1
Doujin Projects / Re: Normalization Quest
« on: March 25, 2014, 06:55:24 PM »OK, what's the general idea of this? Is it Nasuverse-based?
Not at all. That's why I posted it under Doujin.
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Not at all. That's why I posted it under Doujin.
2
Doujin Projects / Re: Normalization Quest
« on: March 25, 2014, 06:46:30 PM »Your instinct of doing what other people tell you to do kicked in.
Besides, he looks like a nice guy enough. Then again, so does everyone at first.
Picking up your phone, you started following the man. You had to put an effort into walking faster than usual. Even though you were a small guy, the need to keep up with tall people’s footsteps had never been a problem for you. The only person ever to walk beside you had been Raido, and he had always walked in short strides.
You made sure not to completely catch up with the man. After the distance between the two of you had shrunk down to 1 meter, you tried to keep it that way and kept trotting along the dim hallway, making a couple of turns here and there.
Tap-tap. Tap, tap. Tap-tap. Tap, tap.
At that moment, the only audible sound in your whole world was the sound of footsteps. You were not the type of person to engage others in conversations. In fact, you loved the moments when other people around you stayed quiet, didn’t ask any questions or best of yet – left you alone. It gave you time to think, to ‘recharge’ yourself. However, your current situation felt wrong somehow.
Why does this feel so eerie?
Even though you had walked these halls countless times, something felt different.
Oh yeah, I usually listen to music. That must be it.
Realizing that you had been clutching your phone the entire time, you finally looked at it; you wish you hadn’t. The phone’s screen was full of so many cracks that you could not see anything on the display; if the phone was still turned on, that is. You could not tell.
Shit! Hopefully someone will be able to fix my iPhone; otherwise I’ll just be throwing money into the wind. The contract’s still valid for a year or so.
Sighing, you suddenly hit your head against something and almost fell down.
“Eh, I was going to make a joke about me filing a sexual harassment complaint, but you look like you might actually take me seriously, “ said the man you were following. Noticing the confused look on your face, he tried to explain further, “You know… because of you bumping into me and hitting an inappropriate part of the body and how it usually is the other way---- never mind. Let’s go inside.” He unlocked a beautiful wooden door and gestured for you to go inside.
Has that door always been here? I’m sure that I would have noticed it before.
All the doors in your school were regular plain old white and had metal hinges. However, the door in front of you was completely different. It almost looked ancient. The entire thing was full of ornate carvings of angels. Every part of the carving looked unique; no detail had been copied or rushed. It almost seemed like a painting. It didn’t even have a hinge. The man had simply pushed it open, after ramming a 20 cm long key inside, made in a similar design to the door.
“I promise not to make any more jokes like that. Sheesh, you are way too serious,” said the man in a friendly tone while pocketing the key.
Feeling pressured by the man’s glare, you entered the dim classroom.
“The light switch is on your left,” came a sound from the hallway.
Hearing that, you immediately started looking for the switch. Even though you had never been scared of the dark before, something inside of you pressured you to find a source of light; fast.
Bang.
You could not believe that closing a door – any door – could make a noise loud enough to rival the sound of a gunshot; that one did. You could tell by the fact that your world had gone pitch-black right after that horrendously loud sound.
Light, light, where’s the damn switc-----aaah!
“There you are!”
As soon as your hand had found the switch, something else had found you. You tried pulling your hand away from the switch, but couldn’t. Something was preventing you from doing that. You felt a pressure rising higher and higher on the back of your hand. You felt as if a hot branding iron was being pressed against you.
And then the pain was gone; in its stead, there was light.
“Aaaahaha, I really should apologize about that,” said the man after pulling his hand away from yours. “You see, this switch is an old relic from the Soviet era that no-one has bothered to replace. You have to apply some serious force in order to turn the lights on. I forgot to mention that, didn’t I?”
Flicking a switch takes only a second; that felt like--- no, I guess it makes sense.
From the inside, the classroom looked like any other. There were 16 double-seated desks, one large desk and a dozen of shelves and cupboards; all on them made out of maple. The only peculiar thing was the door, looking otherworldly even from the inside.
“Please, take a seat, Jaune.”
You did not find it odd for the man to know your name. In fact, you did not even think about it. Everything felt so natural. There was no need to be on your guard around him. After all, he seemed like such a nice person.
“S-sure,” you replied, trying to get your stammering under control.
After you had taken a seat, the man looked in your eyes and said, “Since you probably don’t know me, I should introduce myself.” He offered you his hand. “I’m Patrik Orunurm, this school’s religion teacher.” You shook it. “Well, since it’s not a required class, pretty much no-one takes it. I only have 7 students in total. Aaahahaha”
You let out a small chuckle, finding Orunurm’s odd laughter more amusing than his self-deprecation.
Yeah, coming here was the right thing to do. I think I feel better already.
The man smiled. “It’s good to finally see a smile on your face. You should do it more often, it suits you.”
You smiled.
“Well, I did promise you some coffee. It’ll only take a couple of minutes, so stay put. We’ll put our discussion on hold until then, deal?”
“...deal.”
You watched as Orunurm bustled around, getting hot water and pouring it to his french press, then realizing that he had forgotten to add coffee, then spending half an hour going through all the classrooms in the school, determined that someone must’ve taken his pack of coffee and forgotten to give it back.
Eventually, he found what he was looking for and managed to make a damn good cup of coffee. None of you had said a word since first tasting that strangely alluring hot liquid and none of you had stopped until the entire can was empty.
“So,” said Orunurm, his face darkening. “Who stuck you into that closet?”
“T-Tanel.”
The teacher locked his eyes with yours. After what felt like an eternity, he spoke again, “I’ll change my question, then. Who was responsible for you ending up in that closet?”
You tried to meet his gaze, but couldn’t. You looked left and right, finally to the ground. Gazing at the empty cups, you realized that he’d wait here all night if he’d have to. Besides, you had probably already accepted this man when deciding to go with him. After all, he seemed like such a good man.
“…it was Sandra. She was the one who told Tanel to force me into the closet,” you spit out the words, becoming more confident. “Before him, it was Dmitri. Raido was just, just trying to protect me, to pay back for Dmitri after WHAT HE DID!” You were half-yelling, half-crying by then.
Instead of saying how it’ll all turn out right or offering any kind of consolation, Orunurm simply asked, “What did he do?”
[ ] Tell him. Tell Orunurm what the bastard did!
[ ] Don’t tell him. You don’t feel like sharing that memory.
[ ] Bolt! Something feels wrong.
3
Doujin Projects / Normalization Quest
« on: March 25, 2014, 06:45:45 PM »Normalization Quest
Another cross-post from BL. As with Hot Worms, votes will be added together.
There are 5 “main” endings: Order, Anarchy, Naivety, Megalomania and Apathy. However, since there will be times when I’ll allow write-in answers, it is possible to go so off the rails that I’ll have to write a completely new ending. There are also a numerous sub- and dead endings. Whenever you encounter an ending of any type – even a dead one – I’ll ask whether or not you’ll accept it as the “true” ending to this story. If you do, this Quest will end, if you don’t, then we’ll go back in the story a bit and choose a different course of action.
This quest will most likely be an unhappy one. It will contain dark themes and actions. With enough perseverance, things might just change, but that will be up to you.
Please join me for the Normalization Quest.
-2
Smack
You felt a shock going through your body as your back met with the hard metal of a needlessly large locker.
I bet it’s due to the events of yesterday.
“We’re doing this because of what happened yesterday,” said a girl you wish you knew less than you did.
Sandra seemed to fit a girl who dressed the way she did. Dirty blonde hair, tied up in a high-cut ponytail; thick black-rimmed glasses which lacked the ability to correct anyone’s eyesight; mismatched clothes from numerous older decades – combining all of those elements screamed the name she had. Her personality, however, didn’t.
“We used to do this to you only when you failed to live up to our expectations,” said Sandra. “But now we are going to shove you into your locker. Every. Single. Day.” She smiled. “For your surely to come future insubordinations, we’ll just have to think of something else. Lock the door, Tanel.”
The big guy – made even bigger in comparison to the 160 cm short girl he was standing next to – suddenly blinked his eyes, as if waking up from a daydream. Afraid to do the wrong thing, he decided to be absolutely sure of his orders, “Will I close the locker door first?”
“Yes!” said Sandra impatiently. “Dmitri would have never wasted my time like you are doing now. Get to it already.”
Bam.
Your world went black, save for a small slit about the height of your eye level. Arguing was pointless, dragged things out and usually made things worse. It was easier to just wait until 5 pm, slip your hand through the opening in the door and use your key to unlock yourself. The first dozen times it had taken you close to an hour to accomplish, but hey, practice made you perfect. If you so desired, you could be an your way home as soon as Sandra took her leave.
“Don’t even think of leaving before your ‘Time out’ is over,” said Sandra, repeating the sentence she always said just before leaving. You never did; not anymore, at least. For some reason, she always punished you the day after you had left or even thought about leaving early. She never said why she punished you, but as soon as you stopped having those forbidden thoughts, the silent punishments stopped as well.
She knows. She always knows.
“Well, seeing as you’ll be here until 8 pm today, I’ll grant you the right to think about escaping. Only thinking, understand?” asked Sandra.
You knocked twice. She and you had an understanding that two knocks stood for ‘yes’ and one knock for ‘no’. She had commanded you to use a knocking system after the Ball gown Incident, which rendered you unable to speak for two weeks. You occasionally still communicated that way with her even now; usually in cases when you didn’t want your voice to agitate her. Sandra hated the sound of your voice. You knew that because she said so at least once a day.
“Most pleasing,’ said Sandra in a soft moan. “If you’ll walk barefoot in school tomorrow, you may leave half an hour early today. Follow me, Tanel.”
As if in tune with the fading footsteps, the gears in your head started turning. She said that it was because of what Raido did to Dmitri yesterday. In that case, why is she being so nice to me? I thought that she’d act hysterically today. I guess that she must be planning something special. Just thinking about yesterday is making you feel down. Raido, you didn’t have to do that to him, I tried telling you… You didn’t have to get kicked out of school for me.
Raido Tamm, your best – and only – friend had always stuck up for you. If you hadn’t stopped him from “avenging” you after the Ball gown Incident, he would most likely be in jail right now. Even though he was probably in his room right now instead of a prison cell, it felt all the same for you. Your one pillar of support was gone.
You closed your eyes for a minute and cleared your head. Stupid me. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Boarding that train of thought lead to a bad place; heading in that direction was a sign that you should take your medication. You didn’t like taking it since it made you feel disconnected from yourself, but you made sure to take it at least once a week; it was the best compromise you could make.
Seeing as you were inside your own locker, you had all of your “isolation items” neatly put onto the shelves, to their precise spot. You took a bottle of water and a small round pill from a long and silvery sheet. After ingesting the white ball of numbness, you put the things back to their right places and whipped out your iPhone. Even inside the locker, the reception was great.
Getting out half an hour early in exchange for all of the explaining you would have to do was not worth it. Besides, the only thing that bothered you about being stuck in here was the lack of ability to change positions. Otherwise, you didn’t mind it at all. After all, you would be doing exactly the same thing right now, even if you had gone straight home; being on the internet. The phone’s bright screen gave the insides of your locker a faint blue glow. You Googled “Red Wonder” – the oddly-nicknamed comet flying past Earth – in hopes of digging up new developments relating to it. A lot of people were arguing that the comet was flying too close to Earth.
All of the different news sites were citing just a couple of hours old article written by a well-respected professor. He was saying that the so-called “Red Wonder” posed absolutely no threat to anyone and that the media has blown the absurd theories of anonymous internet users way out of proportions. He even provided calculations, serving to validate his story. Seeing as no-one – besides a handful of commentators – were trying to dispute the numbers, you thought that they must be correct. After all, you didn’t know much about math nor physics.
What a shame. If the world were to end, I wouldn’t have to worry about whatever Sandra is planning. You sighed and then moved your sight to the upper area of your phone’s screen. It’s 5:30 pm, the new episode of Involuntary Waifu Project should be translated by now.
It was. You navigated to a colorful site and clicked on the anime you had in your mind. After a couple of seconds, episode 172 started playing. You observed it stoically.
