"Haaah!" Shinji grunted as he defended a heavy strike from Shirou, who then kneed him in the stomach. "Gah-!" Spittle flew from his mouth as he dropped his bokken.
"Again," With no mercy, the Makiri commanded the Matou to stop kneeling. "This was your idea wasn't it? So come on, you won't impress anyone like this."
"Damn it…" Shinji got up, stumbling to his feet and grabbing his dropped sword. He charged in with another shout, swinging overhead. "Hahhhhh!"
"Congratulations, you've figured out how to put all your power in one swing. Would you like a cookie?" Unfortunately for him, Shirou thrust his wooden sword at the perceived undefended stomach.
But, Shinji swept the bokken down, diverting the strike with a grin.
The Makiri let an eyebrow rise, "Oh? You're getting better." He praised, "But not good enough." With a twist the Magus shunt the wooden sword into the air before slamming the wooden sword down.
"Gah-" The sword hit his head and with a crunch the bokken was destroyed along with the consciousness of his 'cousin'.
The Matou collapsed onto the training floor, the Matou mansion had a surprising amount of rooms, including one modeled after a traditional japanese dojo.
"Sakura, it's your turn." Without looking back, he threw the broken bokken away and headed out of the room as his purple headed 'cousin' shot him a small glare.
Shirou scoffed, the girl was getting too brave for her own good. He would have dealt with it already had his grandfather not told him to simply observe.
It wasn't even like this was all his fault, Shinji asked for the training of his own accord in order to look 'Cool' in front of Sakura. It also held the nice side effect of letting Sakura get in some magecraft practice.
Root only knows how much the girl needs it.
It wasn't even like SHirou was particularly good at Swordplay, but Shinji got it into his head that knowing Swordsmanship was manly and hounded(Read: Annoyed) Shirou until he got what he asked for in the most painful way possible.
It had taken a while, but he had found a decently experienced Swordsman that no one would miss.
Through the use of Mind Magecraft he had managed to store the memories of the man in a Mystic Code for when Shirou needed it.
It didn't help much in the muscle area but after a week or so he had gained most of it.
A neat trick as it were, a small cheat to help him get ahead of other people. Though, it was mostly Shinji.
Shirou was hesitant to admit it, but his cousin was actually decently talented. Enough that even without much study he was beyond most of their 'Peers' bar the genius' like Tohsaka, the hard workers like Issei and the cheaters like Shirou.
But that was what magecraft was all about in his opinion, a shortcut.
Still, the fact Shinji was actually gifted definitely rankled more than a few of his classmates so he had to give Matou that. He was good for generating annoyance.
The fact Shinji wanted to get into Swordplay wasn't very surprising after seeing the Tiger of Fuyuki and how in his words, 'Cool she was!'.
What was surprising was that he wanted his help for it.
Shirou shook his head, it gave him some sense of joy to see that idiot collapse so many times so he would continue so long as the blue haired boy wanted it to.
A few steps more and he found himself in his workshop, a dreary underground room next to the worm pits.
Along the walls were jars of brains, bubbles surfacing every few minutes. Wires connected them all together, faint bits of electricity jumped on them.
Next to them were journals full of his notes on the different forms of the Crest Worms as well as his own new creations.
Messy desks full of notes as well as an operating table splattered with the blood of his last experiment. The smell of copper and mana kept the place familiar to the Insect Magus.
"Now then… what to do next?" Shirou smiled, new avenues of research filtering into his mind.
But first…
"I need more materials."
Familiars flew through the dreary skies in the form of normal insects. Their eyes set to the dark places of Fuyuki, the sewers, the alleys and the boonies where the unwanted of the world were cast out.
The place where no one would miss an extra person or two.
Though it seemed he wouldn't have to abduct someone today…
Floating through the Miyama river was a body face down, a soaked suit and empty eyes. There was no doubt the body would be reported on the morning news.
Through their connection, the familiars sent an alert towards their master.
'Hmm? That was fast,' Shirou thought as he closed both eyes, lounging on a chair. 'How lucky, the Fujimura Group must have dealt with someone…' He mused.
Local Yakuza aside, with a thought, familiars over the city converged onto the floating body. With nearly a dozen familiars- all of them mutating to their larger forms- he had them fly through the city just a bit above the clouds.
Normally most insects wouldn't be able to survive at this altitude let alone speed, however, these were magecraft enhanced bugs with centuries of modifications to their name.
A dozen minutes later and he had his material dropping from the air like a demented drone service.
