Chapter 16 - Sakura Crusade
Pocket Space of Arturia Morgana Pendragon - Fate world - Day of Arcueid's Capture
(Arturia's P.O.V)
It's early in the morning when I and probably the entire manor were awoken by a sudden drastic spike in power coming from Arcueid's room. I quickly scramble out of bed, manifesting my full Lancer armor and body suit before rushing to Arcueid's room, alongside the rest of my family.
As I throw open the door, I see Arcueid on her knees almost in a daze. Her previously short hair is now much longer, practically flowing down beyond her backside, alongside it I can quite literally feel the raw power Arcueid has at her disposal now.
"Arcueid..?" I call out softly to the blonde true ancestor, snapping her out of whatever daze she was in, and starts to chuckle softly before a bright smile appears on her face. As she slowly stands up, she wobbles a bit before getting her bearings.
Her previously E-cup breasts are now more like fucking G-cups with how huge they are, damn my preferences but holy shit it is hot. As these warring thoughts circle in my mind, she comes up to me and the others before surprisingly just going to hug me, her naked form pressed against my metallic armor.
"Thank you for taking me in..you have no idea how much this means to me, restoring me to my full strength…" She says softly. It's then I remember reading something about Arcueid's backstory during the three-day wait for her capture.
Her current-day strength is a result of a large portion of her power being stripped from her by one Michael Roa Valdamjong, or simply Roa. Along with her hair being stolen by another Brunestud, you could call the Arcueid people first meet in Arcueid a "Bird with clipped wings" so to speak.
Here though, none of that is a thing. Her power was fully restored and her hair along with it, only thing is I have no idea how that…
Then I remember, Body Tune-up can restore a capture to peak physical condition. Theoretically, it can also mean that Body Tune-Up can also potentially restore lost power. Although maybe not on its own, however.
But my other defenses, Soul, Mind, and Body Defense are stacked as high as they can go as well, which also means that any prior losses could have also been negated that way as well.
Unfortunately, I have no real way to figure out which of my immediate theories is correct. That's fine though, it doesn't matter to me much anyway as I wrap my arms around the newly restored White Princess, I can easily tell that she's no longer affected by Vampiric impulses either now that both the body-tune up restored her to peak condition prior to Roa's stunt and the fact that she's got back a metric shit ton of her power.
I should probably check my phone after this to see where she now sits in the tiering regarding the catalog, as this is way more power than I had anticipated getting on my side originally. Either way, this is a very welcome surprise.
On a whim I turn around to look at my family, and I pale when I see Medea chuckling softly to herself, seeing that Acrueid has similar curves to herself now which gives her Very interesting ideas for Acrueid's new attire.
"Medea, don't get carried away for now, we got some bug squashing to do now that Acrueid is ready.." I say softly, reminding everyone that This was the planned day we go to save Sakura "Matou" from her adoptive family.
Soon everyone save for Arcueid, who is still hugging me tightly, nods and go to get dressed for the upcoming move against the Matous. All the while Artoria (Saber) looks pensive considering who is the servant under Kariya Matou.
We cannot afford to screw this up.
That Afternoon
(Arturia's P.O.V still)
We're all waiting on Fu who has gone to scout out the Matou Estate in Fuyuki, trusting her to remain undetected while seeing if Berserker is there right now or not. All while we start breaking down the steps to getting Sakura out of the house.
"Right our plan has two objectives, one Critical and one optional…" I start as I lay down the framework for the plan.
"Primary objective is to get Sakura "Matou" out of the estate and into our grasp, where Artoria (Saber) will use Avalon to heal and purge the crest worms from her body…" I say, with everyone simply nodding.
"Our optional objective is to kill one Zouken Matou, which we can only do once Sakura is freed from the crest worms in her body, not a single crest worm is to survive if we are to kill Zouken Matou.." I say, with everyone following along so far..
"How do we go in..?" Says Grey, curious as to how I plan on getting into the estate without alerting Zouken to our plan.
This is where I decide to "cheat" a bit, knowing that there is one ability that Zouken will probably have never considered in his defenses because it never existed here in the first place.
