Chapter 7: Progress
I do not own Fate/Stay Night and stuffs:
o. o. o.
"You know… I'm beginning to hate being an average one…" Rin grumbled as she sat on Shirou's porch in the middle of the night and watched as her studying partner created and shot swords constantly around his body at a reasonable pace at a nearby pile of logs. The steady sound of the weapons impacting the dull wood before shattering in mid air created a unique melody in the relatively cool summer night. "I mean… all you have to do is focus on the few spells that you can actually use and eventually you'll be able to do ridiculous things with them. With me, I have to study my butt off on each and every one of my elements PLUS all the possible spells that they could let me have access to in order to truly realize my potential…"
"Yeah…" Shirou rolled his eyes before he began to pick up his pace on projection and firing his swords, now shooting at least 5-7 swords at a time with relative ease. "It must be so tough having the ability to actually use standard magic with proficiency and knowing what you can actually do with your powers instead of figuring it out by trial and error the entire time." He could feel his od actively flow into his magic now as well as his circuits heating up… however it was still well within his range of tolerance. From what he's learned about magic circuits, they were similar to organs in a way, but they could be trained a small amount unlike the heart or the liver. It was similar to if one left an organ alone for a long period of time. The organ would become more stagnant and not work nearly as efficiently. Some noble families actually utilized this process of enhancing their heir's circuit quality, but not many since it was an extraordinarily risky procedure that if failed would not only break the heir, but potentially risk the destruction of the portion or the entirety of the magic crest that had been infused to the child's body at the time.
Magic that was beyond the caster's abilities would kill them. It was a fairly simple rule that was taught on the first day of any magus' training, and by no means was it a stretch of the truth. It was because of this that few actually went out of their way to train their children and or heirs in this way.
Of course, Shirou normally trained by himself, had an artifact that healed him more thoroughly than any other spell in existence… albeit mush slower, was an extremely stubborn child, and valued his well being less than the normal person.
Because he frequently pushed them to the limits by projecting Avalon nearly every night, and of course because the real Avalon was inside his body repairing any minor damages that he may have put himself under over time, the quality of his circuits improved and any potential… very minor damage he did to them, was almost always gone by the next morning. His circuits would never reach the level of quality of say the Barthomeloi clan with their blue blood fueled noble magic circuits… not that he needed another reason to get a sealing designation… or another noble clan that wanted to kill him to add to the list of ones that his father apparently angered beyond known reason… but he guessed that by the time his body stopped developing his circuits would reach a quality that would make most magi think twice before trying to mess with him… if they were ever allowed close enough to look at his circuits to that degree of course.
Now if only he had a spell that could abuse all that power at once other than just projecting a boat load of swords and firing them off…
Regardless, what he was doing right now was nowhere near as exhausting and straining as projecting Avalon was… not that Rin knew he had the noble phantasm inside of him. Having the girl know of his status as an incarnation was bad enough… he didn't need her to know that he had a relic of immeasurable power and value inside of his body too. He shivered at what the girl would do to him if she ever found out about that… no. It was better not to dwell on that possibility. He would get his hopes too high since Rin always seemed to reach a new level of low whenever he least expected it.
"Oh stop your moaning. I've been helping you iron out everything outside of your projection and reinforcement magic since you got here." The girl frowned. "You'd still be having trouble firing off your little swords if I wasn't here. I even threw in some bounded field lessons because I was so nice…"
"Yeah, and in the mean time you gutted out the only unique line of spells I have to further your research on infusing your magic to your jewels to such a level that you discovered a way to nearly triple the amount each one can contain. Not to mention all the time I had to spend teaching you how to reinforce your body to a higher level. Real fair exchange there." The red headed boy muttered under his breath before stopping his constant projection and firing practice and made 2 shorter versions of the swords he was firing through alteration for his arms and began to swing them in a practiced and focused manner.
"Again with that dual sword training?" The Tohsaka sighed, clearly noting that this wasn't the first time the boy had trained in such a mundane way. "Why do you keep on doing that? I mean other than Taiga, no one spars with you when you use that style… if you can call it that. Then there's the fact that you're in the archery club instead of the kendo club… you make no sense…"
"It's good exercise." Shirou responded vaguely, not at all reminding the girl that he was already in better natural shape than most boys his age… or even most boys several years older than him. "I'm trying to become ambidextrous since it can throw people off in a fight and it strengthens both arms really well. I want to have a good strong flexible style that only I can use." He smiled lightly. "Besides, what kind of sword incarnation would I be if I didn't have some sort of unique style?"
"I would say a weird one, but that would just be redundant." Rin looked at him bored, clearly not interested in his explanation. Getting up the girl brushed her hair back haughtily. It was around 2 in the morning and they had school the next day. Normally this would be a problem for most 12 year old students who wanted to have perfect grades, but one of the benefits of being a magi was the fact that so long as you had access to your magic circuits, you could make it so that you needed less sleep to be fully charged and rested for a full day… so long as you didn't use your circuits to their full capacity in the process of course. It still sucked to stay up late for multiple nights on end, but the repercussions were significantly reduced and no matter what one would still wake up rather groggy regardless of how large their internal reserves of od was or how many circuits they had. Exhibit A: Rin Tohsaka. "I guess I've had enough for the day. You keep on doing that ridiculous training of yours. I'm going home."
"Yeah yeah…" Shirou muttered as he swung his swords down once more while keeping form, focused on the task at hand. "Just make sure you get back home safely. You know that freaks would peg you for an easy target this late at night."
"Oh?" Tohsaka smiled slyly. "Could it be that you've fallen for my charm and beauty?"
"More like I don't want the magus association to come here to claim all of your stuff and find out about me here." The boy grumbled before ducking to avoid a tea cup that the girl had chucked at his head. "Hey watch it!"
