"Two possible towers, and two master/servant pairings…"
"You're suggesting we split up?! Now, of all times?!"
"It's a question of what matters more, Sortiara: the number advantage, or speed! We don't know how long Nathan can keep Rider's attention! If Rider wins that fight and rushes over to assist Archer, it's over!"
"Rider would be exhausted though! He deployed a reality marble, for crying out loud!"
"As if Lancer and Saber aren't on their last legs as well?"
"Can't say I like being counted out like that" Lancer joked.
"Not what-… Ok" Johnathan sighed. "I'm not saying we don't take on Archer together. We each take one tower, storm it, and one of us will find Archer and his master. Once the other pairing realizes they're in the wrong tower, they can just… leap over to the other one."
"And if we're ambushed while separated?"
"Look, it isn't perfect, but nothing is going to be perfect here!"
"…Fine. Fine! We'll do it your way! Which tower you want?"
"…Let Saber and I take the far tower. Likely they're in the furthest tower, but just in case you and Lancer quickly rush through this one, then leap across to the other."
"More like run across…"
"Exactly! Even better for you to take the close one then" Johnathan grinned. "You'll have no problem crossing, nor will you have to rely on Lancer for it."
"Great! Now stop talking and get moving already, if speed if oh so important!"
I didn't bother waiting around any longer, instead opting to make my way towards the front doors of the office tower. Lancer followed close behind, the sound of his armored steps against the paved walkway the only sound as Johnathan and Saber took off down the street.
"So, we're rushing through to the top" Lancer asked as we reached the doors, looking up towards the top of the tower.
"…Yep" I sighed. "Considering the doors here aren't locked, either Archer and his master are in this tower-"
"Or it's a trap" Lancer finished. "Well, at least we don't need to 'go loud', as they put it these days."
"We're not bank robbers, Lancer" I couldn't help but laugh slightly, in part due to the nerves, as I pulled open the door and we stepped inside the main lobby of the building.
"…Long way to the top though" Lancer whistled.
"And with us needing to check each floor, the elevator isn't an option. Assuming the power hasn't been cut or turned off somehow in the first place."
The climb to the top was an exhausting ordeal, but only in the most typical of ways. On the first floor, we found nothing. In the stairwell? Nothing. Second floor? Nothing. Third floor? Nothing.
On and on this pattern went. No matter how much we looked, or took our time examining each floor, Lancer and I came across nothing. No traps. No familiars. Not even late-night office workers or cleaning crew. The place was dead silent, save for Lancer and I. By the time we reached the seventeenth floor, we had still yet to find anything.
"…What could they possibly be up to" I was growing frustrated by the lack of anything, and by the mounting exhaustion of taking the stairs.
Why did humanity even think building towers this tall was reasonable?! This shit was killing my legs!
"Considering none of the floors thus far have been trapped, I think it's safe to say none of them will be" Lancer commented, lowering his spear.
"Then are we in the wrong tower, or-"
"No. It's… muddied, but I can sense someone, or something, else here, above us."
"Archer, his master, or both?"
"That I cannot say… The magical energy sustaining this field is overpowering. All I know is that we're not alone here."
"Comforting…" I grumbled. "Well, better us against Archer than Johnathan and Saber, I suppose. Guess we just head straight for the top then."
"Might I suggest taking that elevator you mentioned earlier" Lancer had the nerve to smirk as I took hold of the handle on the door to the stairwell. "Surely that would be both far easier and faster than having you huff and puff the rest of the way up the stairs."
"…Screw it, why not" I sighed, punching him in the chest. "If that turns out to be a trap though, and we need to bail out, our landing is on you."
"I can live with that" Lancer laughed slightly.
…Bastard probably didn't even feel anything with his armor, but my hand was throbbing with a dull pain from doing that…
"Fifty-three floors in this place" I groaned as I checked the elevator buttons once we'd stepped inside. "We'd have been here all night going floor by floor!"
"I could see this being a good place to set up if it was abandoned, but the place looks as though it's used frequently" Lancer spoke up as the elevator began its ascent to the fifty third floor.
