Fate/Zero Desire

Height Fright

“It's too dangerous.”

Irisviel grimaced.

“It's not that dangerous.”

“Irisviel, one of my duties is to protect you to the best of my ability,” said Artoria. “And I tell you that this is dangerous.”

“It's not!”

However, the voice of the homunculus lacked conviction. 

Of course her idea was dangerous. She was essentially proposing to fight against a former Executor, one of the deadliest soldiers that the Church had access to. And Irisviel, for all her qualities as one of the prime constructs of the Einzbern family, was not designed with combat in mind.

Indeed, going straight to a fight was such a blatant breaking of those rules that Irisviel held no doubts that if Jubstacheit heard of that stunt, he would skin her alive, Grail receptacle be damned.

“Milady, you said that the decision was mine, and I say that your idea is risky. Not only that, but Kiritsugu seemed anxious. Something big is about to happen in Fuyuki. Do you have any argument for why we should stay here when we have a golden opportunity to end that man's reign of terror?”

She tapped her fingers.

“I can think of some. For starters, the Hassan. We don't know what his ability does, but it seems to be something that allows it to multiply in some way. It's probably his Noble Phantasm, but we don't know much about what it does. How many bodies can he deploy? Are they all the same? These questions make me think we could suffer an ambush before leaving the forest."

The eyes of the knight narrowed.

“And we can't detect it because of their Presence Concealment…” she grumbled. “Meaning that leaving the castle would be to forfeit the home field advantage very early.”

The blonde warrior grimaced. Between the time they spent talking and the arrival of the Executor, it was likely that Irisviel's worries were well-founded.

And not knowing how fast Hassan could go…no, thought Artoria to herself. Artoria was fast, but the Assassin class was the fastest of the Four Cavalry if you didn't account for a Rider's mount. And Artoria would need to protect Irisviel, all while carrying her.

“So you leave,” decided the Servant of the Sword. “I can cover your escape while facing Kotomine and his Servants.”

“It still runs in the same trouble,” said the homunculus. “The abilities of Hassan still are an unknown factor for us. If I get in trouble, this would force Kiritsugu to use a Command Seal to protect me.”

Artoria closed her eyes.

“What guarantees Kotomine won't use Assassin against you anyway? If I follow your plan, this would mean that my opponent is my counterpart.”

She closed her eyes.

“It's just a feeling, but I don't think he wants me dead from the get-go. Kiritsugu didn't show that, but I know him. He's worried about Kirei Kotomine.”

Saber frowned, recalling the earlier meeting.

“He didn't seem to give him much attention other than his paper as assistant of Tokiomi Tohsaka and someone that tricked the system.”

Irisviel nodded.

“But we know Kiritsugu hides his true thoughts about many things, and this is such a case. I can tell: Kotomine worries him more than he shows. Take this from his wife.”

The King of Knights frowned. Irisviel grabbed her hands.

“Saber. I know we're taking a huge risk, but any enemy that Kiritsugu thinks is dangerous is probably worse than we think. Please. We're in a prime position to put him down before he becomes an issue."

The Servant stared at the faux-Master. Her eyes showed fear and hesitation. But there was also passion and determination. Saber understood that Irisviel, for all hesitation, was willing to put all in the line for the sake of Kiritsugu's wishes.

“Well then,” decided Saber. “Prepare for our visitors. I will hold down my counterpart while you take Kotomine.”

The screech of metal against metal echoed in the entrance hall of the Einzbern Castle. The blade hidden by Invisible Air against the twin swords of King Bradley, who held a cross guard against the king's tremendous power.

Then, in a heartbeat, the knight broke the conflict and attempted a strong Mana Boosted horizontal slash that, again, her counterpart managed to block with not too much fanfare. And then, in an invisible arc, she performed a feint as if about to hit the other side but instead went with a lunge, but, yet again, the man blocked it, albeit walking it back a bit from the impact.

‘...not bad,’ thought Artoria. ‘A lesser man would have fallen with this sequence. Still, his blades, while of good quality, don't show any signs of being Noble Phantasms. Is he hiding his true power?’

Bradley, for his part, was having similar thoughts.

‘I judged right. This girl is pretty strong for being so petite. How did she boost that slash, though? Some magecraft? It was as strong as some of the strikes that Greed could do in the body of the Xingese noble.’

Half of a fight in the Holy Grail War was about figuring out what your opponent could do for two reasons: for one, to figure out the name of a Heroic Spirit and thus become aware of their weaknesses -which mattered little in a duel between heroes of different worlds -and, more straightforwardly, to feel their style.

‘That clash…he matched the power and timing of my blows. However, he doesn't seem to have any armor. It means he relies on his speed to defeat opponents before being hit. I need to blitz past him.’

Saber charged forward, attempting to slice her opponent to pieces with stabs that the Fuhrer avoided efficiently.

‘Hmph. We are even in strength and speed. But I feel this girl can take quite a beating before going down. And that invisible blade is very annoying. I'm only managing to telegraph it by that girl's movements.’

The Servant of the Sword felt his eyepatch glued to the face. If he took it now…

‘Not yet. Besides, there's more than one way to figure out the size of the blade.’

Rolling over the next attack, he appeared behind Artoria, who turned quickly to strike her opponent. However, the man instead sped towards a wall and, picking some busts close-by, threw them at his enemy.

Per instinct, the girl cut them as they flew towards her. The man gave attention to the timing she utilized to hit the projectiles and used that to estimate the size of the blade.

‘Decently big,’ mumbled Bradley. ‘Something in the lines of 130.’

Yes, he could more or less predict the way of the blade by how she moved. If she relied on the invisible weapon that much, then…

The Blue Servant of the Sword shot forward with a Mana Burst, her weapon ready to decapitate her opponent.

He stepped ever slightly back to be out of her sword's reach. Her eyebrows widened.

‘Now!’ thought Bradley, attempting to nail a stab in the stomach.

Then he noticed how fast the shock disappeared and, with a gut instinct, jumped back as she reverted her grip and unleashed a vertical slash from the ground, barely nailing him with the tip of the sword in the shoulder. Bradley hissed.

‘I massively overshot the size of the blade. It was 120 centimeters long. How did I do that?’

‘Nice try,’ thought Artoria. ‘But by making Invisible Air release smaller slashes, I made the blade look a bit bigger than it is.’

The man touched his wound. Not even deep enough to draw blood, only scratching his shirt.

‘Hmph. She's also not stupid. Even got me fooled,’ thought the Saber, looking at his counterpart.

The woman stopped.

“Why do you smile?” asked the knight, confused.

He touched his face. Yes, Bradley was smiling widely. He quickly wiped it out of his face,

“It is none of your business, knight,” said the Fuhrer. “Now, let's keep our dance, shall we?”

The two Sabers moved to clash again.

‘It's quiet. Too quiet.’

Kirei walked carefully through the corridors of the castle. Contrary to the bright entrance room, the remainder of the structure was in the dark, moonlight barely passing through the curtains in the windows.

‘No sign of interrupters. Not that I hoped to see any, considering that I am walking into a magus castle.’

Then again, Kiritsugu Emiya had an affinity for modern technology, so it didn't hurt to try.

He nearly triggered the trap by accident.

‘Watch your step,’ said Assassin.

The Executor stopped walking, looking down. It was hard to see in the dark, but he saw a wire hastily stuck in the stone. His eyes led to what he barely recognized as a claymore, only waiting to be detonated.

‘Good catch,’ said Kirei. ‘But I thought you wouldn't intervene anymore after my entrance.’

Although the Servant of the Shadows was cooperative in the efforts to suppress escape attempts from the people in the castle, she had decided not to enter the fortress with any of their bodies.

‘Doesn't it mean that I want to see you dead,’ said the Hundred-Faced Hassan. ‘I left our bandolier face to support you from afar. He knows the ins and outs of ambushes.’

He saw the man in his link with Assassin, sitting in a tree with the signature skull mask of the Old Men of the Mountain. He was considerably bulkier than most faces.

‘Rashid shall be our helper from afar,’ said Asako. ‘The rest is with you.’

The Master nodded. He looked at the ground, grimacing. It was hard to see in that darkness. He could distinguish some more explosives, but the darkness hid any signs of further traps. 

‘Hm. The only one who could have set these up is Irisviel von Einzbern. Considering the traditionalism of that family, it's a wonder she managed to handle modern technology. But…’

He stepped back a few steps.

‘You should have littered the whole floor with these.’

Reinforcing his legs, the Executor ran through the safe part of the hall before jumping into the wall and running through its surface, avoiding triggering the traps.

Then, he was temporarily blinded in the dark room when a shining figure appeared in his vision.

“!”

The wire bird ignored Kirei, focusing on the claymores on the ground, ready to trigger them!

SWOOSH!

In a flash, Kirei threw his Black Keys so they didn't hit any explosives and cut the connection between the bird and his controller. The silver wires fell on the ground, Kirei following suit not a second later, as he had to jump from the wall to perform his move. Thankfully, the Einzbern homunculus didn't have time to put any more explosives, as the following area had none of them.

‘Close call,’ thought Kirei. ‘It seems that Kiritsugu Emiya instilled some of his cunning in the homunculus.’

He looked at two armors in the corridors. They were very medieval-looking, with red plumes and all. The priest sighed.

“I suppose this is the moment that they pop from their pedestals to kill me.”

CLANG!

Metal against metal. The two armors moved from their positions, both holding halberds. He figured they were golems. The Einzbern once specialized in such constructs, with the current head being one such figure. It shouldn't be too hard to make a simple one with time.

‘Regardless…’ he drew another set of Black Keys from under his robes, holding them between his fingers. ‘No matter what you put ahead of me, Irisviel von Einzbern.’

He rushed towards the two golems.

‘I will get what I want. One way or the other.’

Diarmuid was starting to hate skyscrapers.

It was already difficult enough to fight archers -the warriors, not the Servants - when they had the height advantage. Even worse if they shoot from up cliffs, having the help of nature for their arrows to move faster than ever.

But at least in those cases, you could always take an alternative route to reach the opponent and beat them up close.

Not so much when you practically only have a straight line between you and your opponent.

And he also had to deal with the monsters that Caster summoned in waves. That was important.

“!”

He slashed foe after foe with his twin spears, forming a red and gold arc of destruction. He attempted to pierce the formation with his momentum, but more beasts popped up to stop his attack, forcing him to retreat.

“Guh!”

He ran down the building. Unfortunately, most Servants couldn't defy gravity, so Diarmuid was forced to keep moving to avoid being crushed by the wave of sea demons or falling to the bottom of the building.