"What are you talking about Shirou?" The girl tilted her head to the side innocently. "I didn't do anything. You know it is very rude to yell at people as they're leaving your home…"
"… Just go already." The boy relented, knowing the girl was the culprit and that she was simply just mocking him as she always did.
"Are you sure?" She asked. "Don't you want to know who threw the cup at you? It could be a spirit or another magus that managed to sneak onto your property."
"Very funny." Shirou looked at her unamused. Rin was always doing things like this. Either twisting his words around to suit her desires or playing innocent any time she was pretty much caught red handed doing anything. She'd make a wonderful politician if she decided to pursue that career… "You almost had me believing you that time."
"Fine then. I can see that my presence is no longer welcome here." She sighed aridly. "Have fun with the rest of your training Shirou. You might even improve if you keep it up…"
The boy shook his head as the girl left his home and continued his repeated swings. This was pretty much how 2 nights every week had turned out for the past 3 months since Shirou met Rin. Many would quickly determine how abusive the relationship was seeing as the girl often forced Shirou to do some of the most menial tasks for her experiments and rarely giving the boy anything in return. That did not mean that Shirou didn't learn anything from the experiences or improve somewhat. The average one did occasionally help him out with his so called "mundane" studies and clarify some complicated concepts that he had trouble understanding when he studied, however it was more to placate her ego more than anything else as far as Shirou was concerned given how much she gloated on how dependant on her he was after every time he made a breakthrough in his research…
Well… the research he allowed himself to do in front of her at least…
Finishing his 100 repetitions and feeling the burn in his arms, Shirou breathed out slowly and forced the short weapons in his hands to dispel themselves. Allowing himself a small breather, the boy turned to the pile of sliced up logs still standing in front of him. From what he could tell, he could fire his projected weapons at a pretty high speed, but all in all he doubted that it was impressive compared to what other magi could do. Granted a flying sword heading at someone's head was nothing to scoff at, but neither were fireballs, blades of wind, and other phenomenon that magi could perform. Shirou knew he already had a decent basic magic based attack under his belt, but he needed to increase the scope of what he could do should he continue to delve into the world of magi. He needed something faster and or stronger… and right now he was attempting something that he assumed would give him both…
"Trace… on." The boy breathed out, holding a hand in front of him… to grasp the bow that he had just projected. It had taken him a few weeks in his basic projecting practicing to memorize the entire scope of a bow, but being a part of his middle school's archery team, it didn't leave him without any source of inspiration. The bow in his hands now was different though. It was thicker and stronger than the bows at the school. The string required a much greater demonstration of strength in order to draw, and the wood itself seemed to be more indented in the center as if to hold something larger than an arrow. In his other hand, Shirou projected a slightly thinner sword than the ones he had been firing off into his hand. He looked at it carefully… before dispelling it again. "Trace… start…" He slowly chanted, hypnotizing himself into slowly going through his projection process step by step until he got to the part he knew where he would be making changes. "Pause. Alter imitation of skill in making. Inscribe contortion. Apply. Resume." His eyes narrowed as he attempted to inscribe alteration into his process. Despite the fact that he was exceptionally good at both projection and reinforcement, alteration was considerably more difficult for the boy to get used to.
Technically he could have made the changes he wanted to the sword after making it, but he determined that his enemies wouldn't allow him the time to complete the 2 step process in a fight… meaning he needed to make it a 1 step process. Unfortunately, he could not reproduce weapons he altered naturally as if they were their own design for some reason. He was guessing that it had to do with the fact that since it was something he himself was adding to the original design it would change the original blueprint stored in his head. If he wanted to make a blueprint of the altered version, he would pretty much be overwriting the original blueprint, something he was very reluctant to do. So, he had to manually alter these arrow sword hybrids from their original sword state each time he wanted to make a new one. The good news was that he was getting better and faster at it. The bad news was it took a bit of extra prana to shape it adequately…
Setting off the metaphorical gun inside his soul, the boy projected his creation into his free hand again, producing the same sword as before, only this time the weapon was twisted all the way down the blade, making it look more like a sadistic nail than a sword.
"Let's see if I can get this to work this time…" Shirou muttered to himself as he knocked the twisted weapon into his modified bow, having allowed a small slit to form in the pommel of the weapon to make things easier. The alteration of the sword had been relatively easy compared to making a bow that would enable him to actually fire it off without breaking in his hands. A normal bow of course wouldn't work even when reinforced to its limits, so he had to make a few changes from a little of what he knew about material compositions and a lot of studying of what materials he actually wanted and needed to use into the bow. The result of his trials and errors was what he had in his hand right now… as were the bows that he had tested out for the past 3 weeks. He had gotten the shape down pretty damned well… now if he could just get the right material…
Breathing calmly, Shirou began to pour prana into his body, strengthening his arms, body, and skin in order to not only drawback the heavy string with the sword notched on it… but to protect himself in case the bow literally blew up in his face… again. Thankfully he had managed a fairly good grasp on basic medical magic before he started… mostly due to the fact that Rin realized that Shirou had a tendency of getting rather injured in her and his experiments and she was getting tired of healing him all the time… so Shirou was fairly confident that should something go wrong he could heal himself so that no one would notice the next day.
Fairly confident.
The bow and string pulled back rather smoothly and so far there were no initial signs of either one snapping. That was already a good sign as the boy decided to pull a bit more. The string was now right around the front of his jaw now and was digging into his fingers. This wasn't a problem, even if he wasn't reinforcing himself. Shirou had already familiarized his body with the feeling of a bow and the rubbing the string put on his fingers. The somewhat painful pressure on his digits were rather comforting and therapeutic to him as he pulled back some more so that the string was now just behind his ear line, which is where most Japanese archers pulled back their strings unlike western bowman who stop just in front of the face. This was a good sign. The pull on the bow was strong, but there was no showing of it snapping under the pressure.
