Chaos.

That was the only way to describe the current situation outside.

Dozens of Goblins and Kobolds were running amok in the area, tearing up crops and invading homes. The sheer contrast to the peace and tranquility from just minutes earlier came as almost as much of a shock to Shirou as the first time he witnessed Berserker abruptly materializing in the dead of night.

It was a strangely surreal sight, one that was nearly enough to make Shirou freeze up in incomprehension and waste precious time—but thankfully, while his thoughts were stuck, his instincts weren't.

Before he knew it, he found himself automatically dashing towards the nearest endangered household. Once his mind rebooted, he tirelessly scanned the surrounding vicinity, trying to pinpoint where all of these monsters suddenly appeared from without warning.

As his vision swept across one of the wider dirt roads constructed on the farm, he noticed that an especially dense concentration of monsters were centered around a particular point, and seemed to be spreading out from there.

'Wait, isn't that...?'

Shirou could felt the beginning of a sinking feeling taking root in his stomach. Focusing his strengthened eyesight on the potential lead, he attempted to discern the object that had caught his attention, while hoping that his eyes were deceiving him.

Unfortunately, that wasn't the case.

He had gone out anticipating a number of possible reasons as to how monsters managed to get into the village. Causes such as a broken down section of the wall, or a hidden tunnel connected to the outside area had all occurred to him.

What he wasn't expecting was that the source of the current invasion was he himself, or rather, the group of visitors that he was a part of.

From within the same storage carts that he had been travelling with for an entire day, a large number of Goblins and Kobalds were relentlessly pouring out into the surrounding area.

A part of him found the sight unbelievable, but his eyes clearly weren't deceiving him. Everything he could take in pointed to that one cause.

However, any further thoughts on the matter had to be temporarily put aside as he approached the neighboring house. Focusing his sights on one of the windows, he briefly glimpsed a woman frantically running past the frame, followed by a group of voracious monsters trailing closely behind.

Putting on a burst of speed, Shirou sprinted until he was only several meters away from the house. Without slowing down, he cleared the remaining distance with a powerful leap that took him straight through the window. Ignoring the shards of glass that bounced off his reinforced skin, he bled off his excess momentum with a roll, and then immediately brandished his newly acquired sword.

The pursuing monsters hadn't yet registered his sudden entrance, and he wasn't about to give them the chance. Firmly gripping the hilt with both hands, Shirou rushed forwards and executed a wide horizontal slash, cleanly decapitating the entire row of goblins that still had their backs turned to him.

As the headless bodies limply dropped to the floor, Shirou internally marveled at the craftsmanship of the weapon in his hands. Even without reinforcement of the blade, it had enabled him to cleave through the flesh and bone of four monsters with barely any resistance at all.

Shirou was still apprehensive at the idea of depriving the former adventurer of his ability to defend himself, but he couldn't deny that having the weapon undoubtedly made his job a lot easier.

His momentary musings were interrupted as more enemies rushed through the door of the house, drawn in by the sounds of conflict. Wincing slightly at the shrill scream emitted by the woman behind him, he directly met the opposing group of monsters. The short but hellish period of tutelage he had under the King of Knights herself passed through his mind, as Shirou called on the experience he had received to furiously parry and counter the oncoming attacks.

Kobolds lunged greedily towards him with extended claws, intent on ripping apart human flesh and bathing in blood—instead, they found themselves on the receiving end of lacerations, as a razor-sharp blade cleaved through those very claws, and continued on to carve straight through their hearts.

Without letting a single monster through, Shirou's slashes formed an impenetrable barrier of steel that repaid assault with dismemberment. Try as they might, none of the monsters could force their way through the relentless swings. Even the few that tried to circle around the sword-wielding butcher towards the easier prey were brutally cut off, the teen's agility more than enough for him to deal with these stragglers and immediately return to hold off the main bulk.

