There was nothing like a good workout session; RITSUKA wasn't a muscle bro or anything, but he appreciated the burnout from a good exercise. He had to skip out on using the facilities to help Pardo with a little project of hers but now he appreciated getting to relax afterwards as he made his way back to his room. As the automatic door closed behind him though, he heard the swooshing of something fast flying. "Huh?" He turned around to see nothing before hearing rapid footsteps passing by outside. "What was…"
"Phew! Thought I was never going to escape them…" RITSUKA looked back forward to see the ELF version of his Master barely managing to keep hovering. "I'll be passing out on your bed now if you don't mind."
Without another word, ELF Ritsuka flew over and collapsed onto the bed. RITSUKA couldn't help but let out a small chuckle at the sight; he also couldn't help but pity the ELF. He had managed to avoid it but the gift from Mobius had quickly found himself being pulled all around by most of Chaldea… mainly the female population. Apparently, a miniature version of Ritsuka was highly desired.
Knock knock!
"I'm not here!" ELF Ritsuka whispered-yelled, shooting up and going to find another spot to hide.
"Gimme a second!" RITSUKA waited for a few seconds before answering the door to see… "Uh… Mobius? Why are you here?"
"To pick up my creation, of course," the snake-woman answered with a tone that asked if there was any other reason. "He's been manhandled the past few days and I say he's in need of some maintenance."
RITSUKA didn't argue with that; it wasn't his place to. A part of him did wonder how she knew ELF Ritsuka was in his room but chalked it up to her putting a tracker or something. Either way, he glanced back and called for his counterpart's counterpart. "Huh? Oh, Miss Mobius," the ELF breathed a sigh of relief before floating over to her and resting in her arms.
"Now then, let's make sure those quarreling fools didn't damage you too much." With that, the two left and RITSUKA could finally actually rest… only for another pair of knocking to come the second he reached his bed.
'Oh what now?!' he grumbled as he answered it to see it was Sakura.
"RITSUKA, why was Mobius here? And have you seen the ELF Master?"
…Was this how things were going to be from now on?
As Ritsuka finished up with his daily duties, his mind wandered towards the gift Mobius had made for him. He pitied the recreation of himself having frequently seen him being chased around but the others all over Chaldea. "I wasn't made to be passed around by a bunch of girls!" He complained as he crashed in Ritsuka's room a couple of nights prior.
At the very least… ELF Ritsuka helped ease the load off his back by dealing with the more clingy Servants for most of the day.
While making his way to the cafeteria though, he passed by a certain room; it had been newly occupied and he decided to make a sudden housecall to make sure nothing too weird was going on inside. As he was about to knock on Mobius's room/lab door though, he felt a presence next to him. Turning around, he saw— "Oh, hey Sakura."
"Any reason you're going to see Mobius?" She narrowed her eyes at his raised fist.
"Just checking up on her," he answered only for her to frown.
"You didn't check up on me in my room."
…Ritsuka ignored that remark for the moment. "A-anyway, were you following me?"
"No, I needed to talk to her about something too," Sakura replied honestly as far as Ritsuka could tell. Either way, it didn't need to be said that she'd be accompanying as he chatted with Mobius. Under her watchful eyes, Ritsuka knocked on the door.
A few moments later, it opened to reveal… not Mobius? "Oh, hello. You're the Master of Chaldea, correct? And Sakura as well." The ELF that greeted them had wavy green hair similar to Mobius along with a somewhat similar headpiece. She wore an oversized lab coat with various straps on top, one of which fastened a book to her side. One of her green and pink eyes was covered by an eyepatch as well.
Fortunately, Ritsuka didn't have to worry about a name as Sakura immediately recognized the small artificial being. "So she built you again, Klein."
"Is that a surprise?"
"Klein, huh?" Ritsuka repeated as he memorized the name. "Nice to meet you, I'm—"
"Fujimaru Ritsuka, I'm already aware," Klein cut him off. "I assume you're here to see Mobius. We were just about finished with work." Without another word, she floated off— assumingly giving them permission to enter. Sakura went in first, glancing around in distrust before motioning for Ritsuka to follow after.