Instead of letting the modified arrow loose, the boy rather quickly allowed the bow to pull his hands back together to get a feel for its retraction. Sometimes a good looking bow with a strong pullback just didn't have the powerful "snap" that made a bow launch an arrow, or would wobble a bit on the retraction that would cause it to shoot poorly. Shirou had created a few of these annoying almost bows in his experiments and each time they had irritated him to no end.
Thankfully, this bow seemed to have neither one of those defects as far as he could tell. Nodding to himself the boy breathed out slowly to himself and began to draw back the string…
o. o. o.
The Next Day:
"Honestly Emiya… what did you do to yourself this time?" Issei Ryuudou sighed as he ate lunch with Shirou, looking warily at the bandages on the boy's cheek and arms. "Every other week you're coming into school covered in bandages with some new excuse on how you got them…"
Shirou laughed lightly before digging into his meal. "It's nothing Issei. I just got hurt testing some new archery equipment back home."
"Oh?" The son of the head monk's at the nearby temple raised an eyebrow. "You mean it wasn't because you were trying to chase off feral and deranged animals going through in your home again?"
The red headed boy managed to hold back his laughter fairly well at his frequent excuse for his injuries caused by Tohsaka. The girl didn't seem to take that thinly veiled insult quite well when she heard how he was explaining his frequent injuries that she was related to… but despite the 2nd degree burns he got that night he believed that the small payback was still worth it in the end. "No… well, yes, I did have them again, but they didn't give me much trouble this time…"
"You really must get better protection for your home Emiya." Issei sighed. "Even though the temple is rather large, spacious, and close to the woods, we still seem to have nowhere near as much trouble with wild animals as you do for some reason."
"Eh. I'm just that unlucky I guess." Shirou shrugged casually as he finished up his meal.
"No kidding." The other boy shook his head. "So were your injuries bad enough to prevent you from doing archery club this morning?"
The faker shook his head. "Nah. It's really only a few scratches. I got to the club on time, helped everyone set up, and did my rounds…"
"You know you really surprised everyone with your archery skills." Issei pointed out. "Even if you've tried it a bit before, I've never heard of someone our age that can constantly get bulls eyes so easily. People are calling you a prodigy and there's word that some of the highschool kids are going to be checking you practice soon."
"They can watch all they want, it's not that big of a deal." Shirou shrugged, not really seeing why everyone was making such a display of it.
Many people were surprised when Shirou signed up for the archery club instead of the kendo club after his very brief fight against Taiga on his first day of school 6 months ago. Even more were surprised when those who didn't know about his hobbies and habits watched him help out the school's maintenance and custodians with the work around the school to such degrees that he occasionally found answers to problems that even they couldn't figure out. It had gotten to the point where Shirou had begun to earn several nicknames including but not limited to "the janitor", since he was fairly good at everything when it came to using his hands. Many people thought that he was trying to be like those old wise strong guys they see in manga and movies who throw people off by working in the most demeaning places. Shirou merely laughed them off when asked and merely replied that he enjoyed getting his hands dirty and messing around with stuff.
Unfortunately, he still managed to get himself into trouble occasionally when he came across bullies picking on others, thus isolating him somewhat from his classmates. Issei thankfully was not one of them and the two boys frequently ate lunch together away from the crowds.
"I've heard that the Tohsaka girl in class 1-A is getting pretty popular." Said apprentice monk sighed irritably.
"And from the way you said it, it's a bad thing." Shirou commented.
"I don't like her." Issei stated bluntly. It was a trait that the two boys shared. They both were rather bad at hiding what they were thinking if they bothered to do it. "I can tell, she's one of those people who are nice on the outside, but pure evil deep down."
"You may be right about that…" Shirou replied almost casually before eating again, making sure his bentou was in front of his face to hide any tells he might be giving off.
Issei smiled. "Finally. Someone who doesn't brush off my comments the moment I voice my opinion about her. Everyone else I talk to about her just look at me like I'm crazy or think that I'm secretly in love with her…" He stuck out his tongue in disgust. "Ugh. No thank you."
Shirou couldn't help but laugh about Issei's response to the evil one. "Haha. I wouldn't keep on trying to convert people against her if I were you Issei. If she really is as horrible as you say, then if you get her attention she might use her despicable abilities against you."
The glasses wearing boy flinched. "Damn… you might be right. I have to be more careful from now on…"
o. o. o.
It was after school and Shirou had just finished practicing at the archery club. Despite his injuries which any experienced person with a bow could tell were the result of a bow shattering in the owner's hands, the boy maintained his virtually perfect shooting record, hitting each and every target dead on much to many of his senior's displeasure, and many other's joy seeing as they were thinking of exploiting his skills to win tournaments. He knew the reasoning for the latter because some of the upperclassmen females normally got very giddy around him whenever he shot and were rather vocal about what they wanted of him.
Plus many of them thought that his red hair was "adorable".
Still, it did nothing to stop the oldest members of the club from forcing him and the other freshman to clean up the club building and supplies, and then a short time later from Shirou offering to finish up the tasks while everyone else went home. It was the last day before summer break and no one really wanted to spend any more time at school than they had to in order to start their vacation and since he of course felt that he was in no real rush to get things started he offered to do everyone else's share. The boy was rather charitable when it came to tasks that were similar to household chores. It sometimes bothered his friends that he offered to do this so frequently, but he honestly enjoyed doing this. The cleaning was rather calming to him and if he helped out others in the process then all the better.
