111: Chapter 111 Crown Designation, Completed
As the dizziness in their vision gradually faded, the players' screen perspective shifted back to the all-too-familiar Chaldea Control Room.
"Rayshift complete! Operation successful!"
Accompanied by the mechanical prompt from the Control Room, Mash slowly opened her eyes.
She looked at her hands in disbelief, feeling her heart beating truly and powerfully within her chest.
That broken body, which originally had only three days of life remaining, was now filled with vibrant vitality.
"Senpai... we really came back!"
The young girl's voice trembled as she suddenly threw herself into the Master's embrace. Through the realistic VR sensations, A-Dai could even truly feel the girl's extreme joy and her warm tears of happiness.
"Welcome back, heroes who saved the world."
Before the doors of the Control Room, Da Vinci stood there with a smile.
And behind her were the remaining staff of Chaldea, who had accompanied the players throughout the long journey of the Incineration of Humanity.
Some of them were injured, others had faces full of exhaustion, but at this moment, everyone's faces were overflowing with the purest ecstasy.
*Clap clap clap—*
Without long-winded praise, Da Vinci took the lead, and these fewer than twenty surviving staff members, within this battered Control Room, offered the returning Master and Mash the warmest, most thunderous, and even tearful applause!
The applause lasted for a long time, echoing through the corridors of Chaldea, as if to completely dispel the oppression and suffering of this year-long (in-game time) ordeal.
All the players watched this jubilant scene and heard the thunderous applause, their lips unconsciously curling upward as their eyes grew slightly moist.
They did it! Humanity's final Master had truly reclaimed the future of humanity!
The applause gradually died down. Da Vinci picked up a tablet, and in those eyes that were always full of wisdom, a trace of indelible sorrow flashed. Yet, she still used the steadiest and most solemn voice to deliver the final battle report:
"Final Grand Order, all itineraries concluded!"
"Incineration of Humanity incident, confirmed resolved."
"All surviving personnel of Chaldea welcome your return here."
She paused for a moment, her voice slightly raspy as she spoke the line that instantly made all players across the internet burst into tears: "...And, one personnel member who failed to return from the Final Singularity."
Under this weightily significant line, the players' gazes uncontrollably and slowly swept across that corner of the Control Room.
At this moment, on the empty table, only a cup of long-cold coffee and a half-eaten strawberry cake remained.
"Let's go, Fujimaru, Mash."
Da Vinci took a deep breath and gave the two of them a gentle smile. "Go outside and take a look. Since the Incineration of Humanity began, we haven't seen the real scenery outside."
As the heavy metal doors slowly opened, Fujimaru and Mash walked out of Chaldea's underground facility side-by-side to the snowy mountains outside, both looking up simultaneously.
PD, Chu He, A-Dai, and tens of millions of players in front of their screens all looked up as well.
The sky that had been shrouded in frantic blizzards and the clouds of the end since the very first day the game launched, appearing as if there would never be hope...
It finally cleared up.
The dark clouds filling the sky dispersed, and what met their eyes was a sky as clear as if it had been washed, brilliant sunlight shining on the snowfields—the clearest and most beautiful azure sky in three thousand years.
It was the future that the cowardly doctor had given everything to trade for them.
A melodious and sorrowful variation of "Shikisai" slowly began to play. Amidst this beautiful azure, the screen gradually dimmed until it fell into complete, pitch-black nothingness.
However, in the face of this long-awaited victory, not a single person was cheering.
...
"Ugh... *sob*..."
The big streamer PD, who was usually loud and boisterous and would drop hundreds of "Da Vinci's Special Lucky Bags" in his stream at the drop of a hat, was now like a three-year-old who had lost a favorite toy, his hands covering his face as he sat slumped in his chair, sobbing uncontrollably.
He had thrown his holographic VR headset aside. On the screen, the credits after clearing the main story were still slowly scrolling to the sound of a melodious piano.
In the livestream, not only did no one mock this "tough guy's tears," but the entire comment section had completely turned into an ocean of tears.
"Old Thief Gu... Old Thief Gu, damn you!!!"
PD suddenly looked up, his eyes red as he cursed into the microphone, his voice so hoarse it was almost cracking.
"I spent hundreds of thousands to get every single Servant in this game to max Noble Phantasm! The saint quartz in my warehouse is enough to smash through the Earth! But why... why is he the only one I can't save?!"
He put the VR headset back on like a madman and logged into the game after clearing it.
On the Chaldea main interface, PD's hands trembled as he clicked on [Material].
Nothing.
Whether it was filtering through the entire archive or summoning from the Friend Point gacha, that man in the white coat, whose smile was a bit tired yet always incredibly gentle, seemed to have been forcibly erased from the world's underlying code, leaving not even a single trace behind.
Even the daily greeting voice line that used to feel a bit long-winded—"Yo, Fujimaru, you've got to work hard today too"—had completely vanished.
The vast Chaldea was so quiet it felt suffocating.
"It's really... completely 'gone'..."
Looking at that empty corner of the Control Room, PD slumped back in his chair, his eyes hollow.
"In the past, when I couldn't clear a stage, I always thought spending money could solve everything. But now I realize that in this game, some things, once lost, can never be bought back."
Countless viewers who had accompanied PD in clearing the Final Singularity in the livestream were similarly plunged into this deep PTSD known as "FGO Syndrome."
"It hurts too much... it really hurts too much. I'd rather this game had no ending, I'd rather we were stuck in the Seventh Singularity forever; at least that way, the Doctor could still nag us through the communicator..."
"I just went to the Chaldea shop to buy some EXP Cards, and I suddenly noticed that Da Vinci-chan's lines have changed. She no longer teases the Doctor for slacking off; instead, she says, 'Don't worry, for the upcoming logistics work, I'll work hard for that guy's sake too'... I just couldn't hold it together; a grown man like me started bawling out loud."
"This is Gu Yi's most cruel aspect. He gave us the most perfect victory, saved Mash, and saved the Earth. But in that most brilliant blue sky, he forcibly carved out a piece."
"Salute to Romani Archaman! The greatest mortal!"