Chapter 133

Carrying Saber wasn't too difficult considering how little she weighed after her armor was dispelled, but it was troubling in other ways for the teenage Shirou. With every step, her golden hair brushed against his cheek, the top of her head smelling like a fragrant field of flowers, even after the battle she had just been through. Her soft and warm body pressed against him closely with her arm wrapped around his neck, and it leaned further in whenever they took a step forward, something soft and squishy pressing against his ribs that made his face flush slightly, despite the situation they were in.

Earlier, she had insisted on walking on her own just after waking up from her electrocution, even while her mouth struggled to form words with the muscles in her body still stiff and unresponsive after getting run through with fatal volts of electricity, which when compounded with Berserker's anti-Saber capabilities, dealt a heavy blow to Saber's body. She had forced herself to stand on shaking legs, her hands braced on the wall, and told them that she could walk by herself. Obviously, she failed to convince any of them, and Caster could only alleviate the tingling in her body slightly, so she was forced to lean on her Master once more.

Kuzuki had considered offering his help, but Caster had subtly signalled him to let them handle it themselves, so he had refrained. Caster could tell how frustrated Saber was, and relying on someone else other than her Master would probably make her even more so. After all, she was also secretly grinding her teeth after her defeat at Berserker's hands, feeling vexed at how Berserker had suddenly transformed into a monster of a Servant, completely surpassing her performance at the start and easily taking out Caster.

Still, she didn't show these emotions on her face too openly, though her eyebrows were furrowed as she replayed the fight earlier in her head, trying to pick out parts where she could have done better. It had been a very fast-paced battle, but that didn't mean there weren't any place that she couldn't have reacted differently and possibly changed the outcome of the battle.

She almost jumped when she felt a hand on her shoulder, but she calmed down quickly upon realizing it was only Kuzuki.

"Focus on the future. Now that our enemies have gathered together, we will need to strengthen ourselves in turn as well."

With his years of teaching at school and skills of observation drilled into him during his younger years training as an assassin, he didn't fail to notice the subtly dissatisfied expression that Caster was wearing as they walked back to the temple. It was easy to imagine why after seeing the battle they had just experienced, and how she might be questioning herself right now.

"When we get back, we can try that thing you were talking about before."

Caster's eyebrows lifted, but then she glanced at the duo behind them, taking it slowly with Saber's injuries, then whispered to Kuzuki.

"I thought you were against it before?"

"It seems like that the environment will force us into using it sooner or later."

It was merely an idea that Caster had thought of regarding how she could help Kuzuki achieve more firepower after seeing that he could stand on the frontlines and fight against Servants, but anything that would allow him to do so also came with its own share of risk and danger. It wasn't exactly life-threatening, but it was still far more dangerous than the reinforcement she had applied with miniature swords as the catalysts, which had done for Kuzuki when he was sent to contact Shirou. Even now, the places where the swords were laid onto the skin and fused into the flesh where still charred and black on the edges after Kuzuki had drawn on their power to fight against Berserker, the conduits pushing more power onto his mortal body than it could handle, even with how highly trained it was. Something a step further than that could possibly cripple Kuzuki if done wrong.

As they discussed the augmentation, Shirou thought about the battle earlier, to take his mind off the soft female body pressing against him.

There really was no way he could step in there. As a human, with a frail and feeble body, he would be chopped to bits if he stepped forward. A single blow, one kick, and he would be fatally injured, the flesh easily giving way to the plasma, the bones in his body shattering from the massive amount of kinetic energy each punch and kick packed. If he fought Caster, he would be dead before he could even take three steps towards her. Against Berserker, all it would take was lightning streaming from her fingertips, and he would collapse on the ground, writhing and screaming in pain. With Saber, well he already knew how it would turn out. He had been training with her for hours after all, and it was pretty obvious how it would turn out in the end. He had barely been able to dodge one or two blows while she was holding back, standing back up with a severe bruise as the only consequence, but in battle when she was serious, he would be cut down on the floor, his guts spilled on the ground before he could even tell he had been struck.

Lancer was only the tip of the iceberg for the Servants, and she had already killed him once.

What...can I do?

For a person struggling to be an ally of justice, a hero that would save people, he couldn't stand watching on the sidelines. It was against his very nature, and he felt sick when Saber and Caster got injured because of him, to some extent. But stepping in without even a shadow of the hope of succeeding was plain dumb. He was only a mediocre magus, with a small chance of successfully reinforcing things and tracing objects. Asides from his admittedly fine physical capabilities, that was it. What else was he capable of?

Inexplicably, his eyes were continuously drawn to Caster, and he remembered the swords she had conjured. There was no way to keep them out of his mind, after he had seen them used so superbly to great effect in the battle earlier. He had never thought that a mage could use swords like that, but here was proof that swords could be used as catalysts. His hands itched when he witnessed Caster fighting like that, his heart pounding as his chest grew warm. Maybe, just maybe, he could become something like that one day? He didn't know what he was feeling, all he could say was that he just couldn't stop thinking about it when he watched from the back, even with fear and anxiety crawling up his throat while watching them fight, frustration and disgust at his own powerlessness mixed in.

He'd have to ask Caster if he could learn more about her magecraft later on.