When you first started watching that series, it interested you; it gave you energy; it was something that made you happy. Now, however, it gave you nothing. It was simply something you mechanically did. You needed to finish that series, that way you would be able to say that you had seen something from start to finish. It was a problem that had plagued your life for as long as you could remember; you don’t remember a single thing that you had completed 100%. You were used to giving up on other things, other projects; this would not be one of them.
Time flew by quickly. The episode was nearing its end. As Waifu’s ending song began with the familiar-sounding four chords of pop, the door shuddered with the sound of a knock. “Well, well. If I knew you liked school this much, I could have granted you the right to roam around here even after hours,” said a smiling man.
Hearing something unexpected, you flinched by reflex, causing your phone to fall to the bottom of the locker; screen down. During the many, many times you had been stuck here, you had never seen someone walk through this hallway past 5 pm. Since it was also dark outside in the hallway, the light of his phone must have given him away. You knew that the speaker was a man due to his voice and you knew he was smiling because his mouth was the only thing you could see through the slit.
You heard a clang resonating from the outside of the locker. “Hold on for a bit. I’ll call our huff-and-puffer and we’ll get you out in no time. Or rather… in a little time.” He paused. “Longer if the traffic’s bad.
He thinks that I’ve been locked inside someone else’s locker.
“I… uh, here,” you said, reaching out hand through the opening; key in your palm.
“Well, that sure speeds things up.”
After a soft ‘clack’, there door opened. The man before you looked too old to be a student but too young to be an employee. Nonetheless, you knew him; kind of. You had seen him walking around the school a great number of times, yet you knew nothing about the man. You figured that he must be an IT guy, seeing as he was a suited-up man in his twenties. Shortly after immigrating, you had learned that 95% of the teachers in this country were women, 4% old men and only the remaining 1% consisted of young men.
“Listen, I know that it’s getting late already. In fact, I was actually on my way home right now, but…” said the man, trailing off. After a short pause, he continues, “There’s obviously a story behind you ending up in that locker… and having a key for it, so let’s continue this conversation in my classroom. I’ll make some coffee.”
Without waiting for your reply, he started walking down the hallway, expecting you to follow him.
[ ] Follow him. He seems like a genuinely nice person.
Our main character was voted to have the name Jaune Delacroix. He moved to Estonia a couple of years ago and speaks – or rather, writes and understands – the language well enough. Nonetheless, he clearly looks different from everyone.
5
Fanfiction / Re: Fanfic ideas thread
« on: March 25, 2014, 06:32:54 PM »Actually, Harry himself has enough power to hold his own against Servants. He was sort of "bred" to do that. (His mother made sure that there were conditions met with his conception to give him the power to sort of punch out Cuthulu if needed.)
Whoa, what? Where did you read that from?
6
Anime and Manga / Re: Tokyo Ravens
« on: March 25, 2014, 05:26:36 PM »
I will be pleasantly surprised if Natsume stays dead. It probably wont happen, but it would be nice. Not because I don't care about her (I do), but because it would make me fear other character deaths; it would make them mean something. IT WOULD MAKE TOKYO RAVENS INTO JAPANESE SONG OF ICE AND FIRE!
But she'll probably will be back.
And then they'll go looking for the Dragon Balls.
But she'll probably will be back.
And then they'll go looking for the Dragon Balls.
7
Fanfiction / Re: Hot-blooded worms & aging swords
« on: March 21, 2014, 06:55:02 PM »
Day 1 – Chapter 10
Shirou knew that Sakura needed to be kept away from the war. Archer’s words made perfect sense. The location, the boy’s own home, made perfect sense. After all, Sakura was familiar with the place and trusted its owner. The fact that the owner had been switched with someone else didn’t matter, seeing as ‘Emiya Shirou’ still appeared as he always did; or so he hoped. There was yet another argument in favor of sending her there; Sakura had never said a single bad thing about her grandfather.
“I agree that we should keep her away from this war, but I’d like to meet your grandfather first. After all, if he’s as great of a magus as you say he is then he might be able to help us with this whole body-switching mess,” said Shirou.
Beep, beep.
Giving it more thought, Shirou realized that Sakura had never mentioned living with or even having grandparents.
“Oh yeah, I never asked for his name,” said Shirou.
“It’s Matou Zouken,” replied Shinji disinterestedly while pulling out his phone.
Matou… Zouken, huh?
Shirou’s wrinkly body suddenly gave a violent twitch, as if something inside of him, something otherworldly, was reacting to his thoughts. Clutching his chest, he fell from his chair. The world around him seemed to blur. He saw a hazy figure of a red knight yelling at some other hazy shape. He wished that the red figure would stop talking. Every word, every yell seemed to agitate parts of his body; parts of himself. The blue shape had the right idea. The red one should’ve followed its example and been quiet, unless specifically asked a question.
“Stahpyo yelling i53i nka0! TC0oen9z first time sm45nos happened hkvae snt9e n4. KK don’t know rocg23 g54t hUVuRP!”
Why did the blue one have to start talking as well?
“E9o guesses?”
Shut up.
“V9uaSeth htOthnAS 93[TVH, konbbnb3.”
STOP---
With a sudden outburst of anger and magical energy, Shirou lost the last of his consciousness.
Day 2
“Hoh, hoh, being young and energetic sure is nice, isn’t it?” asked an orange-haired boy with a smile.
It was like talking to a wall; the three figures had not acted as if they understood anything for an hour already. Pleased that his creations had stopped twitching, the magus continued his speech, “Kekeke, it feels amazing to be able to work all night and not be worn down by fatigue.”
Zouken realized that this kind of behavior was far from his usual code of conduct, but he simply couldn’t help himself. The liberating feeling of being freed from a centuries old agony felt euphoric. The magus figured that there was something else affecting his state of mind but didn’t consider it a concern worth addressing. After all, things were working out for him so far.
His ‘prana puppets’ were no longer human, but simple tools to be used; magical batteries, so to speak. The entirety of their bodies, from the top of the scalp to the bottom of their feet, had been inscribed with small cuts. Together, those cuts formed a coherent carving for a spell meant to transfer the life of his puppets onto his future Servant in the form of magical energy.
However, there was a certain thing that the magus was worried about – Sakura. Last night’s incident had not unfolded as he had predicted; it had seen him use magecraft, it had seen him hurt someone. Zouken was unsure about how strong feelings it held, but seeing such a display of force could possibly damage its attachment to the boy.
No matter, I shall see once it arrives.
Zouken made his way to the living room and took a seat. He didn’t like watching television. Instead, he enjoyed to read. Unfortunately, the only books that he could find were cookbooks. Thinking that it would look like something that the ginger boy would do, he started to read.
An hour later, Zouken had finished reading every single cookbook that the Emiya household had to offer; and there were a lot of them. Fortunately, Zouken was a fast reader. The fact that the books had proved to be more enjoyable than he had originally thought had helped his tempo as well. They were essentially written like rituals; both had directions that one had to follow very closely or end up with disastrous results, both required catalysts for achieving your goal and both needed a lot of time and preparation to get going.
Impressed by these realizations, Zouken revised his opinion on culinary arts. In his previous body, he had had to sustain himself in another way; regular food had not nourished the magus. Now, however, he did need ‘regular nourishment’, and he had not eaten since last night’s dinner. Looking through the pictures and descriptions of a lot of delicious things caused Zouken’s stomach to rumble in an attempt to get the magus to notice its emptiness.
That rumble pulled Zouken out of the cooking zone, causing him to take note of the time. Before jumping to any conclusions, the magus decided giving his grandson a call. After three minutes of waiting for someone to pick up the phone, Zouken finally put down the receiver.
This situation reeks of wrongness.
As he was deciding on a course of action, an image of a soft girl with an even softer voice came back to him. “Berserker’s a heavy sleeper, so if I feel like it, I might be here tomorrow morning,” she had said.
What was he thinking? He couldn’t allow himself the luxury of wasting time on the off chance that she’d be there. Even if she were, his priorities lied elsewhere, didn’t they?
[ ] Go to the park.
[ ] Go to school.
[ ] Go to the Matou house.
[ ] Summon your Servant.
Shirou knew that Sakura needed to be kept away from the war. Archer’s words made perfect sense. The location, the boy’s own home, made perfect sense. After all, Sakura was familiar with the place and trusted its owner. The fact that the owner had been switched with someone else didn’t matter, seeing as ‘Emiya Shirou’ still appeared as he always did; or so he hoped. There was yet another argument in favor of sending her there; Sakura had never said a single bad thing about her grandfather.
“I agree that we should keep her away from this war, but I’d like to meet your grandfather first. After all, if he’s as great of a magus as you say he is then he might be able to help us with this whole body-switching mess,” said Shirou.
Beep, beep.
Giving it more thought, Shirou realized that Sakura had never mentioned living with or even having grandparents.
“Oh yeah, I never asked for his name,” said Shirou.
“It’s Matou Zouken,” replied Shinji disinterestedly while pulling out his phone.
Matou… Zouken, huh?
Shirou’s wrinkly body suddenly gave a violent twitch, as if something inside of him, something otherworldly, was reacting to his thoughts. Clutching his chest, he fell from his chair. The world around him seemed to blur. He saw a hazy figure of a red knight yelling at some other hazy shape. He wished that the red figure would stop talking. Every word, every yell seemed to agitate parts of his body; parts of himself. The blue shape had the right idea. The red one should’ve followed its example and been quiet, unless specifically asked a question.
“Stahpyo yelling i53i nka0! TC0oen9z first time sm45nos happened hkvae snt9e n4. KK don’t know rocg23 g54t hUVuRP!”
Why did the blue one have to start talking as well?
“E9o guesses?”
Shut up.
“V9uaSeth htOthnAS 93[TVH, konbbnb3.”
STOP---
With a sudden outburst of anger and magical energy, Shirou lost the last of his consciousness.
Day 2
“Hoh, hoh, being young and energetic sure is nice, isn’t it?” asked an orange-haired boy with a smile.
It was like talking to a wall; the three figures had not acted as if they understood anything for an hour already. Pleased that his creations had stopped twitching, the magus continued his speech, “Kekeke, it feels amazing to be able to work all night and not be worn down by fatigue.”
Zouken realized that this kind of behavior was far from his usual code of conduct, but he simply couldn’t help himself. The liberating feeling of being freed from a centuries old agony felt euphoric. The magus figured that there was something else affecting his state of mind but didn’t consider it a concern worth addressing. After all, things were working out for him so far.
His ‘prana puppets’ were no longer human, but simple tools to be used; magical batteries, so to speak. The entirety of their bodies, from the top of the scalp to the bottom of their feet, had been inscribed with small cuts. Together, those cuts formed a coherent carving for a spell meant to transfer the life of his puppets onto his future Servant in the form of magical energy.
However, there was a certain thing that the magus was worried about – Sakura. Last night’s incident had not unfolded as he had predicted; it had seen him use magecraft, it had seen him hurt someone. Zouken was unsure about how strong feelings it held, but seeing such a display of force could possibly damage its attachment to the boy.
No matter, I shall see once it arrives.
Zouken made his way to the living room and took a seat. He didn’t like watching television. Instead, he enjoyed to read. Unfortunately, the only books that he could find were cookbooks. Thinking that it would look like something that the ginger boy would do, he started to read.
An hour later, Zouken had finished reading every single cookbook that the Emiya household had to offer; and there were a lot of them. Fortunately, Zouken was a fast reader. The fact that the books had proved to be more enjoyable than he had originally thought had helped his tempo as well. They were essentially written like rituals; both had directions that one had to follow very closely or end up with disastrous results, both required catalysts for achieving your goal and both needed a lot of time and preparation to get going.
Impressed by these realizations, Zouken revised his opinion on culinary arts. In his previous body, he had had to sustain himself in another way; regular food had not nourished the magus. Now, however, he did need ‘regular nourishment’, and he had not eaten since last night’s dinner. Looking through the pictures and descriptions of a lot of delicious things caused Zouken’s stomach to rumble in an attempt to get the magus to notice its emptiness.
That rumble pulled Zouken out of the cooking zone, causing him to take note of the time. Before jumping to any conclusions, the magus decided giving his grandson a call. After three minutes of waiting for someone to pick up the phone, Zouken finally put down the receiver.
This situation reeks of wrongness.
