Chapter Four: The Jaws of Demise, Part Two
His bow formed in his hand after a thought. Black, sleek, and metallic, the bow was the one unchanging weapon he had. But the bow alone wasn't enough; what he needed—
penetration one homing two splitting one explosive one
—was the arrow. It materialized in his hand, heavy and deceptively small. The arrowhead glowed a menacing red as he notched it onto his bow with a practiced motion. And with a single breath, it flew.
A single blur raced into the air with a soft whistle. Ten meters, twenty meters, thirty meters, fifty. As it rose, the arrowhead's red glow brightened and the arrow became a gleam of red light. It accelerated towards the volley of shelled yoma before abruptly separating into several other lights, each controlling its flight to intercept its own target. The arrows roared like missiles as they colored red streaks in the sky that punched holes straight through the carapaces of their targets. A series of brilliant explosions ripped over the valleys surrounding the holy city, the combined shockwave sending a rush of air whipping through the parapet.
The ringing in his ears didn't stop Shirou from moving on to his next target: the carrier.
It was large, that was for certain. It was slow, but he was sure that once it reached the walls, the hordes of yoma it possessed would simply overrun the garrison and flood the city.
explosive two
He notched another arrow. With a quick breath, he let it loose.
It screamed as it soared towards the carrier. Not a moment later, another explosion consumed the lower half of the carrier, where the legs connected to the rest of the body. He saw the carrier freeze, two of its legs hanging mid-stride, before it marched on, as if unharmed.
No effect? No, it slowed. It just recovered that fast.
His eyes caught the carrier's gaping wound close up as the swarm of yoma that clung into it scaled its skin. The lesser yoma buried themselves into the broken flesh and dissolved themselves into the carrier to help close the wound. He scowled, brought to bear another arrow—explosive two burning one—and fired. There was a difference this time; after the smoke cleared, flames covered the carrier's wounds. It froze, this time staggering as fire ate its flesh. The lesser yoma that rushed to seal the wound found themselves batted by flames of such intensity that their bodies would char and harden seconds upon entering them. But the carrier remained standing, and he was wasting precious seconds he needed to clear the city of what yoma had managed to siege it.
He cast the carrier a look before turning his attention to the city, where he could already see his fellow guards battling the shelled yoma.
It was chaos down there.
Word of his advice spread quickly, but not quickly enough. Some of the guards were trying to herd the monsters to empty parts of the city, but were having a hard time in the narrow confines of the streets. Others were desperately hacking away at them with only a few hitting weak points. The guards were too scattered to coordinate properly, and the yoma were too strong to be taken down alone.
He could count the injured and dead, and both counts were too high for his liking.
But I can't leave the carrier alive. It will shoot more yoma into the city. I need to consider the bigger threat. If I kill the carrier, the city will have a better chance at survival.
Even if it means guards will have to die to kill the yoma already here.
He gritted his teeth, tasting the bitterness of his own thoughts, before stringing another arrow into his bow.
And then he saw the impossible.
Explosions filled the air above Flora as she fought her way into Rabona. She heard the exertions of her comrades as they fought to stay together amidst the sea of yoma. As much as she wanted to slow down, she couldn't. Not now. Her sensory abilities were far from God-Eye Galatea's level, but there were strong enough to inform her that yoma had already breached the city.
The situation was dire. What disgusted her the most, though, were the lack of warriors fighting alongside her. Three—that was how many joined her. Three of forty-six.
One of the lesser yoma jumped at her. Flora's sword drew a gust as it bisected the creature. Several attacked her flanks at once. A moment later, her sword left all of them as dark puddles in the ground. She spared a glance behind her, at the team she found herself leading. A number seventeen, twenty-four, and forty-three led by a number seven; she didn't like their odds. Getting to the city was itself a task, not to mention saving it. But Flora stifled her complaints and pressed on, hoping to get her team to the walls in one piece.
"Damn it, these things are endless!" shouted Yuliana.
"Shut up and keep swinging!" Eliza shouted back.
The job was proving to be more dangerous by the second. At first Flora had thought it was a gathering of small yoma crossing the mountains. Her team would have been more than enough for that. But by the time they caught up to the massive yoma that towered far above them, they were already surrounded.
Their formation, made last minute, was best suited for getting them into city. She led the four, with Yuliana behind her. Taking up the rear were Eliza and Zelda, both tasked with defending their backs.
Zelda was taking the worst of the attack. The yoma swarmed at them from her side, which was closest to the massive yoma, and the number twenty-four was doing her best to kill all of them. From her heavy breathing, Flora guessed Zelda to be at her limit. If they were to fall, Zelda would be the first to.
A yoma caught her eye as it jumped at her. Flora sucked her teeth as she cut it down.
"Flora, we need to rotate!" Eliza said. "I don't think Zelda can—"
The ground beside Zelda exploded. The yoma that were hounding Zelda flew apart, leaving the number twenty-four intact. A series of fast-paced explosions rolled off the carrier, causing it to stumble backwards.
"What the hell? Where are these explosions coming from?" Yuliana asked.
Flora didn't have an answer. She didn't sense any other fellow warriors near them, nor could she believe the city to have weapons powerful or accurate enough to do so.
