“Unsummon Program, start. Spiritron Conversion, start. Counting down to Rayshift. Three… two… one… All procedures cleared. Grand Order, commencing operation.”

The voice echoes through Chaldea. Calm. Cold.

Across the room, Leonardo da Vinci gives you a thumbs up. She’s smiling, but it’s not her usual playful smile. There’s worry behind it.

“Fix this final Lostbelt. And find Mash and Fujimaru,” she says quietly. “It’s going to be dangerous. The entire world is the Lostbelt this time…”

The voices fade away as you nod. Your chest feels tight, like it’s hard to breathe. You don’t trust your voice.

Before you can think about it too much, the light takes you.

Rayshifting never feels normal. It’s like your body forgets what it’s made of. The world stretches into gold and white, and your feet lift off the ground even though you didn’t jump. Your stomach drops. For a second, you’re not anywhere at all. Not falling. Not standing. Just floating in between.

Then the cold hits.

It rushes into your lungs the second you breathe in. You open your eyes to your Rayshift Point. Antarctica. Out of all the places in the world to Rayshift too… Antarctica?! You sigh.

Everything is white. The sky and the snow blend together so smoothly you can’t tell where one ends and the other begins. The wind isn’t violent, but it never stops. It moves across the ice in long, steady breaths. Snow slides across the ground like it has a mind of its own.

You quickly pull up your hood and turn on the heat system in your Chaldea coat. Warmth slowly spreads through the fabric. It helps. It reminds you that you’re still here. Still real. Where all the Singularities and Lostbelts collide.

Your communicator buzzes in your ear — the one Romani Archaman always made sure you carried. You tap it, and after a burst of static, Da Vinci’s voice comes through.

“You made it… thank goodness. Are you okay?”

“I’m okay,” you say, staring out at the endless snow. “There’s no one here. But I can feel something. Grand Servants and something worse. Beast-class. More than one. The kind that make your heart race and slow down at the same time. Not all here in Antarctica though.”

The signal fades back into static.

You lower your hand. The five rings on your fingers catch the pale light. They hinder your unknown type of Mystic Eyes in case things go wrong.

The wind begins to slow. The ice beneath your boots trembles.

At first, it’s small — like a heartbeat under the ground. Then cracks spread across the frozen surface. Dark water pushes up through them.

Something massive bursts out.

An enormous hoof swings toward you. Fast. Powerful. Your magic circuits shake inside your body.

There’s no time to move.

One hit. That’s all it would take.

Then— Clang.

A sharp, ringing sound cuts through the air. Steel slams against force. The ground shakes, but the attack stops inches from you. Frost explodes into the air.

A shield stands between you and death.

Mash Kyrielight stands in front of you, boots planted firmly on the cracked ice. Her violet eyes are steady and focused. Lord Chaldeas, (Hope-Forging Shield of the Human Order), her new shield, doesn’t move, at all.

Behind her, Ritsuka Fujimaru grips her shoulder to reinforce her powers. The wind tears through his hair, making his coat whip behind him. His Command Seals glow red against all that white.

“{{user}}!” he calls out, and you can hear the relief in his voice. The furry little creature, Fou, exclaims on Fujimarus’s shoulder, “Fou!”

The monster is forced back, its massive body sliding across the ice. The sound echoes across the frozen land. Her gold-and-white Paladin armor shines softly in the air.

You let out a breath you didn’t realize you were holding. Just a regular monster… but it almost killed me in one swing?

“Thank you, Mash,” you say. At least you’re not alone out here.

The monster stomps its hooves against the ice. The ground shakes harder now. More cracks spread across the frozen surface as snow continues to fall.

This fight isn’t over.

It’s just beginning.