Chapter 40: The Ancestor
Within a week the shed of emiya residence was modified into a smithy. The old forge brought from a local museum was personally cleaned and refashioned by shirou who set it up in a corner.
After being notified Tatsuo immediately came the next morning and shirou had to cancel his morning magecraft practice to learn smithing after meeting and greeting between them the master pulled his would-be disciple towards a smithy.
The bells on Tatsuo's waist jingled as he stepped into the room. Shaking them manually he stopped the sound and said
"Not it is the time to formally ask you, shirou emiya are you willing to be my apprentice and learn the smithing technique of my lineage."
"Yes, I am willing." replied shirou curtly.
Seeing this Tatsuo nodded his head and gestured for shirou to take a seat. After both of them sat face to face the teacher said
"Before you begin learning I would like to share the history of this lineage."
"We don't have a name for our lineage, the unnamed ancestor of my family as well as the lineage of Smiths is considered to be a student of Senji Muramasa. Recognising his lack of talent he withdrew from the famous Muramasa school after his training was finished."
"According to our records, he did so to avoid bringing shame to the school due to his mediocrity. It is unknown for how many generations or whom his inheritance and aspiration as a blacksmith went to but my family had forgotten our roots."
"It wasn't until my grandfather caught the interest of wandering magus who unlocked his circuits in exchange for participating in an experiment. This latter led to the discovery of our old records and rediscovery of our lineage."
"As a homage to the ancestor the lineage was kept nameless and opened a normal swordsmith school but the magecraft that he discovered established my family as a mage family."
"Well, I don't know anything about the magecraft of our family as I was born without magic circuits. So I will only teach you the plain swordsmith techniques and knowledge."
Shirou probed to know more about Tatsuo himself and why was he roaming the lands instead of staying with his family but all his efforts were wasted as Tatsuo skillfully dodged all his questions and changed to subject.
Like this, the 1st lecture began for shirou emiya. As he began learning forging he got lost in it.
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Later that day shirou and Rin were sitting on the rooftop and discussing things shirou asked Rin about Bellerophon as he didn't find any concrete proof regarding this in the library. Rin said
"Bellerophon sounds like something in ancient Greek, you should search for it in texts related to heroes of greece. By the way, why are you asking about this?" her voice contained strong curiosity and a hint of suspicion.
Looking at her shirou said
"I was tasked by my father to learn about myths and legends from across the globe."
"That's the basics of basics, any worthy magus should know of them as how would you invoke mysteries when you don't even know them?" said Rin while giving shirou a side eye as well as a look of disbelief.
Seeing this look shirou looked down a little ashamed but then immediately changed the subject and Rin began guiding him with some magecraft like always. While doing this shirou thought
Then Rin that a magus must be aware of them so she will let shirou borrow some books about greece from her family library after their spar the day after.
Three days later shirou and kiritsugu are sitting face to face and Shirou begins describing.
"Rider is most likely Medusa the youngest of the 3 Gorgon sisters." hearing this kiritsugu nodded and asked shirou to describe everything he found about her and why he thought she was Medusa. Shirou said
"I consider her medusa for 3 reasons. The first reason is Medusa is famous for having Sybil, the mystic eyes of petrification and rider had her eyes covered by a blindfold all the time."
"The second reason is the rider's attack method resembles a predator stalking its prey and she drinks blood from her victim. These are in parallel to the tales of gorgon drinking human blood and hunting her hunters."
"The third reason is her action of summoning the pegasus. The Pegasus is a snow-white winged horse that is supposed to be the mount of the hero Perseus. It is said that pegasus came out of the severed head of the gorgon after Perseus severed it in her sleep."
"The only confusing detail is her noble phantasm. Bellerophon is the name of a Greek hero and the first rider of Pegasus, it is not related to Medusa in any way. And Bellerophon which means the one skilled with arrows is supposed to predate the legend of Medusa so this is confusing."
After this, the father and son pair discussed methods and countermeasures against Medusa plus kiritsugu added the studies of myths and legends into his son`s schedule to prepare him for all events of the future grail war.
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Shirou and kiritsugu were in the mansion where they met Melvin. Today was the day the crest transfer would begin as the crest, as well as the recipient, was prepared for the procedure. Shirou removed his top wear under the instruction of Melvin and laid down on the white bed.
Melvin administered anesthesia to the boy and looked at kiritsugu as if asking for confirmation about this procedure. Taking the strained node of the magus killer as a gesture of yes Melvin begins to play his tuning fork and apply medicine on the upper portion of Shirou's back.
Taking this as a sign kiritsugu removes his shirt too and briskly walks towards shirou. Looking at the pair Melvin draws some magic circle on the back of the older emiya and the crest becomes prominent on the man`s back.
Kiritsugu puts his hand on Shirou's left-wing muscle with a complicated gaze. He then feels an intense pain as a piece of emiya crest detaches from his body under the guidance of the tuner and flows into shirou through his arm.
As the crest comes into contact with the unconscious boy his body jerks and begins spasming, Melvin continuously changes tune and at some point removes an elegant violin from his case and begins playing it.
Shirou`s orifices began slowly bleeding but Melvin didn't care, after about an hour the glow stabilised on Shirou's back and kiritsugu was instructed to withdraw his hand from his son`s back. His removed hand revealed a bluish tattoo on the left wing portion of Shirou's body.
Shirou woke up to a feeling of intense pain causing his muscles to spasm and tears to roll out of his eyes. Felling the burning sensation on his back he swiftly sat up and looked at the scene of Melvin wiping his mouth with a bloodstained handkerchief and kiritsugu sitting on a sofa with his eyes closed.
Affected by the curious look of the boy Melvin muttered.
"What a pity it succeeded….."
Then he looked at shirou and said
"Congratulations the crest transfer`s first step went without a hitch. You have to endure the sensation of your back for a while and take prescribed medicine to allow your body to adapt to the crest"
After some conversation, kiritsugu stood up and beckoned to shirou and said to Melvin.
"Your payment has been done and I will consider the alternate option we discussed about"
Saying this kiritsugu thought about how Melvin had found out about Kiritsugu`s participation in the 4th holy grail war and after learning about it he demanded kiritsugu to describe the whole ordeal to him and in exchange he wouldn`t charge a single penny for the tuning and would also help with maintenance of emiya crest for free.
Kiritsugu ignored the weird questions like asking him to recommend the place with beautiful women and some authentic geisha lap pillow that Melvin had asked during that negotiation. Chalking it up to be the quirk of Melvin he bid fare well to the tuner and went back to Japan.
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Shirou was uncomfortable the whole way back from England to Japan due to his newly transplanted crest piece. He kept feeling a stinging sensation at random intervals from his left shoulder and his back sometimes became extremely itchy.
Dealing with this he and his father reached fuyuki airport and it was noon by that time hence they decided to go home and have a meal. Shirou after freshening up cooked a simple meal for both of them. After having a relaxing meal he went to practise magecraft only to find his concentration repeatedly broken by the pain from his back.
Taking it as a challenge to overcome shirou began to practise focusing and ignoring the bouts of agony. Finally, he was able to focus on analysing the material of the katana on his lap and then lost himself in the ocean of practice.
(A/N: so guys the crest transfer is here and ancestor foreshadowing is here. Plus should I put the lore of servants in the author's notes?
Like the lore of Medusa in nasuverse has stubble differences from the myths. Should I put in like a report in the notes or summarize it into around 300 words or don't mention them at all and include them in the plot?
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THANKS FOR READING:)