Crossover Anime: Picking up Medea at the Start

Page 193

If Ilya is happy, then it doesn't matter if Ilya takes Irisviel as her own and brings her back—at worst, she can just make a few more trips. Anyway, it's not about bringing more people to the neighbor, but just taking one, so it's not a big problem.

But what if Ilya feels even worse?

That's what Roland thought.

When Rin Tohsaka heard Roland say that, her expression turned strange.

“I have probed Ilya a bit… She really wants to see her mother again, after all, the reason she is different from the other homunculi of the Einzbern family is entirely because of Irisviel.”

“Ilya even felt a little guilty towards Irisviel... It would actually be good to let her meet him.”

“Especially since Irisviel has only just been created and hasn’t been awakened yet, in her current state... I think it might be an extra surprise for Ilya.”

Roland was somewhat bewildered when he heard Rin Tohsaka say that.

Especially the part where she says Ilya feels somewhat guilty towards Irisviel... well, that seems subtly different from what he remembers!?

And what about Kiritsugu Emiya?

Why is there no mention of Emiya Kiritsugu?

Although Roland was puzzled, he didn't show it, nor did he directly confirm Rin Tohsaka's words.

"Okay, I'll write this down for now, and then I'll go ask Ilya for her specific thoughts."

P.S.: I've been thinking about it, and I think it's best to cut Kiritsugu Emiya out of the story. Since we're going to write about Irisviel, we should definitely cut him out completely—there's a plot point in my outline that would be perfect if we separated Kiritsugu Emiya into that part.

146. Illya and Irisviel

Rin Tohsaka had no objection to Roland's statement.

Therefore, the candidates to go to the parallel world have been temporarily decided as follows: Roland, Rin, Illya, Bazett, Arisu, and Artoria.

There's not much to say about the first five, but Artoria was chosen by Roland because he remembered that when he came back to see Bai Mao last time, Bai Mao had told him that Artoria felt she had been a bit too free lately.

If Ilya doesn't want to go, then take Iskandar.

After all, the Holy Grail War on the other side is on a completely different scale from the Holy Grail War.

Iskandar can better utilize his strengths in a Holy Grail War.

If Iskandar doesn't want to go either, then take Hercules—Hercules is the last resort, because he won't refuse.

However, Roland had other ideas regarding the specific candidates to participate in the Holy Grail War.

But we'll have to wait until after we meet Alaya and Gaia to discuss that.

However, this is not the top priority right now.

After Roland finished talking with Rin Tohsaka, he told her she could start preparing ahead of time, while he went to find Illya.

Before meeting Alaya and Gaia, he still wanted to ask Ilya what she thought.

Ilya usually stays in the basement of the temple with Medea and Orange, working together to make breakthroughs in the increasingly sophisticated and widely used pseudo-mecha technology.

We strive to create a true machine god as soon as possible.

But coincidentally, Ilya wasn't underground today.

After Medea finished discussing the relevant issues with Mebius and the others using the God Group's communication system, she went to the God Group's advanced industrial area to specifically build an industrial chain under the guidance of Velvi.

So she and Orange have been resting these past few days.

This led Roland, guided by the homunculus maid of Einzbern, to find Ilya in her own bedroom.

To be fair, judging from appearance alone, Illya is more like a young lady than Rin Tohsaka.

Especially after she completed the Third Law, she grew a bit from her original appearance and looked about the same age as Yuzhu. If she wore the Einzbern outfit in the snow, she would be a perfect combination of beauty and elegance. Anyone who saw her would say that she was a noble and beautiful young lady, as noble as a jewel.

When Roland found her in her bedroom, although he could tell that Ilya had tried her best to tidy up, Roland's keen observation skills easily revealed the untidyed game discs, chip crumbs, and the shoujo manga hidden under the magic book...

When Roland saw Ilya sitting on the bed with an elegant yet somewhat forced smile on her face, he knew that Ilya wasn't the kind of young lady who would usually sit in her study drinking tea and reading poetry.

Seeing this, Roland walked over to Ilya and reached out to tidy up her flawless hair, which was as white as fresh snow, making it look less messy.

