Chapter 32: Rin's Retreat

From the castle window, the sea of trees and bounded fields had been parted right in front of me, but I would hardly call it a divine miracle even if that was the objective truth. In any case, what life in the dead forest there had been long chased away by incinerating light, but the forest was far from silent. Above the charred earth, there was the sound of incoming sirens. The sound of bloody sirens quickly approaching. The source of the sound reveals itself through my Archer's eyes.

Fire Trucks. It was painfully obvious where they were going and that was why I couldn't get that fake priest's smile out of my head.

Once Saber had brought down that Holy Sword of hers, this outcome was inevitable. For a little girl who supposedly survived the flames of the last Holy Grail War, she wouldn't be so quick to brandish such blades, but I should have known personally how unruly the most upstanding of children could be if pushed. Of the words that reverberated throughout the castle before everything came crashing down, it was the only one I could recognize.

Install.

A different one from that day. The language of her aria did not help me narrow the origin of her craft at all. I run my eyes from the command spells on my hand to the family crest branded onto my arm. The weight of generations of toil and sacrifice compressed into a searing brand. A body of mysteries both Eastern and Western built upon layer by layer like a precious stone beneath the molten earth. The sacrifices my family made…..my father made…...the sacrifices I made…..were all brushed aside like dust by a little girl cosplaying as a Heroic Spirit. The bounded fields me and my father worked on that covered the family workshop were as irrelevant as the bounded fields that covered the Einzbern forest. Both were as effective as mass produced good luck charms sold at stationary stores, but that was to be expected when faced with the power of ancient myths and gods.

Reinforcing my legs, I drop down from the balcony and approach the scarred battlefield.

I bite my lip before letting out a sigh as I grip the hilt of the imitation treasure Archer had prepared whose design predated the Holy Grail we were supposedly fighting for. This outcome was expected or rather I expected something worse. Throughout all of this, Sakura had yet to appear. As I replaced my familiars, there was one fact. Shirou was still under our control after all of that and for that reason it felt like a trap, but the blaring of horns in the distance does not cease. The protection of mysteries from the greater world was the paramount duty of magi. The common good that holds even greater precedence over any individual's pursuit of the Root lest Enforcers and Executors get involved.

I clutch the hilt of the gem sword in my coat before taking a step which breaks into a run.

As the air around me shifts in a haze, the elaborate castle behind me is no longer in sight. It is only through the connections to my hastily prepared familiars that I could still make out its shape. No counter measures against magi, but that did not matter. As the castle shrinks away in the distance, new foliage sprouts beneath my feet through leftover alchemical reagents within the Einzbern soil no doubt thanks to the quick homunculi maids. Hopefully the police do not venture too deeply before a proper bounded field could be set up. The Einzbern maids still had suspicions about me, yet truthfully to have good help for once wasn't a bad feeling. If I admit such a thing out loud, there is no doubt one of them will quip about my family's financial situation. After all, they weren't too far behind.

Running along the straight road paved out by Saber's sword, my feet stop as I face the center of the conflict with my own eyes.

Standing over the raggedy boy named Emiya, Illya was once again mending his wounds with the flair of a seamstress though she did nothing for his clothes. Having her own life tempered and tampered with must have given her much insight on techniques to preserve it. Her patient doesn't grimace or balk at his treatment and I realize he isn't playing tough. Getting injured and getting treated was simply part of his daily routine. Resistance against torture was simply a side effect. I was curious as to how such techniques stacked up against the smaller Emiya's. Magi weren't the only people who went out of their way to avoid regular hospitals….like those affiliated with Fujimura.

For magi who collect mysteries, it was ill advised to pry in the affairs of others unless there was a direct conflict of interest, but those were only excuses. As seedy as Kirei was, It was ultimately I who allowed him to act in my father's stead. My father, my mother….

I still had two working legs and from most people's assessment, a good head on my shoulders.

The Emiya and the Einzbern family. The Magus Killer. Class Cards. Sakura. It takes courage to pursue the ultimate truth of this world and that's why cowards can't be magi. At this point, I had nothing to lose, but everything to prove. Fear is synonymous with the unknown and monsters are nothing more than beings we can't comprehend. Sakura was no monster and neither was the wounded boy who was the obvious object of her affections. I started to ponder if the school teacher that doted on them had any knowledge of the truth behind those two. I had no illusions of beating Shirou in a fair fight one on one, but he could not outrun Berserker legs, hide from Archer's eyes or break from Sakura's bindings. I grip the family treasure in my pocket tightly as I walk closer.

The sirens grow louder. Sakura wasn't coming. The forest was compromised.

