Phantom Thieves

(A/N: Before you guys started reading this, kindly ask yourself this question. Should Akira has his DLC Personas, especially his Picaro Personas?)

Rin Tohsaka feels really frustrating this week.

She was visiting her newborn baby cousin in London when she first sees the red lines forming before her very own eyes on the back of her palm.

It is not her father that has been selected to participate in the latest Holy Grail War, but her. It is quite an achievement by itself.

Now she can prove to the whole family that she is capable of becoming the Second Owner for Fuyuki and the heiress of Tohsaka, and this time she will make sure to take back her sister.

This is pretty much her life goal as of now.

She knows how important it is for her father to send her sister away to another family, but for a really long time, she despised her father for that.

She knows that he really thinks about his family's benefit from a magus's standpoint, but she could never agree of that.

If only her father did not follow the old ways so much… her sister won't be looking so miserable as of now…

Imagine the first cause of her frustration when she tries to summon her own Servant.

With the hype surrounding Saber as being called as the strongest Servant class (is what she heard her father spoken about once), she tries so hard to actually do that.

They are unable to procure a catalyst to summon a specific Servant, so she had to settle with the next best thing to summon Saber; summoning at the exact time.

With the occasion of going all over the place, and her hurrying up in returning home, the jetlag she suffered decides to dick around with her sense of time that she missed the timing.

Now she is stuck with an Archer… that fights with two swords.

That's just mocking her now…

At least Archer is very useful, aside from providing name and her constant teasing. She seems to be following orders very easily.

Root knows how hard it is for her if she summoned a really disobedient type of Servant… she may did a big mistake like wasting a Command Spell or something close…

Also, she found an enemy Lancer.

That Lancer is using a green spear and is controlling dogs around him and it seems her Servant can at least match up with his speed.

That's a good thing.

Unfortunately during the process of that battle, a civilian dies after witnessing the fight accidentally.

Rin knows that as a magus, a witness of the moonlit world should be dealt with and execution is almost the perfect solution for that.

But if she is going to defy her father's obsession of living purely like one, then she shouldn't let this poor soul rotting away, especially not when he is Tsubasa's cousin. She'd rather not let a friend cry.

Reviving the man with her magecraft, she forgot to make sure he is safe at home. If Lancer figures out he is still alive, he will surely kill him again.

So she and Archer goes all the way to Tsubasa's home and what did she see?

That man is actually a Master. A Master with TWO Servants!

Because of this revelation, she started spying on him throughout the day.

Who is he, really? Is he the Master of Blue or Red? How did he have two Servants?

At the end of the school day, another source of her frustration comes in.

The man and Sakura just disappear just like that…

Where are they!? What kind of magecraft is that!?

Now she is back at her home, angrily entering the front door to be greeted with her maid.

"Ah, Rin-sama. Welcome home," the red-haired maid bows at her happily as she cleans the hallway.

"I'm home, Kohaku," Rin simply responds as she walks straight to the living room, putting herself onto the couch and sighs.

Archer pops up beside her, chuckling, "Isn't that Master a very interesting one?"

"How so?"

"He is able to see me even when I am in the astral form. Not just sensing me, but really looking at me."

Rin looks away, "And how would you know that?"

"If you just pay attention when he was looking at our direction, you could've realized that his eyes are directly looking at me, as if he knows that I was there. He even looks away the moment my eyes see him."

"Great, we have a Master that is not only has two Servants, but he can also see Servants even when they are in an astral form!" she huffs in anger, sighing.

A tray of teapot and cups are being brought onto a nearby table with Kohaku pours the tea, smiling at her master in wonder, "May I ask what is the source of your anger, Rin-sama?"

Archer sits next to her Master and responds with a smile on her face, "Owh, she's just mad that the Master we are currently investigating just disappeared right in front of her face."

"Really?" the maid seems interested with her words, "Rin-sama, that does not sound like what magus can normally do."

