Author's Notes

Hello, this is Captain Bell. Thank you for your interest in my work.

This story represents a difficult challenge for me, so I hope that you find it enjoyable.

I have included a suggested soundtrack within the story. These are songs that I was either thinking of or listening to while writing and editing those sections of the chapter. You should feel free to ignore them or to substitute your own preferred reading music, of course, but if you are interested in following mine then you can find any suggestions I make under the names provided. Just play them on loop until it suggests a new piece or says End Track and you will have the intended soundtrack.

With that explanation out of the way, let us begin.

THE RED DRAGON'S SABER

Chapter One: Waiting for a Miracle

[Fate/Stay Night OST: Fuyu no Yousei]

Avalon, the Everdistant Utopia.

The final resting place of the legendary King Arthur is not a common afterlife, a return to the cycle of reincarnation, or even the Throne of Heroes to which incredibly accomplished mortals usually ascend. Outside of the normal conventions of time and space, the Land of the Fairies hosts the Once and Future King's soul after her death. This magical place bears the same name as the sheath of the king's legendary sword: Avalon. The land serves as a reflection of Arthur's dream for a perfect kingdom and, according to legend, grants the weary monarch her well-deserved rest.

Artoria Pendragon does not receive much rest.

The oath of the king has been upheld and Artoria is no longer bound to project the identity of the male Arthur Pendragon to anyone. There are no witnesses in Avalon for whom the lone human soul there needs to play a part. The persona of the King of Britain has given way to the personality of the girl she might have been had Artoria never pulled the Sword of Selection from the stone. Still, while those two facets of the King of Knights may be permanently intermingled now, there is a single, powerful wish of the feminine side that now dominates her mind: to be reunited with her love.

Artoria waits.

The just reward owed to Artoria after she fulfilled her duty as the king: a girl's right to live happily. This promise is what occupies Artoria now. That reward, however, has been withheld from the heroic soul for a very long time. Regardless of what might be just, or what Artoria deserves, the girl's wish will only be granted to her by the occurrence of two separate miracles.

One must keep waiting, and another must keep pursuing.

Avalon offers a different kind of reward to the king with each second that passes. The utopia around the girl can ease her mind and soul at any time. As a certain magus once told the future king, dreams are more beautiful if they stay as dreams. If she ever allows it, even for a moment, Artoria will be lulled into an eternal deathlike sleep by the enchantment of the domain she resides in. Within that rest Artoria will be spared all burdens and forever experience the peace she has always desired without the need to wait for anyone.

Artoria waits.

Artoria does not listen to the sleepy whispers of Avalon. The girl waits because she believes in her love. Even though the man does not know his miraculous reunion with Artoria depends upon them both, he will surely continue to pursue his ideals and reach her. That is the extent of the girl's faith in Shirou Emiya.

Though their acquaintance was short, the bonds of a Servant and a Master can be greater than the best of friends, the closest of families, and even the most intimate of lovers. Through the ritual of Fuyuki City's Holy Grail War, Artoria and Shirou experienced each other's lives at their best and their worst, and they fought alongside one another in situations that could have destroyed them at any turn. Though it would separate them, neither could be true to themselves and not fulfill their duty to destroy the corrupted Grail before it killed humanity. Even so, neither could either one deny their love for the other by the end.

So Artoria waits. No matter how many centuries must pass for her to see Shirou once more, Artoria will always wait.

Still, nobody ever said how the girl must spend her time while she waits.

[High School DxD OST: Akuma no Kekkonshiki!?]

"Asia!"

Artoria's green eyes snap wide open.

"Shirou?"

Although the king's indomitable will allows her to not succumb to the temptation of sleep, she still spends most of her time in a slight daze. There are centuries to wait, after all, and no denizens of the Faerie Land have ever engaged with the girl while she has been here. That is all the more reason why the sudden echo of a voice alerts Artoria that something is wrong. The girl did not expect to be roused by someone until the time of her reunion, but it takes only a moment for her to understand that the word she hears did not come from her beloved.

Artoria climbs to her feet from the soft grass which serves as her latest bed. The young woman is garbed in an elegant white dress that covers her almost entirely, and her fine blonde hair falls loosely around her shoulders as she moves. The king searches around her but only the same gorgeous, unoccupied natural landscape she has always seen greets her on all sides. The sea of grass set between distant mountains and far-off green forests offers no answer to the king's current question.

