Chapter 274 - 6-8

Chapter 6: The First Battle

Lancer patiently waited at the port for the other Servant to arrive. At night there really was no person around to see the battle that would unfold. Perfect conditions for a secret war. Finally he appeared from the other side. Just like him he wasn't hiding but slowly made his way towards him in full view. Behind him, there was his Master. Unlike his, who hid himself within a bounded field, she was just as open as his Servant. Her trust in her Servant was clearly admirable.

"So, Saber I guess", he spoke to the newcomer who casually carried a drawn katana over his shoulder. "It looks like you are the only one to follow my invitation."

"Indeed. It seems so, Lancer, I guess." Just as Saber wielded a katana, he himself wielded a spear. But opposite to his katana which looked like a fairly normal weapon, you could easily see that his spear was something special as it was three-pronged. It was a gold and blue trident with three silver spikes. And ironically it was called "Trident", too.

"Yes, I am Lancer. Now that the formalities are over, why don't we start, what we came here for?"

"What a hasty fellow. Very well, let the fight commence!"

Lancer dashed forward and thrust his trident at his opponent's heart, only to be met with steel. Saber was holding his sword slightly above him with the blade pointing downwards, sitting between two of the spikes. Lancer smiled. A splintered top on a weapon could usually be used to catch the opponent's weapon and sometimes break it, yet his opponent had no qualms using the same top to block his enemy's strike. This was going to be fun!

Two shapes sat upon the Fuyuki Bridge. On of them, observing the battle between the two Servants, was Rider. The other one, clinging to the steel frame for his dear life, was Waver. He didn't knew it beforehand, but now he had found out that he was afraid of heights. And his Servant made no move towards letting him go back to the ground. She didn't even asked, if he wanted to come in the first place. No, she instead picked him up and with one jump carried him bridal style on top of it and then put him down. Now she didn't pay him any need and instead took great attention towards the battle in front of their eyes. And at the same time her anticipation grew. She wanted to go down there and fight with them. And her Master noticed it, too.

"Wait!", he tried to stop her. "I told you, not to fight until we have more information on the opponents!" He gulped as she turned towards him. Again her face had equipped that cold gaze. "A-at-at last wait until one of them is defeated! And let me down!" To his surprise she actually obeyed, picking him up, jumping down with him and then jumping up alone, again. Waver sighed and proceeded to watch the battle from the eye of one of his familiars. He really hoped, she wouldn't interfere until one of them was out for good!

But Waver and Rider weren't the only ones to watch this battle. In the near vicinity there were five further people watching the fight that had unfolded. On of them was Emiya Kiritsugu. He had brought his sniper rifle, but he wasn't going to use it against Servants. No Servant would be brought down by any modern firearm. The Master though was a different story. Lancer's Master hid himself behind a bounded field, but like all usual magi he made one grave mistake. He made himself invisible towards eyes and magic, but not the infra-red vision, Kiritsugu added to his sniper rifle. With this he couldn't just tell, where some people were hidden, but since magecraft heated up one's body, he could easily pick out one magus in a crowd of normal people.

This time there was only one person at that place and from his position he had a clear view at him. He could shoot and kill him right now, if there wasn't one problem: Assassin. Thanks to his scope he could make him out on top of a crane. It seemed his intuition regarding the death of Assassin was right.

And that was the root of the problem. If he killed Lancer's Master right now, his location would be exposed and most likely would entail an attack from Assassin. And even if Assassins were the weakest Servants in a direct fight, they were still a lot stronger than a standard magus. He - most likely - wouldn't stand a chance. He could use a Command Seal and use the power of the absolute order to bent space and let his Servant come to him, even though Saber didn't even know he was here, but that would leave his wife alone with Lancer. And even without a Master every Heroic Spirit could linger in this world for a little while. He had no other choice but to trust in the abilities of his Servant, who, according to his own words, was just a normal student.

Even though Assassin had the best available spot to look at this battle, he had been spotted. By the man who decided not to go to the same place, because it was the best suited for spying. But neither of them would notice the last pair of the audience.

There was one Servant who had the opinion that the best spot to watch a battle was a spot, he created himself. Saver and his Master were currently on top of a giant open book, hovering in the air. Of course not directly above the battle, but further apart. They were so far away that it should be impossible for Akage to see the fight, yet alone made out details.

But Saver had a way around that. His Master was laying on top of his front and in his hand was something that looked like a rolled newspaper and was looking with his right eye through it. Maybe you know of small children or even did this once yourself when you were small, but playing children would sometimes roll up a sheet of paper, look through it and pretend, it was a telescope.