This in the end left Shirou leaving the school at around 7 at night.
"Man… I guess I took longer than I thought this time…" Shirou sighed to himself as he felt the cooling summer air pass him while walking back to his side of town. "I guess I overdid it again."
The boy walked casually home taking some shortcuts through the local park, thinking about what he had left in his fridge and what he could make himself for dinner when he saw something out of the corner of his eye.
"… You're going back home late again Senpai…" Sakura stated as she sat on the swing. "You let yourself do all the work again while everyone left early."
"Yeah…" Shirou winced guilty. He wasn't surprised by Sakura's presence. She had a habit of occasionally being here during Friday afternoons. If he didn't know any better he would have sworn she did it just to wait for him since sometimes she was the only one in the park when he got there… but that would have just been silly. "… I guess I did it again… but I don't really mind it. It helps clear my head a bit…"
"I thought most kids our age try to avoid chores as long as they could." The girl tilted her head to the side curiously. It had been slow going, but ever since the two first met, Sakura's personality had been gradually coming to the surface. She expressed what she felt more frequently now, though she still was rather reclusive compared to the normal 6th grader. Still, most of her positive expressions rarely ever made themselves known.
"Yeah well you know me." The red head laughed. "I'm a bit different than most kids." He shook his head. "So how was school for you? Are you doing well?"
"I'm doing fine…" She said in a way that the boy could tell hid some deeper meaning, but Shirou didn't try to dig it out. It was her own business after all. "My grades are good and so far there haven't been any problems…I'm more worried about you Sempai." She looked at the patches on his arms and face. "You hurt yourself again."
"It's nothing. It was just a bad bow that I was testing out that broke in my hands." The boy waved casually.
"A bad bow?" She asked curiously. "I thought that the school checks out the equipment that it gives to its club members."
"Nah. This one is something I got for myself." Shirou explained to the girl. "I was trying to get a stronger bow for myself and it ended up being of poor quality."
"I didn't know that archery was so dangerous…" She mumbled to the side.
"What? Did you want to join the club too?" Shirou asked, causing the girl to look at him surprised before looking away embarrassed, causing him to smile. "It's not THAT dangerous. I only got these because I was testing out new bad equipment by myself. Other than that happening, which is nearly impossible if you stick to school equipment, it's no more dangerous than normal archery…" He paused. "Well… you have to make sure that everyone is pointing down the field when they are shooting, especially after that one time when one of my classmates accidentally… but yeah, perfectly safe."
"I see…" The girl looked at him with a very complex expression that seemed to be part hope, part joy, part skepticism, and several other emotions. "… So the new bow was for your practicing?"
Shirou nodded. "Yeah. I was testing out a new arrow, but I haven't found the right bow for it yet. I've been looking around, but no such luck yet…" He was interrupted when he heard the growling of both their stomachs. "Ah… I guess I lost track of the time. Fuji-nee is probably going to have a cow when I get back home since dinner's going to be late." He shook his head in frustration before looking at the girl. "I know you'd have to ask your family first, but do you want to come eat at my place? You seem to be pretty hungry too."
The girl froze in her spot. The two had talked in the park multiple times before, but this was the first time that he had actually invited her over. If Shirou didn't know any better, he could have sworn he saw a bit of fear in her body language. "Dinner?" She asked in a slightly quieter tone as she thought about the subject extremely carefully.
"Sakura?" Shirou asked concerned. Something about what he said obviously unnerved the girl. "Is something wrong?"
"Ah…" She stumbled over her words. "N-no… it's nothing Sempai, I was just thinking about some of the rules grandfather set up…" She looked away ashamed before back to his eyes. "… I don't think it would bother them if I went to your place if it's just for dinner…"
The boy nodded, brushing away any concern for the way the girl acted. She frequently attempted to say things only to let her voice die off in the middle of a sentence if she spoke for too long. It had gotten better, but it was far from completely gone. "Right. So long as it's ok with your family. Anyways, come on. I'm hungry too and no doubt Fuji-nee is starving as well. I think I've told you enough about how she acts when she's hungry, so as long as you remember what I've told you what to say and not to say around her… and keep away from her mouth… you'll be fine."
"… I still think that you were stretching the truth when you said she almost ate you once Sempai." The girl muttered as she followed Shirou to his home.
"You'll find out soon enough…" The faker grumbled, displeased that yet another person did not believe that story. "Just don't say I didn't warn you…"
The two children walked up to his home. Shirou noticed that the girl fidgeted as they got close to his door. He guessed that she was just nervous about being in another person's home like that. He pegged the girl as the extremely shy type. Unfortunately for him, as soon as he opened the door, he saw something that made his blood run cold for several reasons.
In front of his steps in the home, there was not 1 set of shoes lying there, but 3…
"Oh no…" The boy whimpered before the familiar pounding of very large legs could be felt by both the children.
"Oi! Lad! Ta hell have ya been!" Sirius roared as he appeared from the opposite end of the hallway. "Ah've been tryin ta stave off ma gut fer 3 hours now an tryin ta keep tat lass Taiga away from Waver afta we all began ta drink ta kill time! She wants him lad. She wants him bad…" He paused as he noticed Sakura hiding as best as she could behind Shirou who was merely pointing and gaping at the large old man in silent shock and rage. In response, the old man began to chuckle mischievously. "Ohohoh! No wonder ya were late lad. Ya've been entertainin ta wee lass here.
A commotion could be heard from deeper inside the house. "Sirius! For all that is holy help me out here!" Waver's frantic voice shouted as what seemed like something human sized was heard slamming into the ground.
"Waver-kuun! Stop running! I just want to have some fuuuun!" Taiga's intoxicated voice slurred, causing Waver's to yelp in more fear.