The Kai Kai
"We'll teleport into the estate using the Kai Kai, bypassing any perimeter alarms that way plus there is one other thing I plan on doing…" I say, staring flatly at Merlin who realizes exactly how I intend to draw Berserker's attention away from the estate.
"You want me to draw the attention of the Enemy servant…" She says softly, to which I nod before adding.."You'll also be supported by Mashu and Ritsuka during this, I do need to warn you that this particular servant is corrupted due to the taint of the grail…" to which I quickly give a small rundown of what I know about Lancelot-Berserker's abilities.
"Mashu, Ritsuka, you have my permission to use Super Saiyan if the fight starts to get out of hand, as well as full unrestricted usage of Ki after going Super Saiyan, but other than that stick to regular Ki blasts as they can more easily be written off as some mutated form of Gandr or something.." I say to the two, both of them nodding
"What about me and father..?" Mordred asks, to which I respond with.."I need you to keep an eye out for any other servants taking advantage or even potentially Emiya if they've gotten here yet.." With Mordred grumbling about being essentially on lookout duty and Artoria knowing she needs to be on standby anyway for the use of the sheath, they both nod.
"Medea, Morgan I need you to also distract the Matous further once Merlin has Berserker's attention firmly on her, Ritsuka and Mashu and I don't care how you do it so long as you don't put Sakura in direct danger doing so…." I say to the two, needing to hedge all my bets here..
"What of me…?" Acrueid says, unsure as to her own role in the operation ahead. I give her a mischievous smirk before saying…"With your full power restored, I was thinking you could directly tangle with Zouken, try to go for the kill if you can but other than that just keep his attention fixed on you and you alone.."
"I'm back!" I hear Fu say, having returned from checking the Matou Estate and is grinning..
"I can confirm where Sakura "Matou" is…" She says before frowning..putting her finger on the basement level of the rough floor plan we have.."Right here…"
This is both a good thing and a bad thing, it's good because if she is there being "Educated" as Zouken would put it, it means we have an exact location to drag her out from. Bad because it also means the moment we go in, our cover is blown wide open, leaving us a narrow window to ensure we can get Sakura out of there.
"Change of plans, Arturia you'll be coming along with me and Grey to get Sakura out of there, Mordred You're joining Merlin to kick Berserker's ass.." I say, swapping the rolls to fit the change in circumstances.
"Oh hell yea.." Mordred says grinning, really wanting to kick Lancelot's ass herself but she's not gonna turn down a chance to do so alongside her new family.
"Right, Fu I'll have you watching out for any newcomers showing up all of a sudden, just stay out of sight and try not to give away your…." I don't finish my sentence as Fu gets what I mean and nods.
With the plan more or less done with the planning, all that awaits now is to merely prepare for the operation ahead, with any luck we may achieve our goals without too much disruption to the overall plot.
That NightFuyuki - Matou estate1994
(Team Berserker P.O.V)
Merlin, Ritsuka, Mordred and Mashu all group up, weapons and fists (Ritsuka) ready to begin the opening move of the plan.
"Go ahead flower girl, do your thing!" Mordred says, making Merlin's eyes roll but nods as she weaves a bit of her magecraft before sending streams of light to fly into the windows of the Matou estate, almost certainly triggering any alarm systems they may have.
Not even a few minutes later, a blur of misty black comes rushing out, intending to attack Merlin. "Time for me to shine, back me up shieldy!" Mordred says, rushing at Berserker Lancelot as his attention refocuses on her.
Lancelot swipes and tears at Mordred, red eyeslit glowing brighter at recognizing Mordred and howling with rage. A sudden savage swipe is blocked by Mashu who quickly soared into the fight and Lancelot's strikes a blocked by a strangely familiar shield, something that is causing the madness in Lancelot to grow more unstable.
Lancelot growls savagely as every attack is rebuffed by the strange servant with a shield while he's forced to dodge attacks from the traitor's blade. But no matter what he did, he just can't get a strike in, even just to tear away at any armor–
Lancelot's attention is immediately broken away from the fight as he hears blasts and explosions coming from behind him, His master is in danger!