"…It does make you wonder how they managed to make this their base without being discovered, doesn't it" I nodded. "Though considering the master creates illusions, I suppose there's any number of ways it could have been done."
"Where's Merlin when you could actually use him" Lancer sighed. "If anyone could solve illusion magecraft…"
"You always seem to speak so positively of Merlin, yet I thought most of the knights disliked him."
"Hmm… I wouldn't say disliked, per say… It's true that Merlin could be…"
"A pain in the ass?"
"Yes, that" Lancer laughed. "Especially when it was you who was the target of his latest joke or prank. How my king managed to put up with him for so long, I'll likely never understand. But even so, when Merlin wanted to help, when it really mattered, I don't think there was a single one of us knights who wasn't thankful for his presence."
"…"
"…Something on your mind, master?"
"No! …Well…"
"Heh, might as well say it now, master."
"It's just that… well… didn't Merlin bail when it actually really mattered?"
"I suppose he did. Though, lots of us bailed. Tristan. Merlin. Lancelot, somewhat. Myself. I'm sure there were more, but you see my point, yes?"
"I suppose so… Lancer, the-"
The chime of the elevator interrupted what I was trying to say as the doors slid open before us. As I suspected, the elevator would only take us so far. To get to the top, the roof, there were still some more stairs to climb.
"Well, whoever's here, they're close" Lancer sighed, readying himself. "Likely on the roof. Guess there's still some stairs to climb after all?"
"Most likely" I nodded, thankful that the chime of the elevator stopped me from asking such a stupid question. "Um… let's check this way first."
"Alright" Lancer nodded, taking the lead. "And master, to answer the question you actually wanted to ask… the answer is yes."
"That's- I- Um…"
"Master, relax, and focus on Archer for now. Anything else can come after."
"...Right."
I was thankful that it wasn't too much longer to the roof; a couple more flights of stairs. Lancer kept to the lead as we reached the door labeled 'roof access', pushing it open with a loud, metallic groan.
The wind was a fair bit stronger up this high, and with it came a chill I hadn't been fully expecting. It was a good thing I had never been scared of heights; this was probably the highest point one could reach in the entire city. Unless they could fly, that is.
Standing at the far end of the roof, back to us, was a lone figure. He was wearing some kind of armor, though I couldn't quite make it out from this distance. Wasn't metal though, so probably leather, or some other kind of material?
"I was starting to think you'd take all night to reach here, Lancer" Archer commented, undoubtedly sensing us, though still not turning to face us. "A shame you took so long, really. Missed quite the… intriguing conclusion to the fight between Rider and Caster."
"Their fight's already over" the revelation shocked me, and I couldn't help but blurt out the question. "Who-"
"Woah! Slow down there, missy" Archer grinned, finally turning his focus to us. "I'm not revealing anything more than that. You'll find out all you want to know soon enough anyways."
"Where's your master, Archer" Lancer questioned, glancing around the rooftop.
"Not here."
"Other building then."
"Possibly."
"That's revealing, isn't it?"
"You tell me, Percival."
"So, you already know who I am."
"Only one person whose lance could do what you did to Berserker there, so…"
I felt a chill rush down my spine as Archer took a couple of steps forward. Despite knowing who Lancer was, to be so confident to approach as an Archer…
"You might want to step back into the stairwell, missy" Archer turned his attention to me.
"Why? So you can have an easier shot at me?"
"I'm not a murderer" Archer sighed, shaking his head. "No, I'm merely stating it as a suggestion for your protection. Masters don't need to die in this thing, and while my own master might wish otherwise, she's a bit far away to order me to turn you into a pincushion."
"How generous" I snorted. "Think I'll take my chances, Robin Hood."
"…Oh, you're one of those people" Archer sighed, and I couldn't help but get the feeling there was a… shift… in Archer's temperament. "Don't compare me to those upstarts, missy. You won't like the end of that road."
"How about a formal introduction then" Lancer smirked. "Otherwise, that name's gonna stick: fits a nameless Archer, wouldn't you say?"
