It was a cold autumn night, and the crickets were chirping. It was, all in all, a picturesque night in Japan. While many families were either asleep or had decided to eat out at a restaurant, one family was just about to get its first child. Of course, this was by no means an easy feat for the woman in labor. But it had resulted in that family's first and possibly their last child, a boy with fiery red hair and golden brown eyes that looked around in apprehension before meeting the gaze of his mother.
"Awww, he's so cute," she said with untold amounts of affection in her tone. "Say, what should we name him, dear?" The woman asked the man who could have only been her husband.
"Hmmm, You know how my father always wanted to call me Shirou?" The man asked.
"Yeah, he always wanted you to be something like a warrior, in other words, warrior son, which when shortened is 'Shirou,' right?" The woman asks her husband.
The man nods in agreement, "Exactly Sumiko," he nods again, "Exactly that."
"Huh," she scoffs, almost as if holding in her mirth, "Do you think I truly have such a bad memory, Masaru?"
"I have thought no such thing, Sumiko," the man said in faux pain. "Either way, are we calling our son Shirou, yes or no?"
"Of course we're calling him Shirou. It wouldn't do to not name him after his grandfather," Sumiko intoned with a measure of grief.
"Shirou Reiko, yeah that sounds nice," Masaru said with a kind smile and a voice filled with joy.
And after all this time, the baby in his mother's arms just started to realize his situation. 'Wait, did... did I... did I get reborn as a... CHILD? DAMN THAT WOMANIZER OF A MAGUS, I SWEAR ONCE I GET MY HANDS ON YOU, YOU'RE GONNA WISH THAT VIVIAN HAD KILLED YOU INSTEAD OF CHASING YOU INTO AVALON, YOU GODD-' Not known to the enraged and scorned magus, his feelings of rage transformed into cries and wails.
Sadly for the wrought iron magus his cries went noticed and misunderstood by his mother who thought he was hungry, "Oh are you hungry already dear?" The woman smiled before unbuttoning her shirt and proceeding to 'feed' him.
Sadly, for poor Shirou, his mind would repress this moment and all other times this will happen.
When Artoria Pendragon had agreed to her mentors she hadn't expected to be reborn as a child with the exact same name that she had before this all happened. In all honesty she could tell with no issue that her family was a bit 'obsessive' in trying to make the perfect heir to the pendragon name after all when they had given birth to her they were rather disappointed in the fact that she wasn't a man. It was a rather 'odd' experience for the former king of knights who had once been the king that they idolized so. It was even more apparent that they didn't care for her much when they had already been trying to commence an arranged marriage before she was even a month old. Did they really see her as as breeding stock so? Hell she had already heard that they were planning on having another child one that hopefully could be the next heir to the pendragon line and wield caliburn.
It was honestly very surprising that in this timeline caliburn hadn't been broken. But that was all she was able to gain by eavesdropping on her 'family'. In terms of impressions that she has received from them they were rather poor. Well except for one man her uncle who had taken a liking to her and that she could tell was dealing with things that she had no knowledge on. Though she could tell that he was probably troubled by the news which she had heard from her eavesdropping and more private information.
"Oh would you look at the time it seems that uncle Ector will have to leave have a good night Artoria," her uncle, Ector, said before turning and leaving her room. He would be here quite often when her parents couldn't be here, spending most of his time playing with her.
As he left her mother entered the room and tucked her to bed, it wasn't like she needed to sleep that much if she had to she could always just activate her magic core and she would be able to stay up... a bit longer. Her current body had many, many limitations at such a young age which would be expected after all she was in the body of a child who was barely a few weeks old...
In all honesty in moments like these she wondered how Shirou was faring did he have his name too like she did or did he get a new one that she hadn't heard of . She hoped that he still had the same one it would make it exponentially more difficult for her to find him once she left her family when she became old enough. After all it's not like anybody would care except for Ector.
5 years later
It has been 5 years now that he had been reborn and in all honesty Shirou had been living a pretty uneventful life, he had encountered no strange encounter that had dealt with the supernatural and there where no news broadcasts that mentioned anything even remotely suspicious. It was on all accounts an ordinary childhood, it was a shame then for that nothing except for the most feint of magical signatures could escape his nose, there was a reason why his old acquaintance compared him to a magical bloodhound. That was why when a scent of dark energy that sensed demonic in nature wafted into his nose he was on guard after all he had already sensed such signatures during one of his 'hunts', but it seemed weaker than the one he had remembered almost as if it was a kindling compared to the ones of true daemons and higher demons. It was odd, in a better sense but he didn't let that lower his guard. Alas he could never find the source.