“Run all you want, Lancer!” laughed Caster. “You won't be able to avoid my beasts forever!”

The knight of Fionna glared at the weird man atop the building. He had to thank Dagda, Macha, and Brigid - goddesses of wisdom -that the bulgy-eyed man never thought to go after his liege, but it didn't improve the situation much.

The problem was that Diarmuid, although not unfamiliar with a numbers disadvantage, had a poor kit to deal with Caster in this situation. Against the familiars, Gaé Dearg didn't do much that he couldn't already do with a good body stab, and Gaé Buidhé was in the same boat -although it allowed some of his non-lethal shots to ignore the regeneration the beasts seemed to have.

He needed to get close to be able to use his spears against the Caster, but Gilles knew this. With each monster Diarmuid put down, two more popped into its place. Individually, they weren't troublesome, but as a unit, they managed to grind the spearman into the ground.

All the while, the screams of people reached his ears.

“If you were such a noble knight, you should kneel over and forfeit your life,” said the Demon Marshall. “Can't you hear this lovable opera of screams? Aaaaahhhh…”

Lancer didn't know if his opponent was threatening him or if he genuinely enjoyed those sounds, and this scared the knight.

“Never! To fall in the hands of a vile and dishonorable man like you would completely stain my knight pride!”

A giant tentacle popped from behind the monsters. Once again, Diarmuid slashed it with Gaé Dearg, the attack dissipating the summon.

‘At least I can use it to stop this,’ he thought.

Still, the situation was dire. Diarmuid couldn't tell when the madman would attempt a charge against his liege and his…fiancee. 

He didn't want to think about what happened just a few minutes back.

‘That book he holds…It has the aura of a Noble Phantasm. If I can hit Gaé Dearg against it, it should cancel the Bounded Field and his summons.’

Of course, that runs into the issue of getting close. He could try a throw, but such a move had a great chance of being intercepted by one of the demons or by any other tricks the Caster had up his sleeve.

No, he needed to find a way to approach the sorcerer unopposed. But how-

‘Argh!’

‘Master! Is everything alright?!”

‘No, Sola-Ui spit in my eyes!’ roared the Master. ‘She's completely crazy! What kind of person does that?!’

Diarmuid nearly lost his focus for a second, avoiding the charge of a sea demon. However, he jumped on top of it and, using the opportunity, used it as a platform to propel over the monstrous wall.

Unfortunately, large monsters appeared in the way, attempting to immobilize the knight so that their peers could rip him apart. One managed to snag his leg before being cut down by Gaé Buidhe.

‘Tsk. No matter what I do, these monsters don't stop coming. How many can he summon?’

‘Maybe this is why he killed so many people,’ replied Kayneth. ‘He was leeching them to fuel his power…no, something seems off about this conclusion, but I can't figure out what.’

‘He called Saber Jeanne if that helps,’ said Diarmuid. ‘But I know she can't be her if that matters.'

He could see his Master thinking.

‘Jeanne…as Jeanne D'Arc? The saint? Of famous sorcerers from that time, the only one to come to my head is Prelati, but this obsession with the Saint doesn't fit at all. Could it be that he's the killer Bluebeard, Gilles de Rais? But why would he be here? He shouldn't be capable of being summoned from the texts I read. Not only that, but why Caster? A man like him would fit better as an Assassin or even a Saber.'

‘This is hardly a usual war, my liege,’ remarked Diarmuid, somber. ‘But this confirms my suspicions that the book is the anchor for this ritual. It must be how he's doing his magecraft.’

And now he looped back to the old problem: he couldn't break through the monster wall.

“!”

He ducked at the attack of another, piercing through the demon and, with some strength, sending it flying to its demise.

‘I need a way to cut down the distance, my liege. Can you help me in any way?’

He could feel the venom in Kayneth's voice.

‘Unfortunately, there's a limit to how many defenses I can put outside the tower. I thought that making the glasses heat at touch would dissuade most Servants from attempting to climb this, but I underestimated the creativity some have.’

Diarmuid grimaced. All he needed was a free way to-

He looked at his reflection, blinking.

“Ugh!”

He avoided the next attack with haste.

“Fuhahaha!” laughed Gilles. “Surrender, spearman! Maybe I will be merciful and make your death quick!”

Diarmuid grits his teeth.

“Such a blatant lie!” he roared, preparing his spear…

Caster felt the hair in his back rise. He summoned a tentacle just in time to intercept the figure that attempted to kick his head from behind, pushing it away.

Lancer of the ARK triggered his rocket boots, floating in the air, glaring at Gilles.

“Spawn of Outer God,” snarled the Caster before smiling. “Ah, this is perfect. I can eliminate two annoyances in one strike.”

Shadow glared, summoning two Chaos Spears beside him and kicking them at the sorcerer, who summoned two demons to block them before calling a giant tentacle to slap the hedgehog out of the sky. 

Deactivating his rocket boots for a moment, the hedgehog fell for a few seconds before using them again, this time to give him a boost to the tower. Ignoring the protective spells, the Ultimate Lifeform curled into a ball, somehow managed to make it spin, gathering yellow energy, and then flying against the mob, crushing beast after beast in its wake.

It was not enough to break the blockade, as the hedgehog jumped back and teleported in front of Gilles again, intending to pierce him through the chest. However, the Caster managed to avoid the attack and summon a tentacle that held onto Shadow and threw him away.

Noticing this, Diarmuid backed down and jumped to catch the flying hedgehog. After falling for a bit, the spearman managed to push himself and his counterpart towards a window, crashing through it - and making the elder that occupied the room faint, terrified.

“Excuse me, ma'am,” mumbled the knight.

“I don't think she can hear you…” groaned Shadow, pushing the man away. “And you didn't need to help me. I had that under control.”

“You seemed to be in trouble,” said the native Lancer. “It was enough for me to spring into action.”

The Ultimate Lifeform huffed, looking out the window. 

“Help me barricade this window. We don't need those things interrupting our talk,” said the hedgehog.

A moment later, they managed to form a small blockade by putting all the mobiles in front of the window. Both could tell it was only a stopgap, leading Shadow to teleport the woman to the first floor, where at least others would protect her.

“How are things down there?” asked Diarmuid after his counterpart popped back.

“Terrible. Those things are strong, and the people down there can barely make a stand. My Master's assistants are giving them support.”

It surprised him that Kiritsugu stepped up quickly to defend the guests and staff. However, he and Maiya were the only ones close enough to make the difference to save those people, and his Master reasoned that Shadow had the tools to defeat Caster in an instant.

Unfortunately, they couldn't predict his survival from the sneak attack.

‘How did he even feel me coming?’ wondered Shadow.

‘He can sense something in you,’ pointed out Kiritsugu. ‘Maybe it's a skill or a property granted by his Noble Phantasm.’

The hedgehog grumbled. Great. Of all enemies to be at a disadvantage, it had to be the weird Caster.

‘How are things down there?’

‘Maiya and I are attempting to cut down the monsters that appear, but they keep popping. Hurry and find a way to defeat Caster.’

‘As if there was a need to say that.’

“Where is Saber?” asked Diarmuid. “Her power would do wonders to smash those summons.”

Shadow shook his head.

“Unfortunately, she and my Master are too far away to reach in time,” he said, a partial truth. Kiritsugu didn't get a detailed explanation of what was happening in the castle. He only said that, for now, they shouldn't count on their help with the assault. “It's only me and some other Servants down there.”

“I felt your presence,” said the Irishman. “To think that man would have a grudge against me…I already have too much going on to worry about a petty grudge.”

BONK!

They heard the monsters attempting to pass the blockade. 

“Tsk. Pesky things,” said Shadow, snapping his fingers. On the outside, some of the demons roared in pain. “As much as it pains me to admit this, we must work together to defeat that madman. With his ability to detect me, my usual means of attack won't be as effective.”

“Indeed, I was about to make the same suggestion.”

The two Servants jumped at the appearance of Caster of Hogwarts.

“How did you…?!” started the spearman before they heard the screeches of the demons, destroying the blockade and attempting to enter the building.

“That won't do,” said Dumbledore. “Repulso.”

The beasts were sent flying away. With another twitch of the wand, the Caster of Hogwarts summoned a metallic blockade over the window, stopping the entrance of further monsters for the time being.

“You still didn't answer the question, old man,” said Shadow. “How did you appear here?”

“I have my ways,” said the sorcerer. “I saw you two fall and decided to offer my services to end this madness.”

“What about Rider's?” asked Lancer. 

‘What are you doing?!’ roared Kayneth. ‘Working with that brat-’

‘My liege, excuse me,’ apologized the Servant. ‘But the situation is so dire that I feel we need any help we need, grudges or rewards be damned.’

The magus grumbled, but, if grudgingly, he agreed with his Servant's statement.

“Unfortunately, the…” Dumbledore paused for a moment before continuing. “...the Bounded Field around the buildings is also stopping the intervention of more Servants. My Master and Rider are attempting to pierce through it, but the defenses are solid.”

“I knew I should have come instead of Dumbledore…”

“Don't you start it!” snapped Waver. “We have better things to do than throwing fingers!”

The chariot collided once again with the Bounded Field, to no effect.

“Boy, then you better find a way to get through this!” said Iskandar. “Because it's not bulging any time soon!”

All the while, people pointed at the mysterious thunderbolts that struck the dome in awe and fear.

‘What a mess…’ thought the young magus. ‘Our heads will roll after today!’

“I see…” said Diarmuid. “The plan of Caster was probably to raise the barrier to reap the benefits from the Bounded Field while being left alone to fight me and my partner. Seems I must be thankful that others figured out his moves beforehand."

Shadow looked at Dumbledore.

“Is there any way to cancel the spell?”

The old sorcerer hummed.

“Maybe the spear of your counterpart…the other Caster had to make marks on the ground to call the field. However, I can’t say what will happen once the Field is down. It's a pretty advanced spell, after all.”

‘...blast, he has a point,’ said Kiritsugu. ‘We are already in thin ice with a spell of such a large scale in the middle of the city. If the summoning and the field are not directly connected, we may release those monsters to the rest of Fuyuki. If that happens, the Association won't hesitate to drop into the city without mercy.'

Dumbledore raised his eyebrow slightly, having caught some of the thoughts from Shadow's head. 

“We also need to protect the guests,” said Diarmuid. “It's possible that Gilles is attempting to use them as batteries to sustain the Bounded Field.”

“Or maybe he's a crazy asshole that is doing that for kicks,” said Shadow. “And it would be better to focus our efforts on ending him before anyone gets hurt.”