But the funny thing with Akage's telescope was, it was working! He could see the battle as clear as if he was standing right in front of it! At first he was completely occupied with this piece of magic, forgetting their real purpose. Until the fight started. Holy Shit, they were fast! He couldn't even follow their movements at all, only the damage towards the surrounding area. So these guys were the reason for the fire? And they had to defeat seven of them?!

"They are only using their standard fighting methods", said Saver, who knew precisely what Akage was thinking. "They have yet to use their Noble Phantasm."

Of course he could see them. He was a Servant, so he had super human eyes and could follow their movements. The Lancer swiftly swung his trident around, attacking from different angles. Saber had a more calm and focused style. He didn't move more than necessary and met every attack of his opponent with only one swing of his sword. He had yet to go on the offense. Saver realized that using a pronged spear instead of a usual one in this situation was actually disadvantageous for the Knight of the Lance. Soon he had to either retreat or use his Noble Phantasm. The question was only if he would do it before his opponent went on the offense or after.

Lancer was getting irritated. Saber was making fun of him! Casually waving every one of his attacks aside and never losing this smug smile! Now to be fair, he probably had all the reason for that. He most likely spend all his life refining his techniques to become a master swordsman while he just picked up a spear and beat up his opponents, while at the same time learning how to use his special ability. Even though he had become skilled enough to qualify as Lancer, it was still not the same as his opponent. Yes, that was the disadvantages of learning two different occupations. Although he still had to use what he was famous for. After the next attack he pushed himself away from Saber, retreating to a safer distance. His opponent looked curiously at him.

"Oh? Was it that already?!" Lancer looked sour at him.

"Master", he spoke, "please allow me to use my Noble Phantasm."

"Permission granted", his Master agreed. "But please, show me something a little more impressive."

Lancer groaned and let his trident vanish. Saber lifted up an eyebrow. Now Lancer summoned a different spear. It was a long and moreover rather thick red spear with a lot of gold ornamentation. The head of the spear was bulb-like, only narrowing down a little at the top. But even the pointy end was as thick as the shaft. It looked more like a deformed mace than a spear, not exactly suited for piercing. But that was okay. This one had another function besides piercing.

He swung his spear around and again was met with his opponent's katana. But suddenly, Saber jumped back as sparks of lightning escaped from the peak. Immediately Lancer lunged after him, forcing Saber to retreat even further. Yes, that was the real purpose of his this lance called Gungner (Lightning Bolt).

As every child could tell you, metal conducts electricity. And swords were generally made out of metal. So if Saber blocked his lance with his Sword, he would naturally get electrocuted. And although he probably wouldn't die from that, it would still hurt and damage him.

Soon Saber noticed that only the peak of the weapon was electrifying and that he could block the spear at the shaft instead. But that was easier said than done. After all, the main advantage of a spear wasn't the head, it was the long reach. To block the spear he first had to get behind the peak, which wasn't that easy since the spear's tip was thicker than that of a usual polearm.

And just attacking the user instead of the weapon wasn't any less difficult, since the lance was longer than his sword. And while a long reach often meant more difficulties when the enemy got too close, thanks to the unusual nature of the weapon, Saber would have to close into something like hugging-distance to avoid an electrocution. And that was way easier said than done.

"Oho. It looks like I am going to have to use my Noble Phantasm, too", Saber concluded. He gripped his blade with his two hands, calmed his mind and uttered the incantation:

"Meikyō Shisui (Ripples on the Surface)."

Then he vanished. Lancer stumbled as his attack wasn't caught with resistance, but he quickly caught himself and swiftly looked around. His opponent was nowhere to be seen.

'Lancer, what happened?!', his Master demanded to know within his mindscape, but Lancer didn't knew it himself either. Quickly he activated one of his abilities and soon saw a yellow flickering circle coming towards him.

'He didn't turn to spirit form', Lancer observed. 'It is his Noble Phantasm! It seems, it allows him to turn invisible.' Suddenly out of the corner of his eye he could make out another yellow circle on top of a crane. 'Careful, Master. On top of the crane, there's another one.'

'What is there, I can't see that far!'

'Sorry, Master, kind of tied up here.'

He held up his spear to block the sword of Saber, who just became visible again.

"Oh, I was right", Saber uttered. "You are able to see me!"

