Hello again everyone, this is Neolyph, bringing you another chapter of A Broken Wizard and a Broken Magus. Thank you all so much for all the follows, favorites, and reviews. It really means a lot to me. As I had little else to do, I started this only a couple hours after I published the first chapter, so I may not have read all of the reviews pointing out my inevitable mistakes in the first chapter. I will answer some of the reviews currently up though.
Things I edited in chapter 1
-Some grammar and spelling mistakes I noticed
-Made Shinji older, so he's 17 when the war starts. Needed him to be a few years older for what I had in mind for him.
-Changed Harry's element from "unaligned" to "average" This is due to Harry having a converted wizard core, and therefore no elements locked out
It should be noted that Caster is slightly OOC in this fic. I read her backstory, and maybe it's because I'm a huge fan of Wicked, but all I could see was a huge similarity to Elphaba. Both were originally good, innocent people before they were forced to take actions that the world saw as bad, and became the monsters everyone thought they were. As such, I tweaked her personality a little bit.
One common question is what happened to Shirou. Perhaps I'll have to go back and re-edit it later due to it not being clear, but the reason Zelretch takes Harry to the Matous is because the universe he is currently in isn't the LN or Anime version, it's an AU where Shirou doesn't exist and he needs someone to keep Sakura from going apeshit and eating the world via Angra Mainyu, so he figured a beaten and broken chosen one would do the trick.
Jayfeather912: Yes, Rin will be a master in the war. I have not yet decided on Sakura. Harry, Sakura, Rider, Caster, and whoever else is with them will be going to Hogwarts after the end of the grail war. Thank you for the support
Akabara Strauss: Kiritsugu is not dead, but he is still deathly ill. Shirou doesn't exist.
Arawn D. Draven: Thanks man, glad to know I lived up to the challenge
the lone soul: I know right? I never understand why anyone befriends Shinji. Like, everyone just ignores that fact that he raped Sakura throughout her entire childhood, tried to melt an entire school full of children into prana, regularly commanded Rider to eat people, and was just an all around douchebag to everyone. I hope that in this fic I can properly portray his douchebaggerey in all its glory.
Jashava: Thanks for pointing that out. It was what I originally meant, I just couldn't remember the term. And Harry does possess a reality marble, just not the same one as Shirou, so it operates slightly differently. Harry is distorted due to his desire to protect whilst Shirou is distorted due to his desire to save. The difference will become clearer later on
As always, read, review, moo, and enjoy the story!
Chapter 2: Servants and Shinji
Harry felt three command seals burn themselves into his flesh. He ignored the pain, as it wasn't that bad and he had more important matters to focus on, like the beautiful servant kneeling before him.
"Servant Rider answers your summons. I ask of you, are you my master?"
"I am, Servant Rider. Are you prepared to fight in the grail war?" Harry asked, trying not to let any of the nervousness he felt enter his voice.
"I am prepared Master. I await your orders." Rider answered, with her seductive, yet dangerous voice.
"Good," Harry said, slightly more confident, "I am Harry Potter, operating master for the Matou family, and this is Sakura Matou, she will be assisting us in the war. The other three are Leanna, Joy, and Monica. They are my homunculi servants, and will also be assisting us in this war."
Rider stared at the four, as if assessing them as threats and finding them safe.
"Greetings." she said, curtly.
"The grail war will not start for another few days, as not all of the servants are summoned. When they are, we will begin hunting them. Until then, we have some time to familiarize ourselves with each other and plan. For now, let's eat."
"I do not require food, Master."
"That's no reason to not eat," Harry said, with a hint of mirth in his tone as he turned and walked out of the room, Sakura having retaken his hand and the three homunculi following him.
"Very well then." Rider said, already happy with her master as she followed him out of this disgusting basement. She made a mental note to incinerate this place later, preferably with the old man inside it for having the nerve to harm her master and that young friend of his.
Rider had to admit, her master was an exquisite cook. She had somewhat bemusedly followed her master up the stairs into an elegant, if still depressing mansion. There her master and his companions took her to a large kitchen, where Harry immediately set began cooking with Sakura flitting about him, ineffectively helping where she could. It had been rather adorable, watching her go around and try to help out her obvious crush despite clearly having no idea what she was doing. Her master just smiled and obliged her, giving her small tasks, peeling potatoes here, washing vegetables there. It reminded her of raising her younger sisters. This went on for about forty-five minutes when Harry finally asked the homunculi to set the table as the meal was almost done. By the time they were finished, Harry had completed and brought out a pot of a rich stew and several loaves of fresh bread to go with it. There, Rider took a small bite of the stew and had to suppress a small groan of pleasure at the taste. It was absolutely perfect.
