"Dracula is down. Orion, push forward; make Herc focus you and not the cow. Caesar, archers forward; provide covering fire."

"Shingen has one more spawn left. I need spears forward as well to prevent the counter charge."

"Hector, you know the timing?"

"When the respawn timer hits three seconds, yes, I know! Just make sure I don't die while I'm microing this shit…"

"Alright then, moving the archers forward."

"Good; shouldn't be expecting another entrance to appear so close to their main camp. Just make sure they crash into the spear wall; I got my statues defending Hector himself."

"As I said, I got this! Now we just need the right- …or that can happen. How the hell…?"

"I may or may not have sent some statues to cut off Admiral Yi. Thank fuck for companion cavalry though; honestly, Alexander is so broken."

"Think anyone would be broken if they can just instantly spawn in their units from anywhere, rather than just the main camp."

"Very true!"

"But wait, you just said you had them guarding me!"

"Please, like I need all 500 statues to guard the two of us."

"You have all 500 out on the field?!"

"Yeah? Not like Daedalus can respawn when he can only bring 500 units to the battle in total. Nor does a backdoor do anything for them; only weakens their position further."

"That's not it! Just… how are you holding up?"

"I'm fine."

"Yaldabaoth."

"I'm telling you, I'm- …Ok, fine. I… may or may not be right about at my limit. I admit, mouse hand is a bit shaky…"

"Dude! What's your current APM?!"

"According to the game… 274."

"Well, no wonder then! You know you shouldn't-"

"I know I shouldn't do lots of things, but I still do them anyways. Besides, that's what the prize money from the promotional tournament is for, isn't it?"

"…I mean, yeah. But still…"

"Right flank collapsed, left flank collapsed. How's the center looking?"

"Trap worked, and Herc is about to go down too."

"That leaves them with Zhou Yu, Death on last spawn and… Admiral Yi has one more spawn, right?"

"He should, yeah."

"Great, then I'm going to send the orders out for the final push, and just put the statues on assault mode. You guys got it from here; hands need a break."

"Sounds good. See ya in the victory call, man."

I sent out messengers with the final orders as Hector moved out of voice communication range. As soon as I set my statues on assault mode, my hands sprang away from the keyboard and mouse.

It was the worst I'd ever seen them; vibrating and twitching so quickly, I couldn't even hold my Dr. Pepper bottle. Fingers felt tight, and it took all my concentration to prevent them from curling into fists. I knew I shouldn't have gone above 180 APM, but catching Admiral Yi in an ambush like that… that was the whole point of picking Daedalus to begin with; creating a map beneath the map to pull of shit like that!

"Well, it's not like I didn't expect this to be the result, going into game five" I smirked to myself, muting my mic. "Honestly, I'm impressed they lasted so long. About twenty minutes into the fifth game before the pain started to set in… Yeah, the first four games before were shorter, and nowhere near as APM intensive, but still…"

It was impressive, to me at least. Thankfully, it wouldn't be this way for much longer either. With the prize money, I could afford the surgery. Recover just in time for the regular season as well. For the first time in my life, everything felt like it was going… perfectly.

"…Well, except for school, perhaps. But that's something to worry about… well, never now, actually."

It had started off as nothing more than a joke. Then, it turned into a dream. Our dream. With the only group of people I've ever been able to consider as friends. For nearly four years we worked on it, and now…

"To the first step of Royal Mile."

The in-game camera snapped away from Daedalus and began zooming towards the enemy main camp.

"To the first step towards our destiny."

The mini cinematic for the allied flag being raised in the enemy main camp began playing.

"Yaldabaoth, God of Control, claims this day in…"

…Mistimed it slightly, but no matter. I was still muted, after all. I could drag on the 'in' a bit.

"Victory" I laughed at my own stupidity as the word blew up across my monitor.

The game's voice communication limiters ended, and in my ears I could hear my teammates celebrating. Nearly threw off my headset, actually; never had I ever heard them shouting as loudly, or as much, as they were now. Not that I could blame them. After all, we'd done it.

"Holy shit… we actually did it…" I could feel the tears of joy forming in my eyes as the full weight of the word 'Victory' hit me. "We've actually done it… Holy fucking shit…"

Finally unmuting myself, I joined in on the celebration with my teammates.

The phone alarm woke me with a start. My arm shout out, my hand fumbling around blindly for the blasted thing. Soon as I felt it in my hand, I quickly turned the damn thing off.

Looking up, the familiar sight of the ceiling of Johnathan's living room came into view. That, at least, was a nice, familiar feeling. The faint trace of wetness around my eyes, however… that was not a nice, familiar feeling.

Twisting to look at the pillow I had been using, I could see a few dark spots. I couldn't help but laugh at myself slightly as I stood up and pocketed my phone.

"I hate sleep…"

Gathering up my things, I left Johnathan's place and began the walk home. There was work to do, after all. A file timer to reset. Plans to being drumming up. …Archer's identity to be sleuthed out.

"Archer… Archer, Archer, Archer…" I muttered to myself as I walked to the nearest bus stop. "Just who the fuck is Archer…?"

This early in the morning, public transit was a pain. Always running behind schedule, always crammed packed with people… It had been the same back home in Canada too. Why couldn't governments just properly invest into civil infrastructure?

Fucking lobbying… More like legalized bribery…

I felt a bit better as I got off the bus and began the rest of the walk home. I'd lived through the night, so evidently the kids weren't quite ready to kill me yet. I found it amusing, thinking about how that conversation must have gone down. Johnathan was probably more favorable of me, if only slightly, but Sortiara did technically have more invested into me; Lancer's noble phantasm and all. Her internal conflict over the potential waste… oh, how I would have loved to be present to see that course through her head!