We needed to escape quickly, but Sakura could be lying in wait to ambush us. I brush away those thoughts. With Berserker's legs, Archer's eyes and the density of dead wood, there was no doubt we could escape regardless of who we were facing if victory was out of reach. The only certainty was the extent of the earful Kirei will give me when this is all over if I manage to survive somehow..….

"Lancer is watching," was Archer's warning in my head.

At the forest's edge through his keen eyes, I could make out the familiar figure that quickly recedes into the air. The red spear amidst the foliage was the same one Miyu used to take one of Berserker's lives and thus could not be used again. Lancer's Master remained unknown, unless he was another Servant Sakura managed to capture like the one we had beaten in Zouken's pit. I brush that thought off as I remember that agility he displayed at running away. It was unbecoming of a knight to run away without a good reason, but Archer is still technically one of the 3 knight classes as well. Heroes had no obligation to live up to what people perceive them as, but Heroic Spirits are formed by those perceptions.

The sun sets over the steel bridge which connects the two halves of this city.

From Archer's vantage point, there were no enemies in sight. No Servants, no Sakura and an Emiya who was walking silently beside me with Illya and her maids closely behind. I was disappointed for a myriad of reasons, not the least of which involved using magecraft to restore and clean Emiya's torn clothes. I guess the maids deserve some demerit points for handing that task off to me.

The most pressing was the nostalgic hysteria. Rows of cars dot the bridge with suitcases atop their roofs. Mothers were comforting their crying children. There were those who stole glances at us, especially the Einzbern in their gothic attire, but most people were preoccupied with their own lives. From what Ruby forced me to learn that day all those years ago, cosplayers weren't such an uncommon sight. In turn, the traffic police would be too preoccupied with them to bother our suspicious looking party. At least so far, none of the Masters have dared to act within the vicinity of bystanders. All of today's events were something of a litmus test after all.

I steal a glance at Emiya's all too serious face. I still remember vividly of what he said to me after he narrowly survived his brush with the suspicious Lancer. Maybe he was in fact being truthful back then.

My gaze rests on the horizon. It's been 10 years already….

5 Servants remained and 4 Masters have been determined. If Emiya was telling the truth, then there was a sixth Servant still out there. Gilgamesh, the sole surviving Servant of a war my father perished in. Did the Magus Killer really manage to destroy the Holy Grail if such a hero remained at the very end?

Across the bridge was the night sky where Saber had supposedly fought him and was forced to bring her sword to bear over a bustling urban cityscape. A sword whose brilliance did not lose to the sun. Without hostages and in a crowded city, he was able to corner Saber into revealing her sword. The irksome thing was that it was completely plausible considering the power Sakura used to chain up Heracles with ease was his. Sakura's shadows were something else.

An existence that commanded all of humanity's weapons, the strongest Heroic Spirit. If there was someone pulling the strings behind Sakura, the Emiya siblings and the mysterious cards they wielded, he was highly suspect. For all I knew of the boastful king in those Babylonian legends, everything that has happened was his way of getting back at magi who dared to use him as a sacrifice for the Holy Grail. Between him and Sakura, who did I fear facing more?

With the bridge no longer in my view, we leave the daylight behind us.

Through the apartment window without curtains, shined artificial light. From where I stood, I could not see the stars, but the rest of my senses were being tested. Shadows are the result of an absence of light. Through cheap walls, we could hear multiple voices. The Einzbern castle was concealed, but what had transpired had not.

"A gas explosion in the outskirts?"

"We should have moved 10 years ago when that hotel was leveled by a bomber."

"Gas explosions, no it must be that serial killer that was never caught."

"The Great Fire was no accident…."

Countless words that nature bombard my ears. Through the hastily prepared bounded field, sound could come in, but it could not propagate out. Useful for alerting us to a possible intruder, but even though I always had suspicions, having to listen to my family's failings with my own ears…

It was something I must listen to. I had my pride and errors don't become mistakes until you let them fester.

Our ancestors chose Fuyuki as the site of the Holy Grail War precisely because it was in the middle of nowhere, but that was centuries ago. They probably didn't foresee a 5th or a city sprouting around it. Not that I cared at all, but that old worm must've agonized over centuries of failure before losing his way, but that was natural when pursuing the root. Centuries of toil may not amount to anything, but that was the value of youth. At the bottom of their hearts, every fledgling magus that lives arrogantly believes themselves to be the "one" before time catches up with them.

