Chapter 2
Sakura
Her return to consciousness was surprisingly painless, she thought, considering her last memories involved being simultaneously dismembered, disemboweled, and on the verge of being eaten alive.
No, if there was one complaint about how she felt as she woke, it would be concerning the stabbing hunger pangs of her empty stomach, inflamed by the wonderful scent she could smell. She hadn't eaten in two and a half days, ever since her grandfather had thrown her out into this wilderness, and the possibility of food was all it took to remind her of that in full force.
Her front was warm, almost hot, a sharp contrast to the freezing cold of her back and the frozen-solid ground she felt beneath her left side, though being a homunculus the cold didn't really affect her. Even without opening her eyes, she could tell there was light, and when she did –slowly–, she was greeted with the sight of a warmly crackling fire. A makeshift spit sat above it, with a number of bundles of skinned flesh tied to it.
Illyasviel moved to push herself up, and had barely gotten a few inches up before she winced from the soreness of having been on her side on such an unforgiving surface for so long.
"Ah!"
Before she even could react to the sound, a hand was behind her back, helping her into a sitting position.
"Suman, suman! Kore wa ii desuka?"
It a took a moment for her mind to remember that the last thing she'd heard had been Japanese, and another for it to engage and process the sounds into "Sorry, sorry, is this alright?"
Illyasviel nodded silently, her throat dry. As if reading her mind, a pale hand entered her field of vision holding an uncapped canteen. She took it, greedily drinking the water inside until it was empty.
"That's all I've got for now. We'll need to pack it with snow and boil it if we want any more."
With nothing to distract her any longer, she turned towards the source of the voice. Upon seeing the object of her search, her mind went blank, save for a single thought.
Pink.
The pink-haired girl blinked, and then flushed slightly, looking down, and Illya realized she'd said that out loud. "Ah. Yeah. It's a, uh, genetic abnormality. Nobody else in my family and none of my ancestors have had it. Just me." She chuckled lowly. "Special Sakura."
Sakura?
Illya opened her mouth to speak, but just before she could get any words out, she was interrupted by the impatient growling of her stomach.
The girl's green eyes flitted back up and gained some light. "I thought you'd be hungry and didn't want to give you a soldier pill, so I went out and managed to find a burrow of rabbits after I got the fire started." She reached up over the fire towards one of the bundles of meat on the rough spit and pulled off an appendage, rotating the spit at the same time so that it was now upside-down from its previous position. "It's actually pretty good, if a bit gamy." She held leg out to Illyasviel. "Here. You need the energy, especially the protein."
Illya eyed the proffered piece of meat warily, but ultimately it was the emptiness in her stomach that prompted her to reach out and take it and begin picking at it.
It wasn't anything like she was used to with Sella and Leysritt, but it was food, and to her starving body that was all that mattered. Soon enough all that was left was bone, but she'd hardly finished when another leg was offered, and this time she didn't hesitate to begin devouring the rabbit.
It was only after eating an entire rabbit that Illya stopped, giving a quiet burp and noticing that in the time she'd been so focused on her food, the pink girl had strung her canteen up by some metal wire over the fire, presumably with snow inside so that it would melt and sterilize.
Her appetite temporarily sated, she was finally able to give her companion her full attention and look at her where she sat on a snow-free log a few feet behind Illya. Her pink hair was easily the most striking feature, followed closely by vivid grass-green eyes and a strange purple diamond in the middle of her forehead that reminded Illya of that red dot she'd heard of Indian women sometimes having, a bindi.
A red band went over the top of her head, with a metal plate at the top that Illya couldn't understand the function of. A turtleneck long-sleeved black shirt and similarly black long-legged pants covered the girl's skin almost completely, with a strangely tough-looking high-necked forest-green vest that had six rectangular pockets placed next to each other in the front, three on either side.
A brown leather pack sat behind and slightly to the right, and a black holster of some sort was attached to her leg over a set of white wrappings. Identical wrappings were around her shins, disappearing into the openings of a pair of what Illya could only describe as a strange hybrid of open-toed sandals and boots.
"Oh," the girl said, noticing Illya looking at her. "I never really introduced myself, did I? I'm Haruno Sakura, pleased to make your acquaintance." She bowed at her waist, dipping her head.
