The Servant watched impassively as his Master left for bed. She couldn't see him, though he had an inkling that she had an idea that he was watching.
It mattered little.
The moon hung low in the sky, its silver light casting long shadows across the monastery's grounds. And while there were a few people still milling about, it was just about time for them to sleep as well. Even in a world where magic was abundant, it was ingrained in these people that staying out when it was dark was a bad idea.
All in all, it was the perfect time for any would-be assassin to try and get in.
He was under no delusions that Lonato would've just happened to have plans detailing a possible assassination attempt. In fact, it was more likely that it was all deliberate, meant for whoever killed Lonato to find.
That, or Lonato was that confident that it wouldn't be found that he actively carried the missive on his person.
He couldn't help but smirk to himself, unseen to anyone. Either way, it wouldn't have mattered. With Lonato dead, he was one step closer to…
To what, exactly?
His smirk gave way to a frown. Even as he positioned himself along the outer rim of the monastery, eyes peeled for anyone suspicious, he couldn't help but think. Just why exactly was he doing this?
At first, he had to do it. Not out of compassion. No, it was all to protect his contract with his Master. He needed her alive to keep the mana flowing into him. To repair his Spirit Origin. To not die.
After that? He couldn't say.
Was it merely the continuation of his contract, an obligation to ensure the safety of his Master? Or had something shifted within him, a subtle change in his perspective? He scoffed as soon as that thought came into his head. At the end of the day, he was still a Heroic Spirit, albeit an Alter.
Which meant that he was dead. And, unlike what some may say, the dead can't change. By his very nature, he was merely a copy of the original, who was likely within the grasp of Alaya still, forced to be its dog.
His contemplation was interrupted by a faint rustling near the edge of the monastery grounds. His instincts, honed by countless battles, snapped into focus. Without a sound, he moved towards the disturbance, his movements a blur of efficiency and precision.
As he approached, he spotted a figure skulking in the shadows, moving with a caution that suggested they were well aware of the risks of being caught. He didn't hesitate; he materialized Kanshou, his finger just a hair away from pulling the trigger.
The figure halted, turning to look around in obvious wariness. The would-be intruder turned, revealing not an assassin, but a young, wide-eyed student from the monastery. Unknowing of the gunblade tracking his movement, the student motioned somewhere behind him.
He was lucky that Emiya still had some trigger discipline.
Behind him, a student, female this time, came out. Going by their rather disheveled clothes and hair, he could guess what they had been doing
Silently, he dismissed his weapon. Not without sending an annoyed glare at the unaware students. It was things like this that really annoyed him. As much as Garreg Mach was a monastery, it was also an officer's academy. He would've thought that these students would at least have some discipline when it came to their hormones.
Then again, these were noble children. They were much too used to getting what they wanted, when they wanted it.
Emiya perched himself on the highest point he could find. He had taken to doing so, his Reinforcement and status as a Servant allowing him to see across that entire surrounding area. It wasn't up to par with some other abilities that he knew of, but he was an Archer for a reason.
…What?
Other abilities? He knew that he knew of them. But for the life of him, he couldn't remember w̵̯͎̳̆͐͑̂̾̈́̽͆͐͗̃͂̍́̽͝ḧ̴̺͈́̿͂̾́̃͠͝ę̵̨̰̠̙̗̤̖̤̲̩̦̰̆͗͑́̔̿͂̐̏̑ͅṙ̸̬̟̜̬͇̺̞̙͎̜̪̐́͝ͅę̴̨̟̺͇͓͙̺͎̺̟͕͎̋̃̿̂͋̊͊͌̅́͂̕͠ͅ.
He groaned as pain infested throughout his body. He could feel the angry burn that had taken over. The gold cracks that he found himself with glowed with strikingly eerie yellow.
It wasn't that that was painful. It was the sheer feeling of his body being pulled apart. He could hear the sound of his fake flesh tearing at the seams. His tendons and muscles twisted and wrung.
And through the haze of pain, he remembered.
Or rather, he remembered that he needed to remember.
Remember what, he couldn't remember.
Remembering was painful, that was what he remembered.
Remembering was bad, he remembered.
Remember. Remember. Remember.
He saw that sea of stars.
He needed to figure out why he had arrived here. Why he was injured when he arrived. Why he had been summoned near Byleth and her Goddess Core.
He needed to figure out why he kept forgetting all this.
He needed to keep a hold on his Spirit Origin, lest all of that work be for nothing.
He needed to find out why Byleth seemed so damn familiar.
Emiya blinked. The night sky was illuminating the vegetation below. Nothing was amiss. He craned his neck.
That there was nothing that seemed out of place made it likely that someone was trying to make it look that way.
He jumped, astralized, into the air. Gravity had no hold on him as he practically flew. Jumping from one post to another, he followed a patrol path that would give him the best view possible, without anyone the wiser.
And there. In the distance.