More yoma dove mindlessly at them. Flora heard a sharp whistle, the hissing of wind, and the yoma were blown away. She saw the blurred shape of an arrow sail by. There was an unperceivable widening of her eyes as something clicked. A tiny smirk made its way to her lips.
"We have support," she said above the booms. "Ignore the yoma. We're headed full speed to the city."
She looked at Zelda, asking the silent question: Can you make it?
Zelda caught the look and nodded. Flora smiled, cut down a couple of yoma that got too close, and ran. She could hear her team doing their best to keep up. She caught another arrow flying by her, aimed behind her to the right, and then heard cursing. While she didn't see them all, she knew the arrows kept coming, alternating between covering her and her team. In the corner of her mind, she could feel the yoma presence around her team diminish until the horde around them became navigable.
"Is it me or is this getting easier?" Eliza asked.
"There is an archer," Flora responded. "That archer is currently giving us passage to the city."
"Archer? Where?"
Flora's silver eyes traced the path which the arrows sailed by, pressing her vision as far as she could with her demonic energy until she could barely make out the figure standing atop the walls.
"Who knows?" she said.
Arrows flew as quickly as they materialized in Shirou's hands, intercepting shelled yoma, striking the carrier, and covering the fast group of fighters approaching the city through the ocean of yoma. His circuits buzzed warmly, feeling wonderful after a month of sparing use.
The party of warriors had nearly reached the walls. He had no idea how to get them inside the city—as gifted as they seemed in dealing with the yoma he doubted they could last all of them—but at least he could keep an eye on them when they were closer. As they disappeared beneath his vision, Shirou let loose another arrow. It was different than the others. As it arced, it split into several red streaks, then again and again until well over five hundred explosive arrows consumed the carrier.
"Amazing."
Shirou whirled, his black bow vanishing as the materialized blade in his hand was deflected by a white greatsword. A woman with curled locks of blonde hair that reached past her shoulders watched him impassively. Silver eyes met greying brown.
"Who are you?" he asked, his words as cold as ice.
"I am what you call a Claymore. Number seven." She blinked, her eyes focusing on his empty hand. If she was surprised, she hid it well behind a mask of calm indifference. "Where is your bow?"
"You were part of the group down below. How did you get—" He stopped himself. Was it so hard to figure out how they scaled the wall? He could do it. He knew plenty of others who could do similar things. And from how he had seen this woman handle the yoma, it wasn't such a farfetched thought that she wasn't entirely normal. "What are you doing here?"
"I came to see what weapon was damaging that voracious eater so."
"Voracious eater?" he repeated with a raised brow. Crap! He hesitatingly returned his attention to the yoma, watching the smoking husk, reduced greatly from the scale of the previous explosion, begin to move. "Nevermind," he said. "I hope you're here to help. Can you and your friends handle the yoma in the city?"
"Yes, we can."
"Alright." And then, half his mind wondering if he could trust her, Shirou summoned his bow again.
penetration two homing two splitting three
He notched the arrow and fired, the wind roaring as the arrow split into hundreds more that all honed in on the carrier. His eyes widened as the penetrative strength he imbued the projectile gouged meter-deep craters all across the monster—then nothing. If he didn't know any better, the yoma's sheer mass and abnormal regeneration was simply too much to overcome half-heartedly. Indeed, the charred areas of its flesh were breaking off in large pieces only to rapidly reform.
"Current attributes aren't enough. Need something stronger," he grumbled.
homing three splitting three holy five
A heavy growl rose from the bottom of his throat as his next arrow formed. He felt the heat in his body, flooding through his circuits as he prepared what he knew would annihilate the carrier.
Unfortunately, it happened to be even more noticeable than his explosive arrows.
Punctuated with a sigh, he fired.
Flora remained silent as the archer turned away, her own sword lowering as he did so. She didn't voice her surprise at the black bow that suddenly appeared in his hand—out of thin air. Neither did she comment on how unlikely it was for him to hit the carrier from such a distance. She wasn't even supposed to be there, standing on the parapet of the holy city's walls. She was supposed to be fighting down below.
Instead she watched with silent awe an arrow fly into the sky, turn into a bright red light that battered the voracious eater with fire. It was hard to believe how such a small thing could do such damage.
And then the second arrow flew.
This must be hell, was Harold's first thought after he drew his mace.
The monster in front of him was unlike anything he had ever seen. Blood ran down its face as a woman, someone Harold thought he recognized, fell in two pieces on the stone-lined street.
The captain struck first, his men at his back.
A crack formed on the monster's brittle leg when his mace struck.
Its tongue lashed out at him, tearing his armor apart like it was wet paper. His left pauldron and innumerable rings from his underlying chain mail clattered onto the street. Harold swung again, catching that same leg and shattering it. The monster roared and, as his men's pikes scratched its carapace, it threw its body at him. He raised his shield only to bounce off the monster's size. He lost his grip on his mace and it fell out of reach. Harold struggled to get up, feeling dazed and winded from his landing.
