Shirou wasted no time in summoning a petal of Rho Aias to block the storm of Black Keys that Atrum launched at him. Kirei quickly ran across the room to take cover, but was still caught by a few of the blades, which dug shallow wounds into him. The rest of the swords crashed into Shirou's shield, but it easily held strong. Taking advantage of the chaos, Shirou dismissed his projections so that Galliasta would have less ammunition to use against them.
Unfortunately, Shirou was now stuck in place for as long as he held up the shield, and whatever magic Galliasta was using to manipulate the swords had not yet been released. The Black Keys slowly inched their way back out of the shield, attempting to flank Shirou and Kirei. He couldn't hold up Rho Aias for much longer, his sides were too open. They had to move.
"When I drop the shield, sprint for the far door. I'll try to cover us," Shirou told Kirei quietly, who was busy keeping the possessed victims at bay. He believed he heard a grunt of confirmation, but since he was unable to turn his head, he was just going to have to have faith that Kirei had actually heard him. If not, the priest would catch on quickly. Shirou just had to time his execution well.
Once Galliasta was more focused on manipulating the swords than what his enemies were doing, Shirou dropped the shield and summoned two Roman scutum: hefty tower shields of wood and bronze that covered both of them from the hail of swords.
"Go!" he snapped, tossing the second shield to Kirei and making a mad dash for the door. Kotomine was right on his heels, and quickly surpassed Shirou, busting through the far door, leaping over three more possessed crowding the hallway in front of them and continuing his run. Shirou did his best to keep up, but he wasn't confident that he could make that leap, so he used his shield as a wedge to open a gap between the victims and continue following the priest.
The hallway cut sharply left, leading to a few more rooms and small halls that looked mostly disused or for material storage, as well as a couple of paths that smelled much more thickly tinged with Atrum's magics. One led all the way down the hall, and the other was a door that opened up to reveal a set of polished concrete stairs into a darkened basement.
Neither seemed all too appealing.
"Which way seems less hostile?" Shirou asked.
"Neither path looks particularly inviting," Kirei drawled.
"Then pick one."
Kirei moved forward with purpose, striding down to the end of the hall. The doors were magically sealed, so it was most likely guarded Galliasta's workshop. Shirou stepped forward, peeking back over his shoulder to make sure Galliasta wasn't standing there, waiting to steal his blades again with whatever magic he had somehow hidden from the scouting teams.
But what was it? It doesn't make sense.
Telekinesis was an ether-aligned thaumaturgy, and metal manipulation was usually earth-aligned, with himself as the major exception. Galliasta's element was fire, according to the file. Unless he had made some kind of new mystic code, then this magic should have been incredibly difficult for him, if not outright impossible.
Shirou sighed.
Focus on the hostages, for now. If we can get them out, then his tricks won't matter.
He brought a newly traced copy of Rule Breaker down, and the barrier sealing the door was unwound like a loose thread.
They stepped into Galliasta's workshop cautiously, their shields raised in case of some kind of trap. When nothing sprung, they lowered their shields and took in everything Galliasta had built. The workshop looked far more like an Atlas workshop than one belonging to a Clock Tower mage. A steel dais sat in the center of the room while six clear storage tanks formed a hexagon around the platform's perimeter. At the center of the dais sat a small, silvered bowl, directly under a large metal stalactite hanging ominously above it. The air was so thick with despair that he felt like he was suffocating just being in the room.
Shirou's arm felt like a muscle was just pulled. Flashes of Archer's experience in the basement of Kirei's church, staring at all those half-rotted humans came to his mind unbidden. The atmosphere felt similarly horrible.
He soldiered on. He had to.
Shirou wanted very badly to set a time bomb within Galliasta's workshop, just to ensure all traces of this place were erased, but the risk was too high. He didn't know how long they would take, so if he set the timer imprecisely, he could end up killing the kidnappees or Holy Church members clearing out the building after their mission had completed. So, he settled for summoning some ancient Sumerian mace and decided to wreck the workshop as he wracked his brain.
"You saw his mystic code light up when he started controlling our swords, right? I thought it was just shot lightning, how the hell did it manipulate swords? Does he have some kind of telekinesis?" Shirou asked Kirei as he haphazardly bashed open another container.
"It can generate and manipulate electricity. Telekinesis is a possibility, but why would he activate the Primeval Battery if he were controlling the blades telekinetically?" Kirei responded with his own question.
Shirou puzzled over the possibilities as he knocked over the bowl in the center, its support crumpling flat as his mace struck true.
"I want to say that he's using electricity to manipulate them magnetically, but you can't just turn air magnetic, can you?" Shirou didn't remember any scientific discovery that suggested such a possibility.
"No, not that I understand. You would need iron and copper to make a magnet, not simply thin air and an electric charge."
The answer hit him like his mace. He had smelled the iron back in the other room.
"Hold on, I need to check something. Be prepared to have to exorcise me if something goes wrong," Shirou said succinctly, dismissing the mace he had been holding and kneeling down to press his palm against the floor.
"Do not take too long. Galliasta will be here soon," Kotomine warned.
Shirou nodded, closing his eyes and firing up his magic circuits once more.
Structural Grasping.
Within seconds, he understood the entire layout of the home, its occupants and its composition. Information flooded his mind as if through a broken dam, washing away his doubts and uncertainties. Within the walls, the floor, even the ceiling, the entire first floor was inlaid with thick sheets of iron. Understanding suddenly dawned on him.
"You were right. Galliasta built his house to be a giant electromagnet. Anything made of steel won't work against him as long as he has that battery," Shirou explained urgently. "Also, he's coming this way. He's not in a hurry, though. The possessed victims will be here first."
Kirei nodded. "If we can take his mystic code from him, he will lose his greatest advantage. I will do my best to relieve him of it."
"There are more victims in the basement as well. Some of them are coming up those stairs. Be wary of them; we don't want to get cornered. In case we can't get the mystic code out of his hands, I have a couple backup plans, but they could be really destructive. If I yell, 'brace,' then take cover fast."
"And what of the victims?" Kirei challenged, playing devil's advocate.
"I want to make sure they're out of the way. If you can distract them while I try to hit Galliasta at range, we can make this work."
"You believe so?"
"I think it's the best plan we have right now," Shirou shot back.
"And what of your arrows?" Kotomine asked. "Will they not simply add to Atrum's arsenal?"
Shirou shook his head. "I don't need to use iron for my arrowheads."
Kirei smiled like a predator that had caught a whiff of blood.
"Then prepare yourself. We re-engage in five seconds."
Archer's bow materialized in his left hand, along with a set of bright, matte metallic arrows. Their tips were fashioned from inconel, a synthetic metal that Archer had once witnessed. They were far from magical, but they would fulfill their purpose.
