He was a Magus however. That made him a target. It was one of the things Kiritsugu taught you, a Magus was always a target.

If Kiritsugu taught him that, he probably also taught him that the protecting the Greater Good often involves killing people.

So that's what it was. Exactly like it was with Rin. Just a man. Just a person. Not a Magus. Just a Human.

Rin put into the same category as Shinji, ouch.

"Goodbye Shinji." You say quietly.

"If you're going to kill a man, at least look him in the eye when you do it."

...ignore the arrow-snipe later, that doesn't count. Stop looking at me like that.

The pink haired girl, Mash you suppose, has but a moment to look surprised before Fujimaru wraps her in a hug and kisses her.

At least someone is having a good evening.

You saved more lives today than you took, by far.

Still doesn't make it easy. Nothing should make it easy. If it becomes easy, you've already started down a slippery slope.

[X] [Why me?]

[X] [Her thoughts on the situation.]
 
Ah so now we've killed Shinji. Coming to the temple and splitting the party turned out to be a good plan - the threat was eliminated, most of the civilians were saved, we even found Mash - but Shirou has to live with the guilt. This is what I was trying to avoid when we were talking about Rin earlier. He's just a stupid teenager and making him kill other stupid teenagers in this nightmare death game is going to traumatize him for life or worse turn him into the kind of person who's okay with that. If he ever loses that gentle kindness that's horrified by the thought of taking lives he'll have well and truly ceased to be Shirou. (I think this also speaks to the absolute necessity of resolving things with Rin peacefully for the sake of Shirou's own sanity. We can't put him through this a second time)

I feel the need to emphasize that Shinji only survives in Fate repeatedly due to luck. He's the dumbest master in the cast.

By a lot.

Not even luck really. He dies in Fate and HF and survives in UBW only because Rin goes to enormous lengths to rescue him from near-certain death despite the fact that he tried to rape her earlier in the route. His death is practically guaranteed without extreme effort to avoid it on the part of the other participants. It's just that F/SN contrives such that Shirou never has to kill him personally and therefore doesn't end up experiencing this guilt

[X] [That bow I used today]
[X] [Why… did she come onto you?]
 
Ah so now we've killed Shinji. Coming to the temple and splitting the party turned out to be a good plan - the threat was eliminated, most of the civilians were saved, we even found Mash - but Shirou has to live with the guilt. This is what I was trying to avoid when we were talking about Rin earlier. He's just a stupid teenager and making him kill other stupid teenagers in this nightmare death game is going to traumatize him for life or worse turn him into the kind of person who's okay with that. If he ever loses that gentle kindness that's horrified by the thought of taking lives he'll have well and truly ceased to be Shirou. (I think this also speaks to the absolute necessity of resolving things with Rin peacefully for the sake of Shirou's own sanity. We can't put him through this a second time)



Not even luck really. He dies in Fate and HF and survives in UBW only because Rin goes to enormous lengths to rescue him from near-certain death despite the fact that he tried to rape her earlier in the route. His death is practically guaranteed without extreme effort to avoid it on the part of the other participants. It's just that F/SN contrives such that Shirou never has to kill him personally and therefore doesn't end up experiencing this guilt

[X] [That bow I used today]
[X] [Why… did she come onto you?]
I should emphasize luck saved him from *Shirou* killing him.

And yeah.

War bad.
 
As far as next things to do go, I think Shirou really needs to work up the courage to talk to Sakura as soon as possible. She has to be reeling from the shock of her awful brother coming back from the dead and then being killed for good by the boy she likes immediately afterwards and she needs someone to properly talk to her and give her support. Shirou has never really understood her and is terrified that he's permanently destroyed his relationship with her and the two of them need to have a proper heart to heart before either can go on. Hopefully under the circumstances she'll be willing to open up and talk about herself for once. Seeing Shirou kill Shinji will have driven in that he really will kill Rin too if they have a confrontation like this and if she doesn't want that to happen she needs to actually say something
 
As far as next things to do go, I think Shirou really needs to work up the courage to talk to Sakura as soon as possible. She has to be reeling from the shock of her awful brother coming back from the dead and then being killed for good by the boy she likes immediately afterwards and she needs someone to properly talk to her and give her support. Shirou has never really understood her and is terrified that he's permanently destroyed his relationship with her and the two of them need to have a proper heart to heart before either can go on. Hopefully under the circumstances she'll be willing to open up and talk about herself for once. Seeing Shirou kill Shinji will have driven in that he really will kill Rin too if they have a confrontation like this and if she doesn't want that to happen she needs to actually say something
The chapter after next will start a series of character interaction chapters where y'all can pick from the cast that lives in the mansion.
 
It is now my headcanon that Circe was standing just out of frame for every one of the Tiger Dojo endings we've encountered jotting down notes for the main path.
 
Circe breaking the forth wall because she wants to share.

The funniest part about all of this is that she does a little futzing around in F/SR to overwrite her biographical entries in the Crimson Codex so that it's just her waxing poetic about the virtues of kykeon and offering to make Iori into a literal pampered piglet rather than continue on in the Waxing Moon ritual. So something like this would be quite within her wheelhouse, honestly.
 
5.25 - Archer

View: https://youtu.be/ZW7heWDx38A

[Be With Sakura]



*Archer POV*

She wasn't particularly hard to find, she had run away to her room almost immediately after dinner. And since… she hadn't emerged. You were outside, a shadow, a hint of a presence that would be nothing more than a faint chill in the air to anyone that wandered by. You were present, but not present. You could hear sounds from the room, the faint shuffling of feet, exhalations of breath, you knew Sakura. You knew her quite well. You knew when she was stressed.

You were rather annoyed that your younger self wasn't here to comfort her, but then… you knew him to be dealing with his own issues at the moment. To kill… especially the first, it was never easy, and he had not yet grasped the mindset that would be required to save the people he loved in this war. You turned towards the door at the sound of shuffling feet, then you opened it. You materialized the moment your steps transitioned from walking on hardwood to carpet, and you shut the door behind you just as quickly, leaving you and Sakura alone in the dim lighting of the room.

She didn't stir at your presence, she stood at the far end of the room, one hand gripping her arm as she stared out the open window and into the night. Her breath was quiet, her face in the reflection as stone. Her eyes flicked to you only briefly against the glass before returning to the garden that she was gazing down at. "Yes?" Sakura asks quietly.



You didn't know what to say. You never did. It was never one of your talents. You had tried to push Shirou towards Sakura so this kind of thing could be avoided. But even with what he had done, such a thing like this was inevitable, she was too closely tied to this grail war. Her, Shinji, Zouken. You had thought you dealt with them then, but it was too hurried, and you weren't quick enough. Zouken remained an enigma, where he had gone you had no luck, and things had changed too much for you to simply check the church safely.

Now though, Shinji was dead, for the second time to her, and she didn't know quite how to process that. "Do you require anything, master?" you ask.

Sakura doesn't look away from the garden at all this time, instead she just slowly shakes her head. "No, thank you, servant."

You start to frown but keep your face carefully neutral. "The boy… your friend, he is not taking this well. That is why he hasn't come around." You explain, "I can speak to him in the mornin-"

"That will not be necessary." Sakura says, cutting you off. She then turns around, her expression was… very tired. "Leave, I'm going to bed."



"As you wish, my master." You say. Then disappear, moving to the corner. You would not leave her, not on this night. Not on any other. It was a coincidence that you were summoned here, a trick of Fate. But you would help the people here just as you would in your own timeline. Sakura especially.

You would never abandon the woman you had loved. She was not your Sakura, but she was Sakura.

That was enough.



You'd get your idiot self in the morning regardless.
 
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