[A/N: Hello! good to see ya. this note in the beginning is only to inform you guy that I'm posting not one but two new stories as soon as I upload this one, with a third on the way. The first one is a .hack/ GU x Danmachi story, with Skeith as the MC of the story, there are some elements of Persona in there too, but mostly magic because the spells of .hack/ GU just flat out suck. There is another element of Persona, but that's a surprise, read it if you wanna find out. It's called Epitaph of Orario.
The second is a Fate Stay Night x Percy Jackson story, with Shirou remembering his full name, not his childhood but his name from before the fire, he is also a demigod, not of the big three. He was born and raised in Japan, but went to America for a few years, for middle school. Kiritsugu is alive but magically crippled. This story is called Shirou Muramasa and the Olympians, it starts during the lightning thief, Shirou is of course a couple years older than Percy, btw.
The last one is a Fate stay night and Persona crossover, but I've only barely started on it. basically I'm trying to create a story that fits the persona tropes but with Fate characters, and I already have a lot to work with.
Anyways that all for now, I'm sure I'll have more to say by the end of the chapter.
Disclaimer: Me no own, me just fan... fwoosh.
Time slowed for Siegfried, his eyes widen as he stared at the crouched form of a younger, most likely 11 years old, Cinder fall.
kill
Her flame yellow eyes stared at him in slight fear, at being discovered stealing food.
kill
It would be so easy... if he were to end her now... then Salem wouldn't be able to make her a pawn.
Kill her!
"Yeah... that would probably be best... to kill her before she becomes a mass murderer." Siegfried thought, his hand slowly opened to summon a blade.
But... is that the right thing to do... to a child who hasn't done anything yet, who hasn't yet been twisted by her hatred and lust for power?
The words rang true throughout his head.
"That's right... she hasn't done anything yet... there's still a chance to change things... but how?" Sieg wondered, internally grateful to the part of himself that used to Shirou Emiya.
KILL HER! SHE IS DARK AND SHE WILL ALWAYS BE DARK! AND WE DEVOUR THE DARK!
"NO! there's always another way other than death! You lost sight of it. It's my turn! So shut up and watch!" Siegfried mentally snapped at the darker voice.
... fine... do whatever you want... but you will fail just as we did before you.
This conversation happened in the span of one second, and when it finished, time resume for Siegfried, and he relaxed his hand before he could actually summon a blade.
"Hello! Um... you come here often?" Siegfried asked with a nervous smile.
"U-um... please don't tell my step-mother I was stealing food... I'm really hungry." The girl said, holding a half eaten sandwich in her hands.
"Huh? Oh... OH! yeah sure I didn't see anything, as long as you don't rat me out to my big sister that I'm hiding from. She gets really crazy when she's mad." Siegfried said with a grin, as if he hadn't just contemplated killing her.
Cinder nodded her head tentatively.
"Great! Now uh I guess I should introduce myself? I'm Siegfried." He said still grinning, as he stuck is arm out.
"C-Cinder... n-nice to m-meet you..." Cinder stuttered as she took his hand.
While they shook hands Siegfried immediately noticed how boney her fingers and arms were.
"Geez... your so skinny... what are they feeding you?" Siegfried muttered in worry.
Cinder heard him, and flinched.
"I-I should get back to working, before she finds out I'm slacking off." Cinder muttered, nervous that he had noticed her state of malnutrition.
"Huh? O-ok... I guess I'll see you arounds then? By the way my room is 513. If you wanna talk... or even eat without having to hide under a table, you can come up. I'll probably be in there most of the time, but I'm gonna meet a friend at the beach later on so I might not be there that day." Siegfried said deciding to help her get more to eat.
"W-hat!? Why?" Cinder asked extremely confused.
"Why what?" Siegfried asked.
"Why are you offering to help me?" She asked sceptical.
"Why wouldn't I?" Siegfried asked.
"No one else wanted to... they all just look at me... yet never help me... so I thought-"
"That you were nothing? Worthless?" Siegfried asked.
Cinder just nodded.
Siegfried's fist tightened.
"bastards.." he thought.