Lancer didn't made any effort to correct him. After all, he only could see his location. Instead he himself took on a smug smile and spoke presumptuous:

"Yes, I can see you. So, what are you going to do, now that I sealed your Noble Phantasm?!"

Light-footed he jumped back to bring some more distance between them.

"I am going to see, if you are able to see through this technique, too: Kyōka Suigetsu (The Moon Reflected on the Surface of a Puddle)."

What?! Another one, already?! He could feel the outburst of prana, indicating the activation of an attack, but the Knight of the Sword just stood there without moving.

"What are you…"

Suddenly a bolt of pain went through his left arm. Saber, who had previously just stayed still was suddenly right beside him, cutting his flesh with his blade. Lancer swung his spear around, but the shaft did go right through him, turning the area he hit into black fog. Then suddenly blood spouted from the wound on his arm, accompanied with black symbols of kanji. Quickly he changed his ability from 'seeing the hidden' to regeneration and jumped back, frantic looking around for Saber. But his regeneration couldn't keep up with the damage. He took out a jar with an orange liquid in it, opened it and gulped it all down in one go. At once the strange symbols stopped flowing. Then he took out a blue potion and with its help the wound closed, too.

'Master', he sent to Kayneth through their mental connection, 'we have to retreat. I won't be able to fight against him without a big mirror and his sword is cursed. It cost me both an "Uncurse Potion" and a "High Potion" and I only have nine of the first one. Now eight.'

'What do you mean?! Aren't you a hero?! Shouldn't you at last be able to put up a fight?!'

'I told you, there is always someone stronger. And we are completely mismatched. We have to retreat!'

"Interesting", commented Saber. "You have something to negate the effects of this blade? That is the first time I have seen something like that!"

Lancer didn't answer.

'Very well, we will retreat for now. It seems you really are better suited as a Caster than a Lancer.'

Lancer forced himself to not react at his Master's obvious jab towards his abilities and prepared himself to leave, when suddenly a figure came down from above. He slid over the ground, pushing a small shockwave in front of him, as the newcomer crashed into the place he first had stood.

It was a girl in a black dress with long curly golden hair, wearing a black crown. Her most distinctive feature were black wheels instead of shoes, a short black and gold sword in her right hand and a gigantic black and gold shield in her left, big enough for her to easily hide behind it.

"Is that Rider?!", he asked to no one in particular.

Hearing his voice, her piercing gaze quickly drifted towards him. She lifted her weapons and her wheels started to turn. Nearly too fast for Lancer to react, she slid towards him. He was only able to block the sword with his spear just in time, before she split him in half. He pushed against her blade, but she wouldn't let go, when suddenly, while still keeping his spear locked with her sword, she spun around, smashing the thick side of the shield against his head. The impact sent him flying against a container, leaving a dent in the metal skin. He gasped for air, but his opponent didn't gave him any time to breath. He threw a puppet and it was only by a small margin that she cut it in half instead of him when they switched places.

He ran out of options! He pointed Gungner down and focused and when she attacked him again, he let out a load roar and transformed into a giant monster. It resembled a big human with greatly developed muscles and dark tinned skin, no hair on top of the head, a long beard, pointy ears and red eyes, wearing nothing but a big girdle covering his manhood. Furthermore he had a long tail and a pair of black wings and instead of Gungner in his hand there was a black spear with a big metal head, which looked like the cutting part of a kitchen knife.

As soon as he finished with his transformation he skid towards Rider who blocked with her shield, but to her dismay he phased right through it and her, still cutting her in the process. Outraged she turned around to attack Lancer who had just transformed back, but she was hindered by Saber, who just appeared and stopped her blade.

"Now, now", he told her. "Not so impatient. Lancer and I weren't finished, yet."

Lancer actually was just about to go, but thought it would be better for his health, if he didn't mention that.

"Rideeeer!", suddenly the voice of a young man could be heard wining. Waver Velvet had finally managed to catch up to his Servant. "What are you doing?! I told you to wait, why don't you listen to me?!"

Rider didn't sayanything, but she didn't attack again and instead took a defensive position.

"Oh, it's you, of all people!", suddenly Kayneth voice could be clearly heard by everyone.

Waver froze. The voice of his old lecturer was filled with hatred towards him.

"I wondered what you were going to do with my Holy Relic in your outrage and now here you are! I didn't think you would be stupid enough to join the Heaven's Feel, Waver Velvet."

The person in question shrunk more and more.