"You're right," the black-haired girl sips her drink, "That kind of magecraft seems to be some form illusion at first, but as soon as we get close to it, it is almost as if he really did disappear just like that. It is as if he just manipulated space or dimension."

"But isn't that kind of magecraft is Kaleidoscope; only used by the Wizard Marshall himself? I thought he never share that with anyone?"

"Eh~?" Archer grins at her, tilting her head playfully, "Kohaku-chan, you are quite knowledgeable about this. Are you sure you are just a maid?"

"N-no…" Kohaku is taken aback by the Servant's reaction, "I just… heard it from Akiha-sama before…"

"No," she shakes her head, "It is impossible to think of that. He has apprentices before, but none of them can even handle his method of teaching that they choose to quit instead of keep pursuing their goal of learning the Second Magic."

Archer is now twirling the cup around her finger, glaring at her, "Surely Kaleidoscope isn't the only space manipulation magecraft around, right? There's bound to be imitation here and there…"

Rin is still drinking her tea as her mind wanders around. Maybe… maybe there is an explanation for what that transfer student did before?

"Ah!"

She suddenly stand up, startling both of the other ladies in the home.

"R-Rin-sama?"

"No way!" she screams out, as if she is having some sort of revelation, "It's impossible, but it's the only explanation we have!"

The silver-haired girl is now mumbling, "What are you thinking about now, Rin?"

"It's that thing, Archer! He is using a forbidden magecraft!"

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"We're home~!"

A little silver-haired girl runs off from the living room and reaches the front door of the house, greeting a silver-haired woman and a black-haired man before her, "Welcome home, mama, papa!"

She goes to hug the man first, earning a smile from him, "I'm home, Illya."

"Welcome home," Shirou appears toward the door, seemingly wearing an apron around his body.

"Is Shirou cooking today?" the woman looks excited, getting a nod from him as a response.

A white-haired female turns up behind him, sighing, "He really wants cook you guys something that he even forbids me from using my own kitchen."

"It's the other way around, Sella," Illya turns toward her, "You are the one who forbids him from entering the kitchen."

"M-mistress!"

The woman at the door chuckles, "My, my, I really missed this lively home~!"

The women are all entering the house further, leaving the men as the red-haired one quickly runs toward the door, "Let me help with the lug-"

His feet stop.

His eyes are staring straight toward a blonde-haired figure in suit.

The older man notices his reaction, quickly opens up his mouth, "Shirou, this is Saber. She will be staying with us for a while."

"Sa…ber?" his eyes couldn't stop looking at her.

The female in suit bows at him, "Please to be of your acquaintance."

"Y-yeah…"

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Senpai… was that… a Reality Marble?"

That night, back at the home of Oribe, Sakura just finishes cleaning herself up as she walks out of the bathroom, now asking that question toward Akira, who is making himself busy with curry on the stove.

He turns around toward her, mumbling, "What is that?"

"Senpai…" the purple-haired girl asks another question, "You are a magus, right? Have you ever heard of Reality Marble?"

Akira turns back toward the curry.

In his mind, he is wondering if he should even let her know about his current situation.

He has already reminds himself to tell her the truth, but how far the truth can be told before she decides them as lies?

Maybe he should just tell her bits by bits; just not everything.

"I am not a magus, and I have no idea what is this Reality Marble you are talking about."

"But… just now… we summoned Servants, right?" more confusion is filled inside his junior's head, "You even summoned two… only a magus can summon a Servant…"

"What we summoned is a Persona."

"Persona?"

Akira turns around, looking straight toward her, "Persona is a manifestation of our personality. It is a mask we choose to create in time of helpless and vulnerability. I can summon more than one because I am a Wild Card. Wild Card is a rare type of Persona User whereas others can only summon one."

"What kind of magecraft is that?"

"It is not a magecraft, not in the broader sense. Persona is more… mystical than just taking up a chunk of our prana. I don't have any answer to where Persona came from, other than a place I learned, called as Sea of Souls. Just think of Persona as familiars, except if they are getting stronger, than so do we."