Kirei took the offensive, breaking the doors off their hinges as he sensed Galliasta's approach. The victims charged him mindlessly as soon as they saw him, screeching horribly and slinging their malignant ink with wide swipes of their arms. Kirei picked up one of the doors he had broken, using it in conjunction with his shield as a wedge to push past the possessed without hurting them too badly as he bore down on the rogue mage. Galliasta's urn flared with electricity once more, launching the Black Keys at the priest, and as soon as Atrum was focused on Kirei, Shirou took the opportunity to shoot him.
From the raised dais of Atrum's machine, Shirou strung his arrow, drawing it back as far as he could. He released it silently, aiming for Galliasta's chest. Atrum saw him just before he took the shot, and held his crackling urn outward, stopping all the swords in their tracks in hopes that the arrow would also be plucked from the air by the magnetic field that pervaded the house.
Inconel, unfortunately for Atrum, was non-ferrous metal.
Galliasta screamed in agony as the arrow ripped through his left shoulder, only barely keeping hold of his mystic code. His arm bled profusely, and only his snap judgment to immediately try to cauterize the wound with a conjured flame spared him from bleeding out in the next few minutes.
Damn it. I shouldn't have missed that.
Archer's bow had a very heavy draw weight; one that his much younger body could not handle properly. Shirou's aim should have been dead on, but the power he needed to draw the string had made his arms shaky and shot unsteady.
Galliasta was paying attention to him now. He couldn't afford to miss again.
Shirou rushed forward, dismissing the bow and jumping in the air, over the heads of the possessed that Kirei was still holding at bay while he distracted Atrum. He traced three altered Black Keys in midair, gripping them between his fingers as he summoned two dull iron short swords under his feet to suspend himself in midair for a short time, or at least dramatically slow his descent.
Balancing himself upright in the air, his knees bent, he flung the altered Keys at Galliasta with pinpoint precision, swinging himself around a bit with the momentum of his throw. Atrum brought back his captured bladed into a tight defensive formation to block Shirou's projectiles, which clanked uselessly off of the rogue mage's improvised shield. The shifting of the magnetic field also bound the swords he stood on more tightly in their position, and he used that to push off the swords and jump backwards, out of the range of the possessed so that Atrum would not spear them once he decided to fling his blades at Shirou.
He was correct to do so.
Atrum mercilessly launched his swords at him. Shirou skillfully weaved through the first few, bringing forth another petal of Rho Aias to block the rest. Many of the swords broke on the shield, unable to stand another clash with the fortress wall.
"Now!" Shirou shouted.
Kirei sprang into action while Galliasta was distracted with Shirou. He rushed his target, unhindered by the curse-wielding possessed swinging their claws and hurling their vile secretion at him. Atrum swung a haphazard arc of lighting at him, but he was too late. Kirei ducked, easily slipping under it, and threw a punch at Atrum's chest.
It connected.
Shirou could hear the cracking of bones even from beyond the crowd as Atrum let out a choked howl of pain. As Kotomine tried for a potentially lethal follow-up blow, another crackle of lightning flashed from the urn. Kirei let out an anguished grunt and stepped away from Galliasta, trying to create distance between them. One of his arms hung limply at his side, now useless.
Shirou dropped the shield and burst forward, trying to reach Kirei to defend him and attempt a fatal blow on Galliasta. He quickly weaved through a few of the thralls, trying to slip by before they could react, but they were quicker than he anticipated, and once they closed off his escape route and started throwing their curses at him, the protections encompassing him began to sputter and fizzle out. He was surrounded on all sides, and Kirei's wards had dissipated. They were out of time.
"Kotomine!" he shouted, not knowing if the priest had heard him. "We're out of time!"
He quickly summoned two more Roman shields, holding one in each hand. Shirou crashed into a few of the kidnappees, bowling them over one another to give himself a bit of breathing room. Scanning the hallways, he searched desperately for a way out. He noticed Kirei was no longer faring so well against Galliasta now that their protections had faded and Kotomine was forced to deal with the enthralled as well. Neither of them could get close to Atrum due to that damned lightning, and the more time they spent fighting him head-on, the more time the victims' curses would have to destroy them.
They needed a way out.
Shirou's eyes snapped to the open door of the polished, concrete stairs he had pointed out earlier. That was right, he had studied the house's layout when he had Structurally Grasped its floor, and from what he saw, the basement was a veritable labyrinth. They could lose their enemies and regroup down there.
It wasn't much, but it was the best he had.
"The basement!" Shirou called out, making a mad dash for the opening before the possessed could get back up and attack again. They were fast, and with Shirou's limited protection, they would be a real threat. Kirei immediately disengaged from Galliasta and ran to regroup with Shirou, acrobatically leaping over the few upright thralls near him. Atrum shot a couple more bolts at Kirei, but both missed.
They jumped recklessly down the stairs into the dark basement.
Shirou was already regretting not committing the entire floor plan to memory when he had the chance. He knew now that the interior of the home was not teeming with curses, but if he tried to Structurally Grasp the building once more, it could alert Galliasta to their location. They were still too close to the entrance; it would be too easy for Atrum to find them if they broadcasted their whereabouts now.
So, they wandered the labyrinthian basement.
To light their path, Shirou had summoned Dyrnwyn, a Welsh Noble Phantasm that burst into searing white flame if it was wielded by one it deemed worthy. He felt a bit strange using a sword that judged the worth of its wielders as a simple torch, but nonetheless, it met their needs, granting them light and warmth as they traversed the twisting pathways under Galliasta's mansion.
"I didn't memorize the layout of his basement, but I'm pretty sure I saw a few underground exits when I performed Structural Grasping the compound," he murmured to Kirei.
The priest turned to look at him. "Are you certain?"
"No," he admitted. "But they're either exits or dead ends, and I doubt that Galliasta dug multiple random dead ends in his basement."
"Unfortunately, we cannot alert our allies at the moment. Neither of us have a means to contact them right now. We should—" Kirei was cut off by the near-inhuman moans and growls emanating from down the right side of a fork in the hallway they were walking through. They both immediately pressed themselves against the right wall, just next to the fork. Kotomine peeked around the corner, scanning for threats.
"Has Galliasta found us?" Shirou whispered.
"No," Kirei answered quietly. "These ones do not appear to be searching for anything. They look…aimless," he concluded after a second of silence.
Shirou took a look for himself, bringing Dyrnwyn forth just far enough to see past the corner, but hopefully not far enough that he accidentally alerted the thralls and gave away their position. He could make out rough silhouettes of humans of various sizes—even some smaller than his own, to his disgust—but could not recognize any more than that.
The urgent need to save them reared its head within him like an angry dragon waking from its slumber. He did his best to ignore it. There wouldn't be a point in saving them as long as Galliasta was still around. The target had to take priority.
"There are a few of them, but not that many. He might have left these because he can only place his stronger curses on a certain amount of his hostages," Shirou mused quietly, almost to himself.
"Or he only had time to prepare so many before we attacked," Kirei pointed out. "We could immobilize them for now, that way we would not need to contend with them later if Galliasta is still able to rouse and control them."
"How do you plan to do that?" Shirou whispered skeptically. "Don't the curses control them?"