"How the hell is a woman your size so damn strong?" The male voice shouted both bewildered and scared.
"Heheheh…" Sirius laughed nervously. "Ah guess ah shouldn't have given ta lass some o me special brew… didn't catch onta how much she downed till she was already tryin ta jump him…"
"Your SPECIAL beer?" Shirou shouted in shock and fear. "You gave her THAT? Why would you do such a thing?"
"… Seemed like a good idea at ta time… ah thought ta lass was a sleepy drunk…" Sirius muttered guilty before shaking his head. "Now's not ta time ta point fingers lad! We have ta reign in ta lass so ya can make us dinner!" He paused as he looked at Sakura. "Ah… right. Manners. My name is Sirius McGinty wee one. Ah'm a friend of ta family." He then turned to where the chaos in the home was occurring and put on a hard face. "Hang on lad! Ah'm comin!"
"Today?" Shirou almost cried to himself. "They had to give me a surprise visit today of all days?"
"S-sempai?" Sakura stammered, not sure how to deal with this new situation.
The boy took in several deep breaths and began to calm himself down. "Ok calm down. This is still manageable. At least SHE isn't here to truly make things hell." He turned around to Sakura. "Just stay here. No matter what you hear coming from the room, don't come in until I tell you it's safe. A drunk Fuji-nee is a very dangerous thing to deal with, especially when she's clinging onto someone."
"SON OF A LORD'S LOINS!" Sirius' voice roared from inside. "THE 'ELL DID SHE PULL TAT PEPPA SPRAY FROM?"
"A very dangerous thing…" Shirou shivered before walking down his hallway as if at the end was his execution. "Wish me luck." He smiled at her as if he was going to die.
o. o. o.
After roughly half an hour of screaming, things being thrown, and a combination of Sirius' great strength and Waver using slightly stronger than advised hypnosis the drunk Taiga Fujimura had been put down temporarily and was now sleeping in a ball in a guestroom of the building as the older males and Sakura sat in the messed up living room and Shirou cooked in the kitchen.
"Sorry bout tat lass." Sirius sighed as he rubbed his eyes again. His eyes were still killing him from the spray that Taiga had blasted into his face. "Ah didn't tink tat ta lad would be havin people over…"
"I-it's ok. You couldn't have known…" Sakura shyly replied, keeping her eyes down.
"At least that woman is out of our hair now…" Waver sighed, examining his clothes to see what needed to be replaced before glancing at Sakura. "So you're Sakura Matou…" He mused before glancing at the kitchen where Shirou was trying to make a big and fast dinner. "From how Shirou's been acting near you, he doesn't know that you're a magus in training too…"
The girl's body froze, breathing and all.
"Come off it lass." Sirius sighed. "We're not gonna hurt ya. Yer a friend of ta lad. 'Sides, ta Waver is damned familiar wit ta grail war here."
Sakura shivered as she looked at Waver skeptically. "Y-you know of the last war?"
"Worse, I was fairly involved with it too." The 21 year old rolled his eyes. "Dumbest thing I've ever done in my life… next dumbest is helping the Archibald clan stabilize after Kayneth died and talking to that brat who's the next heir… " He paused as the frowned and began to think to himself. "Right… the Matou's usually have a participant as well… so from what I know though… the only servant whose master I didn't know of in the previous war was…" He froze and shivered. "Ah… so berserker was controlled by your family… that clarifies things a bit for me… should have figured it out sooner."
"Ya know… yer gonna have ta tell ta lad about ya bein a magus sooner or later lass." Sirius looked at the shivering girl gently. "He's gonna find out sooner or later. Ta only reason why he hasn't found out already is because he is still pretty new at sensing latent prana in livin tings. He's actually more sensitive ta our craft tan most…"
Sakura looked down again ashamed. "B-but… I just want to keep things the way they are… b-because when he finds out…"
"Ah… ah see…" Sirius nodded solemnly. "Ah happen ta know a bit about yer family's magic an tat old man Zouken." He shook his head as the girl looked at him in shock and fear. "Nasty stuff it is. Ta old bastard isn't much betta. A soul like you shouldn't have ta be put through tat… but Shirou ain't like most magi. He's a pure an honest lad. Ya don't have ta explain everythin to him… but so long as ya let him know yer a friend he'll probably not care about ta small stuff."
"The Makiri magic…" Waver mused, using the original version of the Matou's name before they moved to Japan. "Absorption… or to be more specific "the binding of another onto oneself"… yes it is a rather unusual line of spells to delve into, attributed to water aligned magic I believe… and dangerous, especially if used on a large scale. Still… it is nothing that Shirou would judge you on."
"Who… who are you?" Sakura asked with mixed curiosity and fear at the two older men that knew so much about her family and the ritual.
The two men looked at one another before putting on smiles that screamed that they knew more than they were letting on. "Just some friends of Shirou's father, occasionally helping him practice magic a few times a year and make sure he doesn't do irrational things in his studies." Waver shrugged casually. "Judging from the bandages on him… we still have to work on the latter a bit. Don't worry, we won't do anything regarding your relationship with Shirou or try to pry into your personal life."
"Don't tell old Zouken tat we're here though." Sirius whispered. "He creeps me out. Ah met him once a very long time ago. Nuff said. Jus' tell 'em tat his neighbor brought some gusts over fer diner. It's true since ta lass had some of her friends bring us here from ta airport."
"R-right…" The girl mumbled. She figured she shouldn't ask any more questions of the men. From what she learned, granted that her magical "education" was very different when compared to how the majority of magi are brought up, most magi don't like divulging any more secrets than what was necessary but still frequently had the urge to gloat about their accomplishments. The fact that they only told her their names but didn't tell her if they were part of a clan or not was proof that what they were doing was secret.
