14. Chapter 14

-10 days later-

It was now morning, Shirou woke up at the usual hour and went into the bathroom, after he washed his face he looked himself into the mirror and started to think...

More than a week has passed since the destruction of the Matou, and many things had happened in that lass of time:

1)A Master with a Servant had arrived at Fujuki, it was the one who owned the castle in the forest. All the familiars that Caster had in that part of the forest have been turned away or destroyed, now they had no idea of who the Master was or what it was its Servant. They had decided to wait around 1-2 weeks before attacking the place or doing anything, why? Because Caster had filled the entire place with traps, many traps, too many traps.

2)The Lancer Servant had been summoned two days after the death of Shinji and Zouken.

3)The school had finally started. Usually, it would not be a problem, but both Shirou and Sakura had to attend if they didn't want to attract any kind of attention.

For this reason they have decided to have Rider roam in the school in her spirit form and have a copy of Caster and some of her familiars observing the zone to spot possible coming threats.

For that exact reason Saber got angry and threw a tantrum, she wanted to be the one to guard Shirou and Sakura while they were at school, and she didn't like the idea of Rider doing what was rightly her duty. Shirou and Caster tried to calm her down and remind her that she could not turn in spiritual form, but she would not listen to them. Luckily she later forgave them after they made some delicious homemade cookies just for her, and as she happily ate those cookies in the meantime both Shirou and Caster were smiling at each other, not only Saber was incredibly cute, they had realized how to corrupt or bribe Saber in the future in case of something.

Anyway, during the first week they went to school there had been no problems, and Tohsaka Rin did nothing strange. The only thing the girl did was to carefully observe Sakura when she saw her... she didn't demonstrate to have any hostile intentions toward her sister... maybe he was wrong about her.

Shirou after a moment got out of the bathroom, went into his room to dress, and then he went into the kitchen to prepare breakfast. He entered the living room and saw almost everyone: Saber who was already eating some cookies, Caster and Rider who were now sipping some tea and Taiga who was reading the newspaper, the only one who was missing was...

"Senpai~!" Sakura said as she appeared out of nowhere behind Shirou and hugged him from behind.

Oh right, he had forgotten: 4)Sakura had started to become attached to him... no, trash that, she was outright aggressive.

It had all started 6 days before, after Sakura had recovered from the 'shock' of the incident and the loss of her grandfather and brother. After she had gathered enough courage she went to Shirou and thanked him for having saved her and her Rider from the fire, Shirou said that she was always welcomed and patted her on the head... that it was when he made the first fatal error, and everything began. Long-story-short, since Sakura had no longer any reason to be the timid girl who hated herself because she believed herself to be impure she had started to become more... direct and affectionate?

Shirou didn't dislike the idea of Sakura being more open, yea, she now was a bit too open and aggressive towards him, but he was happy for her. He could not be embarrassed by her action since he started to see Sakura as a little girl who wanted some kind of comfort, so he just sighed and played along... But the real problem was not her, but the other people that resided in the home, or more specifically: Caster and Taiga.

The first days Sakura was just trying to slowly get closer to him, and obviously, he had no problem with that, but then the those people had decided to gave Sakura some tips about seduction and spur her to be more aggressive toward him, they even gave her those tips while he was present... And even now they were enjoying every single second of the little show, and they were not the only ones.

Shirou could see in the corner of his eye both Taiga and Caster having something that could only be described as a shit-eating grin as they observed the two of them, they were not even trying to hide anymore the fact they had fun watching the two of them. In the meantim, Saber and Rider had just a little smile on their faces, but it was clear that they too were amused by the scene.

Shirou watched Rider for a moment, she now had normal clothes and her blindfold now had the aspect of a pair of sunglasses thanks to Caster illusion magic, they went for the excuse that she had very delicate eyes and even the faintest form of light could damage her already fragile sight.

At first Shirou thought that Taiga would not believe that Sakura had an almost blind sister since she had never heard of it and nor Sakura or Shinji had mentioned it before, he started to fear that he should have used magic on her, but after Taiga took a look to both Rider and Sakura she said: "Yea, they do have similar colored hairs and a similar physique." then shrugged and returned to eat her snack as she watched the Tv. After that scene Caster could not believe that Taiga was the same woman which she, the Witch Of Betrayal, had to be careful to not tell lies.

"Good morning Sakura, did you sleep well this night? Did you have any nightmares?" Shirou asked as he turned around and patted Sakura on the head.