"The curses do not puppeteer them. A minor concussion should render them unconscious without permanent damage. We simply need to be faster than them."
He didn't like having to hurt civilians; it left a sour taste in his mouth. Even if there were no casualties, the risk of accidentally causing serious damage against a brainwashed victim worried him. However, the risk that they would attack while Shirou and Kirei were focused on Galliasta was too high. They couldn't dismiss them as entirely harmless.
Shirou sighed, summoning a simple wooden rod about the length of his arm.
"Fine. Give the signal," he murmured, resigned.
A beat. Two.
"Go."
They rushed forth as Shirou pumped prana through his legs, reinforcing them to keep up with Kirei's long strides. They were upon the possessed in an instant. Kirei immediately took two down with precise unarmed strikes to the head, sending them crumpling to the ground with a metallic rattle. Shirou was far less graceful, but nonetheless managed to place accurate blows on the heads of the thralls. They dropped easily, clanking as they did.
Shirou blinked, then looked down. The unconscious thralls were much more visible now that his Noble Phantasm lit the room, bathing it in soft light. The victims' wrists were all bound by cuffs and chains, linked to the wall or floor haphazardly. Their range of movement was severely limited; many of them could barely even stand.
"Kotomine," he alerted. The man stopped and backed out of his perceived range of the enthralled, glancing back at Shirou but not dropping his guard.
"Look," Shirou pointed down to the floor by the unconscious victims. "They're all chained up."
Kirei glanced down to those near him, noticing the bindings, before forgoing his assault entirely and merely backing out of their perceived range as they reached out to try to claw at him. Shirou used his blazing blade to take a closer look around the room, taking note of the mass of empty shackles scattered around the cobblestone floor and walls of the makeshift prison.
Shirou dematerialized the stick in his hand, letting it fade back into small motes of light. He weaved through what few prisoners were still conscious, trying to determine the strength of the curses that their kidnapper had inflicted onto them.
"The curse Galliasta imbued into their hands is a corrosive one, right? I saw it eat through one of his floorboards," He asked Kirei, puzzled.
"I believe so."
"Why are the chains immune, then?" Shirou pointed out the black, oily substance running down the handcuffs and chains of the victims as if it was water.
Kirei blinked, momentarily befuddled in the dim firelight, before he picked up a chain and examined it. He turned it back and forth in his hands, staring at it, then suddenly began focusing intently upon something he noticed near the base of the cuffs and down the length of the chain.
"Runes," he pointed out. "Likely some kind of ancient Middle-Eastern variant. Persian, perhaps. They most likely grant the shackles resistance to the curses placed on the prisoners."
"Think we could use them?" Shirou prompted.
"Unlikely," Kirei shook his head. "They would not grant us their protections. They are only applied to the chains themselves."
Shirou let out a sigh of frustration and disappointment, trying his hardest to think his way out of their situation. He meandered around the small crowd of thralls as he tried to think up a way to deal with Galliasta's mystic code. The victims he passed by were of varying ages; some were nearing adulthood, while others were almost as young as kindergarteners. He was disgusted that this monster would resort to kidnapping and sacrificing children just to fuel his own magical mysteries and acquire some extra mana reserves, and was angry at the Clock Tower for not ousting him far earlier. Shirou knew exactly what the Mages' Association thought of morality, though. Trying to judge them on the standards of normal society was a lost cause.
It's a long shot, but maybe if—
Shirou paused, doubling back as he noticed a familiar face. A girl, a bit taller than him, with shoulder-length light brown hair and the same blackened eyes the other prisoners possessed, willfully struggling against her chains. He swallowed dryly as he recognized her.
Mitsuzuri.
He didn't feel his magic circuits thrumming with power. He didn't think of the mystery he wished to actualize. He hadn't even felt like he had made a choice.
The Muramasa blade was already in his hand.
He raised the sword, holding it steady, and delivered a small, precise cut to her collarbone. Black ichor flowed freely from the wound, evaporating into dark smoke as it was freed from its bindings.
And the sword drank.
Shirou could feel the burning hatred as the Muramasa sword consumed the condensed hatred and rage within his friend. It crept up on him slowly, insidiously, and were he not distinctly aware of the sword's properties, he might have assumed it was simply his own fury at Galliasta, for kidnapping and twisting so many innocent souls into these vile creatures. The curse it had absorbed was relatively small, Shirou noted with relief, since it meant the fervor would be manageable. He could ignore it; push it to the back of his mind and focus on the task at hand.
But it would remain there. And it would persist.
Ayako slowly stirred, her eyes refocusing as she attempted to regain her bearings. She squinted up at him groggily for a few seconds, trying and failing to recognize him, before she looked away. Rolling over onto her side, she slowly pushed herself off of the cold stone and did her best to stand up. She rose slowly and evenly, still a little unfocused, and only when the chains on her wrists prevent her from moving any further did she become more attentive.
Fear suddenly welled up in Mitsuzuri's eyes as her head whipped back and forth like a cornered animal scanning the area for predators. She finally looked back at Shirou, sagging in relief as she recognized him, before immediately tensing up in terror as she noticed the gleaming blades he held—one burning, one menacing.
"Mitsuzuri, it's me, Emiya. I'm here to rescue you. You've been kidnapped," Shirou urged her to try to remember, so that she would cooperate. "I need to cut through your chains so we can get you back home."
She looked back and forth too her chains, trying to say something, but her throat was still too dry. She sealed her lips, likely attempting to produce saliva, before pulling off to the side to draw one of the chains taut.
"Stay still," he told her with an urgent edge that he tried to keep out of his voice. "I don't want to accidentally cut you."
Ayako held still as best she could, and Shirou brought Dyrnwyn forth, cleaving the chains in a single stroke.
"Good job, good job. Let me get the other one now," he encouraged, doing his best to keep the edge out of his voice.
She shifted to the other side, pulling as far away as she could from the wall, and the blazing blade came down on the second chain, breaking it. Mitsuzuri pulled away from the wall as soon as she was free, still standing, but on trembling legs.
"Kirei, she needs some water," he tried not to bark out. Kotomine nodded silently, stepping toward her as he brought out a flask from under his coat, allowing her to take it and indulge in a few precious gulps. She drank greedily from the container, as if she had not had water in days.
She probably hadn't.
"Do you plan on removing the rest of the curses?" the priest asked him as Ayako drank.
"From the conscious ones." Shirou scanned the room out of the corner of his eye, holding Dyrnwyn slightly more aloft for a better view. "I already summoned the sword, and if we can free the rest of them, we'll have fewer problems to worry about."
"Do you believe you can handle the backlash?"
Shirou's expression tightened; his eyes narrowed at the sword. "I can hope."
"Emiya, what the hell is going on?!" Ayako finally found her voice. "What happened to these people? Why do you have a flaming sword? Who's this creepy guy you're hanging out with?" She rattled off questions, sounding on the verge of panic.
"Save your questions, child," Kirei told her. "Time is not a luxury we currently possess."
