Day 6 False Rider — Return To The Forest
The False Rider — a girl known to most as Mononoke-hime, but whose true name was San — looked down at the ruined corpse of the boy who might have been her Master. She kept a wary eye on the spellbook he had dropped, which had begun to throb and pulse in an unnerving manner once the spreading pool of blood had touched its pages. Her first thought was that it was rigged with some form of vengeance spell set to trigger upon the wielder's death, but what happened next was even more disturbing. Pages began tearing themselves out of the book, in the process breaking into writhing clumps of vile worms. San had seen such creations before, and so already knew their foul nature. The hideous things began wriggling across the roof to the dead boy's body, eagerly thrusting into his flesh and burrowing beneath his skin.
Though it struck her as a suitably nasty end to an incredibly nasty person, San knew that she could not permit this. The worms were unnatural, perversions of life and nature. It was the proper way of things that the dead should return to the Earth and become soil to fertilize the next generation of life. In this way, even someone as evil as that boy might contribute in some small manner to the greater good of the planet by becoming part of Gaia's cycle. But the worms which had composed the book were not of Gaia; they were twisted abominations with no place in this world, and San would not permit them to partake of their profane feast.
Closing her eyes, San opened her senses to the greater World. Raised by a nature god in the Ancient Forest, she had always had a close bond with Gaia, and becoming a Servant in service to the World had only increased that affinity. Nature was weak here in this city with so few remaining trees: asphalt, concrete, glass, and steel made it a stronghold of human Alaya against natural Gaia. But nature was adaptable and persistent, and even in the heart of this urban cancer she could feel millions of bright pinpoints of animal life surrounding her. Nature would always find a way.
San softly whispered words not meant for human ears, trusting the wind do carry them to those that needed to hear. Within minutes, her call had been answered. A great, rambunctious flock of crows descended upon the rooftop and set upon Shinji's corpse. They eagerly began to strip the flesh from the dead boy's bones, tearing out and killing every last one of the unnatural worms in the process.
As San sat and watched the crows feast, waiting for Moro to return, she noticed another bird sitting near her on the roof; or at least, something wearing the shape of a bird. Though it appeared to normal senses to be a common pigeon, the magic aura that San sensed from it indicated that it was an unnatural construct; the servant of some magus. San sighed, barely able to muster the motivation to deal with it. For a moment, she considered just letting the wretched thing go about whatever nefarious business its master had put it up to, but she quickly rallied her determination. The energy in the bird's aura wasn't as utterly vile as the miasma given off by the worms, but it was still an abomination, a false life not born of Gaia, and thus needed be destroyed. She made a quick thrust at it with her spear, and the mindless thing didn't even attempt to dodge; it simply burst in a small puff of blue flame. As the last sparks faded, San heard the comforting sound of Moro's claws tapping against the rooftop.
"I was unable to catch the fleeing Rider." Moro said in her deep but feminine voice. "And even if I had, I am uncertain I could have overcome her before exhausting what little prana remains in our reserve."
"It doesn't matter anymore." San said with a resigned sigh. "The Master is dead, and he was the worse of the two. The Servant will either go find a better Master now, or else disappear... like I am about to."
"You should dismiss me, conserve what prana you have left." Moro urged.
San slowly shook her head.
"It wouldn't make any difference at this point." she said. "I can already feel my body starting to break down. And... I'd like to spend my final moments with you, rather than alone."
"Of course, my daughter." Moro said, bowing her head in assent.
"How long do you have?" Moro asked.
"I think I may last until sunrise... perhaps." San said. "When I go, I'd like it to be in a forest, if possible. Could you...?"
"I will carry you." Moro said. "The Einzbern forest is not far. It is small and poor in magic, compared to the Ancient Forest, but..."
San knew. With so little time left to her, it was the only forest within reach.
"It's fine." San said. "It reminds me of home."
She climbed onto Moro's back, and the great white wolf set off towards the forest in great bounding leaps. As Moro's movements fell into a steady rhythm, San felt waves of exhaustion tugging at her consciousness. She had pushed herself too far, burned her energy too quickly, and no longer had the strength to maintain her existence. Though she was a guardian who fought in defense of the World, the World itself was rejecting her. It saw her as something unnatural, a paradox to be erased: a dead spirit given life outside of its proper place and time, altering the natural course of history. With prana, the pure essence of magic, she had been able to force the World to tolerate her existence for a time; but now that her supply was dwindling to nothing, she could no longer deny the force that worked ceaselessly to restore her false life and body to its natural state of death and nothingness. San did not begrudge the World for this; it was the natural order of things, and a fate she had been fully prepared to accept after using the Grail to grant her wish. Instead, she cursed the foul luck that had caused her to eliminated so quickly — and not even in honorable battle, but simply running out of time because she hadn't been able to find a Master. What had even been the point of entering into the Holy Grail War, if it was fated to lead to this pitiful end?
San buried her face in Moro's warm fur. Half-lucid, half-dreaming, she recalled all the myriad ways this Heaven's Feel had gone wrong from the very beginning, dooming her before she'd even had a chance.
==Interlude: False-Rider Dreams Of Memories==
====Flashback: The Tainted Crypt====
San materialized within a pillar of light, summoned in the vessel of a Rider to fight for the Holy Grail. She boldly stepped forwards and declared herself:
"I am Servant Rider, and I ask of you: are you worthy to be my Master?"