But before Lancelot can do anything, he's violently pulled back into the fight by The traitor as Mordred manages to get a good diagonal strike on Berserker's armor, ripping through it but not enough to pierce the skin.
He has no choice, he has to deal with this lot first, and seeing the orange-haired woman near the white-haired one, he can see the marks of a command seal. So she must be the master..
He howls and rushes right past the two, intending to strike at the source directly, and takes a savage swipe at the assumed master..
However, to his own surprise, she suddenly surges with power, hair going blonde and spiking, breaking free from the side-tail and soon he feels his armor groaning as the infernal master manages to land several punches that dent his armor.
As if that weren't enough, he can see the rotten one suddenly appear above the estate on the roof, being chased by a long-blonde woman and swiping at the rotten one just as savagely as he is against his current foes.
Despite his madness, he can see that this entire situation is a multi-layered plan that is working on all fronts, the question is though what that objective is…
(Zouken Matou's P.O.V)
To think the master of caster would be so brazen as to try and destroy everything I've worked so hard for over the many years. I have not turned myself into what I am now simply to fall here..
That being said, the blonde woman I'm having to escape from is clearly the white princess, but she is supposed to be far weaker than this. With her in this condition, my only choice is to keep moving, keep out of her range while I allow some of my crest worms to start escaping..
Only to soon feel them dying by an unknown assailant, the master of Caster must have formed an alliance with Kirei Kotomine to strike at me, they're the one who has the Assassin servant!
Still, even if I temporarily find my body perishing, I will eventually have a new vessel, one strong enough that the Toshakas so ignorantly gave me. It's then I realize exactly what the true objective is..
"You're here for the girl…" I quietly say to myself, cursing at how both I and that fool Kariya were strung along all for the capture of the newly adopted matou..
Well if I can't have her, then neither can these fools. All they will find is the poor girl's corpse!
..
No..when did..
They must have gotten past the perimeter defenses without alerting us somehow, but the only one who could possibly do that is…
Zelretch, you bastard…
(Arturia's P.O.V)
As the battle with Lancelot started, I only wait a few seconds before I call out to grey..
"Grey, keep a tight hold of Artoria (Saber), we're going in.." I say, Grey only nodding while I grip onto Rhongomyniad tightly before the three of us Kai Kai into the Matou estate basement, gritting my teeth as the sound of all these crest worms skittering about around a small child makes my skin crawl.
"Who…..are you….?" I hear the small weak voice of Sakura "Matou" below me, completely surrounded and covered in bugs, no even any clothes to protect her modesty at all. I force myself to calm down and hold out a hand to her.
"I'm here to get you out of here, free from this place…" I say, I see a small spark of hope appear in Sakura's eyes before she asks…
"Is this a dream….?" Hearing this just breaks my heart, I can't wait to get her out of here and into my family proper.
"No dear child, this is real….I will free you, I promise…." The tiny spark of hope begins to burn brighter in her eyes, before I begin to leak the power of Rhongomyniad leak out a bit to start scorching crest worms, timing it to the sound of the explosions of Medea and Morgan's spells above in order to try and minimize exposure.
Once enough of the crest worms are sufficiently culled I gently pull Sakura into my arms, floating over to Artoria (Saber). "Arturia, I need Avalon…" I ask, to which she nods and soon pulls out the scabbard from where it is kept inside her, she aids me in putting it into Sakura and once it's in, it immediately begins working on healing and purging the crest worms.
"Nnnggh…" Sakura moans in slight discomfort as the crest worms within her body are starting to violently be destroyed and the damage healed by a full-power Avalon. I turn to grey who is keeping Artoria (Saber) from dropping down onto the basement floor.
"I'm gonna destroy this basement, I need you to take Arturia and Sakura here out while I do this.." I say, Grey nodding shakily as she sees I'm starting to remove the coverings on Rhongomyniad.
