Also, given we're now past the prologue and I already wrote up a little AU sidestory, I kinda wanted to get an Omake Policy going. My only rule for omakes (if written) is that they have to be at least 400 words long
Omake Rewards I usually offer are writing up side stories, usually AU but canon if possible, or if you can promise to keep a secret, sending a spoiler PM about a question of your choice. For this specific Quest, another reward is I can write up a Servant sheet on a historic, mythic, or public domain story character of your choice
I'll try and upload this info to the front page, likely when I finally update the character sheet
Okay, so my application for Content Promoter on SV has been accepted, though I won't be officially confirmed or not until 2023 (I've checked, and I didn't see any rule against telling other people early). The reason I bring it up here is as a heads-up, as this will likely affect this Quest's update rate, even if I'm certainly not in any senior position
I do plan for votes to be called either later today or tomorrow (UTC+10)
[X] I asked her directly. We'd been getting along so far, and if this guy was so intimidating we could maybe formulate a plan together.
"Tohsaka," I turned and asked, "You, uh, if I may ask, seem pretty disturbed about the match-ups."
"What? Oh yeah, those," she said, then tried breathing deep. "I mean, I wouldn't say 'disturbed' or anything. It's just… a lot, a lot a lot, for me to take in at once." She then pointed right at her own name on the display, and I saw it was right next to…
"Oh hey, what's up?" I heard Felix then greet as he walked up to us. Felix, winner of the last Grail War, and Sakura's first opponent. "Huh, why the long faces? Oh- Oh I see," he then muttered when he saw this week's display.
Trying to say something to lighten the mood, I went, "I got assigned Blut Mavrik this week, so eh, doubt I have much to worry about. He has been talking up his Servant a lot, but eh, you know how he is."
"Huh, haven't had the pleasure to run into this Mavrik guy, but yeah, think I know the type," Felix said, before he turned to Sakura. "Hey look, if you're nerves are all a mess over facing me first, relax. It's the first round, so it's only fair I try and even the playing field a little. I've had my super-big victory after all."
That got me picturing what'd happen if Felix said the same to any other Master I'd met, they'd probably all get mad about him 'talking down' to them. Still, for Sakura those words seemed to leave her in a better mood, comparatively better at least.
"Well, guess the first thing to do is find this Gauntlet," Sakura then said.
"Ah, that I can tell you," Felix said, "For this round, the Gauntlet door's over in the library. Okay, 'spose it's not that much of a freebie 'cause Ciel would've told you the same thing. But hey, saved you the trouble of walking all the way up to that church. Ooh, also something important. While the Duels are strictly one team against another, there's nothing about the Gauntlet that says multiple Masters can't work together."
Well, aside from conflict of interest over who gets a Stage Pass, I had to think. The other thing that came t mind was, while I'd be happy to work with Sakura… I couldn't say the same for Rider and Saver.
"Well, see ya both. I'll let ya get a head start in the Gauntlet today, still a bunch more café food with my name on it," Felix said to us as he waved goodbye.
Once he was gone, Sakura turned to me and said, "We should start thinking about how I'm gonna beat Felix then, right? Except… we've got barely any info on him, beyond what everyone knows. No idea who he could've summoned as a Servant too."
I shrugged and said, "Guess the answers, at least right now, are over in this Gauntlet. I could also prepare a dream ritual to get inside Felix's mind, ah, assuming you're okay with tactics like that, of course." And that it could cut into the second ritual I'd need to prepare to get inside Blut's dreams, dreams I'd otherwise have no interest in.
"I wanna take the high ground and say no," Sakura began, but sighed, "But honestly, I'd say yes, do just that. I feel I need all the help I can get."
"Okay, I'll- I'll see to it," I said, "I can't promise any results though, like I've got no idea if Felix has shielding against scrying set up already."
The last thing I did was try to scan the display for who that Stathis Smaragdis, that scary military guy who Felix had an argument with, but oddly I couldn't see him anywhere. Moving on, obviously we had breakfast first, but after that… the Gauntlet was upon us.
The Gauntlet door was off in a nook in the Library I hadn't really noticed much before now, but certainly did now when I saw Masters going in and out of there.
Stepping inside, Sakura and I still found ourselves in a library… but it was some library. Once we walked past the first corridor, we saw the Gauntlet Library's paths were sprawling, labyrinthine even. There wasn't much sense for structure either, I saw bookcases curve up and down in mid-air.
