8: Sometimes, infodumps are necessary.
The skeletal Assassin stands in place for a bit, his eyes fixed on the creature he had just beheaded until it finally finishes dissolving into a pile of blackish-purple dust. Finally, he turns his attention towards me.
With a cry of "Senpai!" Mash jumps to my defense, placing herself between him and me. I don't sense any hostility from him, but he is an Assassin, so I suppose it's within the realm of possibility that he's still aiming to kill me. But that idea is thrown out pretty quickly.
Still heavily breathing, he kneels in place. "Lord Magus, I am in your debt. Please, allow me to offer my humble assistance."
Now, I'm no stranger to forgiving my enemies and turning them into allies. Hell, Rem killed me twice, and I wound up loving her almost as much as I do Emilia. But all of the enemies turned allies in Lugnica were hard-fought friendships, people I only won over through ridiculous amounts of conscious effort on my part.
"Ah… I didn't really do much, though? Or rather, what did I do?" I say, scratching my head.
"...Many years ago, I made a deal with a Demon named Shaytan. My right arm was traded for his, in order to give me the power needed to inherit the title of Hassan-i-Sabbah. But the Demon was able to influence me through its arm, and within a short amount of time I was completely possessed." He says, his voice flooded with shame and fist clenched tightly.
"Your… sensory deprivation spell, I believe it was? It only affected me, not Shaytan - and as such, our respective consciousnesses were split from each other for the first since the day I made my deal with him."
"And so you were able to rebel against him and free yourself!" I nod with a smile. Sasuga Shamak-san. Truly, you are my greatest and most reliable friend. "Well, it's not like it was intended, but I'm glad it worked out this way. I, Natsuki Subaru, will accept your contract… Hassan-san?"
The red marks on my left hand - command spells, I think the director called them in the first loop - gleam as the contract is sealed.
"You may call me Hanam, Lord Magus. The title Hassan-i-Sabbah was stripped from me when I went mad." He says. "I accept your contract. I may have lost my Noble Phantasm and my right arm, but I shall do my best to live up to your expectations regardless."
"R-right. Well, since you probably know, what's the current situation here in Fuyuki? Is it safe for us to focus on reestablishing communications with Chaldea, or are we likely to get jumped by another enemy servant?" I ask.
"What!? Master, are you saying you came from outside Fuyuki?" Hanam says, his mask's eyes appearing to widen in shock - how's he doing that? Is it like a Noh mask, changing expressions as he tilts his head?
"That's right. Mash-tan and I are from the future - this whole disaster is probably the result of someone messing around with time travel. So all that being said, we're kind of in the dark as to what's going on here." I explain.
"I… see. Well, this area should be safe for now. The servants that were 'blackened' like I was have staked out their own specific hunting grounds, and Caster was still skirmishing with Lancer the last time that I checked." Hanam says, stroking his chin. "The only enemies nearby are a handful of skeletons, so if you wish to contact your comrades prior to my explanation, that would probably be for the best."
"Right," says Mash. "I'll start the setup to re-establish communications."
"Alright, communications online! Mash, Subaru, do you read me?" Says Doctor Romani as a hologram of him materializes above Mash's shield.
"You're coming through loud and clear, Dr. Roman! Where's the Director? She's going to want to hear about this mess." I reply.
"...The Director is currently resting in the Medbay. She lost a lot of blood, so I've mandated a week of bed rest - and that's with us having magi with healing mysteries on tap. So, for the foreseeable future, you'll have to make do with me." He says with an easygoing smile.
"Understood, Doctor." Says Mash with a nod. "I'll begin a quick summary of our progress so far investigating Singularity F."
He nods, and she begins.
"...and that's about everything that happened up to this point." She concludes.
"I see, that all makes sense - not! Did you really think I'd say that!? Subaru-kun, I was going to hold off on asking this considering how complicated the situation is right now, but who are you!?" The doctor yells.
"You're casting spells even though all of our readings are saying your magic circuits are ruptured! You're chatting up fairies like it's no big deal! You're existing on several spectrums that Humans don't actually exist on! And our scanners keep picking up at least three additional soul-like contaminants within your body!"
...Man, he didn't even mention the future sight, and I still sound like some kind of terrifying monster, huh?
"...Well, I'll start with the important disclaimer that this is all the Wizard Marshal's fault," I begin. That's mostly a lie, but he'll probably cover for me at least a little. And besides, it is the old man's fault that I joined Chaldea in the first place.