Sakura looks down, now sitting onto the couch, "Then… what was that just now?"

The man moves close to her as he speaks, "We were at a Palace just now. Palace is a manifestation of distortion; some sort of strong corruption within someone's mind on how they see themselves and others. Palace manifests itself in a different dimension called the Metaverse, and can only be accessible by a certain app."

"Like this one?" she shows him the eye symbol app with red background on her phone's screen toward him, "I never installed this app in my phone before, and this thing appears when I took a bath before."

"That's the one. I used the same thing just now and that's how we got there. You won't be able to delete that app at all."

"Then…" she pulls herself up, staring straight toward him, "That house that looks like mine… why is it appear at our school?"

"The location of the Palace is something significant for the Ruler. It is mostly factored on how influential that place is for them. In this case, your brother sees the school as a place where he can do as he pleases. Him seeing his school as his home's leader must have been thanks to whatever he sees himself as."

"I see… that make sense…" the girl mumbles, "My brother… he… he can never be a magus."

As she keeps on speaking, he uses this chance to sit opposite to her, listening to what she has to say.

"I wasn't born as a Matou. My real name is Sakura Tohsaka. I don't know why my father gave me away, but I do know that at that time, Matou family doesn't have a proper heir. My brother, the latest generation they have could not have magical circuit like other magi did. So I was given to them instead."

"Ever since I was little, I was groomed to become the Matou heiress. Those worms back then… they are Crest Worms; Magic Crests made by my grandfather. They dwell inside my body for years by now… Night after night… they crawl themselves all around me. That's what my grandfather called as training."

My god…

Wow…

He knows that a family of magi can be a bit strange from times to times. They sometimes really hate technologies and some of them can go so far as disregarding human lives.

But this one definitely takes the cake.

Makes him wonder if there are other families that see her grandfather as a role model…

Let's hope not.

The girl is still continuing, "When my brother finds out about this, he's… he is so mad… My grandfather told me that the worms give off libido, and that I need to constantly engage in certain activities to keep myself in check. So he told my brother and he takes an advantage on that… I guess he sees me as that person in that Palace thanks to that…"

Owh… that part…

Let's hope Kamoshida of this world did not learn of that. He is going to see her grandfather as a god…

Kamoshida… wonder what happened to Ann of this world? Let's hope nothing bad happened to her.

But to think that someone would stoop so low as to hurt their own siblings for something like that in this kind of way… It's like the moonlit world is no different than normal human.

They hurt each other. They killed each other. They used each other for their own gain.

He has been wondering this, but if this world can summon heroes with magic and stuff, why aren't they able to stop the world from destruction?

Guess this is the answer.

Akira looks around the house. He is deciding whether he should tell her of this or not. This will be the crucial part of being a Persona User in the Metaverse and he does not want to give this information away.

If his ability of summoning the Metaverse is regarded as his Noble Phantasm, then telling it away won't be a good thing, no?

But being inside a Palace of someone related to what magus's business is, like being part of the grail war may have been a bit different than what he is expected.

The appearance of a cognition version of a Servant really does amp up the difficulties. It could have been because of how inhumanly strong Servants are or if he is still gaining all of his abilities from his worlds, but he alone couldn't steal the Treasure, let alone exploring the whole place.

Still, asking her to do this job…

"Let me help, Senpai…"

!?

The girl is now leaning forward toward him, "Senpai, what you are doing back then, let me help."

"Why would you-"

"You are trying to do something in there. You tried to help me, right? He wanted to expose my secret, so you go to the… Metaverse to help me, right?"

He nods, "All of the Rulers of Palaces all have something in common; a Treasure."

"Treasure?"

"A Treasure in a Palace is akin to something that creates the Palace in the first place. It could be a driving force of a Ruler's desire, or something that changed a Ruler into what he is today. Taking that thing away from the Palace will collapse the building, and in the real world that person will have a change of heart."