Only silence answered her. As the light cast by her summoning faded, she was enveloped in total darkness. It seemed she was alone in a dark room of cold, damp stone; not the position a newly summoned Servant would expect to find itself in. It was possible that her Master was inexperienced with the ritual and had made a mistake, causing San to summoned at the wrong physical location, so San focused on her connection with her Master: the bond formed by the Command Spells, through which her Master would transfer her the prana required to maintain her physical form. A dark chill ran through Rider when she failed to find any such connection. She could not sense her Master, and she was not receiving any prana — as though the summoning ritual had just spontaneously performed itself, and she had no Master at all. Something, it was clear, had gone terribly wrong.
Then she sensed movement. This room was apparently not as empty as it had first seemed. Her eyes, though superior to a human's, could not function in total darkness; but her other senses were likewise enhanced and she could hear the soft, wet squelch of writhing worms. There were everywhere in this dark space with her, thousands of them: a living carpet of worms all crawling towards her. San was not squeamish about such creatures; living in the Ancient Forest, she understood their important role in nature's eternal cycle. These worms, however, disturbed her, for she could tell that they were not natural creatures. Rather than being born of Gaia, they had been created by some foul magic which had twisted them into abominations, perversions of nature which sought to spread the corruption that saturated their misshapen forms. As they closed around her like a toxic flood, San could feel their malicious intent: to violate her body, penetrate deep within her flesh so they might infect her body and soul with the tainted energy they carried.
San needed prana to remain in this world, but she would not even for a single moment contemplate being filled with the foul and corrupted prana which those unnatural worms carried. Death would be preferable to letting the worms penetrate her body so that she could draw on their vile energy. San knew that winning the Holy Grail War might require her to suffer some number of indignities that she would not normally tolerate, such as allowing a human to become her Master and submitting to his authority, but San could not imagine anything that would be worth violation by the worms. She leapt from the floor, shifted into her spiritual form, and fled that unclean stone room, leaving the abhorrent worms far behind..
==== Flashback Out ====
Without a Master, San would have no way of replenishing the magical energy she constantly burnt as fuel for her Servant body. Though she had been summoned with a full reserve of prana, it would be quickly exhausted if she were forced to combat another Servant. Without some means of refueling, her strength would dwindle and her entire existence would eventually disappear.
Fortunately, her close connection to Gaia gave San certain useful magical senses, such as the ability to feel the pulse of the planet's heartbeat. Mana was the life energy of the planet itself; and when gathered in great quantities, San could distill it into prana for her own use. The planet's arteries and veins, through which vast streams of mana flowed, were called leylines; and to her good fortune, she had sensed a convergence of no less than three leylines near the location of her summoning. Such rich wellsprings of mana were quite rare indeed; the existence of this one was quite possibly why the Fuyuki region had originally been chosen as the site of the Holy Grail Ritual in the first place. San had immediately set out for the top of Mt. Enzou, confident that she had found at least a short-term solution to her energy problem. She hadn't been aware that another Servant had already had the same idea.
==== Flashback: The Mountain Temple ====
San walked through the front gate of Ryuudou Temple. The grounds were still and quiet, the monks not yet having woken. She could feel the vibrant pulse of mana in the ground beneath her feet, the rich essence of Gaia rising up through the mountain and gathering at this point. Turning her spear point-down, San thrust it into the earth, and began drawing that power into her own depleted prana reserve.
Instantly, an alarm sounded. Not one that detectable to human senses, but a magical pulse that no Servant could fail to detect. Apparently, drawing mana from the mountain had triggered some kind of magical tripwire. She hadn't even considered the possibility that the leylines might be booby-trapped; though, with her weak knowledge of magecraft, it's not like she would have known how disarm or even look for such traps had the idea occurred. In any case, it was too late to do anything now: the trap had been sprung, and her only option was the fight her way out.
It wasn't immediately clear which way the danger would be coming from, so San continued to draw mana through her spear to recharge herself as much as possible, so she'd have the highest possible amount of energy to fight whatever the alarm was summoning.
They erupted from the ground all around her: crude skeleton-like constructs carrying rough-hewn bone swords. Hundreds of them rose from the soil, sprouting like mushrooms all across the temple grounds. San instantly broke her connection to the leylines and switched to combat mode, sweeping at the nearest skeletons with her spear. Despite their fearsome appearance, the skeletons proved fairly weak: a single strike was enough to break one into fragments. The real problem was their numbers: already they had her completely surrounded, and they were forming up in orderly ranks in order to make space for still more to emerge from the earth.
San spun like a dervish, lashing out in all directions around her. She occupied a circle with a radius equal to the length of her spear, where chips of shattered bone swirled in the air like a snow devil. But no matter how many she smashed, there was no reprieve; a new one rose from the ground to take the place of each one that fell. It was clear that these were low-quality familiars, unable to match her even when they had her outnumbered hundreds to one; but precisely because they were so crude, they would cost little prana to conjure. A decent magus would be able to summon practically infinite numbers of them; and the mindless constructs would fight tirelessly for hours or even days on end if that was what it took to wear her down and eventually overcome her.
San felt skeletal hands emerge from the ground beneath her very feet and grasp at her ankles, and instinctively jumped high into the air. The circle of open space vanished, skeletal warriors moving in to fill it like water flowing into a void. San began leaping across the top of the mass of skeletons, using their heads as stepping stones. Their skulls were only partially complete, little more than jaws filled with jagged teeth, but their reaction speed was much too slow for them to bite San's feet as she nimbly sprang over them. Finally, she reached the roof of one of the temple buildings, and heaved a sigh of relief. The skeletons could only rise from soil, not a shingled rooftop; and it seemed unlikely they had the manual dexterity to climb. She was, for the moment, safe.
