If you haven't realized it yet, there's going to be spoilers since I'm using material from JP F/GO, if you only play the NA version and don't want spoilers you'll probably want to skip out on this story. Also I'm going with "every servant in the gacha is summoned to Chaldea" as canon for this story, since having more characters to work with is a lot more fun. Today's chapter will be a bit shorter.
The walk back home was uneventful, although Rin kept pestering her daughter about her Saint Quartz in her classical magus mindset. She pulled one out for her mama to hold, and Rin started rambling on about "this jewel is worth enough money to buy a house" and other financial jargon.
Eventually they figured that it would be better for their Servants to rush them home as they weren't in any condition to fight and staying out in the open was dangerous. Archer carried Rin in his arms as usual while Saber Lily did the same for Shirou (much to his embarrassment) and Gudako latched onto her back. With the speed of a Servant, they made it back to the Emiya estate within a few minutes.
"Hey, Tohsaka. Did you want to spend the night here?" Shirou offered. "It's pretty dangerous outside, and I have plenty of rooms."
"Well, I-" Rin was cut off by Gudako staring at her with puppy eyes.
"I guess if it's just for one night, it'll be okay..." Rin slowly replied.
"That's great. You and Archer can help yourselves to any room you want. My room is over here, and the bathroom is..."
The three Servants watched Shirou and Rin walked off.
Archer looked at Gudako in disbelief.
"You have her wrapped around your finger already. I can't believe this, she won't listen to me but she'll listen to someone else's Servant. What a cruel Master I have." Archer said in his signature sarcastic drawl while Saber Lily just giggled.
"I'm going to go fix the yard now." Gudako said while pointing toward the yard, which was littered with holes and gouge marks.
Archer watched as his daughter projected a shovel into her hands and began filling in all the holes in the yard. Saber Lily had snuck off into the kitchen again to make tea.
He decided to take the task of guarding the two Masters upon himself as he stood in place and looked out for any threats.
With her newfound Servant strength, this level of manual labor was nothing to her as she filled in all the holes in the yard quickly. Soon enough, Saber Lily came out with some tea and the three Servants were sitting at the table together once more.
"This is boring." said Gudako, who wasn't used to not having to sleep.
"Having a bit of peace and quiet is a good thing, though. We don't usually get that sort of luxury during Singularities. Everyone worries about you, Master." Saber Lily replied.
"I know. You're all like my second family. I still wonder why we're here, though. Sometimes when I go to sleep, I wake up in strange places, although I always make it back sooner or later."
Archer was having trouble following the conversation between the two. Clearly, he was out of the loop here.
"At least you get to see your mama and papa here, even for a bit. Hopefully after humanity is restored, they'll let you go back home."
Truthfully, everyone in Chaldea felt bad that the young girl was forced to carry the fate of humanity on her shoulders. No one missed how her eyes would occasionally have a sad look that had no business being on the face of a nine-year-old. After all, you can't have a child face off against Servants, Demon Pillars, and other life-or-death situations and expect her to emerge unscathed. Fortunately, she was made out of really tough stuff much like her parents.
All the Servants and staff of Chaldea also tried to give her as much of a happy childhood as they could, and Doctor Romani and Da Vinci often arranged to set aside spare Saint Quartz in an effort to summon Servants that were closer to the age of the young Master. EMIYA lamented the fact that she was the last remaining Master and tried to raise the girl as well as he could despite his lack of parental experience, at least until a certain pair of tsundere goddesses showed up in Chaldea.
"I'm rather confused by what's going on. Did something happen in the future?" Archer asked.
"Let's just say...the future for humanity isn't exactly bright. It's a long story, maybe if Gudako here wants to summon more Servants, we can tell you about it." Saber Lily replied.
"Summon more Servants?"
"Yep, I summon lots of friends in Chaldea to help us fight for humanity." Gudako spoke up.
"Long story short, she is part of an organization called the Chaldea Security Organization, which is dedicated to preventing the extinction of the Human Order. Servants contracted to her like I am do not fight for the Holy Grail, we answered her summons with the knowledge that we are fighting for the survival of humanity." Saber Lily explained.
"We go on trips across the timeline to correct errors in human history. I think this is the first time I've been summoned as a Servant, though." Gudako added.
"Wasn't there that one girl who somehow manifested as a Servant too? The one who likes strawberry ice cream."
"Oh, you mean Shiki. We were clearing out that weird apartment with ghosts and zombies and she decided to come back to Chaldea with us in the end. It was pretty fun."
"I'm so confused right now," said Archer. What kind of security organization would hire nine-year-olds?!
"Don't worry, papa, with all the Servants from alternate realities, everyone is confused."