He continues, seeing how she is really intent on hearing him out, "He will turn over a new leaf. He may expose all of his wrongdoing, but he will no longer be able to do the same thing again. His head will feel with guilt if he ever tried to do that again, at least that's what I believe so. I never seen the same Palace materialize again."

"Expose…" Sakura steps back, hearing the word as her hand starts shaking.

"Don't worry," he quickly mutters, "I know a friend who was raped by someone and nobody ever speaks of her badly. People will only talk about your brother and how bad he is. Even if they see you negatively, I won't be doing the same. Trust me."

The purple-haired girl just stares at him for a moment, before nodding slowly.

The two suddenly heard of noises coming from the front door.

"Tsubasa, did you smell something nice today?"

"Ah, it must be Kurusu-san's curry again! His curry is so good! You should try it, nee-san!"

"Really? Then I can't wait for that."

Tsubasa and an older woman walk into the living room, noticing the two sitting on the couches.

Akira sees the older woman and is quickly being reminded of who she is; Tsubasa's older sister and an apparent bread winner of this household, Ayaha Oribe. It seems she is working in a company called Fortuna, and it is the same place Tsubasa works is, whatever that work is supposed to be.

"I didn't know we have a guest today," Ayaha gives them a smile, commenting on the view she is looking at.

Tsubasa seems really startled, looking at her, "That's Sakura Matou, right? She's a member of Archery Club. Rin and Ayako talk about you a lot."

A word piques the interest of the youngest one, "Tohsaka-senpai spoke about me?"

"Yeah, she was wondering if you and your brother are siblings and she even said that it would be better if her family adopts you instead of just living with that 'seaweed experiment gone wrong', whatever she meant with that last one."

Sakura now forms a faint smile, only noticeable by Akira.

He quickly stands up, speaking up toward the two, "She fought with her family just now, so she ran out of her home. Can she stay with us for tonight?"

The two women are now looking at each other before nodding as the younger one among them responds with, "Sure! This place has too many rooms after all."

Hmm…

Something suddenly appears inside his head.

This house that looks like a generic old Japanese house is way too big and seems to be way too special for the Oribe siblings to just found one.

"Ayaha-san," Kurusu turns to ask the older one as the two female students are now walking away from there and goes to see various parts of the house.

"What is it, Akira-kun?"

"Where did you find this home? Didn't you just get transferred here? How is it that you found this place easily? It looks rare to be called a normal house…"

Ayaha suddenly chuckles as she mumbles, "I was wonder why aren't you asking about this place. You didn't say anything the first time you arrived here. My friend told me about a family who wants to rent out this home because they are going to stay in a different house around here so we do just that."

"Who would give away this perfectly good cultural-looking house?"

Feels like Yusuke will make this place his personal 'Palace'. He is going to be pissed if he heard about this place.

"He goes by the name Emiya. Kiritsugu Emiya. Nice man, but he seems not too keen on speaking to just anybody. I spoke to his wife on the phone instead, though she seems clueless about a lot of stuff. They are not here at this moment."

Emiya? Does this guy have anything to do with Shirou?

Owh, the curry is already close to eruption…

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Welcome to the Velvet Room."

Ah, it's Igor again.

Lavenza smiles at him as she mutters, "How is your journey in the other world? You should be thankful to our Master for giving you an opportunity as such. It is risky for us to even meet at this moment."

"Risky?"

Igor responds toward his confusion, "Two realms, having one part of them merged with each other when it is quite impossible for that to happen in the first place, has created something close to duplicates. These two realms each have a concept of their own, and when both concepts meet up, each one try to overtaking the other. The realm of magi and the realm of shadows are not meant to see one another."

"Is that why Sakura gains the ability to summon a Persona? She is from a family of magi, so that means she is not from our part of the world."

"Indeed it is," the little girl nods, "You can also learn magecraft from them, but with what you can do right now, that would be unnecessary."

"Correct," Akira nods, "Living as a magus means you are close to death. I may sometime overuse magic from my Persona, but not once did I ever felt like I'm dying."