Now we were in the Gauntlet, Rider and Saver both materialised behind us. "A labyrinth, huh? Sorry, I was off musing there," Rider muttered, soemthing concerning her.
"Pfft! Oh what, your big strategic brain can't even figure out an entry level maze?" Saver had to say to her, before I overheard saying to her Master Sakura, "Hey, can we ditch these two? Look, I know you feel more comfortable in a group, but I don't see how Rider here and a dream specialist are gonna be much help." I… I tried to act like those words didn't sting.
Fortunately, Sakura had my back as she said, "C'mon Saver, this is an 'entry level maze' after all, which we've got a head start in. You're that worked up over who I explore it with?" Saver… didn't say anything back, though she did twitch.
Yet while Sakura's opponent was gracious enough to give her a head start, I then found out my own opponent this round hadn't extended the same courtesy. "Well, look who it is," Blut muttered as he stepped out from behind a bookcase, "And seriously, these are your Servants?"
I jumped back, but luckily for me Sakura was more observant. "Funny you'd try and mock our Servants when yours is nowhere around," she said, "If they're a Berserker, it doesn't make sense for them to be the stealthy type." She spoke right, I couldn't see Blut's Berserker anywhere.
"Ah, w-well," Blut began, then tried to say, "They're… long range, yeah, that's it," sounding like he was talking more about an Archer or Caster.
Only then I could see someone, a noticeable energy signature coming from her like any Servant, poking out from behind a distant corner. I couldn't get a good look at her face, she was buried in a book at the time, but got the sense she was a shy girl in old-fashioned costume.
"Ah- oh wait! My apologies, I'm here now," this girl said in her quivering voice, then stumbled her way towards us, "So sorry, I was rather absorbed in this book I found, and um- well I know it won't do of a Heroic Spirit to say this, but I am quite nervous to meet with other Servants. I fear an unremarkable girl like me will only pale before them."
I was about to say that she clearly was remarkable if she qualified as a Heroic Spirit, but Saver had to say otherwise before I could. "Ooh yeah, got that right. I seriously feel like apologising to Rider here, 'cause unlike this Berserker here, she at least looks like a Heroic Spirit."
The Berserker, Rider's opponent I remembered, actually nodded in agreement at this. I did however get to ask Blut, "So, you've got Mad Enhancement turned off now, right?"
"Course not, Mad Enhancement's always on around here!" Blut said, his own voice now shaking upon being seen with Berserker. The only other explanation then had to be that EX-Rank Mad Enhancement was something else entirely from the sanity-costing power boost my research told me the Skill was.
"Oh, pull yourself together!" Rider said to Berserker, even putting her hand on the shoulder of this round's enemy Servant. "If you've been summoned, then you've got just as much right to be here as any of us."
Berserker gasped, her eyes beginning to sparkle. "Oh, th-thank you, that's- that's the sweetest thing anyone's said to me in a long time! I know, you must be a prince, or royalty of some kind. It's in your whole presence, the way you carry yourself!" she said, her voice going from hopeless to hyperactive.
"What? No, absolutely not. I despite monarchy with my whole being!" Rider insisted.
"Hmhm, could it be?" Berserker now said, a grin having formed on your face, "You are a prince, but one ashamed of and hiding from their heritage. It's so… heart wrenching! Right, I've seen so many cases of exactly this happening- well, okay, never in person I must admit, b-but nevertheless!" Okay, I was starting to see how this girl qualified as a Berserker.
"Tch, whatever," Blut said, before he suddenly pointed a gun right at Rider and told her, "Whoever you are, you're a Servant, and Servants and Mages are so high and mighty with themselves that they think they're immune to modern weaponry. But now you're gonna see how powerful modern guns are, especially when reinforced with blood bullets!"
Blut then fired whole rounds of crimson bullets right at Rider… which collectively left barely a scratch on her. "Ouch," she half-heartedly said, before she strode up to Blut, grabbed that same gun, and bent it right back. "Word of advice, nino. It's not the weapon, but the brains behind it," she told him to his face.
The rules said nobody could land a killing blow till the Day of the Duel, but were awfully vague on fighting otherwise, being a War and all. I got to thinking how we could slip away from Blut and find these Stage Passes:
[ ] I'm his opponent, so Rider and I will keep him busy while Sakura and Saver get going.