"You're not worthless... you're a living person! And all life is precious!" Siegfried said to the girl.
Those words made her tear up, and she started to sob.
Siegfried freaked out.
"Oh crap! I'm sorry! I didn't mean to make you cry!" Siegfried panicked, only to be hugged tightly by Cinder.
"Thank you! Thank you for caring!" Cinder said.
Siegfried blushed furiously, as his head was placed in a certain... area... which probably shouldn't be that developed due to her malnutrition, but somehow was.
Cinder released him with a sniffle, only to see his eyes became swirls and his face was red.
Cinder tilted her head a bit before she realized what she had done, and she blushed furiously as well, steam poured out of her ears, and she sprinted out from under the table and left him sitting there.
Siegfried sat there, staring at where she disappeared to, for about a minute before he sighed.
"Guess I better find another place to hide before Winter realizes I tricked her." Siegfried said.
"Too late."
"Kyaaaa!" Siegfried shouted as he launched himself out from under the table and ten feet into the air, only for Winter, who was under the table, to grab him and dragged him back under, where he was hogtied and gagged by a sheet.
Comical tears waterfalled from his eyes, as he was then dragged out from under the table by Winter who used the remaining length of the sheet to drag him to the elevator. All the while other guests watched with a raised brow, and some giggles here and there from the female guests who thought the situation was adorable.
Siegfried tried to stare at some of the men to send a mental message to help him get free, but they only shook their heads and gave him a mock salute.
"Don't just Salute! Help me dammit!" Siegfried mentally yelled, as the elevator closed, blocking them from his view.
Yet he could hear a roar of laughter from the other guests, as the elevator began to ascend.
"TRAITORS!! I will have Vengeance!!!"
Siegfried mentally vowed.
Meanwhile Winter gazed at her brother, with concern... but not for him... no it was for the girl he had been with... or rather what was on her neck.
Upon first glance it looked like a simple Necklace/Choker with a yellow gem on it. But Winter knew better it was a shock collar, the "gem" was actually a purified lightning dust crystal, and it was attached to a mechanism that would remotely activate it when the remote was pushed. She'd seen similar things on the Faunus that worked some of the SDC mines, before one ended up causing an explosion and were outlawed by Atlas, they were implemented by Jacque as soon as he gained ownership of the SDC.
And that poor girl was forced to wear one... this would not stand.
Winter resolved to speak with her mother about the subject, once Siegfried and Weiss were asleep.
"For now though..."
Her eyes drifted to the bound and gagged Siegfried, and a wicked gleam entered her eyes.
"I guess I'll just have to find ways to keep him... occupied, so he'll get to sleep quicker." Winter grinned wickedly.
Let it be known to all who read this, Winter was a closet bro-con, she'd never outright admit it though. But she's not that type of bro-con, she's the type that simply enjoyed his company, she liked to believe that she understood him and vice versa.
Of course she didn't know that he held the souls and memories of two Dimension hopping heroes, who were under... somewhat forced servitude to the Diety that created existence in its entirety, that's not really something that comes up in conversation at the dinner table.
As the narrator finally finished his rant (dammit Lenny again!? really, fuck! Where's my fourth wall flex seal!?), the elevator door opened and Winter dragged the poor boy to their room, where Weiss was watching some Dust-Tube (Remnant's version of YouTube.)
It was some animated... show? It looked more like gameplay from a video game from what Winter could see.
Siegfried also saw the video and his eyes widened, in what seemed to be nostalgia.
That made Winter curious, did he know the video?
Siegfried began to struggle harder in his bonds, unintentionally his aura began to condense around him and a glyph formed before it separated into a multitude of Archaic Letters.
"Runes." Winter reminded herself, she had seen her grandfather use them with his glyphs, and taught her a few things, but had died before he could truely teach her them.
The Runes formed lines and slithered up the sheet, before they flashed and suddenly dagger blades appeared and sliced the sheet to ribbons.
This all happened so quickly that Winter barely had time to physically react, and ended up holding what remained of her sheet in her hand bewildered, while Siegfried, not noticing what had happened had bolted to where Weiss was and stared at the TV with a mixture of Awe, Confusion, and... Excitement?