"What do you mean, 'save my questions?'" she snapped back at Kotomine, incensed. "I don't even know how I got here, we're surrounded by zombies, we—"
"Ayako."
She shut up at Shirou's tone.
"Kotomine, once I free these people, I'll need you to repeat your chant. I don't know how consuming all these curses will affect me, but better safe than sorry," he requested.
"I can begin now, but act quickly," Kirei assented, flipping his Bible back open to the passage he had previously recited.
Shirou moved efficiently, delivering quick, shallow cuts to each of the accursed while Kirei's rendering of Scripture coated the room in the warmth of its protection, abating the buildup of negativity in Shirou's head as his absorbed the victims' curses one by one. Once all conscious captives were freed of the curse, he worked on freeing them of their bindings. Kirei had joined him in breaking their chains once he finished his chant, wrenching them apart with a single Black Key.
Once the victims were freed, slowly regaining awareness, Shirou turned to address Mitsuzuri, who was practically shivering at the unfamiliar, ethereal feeling of the protective rites encircling her. She looked lost, staring shock-still at her hands, unable to comprehend what was going on, like she was slowly losing her grip on reality.
"Mitsuzuri," he grabbed her attention. Her eyes snapped to him; the rest of her body still frozen like a statue. "We're getting everyone out of here. Be ready to move."
He pressed his fingertips to the wall, a sword still palmed in each hand as he performed Structural Grasping on the building once more. The layout of the interconnected caverns quickly unfolded in his mind, and he routed out the straightest path to one of the nearby hidden exits. Galliasta likely had them built as a fallback plan; a final means of escape in case something went drastically wrong.
"You know where the closest exit lies?" Kotomine asked him. Shirou nodded shortly, looking over to the opening that most quickly led to above ground. Efficient as ever, Kirei quickly began rounding up the stumbling, lethargic kidnapping victims in hopes of moving them out of a potential battleground quickly.
"Children, we are here to rescue you and return you to your families," Kotomine explained, raising his voice to be heard over the groans of discomfort and rattling chains as many of them tried to stand and assess their current predicament. Some looked over to him and tried to shake off their drowsiness, still affected by the dregs of the curses they were placed under, while others were still not conscious enough to comprehend the priest's instructions and did nothing, unable to even pick themselves up off the ground.
Kirei sought out what looked to be the oldest of those conscious, singling him out and ordering him to assist in rounding up the waking people so that nobody cognizant would be left behind when he and Shirou guided them to the exit. The man, a boy that looked to be in college, helped shake people awake and told them to follow the man with the cross. Once they had assembled as many as they could, Kirei looked to Shirou to direct the civilians.
He led the throng of confused people through the labyrinthian corridors, his flaming sword held aloft as a beacon to follow. The anger towards Galliasta for what he did to these people was building inside him. He could ignore it for the moment, putting his animosity aside for the sake of the task at hand, but he knew he would have to be cautious and keep it under strict control so that it did not slip away from him.
Nonetheless, he could feel himself growing anxious to cut Atrum down. It was slowly becoming more and more personal.
They reached a dead end, and the crowd behind him grew apprehensive. Shirou could hear the whispers and grumbles of how they were lost, and stuck in some horrible case of the blind leading the blind. He could hear their restlessness as their feet shifted and voices grew louder.
He paid it no mind.
"It is here, then?" Kirei asked him. Shirou nodded, stepping back to make room for the man.
Kotomine stepped forward, asking for those behind him to stay clear. As they collectively took a step backwards, unsure of what this priest was planning to do to a dead-end, Kotomine took a wide stance, his shoulders squared, and his toes pointed forward. He took a breath, pulled back his arm in a slow, controlled fashion, his muscles visibly coiling as he did…and he struck.
The walls shook—just a bit—at the force of his blow.
Shirou knew he had to be using reinforcement in conjunction with the Executors' signature technique: forcing their bodies into a state of excessive adrenaline, allowing them to perform feats far beyond what a human ordinarily could. The blocked entrance held strong, but he knew just how powerful Kirei was. The wall would not hold for long.
A second strike, just as deliberate as the first, in the same exact spot. The sound of stone cracking echoed loudly through the air, stirring excitement and confusion among the crowd. Mitsuzuri looked to him for clarification, the unspoken question shimmering in her eyes. Shirou smiled reassuringly at her.
"Watch," he nodded over to Kotomine.
The third strike shattered the wall.
The sturdy, earthen dead-end was blown open in a crushing cacophony of collapsing cobblestone. Dust flew into the air as the wall tumbled down, eliciting a few coughs and shrieks from the front of the crowd. Once the dust cloud settled and the people could see clearly, they found themselves amazed at the calm moonlight filtering through the opening Kirei had made in the side of the majestic, sloping mountain.
"Everyone, please exit the tunnel calmly and carefully. Our allies will escort you down the mountain safely," Kirei wasted no time instructing the victims, who all stood in place, still awestruck at the priest's strength.
Impatience flared up within Shirou, almost unnaturally. "Move!" he barked, immediately realizing his barely pubescent voice was a far cry from the authoritative tone he was going for, and grew a bit embarrassed as he heard it. Nonetheless, the people responded, immediately exiting the tunnel and starting down the lush mountainside, likely to be found and chaperoned by some of their backup, wherever they were stationed.
Shirou sighed quietly once everyone was gone. These people were safe now. The majority of the people were still under Atrum's control, but he found solace knowing that at least some of the victims would return to their families soundly. Ayako would return home safely.
He turned to Kirei, intent on planning how to get the upper hand on Atrum…and Ayako was still standing there, staring at him defiantly. His entire train of thought came to a screeching halt.
"Mitsuzuri," he began, trying to keep his newfound temper under control. "What are you still doing here? You should be getting to safety with the others."
"I know that!" she retorted indignantly. "But that creep deserves a slap in the face! He drugged my drink!"
"Mitsuzuri, how do you plan to get close to him? Do you understand what that man is capable of?"
"He's a creep with drugs and a dungeon. I bet I'm better with a bow than he is, and I know karate. What's he gonna do to me in a fight?" Ayako challenged, her temper flaring at being seemingly belittled.
That temper froze as a Black Key was embedded in the wall in front of her.
"That man is more powerful than you might think, child," Kirei told her softly, his hand still outstretched from the throw.
Shirou shook his head, dismissing the argument entirely. "We're wasting time, Kotomine. The protections won't last too much longer." He gestured to the blade embedded in the wall. "Do you still want to fight, Mitsuzuri? Even after seeing that?"
She nervously glanced back and forth between Shirou, Kirei and the blade nested in the wall, weighing her options. Silence sat between the three of them. She had lost her confidence, and they all knew it.
"We're wasting time," Shirou finally broke the silence, sighing. He released Dyrnwyn, letting it fade away into small motes of light as he brought a new weapon forth from his mind, giving it form and substance.