San had barely rested a minute when a small commotion arose from the skeletons below. She searched for the source of the clattering and saw the ranks of skeletons parting to create a path for a man to walk down. He wore a suit and glasses, and had a serious expression on his face as he walked towards the building that San was crouching on the roof of. She could clearly feel his killing intent.
San stood and backed away from the edge, readying her spear. This, perhaps, was a fight she was capable of winning. And if this man was the magus responsible for summoning the familiars, then they would disappear upon his death.
The man easily leapt up onto the roof to face San. He was strong then; enormously so, by human standards. But San still felt that the odds were in her favor: in a fight between a strong human and a weak Servant, the Servant was still almost certain to prevail. He was mere flesh and bone, while she was pure spirit.
San took a step forwards and thrust her spear, aiming for his heart. With lightning quickness, the man raised one arm to knock it aside. There was a flash of sparks as the spearhead was repelled by a protective enchantment on his forearm — though a useful weapon, it was not a Noble Phantasm, and so mortal magecraft was capable of blocking its edge. Before San could draw the spear back, the man was rushing forwards and swinging his other arm towards her for a closed-fist punch. San would not normally have paid much attention to such an attack; but since the man's arms were clearly imbued with defensive magic, it stood to reason that they might carry offensive magic as well. San ducked, letting the fist pass over her head.
The man's clenched fist immediately opened, becoming a grasping claw. As he drew his arm back, his clutching fingers seized a chunk of San's hair and ripped it out by the roots. San let out a shocked yell and leapt backwards, once more positioning her spear between herself and her assailant. Only once the initial burst of pain passed did she realize that she had just come within inches of death. Only San's short height had saved her: if she'd tried to move her head to the side of the strike instead of ducking beneath it, he would have torn out her throat rather than merely her hair.
This man was skilled in lethal fighting techniques, and had been enhanced through enchantments to make him capable of taking on a Servant. However, San hadn't sensed him draw on prana or perform any magecraft of his own; only passively use pre-existing enchantments. She changed her appraisal of him; he was not the magus responsible for summoning the skeletons, but merely another bodyguard — albeit one far more dangerous than the familiars. San was forced to reconsider her options. There wasn't much point in killing this man if doing so wouldn't stop the skeletons and allow her to tap the leylines.
Then the air behind the man suddenly twisted and warped, and a feminine figure in purple robes and a cowl seemed to unfold out of thin air. San knew a Caster when she saw one; this woman must be the one who had summoned the familiars and enchanted the fighter's fists. The situation had become pretty much unsalvageable at this point; a human magus would have been a manageable obstacle, but there was little hope that she could prevail over a fully-powered fellow Servant.
"I've put all of the monks to sleep so they won't investigate the disturbance." the Caster told the man. "What's the situation?"
"A Servant seems to have infiltrated the temple." the man said.
San felt intense scrutiny from within the Caster's shadowed hood.
"It has some type of concealing Noble Phantasm." she stated. "It obscured her nature enough for her to pass the entrance without triggering any of the alarms. Fortunately, it was careless enough to wake the children of the hydra's teeth. Do you require assistance in finishing it off?"
"It is quite fast." the man said. "Reducing its mobility would allow me to finish this combat more quickly."
"Of course." the Caster said.
She raised one hand and spoke an impossibly resonant word in the Divine Language of the ancient gods. San immediately felt an enormous pressure fall on her back, driving her to her hands and knees. It felt as though her weight had increased tenfold; her head was so heavy that she could barely lift it to look at the man as he impassively walked towards her, preparing to deliver a fatal blow. Under the increased gravity, a sharp downward chop would be sufficient to break her head from her neck, killing her with a single strike, and San couldn't so much as raise a weapon in her own defense.
Taking the only option left to her, San shouted:
"Moro!"
The great white wolf of the ancient forest materialized crouching near San, and the pressure on her instantly dissipated as Moro shook off the magic as easily as she would rainwater. Caster might be able to speak the Divine Language, but she was ultimately naught but a mortal; whereas Moro was a Divine Beast, a true god, with more magic in her breath and blood than any arrogant ape was capable of wielding.
Magic circles filled the air around Caster and fired blinding beams of pure prana at Moro, but the enormous wolf seemed not to even notice. She snarled and lunged at the Caster, fangs bared, with as much momentum of a tank. But though her jaws snapped shut and shredded the purple robes between her teeth, they were empty: the Caster had twisted space to teleport elsewhere at the last moment.
The man who had been fighting on Caster's behalf was no fool; he instantly recognized that Moro was beyond his abilities and beat a swift retreat. Moro swung her head around to glare at him, considering pursuit, but the skeleton familiars immediately distracted her by charging en masse. Though they were too weak to pose a threat to her individually, their sheer numbers meant that they had the potential to swarm and pin her down. Even then, it was unlikely that they would actually be able to kill Moro with their crude weapons; but the Caster was likely still nearby, and there was no telling what other tricks she might still have up her sleeves. Moro chose to let the man escape, instead focusing on defending herself.
Though the familiars had seemed endless when San fought them, Moro was on an entirely different level. She tore through their ranks faster than new skeletons could rise to replace them, quickly clearing out most of the temple grounds. However, San knew it would only be a temporary reprieve; the number of low-quality familiars that a Caster could summon were effectively limitless, while the amount of time San could bear the burden of Moro's prana consumption was not. The Caster could remain in hiding and fling cheap expendable minions at them until they were exhausted, while they had no way of discerning her location.