"No way..." Siegfried whispered to himself.
He gazed at the sight before him.
It was Nier: Replicant. The remake of the game Nier, and true prequel to Nier: Automata. In his old life he had preordered it about a year and a half before it was to be released. But he had been killed/summoned into another world, exactly a week before he could play it, and seeing it a completely different world, even if it was someone else playing the game, was shocking to say the least.
He was enraptured by the game, although the original wasn't very good, it followed a middle aged man trying to cure his sick daughter and save her from shadow like monsters called Shades. But it wasn't very well received, until Nier Automata.
But from what Siegfried could understand was that this was about a teenage boy fighting the Shades to save his sister instead. He'd heard on some forums in his first life that the original version was intended to be like that, but some idiot producer thought it would be better for the hero to be middle aged, and the sister to be the daughter.
"Good to see they went back to the original Idea." Siegfried thought.
The current situation of the show had a young Nier, fighting against two giant robotic guardsmen, each held a large sickle like spear in their grasp, their bodies a gilded silver and brass color with red eyes for one and blue for another.
Nier was having a floating black and sliver book, named Grimoire Weiss (pronounced Veiss) shoot little crimson bullets of dark energy, which was oddly reminiscent of an ability Siegfried's original self created with his use of Ether in the form of Umbrakinesis, the only difference was they weren't in the shape of multi-eyed crows.
He was drawn out of his thoughts when he saw, Nier create a halo of large crimson crystal shaped spears with runes surrounding them, before proceeding to launch them one after another like a bullet from a revolver, impaling the blue eyed statue in the left eye repeatedly.
It's blue eyes cease their glow and it crumpled to the floor.
Neir and Grimoire Weiss share some words before the building began to collapse, forcing Nier and Grimoire Weiss to flee, leaving the armless red eyed robot to be buried in the rubble.
The runes had caught his attention, in fact the so called "magic" of that world was interesting, and possibly recreatable with his glyphs, but he definitely lacked the skill required to recreate those attacks with aura.
He was more of a close-middle range fighter anyways, sure he excelled with a bow, but that was due to his past experiences in both of his old lives, what little archery skill he had had bled into his life as Shirou who then expanded upon it, only for it to bleed into himself.
Anyways he was mostly a close to mid range fighter with some long range skills, so it might do some good to try to recreate the spells from Nier: Replicant, especially in situations where he might not have his new bow, while unlikely seeing as he kept it in his glyphs it was still a possibility, at least that way he'd have a way to hit opponents who fly, like a Nevermore. Hell he could even try to use a Lance as an arrow.
Siegfried shook himself from his thoughts and decided to just watch the show.
Meanwhile Winter looked on as Siegfried and Weiss watched the TV, still stunned at what Siegfried had unknowingly done.
She looked at the remains of her sheet, inwardly pouting, but noticed small glowing object om the floor.
It was a dagger, made of pure aura, something she knew Siegfried could make, but this one was unusual.
It had too much detail, the blade was translucent, completely see through, yet she could see each and every scratch, nick, dent and intrinsic pattern the blade held, which was insane since before his blades, made of his steel colored aura, were more... the general shape of the weapon with no discerning details.
Winter knelt down to get a closer look
The dagger was actually a sword breaker, a single edged dagger that had specialized notches in the dull side of the blade, meant to catch sword blades and, if used with a pair, shatter the steel of the blade rendering it useless. It's grip and guard was like that of a Bayonet, but short, probably meant for something the size of a desert eagle pistol, which usually have their barrels slightly longer than normal sidearms.
Along the blade of the sword breaker, were a multitude of tiny runes, in intrinsic designs, which Winter recognized to be letters, forming a single word... a name: Revenant.
Winter went to pick up the blade, only for her finger to phase right through it, and the weapon shattered into fragments of steel colored aura.
Winter let out a hiss as she held the finger that had phased through the blade, her finger wasn't cut, but her aura had taken damage, which had translated itself into physical pain.
Winter cradled the finger, and began to muse to herself.
The blade hadn't touched her, yet she felt the pain one would feel from getting cut by it.