"The fact that we're here means that there's something wrong with this Holy Grail War. If this is like the other Singularities at all, then we will have to fix it by seizing the Holy Grail. This is probably a minor Singularity that was left over for some reason, although it probably won't affect human history. But it would be best if we fix it regardless." Saber Lily explained once more.
"Okay, it's decided then. I'll try and call another Servant to help us out. Hopefully it'll work even if we can't contact Chaldea right now." Gudako nodded sagely.
"How do you even support that many Servants at once?" Archer questioned. He knew for a fact that Shirou was a terrible magus and sustaining that many Servants should be impossible, barring the unethical methods such as eating human souls (which he knew would never happen).
"Hmm, when I wasn't a Servant, Chaldea would handle 40% of the mana costs and I would handle the rest. It's not like I call all 170 or so Servants into battle at the same time so it's fine." The last part of that sentence made Archer spit out his tea.
"But now I have this cool skill called Independent Manifestation that lets me exist without requiring any mana. And any Servants contracted to me also benefit from it too. Cool!"
"Amazing, Master. I'm sure you'll be a wonderful Heroic Spirit someday!" Saber Lily complimented.
"Do you really think so? I thought modern people couldn't get into the Throne anymore." Gudako questioned.
"Master, if saving all of humanity from incineration won't get you into the Throne, then I don't know what will."
"Hmm, I guess so. I bet it would be cool if I summoned my future self like what mama did with papa."
"Trust me, it's not as great as you might think it is," Archer interjected.
"Hm, if papa says so then I'll listen. Are mama and papa asleep yet?"
"Do you want to go check, Master?"
"Yeah, let's go!"
They found the two Masters snoring away in their respective rooms, which was to be expected from such a long night. Rin had taken the room closest to Shirou's, much to their amusement.
Motioning for the other two Servants to stay quiet, Gudako snuck into Rin's room and took advantage of the fact that Rin was a heavy sleeper as she lifted her mama and carried her into Shirou's room. She carefully set Rin down next to Shirou before wrapping the blanket around the two. Archer sent her a questioning look, but the words that came out of her mouth next rendered him speechless.
"Mama told me how she was always lonely living alone after her parents died and Sakura-obaa-san left the house. If I have the chance to make her less lonely here, then I'll do it."
Archer opened his mouth, but closed it after realizing that he had no words to say. Loneliness was probably the emotion that was kept hidden away the most in the mind of the Tohsaka heir. It would certainly explain her unwillingness to kill the Emiya boy, even in other timelines. She didn't kill him not only because she had owed a debt to the boy for preventing his Saber from cutting her down, but also because she wanted a friend.
Although the Rin in this particular timeline seemed to be a million times more prone to her dere side of her tsundere personality, but when you're suddenly told that you have a daughter in the future with the boy you've been secretly keeping an eye on, it tends to force out suppressed feelings for said boy.
Well, she always did have a soft spot for him so it isn't all that surprising.
They let the two teens sleep in peace as they followed Gudako to Shirou's shed. She projected a broom to sweep the ground with, revealing the long-forgotten summoning circle underneath.
She rummaged around the shed to see if there was anything to draw a magic circle with. There wasn't any magical reagents to draw with, so she eventually settled for some white paint. It wasn't very magically conductive, so she ended up pulling some Phoenix Plumes out of her phone.
Archer's eyes widened at seeing feathers of a legendary Phoenix, which should have all retreated to the Reverse Side of the World long ago.
"Don't tell mama." Gudako told him as she held a finger to her lips. Archer got the message; Rin would probably go crazy if she saw magical items from a Phantasmal Species.
She threw them into the white paint, turning it orange, before carefully drawing a Chaldea-style summoning circle over the original one.
"This circle will summon a Servant from Chaldea. Summoning someone straight from the Throne of Heroes means they won't have any idea about what's going on, which is why I drew the circle." Gudako explained. That, and I don't want to power up a Servant all over again. she thought to herself.
Archer watched with interest as his daughter carefully pulled out three Saint Quartz and a lock of white hair and placed them into the circle. She closed her eyes and channeled a bit of prana into the circle, and the Quartz did the rest as they started crackling with magical energy. It was like using a stick of dynamite; channeling energy into the circle was akin to lighting the fuse, where the explosion was caused by the explosives contained within, which in this case was the three Saint Quartz sitting within the circle.
The Quartz and the hair was consumed as three bands of light formed around the summoning circle, before closing in on themselves and causing a bright flash of light.
The light died down to reveal a small, white-haired girl wearing a Japanese elementary school uniform.
"Ruby, what's going on- eh? Master, is that you?"
She was cut off by Archer, who was trembling.
"Illya, w-what happened to you?!"