As he was deciding on a course of action, an image of a soft girl with an even softer voice came back to him. “Berserker’s a heavy sleeper, so if I feel like it, I might be here tomorrow morning,” she had said.
What was he thinking? He couldn’t allow himself the luxury of wasting time on the off chance that she’d be there. Even if she were, his priorities lied elsewhere, didn’t they?
[ ] Go to the park.
[ ] Go to school.
[ ] Go to the Matou house.
[ ] Summon your Servant.
8
Fanfiction / Re: Hot-blooded worms & aging swords
« on: March 20, 2014, 08:52:46 PM »
Current votes:
[4] Agree wholeheartedly
Siriel, Rafflesiac, Umbra, KitsuneKo
[9] Meet with Sakura’s grandfather first, then decide
Milbunk, Kelnish, Alexi, Chaos, TheMegas, DezoPenguin, Alice, Mike, Names
[7] Finish the prana-puppets
Kelnish, Siriel, Rafflesiac, Frosty, Umbra, Chaos, KitsuneKo
[4] Try figuring out the nature of your magecraft
Milbunk, Renko, TheMegas, DezoPenguin
[2] Write-in: how to handle the situation with Sakura: Rethink and consider your decisions regarding her
Alice, Mike
[1] Go to sleep.
Alexi
Locking the votes tomorrow.
Edit: closed.
[4] Agree wholeheartedly
Siriel, Rafflesiac, Umbra, KitsuneKo
[9] Meet with Sakura’s grandfather first, then decide
Milbunk, Kelnish, Alexi, Chaos, TheMegas, DezoPenguin, Alice, Mike, Names
[7] Finish the prana-puppets
Kelnish, Siriel, Rafflesiac, Frosty, Umbra, Chaos, KitsuneKo
[4] Try figuring out the nature of your magecraft
Milbunk, Renko, TheMegas, DezoPenguin
[2] Write-in: how to handle the situation with Sakura: Rethink and consider your decisions regarding her
Alice, Mike
[1] Go to sleep.
Alexi
Locking the votes tomorrow.
Edit: closed.
9
Fanfiction / Re: Hot-blooded worms & aging swords
« on: March 20, 2014, 08:49:05 PM »
Day 1 – Chapter 9
“Sakura, run home. Quickly,” said Zouken.
Even though the situation he was in felt tense, the orange-haired boy’s voice betrayed the state of mind of a several hundred year old magus; utter calmness. It was one of his best qualities; the ability to never rush himself, the ability to take his time and think of the best possible course of action, the ability to suppress the need to take risks.
Just a moment ago, when he had been struck, the magus felt an unnatural rush of anger; the need to eliminate everyone who dared to endanger his favorite tool. However, he had dealt with unnatural emotions raging inside him all day. Zouken knew to expect these little outbursts now, and to crush them.
Given a right push, any situation can be turned in favor of you; even this one.
Zouken stood up from the ground, noticing the exasperated expressions of every person in the conflict.
Since he could no longer rely on the 'frail old man' shtick, the magus had to think of a new way to appear weak; blatantly lying about his condition would do well. Looking straight into the eyes of his previous attacker, he willfully wobbled his left knee and said, “You hit me at a bad angle. Bad for you, I mean. I didn’t feel a thing.”
“But Senpai---“ said Sakura, looking at the boy of his dreams with a concerned expression.
Without turning towards the girl or stopping his soul-piercing glare, Zouken responded, “Run home, right now. Don’t mention it to Shinji. I wouldn’t want him worrying about me. I’ll be fine, now go!”
With a sour face, it bolted towards its house.
The previous conversation had seemed to amuse the goons surrounding you, seeing as the high-school kid appeared to be in danger of falling back down at any given moment. However, as soon as they heard the words ‘run home’, they reacted. One of the pipe-wielders dropped his weapon and dashed towards the purple-haired girl; as did Zouken.
The magus knew about his body’s excellent physical condition, but was unsure about its magical capabilities. After all, he had just opened its circuits this very day. While maintaining his running speed, in one fluid motion, Zouken pulled his white-and-blue shirt over his head, infused it with prana and sent it flying towards the bald thug between him and his purple tool. Zouken had meant to use the shirt as a distraction. He infused the shirt as full of magical energy as he could, thinking that in such an extreme case, the cloth might harden enough for it to reach his opponent and send him tumbling down. The moment his shirt got in contact with the thug, it exploded. Every single person froze; including the bald thug lying on the ground. Sakura's pursuer was missing half of his back and had steam rising from the remaining chunk of his charred meat.
…not as planned.
Sakura, noticing the new development looked more shocked than anyone else on the street. The magus noticed that its eyes kept darting between baldy and himself, but he could not understand why. After relaxing her expression and blushing, it ran away.
By the time the other two thugs finally managed to get a word out of their mouths, the purple-hair was no longer in sight.
“Will you let us go?” asked the knife-wielder, trying to contain his fear.
The old magus smiled.
“Ahahaha! I win again,” yelled Shinji, standing up from the table and exposing his cards to both of his opponents. “This means I’ve won the right to eat 3/4 of the cake already.”
“We know,” said Shirou along with his Servant at the exact same time. “Can’t we play something else?”
“I’m afraid that this is the only game we have in our household,” said Shinji gleefully.
“Try not to sound so excited about that,” grumbled Shirou. “In any case, it won’t be ready for another hour or so, so there’s still time to win our rightful shares back!” He turned his head towards his Servant. “Right, Archer?”
“I’ll pass. You can have my share. I enjoy making things more than actually using them. If you don’t mind, then I’ll take a look at the premises. This has been fun and all, but if we’re planning on winning this war, then we should start by fortifying this place.” The man in red stood up as well, addressing Shinji, “If what you say about your sister is true, then I propose sending her somewhere safe. This area will become a warzone soon enough. No-one should have to suffer through something like that.”
“You’re right,” agreed Shinji. “She might die or even get taken as a hostage and used against us, were we to let her stay here.”
After taking a few moments to observe the blue-haired boy, Archer continued, “Unless either of you have a better idea, I think that we should send her to live with her grandfather, as in, the man walking around as you.”
[ ] Agree wholeheartedly.
[ ] Meet with Sakura’s grandfather first, then decide.
[ ] Write-in.
When the old magus had first set his eyes upon the farthest room from the courtyard, it had looked like a clone of every other room in this absurdly large house. Now, however, it had its own look. Three men had been chained to the wall, their hands and legs carefully bound. One of them was rumbling around, trying to kick, punch or even bite the young boy in front of them. The second one was attempting to threaten his capturer into releasing them.
“---a‘ll pay for what ya did to us, to Kaz. Ya fuckin’ psycho! Our crew will find ya. And when they do, they’ll burn this place to the ground! And after that, they’ll keep going until your entire family tree is---“
Zouken payed neither of them any heed; he needed to concentrate on the third male. After all, if he messed carving this spell up, he would have to get rid of this half-burnt thing. While the screams were irritating, they were also useless; Zouken had set up a sound cancelling barrier around this room right after shackling down his future prana-puppets.
The first one is ready. Heh, it may look dead, but it still has some life left in it.
The entire process had taken the magus longer than anticipated. While the spells he was using were simple enough, this new body seemed to hinder his every magical step; except for the time when he strengthened his shirt.
If I were to work on it all night, I might just finish all the necessary steps in order to activate the prana-puppets.
[ ] Finish the prana-puppets.
[ ] Summon your Servant.
[ ] Try figuring out the nature of your magecraft
[ ] Write-in: how to handle the situation with Sakura.
[ ] Go to sleep.
“Sakura, run home. Quickly,” said Zouken.
Even though the situation he was in felt tense, the orange-haired boy’s voice betrayed the state of mind of a several hundred year old magus; utter calmness. It was one of his best qualities; the ability to never rush himself, the ability to take his time and think of the best possible course of action, the ability to suppress the need to take risks.
Just a moment ago, when he had been struck, the magus felt an unnatural rush of anger; the need to eliminate everyone who dared to endanger his favorite tool. However, he had dealt with unnatural emotions raging inside him all day. Zouken knew to expect these little outbursts now, and to crush them.
Given a right push, any situation can be turned in favor of you; even this one.
Zouken stood up from the ground, noticing the exasperated expressions of every person in the conflict.
Since he could no longer rely on the 'frail old man' shtick, the magus had to think of a new way to appear weak; blatantly lying about his condition would do well. Looking straight into the eyes of his previous attacker, he willfully wobbled his left knee and said, “You hit me at a bad angle. Bad for you, I mean. I didn’t feel a thing.”
“But Senpai---“ said Sakura, looking at the boy of his dreams with a concerned expression.
Without turning towards the girl or stopping his soul-piercing glare, Zouken responded, “Run home, right now. Don’t mention it to Shinji. I wouldn’t want him worrying about me. I’ll be fine, now go!”
With a sour face, it bolted towards its house.
The previous conversation had seemed to amuse the goons surrounding you, seeing as the high-school kid appeared to be in danger of falling back down at any given moment. However, as soon as they heard the words ‘run home’, they reacted. One of the pipe-wielders dropped his weapon and dashed towards the purple-haired girl; as did Zouken.
The magus knew about his body’s excellent physical condition, but was unsure about its magical capabilities. After all, he had just opened its circuits this very day. While maintaining his running speed, in one fluid motion, Zouken pulled his white-and-blue shirt over his head, infused it with prana and sent it flying towards the bald thug between him and his purple tool. Zouken had meant to use the shirt as a distraction. He infused the shirt as full of magical energy as he could, thinking that in such an extreme case, the cloth might harden enough for it to reach his opponent and send him tumbling down. The moment his shirt got in contact with the thug, it exploded. Every single person froze; including the bald thug lying on the ground. Sakura's pursuer was missing half of his back and had steam rising from the remaining chunk of his charred meat.
…not as planned.
Sakura, noticing the new development looked more shocked than anyone else on the street. The magus noticed that its eyes kept darting between baldy and himself, but he could not understand why. After relaxing her expression and blushing, it ran away.
By the time the other two thugs finally managed to get a word out of their mouths, the purple-hair was no longer in sight.
“Will you let us go?” asked the knife-wielder, trying to contain his fear.
The old magus smiled.
~~~~~
“Ahahaha! I win again,” yelled Shinji, standing up from the table and exposing his cards to both of his opponents. “This means I’ve won the right to eat 3/4 of the cake already.”
“We know,” said Shirou along with his Servant at the exact same time. “Can’t we play something else?”
“I’m afraid that this is the only game we have in our household,” said Shinji gleefully.
“Try not to sound so excited about that,” grumbled Shirou. “In any case, it won’t be ready for another hour or so, so there’s still time to win our rightful shares back!” He turned his head towards his Servant. “Right, Archer?”
“I’ll pass. You can have my share. I enjoy making things more than actually using them. If you don’t mind, then I’ll take a look at the premises. This has been fun and all, but if we’re planning on winning this war, then we should start by fortifying this place.” The man in red stood up as well, addressing Shinji, “If what you say about your sister is true, then I propose sending her somewhere safe. This area will become a warzone soon enough. No-one should have to suffer through something like that.”
“You’re right,” agreed Shinji. “She might die or even get taken as a hostage and used against us, were we to let her stay here.”
After taking a few moments to observe the blue-haired boy, Archer continued, “Unless either of you have a better idea, I think that we should send her to live with her grandfather, as in, the man walking around as you.”
[ ] Agree wholeheartedly.
[ ] Meet with Sakura’s grandfather first, then decide.
[ ] Write-in.
~~~~~
When the old magus had first set his eyes upon the farthest room from the courtyard, it had looked like a clone of every other room in this absurdly large house. Now, however, it had its own look. Three men had been chained to the wall, their hands and legs carefully bound. One of them was rumbling around, trying to kick, punch or even bite the young boy in front of them. The second one was attempting to threaten his capturer into releasing them.
“---a‘ll pay for what ya did to us, to Kaz. Ya fuckin’ psycho! Our crew will find ya. And when they do, they’ll burn this place to the ground! And after that, they’ll keep going until your entire family tree is---“
Zouken payed neither of them any heed; he needed to concentrate on the third male. After all, if he messed carving this spell up, he would have to get rid of this half-burnt thing. While the screams were irritating, they were also useless; Zouken had set up a sound cancelling barrier around this room right after shackling down his future prana-puppets.