"That's the kind of claim that needs some proof, Subaru-kun," Romani says.
I toss Mash my cell phone. "Check my call history. I spoke to him just before you and I met, Doctor."
Mash nods, and the doctor relaxes a bit. "Well, that old man would probably have annihilated you if you were some kind of villain. Still, I would like an explanation. All our records say that you should be a first generation magus, so this nonsense is a bit…"
"Right. In short, about three months ago, I wound up getting sent to another world, full of fantasy elements like magic and demihumans. If you're aware of the Isekai craze going on in the Japanese Light Novel market right now, it was basically that."
"What."
"Right? Anyways, some stuff happened, and eventually I wound up getting sent back to Earth, only with a bunch of extra knowledge related to the supernatural, especially when it comes to interacting with spirits. After I broke my ga- er, magic circuits, I wound up learning the Spirit Arts - contracting with a sort of local fairy equivalent in order to still use magic." I explain.
Romani massages his temples. "Okay, so none of that made much sense, but I'm just going to accept it and move on, because otherwise I think I'm going to get a headache. I'll just get Da Vinci to interrogate you later."
"Right. I guess that makes it your turn, Hanam." I say, scratching my cheek.
"Understood. To start with, the current state of the city is the result of the fifth Fuyuki Holy Grail War-" He begins.
"What do you mean fifth!?" Romani shrieks.
"So Saber went nuts and started turning everyone evil, which is how you wound up possessed by your arm?" I clarify.
"That is correct, Master. The unaltered Hassan of the Cursed Arm retained his sanity his whole life. It's safe to say that the other servants were altered in a similar manner, a dark twist on their legends."
"And as far as you know the only one who wasn't turned evil was Caster, who has somehow been able to keep up a run-and-gun style conflict for a whole month against six other servants?" Romani says, somewhat impressed.
"...Somewhat. In reality, He has only ever had to face two or three of us at a time, and only for the first week. Berserker is highly territorial and uninterested in cooperation, as Rider discovered. Saber has not left the site of the greater grail since her initial rampage, and Archer has stood guard over her for all that time. And after Rider fell to Berserker, Lancer and I went our separate ways - presumably she is still in her hunting grounds near the church in the eastern half of town." He replies with a one-armed shrug.
"Caster should still be in that area as well - I haven't felt either of them fall, and he's been putting enough effort into fighting her recently that I'd assume he's looking to finish her..."
"▂▂▃▃▄▄▅▅!" something howls in the distance.
"...Or perhaps he's decided to poke Berserker. Perhaps now would be a good time to finish summoning reinforcements, Master?"
"...Probably a good idea, yeah."
After finishing the circle, I pause for a moment. "Hey, Doctor, I've been meaning to ask. Just how many servants can we actually support?"
"Hmm." He hums. "Well, with the power in its current state at Chaldea… I'd say we can manage one or two active combatants, not counting Mash - and their ability to use Noble Phantasms is likely to be impaired. And of course, that all depends on the power level of the servant - someone ridiculously powerful like King Arthur or Heracles would probably take up all of our resources, with no power left for their Noble Phantasm."
"Well, in that case, let's hope that we don't summon someone ridiculously powerful, right?" I say with a nervous smile.
The magic circle flares to life, and then in a flash of bright blue light, a Knight in red armor is standing there.
"Servant, Saber! I, Mordred, the true heir of Camelot, have arrived!" He proclaims.
Someone ridiculously powerful came!
A/N:
It's Mo-san! Mo-san is here!
This chapter is kinda icky, but to me infodumps always feel icky to write, so I have no clue whether people will be ok with it or not.
Next chapter Monday hopefully.
REVIEW RESPONSE CORNER:
The Crowned Reaper said:
Did Subaru just summon Gramps? As in the Grant Assassin? Welp, we won.
Unfortunately for Barasu, Gramps was only here as a weird visual and auditory hallucination. It's just Hassan of the now absent Cursed Arm here.
MrNoName said:
I think it should be made clear how many servants subaru should have since potentialy they can single handily destroy tension with power so something should be done to limit him or make it clear how many he can get although for bow he is doing pretty well.
Don't worry too much. Subaru is gonna be on the back foot for most of this fic, even with Mo-san here now. (Chaldea generators ore still fried, so Mordred is stuck not NP spamming. This is a no surfing zone.)