Dumbledore raised his hand.

“At ease. I found someone willing to hold the beasts down for now.”

‘So…inelegant…’

‘I suppose such magic doesn't have much space to be pretty.’

With a gesture of her hands, Robin's fleurs crushed three more of the sea demons, making them dissipate into mana.

‘Still…what a painful task that man gave me,’ she said.

The Assassin of Ohara was well-versed in unexpected situations - when you live in a world where eating fruits turns your body into rubber or allows you to become sand, that was a requirement to go anywhere in life - but she was very startled when Caster of Hogwarts appeared beside her and practically ordered the pirate to help the guests inside the hotel to fend off the beasts that attempted to devour them.

As it turns out, octopi -or whatever the demons were -didn't have throats to crush, and their bodies were very flexible. Thus, the Assassin had to delegate at least ten arms to kill those things without giving them a chance to react.

‘So this is how most people that fought captain felt…I almost pity them.’

Another beast bursts from Robin's attacks. 

‘You don't have a way to deal with those things faster?’ asked Tokiomi, exasperated. Only years of discipline and the rush of the moment allowed him to keep a cool head in the face of such a disaster.

‘I do,’ said the archaeologist. ‘But such methods will almost surely break any chance of keeping Kirei's facade.’

The magus grumbled, recognizing the wisdom.

‘If things get too bad, however…’ thought the Assassin for herself. ‘I may be forced to take drastic measures.’

“It's only us against Caster, then?” said Shadow. “I like those odds.”

“Don't underestimate that man,” said Diarmuid. “I feel we haven't seen the end of his trickery.”

“Do not fret,” said Dumbledore. “I shall handle anything he throws at us.”

The two Lancers looked at each other, then shrugged. Dumbledore seemed skillful in the docks.

“Well then. We shall already go,” declared the spearman before hearing an explosion from ground level. 

‘Rider, what is-’

“No time, trying to kill this vermin!”

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

The fists of 02 flew towards the Berserker, who avoided them nimbly. His Persona fought back with some Ziodynes coming from the tip of its naginata.

“Hey, I can hear you,” said Adachi. “You are being rude. Didn't your mother teach you to-”

BOOM!

He ducked over the gunshot of the summoned weapon as Asuka's glare pierced through his soul.

“No. Not at all,” snarled the pilot, moving her hands to crush Adachi like a fly. He managed to avoid the attack by jumping high in the air, but that left him open to the follow-up kick that Asuka delivered, the titanic metal feet crashing straight against the body of the serial killer and sending him crashing against a wall.

Then, she summoned a gun and started blasting. 

BANG! BANG! BANG!

The Berserker of Inaba barely managed to avoid the attack by rolling away. 

‘Rider!’ said Kayneth, angry. ‘What part of 'secret war' you don't understand?!’

‘The part where I need to keep appearances after everything goes to hell!’ she snapped. ‘If it didn't make such a mess, I would already be using 02's full power! I need to have some fucking restraint, or I could wipe the damn city by accident!'

Dismissing the rifle, she called two knives, swinging wildly against the Berserker of Inaba. 

“This is getting annoying already,” said the man. “Atom Smasher!”

Magatsu-Izanagi swung his spear, and, in response, a thousand slashes happened simultaneously. Asuka felt the AT Field around her arms crack in response as she stepped back, bewildered.

‘How did he slash so fast? I only saw one move!’

‘It's magic!’ pointed out Kayneth. ‘This is hardly the least of your worries when this guy can throw-’

She put her arms in front, summoning 02's arms to block the following Maziodyne.

‘-lightning,’ finished Kayneth.

‘And you say as if that wasn't weirder than the damn-!’ swinging her arm, she swatted away some approaching sea demons, launching them to the sky. ‘The damn demon octopi!’

In Rider's distraction, Adachi snapped his fingers, which his Persona answered by casting a spell on the man. He then charged towards the girl, who took notice of that and swung her arm, a titanic ax appearing in her hands. The spear of the Persona collided with the Smash Hawk…

And the Smash Hawk broke. The girl looked at her destroyed weapon dumbfounded. 

“Wha-!”

Magatsu-Izanagi took the opportunity and pointed his naginata at her.

“Evil Smile.”

A dark purple ghostly skull appeared above the head of the girl. She attempted to dodge it, but it was too late, as it passed through the shield and hit her in the head.

“Agh…wait, n-nothing happened to me,” she said before frowning and looking at her trembling knees. She was shivering. The girl attempted to move for an attack but found herself hesitating, the feeling dominating her whole being. “W-what did you do y-you…”

“Oh, come on,” said Adachi. “A lil' bit of fear never was bad for anyone.”

The girl attempted to move to punch that man, but she once again didn't manage to do anything. Meanwhile, Magatsu-Izanagi floated in front of her, his smile seemingly wider. The Berserker Servant scoffed at his summon.

“Alright, alright. Do your thing. Kid was annoying me anyway.”

The red and black figure used his spear to sweep the Rider of Tokyo-3 off her feet and stabbed her once, twice, thrice. Her forcefield cracked. Adachi snapped his fingers.

“Ghastly Wail.”

And the world spun, and Asuka roared in agony.

The scream destroyed her shield, and only a last-moment dodge stopped Magatsu from connecting a killing blow -and even then, the shoulder of the girl got pretty messed up.

“And let's put you out for now.”

Adachi lifted his feet and punted the girl on the side with all his strength, using the remaining power of Heat Riser on the punt.

The girl rolled away on the ground, her blood staining the concrete. The Berserker cracked his neck.

“Well, let's end this,” he said, grabbing his gun and aiming at the girl's head.

BANG! CLUNK!

He snapped his tongue at the metallic shield that appeared around her.

“Oh right, you could do that too.”

Asuka lifted from the ground, growling.

“Bastard…I will rip you to pieces!”

She summoned the arms of 02, ready to crush that man like a bug. Her eyebrows furrowed as she felt Diarmuid still connected.

‘Why are you lollygagging, huh?! Go ahead and punch that buggy-eyed freak in the face for me!’

The knight blinked, shaking his head.

“So?” asked Shadow.

“Rider is holding down that Adachi man for now,” said Diarmuid. “But we better rush.”

“Agreed,” said Dumbledore. With a move from his wand, the improvised blockade in the window disappeared. A sea demon attempted to jump at the trio but got incinerated by a jet of flames from the sorcerer. “We have spent enough time talking things out. Now, we must finish that man before anyone else is hurt.”

The two Lancers nodded, jumping out of the room. Dumbledore followed suit.

The Servants of the Spear fell for a few seconds before colliding with the wall and grabbing onto it to stop their fall. Dumbledore, meanwhile, kept falling a bit more before a shape that looked like a very cheap carpet flew under him and lifted him.

“A rather… Arabic way to fly,” said the Knight of Fianna. 

“I would say more Babylonian,” commented the Ultimate Lifeform. “Or so professor taught me…”

At some point in the city, a certain golden king sneezed.

“I prefer brooms to carpets,” said the sorcerer. “But this will have to do.”

He noticed the demons crawling towards the trio, and with a swipe from his hand, he summoned large energy shields that pushed the beasts to the top of the building.

“Who comes there?” asked the booming voice of Gilles. “Is it another upstart attempting to interrupt my path to victory?”

Dumbledore pointed his wand to the throat, casting a silent spell, before answering with an equally booming speech.

“Nay! I am but a man attempting to stop a tragedy. I shall ask for the first and final time: give up your mad ambitions or..." he didn't finish, the threat implicit in his tone of voice.

“Ah!” barked Gilles. “Your folly knows no limits, loathsome counterpart! If the words of saints couldn't dissuade me of my vengeance, then the barks of a senile fart will do little more! But be glad you have the opportunity to be something bigger than yourself: to bring a great woman back to our world!”

“We could care less for your delusions!” barked Shadow, boosting through the side of the building, summoning two Chaos Spears in his hand but refraining from throwing them. Once the tentacles popped to snare him, he used them as weapons for once and sliced them apart before throwing them against another bunch of tentacles, blowing them into pieces. One managed to survive, however, and charged against the rodent.

SLASH!

However, it didn't go far: Gaé Dearg slashed through the flesh of the summon, forcing it to dispel thanks to the spear's abilities.

“Do you think your friend would approve of your acts?” growled Diarmuid. “To see such bloodshed in her name?!”

“She will understand,” said the mad Caster. “This world of God forsake her! Her heart will suffer, yes, but she will understand!”

“Or so you say,” said Dumbledore. “Judging what kind of person Saber is from our brief meeting, I'm afraid to say she would be the one most willing to slay you,” his small glasses glinted. “Admit it. You do this for no other person than yourself.”

The googly eyes of the sorcerer focused angrily on his counterpart. 

“Silence him!”

A dozen sea demons appeared around Dumbledore from nothing, ready to tear him apart.

And then the Caster blew up.

BOOM!

The smell of carbonized sea demons pestered through the air as the crumbling forms fell, dismantling themselves before hitting the ground. Caster of Hogwarts barely batted an eye, pointing his wand at Gilles. Some fire still burnt, never harming the glass.

“You are grieving. You never stopped grieving. In doing so, you neglect the most important part of mourning: to keep living life in a way to make the fallen proud.”

He swung his wand again. The remaining fire reunited, taking the shape of a flaming bird. The structure released a cry that felt soothing to the two Lancers and horrific for the fallen marshall.

“Now, it's time to put you to rest.”

Irisviel was positively sweating from her hiding spot as she saw Kirei Kotomine methodically destroy the guardian golems, barely sweating. The woman closed her eyes, feeling the link with the remaining structures.

‘Not enough,’ she thought. ‘What I had was not enough to stop Kotomine.’

Kiritsugu taught her many things through their time together. Most of them were about the world beyond the Einzbern Castle, but her husband had taken it upon himself to teach enough for Irisviel to at least be able to think tactically on a battlefield and fulfill her role as a Master. She watched as one of the constructs attempted to strike down the priest as he handled another statue, and, in response, he reinforced his arm to the point that the blade couldn't bypass his robes and, shoving the other structure aside, punched a hole through the core of the armor, disabling the soldier.

‘He seems well-versed in disabling golems,’ thought the white-haired woman. ‘Is this something that Executors teach to their disciples?’ She frowned. That didn't seem right from what she knew about the group, slayers of heretics and demons alike. ‘This is probably the work of Tokiomi Tohsaka.’

Yes, it did make sense. Through the years, the Tohsakas would have much experience fighting against the Einzbern and would know the best ways to shut down their go-to asset after homunculi.