He suddenly wonders something, "Wait, what about Yaldaboath? Is there him in this world too?"

"I am afraid we couldn't determine that," the long-nosed man speaks up, "The state of this new world is confusing even for me. The driving force of that world is undetermined. What I could say is that as the world is unable to pick either Root or Axiom as their pantheism force, the world ended up creating duplicates of information within that world. At some point you may see another me, or my superior, Philemon, or even Gaia or Alaya, but they are definitely not what we are originally."

"I don't get it."

Lavenza mutters, "Unfortunately neither do we are able to determine what that world really has become. It is why we employ you in the first place as both our Wild Card and our Servant."

She continues, "You are a Fool-class Servant. You are now representing both realms. As a Fool, you are being given a freedom that should be considered a skill by other Servants to investigate the cause of the future destruction of both realms."

"As such, it is possible that even in this new world you will be having allies along the way. Such is how a Wild Card lives."

Igor suddenly mentions, "Then, we shall end this conversation today. We will meet you again soon."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Akira wakes up the next morning early, preparing himself as he now walks toward the living room, seeing Ayaha preparing something at the kitchen.

Hmm? Sakura is there as well…

"You don't need to do all of this, Sakura-chan," Ayaha looks at her with some worries in her eyes, "You are our guest after all."

"It's fine. I am used to all of this. I am usually the one that does all the cooking at my home. I also helped out at a senior's house most of the time."

"Owh?" the older girl's heard something interesting, "A boyfriend?"

Sakura quickly blushes red, "N-no! He's… he's a friend."

"But you helped out in his home a lot?"

"Yeah…"

"He must be really dense then."

"Well… he is kinda…"

"Nee-san!" Tsubasa walks into the room, already in her school uniform as she seems angered at her sister, "Stop teasing Sakura-chan so much!"

Akira just chuckles, looking at the three as he now turns his attention toward the television.

Whatever happens in this world today? He would like to know that. A piece of news would be of great help.

"A school in Tokyo has faced two horrifying incidents yesterday morning as one of the students of Shuujin Academy attempted a suicide and a teacher was found dead on his desk. The student Shiho Suzui was seen jumping off from the rooftop toward the school yard and several moments after that, Suguru Kamoshida was seen having a heart attack and mysteriously having his eyes turning white while black goo coming out from his eyes."

"Several minutes before his demise, Kamoshida admitted to have been physically abusing the students and sexually assaulted Suzui repeatedly."

"The same disease, dubbed Mental Shutdown by some, was also happened similarly to a political figure, Masayoshi Shidou, who admitted of murder and bribery and a police officer, Tohru Adachi, who admitted of murder and attempted kidnapping several days ago."

"The student is now in coma and is receiving a care at the nearest hospital. Further investigation regarding the Mental Shutdown-"

*switch*

Akira startled by Tsubasa's presence, who looks sad for some reason as she is heard mumbling, "The same thing happened to that cameraman…"

She is suddenly snapped back to reality before turning toward her cousin, "Come, we should have breakfast before we go to school."

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Strange…"

"What now?"

Shinji is preparing to go to his school when he heard his corpse-looking grandfather mumbling and looking bothered by something.

"Your sister… there's something strange with her…"

The blue-haired guy snickers, "Strange? What is so strange about that bitch?"

"Is there anything different about Sakura yesterday?"

"Different?" Shinji wonders for a moment, "Not really. She's being as sad as she always is. Owh, yeah. She has found a new boy toy, apparently. That slut must have stayed a night with him yesterday."

"New boy?" his grandfather wonders, "She's not with Emiya anymore?"

"Nope. She's with this transfer student, Akira Kurusu."

"Interesting…"

"If there is nothing else, I should get going now…"

The old man gives off a creepy smile as he speaks up, "Don't forget to go to the Einzbern Castle this evening. There will be a meeting between Masters of Blue."

