Resistance 2.2
Victor was bleeding out. His vision was going dark and his muscles ached. He should have taken the opportunity to flee, to get away from the monster known as "Lancer", but he didn't. Othala was dead, and between the grief and blood loss all he could think to do was stab. Lifting the blade up and slamming it down over and over. Again. Again.
For a brief instant Victor only saw black. When his vision returned things had changed. Theo bucked the older cape off of him with a strength that he didn't possess before, moving to an upright position faster than Victor expected. He grabbed the man by the scruff of his t-shirt, and threw him forward. Theo paused, breathing heavy from adrenalin, and marveled for a moment at what had just happened.
"MAGNUS!!"
The shout shook Theo out of his stupor, and he turned around to see a mangled mass of metal flying towards him. He reacted by diving to the side, a move that had him landing face first on the ground but which didn't seem to do much harm to him. The meteor that was Hookwolf slammed into Victor, killing the man as he was impaled on the larger cape's blades.
What was left of the metal cape's 'head', now only half of a canine skull missing its lower jaw, struggled to lift itself. Then, with a might crunch of metal, Romulus landed on top of the downed beast, driving his lance into the metal mass of blades over and over again until finally the cape's frantic struggling ceased.
Theo stood up and looked down at his hands. "Am...am I a cape?"
"Hah! Finally!" The divine founder grinned as he strode towards his Master. He laid down one massive hand on the shell shocked boy's shoulder. "Congratulations, child. You are a
novus homo, a new man who has finally transitioned into the
nobilitas."
Theo furrowed his brows and looked up at his Servant. "Nobilitas?"
The bronze man grunted. "Men can inherit greatness, but it is not always so. A talent, a feature, can go unnoticed for generations before finally resurfacing. Nobilitas. Inherited excellence, but also something that must be proven."
The giant of a man struck his lance down, embedding it into the concrete. "You never know what greatness exists in a man's ancestry. A plebian may become an emperor, and just the same a prince can become a beggar. Status can be earned, and it can be lost." Eyes like fire bore down on Theo. "There is Rome in you, child. You have earned that much."
Theo did not say a word for a time, he simply stared up at his Servant. He felt a strange prodding in his head, in his skull right behind the spot between his eyebrows. He winced, then stilled. He looked out across the warehouse, at the blood and destruction, and as much as he wanted to turn away from it, to shudder in revulsion, for some reason he didn't. Somehow he knew that was the wrong thing to do.
He spoke without thinking. "They will hear of this, and they will know we are coming. The die is cast. Let us leave for now, hold back for a time." Yes, he desperately needed to recover emotionally from all of this. Furthermore, he needed to learn about his new powers. "Let them stew in their fear and paranoia." What? "Let it wear away at them."
Romulus grinned, slapping his Master's back hard enough to make the boy stumble forward. "Magnus! Truly there is Rome in you! Truly! Then let us go! Let them jump at shadows! Let them exhaust themselves in their preparations! Time will not make our enemies more dangerous! No! It will only make them tired old men!" His laughter hung in the air as he entered astral form.
Theo frowned. What was all of that?
Before leaving he felt the need to say one last thing. "We are strong, therefore we will be the ones to survive."
Hidden in the shadows, Shadow Stalker watched the blonde teen leave the warehouse with interest. Under her mask she smiled.
The remnant opened their eyes and squinted as they were met with endless spotless even white. White walls. White floors. A glass ceiling letting in an even amount of white light. The remnant felt...warm, for lack of a better word. Like an atom that was artificially excited in a lab. Something outside of its reach was stimulating it. Like how human react when someone on the street says their name. An unconscious perking of the ears as the senses zero in on whomever demanded their attention.
They stood and took the time to examine their body. The body felt around. A box. Glass. They looked down. They were lacking in clothing. That was bad. When they left they would stand out and call attention to themselves, which would make it harder to steal clothing without being noticed.
The room had no doors or windows, they also noticed. Teleportation was not outside the range of possible abilities a remnant could grant, so they assumed that is how they were transported into the room.
Well, breaking out of the room would be a simple matter. They walked to a wall and-
"Stop."