"Right… now onta more important matters…" Sirius grinned, deepening the wrinkles on his face. "Ah can tell lass. Ya have a ting fer Shirou…"
The girl blushed and froze in an instant, causing both of the men to chuckle in amusement. "Wh-wh-wh…" She stammered.
"It's not hard to figure out…" Waver smirked. "You were clinging onto him like a lifeline for a while. Plus there's the looks you were giving him…" He waved his hand and sighed aridly. "Though considering how dense and stubborn Shirou can be to things, I doubt he would notice unless you slapped him upside the head and told him to his face how you felt. He's that kind of person…"
"Ya mean like yerself?" Sirius smirked, causing Waver's confident demeanor to crash instantly. "If ah remember correctly, 'twas only ah few weeks ago tat ya got a confession yerself from some lass tat everyone else 'round yer age pretty much knew liked ya…"
"But I almost never even talked to her and…" Waver began to throw out excuses before glaring at Sirius. "Hold on… how the hell do you even know of that? I never told you!"
Sirius chuckled. "Ah'm old lad. Ah have connections and ah keep mah ear to ta ground." He looked at his fingers casually. "… Like how ah know which o tem lazy stuck up bastards ya've impressed an which ones are actually gonna give ya sometin special soon… sometin along ta lines of a position or a title if mah sources are right…"
"Dinner's up!" Shirou called as he walked into the room with several plates, interrupting Waver's further investigation into what he would be receiving in the near future. Looking around as he put the plates down he noticed Sakura being more rigid than normal. "Sirius-jiji, did you do something that scared Sakura?"
"Wha?" The old man sputtered, his mouth half full with food already. "Ta hell lad? Why did ya automatically gun fer me ta moment ya tink sometin's off?"
"Because other than Fujimura, you're the one that responsible for things getting chaotic most of the time." Waver smirked as he began to fill his plate with fried rice and some quickly warmed up meat.
"Ya wound me lad." Sirius dramatically held a hand to his chest right over his heart. "Ya wound me deep."
"Just play along with these two Sakura." Shirou sighed. "They're both really good guys… if not a bit weird at times…"
"Says ta lad who wants ta be a superhero…" Sirius snorted.
"Stop bringing that up already!" The boy shouted defiantly. Clearly this wasn't the first time he was made fun of for this particular subject "I just want to help people!"
"Right. Sidekick it is." Waver smirked before putting some food into his mouth.
"Gah!" The boy threw his hands up in the air before going into the kitchen to bring out more food.
"Sempai… wanted to be a superhero?" Sakura tilted her head to the side curiously.
"Yeah. He was really into it too." Waver smirked. "Kept on fighting bullies and stuff like that a lot. Really got on Kiritsugu's nerves after a while." He drank some water. "From what I've heard he's toned it down a bit, but he still gets into trouble every now and then…"
"Ta lad is funny tat way." Sirius laughed. "He can take a beatin like no one else an still get up… an believe me ah know tat fer a fact… but when it comes ta wee tings like his habits an his dreams he can crack under a fetha."
"Sirius-jiji…" Shirou growled as he sat down at the table. "Remember one of the rules you and dad told me about when going to someone else's place for meals?"
The old man paused for a moment. "Always wash yer hands afta takin a dump?"
"He was talking about never messing with the guy that prepares your food you old fool." Waver corrected as he continued to eat.
Sirius paused before laughing sheepishly. "Ah… right. Sorry lad. My bad…"
The rest of the dinner continue as such. Light hearted and rather energetic. Sakura remained quiet throughout the entire thing and while she only smiled a very small amount, Shirou could tell she enjoyed the atmosphere greatly. Shortly after the meal was finished, the girl returned home and Taiga was taken to her home by Sirus, albeit reluctantly since the old man didn't want to be near the girl again so soon after nearly blinding him.
After that though, it was time for an evaluation.
"So lad… how have yer studies been doin?" Sirius asked curiously as they all stood in the boy's back yard.
In response, Shirou instantly traced 7 swords around him and fired them all off at once at the wood pile he had been practicing on the night before.
Sirius whistled, clearly impressed. "Not bad lad. Tat ta most ya can do? How far can ya project tem things from yer body?"
"At best I can make around 10 before I start making mistakes on the tracing process." Shirou explained. "From what I can tell it's mostly in the excelling the manufacturing process. Doing the same weapon repeatedly rapidly makes it hard to make everything exact on that step. As for how far I can make them from me…" He frowned in concentration as a sword was made roughly 4 meters from his body. "That's my limit so far, but I've been getting better at it."
"Impressive…" Waver mused as he looked at the swords lumped in the wood shatter all at once. "Is there anything else you've been working on?"
"I've been experimenting with bounded fields and I think I'm ready to start testing out some basic security and prana leak prevention barriers in case I ever need to make a workshop alone somewhere else…" The boy began to think. "Also other than basic repairing spells and my reinforcement improvements, I've gotten pretty good at basic healing spells too… but that's only because I've had to use them on myself so much…" He paused and looked at his arms. "Well I could use your help on something Sirius-jiji."
The old man raised an eyebrow. "Eh? Sure. Tat's what ah'm here for. What do ya need lad?"
Shirou responded by producing his latest attempt at a bow and his modified sword-arrow. "I've been trying to get this bow to shoot my altered sword like an arrow, but I can't get the bow right. Reinforced ones aren't strong enough, and no matter what ones I try to come up with despite the materials I try to implant into the duplication material composition step, I end up with a bow that either isn't strong enough or just blows up in my face."