"No, I slept well..." Sakura said as she dropped the hug and blushed a bit. She was starting to get used to being near to her senpai, but the way he treated her was too much and she could not handle it.

Everyone smiled at seeing Sakura acting that way, everyone expects Shirou.

-1 hour later-

After both Shirou and Sakura had breakfast they had left for school and Rider went with them. Saber in the meantime was meditating in the dojo and now Caster was in the living-room as she relaxed as she watched the TV.

"I'm happy to see that Sakura has quickly recovered from Shinji and her grandfather's loss..." Taiga said to Caster in a sad tone.

"...Why are you still here? Shouldn't you be at school now?" Caster asked Taiga. Somehow she didn't notice that the freeloader was still there.

"No, Saturday is my free day." Tiga said as she rested her head on the table.

"Huh... anyway you're right, she got over them pretty quickly." Caster said as she took another sip from her cup of tea. "She never liked to talk about them, so I can guess that they did not have a good relationship..." Caster then trailed off.

Taiga got a very grim expression before she sighed.

"...You're right. Shinji was... a difficult boy, but still, I know that deep down he was a really good kid. You should have seen him and Shirou before they had that argument, they were always together, almost inseparable. When they were little they always played together, fought the bullies to protect the other kids, Shinji would often come here to eat, he then..." Taiga stopped talking as her eyes started to get watery, she was very sad about the loss of a student and a close friend of Shirou.

"There is no need to continue Taiga-san." Caster said with an understanding tone as she got close to Taiga and patted her on the shoulder.

But as she said those words deep down Caster could not help herself since she wanted to see Taiga's face as she told her the truth of what had really happened. She wanted to see her face as she told her how Shinji raped and abused Sakura, she wanted to describe in details to her how the little worm died, she wanted to tell her that Shirou himself had mutilated the parasite before cutting his head off after he pleaded for his life and screamed in terror... but Taiga did not deserve it. She was a good and sympathetic woman, she didn't deserve to know the truth.

Caster then got up and said: "Oh well, before I will start to take care of the house do you want anything? Some biscuits? A cup of tea?"

"No thank you... it's better if I go, I cannot remain here all the day anyway..." Taiga said with a sad voice before she got up and started to stretch.

"Good, see you later Taiga-san." Caster said before getting out of the room.

It was almost an hour before Shirou and Sakura returned from school and Caster had finished cleaning the entire house. As she went toward the kitchen to start to prepare the ingredients for lunch she had a genuine smile on her face, she really liked this home's environment. As she entered the living room she saw a bored Saber as she watched the Tv, she smiled even more at the sight.

"Oh poor Saber, are you bored?" Caster asked as she observed the cute King of Knights.

"Indeed I am." Saber answered as she turned toward Caster. "I cannot wait to train with Shirou today." She then continued.

"I know." Caster said with a nod before she went into the kitchen, put on an apron, and went toward the fridge.

"Oh? Is this the day you will cook something?" Saber asked as she got up and got close to the kitchen.

"No, I just to start the preparatives before Shirou return... but it seems that we have almost finished the majority of the ingredients..." Caster said after she had taken a look in the fridge, she had to ask Shirou to do a bit of shopping.

-1 hour later-

After Shirou had finished school he immediatly got out, from the start of the year the afternoon activities were canceled because of those strange assaults that happened more than a week ago, which the police still had to find the responsible. He was now in the shopping district as he bought some food, he told Sakura to return home and Rider followed her, other than Caster copy floating up in the sky observing the place, he was alone.

Or so he thought.

"Hello, Onii-Chan!" Shirou heard the voice of a child behind him.

As soon he heard that voice Shirou froze and a shiver went down to his spine, he didn't know why, but he had a very bad sensation! He had to act now or something bad would happen!

He quickly turned around but it was far too late for him, the girl struck him in the chest and Caster's copy could only watch.

Almost a week has passed from when Illyasviel von Einzbern has first arrived in Japan.

She at first thought that she would arrive at her base, then start to wander around the city to kill the other Masters who were already present in the territory, and then she would search for that certain boy that had robbed her father from her before winning the war.

She didn't care about the Grail war, she never did, she knew very well that she was going to die very soon, but for now, she did not care. She just wanted to find the boy and play with him before she got bored and killed him...

Or that was what she thought before she arrived at the Castle. She noted some enemy familiars all around the forest so she started to destroy them or turn them away, after she did so she wanted to get in her room to rest... But then she stopped when she sensed that someone had infiltrated the castle and ridden the place with traps. She simply shrugged at first, just how many traps did she had to deactivate she asked herself?