A thrumming feeling echoed through Illya's command seals, and she started at the sensation, only then realizing that the prana she continuously let flow into it was going to this girl. It was an extremely small draw, not causing any of the pain she'd expected from maintaining a servant two months before she should, but it was there, and it could mean only one thing.
Her disappointment rose, and though she had a sinking feeling that she already knew the answer, she still had to ask: "Not Heracles?"
The girl's eyebrows scrunched together. "Herakuresu?
Illya's head fell, mirroring her spirit.
She had failed.
Her grandfather had sent her out with one task: to summon the strongest hero in the strongest role, to gain the demi-god who had withstood twelve trials as Berserker.
And she had failed.
By the looks of it, she hadn't even managed to summon Berserker, as this girl was far too lucid to be the mad Servant.
"I… see," she responded morosely. "I am Illyasviel. Illyasviel von Einzbern."
"Ainsuberun?" the girl repeated, attempting to match the accent that Illya had said her name in.
Illya nodded. "Einzbern. Which Servant are you?"
"Servant?" The girl's confusion only appeared to grow. "Oh!" she exclaimed, as if she'd suddenly discovered something. "I'm Berserker." Her forehead furrowed. "That's weird. At first I didn't understand what you were asking, but then I suddenly knew the answer."
Illya's jaw went slack. This girl was Berserker?
"You… you summoned me?" the pink-haired girl –Sakura– asked.
She nodded again, though the reminder of her failure stung. "…Yes. But I was trying to summon Heracles."
"Who is this Hera-clesu?"
What? How could she not know about Heracles? The strongest warrior to ever live, who practically everyone knew about? This girl was clearly from a semi-modern age, judging by her dress, so how could she not remember?
"A very well-known hero," Illya provided, looking for any clues in the girl's reaction but receiving none.
"You were really lucky you got me, then. You were less than a minute from dying before I got to you."
"You healed me?" Illya said incredulously, though she knew it had to be true. She'd hoped the wolves had only been a nightmare, though her blood-stained, tattered white dress made it impossible to deny.
Perhaps… perhaps she had been wrong. She'd believed that a Servant was little more than the highest class of familiar, that it wouldn't hesitate to betray her except for her command spell.
But Sakura hadn't needed to save Illya, there was nothing requiring her to. If she hadn't she would have been free, able to go and find another master, though she would have needed to find a source of mana for the next two months, but for a Servant that wasn't too problematic, considering they could use souls as energy.
And yet… Sakura had saved her. Simply because she'd wanted to. It was hard to think of Sakura as just a familiar when she seemed even more intelligent than some of the homunculi back at the castle.
Sakura nodded, a wide smile on her face. She raised her right arm, grasping her bicep with her left hand. "Best medic in the Nations. Well, after my shishō of course. She and I are the only ones in the world strong enough to fight on the front lines." She dropped her arm.
"Your master?"
"Yeah. Tsunade of the Sannin? Fifth Hokage?" Sakura said, as if Illya should know who that was.
Fire shadow?
Sakura's smile faded. "Oh. This… this is a different world, isn't it? I just had another one of those memory-things in my head."
She'd summoned a Servant from a different world? That wasn't possible, was it? But… the Throne of Heroes was supposedly outside of time and space, so it wasn't totally impossible that it also held heroes from other worlds, right?
Zelretch the Kaleidoscope proved that there were other realities out there. So it wasn't totally impossible. Especially when considering that the summoning ritual would usually summon the Servant with the best fit without a catalyst. Perhaps her emotions had overridden the slab she'd had?
It was true that had she not summoned a healer as skilled as Sakura said she was it was unlikely that she would have survived. And her aria had practically demanded her Servant be Berserker. Which asked the question how this girl was the best fit for both a miracle-healer and Berserker.
Illya's mind suddenly latched onto one of the things Sakura had just said. "'Strongest' medic? What does that mean?"
Sakura flushed, and scratched at her temple with a finger. "Ah, I uh… meant it literally. Tsunade-shishō is easily the strongest person in our world. And I was her apprentice, so I learned all of her techniques as well, and I seem to be a lot stronger here, so um, if I try Imightbeabletodestroyamountainwithapunch?"