Had all the monsters spread out from the very beginning, Shirou would have likely been unable to keep every single one from getting past him. But despite the apparent intelligence that had enabled these creatures to think of hiding in the storage carts and mounting a surprise attack, it seemed that the majority of them were unable to decide on any other course of action, save for charging straight ahead into the teen's glistening blade.

In the process of hacking and slashing, a vague sense of dissonance with the way he fought sprouted in his mind. Shirou had certainly spent nearly two weeks honing his sword skills by sparring with his servant, but those lessons had only enabled him to learn the absolute basics of sword fighting, with the sole aim of increasing his survivability.

Yet not a single trace of that amateurish skill was evident in his current movements.

On the contrary, every action was so precise that it shocked even he who was performing them. The manner in which he gripped the hilt, the angle at which he swung the blade—everything about the way he was fighting felt unfamiliar and foreign.

Yet in a blatant contradiction to that feeling, his body continued to freely execute those advanced techniques that it had never even learned before. This odd feeling felt somewhat familiar to the third-rate magus, but the origin of it eluded him at the current moment.

Despite how unsettling the sensation felt, Shirou couldn't deny that it enabled him to fight against the monsters far better than he otherwise would have been able to with his own subpar swordsmanship.

Soon enough, the stream of monsters rushing in through the door gradually ebbed, as they finally realized that trying to force their way into this particular house was a futile effort. Wiping away the thin layer of sweat that accumulated on his forehead, Shirou flicked the excess blood off of his blade, and then turned around to look at the woman he had been defending for the last few minutes.

He found her currently huddled in a corner with her face to the wall, shivering uncontrollably with her eyes closed, and ears firmly covered.

"Um…miss?" The teen called out in concern. "Everything's all right now."

Without showing even a single sign of response, the woman continued to face the wall while whimpering in fear. It looked like his words just completely passed through her ears.

Shirou was half-inclined to drop his weapon and attempt to calm her down, but he resisted the urge to, knowing that there were far more important things to worry about at this moment.

Leaving behind the shell-shocked woman with no small amount of regret, Shirou ran past the door and scanned the area to identify where he would next be needed.

However, as he took in the view around him, a distressing realization caused him to stop in his tracks.

'Not good, there are too many of them!'

There were over 10 large carts that had been brought in from their trip, each one designed to store a large amount of goods—and almost every single one had been infiltrated by monsters.

All of the bodyguards who had arrived with the caravan were sleeping over at the inn, and the majority of the town guards were posted on the other side where the main gate—the weakest part of the wall—was. That meant Shirou was most likely one of the only individuals in this part of the village who was capable of fighting monsters. There simply wasn't enough manpower to protect all of the vulnerable villagers.

With all the noise and destruction happening, there was a high chance the others would have realized that something was wrong by now, and were on their way at this very moment. But at the rate that the destruction was spreading, too many lives were going to be lost by the time they arrived.

As much as Shirou wanted to immediately head out, he had to stop and think of another way to deal with the situation. He needed to at least delay the destruction long enough for help to come, but the monsters were far too spread out at this point in time for him to do anything on his own.

'Crap, if only there was a way to deal with all of them at once. No, of course there wouldn't be something that convenient. In that case, is there anything I can do to turn their attention away from all of the villagers?'

As Shirou frantically worked his mind on overdrive to find a way around this mess, his gaze happened to sweep across a tiny red stone on the ground nearby that was releasing a faint glimmer of light.

In the process of staring at the misplaced object, the beginnings of an extremely reckless plan started to form in the teen's mind.

'If this idea doesn't end up killing me, Tohsaka definitely would if she ever found out about it,' Shirou dryly thought to himself as he picked up the magic stone, and rushed back towards the house that he left just moments ago.

Bursting through the closed door, he found the woman he had saved before, still huddled up in the corner in fright. He ran up to her and forcefully shook her on the shoulders to grab her attention.

"Miss, listen!" he spoke in a loud voice. "I need you to help me collect all of the magic stones that you have right now."