The first one is ready. Heh, it may look dead, but it still has some life left in it.
The entire process had taken the magus longer than anticipated. While the spells he was using were simple enough, this new body seemed to hinder his every magical step; except for the time when he strengthened his shirt.
If I were to work on it all night, I might just finish all the necessary steps in order to activate the prana-puppets.
[ ] Finish the prana-puppets.
[ ] Summon your Servant.
[ ] Try figuring out the nature of your magecraft
[ ] Write-in: how to handle the situation with Sakura.
[ ] Go to sleep.
Chapter 9 – End
11
Fanfiction / Re: Hot-blooded worms & aging swords
« on: March 20, 2014, 08:44:13 PM »
Day 1 – Chapter 8
“What will our course of action for tonight be?”
The rotting magus stroked his chin, appearing to be deep in thought. His Servant seemed to be pleased about the fact that he didn’t reply immediately. Archer thought that Shirou was considering all kinds different scenarios and was trying to decide which one of them would be the best course of action.
He wasn’t.
Archer must be quite hungry after being summoned from who-knows where.
He wasn’t.
Now that I think about it, I haven’t eaten anything the whole day myself. Hmm, might as well make something grand to celebrate the start of our partnership then.
“Just wait here for a while, Archer. I’ll go prepare something.”
“As you wish, Master,” said the knight with a bow and found himself a place to sit. Since he felt that his Master was close enough for him to hear his words, the Servant decided to spend the time inquiring about some things. “So, Master, could you tell me how you ended up in the body of this old man? Your reason for seeking the Holy Grail sure was… unique, to say the least.”
“Well, I actually have no idea… I just know that I woke up as Shinji’s grandfather this morning,” replied the boy while searching for the necessary cooking utensils in the kitchen. After saying that, he realized that he had not seen the blue-haired boy for hours.
Sure, the pries---, no, Tohsaka’s punch had been incredible, but it has been hours since he got knocked out.
Shirou thought of going to check up on the boy himself, but he then realized that if he wanted to get the cake done by that night, he couldn’t afford to waste any time. “Hey, Archer, could you-----“
Click.
His words were interrupted by the sound of a door opening.
Crap! How could I have forgotten this? If this is the Matou house, then it would be natural for her to return home.
He rushed out of the kitchen, still wearing his apron and dashed towards the front door. He knew that the first thing he had to do was quickly drag his Servant to another room, away from Sakura’s sight. He had no intentions of dragging her to the world of magi, let alone reveal his true identity to her. He was planning on winning the War quickly, without harming any of the Masters, and then use the power of the Grail to return to his original body.
Finally reaching the front door and seeing Archer casually sitting on the sofa like nothing had happened, he realized that trying to hide him would be impossible.
Okay, so now I need to quickly come up with an explanation for… Shinji.
“Yo Emiya!” said the blue-haired boy energetically. He cast an annoyed-looking glance at Archer, then continued talking with a sly smile, “You see, when I told you that you’d get your body back with that spell, I was not lying. Since you’re my dear friend, I wanted to help you by participating in that War. There’s no way I would want you to risk your life and my grandfather’s body in that crazy battle.”
Archer snorted and asked with a raised eyebrow, “Then why didn’t you summon a Servant on your own?”
Shinji grit his teeth and looked at the knight with eyes full of hatred, “It-it’s because I am not a magus, while my grandfather is one.” He knew that he should try to conceal his enmity, but he wasn’t very good at doing that. Fortunately for him, his ‘friend’ was quite dense at times. Unfortunately for him, Archer had been waiting for a response similar to that.
“Oh, so you think that a person possessing no magical powers would have higher chances to win than a powerful magus?” asked Archer while sneering.
Shinji clicked his tongue, and then looked at Shirou in an attempt to change the subject, “…More importantly, Emiya, are you currently in the middle of cooking something?”
“Well, I haven’t started yet, but I was thinking of baking a cake to welcome Archer. I wanted to skim over some recipes though, seeing as I haven’t baked one in a long time… The thing is that I didn’t manage to find any cookbooks. Is that even possible?”
Shinji, being glad that he was no longer being questioned took the chance that Shirou gave him and said, “Yeah, from what I know, we don’t have any… But I can probably help you find the utensils you need.”
Archer, being taken aback for a second after hearing Shirou’s words smiled and also offered his help, “Well, I’m not unfamiliar with the art of baking cakes. Perhaps I can be of assistance in the kitchen.”
Letting a person for who I am baking the cake for help me make it kind of defeats the purpose, but I've got to swallow my pride, because I don't think I can remember the recipe perfectly.
Shirou accepted both offers to help him and lead the men into the kitchen.
While having a Command Spell appear on his hand was a good thing, Zouken did not think that it was yet the time to summon his Servant. After all, rushing into things was not his style. Since he assumed the dinner was over, the magus decided to get up from his bed.
I should send her--- The magus clicked his tongue and corrected his mistake. I should send it home. I need to understand how to act more like this kid around it. He curved his lips to a cruel smile. To crush it when it least expects it.
He went downstairs and motioned Sakura to come towards him.
“The streets of Fuyuki have gotten dangerous recently. I think I’ll escort you home today, Sakura.”
“Eh? N-No, that’s okay, Senpai,” replied the girl in surprise. “Besides, you were feeling bad earlier and—”
“That was then, this is now,” interrupted Zouken. “My decision is final.”
Seeing a determined look in the orange-haired boy’s eyes, Sakura gave a small sigh, and then became cheerful. “If you say so, Senpai.”
Walking towards the Matou residence with his granddaughter, Zouken started to become annoyed by the uncomfortable silence. Apparently, ‘it’ seemed to be pleased with just walking besides him, but the magus wasn’t. If he had known they were going to be walking in silence the entire way, he would have not decided to escort her… no, it. Zouken had thought that coming up with subjects to talk about with teenaged girls would be easy.
It wasn’t.
Zouken made a mental note to ‘research’ things that were ‘hip’ in the current generation later. He was just about to start talking about his ‘trump card’, Neon Genesis Evangelion, but a group of unfamiliar voices stopped him from doing so.
“Hey, missy, want to have a rea~lly good time?”
“Leave this loser and join us, will ya?”
“We’ll be sure to be gentle, won’t we?”
A group of three crude-looking men surrounded the pair, laughing menacingly. From their breaths, anyone would have realized that they were drunk. Two of the men seemed to be carrying steel pipes, while the third one expertly handled a small pocket-knife between his nimble fingers. Apparently, the leader of the pack was a rather skilled knife-fighter, even if he was under the influence of alcohol.
They ignored Zouken and started moving closer to the purple-haired girl.
“S-Senpai!” squealed the girl with fearful eyes. Her whole body was shaking. While she knew that Shirou’s body was fit, she wasn’t naïve enough to think that he could take on three armed thugs in their twenties.
“Huh?” asked the leader with annoyance. “It’s not like we’re goin’ to hurt ya or anythin’. I told ya, we’ll be rea~lly gentle.” He motioned one of his followers with his chin, who seemed to understand his signal.
While Zouken was thinking to himself which course of action would be the best to take, he suddenly felt a sharp pain coming from his legs; more specifically, from his knees. The back of his left knee had been hit with a metal pipe, causing the magus to fall to the ground.
And that pissed Zouken off.
“See? Since that guy is outta the picture, you’ll join us now, won’t you, missy?”
Sakura brought her hands next to her mouth in shock. She was obviously scared and confused.
[ ] Pretend to be too injured to move and let them have Sakura.
[ ] Tell Sakura to run away and beat the hell out of those three.
[X] Beat the hell out of those three and let Sakura watch.
“What will our course of action for tonight be?”
The rotting magus stroked his chin, appearing to be deep in thought. His Servant seemed to be pleased about the fact that he didn’t reply immediately. Archer thought that Shirou was considering all kinds different scenarios and was trying to decide which one of them would be the best course of action.
He wasn’t.
Archer must be quite hungry after being summoned from who-knows where.
He wasn’t.
Now that I think about it, I haven’t eaten anything the whole day myself. Hmm, might as well make something grand to celebrate the start of our partnership then.
“Just wait here for a while, Archer. I’ll go prepare something.”
“As you wish, Master,” said the knight with a bow and found himself a place to sit. Since he felt that his Master was close enough for him to hear his words, the Servant decided to spend the time inquiring about some things. “So, Master, could you tell me how you ended up in the body of this old man? Your reason for seeking the Holy Grail sure was… unique, to say the least.”
“Well, I actually have no idea… I just know that I woke up as Shinji’s grandfather this morning,” replied the boy while searching for the necessary cooking utensils in the kitchen. After saying that, he realized that he had not seen the blue-haired boy for hours.
Sure, the pries---, no, Tohsaka’s punch had been incredible, but it has been hours since he got knocked out.
Shirou thought of going to check up on the boy himself, but he then realized that if he wanted to get the cake done by that night, he couldn’t afford to waste any time. “Hey, Archer, could you-----“
Click.
His words were interrupted by the sound of a door opening.
Crap! How could I have forgotten this? If this is the Matou house, then it would be natural for her to return home.
He rushed out of the kitchen, still wearing his apron and dashed towards the front door. He knew that the first thing he had to do was quickly drag his Servant to another room, away from Sakura’s sight. He had no intentions of dragging her to the world of magi, let alone reveal his true identity to her. He was planning on winning the War quickly, without harming any of the Masters, and then use the power of the Grail to return to his original body.
Finally reaching the front door and seeing Archer casually sitting on the sofa like nothing had happened, he realized that trying to hide him would be impossible.
Okay, so now I need to quickly come up with an explanation for… Shinji.
“Yo Emiya!” said the blue-haired boy energetically. He cast an annoyed-looking glance at Archer, then continued talking with a sly smile, “You see, when I told you that you’d get your body back with that spell, I was not lying. Since you’re my dear friend, I wanted to help you by participating in that War. There’s no way I would want you to risk your life and my grandfather’s body in that crazy battle.”
Archer snorted and asked with a raised eyebrow, “Then why didn’t you summon a Servant on your own?”
Shinji grit his teeth and looked at the knight with eyes full of hatred, “It-it’s because I am not a magus, while my grandfather is one.” He knew that he should try to conceal his enmity, but he wasn’t very good at doing that. Fortunately for him, his ‘friend’ was quite dense at times. Unfortunately for him, Archer had been waiting for a response similar to that.
“Oh, so you think that a person possessing no magical powers would have higher chances to win than a powerful magus?” asked Archer while sneering.
Shinji clicked his tongue, and then looked at Shirou in an attempt to change the subject, “…More importantly, Emiya, are you currently in the middle of cooking something?”
“Well, I haven’t started yet, but I was thinking of baking a cake to welcome Archer. I wanted to skim over some recipes though, seeing as I haven’t baked one in a long time… The thing is that I didn’t manage to find any cookbooks. Is that even possible?”
Shinji, being glad that he was no longer being questioned took the chance that Shirou gave him and said, “Yeah, from what I know, we don’t have any… But I can probably help you find the utensils you need.”
Archer, being taken aback for a second after hearing Shirou’s words smiled and also offered his help, “Well, I’m not unfamiliar with the art of baking cakes. Perhaps I can be of assistance in the kitchen.”
Letting a person for who I am baking the cake for help me make it kind of defeats the purpose, but I've got to swallow my pride, because I don't think I can remember the recipe perfectly.
Shirou accepted both offers to help him and lead the men into the kitchen.
~~~~~
While having a Command Spell appear on his hand was a good thing, Zouken did not think that it was yet the time to summon his Servant. After all, rushing into things was not his style. Since he assumed the dinner was over, the magus decided to get up from his bed.
I should send her--- The magus clicked his tongue and corrected his mistake. I should send it home. I need to understand how to act more like this kid around it. He curved his lips to a cruel smile. To crush it when it least expects it.
He went downstairs and motioned Sakura to come towards him.
“The streets of Fuyuki have gotten dangerous recently. I think I’ll escort you home today, Sakura.”
“Eh? N-No, that’s okay, Senpai,” replied the girl in surprise. “Besides, you were feeling bad earlier and—”
“That was then, this is now,” interrupted Zouken. “My decision is final.”
Seeing a determined look in the orange-haired boy’s eyes, Sakura gave a small sigh, and then became cheerful. “If you say so, Senpai.”
