Hero of Hate (Battle)
(Sakura)
"In any case," Sasaku said, turning her attention back to Shirou, "Abstractions like humanity, good-evil and so on aside, you really only have to decide if you will put your faith in me. Or not. Or equivalently, if you think I am faithful to deliver on my freely-given promise."
"What is objectionable about my homeland? Speaking nothing of gods or magi, do the people around you give of their flesh and blood and spirit, saying 'eat, drink, partake,'? Or 'you, be a father to a nation, many nations' or 'I bring you our of the house of slavery and give you your own house, which you did not build"?"
"Hmph," Rin scoffed. "It's rather, what did you say, hypocritical, of you to say that last."
"Tohsaka." Caster said. "If you are so distraught, tell me clearly; would you rather die?"
Sakura was a bit taken aback by the detachment, given what Shirou had told her about the incident. "Wait a moment," Shirou broke in. "You're still my Servant, that's not for you to decide."
"I'm not so cruel as to force someone to live," she replied without missing a beat. "That's a hell and I have no authority and thus desire to deliver it."
"Magic crests of longer lineages force a type of geass on the bearer, they can't commit suicide," Rin explained to no one in particular. "That's ironic, or perhaps not given your low view of magi in general."
"There actually is a specific rule about servants for life, but since fate has already remanded you in Sakura's custody I will say no more." Sasaku sighed. "It's already 4:30, go get some rest as we will be moving on Kotomine's hideout at 6. Any last questions?"
"There's one major thing Rider brought up that you didn't mention," Sakura recalled from that morning. "Do you know anything about what happened about 4 am today?"
"What? What happened exactly? I wasn't asleep, of course, and didn't detect anything. And I doubt Rider could out-sense me within this Realm."
"It was further away, she said it was in the direction of Fuyuki Park."
"That's where the Grail manifested at the end of the last War!" Rin exclaimed. "Which resulted in the Fire..."
"Could Kotomine have made his move already? But no, fully half of the Servants are here, so that can't be the Grail." Sasaku frowned. "Still, that can't be a coincidence."
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(Fuyuki Park, early Sunday morning, about 3:30 am)
(Cu Chulainn)
"Cu Chulainn, I challenge you to-"
The Lancer hardly heard his second Master's command of "kill her" as he rushed forward towards Bazette. -Perhaps I'm just a little weak to challenges- he chuckled to himself upon seeing several runes begin to light up in formation around the two of them as soon as he was close enough. He thrust Gae Bolg into the ground and raised his fists.
"... a fistfight to settle a matter of honor."
The terms of the duel having been fully declared, the spell took effect.
-I see that she paid attention when I was rambling about -((Ath nGabla))- though I'm not exactly sure it can be used like that.- He quickly dodged a quick jab from Bazette's remaining hand.
"Very well, let me show you the close quarter combat techniques of the Land of Shadows."
(Jeanne d'Arc)
"Berserker, kill her," the small girl no, homuluncus next to Kotomine said with seeming disinterest in her red eyes. With that, the giant... -General of Rebellion, Lu Bu- charged in with unrestrainted killing intent.
-At least with my Magic Resistance, most of their magecrafts will be ineffective. Though, Kotomine would probably have researched some of the church's Sacraments specifically for this use case.-
Jeanne swung her furled banner to deflect Berserker's swipes as the two Servants clashed several times. Each time she gave a little ground in order to dissipate the momentum of Lu Bu's powerful lunges.
-This isn't good, Berserker must be greatly powered up if his Master is a specialist Einzbern homuluncus.- This suspicion was confirmed when she began reciting some sort of chant which seemed to boost Lu Bu's speed even more.
Jeanne managed to get a few glancing hits in with her speartip, but they did nothing against Berserker's armor which -are those runes? Cu Chulainn...- While on her end, the banner could absorb the punishment of being struck repeatedly by the God Force halberd, the same could not be said of herself.
She tried redirecting some of Lu Bu's more vertical strikes into the ground, but he immediately switched to thrusts. Still, this meant he had to commit to a linear motion, so... -there!-
Sensing the flow of his attack and moving around it, she struck true into a gap near his left arm pit.
But the point did not strike flesh, instead slamming into the interior portion of Lu Bu's back armor. Almost immediately he, removing left hand from his halberd, grabbed hold of the shaft of Jeanne's weapon.
With his control over both weapons, Berserker tried to drag Jeanne into the path of a one-handed horizontal swing, but she jumped upwards to clear it while using the sudden change in angle and both hands to twist and pull her banner free.
However, while she was still in midair, Lu Bu moved forward, which slammed his shoulder into her feet, sending her into a flip over his head. As she landed, Jeanne allowed herself to collapse into a crouch as a swing that would have decapitated her otherwise passed overhead.
Kicking off the ground, she backflipped as Berserker's halberd came around again, this time with a downward-angled arc, and then deflected another horizontal sweep coming in just as she landed from that. -Why is he back to swings, could it be that he's reverted to charging in? No-
Due to the power and weight distribution of Lu Bu's halberd, she had to parry with the portion of her weapon where the banner was. One of the attacking sweeps that hugged her weapon a little closer nearly caught the axe-blade on the bottom section of its spearhead. Or rather given the difference in their strength, it was Lu Bu who had almost hooked her weapon.
-If we're stuck in a stalemate, Bazette will eventually lose to Lancer, even with her preparations.- The longer she continued this 'fight' against Berserker, the worse things would get, not better.
She glanced over at the two Masters, wondering if she might be able to get over and neutralize at least one of them. From where he was oddly standing behind the smaller homunculus, Kotomine pulled out several of his Black Keys and there also appeared... Is that the King of Heroes?
Even if he didn't look as she'd expected, ((True Name Discernment)) was close to certain in identifying the third Servant. It was time to make a decision.
((Revelation)). It didn't give her an answer she liked. But it was an answer, a chance at least.
Closing her eyes to the distractions of battle, she jumped backwards and away from Berserker to gain a little distance. Jeanne undid the bindings on both her banner and herself.
-I offer this body to you.-
(Jeanne d'Arc)
To awaken again to this wretched ((Ephemeral Dream)).
When she opened her eyes, Lu Bu had not attempted to close the distance, rather he's switched to its bow form for a wide area attack. Doubtless the sight of her black-and-white banner stirred an understandable hesitation, even in a Berserker.
She looked around, basking in the earlier oppressive energy of the place. It was perfect. All evil has gathered here... She could feel chaos swirling around him as he prepared to unleash his ((God Force)).
Practically ripping out her jet-black sword from its scabbard, she pointed it him as though aiming. Everything else was forgotten. "This is the howl of a soul filled with hatred!"
With a shout that she never head, Lu Bu released a blast of destructive force from his bow, aimed directly at her.
((La Grondement Du Haine))!
The two waves of hate and chaos slammed into one another, and the latter was consumed by, no rather added to the first. However, before it impacted Berserker, a third wave pulsed outward.
The air was heavy with corruption spilled from the Grail ten years ago, and like a flammable cloud brought to spark, exploded as Jeanne's hate-fuelled flames passed through it. Converted in such a manner left a vacuum of sorts and the inferno sucked even more of the ambient hate in. Multiple layers of hate and fire rapidly crashing in upon one another.
The implosion was only the first phase. As all that pressure began rebounding outwards like a star going nova, Jeanne realized just how complete of an answer ((Revelation)) had given to her earlier self.
Damn saint.
l
Notes:
I guess that area has exploded a second time now.
Seeing the Noble Phantasm animation in 3D (the FGO arcade game) is really cool! You can see La Pucelle in the Extella games, though the Apocrypha version looks cooler.