It was only by the grace of Archer's keen eyes we were able to narrowly evade the eyes of a familiar school teacher who was roaming the city. Strange how he wasn't as keen about other things, but I didn't need any more trouble, but trouble was inevitable. The me 10 years ago would be ashamed of me that was bunkering down in some musty apartment. I tried to gather my thoughts, but it was hard to do with "company" within such a small place.

"So shady….this is the first place the cops will check….," was the magical wand that did not qualify as a tool let alone "company".

"It speaks the truth. Are the Tohsaka truly the Second Owners of this land or did your ancestor lie to ours?" were words that left that Einzbern maid's mouth automatically. Sella was it? The one who still had both arms. I look around.

A musty old apartment bare of any furnishings.

The original occupants disappeared 10 years ago and Kirei must've snapped it up as part of his clean up operation at the end of the last Holy Grail War with Tohsaka assets. It was one of the few properties my family still owned after Kirei let go of the others for a loss. Justifying what he did by invoking his duty as my guardian and my late father's apprentice.

At the very least, the place had running water. It was strange to think that the Einzbern Castle in the middle of nowhere somehow had electricity too.

The Einzbern "princess" who lived exclusively in castles would have sneered at the place if she had the energy. Her back was pressed against the wall as she leaned against her one armed maid who was scanning the room for shadows. We were tired. We were all tired after what we had to do even if some of us could draw energy from parallel worlds.

And for what?

With his back against the wall stood the catalyst for us losing our homes, Emiya Shirou. Restraining him was ultimately a liability considering the suspicion we would draw from neighbors and we already had Servants to keep him in check. The way he was leaning on a wall with his arms crossed still pissed me off. He was a human who wielded a heroic spirit's power, but unfortunately that wasn't the only thing he inherited.

A prisoner that wasn't a prisoner and a Servant that wasn't a servant, despite having the aptitude for it.

"You don't look too happy despite being allowed to walk around."

His eyes trace around the room and settle on my Archer's phantom form like a bloodhound.

"Not like there's anything to sit on. This place doesn't even have a functioning kitchen. I can't imagine I'm the only one upset," he had the gall to say, but he was right with the fact this place didn't even have a working refrigerator.

How much of his personality was the heroic spirit he imitated and what was his own was getting harder to discern the more we press him. The truth behind the boy wasn't something I could discern, yet maybe it was because I was making the wrong assumptions from the start. He was being too casual about this. I recounted today's events inside my head from start to finish and parse out the most important detail.

"Back there, you refused Rider's help."

"What would have happened if I accepted it?" he asks.

Holding him hostage was never part of my plans, though that's dubious of now. When the opportunity presented itself back then, there was no reason not to take it at the time. From what I knew back then, he was the greatest enemy and he wasn't even a Master. He was a formidable fighter, but the Servants at our beck and call are more so, yet Sakura could face them down alone with little trouble. That was why I shouldn't carelessly remove pieces from the board. That was why we didn't chase down Lancer.

I tried to look away from Sakura, but in the end I was always looking in her direction.

Sakura was the one who had Shirou subdued in the first place, so he wouldn't be so quick to accept her Servant's help, which simply raised more questions. Shirou's relationship with Sakura can't go back to the way it was, whatever that was. A relationship built on secrets as fragile as the mysteries we magi hoard. That is why most magi are alone and I'm no different.

"Nothing good, I suppose."

The things that are lost cannot be re-obtained.

If he kept secrets from Sakura, then of course he would keep secrets from me. As I was probing him, he was probing me. We were on the same boat…...yet...at the corner of his lips...

"Why are you smiling?"

"People can only be enemies if they are on opposing sides, so at least right now, I know we aren't enemies," were Emiya's unnecessarily honeyed words that caused my own lips to go sour.

As stupid as it sounded, circumstances have forced me to agree. If he doesn't trust Sakura's Servant with the little sister he never shuts up about, then Sakura's condition and actions cannot be his doing. It was obvious and it was obvious I was looking for someone else to blame, but the mystery of those Class Cards persist.

"For the time being."

"So noisy," was the tired voice of defeat that I didn't want to hear. Especially from someone who came to this country specifically to torment the Emiya's. Listless words that came from a fangless mouth, yet the Einzbern pup was not without her pack. The one armed maid seldom spoke, but the other didn't stop for a moment to remind you that she possessed a mouth.

"Are you certain this boy has any value? So far, he's been more trouble than he could possibly be worth," were her words directed at me, but her opinion was meant for her master's ears.

"Or maybe Rin is just really into this sort of play? Stealing the boy her sister tied up…..," was the drivel pouring from Ruby's non-existent mouth once again.

Stealing. Borrowing. Mimicry.