~~~~~
Walking towards the Matou residence with his granddaughter, Zouken started to become annoyed by the uncomfortable silence. Apparently, ‘it’ seemed to be pleased with just walking besides him, but the magus wasn’t. If he had known they were going to be walking in silence the entire way, he would have not decided to escort her… no, it. Zouken had thought that coming up with subjects to talk about with teenaged girls would be easy.
It wasn’t.
Zouken made a mental note to ‘research’ things that were ‘hip’ in the current generation later. He was just about to start talking about his ‘trump card’, Neon Genesis Evangelion, but a group of unfamiliar voices stopped him from doing so.
“Hey, missy, want to have a rea~lly good time?”
“Leave this loser and join us, will ya?”
“We’ll be sure to be gentle, won’t we?”
A group of three crude-looking men surrounded the pair, laughing menacingly. From their breaths, anyone would have realized that they were drunk. Two of the men seemed to be carrying steel pipes, while the third one expertly handled a small pocket-knife between his nimble fingers. Apparently, the leader of the pack was a rather skilled knife-fighter, even if he was under the influence of alcohol.
They ignored Zouken and started moving closer to the purple-haired girl.
“S-Senpai!” squealed the girl with fearful eyes. Her whole body was shaking. While she knew that Shirou’s body was fit, she wasn’t naïve enough to think that he could take on three armed thugs in their twenties.
“Huh?” asked the leader with annoyance. “It’s not like we’re goin’ to hurt ya or anythin’. I told ya, we’ll be rea~lly gentle.” He motioned one of his followers with his chin, who seemed to understand his signal.
While Zouken was thinking to himself which course of action would be the best to take, he suddenly felt a sharp pain coming from his legs; more specifically, from his knees. The back of his left knee had been hit with a metal pipe, causing the magus to fall to the ground.
And that pissed Zouken off.
“See? Since that guy is outta the picture, you’ll join us now, won’t you, missy?”
Sakura brought her hands next to her mouth in shock. She was obviously scared and confused.
[ ] Tell Sakura to run away and beat the hell out of those three.
[X] Beat the hell out of those three and let Sakura watch.
Chapter 8 – End
12
Fanfiction / Re: Hot-blooded worms & aging swords
« on: March 20, 2014, 08:39:59 PM »
Day 1 – Chapter 7
“Wait!” Zouken called out without thinking.
The silver-haired girl stopped. She did not expect her brother to call out to her. Luckily for Zouken, it was still fairly bright outside and the girl had left her Servant at the castle. The girl couldn’t hide her surprise. She had never actually talked with the boy before, so she had to admit that she was curious as to why he stopped her.
The girl turned around slowly and regained her composure. She slyly looked at the orange-haired boy and asked, “What is it, onii-chan?”
“You know, it’s rude to start a conversation and then just walk off, young lady.”
The girl’s eyes widened. She didn’t think there was a person in the world who would take what she said to him earlier as a conversation opener. She was going to tell that to him and walk off, but something the boy said annoyed the girl. She felt the need to correct him before anything else. “I’ll have you know that I’m older than you, onii-chan!” she pouted.
Hmm, so her personality is nothing like Justica’s… But it’s not like I can move ahead with my plan right now in any case. I might as well spend my time with her then.
“Hoh~ Well, you sure don’t look like it, missy,” teased Zouken. This was the first time in 200 years when he had light-heartedly done so. In the past, he had also tried to poke fun at Justica, but due to her aloof personality, it never gave him satisfying results. But it was different with this new homunculus.
The girl waved her hands up and down in dismay. “LIKE-I-SAID, I am! So you’ll just have to believe me! …And don’t call me ‘missy’, my name is Ilyasviel von Einzbern,” she said while curtsying. “Well, if that’s too hard for you to understand, just call me Ilya.”
“Alright, alright, Ilya. My name is… Shirou, Emiya Shirou, but long ago my friends used to call me Makki.”
“Makki?” asked the girl with a puzzled look while putting a finger near her mouth, then started walking somewhere with a smile, “Yeah, Makki is Makki.”
Zouken followed the girl, not noticing himself wearing a gentle smile.
His battle had ended. The knight had accepted his fate, held out long enough to help his younger self and parted from the mortal world; the smile of the girl he always admired being the final thing he saw.
That’s what the records he just finished reading told him. It was a story that contained both sadness and happiness. But finishing that, he felt strangely happy. The knight no longer possessed a burning desire to hunt down his younger self. The man closed his eyes and waited for his next summoning; his next job as a cleaner of the world.
He didn’t know if it was after an instant or an eternity, but finally the call came. Strangely enough, it wasn’t a call from the World. The knight knew where it was calling him to. A voice was asking him to become a Servant in the Holy Grail War once more. But it was odd since the voice did not sound anything like that girl’s voice.
And there should not have been anyone else who could have summoned him to that War. No one, besides for one boy… But he knew that even that should have been impossible due to him having Avalon inside of his body. And that oddity raised his curiosity.
The knight in red smirked and accepted his fate as a Servant once more.
The two figures arrived at their destination – the park. Neither of them had said a word while they walked there. The young girl led the way and the old magus simply followed her. Ilya sat on a bench and expectedly stared at Zouken’s face, waiting for him to say something.
“You know, Ilya, you shouldn’t speak so lightly of killing people,” Zouken said with a strict voice. While he was aware of the hypocrisy of what he just said, he just blurted that sentence out. He didn’t know why, but he simply didn’t want a girl who looked just like Justica to act like that. The person who he remembered, the person very dear to his heart, was a pure woman who would never speak of such things.
Ilya looked like a child who was looking for an excuse after doing something bad and said, “I-It’s not like I’m going to kill you right away… I planned to let you-----“
She could not finish her sentence, Zouken managed to cut her off before that by grabbing her shoulders and looking her directly in the eyes. “Ilya, you would be much cuter if you would not talk about killing other people.”
“…Eh?” was the only thing the silver-haired girl managed to say after hearing that. Her mind went blank; she needed some time to process what had just happened. She shook herself free of his arms and hopped a few steps backwards. Ilya turned her back to the orange-haired boy and said, “W-Well… it seems like Berserker has woken up… So I need to hurry back to the castle.”
Zouken saw the girl start running with light steps, only to stop and turn around after a short while. “Berserker’s a heavy sleeper, so if I feel like it, I might be here tomorrow morning.” Leaving with those words, the silver-haired girl soon disappeared from his sight.
The magus sighed when he realized that it was already dark outside. He knew that he should hurry to the Emiya residence in order to avoid appearing suspicious.
That Einzbern girl sure was soft… Wait, what the hell am I thinking? I’m in an excellent position for activating… it. I shouldn’t concern myself with other things.
There was a loud bang, followed by a trail of smoke. One additional person now resided in a room where there were just two people a short while ago.
“So that’s how a Servant looks like, huh?” mumbled an old wrinkly man in bafflement.
Ignoring him, a girl with twin-tails walked towards the newly summoned Servant in red and said, “My name is Kotomine Kirei. The one over there, Emiya Shirou, is your Master.”
Hearing that, the knight narrowed his eyes and asked, “Before I acknowledge you as my Master, I’d like to know for what purpose did you summon me. Why do you desire the Holy Grail?”
“I require the help of the Holy Grail to return to my original body. What about you? Kotomine told me that the Servants seek the Grail as well.”
“Me? I don’t seek that thing. I simply answered your summon as a whim.” The knight in red sighed. “That’ll do. I acknowledge you as my Master. But, Kotomine, it’s not like I don’t appreciate your help, but I’d like to hold a certain meeting with my Master right now. You understand that I don’t want any outsiders to know my identity, right?”
The priest closed his eyes and replied, “Of course. Then I shall take my leave.”
Was it just my imagination, or did he emit enmity towards Kotomine?
“Now then, Master, you may call me Archer. As for my identity… I’d rather keep that a secret. The only thing you need to know is that I’m quite capable,” said Archer with a grin.
Hmph, somehow I get the feeling that I will not be able to work well with this guy.
“What will our course of action for tonight be?”
[ ] Patrol Shinto.
[ ] Patrol Miyama.
[ ] What do you mean he’s not going to reveal his identity? Use a Command Spell to force him to spill his beans.
[X] Stay home and bake him a cake to gain his trust.
Zouken finally arrived ‘home’. During his way there, he had become quite irritated. He couldn’t figure out why he had acted so differently when he was around the girl. Why he had had a fun time. He didn’t want to admit it himself, but being around her had made him forget all of his evil schemes.
And that was exactly why he was annoyed. He could almost taste immortality, but…
Why did I want to become immortal in the first place?
He took off his shoes while gritting his teeth. He did not remember the reason for having that as his goal. In any case, it was irrelevant. He had to become immortal, just because. That’s what he convinced himself in his mind to make the uneasiness go away.
He heard footsteps coming towards him.
Damn it, I really don’t want to deal with her right now…
The magus’ eyes went wide when owner of the footsteps appeared before him. It was not due to seeing her identity; she was indeed the person who he thought it would be – Sakura. The thing that surprised him was how he had thought of her. He had never thought of Sakura as a person before.
Tch, it must have been a slip of my tongue… er, mind.
“Senpai, we were waiting for you to get here. The dinner is still warm, so join us,” said the purple-haired girl gently.
Surprisingly enough, no sounds of protest came from the mouth of Fujimura Taiga. Apparently, she still felt a bit weird about what he had done earlier that day. That should have brought pleasure to the old magus, but it didn’t.
He looked gloomily at the girl and said, “Sorry, Sakura, I’m not feeling well. I think I’ll go to my room and skip dinner.”
“W-What happened? You look pale, Senpai.”
Ignoring the worried voice of his granddaughter, Zouken trotted towards ‘his’ room.
The sounds of dishwashing echoed throughout the residence, so the magus assumed that the dinner had come to an end. He had been musing over the happenings of his weird day, and while doing so, he had managed to compose himself. He was still feeling a bit annoyed, but that was now a minor thing. He looked at one of his hands and grinned while staring at the blood-red mark that had appeared on it.
[ ] Wait for the girls to leave and summon your Servant.
[ ] Continue your plan with Fujimura after seeing Sakura leave.
[X] Walk Sakura home in an attempt to get closer to her.
“Wait!” Zouken called out without thinking.
The silver-haired girl stopped. She did not expect her brother to call out to her. Luckily for Zouken, it was still fairly bright outside and the girl had left her Servant at the castle. The girl couldn’t hide her surprise. She had never actually talked with the boy before, so she had to admit that she was curious as to why he stopped her.
The girl turned around slowly and regained her composure. She slyly looked at the orange-haired boy and asked, “What is it, onii-chan?”
“You know, it’s rude to start a conversation and then just walk off, young lady.”
The girl’s eyes widened. She didn’t think there was a person in the world who would take what she said to him earlier as a conversation opener. She was going to tell that to him and walk off, but something the boy said annoyed the girl. She felt the need to correct him before anything else. “I’ll have you know that I’m older than you, onii-chan!” she pouted.
Hmm, so her personality is nothing like Justica’s… But it’s not like I can move ahead with my plan right now in any case. I might as well spend my time with her then.
“Hoh~ Well, you sure don’t look like it, missy,” teased Zouken. This was the first time in 200 years when he had light-heartedly done so. In the past, he had also tried to poke fun at Justica, but due to her aloof personality, it never gave him satisfying results. But it was different with this new homunculus.
The girl waved her hands up and down in dismay. “LIKE-I-SAID, I am! So you’ll just have to believe me! …And don’t call me ‘missy’, my name is Ilyasviel von Einzbern,” she said while curtsying. “Well, if that’s too hard for you to understand, just call me Ilya.”
“Alright, alright, Ilya. My name is… Shirou, Emiya Shirou, but long ago my friends used to call me Makki.”
“Makki?” asked the girl with a puzzled look while putting a finger near her mouth, then started walking somewhere with a smile, “Yeah, Makki is Makki.”
Zouken followed the girl, not noticing himself wearing a gentle smile.
~~~~~
His battle had ended. The knight had accepted his fate, held out long enough to help his younger self and parted from the mortal world; the smile of the girl he always admired being the final thing he saw.