‘No, it matters not where he learned this information,’ reflected the homunculus, her red eyes watching the ball with worry. ‘What matters is to defeat him, here and now.’

She remembered some of Kiritsugu's lessons. The first lesson was about recognizing superior opponents and what to do in those cases.

‘My first recommendation for you would be to escape,’  the mercenary said. ‘But if that's not possible, then never attempt to go for direct combat. Play smart, not hard.’

Irisviel frowned, thinking of the resources she still had available. Kirei had already run over most of the golems, she reminded herself, but a few prepared her final trap with Kiritsugu's equipment in the castle. She held a pistol she knew wouldn't do much against the enemy magus, her magecraft, and Avalon.

The homunculus touched her chest, the image of the golden sheath in her mind. Yes, it was thanks to the Noble Phantasm that her plan was possible. Otherwise, the risks would have outweighed the reward at every turn. It was so dubious that she still hesitated tremendously in executing it.

But if it did work…

It would put Kotomine in such a position that it was doubtable if even his Servants could save him.

Irisviel took a deep heart and steeled her resolve. The woman knew what she was getting into after deciding to face Kotomine head-on. 

‘I must do this myself,’ thought Irisviel. ‘If those two ever met…’

The homunculus couldn't think of her husband losing to any magi. Except if said magi was Kirei Kotomine.

Leaving her operation room, she started walking for the scenario of her ambush.

The castle's lady was obliged to receive her guests well.

The priest didn't even wince after he punched the last golem. He felt pain in the first few fights, even through his reinforced fists, but soon learned to hold on against the pain. Either that or his hands became numb from punching through stone and steel, but Kirei was aware enough of his body to know that such a thing was unlikely.

“...”

The former Executor analyzed his surroundings, looking for more enemies or traps, eagle-sharp eyes analyzing everything.

‘There is nothing ahead,’ said the bandolier Hassan, confirming what Kirei saw. Then again, he hardly needed that, considering that golems were far from being stealthy beings. Even the Einzbern, masters in the craft of artificial life, needed time to make their more advanced creations, like the current head of the Einzbern, Jubstacheit.

Making an already done structure a golem was easy in comparison, and, for a well-trained master of the art like an Einzbern, making simpler golems like the rougher ones he faced was incredibly simple. Other magi would have issues dealing with so many of them at once. However, Kirei was not like most magi: he had the training of an Executor and years of training in a martial art that specialized in inner damage to the opponent, meaning he could destroy the cores that powered the constructs.

It was not an easy trial to overcome, but Kirei did well enough and didn't suffer too much damage.

Now, he was a step closer to his objective.

‘It's unlikely that the Einzbern homunculus knew of my arrival for too long,’ thought the priest. ‘I don't think I will see many more traps on the way ahead.’

Still, Kirei was no fool to jump to a wrong conclusion. Who knows what the Magus Killer taught to that woman? So, he started walking through the halls, carefully squirting the area around him for more traps.

‘...why?’

The Executor raised his eyebrow.

‘Why what?’

‘Why go through all this for a woman?’ asked Hassan -not Rashid, Asako, thought Kirei.

‘I thought you did things without questioning,’ replied Kirei.

He could feel the Assassin woman crossing her arms.

‘Indeed we do. Yet, the more we think about this, the less this action makes sense. It isn't about revenge because there is no tale of this family or their contractor wronging you or your parents. It isn't about obeying orders: Tokiomi Tohsaka ordered you to stay in one place and let us and Saber do the work. It isn't even about this Holy Grail War, as you have no interest in the homunculus condition as a Master. Objectively, this is a foolish maneuver, risking bringing unwanted attention to our forces from one of our main competitors. So, why go through all this?’

The man stopped for a few seconds, thinking in an answer, before moving onwards.

‘You watched me,’ he said. ‘You know that this…is a journey to understand who I am and that Kiritsugu Emiya is key for its success. The Einzbern employed him for years now -therefore, there are great odds that Irisviel von Einzbern is familiar with his character. And having him gunning for me is just what I want.’

The Assassin scoffed. ‘Whatever you say, Master. However, do not point fingers at anyone after getting hurt playing with fire.’

‘It was never in my plans.’

He stopped in his tracks, taking notice of a sudden screech. His muscles tensed, but it was not necessary. The new construct that flew at the end of the corridor immediately performed a U-turn, leaving only a trail of silver lining to follow.

‘...seems that she wants to talk,’ thought the priest.

‘Or kill you,’ shot back Asako. ‘This screams trap to me.’

The priest cracked his shoulders.

‘Well, let's see if the prey can become a predator,’ he said, starting to follow the trail.

Bradley has never been so much in the backfoot before.

Now, for all his abilities, he was fully aware that there were people who surpassed him in certain aspects on the battlefield for all the efforts Father put into creating an ultimate warrior. Some were far more experienced, others had techniques born from years of training solely for that, and then there was the occasional freak of nature that could trade blows with him with no problems.

But here was the thing. Though King Bradley was not the best in each area of battle, he was excellent in them all - which, time and time again, proved to be far deadlier if he had specialized in a single topic.

The female knight, though?

At first glance, they seemed to be trading blows evenly. An outside viewer would see them as blurs striking at speeds no human could expect to match.

Yet, the one that shed more blood was the homunculus.

He crossed his blades to stop the attack from his counterpart, the invisible sword making visible cracks appear in the military weapons. Snarling, the wrathful homunculus kicked the blonde knight away and threw the broken weapons at her -which would be an unorthodox move if it wasn't for the fact that the Saber of Amestris immediately summoned a new and fresh pair to his hands, simultaneously charging with his wrecked blades against the king.

Without batting an eye, the swordswoman blocked the projectiles with the back of the blade. Then, she swung a Mana Burst-empowered diagonal slash that Bradley barely managed to slide below. After the fact, he touched his forehead, feeling hot blood in his fingers. It was a light wound, but a wound nonetheless.

Yes. Even against an army. Even against the men of Briggs, Amestris finest force. Even against the traitor, Greed, inside the body of the Prince of Xing. Never had Wrath of the Homunculi been so much in the backfoot…

And he was thrilled.

He couldn't help himself. His life, for lack of better words, was boring. Father took care that he had no opposition in the political world, and Bradley had to obey his orders to the letter, only having the freedom to be. His fate, set in stone from birth.

Not battles, however.

Of course, not all fights were unpredictable. Sometimes, it was as simple as “I am stronger than you, so I win.” Other times, however? It was a complicated affair, as people had different styles, mindsets, and objectives: no fighter was the same, and when Bradley found someone unique, part of him couldn't help but enjoy it.

Because it meant a change of pace, a way for different things to happen: a battlefield was an arena where anything was possible. A match of wits, power, skills, a way to express his true self.

Yes, King Bradley was…

He felt the muscles of his face start to move.

The knight interrupted her charge as she saw the bloodthirsty grin appear once again on Bradley's face.

Artoria was a brave person. A cowardly king would inevitably doom their country by making decisions based on fear rather than thinking logically.

Yet, even she hesitated in the face of the visage of a smiling demon, an image straight from the depths of hell. 

Why was he smiling? He was an excellent warrior, no doubt about that. Yet, up until now, Artoria was dominating her counterpart in combat. With every blow he attempted, the King of Knights delivered two. Every stab, every slash, thanks to her Instinct, none of these blows even managed to bypass her armor - the closest thing to a wound until now was a slash in the side of her armor from one of the broken swords, and even that was patched quickly with some mana channeling.

By all means, he shouldn't be so carefree.

So why did he smile? Did he know something she didn't? Or was she overanalyzing the situation?

Using the moment of hesitation, Bradley jumped to the other side of the room. Artoria kept her back against the staircase. The smile on his face slowly disappeared as he bowed slightly.

“Forgive me,” said the warrior in an overly formal tone. “I am better at controlling my temper normally.”

Saber narrowed her eyes, pieces slowly clicking together. 

“It's quite dangerous for a warrior to let their battlelust out of control,” remarked the knight, gripping Excalibur's handle tightly.

She had seen many cases of such things happening: of great warriors losing themselves in the heat of battle and focusing only on slashing the opposition away until everyone was dead or the warrior was.

“Oh, you misunderstand me. I can hold myself back…” the one-eyed man cracked his neck. After a few seconds, his wounds started to close - Artoria recognized that her counterpart's Master was sending energy for him to patch them. “But I do not need to do so, nor have the wish.”

Every battle he engaged back then -bar his last one, possibly - was to further Father's goals. Here, he still was fighting for the sake of someone else's plans, but, most importantly…

“Don't you think there's a certain beauty in fighting for the sake of fighting, knight?”

Saber narrowed her eyes.

“Excuse me?” Her voice had a dangerous edge to it.

He stared at her with his uncovered eye.

“I can see the image of a leader in you. Anyone can. The way you walk, your speech filled with pride, the aura of a ruler. Surely, you must have fought countless battles by the way you move.”

Saber wanted to keep fighting and not let that man speak. However, her curiosity bested her common sense.

“Indeed,” said Artoria. “My country was under threat of many enemy attacks in my time. To fend them off my lands, I had to take arms and strike them down whenever they rose to threaten my home."

“Yes, I see, I see,” said Bradley. “Yet now, we fight free from such bindings. We fight to fulfill our wishes and nothing more.”

The glare of Artoria became positively dragon-like. If eyes could kill, King Bradley would be eight feet underground.

“If this is your sad attempt at comparing us, give up. I fight for a bigger cause than you could ever muster.”

“Oh, but people always say that,” said the homunculus, wearing a disdainful expression on his face. “The holier than thou type, fighting for gods, for the oppressed, for the dogs that eat food out of the ground. I have no interest in such reasoning yet, I fought for them for so long. Isn't that contradictory, oh counterpart mine?”

Artoria answered by boosting towards the swordsman, stone cracking with each step. The man blocked the attack, but the impact sent him flying to the wall -no, wait. He somehow managed to flip midair and land on his foot against the stone, the wall cracking from the impact.

“Maybe it is,” commented the knight. “But it's also a very shallow view. Fighting for the sake of it… if that's how you view the world, you're nothing but a dog barking at the wrong tree. I never claimed to be on higher moral ground: I fight for the sake of my people, and that's that, and the same applied to all of those I met on the battlefields in life.”

“So you recognize that,” said Bradley. “Yet, you misunderstand me, but perhaps there's no one to blame but me for this. For all the speeches I gave, I never wrote them, except for the one I gave in my marriage. Yet, even there…”

He went silent for a few seconds before continuing.

