(A/N) Hey everyone! Sorry that it's been so long. I was out of the country for a little bit.
I'll try to keep the author's note as short as I can this time around, mostly because I'm tired and wanna go to bed lol. Shoutout to y'all over on pa treon for the support and for voting on the scene that would be illustrated for this chapter. (Speaking of which, my entire pa treon tiering system has been overhauled in mid February to maximise the benefits for you guys. Feel free to check it out!)
Shoutout to noschittsherlock for being an excellent beta reader as always (and for keeping me locked in his basement at gunpoint until he was sure that I would upload the chapter tonight).
Emiya-sensei? will be updated next!
X
There was a thick tension in the air of Takami's office, which was strange if one considered the fact that Takami herself was absent. More often than not, the high-strung woman was at the heart of any conflict that took place within these walls.
Natsuo Ichinomi wore a stern expression as he glared at the empty desk in front of him. Standing at his side were his two Sekirei.
For once, they weren't at each other's throats. They were quite subdued, in fact. In any other circumstance, he'd be worried that they were feeling unwell.
They were curious, and maybe even a little nervous. He felt the same way.
The Disciplinary Squad had received a message from the head researcher asking them to meet her in her office. They were told to keep the meeting a secret. No one could know that they were here.
Not even Minaka.
Something was amiss, and if it was bothering Benitsubasa and Haihane enough for them to be as quiet as they were, then it surely wasn't just him that felt that way.
"Do you think Takami's mad at us or something?" Benitsubasa asked.
He forced his tensed shoulders to relax and he turned his head towards the pink-haired girl.
"No," he disagreed quickly. "If this was just about her wanting to tell us off, then she wouldn't have felt the need to keep it this private. She usually comes to us if she wants something, not the other way around."
Haihane hummed.
"Hey, you don't think it has something to do with what she asked you to do a while back, do you? "
Natsuo grimaced. If that was the case, then their misgivings were justified. That woman had him get in touch with as many Ashikabi with at least three or more Sekirei as possible. All he did was make contact, get the Ashikabi on a secure line with Takami, then leave so as to give the Ashikabi a false sense of privacy. He wasn't privy to what was being discussed. He wasn't supposed to let anyone else in the organization know what he was doing, and she hadn't even given him a reason as to why she wanted him to do it to begin with.
She was plotting something, and Minaka didn't know about it. Even if he wanted to tell the head of the company that she was up to something, betraying her had more consequences than benefits.
As if summoned by their turbulent thoughts, the door behind them swung open and in came Sahashi Takami.
The man didn't bother looking over his shoulder. He waited for the woman to walk around them and take the seat behind the desk.
She wasted no time on introductions.
"I'm sure you've all heard of Karasuba's decision to take an unscheduled vacation."
"Of course we have!" exclaimed Benitsubasa exasperatedly. "Everyone around here is still scrambling. We've had more on our plates to begin with because she barely does any work as it is, and now this? Seriously. I know that she's technically in charge of the Disciplinary Squad because she's been around the longest or whatever, but lately she's been more trouble than she's–"
"Benitsubasa."
Natsuo's voice was much too soft for it to have sounded like a snap, but it might as well have been with how quickly she shut up.
"No, no, she's got the right idea."
Takami's dismissive response was alarming.
The Ashikabi and his Sekirei held their tongue, and so the head researcher continued, "Karasuba is now a liability to MBI. I've summoned the Disciplinary Squad –that's you guys, by the way– so that we can run through how we're going to eliminate her along with her Ashikabi."
The assuredness with which the woman said such a thing sent a shiver down Natsuo's spine. It took a moment before he regained the ability to speak, though Benitsubasa seemed to have regained that ability much quicker.
"Good riddance!" exclaimed the pink-haired girl. "Two on one shouldn't be too bad."
Natsuo's frown fell deeper until it became a grimace.
"Don't underestimate Karasuba," he chided.
Takami leaned forward, the chair's creak audible through the silence of the room.
"Don't underestimate the Ashikabi," she stressed. "If all I had to work with was you three, then I wouldn't even bother."
While Benitsubasa and Haihane's body language made it clear that they didn't appreciate the lack of confidence, Natsuo couldn't find it in him to take it personally.
His eyes hardened.