"The clowns that masquerade under that moniker have nothing on me. You face a real deal here, Lancer. Hope you're ready for it."
"Never been one to back down from a good fight."
"Perfect! Neither have I" there was a wicked gleam in Archer's eyes as he manifested a bow in his hands. "Then hear me now, Sir Percival of the Round Table!"
Aiming towards the sky, Archer fired an arrow aglow with not red, but white magical energy.
"My name is Hereward the Wake" Archer shouted as the rooftop beneath our feet began to glow with a similar white light.
That was, until blades of grass, reeds and even a few trees and a small body of water sprouted up from the glowing surface and began to rapidly grow.
Great, more terrain manipulation bullshit…
"Know that so long as I stand, Ely shall never fall!"
A/N
Would have posted this last night, but, well... St. Paddy's day goes HARD for uni students, and I'm no exception to that xD
But, yes, for those who did pick up what I was putting down, this should come as no surprise, but Archer is indeed Hereward the Wake, who is one of the many potential bases, or influences, behind the 'character' or 'moniker' of Robin Hood in real life. Now that it's officially revealed, though, I suppose now is a good time to say that Hereward was the last servant I ended up coming to for this story, and wasn't even my intended Archer to begin with.
Originally, I actually didn't know who my Lancer was going to be. I'd wanted to put Percival as Saber, actually, and have him be really young, like when he'd have first began his training as a knight. Reasoning for that was that the grail summons servants in their 'peak', or 'prime', and I wanted to play around with that notion. After all, one could say there are many peaks in one's life. There's the peak of their abilities that they achieve, naturally, but isn't there also the peak of... potential? The peak point of where one has the most flexibility to learn, grow, and become the best version of themselves they could possibly be?
That idea was the basis for The Fool's Journey skill I wanted to give Percival, and I'll admit, I wanted to play with the idea so much I compromised on my idea and gave it to him in this Lancer version of mine anyways, even though he arguably, really, shouldn't have it as a Lancer xD
As for the Archer I'd originally wanted to go with... it was actually Wang Yi. No, not China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi, but Three Kingdom's Era China Wang Yi. As for why, well... she has always been my favorite female character in Dynasty Warriors, and historically speaking, she is one of the very, very few women (if not the only woman...?) WHO ACTUALLY FOUGHT during the time. I've found her to be a really interesting person, historically speaking, and I REALLY wanted to have her in here.
So then, why didn't I? For many reasons. One was that, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't come up with a Noble Phantasm for her, and let's be real, having her in without a Noble Phantasm just isn't going to fly. Second problem was that Johnathan would be the only one who could realistically summon her, but the kids were also the only ones Nathan could realistically ally with, and, well... having both Caster and Archer in the alliance? The camping strats Nathan would have insisted on deploying would have made the story so boring to tell from any of their perspectives!
Combine those two issues together, and it was clear I needed some restructuring of my servant lineup. Still wanting someone from Three Kingdoms Era China (that wasn't another strategist!) I opted to switch Percival to Lancer, give him Longinus as his weapon, and add in Liu Bei as the Saber class servant. It would be another two days after that, while going through yet another playthrough of Persona 5 Royale, that I did Akechi's third awakening for Hereward, and it hit me: I could make Hereward the Wake the Archer servant!
It would work so well, after all: I could do the camping strats that Archer servants should realistically employ, while not making it OP due to the nature of the setting of the war, and not make it a super boring story to tell as Nathan wouldn't have to plan with it, but rather against it! I could also add in good hints to his identity by doing things like, oh, I don't know, make the master of Hereward a descendent of the Wake family (which historically claimed descendance from him, although I'm unsure as to if that has ever actually been proven to be true or not).
Hence why his master is Elise Angeline Wake xD (For anyone who did catch that when I first mentioned that back in Fragment 15, I salute you o7).
But yeah, so that's how I got to my three Knight Class servants. Also why I have no female servants (except maybe Assassin ;) ) in this story: I hate genderbending! I think it's stupid, and if you're not going to use an actual female figure, then just DON'T HAVE ONE!