There were soo many traps and of so many different kinds that Illya lost 5 hours just to clean the entrance of the place... and right at that moment, she started to get a bit angry.

Things from then only got worse, in the following days she had to sleep in the car or in some shabby hotels since she knew very well that the bedrooms in the palace were probably going to explode of something similar. Then when the temperature started to get lower and she started to suffer the cold as she deactivated the traps in and around the castle. Then since her maid could not get in the kitchen she had to go to the restaurant every single time, or she would eat delivery-food, sandwiches, and can-food during the day if she was too much busy with the castle...

After six days of continuous work and stress, she snapped and threw a tantrum. After she vented her anger to no one in particular and made Berserker destroy some trees she decided to take a walk with Berserker to calm herself down. Before she went out her maids told her to be careful, so she listened to them and hid her magic presence. Her maids until now had tried their best to help her, so she decided that she would reward them by listening to their advice. Also, now she just wanted to walk around, she had no intention to have a stupid enemy bothering her or ruining her walk.

She took a walk in the forest and then in the city, as she walked near a school she saw many students going home after the school lesson ended, she started to ask herself how it felt to be a student, but then her attention had been caught by a certain redhead boy... It was him: Shirou Emiya!

At that moment a smile appeared on Illya's face, it seemed that this war would not be outright terrible.

She started to follow him, then she saw him separate from a girl to go to some kind of shopping district. She could not let this opportunity go to waste! She had passed a very stressful week, so now the only thing that she could do was have some fun!

She got close to him, but after studying him for a while she couldn't sense any magic from him... what a pity, she had hoped him to be a master so that she could destroy and humiliate him in the war... oh well, since she could not do much to him right now she decided to greet him and to give him a simple warning for his future demise.

"Hello, Onii-Chan!" She said with a cheerful tone with a hint of homicidal intent as she got closer to him.

She was soo excited to see his face that she didn't notice the faint magic coming from the lucky charm that Shirou had, the one that Caster gave him.

Right at that moment a passer-by threw a banana peel that by pure luck fell under Illya's foot, and she slipped. But she didn't fall to the ground, she somehow flew against Shirou's chest and right into his arms.

Right now Shirou was very confused, he first heard a voice calling him, his instinct told him to quickly turn around but after he did he, for some strange reason, he had an incredibly cute little girl right into his arms, which had a very confused expression just like him.

"Hmmm... Do you want an ice cream?" Shirou asked the girl since he did not know what to say.

"Ah, oh, ehmmmmm... y-yes?" The girl said uncertain, clearly confused and embarrassed.

-5 minutes later-

"Sorry for before, see you around Illya!" Shirou said with a genuine smile and a wave before he turned around and started to get back home.

Illyasviel von Einzbern was now still in front of an ice cream shop, with an ice cream in her hand, as she watched the boy that she so much hated going home.

Everything for her had happened so fast that it left her so confused that she just said 'yes' to whatever the boy asked her, and even now she didn't know what to think or do. She then kept watching the boy figure shrinking into the distance until she saw him no more... then she snapped out of her trance.

After a long moment she shrugged and started to eat her ice cream while she headed back to the castle a bit confused, she decided that she would say to her maids that nothing special happened during her walk.

'Huh, what a cute and polite girl!' Shirou thought happily as he thought about the girl who introduced herself as Illya. Really, he didn't expect to see such a cute foreign girl here in Fuyuki at this time of the year, it was such a shame that she arrived here just before the Holy Grail War started...

At one point while walking alone in the street Caster's copy, who was wearing normal clothes, appeared at his side and asked: "Who was that cute little girl?" As she asked that Shirou saw a glint in her eyes.

"The little girl? She said that her name was Illya, she and her family had come here for vacation, didn't you heard her?" Shirou asked.

"No, sorry, I was too distracted when I felt something... familiar." Caster's copy said as she shrugged. For a moment she could swear that she felt the presence of one of the few people she respected in her life.

"Oh well, could you tell to... yourself that I'm coming back?" Shirou said a bit confused.

"Don't worry, we already know." Caster's copy said as she watched the confused Shirou.

"Wait, so, are you just a copy of Caster, a part of her, or her?" Shirou asked curiously, Caster had never explained to him who her copy worked.

"Hmmmmm, all of them." She said with a smile just to confuse him even more. "Shirou, I'm Caster, but my body right now is not real. You can say we are the same person even if we have different bodies, but we are even able to do different actions at the same time if needed."