The white-haired girl's jaw dropped.
Oh.
That was why she was Berserker.
"A really small mountain. Not a big one. You know," Sakura rambled. "Like a mini-mountain. A hill? Definitely one of the faces on the Hokage Mountain."
"Wh-what were you?"
Sakura looked back at Illya. "Hm? I told you, I'm a field-medic."
"No, why did you need to be so strong?"
"Oh. Well, I was a kunoichi. And there was a war. A world war, against some really crazy powerful people, and we –my team and my friends, that is– were the ones actually fighting them mostly." Sakura made a thoughtful expression. "Now that I think about it, Kaguya was even a goddess. 's a good thing Naruto, Sasuke, and I beat her before… that bastard killed me."
Illya felt faint. This girl had fought a goddess and won. Yes, she was definitely qualified to be a Servant.
"You guys don't have shinobi here, do you? At least …not like us. As military forces, I mean." The smaller girl shook her head. "Huh. That's weird." Sakura put the heels of her hands against her forehead. "This is so strange. Not knowing stuff and then suddenly knowing things I shouldn't."
"It's part of the summoning," Illya told her hesitantly. "Most Servants wouldn't know how to act in the modern world otherwise."
Sakura nodded slowly. "I guess that makes sense. We had some of the stuff I'm getting bits and pieces of. We had TV. And radios. And electric stoves and ovens and microwaves and refrigerators. And computers, though they were really rare. No… cars though. Or… airplanes?" Her eyes went wide as she looked at Illya. "You can fly? Without chakra? Only Pein, Madara, Sasuke, and Naruto could fly, and that was because of how powerful they were!"
"Chakra?" She hadn't heard the term used like that, as a singular noun before.
"Un. …You don't have that here either, do you?" Sakura said slowly.
"What is it?"
"It's… well, it's a form of energy. One part spiritual, one part physical. Your body's cells make the physical part, and your consciousness, your mind, generates the spiritual energy. The mixture circulates through the chakra network. Shinobi are able to consciously use the energy in techniques, and even control and separate the spiritual and physical parts if they're skilled enough." the pink hair-girl explained. "But you didn't have a chakra network, at least, not that I could tell when I was re-growing your limbs. You had these weird nerve-like things running all through your body, though."
"Magic circuits," Illya said, hugging her knees to her chest. "Your 'chakra' sounds very similar. Magic comes from the soul and the life-energy of the world. But having magic circuits is something unnatural for normal humans."
"You make it sound like you aren't," Sakura stated.
Illya shook her head as she hugged her legs tighter. "I am not."
"Then what are you?"
The girl looked up and met Sakura's eyes. "A homunculus. An artificial human given life through alchemy, constructed to be the ideal embodiment of magical capability." The words came out flat and lifeless, with no inflection or emotion.
"…Ah."
Illya blinked. "You… don't seem surprised."
"Mmm. Well, I had suspicions, considering how easy it was to heal you. Regrowing limbs is practically impossible usually. But your body seemed more than willing to do so. And Orochimaru did research into artificially cloning and growing humans in incubation tanks…" Sakura shuddered. "He was terrible, but I can't deny that medically some of the things he achieved were groundbreaking."
"Oh. No, it… wasn't like that for me. I was a natural birth, with a mother and father," Illya said quietly. "Other homunculi are grown to maturity almost immediately, and come out with all the knowledge they need, but I was different."
"Then how are you artificial?" Sakura asked, seeming slightly confused.
"My mother was a homunculus, and there were rituals and techniques performed on me even before I was born. It's why I look like this." She gestured to her eyes and hair, and then down her body. "I am eighteen, but I'll never develop any further than I have. Every homunculus has a price to pay, and I am even less human than normal homunculi, so it is even more true for me," she said hesitantly. "It's likely I will only live two more years at most."
The pink-haired girl looked surprised, and worried, and then thoughtful. "That's… horrible," there was a flicker of emotion, and then an expression of resolve appeared on Sakura's face. "No. I refuse to accept that nothing can be done. I've seen people come back from the dead, and beings made of pure chakra, pure energy." She clenched her fist in front of her. "You gave me a second chance by summoning me, and I refuse to let you die without a fight, Master."