To anyone else, it would've been nothing. The dark making everything blend too much to see. For an Archer, it was screaming at him.
Marks on trees, following a meandering path into the forest. Following them proved to be simple. Whoever had made these marks had not been careful enough to hide them properly.
The trail led Emiya deep into the forest, a dense canopy overhead muting the moonlight and casting everything in an eerie semi-darkness. Despite the reduced visibility, his heightened senses allowed him to navigate with ease, his every step silent on the forest floor.
A clearing, where the trees thinned out to reveal a small, hidden campsite. It was clear from the fresh embers in the fire pit and the makeshift tents that someone—or some people—had been using this spot as a base of operations. Scattered around the site were various items: maps, weapons, and what appeared to be plans for some sort of operation.
Emiya's eyes narrowed as he took in the scene.
He recognized some of the maps. The internal layout of Garreg Mach, with some others that he didn't.
None of this made sense. Should the enemy have abandoned this site, they would've taken the weapons and plans. Instead, they were all there.
Either they were supremely confident that none of this would be found, or they intended on being found.
Silently, he began to investigate the camp, his movements a ghostly whisper against the night. The maps caught his attention first. He spread them out, examining the detailed annotations and the strategic points highlighted around Garreg Mach. These were not the haphazard plans of bandits or petty criminals; they bore the mark of someone with intimate knowledge of the monastery and its defenses.
As he sifted through the documents, a small, sealed letter caught his eye. It bore no insignia, but the seal itself was intricate, suggesting it was from someone of considerable importance. Emiya broke the seal and unfolded the letter, his eyes scanning the contents quickly.
A correspondence between these people and whoever was coordinating them, it seemed. Whatever this operation was, it didn't explicitly say. Just that it would take place during the Goddess's Rite of Rebirth.
His ears picked up sound from outside. Without a moment of hesitation, he Traced an exact copy of the letter he had picked up, still sealed this time, and placed it back onto the desk. In the next moment, he was astralized, the real letter being slipped through the back.
Just as he did so, a figure in white, with a pointed mask came in, stretching as they did so. Emiya, invisible to the world, had Kanshou already pointed at his temple.
He hesitated.
Not due to some sudden bout of morality, no.
It was practicality that stopped him.
Over the time he had been in Garreg Mach, he had been killing bandits, making a name for himself. Becoming the monster that everyone feared. That was just part of the plan, in actuality.
He had, originally, thought that these bandits were nothing more than opportunists. They would camp out near the roads, and would harass, steal and kill any person that came along. With the monastery being, well, a monastery, as well as the center of the religion, it was more than likely that a group of civilians would be wandering along there.
That these same bandits conveniently forgot that this was also an officer's academy was something that Emiya ignored. Bandits weren't often known for their intelligence, after all.
He had carved out a bloody path across those same bandits. Intimidation was the name of the game. He was marking this area as 'his' territory, and that anyone was encroaching on it was fair game.
Killing them was the easiest part. He could've done so with a few bullets, and they would've died instantly, without anyone knowing. And that was the thing - if no one knew that he was here, then they would still be actively moving in repeatedly. In a world like this, where mass communication wasn't really a thing, the bandits couldn't know not to move in, after all.
So, he cultivated an image of brutality. The most efficient manner of preventing bandit attacks was to make sure there were no bandits in the first place. He couldn't do that with money, since they'd just keep asking for more. Neither could he persuade them through diplomacy. He wasn't exactly known to be diplomatic at the best of times.
The only thing that he could do was rule them through fear.
And yet, no matter how many rumors he had spread with his actions, more bandits came along. More and more, to the point where even he was getting tired of killing them.
And all of it was because of this little operation.
He had seen the maps. He could see marks on it that more or less pointed to where he had found pockets of bandits.
The entire point of the cannon fodder being sent into the meat grinder wasn't to raid Garreg Mach. It was just the intel gathering portion.
The figure in white, now idly flipping through the papers on the desk, seemed to be a key player in this elaborate chess game. Emiya's initial impulse to eliminate the threat was tempered by the realization that this person could provide valuable insights into the enemy's plans and objectives. Perhaps, even lead him to the mastermind behind this scheme.
Slowly, almost painfully, he let Kanshou fade. It went against the instincts that had been drilled into him, to kill a threat when he found them.
It was lessened by the fact doing it this way would be the most efficient way of dealing with whatever was going to happen on the Rite of Rebirth.
As more white cloaked figures started to fill the camp, bringing with them more and more supplies, Emiya faded into the dark. He would keep an eye on them, sure. But for now, he was willing to let them do as they please, if only to strike at the hydra's head when he could.
Then, after that, maybe he could do what he needed to do.
He furrowed his brows.
What did he need to do?
Commissioned by: FireRogueWolf25
A/N: If you like what I do and want to support me, check out my P-atreon at P-atreon•com(slash)Almistyor.
And a special thanks to: FireRogueWolf25, brutalcrab and Tassimo.