After a few more minutes of pondering, she came to realize, Siegfried's aura weapons had no true physical bodies yet still held the concept of being a blade, so it wouldn't cut, but it would still hurt just as much if not more.
And then the fact that his blades now held more details than before, it just proved Winter's affirmation of her theory on what was happening eversince that day at the false Orphanage.
Siegfried's semblance was evolving, at an incredible rate... especially for one his age.
But perhaps his age was the reason behind the sudden shift in abilities.
According to Aura researchers People who are young yet have their auras unlocked do not display their semblances until later on, as their personalities are still taking shape.
But in the case of Hereditary semblances, they're always the same, when they actually get inherited anyways, but due to the individuality of the person new abilities get created for the semblance after each inheritance, such was the case for the Schnee semblance, the "diversity" of their semblances, it's many abilities, they were originally created by the souls of past inheritors, and were recorded in the Schnee Semblance Grimoire by said users, and while they could be taught to older inheritors, the younger ones had an easier time of learning them.
Among the abilities was Blade Projection, and runes, which were created by a Schnee who had a split personality, one a warrior with an unparalleled skill of any bladed weaponry, so he created weapons he could summon, and the other a scholar who sought to unravel the very fabric of the world itself, which lead to the later rediscovering Runes, an Ancient Occultic Language that was said to be the very "data" of the world itself, and learned to use them with his glyphs.
A double souled, Warrior and Scholar, a dangerous combination, they were named Ozone, if Winter remembered correctly.
And Siegfried had discovered how to use both of them... suddenly Winter felt very inadequate compared to her younger brother, who was by all intents and purposes a prodigy.
If only she knew that he had experience with both types of powers before he even became her brother, then it might make a little more sense to her.
He was by no means a prodigy, he just knew what he was dealing with, and used his knowledge to strengthen himself.
Winter contemplated telling Siegfried her discovery.
But when she looked to see him staring st the screen with wonder, she decided against it, so she sat with them content to watch whatever they had found so... enthrall...ing...
Winter's thoughts trailed off as she too fell into a trance at the show.
The use of powers so similar to their families semblance, the way the brother fought through shade after shade to protect the village where his sick sister resided, drew her in, she related to the boy, Nier was his name, and the woman Kaine, while she found her to be more than a bit vulgar, she could see that she struggled to hold herself together, and used combat as a way to focus the hate she felt, and her use of dual swords and her "magic" was rather intriguing, Winter now wanted to try to recreate those spells, specifically the enemy seeking energy bullets that Kaine often used.
Perhaps she could use some small Nevermore as the bullets?
Weiss was enchanted by the story, it was like something out of a fairytale for her. The brave hero who fights to save those he loves and protect his home, against evil creature of darkness, using powers granted to him by an powerful being, a book who was named Weiss, like she was! He spoke in a very fancy and smart way! Maybe she should speak like that? Oh how she wished to see the ending.
After the 5th episode came to an end, it was time for them to go to sleep, their food having arrived and been eaten shortly before the third episode, Weiss pouted, but Winter just ignored it.
"We'll watch it tomorrow ok, with mother next time." Winter promised, which caused Weiss to cheer before she hopped into the bed, the three would share.
Speaking of Willow, aforementioned woman opened the door to their room with food, for herself.
Before Willow even had a chance to gush over the sight of her adorable daughter getting ready for bed, Winter pulled her aside to inform her mother of the event that transpired only a little bit ago.
Meanwhile Siegfried sat on the shared bed, his sister cuddled next to him.
Siegfried stared at her and, try as he might, he couldn't help but remember Cinder. How thin and frail she was. And how his sister would look if she was born anywhere other than the schnee family, and somehow ended up living with the owner of this hotel. To be tortured and worked as a literal slave.
And he got angry at the image, but he forced himself to stay calm.
"That woman will get her's soon enough..." he thought to himself, as he began to plan to free Cinder in some way.
He considered killing the owner. But then he'd be on the run and wouldn't be able to get into beacon later on. Which would negatively effect his plans for the future.
He considered a couple more options but ruled them out instantly. In the end he decided to find a legal way and let the chips fall where they may.
