Satsuki stood in the centre of the park that Shirou had uncursed a year ago. The full moon hung ominously above her head illuminating all the shadows. She had chosen the park as a place to have her showdown with Sumire because there were no nearby water sources and more importantly there were no buildings and people that could get caught up in their confrontation. She was aware that Shirou was behind her somewhere, although the magician had performed some piece of magic that had rendered him concealed from her senses.
He had insisted on being there for her fight. The primary reason that he had given was that if Sumire's servant was indeed Sun Wukong then he would only be vulnerable to being buried or drowned. Satsuki didn't believe that his explanation was his full and only reason however. Shirou had initially sounded rather sceptical when Nine claimed that the Servant was the Monkey King and he fully expected that Sumire was pulling a fast one. Satsuki thought it just as likely that he wanted to see Sumire on the enemy team and try to confirm her reasons for her to oppose them.
Satsuki had barely spent anytime waiting when the shadows parted and Sumire stepped forth from the darkness. "It is so nice to see you patiently waiting for me Satsuki," the Dead Apostle Ancestor said. "Oh and Shirou joined you as well. It does my heart good to see both my apprentices doing so well. Although I see you haven't brought your servant, Shirou."
As she said this Shirou appeared from about five metres behind Satsuki causing the Lunarian to flinch slightly but she controlled it refusing to show any weakness before her opponent. She stepped slightly to the side angling her vision so that she could get a good look at the magician while still keeping an eye on her Sumire. Shirou was intently staring at their former teacher, his eyes scanning her form with a frown upon his face.
"I hate it when you do that," Sumire said pouting. "Isn't a girl entitled to her privacy?"
"How long have you wanted to die Sumire," Shirou said his subdued words cutting through the charged atmosphere of the evening like a sword.
"Over a thousand years now," their friend said smiling at the pair. But no matter how warm her smiles were it was nowhere nearly enough to restore the mood. "It's a bit rude to ask after a woman's age. Are you planning to add me to your harem?"
"How did you…" Shirou started. "I've been tricked," he said a second later, Sumire's smile confirming his fears.
"Oh so you finally have a harem Shirou," Sumire said grinning.
"It's an open relationship," he said defensively. "Besides you've always been a bit more attracted to Satsuki then me."
"Damn fourth magic," Sumire muttered and then started to say something further when the pair was cut off by Satsuki.
"Stop," she yelled. "What is this about being wanting to die Sumire?" she said ignoring the bit that the Dead Apostle Ancestor was attracted to her.
"No point in hiding it now," the vampire said her voice suddenly tired. "The silence of death has been my goal for a while now."
Satsuki felt as if the rug had been pulled from beneath her feet. All this time her mentor was suicidal but she hadn't even noticed. Even as she taught her and offered her a job she wished she was dead.
"Don't worry Satsu," the vampire said smiling. "I could only fool you because I'm a good actor; your observation skills are still pretty good."
"That's not what I'm concerned about you inconsiderate idiot," Satsuki yelled out raging at her mentor. "
"I know," Sumire said. "Let's talk in another location. Some place more watery."
"I swim among monsters," Sumire said beginning her chant to bring her reality marble into being. The very next a bang resounded through the silent night and Sumire jerked back with a hole through the middle of her forehead.
"Did you think I would let you summon your Reality Marble," Shirou remarked with some trace of amusement in his voice. The next second bullets of water and ice rained down on the position of the Dead Apostle Ancestor. The magicians attack came a split second too late and Satsuki witnessed as Sumire even with a bullet in the brain backflipped backwards dodging the hail of attacks and landing on her feet. The magician summoned hands of ice that grasped towards the vampire but they were to slow as Sumire teleported backwards avoiding all of them.
Shirou stepped forward gathering more prana as he did so. Only to get knocked backwards and launched across the path by a rod that had suddenly appeared. Focusing Satsuki noticed that the rod was a polearm that was held by a rugged looking man. He had monkey ears and tail and wore what Satsuki believed to be traditional Chinese clothing.
"Take him down Wukong," Sumire said smiling nostalgically. "Don't go easy, by no means is your victory certain."
"At once master," the man called Wukong said.
"And try acting better or he'll see through your form in a minute," Sumire said as the man ran off.
"Shirou already is of the opinion that he wasn't the actual Monkey King," Satsuki said watching her mentor.
Sumire just smiled shaking her head. "That boy," she said smiling self-consciously. "He always did manage to see through my clever ploys. It doesn't matter if he believes it to be a trick. By making it known that the opponent is the monkey king I have engineered a scenario that he will be compelled to fight. His two weaknesses of water and being buried are well documented and I expected Shirou to take advantage of that. After all Sun Wukong is known to be immortal otherwise."
"But why would you specifically force Shirou to engage your servant," Satsuki said trying to wrap her head around her former mentors plan.