"Wha-? I-I-I don't know what—"

"Hurry! More people are going to die at this rate!" He yelled over her with an urgent tone.

"Eeep! R-right away!" the woman blurted out in a nervous fluster, as she took off upstairs to the second floor of the house. Silently apologizing to her for his rudeness, Shirou got to work dismantling the nearby magic stone devices and salvaging the stones dropped by the slain monsters.

In the process of forcefully ripping out a purple stone from its casing, Shirou mentally went over his improvised plan.

When he initially laid eyes on the red magic stone outside, he had been reminded of the earlier strange behavior that the monsters invading the former adventurer's house exhibited. Recalling how the Kobolds and Goblins seemed to purposely go for the magic stones embedded within magic stone devices, it occurred to him that he could use that unusual attraction to his advantage.

Just as Shirou took apart the final device in the room, the woman came running back down the stairs carrying an entire box of stones.

"Huffhuff…will this do?" she said while panting, but having evidently calmed down significantly from her earlier panic.

"Yeah, that's more than enough, thanks," Shirou gratefully replied, as he dropped his own stones into the box and took it from her.

"What are you going to do with all of these?" the woman asked in curiosity.

"Sorry, no time to explain," Shirou apologized as he took to the door with the stones in hand. "Whatever you do, don't leave this house," he briefly warned on his way out.

Once he got out of the house, he sprinted towards an open patch of deserted land. Looking around the village, he took note of how the monsters were spreading further and further in— with any luck, his current idea would reverse that situation.

Reaching the empty space as fast as he could, Shirou took a moment to catch his breath as he dropped the box he was holding. Picking up a handful of stones, he proceeded to scatter them around the general vicinity, making sure to leave them in the open as conspicuously as possible. Over time, a rough circle of multicolored gems started to form around the teen, one that practically lit up the surrounding pitch-black area in a subtle glow.

Once the box was nearly emptied, Shirou dropped the remaining stones in front of him and gathered them into a tight cluster. After throwing aside the now-useless container, he took a deep breath to prepare for the incoming mayhem that would potentially ensue, if his plan succeeded, before lifting up his sword with both arms.

'It's all or nothing.'

He brought down the blade on the cluster of magic stones with all of his reinforced strength.

*CRACK*

Accompanied by the sound of glass shattering, a dense concentration of magical energy burst forth from the fractured magic stones. The sudden release of mana was so suffocating that it nearly caused Shirou to keel over in dizziness.

After regaining his balance, Shirou got into position with both hands on the sword, awaiting any signs of response.

Soon enough, the reverberation of incessant footsteps started to ring audibly in his ears, followed by the outlines of countless small figures closing in from every possible direction, all drawn in by the sudden release of magical energy in the air, as well as the attractive sight of innumerable magic stones littering the floor around him.

As Shirou prepared himself to face the literal tide that was about to rush over him, a part of him absently wondered whether it would have been better to ask for help from some of the other individuals in the area who were capable of fighting.

He immediately dismissed such thoughts; it would have likely taken far too long to contact and rally the thinly spread fighting potential. Moreover, Shirou wasn't comfortable with dragging others into his own fight. He was the one who came up with such a suicidal plan, so it only made sense that his was the only life that should be put at risk. As it was, he would just have to fight and delay the oncoming horde for as long as he was able to by himself.

Just as the first wave of monsters was nearing him, a sudden thought entered Shirou's mind. Freeing one of his hands from the sword hilt, he reached down and picked up one of the many magic stones that were lying around.

Firmly gripping the rock in his hand, he concentrated and injected some of his prana into it, all the while utilizing structural grasping to keep track of the magical energy coursing throughout the interior. What he was trying to do was fundamentally similar to the failed attempts at reinforcement that he made ever since his circuits were opened.

With sudden access to more prana than he ever imagined he would have, the third-rate magus had frequently misjudged the amount of magical energy he poured into objects, causing said objects to break apart as their structures were unable to withstand the excess amounts of foreign energy. In this case, he took the magic stone, which should already have been filled with magical energy proportionate to its size, and added even more energy to it, purposely making it unstable.

In the process of analyzing the stone, Shirou noticed something peculiar happening. Initially, he assumed that the prana he was injecting would blend in with the magical energy already in the stone. Instead it appeared almost like the two energies were actively rejecting each other, and causing violent disruptions within the container.

Normally, this would have been cause for rather major concern. But in this case, it was just what he needed.

Soon enough, the purple stone started to emit ungodly amounts of dazzling light, as the crystal shook and strained in an attempt to restrain the raging magical energy within. While internally praying that the overloaded stone wouldn't prematurely detonate in his hand, Shirou singled out the densest concentration of monsters within the approaching mob.

Spreading his two feet apart, he lifted his front leg up and twisted his body. Focusing one last time at his intended target, the teen stamped his raised leg down hard enough to crack the earth, while simultaneously unfurling his twisted body and sending every ounce of his reinforced strength towards his throwing arm. At the moment of extension, he released his grip on the stone.

Barely a second later, the glowing missile made impact.

*KABOOM!*

The sudden flash of light that accompanied the spectacular explosion swept away the darkness and forced Shirou to quickly cover his eyes. A searing wave of heat was released, which he could feel on his exposed skin even from how far away he was standing.

Once the ringing in his ears subsided to manageable level, he risked peeking open his eyes to witness the results of his impromptu handheld bomb.

"…Huh."

Where just a few seconds ago, a large cluster of Goblins were gathered, now, a smoking crater that looked to be several meters wide stood in their place. Within that patch of blackened land, he could see the charred, backish-green remains of the creatures that had been caught right in the epicenter of the detonation.

It looked like the attack had also inflicted damage beyond the initial blast zone, if the few limbless monsters that he could spot writing in agony at varying distances around the crater were any indication.

All in all, the damage exceeded his initial expectations of such a tiny stone by a rather large degree.

That single explosion had caused the vast majority of charging monsters to stop in their tracks—likely from the shock at witnessing such an unbelievable scene. Shirou could somewhat sympathize with that disbelief; if he ever saw the equivalent of his own heart violently blowing up like that, he'd probably be fairly unnerved himself.

That didn't mean he was going to be considerate and pass up this opportunity though.

Filling up another magic stone with his prana, he lobbed it at a separate group of tightly packed monsters and squinted as yet another flash of light eradicated the creatures unfortunate enough to be standing nearby. With that second explosion, the mob of monsters frantically resumed their charge in earnest, likely in an attempt to overwhelm the teen before he could inflict more damage.

While apologizing in his heart to the villagers for performing what was essentially a glassing of their all-important farmland, Shirou took the chance to detonate two additional magic stones, before he resumed his earlier two-handed stance with the broadsword.

As appealing as the idea of dealing with all of the enemies from a safe distance sounded, it was far too costly in terms of prana. If he tried overcharging too many stones, he ran the risk of leaving himself too depleted to sustain his self-reinforcement, which was tantamount to committing suicide in this situation.

Once the first monster stepped into range, he violently kicked off the ground with his leg, appearing in front of the startled creature in the blink of an eye.

Maintaining his speed, Shirou ran his blade through the Kobold's magic stone, before swiftly spinning around to slash two other enemies that lunged at him from behind.

Without missing a beat, he charged through a gap in the encirclement and executed a flurry of strikes to keep the encroaching monsters at bay.

If there was anything that the teen could take comfort in with this situation, it was the lack of a stationary position to defend. In his earlier fights, he had been forced to play defensively in order to protect the vulnerable villagers who were being targeted.

Now, he took full advantage of his newfound freedom to duck and weave around the enclosing horde, always keeping a lookout for the tiniest openings that would enable him to avoid being surrounded.

As Shirou continued to slash, stab, and parry, that sense of incongruity he felt earlier came back to him.

Now in the middle of a more intense fight, he was able to get a better feel for the foreign movements that his body was unconsciously executing. If he had to put the sensation into words, it felt as if the sword in his hands was the one doing the actual fighting, and his body was merely following through with the weapon's directions.

It felt similar to those times that he had traced and fought with Caliburn during the Grail War; whether it was fending off Berserker's blows or deflecting Gilgamesh's bladed projectiles, Shirou's skills alone would have never enabled him to accomplish feats of that level.

Instead, by faithfully reproducing each and every aspect of the original Sword in the Stone, the third-rate magus was able to draw out the latent experience engraved within the blade over its lifetime of being used as King Arthur's weapon of choice.

Perhaps in this case, he was unconsciously delving into this sword's memory, and drawing out the skills and techniques of its previous wielder as he was fighting.

However—

'It's still not quite there yet,' Shirou internally remarked to himself, as he sidestepped to avoid a Kobald's descending claws, before mercilessly decapitating it in return.

Some part of him could instinctively tell that the current ability he was exhibiting was only a fraction of the original wielder's full capabilities; attempting to draw out more would likely require further training.

But perhaps this was a blessing in disguise, given that trying to keep up with Caliburn's ingrained experience for even a few seconds was already enough to leave the teen with torn muscles and broken bones. Considering that the skills stored within the borrowed weapon were those of an advanced level 3 adventurer, Shirou doubted he would be able to safely handle the full extent of the sword's stored technique with his current ability.

Before he could continue down that line of thought, a sudden increase in the hostile presences surrounding him forced the teen to direct all of his remaining attention to the fight at hand. As he leapt off of a Goblin's shoulder to escape the latest encirclement, he surveyed his surroundings while still in the air.

Scanning every direction, Shirou noted that the number of monsters charging towards his current location had since increased by a significant amount.

'Good, it's all going according to plan,' he calmly thought to himself, as he landed back on the ground and resumed running while slashing.

When he had first shattered the magic stones, he naturally wasn't expecting just that much to be able to attract the attention of all the monsters in the area; what he was banking on was that the subsequent heavy fighting he would be engaged in would finish off the job.

Earlier that day, the ex-adventurer had informed him of how prolonging intense fights in the dungeon tended to attract more monsters, because they were drawn to signs of fighting on an instinctual level.

While most people would have taken this as a warning to not do precisely that, Shirou, being who he was, decided to put that information to use in the exact opposite manner.

Knowing that every additional monster he drew to himself meant one less source of danger to the villagers, he continued to battle against the ever-increasing horde of enemies.

But that small sense of comfort didn't change the increasingly dire situation that Shirou was facing.

Even as he desperately fought on, sweat poured down every inch of his body, and his arms grew heavier with each additional swing he made, to say nothing of his legs that were constantly on the move.

Numerous small cuts and gashes from near misses littered his body. Initially he had the luxury of counter-attacking to whittle down the monsters around him, but as their numbers mounted over time, he had less and less opportunities to go on the offensive. With even more foes inbound, Shirou held no illusions as to how much longer he could hold out for.

The fatal mistake came just moments later.

Distracted as he was by the ravenous monsters, Shirou failed to notice the excessive amounts of blood that had been spilt over the ground. As he leaped to the side to avoid the simultaneous strikes of several monsters, he slipped on a puddle of thick blood upon landing.

The teen barely managed to find proper purchase on the ground with his other foot, but in the time that it took for him to regain his balance, two Goblin's lunged straight towards him.

With his body in a position where he couldn't brace himself, Shirou was struck head-on by the full body weight of the two opposing monsters and tackled to the ground.

Before the Goblins could get back into position to attack, he quickly decapitated one and kicked the other away, but the damage was already done.

With his body lying in a prone position on the floor, the rest of the monsters charged in gleefully, intent on finally tearing apart the lone individual that had managed to elude them for so long.

Right as the tip of the first claw was about to cut into him, however, an axe came flying in from behind, embedding itself through the chest of the oblivious victim.