He glanced around and was admittedly amazed at how quickly Mobius had transformed the standard quarters into a full fledged laboratory; must be that Caster Class Skill coming into play. As Klein had mentioned, said Caster was hard at work on… something at one of her workbench. "Oh, it was you two," she remarked upon glancing back. "Klein, finish the calibration if you would."
"Yes," the ELF nodded in affirmation before taking her creator's place.
"Any reason for paying me a visit? I doubt I've done anything yet to warrant such a thing," Mobius smirked. It didn't escape her notice how Sakura was resting her hand on her sword's handle. "Will you ever relax around me? I assure you, I have no ill intentions towards anyone here."
"For now."
"I don't recall you distrusting me this much, Sakura. Any reason why that's the case now?" Despite asking, the tone she had made it clear Mobius really didn't care for Sakura's obvious distrust. "Why don't we go back to how things were before— staying out of each other's way?"
"I'd love to, but only once I've figured out your goals here," Sakura replied.
"I only responded to his call out of curiosity if that's what you're asking," Mobius glanced at Ritsuka. "And as of now, I'll do as our Master says as it suits my interest."
Before Sakura could reply, Ritsuka spoke first. "And if your interests change?"
"Hmm…" The serpentine woman placed a finger on her chin as she thought of an answer. "We'll see what happens then," she finally answered. "But as of now, you're good enough of a test subject to warrant further research." Her previous mischievous grin turned into a devious that slightly unsettled Ritsuka.
Fortunately, her balloon was popped by Klein joining the conversation from the workbench. "What she means is that interested in your capabilities and exploits. She's been pouring over the action reports of your previous missions," her assistant said in a slightly exasperated voice.
"I don't need you translating for me, Klein," she huffed. "But I'll admit she's telling the truth. To be as blunt as could be, I want to know how a simple person like you accomplished a feat us at Fire Moth failed to do— saving the world."
A normal person might be offended by being called "simple," but Ritsuka was not as normal as he wished he was. "I didn't do anything; it was ever—"
"Everyone at Chaldea working together; yeah yeah, I've got that," Mobius rolled her eyes at his attempt to refute the feat. "But the Grand Order would have fallen apart should you have gotten killed in action, and I refuse to believe it was only luck that got you through."
"Are you implying he's not as he appears?" Sakura finally spoke again, sounding offended in Ritsuka's place.
"Of course I am, but that's not what the reports say," the researcher voiced her doubts. "Although I'll admit again that I've yet to see Master on the field with my own eyes. Perhaps it simply is him being blessed to be able to overcome his obstacles by all the deities in this world. But until I've come to a conclusion, I'll continue keeping a close eye on him."
The glint in her eyes told Ritsuka he should be careful lest he ends up being an actual test subject… Nothing out of the ordinary to be honest. "Then I'll try my best to meet your expectations then," he chuckled much to Mobius's amusement.
Sakura, on the other hand, was not amused. "Can you not play along with her schemes?" She sighed but muttered under her breath, "But I suppose that's just the sort of person you are…"
"I'll take that as a compliment," Ritsuka smiled, having overheard her.
"You really are a weirdo, you know that?" The off-handed remark didn't come from any of the others but from ELF Ritsuka, who floated over to them with Klein. He then turned towards his creator to complain, "Couldn't you have based me on someone less… passive?"
"Hey, I'm standing right here," Ritsuka pointed at his smaller copy to which the ELF apologized.
"I mean that in a good way! All I have to go off is your previous mission reports and you mostly just went along with basically everything that happens."
"I've learnt to accept things as they are; case in point—" he not-so-subtly glanced at the others in the room (except Klein).
"...Why don't I take issue with that?" Both Sakura and Mobius sighed at the same time. The former though decided to calm down by grabbing ELF Ritsuka and holding him close again.
"Hey! I have rights, you know?!"
"Let's leave, Master," Sakura stated before turning around and heading for the door.
"She really goes at her own pace now," Ritsuka muttered. Was she always like that, or did she just dislike being around Mobius so much? Though from the scientist's comment, she wasn't like that before when they were alive— not to this extent at least. In any case— "Stay out of trouble, Mobius, and good luck with your experiments. You too, Klein."
"That's the first time a lab rat told me that," Mobius mused before grinning. "I suppose it's only right I tell you to take care too."