"When you didn't summon Alexander the Great, you should have taken this as a sign to give up this nonsense. I wanted only the best for you, living a mediocre and stable life. But if you are going to throw that all away, I am gladly going to give you an extra tutorial. The true meaning of the slaughter between magi. I will pass the terror and pain of the kill onto you without reservation. You should be proud."

Waver was already shivering in fear, not being able to pay attention to his Servant anymore. Lancer sighed.

"You can really overdo it, Master."

Suddenly Rider, who had looked around for the origin of this voice, directed her gaze towards Lancer.

"Great, here we go again."

But this time her gaze wasn't as cold as before. It was burning with hatred! She waved her arm around and sent her shield flying into the air. How such a small child was able to throw such a heavy object that high in the air was beyond him, when suddenly it came down again. On top of him. With ten times the size.

Lancer dashed to the side as a giant construct crashed at the place he had been standing before. It was a giant vehicle with six spider-like legs and something resembling a fabric face with pink frills at the front. At the rear there were two giant wheels, looking like her shield from before. Now Waver knew, why his Command Seals were in the shape of a spider and two gears.

Rider jumped onto a seat, located between the two wheels.

"Master", Lancer just said, "I hate you!"

The legs started to move and the whole thing rushed after the Knight of the Lance, who used a sudden burst of speed to move to the side, when suddenly the wheels grew spikes and quicker than you would expect of such a large vehicle it turned around, nearly skewering him. Instead she hit one of the container and with the force of her attack, knocking him through the air into the nearby water. The water! That's it! Quickly Lancer made his way towards it and jumped inside, Rider with her vehicle right behind him.

"Rider!", Waver whimpered. She had left him alone without any protection in front of all the enemies and especially Kayneth El-Melloi. Saber looked towards the boy.

"So, what are you going to do now?", he asked him. Waver winced, when he heard the Servant address him.

"Rider!", he whispered fearfully and tried futile to reach her through their mental connection. Kiritsugu pondered. This would be a good opportunity to get rid of Rider's Master, but he couldn't do it out of the same reasons, why he couldn't shoot Lancer's Master. So once again he just sat back, silently watching.

Suddenly Lancer shot through the surface of the ocean and into the air, him following were different colored round objects the size of a human, looking just like…

"…are those macarons?!"

Every Master and Servant present couldn't believe their eyes, when the Knight of the Lance was multiple times thrown around in the air by oversized sweets.

"Don't kid with me!", Lancer screamed and took out a long but normal spear and rotated it in front of him, batting away all the eatable projectiles.

Now Rider's mount jumped out of the water and one could see that the origin of the macarons was actually the open mouth which was at the same place where before there had been a face. Lancer evaded the new coming sweets and landed on top of the construct, charging with Gungner in his hand towards the Servant, when suddenly an army of small black spiders with a face like the big vehicle jumped towards him. He batted the first ones away, but the numbers overwhelmed him, making him lose his support and fall down. He crashed into the ground and Rider landed some yards behind him. Suddenly around Lancer a tornado formed and blew away all the small spiders on him.

"Now I am mad!", he declared, turned towards Rider and with a wave of his arm conjured a wave made out of flames sailing over the ground and burning all the new spiders out to get him. Then he hold out his hand and a white laser beam shot towards Rider. But Rider launched herself with the help of her construct into the air, letting it disperse, before the beam hit it. In the air she conjured her shield again and threw it towards Lancer, who slid backwards to avoid it. Shortly after it buried itself into the ground. Rider landed beside it, pulled it out of the concrete and again hunted after Lancer.

'Damn', Lancer thought, but to his surprise…

"Oj, Rider", another voice chimed in. "You sure, you wanna let your little Master stay here all alone?! What if something's happening to him?"

Everybody turned towards the newcomer who stood leisurely on Waver's left side, pointing with the thumb towards him. Waver let out a startled cry and stumbled back while Rider forgot Lancer and as quickly as possible slid towards Waver. Meanwhile an army of black spiders materialized next to Waver and jumped at the estimated threat. Smiling the young man with Asian features and black clergyman clothes took out a scroll of paper, opened it and declared:

"Disputatio pro declaratione virtutis indulgentiarum (Ninety-Five Theses)."

The spiders stopped attacking him, turned around and instead now crawled towards Rider. Her eyes widened in panic and she dismissed all of them at once. The newcomer raised an eyebrow and took out a small book. Then Rider had reached him, swinging her sword, but missing him as he jumped back.