"Alright, at least remember to comb your hair next time... As for other things, there's no need to hide anything. It's just a personal preference. At least there's no need to hide it from me. I don't care."

As he spoke, Roland helped Ilya tidy up the game discs she had hidden behind her back.

He initially thought that since Ilya was hiding shoujo manga, these were probably just some shoujo games, but in reality, Ilya was much more hardcore than he had imagined.

There wasn't a single otome game; they were all high-rated titles on the market.

"You have a good eye for games. There are quite a few here that I like. We can play together sometime."

Games from this era are considered somewhat dated works by Roland.

But he did play it.

Moreover, there are several works in it that he quite liked—it's just a pity that none of these works had sequels.

"Really?!"

Seeing that Roland genuinely understood the situation and wasn't just trying to comfort her, Ilya's eyes lit up, and she started chatting with Roland about games and comics.

Roland did not object to this, but gave his opinion on most of them.

They chatted like that, and during that time, the android maids came in, cleaned and tidied the room, and then brought Roland and Ilya some tea and snacks. Only then did Ilya stop the conversation.

"Roland, you must have something to say to me."

Although Ilya was interested in topics about games and comics, she knew very well that Roland couldn't have come to her to discuss those things.

So she took the initiative to change the subject.

Roland nodded in agreement.

“Then I’ll be frank—Illya, I’ve been having Rin research the issue of parallel worlds lately. She’s been observing a parallel world and, with Zelrich’s help, created a Mystic Code that will take us there.”

"I need to travel to a parallel world to test some things and do some other things as well."

"And their timeline is different from ours; it's a mutated Fourth Holy Grail War."

"So—Ilya, this time you can see Irisviel from a parallel world, do you want to come along?"

Upon hearing Roland's words, Ilya's expression visibly stiffened.

But her gaze quickly hardened.

"I'm going!"

Ilya gave the answer directly, and then, under Roland's watchful gaze, she explained it to him.

"You know about the Lesser Grails that we Einzberns created to participate in the Holy Grail War... But in theory, these Lesser Grails are all artificial beings cultivated by humans, except for me."

"The reason for the exception is because of my mother... Irisviel."

"She was created as a minor Holy Grail, and before participating in the Holy Grail War, she made a request—that she could participate in the Holy Grail War wholeheartedly, but before that, she wanted to leave something behind so that even if she died in the Holy Grail War, she would have no regrets."

"And what she left behind at that time was her child, who was born through normal reproduction after being nurtured inside her body."

"That is... me."

"I have always felt guilty about this."

At this point, Ilya sighed.

"From my perspective, I always feel that my mother sacrificed herself for me."

"So even if she's from a parallel universe, I still want to go see her—even if they're two different people, I want to do something for her, so I'm going!"

Ilya explained her reasons, her eyes growing increasingly resolute, and gave her answer once again.

As Roland nodded, he was inwardly bewildered.

At once...

What about Kiritsugu Emiya?

Where did Kiritsugu Emiya go?

If Roland was only a little puzzled when Rin Tohsaka brought up this issue before, thinking that perhaps Rin Tohsaka hadn't mentioned Kiritsugu Emiya, now that Illya had said it, Roland realized that something was wrong—wasn't this completely unrelated to Kiritsugu Emiya?

And Kiritsugu Emiya definitely existed.

Emiya Shirou also mentioned...

Artoria also knew about Kiritsugu Emiya.

But where did Kiritsugu Emiya go on Illya's side?

Roland thought about it for a long time and felt that something was wrong.

He wasn't completely clueless about this situation.

While attributing it to the butterfly effect, the fact that he had absolutely no impact on events here seems far-fetched. However, if it's a convergence of parallel universes, then it's still possible...

Roland himself possessed this ability.

Everyone who comes into contact with him will undergo parallel world convergence, but this skill is actually a 5.8 effect brought about by his individual existence.

In other words... this effect isn't just something he experiences himself.

Other beasts may also exist independently with the same effect as themselves.

It's impossible for such a solitary being to gather those around him, because his solitary existence is already at the highest level.