"Shooting swords as arrows…" Waver shook his head as Sirius took the bow to examine it. "I want to say I'm surprised… but I can't after seeing the Archer of my war in action…"
"Ah… ya've used an interestin' compound fer dis bow…" Sirius mused as he examined the modified weapon. "Usin alteration ta give a normal projected bow ah modified shape an den alterat'n it again ta infuse it wit stronger materials… a bit heavy in terms o prana cost ta make, but all tings considered it's definitely sometin worth continuin' ta research since yer projections are so damn bloody good…" The old man mumbled to himself, both spells and comments, as the bow was magically gutted in his eyes and mind. "Ah… it's too brittle. Close ta what ya want lad. T'would fire off a normal arrow wit gusto, but it would still blow apart if it shot sometin big enough… which ah'm guessin happened already…"
"Good guess…" The boy looked at the fellow red head with no amusement in his eyes or tone.
"Hmm… have ya tried carbon tubing lined plastics yet lad? Ah've heard tat they're pretty solid an strong…" Sirius began to bounce ideas off of the boy.
"Some, but so far they haven't given me the strong recoil I need to launch the sword." The boy sighed. "I've also tried reinforced fiberglass with carbon fiber lining, but that just broke apart the moment I tried to pull it back…"
"Fiba glass sucks as a magic conducta lad." Sirius commented. "It's so full of gaps tat if ya try ta fill tem in wit prana it only makes it more brittle in the process of hardening it." He pulled the bow back again several times to test how strong it was before taking the altered arrow and examining it for a bit as well. "I see… so ta strength an ta flexibility have ta be tat much, but still retain ta original shape afta release even afta bein fired a bunch a times…" He shifted the objects so that he was holding both up with one hand and the other was checking his pockets. "If tat's ta case… ten… ta bloody hell did ah put…" He mumbled to himself as his massive hand sunk deceivingly deep into each pocket, no doubt much larger inside due to some sort of bounded field that he had set up in all his pants. "Aha!" He cheered as he withdrew the massive hand from one pocket to hold a rather large slab of what seemed to be like a black plastic. "Found it!" He cheered as he showed it to Shirou and Waver, no doubt expecting praise of some sort.
"Um… congratulations?" Shirou said confused.
"It's a large black brick." Waver stated bluntly.
"Ah ta hell wit bot of ya." The eldest of the three shook his head. "Dis is a new plastic ah've been workin on in me spare time. In addition ta makin mystic codes, ah also occasionally try ta make new materials an compounds ta make new products. Ya know. Fire enhancing cloth. Metal fer daggers tat don't have lightning sub element feedback, stuff like tat." He tapped the plastic in his hand, making a dull sound in the process. "Dis here is plastic tat is rich in ether, mixed wit carbon tubing, about half a dozen oter secret materials tat ah had ta lift from several government research facilities in order ta make just right, an very flexible an very resistant ta prana fueled attacks, but is still bloody hard ta put a dent or a crack in or permanently bend outta shape witout ta proper method ta do so. Ah was originally gonna make an armor outta dis stuff but the bloody fool of a lord tat ordered it got himself killed recently on an apostle hunt." He shook his head before sticking it in front of Shirou's face. "Try alterin tis stuff inta a bow an tell me what ya tink lad."
Shirou blinked before irritably grabbing the surprisingly light thick chunk of plastic and channeled his prana into it. The material may have had some resistance to things like swords and magic fueled fireballs, but the material was still rather compliant to being molded via prana. Giving the material the concept of "bow" and reinforcing it rather quickly, the boy soon had in his hands an exact model of the bow he had loaned Sirius, only this one was completely black. Once more he tested the experimental weapon, the strength, the pull, the flexibility. It all passed. A quick examination into the structure and composition of the bow told the boy that the material itself was definitely not something that could be easily made or accessible to. Most of what he found in it were things he had never seen or come across before in any other object he had found ever.
"Well?" Waver asked curiously. "How is it?"
"Other than the fact that I've never even seen anything close to half the things in this stuff…" Shirou started off skeptically. "… I can't see anything wrong with it at the moment, but I have to actually test it out first to be sure."
"Well ten what are ya waitin for lad?" Sirius asked as he tossed the boy his modified sword. "Test 'er out."
"Excuse me for being hesitant after 3 weeks of having these things blow up in my face…" Shirou grumbled under his breath before notching the bow with his arrow and took aim at the pile of wood, drawing back the string with his enhanced strength, taking aim…
… and watching in stunned silence as the released spinning sword drilled through not only the logs but halfway through his bounded field enhanced concrete Japanese style wall that separated his property from the streets next to it.
Waver whistled, clearly impressed. "Not bad for a first shot. You could do some real damage with that thing if you keep practicing with it and not blow your cover of being a magus. I'm almost eager to see how strong it could get if you put a prana burst behind the arrow when you fire it off." He looked at Shirou. "Let's see, give him a tan… a headband, throw a little dirt on him… and I do believe we have a child Japanese version of Rambo on our hands…"
"Gahahaha!" Sirius laughed at Waver's joke. "Why not? He even already has a girl chasin' after 'em!"
"Not funny!" Shirou yelled defiantly. "Sakura's just my underclassman! There's no way she has those kind of feelings for me!"
This only caused to Sirius to laugh even harder.
"Damn it I said stop laughing!" Shirou yelled as he projected and launched several swords at the old man. Unlike what would normally happen to a human that was hit by several flying swords head on at roughly 60 mph, these swords merely bounced off the old man's skin doing no damage. They did however make the old man stop laughing and glare hungrily at the boy.
"Ah… so since ta lad tinks tat he has a few new tricks he can start ta orda me around… is tat it lad?" Sirius grinned dangerously as he began to walk threateningly to Shirou. It was at that point that Shirou remembered why Kiritsugu didn't like arguing with Sirius or getting on his bad side:
Sirius McGinty. Master of reinforcement magic, structural based magic, and rune based magic. Mystic Code crafter. Average One.