"Now, see here", he tried to reason while improving the distance between them, "I didn't come to fight…"

But his pleas fell onto deaf ears as she summoned her vehicle again. The mouth opened and a cross-fire of macarons was directed towards him. He sighed, took out another book, opened it and said:

"Als ich ein kleiner Junge war (Not Everything Seen by Children Should Be Told to Children)."

Now an interesting phenomena happened. When the macarons reached him, instead of doing any damage, they were absorbed by the book. Aghast Rider stopped firing and the last of the sweets was included into the book.

"Alright!", Saver decided. "Me, not fight! Me, warning! Police coming! Did that go through your thick skull, Rider?!"

The mentioned Servant narrowed her eyes, but Waver held her back.

'I would be dead, if he wanted to kill me', he sent towards her. That was apparently enough to hold her blade, for now.

"What do you mean with the police is coming", Irisviel wanted to know.

"Well, ya don't think with all that riot you are making, nobody's gonna notice?!"

"You underestimate my bounded field", Kayneth arrogantly said, "It is impossible for someone unrelated to notice, yet alone intrude!"

Lancer had to resist to let the palm of his hand meet his face. He just gave him an excuse to get away and his Master had to botch it up. But the newcomer just shrugged.

"Well, I am here right?"

Everybody froze, as they figured out the meaning of this words. There was no way this guy wasn't a Servant, so that would mean…

"…don't tell me, you did call them?!", Saber voiced out, what everybody was thinking.

"What? How did you came to that conclusion? I never said that!"

His amusing tone stood in contradiction to his words.

"Lancer, we are going!", Kayneth told his Servant, who suppressed a sigh and turned to spirit form. Finally he was saying something intelligent! Waver, too, urged Rider to leave.

"You can fight another time", he tried to reason with her. "We absolutely mustn't let anyone notice!"

Reluctantly she let the spider-like construct fade into air and turned her footgear into the wheelchair. Waver sighed relieved, while Saver raised an eyebrow. And he wasn't the only one who was surprised at the interesting choice of civil attire. And more than one involved thought about the crutch of the Assassin-killing Servant.

With Lancer and Rider gone, the only Servants left were Saber and Saver – and the Assassin hiding on the crane. But before Saber followed his Master's order to retreat, he wanted to clear something first.

"Did you really just called the police, knowing very well that if they were to watch this battle, we would have to kill them?!"

One could clearly tell that he wasn't satisfied with the newcomer's course of action. This was something he couldn't tolerate. Bringing innocent into a fight that wasn't theirs. But to his surprise the other Servant just looked at him as if he said the most insane thing on earth.

"Are you kidding?", he asked. "Summoning the police would be a sure-fire way to get the supervisor mad at ya. So, no thanks." For a short moment Saber was silent. Then he smiled.

"I see. Even though our goals differ, as long as it has the same result, I won't mind, would you?"

"No, not really."

"Good. I'll be looking forward to seeing you again. I can tell that you are quite the interesting one."

"Well, thank you, I could say the same 'bout you, Saber. See ya."

Chapter 7: The Aftermath

"Why did you rush in just like that?", an outraged Waver wanted to know.

His Servant just stayed quiet and refused to meet his eye. That just angered Waver even more.

"I told you to wait until one of them was defeated! Yet you attacked just like that, disregarding anything I said! And what's worse, you left me behind, vulnerable to attacks from all the others! If Saber and that mysterious guy had wanted to, they could have killed me! Just why didn't you listen to me!"

Rider still looked down, a sorrowful expression in her eyes, while Waver stared down at her. She looked so fragile. You wouldn't believe this small girl to be a Servant. Waver remembered, how Rider attacked Lancer, after Kayneth threatened him and sighed. How could he be angry, while looking at this child? He sighed again and patted her head. Surprised she looked up. In her eyes were already the first traces of tears.

"Just try to listen a little bit more to me", he asked of her. "And please, don't leave me behind again."

Rider jumped up and hugged him, pulling him down onto her futon, refusing to let go. Waver just hoped, the MacKenzie's wouldn't walk in on him right now or it could be pretty ugly, since he was in no position to erase their memories right now.

Kirei, Risei, Assassin, Volquart and Avenger stood in front of a gramophone that was placed on top of a column. Interested Avenger was inspecting it from top to bottom.

"What's that? And what can it do?", she asked hyper.

"This is something that lets us to contact Tohsaka Tokiomi", he explained patiently.

"Indeed", came his voice out of the gramophone, "but why would you show this to someone else, Risei?"

Before the priest could answer, Avenger decided to take the matter into her own hands.

"Tokiomi, right? I am Avenger! Let's get along!"

