do you mean?"

"Reversing the time of the entire world is impossible, but reversing or accelerating an individual's time isn't—I've personally seen such an example."

"You've seen it yourself?"

Hearing Touko's words, Shinji was initially stunned, then quickly nodded as if recalling something.

"Ah, that's right, it is possible. Time reversal is akin to a miracle, and miracles do exist in this world."

"Miracle, you mean—"

Sion's mind raced, and she quickly concluded.

"—Magic?"

"Yes, magic."

"The Second Magic?"

When it comes to interfering with time, the first thing that comes to mind is the Second Magic, Parallel World Interference. It sounds like a manipulation of space, but Sion knows that time and space are inherently one.

"No, it's the Fifth Magic."

Touko shook her head, the transparent surface of her glasses reflecting a layer of hazy light.

That was the most painful failure of her life. From a young age, she was cultivated as a potential Magician. Before she turned eighteen, her goal was to inherit the Fifth Magic from her grandfather. However, on her eighteenth birthday, her grandfather suddenly changed the heir to Aoko Aozaki, who had been living an ordinary life.

This act was a denial of all the efforts and life that Touko had put in since she was four years old. Unable to accept such a reality, she experienced a split in personality and broke off from her family, traveling alone to study at the Clock Tower. During her studies abroad, she researched puppets, runes, magical engravings, and phantasmal species, using any means necessary to gain power, all to return to her hometown of Misaki City and duel with her sister who had inherited the Fifth Magic.

In the late 1980s, Touko finally completed all her preparations and returned to Japan with numerous trump cards, causing a commotion. At the beginning of the turmoil, Touko, with her thorough preparations, fought against Aoko and her old friend, the witch Kuonji Alice, who had the heritage of fairy tale mystery, and a mysterious boy named Soujuurou Shizuki, who accidentally got involved. Touko held the upper hand.

Unfortunately, the good times didn't last. First, Soujuurou Shizuki suddenly erupted, defeating Touko's greatest trump card, the highest-ranked phantasmal species, Lugh Beowulf. Then, Aoko, determined by Soujuurou Shizuki's death, activated the Fifth Magic to interfere with time, throwing Soujuurou Shizuki's death into the distant future and gaining ten years' worth of experience, ultimately defeating Touko and cursing her never to step into Misaki City.

Although the essence of the Fifth Magic has no definitive explanation to this day, it is possible to interfere with time to achieve the future or change the past.

This experience was processed into a game called "Mahoyo: Witch on the Holy Night", and Shinji thus knew Touko's backstory. Additionally, he combined the fact that both Aoko and the final boss of "Fate/Grand Order" Part 1, Goetia, had the ultimate move Ars Almadel Salomonis, deducing that the Fifth Magic might be related to the Quantum Time-Lock, the foundation of human order.

If this deduction is correct, the Fifth Magic indeed has the potential to rewrite the past and overturn the future. Shinji never imagined that Touko would voluntarily bring up the matter of the Fifth Magic."He invited her to the conversation without any connection to the Fifth Magic, simply wanting to rely on her puppet-making skills as a bargaining chip to assist Sion.

"Touko, this is—"

"Nothing, the past always needs to be faced, and seeing Miss Sion, I somehow thought of my past self."

The same persistence, the same tenacity, especially those eyes that held doubts but stubbornly forged ahead.

Such a state is very dangerous, one wrong step and she could go astray. She doesn't want Sion to walk down the wrong path.