Hey! I've decided to continue this until I either get bored, or I run out of ideas on where to take the plot. I appreciate the review and bits of help i have gotten so far

Chapter 3: Levelling and dreams.

Shirou sidestepped as another balloon lunged at him. With a swipe of his sword, he popped the balloon, the scraps falling to the floor in a small pile.

+1 Exp!

Level up! You are now level three.

Shirou looked at his stats, seeing them rise again. It seemed like he was more focused on attack and speed rather than any magic based attack, although he was no slouch in that department either. He stood for a moment watching as the other members of his party engaged in their own combat.

Welt was surrounded by balloons, but none could close the distance between themselves and the axe wielding man. For every swing he did, a balloon popped, its remnants being left on the ground. Soon enough, there'd be no balloons left, only a mountain of scraps. Shirou would still keep an eye on him, just in case.

Farrie was next. Shirou could see the wind coiling around her legs, watching as she darted in and out of the crowd of balloons Infront of her. Every movement of her fists left another balloon popped. Much like Welt, the balloons soon wouldn't be a problem.

Bakta was having a few issues killing the balloons, so he had paired himself with Tersia.

"First wind!" Bakta called, the pages of his book flipping wildly as the wind pushed against the balloons, launching them into the sky. Normally, the balloons would simply fall and take no damage due to their nature, but that was why Tersia was there.

With a swift movement, daggers were buried into several balloons being lifted by the wind, and Tersia would dash in when he had used up his knives, picking them up whilst Bakta launched them into the sky again. Shirou nodded. It was good that his party was working together to compensate for their weaknesses.

It was out of the corner of his eye that he saw Welt put too much momentum into his strike, sending him spinning forwards into the balloons. The balloons took the opportunity to lunge onto the Axe wielder, Sinking their teeth into him. Welt simply grunted as Shirou stepped forward, thrusting forward with his sword to pop the balloon on his arm.

"Thank you Shirou."

"No problem Welt. To your left."

Welt swung his axe, catching the balloon mid leap , sending the scraps flying.

Shirou looked over the group. Shirou was level three whilst everyone else seemed to be at level 7, which made sense in Shirous eyes. If they were going to live in this world, then they would surely have fought a few monsters before, much like Welt had said he had.

"Hey, Tersia. Do you think we are strong enough to move ahead? You know this route better than I do" Shirou asked.

"Yeah, I'm confident. The worst thing we might find is a usapil if we move further into the forest. Probably better to get a group vote on it though." he spoke, gathering his knives before sheathing them on his belt. He nodded in appreciation to Bakta as he handed a knife to him. Farrie and Welt weren't far behind, gathering up the balloon scraps. Shirou picked up one carefully and dropped it into the sword.

New sword!

Orange balloon sword.

Attack +1

After gathering the rest of the balloon scraps into his sword, Shirou turned to the rest of the party. "Alright, I'll leave the choice up to you. Do you think we are strong enough to advance further into the forest?"

Farrie would nod her head. "Yep! The most dangerous thing I'd say we could find would be…" She put a finger to her chin in thought. "A Usapil, like Tersia said! Cute, little round monsters. They almost look like they could be a pet… if only they could be trained."

Shirou looked at the other two members. "Do you think we can handle it as well?"

With a nod from the duo, Shirou stood straight. "Then let's keep going into the woods. If at any point you feel like it's getting too dangerous, just tell us, and we will move a bit further back. Understood?"

Noises of agreement followed, and Shirou and his party continued into the woods.

Line here

Shirou paused as the bush rustled beside him. He held his sword towards it, and stepped back as a ball of fur shot out of the bush. Shirou dodged again as the round monster lunged at him again, and Farrie spoke up.

"That's the Usapil!"

Shirou nodded, and stepped forward, slashing to the side of the rabbit looking creature. Whilst the Usapil itself wasn't defeated, it looked heavily injured, a deep gash on its side. Shirou stepped back as the Usapil lunged forwards, but he did not step back far enough. He was rewarded with a scratch on his leg, only feeling it slightly thanks to the leather armour he had purchased. Tersia would move to the side, chucking a knife at the Usapil. With one screech, it fell over, and Shirou walked over to it, taking the knife out of the Usapil.

+15 Exp!

"Here, thanks for the help Tersia."

Tersia nodded, and sheathed the knife again.

"Alright. For now, we should hunt some more Usapils. I can make something edible with these, so the more we collect, the more we can eat tonight."

With a cheer from the group, they split off, Farrie and Welt heading off in different directions whilst Bakta and Tersia stuck together. Shirou headed off from the others, ready to defeat some more Usapils

—-

Shirou wiped the sweat off his brow with a sigh before sitting down on a fallen log. Beside him, Farrie let out a small groan.