"That's why you wanted to speak with other strong Ashikabi. Since Minaka probably doesn't want this to happen, you're planning on using competitors of the Sekirei Plan as backup instead of our paramilitary resources. "
Instead of giving him a proper response, Takami shouted at the door.
"Come on in!"
Unlike the first time, Natsuo turned around when he heard the door open again. His Sekirei, who did the same, shuffled back when they saw who had entered.
"You're…" Natsuo trailed off, staring at Sekirei Number Five.
The tall, grey-haired man offered a curt nod before directing his attention to Takami.
"Were the theatrics necessary?" he asked.
She scoffed but offered no comment beyond that.
The sharp sound of hard leather striking the tile floor informed them that Number Five wasn't the only one joining them today. Passing through the entrance was a well-dressed and handsome man with light-coloured hair. His identity was unmistakable.
"Higa Izumi," uttered the MBI employee. They had never been acquainted before today, but the man was a prominent enough figure to be recognizable on sight. He was powerful: both as a modern-day entrepreneur and as one of the Sekirei Plan's contestants. The verbal slip came out as more of a remark of disbelief than a greeting, but the young CEO of Hiyamakai Enterprises was happy to pretend that it was supposed to be the latter.
Higa shot him a curt nod.
"A pleasure."
Natsuo closed his eyes and took a figurative step back. He tried to soak all of this in at once.
Both the Ashikabi of the South and the East had sent representatives. The Ashikabi of the East had even come in person. Either Takami had been hiding her silver tongue from him, or her opinions on the Black Sekirei's partner was more of a shared sentiment than he originally thought.
Takami got up from her chair and leaned over her desk.
"Let's get right into it," she suggested. "We all know why we're here and we all want the same thing, so let's get along. Agreed?"
No one spoke up, so she took the silence as an invitation to continue.
"Karasuba has unfinished business in this city. This is not an assumption. This is a fact." She waited a moment to let that sink in. "I don't understand her that well –no one does– but I know enough to be one hundred percent sure that she and her Ashikabi will be on a flight back to Japan before the Sekirei Plan makes too much headway– soon, in other words."
"We'll go after her once they arrive?" asked Mutsu, trying to follow the train of thought.
Her finger tapped the tabletop twice.
"Something like that. Thanks to Japan's new customs policy, MBI databases will let us know when they step foot on any aircraft heading into the country. If they come back the same way they left, we'll have a little under twelve hours to get ready. If they fly in from anywhere else, then there's a two-hour travel time at minimum between us and the closest international airport. That gives us enough time to get to any of the five airports that they might land at, and more than enough time if they land at either Narita or Tokyo– which is likely."
"An ambush," concluded Higa.
She nodded and followed by addressing the two unaffiliated Ashikabi directly. "That's right. Before anything else, though, let's discuss manpower and resources. This partnership between us has nothing to do with MBI, so, unfortunately, there's nothing that I can do to take the pressure of the Sekirei Plan off your shoulders while we deal with our errant problem child and her boy toy. I doubt that you'd want to commit the entirety of your flock to this effort, nor would I expect you to."
"I'm much too busy to come myself, but I'm not so daft that I don't realize the importance of capitalizing on this," Higa said. "I'll lend two of my own Sekirei –both of them fighters. My assistant will oversee the operation in my stead along with his brain type Sekirei."
"I'll come alone," announced Mutsu. As a Single Number, no one present doubted his worth in a confrontation of this sort. No one made a fuss until he continued, "My Ashikabi will remain uninvolved. I'm acting as an independent party."
"A Sekirei acting without the instruction of his Ashikabi? Strange."
Natsuo was here to act as an extension of Takami, so he didn't feel compelled to speak his mind any more than he had to. Higa did a good job of vocalizing his thoughts for him, though Natsuo personally wouldn't have phrased the comment in such a fashion.
If Mutsu took the quip the wrong way, then he certainly didn't show it.
"My Ashikabi is just a boy," the superhuman entity muttered with closed eyes. "What he's been through during this conflict is not insignificant, but his priorities are a boy's priorities nonetheless. As his guardian, I take it upon myself to make judgement calls that will keep him safe."