“Even there, I had to hide myself. My true self. Something that I'm only allowed to bring out on the battlefield, and not for long. In my world, it took an army to defeat me, and even then, I dragged a fair amount of men and women together to hell,” he gave a joyful laugh. “And yet, here you are. A woman strong enough to wipe a battalion with a swing of your blade, tough enough to tank a cannonball to the chest, fast enough to outrun even the fastest locomotive. For men like me, those that can only express their feelings on the battlefield…”

Ignoring the protests from Kirei in their mind connection, he ripped his eyepatch out and threw it away.

“...can't you understand that meeting such a mighty foe makes my blood boil red hot?!”

The knight stared intently at the eye in what she presumed to be an empty orbit. She managed to muster a vaguely red circle around something when Bradley charged.

And then her Instinct roared.

“!”

Artoria had naturally good instincts in life. It was as natural to her as breathing. They were so good that, as Servant, they were one of her skills.

How would she describe them?

Think of someone throwing a ball. If you watch sideways, you can follow the trajectory it will take acutely, right?

Artoria was that observer - except that she anticipates the moment when the ball is thrown and can follow many of them at once -even from angles where it should be impossible to notice them.

It was a bogged-down explanation - it's not true Clairvoyance like Merlin had. It's simply an elevation of a human's instincts to the point where it's possible to “see” the future, and Artoria would be lying if she said it was a perfect system, as it still depended on her perception of her surroundings and what an enemy is capable of. She felt she had a good grasp on the abilities of the other Saber, however.

Which is why it was surprising her Instinct blared.

“!”

During the following seconds, she saw at least thirty possibilities to counter Bradley's charge.

And in all thirty, they ended with him-

Thinking quickly, she decided to go for a Mana Burst-boosted lunge against his enemies' own.

Much to her surprise, the man avoided the attack with ease and struck her in the chest.

She unleashed Strike Air against the man, throwing him away as she felt the blow against her armor. It didn't straight pierce it, but it was caving in in the area of impact.

The man charged again. Once more, possibilities filled Saber's mind. Eyes widening, she attempted to retreat, but the man somehow predicted her intentions and unleashed a slash that nearly split her head open in two, only barely avoided by the knight twisting her neck so that the point of impact was instead her left shoulder.

She grunted in pain as metal hit bone, but Bradley was only getting started. With his other blade, he moved to perform a scissor attack, once again aiming for the head. However, Saber managed to grab it with her armored left hand -a painful feat, considering the previous wound -and wrangled it out of his hands, attempting to skewer the man with Excalibur, but he avoided the attack. Artoria grits her teeth. ‘So he learned the true size of my sword.’

The King of Knights let the borrowed blade fall to the ground, turning into mana and then ripped the other out of her shoulder. Blood flew for a few seconds before Irisviel's magic patched the wound.

“My, my,” said Bradley, his two eyes staring at her with hunger. She could see now that the symbol in the otherwise blank eye was that of some dragon surrounding a hexagram. “You are worth the attention you got, knight. But here's a little secret for you…”

His grin became positively predatory.

“No person or group that fought me has ever escaped unwounded after I unveiled this eye of mine.”

‘Saber!’ snarled Kirei, irritated.

He didn't want to reveal Bradley's true abilities so early in the war. Tokiomi would be unhappy with that, even more so with the attack on the Hyatt. He could imagine the Second Owner pulling his hair out in anger at the blatant break of secrecy over the rules of the war.

‘I suppose he would be even angrier for even more things if they ever came to light.’

Kirei nodded absently.

‘How is father? What is he-’

‘Preparing damage control,’ said Asako. ‘He tried to look for you at first, but we diverted his attention to making him focus on performing damage control over the situation in the Hyatt. So far, it seems to be working: some of the newspapers we saw declared what is happening there as another move in the gang wars, with the fight leading to a massive…’ she paused before saying with some confusion. ‘...gas leak.’

Kirei nodded. ‘The usual excuse, then.’

‘I question the validity of such an excuse.’

‘People tend to believe in what they want to believe,’ replied the priest. ‘A gas leak is simply an adequate scapegoat for the more egregious cases. As long as it is plausible, common people will latch on to that as the true reason behind the events.’

The woman hummed over this information, recalling past assassinations. She didn't have much space to question her Master after some things she -they - saw through the years.

‘Still…I want a full report of what happened later. Tokiomi will rely on me to inform everything he may have missed with his Assassin.’

He turned towards a large corridor. The man noticed that the wire turned into another curve, but he could see that it didn't go further.

‘Final stop, then,’ thought the priest.

‘Seems so,’ replied the Assassin. ‘If there's any trap, it's inside that room. Be careful.’

Kirei nodded, approaching the room with extreme caution. He turned to the oak door and put an ear against it, attempting to hear any sounds. Either there was nothing, the homunculus used a spell to muffle any sounds or maybe the door was only that good at cutting sounds from inside.

Part of him wanted to kick the door and use the surprise factor to overcome whatever trap Einzbern left inside. Yet, discipline prevailed: he slowly turned the knob of the door and opened it.

In a chair at the other end of the room sat Irisviel von Einzbern, her face a mask of pure, tranquil fury, fitting to receive an invader like him. Her clothes were completely white, which, combined with the natural pale complexion of an Einzbern homunculus, reminded him of snow.

His muscles tensed. Where was the-

A whoosh in the wind! Kirei was too slow to dodge the wire construct that hit from behind and into the room, the door closing noisily behind him. The priest felt the wire constrict against his neck, to which he answered by reinforcing the body. It didn't cut, but he felt the pressure of the tool attempting to decapitate him. 

‘Dammit! I got careless! I need to end this fast!'

He prepared to charge against Irisviel von Einzbern-

“Behind you.”

The man scoffed at that, but then he heard the mechanical beeps behind him. He committed the mistake of looking at the wall at his back, and his blood went cold.

Explosives. The wall behind the priest was plastered with explosives, all seemingly ready to blow up at a gesture. He noticed the detonator in the homunculus hands, positioned so that one move would trigger the charges and blow them both to kingdom come.

“Make a wrong move, and I will blow us both to smithereens,” she said coldly -and Kirei didn't doubt that the woman would do such a thing without hesitation. Even then, he argued:

“You won't press that button," said Kirei. "The Einzbern wouldn't be happy to see the Grail War ruined once more - and in the hands of their representative, no less."

“Contrary to you, I'm certain of my survival,” barked back the homunculus - but Kirei noticed her hand slightly trembling.

He understood the situation quickly, a pit forming in his stomach. The wire would keep trying to crush his throat until he couldn't keep Reinforcement anymore -and there was no hope of him outlasting an Einzbern homunculus in terms of magical reserves, so it was a matter of when. Saber wouldn't hear him in his near-state of battle frenzy, requiring a Command Seal to summon him, leading the homunculus to call her own Saber for defense. And, while there was a short distance between them two, Kirei was uncertain of his chances of reaching the woman fast enough to stop the explosives.

She forced him into a stalemate.

A stalemate that she was sure to win.

CRACK!!

Asuka winced as the lightning beam thrown by the Berserker of Inaba hit her. Saber had made it look like it wasn't a big deal at first, but now Asuka realized it was because the blonde bitch had a high rank in Magic Resistance.

She looked at the scorched spot where thunder hit her armor. That was a powerful spell, no doubt about it. Zero Two was pretty resistant with the AT field and its natural defenses, but Asuka's own Magic Resistance was in the gutter, meaning that the attacks hit with near-maximum-

“Just make things easier for me and stay down, girlie!”

The bastard snapped his fingers, and Magatsu-Izanagi called forth a tornado that surrounded Zero Two, forcing Asuka further into the defensive. She attempted to dodge the attack she knew was coming, but-

Again, the ghost skull connected. Asuka's breath accelerated, the world muddying out of the blue.

“And a one, and a two, and a one, two, three!”

The Ghastly Wail hit her like a truck, throwing the girl against another building -the fourth. 

“Do…do you know…only one trick, you bastard?” panted Asuka, falling to the ground, temporarily dispelling her Evangelion.

The man in the fancy suit raised his shoulders - a motion that his protector also did, much to her irritation.

“Hey, if it works, it works. Why change the team that keeps winning, eh?”

“Guh! You…piss me off!”

The teenager called 02's arm. It held an enormous pistol that she proceeded to fire against the man, who hid behind his spirit for protection.

“Woah, woah, lass! If you came carrying that kind of heat when I was a cop, I would have to arrest-”

The girl didn't let him finish his quip, jumping from her hole and drop-kicking Magatsu-Izanagi into a building with 02's legs.

Of course, as Adachi was behind the Persona, he was also thrown into it.

Much to her annoyance, it wasn't enough to harm him too much, as he lifted from the point of impact, cracking his neck.

“Owie. I'm making being thrown into buildings too much of a habit recently,” he glared at the girl. “And that's the second time you do that. What do you have against me?”

“Your whole being,” snarled the pilot.

“...you know, fair,” admitted the dirty cop, scratching his head with his gun. “Teenagers these days can be so blunt, eh?”

He threw his weapon in the air and clapped his hands.

“Whatever! Regardless of your opinion, it is obvious to see who's winning here, girlie!” he pointed at her. “So do yourself a favor and stop fighting. Like, for real. I want to get back to my business, but Gilles dragged me here, so-”

Right at that moment, the gun fell in his head. He touched the point where it hit, then cowered:

“OWWWWWW! Why did I think that was a good idea?! Ow, ow!”

Rider of Tokyo-3 stared blankly at the man.

‘Will I…will I lose to this clown?’

That impromptu off-time was helping Asuka to get herself together. Even then, the man had battered her with the Evil Smile/Ghastly Wail combo. Not to say he was fast even when that entity didn't help him move by dragging him like a rag doll or casting spells to buff him.

‘Dammit, Rider, you're supposed to be better than this!’

‘You've been…quite silent for a while…Kayneth,’ said Asuka. ‘This bastard is…nimble, and his spells are troublesome…’

The man huffed through their connection.

‘How are things…up?’

After a few seconds, Diarmuid's voice answered.

‘Not as good as you would expect,’ said the man. ‘We may be three, but this man…this man is proving to be a handful.’

BOOM!

Both Servants looked at the sky as candy corn rained upon them. The Rider looked at them, baffled.

‘...I wouldn't eat if I were you.’

‘Ew.’

Meanwhile, Berserker munched at his candy.

“Why does this taste like takoyaki?” His eyes slowly widened, and he spit the sweet. “Ew, ew, ew…!”

Asuka would laugh if it weren't for the fact that she was pissed and exhausted.