"...Cool, can you teach me to do that?" Shirou asked joking.

"Sure, but just be prepared to suffer a 'splitting' headache." Caster responded with a smirk.

"Huh, good one." Shirou said as he started to see his home from far away.

After Shirou returned home and made lunch with Caster Saber asked him if after lunch he wanted to train, he accepted the request immediately.

Right now Shirou and Saber were in the dojo and they were ready to fight, both of them had their wooden swords, but before they started they got interrupted by Rider that entered the dojo.

"Rider, what are you here again?" Saber asked almost indignant for being interrupted by Rider.

"My Master has ordered me to directly observe your spar so that I may study your fighting style. That way if she should fight together in the future I will already know what to expect from the two of you." Rider answered calmly.

"Yes, as always." Saber said sighing. Caster had a good idea at sending Rider to watch them spar, but still, Saber started to dislike the presence of the other servant every time she had to train with Shirou.

"Shall we start?" Shirou asked.

"Yes, but before of that..." Saber started to say as she watched Rider for a pair of seconds while she recalled the fight they had. "Shirou, do you remember the first moment of my fight that I had with Rider?" She then asked.

"Hmmm, yes, you caught her by surprise as she took off her blindfold by dashing toward her at incredible speed." Shirou said as he recalled that moment.

"Listen carefully to my words, if you truly want to take down a Servant by yourself, you will need the element of surprise by your side. Even with all the powers that you have and the strengthening that you can receive, you are, and always will be, a human." Saber said with a serious tone as she watched Shirou. "But thanks to the fact that you are a 'normal' human no servant will ever see you as a threat, and that will be the main reason for their downfall. By taking them by surprise you will be able to outmaneuver someone who is faster than you," Saber said as she pointed Rider. "you will be able to crush someone who is stronger than you," She said as she pointed to herself. "And you will be able to trick someone who is smarter than you." Saber said with a little smile as she remembered Caster telling her that when she first met Shirou she thought him to be some kind of Master that was involved in the war.

Shirou remained silent and simply nodded, thanks to their connection Saber could feel how seriously Shirou was taking those words... he knew that he had to strike quick, and hard.

And right at that moment Shirou suddenly dashed towards her at high speed ready to hit her as she had her defense down.

Saber could not help but to be both a bit proud and disappointed, she was proud because as she expected he had already started to follow her words, then she was a bit disappointed because he knew how much she hated these 'dirty techniques' and anything that was not a fair duel, and yet he did not hesitate to use them. Oh well, it seemed that she had to beat him a bit this time too.

As Shirou dashed toward Saber smiled while she raised her sword and then swung it down, an instant later it struck Shirou in the middle of the head sending him straight into the ground, everything happened in an instant.

"Shirou, just because you think that you have caught me by surprise does not mean that you can lower your defenses." She said as she watched Shirou already getting up from the blow, a bit of blood was getting out of his nose.

"S-Sorry, I had to try-" As he spoke he did a horizontal cut aimed at Saber's stomach. Saber could see that as he swung his sword he had a cold and serious look.

Saber parried the blow and then tried to lung her sword toward his chest, but he had already moved away out of her reach and throw the sword toward her head, she easily deflected it. A moment later Shirou had already projected two short swords and was now at Saber's right side, he tried to then slash the head and her tight at the same time, Saber parried the sword directed at her tight and then dodged the other sword with a simple movement of the head. Shirou dashed back and threw his left sword to Saber which she parried as she went towards him, he then projected 3 throwing knives and threw them, but he threw them at her left side. Saber stopped then turned her head around just in time to see the knives suddenly changing direction mid-flight and fly toward her head and torso, she then proceeded to deflect those who aimed at her head and dodge the one aimed at her torso all just by stepping aside.

"Good try Shirou, but do not rely on simple tricks like this." Saber said as she turned around and watched a knife with many little magic runes on it before returning her attention to him, this had been the first time he used such things against her. "Then you did a good job by getting out of my reach before, but just because I was a bit too far away from you does not mean that you can throw your weapon to me from such short-range, I could have dodged it or parried it as I went towards you and then cut you down since you still had to project the swords. Also, as I was distracted by dodging the knives you should have attacked me, do not hesitate next time. Hesitation leads to defeat, Shirou." She continued.

Shirou absorbed Saber's teaching and simply nodded, then he projected a sword.

"Good, now it's my turn to attack." Saber said as she tightened her grip on her sword and saw Shirou getting on the defensive.