Benitsubasa rolled her eyes, but she didn't interject. For all their eccentricities, both she and Haihane knew that this wasn't the time for them to be speaking their minds.
Takami collapsed back into her chair tiredly.
"Right, well, let's get into ironing out the details."
X
"If our pocket isn't where we need it to be, we can tamper with ATC to delay the landing. That will–"
Matsu threw her headphones to the ground and stared at them, wide-eyed, as if they were some sort of foreign object that had magically spawned on her head.
She made sure that the audio of the wiretap was recording. After doing her due diligence, she allowed herself to panic.
Was this really happening? This was a big deal, right? If–
Oh, man. Oh, jeez. Takami was Minato's mom, wasn't she? If she was organizing this whole thing, then that made this mess even more complicated!
Minato.
She had to tell Minato!
The thought died after a moment.
…Did she really have to tell him about any of this?
He was her Ashikabi. She loved him, and she would do anything for him. But… doing what was best for him wasn't necessarily the same thing as doing what he wanted, right? This would be better for all of them, in fact.
"…"
Her traitorous brain reminded her of the moment when Minato declared that he would "save" that duo from MBI. That he would use them as the keystone to joining forces with all Ashikabi and put an end to the Sekirei plan. He looked so confident at that moment. She couldn't help but be smitten with him all over again.
She then thought of the unlikely scenario in which he found out that she knew about this and hid the information from her. How angry and disappointed he'd be.
At her.
"…"
Allying with Karasuba wasn't possible to begin with. She knew that woman for a long time. Did she do MBI's bidding? Maybe, but that didn't mean that she knew her to care about anyone but herself. Minato understood one thing, but the reality of the matter was surely something entirely different.
Only… What if it was possible? Karasuba had been off ever since she was winged. If she had reacted, then there must have been more to the story than even she understood. If Minato actually pulled this off, then ending the Sekirei Plan prematurely was no longer that tall of an order.
Gah! Here she was, talking herself back into it. What a selfish person she was.
"Minato!"
Momentarily forgetting why she holed herself away in a hidden room to begin with, Number Two sprinted out of the room and nearly tumbled down the stairs.
Everyone had to know. If her Ashikabi was serious about all that stuff he was saying before, then now was the time for him to prove it.
X
Miya kept an uneasy smile on her face as she tried her best to stay relaxed.
By all means, she shouldn't have been having any difficulty doing as much. The weather was nice, her garden was tidy, and the engawa on which she was seated felt springy against her knees. The gentle fingers caressing her scalp and combing her hair felt therapeutic more than anything; all in all, in any other circumstance, it would have been enough to lull her to a peaceful slumber.
And yet, it was the hands working behind her that were at the root of her distress.
"You have very pretty hair, Miya-san. The colour suits you quite well, I think."
Trying not to move her neck too much, the landlady gave a slight tilt of the head instead of a polite nod.
"Thank you."
That was all that she was able to say in response. She was too flustered for anything else.
This person's touch was warm. It made her feel safe. It was comforting.
And that's why it was so wrong.
It shouldn't have been any of those things. Someone that she's only known for a few days shouldn't have been this comfortable with her, and she shouldn't have been this comfortable with someone that she's only known for a few days.
Her newest tenant had come down early that morning, still groggy, and made conversation with her as had become the norm over the course of their stay at the Izumo Inn. The topics themselves were fairly innocent, and she didn't think twice when she had mentioned that she hadn't had her hair brushed by another person since her husband passed away. The tenant offered to do it for her after breakfast, and at the time, it felt like a completely normal thing to agree to.
It no longer felt that way.
How long had they been sitting here? It must have been close to noon now.
"Minatooooo!"
They both froze for a second as the loud shriek resonated throughout the property.
Matsu?
"Ah. That was…"
The tenant's voice trailed off as they got up to investigate what was going on in the house. Their presence no longer felt behind her, Miya shot to her feet and followed closely behind. She was ready to run damage control.
What are you doing, Matsu!
X
Minato had a smile plastered to his face as he watched Musubi-san and Tsukiumi-san argue about something or other for what must have been the third time today alone. He absentmindedly rubbed Kuu-chan's scalp as the girl rested her head comfortably on his lap.
"Sup, bro."