Ayako stared open-mouthed as Shirou created a large, traditional Japanese recurve bow from what seemed to be thin air as it manifested in a flash of light. Once it solidified, Shirou offered it to her silently and somberly. He could feel the weight of responsibility in the bow he held out. Mitsuzuri swallowed, hesitant to take the weapon.
"Take it and head down the mountain. If people that aren't dressed like us—" he gestured between himself and Kirei with the proffered bow, "—try to approach you, do not trust them. Get away from them as fast as possible. They'll probably try to chase you. You might have to fight them off to escape. If it comes to that, then this is your best bet."
She gulped, visibly swallowing her nervousness, and she reached out and took the bow with only a slightly trembling hand. Kirei watched from the side, his expression neutral.
"I'll need arrows," Mitsuzuri tried to sound brave.
Shirou nodded, projecting five identical blades, leaving them hanging in the air as he meticulously performed Alteration upon each one, thinning and lengthening them, feathering the cloth wrapping their hilts into fletching and widening the tips into proper arrowheads. Shirou grabbed all of the newly formed arrows in a single motion, holding them out horizontally for Ayako, his palm facing downward.
"I'd give you a quiver as well, but it would dissipate too quickly," he lamented. "You'll just have to carry them."
"Alright," she said absentmindedly, still stunned at the feats Shirou had performed in front of her.
"You'll be alright, Mitsuzuri. I believe in you," Shirou smiled at her warmly.
He could tell she had heard him, but she barely gave a nod in response, her curiosity and impatience shining through as she blurted out the question at the forefront of her mind.
"How did you do that?"
Shirou kept smiling, almost teasingly.
"Magic."
Ayako pouted.
"Go," he commanded her mirthfully.
"Fine," she harrumphed cutely, before she turned and began to quickly make her way away from the mansion. After a short jog away, she turned back to them, cupping her hand to her mouth.
"You better make it back in one piece!"
He waved goodbye before turning back into the tunnel. Beginning to head back through, he caught Kirei's eye as the priest turned and fell into step with him. Kotomine's eyes were glittering with open interest as he stared at Shirou.
"What?" he asked testily.
"The swords you converted into arrows for the girl were chosen purposely. You would incorporate that girl into your strategies?" Kirei prompted, amusement evident in his voice.
"I wouldn't call it a plan. It's a possibility, at most. I hope she won't do what I think she might, but if she does, I'll need it to work to our advantage."
Kotomine chuckled. "I see. What is the main plan, then?"
"We have to disrupt the magnetic field. Easiest way to do that is destroy part of the house," Shirou explained. "I'm going to pump a bit of extra prana into another Noble Phantasm I plan to use. It shouldn't be enough to break it entirely, but it'll do a lot of damage. It can twist space around the path it fires, and with some extra firepower, it should be able to rip the roof off."
"That could cause quite a bit of rubble. Are you willing to risk the lives of his victims?" Kirei challenged.
Shirou's expression hardened. "I saved who I needed to. I'm prepared for the possibility. As long as Galliasta lives, they'll all be at risk. We can't save everyone."
"You speak with conviction, Emiya. Does your justification soothe your conscience?" Kotomine asked with a knowing look.
"…No," he admitted. "It doesn't."
The priest nodded solemnly, satisfied.
"What am I to do once we engage the target?"
"I'm going to try to take out his mystic code, it'll draw his attention. Keep anything he throws at me off my back, I won't be able to defend myself very well. And if you see a chance to take him down, take it."
Kirei smirked, eyes glinting.
"Understood."
Atrum had not followed them into the basement, but instead had simply sent some of his thralls to hunt them down, choosing to guard the stairway's entrance himself. Shirou and Kirei waded through the possessed that rushed them, incapacitating them all easily. Kirei systematically dropped every victim that rushed him with precise strikes to the head or neck, while Shirou delivered shallow cuts with his katana to relieve them of their misfortune. The curses wielded against them were easily neutralized by Kirei's protective chants, splashing off them without any real effect as they steadily pushed through the crowd.
They quickly reached the stairway and took position on either side of the entrance. Shirou peeked out first, keeping low so that he would not be spotted very easily. The door at the top had been closed again. Atrum was likely positioned on the other side, waiting for them to bust through the door with some sort of trap prepared.
"Door's closed, he can't see us," Shirou whispered, summoning Archer's black bow as he stepped back from the wall. Its draw weight was still difficult for Shirou to control, but the hallway up the stairs was wide enough that he could still hit the door. He would not need to be accurate beyond that.
Kirei wordlessly stepped back away from the stairs as Shirou adjusted the grip on the katana in his hand, holding it in a reversed grip with his index finger and thumb free as he traced a short, spiraling silver sword reminiscent of a hand drill. He performed Alteration, elongating the small drill into a shape loosely reminiscent of a long arrow, before nocking it and drawing the bow in a somewhat unusual thumb-and-index grip so that he could pull back the string without dropping the Muramasa blade.
"Do you think you're fast enough to land a hit on him from here? This is gonna be loud, it should distract him for a bit, but probably only for a second or two, so you'll need to be quick," Shirou explained, slowly charging the altered arrow with more and more prana.
"We will see," Kirei answered, his muscles tensed and jaw set. His hands were fidgeting, eager to jump back into the action.
Shirou nodded, not taking his eyes off of the door at the top of the staircase. He continued reinforcing his nocked projectile with prana, paying careful attention to how much he imbued into the missile. Once it just barely reached the point of breaking, right before its structure cracked and it became a Broken Phantasm, he let off on the Reinforcement spell, not allowing the altered sword to become too unstable. Too great an explosion would render them all dead.
Shirou swallowed, inhaled, then exhaled.
"I am the bone of my sword."
The arrow's distorted energy whirled around it, desperate to be unleashed.
"Caladbolg."
The twisted blade launched out of the bow, screaming through the air at fantastic speeds. Caladbolg pierced through the door as if it did not even exist, flying above Atrum's head and ripping through the opposite wall, second story and ceiling of the home, warping the entire area surrounding it before detonating in an impressive explosion that launched the rubble it had created in in all directions. It looked as if Zeus himself, in his fury, had torn a large chunk out of the mansion.
Kirei wasted no time and began to sprint up the stairs, determined to take down Galliasta while he was still distracted. At the top of the steps, he burst through the remains of the door, launching himself directly at the rogue mage in hopes of taking him down in a single blow.
Unfortunately, Galliasta was prepared for him.
Reaching the top of the stairs himself, Shirou arrived just in time to see a sphere of coursing lightning surround Atrum like a shield, preventing Kirei from landing a blow on him. Kotomine quickly stepped back, throwing a set of Black Keys at him. Atrum dodged them and used the remains of the magnetic walls to drag the weapons off course. They clearly no longer offered him the fine control he had previously, but he still had some semblance of control over the weapons near the larger parts of the remaining electromagnetic field.
