CK Simulation, Creating the Style of Tsukino Fumi

Page 109

Even though Quinn never intended to back out, he couldn't help but regret his actions at this moment.

When I was so focused on making progress, why didn't I ever think about encountering this situation one day? Sigh, people really do have to pay the price for their past selves.

Quinn, who felt he could now understand the feelings of the Red Archer, could only nod again. In order to avoid the El-Melloi family's pressure to get married, he had taken on almost all the communication between Chaldea and the Mage's Association, just to delay this moment. But now he couldn't escape it anymore and had to accept reality.

“Don’t worry, you know about my family matters. They need some time to be dealt with. I won’t forget about Reines,” Quinn reassured Kenneth. “Besides, the Europa mansion… is indeed a bit too small.”

Upon hearing this, Kenneth's eyes began to twitch uncontrollably.

He knew how big the Europa mansion was; if you included the servants' bedrooms, the old house could easily house ten or so people. But unfortunately, Quinn brought back far more than that.

King Arthur and his sisters, the fairies, the Knights of the Round Table, Guinevere, plus Quinn's four students, and the True Ancestor Princess who basically treats Europa Mansion as her own castle, Europa Mansion is already full. If it weren't for certain individuals sharing a room with Quinn, the old mansion probably wouldn't be able to accommodate everyone. Where are you, Lin Yongmei Yong? Are you free, Lin Zaizai...?

From every perspective, this was an excuse that no one could find fault with, but Kenneth was no ordinary person; he had already anticipated this step.

“This is no problem. Reines is still my sister, and as her brother, I should give her a gift and offer my blessings as she gets married. I have already purchased a 17th-century castle near your current residence, which can be used as the residence for the Knights of the Round Table.” Kenneth sneered, blocking Quinn’s last escape route.

With things having come to this point, Quinn had no choice but to nod in agreement, saying that everything would be taken care of within the week.

Having received a positive reply, Kenneth was satisfied and chatted with Quinn as they left the Clock Tower, a place of trouble. When the two parted again, Quinn had already been taken to the gates of the Europa mansion by the El-Melloi family's driver.

Looking at the old house before him, Quinn took a deep breath. To avoid worldly troubles, he had passed by his home three times without entering, but now…

Quinn pushed open the door and stepped inside. Before he could even speak, he felt several cold gazes.

Morgan, Artoria, Guinevere, and others were sitting together on the sofa in the living room, and among them, Reines sat obediently like a lifeless doll.

Chapter 257 Spiritual Fusion

Quinn's entrance finally snapped Reines out of her reverie.

Reines looked at Quinn as if she had seen a savior, blinking frantically at him, trying to summon him to her rescue. If Quinn was merely being stared at, then Reines was being scrutinized, especially by Morgan, whose gaze was full of doubt, as if he were very suspicious of how Quinn could have taken a liking to a girl like her who had neither a good figure nor any elegance.

Although Reines tried many times to explain that her relationship with Quinn was simply an exchange of interests, she couldn't bring herself to speak when faced with the death stares of these women.

Therefore, she could only hope that Quinn could rescue her.

However, Quinn completely ignored the gaze that Reines cast at him. He looked at Morgan and the others who were staring at him, and walked into the living room as if nothing had happened. He put his coat on the hanger and then shamelessly sat down between Artoria and Guinevere.

"It seems you two get along very well?"

Quinn's words chilled Reines to the bone. She had never seen anyone like him before, and she immediately felt that she was about to die there. After all, as a woman herself, if Reines were in this situation, she would be lucky if she didn't tear Quinn to pieces.

However, the attitude of Morgan and others left Reines confused.

“Not bad, this little girl is quite sensible,” Morgan said, reaching out to pat Reines’ head as she sat beside her. “At least she can tell the difference between big and small, and knows who the master of this house is.”

Reines's lips twitched slightly. She wanted to refute Morgan's last words. Although she and Quinn didn't have much affection for each other and were at most just close friends, the marriage between the El-Melloi and Europa families was a real deal. After she married Quinn, she would legally be the mistress of the Europa family. However, she wanted to refute him, but she didn't have the courage to say it.

Even though Quinn never told her what his relationship with Morgan and the others was, as a normal woman, Reines could see the way these women looked at Quinn. They regarded him as family and had no attempt to hide their desire to possess him, especially after they learned of her engagement to Quinn and began to show her hostility.