So lost in the amusement of such a thought I was, that I accidentally walked right into another pedestrian.

"Oh, sorry about that" I apologized instantly, true to the Canadian nature. "Wasn't paying attention to where I was going."

The man I had walked into simply smiled slightly. He was taller than me by a fair it. Estimate about… two heads taller. Despite the chill I felt, he seemed perfectly comfortable in a solid black t-shirt and shorts. Pair of battered looking running shoes on; likely out for a morning run, or something along those lines. Funny; didn't seem old enough to be retired. Couldn't recall what day it was, exactly, off the top of my head, but it sure as shit wasn't the weekend. Must be nice, not having work to do…

"Late night" he asked.

"You could say that" I laughed slightly. "Anyways, sorry again, but I really do need to get going."

"Of course, wouldn't want to hold you up" the man continued speaking as I took off walking again. "This war is both time consuming, and taxing. Can't be faulted for wanting to do… whatever it is you want to do."

I came to a very quick stop. Suddenly, my head was clear of all distractions, and I rapidly took in everything around me. No traffic on the street. No pedestrians or cyclist in sight. Not even the sounds of the morning birds filled the air. We were isolated. I see…

"...This wasn't a chance meeting, was it" I asked, beginning to run through my options.

Considering we were alone like this, I could only assume a bounded field, or some other kind of magecraft. Running was likely not an option then. I had the sword in my bag, but getting it out would take a moment that I may or may not have. To say nothing about-

"I would say don't expect anything to be by chance when it comes to magecraft, but, well… you did turn out to be the seventh master now."

"…What is the point of this?"

"Not to kill you, if that's what you're wondering" the man laughed. "No, more so to satiate my own curiosity about you."

"Hate to tell ya, but I'm not all that interesting."

"Agree to disagree, then" the man shrugged. "Though, how you could honestly try to tell me that the man who aspires to godhood isn't interesting is beyond me."

"You know of my wish then?"

"Know a fair bit more than that. I would kill you, but I can't really kill you now, can I?"

"…No, I suppose you can't."

"See! Another thing that's fascinating about you! To come up with such an effective form of defense; no magi would have ever thought of using a tactic like that, I tell you."

The man took a couple of steps forward, closing the distance between us.

"The way you conduct yourself, the way you fight in this war… it's so fundamentally different, that I just couldn't help but take notice of it. Nor could my employer."

"Employer?"

"Of course! Think I'd be here if I wasn't getting paid?"

"So, you're a magical mercenary?"

"Freelancer would be the better term, but yeah, more or less."

"You can't seriously be telling me the Mage's Association is running scared because of me."

"Ha! They run scared of their own shadows, man! But no, it's not just you, specifically. This whole war has them on edge. The news is all they really have to go by, beyond what Elise and myself report back to them."

"I could see how that's… troubling, yeah. Not a pretty picture for a group of people trying to keep a secret as big as, well… magecraft being real."

"See, this is what I'm getting at. For an outsider, you show fundamental understanding. Yet, at the same time, you fight like an outsider, and chase after a wish so brazen I'd bet not a single magus in the Association has even entertained the notion of it. It makes you… unpredictable."

"It makes me dangerous, you mean."

"You said it, not me."

"...As entertaining as this conversation is, I know you're not here simply to tell me this" I smirked. "What are you really after?"

"…Heh. Ok, you got me" he sighed, though his smile remained. "What I'm really after is this… What has Berserker's master running so scared of you?"

I blinked a few times; gave the man a moment to further explain himself. Yet, nothing more came.

"What makes you think Berserker's master is scared of me?"

"Before he ran into you, he was pursuing the other kiddies. Not a terrible move on its own; removal of the knight classes is always a good thing for everyone else. But ever since the fight at that school there, he's been avoiding your part of the city like it contains the plague."

"How should I know? I just stood around the entire fight."

"Don't think you're giving yourself enough credit there, pal."

"Well, I think you should stick to magecraft, for you are a terrible fisher" I smirked.

"Ah, you do know" the man backed up a bit as he laughed. "Yeah, you have it figured out… How many of the others do you know? Really know, I mean?"

"I have no reason to tell you. Well, not unless you can offer something just as valuable. Equivalent exchange and all that; sure you understand."

"Ah, you're right… Not a magus, yet also more of a magus that most magi, in some really bizarre ways… Oh, how I hope you last for a good while longer. You make all of this far more interesting. That, and you're probably doing more to keep this whole mess under wraps than Elise or the Church. For that, you have my thanks; makes the job so much easier."

The man backed up and stepped into the shadow of a nearby streetlight.

"Well, maybe I'll see you around. Provided you don't get yourself killed, that is" he smirked, sinking into the shadow and disappearing from sight.

A/N

Another chapter down! Hard to believe it's already October... Here I was, when I first started, thinking that this would be all done with back in September. But NOPE! Not even one servant is dead yet. Evidently, I severely underestimated how long it'd take for me to write for this. And for how long I planed for this story to be... Hope this isn't feeling like a drag to all of you!

As for the latest review: yeah, Hou Yi would be nuts in a Holy Grail War.

I mean, it wasn't the loudest outcry ever, but when FGO made Orion 'The Grand Archer', there were some complaints about how it should have been Hou Yi (mostly by the Chinese player base, which... well, make sense, I suppose...). Not that, you know, that's how the Grand system/thing works (except for the Assassin class), but that's a topic/lecture/rant for another time, should I need to delve into it.

But... on the topic of Hou Yi... would he be a good counter to Gawain? Like, Gawain is basically unbeatable under the sun, but if Hou Yi brought down the sun on Gawain... would be lose the power of the sun, or would being squished directly under the sun empower him further xD

As always, thanks to everyone who makes it to this point! Looking at the analytics every few days never ceases to amaze me.