Atrum lashed out with his electric field, sending arcing bolts of electricity racing at Kirei. The priest evaded the bolts nimbly, weaving through the lashing thunderstrokes with the grace of a dancer, launching his own blades back at Galliasta here and there to keep him on his toes. Neither scored any significant hits on the other, simply keeping each other paying attention, waiting to see who made the first slip. Time was on Atrum's side, though, for Shirou and Kirei only had a few minutes until their reapplied protections wore off, and then they would find themselves at the mercy of the horde.
Shirou quickly surveyed the situation.
I need to get away from the rest of the electromagnet. If Muramasa's sword is ripped out of my hands, I'm as good as dead.
Moving out of range of the thralls, Shirou scanned for a position with a good line of sight on Galliasta. He needed to do something attention-grabbing so that Atrum couldn't pay as much attention to Kirei. His first thought was to find some kind of perch, but attacking his enemy's mystic code would still be a difficult endeavor.
Maybe I could use Hrunting, or another inconel arrow?
The rumbling of thunder interrupted his strategizing.
Shirou looked up towards the sky. Dark, bulky cumulonimbus clouds had formed in the night sky, blocking out the moon and indicating the beginning of a storm. He witnessed agitated flashes of lightning flicker across the heavens, and the distant peals of thunder reached his ears only seconds later.
Shit. If Galliasta starts trying to use the storm….
He promptly glanced back to where Galliasta and Kirei were fighting, and the gathering storm had clearly not gone unnoticed by either of them. Judging by the rogue mage's widening grin, wielding the thunderstorm was probably within his ability. Atrum's Primeval Battery was incredibly powerful if that were the case.
Holding the mystic code up to the sky, Galliasta called out an incantation, presumably in Arabic, and the sky responded with a crackling bolt of lightning that Kirei barely managed to redirect with a few thrown Black Keys to act as a lightning rod. A hole was blown through the floor where the bolt came to ground, deafening them all temporarily and shaking the ground. Atrum could barely be heard laughing maniacally through Shirou's ringing ears, evidently high on his newfound power.
Shirou's grip on his blade tightened as he became more frustrated. It was becoming more difficult to think clearly; the sword's curses enriched his growing anger and slowly clouded his thoughts. He felt like he couldn't come up with any real strategy; the sword was continually whispering into his head, suggesting that he should simply brute force his way through Galliasta's defenses and crush him with overwhelming strength.
Magnet, lightning, curses…how the hell am I supposed to stop all of it? Could I force some kind of opening somewhere…?
Unlimited Blade Works stirred in his mind. A sword came to the forefront of his thoughts in a moment of clarity.
Shirou smiled.
That could work.
He rushed towards and up the ruined wall of the house, scaling the sheer surface fluidly despite the difficulties that holding a blade while climbing presented. Shirou could hear Kotomine and Galliasta still fighting behind him; Kirei was doing his best to avoid the lightning from both Atrum's electric field and the sky. He was fast enough to dodge the worst of it, but the small grazes and shocks that Shirou knew Kirei was clipped by occasionally would add up.
He had to be fast.
Once he had scaled the wall, he ran across the intact sections of the roof, coming to a stop at the mansion's zenith. With his vision no longer blocked by the constantly shifting horde of accursed, he could much more clearly see the battlefield, and the duel that was taking place upon it.
Both Kotomine and Galliasta fought with incredible swiftness. The possessed could not even react to Kirei's speed as he lashed out with fists and blades alike, and had to stay away from Atrum so that they would not be inadvertently caught by their master's uncontrolled, sweeping arcs of crackling lightning. Whether Galliasta was ordering them to stay them out of his way or they had some semblance of a survival instinct, Shirou did not know.
The storm overhead steadily expanded. Atrum clearly planned to stall out Kirei until he could summon multiple bolts of lightning simultaneously. Kotomine could avoid a single strike as long as he was prepared, but three or four concurrent attacks would be nigh-impossible to evade. Kirei would be killed if Galliasta could simply survive long enough.
I'll have to strike first.
Shirou held out his left hand, reaching deep into his soul for the sword he needed. It was one of the first Noble Phantasms that Archer had collected, and one of his least used. Acquired simply by visiting a shrine and peeking in a box, it had been one of two Noble Phantasms Archer had seen that day. Said to be once wielded by Susanoo himself, the black sword was a far cry from standard Japanese swordsmithing; it bore a straight, double-edged blade with a raised central ridge, a small integrated cross-guard and a strange, ovoid disc pommel.
"Trace, on."
In a blazing flash of light, the sword materialized in his hand. Galliasta must have sensed his spell; as soon as he summoned the sword, Atrum's gaze snapped toward him, and Galliasta crafted and fired a spear of electricity at him, trying to end him before he could use his Noble Phantasm. In his haste to bring down Shirou, though, he had turned his back on Kirei, and the priest immediately took advantage of Atrum's distraction. Kotomine threw a single Black Key at the man's heart, intending on running the mage through. Atrum realized his mistake as soon as he fired the bolt, and tried to avoid the blade as he turned back towards Kirei, but was not fast enough and suffered a cut to his left side, just below his limp, useless arm.
Shirou used the black sword to redirect the bolt safely away into the distance.
"I tire of your tricks, priest," Atrum growled, flooded with rage and pain. He was likely circulating his prana to keep his adrenaline going and numb his wounds, Shirou hypothesized, since he seemed to be able to ignore both the hole in his shoulder and the gash in his side and continue fighting.
Galliasta raised his mystic code and let loose a torrent of crackling light before Kirei could react. Kotomine was unable to dodge the attack, and he grit his teeth as the electricity coursed through him. A few of the possessed were fried by the uncontrolled, roiling electricity and fell to the ground, unmoving. Even Kirei could not continue standing by the end of the assault. He dropped to one knee with his right arm held tightly across his chest, temporarily paralyzed. Burn marks could be seen across his clothing, and his breathing was uneven. He could be heard coughing and sputtering, as if his lungs had stopped working and he had to force them to keep breathing himself.
Atrum did not brag or boast to the injured priest, but simply held out his Primeval Battery, forming a concentrated lance of plasma in front of him, with which he planned to strike Kotomine down permanently. His focus was entirely on the older man now; his rage blinded him to both outside threats and his own bleeding wounds.
Looks like his own curses are affecting him as well.
Unfortunately for Galliasta, he had given Shirou the exact opportunity he needed.
He held the black Noble Phantasm above his head, its tip pointed skyward. The dark clouds thickened, and thunder roiled within them. The scent of ozone grew heavy, and the static in the air was tangible. Once Galliasta noticed that even his electric spear had begun to destabilize, slowly fraying as it tried to arc upwards, he quickly searched around for the source of the disturbance. Looking up at the roof, Atrum's eyes locked with Shirou's, and realization dawned on him.
Shirou smiled grimly.
The Primeval Battery was an ancient mystic code, and one of the most powerful magical artifacts to still exist. The ability to wield lightning as a weapon and summon storms on one's own, without the aid of a large ritual was an incredible feat, and its power only became more valuable as time passed and the potential of magecraft slowly dwindled.
Its strength was nothing next to the blade of a storm god.