These women were clearly having affairs with their fiancés, considering the historical reputations of some of them…

Reines felt that if she dared to show any inclination towards being the mistress of the house, she might commit suicide the next day because of the thirteen curses afflicting her. She was still young and didn't want to die young. "You Lin Yongzai are busy... You Lin Zaizai are not here..."

"That's good. I've already taken care of the Clock Tower matter. Now all that's left is the El-Melloi family. I estimate that I'll be marrying Reines in a few days, and then she'll be settling down here permanently."

Upon hearing this, Reines turned ashen-faced.

However, things didn't go as she expected. Morgan's eyes twitched, clearly annoyed, but she didn't vent her anger on Reines. She just glared at Quinn and said, "I didn't expect you to share the same interests as those priests. I don't care about your personal hobbies, but don't forget, we still have things to deal with."

"Don't worry, I remember everything," Quinn reassured Morgan. "I already have a solution for Mordred's matter."

Hearing this assurance, Morgan finally calmed down.

Yes, neither Morgan nor Artoria would be angry with Reines because of Quinn. They were just unhappy that Quinn had been avoiding them ever since he returned to the modern world. And beyond that, Quinn had not yet taken any action regarding the handling of Mordred and Europa II.

After all, from any perspective, Quinn should prioritize dealing with Mordred's situation, because Mordred's current situation is far too delicate.

After the Sixth Beast was banished, Europa II's body was also completely shattered along with the collapse of the Grand Magic. Morgan used runes to extract Europa II's soul as originally planned and preserved it. If everything went according to plan, Quinn should have immediately created a new body for Europa II after returning to the modern world, so that the soul could smoothly reside in it, in order to prevent Europa II's soul from being separated from his body for too long, which could cause an accident to the soul itself.

However, because Quinn was unconscious for quite some time, the time to create a new body for Europa II was also delayed. Morgan had no choice but to entrust Europa II's soul to Mordred, using Mordred's spiritual body, which was very similar to Europa II's, to ensure that Europa II's soul would not be damaged.

This is the best course of action in an emergency, because Mordred is strikingly similar to Europa II.

Normally, if Europa II's soul were implanted into another person's body, the result would be possession. The amount of information accumulated within Europa II's soul is too vast; even a tiny leak would overwhelm the possessed person's consciousness. However, Mordred is different. The two can almost be considered as one individual. Furthermore, Mordred experienced Europa II's entire life through a dream, which means she already possesses a great deal of information that only Europa II knew. Therefore, Mordred can coexist with Europa II's soul.

However, Morgan did not expect that Quinn's coma would last much longer than she anticipated.

The prolonged fusion of spirits has inevitably caused Mordred's spirit origin, which is not a living person to begin with, to begin to move closer to Europa II. Now, Mordred's spirit origin is highly similar to Europa II's. As a Servant, Mordred originally only needed her Master's magic power to function normally in the mortal world. However, now, in order to supply her greatly changed spirit origin, in addition to basic magic power, she also needs a very high concentration of True Aether to maintain the activity of her spirit origin.

In modern times, true ether is an energy that has long since disappeared. Except for a few hidden areas, true ether has almost vanished from the earth.

Fortunately, there are other people in Europa's mansion who can create true ether.

That's Arcueid.

This princess, who possesses planetary authority, is capable of producing True Aether through the manifestation of imagination. Even though True Aether has long since disappeared and Earth itself does not allow it to exist, it is not impossible for it to exist only within the basement of Europa Mansion.

However, even if an environment were created that would allow Mordred to continue to exist, it wouldn't be a good thing.

Because, with the change in Mordred's spirit origin, the difficulty of recreating a body for Europa II has also increased. Now, Quinn can no longer create a body large enough to accommodate the soul of this independent world's ruler on his own.

He needs outside help.

Chapter 258 This is what middle-aged men are like

After calming Morgan down and managing to gloss over the El-Melloi family's situation, Quinn used the excuse of checking on Mordred to slip away and went alone into his underground workshop in the Europa mansion.

A large amount of True Aether merged with the air in this underground workshop, almost perfectly replicating the air environment of the Age of Gods. The remnants of the Holy Lance from another world, along with the Dragon Bone Throne, were placed in the center of this workshop to connect the ley lines of Britain and to stabilize the environment. Mordred, meanwhile, was sitting peacefully on the throne, reducing the consumption of True Aether reserves in the environment.

