There were some things that just couldn't be let go.
Delayed, but never forgotten.
Achilles shook his head, a shuddering breath entering his lungs as the blood in his body coursed through his veins and ignited his divine nature. A blaze of green enshrouded him with a presence similar to nature, yet versatile as water.
The gifts of his mother remain with him even now. Her affection, her fear, everything that she had done to raise him from a boy into a man, and his decision to forsake all that in pursuit of his dreams.
He was to be the greatest of all warriors. The mighties, the noblest, and most heroic.
Instead, the Iliad sang of his rage, his tragedy.
Rider pointed his lance forward, standing across from Heracles at a distance his speed could cover in an instant.
He could feel Shirou dissuading him from the link he shared as Master and Servant, but he brushed it off into a vague corner of his mind. For all his carefreeness, it wasn't as if Achilles did not have his own aspirations and ambitions beyond a leisurely time.
No. He was a Greek Warrior, the finest of the Myrmidons.
"My name is Achilles, son of Peleus, and child of the Sea Nymph and Goddess of Water, Thetis!"
Rider knew Archer already knew everything. Yet it was all formality learned from Chiron to tame the beast of a killing machine within him and turn him into a Hero.
Archer stood in the same vein, as a Hero from a past age to that of Achilles' coming.
Archer too knew the rules of honor and etiquette.
"Heracles, son of Zeus, child of Alcmene." Archer responded in kind, taking a stance in which he readied his bow and kept his obsidian ax-sword in reach.
Heracles's words, though not yelled, reverberated with a steady surety that stunned an old man who flinched at the name of the mother.
"Let's have a fair fight!/ Let's have a fair fight!"
-Shirou's voice urging two of Greece's mightiest heroes to reconsider was left in deaf ears.
There were just some things that Shirou could not see nor understand beyond the history of mere weapons.
A duel now was fool hardy, dangerous with the spectators within the vicinity, and yet it would still be done.
Honor bound?
Duty bound?
Pride?
It was none of those things! Rather, it was inevitable.
If not now, then when?
When Shirou wouldn't have to protect the spectators and could actively interfere?
To stop Rider and Archer now would force Shirou to use a Command Spell which he'd surely hesitate over while constrained by protecting those around him.
This was the best time.
This moment carried a sentiment inherently acknowledged by both warriors, a meeting that was impossible in their lifetimes.
Light flickered in Rider's eyes as he assessed his adversary and in the next second a shockwave of wind created a pressure tunnel that left a jetstream in his wake.
Known as the fastest Hero of all Greece and renowned throughout the world, his footspeed was immortalized in one of his Noble Phantasms, Dromeus Komētēs. Invoked by stepping on his chariot, he didn't even need to fully utilize it to prove why there was no one before or after his death who was equal in speed.
And it showed.
Goosebumps traveled down Ais's back as she distantly heard the drone of an impact before a fierce wind blew her bangs violently behind her.
In slow motion, Rider's foot dug into Archer's chin, Archer's jaw clicking as his body began to lift, and in the next moment, an explosion kicked up dirt and sand.
Sent flying, Rider rapidly chased after Archer and followed with a volley of blows at Godspeed, each erupting with the roar of a miniature storm and buffeting wind.
From the naked eye, Archer's form became a blur tossed into the air, and then hit in one direction and into the next, never touching the ground.
Each blow sent reverberations throughout the surroundings, some even causing stone to split, and trees to uproot.
"..." The expression on Finn's face was one of silent horror that matched many others.
The answer to Riveria's question about what had happened to her and Finn during their sparring was answered.
With a speed and power like that, it wasn't a question of dueling, but a matter of even surviving.
If it were anyone else but Archer under Rider's relentless assault, their bodies would have already disintegrated or be reduced to a blood bag from the sheer number of blows released in an instant.
Punching Archer up into the air, Rider leapt faster than Archer's ascent to deliver an ax-kick down on his abdomen to send him crashing back down to the earth.
Within a blink of an eye, Rider appeared, heels digging into the dirt as if he'd just come from a sprint. The orange scarf around his neck was billowing in the ensuing wind of his halted momentum, but his expression was hardened with exasperation.
"That damn immortality." Rider muttered, spitting blood out from a split lip.
Bastard had given as much as he took.
Archer could not keep up with Rider's speed, but Archer could ensure a blow by trading one hit for several of Rider's.
Worse, Heracles stood up from the crater he'd made with hardly a change in expression. In battle he remained somber, a man molded by the tragedy and redemption of his legends.
Heracles possessed the Noble Phantasm that represented his twelve labors, God Hand that made him practically immortal.
Different from Rider's immortality granted from bathing in the Styx or even his armour, Heracles gained true immortality through his passive Noble Phantasm, God Hand.
Damage of lower or equal divinity was mitigated, and beyond simply defeating him, he would have to be killed twelve times using twelve different methods. Each method of death would be effectively negated the next instance, and not due to resistance, but due to distortional phenomenon bordering on True Magic.