-2 hour later-

Shirou was now on the ground and he was watching the ceiling, even while he was tired and his body was suffering because of the numerous blow that Saber had inflicted on him, he smiled, after 3 weeks of intense beating and training, he had almost managed to hit Saber!

That has been the first time ever that he got that close to hitting her, he had 2 short swords in his hands, his left one was blocking Saber's sword and the right one had almost trusted into Saber's belly, but before he could hit her she kicked him in the stomach him sending him flying.

"Good work!" Saber said with a big smile as she got closer to Shirou. "You had almost hit me, you sure are making a lot of progress," She said before she started to poke him on the head with the sword and her smile dropped a bit. "but you would've struck me if you had been just a bit faster. Really, you should try to be more aggressive, the enemy cannot try to hit you if he is too concentrated to parry, deflect or dodge all of your blows. The best defense is a good offense, right?" She then asked as she gave her hand to Shirou.

Shirou took her hand, got up, and said: "So, I should take the enemy by surprise, strike them fast and hard until I overwhelm them... wouldn't that make me more of an assassin than a swordsman?" He asked joking.

"Unfortunately yes, that would make you more an assassin than a swordsman, but that is the only thing that you can do. There will be enemies so fast that you will not even be able to see their movements, there will be enemies so strong that just being hit with the tip of their weapon would shred you apart, there will be enemies so cunning that they will be able to make a flawless strategy to take you down in a few moments... But all their strengths and abilities will be useless if you kill them before they will be able to do anything at all." Saber said before she sighed.

She would never encourage someone to fight like that, but this was not a simple war, this was a corrupted war for a corrupted Grail, and if they somehow lost a lot of innocent people would pay the consequences.

This was an honorless war, even if they won there would be no reward, no honor, no glory, no sense of accomplishment, nothing. The only thing they could find was pain... and since they had to fight anyway, they might as well win.

Saber thought that this was the kind of competition perfect for those like Caster, which were ready to do anything to win. Even if now Caster was doing nothing strange or immoral Saber knew well of what horrors she could be capable of doing, the woman had been capable of killing her own children just to take revenge on Jason... then a shiver went down her spine as she thought for a moment both Kiritsugu and Caster to be in the same team. She didn't know if they would have stabbed each other in the back a moment later they had met, or if they would have got along as a perfect duo and doing absurd things like skipping around as they held each other by the hand.

"Anyway..." Saber turned her head to watch Rider that was sat in a corner of the dojo, around her there were some swords that Shirou threw during the training. "What do you think? Is there something you would like to say or ask?" Saber then asked.

"...Why do you keep the materialized the swords and knives that you don't need?" Rider asked Shirou. During the fight, all the weapons that he threw or Saber disarmed from him remained materialized.

"I am just exercising to keep more swords as materialized as possible while I fight. Right now all the weapons around us have no special enchantment, but I have in my arsenal some that do." Shirou said as he projected a little wooden knife that had a red gem in it and threw it in the air, then in a single moment it popped and a little blaze of fire appeared in its place. "The explosion of a real sword would be much stronger and you should also consider the shrapnels of it." He then continued with projecting once again a knife full of runes and threw it on his side, but then the knife snapped in different directions before hitting a wall and fall on the ground. "And this one is just another prototype of the real thing."

"I see." Rider simply said.

"I see you took my words into consideration," Saber said with a satisfied tone. She knew that with Caster's help Shirou would have been able to create many useful weapons. "too bad things like this will not work against me." She said as she took one of the wooden swords on the ground, she had A in magic resistance, not even the most powerful magic bomb exploding in her face would be able to scratch her, and thanks to her instinct she could parry or dodge the knives even without seeing them.

"Oh well, I will start to repair the dojo." Shirou said as he looked around and saw some of the holes and dents on the walls and floor that were made during the training.

"Ok, I will go in the living room then, see you later Shirou." Saber said as all the wooden swords in the room started to fade, in the meantime Rider had already dematerialized and went to Sakura.

"See you later." Shirou said as he watched Saber leaving the room.

As he started to repair some of the damages with magic runes, one of the first things that Caster taught him since he could not use other types of magic, Caster appeared in the dojo.

"Rider was satisfied with what she saw." Caster started to say as she got closer to Shirou. "Still, I can feel that she see you as some kind of anomaly. When I asked why she told me that you strangely smell of smoke and steel."

"...Smoke and steel?" Shirou asked after a moment as he raised an eyebrow.