The pink-haired girl blinked and then shook her head. "Kami, that's weird. I didn't even mean to call you that."
Illya giggled.
"So… that's why you aren't even shivering even though it's absolutely freezing out here?" Sakura looked thoughtful. "Come to think of it, neither am I, and I'm not even circulating this… stuff that's like chakra but not through me."
The homunculus nodded. "Prana," Illya provided. "But yes, I am much more resilient than most humans, and you are a Servant, and thus it is practically impossible for something like the environment to affect you. You don't need to eat or drink, either, though doing so would decrease the amount of prana I need to provide you, and astralizing would also lower the requirement as well. Though… you are taking barely any of what I expected to need to provide, summoning you two months early."
"Astralizing?" A sudden look of understanding appeared, something that Illya was starting to become accustomed to. "Oh, wow. I can go non-corporeal? That's awesome. I guess the reason I don't need so much… 'prana'?" Sakura looked at Illya for confirmation, and she nodded, "is because I had pretty much perfect chakra control, and I'm so used to unconsciously managing energy in myself that I'm just naturally doing it."
"That… would make some amount of sense, yes."
"So, um, if you don't mind me asking, why were you out here all alone by yourself?"
"My grandfather put me here and told me not to go home until I had summoned a Servant," Illya replied uncomfortably. She'd nearly died because of that, and then where would her grandfather be?
Sakura's expression darkened, her eyes hardening until they looked like flecks of jade, but she didn't say anything.
"As I have successfully summoned a Servant, I can return home. The Einzbern estate is to the north in the forest, though I don't know how far away it is exactly," Illya told her.
The pinkette nodded decisively. "We'll finish eating and go that way then. …Would you mind if I carried you? It'd be a lot faster."
Illya shook her head, smiling happily. "That's fine." And then her smile turned impish. "…Sakura-neesan"
"W-what!? That's… that's not even…" Sakura spluttered, her face red. "You're older than me!"
Illya giggled, her eyes sparkling. "Mmm, but this seems better, right? And it's only natural that it's the older sister protecting the younger~"
Sakura stared at her for a moment, and then just shook her head, looking exasperated. "Fine. What would you like me to call you?"
Illya hummed. "Illya's fine."
The other girl nodded, smiling slightly. "Alright, Illya."
Whatever she could have expected, the situation she was in was not one she'd ever even imagined.
The concept of being summoned was not foreign to her, and the whole point of reverse-summoning was to bring someone to you, but this whole… Servant thing would have been absolutely unbelievable, except she knew it. She knew things she hadn't before, about this world and its people, about this completely insane battle royale she'd be participating in alongside her Master –and wasn't that just crazy by itself–.
She knew how she'd been summoned now, that she truly had died and become a part of this "Throne of Heroes", and that the ritual Illya had used had pulled her out of it, putting her into a mortal world once more.
She knew about her duty, her purpose, and the reward she'd get from being the last standing alongside Illya: a nigh-limitless wish. And she wanted it. Oh, how she wanted it.
Her life had been cut short before its time, stolen from her by the man she'd thought she loved, and there would be no sweeter revenge than living out a happy life in spite of that. Maybe she'd even wish to go back to Konoha. Yes, she wanted a second chance, and this …Holy Grail was the perfect opportunity.
Sakura looked down at the deceptively-undeveloped girl in her arms even as she continued moving forward through the trees, snow falling around them. When she'd first seen Illya, she'd never thought that she could be eighteen, though the revelation of being an artificial human did explain that. She bet Orochimaru would have had a field day analyzing her.
The fact that she would die in two years, but didn't even seem worried about it just made Sakura mad. Her purpose was to protect, to keep Illya alive, and the thought that her efforts would be for nothing in less than half a decade made her fundamentally aggravated in some deep part of her. She refused to accept that nothing could be done about it, that this girl –this young woman– would never grow beyond what she was, never experience life completely.
No, Sakura wouldn't just let this go.
The pink-haired girl was brought out of her thoughts as they reached a large river, which Illya had said would indicate where they needed to start moving east. Sakura did so, keeping to the trees, and it was another ten minutes before a large structure appeared over the tops of the trees in the distance, making Sakura pause.
A castle?