With that, Ritsuka followed Sakura out… where they immediately ran into their new feline friend. "Oh, there you are! I was looking everywhere for you two," Pardo cheered upon finding them.
"Did something happen?" It didn't sound like anything bad, but Ritsuka's curiosity was piqued. The Assassin's response was to grin before pulling out two stuffed plushies of… Ritsuka?!
"Tadaa~ they just went on sale today! The Queen of Sheba, Caesar, and I worked hard to get these made so that our little friend here doesn't have to suffer anymore," Pardo proudly declared even though everyone knew that was not the reason at all. "Since we're friends and all, I've saved two just for you guys."
Ritsuka gratefully took one of the plushies and stared at it with scrutiny. He briefly wondered how they managed to make one of him so fast; it's only been a few days since ELF Ritsuka showed up so how did they make enough to be able to sell them? Sakura, meanwhile, took the other one without loosening her grip on ELF Ritsuka who was now claiming she could let him go now that she had a replacement.
"How many did you make?" Ritsuka asked as he inspected the plushie closer.
"Oh, I wanted to start small at about 50 units just to test the waters. But then those two told me we should multiply that number by ten," Pardo sighed. "We compromised and had 250 made but they still insisted it was nowhere near enough."
"...Pardo?"
"Hmm? Yeah, Master?"
"You probably should have started with a thousand units."
Just as he finished saying that, a shrill scream echoed through the halls coming from one Queen of Sheba. "-gency! Emergency! Felis, where are you?!" They heard her frantic cries before the Caster emerged from around the corner. "There you are! We have a problem on our hands!"
"Nya? What is it?" Pardo tilted her head though Ritsuka could already tell what that emergency was.
"We're completely out of stock for the Master plushies and they're still demanding more!" The Queen of Sheba cried. "Meltyrillis immediately bought fifty and now the others are buying in bulk!"
"What?!"
"I think we better leave them to deal with that," Ritsuka whispered to Sakura who nodded in agreement… before he noticed she had somehow snatched the plush he had. The two along with his ELF counterpart were now all in her arms as Sakura walked away without him. "...Well, better that than me."
Honestly, he was somewhat surprised they hadn't tried selling merchandise of him before…
Once again, Ritsuka found himself in the summoning room. If the streak keeps going, he would probably find himself walking out with another of the Flamechasers. They seem to all be coming to Chaldea now. 'Just hope that isn't a sign of something.' He felt himself already shuddering to think about what he'd get dragged into next with them when they each already contributed to his Servants fighting one another.
Either way, he recited the summoning chant and waited for the results. Sure enough, when the flash of the first triple-bands died down— "Berserker; codenamed "Decimation, but if you wish to call me by my name, it is Kalpas," the masked man introduced himself in a straightforward manner. "I do not care for what reason you summon me, simply point me towards your enemies and I'll turn them to nothing.".
Well… he doesn't seem to recognize him so despite looking like a modern day person barring the mask, Kalpas was probably not a— "Wait… do I know you from somewhere?"
…Never mind. "It's probably a long story. We can talk about that later," he tried to smile through his underlying nervousness. "For now, can you step off the circle?"
The new Servant did as told and moved from the centre of the room. After a couple more Craft Essences, another golden light followed by three bands shone. The next voice that came was a soft one. "My name is Aponia; I am of the Caster Class. I hope we get along well," the nun-like woman smiled at Ritsuka before noticing Kalpas behind him. "Huh? Is that you, Kalpas?"
"Aponia."
…Alright, definitely Flamechasers.
A/N: Finally got this chapter done. Been lazing around a lot while trying to catch up on HI3's story because a certain person shared certain art and now a certain character has been stuck in my head for a while. You guys will probably see something coming out of that in the near future. But back to the story at the moment, Mobius is taking an interest in Ritsuka that is detached from RITSUKA; Pardo accidentally broke the economy by making Ritsuka merch; and the nun and the mask is now in Chaldea. Those two won the next wheel of names so now we only have a handful of names left.
Now to figure out what sort of storyline to do with those two, and all I can think about is related to SAKURA. How she managed to become the central character of this side story that was supposed to be about RITSUKA, I have no idea. Anyway, see y'all next time!