-froze. Angra Mainyu awoke from their slumber, disorientated, but rested. It took control of the body, placing a hand on the wall and making use of one of the most basic forms of magecraft. Structural analysis.
The insight gained was not very detailed, but it told them enough. Breaking the wall would only see them trapped in a tighter prison. Foam, like the sort they saw at the Rig, was stored in the space beyond it, all around the box they were in. It was not impossible to brute force their way through it all, but it would be difficult. They were able to keep most functions of the Grail active after they had to fix their body's head, but it had been a close call, leaving them in a state too close to true dormancy for comfort (the Holy Grail itself had mixed feelings about that particular facet of their situation). If the foam closed in on them, would they be able to blow it all away without critically wounding their body again?
It was too big of a risk.
They waited. While the Holy Grail was content to do nothing for now, Angra Mainyu began to explore the network that the remnant had revealed to it. Like artificial ley lines spread out across multiple worlds. It followed a few threads that were directly connected to themselves and could recognize the feelings of the current Masters. Following other paths was more difficult, but with some effort it was able to sense some more feelings, though less defined.
A light appeared, white, and a woman stepped out.
She wore a black suit and fedora which stood out against the white room. Her skin was pale, contrasting with her dark hair that fell down in waves. Striking blue eyes stared at them as the woman walked forward. Angra Mainyu couldn't help but think those eyes were familiar.
Angra Mainyu would have frowned hat it been in control of the body. It instinctively followed a thread that presented itself as soon as the woman appeared. The thread was strange. It was not connected to the artificial ley lines, and instead broke off directly from themselves. The thread was frayed and damaged, tied together in knots at places and fluctuating in its strength.
All the World's Evils could not travel down the full length of the thread because of these complications, but it got far enough to be able to get a sense for the emotions there. Pulling back, Angra Mainyu focused on the woman. The same odd dualistic jumble of negativity (mixed with things that fell outside of his domain). That thread most assuredly led to that woman.
The woman's face was stoic. "So you are awake."
"So I am." Angra Mainyu was more than annoyed, but it held back for now. This woman could be their way out of their prison.
"I have questions. A lot of them. But someone else wants to speak with you first."
The woman rose a gloved hand to her head, gripped the side of her fedora, and removed it. She closed her eyes, and her hair turned from black to silver. Her eyes opened, and she smiled a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. Angra Mainyu felt shock pulse through itself.
The spirit controlling the woman's body bowed at the waist. "Greetings, Grail-sama. It has been a long time."
"Musashi...how are you here?"
She righted herself, bouncing on the balls of her feet. "Well, you fell one way, I fell the other. The
hentai monster did some...
stuff to me on the way down, and my connection to you got all screwed up. Next thing I know, I'm in this little girl's head while people all around start getting crazy super powers. We go off to find the
hentai monster because of something the girl saw, we find it, it starts does more
stuff to me, and then we killed it. Well, the Doctor killed it, but we told her how."
Most of it went right over the Grail's head, but Angra Mainyu understood a few key points.
"Fucking thieving bitch…"
[INSULTED]
"So yeah! Me and Contessa, what the girl here calls herself, have been helping with stopping the other
hentai monster. Not really a fan of some of what the Doctor does, but I mean, I guess I'm the one providing the advice so…" She shrugged her shoulders. "Still wish she wouldn't make so many
hentai monsters of her own though."
Musashi leaned forward and whispered into the naked teen's ear. "I think the Doctor is a closet pervert."
Musashi jerked back suddenly, her hair going from silver to black. Contessa blinked twice, and flushed, putting her fedora back on and lowering the rim of it to hide her face as she stepped away from the Grail.
"Anyways, we come now to make a request. Since it seems this body of yours is only a puppet, we were unable to get the results we wanted, as such, we have decided to go for diplomacy." The woman stopped hiding her face, which had returned to being the very picture of calm, and met the Grail's eyes. "I would like you to officially make me a Master in this war."
The Grail blinked. "What?"
"Doing so would reinforce Musashi's connection to the Grail. It is unclear if this would undo the tampering done by the fallen Entity, but it will most assuredly help in our goal. Furthermore, using the wish granted from succeeding in this ritual may be just what we need to save mankind."