The Goblin had nary a chance to scream out in pain before its body turned to ash, face still frozen in an expression of shock.

In the blink of an eye, numerous adventurers came charging into the scene with weapons drawn, violently cutting apart the screaming monsters like a tidal wave of metal.

As the hostile presence around him was cleared away in a heartbeat, Shirou let out a sigh of relief towards the reinforcements that arrived just in the nick of time. Wearily exerting his overstrained arms, he pushed off the bodies of slain monsters that ended up dropped on top of him, and sat up.

Among the many armed-individuals that ran past him, a certain bearded adventurer in dark blue armor stopped by Shirou's side and extended a hand out to him.

"You alright there lad?"

"I'm fine, thanks," Shirou gratefully replied as he took the hand and allowed himself to be pulled up.

"Good." The man nodded once, before letting go and pulling his axe out from the dead Goblin. "Just sit tight for a second, we'll be done in no time."

As he watched the leader join his subordinates in the skirmish, Shirou could immediately tell that statement was no exaggeration.

The monsters had been so focused on him until now that the sudden entrance of so many additional fighters had thrown them into complete disarray. The fact that practically all of the invading enemies had been drawn to this one spot only made the slaughter that much quicker, in the face of foes that were many times stronger than them.

In just a few minutes, the remaining monsters decided to cut their losses, and attempted to escape through the small forest leading to the other side of the village. A few adventurers broke off from the group to chase down the fleeing monsters, while the majority stayed back to clean up any remaining stragglers and deal with the aftermath of the attack.

Sure enough, the leader of the bodyguards that Shirou had become acquainted with came walking back to him.

"Here." He took out a potion from his pouch and handed it to the teen. "A little something for all of your hard work."

"Thanks for the reward, boss," Shirou responded with a wry smile as he took the potion and greedily drank from it.

Immediately, he could feel the familiar effects of the rejuvenating serum restore some of his depleted stamina. He consumed around half of the bottle before storing it away in a pocket, in case he would need the precious resource at a later point in time.

"Well I'll be damned though," the adventurer suddenly spoke up. "I knew you were hiding something from me back then, didn't think you were actually an adventurer yourself this whole time."

"Sorry, it wasn't my intention to conceal anything," Shirou apologized while sheepishly rubbing his hair. "But I'm really not an adventurer though."

"Oh come on, don't give me that now, lad," the adventurer spoke incredulously. "You honestly expect me to believe that after what I just saw?

"I know it sounds unbelievable, but it's the truth." Inwardly, the teen started to panic. He couldn't outright admit the truth, but he'd be hard-pressed to come up with a convincing cover story if he was forced to mouth on.

"Hmm… " The man stared pointedly at Shirou with suspicious eyes, but relaxed his expression shortly after. "All right, I understand. There's no helping it then."

Shirou let out a breath of relief at that.

"I know how some gods can be rather peculiar, it's fine if you're too embarrassed to say."

'What exactly do you understand?!'

The redhead was about to break out in protest to defend his crumbling image, but stopped himself after seeing the man raise his hands in a placating manner.

"Just kidding, just kidding, you don't have to say anything. It's none of my business anyway," he spoke with a short chuckle. "At any rate, there're more important things to worry about."

All at once, the man's easy-going expression turned serious.

Sensing the change in atmosphere, Shirou put aside his slight annoyance and listened intently.

"I didn't see you around the inn," the man noted. "Does that mean you were here the whole time?"

Shirou nodded once.

"Then, do you know how they managed to get in?"

"…" It was obvious what the leader was referring to by "they", but Shirou hesitated as he thought of how to go about revealing the information. The first person anyone would suspect upon hearing the facts would be someone within the travelling group, so carelessly disclosing the information could lead to unwarranted suspicion.

On the other hand, hiding the important details could prove to be just as damaging, so he decided to spill out all of the details in the end regardless.

"The carts."

"…What?" the man uttered with a perplexed expression.