"This fight is pointless." San called to Moro. "Let's get out of here."
San took a step forwards to go to Moro, and that was why the Caster's dagger only grazed the small of her back instead of plunging into her side. San immediately tucked into a roll and spun around as she rose. The Caster had teleported behind her and lashed out with what appeared to be a strangely shaped ceremonial dagger. Though on the surface it looked like a fairly weak and inefficiently designed weapon, the magical perception available to San as a Servant showed her that it burned brightly with prana. It was nothing less than the crystallization of a Divine Mystery, a Noble Phantasm. And San had a terrifying guess as to what its power might be; because when the dagger's tip had carved a burning line across her back, San had felt her connection to Moro waver. It was as though the channel of prana which connected them had suddenly frayed, leaving them bound by precariously few threads. If the dagger had truly stabbed her instead of merely inflicting a shallow scratch, it would have completely severed the connection between San and Moro. Not only would Moro have instantly faded without San to provide her prana, but San wouldn't have been able to summon her again until the bond regenerated, however long that took. In the worst-case scenario, the dagger would not only sever such bonds with contact, but leave a curse on the victim to prevent them from repairing the connection — in which case, San had just been a single step from losing Moro forever.
Seeing that her first strike had failed, the Caster twisted space and disappeared once more. She would no doubt keep trying until she succeeded — and since she could strike from any direction at any time, there was no way for San to defend herself.
"Mother!" San called. "Escape!"
San leapt into the air, and at the same moment Moro broke into a charge towards her position. As the great white wolf passed beneath her, San grabbed onto the scruff of her neck. Then San was clinging to Moro's back as the goddess leapt the perimeter of the temple grounds and, without slowing, began a headlong run down the slopes of Mt. Enzou — out of the Caster's territory, and hopefully beyond her reach.
==== Flashback Out ====
Moro had carried San all the way down the mountain and into the city, but they'd found themselves repeatedly attacked by the Caster's skeleton familiars. The crude constructs hadn't been strong enough to best San in combat; but then, they hadn't needed to be. From the fact that San had been attempting to draw mana from the leylines, the Caster had known that she was without a Master. Repeated battles against even these clumsy familiars would gradually deplete her reserves and cause her to disappear. What meager energy she had been able to draw from the leylines before being interrupted had already been more than expended in summoning Moro.
By the third time she was ambushed by the familiars, San had realized that the Caster was somehow magically tracking her location. Though she knew little of magecraft, she knew much of hunting, and guessed that Caster was using the hairs her bodyguard had ripped from San's head to track her magical "scent", such as it was. San eventually came up with the idea of cutting more locks from her hair and tying them to the legs of birds, and this had succeeded in laying down enough false trails that the familiars had no longer been able to hunt her. But San's energy remained low, and her situation as desperate as ever.
Desperation had driven her to seek aid from an unlikely source. The circumstances of her summoning were a definite aberration from the normal events of the War, and there existed a position meant to handle such irregularities, though it was not someone who Servants were ever supposed to interact with.
San had sought out the Overseer.
==== Flashback: The Blackened Church ====
San hesitated before the doors of the church. Technically, this was neutral territory, upon which Servants were not supposed to tread. However, she had come not to battle, but to seek clarification from the Overseer. Surely that was acceptable. Being summoned without a contract was an extraordinary deviation from the ordinary progression of the war, exactly the sort of situation that the position of Overseer existed to address. And she had dismissed her spear and her war ask, so it should be clear that she had come to parley rather than attack. Still, entering this sanctuary felt like violating some deep taboo.
Quickly, before her resolve could falter any further, San rapped sharply on the door. She had scarcely finished knocking when the door was swung open from within, giving the unnerving impression that the Overseer had already known she was there and had been silently standing just inside the entrance, patiently waiting for her to knock.
"Welcome, Rider, to Kotomine Church." the Overseer said. "I am Kirie Kotomine, local priest and Overseer of the Fifth Heaven's Feel. It is rather unusual for a Servant to come here, but all wayward souls are welcome within the House of God."
San recoiled from the man. It was such a base, instinctual reaction that it took her a few moments to consciously realize why she'd done it. She sensed no life energy in Kirie Kotomine, and her keen ears heard no heartbeat. He seemed to her senses a corpse; and yet he moved, spoke, as though animated by some malevolent energy. Unnatural!, her instincts screamed. Abomination!
"You need not fear me, Rider." Kotomine said calmly, seemingly unperturbed by her reaction. "I promise no harm shall befall you while under my hospitality."
San recomposed herself. Having been raised in the wilderness by gods of nature, she knew very little about the practice of organized religion in cities; and apparently the Grail did not see it as relevant to the War, as it had not imparted her with much knowledge on the subject. For all she knew, Kotomine's condition could very well be typical of priests of this religion. Perhaps as part of their initiation rites they were required to die and rise again as the savior they worshiped was said to have done. It was not her place to judge, and she had come too far to give up now. Overcoming her aversion, she followed the Overseer into the church.
The silence inside was oppressive. Even Kotomine's footsteps seemed muffled, as though the very air smothered all noise at the source. It was like being sealed into a bubble, cut off from the natural world. Sudden claustrophobia flared in San's breast. She was not meant for this tomb of dead stone; she should be outside, beneath a living canopy of branches and atop a floor of fertile soil.
"So," Kotomine said, making San flinch as his booming voice shattered the silence. "Why have you sought my counsel?"