Right in the middle of the Matou family gardens, full of beautiful flowers, in full bloom even as the seasons changed and the night took the place of day. Something Shirou quite enjoyed, the sweet smell of Roses and Hyacinth and Lavender filled his nose as he took the time to enjoy the sights.
It was something that Sakura actually made, well, added to anyways. It seems his grandfather had the garden long before the three of them were even born, what little information he knew was that someone the old worm was fond off liked them.
Still, Shirou could enjoy them, even if it was simply the scents and how even as time passed they still lived.
It really was a rare instance of magecraft in the Matou household that didn't have something to do with familiars or curses.
Or maybe they did and Shirou simply didn't know or realize.
Either way, it didn't really matter in the grand scheme of things. Not when his order just got here, splattering onto the stone floor with a sickening crunch.
If the body wasn't broken before it was definitely broken now.
Not that it mattered much, Shirou was after the flesh and muscles, not the bones. Though who knows how long the body had been decomposing, it would be better to harvest the materials now before it could degrade any further.
With a grunt, Shirou dragged the man onto his shoulder. Careful of any blood that might stain his yukata.
The process of getting the man to his workshop was slow, but even reinforced a 13 year old could only handle so much weight. And he didn't have much confidence in his Familiar handling to not drop the body while they weren't in the open sky.
'That's what I should do,' Shirou thought as he walked to his workshop, 'Make a familiar capable of handling the grunt work.'
In fact, maybe this body could help him-
Shirou stopped, dropping the body onto the floor with a groan. Facepalming as he realized he had been stupid for years.
This must've been why his grandfather laughed at him when he saw him dragging bodies.
So much time that could've been used for something else, wasted on carrying dead bodies. Shirou wanted to bang his head against the wall for how stupid he had been.
A singular vein popped on his wrist, a small larva came out from the incision. Crawling on his hand, Shirou lifted it towards the dead body until the larva sat on an outstretched finger.
"Alter the course of life," With that small chant, SHirou infused the larva with his od, causing it to bulge in strange ways. In a single seconds, a cocoon had formed around it, and in another a worm popped out many times larger than the original larva.
Now the same size as his finger, he let it drop onto the corpse, after which it started drilling into the head.
Necromancy at its core was about manipulating bodies through use of magecraft, usually it was through binding parts of the leftover soul onto the dead body so it would have some ability to move.
That was the normal version, the one his grandfather taught him… was less than normal to say the least.
By having the worm burrow into the center of the brain, it would then combine into it using the aspects of the Matou magecraft and become a sort of spiritual core from which Shirou could bind the rest of the soul to itself.
"Combine and become one," As he chanted a purplish glow became apparent within the dead body's eyes. "Let two be one and one become whole."
With that, the body convulsed and Shirou could feel a new connection being made. Sending bits of his own prana, the body started to rise up.
"U….gahhh…" It moaned as it stood up for the first time in its new life. Seeming to favor the left leg rather than the night.
"Oh right, the fall…" The Bug Magus muttered, shaking his head as he ordered the zombie to follow his lead. WIth a bit of fumbling on Shirou's part, they managed to find their way to his workshop.
Dropping the body onto the operating table, he cut off his connection to the undead. The body turned still, the worm dying inside without the precious flow of od.
'Now, to start the harvest.' Shirou brought out his tools.
The blood would be stored for future endeavors, rich in lifeforce, it would help with rituals. The skin would be turned into pages for a Mystic Code inspired from what little he managed to gleam of the Fourth Heaven's Feel Ritual. The muscles would be used to help his pet project. The bones to be burned and turned to dust so as to help with a specific function of his Centipede-blade.
Finally he would throw the rest to the worm pits to dispose of, he didn't need them for much of anything really.
Still, he was sure all of this would've been far more fun had he brought in a fresh body, the stench of rot was something Shirou never liked.
"V-vice-president! Nemura-Sensei told me to give this to you!" A brown haired youth clambered up to a taller boy of pale auburn hair. "A-apparently these are some forms that need to be signed for the Cultural festival…"
Golden eyes narrowed, the brown haired boy shuddered near them. "Really? How lazy," Although he insulted a teacher, the Vice-president still took the papers. "Go on and go back to your class Ooei-kun," Though he meant it as a suggestion, the brown haired boy still felt compelled to go anyway.
"Y-yes Vice-president, have a nice day!" With a courteous bow, he speed-walked back to his class with nervous eyes.