He looked over his shoulder and beamed at both Uzume-san and Kazehana-san, who was trailing not far behind her. They looked pretty bagged –their late start to the day likely the result of excessive drinking the night prior– but both showed up fully dressed for once. Uzume-san dropped down on the other side of the dining room table whereas Kazehana-san kneeled right behind him and draped her arms over his shoulders.
He didn't mind days like these. Nothing stressful was happening, and he didn't have to go to work today. Everyone could just take a break and have fun.
Heck! Even the landlady was doing it! She and their new housemate were getting along pretty well. He was happy that she had someone to spend time with.
It didn't take more than five minutes for his hopes for an uneventful day to crash, burn, and die a horrible death.
The sound of stomping feet running down the staircase shook him out of his leisurely appreciation for the simpler things in life. The ruckus was enough of a disturbance to get Musubi-san and Tsukiumi-san to quiet down, and he craned his head back to see what was going on.
"Matsu-san?"
The bespectacled girl might have called out his name, but it was difficult for him to make out over the sound of her tripping over her own feet and crashing to the floor.
As quickly as he could without disturbing Kuu-chan, he shifted her into Kazehana-san's arms and made his way towards the brown-haired woman.
"Are you all right?" he asked, crouching over her worriedly.
It didn't even seem like the gesture had registered with her. Matsu gasped, popped back onto her feet with more athleticism than he's ever seen from her and dragged him back into the room by the arm.
She didn't give anyone enough time to process what was going on.
"Karasuba and her Ashikabi left the country, but they'll be back soon," she relayed. "The head researcher is going behind Minaka's back and wants to kill them so she's getting help from strong Ashikabi and Mutsu was there too and–"
Kazehana-san slapped a hand over the rambling Sekirei's mouth.
"Slow down, girl. No one knows what you're talking about."
Once the palm was removed from her lips, Matsu tried again.
"Takami has decided to kill Karasuba and Emiya Shirou."
The reactions differed from person to person. Musubi-san and Tsukiumi-san looked concerned, Kuu-chan was completely frozen, and… he couldn't really tell what Uzume-san or Kazehana-san were thinking.
He was too caught up with his own thoughts.
A pit formed in Minato's stomach.
His mother? Planning a murder?
That felt wrong. It was wrong. The woman who raised him and his sister all on her own. She fed, clothed, cared for and loved them. He couldn't consolidate the image that Matsu-san was painting of Takami with his own.
His thoughts rewound to the time when she found him being held at gunpoint by the man called Emiya Shirou. Regardless of his intentions, Minato had almost died that day. He, Musubi-san and Tsukiumi-san had to be taken into the hospital.
Was that why she…?
"Matsu-san. Where did you hear this? This is so sudden!"
The urgency in the woman's eyes momentarily made way for a softer expression.
"I have ears in the right places. I'll explain later, Mina-chan. I promise. For now, what's important is that I tell you exactly what I've heard."
He could only nod cautiously at that. If Matsu-san thought so, then he'd trust her. Regardless of how excitable she was, Matsu had a strong head on her shoulders.
Uzume-san chuckled awkwardly.
"Hey, maybe I shouldn't be here? I'll go–"
"This isn't the time for that," interjected Matsu-san in a stern tone that felt a little out of character for her. "You're not fooling anyone pretending that you're not involved in all of this."
Minato didn't have a clue what she was talking about at first. After the awkward silence was prolonged for a few more seconds, which was enough for his brain to figure it out.
"Uzume-san is a Sekirei too?"
He was ignored.
"Besides the Disciplinary Squad, two groups are helping her," Matsu-san continued. "One is a pretty powerful Ashikabi named Higa Izumi. He's the CEO of a large organization. Not MBI large, but still massive."
Uzume-san seemed tenser about that than the others. Did she know something about this guy?
"The second is just a lone Sekirei, but that Sekirei is Number Five: Mutsu. I'm not sure that him working on his own is less dangerous than him working with his Ashikabi, truthfully."
"A Single Number," Tsukiumi-san remarked. "This Mutsu person is strong, no?"
"Very," Kazehana-san answered in Matsu-san's stead. "He was one of the original Disciplinary Squad Members."
Before Minato could get a word in, Kazehana-san continued by addressing him.