San quickly explained her circumstances.
"You are not unique in this." Kotomine said. "For some reason, it appears that two Servants are appearing for each Master in this War. However, only the first Servant to be summoned appears with a connection to their Master. The Servants which arrive second are forced to fend for themselves. I can see three possibilities for a Servant in your situation. First, you might find an alternate source of energy, such as the mana which flows through the leylines beneath Fuyuki."
"Already claimed by a Caster." San said.
"Second, you might acquire prana by killing civilians and consuming their souls." Kotomine said. "Of course, as my duties include maintaining the secrecy of the War, I cannot allow open and indiscriminate slaughter; but if you perform your killings discreetly, there should be no problem."
San grimaced in distaste, prompting a chuckle from the Overseer.
"Why the look of revulsion?" Kotomine asked. "From your appearance and your demeanor, I judge you to be a Heroic Spirit of the untamed wilds — a hunter, a predator. Killing for sustenance is only natural, right? Surely there is no crime in eating simply to survive."
"It is natural to eat the flesh of your kills, but not the souls." San said harshly. "Souls are sacrosanct. A priest, of all people, should understand."
"Very well." Kotomine said. "That leaves the third option: finding a magus to make a contract with and become your Master. This is likely the most difficult method, given that there are a surplus of Servants competing for fewer Masters. Though, I hear that some Masters with above-average magic circuits are trying to take advantage of the situation by contracting both of the Servants that answered their summoning. It's quite the impressive feat, maintaining two Heroic Spirits at once, and not just anyone can pull it off. It sounds like you didn't have any contact at all with your Master after appearing, so who knows if she would have been strong enough to manage."
"She?" San asked. "Then you know who summoned me?"
"Of course." Kotomine said. "As Overseer, it is my business to know who the Masters are and which Servants they have called. I'm strictly forbidden from granting Masters unfair assistance such as knowledge of their opponents' identities... though, there is no rule against telling a Servant the identity of their summoner, since this is information they would normally already be privy to."
"Then tell me." San asked. "Who is the Master who summoned me, and where might she be found."
"Sakura Matou." Kotomine said, then smiled broadly. "Rejoice, Rider! Your wish may yet be granted."
==== Flashback Out ====
And so, with the dubious blessing of Kirie Kotomine, San had gone to seek her Master — or rather, the one who had been responsible for her summoning, who San had hopes would become her Master. But as the black-hearted priest must have known, the hope she had sought lead her to discover nothing but further pain and despair.
==== Flashback: The Forsaken Master ====
Following the directions given by the Overseer brought San to an ordinary-looking house. However, as soon as she set foot on the grounds, she was hit with a powerful feeling of revulsion that made the hair on the back of her neck stand on end. The property was seething with twisted, aberrant worm-creatures much akin to the ones that had tried to infest her body when she'd first appeared. They writhed within the soil of the yard and the wood of the trees and even within the walls of the house. Thousands of worms, each of them appearing to her magical senses as a dark knot of malignancy poisoning the world around it.
San did not dare tread further upon the corrupted ground, but instead began watching from a safe distance. And, eventually, the person she wanted to see walked out of the entrance: a young woman with purple hair. San approached her as she walked out onto the street, removing her Mononoke Mask so that the young woman would be able to see her true face.
"Sakura Matou?" San asked.
"Yes?" Sakura innocently replied.
"I am your Servant, called by the Holy Grail." San said. "I ask you to complete our pact. Become my Master, and I shall become your sword, and together we—"
"No!" Sakura interrupted with a panicked shout. "Stop! I won't! I don't want any part of your Holy Grail War!"
San started at her in shock.
"But... you called me." she said. "You summoned me from my peaceful rest in the Throne of Heroes and gave me form in this city-blighted world."
"I never wanted a Servant!" Sakura said. "I gave away the other one that tried to swear herself to me as well. Just leave me alone."
Now San began to grow angry.
"Take some responsibility for your actions!" she shouted. "You lured two Heroic Spirits to this world with the promise of the Holy Grail as bait; do you no intend to just abandon them to perish? What kind of cruel, twisted person would Summon Servants only to condemn them to such a fate?"
"Not me." Sakura said. "My grandfather. He needed me to summon a Servant for him, and I could not disobey. I'm nothing but a tool for him to use as he please."
San felt them, then, under Sakura's skin and within her organs. Points of nauseating wrongness, tainting her youthful vitality. Sakura's Matou's body was riddled with unnatural parasitic worms.
"It's so hard sometimes, keeping it all bottled up inside." Sakura said. "When the worms twist beneath my skin and make me... force me to feel lust, it feels like there's so much darkness building up inside of me that I'm going to break open and it's all going to spill out and the world is going to burn. If I actually had to fight, to kill... I wouldn't be able to bear it. It would be too much for me, and I'd lose myself to the darkness. So I can't be a Master."
San's anger turned to shame as she was overcome with pity for this poor, afflicted girl.
"Maybe I could help you." San said. "Contract with me, and I'll try to find a way to rid you of those unnatural things. My mother is wise in the ancient mysteries of the World and may know something —"
But Sakura only shook her head sadly.
"It's useless to try to defy grandfather." she said. "He'd know I had taken you as my Servant, and then he'd force me to use you. But I am truly sorry to have put you in this position. I gave my Command Spells and my other Servant to my brother, Shinji. Perhaps, if you seek him out, he will agree to take you as a Servant as well. ...Though, I can make no guarantees."
