All The Statesmen: Section 5 & Epilogue Summary
Section 5: Civilization
I was always chopping down trees.
I chopped, and chopped, and chopped, I sawed them into lumber, and shipped them out.
The wood built homes, built roads, created villages. The villages became towns, and the towns became cities.
I kept repeating this, over and over. A hundred oil fields, a thousand mines. Progress! Progress! Progress! Progress!
And always, the people shouted. Because of you, everything was destroyed!
If you were gone, the world would have been more beautiful for it!
Why did this happen? I just wanted everyone to smile.
Babies who died before being born, the elderly trembling in the cold. Farmers suffering from starvation, workers crying from loneliness.
I wanted to save everyone, I wanted to help everyone. That is why I swung my axe, and broadened the world.
Why do I always become unneeded? Why am I always parsley, I wonder.
Ah, I understand.
The nature that I should have destroyed is my own self. Because I have a heart, I will hurt others.
Become as a machine. Become as steel. Become a system that grants everyone’s wishes.
That, must be what everyone wishes for---!
Guda:
That’s--- wrong---!
Together with everyone, you’ve managed to reach Bunyan in the forest.
Bunyan:
Eh---!? Why, are you all---!?
Guda:
We like Paul Bunyan.
Bunyan:
But--- you heard it, right? I’ll destroy everything that I love.
My hands are too big, my ambitions too broad. I’ll keep hurting people if this continues.
Guda:
That doesn’t matter!
Even if you destroy all that you see before you...
Jack:
We are all right here. No matter what we were born from, we are here.
Mashu:
Me too, a Demi Servant created from the fusion of human and Servant.
Nursery Rhyme:
Me too, a nameless story that was given a name.
Jack:
Me too, born from children who could not be born.
Geronimo:
---Even a hero drenched in vengeance and blood, who lived out the latter half of his life in shame and regret.
Guda:
Everyone is right here.
Bunyan:
Master, I----
Want to, come back---!
I want to eat Hamburg steak---! I’ll eat up the parsley too---! So---!
Guda:
If the Holy Grail binds you, then I will drag you out!
Mashu:
Yes! Mashu Kyrielight will let out a cry of battle! In order to pull our friend out from the Holy Grail’s udon dough!
But though you fight desperately, it’s to no avail. You can’t stop Bunyan from getting larger. To make things worse, you and your Servants are beginning to fade. As Bunyan and the world grows larger, she becomes less and less able to perceive you, just like you would not be able to perceive the bacteria living on the surface of your skin. And in this world, if you are not perceived, you are nothing.
???:
...Though I had intended to just observe from the side. But if she is lamenting her own size, I cannot remain silent.
---I will lend you a hand, Master of Chaldea.
Guda:
What is your role this time!?
Altera:
I am Altera. Nothing more, and nothing less, though I am not the Altera that you know either.
...However, your voice has reached me. The voices of everyone seeking to save that girl.
Hunting that girl down is bad civilization. It cannot be good civilization.
Even if the world is a cruel system where one person is sacrificed so that 10 billion may live.
Even if continued progress is an attack on the old world, even if there are more dangerous choices lying ahead in your future.
Even so, if you continue to struggle and resist, that should be good civilization!
Please take my hand, Master of Chaldea! Form a contract, and with your magical energy for just a moment---!
Guda:
Got it! Mashu, back me up!
Mashu:
Yes! My Noble Phantasm can just barely manage to maintain Senpai’s perception!
Altera:
Connection acknowledged. Mars Effect, overuse.
---Replicate, Crest of the Umbral Star. You are not the only huge titan.
It is time to awaken, dream of the pioneers! Teardrop Photon Ray!
A torrent of light turns everything white. Amidst it all, you see the Holy Grail…
Epilogue: Master Returned to the Cafeteria
Mashu and Fou wake you up urgently, saying that something big has happened.
Guda:
What could it be? Isn’t it the usual pattern?
Mashu:
If you talk like that then it’s all over!
The repetitions of daily life are akin to enactment of a foolish play, and one must advance within this spiral, that’s what Andersen-san said!
Anyway, just come down to the cafeteria!
There, Emiya is waging his own war.
Emiya:
To think that the end would come in such a form! Sous chef! How is the stockpile of our ingredients!?
Tamamo Cat:
We’re in a terrible situation where there’s not even powdered cheese to be hoped for, you know? The emergency rations are exhausted, and my cat cans are in peril!
But we have secretly stored some seeds away. Because these seed rice are the future there is no choice but to cook them!
Emiya:
---It is unavoidable. Prepare the seed rice with quick cooking.
Tamamo Cat:
Seriously!? There’s a limit to how hard-boiled you can get! But to bring out something unpleasant like that is also part of Cat’s character.
I’ll make some delicious cooked rice somehow! Specifically, I’ll add in corn and saffron and see how it goes.
Bunyan:
Corn! I can make lots of that! Leave it to me!
Oh… but, it’s mostly inedible corn that’s used for oil…
You witness the entire scene, unable to believe that Bunyan is here. It looks like she managed to come along with you when you leyshifted back. Unfortunately, the Grail that created Bunyan was damaged and can’t be used as one anymore. In exchange, it seems that Bunyan’s Saint Graph was registered as a Servant.
Guda:
As for the Holy Grail, well, we have more of it anyway.
Mashu:
Yes. It’s too bad about the Holy Grail, but the singularity was destroyed and Chaldea now has yet another new ally.
This could be the closest we can get to a good result. So Emiya-san is busy with cooking because of that.
It’s the commemoration day of a new Heroic Spirit joining our ranks.
Meanwhile, Bunyan is asking for seconds. Hamburg steak, in particular. Emiya is preparing it for her, though he’s already used up the entire food budget for the staff for today.
Emiya:
This is--- the premonition of a birth of a new hungry character! I can’t let my guard down around her!
Bunyan:
Ah! Master, hey---!
Yay, let’s have breakfast together!
Jack:
Let’s eat, let’s eat!
Nursery Rhyme:
Ufufu. It’s more delicious when you have a meal together.
Edison:
Hm. Inspiration starts from breakfast. One in each home, the Edison-brand Toaster!
Geronimo:
By sharing our meals together, we can become as brothers. In truth, I need nothing else.
Tamamo Cat:
Umu! The Hamburg steak set meal is served! Don’t ask about the ingredients! It’s probably healthy for you, woof!
Guda:
Let’s tuck in!
Andersen:
---Thus.
The customary comedy came to a common end.
That world continues to live on inside Bunyan.
Whilst still embracing loneliness, from now on, Bunyan will “live” in this Chaldea.
Though that way of existence is different from we, the record tapes of the dead, she is not truly a living person either.
Having one such incomprehensible girl that is an irregularity in Chaldea is fine too.
Urban legends, Demi Servants, phantoms and AIs too, all share the same “possibility” here.
As long as it can maintain the stability of the Human Order, all “ifs” are permissible and usable. That is Chaldea.
It is the most confusing “bulwark” of the world, where the Master named Guda resides.
Where this story will continue from now on--- is it not a most interesting subject?
Bunyan:
Thank you, Master…! Even though I’m a Heroic Spirit like parsley, please eat me up without leaving anything behind...!
-END-
Posted Aug 7, 2017, 3:30 PM UTC · edited