"This is a good opportunity for us to disentangle ourselves from Karasuba and her partner, Minato. Let That Woman deal with this."
"I won't let someone die when I know that I can prevent it!" he countered. The boy levelled a self-assured glare at his newest partner.
And I won't let my mother become a killer.
In his mind, that was never an option.
Matsu-san let out a dramatic sigh, cutting the tensions that were beginning to rise. She covered her face with her hands, and she peered at them through the gaps of her fingers.
"You wanted a good opportunity to get in their good graces, right?" she asked. "Well, this is it. Saving the Black Sekirei will throw her for a loop if nothing else, and honestly, I think that if you have any intention of getting them to work with you, it's what you'll have to do."
Tsukiumi-san's fists tightened in her lap.
"I don't like this. Are you confident in our odds, Matsu?"
The brain-type blinked owlishly.
"Odds? What odds? I mean, I suppose they're non-zero as opposed to definitely zero in any other circumstance."
That didn't inspire confidence. Not from Tsukiumi-san or from anyone else.
Minato took a deep breath.
"Let's do it," he said. "We have to do it."
Uzume-san suddenly got up and maintained a stony expression.
"Sorry, bro. Can't help you here."
He couldn't get a word in before she hurried towards the stairs. He could've sworn that he heard her mutter another "I'm sorry" before she disappeared, but he couldn't be sure.
They all watched her leave quietly. Kazehana-san, her friend, seemed particularly saddened.
His confusion melted into a more understanding expression. It wasn't that he didn't understand where she was coming from: she wasn't his Sekirei, after all, and she would probably want to prioritize her own Ashikabi over whatever plans he had. Humans and Sekirei were different creatures, but he'd like to think that he would do the same were he in her shoes.
"Ah. I could lend a hand if you'd like."
A voice that he wasn't expecting spoke up. He whipped his head to the back of the room where Miya-san and their newest housemate stood. The landly stayed a few steps behind and had an uneasy frown on her face.
Wait. How long had they been standing there? Were they here this whole time? Was it fine to talk about the Sekirei Plan around people who weren't involved? Miya-san was one thing, but–
Lend a hand?
Matsu-san stepped in and did her best to defuse the situation.
"Sorry, uh… Maybe it's best that you stay out of this. You're a busy person, right? Always working and all that, and what you just overheard is a little complicated, so…"
As expected, Matsu-san wasn't the best with words around people she didn't know.
The awkwardness was dismissed by a kind smile.
"Don't worry about it! Emiya Shirou is an acquaintance of mine, you see. I have to speak to him about work anyway."
X
Karasuba's first thought was that she felt incredible, but that wasn't really true at all. She felt the same as always, only now her mind was perhaps a little clearer. Less muddled.
The sword that she held tried to strike the enemy once more. Then again, and again, and again.
The enemy was strong.
One time her slash was diverted by a milky thread. Another time it crashed against the carcass of an arachnid. She wasn't getting anywhere, and under normal circumstances, the barrage of her opponent would have been enough to overwhelm her.
But the sword was telling her what to do. How it should be used. She saw it. She remembered it.
These memories weren't hers, and yet she acted on them. Where they came from she did not know, nor did she care.
She wanted this thing in front of her to die. She wanted to kill it.
Her grin was inhuman. The sword in her hands struck faster. Stronger.
The enemy's blows did not lack strength either, however. It was only a matter of time before the beautiful weapon shattered completely.
And so it did. It broke apart and fell to the ground uselessly.
I want it back.
She swung at a twirling spike of stringy material that was threatening to gore her. Despite it being in a broken pile, she knew that the sword would be back in her hands once more. The swing would strike true.
It did.
The sword, perfectly intact, diverted the spike just enough for it to miss her body.
The onslaught ceased for just a moment. The enemy burst out into a fit of maniacal laughter once more.
"Hihihihi… Hahahahaha! I have no idea what you're supposed to be! This is great! Both of you are great! This is better than anything I could've–"
The enemy was cut off by what must have been well over a hundred weapons raining down on her. She wasn't fast enough to get out of the way in time, but she didn't have to be. Her body melted into a puddle of tiny spiders and reformed into a single entity once the sky stopped raining blades.
Shirou appeared by Karasuba's side. Despite the predicament, his eyes were planted firmly on his partner.