Ironically, Rider was starting to understand what it was like for his enemies to face him at the peak of his legend, and that reaction speed- Archer was truly a rival worth defeating.
"Your speed is as remarkable as legend," Archer acknowledged, but his words caused no small amount of tension to Rider. "I cannot hope to match it with my body alone, but weapons were made for such a purpose as to match those beyond our personal capabilities."
Heracles fully drew his bow, the empty quiver at his side filling with arrows.
"To defeat you, is to strike you down in an instant no different from the poisonous nature of the hydra," Archer's magic energy rose with the scent of ozone. "I will show you the technique that bring's a weapon's capabilities to the pinnacle."
It was the sole Noble Phantasm Heracles could ever need.
Murmurs spread throughout as static charged the air, but Rider could not care to focus on any of them.
The bow in Heracel's hands imposed a danger impossible to ignore.
"Nine Lives,"
Two words, and a crushing force dominated the area with Heracles at its center, arrows notched and eyes focused with unerring accuracy.
To miss once would have been his death in the process of a particular labor.
"The Shooting Hundred Heads."
The Labour of the Hydra, and the heads that continuously regenerated if not struck in tandem.
Arrows launched at Godspeed and brimming with divine penetrative force flew at once, leaving no room for error. It was to the point that the air before Heracles's bow distorted in real time.
Rider's pupils dilated as the recipient of the attack.
As a Heroic Spirit capable of moving in Godspeed, his perception was fast enough to see the trajectory of each and every arrow fired at him, and it all led to a single conclusion.
The attack was inescapable.
His immortality was different from Archer's. Mitigations were similar, but Rider only had a single life, and enemies with divinity equaling his or greater were effective in overcoming the mitigations.
That monster…
Each arrow.
Each and every arrow was tinged with a divinity of A-Rank and higher to the point the Gods watching could feel them from Orario.
Rider balled his hands into fists.
'Can't lose.'
With a speed that rivaled that of the incoming arrows Rider drew forth his strongest trump card.
A familiar shield was instantly held in front of him.
-[Dearest Achilles. This shield was meant to protect you who matters the most to me.]
A gift from his mother that he had passed to her only to have it forced back.
With her watching, Achilles could never show defeat. Not again.
'Mother- your son will not lose here.'
Upon the words, a shield would bloom with a verdant light.
"Akhilleus Kosmos!"
The legend of the Iliad and the world within began to unravel once more under Rider's directive.
Those that saw it for the first time had no choice but to lose their breaths.
Marble columns rose from a rapidly expanding dome, filled with Greek architecture, culture, and the life depicted in Achilles's legend. From the earliest memory of a hazy faced Thetis, to the pride of a man he would become, and the war and battles that spanned afterwards, the shield contained it all.
A world within the confines of the shield, a work of equipment none but the best of the smithing Gods could hope to create, and that was why it was blatantly evident.
The mark of Hephaeastus's own work was obvious to the spectating blacksmith God's own eye, and yet, she could not remember having worked on such a masterpiece.
She grew choked with uncertainty much like her fellow Gods who tried to interpret everything as best they could from the flash of visions they had received rather recently.
That battle portrayed, that world, that shield, to the eyes of all those who could not comprehend the events depicted but recognized the characters and Gods involved in that war, it might as well have been a prophecy.
Such things were not unheard of in the realm of the Gods.
A war of that scale, the combatants, and the actions of the Gods that had yet to even be carried out were telling signs.
Most of all was the image of Thetis cradling a deceased Achilles and returning him to the embrace of the waters where the greatest of the sea nymphs wept into seclusion.
The shield spoke of Demi-Gods, Gods, and Mortals in a violent conflict that led champions to their deaths, and needless slaughter of thousands.
It was a harrowing development.
In truth, the shield and the world it depicted was the greatest of the Noble Phantasms Achilles possessed, able to shield all within its world no matter the intent of a God, Demi-God, or Mortal.
Braced behind it, Rider would never be damaged unless his adversary wielded an Anti-World Noble Phantasm.
The endless barrage of arrows Heracles unleashed was met by an impenetrable defense and bounced off with a reverberating bang before dissipating into motes of blue light.
Heracles hummed in thought, putting away his bow and reaching towards his sword, knowing that arrows would never be effective so long as Achilles was armed with his shield.
A stalemate then?
Rider could not hope to damage Archer enough with raw force, and Archer could not easily breach Rider's defense.
Yet there was still another method.
Rider whistled, leaving his shield deployed as he summoned his horse-drawn chariot to his side.
("Rider!") Shirou's tone grew increasingly sharp in the wind. ("You're going too far!")
The Master could certainly tell what Rider intended to do.
Yet why was Rider going to this extent?
The answer was simple.
No matter what Rider had done in life, it was never enough due to the difference of time.
From the era of his forefathers and a period of legend and adventure, the feats of Heracles and his twelve labors resounded.
Mighty Achilles was never said to have surpassed the legacy of Heracles, only said to have clawed his way to be seen as equal…
That's why there was meaning!
