Agony.
Come to think of it, this was his first time being slashed by Nugata.
The excruciating pain of his soul being pierced instantly swept through every cell in his body.
Yet, amidst this maddening agony, Asuka also felt an unprecedented sense of clarity.
It was the exhilaration of shattering some invisible shackle, the tangible sensation of his soul reclaiming control over his body.
Blood gushed forth.
But the blood was neither red nor black.
It was golden.
That was his Spiritual Pressure, his unyielding will, the sole light blooming within this pitch-black despair.
*Crack!*
As the blade plunged in, the entire black dreamscape began to tremble violently.
Massive fissures appeared in the sky, like a mirror smashed by a heavy hammer.
That voice was trembling, gripped by fear.
It had encountered an incomprehensible madman.
"Fade away?"
Even with blood spilling from his mouth, that arrogant smirk remained plastered on Asuka's face.
"I am someone... who has hovered on the brink of life and death more times than I can count."
He violently yanked out the longsword.
Golden light erupted instantly, radiating outward with him at the epicenter!
"Get lost!!!"
*Rumble!!!*
The light swallowed the darkness, pulverized the black mud, and completely tore the layered nightmares to shreds.
"Hah—!!!"
The real world, Ryuudou Temple.
The black silhouette that had been standing stiffly in the black mud, maintaining a sword-wielding stance, suddenly jolted as if struck by lightning.
Then, he took a massive, gasping breath.
The sound was like a drowning man finally breaking the surface of the water, greedy and frantic.
Asuka snapped his eyes open. His pupils violently contracted and dilated while his chest heaved heavily.
Cold sweat instantly soaked his Shihakusho. His heart hammered frantically against his ribs, feeling as though it might leap right out of his chest.
This was real air.
It carried the agitation of magical energy and the foul stench of the black mud, but it was real—the scent of the real world.
Asuka panted heavily, his grip on Nugata so tight that the weapon creaked under the pressure.
He immediately scanned his surroundings.
This time, it was no longer an illusion.
Ryuudou Temple was indeed covered in black mud, but it was not as exaggerated as it had been in the dream.
The massive void in the sky was still slowly rotating, and the black curse continued to flow.
Sumire Kamado, Artoria, Kiritsugu Emiya... they were indeed standing in place, but without the horrifying imagery from before.
Everyone was wreathed in a black aura, clearly still struggling within their respective nightmares.
In the entire area, he was the only one who had forcibly broken free from the shackles, relying on that borderline insane, self-mutilating awakening method.
"That was way too close..."
Asuka wiped a speck of mud mixed with cold sweat from his forehead, lingering fear gripping his heart.
If he had actually listened to that imposter earlier and killed Irisviel...
Would he have completely succumbed? Would he have become a puppet under its control?
"This is seriously pissing me off..."
Asuka stood up straight, feeling the Spiritual Pressure inside him—slightly chaotic, yet still surging powerfully.
He raised his head and looked at the Holy Grail, which was still continuously overflowing with black mud, and at the homunculus trapped in the center of it all, Irisviel, whose pained expression suggested she was also trapped in a nightmare.
"Hey! You bastard hiding in the cup!"
Asuka pointed the tip of his blade toward the sky. His voice was hoarse, yet it carried a piercing, murderous intent.
"Stop hiding inside a woman's body and playing cheap tricks!"
"Didn't you want to devour me? Didn't you want to see my nightmare?"
"I'm right here, completely wide awake!"
As if understanding his provocation, or perhaps out of fury toward this escapee...
Magical energy flared.
The black mud within the Holy Grail suddenly began to boil violently.
*Bubble... bubble...*
The massive amount of black mud stopped spreading outward and instead began to pool beneath the Holy Grail.
A humanoid silhouette slowly rose from the accumulated malice.
It was a small, faceless figure composed entirely of pitch-black sludge.
From this faceless mud doll, he could not sense the Spiritual Pressure of a Soul Reaper, nor could he sense the magical energy of a magus.
All that existed was a pure, vast, and incomparably hollow 'evil'.
The sensation was like facing a bottomless cesspool, or a mountain piled high with human corpses.
Just looking at it was enough to induce physical nausea.
This was the rule-breaking Servant summoned during the Third Holy Grail War.
The Avenger who had used himself as a sacrifice to pollute the magic circle of Heaven's Feel with All the World's Evils.
Angra Mainyu.
The mouthless mud doll actually produced a voice.
The sound didn't seem to ring in his ears; rather, it felt like static scraping directly against his cerebral cortex.
The mud doll spread its hands, making a somewhat comical gesture of helplessness.
"Shall we talk?"
Asuka sneered. "Just a moment ago you were trying to corrupt me in a dream, and now you want to talk? Is your brain filled with this rotting mud too?"
The mud doll shrugged, its tone actually carrying a hint of grievance.
It took a step forward, the black mud beneath its feet automatically paving the way.
Its faceless head tilted forward slightly, as if carefully inspecting Asuka—or rather, inspecting something much deeper within Asuka's body.
Asuka's heart stirred, but he didn't respond, quietly waiting for Angra Mainyu to speak first.
The mud doll's body trembled slightly, as if recalling something terrifying.
Angra Mainyu sighed, even though it had no mouth. "Pulling such a troublesome thing over from another world... I truly regret it..."
"These Servants and the karmic lines on your body are hopelessly entangled, generating errors that somewhat exceed my expectations. What absolute rotten luck."
It raised its hand made of black mud and pointed at the massive void in the sky.