Power surged through the black blade, and the sky roared in tandem. For a moment, the entire battlefield stilled. Even the possessed, robbed of their free will, stopped in their tracks and simply stared into the sky. Everything was quiet. No words were spoken in the Sword of Gathering Clouds' presence.
None, except its name.
"Ama-no-Murakumo!"
Shirou swung the sword downward, and the storm fell with it.
Lightning crashed down at Galliasta like the fist of a vengeful god: unerring in accuracy and unabated in power. Atrum had only a scant second to raise his own conductor to defend himself before the massive coil of thunder impacted his shields, overwhelming the Primeval Battery with incredible voltage and shattering it in his hand. Galliasta was thrown across the hall by the force of the storm's impact, and his right hand had been mangled by the shrapnel of his mystic code, which had violently shattered in his palm.
Shirou fell to one knee, coughs wracking his chest as he let Ama-no-Murakumo dematerialize. Controlling such an immense lightning bolt had taken a massive amount of energy from him, and even despite his greater prana capacity in his new body, with his stronger, less-atrophied magic circuits, he still found himself quickly depleted of his mana.
Galliasta managed to force himself back on his feet despite his damaged arms and bleeding ears, clearly still disoriented. Unfortunately, Kirei was not able to take advantage of his momentary weakness, since he had been blinded by the flare of lightning, and was attempting to mend both his vision and his injuries with a healing spell.
Dammit.
Shirou felt his overwrought hatred for Galliasta urging him forward, driving him to jump down and end that bastard himself. Resisting the animosity that the sword was riling up within him was becoming more and more difficult, especially after using so much prana. He managed to stumble down the collapsed roof onto solid ground without falling, and brought up his sword to defend against the fervent mob that rushed him as soon as he was within their reach.
He swung his katana three times, scoring shallow cuts on his attackers' extremities as they struck out at him, allowing the sword to drink in the curses compelling them. He quickly pivoted left to avoid a swing before slicing open the back of another thrall's hand. Shirou lashed out at two more foes with sweeping horizontal cuts, both of which struck true. One of them jumped onto his back, knocking them both to the ground, but he managed to keep a firm grip on his blade and rolled with the landing, slicing open the man grappling him as he did. The victim's grip loosened, and Shirou managed to roll back onto his feet, using broad swings to keep the crowd at a manageable distance.
In a moment of reprieve, Shirou glanced over to Kirei and Galliasta. Kotomine's sight looked like it had recovered, along with some of his more major injuries, and he was already back in the fight, weaving in and out of Atrum's lashing flame spells. Shirou had no clue how Atrum managed to cast spells with both of his arms damaged, but he apparently had no trouble doing so. However, the fight was still clearly in Kirei's favor. Kotomine was a blur, avoiding Galliasta's and striking out with fists and elbows before quickly backing out of range of his opponent's thrashing flames. The whips of fire still caught him occasionally, but a continuous healing spell cast across his entire body allowed Kirei to ignore the milder blows Galliasta managed to land and continue his own assault.
Shirou waded further into the crowd of thralls, absorbing their curses with his blade one by one, slowly growing stronger and stronger. His dwindling protections allowed him to stave off the smaller curses thrown at him en masse, and he was steadily reducing the number of enemies he had to fight with each blow he landed. His fury rose with each curse that the katana collected, elevating his adrenaline ever higher, until it felt like he himself was a storm, not dissimilar to the one overhead. Lightning coursed through his veins, and a hurricane filled his lungs. His swings were faster, more aggressive; his cuts were deeper. Control slowly meant less and less to him as he synchronized with the sword's past wielders, emulating their skill and cutting through his foes like a raging river. He might have accidentally killed one or two of them. He found it difficult to care.
He would probably feel guilty about that later.
A rush of cold, dead air suddenly washed over his skin.
Dammit. Out of time.
The protections Kirei had cast on the both of them had sputtered out, and he was overextended. The thralls had surrounded him. He needed to get out of the crowd as fast as possible.
Pouring prana into his legs to reinforce them, Shirou vaulted up and away, out of the horde's reach. Rolling as he landed, he settled into a defensive stance and quickly glanced over to his partner to confirm that Kotomine was still unharmed.
Without his divine protection, Kirei could no longer take the offensive. Galliasta had regained the momentum, and was once again setting the pace of the fight. The rogue mage grinned savagely, knowing that Kirei's window of opportunity had passed. He raised his broken, bleeding hand, gathering his magic as he chanted maliciously.
"تختفي في الفراغ!"
Thick, pitch-black smoke whirled into existence, limiting the executor's visibility and enshrouding Atrum completely. Before they could conceive what kind of spell Atrum had cast, the smoke lashed out at Kirei, forming ethereal hooked claws and jagged blades with which to tear his flesh and bleed his spirit. Kotomine was able to avoid the worst of it, but he did not escape unscathed, and he was forced to repeatedly avoid the smog and heal himself to undo much of the damage he suffered, unable to press any kind of offense against the cloud of curses.
He was at a disadvantage, and they both knew it.
"Kirei! Switch!" Shirou called out, rushing over to his side. "Keep the thralls off of me! I can handle him!"
Without hesitation, Kirei pulled away from his engagement with Galliasta as Shirou rushed in, granted power by the Noble Phantasm he wielded. The black smog reached for him as if to consume him, but Shirou cut cleanly through it with a single swing, dissipating the smoke and absorbing its dense, powerful curses into his blade.
He grinned coldly, barely able to contain the hatred the sword was imparting unto him. Galliasta burst through the fading smoke with whips of flame coiled around his broken arms, swinging the fire at Shirou wildly. Emiya was forced back on the defensive, trying to avoid the searing flames and rush in for an attack any time he was given an opening. Atrum was quick on his feet, however, and was able to step back out of Shirou's range whenever he tried to close in for the kill. They both fell into a rhythm of fire and steel, slipping in and out of each other's range and prodding at each other's defenses like experienced fencers, despite their weariness and injuries.
After an intense back and forth, Shirou finally managed to exploit one of Atrum's wider openings and closed in just far enough to slice open the tip of the mage's middle finger. He caught the digit with the tip of his blade, splitting it cleanly.
And Atrum howled.
Galliasta's restraint shattered. He abandoned their dance entirely, pouring as much prana as he could muster into his flames as they grew, coalescing into a grand inferno above his head. The heat was intense; Shirou could already feel himself sweating heavily.
"I grow tired of your tricks, you nuisance," Atrum ground out. "Burn to cinder!"
He stepped forward thunderously, preparing to bring down the conflagration and reduce Shirou to ashes, when a new voice rang out from beyond the ruined wall.
"Hey, asshole!"
An arrow zipped by Shirou, aiming for Galliasta. The shot was slightly off, and he just barely managed to avoid getting his stomach run through by the projectile. It embedded itself behind Galliasta, just beyond the firestorm. The man laughed spitefully at the poor shot.
"If you're going to shoot someone, then make sure you've aimed correctly, girl!" he admonished tauntingly, bringing down the incandescent pyre to char them all….