That’s what the records he just finished reading told him. It was a story that contained both sadness and happiness. But finishing that, he felt strangely happy. The knight no longer possessed a burning desire to hunt down his younger self. The man closed his eyes and waited for his next summoning; his next job as a cleaner of the world.
He didn’t know if it was after an instant or an eternity, but finally the call came. Strangely enough, it wasn’t a call from the World. The knight knew where it was calling him to. A voice was asking him to become a Servant in the Holy Grail War once more. But it was odd since the voice did not sound anything like that girl’s voice.
And there should not have been anyone else who could have summoned him to that War. No one, besides for one boy… But he knew that even that should have been impossible due to him having Avalon inside of his body. And that oddity raised his curiosity.
The knight in red smirked and accepted his fate as a Servant once more.
~~~~~
The two figures arrived at their destination – the park. Neither of them had said a word while they walked there. The young girl led the way and the old magus simply followed her. Ilya sat on a bench and expectedly stared at Zouken’s face, waiting for him to say something.
“You know, Ilya, you shouldn’t speak so lightly of killing people,” Zouken said with a strict voice. While he was aware of the hypocrisy of what he just said, he just blurted that sentence out. He didn’t know why, but he simply didn’t want a girl who looked just like Justica to act like that. The person who he remembered, the person very dear to his heart, was a pure woman who would never speak of such things.
Ilya looked like a child who was looking for an excuse after doing something bad and said, “I-It’s not like I’m going to kill you right away… I planned to let you-----“
She could not finish her sentence, Zouken managed to cut her off before that by grabbing her shoulders and looking her directly in the eyes. “Ilya, you would be much cuter if you would not talk about killing other people.”
“…Eh?” was the only thing the silver-haired girl managed to say after hearing that. Her mind went blank; she needed some time to process what had just happened. She shook herself free of his arms and hopped a few steps backwards. Ilya turned her back to the orange-haired boy and said, “W-Well… it seems like Berserker has woken up… So I need to hurry back to the castle.”
Zouken saw the girl start running with light steps, only to stop and turn around after a short while. “Berserker’s a heavy sleeper, so if I feel like it, I might be here tomorrow morning.” Leaving with those words, the silver-haired girl soon disappeared from his sight.
The magus sighed when he realized that it was already dark outside. He knew that he should hurry to the Emiya residence in order to avoid appearing suspicious.
That Einzbern girl sure was soft… Wait, what the hell am I thinking? I’m in an excellent position for activating… it. I shouldn’t concern myself with other things.
~~~~~
There was a loud bang, followed by a trail of smoke. One additional person now resided in a room where there were just two people a short while ago.
“So that’s how a Servant looks like, huh?” mumbled an old wrinkly man in bafflement.
Ignoring him, a girl with twin-tails walked towards the newly summoned Servant in red and said, “My name is Kotomine Kirei. The one over there, Emiya Shirou, is your Master.”
Hearing that, the knight narrowed his eyes and asked, “Before I acknowledge you as my Master, I’d like to know for what purpose did you summon me. Why do you desire the Holy Grail?”
“I require the help of the Holy Grail to return to my original body. What about you? Kotomine told me that the Servants seek the Grail as well.”
“Me? I don’t seek that thing. I simply answered your summon as a whim.” The knight in red sighed. “That’ll do. I acknowledge you as my Master. But, Kotomine, it’s not like I don’t appreciate your help, but I’d like to hold a certain meeting with my Master right now. You understand that I don’t want any outsiders to know my identity, right?”
The priest closed his eyes and replied, “Of course. Then I shall take my leave.”
Was it just my imagination, or did he emit enmity towards Kotomine?
“Now then, Master, you may call me Archer. As for my identity… I’d rather keep that a secret. The only thing you need to know is that I’m quite capable,” said Archer with a grin.
Hmph, somehow I get the feeling that I will not be able to work well with this guy.
“What will our course of action for tonight be?”
[ ] Patrol Miyama.
[ ] What do you mean he’s not going to reveal his identity? Use a Command Spell to force him to spill his beans.
[X] Stay home and bake him a cake to gain his trust.
~~~~~
Zouken finally arrived ‘home’. During his way there, he had become quite irritated. He couldn’t figure out why he had acted so differently when he was around the girl. Why he had had a fun time. He didn’t want to admit it himself, but being around her had made him forget all of his evil schemes.
And that was exactly why he was annoyed. He could almost taste immortality, but…
Why did I want to become immortal in the first place?
He took off his shoes while gritting his teeth. He did not remember the reason for having that as his goal. In any case, it was irrelevant. He had to become immortal, just because. That’s what he convinced himself in his mind to make the uneasiness go away.
He heard footsteps coming towards him.
Damn it, I really don’t want to deal with her right now…
The magus’ eyes went wide when owner of the footsteps appeared before him. It was not due to seeing her identity; she was indeed the person who he thought it would be – Sakura. The thing that surprised him was how he had thought of her. He had never thought of Sakura as a person before.
Tch, it must have been a slip of my tongue… er, mind.
“Senpai, we were waiting for you to get here. The dinner is still warm, so join us,” said the purple-haired girl gently.
Surprisingly enough, no sounds of protest came from the mouth of Fujimura Taiga. Apparently, she still felt a bit weird about what he had done earlier that day. That should have brought pleasure to the old magus, but it didn’t.
He looked gloomily at the girl and said, “Sorry, Sakura, I’m not feeling well. I think I’ll go to my room and skip dinner.”
“W-What happened? You look pale, Senpai.”
Ignoring the worried voice of his granddaughter, Zouken trotted towards ‘his’ room.
~~~~~
The sounds of dishwashing echoed throughout the residence, so the magus assumed that the dinner had come to an end. He had been musing over the happenings of his weird day, and while doing so, he had managed to compose himself. He was still feeling a bit annoyed, but that was now a minor thing. He looked at one of his hands and grinned while staring at the blood-red mark that had appeared on it.
[ ] Continue your plan with Fujimura after seeing Sakura leave.
[X] Walk Sakura home in an attempt to get closer to her.
Chapter 7 – End
13
Fanfiction / Re: Hot-blooded worms & aging swords
« on: March 20, 2014, 08:35:31 PM »
Day 1 – Chapter 6
I have no intentions of staying in this body for an eternity, but that does not mean I want to take someone else’s opportunity to return away.
“I’m not going to stop you from using that artefact,” declared the boy, turning Rin a bit cheerful. “But I’m also not going to give up trying to regain my body. There has to be another way to do it!”
Rin sighed. “While I was aware of your stubbornness, I can’t believe that you’re this naïve, Emiya-kun.” Shirou made a sour face after hearing that, but let her continue, “Listen up, during all of my years as a magus, I have never heard of a spell letting you do this. …Well, whatever, at least this means you won’t be my enemy, correct?”
The boy didn’t like what she said once more, but he nodded.
How can she say that without even trying? You can’t rule out the possibility of there being some other way. Besides, if there was one way to do it, why can’t there be two?
As he opened his mouth to protest, he noticed that his conversation partner was no longer in front of him. Instead, she was walking away, glaring at her former body.
Kotomine did not seem to care about that, seeing as he cheerfully walked towards the boy, as if to replace Rin.
“I heard you mentioning an alternative way to return to your body.” Kotomine smiled and moved closed to Shirou. “I might be able to help you with that. But let’s talk inside, Emiya Shirou. You’re in the shade right now, but you still shouldn’t wander outside of your house during the daytime. I’ll answer any questions that you might have.”
Damn it, I know that he’s really a guy, but that sure is some pretty hair…
“…Are you listening to me?” asked the voice of a young girl.
He wasn’t.
“Huh? O-Oh, yeah, sure,” replied the boy while fumbling for words.
The priest raised an eyebrow. “Then let us go inside.”
“And this is it what the Holy Grail War basically is. Do you understand now, Emiya Shirou?”
“Yeah, thanks, Kotomine. You helped me understand the point of Shinji’s spell.”
It felt weird for him having to address the school’s idol that way and it was even weirder to hear such long lectures, but for some reason, he just didn’t seem to mind hearing all of that in her voice.
The priest crossed his legs and posed a question with a broad smile, “Well then, Emiya Shirou, I told you about the power of the Holy Grail. How about using that power to get you back into your original body?”
“Is Tohsaka a Master?”
“She has no Servant.”
Thank goodness. If she had been a participant in that war, then there would have been no way for me to take part in it, but if she isn’t…
The wrinkled old Shirou stroke his chin. “Alright, I’ll participate. Also, while I do appreciate all of your help, wouldn’t it be better for you to use the power of the Grail yourself?”
Kotomine laughed as he replied, “Silly boy, not being in my own body does not change the fact that I’m a servant of the God. Do you really think that a supervisor of the War could take part in it?” He re-crossed his legs, finding it to be amusing to see Shirou’s gaze fall on his thighs. “Besides, knowing Rin, she’s already doing everything possible for us being able to swap back.”
He has a point… she is an honour-student, after all. That kind of a thing needs determination.
“Well then, about your Servant. Currently the only classes available are Saber, Archer and Rider,” said Kotomine and licked his lips. “But if we leave out a few lines from the spell that Matou Shinji gave you, summoning Assassin should also be possible. Do you want to summon a Servant similar to yourself or do you want Assassin?”
[X] Come what may.
[ ] Go for certainty – pick Assassin.
The bell signalling the end of the classes finally rang.
Zouken had not enjoyed his first school-day. Namely, because he got annoyed at his biology teacher for claiming that worms looked ugly.
He ignored a blue-haired boy with glasses walking towards him and jogged down the stairs. Zouken wasn’t planning on wasting any more time in that place. He made plans on what to do next while exiting the school premises.
Those thoughts were interrupted.
“If you don’t summon it soon, you’re going to die, onii-chan~!” was the only thing a silver-haired little girl told him while childishly walking past the man.
The magus’ eyes went wide.
Justica? Wait, no… calm down. She’s not her, she’s this year’s Grail vessel. But still…
[X] The resemblance is too great. You just can’t pass up the opportunity of talking with her.
[ ] Ignore her and go straight home.
[ ] Ignore her and visit the archery club’s practice.
I have no intentions of staying in this body for an eternity, but that does not mean I want to take someone else’s opportunity to return away.
“I’m not going to stop you from using that artefact,” declared the boy, turning Rin a bit cheerful. “But I’m also not going to give up trying to regain my body. There has to be another way to do it!”
Rin sighed. “While I was aware of your stubbornness, I can’t believe that you’re this naïve, Emiya-kun.” Shirou made a sour face after hearing that, but let her continue, “Listen up, during all of my years as a magus, I have never heard of a spell letting you do this. …Well, whatever, at least this means you won’t be my enemy, correct?”
The boy didn’t like what she said once more, but he nodded.
How can she say that without even trying? You can’t rule out the possibility of there being some other way. Besides, if there was one way to do it, why can’t there be two?
As he opened his mouth to protest, he noticed that his conversation partner was no longer in front of him. Instead, she was walking away, glaring at her former body.
Kotomine did not seem to care about that, seeing as he cheerfully walked towards the boy, as if to replace Rin.
“I heard you mentioning an alternative way to return to your body.” Kotomine smiled and moved closed to Shirou. “I might be able to help you with that. But let’s talk inside, Emiya Shirou. You’re in the shade right now, but you still shouldn’t wander outside of your house during the daytime. I’ll answer any questions that you might have.”
Damn it, I know that he’s really a guy, but that sure is some pretty hair…
“…Are you listening to me?” asked the voice of a young girl.
He wasn’t.
“Huh? O-Oh, yeah, sure,” replied the boy while fumbling for words.
The priest raised an eyebrow. “Then let us go inside.”
~~~~~
“And this is it what the Holy Grail War basically is. Do you understand now, Emiya Shirou?”
“Yeah, thanks, Kotomine. You helped me understand the point of Shinji’s spell.”
It felt weird for him having to address the school’s idol that way and it was even weirder to hear such long lectures, but for some reason, he just didn’t seem to mind hearing all of that in her voice.
The priest crossed his legs and posed a question with a broad smile, “Well then, Emiya Shirou, I told you about the power of the Holy Grail. How about using that power to get you back into your original body?”
“Is Tohsaka a Master?”
“She has no Servant.”