"So, what, another one?", an annoyed voice made itself known onto the other end. Volquart dragged her away and addressed the Master of Archer himself:

"Greetings, Master Tohsaka. My name is Volquart Weissbach, a magus from the clock tower and the Master of the Servant Avenger. Someone else had been trying to violate the Holy Grail system and through a stroke of luck, I managed to summon my Servant, which saved my life. But I know that I will have no chance to reach the Holy Grail by myself. That is why I propose that we both join forced until all the other Servants are defeated and then let our Servants decide who will win the Holy Grail and reach the Root!"

Tokiomi stayed silent for a short period of time, but then accepted.

"Very well, let us proceed this way. I am looking forward to working with you."

"It's a great honor for me."

"Good, now that that's settled, can we go to the real purpose of this meeting and get this over with?!" It seemed, Archer was as impatient as ever.

"If I may", offered Assassin and after an affirmative nod from his Master, he began to summarize the important facts:

"Today we have encountered four Servants. First is Lancer, the one who issued the challenge. He is an Asian teenager and definitely not the King of Conquerors, wielding either a normal spear, a trident or an electrical lance. He claimed the electrical spear is his Noble Phantasm, but I don't think that's necessarily true. Why? Because he didn't issue ist name.

Further worrying are the other abilities he displayed. A large beam of light, fire, place switching with a voodoo puppet, transforming into an unblockable monster, suddenly shooting skywards or gaining speed, not to forget his ability to see through Saber's invisibility. That is the one, I would think about as the most worrisome. Why? Because it could find someone hiding himself, so it might work against my Presence Concealment, too. All in all, I think this Servant is not Lancer but Caster. Why? Because his great range of unnamed abilities and use of potions. Of course, there is still the question, why a Caster would announce a challenge and not hide within their territory."

"Indeed", added Kirei, "this Servant raises a lot of questions. But for now to Saber…"

"Yes, Saber, the Servant of the Einzbern, who was the first to fight against Lancer. His attire and weapon of choice, a katana, is clearly pointing towards Japanese origin. And opposite to his opponent he used only two abilities: Meikyō Shisui and Kyōka Suigetsu. The first allows him to become invisible, the second to create a mirage-like copy. Both of these abilities have similarities to "genjustu" or illusion techniques, as you may call it that are really fitting for someone of the Assassin-Class.

Yet it isn't possible for him to be Assassin. Why? Because only one Servant of each class will be summoned in each Holy Grail War and I can assure you that I am indeed, the Servant I claim to be. Still, his sword isn't a normal katana, but one that, after cutting an opponent, stops the wound from healing and rapidly decreases the targets health. The only known counter to that, right now, are the potions, Lancer used. Either Lancer knew this curse and had the right potions ready, or he has a potion against most curses and luckily it worked against this specific one, too. Now someone could argue that Saber might be a Caster in disguise, but he only showed two abilities that both activated only with a certain movement of his sword. It is more likely for him to be a Saver in disguise."

Now Risei interrupted him:

"But that itself is implausible, as the Einzbern are proper Master in this War and already had experienced failure with an irregular Servant. They wouldn't try that this time again."

"So, leaving Saber aside for now, the next would be Rider, a small girl with blond hair and again Asian features. This one is the most likely to really be the Servant as claimed. Why? Because her footwear of choice had been wheels, her civilian attire had been a wheelchair and she summoned a hug spider-like construct with wheels. Furthermore, the way Rider's Master addressed her leaves little room for doubt.

Rider's Master seems also to share an interesting relationship with the Master of Lancer. From what I have concluded, he stole Kayneth summoning catalyst, but still didn't manag to summon Alexander the Great and instead became the Master of that girl. The Servant in question didn't took gently to him threatening her Master to the point where she focused only on Lancer, even contradictory ignoring her own Master's safety, something that is definitely going to cost her her Master in this war. Rider's abilities include summoning an army of small spiders and the aforementioned construct, fully or partly, as her shield showed us. The construct itself is capable of unpredictable movements and shooting sweets bigger than a human. All in all, even if it is clear that she is a Rider, she is still an unusual Servant."

"Which leaves only the last one", continued Kirei.

"Right, the mysterious priest. The one we don't even know the class from. We only know that his features are Asian with white hair and he is wearing black and red priest clothes. That and his two Noble Phantasm. One of them being…"

"…Disputatio pro declaratione virtutis indulgentiarum (Ninety-Five Theses), associated withMartin Luther", finished Kotomine Kirei for him.