"Yes, she tells me that when you project something the odor becomes stronger. I can guess that she is somehow smelling some odors coming from your Reality Marble, or more specifically, the odor of the weapons coming from it." Caster said as she helped Shirou to repair some of the damages.

After that they remained in silence as they repaired the dojo, then after some minutes, the Dojo was back to normal.

"So, have you thought of another strategy to be able to strike Saber?" Caster asked as she snapped her fingers and a case of materials appeared at her side.

"No..." Shirou said as he got closer and watched the case in search of something that could help him to create a tool or a weapon to take Saber by surprise. "She is not someone who I can fight face to face, she is too fast, too strong, her techniques are too refined and her instincts will protect her from simple tricks and traps... the only thing that I could use to defeat her would be that special weapon or a Noble Phantasm, which I lack for the moment."

"Yea, against Saber there is not much you can do. If she takes someone seriously there is nothing that her poor adversary will be able to do. If you want to have a chance with her you should fight dirty, but that would only make her angrier." Caster said as she too thought of some ways to defeat Saber. The only things that came to her mind were to first take care of her master and wait until she was too weak to fight, or to beat her with numerical superiority... yes, Shirou and Rider together would be able to take her down... numerical superiority, huh?

"As Saber said: if I want to take on those stronger, faster or smarter than me I have to take them by surprise and strike them down as fast I can... but now that she knows that I am a possible threat she will never underestimate me, and I cannot think other things that could help me against her..."

"Since you cannot take her on directly as a swordman you should start to think more like an assassin and as a mage. Think Shirou, what could help you against someone like her?"

"Hmmm... since in a duel there is not much that I can do I should use something to restrain her movements or to blind her in some way, but I don't know if they would work... wait. Caster, is there some kind of magic that works against senses that you could teach me?"

"Sure." She said as she with a snap of her finger made the case disappear. It seemed that it was finally the time to teach Shriou some of the most advanced spells that he could use. "So, what are you interested in? I have soo many spells to think that I have no idea from where to start." Caster then said.

"Let's start with those you think will be the most useful ones." Shirou proposed.

After 3 hours Shirou had learned some new spells which now he could use with no problems, but more than spells that he could use against enemies he had learned some spells he could use on himself, like how to not produce sounds, how to make yourself less notable, etc. perfect to take someone by surprise. If no one noted a simple human from which they could not sense even a trail of magic there would be nothing strange with that, right? Then there would be no need to restrain an enemy if it was already dead.

All these spells involved the use of ancient greek runes, after a month of magic lessons with Caster he now had no problem at using them, but the only problem was that some of those tended towards black-magic and the runes had to be engraved with blood or in the user's flesh, still, those were a new addition to his arsenal and he did not doubt that they will be useful in the future.

At one point the two of them decided to stop and they went into the living room to take a cup of tea and to talk about strategies on how he could defeat Saber in a spar, and from time to time, they would ask Saber herself if she had some weak point he could exploit.

Saber was not happy about the fact that Shirou was 'plotting' with Caster a way to defeat her, in front of her, and even had the courage to ask bits of advice, but she could not help but smile a little when Shirou started to complain in a tired tone that she was too strong and that it was not fair for him. Saber told him that he had simply to become stronger, but then Shirou said that it was not possible for him, she gave him a predatory smile and told him that they should simply make their training simply more intense. After a pair of seconds Shirou paled a bit and decided that it was time for him to rest and take a bath, Caster could not help but snort at seeing Shirou running away from Saber.

As Shirou went toward the bath-room knew very well that if his training with Saber got even more intense after said training he would not have a body full of livid as usual, but a body full of fractured and broken bones... no, only broken ones.

As he entered the bathroom he was thinking, he knew that if he really wanted to have a chance against Saber in a duel one-on-one he should train with her for many other years and that today he had just been lucky, but right now he did not have the time, he had to become stronger faster. Right now Saber was the strongest fighter that he knew, but what if there was someone even stronger? What could he do against that person?

There were now 2 enemy Servants, and he surely was going to fight them with Saber at his side, and maybe even with the Caster and Rider... but what if he at one point remained alone? What if something happened to Caster, Saber, and Rider and he remained alone to fight the rest of the war? How could he compensate for their loss? If he found himself alone in front of an enemy Servant stronger than Saber, what could he do or use? He had to do or think something... he had to make a weapon or a plan that would make him able to strike the enemy down. Then as he thought in the bath-tub something came to his mind: his Reality Marble.