Thank goodness. If she had been a participant in that war, then there would have been no way for me to take part in it, but if she isn’t…
The wrinkled old Shirou stroke his chin. “Alright, I’ll participate. Also, while I do appreciate all of your help, wouldn’t it be better for you to use the power of the Grail yourself?”
Kotomine laughed as he replied, “Silly boy, not being in my own body does not change the fact that I’m a servant of the God. Do you really think that a supervisor of the War could take part in it?” He re-crossed his legs, finding it to be amusing to see Shirou’s gaze fall on his thighs. “Besides, knowing Rin, she’s already doing everything possible for us being able to swap back.”
He has a point… she is an honour-student, after all. That kind of a thing needs determination.
“Well then, about your Servant. Currently the only classes available are Saber, Archer and Rider,” said Kotomine and licked his lips. “But if we leave out a few lines from the spell that Matou Shinji gave you, summoning Assassin should also be possible. Do you want to summon a Servant similar to yourself or do you want Assassin?”
[X] Come what may.
~~~~~
The bell signalling the end of the classes finally rang.
Zouken had not enjoyed his first school-day. Namely, because he got annoyed at his biology teacher for claiming that worms looked ugly.
He ignored a blue-haired boy with glasses walking towards him and jogged down the stairs. Zouken wasn’t planning on wasting any more time in that place. He made plans on what to do next while exiting the school premises.
Those thoughts were interrupted.
“If you don’t summon it soon, you’re going to die, onii-chan~!” was the only thing a silver-haired little girl told him while childishly walking past the man.
The magus’ eyes went wide.
Justica? Wait, no… calm down. She’s not her, she’s this year’s Grail vessel. But still…
[X] The resemblance is too great. You just can’t pass up the opportunity of talking with her.
[ ] Ignore her and visit the archery club’s practice.
Chapter 6 – End
14
Fanfiction / Re: Hot-blooded worms & aging swords
« on: March 20, 2014, 08:31:06 PM »
Day 1 – Chapter 5
Thanks to Shinji’s great efforts, I know that there’s a way for me to return to my old body. So there’s really no need to rush.
“I’m sorry, Shinji. I appreciate your hard work, but it would make me a terrible host to ignore a doorbell like this,” said Shirou with a smile on his face. “We can do it after I get back, right?”
While Shirou did not seem to notice it, Shinji was visibly getting irritated. He gritted his teeth and mustered out, “Yeah, Emiya… We’ll do it after our guest goes home.”
The two boys went downstairs and opened the door. Behind it was a tall man with a strong build. He was wearing a blue trench coat and a golden cross. His expression was grim. Right after the door had been opened, the priest had taken a small step forward with one of his legs, ensuring that the door could not be slammed shut in front of him.
The man was not smiling and his words were as cold as ice. “Emiya Shirou, I presume?” asked the priest while looking directly at the old magus, as if staring deep into his soul.
Shinji was both scared out of his mind and also extremely annoyed. He couldn’t understand why the world was filled with intimidating people who always seemed to ignore his existence.
Shirou was also taken back by the odd-looking man’s presence, but he decided to do his best to not make it show.
“Yeah, I am. And how did you know that, Mr…?”
After hearing that, the priest’s body seemed to relax a bit. Even a warm smile appeared on his face. “Well, it’s actually Miss, not Mr.” Ignoring the confused faces of the boys, the girl continued, “I’m in a similar situation as you are, Emiya-kun. …My name is Tohsaka Rin.”
A beat.
““WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?”” was the single word that escaped the lips of both of the boys.
“Uh, yeah… I’ll explain it properly after we go inside,” suggested the girl.
“Stop right there,” exclaimed a female voice.
A brunette girl with twin-tails was walking towards the front door of the Matou residence at a leisurely pace.
“So it really did happen, huh…?” said the man wearing a cross while biting his lip.
The girl in red ignored the rhetoric question and continued, “I’m afraid I can’t let you harm Emiya Shirou at this moment, Rin.”
Tohsaka Rin, in the body of a priest narrowed her eyes and raised her voice, “What are you talking about!? I came here to ally myself with Emiya-kun, since we’re in the same boat; it’s obvious that you’re behind all of this!”
Kotomine, in the body of a young girl made an exaggerated surprised face and asked, “Hoo? So you’re saying that you have no intention of stabbing him in the back?”
“Of course not, get to the point already!”
The two boys could only stare at the sight before them while gawking; trying to process the situation in their brains.
It was the answer he had been waiting for. Kotomine smiled creepily and started talking, “And you said you wanted your body back, correct?” He seemed to be pleased after seeing the girl nod once. “You see, Rin, because of your meddling during my ritual, you happened to damage the holy artefact that is needed to perform it.”
He moved one of his hands in front of his chest and the other one behind his back, then continued with a smile that now bared his teeth, “Because of your actions, Rin, it is now only possible to perform the ritual one more time; meaning that only one pair of minds can be swapped.”
Everyone besides Kotomine gasped, but it did not seem like the man was about to stop his preaching.
“Furthermore, it will take a great amount of magical energy to fix the artefact. …Well, the Holy Grail should have enough.” He licked his lipped once. “So, do you still feel like teaming up with your rival, my cute apprentice?”
At that point, Rin could no longer say anything. Her facial expression showed a mixture of anger, helplessness and regret.
“Hey, Emiya and er… Tohsaka!” Shinji said in a loud voice to grab everyone’s attention. “Don’t take Tohsa--- uh, that priest’s words as the absolute truth! He could be lying his ass off.”
“Even if he isn’t, there’s nothing to worry about, Tohsaka,” claimed Shirou for the first time in a long while. “You see, Shinji found this spell which will let me get back to my original body. So there’s nothing to worry about.”
“Wait, Emiya!” yelled Shinji as he moved his hand to grab the paper Shirou was holding. But he was too late; the naïve boy had already happily given that paper to Tohsaka.
A beat.
“Shinji, you…” said Rin as a vein her forehead started to twitch.
“W-What is it, Tohsaka?” asked the blue-haired boy, hoping that through some miracle, she would not understand the meaning behind the spell.
Such a miracle did not happen.
“I’m quite amazed that something like this would even be possible, and I’m even more amazed that someone like you managed to understand a spell like that,” said Rin as he slowly walked towards the scared boy. “So, exactly when were you planning on telling Emiya-kun that reciting it would have given you a Servant, while dumping its upkeep part onto him?”
“Don’t come any closer, don’t come any closer, don’t come, don’tcome don’tcomedon’t-----“
A sound of a gunshot was heard.
No gun was fired. But the punch made by Kotomine’s body was powerful enough to sound like one. It had sent the blue-haired boy’s body flying against the outer wall of the Matou residence, rendering him unconscious.
“Ah, crap! I didn’t mean to punch you that strongly,” Rin yelped with a shocked face. “What the hell have you been eating to become that strong, Kotomine?”
He groped his breasts a few times, then replied with a disinterested voice, “What have you been eating to get such a flat chest?”
It was possible to visibly see steam coming out of Rin’s nostrils and ears after seeing Kotomine abuse her body like that. She immediately started running towards the priest, planning to punch him too; not holding back that time.
“Wait, wait, wait!”
But, after hearing that, she stopped. Both she and the priest turned their attention towards the person who said that – Emiya Shirou.
“…So, more than one pair really can’t switch back?”
It seemed like Kotomine wanted to answer his question, but Rin interrupted him and replied instead, “I’m afraid that’s the case here. While that guy is a real bastard, I have never seen that fake priest lie during all of my years with him.”
Rin averted her gaze for a second, then looked at Shirou with a firm look and asked him, “Emiya-kun, are you going to stand in my way of getting my body back?”
[ ] Unfortunately yes; reclaiming my own body is more important.
[ ] No… I will accept that I won’t get out of this body for the rest of my life.
[X] …Is there another way?
Thanks to Shinji’s great efforts, I know that there’s a way for me to return to my old body. So there’s really no need to rush.
“I’m sorry, Shinji. I appreciate your hard work, but it would make me a terrible host to ignore a doorbell like this,” said Shirou with a smile on his face. “We can do it after I get back, right?”
While Shirou did not seem to notice it, Shinji was visibly getting irritated. He gritted his teeth and mustered out, “Yeah, Emiya… We’ll do it after our guest goes home.”
The two boys went downstairs and opened the door. Behind it was a tall man with a strong build. He was wearing a blue trench coat and a golden cross. His expression was grim. Right after the door had been opened, the priest had taken a small step forward with one of his legs, ensuring that the door could not be slammed shut in front of him.
The man was not smiling and his words were as cold as ice. “Emiya Shirou, I presume?” asked the priest while looking directly at the old magus, as if staring deep into his soul.
Shinji was both scared out of his mind and also extremely annoyed. He couldn’t understand why the world was filled with intimidating people who always seemed to ignore his existence.
Shirou was also taken back by the odd-looking man’s presence, but he decided to do his best to not make it show.
“Yeah, I am. And how did you know that, Mr…?”
After hearing that, the priest’s body seemed to relax a bit. Even a warm smile appeared on his face. “Well, it’s actually Miss, not Mr.” Ignoring the confused faces of the boys, the girl continued, “I’m in a similar situation as you are, Emiya-kun. …My name is Tohsaka Rin.”
A beat.
““WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?”” was the single word that escaped the lips of both of the boys.
“Uh, yeah… I’ll explain it properly after we go inside,” suggested the girl.
“Stop right there,” exclaimed a female voice.
A brunette girl with twin-tails was walking towards the front door of the Matou residence at a leisurely pace.
“So it really did happen, huh…?” said the man wearing a cross while biting his lip.
The girl in red ignored the rhetoric question and continued, “I’m afraid I can’t let you harm Emiya Shirou at this moment, Rin.”
Tohsaka Rin, in the body of a priest narrowed her eyes and raised her voice, “What are you talking about!? I came here to ally myself with Emiya-kun, since we’re in the same boat; it’s obvious that you’re behind all of this!”
Kotomine, in the body of a young girl made an exaggerated surprised face and asked, “Hoo? So you’re saying that you have no intention of stabbing him in the back?”
“Of course not, get to the point already!”
The two boys could only stare at the sight before them while gawking; trying to process the situation in their brains.
It was the answer he had been waiting for. Kotomine smiled creepily and started talking, “And you said you wanted your body back, correct?” He seemed to be pleased after seeing the girl nod once. “You see, Rin, because of your meddling during my ritual, you happened to damage the holy artefact that is needed to perform it.”
He moved one of his hands in front of his chest and the other one behind his back, then continued with a smile that now bared his teeth, “Because of your actions, Rin, it is now only possible to perform the ritual one more time; meaning that only one pair of minds can be swapped.”
Everyone besides Kotomine gasped, but it did not seem like the man was about to stop his preaching.
“Furthermore, it will take a great amount of magical energy to fix the artefact. …Well, the Holy Grail should have enough.” He licked his lipped once. “So, do you still feel like teaming up with your rival, my cute apprentice?”
At that point, Rin could no longer say anything. Her facial expression showed a mixture of anger, helplessness and regret.
“Hey, Emiya and er… Tohsaka!” Shinji said in a loud voice to grab everyone’s attention. “Don’t take Tohsa--- uh, that priest’s words as the absolute truth! He could be lying his ass off.”
“Even if he isn’t, there’s nothing to worry about, Tohsaka,” claimed Shirou for the first time in a long while. “You see, Shinji found this spell which will let me get back to my original body. So there’s nothing to worry about.”
“Wait, Emiya!” yelled Shinji as he moved his hand to grab the paper Shirou was holding. But he was too late; the naïve boy had already happily given that paper to Tohsaka.
A beat.
“Shinji, you…” said Rin as a vein her forehead started to twitch.
“W-What is it, Tohsaka?” asked the blue-haired boy, hoping that through some miracle, she would not understand the meaning behind the spell.
Such a miracle did not happen.
“I’m quite amazed that something like this would even be possible, and I’m even more amazed that someone like you managed to understand a spell like that,” said Rin as he slowly walked towards the scared boy. “So, exactly when were you planning on telling Emiya-kun that reciting it would have given you a Servant, while dumping its upkeep part onto him?”
“Don’t come any closer, don’t come any closer, don’t come, don’tcome don’tcomedon’t-----“
A sound of a gunshot was heard.