Alongside her were three winged Valkyries, also in a slumber. These real Valkyries would awaken immediately should anyone intrude into the magic workshop, but for now, they were just like Mordred. (The last sentence appears to be unrelated and possibly a fragment from another text.)

"That terrified me."

After closing the workshop door, Quinn could no longer maintain his composure. He took several deep breaths to calm his wildly beating heart.

Despite his calm demeanor just now, he is actually more afraid of death than Reines. However, he has an advantage: as long as he brings up the real issue, Morgan and the others will temporarily suppress their dissatisfaction.

After calming himself down a bit, Quinn walked to the telephone in the workshop and skillfully dialed a number. After a few beeps, a slightly tired voice came from the other end of the line.

"This is Emiya."

"Emiya Kiritsugu, how is your long-awaited peaceful life?"

As soon as Quinn spoke, the tired voice on the other end of the phone paused for a moment, then perked up a few seconds later, "Thanks to you, things are going well. How's Bai doing lately?"

"She's grown a lot and will probably graduate soon. Let's cut to the chase. Have you gotten any results with the information I asked you to inquire about a while ago?"

On the other end of the phone was Emiya Kiritsugu. Due to the changes in the Fourth Shinobi World War, the magician assassin who was not corrupted by the black mud did not die young. Instead, he went into seclusion in Fuyuki with his family. However, based on the contract he had made with Queen, while living a peaceful life, Emiya Kiritsugu also had to act as Queen's eyes and ears in Japan.

“Kanbuko City.” Kiritsugu Emiya uttered a place name. “There’s news that several outstanding dolls appeared at an art exhibition there and were auctioned off for a very high price, causing a bit of a stir in the Japanese art world. I estimate that those should be the works of Aozaki Touko. Judging from the production and auction time of these dolls, Aozaki Touko is probably still in Kanbuko City.”

Grand Puppeteer, Aozaki Touko, is the outside helper Quinn mentioned. In terms of puppet-making skills, she is a puppet master who is on par with Quinn, who possesses the forging skills of the Age of Gods.

In fact, if we disregard Quinn's achievement of creating an artificial god through the power of the Greek gods, and only consider his knowledge and understanding of doll making, Aozaki Touko, who can create dolls indistinguishable from living people in this modern era where mystery has little left, is even better than Quinn. After all, even if Quinn were to do it again, he wouldn't dare to be sure that he could create a miracle like Jupiter.

Aozaki Touko is different. Her advantage is that she is very stable: stable skills, stable practical experience, and stable lack of money. She is so poor that as long as you pay her, she is the best mercenary.

"Then go to Kanbu City and find out the location of her magic workshop. I'll be coming to Fuyuki in a couple of days with your daughter, so your family can have a reunion. Oh, and I'll leave the booking of the plane tickets to you. Let's go for the flight three days from now."

After saying that, Quinn hung up the phone, giving Kiritsugu Emiya no chance to speak again.

On the other end of the phone, Kiritsugu Emiya was about to say something more, but hearing only the beeping of the receiver, he could only sigh helplessly and begin to comply with Quinn's arrangements. Because Haku Emiya was still in London, unlike other Far Eastern magicians who were out of touch with the news, he was somewhat familiar with the situation in London and had heard a lot about the Europa family.

Considering Quinn's current arrangements, Kiritsugu Emiya felt that his return to Fuyuki with his daughter was probably not for the sake of reuniting his family, but rather to find an excuse to get as far away from London as possible.

Sigh, that's just how men are. No matter how successful they are in the magic world, it's hard for them to clean up the mess at home.

His guess was quickly confirmed.

Three days later, when the plane bound for Fuyuki, Japan landed at London Airport, Quinn appeared there without the knowledge of most magicians in London. Accompanying him were not only Shiro Emiya, but also the Tohsaka sisters and a large transport box that was as tall as a person.

It wasn't until about two hours after the plane took off from London that Kenneth, under the pretext of "bringing some daily necessities for his sister," visited the Europa family and learned from Reines that Quinn had already left London with his followers and students, leaving only Morgan and others at the Europa family to familiarize themselves with modern things and customs.

Quinn didn't care how bad Kenneth's mood was after learning about this; he only knew that he was very happy right now.

Far from the El-Melloi family's pressure to get married, and far from Morgan and others' relentless exploitation day and night to vent their dissatisfaction, Quinn felt like the freest person in the world. So much so that when the plane landed, Emiya Kiritsugu, who had disguised himself as an ordinary driver to pick him up at Fuyuki Airport, almost suspected that Quinn had enjoyed some special experience on the plane as he walked off with a group of girls with a beaming smile.