Pushing aside her disbelief, she moved towards it, mildly amazed at how large the structure was. And Illya grew up here?
She only momentarily hesitated when she reached the front road and a faint tingling passed over her skin a hundred feet away from the structure. She reached the front door only moments later, but wasn't surprised when a number of white-haired, red-eyed women in nearly full-covering white clothing came out of the front door and surrounded her in stances that indicated they were prepared to fight.
"State your reason for trespassing."
Sakura blinked. The language the woman had spoken in was totally different from the one she and Illya had spoken in –her native language–, and she'd automatically assumed that it was the same in this world as in her own, with only one primary language that nearly everybody used, and only a few extra ones floating around nomadic tribes in areas like Wind and Lightning.
She'd still understood the statement, though, and she also knew she could speak this new language as easily as she could her own. Another thing it seemed that had been implanted in her mind in order to ease acclimation to this world, and one she was actually grateful for, as now that she wondered how many languages there actually were here, the number that she came up with was boggling: over a hundred spoken widely, and a complete total in the thousands.
Instead of replying to the woman who had spoken, she simply looked down at the girl sleeping in her arms, the five who'd come out to meet her following her eyes as well. At the sight of Illya, they relaxed, hands dropping to rest in front of them.
"Apologies. Thank you for bringing Lady Illyasviel home."
Sakura nodded.
"May we assume that you are the one she was tasked to summon?"
Sakura nodded again. "Yes."
The lady in front who had been speaking dipped her head. "Then please, come inside," she said, motioning towards the door.
The women turned around and moved towards the entrance, and Sakura couldn't help but notice how they surrounded her as though protecting her, or, perhaps more likely, Illya.
Unlike the outside of the castle, which was large, grey stone and imposing angles, tall walls and towers , the inside had a polished marble floor, white walls, wood paneling, lit enough by candle-like lights on the walls that what might have been an otherwise depressing atmosphere was instead bright and inviting.
The women led them down a hall beyond the large stairwell at the center of the entrance hall, further into the castle to the point that Sakura was sure they were on the opposite side now.
By then Illya had begun to move, blinking slowly and then looking up at Sakura with a hint of confusion before it was replaced by understanding. However, she made no move or signal that she intended to move from the position Sakura was carrying her in, instead looking around as her eyes continued to brighten as she woke up.
After a turn down another hall, their group paused, and the woman in lead turned around, motioning to a door on the left. "The master will receive you in his study."
Illya's eyes widened, and she squirmed from Sakura's arms to get down, barely giving the taller girl a chance to help her stand upright on the floor.
At once, Illya went from the assured, calm, and slightly mischievous girl Sakura had met in the forest to a clearly anxious and almost fearful state. It was intensely jarring, but none of the women around the pair reacted, the first one only calmly opening the door to the room.
Illya hesitantly moved through the doorway, Sakura following immediately behind her. The inside was darker than the hallways, and only the white snow outside reflecting light through the windows barely brightened what would have been an oppressive dimness.
A man sat behind a desk to the left, with long, straight white hair and a just-as-long beard, writing on a piece of paper. He made no indication of noticing their presence as the pair moved to the center of the room, where Illya stopped and turned to face him.
It was a full two minutes before the man looked up, at which point Sakura's patience had begun to fray.
His eyes flicked down to Illya's tattered, blood-stained white gown, and then over to Sakura before immediately returning to Illya's face.
"You have failed."
Illya flinched, and a burst of anger shot through Sakura at the man's words. Her jaw clenched tightly as she kept herself from saying anything.
"You were to summon Heracles, the greatest hero to have ever lived. You were given the ideal catalyst, but instead of a demi-god you return with this," the old man said, not even looking at Sakura.
Illya's shoulders hunched as she curled in on herself.
"At least you managed to summon a Servant at all."
The smaller girl nodded, silent.
"The situation may yet be salvageable. Who did you summon?"
"…Berserker." Illya took a deep breath, still looking at some point between the older man and the floor. "Her name is Sakura Haruno. A hero from another reality." The younger girl finally looked up and met the man's eyes. "She defeated a goddess."
The man's expression changed for the first time, barely, but it was still there, his eyebrows rising a fraction of an inch. "Is that so?" he asked, looking over at Sakura.