"Ugh. My arms are so sore! My teacher warned me that it would be different in actual combat, but I didn't expect it to be this bad!"

Welt smiled at her, patting her on the shoulder. "Don't worry, I think all of us are tired. The suns are starting to go down anyways, so i think it's enough for today. What do you think Shirou?"

"I think we should camp here for the night. We`ve made decent progress with our levels. You can rest while I cook."

Tersia stood up almost immediately.

"Surely it's not right for a hero to cook for themselves, right?"

Shirou stared at him before shaking his head.

"Tersia, this is the one thing I will not budge on. I like to cook. It helps me to relax, and you heard what Motoyasu and Itsuki said. This is my way of doing what they asked."

Tersia seemed to struggle with himself before speaking.

"That's fine, but at least allow me to be of assistance. That's all I ask."

Shirou nodded. That was acceptable to him, so he gave out something to do.

"Fine. Can you please start skinning the Usapil? I'm planning on making a soup, and the usapil looks exactly like a rabbit."

Tersia nodded, taking the knife from Shirou before sitting down to skin the usapil in silence. Shirou quickly began putting everything together.

Everyone sat in silence, eating their meal, a content smile on their faces. Welt was the first to finish his soup, putting his bowl to the side before letting out a small sigh.

"Shirou, that was great! Where'd you learn to cook like that?"

Shirou let out a small laugh.

"Well, I'm self taught. Back home, I was the one who cooked for my dad and me. Anything my dad made either burned, or it was military rations."

"Really? That makes it even more impressive!" Welt spoke.

The other three all nod in agreement, finishing their soups soon after.

"Alright, I'm going to clean everything. Feel free to sort out everything else. I'll take the first watch for tonight, ok?" Shirou spoke, and Tersia stood up as well.

"I'll come help you swor- Shirou." he spoke determinedly.

Shirou nodded, motioning for him to follow him towards the river, even as the others sorted themselves out.

The pair stay quiet, the sound of the river being the only thing that interrupts them. Shirou decided to break the silence first.

"Tersia, can i ask why you keep calling me Sir sword hero?"

Tersia seemed to struggle for a moment. "My family… They are… devout followers of Melromarcs' religion. Do you know what it is?" Shirou shook his head, motioning for Tersia to continue.

"Melromarc follows the three heroes' church. They worship the sword, spear and bow heroes, whilst decreeing that the shield hero is a devil made to tempt the other 3 heroes. Whilst I never fully believed it, having it shoved in your face for a lot of your childhood will leave its mark on you. It's why despite the shield seeming like a good person, I couldn't bring myself to join him despite it all. And hearing that declaration he gave to you? It just made me feel worse."

Shirou thought the information over. "Since you're knowledgeable about the three heroes' church, why did they summon the shield if he is a devil?"

Tersia let out a sad chuckle. "You know, I already forgot you're not originally from here. You need a bit of background information first. The heroes are the last defense against the waves, that's what the legends say. The waves happen all over the world, and the heroes were originally meant ot be separated to the corners of the continent, only supposed to meet up when they were strong enough. Of course, as you can see, that didn't exactly happen did it?"

Shirou looked at him in confusion,not having heard that the waves happened all over the world, but he motioned for Tersia to keep speaking.

"The nation of demi-humans, Siltvelt, considers the shield hero as a god over there, and Melromarc and Siltvelt have a rivalry. They despise each other for several reasons. But all that's important is that because the four heroes were summoned here, they denied their rival the shield hero they worship. What worse blow could they make to their rival without outright declaring a war?"

Shirou nodded in understanding.

"So the shield hero is being treated horribly in place of declaring war on siltvelt? That's…" ridiculous, Shirou wanted to say. But he was reminded of what his father spoke about, the cruelty of Magus back home, the fate of Sakura because her father decided that she would live better with the Matous. It was all so frustrating. Shirou shook his head.

"I just hope Naofumi is ok then. He may be the shield hero, but he's still human. He's going to be hurt somehow, I feel it."

Shirou picked up the last bowl, smiling sadly at Tersia before speaking again.

"Thank you for explaining some stuff to me. I appreciate you taking the effort to call me by my name instead of my title, and I appreciate you explaining the things I didn't understand."

"It was no problem sw- Shirou. None at all. It's the least I can do."

With that, the duo walked back to the rest of their party in silence, with Tersia quietly slipping into his sleeping bag as Shirou took the first watch.

—-

Shirou took the Usapil parts that had been left over from dinner and deposited them into his sword, watching as the sword absorbed them and two new swords were unlocked

New swords unlocked!