‘We're running out of time. This Servant prepared for a war of attrition,’ snarled Kayneth. ‘We need to figure this out, now.’

‘Maybe I can crush him with 02?’ wondered Asuka. ‘If you just allow me to use it's full-’

‘No!’ said Kayneth. ‘This situation still can be hidden without further issue, but destroying the hotel will raise too many questions! We need to think of something else!’

‘...I may have a plan,’ said Diarmuid. ‘But I will need some time to execute it. Asuka, do you have something that can hit from far away?’

‘I do have something,’ said the girl. ‘But, if we don't want collateral, it has to be a shot to the sky.’

“Oi, your guard is wide open!”

The girl summoned 02's armor as Magatsu-Izanagi unleashed its Vorpal Blade again. She grits her teeth. It was the same cycle. He kept her away with the naginata of his protector, locked her down with its magic, pulled that combo, and repeated the lockdown.

‘Dammit, he seemed tired after a few spells against the white chick's Saber,’ snarled the pilot. ‘Is this jester being boosted by his Caster? How can I-’

Her eyes laid on the man, who was…sweating profusely. What happened? He seemed fine before, and-

‘I got it!’

She opened her eyes.

‘Got what?’

‘The sealing spell to the remnant of the building. I will not let those pesky things invade my turf so easily. Oh, and also the spell to make Sola-Ui stop struggling -damn woman, get your priorities straight, can't you see we're in danger?! Oh, and the weakness in this pathetic combo of his.’

‘Milord, I think you should have led with that,’ said Diarmuid. Asuka agreed but decided to ignore that for now.

‘Alright, you are on mission control today. What do I have to do?’

‘Let him do his lockdown, and be prepared. You will know what to do next.’

Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion. What-

The weight of 02 stopped her from being dragged by the winds, but it was a close call.

“Alright, lass. It was fun to play with you, but maybe it's time for lights out in our small show!” he snapped his fingers, and the curse appeared midair. “Let's see if a rowdy girl like you gets scared straight by this!”

Evil Smile flew in her direction, and she grit her teeth in frustration, waiting for the paralysis to come.

Yet, it never did.

‘What?’

She heard the Ghastly Wail echoing through the street, but the pilot felt nothing. His vision obscured by dust, Adachi looked at the girl, surprised by seeing her unharmed.

“What?”

In that brief moment of shock, the arm of 02 stretched, wielding a Progressive Knife, and only a hasty dodge by the cop stopped him from being skewered. Even then, the blow pierced his side cleanly.

The red-haired girl gave a grin filled with malice. “Got you~!”

His Persona flew in the man's defense, unleashing Atom Smasher. However, he was sliced in half by a quick blow of the Evangelion. His master grits his teeth.

“I got it now,” said Asuka. “Your weak spots. That scream thing only works when I'm afraid, right?”

She remembered the words from before. ‘A lil' bit of fear never did any bad to anyone.’

“That curse forced that feeling on me, leaving your move in the best conditions to mess me badly.”

‘Not only that, but it also messed up my synchrony with 02,’ thought the pilot. ‘I dismissed it as being because of the fight from earlier, but if it's fear that he's forcing me into it, then that means my connection with it was unstable as hell.’

Asuka bit her lips in frustration. If Asuka had known that earlier, she could have asked Kayneth to help her and this farce.

‘What did you do anyway?’ asked the pilot. 

‘Momentary Reinforcement,’ replied the man. ‘I temporarily cut Diarmuid's energy to focus all of mine and Sola-Ui's power into you. It ramped up your Magic Resistance enough to null the spell.’

Right, which led to the second thing. She summoned 02's arm and held the Berserker against the concrete.

“Second thing. This whole beat-and-run thing. I suppose your Caster helped to expand your mana pool, but those blade tricks don't use mana, right? They leave you winded up, meaning you need space to keep using them. So, you let two or three big spells out, use that annoying combo, and repeat until I was dead.”

“It…worked pretty well, didn't-!”

The entity appeared in midair, attempting to stab the girl, but the AT shield didn't budge a bit this time around.

“Sorry, but your time is up, pain in the ass,” said Asuka, increasing the pressure. “Let's see how well you joke when I open your head like a melon!”

She called her other arm, summoning the Progressive Knife. 

Much to her surprise, the man laughed.

“What's so funny?”

“Oh, nothing…” he said, a shit-eating grin. “Just…thinking that you didn't read many stories back in life, girlie. Most bad guys ain't dispatched so easily, you know?”

“Too bad this is reality!” she lowered the knife only to find her movement restricted. “What the-”

She found herself staring at an enormous tentacle monster. Her mind estimated that as being around three men tall and being pretty similar to the smaller fry she had been crushing during the fight with Adachi.

Only now did she realize how these tentacles were strong. And how sharp were those teeth. And how slippery they were, as she was grabbed by her torso and raised to the sky, 02's arm disappearing thanks to her shock.

“What the fuck is this?!”

Adachi lifted from the ground. His clothes were crumpled, and he wore an annoyed expression, but he seemed overall unharmed.

“Seems that Gilles got enough energy to make some of his good stuff. Meet the Sea Horror, girlie! If you don't know where things are going now, well, you haven't seen enough anime!” he paused. “No, wait, take a deep breath, Adachi. You are depraved, but not that much. You don't want to see that.”

“For once, we agree!” snarled the girl. The tentacle around her waist hurt like hell - she could feel spikes piercing through her suit -but Asuka glared at the beast. When it moved to eat her, she roared. “Now cower and die!”

She summoned 02's arm, crushing the demon against the floor like a bug. The girl rolled onto the floor, wincing at the new wounds, but felt they weren't too deep. She had now to focus-

The Rider turned to where the man was. She could see her, alright. Only now, he was protected by half a dozen of those things.

“Now, lemme give you a life lesson, girlie. If you ever become an adult, you will realize that there are certain battles you must fight…but most importantly, know which ones you need to bail out. Sayonara!”

Avoiding the shot from her gun, the man jumped into the air and jumped straight into the wall of the building, as he used his Persona to slingshot himself to the top.

‘Dammit! That piece of shit slipped right between-!’

She didn't finish her thoughts as the demons jumped at her.

‘Asuka!’ said Diarmuid, feeling his companion's plight.

“Watch it!”

The Lancer barely dodged the tentacle flying in his direction, slicing it with Gaé Buidhe, then throwing Gaé Dearg to finish it off. With a gesture, he recalled his weapon.

“What happened?” asked Dumbledore, using his wand to twist two beasts into a singular shape that was seemingly made only of knots. Meanwhile, his fiery phoenix burned to a crisp anything that attempted to catch the old sorcerer from behind.

“My partner managed to wound Berserker of Inaba, but he managed to escape the battle. I don't know what he's about-”

Diarmuid's instincts blared as the naginata flew where he previously stood a moment ago. The magic defenses of the building held, but barely.

“Damn, guess the brat snitched on me,” said Adachi shamelessly. “Thought I could have at least gotten a kill while you were distracted.”

The eyes of the knight narrowed.

“You are a fool if you think a Knight of Fionna would fall for something as dishonorable as a sneak attack.”

The smirk of the man was a sign something wasn't right.

“Good thing it was no mere assault.”

He noticed something at his feet and attempted to dodge it, but it was too late, the orb shot to his chest.

“Let's see how damaging this is. Mudoon.”

“!”

The knight felt his mind spin for a bit. 'A death curse?' He then smirked as the Berserker looked at the spearman, dejected.

“Sorry, but a curse of this level has no hope of bypassing my Magic Resistance.”

Adachi scoffed, scratching his head, only to dodge a stray kick from Shadow. He attempted to use Mudoon again, but the Ultimate Lifeform was fast enough to avoid the spell and counter it with a punch to Adachi's chest.

“Seriously, why you knight guys-” the serial killer dodged the rain of Chaos Spears that followed. “-are so freaking hard to fight? It's unfair. I want a balance change here!”

A water orb swallowed him whole from above -or, depending on perspective, from the side of the building -and then froze midair.

“Sorry, but we only have the cards we got at the start of this ritual and nothing else,” said Dumbledore. “Now…”

Before he could move, a tornado blew inside the sphere, releasing its prisoner. Then, a tentacle flew from above, dragging him to the top of the building.

“Like hell you will escape!” snarled Shadow. He charged energy, then unleashed a wave of Chaos Spears against the escaping Berserker, but a Sea Terror popped in the way, absorbing the attacks like a meat shield.

“Have fun!”

More Terrors popped on the surface of the building. Soon enough, Adachi couldn't listen to them anymore and found himself face-to-face with his partner.

“Man. I think we're going have to kill that Rider chick, Gilles. She will rather rip herself apart than become art.”

“Shameful,” said Gilles. “Such a beauty that could make a beautiful piece.”

The man shrugged, then stopped to think.

“Say, we are on top, and those guys are in the middle to bottom of this building. Why don't we kill Lancer's Master and get this done?”

The sorcerer closed his eyes.

“If you wish for a logical answer, my friend, then there's always the chance he meets one of the other Masters and makes a new contract. Therefore, we must personally remove him from this plane.”

He opened them and turned to his friend.

“Besides, where is the meaning of killing that man in such an ignoble way? To win Jeanne's memories back, we must conquer this obstacle by conquering him, killing the man who dared to wound dear Jeanne! Yes, we must crush that man!”

“...man, you nearly had me there for a moment,” chuckled Adachi. “Almost thought you went sane for a bit. Good to see you are the same old Gil.”

The cop put his back on the ground, closing his eyes.

“Mind if I take a nap for a bit? That girl roughed me up down there.”

Gilles gave a blissful smile.

“Sleep all that you want, my friend,” said the sorcerer as he looked down below. “Our victory shall come soon.”

Gilles was sure of that, or he wasn't the former Marshall of France. He had put much thought into making sure this adventure worked for him.

The spell he used to form the Bounded Field was a pretty "cool" trick that Prelati developed. After preparing the seals, they created the field around the designed region. While it was visible to anyone - even non-magical people - its intention was never to hide anything.

It is to trap and ensure no one enters. Perfect to kill large groups of people or imprison someone that you really wanted dead. It was only possible to escape safely by killing the sorcerer that cast it or destroying Prelati's Book. The single drawback of the technique is for him to be inside the sphere, but the skill of the Field made that meaningless.

That field amplified the natural abilities of his Noble Phantasm - in other words, the near-limitless summoning of sea demons - and applied to a set region. That was not all: it also leeched mana from the air to help supply the book's natural Magical Reactor, allowing it to easily summon bigger demons. Gilles could have called the stronger demons in the book from the get-go, but he had the prudence to keep those cards close to his chest in case something went wrong.