Saving mankind? Well, that sounded promising at least. Or maybe not. Emiya's never did seem to work out well for them despite expectations. Still…
"And why exactly are you being so open about this?"
"Musashi has told me much about you. About the Holy Grail and how it functions. You, like the Entities and Endbringers, are a blindspot, so relying on our power to guide us through the conversation can't be done. Instead, we came to an agreement that establishing a level of trust between us would be for the best. After all, even in your diminished state, you are most assuredly an extremely intelligent being, with wisdom and insight far surpassing that of a normal human. You'd see through any deceit without fail."
Angra Mainyu thought back to some of the choices they've made since awakening.
…
It probably wasn't a good idea to burst this woman's bubble.
Instead they changed the subject. "Then how did you find us?"
"Even if we cannot use our power to track you, there are other ways of finding people. We noticed your conversation with the Simurgh, and kept an eye on it. You posted your address on there, which gave us all the information we needed to find you."
Right. Moral of the story: don't post personal information on the internet.
"I don't know…"
The woman took her fedora off suddenly, her hair turning silver. Musashi practically lunged forward, holding both of the Grail's hands in her own as she invaded their personal space (or what would have been their personal space had they been a normal human with normal human values).
"No! Don't do this to me! You never even consider me for any of the Wars, and the first time I'm summoned is to be your GPS? And then you forgot about me! I know you did! You didn't even look for me, did you? No! You owe me! Just let me have this!
Please."
"Uh...summoning a Japanese Servant in Japan just isn't a good idea. The Servant would be way too strong."
"Then why was Kojiro summoned?"
"He doesn't count."
"Bullshit! Besides, what about those wars that weren't in Japan? Like the one after Yggdmillennia stole the Greater Grail? That was in Romania!"
"...what the fuck are you talking about?"
Sometimes it was easy to forget that while the Throne of Heroes was connected to several universes, the Holy Grail itself was not.
"And in each War you summon King Arthur! Each one! And I don't care if you give them different names like 'Mordred' or 'Nero'. Have you seen what they look like? Even if you tweak how they look a little bit they are obviously still King Arthur!"
"Wait, no. That is a coincidence. They aren't King Arthur, just saber face-"
"FUCK YOUR SABER FACES!"
Musashi was cutting off blood flow to their hands now, her face nose to nose with theirs as she grit her teeth in anger.
"Both the Master and Servant each get a wish at the end of the War, right?" Her voice was cold and sharp like the edge of a blade.
"I mean, yeah, they could both get a wish."
"Contessa is wishing to save mankind, or kill Scion, or whatever. Me? I'm going to erase the 'saber faces' from the Throne."
Angra Mainyu blinked in shock. "Wait. I know you are angry, but isn't that a bit-"
"And then, so you have to summon me in every War, I'm filling the Grail with 'Musashi faces'!"
...that wish was way too ridiculous.
Her hair turned black again, and Contessa leapt back, grabbing her fedora from where it was dropped and putting it back on her head. She took a moment to compose herself, then spoke. "If you do this we will be sure to provide you with potential Masters so this War can get underway."
What went unspoken was that they'd be choosing Masters that would be on their side.
Angra Mainyu and the remnant recognized this as bad. They needed to get out of here, somehow.
Angra Mainyu could corrupt the girl. After the girl was corrupted they could get her to open a portal and let them out. It could be risky, of course. Chaos was a curse in and of itself, after all.
The remnant itself had remembered the lessons on how the Grail worked it had received from its sempai. A Ruler may be able to help, and this seemed like a situation where they would be justified in summoning a Ruler.
The Holy Grail, of course, had its own ideas. It did not like having to mess with the process of granting Command Seals again, but it also did not like the idea of a Master-Servant pair, of any form, running around unofficially. They could make the woman a Master and teleport away like they've done before, using their newly discovered connections to the other Masters to figure out where to teleport to.
OPTIONS:
[] Corrupt Contessa
[] Summon a Ruler
[] Make her a Master and teleport
rofl:
