Fate: All Riders.

Chapter 9: Cooling off.


Waver was in panic mode. Two Masters along with Saber behind him with Lancer who knows where and two Assassins in front of him. It didn't even register in his mind that having two Assassins broke the rules. Then again even if he did realize that sooner he would've probably been okay with it since his own Servant broke the rule already.

Seriously, seven Riders it was ridiculous.

The only thing that would make it even more unbelievable was if a single Master had eight servants at the same time without any of them resorting to logic defying Reality Marbles.

Despite being surrounded by enemies Waver soon realized that Rider had yet to materialize himself. If he remembered correctly impossible odds were things that his Servant lived for so why wasn't he protecting his Master?

Of course Waver knew that such a defence would be hopeless but Rider struck him as the type of hero to fight until the bitter end.

Taking a step back the two Assassins moved in.

"Rider what are you doing?" He asked his Servant mentally.

"Oh don't worry Master you've got five other civilians in the area at least." He began.

"First you have that violin player, and then you have that cool looking guy with the jacket and shades." Waver still wasn't confident in his chances.

"Third you have that guy with the army pants and spiky hair next to that serious looking guy with all those buttons."

Even with civilians Waver still considered himself in grave danger.

With two other Masters nearby clean up wouldn't take too long despite the annoyance that would inevitability come with it.

He knew for a fact that his teacher Kayneth was an accomplished mage, tampering with the memories of four bystanders would be child's play for him.


"Wow Waver isn't doing too bad." Commented Saber.

"He's got their attention but does he have the right bait?" Asked a very suave Kayneth.

"He's going to blow it, look he's sweating bullets!" The red haired Irisviel noted somehow caught up in all this. "It's like he thinks that they're going to attack him or something."

"Well sometimes a gentle man is okay." Said Sola still hanging off her husband's arm.

"Oh look they approached him! Not the other way around! Is that normal?" Asked Saber.

Lord El-Melloi raised an eye brow. "Well for someone with me of course, perhaps some of my charm has rubbed off on him?" In his mind it was a definite possibility.


Kotomine was resting. Others would say he was working. To those people he would tell them that it kept his mind focused leaving his body to heal.

Going over a map of the city the priest went over his plans.

Of his seven Assassins one of them didn't actually have a civilian form at least not in the traditional sense. According to 'Nago' the 'Ixa' system had so many users that bystanders during their own time seeing the armour couldn't really separate one user from the next.

This seventh Assassin who almost always wore it's armour was more of the concept of the armour come to life.

An identity given form if you will.

The idea itself wasn't foreign to Kotomine and it had similarities to the original Assassin he wanted to summon.

One theory behind the Hassan was that he was multiple people with either the same mask or at least masks that appeared the same. So when one died another would adopt his mantle giving the illusion that the Hassan was immortal.

It wasn't to say that this Assassin had no civilian identity in fact he had them all. He or she could change its appearance to match the civilian forms of all of the other Assassins and a couple others that Kotomine had never seen.

The problem came was that some of these forms didn't sit too well with the other six.

From what he had gathered a few of these faces were their enemies who had gotten their hands on the noble phantasm at one point or another.

Sure the priest could in theory just tell them to shut up and deal with it but there was no real point to sending out a single extra Servant at the cost of the other six's resentment.

Another course of action involved having the doppelganger Assassin simply take the form of one of his other Servants but apparently the others didn't like the idea of a twin walking around, it seemed to unnerve them on some level.

Honestly it seemed to be redundant considering all Servants participating in the Grail war were copies from the throne of heroes any ways.

True they could work with it as seen by their ambush operation last night but for a reconnaissance mission where they had to be unmasked it quickly became a sour note.

Thus the seventh Assassin was put on guard duty.

The other six however were all given the freedom to explore the city to find the bases of the other Masters if possible.

Because of their relatively low power compared to the other Heroic Spirits in the war Kotomine didn't really have to worry about them being detected as Servants.

Archer on the other hand was a different story.

Even in his civilian attire he exuded the presence of a Heroic Spirit, anyone with any sensitivity to magic would instantly pick up on it. Those who couldn't might still instinctively know that whatever was in front of them wasn't natural and inhuman. The best case scenario was to hope that people simply believed he was a remarkable example of the human race.

Normally he'd allow Archer to go out with his 'invisibility' power but considering his own low levels of prana it was inadvisable.

"So how are those six doing?" Asked Archer. With no television in the church the only source of entertainment was to annoy his Master and that proved to be a challenge at times.

"They've come in contact with three Masters, I'm having them keep watch in case they decide to form an alliance but this doesn't seem to be the case…. That and it seems that the Master of Rider is aware of them at least to some degree." He spoke.

Archer simply shrugged and decided to throw in a few helpful comments.

"The kid has the oldest Hero out of everyone but the old fart is hardly the strongest." He smirked at his own secret joke. "In fact Rider might find that to be a compliment."

Kotomine simply went back to studying the map of the city.

"You should probably know, all of us can probably be considered Riders though the title we've gone by has nothing to do with the class system, I suppose for us it's another way of describing our jobs."

This actually sounded important.

"And what kind of work does a Rider do then?" He asked still studying the map.

"We all fight." That was hardly helpful yet the way he said it held weight.

The priest saw no point in commenting and continued his own work in silence.


Waver was not in the best situation, so his panic addled mind decided that the best course of action was to simply call for help.

Staring back at his teacher and Saber the two looked as if they were having a friendly chat with only the Einzbern giving off any feel of aggression.

To say it was the kind of aggression that came with getting ready for combat was wrong. It was more accurate to say that she was annoyed.

"Sensei!" He yelled out calling his teacher, the words simply were blurted from his mouth.

Before he could even regret his action Kayneth was already at his side.

"Why hello ladies." He smiled before freezing in shock.


Lancer recognized Assassin.

It was the same man from before, the man that Kotomine Kirei had returned the belt device to.

In that man's hands he held a violin, how Lancer had missed him before was a mystery to himself. Then again the Servant was Assassin, blending in and not being detected was his forte.

"Sorry ladies but me and my young, very handsome and very available friend should ship out for now, I'll be sure to catch you again." He said in a somewhat hastened tone.

Lowering his voice he whispered into Waver's ear.

"C'mon let's get out of here, I just noticed Assassin, we're not safe." If one Assassin was here then the priest and his other Servants could be nearby.

With his depleted stores of prana and only one Command Seal remaining there was no doubt that he'd come out as the loser in such a battle.

Even if Assassin was as injured as himself the same couldn't be said for the other two heroes.

Saber was honourable and naïve enough to be manipulated into protecting him he supposed and Rider didn't seem like the kind to take on someone weaker either.

However the Assassins didn't have to beat them, they just had to distract them long enough for their allies to ambush Lancer once and for all.

That and Sola would be in danger.

Grabbing his student by the shoulder he nodded at the two lovely ladies before taking his leave.

Finally out of ear shot Waver seemed to sigh and relax slightly.

"You know you did swimmingly for a first try, you didn't even get slapped!" Lancer smiled.


Waver was grateful for his teacher's assistance.

Yet he was also confused, several anomalies presented themselves.

First off Kayneth El-Melloi was never this warm towards his students. Yes he was a good teacher but his relationship with those he taught was strictly professional (despite himself being on the receiving end of a lecture that embarrassed him in front of the whole class). Kayneth got results and at the clock tower that's all that mattered.

Second was the fact that he was wandering around during the Grail War with his fiancé.

Strictly speaking from a Magi point of view putting your fiancé and future bearer of your child in such a situation was simply a bad idea.

Kayneth would never do such a thing without reason.

Thirdly the warning about Assassin was suspect.

He said 'Assassin' not 'Assassins' which meant…..

"Wait one Assassin sir? Don't you mean two?" Judging by his expression it was Kayneth's turn to be confused.

"Two? I only saw one, what are you talking about boy…" Lord El-Melloi quickly scanned the area and his eyes narrowed.

Smiling he pushed Waver behind almost protectively.

"Assassins!" He announced. "I did not think you all would be so eager for a rematch, do you wish to be reeled in?!"

Was Kayneth suicidal? He could reveal the existence of magic to the world just saying such words to all the civilians here!

Then again such a phrase wasn't inherently volatile and would not point towards such a thing.

Rather it would simply confuse the average civilian.

However these specific civilians did not appear to be confused at all.

"My my my." Spoke the violinist from earlier. "You're Lancer aren't you?" Waver simply raised an eye brow, what was going on?

"I am and I must say you have a pretty good right hook, my jaw still hurts slightly." Lancer replied. Sola-Ui massaged her chin in annoyance.

"Oh? How did you know it was me?" He asked as EVERY civilian in the area converged, all six of them.

"I didn't until you took the bait and told me just then." The violinist offered his hands up in defeat, despite being sworn enemies they were fairly polite with each other.

"Oi what's going on here?" Spoke a very annoyed Einzbern.