That said, the Field benefited from consuming a particular type of energy.

‘Yes…they are faltering. Cucucu!’

Humans. Gilles needed a place with many humans close. It was only a blessing that his loathsome target resided in such a place, right?

Once he consumed those humans, Gilles would have no trouble calling a horde of demons to crush all the Servants in the region. Then, he would keep marching either until Jeanne recovered his memories or, if he had to, win the Cup of the damned son of God and use its power to restore what she lost.

‘Yes, Jeanne. Soon, I shall bring you back in your full glory!’

He looked dismissively at the knight, the sorcerer, and the eldritch emissary.

‘Be glad, misguided souls. You shall serve a purpose higher than you could ever think of.’

‘This is a losing battle,’ thought Robin.

Her Master didn't answer. What could he say? The judgment of the woman couldn't be more correct. Tokiomi had lost count already of how many monsters he had seen Robin crush. Or the number that fell by the occasional hits of what he supposed was the work of the Magus Killer. Or even the deaths that some of the Hassans managed to sneak through unnoticed.

Subtly, Tokiomi had to pull all the stops to avoid a tragedy that could incur the wrath of the Association upon the heads of every magi in Fuyuki, and even that was not enough.

Worse, the monsters inside the field seemed to be growing stronger.

‘Good grief, we had no records that Prelati had such a nasty spell!’ snarled Tokiomi.

“From what I read about magi, this seems rather on par with your overall behavior!” said Robin, summoning fifty arms to crush one of the Sea Horrors. “Though this could be something he did for-Ugh!”

She grabbed her arms, feeling the pain of another cut below her coat's sleeve. The pirate grimaced.

“Ah…I liked this coat,” said the woman. “I didn't want to stain it.”

Then again, this was already a lost cause, she thought grimly, looking at the arms filled with cuts. Robin figured out the best ways to kill the Sea Demons quickly, but by then, the former Straw Hat Pirate had taken considerable damage from the try-and-error method she took and from fighting on many battlefields at once.

And the worst part was the larger demons that started popping up. She had to give half a mind to deal with just one.

Well, now there were four of these things sliding towards the entrance of the building. The Assassin of Ohara could hear the fearful screeches of the people, watching horrified as the beasts continued on their way.

‘Guh! No choice then,’ she thought. ‘I will have to take them in pairs.’

She focused on the two that seemed to go faster than the others.

‘Cuatro Manos! Clutch!’

From the backs of two demons, two titanic arms - four in total -appeared and wrapped themselves on their heads. Then, with a sickening crush, they started to suffocate the monsters and crush their bodies like cola cans.

Meanwhile, as the two other monsters advanced, something fell into one of their mouths, making it explode in a mess of blood and guts and the other to slip and fall - which Robin gracefully abused to summon one more Mano to crush its brain.

The Devil Child took some deep breaths. She wasn't as used to using her Manos as her other techniques - as it turns out, giant limbs weren't all that great when you are an expert in silent assassination.

It was working until now -but for how long?

‘We can't…let those people here,’ said the archaeologist. ‘Caster probably needs them for some reason. It would be in our best interests…’

‘...to remove them,’ concluded Tokiomi. ‘I'm using all of my available tools to look for holes in the defenses, but-’

She grimaced. ‘We can't stay on the defensive any longer.’

The woman looked at the entrance of the building. Some guards used their remaining ammo to snipe away a few more kills with their guns, but it did little to stop the hoard. Robin did not doubt that their rushed blockade would fall like a stack of dominos once the monsters reached the-

Her eyes narrowed a bit, as a thought came to her head.

‘What is the problem?’

‘Why didn't we hear of any monsters appearing inside the building?’

Silence.

‘I…would suppose that this is the work of the Lord in Hyatt, El-Melloi,’ started Tokiomi, only to stop himself. ‘No, this wouldn't make sense. I only felt partial protection in the upper levels. If that's the case, then…’

Robin heard it first: the screams of fear and pain, of people terrorized at being ripped apart by something beyond their worlds.

‘Curses! They were hunting on the other floors first!’ said Robin.

She could hear gunshots as people attempted to slay the monster inside the hotel. The Assassin of Ohara moved to help, but then-

“!”

More Sea Horrors appeared close to the entrance, and Robin had to summon her Manos to immobilize them - all five she could muster. She felt sweat wetting her back, her devil fruit power pushed to the limit.

‘I can't…I can't move,’ said Robin, in a frustrated tone.

For a moment, her memories flew back to that day. The smell of fire, the screams of confusion, the-

‘Snap out of it, Assassin!’

She shook her head as she attempted to crush those monsters as fast as she could to help the other people.

Then, she heard a siren, and a few seconds later, something pierced through the Bounded Field.

A few minutes earlier

‘Ah…this is a tough nut to crack, isn't it?’ said Iskandar.

“You only realize this now?” said Waver, sitting at a bench tiredly, attempting to look small. It was unlikely for anyone to recognize his face, considering he was up in the sky when he and Rider tried to break through the Bounded Field, but he wouldn't take any chances. “Caster, how are you doing?”

‘Not as well as I expected,’ admitted the sorcerer. ‘I managed to figure that the Bounded Field was related to the concept of summoning, but that's it. The more time we leave it untouched, the tougher it is to end this.’

‘Can't you destroy the seals that are feeding into this?’ 

‘I considered it, but the backlash would be too much for anyone,’ replied the sorcerer. ‘Besides, I can't predict what will happen with the monsters if we do that. Will they stay in this area? Will they disappear? Or will they be unleashed in the city, causing further chaos?’

Waver grits his teeth in frustration. He could also feel that Iskandar was also frustrated.

“That Caster's audacity…the King of Conquerors can't be stopped by something as silly as a wall!”

The boy turned to see the materialized form of Iskandar. The good news is that he wasn't wearing his warrior vests.

The bad news is that he was still pantless. The boy's cheek went red.

“Dammit, Rider!” hissed Waver. “Don't you materialize-!”

He felt a hand on his shoulder. A cop, he thought, ready to arrest them for indecency or something like that.

“No, mister officer, I don't know this-” he started before realizing it wasn't a cop.

“You are lucky that my Hero License holds no value here, young man,” said Archer of Musutafu, looking unamused at the fellow red-haired Servant. “Now, move. We have too little time to waste in games like these.”

“...wha-”

Without waiting for an answer, Archer lifted the boy from the bench and started dragging him by the collar.

“Oi, Rider!” snapped the Master. “Won't you do anything about this?!” he pointed at the Servant, who scoffed.

“Please, if I had the intention of harming either of you, I wouldn't be foolish enough to make it close to a crowd,” he stared at the dark dome around the Hyatt grimly. “Even though I feel it would go unnoticed for a time.”

“I can't see a problem with your arguments, but please, put him down,” asked the king. “He gets quite surly when things don't go his way.”

“I don't-!”

The human didn't finish, as Endeavor promptly dropped him in his ass.

“I will only ask it once. Be our ally for the night, and we shall provide a ride inside the Bounded Field. So, if any of us gets a killing blow on either Caster, Berserker of Inaba, or their Master, everyone else gets the credit. Is this clear?”

He blinked. Rider frowned.

“You clearly state that you have a way to bypass the defenses around the tower. Why include us in your plan?”

The Archer scratched his chin.

“My Master needs the additional seals and doesn't mind allying with your group to do so,” he explained. “More than anything, though, I'm putting the neutralization of the menace from the rogue faction above competition. I couldn't call myself a hero if I let such blatant villains walk around like this, even more after such a stunt.”

The boy looked skeptically at the Archer, but then Rider put his hand on the Master's shoulder.

“Well then. We shall follow your lead for now.”

Waver looked surprised at the man. He smirked.

‘Don't be so surprised,’ replied Dumbledore. ‘Even a warrior king like Iskandar recognizes the virtues of alliances when needed. Besides, if this method works, it will probably be less lousy and mana-expensive than our current idea.’

Waver nodded at that. He had planned to use Gordius' Wheel attack as a Noble Phantasm - Via Expugnato - to pierce through the Bounded Field if things got ugly. However, Waver was expecting to keep that trump hidden for as long as he could, and, as it was a Noble Phantasm from Iskandar, it was guaranteed to be noisy as hell.

“So, what is your big plan?” asked Waver. “Or are you only talking out of your ass?”

The Professional Hero scoffed.

“I don't ‘talk out of my ass,’ boy. I act. Or, if that is not the case, I ask for others to act.”

At this moment, a car parked in front of them. It was black on the upper half and white on the other, with a siren on top of it, a police car. Endeavor frowned.

“Was that the best you could do?”

The window opened to reveal the rather comical visage of the other Berserker on the wheel, tapping the wheel with its fingers.

“Aaaaah…”  said the Servant. It was hard to tell if he was answering the man or if he made noises because of being, well, a Berserker.

Archer of Musutafu sighed and looked at Rider.

“Pick the wheel. Berserker will take care of the rest.”

CRACK! WEEE OOO WEEE OOO!

The police car cracked through the entrance at full speed, torpedoing straight to the Hyatt's entrance. On the way, the vehicle, marred in red lines and surrounded by a dark fog pierced through one of the monsters, defeating it almost instantly before sliding and stopping in front of the entrance.

From the vehicle, four men stepped down. Alexander the Great, with a wide smirk and lacking pants; the mysterious Berserker in black, growling at his opponents; the Master of Rider, green like a pea; and Archer of Musutafu, keeping a heroic expression with his vomit-stained pants.

Robin stared at the hole that quickly mended before anyone else could enter.

‘Wha- How did they get inside?!’ asked Tokiomi, surprised.

The Assassin analyzed the situation coldly.

‘If I had to guess, from Hassan's report…I think this was thanks to Berserker,’ she theorized, watching as the lines faded away from the vehicle. ‘She heard the other Servants theorizing anything he touched became a Noble Phantasm. So, if I had to guess…’

‘He turned the car into a ram,’ completed the magus. ‘So an offensive Noble Phantasm can break through the walls outside. We were so focused on killing Caster that we never tried that.’

“Assassin!”

Her attention snapped to the Archer, looking at the immobilized horrors.

“If this is you holding the monsters back…release them. We shall handle things outside and open a way out for those people. Meanwhile, take care of the beasts inside, hold them off.”

The pirate hesitated for a moment, but hearing the screams allowed her to make a decision. Releasing the Manos, she moved out of her position for a better one to use Ojo Fleur to see inside the hall.