[ ] He can't do a thing to our Servants, so Sakura and I will slip out. It'll be dangerous wandering the Gauntlet by ourselves, but hey, no killing blows till Saturday, we should survive.
[ ] We'll all get away from him, we just need to come up with a distraction.
-[ ] While you're at it, have Rider carry off Berserker to leave Blut stranded alone in the Gauntlet. (Edgedancer write-in)
...well. I'm glad I was wrong about Blut's Servant!
[X] He can't do a thing to our Servants, so Sakura and I will slip out. It'll be dangerous wandering the Gauntlet by ourselves, but hey, no killing blows till Saturday, we should survive.
[X] We'll all get away from him, we just need to come up with a distraction.
-[X] While you're at it, have Rider carry off Berserker to leave Blut stranded alone in the Gauntlet.
While a distraction sounds more like a job for Saver, I kind of want to live in a world where Rider just straight up steals Berserker here. Like, pick her up in a princess carry and "elope." Then again, there's no reason it can't be a team effort where both happens. Blut doesn't seem like he can get that much done in the gauntlet on his own without a Servant.
Is it going to play into Berserker's insanity, especially as it concerns Rider? Absolutely.
Is that even going to make a difference now that she already got ideas? I have no idea, but we might as well get the most screen time value out of her while she's at it. Berserker actually kind of reminds me of Sakura herself, what with the "that's the sweetest thing anyone's said to me" bit.
Talking about Sakura. Ouch. That's... a worrysome first opponent.
I am honestly kinda shocked he's talking shit when his servant isn't a fighter. I am pretty sure the only way Berserker can even touch us is with her Noble Phantasm.
[X] We'll all get away from him, we just need to come up with a distraction.
-[X] While you're at it, have Rider carry off Berserker to leave Blut stranded alone in the Gauntlet.
[X] We'll all get away from him, we just need to come up with a distraction.
-[X] While you're at it, have Rider carry off Berserker to leave Blut stranded alone in the Gauntlet.
[X] We'll all get away from him, we just need to come up with a distraction.
-[X] While you're at it, have Rider carry off Berserker to leave Blut stranded alone in the Gauntlet.
I do feel bad for Blut that he got his back story rewriten by his servant.
[X] He can't do a thing to our Servants, so Sakura and I will slip out. It'll be dangerous wandering the Gauntlet by ourselves, but hey, no killing blows till Saturday, we should survive.
Thought this was something I should bring up with my readers. I've been thinking this over for a while, and felt you guys had the right to know
My plan right now is to keep going with Starless Black as much as I can, hopefully to the end. But once it's over it'll be my last Fate/ fanfic, it's just not a series I want to write fanfic of anymore
Don't worry, that does not mean that any Servant sheet of mine not featured in this Quest will go to waste, they'll just be used in my own settings with any Fate/ references removed (which fortunately for me my sheets don't have much of, beyond basics like Classes). And I also plan to keep on writing profiles of mythic, historic, and public domain figures, just not as Servants
[X] He can't do a thing to our Servants, so Sakura and I will slip out. It'll be dangerous wandering the Gauntlet by ourselves, but hey, no killing blows till Saturday, we should survive.
I have already started writing the next story post, but finishing it might possibly take a little longer. My writing may have been getting a little slower in general these past days
With Blut now struggling to get his gun back into its original shape, I tried to say to Sakura and our Servants, "This may be our chance. If we charge or dash through him, we may be able to escape."
My words seemed to give Sakura an idea. "Wait, Berserker thinks Rider's a prince or something, right?" she said.
"Even though I'm actually royalty," Saver grumbled.
Ignoring her own Servant, Sakura went on, "So we could separate Blut from Berserker by having Rider literally sweep her off her feet and run off together!"
"…Que? Are you seriously insisting I go along with having her think I'm royalty?" Rider spat out. "I am not above deception, and my opposition to Berserker is just business, but this?"
"Okay, yeah, now we gotta go through with this," Saver smirked.
I kept silent, worried about how anything I said could affect my Servant's opinion of me, but Sakura spoke up with, "Okay, then can you think of anything else right now?"
Rider was about to say something, then paused, then gritted her teeth. She turned around and looked straight into Berserker's eyes, giving her a smile however forced, and saying, "Well then, Senorita Frenetica, if you'll please step this way."
