Tags:
AU fem!Percy / Mostly Archer-centric / Adventure / Lore-Alchemy
Disclaimer:
I read the Percy Jackson and the Olympians novels once a decade ago so if there are any inconsistencies with canon, kindly point it out and I'll see if I can work it into the working lore for this fic, otherwise it's something I might have to discard to make sense of a shared universe with this being an AU and all, y'know? Same goes for Fate and the Nasuverse but, well, with Fate being Fate everything is canon, right? lol
Chapter 1: E-Rank
He was a sword, resigned to his fate of endless slaughter as one of Alaya's dogs.
He was resigned to his fate, but it seemed his luck changed, for good or for worse he didn't know. This smelled of the Second Magic and, though it would be out of character for the Dead Apostle Ancestor, Archer couldn't rule out Zelretch's involvement - not entirely. For all he knew, there could've been a luckier magus who reached the Root and he was just collateral as a result.
"Hey, Yuuki (勇気)! Stop spacing out and pay attention!"
The sound of his family name in this life being called out brought him out of his musings. The irony of having a family name that had heroism in it of all things wasn't lost on him. He refocused on the teacher, a tall Caucasian in his forties with a balding head and a growing belly. Archer never bothered to remember his name. He grunted in response and instead turned to look outside.
He hissed under his breath as he suppressed millenia of conditioning. Even after all these years, he still found it difficult to ignore the reflex to exterminate any and all phantasmal beasts he came across. The fact that they were hidden in plain sight, merely disguised by a pervading haze that moved to cover their forms, did nothing to calm his nerves. It didn't help that there were times he had no choice but to fight.
He had decided to stay as detached from this life's Moonlit World as much as he could not only because it was troublesome but because he had had his fill and more of the supernatural to last him this life and probably the next hundred. The world of his previous life had moved past the Age of the Gods and it was already problematic, what more this life where the Age persisted well and truly past the point where it should've ended.
The bell rang and he stood to join the mindless cacophony of students going from class to class.
When the last bell of the day rang, he went to his assigned room, locked the door behind him, and opened his window. He eyed the tree branch three meters away. He climbed his windowsill, lowered his window just enough to make it look like it was closed, and jumped.
Thank the Root he still had access to his magecraft.
He grabbed the branch, swung himself down another, and dropped the rest of the way from his third storey room to the pavement below. The other people on the sidewalk didn't even bat an eye.
The bus ride to his house was filled with the same monotony as everything else while he ignored the phantasmal beasts that got on and off of the bus at odd intervals.
It took a few minutes of walking after he got off the bus to get to his apartment.
「ただいま(I'm home)!」he called out as he entered and locked the door behind him.
「お帰りなさい(Welcome home)!」His mother was already sitting at the dining table with dinner. "You're just in time." Though she knew and agreed he was required to stay at the boarding school, she never reported any of his unsupervised forays into the city.
Sei (棲) Yuuki was a Japanese woman in her mid-thirties, blessed with a porcelain complexion and deep, black hair. Hailing from a long line of blacksmiths he would think she would catch the eye of someone like Kagutsuchi (火之迦具土神) - if he existed at all - but, no, his mother had chosen to forsake the family tradition and move, instead, to the United States where she caught the eye of a different god entirely.
Hephaestus (Hephaistos Ἥφαιστος), his godly father, at least in this life.
「頂きます (Thank you for this meal!)。」 His mother was many things but a good cook was not one of them. Still, he ate as much of the food prepared out of gratitude for her effort.
"How was your day?"
"All the same," he answered. "Boring lessons day in and day out." He ignored the beginnings of a frown creasing his mother's brow and continued. "In the end, my grades are all that matters, what I think about them is irrelevant." Truth be told, he could do without the schooling, he was fairly certain he could get a GED and look for a stable source of income. It wasn't like he was any stranger to hard work. He was, however, considered a minor, being physically twelve years old so that put a damper on any of his plans. Her worry was also understandable, not like she knew how old his soul really was - or how dyed in red it was.
They continued their dinner in relative silence where his mother filled in the quiet with stories of her day job as a grocer until a stench reached his nose, a stench he did well to remember to avoid. 「ごちそう様でした (The meal was delicious)。 Be right back.」
「士郎-- (Shirou)」
"I won't be long," he instead answered to his mother's obvious worry. He donned the half mask and hoodie he reserved just for such occasions. He closed the door behind him with a soft click.
It irked him that he bore the name he forsook even in this life.
This wasn't the first time a phantasmal beast managed to stumble its way into the range of his bounded field which meant this wasn't the first time he had to take care of it. His hands curled at the ready as he made his way closer to the beast.