The civilians all smiled. "We're Assassin." They spoke in unison making Waver shiver in response.

This was insanely stupid, why did they reveal themselves like that?

It made no tactical sense what so ever! Everyone looked like they were tensing up for a fight.

Everyone was tired and exhausted but they didn't want anyone else to figure that out.

Ironically the only one fit to fight was the one who did not look like he wanted to do so.

"Hey hey we can all get along right?" Saber spoke intervening. "Here I have ice sticks for everyone!"

And indeed he did.

No one moved for a moment then Rider stepped out of spirit form taking a stick.

"Oh I haven't had one of these for ages, thanks Saber." The two of them smiled and the tension was broken.


"What do you mean you're all eating ice cream?" Kotomine exclaimed in surprise.

"Actually they're Ice sticks, they're lactose intolerant friendly!" Answered an Assassin.

It appeared that despite the professionalism they showed earlier the Assassins really wanted a break.

The priest considered this for a moment.

The Assassins had just made their civilian forms known; luckily for him they still looked like the average Japanese citizens and thus could still blend into a crowd.

Having no aura that screamed 'SERVANT' was also a blessing, in theory he could simply just have them hide and spy on their enemies.

Regardless the master of Saber now knew he had at least six Servants under his belt.

Like all developments Kotomine Kirei had already found a way to make this work in his favour.

"Assassins." He spoke sternly in his mental link. "Reveal your abilities to them in the course of conversation." The replies were somewhat confused.

All of the Assassins assumed the priest was a naturally secretive person, such an act was out of character.

"Casually have them reveal their abilities as well, perhaps ask about their legends." He continued.

"From what they tell us I can cross reference what Archer has already said to see how accurate his information was." That was making more sense.

By the sounds of it Archer already knew who the Servants were but such stories he had told were outlandish and hard to believe.

If he could get the other Servants to confirm what Archer was saying as true then this would not be for nothing.

"Just make sure they don't find out about Archer." Trading information was useful, especially if the enemy thinks you're trading everything you have.

This of course still left Berserker. Archer's report had been evasive but from what the priest could tell the Servant was dangerous.

The crazed Servant was both fast and strong, all this he already knew.

The drawback of such a power was the immense mana cost required to even keep it in existence.

He already knew that to. The above information was something that was applied to most if not all Berserkers.

So what was different with this one?

Well for one it was impossible to detect using magical means.

From what he remembered of listening in on his father and teacher's death the thing was also able to passively disable magical defences as well.

No hero that Kotomine could think of had these all of these traits.

Another piece of information was that Archer seemed to know this Servant personally.

Nothing was said but the priest had to be good at reading people in his profession.

From the way his own Servant spoke of Berserker he could gleam several undertones of friendship, affection and in some cases resentment and rivalry.

It wasn't that hard to put two and two together honestly.

Archer had spoken of being the main character of his own story and having a secondary character as an ally. It seemed that Berserker was this character.

In other words he was a hero from an alternate dimension; all of his research on heroic spirits was for naught.

Regardless it was more then what the other masters seemed to know thus far.


Kayneth was possessed, it was a strange feeling but one he could academically admire if not for the fact that the one who possessed him was a complete womanizer.

He could not help but feel that his fiancé was cheating on him with himself.

It was a rather strange day.

Even stranger was his student Waver! He did not foresee the boy living more than a day or two into the war but here he was completely unscathed which was more than he could say for himself.

Though Lancer controlled his body he occasionally glanced at Rider.

Rider, the white scarfed hero.

That white scarf was rather easy to get. However given the choice Kayneth would never do such a thing again, it had been one of the most terrifying ordeals he had ever gone through.

The memory was still fresh in his mind even after all this time.

Kayneth had been researching appropriate heroes to summon at the time going through multitudes of history books.

Making a list he had concluded that he wanted Alexander the great! Not just a brute who craved war but apparently the man was a great philosopher, such a Heroic spirit would have been fit to serve himself.

However as he perused and scryed potential locations of heroic catalysts, fragments of famous weapons and the like he was interrupted.

The wizard marshal Zelretch had appeared before him asking what he was doing.

However so engrossed with his research Kayneth simply snapped yelling at the man to go away and that he was doing important work preparing for the Holy Grail war.

Unused to being abused so openly (If accidently) in the clock tower he felt it was a novel experience and simply decided to give the blond noble a white scarf.

A badly damaged white scarf.

"Here's an artifact you can use, it belonged to the STRONGEST rider ever, of all time. Be sure to praise him as such when you summon him."