But after a brief moment of surprise, the magician killer immediately became a competent pick-up man. Like a chauffeur who had been booked by Quinn, he quietly drove the car to pick up the group and then took the Tohsaka sisters back to the Tohsaka mansion. Only when Shiro Emiya and Quinn were left in the car did he speak, "Welcome to Fuyuki, Lord Europa."

It wasn't until he spoke up that Shiro Emiya, who was sitting with Quinn, realized his identity and looked at Kiritsugu Emiya, who was sitting in the driver's seat and looked like a different person, with a look of surprise on his face.

"Dad?"

"Hmm." After giving a brief reply to his adopted daughter, Kiritsugu Emiya looked at Quinn through the rearview mirror. "Aozaki Touko, the things you asked me to investigate have yielded results. Do you want me to drive straight to Garan no Dou, or stay in Fuyuki City for a couple of days to rest?"

Chapter 259 Painful Fruit

Mifuko City or Fuyuki City? Mifuko, of course! What am I doing staying in Fuyuki? Just to watch your happy family life and eat dog food?

Quinn, whose inner turmoil was naturally unspeakable, was already halfway into the predicament of a middle-aged man, whose family situation was so complicated that he needed to seek refuge. Driven by the ugly human instinct that he didn't want others to have an easy time either, he decisively chose to take over the life of Emiya Kiritsugu.

To this, Kiritsugu Emiya remained silent, only continuing to drive.

However, as soon as the car left Fuyuki, Quinn began to regret it, because he had forgotten that there were not only him and Kiritsugu Emiya in the car, but also Haku Emiya.

As we all know, racing may be full of speed and passion, but driving is a rather boring thing, especially long-distance driving. In order to relieve this boring time, drivers often become exceptionally talkative. And if the person sitting in the car is someone they know, then the talkativeness level is doubled.

In the car, where both of these factors were present, the adoptive father and daughter, Kiritsugu Emiya and Haku Emiya, quickly began to chat about Haku's daily studies in London. Their conversation ranged from major events like their adventures in Chaldea to minor details like food and drink in London, showing the typical harmonious family dynamic.

Despite the fact that Shiro Emiya spends far more time in London than in Japan, and the two of them only have time to spend together during the year-end holidays, they don't seem to have any estrangement at all.

This harmonious scene was so rare that even Quinn felt a pang of jealousy. She began to wonder if she should have helped Kiritsugu Emiya in the first place, as the Emiya family, which should have been torn apart, had become such a beautiful place. In comparison, her own Europa family...

It can only be said that young people who have not experienced the harsh realities of society may envy it, but experienced middle-aged people will only look on with awe.

Fortunately, Japan is a small place, much like Britain when it wasn't a colony. The journey from Fuyuki City to Kanbuko City wasn't that long. Before the conversation between Emiya and his daughter was about to start with the Emiya family and then move on to Emiya Haku's life in Europa's house, the welcome sign for Kanbuko City was already in the distance.

As they approached their destination, Kiritsugu Emiya regained his professional demeanor, entered a serious work state, and became taciturn, ceasing all idle chatter. And as soon as he shut up, Haku Emiya, sitting in the passenger seat, also stopped talking.

It wasn't because she had the same professionalism as Kiritsugu Emiya, but because after Kiritsugu Emiya shut his mouth, she noticed in the rearview mirror that Quinn, who hadn't said much since the beginning and had only chimed in with a few casual remarks, was occasionally stroking the container that was also in the back seat.

Kiritsugu Emiya might not be able to guess what was going on, but Haku Emiya knew it all, and immediately became hesitant to continue talking about family matters.

However, after two minutes of silence in the car, Quinn couldn't sit still any longer and couldn't help but speak up, "Why are you so serious? Kiritsugu Emiya, this trip to Kanbu City isn't to let you go back to your old job. You're just a driver. I brought your daughter back not so she could see you working a regular job."

“Old habits die hard.” Upon hearing this, Kiritsugu Emiya realized that the purpose of this trip was not to kill anyone, and Queen had never asked him to return to his old ways as a magician killer. He then smiled to cover his embarrassment. “However, Kanbu City is Aozaki Touko’s territory. It’s best to be careful when facing the Mage Association’s sealing designation.”

"Has she been sealed away again?"