Archer surely understood, perhaps even better than Rider, and that was why Archer made no bid to stop him, much to the Master's chagrin.
("A-Archer, you too?")
Now, here as a Servant, the two most renowned of the Greeks could compete face to face as equals.
Veins popped over Rider's temples as he mounted his chariot, pushing the boundaries of his own limits.
'I will win!'
Back then as it had been all along.
He'd made a promise to himself and to his Mother to be the greatest warrior even if that meant a prophecy of death.
That had been his choice, and his mother's regret!
Even now she was watching, supporting with hands clasped at his victory.
He would show her that her child was truly the best.
…That his death had not been in vain only to play second fiddle to the feats of the past era!
He would show them all what it meant to be named Achilles!
'Run as if your life depends on it…!'
For him whose life had always been as fleeting as a shooting star.
He would light up the night sky.
Rider gritted his teeth and dug his heels into the flooring of his chariot, his arms bracing as tethers of magic energy shot out from either side of him, clasped tightly in his palms.
The unraveling tethers of magic energy shimmered before anchoring themselves around Rider's deployed shield.
"Xanthos! Balios! Pedasus!" Rider spurred his horses forward.
The ground rumbled all at once, drag marks etched into the dirt as the weight of an entire world began to move in tow.
Rider's muscles bulged, his forceps growing more and more defined as he put in the strength and pulled.
"Run!"
Neighing, the three divine horses pushed on their hooves and began galloping towards the sky, and with them, pulled forth by Achilles himself, was the weight of the world in his shield.
"Archer! See if you can stop this!" Rider goaded with clenched teeth.
Heracles raised his hands up to receive Rider's attack.
His body alone was capable of becoming his strongest weapon.
Rider did not waste a second for the burden on him was too great. Directing his chariot forward, Rider dragged his entire legend to battle over Heracles head.
Hands to the sky, Heracles bore the weight of Achilles's world in his strained palms, a ferocious storm of magic energy swelling from the point of contact.
Rider gasped as his charge was halted, his three horses huffing from exertion.
"Is this still not enough?!" Rider grunted, pushing harder and harder as the ground quaked beneath.
Was he destined to only be an equal to Heracles? Never to surpass?
"HERACLES!" Rider gritted his teeth and pushed onward with all his being.
As a mother, how could Thetis not react to her son's earnest efforts?
The crest of Thetis shone brighter and brighter behind Achilles, creating the image of Thetis with her palms pressed to her son's back, asserting that she'd joined in his struggle.
"OOOARGhhh!" Rider yelled, gaining momentum.
Heracles finally grunted, his knees buckling and bending little by little as he surely began to struggle.
Watching that struggling form, a feeling coursed through an old man that had never appeared within him so strongly before.
Guilt and paternal instinct.
The visions, the horrible things that pitiful child, his child, had to endure at the hands of that wretch.
The old man took notice of Thetis standing next to him, watching her Divine power ceaselessly funneling into Achilles.
The two were old acquaintances, but for the first time, the old man felt animosity towards her.
Heracles' knees finally gave out, forcing him to press his back along with his arms just to prevent himself from getting flattened, and the old man had had enough.
That child had endured enough.
How could the old man have let the abuse go on for so long, even under the excuse that he hadn't known?!
Tears welled in the old man's eyes.
Dark clouds covered the sky, tendrils of lightning writhing within and warning of a coming storm.
"Thetis," the old man called out to Thetis next to him who flinched at the very sound of the voice.
Stiffly craning her neck, Thetis paled at the thunder brewing on the old man's face.
"You think this old man's a push over?"
All at once, lightning crackled as the image of a thunderbolt manifested by Heracles's side and spurred his divinity to a higher level.
Heracles himself blinked in confusion, but wasn't one to miss an opportunity. Putting strength into his legs, he pushed back up onto his feet and began pushing Achilles back.
"Y-You damn old man!" Thetis quickly got over her initial shock and fear as maternal instinct kicked in. She cursed as she saw her son losing ground. "Go back to your shitty mountain! You loser! Loser!" She wrung her clasped hands dry in transmitted prayer.
The old man's expression grew stony in annoyance, the growing lightning only intensified until a third party finally intervened.
"ENOUGH!"
A loud bang echoed as Shirou appeared between Rider and Archer, a ring of fire surrounding him from a partial deployment of his Reality Marble encroaching outward.
The heat and the steel-like presence of the ring of fire caused no small amount of fascination in the eyes of the Hephaestus Familia, and a blank look from Hephaestus herself.
Regardless, the shock snapped everyone back into attention.
"This. Ends. Here." Shirou enunciated, raising an arm to reveal glowing Red Command Seals at Rider and Archer.
Push their luck any more and Shirou would use them.
Archer nodded and reeled in his magic energy, while Rider reluctantly followed suit.
The sparring was over, but in its wake was an eerie silence.
/-/
Ais, the Gods, and the others who stood as spectators stared at the wreckage of the battlefield, the craters, the ruins, and the stale wind that blew over it.
…
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