The sunshine lights the fields beautifully, and the gentle breeze and the sweet scents carried on it are unchanged from how they have been every time Artoria chooses to explore Avalon and enjoy its conscious pleasures. There is no sign of a disturbance, and that is to be expected. Avalon is a realm separated from the rest of reality. No corruption, no pollution, and no curse from any land can possibly enter here. There is no such thing as an intruder in Avalon, only those who are allowed to exist there can enter.

So whose voice is that?

"Let go of me!"

The voice yells again, its sound garbled. It is almost as if Artoria is hearing the call through water, though the words themselves are understandable. The blonde spins around but there is still no source to be found. It is impossible for anyone to project their voice into Avalon, after all. It isn't a matter of power or knowledge, the immutable laws of creation itself forbid any trespass here. No matter what Artoria knows should be true, though, the girl can't delude herself to think that she didn't just hear a young man scream out in desperation.

Artoria is sure that it is not Shirou who calls to her now, but she is surprised to recognize that the masculine voice she hears speaks Japanese. The coincidence is a concern, if only because it makes the girl wonder if this voice does have some tangential connection to the boy she waits for.

"I have to save Asia! Let go of me!"

'Save?'

Artoria reels in surprise again. To save people. That is Shirou's dearest wish. The voice she hears now, it belongs to someone else who wants to save another.

'But the voice does not come from anywhere in or outside of Avalon. It is coming from...'

Green eyes turned downward and gaze at the white-clothed form of Artoria's body.

'... within me?'

It is nearly inconceivable, but also one of the only explanations Artoria can fathom for how anybody's words have managed to reach her in her resting place. Someone out there, maybe from her own world, maybe from one of infinite parallel realities, now resonates with Artoria's very being. The pleas that echo in the blonde's ears do not actually reach the Faerie Realm from outside it. Through a connection that the King of Knights can only now begin to guess at the identity of, her own body and soul resonate with an outside source and produce the voice on their own.

Is it another version of her? Perhaps a King Arthur who had actually been born male? That is the most likely option Artoria can think of, though the possibilities are technically infinite. Being outside of time as she is, Artoria theoretically has all the time she wants to think the puzzle over. To do so might even be a way to keep herself occupied for a while as she waits for her two miracles to occur. That idea is set aside when the voice begins to bubble up from within the girl once more, this time even more desperately than before.

"Someone! Anyone!"

Artoria turns her eyes up and looks at the soft clouds above. The king recognizes that the voice no longer calls out in despair. Now it calls out for help.

"Please save her!"

Artoria closes her eyes.

One must keep waiting. That is the role of the king who wishes to receive a young girl's happy life as her ultimate reward. Artoria will never turn her back on Shirou, not when she knows that he will pursue her forever if he has to.

'But how can I ever face you again,' the girl finally thinks as a fond smile graces her lips. 'If I don't try to help someone who needs to be saved?'

[Fate/Stay Night [Unlimited Blade Works] OST: Former Dream]

In all the incalculable variations that exist in the multiverse, one of them has managed to reach out to this Artoria in this Avalon with a genuine cry for help. The odds for such an occurrence to happen go far beyond unlikely. Unfortunately, the odds that Artoria can find a way to actually offer her help to this unknown boy are even lower than that. Since the hero is already dead and has no magic to wield, King Arthur is nearly as trapped within Avalon now as all else is trapped outside of it. Deciding to help does not mean that the girl has any means to do so, only the will to try.

It is to Artoria's benefit that she does not feel rushed. The convoluted flow of time between the dimensions means little to the girl while she is in Avalon, so she can afford to stop and consider her options. Artoria adopts the mentality of a king with an operation to plan once more and thinks through what she has available to work with.

'Whoever called out was able to resonate with my being directly,' Artoria reasons as she crosses her arms. 'It is highly unlikely that they are a mundane person for such a phenomenon to occur, no matter what the connection we share is. A magus, then, or perhaps a Heroic Spirit. Any type of supernatural creature would be more likely than an ordinary person.'

Artoria cups her chin as she opens her eyes to view the rich green grass at her feet. The blonde contemplates further while using the scenery as visual stimulation.

'My only previous means of traversing parallel realities was my contract with the World,' the king reminds herself. The World, the personification of Earth's reality that can grant great gifts in exchange for a promise to protect humanity after death, is the source of many legendary heroes' abilities. Though Artoria became a hero with only her own effort, it was the deal to enter the Throne of Heroes as an eternal guardian of humanity in exchange for the opportunity to retrieve the Holy Grail with her own hands that led Artoria to become the Servant Saber in the Holy Grail Wars. Artoria had hoped she could use the Grail to wish away all her failures, but Shirou made her realize that attempts to change the past are a mistake. 'I severed that contract when I destroyed the Grail of my own free will.'