"Do you like the stew?" Harry asked, apparently having noticed her reaction with a hint of pride.
"It is very good stew Master." Rider answered, glancing around the table and seeing Sakura, Leanna, Monica, and Joy experiencing similar reactions to the stew.
"Glad to know my cooking is appreciated. Now, let's get down to business. It is my understanding that all servants summoned by the Grail are summoned because they have some desire that it will fulfill. May I ask what yours is?"
"I have no desire for the Grail."
Harry looked at her, confusion showing on his face. "Then why did you agree to being summoned if you have no wish?"
"I have a wish, but not for the Grail. What I wish most of all is to protect someone. I want to protect someone like you, Master. I wish to protect someone who has never had someone to protect them before. That is my wish for this war. To protect you."
Harry was touched at her sentiment. "Truth be told, I have little personal desire for the Grail myself as well, but I will do whatever it takes to get it. Grandfather has agreed to let myself and Sakura go in peace should we win him the Grail. If it means Sakura can live happily, I will do whatever it takes."
"If that is what you desire, Master, then it is my duty as your servant to fulfill it. The Grail shall be yours," Rider said, smiling slightly at his dedication.
Harry smiled at having reached an accord with his protective servant. He took the moment to examine his command seals. He had heard that every master has their own unique set of command seals. Upon examining his own, he saw that inscribed on his skin in red lines, overlapping and combining with the existing alchemic tattoos were three tribal insignia in the design of a shield, with two swords crossing behind it. Harry though a shield bearing weapons was a fitting sigil for a protector such as himself.
"Well, now that we are all settled, let's enjoy the rest of this meal."
And with that the meal began in earnest.
Shinji Matou was furious. That little shit Potter and his filthy whore of a little sister had summoned a servant to compete in the grail war. Shinji just knew that if he could do the same and summon his own servant, he could destroy that bastard and remove the taint from the Matou family that came in the form of Sakura. Now that he thought about it, he didn't think Harry had cleaned up the summoning circle he had used to summon that purple-haired slut with the blindfold. This gave Shinji a cunning idea.
Shinji Matou was ecstatic. It hadn't been that hard to find a couple convenient sacrifices just lying around, that is to say, out alone past dark. He'd found two adults, both women, and a little girl. A quick club to the head for each, some rope, a stolen van, and voila! Three gift-wrapped sacrifices just ready for a summoning. Shinji may not have possessed magical circuits, but with three lives to fuel the ritual, he had enough prana to pull it off. The fact that he also took the opportunity to rape the two women he was sacrificing just helped sweeten the pot. Hey, they were to get drained into empty, dead husks pretty soon, he might as well make use of them while they were around. He snuck his three sacrifices into the manor while everyone else was asleep and took them down to the summoning room. He carefully placed the two squirming women on the edges of the circle and placed the little girl in the dead center. He then did the same stupid sounding chant from the book Harry used.
"For the elements silver and iron. For the foundation, stone, and the archduke of contracts. For the ancestor, my great master Schweinorg. Close the gates of the cardinal directions.
Come forth from the Crown, and follow the forked road to the Kingdom
Fill. Fill. Fill. Fill. Fill
Repeat five times. But when each is filled, destroy it. Set.
Heed my words.
My will creates your body, and your sword creates my destiny.
If you heed the Grail's call and obey my will and reason, then answer me
I hereby swear...
That I shall be all that is good in the world
That I shall defeat all that is evil in the world
You seven heavens, clad in the three great words of power, come forth from the circle of binding... Guardian of the Scales!"
Shinji watched in glee as the three victims in the center of the circle writhed in agony, unable to scream due to the gags he had placed in their mouths. Before his eyes, they dried up, like a time-lapse of a corpse in a desert, eventually looking like preserved mummies in the clothes they had been wearing prior to the ritual. There was a blinding flash of light as the room filled with smoke. As Shinji regained his vision, he looked excitedly toward the center of the circle to see what cool servant he had summoned. The smoke cleared, and Shinji gazed on a hooded woman with a blue hair, kneeling on the ground.
"Servant Caster answers your summons. I ask of you, are you my master?"