It was only until hours later after the Kaleidoscope had left that Kayneth learnt what had truly transpired.

Kayneth experienced several emotions.

Shock at being so close to such a dangerous individual and living through it without injury.

Pride at being able to do so.

And finally joy at receiving such a valuable catalyst.

Then Shock again.

It was at this point that Kayneth decided he was too sober for this and promptly lost the scarf.

He would've locked it behind multitudes of defences but in his drunken stupor Waver had somehow managed to grab it.

The Strongest Rider now in the hands of his student.

'Lancer.' Thought Kayneth. 'Use your guile and see if you can't find out what Rider's noble phantasm is would you?" He didn't like being so sneaky but being shot by a bullet and having all of your magic circuits fry was enough that he'd swallow his pride.

"Hey Rider!" Lancer seemed to obey as he tried to grab his fellow Servant's attention.

"Who would win in a fight? You or Assassin?"

Rider simply laughed.

"Me of course! Assassin would stand no chance!" The combined forces of Assassin all reacted with varying degrees of amused confidence and annoyance at this declaration. It seemed that they thought otherwise.

"Right and how would you do that?" Biting his popsicle the Assassin wearing army pants and combat boots stood up as if in challenge.

"Well I'd fight you and win of course." Rider kept sitting and continued to enjoy his popsicle.

"Hey guys let's not fight right now okay?" Saber tried to calm the group down.

Being a nice guy Saber was a fairly effective peace keeper.

It also helped that he was clearly the most battle ready out of anyone there.

If everyone teamed up it might be possible to bring him down.

However neither Lancer or Rider were willing to even try that due to the fact that their masters were at ground zero.

Only the Assassins had a good chance and they had less mana in them all combined than any other Servant individually.

"Seriously though Rider." Lancer spoke once more as if the previous tension was never there.

"You're a fairly powerful hero that's very easy to see." Everyone liked to be flattered.

"But I can't imagine you defeating all of the Assassins." At first Rider nodded at being complimented, then confused as Lancer continued his speech.

"What I mean is I'm sure with your superior abilities you'd be able to wipe out three maybe four or five of them but they still outnumber you, at that point I'm sure they'd wipe you out."

Rider simply smiled not even trying to hide that he indeed had an ace up his sleeve.

"I'd tell you but I'm sure my master wouldn't like that, nice try though." Waver let out a sigh of relief that he himself did not realize that he was holding.

Despite his silence however it was enough information to understand that Rider had an ability to combat multiple enemies at once.

Kayneth seemed satisfied by that little nugget but mentally urged Lancer to find out more.

"Well whatever skill you have I doubt you'd be able to beat Saber there!" Saber's eyes widened as he licked his popsicle.

It was at this point the Einzbern spoke up in a rather angry fashion.

"OH COME ON LANCER!" Everyone reacted to that piece of information differently.

Before now they all simply assumed that Kayneth's Servant was somewhere else or perhaps in spirit form.

Now they realized that the Master and Hero were one of the same.

Waver acted in surprise wondering where that Servant of the spear was.

The Assassin's simply glared and Rider chuckled.

Standing up the Assassin that spoke up before produced a golden belt and a knuckle duster.

"Wait what?" Waver was the only one clueless about this development.

"Lancer has the ability to possess people and now he's trying to fish for information, he's not very subtle about it!" Waver looked over at his teacher and his face paled.

Kayneth was already terrifying in his mind but a man who was his teacher with the power of a servant?

It was almost unthinkable.

"Oh?" Despite everyone knowing the truth at this point Lancer continued to play dumb.

If Kayneth had complete control of his own body he's use it to apply the palm of his hand to the front of his face.

"Well I'd say the same about you, whatever you are Mr red head." The words had obvious implications.

The meeting had gone from tense, to slightly cautious ice pop relaxation to tense once more.

"Tcch.." The Eizbern remarked taking a bite of her ice stick.

The Assassin's all held their golden knuckle duster by now with their belts visible.

And then all the Assassins present were annihilated by a bright pink light.


Kariya was in pain but he refused to use another command seal to alleviate it.

The pain was good, it was a small reminder of what Sakura had to go through.

The thought of saving her kept him going, he didn't need to be comfortable to do it.

Behind him the crazed Servant followed obediently out of sight.

Though he was no Magus Kariya was naturally talented, very talented in fact.

From Zouken's point of view it was unfortunate that he left the family, such potential simply gone.

So here he was stalking the more quiet areas of the city, parklands stretched far ahead of him.

However the area was unused, everyone was either at work or at school.