The blonde blinks her green eyes as a sudden incredulous thought occurs to her. The girl turns her gaze skyward once more, and her arms drift down to hang at her sides.

'But the reason I have time to think about a way to help is because I exist outside of normal time. Somewhere out there, another Artoria is certainly still contracted to receive unlimited opportunities to find the Holy Grail.'

That train of thought is truly audacious, especially since there is no telling how the World might react, but the longer she tries to think of another option the more Artoria begins to accept that she has no other tools available to her. The spirit's one chance to answer the mysterious call is to attempt to connect herself to one of the still-valid Heroic Spirit contracts of another King Arthur.

After a short time the girl puts one knee down on the grass and lays a hand on the fertile earth. To accept this risk is no small feat, but Artoria has always been decisive. The king stares at the back of her hand while she crouches, and her imagination runs through countless possible consequences of her plan.

"For this to work, you will need to be in a world that still has a Holy Grail in existence so that the contract is valid," Artoria speaks aloud. Though the girl's own voice is unlikely to reach the one who has unknowingly entreated her, Artoria still says her piece out of respect for the stranger's incredible feat. "I will also require a suitable magic circle nearby that can be appropriated for the summoning in order for me to reach you. If fate has truly allowed such an unlikely pathway to your side to exist, then I will take up the oath once more to fulfill your wish."

Her promise made, the spirit closes her eyes and shifts her mental landscape. No longer is Artoria a girl in the peaceful utopia of Avalon, now she is once again King Arthur on the battlefield of Camlann. The king forces her mental state to resume its old form, that of a fatally wounded mortal who is frozen in time and waits only for the next chance the World provides to summon her to a new time and place.

Artoria makes herself susceptible to the influence of the World and allows the bonds of her old contract to take precedence in her mind. At the same time, Artoria focuses on the resonance of the voice as it echoed through her core in the hopes that she can influence the World's choices. The spirit being pulled into a completely different place to seek a completely different Grail than the one she wants is a genuine risk, but the memory of Shirou Emiya pushes the hero to take this chance.

There is no action that the king can take to make her more likely to reach her goal. Once more all Artoria can do is wait. Wait, and believe.

Fortunately, that is something that the girl has gained much experience in.

FATE

[Fate/Stay Night OST: Kishi Ou no Hokori]

Artoria doesn't know how much time has passed between when she began to submit herself to the old contract and now. The girl only knows that something has changed when her body is suddenly no longer in Avalon. A sensation of absolute freedom from natural forces overtakes the girl before all her experiences and consciousness become lost in a sea of stimuli no human mind is meant to perceive. Artoria has gone through this several times before, so she knows immediately what happened to her.

King Arthur has been summoned.

Pendragon's soul traverses the space between realities. The spirit is brought forth by the two powers of the World and the Holy Grail of another dimension. These forces use an individual's call for aid as the trigger and an available magic circle as the medium through which to express the ritual. Against all odds, the king has been chosen to answer the summons of the boy whose voice reached out to her.

It is almost like fate.

'I'm going to go pass some time while I wait for you, Shirou,' the girl thinks with fondness as her body is transformed into a new, tangible form. 'Don't worry, I'll be back before you get home.'

With that final promise to always wait for her love no matter where she might physically be, Artoria bursts forth into a new reality.

FATE

[Fate/Zero OST: Tragedy and Fate]

A brief flash of brilliant light precedes the emergence of the fully-armored King of Knights. Green eyes that have become stern with intent survey the new world that Artoria finds herself in. The king's keen tactical mind immediately catalogs what she can see into the relevant and the irrelevant.

Artoria has clearly been summoned into the middle of a conflict, and she is surrounded on all sides.

The girl prepares herself for what comes next, for the situation she has been called into is clearly dangerous and she lacks all context to discern the best possible course of action with. The only question Artoria has time to answer after her assessment of the area and its occupants is complete is... what will she do first?

After a moment of thought, the Servant of the Sword finds no reason not to continue with her previous tradition.

"I ask you..."

Chapter End

Author's Notes

This concludes the introduction to The Red Dragon's Saber.

I considered whether to include more in the first chapter, but my plot outline suggests that things flow better if I end it here. I think that this serves as a strong setup for things to come. Future chapters are likely to be longer than this introduction ended up being, but I split up chapters based on content covered rather than length so I don't have a word count in mind for them.

If the premise intrigues you and my writing was satisfactory then I hope you will continue to follow this story in the future.

Sincerely,

Captain Bell