"It's simple Satsu. I want to fight you," Sumire admitted. "If I drew Shirou into my Reality Marble I would lose. That boy is almost undefeatable when in water. But I can still have a good fight with you." She smiled with a look that seemed to be genuine joy, but knowing what she knew now put all of Sumire's reactions in doubt
"I swim amongst monsters
My blood is their water
My veins are their nests
My tears are their salt
No longer in despair
I prepare unseen futures
My body creates
The infinite Ocean.
Satsuki chose not to interrupt the chant this time. Instead she merely listened to the words that arose from Sumire's soul. "So that is it huh," she said as she the waves washed over her and she tread water to stay afloar. "That's what Shirou and I are to you. The things you leave behind, your legacy. This fucked up suicide by cop thing you have going on, is this some final attempt at training."
"Do you know depression is the leading cause behind suicide Satsuki," the Dead Apostle Ancestor spoke up. "You should considering you live in a country where it could almost be considered the national pastime. Let me tell you a story," she said as she stood amidst her watery reality. "It involves a girl who had her entire island, everybody she ever knew and loved, murdered due to a vampire. She and a handful of the survivors escaped on a boat. But they were not alone on that vessel. One of the bloodsuckers had also stowed away and the creature picked off the remnants from the island one by one. Finally only the little girl was left and as she ran for her life, she by some stroke of providence managed to trick the vampire into falling overboard. The young girl lay on the raft and she starved and grew thirsty. She wanted to die but her body revolted at the thought of death. Her body's reluctance to die was so strong that she eventually consumed all the corpses of her fellow villagers. Drinking their cursed blood and becoming a vampire herself."
Satsuki stared wide-eyed at the face of Sumire. Her smile had died upon her face to be replaced by a haunted weariness that somehow made her look much older. "I don't want to live any more Satsuki," she said. "I want to see my friends and family. I just want to rest. Being with you and Shirou were some of the happiest years in my life but even that happiness is fading day by day." She suddenly smiled again. "But my body will not let me go down easily."
She suddenly gestured and the sea exploded. Satsuki's eyes grew wide as she saw the water rise carrying her mentor into the sky. After rising about one hundred metres the water exploded to reveal an enormous creature. It had the head of a carp but the body shape of a muscular human and its body looked brown and slick. It raised a pair of enormous hands and Satsuki was surprised to see that on each of the four fingers there was a mouth.
But for once in her life Satsuki did not feel out matched. "You better be recording this Anderson," she announced to her servant who gave her the equivalent of a mental thumbs up. She ducked down beneath the water and sped towards the torso of the creature, which looked almost like a centipede. Satsuki felt the ripples a moment before it impacted and dodged the giant hand that plunged into the water causing waves to spring up from where it hit. From the maws on the fingertips countless tentacles sprouted and Satsuki momentarily regretted the fact that Shirou's blood did not give her supernatural control over water.
Then the very next second she remembered why she had to give Shirou a big round of thanks for donating his blood as she sheared through dozens of tentacles with a single swipe of her arms, the magician's unique body structure giving her an advantage underwater. Rocketing forward she jammed her hands into the hand, her immense strength managing to penetrate the rubbery skin of the creature and she physically pulled herself up the arm making her own handholds and rocketing up the beasts arm at a speed that would make world-class rock-climbers resign in shame. The other hand came to intercept her climb and the tentacles again attempted to latch onto her but she dodged their approach and leapt onto the other limb and started ascending using that appendage. She made it to the shoulder flipped onto the neck and sent out a single kick with all her might causing the beast to stumble and fall. As it fell Satsuki jumped landing on the monster face and in a flash summoned the 'primordial soup' from her Reality Marble and fired it directly into the eye of the unfortunate creature.
The creature howled in pain and started to tremor as the corrosive liquid ate into the eyeball of the beast. Satsuki maintained control over the liquid and with a force of will directed it forward into the brain. Satsuki jumped off the beast into the water again and had to dodge as the limbs of the beast were flung around randomly in the creature's death spasms. A few moments later the creature went still and sank beneath the waves and a moment after that Satsuki felt the creature's DNA enter her Reality Marble.
"Wow that was pretty good Satsuki," she heard the voice of her mentor behind her and turned to see Sumire still standing ankle deep in the water. "Feel like giving away what your new Reality Marble does." At Satsuki's deadpan look Sumire smiled. "No, but it's made you confident. That is good." Suddenly the entire surface of the sea rippled and Satsuki had to focus on keeping her calm at the sight that appeared before her.
Countless monsters arose from the depths. Some were the size of only a man while others dwarfed even the monstrosity that Sumire had summoned earlier. They took a multitude of shapes. From tentacle men-sized creatures with bulbous glowing eyes that looked like something from one of Lovecraft's works to floating jellyfish that blotted out the sky with their numbers to armoured oceanic serpents. Satsuki got the sinking feeling that Sumire had finally taken the limiters off and this was the result, an endless army of creatures of unknown strength.