‘Good luck in your deeds, mister hero!’ thought the archaeologist, jumping from the building she stood for some time.

“Berserker, go up there and kill Caster and his partner,” said Endeavor. “If Saber is up there, do not-”

“She's not,” interrupted Iskandar. “Our partner said so. But the other Lancer is.”

The Archer raised its eyebrow. Considering how determined she was against the man in the dockyard, the hero expected the knight to participate in the hunt. He shook his head: things to mumble over later.

“Go for the kill,” repeated the Archer.

Berserker growled slightly but obeyed. Ripping out one of the car's doors, he ran towards the building, using it as an improvised shield to rip through the beasts on his way to the top.

“...we were going to return that,” lamented the Archer.

“If it makes you feel any better, our Caster knows charms to repair the door,” said Rider.

“...can you put on some pants and stop walking around half-naked?”

Waver weakly groaned in agreement. Iskandar called for Gordius' Wheel and put him in it.

“Yes, talk is cheap right now, and I have no interest in recruiting a despicable man like Caster. So, I shall do what I do best and conquer this area for us.”

“I could care less,” said Endeavor, summoning his suit -thankfully vomitless. “So long as the people inside are safe, you could be king of Monaco, and I wouldn't bat an eye.”

“Monaco? Hm, I will have to check the atlas once we're-”

The chariot moved onward, the Divine Bulls moving to trample the Horror that attempted to attack them in Rider's moment of distraction.

“Yes, you are right, boys!” said Iskandar. “The time is to ride and fight! Onward, and trample the opposition!”

The bulls roared and moved to crush their second Horror, then started trampling through the horde around the front of the building, leaving only Enji in front of the hotel.

The Horrors saw an easy prey. 

The blasts of fire that flew from his hands and seared through the beasts dissuaded them of such thoughts - for the remainder of the time they had, anyway.

Endeavor heard the sound of more Sea Horrors popping. He looked at them, cracking his fingers.

“So,” he asked. “Who's next?”

Kiritsugu was blinded for a few seconds by so many flashes of fire flying from the Archer's hands. It didn't stop him from chucking another grenade in the middle of some Sea Demons, the explosion obliterating a section of the group.

“How many grenades do you still have? Over,” asked Maiya.

“Carried five, used three, over,” he replied. “How are you?”

“So far, all clear. Caster seems to be focusing all on the hotel, but a few monsters appeared further from that area. No casualties. I still have two magazines. Over.”

The man nodded to himself. Part of him wished he still had his sniper rifle with him -currently, he only had a Calico, the grenades, and the Thompson Contender.

‘Shadow, how are things up there?’

‘Tough,’ said the Ultimate Lifeform. ‘I heard Berserker coming up here, and he's now fighting one of the monsters, but…’

He saw the scene through his eyes. A wall of flesh stood between them, the sea demon tentacles moving alluringly.

‘I can bypass this by teleporting,’ said the Lancer. ‘But Caster always seems to know where I will be.’

Shadow controlled his emotions well, but Kiritsugu could feel the frustration of the hedgehog.

‘Something else to notice?’

The hedgehog thought over it, then said:

‘He has a book. He seems to be calling the monsters through it.’

The magus killer thought about that. They had established that Gilles de Rais wasn't a natural magi, so it was probably thanks to François Prelati that the old Marshall of France could cast a single spell.

'Like a Bounded Field.'

His mind started running. Yes, it was risky to destroy the seals of the Bounded Field while they were active, but what if the source got its connection cut? 

Rhetorical question. Kiritsugu did that before. A Bounded Field of this size by a mage of a relatively modern era would need a potent power source to keep working, something that any weapon capable of neutralizing magic could do.

‘Logically, this would mean to play as a team,’ thought Kiritsugu. Use Shadow as a distraction to allow the spearman to aim to kill Caster or destroy the Mystic Code that fed the energy for the field. However…

It wasn't his only option. And the masters still were competing for the Church's command seals at the end of the day. It would be good to have them and even better to deny the other Masters the chance of obtaining more.

He designated two plans. One would be his original idea: use Shadow to coordinate a situation where Diarmuid has enough space to cut the power of the energy book.

His plan A, while riskier, could pay enormous dividends if it did work.

‘Lancer, I got two ideas,’ said Kiritsugu before being interrupted by a scream. It took a second to notice that he didn't hear anything. ‘Saber?! What's happening?’ Silence. ‘Saber?!’

BOOM!

The knight crashed through the stone wall, rolling into the snow. She quickly put herself back on foot, closing the link she inadvertently opened up.

Her Instinct blared, and she ducked over the flying missile that was her counterpart. The attack went with so much speed and power that he went over Artoria by much and ended up cutting a tree in the way.

The knight used the opportunity to attempt to win the trade by kicking the falling plant to fall on top of him, but he proceeded to cut that in two more parts. However, this left him vulnerable to a blast from Invisible Air that sent him crashing through more trees.

The knight panted tiredly, pushing the hair in front of her eyes - she had no time to do her elaborate hairstyle, and having the tiniest blind spot could make or break that fight.

It was quiet. Too quiet. Was that enough to-

SIDE!

Her Instinct allowed her to react quickly and block the sneak attack by Bradley - then again, was it a sneak attack when it was so…Saber decided that ‘in your face’ was a fitting expression, though she couldn't make head or tails of-

CRACK!

The attack pushed her back, the armor cracking where the hilt of his sword hit her. She managed to patch her protection rather quickly but was soon on the back foot as he continued his relentless assault.

Fifty possibilities appeared in front of her.

‘There!’

A hasty defense. More fifty.

‘There!’

An attempt at a counter, the man answered with a counter of his own that scratched the same cheek Diarmuid wounded. More.

‘Again! And again!’

If Bradley had unleashed that power against any of the other Servants of the war… she had doubts most would do well against it, combined with the shock factor. Maybe Shadow with his superior speed or the golden Archer with his fast projectiles. Everyone else, though…

Her Instincts acted. ‘There!’

She pulled a swerve on the man, quickly faking attacks at the sides, until she went for one side, leading to a block… only to change to the other side in the blink of an eye. It was a shallow cut. However, Saber noticed the blood flowing from the wound on that side, bleaching her opponent's clothes red.

The Saber of Amestris cracked his neck.

“Impressive…I can barely follow your movements,” said the man.

Her eyes narrowed in annoyance. Her counterpart was practically giving away the secret behind (what she supposed was) a Mystic Eye.

“I didn't expect a man like you to possess the gift of Clairvoyance,” said the King of Knights. “Nor that it would be so precise.”

From her lessons with Merlin, she understood that Clairvoyance could be a complex affair even for a magus, what to say of a man that seemingly had no ties with the magical side. 

“Something my creator gave me,” he replied coolly. “As you can see, I can use this power of mine to great effect.”

Yes, a terrific power it was. Being able to anticipate one's movements before the opponent even thinks about doing them could turn a battle's tide single-handedly.

On the other hand…

“Hmph. Your wounds are proof that your power is not flawless. Don't grow cocky.”

“I could say the same,” replied the Fuhrer. “But I said before…”

His ouroboros eye seemed to emit a red light at night.

“My Ultimate Eye never gives a wrong prediction.”

Both Servant's muscles tensed, and in the next second, they flew towards each other, pushing deeper and deeper into the woods of the Einzbern forest.

The fight raged on.

Saber of Amestris - Fuhrer King Bradley

True Name: King Bradley

Title: Wrath of the Homunculi  Fuhrer of Amestris

Alignement: True Neutral

Alternate Class: Berserker

Parameters:

Strength: B(+)

Endurance: C(+)

Speed: A(+)

Mana: D(+)
Luck: E(+)
Noble Phantasm: C(+)

( ) - Under Mad Enhancement

Class Skills:

Magic Resistance - D

Allows to negate simple action spells. Saber has experience fighting magic users (“Not too different from fighting alchemists”), but he's only able to achieve this rank thanks to the enhancement provided by his class.

Riding - C

Can flawlessly manage beasts and vehicles with proper training. Saber lacks notable mounted feats, but he still had training to become one of the deadliest men alive, so it isn't too far fetched to say he can handle most vehicles and animals with no issue.

Personal Skills:

Mad Enhancement -EX

Usually this class skill is reserved to the Berserker class, improving one's physical abilities in exchange for the sanity of the servant. However, Wrath is no mere servant: he's a living embodiment of his creator's rage, a capital sin in itself. Thus, as his essence is nothing but fury, he possesses this skill at the highest rank, increasing his skills to a new level. When fully unleashed, all of his stats receive a + modifier. Noble Phantasm abilities are also enhanced.

Battle Continuation - B

Keeps fighting even when under duress of a mortal blow. In the final battle for Amestris, it's said by some that King Bradley bravely faced an army head-on. He nearly exterminated it whole before going down. 

Homunculus - E

Represents Saber's existence as an artificial being. The Homunculi that the being called father produced had incredible powers, but Wrath is the exception to the rule. However, Saber is the exception to the rule: he was created based on a human, and had the simple job of leading the country of Amestris to do the bidding of his creator. Thus, he lacks many of the traits that define his brothers, while still having the critical weakness that destroying the Philosopher's Stone (a red stone that's supposedly composed of human souls -though Wrath only contain one, very wrathful one) will put him down, Battle Continuation be damned.

Vitrification - B

Serenity of mind that allows for negation of mental interference. In Saber's case, this is an acquired skill, needed to contain its wrathful instincts, ready to go off at the smallest thing. This doesn't mean that it always works, though.

Noble Phantasm

Ultimate Eye - Wrathful Gift of the Father

Rank: C+

Type: Support

Saber's Noble Phantasm is a special eye that Father gave him. Hidden under his eyepatch, the name of this structure is the Ultimate Eye, a heavily enhanced organ that is marked with a ouroboros sign. In an effort to turn him into the ultimate warrior, Father knew that his puppet soldier would need to adapt to any situation thrown into his way. Thus, the need for this.

The Ultimate Eye grants its user enhanced eyesight, which would already be a powerful resource. However, its true ability lies in something that many Heroic Spirits possess: precognition. While this skill would be sufficient for the classification as a Mystic Eye, Saber's clairvoyance is a type that works with line of sight. While one would think that as disadvantageous, the predictions of the Ultimate Eye are always correct. No attack can catch him off-guard, no defense is peerless in front of his swords, all failures in one's style are glaring for him. He can always make the best decision in a fight…because he knows what will work and what will not. With that said, as his power relies on being able to see people, blinding him would work to give an edge. If destroyed, there's no way to recover the Ultimate Eye, and this ultimately becomes a sealed Phantasm.