After the bath, he went to Caster's room and asked Caster, who was reading a book about cooking, how he could start to unlock his Reality Marble, but just like he first thought she had no idea. Caster may be one of the best Mage of The age of Gods that was able to manipulate space itself and create very complex Bounded Fields that could be comparable to Reality Marbles, but she never had the chance to see or study a real Reality Marble until she had met him, she had no idea on how a 'simple human' like him could even have one. In fact, in all of human history, there had been around 10 people that had unlocked a Reality Marble, and almost all of them now were Dead Apostol Ancestors. She then said that he should not even able to interact with his Reality Marble, but for some reason, he could just take things from it, and not just normal objects, but weapons like Noble Phantasm made by the gods, like Rule Breaker.

After that Caster closed her eyes and started to think, she deduced that his Reality Marble was something like a forge where all the weapons he saw were copied, she started to wonder if it had limits and could even copy things like Saber's Excalibur or her Sheath, it was clear that in future they would have to make some experiments. Caster started to say how it would be dangerous for him to do it since the magical foundations and elementals of the fairies were mysteries unable to be normally reached, she then admitted that even she would have some difficulties understanding them, but then after a moment Caster opened her eyes as she sensed magic being used, just to see Shirou with a very happy look as he looked a perfect copy of Avalon in his arms.

Caster looked at Shirou, then Avalon, then Shirou, and then Avalon... she didn't even have the need to analyze it, she had studied the artifact for a while and she could sense and tell that it was an identical copy. After a moment Caster just frowned, put down her book, got up from the chair, and started to look around to find something to beat Shirou with. As much she was fond of the boy she couldn't forgive him, he had just discovered how to do magic correctly around a month ago, he could not just come to her room to ask a question about his Reality Marble (that he shouldn't have and let alone even be able to use), and then create a flawless copy of a damn Fae artifact an instant later she asked to herself if he could do it. Did he come here to ask her some questions or to flex on her? It was time to test the cursed sword that she had found.

After looking at Avalon in his arms Shirou looked up and started to get scared, he did not know how or why but he could see that he had made Caster very angry... could it be that he should have waited for Caster's permission to create a copy of Avalon?

After Caster asked herself if he could be able to copy Avalon he- no, his body told him that he was capable of tracing it, so he just closed his eyes, concentrated, and after some seconds he had an identical copy of Avalon in his arms. As he looked at Avalon copy he was happy, he was sure that Caster too would be happy about the discovery that he was able to recreate Avalon, but as he raised his look he could just see a very angry Caster who now had a familiar sword in her hand.

"C-Caster, may I ask you why you have Tora-Shinai in your hand? Where did you find it?" Shirou asked a bit agitated at the sudden appearance of the cursed sword.

"I found it in the tool-shed boy, now, why don't you help to see why this sword is cursed?" She said as she slowly started to get closer to him.

"Oh." Shirou said before he turned around, got out of the room, apologized with a deep bow to Caster, closed the door, and started to walk quickly toward the living room hoping that Saber could protect him in some way, he still had Avalon in his arms.

Not even a moment later a very agitated Saber came out of the corner.

"Shirou! What is happening?! I felt that you were in dang- ...Avalon?" Saber asked surprised as she watched her Sheat as she got closer to Shirou. "This... is not Avalon..." Saber said as she was in front of Shirou and placed her hand on the Sheath in his arms.

"Saber this is a copy that I made but this does not matter right now! You have to help me!" Shirou quickly said as he heard Caster opening her door and coming towards him.

"Even if it's just a copy... it's identical..." Saber said as she took Avalon into her arms, even if it was not the original it gave her a comfortable sensation, one that she had missed for many years.

"I understand what you are feeling Saber, but now you really have-" Shirou interrupted himself to turn around and saw that Caster was not too far from him, he turned back to Saber just to see her being completely enchanted by his copy of Avalon, he then started to run for his life.

"You will not run away from me boy!" Caster said as she started to chase Shirou, completely ignoring a cute Saber that was now hugging her sheath.

Now it was almost time for lunch and things had calmed down. Thanks to some of the spells that Shirou had learned that same day he had managed to hide and run from Caster for a while before she used some divination spells to track him down, after that she started to attack him with the swords but he easily dodged and parried all of her blows with his bare hands, Caster even with her inhuman strength and speed could not be compared to Saber. After a while she calmed down and started to listen to the things that Shirou wanted to say.

Right now Shirou (Who now had a very red nose for being pulled too much) was cooking, Saber was admiring the copy of her sheath, and Caster was admiring Saber.

"So, do you know how much this copy will last?" Caster asked Shirou.