However his bugs had managed to find several interesting individuals.

There were at least three Servants in the area from what he could tell.

Two of which were weakened yet the third did not take advantage of this.

The only conclusion was that they were all allied, such a threat could not be ignored.

Getting closer to the area the bugs had something else to report.

One of the civilians sitting with the Masters and Servants held a noble phantasm, a golden knuckle duster and a belt that was identical to the white knight he had fought before.

Eyes widened at the revelation, he had to act now.

Somehow Assassin had survived, Kariya wasn't sure how but this time he planned to end it.

"Berserker!" He whispered. "I command you to destroy them all!" A command seal faded away in a flash of light.

"I wish you had more prana!" Another seal faded away and his pain along with it.

A grey miasma appeared above the group of Servants and down dropped an abomination.

Slamming down into the ground Berserker seemed to flicker for a moment as if there were multiple versions of himself smashing the ground where the Assassins had once sat.

Everyone sprang into action.

As the smoke cleared words were yelled.

"HENSHIN!" They cried in unison.

Leaping from the dust three shapes emerged from different directions.

The Servants all held their Masters in their arms bridle style.

The Einzbern complained and beat her fists against the armoured form of Saber uselessly.

"PUT ME DOWN IDIOT!" She yelled.

Waver Velvet gave an undignified squawk as Rider carried him to safety.

"Oh god I'm getting too used to explosions…" he thought to himself silently.

Sola-Ui simply clung to her fiancé, eyes wide and blushed.

"So manly." She thought.

Sliding to a stop the heroes put their respective masters down.

Such an attack was sure to bring out a few onlookers and bystanders right?


Kotomine simply watched the area with his scrying magic and sighed.

He had taken the precaution last night not only to create anti-sound boundary fields at the docks but also in places that he thought were potential battle grounds.

Normally he would not have done such a thing but being the unofficial self-appointed overseer of the war he felt that it was a good idea at the time.

Regardless there was something to be gained from this encounter.

Information on Berserker and thus the Master who had killed both his father and teacher.

He did not feel rage at seeing such a foe though, honestly this whole revenge thing was simply something he was forcing himself to do. He felt no obligation to carry it out yet his mind told him that he should.


"Ank- I mean… Iri! Get somewhere safe!" With an annoyed grunt the white haired girl obeyed.

Bringing up his sword Saber studied his new opponent.

Lancer and Stronger readied themselves with spear and fist respectively however it was clear that neither were in any shape to fight.

"So which Servant are you?" He asked the green eyed monster.

All it did was growl.

"It seems we've reeled in a Berserker." Lancer commented as if he was talking about a fish rather than an actual threat to his life.

Stronger nodded. "Then he's mine to fight!" Valliant words and despite his weakened form everyone there almost believed he could do it if only for a second.

"RIDER!" Waver yelled. "We have to get away!"

Stronger would not take a step back, this was something he could not turn away from.

"I made a promise to a little girl didn't I? That I would find the monster that took her father's life." He spoke solemnly.

Waver tried to think of something to get his Servant to back down.

"Damn it we can save him for later you're not strong enough now!" Rider chuckled at the response.

"True but that thing is faster than me, you saw how it got us all by surprise, it's either fight or die."

Lancer and Saber could see it too, it's why they didn't just keep running with their Masters in tow, they had to draw a line.

"Rider…." Waver reached out.

"Don't worry ya idiot, as long as I'm needed I'll never die." He said calmly taking another step forwards.

At this point Berserker had decided to focus all attention on the Rider. Though Saber was stronger he had kept a defensive stance.

"Did I ever tell you about my Noble Phantasm? That I'm basically a living battery with a power generator inside me?" Taking another step Berserker growled in his direction ready to pounce.

"It basically means that I have a one off mana boost that I can use in an emergency."

It was at this point that everyone there realized that Rider's aura had become stronger. Before it was weak but now it's energy threatened even Saber's power and even then it continued to grow.

"CHARGE UP!" The hero flashed white as if he was a child of the sun.

Before the flash could clear a voice rang out from the light.

"The heavens cry out!" The glow began to dim.

"The earth cries out!" The glint from his helmet was amplified with the light.

"The people cry out!" Waver stared in worry.

"They cry out for me to destroy evil!" The silver form of Rider was revealed.

"Listen up, evildoers...I am the warrior of justice, Kamen Rider Stronger!" Clearly this was the greatest threat among the three Servants and Berserker treated it as such.

"THE LEGENDARY SEVEN RIDERS!" The world seemed to explode.