"How–"
He wasn't given the chance to get his words out. The silk-like substance was on them again.
X
Shirou gritted his teeth.
He had many questions, but it didn't seem as though he had the time to have them answered.
This Dead Apostle was incredibly powerful. Never did he imagine that she would be the one causing a ruckus in some remote part of the world. It was impossible for him to comprehend what she gained from it, but then again, understanding inhuman monsters wasn't one of his talents.
Arach was going to overwhelm them soon. Combat ability aside, there was a certain quality to quantity: something he understood very well, as when push came to shove, that was one thing that tracing was best at.
And yet, he couldn't produce weapons at the same rate that she could produce her threads. His magical reserves weren't even the issue: low-cost swords were more than enough to deflect the individual strands, but there simply wasn't enough physical space around him to manifest them all.
There was a "field" of sorts around him in which he could manifest his projections. Once that distance was breached, projections were either too costly or simply impossible to produce.
The entirety of that field was already filled to the brim with as many projections as he could manage. He tried to extend himself beyond that –even one or two more would make a difference– but it simply wasn't feasible for him right now.
Damn it!
Karasuba was hanging on much better than he was. Her physical ability was already far beyond the realms of what a human being could achieve, and with her apparent access to his reality marble, he was much less worried about her than he was about himself.
Once the alien crossed his mind, his field suddenly doubled. It was such a sudden change that he almost tripped over his own feet.
He then realized that it wasn't quite that his field expanded, but rather that he had a second one.
Swords began to spawn around Karasuba's head. Their sudden appearance distracted her for a moment, but the blades protected her for the split instant that she lost track of Arach's tendrils.
It didn't take long for her to adjust to the chunks of metal around her. Her smile still in place, she began to move as if they were extensions of herself.
Just as he would.
He thought back to their kiss.
They were always strange to him, particularly due to the fact that it was abundantly clear that their kisses were never normal. Their first was the cause of their strange alien contract, and every subsequent lock of their lips connected them in a way that was more than physical but doubtlessly real.
Very real.
He knew that they served a purpose beyond his understanding, and what happened just now was proving it. Karasuba uttered a phrase –an aria, were this an act of magecraft– and that connection between them was magnified to such an extent that it practically became something entirely different.
Until now, he hadn't put two and two together. His reactions around her. Her reactions around him. The way that she seemed to be able to use his reality marble as if it were her own.
In a sense –one that was in equal parts frightening and incomprehensible from the perspective of someone who saw the world through the lens and the mind of a human being– she had become a part of him.
Was this an occurrence that was unique to them, or were all Sekirei and Ashikabi the same? It would be easy for him to compare the relationship to a parasite and its vessel, but it would have been a comically inaccurate descriptor.
What was once foreign was no longer so.
"Oooh!" Arach cooed. "I like you two a lot! You're stronger now– like two peas in a pod! Yeah, something like that. I'm trying rea~lly hard to keep you both in one piece but you're making that a teeny weeny bit difficult."
Shirou clenched his teeth.
This all filled him with uncertainty, but again, it was the least of his concerns at the moment. If they weren't able to keep themselves alive to begin with, then nothing mattered.
"I am the bone of my sword. Steel is my body, and fire is my blood."
Arach's eyes lit up once he started the incantation, but they held no fear.
"Oh! Oh! I feel it. This is your reality marble, isn't it? Please do show it to me!"
…What?
Was this something that she expected him to have?
Her knowing grin widened.
"Why look so surprised? If you were trying to keep a secret, you weren't doing a very good job of it."
He didn't rise to the taunts. Instead, he turned to his partner whose eyes he could feel burning a hole into the side of his head.
She seemed ecstatic despite the seemingly insurmountable obstacle in front of them. With nothing more than the short exchange of locking gazes, he could understand what she was thinking.
She was ready for whatever it was that he was about to do.
"I have created over a thousand blades, unaware of good, nor aware of evil."
How strange. At this point, he shouldn't have had the energy to get this far. For whatever reason, he felt like he could make it.
"I have rejected stagnation. With a heavy heart, the scales are weighed."
Reality crackled. His vision began to blur, just as he knew was the case for anyone and everything close by.
"I will become Unlimited Blade Works."