"I got it! It's not like I need those losers' helps in the first place…"

"Don't be a fool, Shinji. Ignorance will definitely kill you."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Mental Shutdown…

If what Igor said is true, then there is no reason to not believe that these cases caused by a fellow Persona user, most likely Goro Akechi of this world. He may also have the Psychotic Breakdown inducing ability as well.

But Shidou and Kamoshida… they shouldn't be having a shutdown if he were to go with that logic.

If he is now in Kyushu instead of Tokyo, then all of his friends are just strangers to each other. Everyone will have their lives as if they are untouched by anything.

The same goes for those they reformed before.

Kamoshida should still be a creepy teacher like he used to. Shidou should be two-faced like always.

But now they are downed earlier, how? Doesn't seem like having magi in this world will affect the two.

Maybe this is why he was called here instead of someone else? Maybe this change in pattern would be a lead for him to find the truth?

"Senpai!"

Ah, now he has gone back to the reality.

It seems Sakura, who has been walking by his side toward the school, looks really pissed at him, "Senpai, weren't you listening?"

"N-no… I was just thinking about something else… What was it again?"

She takes a deep breath as she mutters, "I was asking, how do we change my brother's heart?"

Ah, he forgot that she is a beginner in this line of work.

"I told you yesterday; we are going to steal his Treasure this week. To do so, we are going to venture deep into his Palace and secure an escape route so that when we steal the Treasure, we won't get lost. Palace can be really tricky to navigate. After we secure the route, we should send a card telling him that we are going to steal something important to him. This will make him wary of us and thus, putting us on high alert. At that point, the Treasure will finally show itself up. Then we can go and steal it from him."

The female student is now lost in thought, "That… sounds like how that thief from that one anime I saw once; the one about a detective turned into a child... sounds like how he works…"

"That's just how us Phantom Thieves work."

The girl suddenly stops moving, startling him, "What is it?"

She stares at him for a moment, "First, a hero. Now, a phantom thief? Does all the boys act like characters from fictions?"

"Hey, at least mine is real."

Sakura chuckles for a moment, before taking a deep breath, "Then, when should we explore the Palace?"

"This evening should do it. If nothing else stopping us, we should be able to give him the calling card tomorrow morning."

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

That evening, at a really huge castle somewhere inside a nearby forest, a pair of people are now standing around, looking nervously as their heads keep turning toward whatever direction they can see, at least one of them.

One of them, the blonde in suit, simply standing in one place, looking proud with no need to look cautiously all over the place like the woman in white does.

Inside a room in the castle, this scene is being watched by Kiritsugu Emiya, a known Magus Killer who is a mercenary, currently employed by the Clock Tower.

This isn't the first grail war joined by him, even if the previous one was short lived.

10 years ago, the fourth Holy Grail War is supposed to happen in this exact place and he was employed by the family of his wife, the Einzbern family, who is also in charge of the grail war, to participate in the war itself as their representative.

Unfortunately someone activated the Greater Grail itself way too early and in all confusion, managed of being stolen by an unknown third party.

That happened right after the defeat of the previous Caster.

Kiritsugu managed to use that confusion to bring his wife, his daughter and two maids to stay with him and his adopted son here in Fuyuki.

Of course, the Einzbern aren't taking too well of his action. It seems they were trying to groom Illya into a Lesser Grail, even preparing a catalyst of their own.

Before this new war, he works with his wife and a friend of him all around the world, trying to get rid of any of the Einzbern, away from others for their safety.

Now, he is being paid by the Clock Tower to figure out the main culprit of the theft of the grail and prevents the war from escalating.

If not because this war happens once again in Fuyuki, potentially endangering his kids, he won't be accepting this offer.

There is also the fact that it seems Einzbern has employed a different mercenary to track him down.

Ah, from the camera, Kiritsugu sees a pair of twin-tailed female in red appears and accompanied by a white-haired female in red.

This must be Rin Tohsaka. He spoke with her father once in London before.