It seemed that was the most she was going to get; Sakura's dull eyes and flat expression made it clear that there was no possibility for negotiation. It was the expression of someone who has given up all hope, and no longer possesses the will to fight. San began to walk away, then hesitated. Perhaps it was because Sakura, being the one who had called her into this world, was connected to her by a unique and special bond even having rejected her. Or perhaps it was simply that she felt pity for this poor, worm-infested girl who had abandoned all hope for salvation. But for whatever reason, San couldn't bring herself to simply walk away. Sakura had made it clear that it wasn't possible for San to stay as her Servant, but there must be something else she could do, some gesture she could make...
San reached under her shirt and pulled out a small crystal dagger hanging from a necklace.
"Here." San said, tossing the pendant to Sakura. "Go ahead and hold onto this."
"What is it?" Sakura asked, holding it up to look.
"It's a memento." San said. "Someone important gave it to me to remember him by. Now, I'm giving it to you. So, even if I can't be by your side, you will remember that I was meant to be your Servant."
"A memento..." Sakura said.
Apparently unconsciously, her hand rose to brush the pink ribbon tying her hair.
"There's no guarantee that I'll be able to find Shinji Matou in time to avoid disappearing." San said. "It may be selfish of me, but I don't want to disappear entirely without a trace. I want to be remembered by at least one person in the world. As the one who called me, the one who should have been my Master, you are closer to me than anyone else. So, I'll entrust you with my memory. Even if I do find another Master, I won't forget you; so, do me a favor, and don't forget me, either."
San swiftly departed, leaving Sakura staring at the pendant with an unreadable expression in her eyes.
==== Flashback Out ====
After Sakura had declined to form a contract, San's situation had become truly dire. Her last remaining hope had been a contract with Sakura's brother, Shinji — and since he already had one Servant and San knew not where he was, it had been a very thin hope indeed. San had believed things could not possibly grow any worse for her. And then, as if to prove her wrong, she had encountered the golden Servant who named himself king of all the world.
==== Flashback: The Golden Hunter ====
"You have some nerve trespassing on my territory, you filthy mongrel."
The light-haired, red-eyed Servant regarded San with a haughty sneer. San had been traveling through the city at night, hoping to encounter Shinji and his Servant. Unfortunately for her, she had encountered a different Servant instead.
"My apologies." San said, trying to remain calm; she had nothing to gain from fighting at this point, and in any case was unlikely to prevail over a Servant with support from a Master. "I did not know this area of the city had been claimed. Permit me to retreat peacefully, and I promise I will not return."
The Servant laughed in her face.
'"This area of the city?" he said. "You small-minded fool. This entire world is my garden. The very act of your summoning was an unforgivable trespass upon my grounds, and your continued existence is an intolerable insult to my sovereignty. For an unnatural Servant such as you, a hideous weed which dares defile my eternal garden, the punishment is death — such is the judgement of the king!"
Great; he was a complete lunatic. That was just what San needed right now, a raving nut job who couldn't be reasoned with. San materialized her spear and brandished the point at him.
"I didn't come here looking for a fight, but I'm prepared to defend myself." San said. "Unless you want a spear through your guts, I suggest you let me leave peacefully."
"A spear?" the Servant asked derisively. "Did I just hear you call that ugly tree branch a spear? I cannot allow such ignorance to go uncorrected. Behold, and know your folly."
The air behind the Servant became a golden curtain, which rippled as a dozen spear-points pressed through it. Unlike her simple wooden spear, these all shone with gems and precious metals. They bore elaborate designs, and some clearly displayed their magical nature by shining with unearthly light or bursting into flame. Then the Servant snapped his fingers, and all the spears launched themselves towards San. She barely managed to dive out of the way in time as they pincushioned the ground where she'd been standing.
"What's wrong?" the Servant taunted. "Don't you want to test your spear against mine? Of course, these ones are all second- and third-rate, since I wouldn't dare allow my finer treasures to be soiled by the unworthy eyes of a filthy cur like you."
San turned and ran. Even in peak condition, she would not have stood a chance against a Noble Phantasm that could launch other Noble Phantasms as if they were mere expendable arrows. Her only option was to flee.
"Leaving already?" the Servant called. "That will not do."
A line of enormous swords fell from the sky and pierced the ground in front of San, their blades forming a giant wall of shining steel across her path.
"Moro!" San shouted.
She felt something inside her break as she called on her mother. She didn't have enough prana to perform the summoning, and so a chunk of her soul was being burned as fuel to generate enough energy to make up the difference. She had no way of knowing how much of herself had been lost; she felt no pain but rather a terrible numbness, as though her body were being hollowed out from within. A wave of weakness passed through San and her legs collapsed out from under her; she landed on the white fur of Moro's back as the wolf goddess appeared beneath her.
"How fitting." the Servant said. "The mongrel has summoned another mongrel. But this should at least make things a bit more interesting. You are nothing compared to the mighty Boar of Heaven I once slew — but I will not disgrace any but the basest of my treasures by using them to slaughter such a pathetic creature as you, so that should make for a suitable handicap."
Moro leapt, her mighty jump carrying her over the wall of swords before her, just as a new salvo of weapons plowed into it. And so Moro fled, San clinging to her neck; and the golden Servant pursued, firing weapon after weapon after them.
==== Flashback Out ====
The pursuit had taken them halfway across the city, and in the end they had only escaped because the golden Servant had lost interest after spotting another "mongrel" that he deemed even more in need of punishment for some probably-imagined sin. By that time, San had known that she could not endure much longer. She had been close to disappearing, and had known that one more summoning of Moro would push her past the point of no return.