No gun was fired. But the punch made by Kotomine’s body was powerful enough to sound like one. It had sent the blue-haired boy’s body flying against the outer wall of the Matou residence, rendering him unconscious.
“Ah, crap! I didn’t mean to punch you that strongly,” Rin yelped with a shocked face. “What the hell have you been eating to become that strong, Kotomine?”
He groped his breasts a few times, then replied with a disinterested voice, “What have you been eating to get such a flat chest?”
It was possible to visibly see steam coming out of Rin’s nostrils and ears after seeing Kotomine abuse her body like that. She immediately started running towards the priest, planning to punch him too; not holding back that time.
“Wait, wait, wait!”
But, after hearing that, she stopped. Both she and the priest turned their attention towards the person who said that – Emiya Shirou.
“…So, more than one pair really can’t switch back?”
It seemed like Kotomine wanted to answer his question, but Rin interrupted him and replied instead, “I’m afraid that’s the case here. While that guy is a real bastard, I have never seen that fake priest lie during all of my years with him.”
Rin averted her gaze for a second, then looked at Shirou with a firm look and asked him, “Emiya-kun, are you going to stand in my way of getting my body back?”
Chapter 5 – End
[ ] No… I will accept that I won’t get out of this body for the rest of my life.
[X] …Is there another way?
15
Fanfiction / Re: Hot-blooded worms & aging swords
« on: March 20, 2014, 08:21:45 PM »
Day 1 – Chapter 4
“Yo, Emiya!” said the handsome blue-haired student while walking towards Zouken.
The magus had decided to flat out tell the boy who he really was. Now that he thought about it, doing so would actually be beneficial to him. Even though Shinji was incompetent, he could still be used as a spy or as a simple decoy. In fact, a certain plan sprung into his mind at that moment.
“Shinji, I’m your grandfather,” the man said with a completely straight face.
A beat.
Shinji blinked his eyes a couple of times, then burst out laughing, “Buahahahahahahahaha! What, did you watch yesterday’s Star Wars marathon and decided to put a spin on Vader’s line?”
As Shinji patted the magus’ back while laughing like a hyena, Zouken’s eyebrow twitched a couple of times.
“Shinji, how well do you get along with my worms?” the orange haired boy asked emotionlessly once again.
After hearing that, the school’s idol stopped. He pulled away his hand and took a few steps backwards, muttering something to himself, “No… No, that’s not true… But THAT’S IMPOSSIBLE!”
“Heh, you’re just as pathetic as always, boy.”
“Hiiiiiiiiiiii-----“
“Fool, don’t cause a commotion here,” said the magus in a slightly annoyed voice as he beckoned the boy to come closer.
The blue-haired boy reluctantly did what he was told.
“Listen up, if you do what I say, you might be able to enter the Holy Grail War,” said Zouken while noticing Shinji’s eyes light up. He continued, “First, you’re going to need to…”
The bell signalling the beginning of the lunch break rang.
If my theory about the person being responsible for this swap holds water… I’m going to need to be prepared.
The man looked around and saw many students leave the classroom. He also saw Fujimura Taiga cleaning the blackboard. Zouken narrowed his eyes and smiled as he walked towards the female teacher.
Now it’s time to set the second part of my plan in motion.
Since she didn’t seem to notice him approaching her, the man leaned closer to her and whispered, “Hey, Fuji-nee, I don’t think I will be able to eat all of my lunch today. And I don’t really want to waste it…”
The tiger’s eyes turned catlike after hearing that. She immediately turned around, puffed out her chest and proudly said, “Well, if it’s to help you~.”
They made their way to the rooftop. At first, Taiga had suggested the archery range, but Zouken had managed to convince her to give up on that. For his plan to work, he needed some time alone with Taiga.
Both of them were eating lunch with happy faces.
When they finished, Zouken asked Taiga a question while staring into the sky, “Hey, Fuji-nee… Am I similar to dad?”
The female teacher noticed that the boy appeared to be serious, so she wasn’t going to tease him for asking something that corny.
She followed Zouken’s lead and also looked up at the sky absent-mindedly and told him, “Yeah… You really do remind me of him.”
Zouken smiled gently at her last comment and put his hand on top of hers while not moving his head and replied, “Thank you for always being there for me, Taiga.”
“Eh? Shirou, what did you just call me?”
Zouken ignored her question, stood up and started walking towards the exit while making a hand-wave motion with his hand. He planned to let Taiga muse over what just happened during the classes.
Fujimura Taiga just sat there dumbfounded, forgetting that the class was about to start.
Emiya Shirou regained his consciousness for the second time that day.
Even though he had just woken up, he felt extremely fatigued. The boy didn’t know if the pain he felt when he woke up the first time had decreased or if his mind had gotten more accustomed to it.
While his whole body was burning hot, he noticed something that made him feel better; something cold. He moved his hand towards his forehead, to press the towel more tightly against his skin, but he stopped half-way there.
Whenever he moved his body, he felt a repulsive feeling. It was as if thousands of worms squirmed under his skin every time his muscles twitched even slightly.
“Ah, I’m glad you’re finally up, Emiya!” he heard a familiar voice sound happy for some reason. It took a while for Shirou to realize that it belonged to a person who he knew well, Matou Shinji.
He slowly got up from bed, resisting the urge to vomit while doing so and said, “Huh, Shinji? Uh… where am I?”
“You’re in my house. Now, pay attention, Emiya. For some odd reason, you ended up switching bodies with my grandfather, Matou Zouken,” said Shinji as he raised his hand when Shirou wanted to say something and continued his explanation, “I spent the entire day in the Matou library in order to find the spell which would send both of you back to your original bodies. Unfortunately, I can’t use magecraft myself, but you can, through my grandfather’s body.”
“Wait, you’re also a magus? What about Sakura? Is she also involved in this?” asked Shirou while being bewildered.
Shinji pulled out something from his pocket and replied, “Well, I’m not, but I do have the knowledge of one! And wow, it seems like you really don’t know anything about magi, Emiya. You see, only the eldest child inherits the family’s Magic Circuit. Other children are raised normally.”
Shirou sighed. He felt extremely relieved about the fact that Sakura was being kept out of that world.
“But Shinji, I’ve never heard of any spells which let you switch other people’s bodies. Is it really possible?”
Shinji was starting to get annoyed by Shirou’s attitude, but he tried his best not to let his irritation show itself. He gave the paper he took from his pocket to Shirou and said, “…You do realize that you’re a living example of it being possible, right? Now that you’re awake, you can use this spell to get yourself back to your old body. Isn’t that great, Emiya?”
Shirou thought that perhaps his friend was being a little too eager about him chanting that spell. After all, he had just woken up a few minutes ago.
Nah, I think that Shinji is just concerned about the well-being of his grandfather.
Suddenly, the ringing of a doorbell was heard.
[ ] Ignore the doorbell and recite the spell that Shinji gave you.
[X] Where’s the rush? Check who’s behind the door.
“Yo, Emiya!” said the handsome blue-haired student while walking towards Zouken.
The magus had decided to flat out tell the boy who he really was. Now that he thought about it, doing so would actually be beneficial to him. Even though Shinji was incompetent, he could still be used as a spy or as a simple decoy. In fact, a certain plan sprung into his mind at that moment.
“Shinji, I’m your grandfather,” the man said with a completely straight face.
A beat.
Shinji blinked his eyes a couple of times, then burst out laughing, “Buahahahahahahahaha! What, did you watch yesterday’s Star Wars marathon and decided to put a spin on Vader’s line?”
As Shinji patted the magus’ back while laughing like a hyena, Zouken’s eyebrow twitched a couple of times.
“Shinji, how well do you get along with my worms?” the orange haired boy asked emotionlessly once again.
After hearing that, the school’s idol stopped. He pulled away his hand and took a few steps backwards, muttering something to himself, “No… No, that’s not true… But THAT’S IMPOSSIBLE!”
“Heh, you’re just as pathetic as always, boy.”
“Hiiiiiiiiiiii-----“
“Fool, don’t cause a commotion here,” said the magus in a slightly annoyed voice as he beckoned the boy to come closer.
The blue-haired boy reluctantly did what he was told.
“Listen up, if you do what I say, you might be able to enter the Holy Grail War,” said Zouken while noticing Shinji’s eyes light up. He continued, “First, you’re going to need to…”
~~~~~
The bell signalling the beginning of the lunch break rang.
If my theory about the person being responsible for this swap holds water… I’m going to need to be prepared.
The man looked around and saw many students leave the classroom. He also saw Fujimura Taiga cleaning the blackboard. Zouken narrowed his eyes and smiled as he walked towards the female teacher.
Now it’s time to set the second part of my plan in motion.
Since she didn’t seem to notice him approaching her, the man leaned closer to her and whispered, “Hey, Fuji-nee, I don’t think I will be able to eat all of my lunch today. And I don’t really want to waste it…”
The tiger’s eyes turned catlike after hearing that. She immediately turned around, puffed out her chest and proudly said, “Well, if it’s to help you~.”
~~~~~
They made their way to the rooftop. At first, Taiga had suggested the archery range, but Zouken had managed to convince her to give up on that. For his plan to work, he needed some time alone with Taiga.
Both of them were eating lunch with happy faces.
When they finished, Zouken asked Taiga a question while staring into the sky, “Hey, Fuji-nee… Am I similar to dad?”
The female teacher noticed that the boy appeared to be serious, so she wasn’t going to tease him for asking something that corny.
She followed Zouken’s lead and also looked up at the sky absent-mindedly and told him, “Yeah… You really do remind me of him.”
Zouken smiled gently at her last comment and put his hand on top of hers while not moving his head and replied, “Thank you for always being there for me, Taiga.”
“Eh? Shirou, what did you just call me?”
Zouken ignored her question, stood up and started walking towards the exit while making a hand-wave motion with his hand. He planned to let Taiga muse over what just happened during the classes.
Fujimura Taiga just sat there dumbfounded, forgetting that the class was about to start.
~~~~~
Emiya Shirou regained his consciousness for the second time that day.
Even though he had just woken up, he felt extremely fatigued. The boy didn’t know if the pain he felt when he woke up the first time had decreased or if his mind had gotten more accustomed to it.
While his whole body was burning hot, he noticed something that made him feel better; something cold. He moved his hand towards his forehead, to press the towel more tightly against his skin, but he stopped half-way there.
Whenever he moved his body, he felt a repulsive feeling. It was as if thousands of worms squirmed under his skin every time his muscles twitched even slightly.
“Ah, I’m glad you’re finally up, Emiya!” he heard a familiar voice sound happy for some reason. It took a while for Shirou to realize that it belonged to a person who he knew well, Matou Shinji.
He slowly got up from bed, resisting the urge to vomit while doing so and said, “Huh, Shinji? Uh… where am I?”
“You’re in my house. Now, pay attention, Emiya. For some odd reason, you ended up switching bodies with my grandfather, Matou Zouken,” said Shinji as he raised his hand when Shirou wanted to say something and continued his explanation, “I spent the entire day in the Matou library in order to find the spell which would send both of you back to your original bodies. Unfortunately, I can’t use magecraft myself, but you can, through my grandfather’s body.”
“Wait, you’re also a magus? What about Sakura? Is she also involved in this?” asked Shirou while being bewildered.
Shinji pulled out something from his pocket and replied, “Well, I’m not, but I do have the knowledge of one! And wow, it seems like you really don’t know anything about magi, Emiya. You see, only the eldest child inherits the family’s Magic Circuit. Other children are raised normally.”
Shirou sighed. He felt extremely relieved about the fact that Sakura was being kept out of that world.
“But Shinji, I’ve never heard of any spells which let you switch other people’s bodies. Is it really possible?”
Shinji was starting to get annoyed by Shirou’s attitude, but he tried his best not to let his irritation show itself. He gave the paper he took from his pocket to Shirou and said, “…You do realize that you’re a living example of it being possible, right? Now that you’re awake, you can use this spell to get yourself back to your old body. Isn’t that great, Emiya?”
Shirou thought that perhaps his friend was being a little too eager about him chanting that spell. After all, he had just woken up a few minutes ago.
Nah, I think that Shinji is just concerned about the well-being of his grandfather.
Suddenly, the ringing of a doorbell was heard.
Chapter 4 – End
[X] Where’s the rush? Check who’s behind the door.
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