If any other magus had the abilities the little Emiya possessed, there was probably nothing in this world that would be out of reach. To obtain what she already possessed, the power of heroes of legend, such a thing would warrant a wish on the Holy Grail itself for common folk. For her who has so much, the Holy Grail is unnecessary. What she desired was something the Grail could not grant. It was something she had to protect.

Family.

She risked everything to face us disregarding any consequences because family wasn't something that could be re-obtained even with a Holy Grail. The omnipotent Holy Grail is not omniscient. Tools have no will. We couldn't have been any different. It was evidently clear why Sakura doted on her and it was clear to me she was ignorant of what Sakura was. Reality rarely plays out exactly how it does in your head and that is precisely why magi pursue endlessly. There are times people need to compromise and there are times people need to make sacrifices. In doing so, people lose sight of what truly matters and without such things, the Holy Grail is just a cup.

For Sakura, it must have been the same. Doing everything for each other's happiness while keeping everything to themselves. Just as Sakura and Shirou kept secrets from each other, they both must have kept secrets from Miyu. A blind family with each member doing what they think is best was a vexing thing.

I always gave Kirei an earful about how he should step aside already, yet the Holy Grail War has only proven his assessment of me correct. That was why his grin could be so wide. I wonder if this jerk in front of me is grinning for the same reason as that fake priest, let alone Archer whose face I could not see.

The heroic spirit I summoned seemed to have roughly the same confidence in me as that fake priest, yet he stood by my wishes up to this point, but there was no denying that my own Servant was keeping just as many secrets as my enemies. Even if I got the optimal timing wrong, my summoning was otherwise perfect, but heroic spirits were no simple familiars.

As I stared at the boy Sakura irrationally liked, I couldn't help but be a bit envious.

Emiya didn't count on being captured by Sakura or to be captured by us, yet he had that annoying assurance about him. We were both guilty of looking away from Sakura, yet right now he was looking at me with hope in his eyes.

"We might not be enemies right now, but that doesn't make us allies. All you are is insurance against Sakura who's doing god knows what in town. What makes you think we'll go along with what you want?"

"Because we have to scold them….and I hoped you two would help me…because that's what family is," was his answer that reaffirms my suspicions.

Family.

His gaze does not waver. If there was any deception, I couldn't see it. Short and simple like the answer to a mathematical formula. For this boy, his sister and Sakura, such a thing was always the answer. It was natural for those who sought the same thing to congregate together.

"And what makes you think we can?"

"Unlike me, you two are proper magi," was his confession that felt like a lie compared to the power he wielded, but interrogations never yielded much.

My eyes wander to the little brat who continues to have things to hide, but I could understand the meaning her smug look was trying to convey.

"Even if they end up crying and screaming?" was Illya's offer with a sly smile.

Shirou simply meets that smile with his own.

"Tears are the body's way of asking for help. Rather than a world where no one cries….perhaps a better world would be a place where it's okay to cry. That's what it means to scold someone," as the boy laughs at himself.

"I'm sure Kirei would be all too eager to hear such words," I say.

My Servant Archer on the other hand wasn't laughing at all.

"There will always be people and places outside your reach, Emiya Shirou. For the God a certain priest claims to serve, that place is Hell. Please refrain from taking my Master there with you," was my Servant's warning.

"The place I want to go isn't the place you're thinking of Archer," was Emiya's clarification.

Archer furrows his brows. He didn't want to meet the boy's gaze, but his pride didn't allow him to do so. Fire meets steel.

"It's unfortunate, but all the people precious to me were never part of that humanity you're always thinking about," was Emiya's straight forward verbal attack.

The two were the same and that was why they couldn't stand each other. Shirou's smile only grows wider as a barely noticeable frown forms on Archer's face.

"It's for that very reason that the "you" on the throne granted his power to me isn't it?" he asks.

I turn to face the hero I had summoned. He makes no reaction. No confirmation or denial. I focus my eyes on "Emiya" once more. The make up he used to cover up his mismatched skin tone had been long washed away. If he was a proper magus, he wouldn't have resorted to such an mundane and fallible method.

"Well, there's no concept of time let alone parallel worlds on the throne of heroes so I guess this is possible," was Ruby's highly implausible implication, but Illya's expression turns sour as she stands up with renewed vigor before letting out a sigh.

"This Sakatsuki family you spoke about earlier before we were so rudely interrupted. Where are they?" Illya asks, entertaining the idea of an implausible truth.

The Sakatsuki family which he claims his little sister is descended from rings no bells for me or the Einzbern, but Shirou hesitates.