Then she had finally encountered Shirou Matou. But he had not been her salvation; only another monster in a world that seemed full of them. Faced with the choice of serving him of embracing oblivion, she had made the only decision she could. She had summoned Moro for the final time.
==Interlude Out==
Moro's voice drew San from her dream-like fugue.
"We're here." the wolf-goddess said.
San raised her head from the fur of her mother's neck to look around. They had reached the border of the local forest. But it seemed not even this small, unimportant refuge had managed to remain untouched by the ravages of the Holy Grail War. A battle must have been fought within the forest at some point, for there was now a large crater in the landscape; a patch of naked dirt in the forest where trees had been blasted down and burned. It seemed the land would suffer as much as the people from the fallout of this Holy Grail War. She had been enticed to enter the War with the promise of a wish that could change the world for the better; but from what she'd witnessed so far, it was hard to see how anything but destruction could result from this bloody ritual.
As Moro walked into the forest, San felt a slight tingling sensation as she passed through an invisible boundary. It seemed there was a bounded field around the forest set to detect anyone entering or exiting; perhaps the work of a magus operating from a hidden base somewhere within. San's Mononoke Mask might have prevented her from being picked up, but there was no way that the magus responsible could have failed to notice a Divine Beast like Moro crossing the boundary. For a moment, San reflexively began considering the tactical implications of the situation; then she felt another chunk of her fading soul crumble away to nothing, and remembered that it didn't matter. Not only did she not have the strength to defend herself, but she probably wouldn't even live long enough for the one responsible for the field to arrive to investigate.
San casually pulled off her Mononoke Mask and let it fall from her numb fingers. That was her war mask, her face for going among humans. Here, in the forest, she was free to show her true face, to be her true self. It was only the palest reflection of the Ancient Forest from which she had come, but it was enough. Enough, at least, to comfort her in her final moments.
"Here's fine." San whispered.
Moro lay down beneath a tree at the edge of a small grassy clearing. San used the last of her strength to pull herself down off of Moro's back, then curled up in the grass and rested her head against the fur of Moro's neck. Then she closed her eyes and awaited the end. She could feel herself disappearing, the light of prana within her which had maintained her existence had now dimmed to a final dying ember and could no longer hold back the World from erasing her as a paradox. It was bitterly ironic that she, who had sought to fight for the sake of Gaia and the natural world, was now dying because she herself was deemed an unnatural existence by that very World. In becoming a Servant, an irregular spirit removed from its proper place and time, she had become the very type of unnatural being that she had wished to protect Gaia against. San wasn't sure if she should laugh or weep at this final irony; but it hardly mattered, since she doubted she had the strength to do either.
She lost all feeling and perception of her body. She was a spirit, floating in a featureless void. Then, below her, there materialized a great golden cup. The Lesser Holy Grail, San dimly understood; the vessel which would gather the souls of the Servants and use their energy as the key to unlock the Great Holy Grail and free the miracle in contained. Only the winner of the War would be permitted to claim that miracle; as one who had been eliminated, San would lose all that remained of her soul when it melted down and become fuel for the Lesser Grail.
But as her spirit sank to its final destination, San noticed something appeared to be wrong. The vessel's golden surface was pitted with spots of black corrosion. And though the cup should have been nearly empty this early into the War, as few Servants had yet sacrificed their lives to fill it, the cup was already nearly overflowing. The liquid within was not the pure, colorless energy of the Swirl of the Root, but a thick black tar laced with streaks of burning red. And there was something more: a tether of sorts that emerged from the churning depths and extended off into the hazy distance. Pulses of tainted energy flowed from the liquid within the Grail and surged up the tether, disappearing from sight. The physical structure of the tether appeared similar to a chain; but for some reason the regular, pulse-like beat of the malignant energy flowing through it put San in mind of an umbilical cord.
The pull of the Grail was irresistible now, and San's spirit was pulled rapidly towards the burning tar. As she fell towards it, it seemed to stir hungrily and reach up to meet her—
"San."
Moro's voice jolted San to awareness, and she found herself back in her dying body. She blinked in confusion as her fraying mind tried to process what she'd just experienced. Had it been a true vision, or just a dying dream as her shell broke down? It was hard to think anymore; her thoughts were fading as her body crumbled. With her reason and memory burning away, she could no longer rationally process her experiences. But since she could feel her remaining essence evaporating like water on a hot day, she supposed she find out soon enough.
"San."
Moro spoke her name again. That's right, Moro was calling her attention for some reason. San opened her eyes, and saw the she and Moro were no longer alone. A giant stood in the clearing; a massive Servant of the Berserker class. A young girl, smaller than San herself, was sitting on the giant's shoulder and looking down at her. A Master and Servant, then; the ones responsible for the bounded field around the forest, no doubt. It was surprising that the Berserker's Mad Enhancement hadn't caused it to instantly attack upon coming across intruders; but then, no matter how rage-maddened the giant Servant was, even it could probably tell that finishing them off wouldn't be worth the effort it took to lift its stone axe-sword — not when they were so clearly about to vanish on their own.
"My name is Ilyasviel von Einzbern, and this is my Servant, Berserker." the girl said, giving an unnecessarily formal introduction. "This forest is the property of the Einzbern family. Why have you intruded upon my territory?"
"To die." San said through numb lips. "As you should be able to see."
"Your mana feels incredibly weak..." Ilya said. "You lost your Master, is that it? And now, without a source of prana, you're fading away. That has to suck: losing in battle is one thing, but being eliminated without even a fight... it must feel so unsatisfying."