She Kai Kais out of the basement to an awaiting Medea and Morgan while I slowly walk up to the top of the stars of this basement.
With a stoic, blank look that would perfectly fit on the original Goddess Rhongomyniad's face, I begin to release the power of the lance without invoking the restrictions, only needing so much of the lance's power even without doing so to decimate this entire wretched hive of a basement.
To further limit the blast, I also forgo the limited release aria as well. And so as I point the lance's tip right at the bottom of the basement where all these wretched things congregate..
"UNLEASH, RHONGOMYNIAD!" I let a beam of pure light energy pour out and when it connects with even a single crest worm, the power detonates. I am forced to duck out of the way into the hall as the entire basement is completely destroyed, screeches of all the dying crest worms being music to my ears.
"YOU, WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!" I quickly get my bearings as I stare at an emotional, enraged, and distraught Kariya.
Seeing a need to very quickly avert a crisis, I quickly hold my hands up and rapidly say.."I got Sakura out of there before I destroyed that infernal nest…" I say, trying to keep him calm. Hearing this Kariya freezes for a moment.
"You…wish you save Sakura…?" He asks, almost hesitant to ask this of another of the moonlit world.
"That's what this whole thing was about, although if I could get rid of Zouken while at it…" He grits his teeth before nodding. He looks at me warily before asking…" What will you do with her…?"
"Give her a family that will treat her right, my family….she deserves all the love and care in the world after the shit Zouken put her through…" I respond. Kariya snarls and looks at me with an unhinged and unstable look in his eyes.
"I never wanted to be in this war you know…I'm only in it for Sakura…" He says, stumbling as his body wrestles with trying to sustain Lancelot. He suddenly almost falls over before I catch him, the man looking weak as he realizes he can't keep this drain up for much longer..
"Promise me, you will care for her…..got it?!" He demands, to which I solemnly nod and respond with.."She will be as if she were my own daughter…."
He nods shakily before pulling away from me violently.
"G-go….before the Master of Caster finds you here…" He says, not aware that I am the Master of Caster..
Chuckling I merely say.." Well, good thing I am the Master of Caster…" shocking Kariya before he begins to burst out laughing, a crazed smile as the Irony of the situation dawns on him.
"To think….my enemy would be my greatest ally…." He says before shaking his head ruefully..
"Go, leave while you still can…." He says before turning his back to me and walking away before I can say anything in response.
I sigh once he's gone and call on the rest of my Retinue.
"Primary Objective achieved everyone, weapons free on Zouken everyone!" Is what I say before I kai Kai over to Medea, Morgan, Grey, Artoria, and a sleeping Sakura who's been given some provisional clothing by Medea.
(Team Berserker's P.O.V)
"About time she fucking said that!" Mordred says, seeing how Lancelot is starting to show visible signs of fatigue while everyone else is still in top form. Bullshit of Inexhaustible is what her Big tits of a sister calls it, something that she is more than willing to take full advantage of herself.
Mordred races past Lancelot, who is now being kept in check by both Mashu and Ritsuka now going Super Saiyan after the call went out. Merlin herself is sending further streams of light to attack Zouken's position, prompting the old bug to realize that the target of the operation has changed from rescue to assassination.
At this point, all he can do is delay the inevitable, even so like a cockroach he does his damn best to stay alive for as long as possible. But even that becomes impossible and suddenly he finds himself staring down Berserker..
"KARIYA, YOU FOOL–" He doesn't get a chance to finish as Lancelot howls and rips what remains of Zouken to shreds, a victorious but utterly exhausted looking Kariya looking up at the roof from a spot in the front of the Matou Estate.
"Sakura…..I wish I could have been there to watch you grow up…..Your uncle will be watching over you…" He says with a smile before he has about to use magecraft to destroy himself, hoping to ensure Zouken can't use the Crest worms in his body to return.
However, he is stopped by someone he never expected to appear right at this moment…
"Now now young lad, there is really no need to go THAT far…" Zelretch himself intervenes, holding Kariya's hand to prevent him from completing the magecraft formula.