"If you're asking for help from us proper magi, we need more than just names for us to consider you an ally. Any lead to Sakura's condition will help," was my ultimatum.

Shirou was someone who could endure anything, but that didn't mean there wasn't something he wanted. He already revealed his heartfelt wish and he understands he can't achieve it alone. He called himself our ally, but this is the first step he must take for his actions to match is words. The secrets he kept from his family, he'll need to tell us. He turns his gaze to the Einzbern maids before turning back to me.

"Miyu is the last Sakatsuki I know of after they all perished in the last Holy Grail War. All I can really tell you is that they appeared in Fuyuki over 400 years ago….., no one has witnessed the birth of girls in that family and that children in that family possess the characteristic of wish granting," he states uneasily. The Einzbern maids go on edge as he intuitively knew they would, while Illya couldn't help but smile.

As the head of the magus family who governs Fuyuki, such a name shouldn't have escaped my grasp especially one he claims to have had 400 years of history within this city. It sounded like a fantastical story, but magi lived in a fantastical world. The tidbit about no one witnessing the births of girls in that family seemed to coincide with what I knew about Einzbern Homunculi. Still, the Matou were once known by a different name before they settled here over 500 years ago after being driven out of their homeland. Knowing my own complicated family history with the Edelfelt, let alone the one unfolding in front of me, it isn't implausible that an off-shoot of the Einzbern family settled here without anyone knowing. After all, Zouken himself managed to steal a piece of the last war's Holy Grail to make Sakura what she was. That's all the more reason for the Einzbern to erase the Emiya along with the Matou.

One soul per vessel. When two souls touch, the lesser one is simply subsumed into the greater one to be nothing more than food. For Shinji who wasn't a proper magus, it was the only way to supply Sakura's Rider with energy and Sakura allowed him to do it. The fact Emiya was still alive while undergoing such a violent transformation over the years was a testament to his compatibility with Archer as a vessel. I'm certain there are other individuals with the same terminal affliction in this world. Maybe that unusually talkative Lord El-Melloi II knows something on the topic. The exceptions are the vessels the Einzbern family produced specifically for the Holy Grail War to collect the souls of fallen heroes to fuel the wish granting artifact.

My eyes turn to Illya. After seeing what Miyu could do and what Sakura could do, I had no illusions about what they all were. Shirou was taken aback, but continued to lay out what he knew as the truth despite his unease. His ability to form Noble Phantasms was a form of Gradation Air. The basis of the Class Cards were based on Flash Air. Forms of magecraft and alchemy that are commonly considered dead branches and rarely studied in depth.

For the former, he truthfully sounded like an elementary schooler trying to explain college level thermodynamics. For magi who live as hermits outside the reach of the Association, it regrettably wasn't anything unusual. How one's personal magecraft worked under a closely guarded paradigm only needed to be understood by oneself and successors, which was half of the battle when deciphering magical texts. How something plays out in your head rarely matches how your words come out and most magi aren't the talkative type. Something you understand to the point of instinct is difficult to break down into words. Most high schoolers probably have trouble trying to explain multiplication without using the word multiplication.

For the latter, he admitted he didn't know where to begin. He simply described the body as "hardware" and the cards as "software". Most people who use computers have no idea how the "software" they "install" actually works. For the Einzbern alchemists coined knowing everything they needed to know, except for the difference in terminology, such concepts weren't foreign to them.

All in all, his words simply reinforced the idea that the Emiya siblings were products of alchemy, but the one who created them was long dead, reinforced by the brashness the younger one displayed today. If the Sakatsuki alchemist was still alive, they wouldn't tolerate such behavior. It wasn't unthinkable for someone as unscrupulous as the Magus Killer to have even more unscrupulous contacts no one knew about, but as far as this Emiya knew, the Sakatsuki family no longer exists. For magus families to meet their end because of their own exploited children was an all too common story among Executors like Kirei.

I wasn't able to get much from Emiya's words, but the smile plastered on Illya's face meant that she did. Even if she didn't, wishcraft could be used to pry open the smallest of leads. Something had clicked in her head and clutching her heart as if in prayer, I could feel the air shift and flash around her as she made a wish.

"Installieren."

Veiled in unmistakable robes, Illya clutched an ominous jagged dagger in her hands. We were in the aura of the one who caused us so much grief today. How ironic that she was the first Servant to fall in this Holy Grail War or rather that was why she had to fall first. In front of us was Caster's trump card that we had never seen, but Archer recognized it immediately.

"Rule Breaker, All Spells Must Be Broken," was the name of Caster's Noble Phantasm resonating in my head.

It was the bane of all magi, Sakura included.