Medea sat in the throne of heroes, partaking in every heroic spirit's favorite pastime, reflection. Medea was a woman who had been screwed by fate and the gods, and repaid them by betraying as many times as she had been betrayed. This had earned her a rather infamous position on the throne of heroes, with her most famous title being, "The Witch of Betrayal." Medea understood why people were so wary of her, even if she thought them fools. Everything Medea did was in response to evil being inflicted on her. She had started out a kind, innocent young princess, until the gods forced her to commit terrible crimes against her fellow man and the the world turned on her. "You're a monster!" the people had cried at her. "And so I shall be," she had answered. So she killed, manipulated, tortured, seduced, and betrayed. It wasn't until she finally met her end that she realized that it hadn't been worth it. Sure, the majority of the world consisted of sheep for her to use, but she also had to admit that there was good in the world. Even after she had become a monster, there had been people who were kind and fair to her, even though she had been too caught up in her sins to notice them. As such, she had used and crushed them like the rest.
This reflection came to a halt though though when she felt a grail summoning call out for her. She felt it the connection, though it was strangely weak for some reason. She felt towards her summoner and found an individual with which she felt she could redeem herself. It was a young boy, one who had been beaten and broken. She looked through this boy's life and felt further ashamed. This boy had been through hell comparable to hers, but hadn't let it break him or turn him against the world, not all of it at least. Instead he had let it harden him, making him more capable of protecting those he was close to. She decided that she would protect this boy, and keep him safe. Perhaps if she did so, she could finally earn the redemption she sought. Her mind made up, she let the weak connection pull her into the material world.
Little did she know, she was sensing the previous user of the summoning circle, and not the current one.
Caster was... confused, to say the least when she appeared in the circle and looked up expecting to see a young, black haired boy and instead saw an arrogant, blue haired boy leering at her with a hungry look in his eye. Just being looked at by this boy made her feel violated, like he had somehow skipped undressing her with his eyes and gone straight on to full blown rape. What confused her even more was that this boy did not appear to be a magus, as despite feeling the contract between them, she was receiving no prana from him at all. Thankfully, she seemed to have full reserves at the moment, but it appeared she wouldn't be getting any more from her apparent master. Wondering just where the prana had come from, she looked around and what she saw made her very angry. Immediately behind her was the dried husk of a little girl, no older than six, completely drained of prana. Two older women to her left and right were similarly drained. Despite her anger at the obvious cold-blooded murder of three women, there was a certain decorum to be kept until she could figure out what went wrong with the summoning and track down the boy she had intended to be her master. Once she figured that out, she could use Rule Breaker and rebind herself to that boy instead. Then, she could kill this sadistic boy, slowly and painfully if possible. Her plan of action devised in the span of two seconds, she waited for the dust to clear and intoned the customary phrase.
"Servant Caster answers your summons. I ask of you, are you my master?"
Shinji looked at this woman he had summoned to be his slave with hunger in his eyes. This was far better than he had hoped. Not only did he get a slave he could use to win the war, but he got a smoking hot one. He was already having visions of just what he could do with this slut. Anyway, for the moment, he should probably answer her and make sure she new her place.
"Yes, slave. I have summoned you and am therefore your master. Do not bother me with such pointless questions in the future."
"Yes, Master." With some insight into the boy's personality, Caster decided that the "submissive slave" routine would keep this boy satisfied until she could find her true summoner.
"Good, for now, I have something I need you to do."
"What is it, Master?"
"There is another servant in this manor, Servant Rider. You are going to kill her later."
"As you wish, Master."
"Good, but first, there's another matter I need you to take care of. You see, those two women I raped earlier struggled too much and ruined the fun. And what's the point of having these command seal things if I can't have a little fun?"
Casters felt fear paralyze her as the command seals on the boy's arm glowed.
"Goodnight Rider, and get some sleep. I don't want you to stay awake and astralized all night. This is the Matou Estate, nobody will attack us here," said Rider's beloved master.
"Of course, Master. But I will take the time to familiarize myself with the manor, in the unlikely event it should be attacked."
"Alright," her master obliged, "just make sure you get some sleep. Consider that an order if it helps."
"Thank you, Master. I will be sure to do so." Rider internally chuckled at her master's care.
She watched as her master climbed down into that fetid worm pit, the worms immediately dragging him down and borrowing into his flesh. Moving next to her, Sakura dragged out a futon, placed it a couple feet from the edge, placed a second one near it, presumably for Rider to sleep on, and laid down to sleep. Rider mentally reaffirmed that she would absolutely destroy anyone who attempted to cause suffering to her selfless master and stalked out of the room.
Caster was livid. That boy had used his command seals to violate her! His first order was that she did not harm him. His second was that she disrobe. His third was that she-
Caster mentally cut herself. Dwelling back on it would do little to solve the matter. All she could do was move beyond it and quietly resolve to torture and kill him later. She stalked through this manor, recognizing portions of it from the flashes of her true master's memories she had felt on the throne. She was still greatly confused as to exactly what had happened. The only thing she could think of was that two people had preformed simultaneous summonings and she responded to one and been dragged to the other. She could tell that this was the manor her true master had been tortured in, but the bounded fields surrounding the manor interfered with her ability to search for his prana. Perhaps this was the former residence of her true master, and he had moved out while that slimy boy in the basement masquerading as her master moved in after him. Maybe it was that link to the residence and the fact that the boy used sacrifices instead of his own prana that caused her to feel her true master instead of the scum that had preformed the ritual. Regardless of these thoughts, there was currently a servant in the manor, and she had to make sure she survived long enough to track down her original master. It was just as she rounded a corner that she came almost face to face with a blindfolded, purple-haired woman.
Rider walked through the desolate hallways of the manor. The place was entirely depressing. What once may have been a lovely and elegant manor, full of love and light seemed to have been tainted by mere proximity to the bastard her master called "Grandfather." Despite what her master may have ordered, she was not convinced as to the security of the manor. It may have been her imagination, but she had felt prana fluctuations an hour or so ago and was determined to find the source. To that end, she began stalking throughout the manor, her chain weapon in hand, ready to kill whatever was threatening her master. It was just as she rounder a corner that she came almost face to face with a hooded, blue-haired woman. She reacted instantly.
Caster just barely dodged it when what looked like a knife attached to the end of a chain skimmed past where her head had been milliseconds ago. She jumped back, caught flat footed, and on reflex chanted her divine words and shot a large fireball at what she assumed was Servant Rider. Rider ducked around it, and it impacted against the wall, causing a large explosion that shook the manor. Slightly recovered, Caster dodged yet another swing of that odd chain and began shooting fireballs as fast as she could at this Servant.
Internally, Rider was panicking. When she had felt those prana fluctuations, she had thought it might be an enemy master taking a poke at the bounded fields, not a full-blown enemy servant infiltrating the manor. She mentally called out to her master to warn him of the threat. She felt him awake, and acknowledge the threat.
"Hang on Rider, I'm coming," Harry said over their mental link.
"Master, that is not a wise decision."
"Regardless, it is the one I'm making. I will not leave my servant to fight alone while I can help it."
Rider's concentration was broken as she was forced to dodge yet another barrage of fireball from this apparent Caster.
Harry climbed out of the worm pit, slightly weakened from the exposure. He snuck past the still-sleeping Sakura, and went to the nearby room where the homunculi slept. After awakening them and explaining the situation, they armed up. Leanna and Joy pulled out their weapons of choice: Dual collapsible batons specially designed for homunculi use, which is to say that they each weighed about one and a half tons. Harry had alchemically crafted the batons, making them ridiculously heavy and almost impossible to break. A good swing from one of them hit the target like a wrecking ball, capable of caving in a tank. Monica's hands began crackling as she channeled lightning through them. The three homunculi sisters took up a defensive formation around Harry as he went in the direction Rider had indicated him. Even without the directions, it wouldn't have been too hard to find. All one had to do was follow the explosions.
Caster was in trouble. Normally, she would be able to outlast a servant such as Rider, as it was standard procedure for a Caster-class servant to tap into local ley lines to fuel themselves. The problem was that Caster hadn't had the time to do this, and her current bastard of a master certainly wasn't providing her any more. Because of this, she was almost out of prana. She only had a few more good barrages of fireballs left in her before she would have to retreat back to that twisted master of hers and likely do unsavory things to get more prana. She was already plotting her retreat when movement behind Rider caught her eye and she gasped. Coming around the corner was her true master, flanked by three beautiful women with black hair, red eyes, and for some reason wearing maid uniforms. All three were armed though, and if Caster's guess that they were homunculi were correct, she needed to be slightly wary of them as the physically weakest servant. The homunculi didn't matter all that much though. What mattered was the boy whose summons she had answered and with whom she hoped to redeem herself. It was a second later that she realized that she had likely just been attempting to kill his servant as Rider took a protective stance in front of the boy and prepared to charge once again. Caster did the only thing she could do.
"WAIT!"
Harry was very confused. He had come into the hallway expecting to have to fight a servant, but instead the second this blue-haired woman saw him, something that he could only identify as "recognition" flashed across her face. As Rider jumped in front of him to shield him and prepared to charge again, Caster immediately stopped casting and put her hands up.
"WAIT!"
Now Harry was even more confused. Seeing Rider tense in preparation to charge again, he put his hand on her shoulder.
"Wait Rider."
Rider looked back at him in shock
"Master, she's an enemy servant and obviously attempting to deceive us or buy time to escape. We have to kill her now."
"Perhaps she is, but I would still like to ask her some questions. Chiefly, how she got past the bounded fields and into the manor."
"Some teenager in the basement summoned me, raped me, and then ordered me to kill Rider," a soft, melodic voice interjected.
Harry looked up to see that Caster had taken her hood down. Harry had to admit that Caster was a beautiful woman, with soft, aristocratic features, beautiful light-blue eyes, and long blue hair the color of the ocean. What surprised him even more was that she was answering his question. Harry immediately knew who she was speaking of.
"Is this teenager about 17, blue hair, voice that just makes you want to strangle him?"
Caster smiled slightly. "Yes, that seems to be a fairly good description."
Harry cursed. Leave it to Shinji to preform a summoning, rape the servant, and then immediately order her to try and kill him and his servant.
"I see. If Shinji is your master, you have my pity."
Caster figured she had nothing to lose and decided to try and convince Harry to take her on as a servant. If he didn't, she was dead anyway.
"I never said Shinji was my master, only my summoner. You see, Harry, you are technically my master."
Harry started. "Pardon?"
"I mean what I said. Shinji sacrificed three people to summon me in what I assume was the same circle you used to summon servant Rider there," Caster said, indicating towards the still tense Rider, who was currently preoccupied with joining the homunculi in their shielding of Harry.
"You see, Harry. What I felt and responded to on the throne was your ambient prana left over from your summoning. Imagine my surprise when I came out to find that blue-haired rapist instead."
"I see. I apologize for that. It wouldn't have happened had I cleaned up the circle when I was done."
"Don't apologize, just listen to my request. My noble phantasm is called, Rule Breaker. It lets me sever and rebind any magical contract. I lack the prana to use it right now, though, as Shinji doesn't possess circuits and can't supply me with any more. With it, I can break my contract with Shinji and rebind it to you. So, what I am asking, I suppose, is if you will accept me as your servant?" There, the cards were thrown on the table. The only thing to wait for was for the ax to fall.
Harry was shocked. Here was a servant that had been trying to kill Rider moments earlier kneeling before him, begging him to accept her contract. Harry knew that if he didn't accept her contract, he would be forced to either kill her, which he didn't want to do as he felt pity for her, or send her back to Shinji, which was even worse. His mind made up, he spoke again.
"How much prana do you need to power your noble phantasm?"
Caster was surprised, expecting him to turn her down out of suspicion. Rider was just as surprised, turning to face him.
"Master, it's not my place to question your decisions, but is it really such a wise idea to empower an enemy servant's noble phantasm based on a story alone?"
"Perhaps not, but like I said before: it may not be the wise idea, but it the one I'm making because I'm not sending her back to Shinji to get raped again. So, Caster, how much prana do you need."
Caster took a moment to find her voice. "Not a lot. My noble phantasm is considered rather weak, so it is low power."
Harry projected a small cup and a knife. He sliced his hand open, letting the prana-enriched blood pour into the cup. He stepped past Rider, approached Caster's kneeling form, reached down, and handed her the cup.
Caster took the cup, and drank it down happily, ignoring the taste. She was happy that the boy she knew she could redeem herself by protecting had accepted her, and for that, she would serve him as long as he wished. Feeling her prana reserves recharge, she produced her dagger and powered it up. She pricked herself with it once, severing her contract to that slime that had summoned her, reached over and pricked Harry's outstretched hand, rebinding herself to him. Immediately, prana flooded through her body in massive quantities, a testament to Harry's large amount of circuits that he could easily support two servants. She looked up at her new master, tears forming in the corners of her eyes.
"Servant Caster is now yours to command, Master."
Shinji Matou was pissed. He had sent that slut he had summoned to kill Rider hours ago. She was his slave, dammit, and she was supposed to obey him! If she didn't, what use was she? It was bad enough that he had to use all three command seals just so he could let some stress off, but now he had to wait while she took goddamn forever just to kill one servant! Honestly, the Potter brat summoned Rider, how strong could she possibly be? His thoughts were interrupted when the door to his room opened and the slut in question strolled into his room like she owned the place.
"About goddamn time," Shinji snarled as he marched up to her to give her a well-deserved backhand. He was confused, however, when she grabbed his wrist and gave him a cold smile.
"Shinji," said a voice that made him freeze. No no no no no! This couldn't be happening! "I knew you had fallen pretty far over the years, but rape and murder? That's beyond even what I thought of you."
Shinji looked past Caster and what he saw made his heart drop. That fucking Potter brat was standing there with all his whores: Sakura, those three dolls of his, and that purple-haired cunt, who was looking at him with a hungry expression on her face, but much different than the hungry expression on his face when he looked at women.
"Shinji, I was prepared to let you walk out of this war unscathed, but now? Now I have to put you down for the public good. Granted, the fact that everyone in this room hates you only makes that easier."
"Caster, Rider," he ordered, "make my displeasure with him known."
Shinji gulped as the two servants looked at him with eyes bearing nothing but sadistic glee.
The screams emanating from Matou manor that night would have sparked local ghost stories for years to come had the bounded fields not kept them contained.
With the matter of Shinji dealt with and three new command seals dotting his left arm, Harry decided it was time to have a discussion with his newest servant. Just as he reached an accord with Rider over dinner, he hoped to reach an accord with Caster over breakfast. Over a simple meal of oatmeal and cereal, Harry opened up discussion with the blue-haired elf across the table.
"So Caster, I had a talk with Rider over dinner last night and would like to hear your response to the same question so that we can work together better. What is your wish for the Grail?"
"I have none," was her reply.
For some reason, Harry wasn't surprised. "Then what is your wish for the war?"
"To protect you."
Once again, Harry, for some reason, expected this. "And why is that, exactly?"
"When I was alive, I... was a monster. I had horrible things done to me and did horrible things in return. It wasn't until the end of my life that I realized that I had been given the choice between becoming a monster and becoming a protector, and I realized the choice I had made. Maybe this is penance is some way, but when I felt you through the Grail and saw all the evil that had been inflicted upon you and the fact that you hadn't turned into a monster I thought that, just maybe, I can redeem myself by protecting him, and keeping him from following my path. So that is my wish, to shield you from harm so that you do not follow my path."
Harry looked at her for a moment, then smiled.
"I thank you, Caster. I guess something about me just makes people want to protect me like I want to protect them. I thank you for your wish and will do my best to fulfill it by being the best master I can be. My desire for this war is also to protect. The only way Grandfather will willingly let Sakura and me free from his machinations is if I win the war for him. I will do so, so that Sakura never has to look upon this manor again, so that she never has to sleep in that worm pit again, and so that she is free to find her own life and love, free from Grandfather's manipulations."
Sakura teared up a bit and took Harry's hand in her own as a silent thanks.
Upstairs in his office, Zouken Matou chuckled darkly as he watched events unfold in the manor. One modification to the bounded fields surrounding the manor allowed him to observe any part of it whenever he wanted. He had been overjoyed when the boy he had invested so much in showed such promising results. His servant Rider was clearly a very powerful servant, surpassing even the presence of Berserker in the last war. Perhaps the boy's amount of prana had led to the servant becoming more powerful than originally intended, but she was obviously very powerful. Caster was an unexpected but very welcome bonus. When he had first seen Shinji leave the manor and come back with three bound women, he had been confused. When he took them down to the basement, summoned a servant, raped her, and then sent her after Rider he had been intrigued. When Caster severed her contract with Shinji and rebound herself to Harry, he had been ecstatic. He had watched the fight and knew that it was only Harry's ambient prana left over from the last summoning and the prana from three whole human sacrifices that allowed Caster to keep up with Rider in the fight. With both of them on the same side under Harry, he had likely just become the top player in the war. Even Zouken took a certain joy in watching the two servants slowly disassemble Shinji while Harry, Sakura, and the homunculi watched on impassively. Well, Harry watch impassively. Sakura and the homunculi both seemed to take pleasure in watching Shinji suffer. Whether it was because he was an annoying twat towards Harry or Shinji was just irritating had yet to be seen. Zouken was also intrigued by the fact that both of the servants had answered Harry's summons not out of a desire for the Grail, but out of some desire to protect Harry. It was odd to say the least that both servants were villains that saw a little of themselves in Harry and wanted to protect him so he wouldn't follow down the same path. Zouken decided to reflect on the matter further later. For now, he would sit back and watch Harry. The boy's life was just so very interesting.