"Einzbern Master..." Moro said weakly. "If you have only one Servant... could you contract with San, and spare her that sad fate?"
"That's impossible." Ilya said, shaking her head. "Berserker is many times stronger than an ordinary Servant; and with his Mad Enhancement, it takes all of my magic circuits to control him. If I tried to support another Servant as well, he might break free and go on a rampage."
"I understand." Moro said. "I bear you no grudge, child. You owe no debt to my daughter, and it would be an unfair imposition to add to the burden of one who must support so mighty a Servant and so tender an age."
Ilya made a pouting face, then looked at San.
"Daughter, did you say?" Ilya asked. "So, is San some kind of half-wolf demigod, or is it a Romulus and Remus type of thing?"
San figured she might as well talk to the girl. It might turn out to be marginally more comfortable than dying alone.
"I was born to human parents, but they abandoned me." San said. "They flung me at mother's feet and ran away. Perhaps they hoped she would eat me instead of pursuing them. But though she would have been justified in killing me as an enemy of the forest, Moro showed mercy and took me in instead. Even though I have an ugly human body and stink with human scent, she raised me as one of her own children, as a wolf of the forest."
Ilya looked down at her with a sympathetic, somewhat wistful expression.
"That's not too different from what happened to me." Ilya said. "After my mother died, my father abandoned me. Then, as preparation for this War, I was cast out into the forest with only Berserker to protect me. I really do regret that things had to end up this way for you; I think we could have been friends. Though I suppose that even if things had gone differently, I would have had to kill you in order win the Grail. It's regrettable, but that's the nature of the Heaven's Feel."
"But the wish you desire is worth it, right?" San asked.
Ilya sighed.
"I'm going to win the Grail, but I won't receive a wish." she said. "I am only a tool, made by Granfather Acht for the purpose of winning the War. Tools only serve their master's bidding; they aren't allowed to have wishes of their own."
"Hmph." San said, a flash of scorn revitalizing her mind a little even as her body continued to shut down. "If you're fighting for a half-assed reason like that, then I'm glad I'm dying this way rather than being defeated you in battle. If my wish was never meant to be, then that's just fate; but to be defeated by someone who doesn't even have the will to have a wish of their own — I wouldn't be able to bear the shame of a loss like that."
"What was your wish, then, that you think was so great?" Ilya demanded.
"I was going to restore the Ancient Forest which covered this land during the Age of Gods, returning the old gods to their rightful place and healing the wounds humans have inflicted on the Earth." San said proudly, then hesitated. "Well... that was the wish I had in mind when I answered the Grail's call, anyway. I've since come to think that it was a little short-sighted. The Ancient Forest may be the world I most dearly desire, but bringing it back into existence wouldn't change humanity's nature. It'd simply restart the same cycle once more, the war between humans and the planet. A huge amount of trouble to cause everyone else just according to my fancy, when I'm not even going to be able to stick around to enjoy it myself. So, if I was able to make a wish right now, I suppose I would ask for harmony between Gaia and Alaya — for Nature and Humanity to henceforth coexist in peace. Maybe I wouldn't benefit from it, but everyone else would: the forest would no longer need fear destruction by man, and other humans could gain the privilege to be raised among nature as I was. A peaceful world, free of conflict... that'd be pretty nice, don't you think? Particularly compared to this stupid destructive Grail War."
Ilya however, was frowning darkly.
"Peace between Gaia and Alaya wouldn't necessarily mean peace for the World." she said. "There are some unnatural things which are anathema to nature and humanity alike."
She told San of the burning shadow which had oozed from the Grail Vessel and taken the shape of the forbidden Servant Avenger — an unnatural and unwanted additional participant in this Heaven's Feel. The description jogged San's fragmented memories of the dream — had it been a dream? — she'd had just before Ilya arrived. She described what she'd seen: a corrupted Holy Grail filled with a curse rather than a miracle, steadily leaking poison into the world.
"Darkness still in the Grail, and an umbilicus leading out?" Ilya asked. "Avenger's existence showed that there was corruption within the Grail; but when it left the Vessel and took Servant form, I assumed that meant the darkness had been purged. But if your vision was true, then the Avenger which manifested is only a small amount of the Grail's darkness — and the rest is still trying to find a way out..."
"A problem you'll have to deal with alone." San said, her expression going slack. "I can feel myself fading, now. Back to the Throne of Heroes... to the eternal forest which lives in my soul..."
Ilya motioned for Berserker to set her down. She walked over to where San lay and took up one of San's cool, clammy hands in both of her own.
"Is there anything you'd like me to do for you?" Ilya asked. "A tombstone, or a memorial...?"
"This world... is beautiful." San whispered. "If you wish to honor my memory... then please, protect it."
The sun broke the horizon, spreading its warm light across the forest. A single ray broke through the tangled branches of the crown and illuminated San in a shaft of golden light. Then her body began to glow from within as well, and she slowly dispersed into a cloud of golden sand. Moro faded along with her, their two souls departing the world as one. Within seconds, no trace remained of either, save for the girl in the white dress looking at the place they'd been.
A body returns to the earth and becomes soil, and in time new life springs forth; such is Gaia's eternal cycle. But a Servant is not of the World and so cannot become part of the World: it leaves behind no body, only memories. Ilyasviel von Einzbern stood for a long time, staring at the empty spot where the Servant had lain, before finally turning and walking back to her mansion with Berserker in tow.