"I think that it will last around a day, but I'm not too sure about that."

"Saber, what do you think? It is identical right?" Caster asked Saber, which simply nodded in response.

"Huh, this will be another great asset that we will use for the war... I can imagine both of you having Avalon as you fight against the same enemy..." Caster shivered at the thought.

"Does this mean that he will able to copy Excalibur too, or Avalon it's just an exception?" Saber asked before returning her attention to the copy of her sheath.

"I think that Avalon it's just an exception, as you can see it's a perfect copy. Even the copy of my noble phantasm is of a lower grade and quality, even if it should be something simpler to make. I guess that he was able to do it because both his body and sould have been healed by it, and that it has been in his body for over 10 years. Shirou did tell me that it was completely natural to him so I guess that the one who truly made the copy was not him but his body..." Caster said. it sounded strange but it was the only possible explanation. "Still, one of these days you should let him see your blade as well Saber." Caster continued.

"I think that I will do it tomorrow after the training with Shirou." She said as she observed closely the sheat.

"Saber, are you sure about me having your sheath?" Shirou then asked as he turned around to look at her.

"Do not say foolish things Shirou, I do not need it. It will be more useful to you, with Avalon you will not die even if you are killed, and I prefer to have my Master to be alive than to have my sheath." Saber said with a serious tone.

"Understood... so, what we will do tomorrow? We will stay low as usual or any of you has some kind of plan? Are we going to attack the Master at the castle a bit sooner than we first intended?" Shirou then asked. Right now the only thing that had in mind was the other enemy Master, and he wanted to take him down as soon as possible.

"No, we will just stay low. I know that you want to prevent any kind of fight that involves civilians, but we should just wait the best moment to strike the enemy down."

"But what if they start to attack civilians?" Shirou said as he turned his head toward Rider, who was also in the room. She was watching the Tv with Sakura.

"Rider was an exception, her Master could not give her mana so she had to find energy in other ways." Caster reminded him.

"...You're right." Shirou said as he returned to cook.

"Anyway, did you do any new discovery about the Grail?" Saber then asked Caster.

"Yes, I did. So, during the third war the Einzebern, one of the families responsible for the creation of the Grail, was desperate to win and they decided to summon a god instead of a servant. They summoned Angra Mainyu the evil god of Zoroastrianism, under the class Avenger, but instead of being the strongest Servant ever for some reason, he was the weakest. He was so weak that he quickly got killed in four days and then his soul remained trapped in the Holy Grail since he was not a heroic spirit. From then he had started to corrupt the Grail, and thanks to that Anti-heroes like myself and Rider could be summoned for the war."

"That would explain a lot..." Saber said as she recalled Shirou's first memory.

"And not only that, I have already started to work on the barrier that is blocking me from reaching the Grail, I think that is way less than a month I should safely reach the greater Grail and destroy it."

-In the meantime in a city close to Fuyuki-

"I understand, thank you for the warning... see you soon." The woman said before putting down the phone.

"Master, what did that priest told you?" The servant asked.

"When we will arrive we will have to be careful, strange things are happening there... and I told you to just call me Bazeet damn it!" The woman then exclaimed.

"Understood Master." The servant said with a smirk. "Jokes apart, why should we be careful?" He then asked with a carefree tone.

"Right now there were 4 in the city servants and in the past weeks, there hadn't been any big fight yet, except for one of the 3 big families getting destroyed, still, no Servant died that day. What is really happening there? Even the priest doesn't know anything about it."

"Are you worried? You of all people?" The servant said with a smirk.

The woman sighed then said: "Instead of being useless do you have something useful that will help us to go under the enemy radar or unnoticed? We sure do not want to be attacked before we reach our base. We still have to understand what is happening there."

"Of course I do, if you have forgotten I can be also summoned as a Caster servant, but even as a Lancer I have something that will be useful to us."

"Good, at least you had started to become useful... so, what will you do?"

"First, take off your suit and give it to me, I will make some little modification."

"Sure, just make sure to not ruin it, it's already enchanted." She said as she started to undress.

"Do not worry, I'm still good with this kind of stuff... or so I think." Lancer said before he frowned a bit. "Anyway, what will be our course of action?"

"It's pretty simple, I'll pretend to be a tourist. With this, I should be able to go around and explore the most important locations of the territory and buy some things without attracting too much attention. Then I think that we will be able to go to the church within the next week."

"I wanted to know when we will start to fight." Lancer asked with a smile.

"Soon Lancer, very soon..."