He found the phantasmal beast in an alleyway near their apartment. It was a lamia and its confusion was evident as it tried to find his scent. His bounded field wasn't the best, he knew. It only diffused his scent everywhere and on everything. It wouldn't compare to anything a decent magus would be able to put up in a few hours but if there was anything this new life gave him - other than a second chance - it was a bump in anything he made thanks to his godly heritage. "Trace, on," he whispered. Prana flooded his body as he Projected his bow. He notched an arrow, breathed deeply and drew back, then let loose. The arrow punched into the beast's eye and out the back at an angle. He watched it flail around in confusion as it faded into gold dust.
Dealing with lone beasts that roamed the Mundane was simple and easy but it always bothered him that these beasts seemed weaker than those he was familiar with. It always put him on edge, especially as he knew the damage a phantasmal beast in his old life was capable of.
"I'm back."
"Welcome back. You didn't get hurt, did you?"
"No, it was just a lamia. An arrow took care of it." His mother let out a sigh of relief. He understood her worry but there really was no need for it. "I'll do the dishes since you cooked dinner." He might've been weaker right now than he was as a Counter Guardian but he was improving every day. He couldn't pull out some of his stronger Projections but only because his young body could yet handle the strain.
The next few days were filled with the dull monotony he grew to appreciate. If only his past life was filled with this dull monotony as well, then he wouldn't have been so blind to what he had. Maybe.
He couldn't even remember their faces or their names anymore.
A loud crash along with the stench of a phantasmal beast tore him from his peace. He shook his head. Not all phantasmal beasts were his problems. So long as they didn't bother him, what they did was of no concern to him. Against all his reasoning, however, he found his feet planted in place. He clicked his tongue and huffed. It wouldn't hurt to take a look, right? If it was a beast he'd seen before he'd have to dispose of it before it saw him. Judging from the sound, it wasn't far into the back alleys. Breaking off from his path home, Archer ran and pumped prana into his body. His circuits warmed up as he Projected a copy of his hoodie and half face mask.
He took the corner at full sprint and used the brick wall as leverage. He took in the scene in a blink - small girl and cyclops - and let loose a volley of arrows which struck true. Too shallow, not enough; just a distraction. In the next instant, his favored blades were in his hands, bow discarded. He slid between the beast's legs and cut its tendons on his way up. He swung at the back of its knees even as it fell to its hands and, with a final swipe of both blades, beheaded the beast before it made sense of what happened.
He stretched his senses as far as they went and only dismissed his weapons when he didn't find any other threat nearby.
He shook his hands and pushed down the irritation he felt. Though he had improved circuits and a better constitution in this incarnation due to his godly heritage, he still found himself lacking. He was too used to operating under Alaya. Years went by and he still made rookie mistakes. He needed to up his training.
The girl - black hair, green eyes, pale complexion - was still sitting on the ground. She stared at him amidst broken crates, shorn pallets, and cracked concrete. "Get up, your jeans are getting dirty."
"Thanks." She paused and, as if a switch flipped in her head, the child scrambled to her feet and shot question after question. "H- How did you do that? Who are you? What was that- that thing!"
He let her run out of steam before he responded. Instead of answering her questions, he said, "You should be more careful so this doesn't happen again. You were lucky I was nearby."
Her jaw clicked shut and her gaze snapped to where the cyclops disintegrated into gold dust. She looked like she had wanted to ask more questions before but it looked like what happened and what could've happened was sinking in.
And now she was hyperventilating.
He sighed and shook her shoulder. Her gaze snapped to him but it was lost, empty - looking past him. He shook her again. "Look at me. Focus." He squeezed her shoulder and her eyes gained some clarity. "Deep breaths." It was a moment before she tried to follow his instruction. Her breath hitched and stuttered before she breathed deeply. "Good, just like that. Now, I want you to forget what you saw today, it'll be safer for you and your mother or father."
"I- I don't have a father."
The sullen, bitter frown was a stark contrast to the hyperventilating mess just a few seconds ago. "Your mother, then. Like I said, forget everything that happened here and live a normal life, you'll be happier for it."
"But--!"
"Forget what happened here and go home to your mother." It might've been cheating to hypnotize the girl but, really, she should be thankful she was even still alive. His hand brushed against something in his pocket and he pressed his lips. After a short debate with himself, he pulled out his talisman and handed it to her. "Keep this with you, always."
There was a moment of resistance then her eyes turned glassy. She nodded and mechanically walked away.
He watched her go and sighed heavily. He resigned himself to taking the long, winding way home. Since he gave up the protections of the Ægishjálmur by handing his talisman to that girl, it looked like his afternoon was going to be filled with beast culling. He ran a hand over his face. He was too old for this shit.
"It's you!"
E-Rank Luck, indeed.