X
Karasuba was disoriented. The world around her was suddenly not as it should be.
She wasn't in the bushes of the mountainside anymore. The new location was almost the complete opposite, in fact.
The sky was a clear blue. Almost unnaturally so. The cracked earth beneath her feet was flat, empty, and went on for as far out as the eye could see.
Weapons stuck out of the ground like grave markers. They were literally countless.
Somehow, it felt as though she'd been familiar with this place her whole life.
Shirou was beside her. She didn't even need to look at him to know that much.
"Amazing! Fascinating!"
It was only then that she noticed that the enemy was here too. The woman was making exaggerated movements, swivelling her head back and forth to show that she was soaking everything in.
For whatever reason, the fact that the enemy was in this place was upsetting. They were an outsider. They didn't belong here.
The enemy tapped her chin and hummed.
"Oh my… oh my… how sad this place is. How I'd love to look around just a little longer. It's quite beautiful in its composition despite the… dreariness."
Karasuba didn't know what this make-believe art critic was on about. All she knew was that one moment they were in a forest, and the next moment they were here. She didn't even know where "here" was.
Was this… something to do with her Ashikabi's magical abilities?
The enemy had a mocking twinkle in her eye.
"You seem confused, girl. Are you lost? Has he never shown you his–"
A cleaver the size of a boat sliced off the enemy's head. It reformed a second later.
Karasuba took it as a signal to take the offensive. The stringy tendrils weren't getting in the way anymore because random weapons were shooting out of the ground to intercept them faster than they could form.
In the blink of an eye, the Sekirei was in front of the brunette. Making use of a technique that was not her own, the enemy was trapped by three simultaneous strikes coming at her from multiple directions.
All three landed, and yet it didn't really matter. Just like all of their attacks until now, it went right through the non-human entity uselessly.
How frustrating. How was she supposed to kill something that she couldn't cut?
"That weapon isn't going to be enough!" Shirou shouted at her. Before she could shout back some smart-mouthed remark, the Japanese blade vanished and was replaced by something that could barely be called a weapon.
It was a slab of metal with a handle and an edge, and that was as much of a resemblance as it bore to anything usable by a human. It was just as wide as she was and twice as tall.
If she were anyone else, the sudden weight being placed in her hands would have toppled her over and crushed her to death.
Unlike the last sword, this one didn't give her any immediately apparent way to use it. It didn't force any memories of a previous user onto her, and there wasn't an incredibly specific technique that came to mind. And yet, she somehow had a good idea of what it could do.
She swung the large mass at the unphased yet unprotected target with herculean strength. Once the weapon's blade spontaneously combusted, however, the enemy's lackadaisical posture shifted to a much more guarded one.
Karasuba's eyes were forced into a squint by her impossibly large smile.
Her downward swing was intercepted by a wall of thread: more thread than she'd seen the enemy use at once until now.
Something like that wouldn't stop her. She was too strong. Her weapon was too powerful.
She was too powerful.
The flaming metal sliced right through any obstacle that dared to get in her way. Again, she sliced into the enemy, but this time she heard something beautiful.
A scream.
Karasuba was blown off of her feet by a wave of white and the giant weapon fell out of her hands. As she tumbled to the ground, her spinning vision caught sight of her Ashikabi rushing to take her place. He didn't have the same level of strength as her, but he had his own means of keeping their spider-like adversary occupied: a dozen copies of five-meter-long flaming poles appeared from the horizon and slammed into the cloud of dust in which the enemy lay.
He wasn't taking any chances.
Karasuba and Shirou were both still as statues, taking deep, steady breaths. They watched the now-larger dust cloud disperse with hawk-like attention.
Their enemy was not dead.
She was on her hands and knees taking exaggerated gulps of air. Her clothes were a burnt wreck, and scratches littered her form. For the first time, it seemed as though they had actually been able to do something to her.
"Fire… bad…" she croaked out between pants. "How did you…?"
Shirou's face was stone cold.
"Wild guess."
The enemy looked like she wanted to laugh, but it was obviously too difficult for her to do so.
"That was a powerful mystic code," she noted. "Can't imagine it being useful to anyone else, though. It looks pretty unwieldy."
Neither Shirou nor Karasuba made any move to say anything in response, so the enemy was happy to fill the silence.