"Why are you…." Kariya goes to say before he's suddenly forced to take a foul-tasting alchemic potion of some sort. He can feel its effects decimating the Crest worms and slowly revitalizing him in turn.
"This stuff cost me quite a lot to get my hands on from those stuffy Alchemists over in atlas.." Zelretch says, remembering how annoying it was to get this one simple vial past all those protections preventing things being created at atlas from leaving, let alone simply getting the potion created in the first place.
Soon enough though Zelretch grins and leaves an utterly bewildered and confused Kariya sitting on the front lawn of the estate, soon being joined by Berserker.
"They're gone..?" He asks, to which Bersker gives an affirming growl. Good, perhaps without Zouken around the Matou might be able to change things…
But first thing is first, he has one last target for his ire before he can pull out of the war entirely..
"Tokiomi Toshaka…that bastard will die…" Kariya vows..
Pocket space of Arturia Morgana PendragonFate world19943 days later
(Arturia's P.O.V)
I smile softly while Sakura sleeps in my arms..
I'm a mother it seems now…
Sakura woke up in her own room just the day after we rescued her, after she realized it truly wasn't a dream, she cried tears of happiness of finally being free, free from the torment of Zouken Matou.
In a roundabout way, Kariya's promise to her that she'd be free came true. Although we did offer to her to return to the Toshakas only if she wanted to, she ended up wanting to stay here with me and my family.
And after a bit of legal wrangling with the help of Zelretch and his own connections, I am the adopted mother of one Sakura Pendragon..
I never really expected to have a kid coming into all this when I met that bastard fake Kirei..
But looking down at my new adopted daughter as she slumbers in my arms, hugging me in her sleep while I sit on the couch..
I can't help but feel giddy at the prospect, I can only hope I can raise her well. Still, I have to win this grail war first in order to ensure I can give her a home here in Fuyuki..
I wonder if there is any property I can buy after the war…?
Thoughts for another day..
Author's notes
At long last, one Sakura formerly Matou but now Pendragon, now the adopted Daughter of Arturia Morgana Pendragon.
Arcueid's Full restoration
This was something I debate doing ever since I brought her into the fanfic, wasn't sure if it would work at the time but I figured out exactly what the problem that prevented her from returning to full strength was and reasoned out that the body tune-up and defenses would fully resolve this problem.
The Operation - Team Berserker
Their role was merely to keep Berserker from returning to the estate before we could get Sakura out of there successfully. Hence why they didn't do all that much except fight, just to keep Lancelot from causing problems.
The Operation - Medea and Morgan
Due to their role of providing a further distraction, I wasn't able to give them much direct screen time. But their assistance was required to keep Zouken and Kariya guessing on what the true target was.
The Operation - Arcueid's Role
Considering how fucking annoying Zouken is to kill, I thought that Arcueid would be the most capable of chasing him and trying to slowly rip through his array of crest worms. Again this was another ploy to keep his attention away from Sakura.
The Operation - Arturia, Grey, and Arturia
Arturia had to use the lance here, while at a heavily reduced power level and holding it back immensely at that to ensure that it didn't just detonate the entire fucking estate and cause a massive amount of problems so quickly.
Kariya
Yea he gets to live for now at least. Soon he'll be gunning primarily for Tokiomi.
Zouken Matou
DING DONG THE WITCH IS DEAD, or rather the bug is dead. It's funny how that works when you split your very nature into pests that wriggle around, still yea with the small amounts of the bugs that were escaping due to a certain someone who was on lookout duty killing them and the entire lot of them in the basement being utterly decimated by Arturia's lance..
There was no way Zouken was getting out of this without an insane amount of luck, which ran dry the moment Kariya decided NOW was the time to turn on him. Death by berserker was perhaps the most ironically poetic way to end his life.
Where was Fu?
Scout and then silent lookout, plus she was ensuring that none of the bugs managed to flee into the woods.
What happens now?
Depends on how the other masters react to this really..
Well, I had honestly expected to have this ready a lot later but hey, best strike when Inspiration is fresh.
See you all next time!