"It was the carts that we brought with us to the village, all the monsters were hidden inside. They escaped and attacked after the storage carts were brought to this side a few hours ago."

At some point during Shirou's explanation, the surroundings had gone eerily quiet, as people within hearing distance stopped chatting in favor of staring blankly in his direction.

"…Hey, stop screwing around," the man spoke in disbelief, his words a likely reflection of everyone else's thoughts at the moment. "How could something like that possibly happen?"

Shirou shrugged lightly in response, but continued staring back with an unwavering expression.

That alone seemed to be more than enough to convey his response.

"…Ah shit," the man quietly cursed. He proceeded to lowly bring a hand up to cover his entire face, staying still in that position for several seconds. His broad chest visibly fell and rose as he took in several deep breaths.

Eventually, he slowly took his hand off of his face, and looked down in contemplation.

"We were careful to look over each and every cart before leaving the city gates, and there was definitely nothing out of the ordinary," he murmured out loud, more to himself than anyone in particular.

"That means, the only opportunity for monsters to have snuck in was during our ride here, when a certain group of people weren't keeping a proper lookout…"

All the adventurers standing nearby immediately recoiled back in fear, as their leader looked up and stared at them with cold fury. Evidently, the leader trusted his men enough to conclude that none of them were directly responsible for the events, but not enough to dismiss their laziness as an indirect cause.

"C-come on boss, it's not our fault!" One of the cowering men hesitantly stepped up and attempted to protest in place of everyone else. "We had our hands full defending against all those other attacks, there's no way we could've kept our attention on other things the whole time!"

The leader continued to stare sharply at his subordinates, and the men grew visibly tenser. But much to their relief, he eventually backed down with a resigned exhale of air.

"…This is gonna be a pain to deal with," he uttered, in a tone that clearly indicated he would much rather be anywhere else but here.

Shirou could sympathize with that frustration. If word got out that the caravan they were associated with was responsible for releasing a horde of monsters onto a village, a thorough investigation would be unavoidable. Their entire group would be put under intense scrutiny and suspicion by the village, and possibly even Orario itself.

While Shirou stood waiting for the leader to fully sort out his thoughts, a sudden urgent shout rang throughout the area, attracting everybody's attention.

"EVERYONE, WE HAVE TO GET BACK!"

Turning towards the direction of the voice, Shirou caught sight of a lone adventurer bursting through the forest that separated the two parts of the village in a frantic run.

"Ah great, what is it now?" The leader complained in irritation as he ran up to meet the newcomer. The rest of the nearby adventurers also dropped what they were doing and gathered around out of curiosity.

"B-boss! We have to get back, now!" the messenger gasped out as he panted harshly.

"Wait, calm down Bran, what happened back there?" The leader implored as he handed the sweating man a water pouch. "The few small-fry that escaped shouldn't have been that much trouble, right?"

"N-no, that's not it!" The subordinate said after taking a large gulp of water. "It's the gates!" he shouted out in alarm towards everyone.

"There's been a breach, monsters are invading the village!"


Author Notes:

Erm… yeah

So shit just sorta piled up, and before I knew it summer was over, and then semester started, and then even more shit piled up. Anyway, I apologize for the crazy long delay and the rather short chapter.

Was initially planning on posting this and the next chapter up as one entry, but the word count ballooned up over time, and I felt that it would've been a bit jarring to post a 13k+ chapter all of a sudden. I've got the next part almost fully written out, so with any luck it should be up fairly soon (hopefully not another 4 months).

Anyway, I've noticed a few people were concerned about how weak I was making Shirou. As shown in this chapter, he's well equipped enough to take on surface monsters without too much trouble, unless he gets swarmed. Keep in mind he's only going to be improving from this point onwards, even more so when he eventually gets a Falna, so I hope that his current level of strength isn't making any of you tear your hair out in frustration.

That's it for now, hopefully you'll hear back from me pretty soon. Until then, keep those reviews coming. I really appreciate them!