"Yes," she responded, using the man's question to finally interject herself into the conversation.
If anything, the man's eyes rose ever-so-slightly higher as if he hadn't expected her to speak. "A lucid Berserker? How… unusual." His eyes roved over her body, taking in her flak vest and various pouches and holsters, which made her want to squirm, but she stayed put, not flinching under his piercing, almost frighteningly intelligent gaze. "And what are your skills, Berserker?"
"I'm a medic," she said simply.
The man's eyes narrowed slightly. "A medic," he repeated. "Familiar with the body and all its weaknesses, likely able to create poison as well as any antidote." He said it as a statement, and she knew that he wasn't asking. "That is much more suited for Assassin. No. What makes you able to be Berserker? No mere medic could defeat a god."
Sakura took a breath. "I was one of the strongest people on my world. The second-strongest, if we're only talking about physical strength."
His eyes looked like that gained the barest hint of approval. "Much more of what I would expect. Who was the strongest?"
"My teacher," she replied plainly.
"Ah," he said, as though understanding. "You are not Heracles, but you may yet prove useful as a Servant."
She didn't like the way he said it as though she were only a tool. She was not unfamiliar with the idea that shinobi were only tools for the village, but she'd never thought of herself that way, and she had to repress the growl that rose in defiance. She was not here for him, she was Illya's, and while she doubted that Illya would ever direct her toward this 'grandfather', she could dream.
But with that final statement, he looked back down at his papers and didn't acknowledge them again. Illya turned to look at Sakura, and then reached out and took hold of her hand, leading her across the room to the door and out into the hallway. To her surprise, there were two women outside waiting for them, though she couldn't tell if they were any of the five that had led them there. The only visible difference between them was that one wore blue under the white of their outfit and the other wore black.
Sakura watched as Illya's postured straightened and a smile broke out on her face, quickly growing into a grin. "Sella! Leysritt!" Unlike the women before, these immediately smiled, showing emotion.
"Welcome home, Lady Illya," the blue one said. The one in black simply hummed, a happy sound of agreement before looking at Sakura.
"Pink."
Her first words echoed Illya's in the forest, and Sakura internally sighed. It seemed she would never get away from the color of her hair.
The blue one's eyes moved to Sakura from looking at Illya. "And this would be Berserker?"
"Sakura Haruno," the medic answered, imitating Illya's previous introduction in reversing the order of her name.
The two women looked at her in surprise, though the black one seemed much more subdued. "You can speak!"
"Why is everyone so surprised by that? Of course I can talk! Why wouldn't I be able to?" she asked indignantly, her voice rising.
"Because–"
The blue one was suddenly cut off by the one in black. "Illya should change."
The one in blue stopped whatever she was about to say. "Ah. Yes. Let's get you cleaned up and into some nicer clothes, Lady Illya. We can discuss this later."
Illya just nodded, following as the two women turned and began walking down the hall, though the blue one glanced over her shoulder at Sakura once. Sakura followed Illya as they went through a number of hallways and turns, eventually arriving at a large pair of doors that the blue lady opened to reveal a tiled room behind it. Illya unabashedly removed her ruined white dress and then the tattered remnants of her underwear as well, handing them off to the blue woman. Illya seemed to suddenly notice Sakura to the side, because she turned to the pinkette who was simply standing there feeling awkward.
"Sakura-neesan too!"
She waved her hand in front of her face. "Ah. No, no. I'm fine. Really–"
"No."
That one word stopped her protests cold, and Illya's eyes closed as her cheeks puffed up. "Sakura-neesan will join me."
Sakura just stared. For an eighteen year-old, Illya did an impressive job of acting how old she looked when she wanted to.
She sighed to herself.
Well, it wasn't like a bath could do her any harm, especially considering the last time she'd had one must have been a week before she'd died, back at the Logistical Support and Medical Division camp's river. And even if she wasn't physically dirty after having been summoned, it might still do her mind some good.
Illya opened her right eye and stared at Sakura. The pink-haired girl relented, and unzipped her flak jacket, shrugging out of it. She was looking for a place to put it when the woman in black appeared next to her.
"I will take your clothes," she said, taking the heavy vest from Sakura.