How would he not know about it? Martin Luther was one of the most famous monks in Christian history. And with hearing the name, all assembled Servants received the information about him from the Holy Grail.

Martin Luther was a German catholic monk, who wasn't satisfied with how the church made money from its believers and spoke against that. He strongly distributed his opinion that atonement for one's sins should be given free and not bought. This lead to the Protestant Reformation and the splitting of the Christian Church. His Ninety-Five Thesis were the arguments he wrote down. And the mysterious priest used them as a Noble Phantasm. The logical conclusion would be, the real identity of the priest being Martin Luther…

"…but Martin Luther had clearly been German origins", Assassin refuted this theory. "And even if we assume that through some special circumstances he now has a different appearance, there is still his second Noble Phantasm: Als ich ein kleiner Junge war. No matter how much I look into the legend of Martin Luther, I can't find a book named that way."

"Could it be that's just something he used in life?", Avenger asked.

It was possible. More often than not the objects a person used in his past life could be used, when summoned as a Heroic Spirit, even if they weren't on the same level as Noble Phantasm. They were just treated the same way as their clothes.

"That is indeed possible", Assassin admitted. "And it would also explain, why he didn't attack Rider's Master, given the chance. Why? Because Martin Luther was averse to taking up arms."

"So, the priest could be Martin Luther. Although you failed yet to mention, what the effects of his Noble Phantasm were."

"Right, forgive me. Disputatio pro declaratione virtutis indulgentiarum was capable of turning Rider's spider-like minions against herself and Als ich ein kleiner Junge warabsorbed the sweets coming out of Rider's construct. Furthermore I don't think that are all of his abilities. Why? Because I could see him carrying a third book in the fight which he didn't use."

"Maybe it's the bible", offered Avenger, "he was famous for that, wasn't he."

Kirei thought about that.

"If he is using a bible, he might be capable of materializing 'Black Keys' from its pages, like some members of the Burial Agency. If that were the case he might have other Conceptual Weapons, too."

Risei nodded.

"I'll be asking if there are records of Martin Luther joining the Executors", he decided. "If this Servant really is the reformist and a member of the Executors, he might be the additionally summoned Saver, as he would be fitting as someone saving people."

"So", mused Tokiomi. "if he is Saver that would leave only Berserker and Lancer – or Caster, depending on whether the Servant lied about his class or not."

"Please continue with the surveillance of the Master and their Servants, Assassin", Kirei asked of his Servant and soon enough he faded from their view.

Kayneth was a little disappointed in his Servant. Of course he knew that he was rather good as a Caster, with his Territory Creation…

"…but what's the point in having the skill Double Summon, when you are weak in your original class?", he asked his Servant, not exactly expecting a satisfying answer.

"Well, excuse me, Master, but not everybody is capable of seeing through illusions!"

"Yes, that was one fact, but why would you want to issue a challenge against everybody, when you were clearly not capable of even keeping up with one Servant?"

"I just didn't want to show all of my abilities on the first day. And who was the one agitating Rider into attacking me without restraint?!"

"So, are you telling me that it is my fault that you lost that badly? Don't make a fool out of me! Your Noble Phantasm couldn't even compare one bit against hers!"

Lancer laughed, what irritated Kayneth even more.

"Stop laughing! Your incompetence is clearly no laughing matter!", he demanded.

"Please, Master, tell me, when I used this spear, did I ever call out it name?"

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, what I mean is that I may have used my Noble Phantasm, I never activated it once. That was all its passive effects. Please, Master, what does your Clairvoyance tells you, about my Rank in 'Noble Phantasm'?!"

Every Master had another ability granted to them by the Holy Grail. It was the ability, to see the Parameters of all the Servants. "Strength", "Endurance", "Agility", "Mana", "Luck" and "Noble Phantasm". Strength showed physical power, Endurance the tolerance to damage, Agility the speed, Mana the amount of prana one could handle, Luck the amount of Luck one had and Noble Phantasm the strength of one's Noble Phantasm. It was displayed with letters from E to A with E the lowest and A the highest, together with EX for "too high to be ranked". And his Noble Phantasm was ranked…

"A", Sola-Ui answered his question in his Master's stead.

"That's right: A. Do you really think, the ability to produce some little sparks would count as A? Although admittedly the Rank of my spear is only D, but it would still be higher than what you've seen."

"Still, Rank D is not very impressive. Rider's Noble Phantasm has to be at last Rank C!"