Shirou sighed, although he had first been the VP for only his class, soon enough Issei had become Student Council President despite only being a second year and brought Shirou with him.
It was a pain, but at least it got him out of the house when Shinji and Sakura started doing… things.
He was tempted to tell them off but then realized Shinji started being a model student. But more importantly, not a pain in his ass.
So Shirou withstood the pain, but made it clear that any further after six he would send them both to the worm pits to cool off. He even managed to get a smile at their terrified eyes.
Shirou could understand that the worm pits were uncomfortable, but they were far from the horrifying possibilities that his cousins thought it was. Not to mention they strengthened their magic circuits, well, Sakura's anyway.
Shirou envied that about them, even as he tried to replicate the Crest Worms that would widen his circuits, it seemed that his 'Soul' took offense and devoured them before they could even get close no matter the worm.
It seemed they could be born from his body and do all they wanted, anything close to the soul and they would be eaten.
The Makiri shook his head, now was not the time for Magecraft, now was the time for crafting a perfect human mask.
Like Tohsaka.
For some strange reason it seemed people liked her far more than him, whether than was because of her looks or his lack of social grace, Shirou didn't know.
What he did know was that his peers seemed to avoid him for some reason, the only ones not avoiding him were Tohsaka, Issei and Shinji, but he tried to avoid Shinji.
Oh well, it didn't really matter, did it?
"Yo, Kimura! You doin' good?" A boy with dark hair and dark eyes wrapped an arm around a depressed looking fellow, "You look like you're contemplating suicide man,"
The depressed boy, Ooei Kimura slumped down even more. "No, it's just that I saw the Vice-president…" He trailed off with a haunted look. "I felt like I was being sized up by a snape or something!"
The other boy whistled, "What? The hell d'you do to have Makiri on your ass man?"
"Nothing!" He said, rejecting the suspicious glance he gained. "Really! It was nothing! Nemura-sensei made me give him papers for the Cultural Festival!"
"Eh, seriously? But then why do you look so terrified?" The dark haired boy asked, "I know Makiri is a bit creepy but he's a good guy! It's just that he's related to Matou…"
Both of the boy's shivered at the name, both a delinquent and a sis-con at the same time, the blue haired boy once broke another boy's arm for talking to his sister.
"No, it's not that either, it's just, well, it felt as though he was looking past me." Ooei admitted, "Like he was looking at a toy that could be discarded without a second glance. It's really creepy."
"No, no, I get you Kimura, Makiri was terrifying before he started dating Tohsaka. Now those two are the power couple of the school and more powerful than ever."
"Eh!? Their dating!?" Ooei jumped up from his seat, grabbing the other boy by his shoulders.
"You kidding, right Kusakabe!?"
Kusakabe struggled, "Yeah! How have you not noticed the sexual tension! I could feel it all the way back since elementary! Now get off!"
"No way… Tohsaka-sama… and the Vice-president!? My dreams… my dreams!" Ooei dropped to the ground, his tears stained with blood.
Kusakabe looked awkward as the rest of the class looked at them with a dark curiosity.
"Come on man, I'm pretty sure the rounds already made it last year…" The dark haired boy crouched to be on his level and tried to cheer his friend up, "Also, if you hate that union so much, go fight Makiri for the right to Tohsaka's love or something." He tried to make a joke.
"...You're right." Ooei stood up, fists clenched together.
"H-huh?" Kusakabe looked at his friend with bewildered eyes.
"I'll go and fight the Vice-president for Tohsaka-sama's love!" He rushed out of the room to presumably fight the Vice-president.
"K-Kimura? Kimura, come back and I was joking!" He rushed out to restrain his friend, leaving the class bewildered at their actions.
Yeah no, that kid's dead.
Anyways, hello there my dear reader! Not so long time no see!
Here we just have a bit of world building as well as some of Shirou's talents in new fields other than sword making. Well, other than the Wing-blades. Or the Centipede-blade. Hmmm… Is Shirou just meant for sharp objects?
And no, Shirou is not dating Rin. That's just a rumor that's been going around since their time in elementary. Hell, I don't think Shirou knows what love is. The best he knows is tantric rituals.
Also, to that one reader asking about Shirou's sorcery trait. It's just High-Speed regeneration, if there's a sorcery trait that just enhances reinforcement there's sure as hell a regeneration one. It's just that Shirou can use the eyes and ears of the Crest Worms, which are inside both Sakura and Shinji as well as around the Matou mansion.
See ya later~