"Oh. Um. Alright." Having servants was weird.
The forehead protector on her head was next, followed by her medical pouch, her kunai holder, her shoes, and finally her actual clothes, leaving her bare. Illya ran over and gripped her hand, pulling her in the direction of the double doors on the other side of the room.
The faintly-steaming bath that was revealed was easily the size of the one in the public bathhouse near Sakura's home in Konoha. Illya continued pulling her towards the wall on the right, where there were a set of spigots and a few seats.
It was only after they'd sat down and started washing themselves that Illya turned to Sakura and, smirking, said,
"You could have just astralized them, you know."
After thirty seconds or so the two homunculi named Sella and Leysritt –and Sakura still wasn't sure which one was which– entered the room with their arms empty, making Sakura assume that they'd put their clothes somewhere while they were bathing.
Once they'd gotten clean (in which Illya had insisted that Sakura help with her back, not that she minded, but she had no idea what Illya was trying to do, if she was trying to do anything), they'd entered the bath, and Sakura could practically feel her muscles relaxing in the hot water.
Illya was floating face up in the water, but then turned to Sakura, smiling impishly. "You really do have pink hair, don't you?"
Sakura had started replying with a "Yes" before her mind finally engaged and she realized what Illya was saying. "Illya!"
Her face was already red from the hot water, but she was sure it turned a few shades darker as she automatically covered herself, even if it didn't really do anything as she was submerged from the neck down.
Said white-haired girl just giggled, the sound ricocheting off the tile walls.
Sakura was still curled around herself when Illya spoke up again. "It's not fair. I'm older than you, but you get those things …and I don't." It took a moment, but she realized Illya was talking about secondary sex characteristics.
Sakura's anger dissipated as she recognized that Illya was likely only teasing her in order to deflect her own discomfort and perhaps even mild jealousy.
Even if she did want to do something for Illya, she knew that talking about it now wouldn't do any good. Instead, she looked over at the woman in blue, who was standing silently to the right of her companion and staring forward. "Why were you surprised I can talk?"
The woman looked at her. "Each class of Servant is defined by a core trait. Archer, Lancer, Saber, Berserker, Assassin, Caster, and Rider. The Three Knight classes, Saber, Archer, and Lancer, are defined by prodigious skill with their respective weapons. Rider is defined by their mount. Caster is defined by their ability to wield magic. Assassin is defined by their stealth and patience. And Berserker…"
"Berserker is a hero who lost sense of themself once in battle. Someone who gave in to their emotions and just fought and fought and fought," Illya said.
…Oh. Sakura could think of a few times like that. Where her vision had gone so red that all she could focus on was winning. The most memorable was when Chiyo-baachan had used her body as a puppet against Sasori.
And yes, okay, she sometimes had a tendency to react in anger before thinking.
"All of the classes are strong in their own field," the blue woman continued, as though Illya hadn't interrupted. "For Berserker, who is defined by their lack of emotional control…"
"They wouldn't have any," Sakura finished, beginning to understand.
The woman nodded. "Correct. In exchange for their sanity and ability to reason, they are stronger than they would normally be, as if they were lost in the middle of battle at all times. It also seems that the more a hero was known for their madness, the stronger that madness is when they are summoned."
"But I wasn't," Sakura said.
The blue woman just looked at her flatly, and her stare made Sakura feel like she was back in the Academy in front of Iruka.
"Alright, maybe I had a bit of a temper, and people knew it. But that was it!" she defended.
The woman nodded. "And that is likely why you are sane. Because your madness in life was so mild. It simply means that in exchange, you do not have the usual benefit of the Berserker class being stronger than they would otherwise be."
Sakura sighed, leaning her head back against the stone. "I can live with that. I like being sane, thank you very much."
Illya floated closer. "I like this Sakura too."
"This is best, for Lady Illya," the woman in black agreed, her voice much smoother.
Sakura simply lay there for a few minutes, her eyes half-closed as she stared at the ceiling. But it was only so long that she could hold in the question that had been on her mind since she'd learned about this mess.
"Soo… What're we going to do for the next two months?"
A/N: Pigs flew, Hell froze over, ensou updated a story she had no plans of continuing until others were finished.
…Will wonders never cease.