Usameat sword

Agility + 2

Equip bonus:

+5 Strength against Usapils

Usaleather sword

Agility + 2

Dissection + 1

Shirou swapped to the Usaleather sword. Instead of having a metal handle like a regular sword, it was instead made of leather, but other than that, it was no different from any other sword he had seen. He wondered what the Dissection + 1 meant. Would it make dissecting other creatures easier? Shirou shook his head.

Shirou sat down, laying his sword down beside him before looking for a rock of any kind to practice his reinforcement. Whilst he was confident he could reinforce himself if needed, he didn't want to test the theory when he needed to most.. He quickly found one, and held it in his palm.

"Trace on." he murmured.

Shirous circuits lit up, and the rock in his hand absorbed the energy. He watched as the blue bar in the corner of his vision began to go down. He waited until it reached halfway, cutting off his circuits before looking at the rock in his hand with Structural Analysis. He nodded to himself as he saw that no energy was leaking out of the rock.. A small rustle behind him took his attention away from the rock, and face to face with Bakta. He looked on in interest.

"Shirou, what is that magic?"

"This is from where I'm from. It is called Magecraft, and this particular branch of it is called Reinforcement."

Bakta nodded. "Is there any other Magecraft you can do?"

"Only one, and it's called Structural Analysis. It allows me to understand an object better. For example, this rock." Shirou lifted the reinforced rock up slightly.

"I was using Structural Analysis to help me reinforce the rock's weak points. It gives me a higher success rate than if I were to do it without."

"What happens if you fail?"

"Well, the energy could just fizzle out, or what is more likely to happen, the reinforced object will explode."

Bakta nodded. "I see, I see. Would it be possible to teach other people this Magecraft?"

Shirou thought for a moment. "I'm… not exactly sure. The reason I'm able to use my Magecraft is because of my magic circuits. I'm not sure if people in this world are born with them, and I don't exactly know how to check. I'm… also not the best to ask for information regarding Magecraft. I'm third rate at best."

Bakta hummed. "I see… but if there was a way to find out, would you be willing to teach me?"

"Of course, I would attempt my best to help you."

"Thank you Shirou."

Shirou put the rock down before standing and making his way to his sleeping bag.

"I'll speak to you in the morning."

—-

Yet again, Shirou dreamt of a mountain of swords.

He could recognize more of the blades, the answers coming from archers' memories.

Even as Shirou continued to move through the mountain of blades, he could already tell that something was different.

That something had changed this world of blades.

As he reached the peak of the mountain, he was met with the familiar warm light he felt whenever he reached the peak, but there was another blade, standing against the light.

Shirou looked at it, recognising the gem of the Legendary sword, moving over to it slowly.

He put his hands on the handle, drawing the blade out of the ground and pointing it to the sky, even as a flash of light blinded him.

—-

Shirou woke up in a sweat, even as the light came through the trees. The dream felt so real, and yet, so alien. He shook his head again, Looking at his status.

Name: Shirou Emiya

Role: Sword Hero

Level: 7

Stats:

Attack: 35

Special Attack: 25

Defense: 35 (25)

Magic Defense: 24

Agility: 30

Shirou looked at the stats, nodding in approval, before moving onto his sword options. He sighed looking at them, looking at the small amount he had unlocked, and how many more there was to be unlocked. Shirou switched to the help menu, and started going through it again, trying to see if he had missed anything.

After looking through the power up methods available to him, he almost left, until his eye caught sight of another guide.

"Equip bonuses?" Shirou spoke, clicking on the guide to expand it.

Shiro read through it, switching to his Usaleather sword as he did, checking the stats on it. Sure enough, on the sword, it had (Locked) on it.

"So, according to this, if I just simply keep it equipped for long enough, will I get these stats permanently? That seems a bit… weird?" Shirou spoke to himself before shaking his head. He wasn't going to complain if he could get stronger even faster than he thought originally. He decided to keep the Usaleather sword equipped for now, not sure of how long a weapon would take to unlock. Did the time required scale with rarity? How would it interact with his other power up methods? Shirou wasn't sure, but every stat helped in this world.

Shaking his head, Shirou stood up, and stretched. Bakta seeing him would smile and wave. "Shirou. Did you sleep alright?"

"Yeah, I slept fine. What about you?"

"It was a bit of a struggle. I've never slept outside, but it was certainly an experience. I`ll have to get used to it if I want to stay at the party."

Shirou nodded his head. "Where's Tersia and Farrie?"

"They said they wanted to make something for us all for breakfast. Between you and me, I don't think they want you cooking."

Shirou could only grumble, turning to face a yawning Welt.

—-

As it turned out, Tersia and Farrie made quite a good duo when cooking. They made a quick and simple breakfast of eggs and some bread they had picked up before leaving.

"Alright, so are we fine to keep moving on?" Shirou spoke, having finished his meal. The group all nodded. With that decided, they moved on further, heading further through the forest.