And Galliasta found that he couldn't move.
Frozen to the spot, unable to unleash his flames, Atrum's face twisted in rage.
"You bitch! What the hell did you do to me?!" he yowled, trying as hard as he could to break free of his invisible bindings, but to no avail.
Shirou grinned savagely. He had lucked out. Betting on Ayako's headstrong, reckless nature had paid dividends, and while he would have preferred if she had prioritized her own safety, he figured that something like this might happen. She was never one to shy away from interesting situations, even if they were incredibly dangerous. Her impulsiveness often tended backfire on her, and she was hardly the best under pressure, but that was why he had given her the arrows that he did. Even if she missed, her shot still accomplished what he needed it to.
The altered Black Key had pinned Galliasta's shadow, rendering him entirely immobile.
Shirou rushed towards without hesitation, the cursed blade's rage and hatred pumping adrenaline through him like no tomorrow. His thoughts were entirely single-minded: cut town the bastard in front of him at all costs.
"You think this is enough to stop me?!" Galliasta thundered challengingly as he pumped even more mana into his flames, forcing them to expand further and further, whirling like a tornado and consuming everything in sight. If Shirou wanted a clean shot at Atrum, he would have to go directly through the flames.
He didn't even slow down.
"Steel is my body, and fire is my blood."
Tiny blades wove into a scale-like lattice just beneath his skin, giving his innards a layer of protection against the inferno. Pain coursed through his entire body, but he pushed onward and ignored it, reinforcing himself as much as he feasibly could. He had dealt with worse. The flames would not slow him down.
The firestorm exploded outward in a swirling ring of death. Shirou charged directly into the combustion, heedless of the scorching pain and blinding light. He kept moving forward, driven entirely by the desire to cut Atrum down where he stood.
The flames abated, and Shirou opened his eyes, picking up more speed as he brought his sword up to deliver the final blow. Galliasta, still seething with rage, opened his mouth to curse him, or cast a spell, or possibly perform some other trick he may have prepared to try to save himself.
It was too late.
Shirou lunged forward, piercing straight through Galliasta's chest with his sword. Atrum's breath hitched as he was stabbed, and his eyes dilated, becoming unfocused. Blood ran freely down the blade, dripping off of the hilt and forming a puddle at his feet. He tried to bring his hand up, possibly to impart another curse on Shirou, but Galliasta no longer had the strength. Everything was silent. All was still.
Shirou released the Noble Phantasm's power.
"Muramasa: Juso Kuraishi!"
Black, malevolent energy ripped through Galliasta's body. His skin blistered and split open as if he had been whipped and flogged. Tears and cuts rent open his chest as searing heat scorched his flesh and cauterized his profusely bleeding wounds. He howled in agony as the strength of his own curses tore through him, setting his whole nervous system afire. No pain Galliasta had ever felt could compare.
Finally, the dark, necrotic energy gave one final pass over him, dissolving and decaying his flesh and organs, before one final curse completely tore his body asunder and he fell backwards, dying.
The Muramasa blade dissolved into motes of prana, its purpose fulfilled. Shirou collapsed onto all fours, almost entirely spent after his liberal usage of multiple Noble Phantasms. He was wracked with coughs, practically dry heaving onto the floor. His magic circuits felt like magma had just run through them, and his head was pounding horribly. Not all of it was physical, he knew; the backlash of Juso Kuraishi's stored power was rather limited, and he was only feeling the residual effects of its blights.
I guess I'm still vulnerable against curses.
The great flames of his accursed birthplace flickered across his vision.
"Emiya? Emiya? Are you okay?" Someone was gently shaking his shoulder. Shirou blinked away the memories and tried to recenter himself. His vision refocused, and he looked up, realizing that Ayako was hovering over him, concern shining clearly in her eyes.
"Thanks, Mitsuzuri," he smiled, coughing a bit to clear his throat. "You really helped us out there."
"It certainly didn't feel like it, Emiya! What the hell were you doing out there?! You just straight up ran through fire! You're burnt all over and you smell like death! Hell, I'm surprised you still have hair left!" She scolded him, trying to help him up.
After she helped Shirou sit upright, he looked back at Kirei, who seemed to be contacting their backup while he cured the victims' more grievous injuries and undid the curses upon the ones that he missed. Ayako also glanced over, following his line of sight, but quickly turned back to him and poked his cheek, obviously annoyed at his recklessness. As he stared deeply into her eyes, though, he could more clearly see the myriad of emotions swirling behind the brave face she was putting on. He swallowed guiltily.
She deserved an explanation, but he doubted she would be allowed to remember any of it.
"Ayako—" he began, but he was interrupted by a strained, spiteful voice. It rose barely above a whisper, but the sheer hatred within the voice stopped his own train of thought dead in its tracks.
"أنتم، الذين ستفرضون عدالتكم الذاتية، وتخرسون حياة الآخرين من أجل مكسبكم الخاص، ستتخلصون من أنفسكم بدورهم. تقع بجانبي، وذبح بسيفك الخاص! دع العدالة تبتلعك بالكامل!"
Atrum Galliasta, still barely clinging to life, spat one final curse at them with his last breath before his life was snuffed out.
The ground began to slowly shake, ebbing and flowing like the beginning of a large quake. If he had not heard the venom in Galliasta's final words, he might not have paid much attention to it at first, given how common earthquakes were in Japan. As its speed and intensity increased, however, Shirou knew that something was very wrong.
This was not a normal earthquake.
"Move!" Shirou shouted at Ayako, his voice still raspy. He shoved her weakly away from him, knowing that he would end up at the epicenter of whatever was about to unfold. He heard Kirei behind him, telling their support team to fall back and regroup over his earpiece. Some kind of failsafe had been triggered, and they could end up within the affected area if they attempted to retrieve the victims now. A few of the people had regained consciousness, but the severity of the earthquake made it difficult for them to stand up. Shirou found himself in very similar condition.
Then the ground began to give way.
Kirei had quickly realized how unsteady the floor was, and attempted to move to more solid ground, taking two of the unconscious civilians with him and moving them to safety outside. He had managed to go back and rescue two more before he had to clear the area entirely. It was too risky for him to try to move anyone else.
Shirou looked over at Ayako again, who was now completely frozen in fear, staring unblinkingly at the ground. Mitsuzuri watched, terrified, as the floor began to crumble beneath them. She stood shock-still, unable to even think clearly. Emiya forced himself to stand, using every last drop of energy left in his body to try to reach her, but he wasn't fast enough.
With a deafening rumble, a massive crevice began to open beneath them, splitting the building in twain as the floor crumbled away, its pieces falling into the bottomless chasm. The very mountain was being broken into two by Galliasta's dying curse, attempting to swallow them whole. Shirou strained his body as he lunged towards Ayako, hoping to shove her backwards away from the pit, but the unstable ground at the edges of the newly formed cliffs lacked any support and collapsed beneath them both.
Shirou and Ayako fell into the abyss.