"Ah, well, right. Sounds like this is gonna be a bit more of a hassle than I wanted it to be. Sorry. I'm a little scary-looking in this form."
They weren't given a chance to figure out what the dead apostle lady meant by that before she vanished and a giant, eight-legged monstrosity took her place.
Karasuba liked to think that she was a pretty composed individual, all things considered. There wasn't much that could rattle her, let alone plant a stupefied look on her face.
This was one of those things.
The monster roared. Loudness aside, the sheer force of the air leaving that thing's gullet made a shockwave that almost knocked both of them on their rears.
"Shit!" Shirou cursed. Something happened, and he stumbled to his knees. "I won't be able to keep this up for much longer!"
She didn't know what "this" was, but she felt something similar within her being. It wasn't her Norito, but–
No, that wasn't true. It was her Norito, but something else, too. Something more.
The world around them began to crumble away. Literally.
She knew that she had to act. An entirely different weapon was summoned to her hand.
A katana.
Her body practically glowed with untapped power. It was the culmination of something that she didn't quite understand or have the desire to piece together at that moment.
The beast stomped toward them, and it was at that point that she crouched down, ready to pounce like a panther on its unassuming prey.
That her prey looked like a twenty-meter-tall eldritch abomination was beside the point.
She emptied her mind, and as she did so, her instincts took over. What she was about to do was nothing more than the natural order of things.
This was the closing act of Sekirei Number Four's Norito. Her Ashikabi gave him half of himself, and this was the half of herself that she gave to him.
As the sword was swung, the image of a closing gate crossed her mind. The blade made contact with the force of those two strange, immeasurably large yet surely imaginary doors crashing shut against each other.
"Long Blade of the Underworld: Cerberus."
Her aim was true, and Karasuba's strongest attack impacted thick chitin-like plates before everything around them vanished.
X
They were back in the forest.
Karasuba could barely hear anything over the sound of her rapidly beating heart. She was exhausted.
With whatever strength she had left, the Sekirei looked over to her Ashikabi. Shirou was flat on his stomach, the man's profusely sweating face turned to the side to drink up however much air he could.
Seeing him in such a state triggered something in her brain. Her limbs gave out on her and she fell into a similarly compromising position.
Neither had anything left to give. They were completely spent.
"You're both way too troublesome, y'know."
Karasuba felt it.
A pit forming in her stomach.
It was a feeling that she wasn't familiar with. She couldn't give it a name.
From where she was sprawled awkwardly, she saw a dainty finger poke her Ashikabi on the nose, then felt the same finger poke her own.
They weren't able to beat this thing. It was stronger than them.
She was too weak.
"Hah… hm…" it hummed. It continued to make strange sounds for a few moments longer. "I know! I think I'll leave you both alive. You're pretty interesting now, but you'll be more interesting later. Well, see ya around!"
And with that abrupt parting message, nothing was heard from that creature again.
Karasuba could only stare at the blend of mud and shredded grass under her face wide-eyed. She was still as a statue.
She lost. She really lost.
She and her Ashikabi had given everything they had. Never before had she reached such heights, and she still lost.
It was only the steady rise and fall of her Destined One's chest that told her that he was still conscious, let alone alive.
"Hey… Shirou…"
"…"
He barely made a sound, but his trembling head moved just enough for them to stare into each other's eyes.
How romantic.
She smiled like a loon.
"That was pathetic. I'll have to get… much, much stronger."
Her Ashikabi sighed.
After a little longer than a few moments, he tried to force himself to his feet despite his condition. Of course, he was unable to do so.
"We have to…" he wheezed. "We have to leave. Resting here will do us more harm than good."
She watched him struggle and flop about with the same kind of idle curiosity that a cat would have observing a mouse with a broken leg. At a certain point, however, she grew tired of it.
The woman hooked her finger around the torn cloth of his pants and he immediately lost his balance and fell right next to her. She dropped her palm against his cheek and whispered, "That can wait."
His body language showed that he was struggling with the thought internally, but he simply wasn't able to put up much of a fight as he was right now. Her fingers slowly caressed the side of his face, and it wasn't long before he was lulled to sleep.
She stared at his resting expression joyfully.
And nothing else mattered.