With his thoughts concluded he looked to his side to see Weiss already sleeling soundly.
He chose to do the same, and laid down and closed his eyes, drifting into the realms of Slumber.
Here I stand, again, in this frozen world it's only tenants being myself, and my subjects, the infinite Ethereal blades that cover the landscape.
I gaze down from my frozen hill overseeing the blades in silence, before my attention moved upwards to the sky.
A black void that contrasted to the froze white below. A black hole with a white and steel colored cloud swirled in place of where a Moon should be, ominously beautiful.
My eyes return to the snow.
I sit down in the frozen earth and simply stare blankly at the world around me.
A sudden snowflake drifted in front of my eyes gaining my attention. The flake is shaped like my Glyphs.
"Well well kid... what an interesting place you've got here." A sudden familiar voice spoke feom behind me.
I turn to face the source, my eyes as dead as the landscape around us.
The man is tall, and dark skinned with white hair.
I almost mistook him for Archer if not for his Traditional Japanese Haorihakama along with a white scarf. With two katana at his side.
I recognized him immediately.
"Muramasa... why are you here?" I ask, my voice empty of all emotion.
"Hm... seems you're not that far along in your Aria, must be the reason your emotions haven't been able to manifest into your mental world. Still I am impressed that you've managed to create a reality marble in our current reality. But it's incomplete I guess I'll have to aid you in strengthening it, perhaps even forcibly change it for the better." Muramasa says, not answering my question.
I stare at him which he notices.
"Oh! My apologies, this old man just went on a tangent and didn't even answer your question." Muramasa said
I nod in acceptance to his apology.
"Now to explain my existence here in this little world of yours, well... due to our... relationship with each other I am able to enter your subconscious while you sleep. as to how I am here, well... I was offered a job by Chaos to forge blades for his workers, the Archivists as they've taken to calling themselves since your disappearance." Muramasa explained
Idly I notice my eyebrow twitched at the mention of the Primordial Creator.
I nod at the explanation.
"What did you mean when you said you'd help in strengthening and changing this place..." I ask monotonously, gesturing to the world around us.
Muramasa smirked and tapped the right side of his nose. A sign of secrecy.
"Muramasa..." I say in a tone of annoyance, the first emotion to manifest in my world.
"Ah! There we are. A little emotion. Good now we can begin." Muramasa said.
"Begin?" I ask.
"Yes well... to be honest... in order to begin you'll need to come to my shop at the market in Mistral. You saw it yesterday as you passed by. Come by tomorrow. I'll be waiting for you, along with someone who'll be able to assist me." Muramasa said sheepishly.
I roll my eyes at him but agree nevertheless.
Muramasa grinned and spoke.
"Good now I'll see you tomorrow. We'll prepare while we wait for you."
With that Muramasa vanished and in his place was an anvil made of what looked like Diamond, with an Obsidian hammer on top of it, both items glowed red with indistinguishable levels of heat.
I tilt my head at the items. They're the only items in this world of mine that aren't Ethereal.
I pick up the hammer and turn to the anvil, both are items of the forge, both made of crystals.
I inhale and lift the hammer before swinging it into the anvil, and my frozen world... Ignited.
Welp... yeah uh... my bad... some things happened and I kinda forgot about updating for a while. Well I'm back now. and let me tell ya... the A/N at the top is out of date...but uh... I'm too lazy to bother changing it. So anyways here. I'll be sending out the other stories I made alongside this one. Then I'll get to work on the next chapter for this immediately.
Oh and I probably should explain something about Siegfried's abilities. someone stated that Siegfried has similar abilities to Virgil from Devil may Cry. And while they're not wrong. To be more accurate his abilities are more closer to the Soaring Blades skills from Phantasy Star Online 2 (Original and New Genesis) Which both comparisons were in actuality happy accidents. I wanted him to keep abilities from his Shirou life but mixed with his Glyphs. And the result ended with him having the Ethereal swords. Which as I'm sure you've guessed will change into Dust Blades very soon.
And yes... the Anvil is important for the current storyline. Just putting it out there.