On another note entirely, when Merlin had said that he would be getting a magic core on the same level of Artoria he hadn't taken him completely seriously, he would have to apologize on that front after all the magical energy in his core felt overwhelming to him. And because of that he wouldn't dare to even activate it unless he was actually forced to his circuits increased quality would do just fine, if his past circuits could be considered poor in terms of quality while above average in terms of quantity his current circuit quality would be considered unheard of even to the most proficient of mages and somehow his circuit quantity had also somehow doubled. So in his mind he could very much just really on his 54 EX quality magic circuits instead of relying on his core, which knowing his luck would undoubtedly attract attention to himself and so he wouldn't use his core unless forced to and he would do it in a similar manner to which Artoria did so by reading Excalibur history when it considered her time not its ginormous history unless he would want to give himself a headache.
But still ignoring the scent of dark energy not much really happened except that he had made a few friends surprisingly, one of these was a boy with the name of Issei Hyoudo, he was a nice kid If a bit younger than him being, 4 years old compared to him being 5, but still it was Issei who initiated their friendship. He had a pretty good time with the kid playing and doing other such things with another one of Issei's friends, one Irina Shidou, it was honestly kind of funny how Issei never noticed her as a woman always thinking of her as one of the 'bros' as he would put it. But he was a nice kid but it was weird to call another kid Issei when one of his closest friends in his past life had that exact same name..
"Sumiko no-Obasan is Shirou available," the child, Issei, asked excitedly.
"Oh Issei-kun, yes he should be available give him one moment," the woman answered politely.
footfalls descended down the steps as Shirou Reiko appeared down the stairs said goodbye to his parents and started to head out with his friend, "So Issei what should we do today?"
"Hm, oh I was thinking that we could play in the park Irina isn't available today I already asked her parents," the boy answered the old soul.
"Playing in the park seems nice," Shirou said.
In Britain
Artoria was enjoying her day playing with her younger brother, and her younger sister a boy by the name of Arthur, the pendragon family's heir, and a girl by the name of le Fay. It still felt weird playing with them in all honesty, not because they were her siblings, no because of their names, Arthur as in King Arthur, Le Fay as in Morgan le Fay it was honestly a surreal experience for her.
"Big sis, big sis want to play with us?" Le Fay asked her older sister.
"I would like to yes Le Fay but mother and father have called for me today I'm sorry," Artoria said to her little sister with disappointment before turning to Arthur, "Please make sure that she doesn't injure herself by accident Arthur."
"Of course what type of older brother would I be if I couldn't even accomplish that," he said with a bit of pride.
Artoria smiled before turning to leave and go and meet her parents after a couple of minutes she arrived to where her parents had requested her presence. It was an odd occurrence for her 'parents' to call on her they tried to ignore her during her childhood until they had birthed Arthur and Le fay, what made this an even more odd occurrence was that they wanted her to wear a white dress.
"Ah Artoria dear you've arrived," her 'mother intoned', "come I'd like you to meet your future husband."
"Future... husband?" The young girl questioned.
"Indeed your future husband," her father answered, "you will marry him once you are of age."
The boy spoke next, Artoria still stuck in her stupor, "Ah.. You are perfect, so, so perfect I can't wait to taste you once you are of age hopefully you will taste better than the people father brings for me." He was plump almost a circle, his clothes could barely even fit him and judging from his height he was most certainly a teenager probably three times her age.
"Wait, wait what do you mean future husband?" Artoria questioned her parents.
They in response looked at her in stupor before realizing that she didn't understand what they meant, "Ah it's simple dear you see our family are allied together and to increase our bond together we decided to marry together our oldest children, since you are still the oldest one we have and he is theirs you will marry once you are 18 years of age."
The youngest one there looked at her parents then her 'future husband' who was still panting trying to take in all of her features, and then the man who seemed to be the father of the teenager. Noticing this the man spoke, "My son's name is Claudas it will do you well to memorize it by the time you are of age dear."
Now Artoria was pushed away by her parents saying something like they have to discuss which family name she will take when she marries, she heard none of that instead she was angry, no enraged and confused. Enraged that her parents who had done nothing for her think that they can force a marriage on her and confused on why they would do something like this, she knows they said that it was to strengthen their bonds as allies but she couldn't help but feel that there was a different reason. 'Do... do they want to get rid of me? Or do they think me breeding material? Why? Why do they want to for all intents and purposes sell me to another family?'
Author note
Hello everyone and thanks for reading this chapter, I'm sorry that there is no action this chapter was mostly made to explain where they are and their familial relationships, and as you can see Shirou for once in his life doesn't have the worst possible lot this time it's mostly Artoria as she's basically being sold to another family since they're angry that she wasn't a boy and they are basically trying to sell her off not only because everybody but Ector hates her but because they are probably being paid.
And on another note thanks you for reading this chapter, last chapter and thank you for following and favoriting this story that I had made in the spur of the moment I'll try to get as many chapters as possible out during the summer but they aren't going to be huge, unless I spend a week making it or I have a hol lot of inspiration.
So thanks for reading this story and giving this admittedly amateur of a writer attention it means a lot.
And by the way thanks for the reviews.