That man is quite an arrogant one; a failure of a father.

What kind of a person giving away his daughter toward a rival family? He was pretty sure while Servants band together fighting that monstrous Caster, that man was in a fight against Matou.

At that point he should have demand his daughter back, but he didn't.

There is no way Kiritsugu can just give away Illya, not in a million years.

If she is Tohsaka, then that lady in red must be Archer... though she feels a lot familiar for some reason.

It feels like he is looking at a younger Iri…

Is there a heroic Einzbern?

That's stupid. No Einzern was recorded being a hero. The family is a magi family. Exposing themselves sometimes means death.

Next to enter is a blue-haired man with a purple-haired female in hood.

He can see how she is wielding her scythe around, almost engaging in a fight against Archer and his Servant, Saber.

Judging from her weapon, she could be a Lancer, but he could be wrong. She could be Assassin or Berserker.

Definitely not Rider.

He found out not too long ago that Rider of Blue was summoned by a comatose girl in a hospital nearby, so they should be around their Master.

He should go and find this Servant. Who knows? Maybe he could ask Rider's help?

Owh, the grey-haired Master and his Caster arrive into the scene.

That Master of Lancer must have a really short fuse, seeing that he quickly pick a fight against Master of Caster.

This guy is going to be hard to work with.

Next one is…

Hmm…

Interesting…

Olga Marie Animusphere…

He once heard of Marisbury Animusphere, who was regarded as a failure of a magus for researching on something so stupid, not one magus believe in his theory of… something.

He should read more about what this guy does…

Recently, he heard that this man founded an organization that combines both magecraft and science, and is now obsession over "saving the world" as he called it before he passed away.

So now his daughter comes to join the grail war, probably for the same reason?

If it is about saving the world, he will be all ears, as long as it helps others.

Her Servant is… quite an interesting choice of clothing.

She wears a negligee and walks around like it was nothing.

The male in the room looks really flustered by her appearance.

Master of Caster looks away and Master of Lancer couldn't stop looking at her.

The Servant is probably an Assassin.

Honestly, that clothing, while distracting, can be used to get close to the enemy.

Then comes the last one, a man… a single person?

That man is El-Melloi II's student, Flat Escardos. He is the only true representative of the Clock Tower.

He is a prodigy, but he is way too cheerful for a magus.

Right now, he even takes selfie with almost everyone.

But where is his Servant?

Kiritsugu just realizes of this.

His Servant is most likely Berserker.

That class is known for the Mad Enhancement "skill" that turns the Servants insane. It is unwise to just bring them along for a simple meeting like this one.

Okay, he should go show his face now.

Back then Kiritsugu prefers not to show his face so that he could assassinate the enemy Masters without them knowing him.

But this is a team battle. Trust is a key component for this version of Holy Grail War.

And… he won't be focusing on killing the enemy.

The Fire of Fuyuki reminds him that he killed so many people already, he shouldn't be doing that anymore.

This time, he is here to protect, not to kill.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

[Next Morning]

"What are these?"

"Who put them here?"

"Phantom Thieves? Who the crap-?"

"Shinji, your name is right here!"

The seaweed-haired man grabs one of the cards posted on the bulletin board and starts reading it out loud, "For Shinji Matou, the sinner that hurt and look down toward those around you. We, the Phantom Thieves, will steal your precious desire and will change you into a better person."

Now crumpling the cards in anger, he turns around and starts screaming, "Who the fuck put these up!? Come and face me, you cowards!"

"Come and steal my Treasure. See if you can even come close to me."

The content of the meeting and the Palace will be done next chapter.

Now, here comes the problem with the Palace. I've recently read an xover story with Persona 5, and the author makes a good point that it is really hard to just describe everything that happens inside the Palace. Every puzzles, shadow's dialogues, etc…

What will happen next is just a bunch of description before the boss fight.

Next: Ending Shinji's Palace and a meeting with Ruler. Also, a brief appearance of Team Red and a clue of who is the next Palace.