With his vast comprehension of material based magic combined with his ability to utilize all 5 primary elements, Sirius was capable of making weapons for just about everyone that came to him for help. He knew enough about warfare that he made exactly what his clients needed to suit their style and was capable of testing them out to the extremes, no more no less. However when he himself wanted to fight, he utilized the magic he enjoyed the most: reinforcement. Taking the relatively simple spell to levels that to this day are unheard of anywhere else, the man was supposedly a juggernaut on the battlefield, toughening his body to a point that it was said that he once went toe to toe with a rather powerful dead apostle ancestor of all things using only his fists back in his prime. Combine that with the vast amount of equipment he has hidden on his person and his access to all 5 elements and you had one of the most dangerous magi to ever step into a fight period. It is said that even the enforcers are wary of angering the old and powerful man, but no one is dumb enough to ask them if it was true.
Thankfully, the old coot was a bleeding heart and an overall nice guy once you got used to his rough personality.
Shirou knew that there was some merit to those rumors that Waver had told him. During his training in England, no matter what Shirou did to his projected weapons, not a single one was able to do any sort of damage to the old man's stronger hide during the spars that left the boy exhausted and somewhat injured on the ground. He had hoped that his projected and fired swords could at least stall the old man…
Obviously he had forgotten how ridiculously tough the old man's skin could get in an instant.
"C'mere lad! Let's wrassle!" Sirius shouted with sadistic glee as he charged at the boy, eager to remind the redhead of his place.
Panicking greatly, Shirou instinctively brased himself. His first thought was to reinforce himself in order to reduce the damage, but a small pull in his mind most likely induced by his recent progress yanked him to do a spell that so far had not only yielded no results, but he honestly didn't know how to enact the spell in the first place other then the small feeling of what should be done. "My body is made of blades…" He muttered. However unlike last time, new verses had somehow come to his mind, reminiscent of how he thought of himself and how others described him.
"He can take a beatin like no one else an still get up… an believe me ah know tat fer a fact… but when it comes ta wee tings like his habits an his dreams he can crack under a fetha."
"Remember Shirou. You are a sword. You are strong, but you can still break if you aren't taken care of. You have to remember that you are a human as well. In that way you are more fragile than either one of those two things alone."
"Iron is my blood… and glass is my heart…" He whispered with unknown conviction… just before Sirius tackled the disproportionately small child with glee.
Waver's eyes widened… and not because he just saw a massive old man tackle a small child with superhuman strength. "That… that was…" He whispered in disbelief before a shout of pain reached his ears… from Sirius.
"Ta bloody hell?" The old man picked himself off of Shirou and patted himself down to examine all the scratches on his body. "Feels like ah just tackled a metal cactus!" He glanced down to see an unconscious Shirou passed out on the ground from the blow, his clothes having similar cuts to the ones on Sirius, but his body was more or less unmarred.
"Sirius… did you hear that spell he was chanting?" Waver asked warily as he walked to the two males.
"He was mutterin' sometin'… but ah was a tad bit too excited ta hear em…" The old man scratched his head sheepishly, that is, until he noticed the sharp look in the boy's eyes. "What's wrong lad?" He grunted in a significantly darker and concerned tone.
"Sirius… he just recited the first 2 lines of THAT aria." Waver stated ominously.
The eldest of the three froze momentarily before looking back at the boy. "… Ah… ah see…" He grunted darkly. "Musta instinctively an accidentally set up an innate bounded field on his body ta replicate ta first line. Kiritsugu told us tat was one of his reality marble's powers… but ah didn't tink he'd accidentally do sometin so complicated an advanced so soon."
"That makes two of us." Waver nodded. "In a way it is a good thing that he is one step closer to utilizing his reality marble to its fullest potential… but on the other it's a huge risk to allow someone so young to start studying innate bounded fields. Remember what Kiritsugu told us about when he applied his family's crest to making a field for his body? Merely doubling his speed was enough to nearly break his body down completely. If the boy tried that with the 3 circuits he has on him…"
"Ta lad would tear himself apart ta moment ta spell would end." Sirius nodded solemnly, knowing of magi who had ended up in such a condition utilizing similar spells. "Good ting we got here when we did. We were gonna bring him back wit us for ta summer break in a few days… but now…"
"It's fine Sirius." Waver interrupted. "We'll just make sure that he doesn't practice any dangerous magic while we're here and explain everything when we get him to your other place. It's too much trouble to change the tickets now. You said yourself, you got Shirou a combat teacher right?"
The old man nodded. "Aye. Ah just wonder how lenient wee Bazett is gonna be on ta lad when she realizes tat I dragged her away from her missions ta teach a brat she might have ta hunt in ta future…"
o. o. o.
A/N:
(Starts dancing in a devil suit) I am evil bas-tard! I am evil bas-tard!
Sorry for the late chapter, but yeah, I have another story and all that crap. It was also kind of hard to write this chapter since I was stuck deciding how the story should continue, being focus more on the training for a bit and do more character development or screw the development and go straight to the war. As you can see, I went for the former.
As for the comedy sections of the story. Some people like it, some people don't, personally… I just do it to get it all out of my system since Sirius and Taiga are the only ones that I can truly channel chaos in and still make the story reasonably on track.
As for how old Bazett is gonna be, she's 6 years older than Shirou, so she's about 18 right now.
So… yeah that's all I got for right now. Gotta actually start watching/playing ataraxia now to see how the hell she acts and stuff for the next chapter… if I use her in character instead of just referring to her. Damn it.
So review! Worship the log! Freaking get set for Fate Zero next month and all that crap! And Review again!