"Don't stand there looking like a half-wit Master," her servant spoke up. He had materialised next to her and was floating on the water with a book held up out of the water in which he wrote as he spoke. "The vampire said that the magician would have been able to defeat her. That means that she is not undefeatable." The servant shook his head gazing at her in disappointment. "Besides while I am only recently become acquainted with your Japanese literature. I am fairly certain that this is the point at which you show off your powers, or are you to dull to do that?"
Satsuki shook her head vaguely noticing that the sea monsters were not attacking quite yet. "No you're correct. Anderson watch this battle and write down the record."
"You've already commanded me to do so," the dour servant said. "You should get your memory check if you cannot even remember the prologue." With those cheeky words the servant dematerialised and Satsuki found herself alone against the hordes of monsters.
"Alright how are we going to do this," she said and as she did this she felt a shift in her body. Her eyes widened as she realised that she understood perfectly everything about the creature that she had killed before. Almost unconsciously she chopped and changed her respiratory system and felt her absorption of oxygen increase in efficiency by a percentage only Shirou would be able to quote.
Again eying the creatures she felt a small shift in her outlook. Instead of insurmountable challenges she identified them as opportunities to obtain new unique and powerful DNA.
Satsuki smiled and somewhere within the depths of her soul a tree started to bloom.
xxx
"She's putting up quite a good fight," Sumire mused to herself as she saw her apprentice charge a horde of her unwhole men. The creatures were so named because they consisted of a single organism that contained multiple bodies and every time a piece of the figure was lost a new body would sprout from that part. Sumire watched as Satsuki hacked at them without success before she was forced to abandon as she was hit by multiple screeching noises arising from the two-tailed dolphins that she hadn't thought up a cool name for.
Sumire watched as Satsuki summoned that strange watery liquid that defied her knowledge and managed to dissolve one of the dolphins before tearing an unwhole man apart with a sonic screech.
"Adaption," the Dead Apostle Ancestor said. "My apprentice could at least learn to be subtle about her power," Sumire sighed. "As could you," she said turning towards an empty space a few metres on her right. "It is most unlike me to divulge my personal history at the drop of a hat."
The blue-haired servant materialised. "You didn't try to resist the compulsion to do so at all," he said, still writing in his book.
"Sometimes you just want to get some things off your chest," the Dead Apostle Ancestor said. She suddenly winced as she felt more prana leave her. "Damn, Shirou's putting up a fight," She said smiling. "If Shirou continues to push this hard he's going to force my servant to go berserk. That would be pretty unfortunate for him, I don't think there is a single servant in this war that could beat my servant then."
xxx
A bit earlier
Shirou leapt up from the tree he had just impacted in time to parry the staff that was aiming to crush his skull. His golden swords glinted as he strode forward engaging in a display of skill with weaponry with the slightly simian servant. He blocked a swing of the staff and his arms almost crumpled under the weight of his opponent's blows. Stepping to the side of a lunge he summoned jets of water that were skilfully dodged by his opponent.
Thinking quickly he stomped his foot channelling his prana into the ground. He simultaneously dropped one of his swords and flicked his hand summoning his Desert Eagle into it. Locking the staff with his remaining blade he fired multiple shots at the fake Monkey King. The servant was forced to dodge it and fell prey to the second part of Shirou's trap. A floor of ice momentarily made the servant lose his footing and he was thus momentarily debilitated which left him unable to react as the Magician ran him through with his sword.
Shirou didn't let his guard down which was what let him dodge the retaliatory blow that almost took his head off. Falling backwards he was able to see the shape of an axe whirl through the space that a moment ago had been occupied by his neck. Summoning his prana he launched an all-out attack on his adversary and even as he retreated back to his other sword he observed as every shard of ice and potent jet of water was destroyed, his opponent's body shifting and reforming creating weapons that utterly repelled his attack before they faded absorbed into the beings body.
Shirou kept an eye on him even as he drew his sword to eye-level and his attack slowed and stopped. To his surprise he found that there was not one drop of blood on the blade. Instead the golden blade that had run his opponent through was coated with a much more alarming substance.
"Clay," Shirou remarked to himself contemplating his life choices. "What are we playing at Mesopotamian bingo."
Author Note: I'm going to put on my serious hat for a moment and state that this Author does not advocate suicide and advises all those reading to educate themselves about the epidemic spreading through modern society. On another note I didn't specifically state this earlier but the dreams that Shirou had about Ishtar were all from myths involving the goddess. First was Enki and the world order. Second and third was Inanna and Shu-kale-tuda. Third was the descent of Innana into the underworld. Fourth was the incredibly long title of Inanna and Enki: The transfer of the arts of civilization from Eridu to Erech.
gwojo: Yes
Dr. Masaki: Yes but Shirou doesn't have the time to devote himself to finding a solution in the middle of the Grail War. This is also an out of context problem for him. He had never considered it a thing that needed to be doing.
Gilgamesh King of Mongrels: You know as I wrote that I knew somebody would mention the Bull Shark. Except I was thinking of the Zambezi shark. Blame it on the local culture.
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