"What the-? Hey, whatever you think you can pull," Blut began, but Rider acted swiftly before he could say anything else.
Rider then swooped to pick up Berserker in her arms, which made the latter blush and almost swoon herself into unconsciousness. With his Servant, er, currently occupied, and his gun still out of use, the three of us on cue sprang forth and rushed him. Blut even span around a little as we dashed past him.
Moving forward into the library Gauntlet, we caught up before long to Rider and Berserker… in a section of the library where the bookshelves had gone from a light brown to completely black, gnarled branches and roots had seeped in from through the walls, and no less than a black carriage, I think, had suddenly shown up.
Rider, having been made to play the prince act till now, had to relent and ask Berserker plainly, "Wait, is this carriage your doing? What game are you playing at?!"
"Actually, I thought the carriage was yours," Berserker said, before her tone became surprisingly excitable despite what she said next, "I did presume you were about to kidnap me, take me your castle or mansion somewhere?"
At first, Rider could only stare blankly at her, her grip having slackened enough that the carried Berserker got unceremoniously dropped onto the floor. "What is your problem?" Rider then asked her rather, than y'know, help her up, "What participant in a War genuinely looks forward to getting kidnapped? The only circumstance I can think of is if this is part of some double-agent plot of yours."
"Double agent? Oh no, that wasn't what I was thinking at all," Berserker then said, but then muttered, "Though come to think of it, that certainly sounds like exciting. But I assure you, I really was looking forward to getting kidnapped. My own life so far has been quite uneventful, and getting kidnapped or eloping or such things sound like just the things I thought could only happen in novels!"
"…Are you mocking me?" Rider said, "You're really treating this like adventure, not the War it blatantly calls itself? Is that not 'excitement' enough for you?" She groaned, before she no less unsheathed her sword right at Berserker, "If the Star-Cell didn't prevent me from killing you till this Round's End, I would frankly kill you right now. It's not my policy to spare a single enemy, that's what 'adventure' and 'excitement' told me. And I assure you, being dead is most certainly dull and uneventful."
I froze hearing Rider say such… things. I know I know, she'd come forth and told me who she was, so words like these were something I should've seen coming, and the whole point of the Grail War was defeating our opponents. But… it was one thing knowing she had a reputation for ruthlessness, and another seeing that in action.
"Y'know, I can't believe I'm saying this…" Saver then had to say, "But I'm thinking Berserker could prove useful, or at least more fun than I thought, given the weird powers it looks like she's pulling off. Plus, I gotta hand it to anyone who can grind Rider's gears that hard," she smiled. I guess that was… nice to hear?
"To be honest, I doubt you'd say that about her if the Star-Cell assigned us her as our enemy," Sakura said to her Servant.
"Hey, if we make it through enough rounds, and Rider gets totally wiped when the Duel comes, who knows, she could be," Saver said, taking Sakura's words in stride. Though the thought of Rider and I not even making it past the first round was, well, something I could've done without.
This little exchange at least got me thinking about how we could break up all this tension between Rider and Berserker and push on through to, hopefully, wherever a Stage Pass was:
[ ] Try introducing Saver to Berserker, since she may be taking a shine to her, allowing Rider to slip out and get us further into the Gauntlet.
[ ] Just leave Rider with Berserker and move forward, it's not as if Rider can just straight up kill Berserker, Star-Cell rules and all, or be threatened at all by Blut if he comes back.
[ ] Maybe now's the time to head back out of the Gauntlet. We've gotten pretty far in and collected a good chunk of info on Blut and Berserker, and we still have more than enough time slots to explore the Gauntlet before the Duel comes.
[X] Try introducing Saver to Berserker, since she may be taking a shine to her, allowing Rider to slip out and get us further into the Gauntlet.
There's a part of me that wants to keep Rider sticking with Berserker, but she probably just wants to spam her disengage skill as hard as possible right now. Meaning it's time for the agent of chaos to play with her new "friend" instead.
[x] Maybe now's the time to head back out of the Gauntlet. We've gotten pretty far in and collected a good chunk of info on Blut and Berserker, and we still have more than enough time slots to explore the Gauntlet before the Duel comes.
[X] Maybe now's the time to head back out of the Gauntlet. We've gotten pretty far in and collected a good chunk of info on Blut and Berserker, and we still have more than enough time slots to explore the Gauntlet before the Duel comes.