One of his men had a hammer. The man swung at the carapace and cracked it a bit. The monster's tongue lashed out in retaliation and took that man's arm clean off. Blood spurt from the wound and splattered everywhere.
It was almost surreal as he saw, from the corner of his eye, another of his men hit the ground. This man had lost his leg, the stump bleeding a pool around him.
Harold threw away his shield and retrieved his weapon. He aimed for the legs again, and with a furious rage, snapped them until it fell. The monster didn't go down without a fight; it curled into its body, forming a perfect sphere, and with an impossible strength rolled itself into the crowd of soldiers. One man was unfortunate enough to fall right in its way and was crushed, armor and all.
"Gods save us," Harold muttered. "Teresa have mercy on us. Clare give me courage."
The sphere unfolded, and the monster sent them a mocking glare with its hideous face. Its mouth opened, its mandibles tucked away, and its tongue shot out. A man raised a shield only to have it punctured through and into his heart. The tongue twisted and penetrated the back of another soldier. And another. And another.
Harold grabbed the appendage and tore it open with his teeth. Black blood spewed from his mouth as he screamed, charging at the monster with reckless abandon.
Fueled by anger and fear, he didn't notice another monster emerge from a ruined house until it was too late.
Harold fell into the ground. He couldn't feel one of his legs.
The words that came from his lips were the first thing that came to his mind. "Catherine save us from the unrighteous. Abigail, grant us a way in your infinite wisdom."
He heard scratching against the stone. The monster he had worked so hard to cripple rose as its legs regenerated.
He stared at death's eyes.
Heavens, hear us.
Time seemed to slow, then.
The sun dimmed. It was as if dusk had suddenly come, despite the day having just started. The sky grew a dark blue, almost violet, and the sun's light turned a shade of red. As he watched the clouds darken, he feared the very ending of the world. It would make perfect sense; with these monsters in the holy city, killing and slaughtering his men like demons from hell, Harold believed the end of everything was upon them.
And yet as the world dimmed, a bright light rose into the heavens. Reaching until it passed the clouds. An intense light, a star on the earth just beyond the walls, washed the darkness away.
The guard captain's hands shook. His eyes watered until fat tears rolled down his cheeks. Even the burning pain crippling his body seemed to fade in the brilliance of what he was seeing. The light intensified before it swept through the city, washing over him with a warmth that seeped into his soul. He could no longer hear the sounds of fighting, the wails of his men dying, or the throaty rumbles of the demons plaguing his city. The heavens saw their plight and answered. Laughter bubbled out of him as that light surged, enveloping everything he could see in white. The monsters closing in on him disappeared as if they never existed.
As Harold lost his consciousness, he had to wonder.
Is this for real?
As the carrier yoma's form vanished in an overwhelming explosion of light, Shirou prepared himself for the fallout. He had his guesses as to how Rabonians regarded magic. Something akin to the Salem witch trials, he imagined. When he turned to see that woman from before staring at the fading aura of light where the carrier yoma once stood, the tiny, impossible hope that maybe no one had seen his little trick disappeared.
Now, how do I explain this…?
Flora then snapped out of her daze, her eyes locking with his. What was reflected in those eyes he did not know. They stared for a moment before he saw something in her click.
Gracefully, Flora bowed her head, then lowering herself to one knee. Her giant sword rested flat on the parapet across from her. A strong memory hit him, and he felt immensely nostalgic. He shook it off, lifting his gaze from Flora to the remaining men on the parapet. There were few, but they too regarded him with hushed awe. When Flora knelt, the men looked at each other and slowly did the same. It wasn't what Shirou was expecting—less screaming and far less fire to burn him alive. He felt lost for a moment, wondering what to do, before descending the parapet.
When he emerged from the wall, he was greeted with cheer. Applause.
He had no idea what was happening anymore.
Civilians and soldiers, clerics and merchants gathered around, hoisting him off his feet and carrying him off. In the corner of his eye, he caught people kneeling—kneeling—at his procession, muttering chants to themselves.
As he faced the brightening sky, a stream of thoughts crossed his mind.
They saw me do magic. The wall isn't so tall that you can't see anyone standing at the top. They saw me do magic, so why aren't they scared?
They're celebrating. Why are they carrying me? I mean, I—wait, maybe they think I'm a hero?
Maybe they're not scared of my magic?
His heartbeat sped up. The possibility that he could be accepted by the city never crossed his mind in the past month. It was why he so desperately hid his magecraft. It had worked until now, for he never needed such power to help his fellow guard. As his procession—shouting "Shirou! Saint Shirou!" at the top of their lungs—passed the wreckage of a fallen house, he was struck with the weight of guilt.
It occurred to him then that there were people dead from this attack. The city might not have been overrun, but not everyone made it out alive.
Perhaps if I had used my magecraft earlier, then maybe things would have turned out better.
As the growing cheers drowned out all other noise, Shirou bitterly reminded himself how far away he was from being the hero he wanted to be.
a/n: Papers for English done. Whew.
I'm anticipating readers complaining That's not how Unlimited Blade Works works! I want to head that off.
My answer: No shit. You think I'm stupid?
And please, please, don't spam me with questions on how the UBW works. I'll reveal it bit by bit.