"Alone that might wouldn't have been enough, I know, but together with my abilities and summons, I am confident, I could have taken her. I just didn't thought it would be a good idea to go full out at the beginning with other Servants watching! But you had to agitate Rider so much that I had to show a lot bigger variety of attacks than I actually had wanted. Now no one is going to believe, I am not a Caster in some way! We can only hope, they think I lied about my class and take them by surprise with my spear or when the real Caster shows up, they would disregard my abilities as something not bound to my legend that I showed to keep them guessing about my identity, so that I can take them by surprise with this castle. Our only real advantage is that the other Master and Servants doesn't know about the skill called Double Summon and I would like to keep it that way! Get it, Master?!"

"You are getting ahead of yourself! You seem to forget who the Master is in this relationship!"

"Seriously, let's face the facts, you are only called Master because you have those fancy Command Seals on your hand. The one with the greater strategically thinking here is definitely me."

"You dare…"

"Oh, come on, Master, you're always only defeat this, defeat that, strong, weak. Not every battle is won with pure military power. Look at the concept of Assassin, he…" Suddenly Lancer grew silent. Kayneth, who couldn't mold words, because of his outrage at his disrespectful Servant, was surprised at the sudden stop in the talk. His wife too, was rather astonished. He stopped just like that, right in the middle of the sentence.

"What is it, Lancer", Sola-Ui tried to bring him out of his musing and sure enough, registering her voice he turned around to face her. With a loud and excited voice he spoke towards her.

"Assassin!", he exclaimed. "It was Assassin on top of that crane! It all fits! 'Search Eye' only shows what is hidden and it had to be a Servant and not a magus because of the place. Only someone who was still visible would choose that place and being both visible and hidden at the same time just screams Presence Concealment! So, it had to be Assassin!"

"But I saw Assassin dying", Sola-Ui objected. "Do you think it was just a trick?" Lancer snorted.

"Wouldn't be the first time someone doesn't stayed dead. You should have seen Dimitri. He feigned his death while possessing me without me noticing. Imagine my surprise when he appeared again. And copying my ability, that bastard. Well, he shouldn't have. Nasty experience, I can tell you, nasty experience."

"Oh, so what happened to this Dimitri", Kayneth wanted to know. Usually Lancer kept anything hidden that could lead to his identity, but right now he seemed to be in a rather talkative move. And he really wanted to know what would happen to someone, who tried to copy the abilities of this Heroic Spirit.

"You don't want to know. It had been ugly, really ugly. And painful, not to forget the painful. Well, to be fair, I don't know for sure about the last one, but it looked at last really painful. I mean, his ribcage exploded! That's gotta be painful!"

"Your old enemy aside for now", Sola-Ui interrupted his musings about the grotesque memory, "what shall we do about Assassin?"

"Well, as long as we remain inside this castle, he won't be able to attack us, as he wouldn't be able to get inside unnoticed, even with Presence Concealment. So we don't need to fear a surprise attack on the Masters. For now we stay inside our stronghold like a good Caster and wait for the others to take each other out."

"I really don't want to take such cowardly actions", Kayneth said scowling, "but with your skills, that would probably be the best course of action."

Kiritsugu, Maiya, Saber and Irisviel finally all met in the Einzbern Castle to discuss their new course of actions. Kiritsugu actually hadn't wanted his wife to be part of this military get-together, but there was no way she would let herself be singled out. Saber had reverted back to his Standard-Form and together they had come to mostly the same conclusions, as Team Tokiomi, with one exception. Saver. They just didn't knew, what this new Servant was going on about. Someone using magical books to fight would be most fitting under the Caster-class. Yet Lancer was the same. But there could only be one of each class. So, there couldn't be two Casters.

"Maybe Lancer really was, what he claimed to be", suggested Saber. "I mean, I, too, have some abilities that doesn't exactly fit into the Saber class! And he didn't even activated them as his Noble Phantasm!"

Saber was right and the gathered people knew it. He was the living – more or less – proof for that.

"What happened to Lancer and his Master?", Irisviel wanted to know. Kiritsugu looked towards Maiya who took out some notes.

"We managed to track down Lancer to his base of operations. As it appears, el-Melloi did buy a house, just for the Heaven's Feel. Although what is worrisome is that he doesn't appear to have brought any furniture for the house or let them deliver to him." This was indeed worrisome. A guy like Kayneth would never forgo his luxury. So, they either had to carry them in some sort of mystical bag or create them somehow themselves.

"But wouldn't that mean that Lancer actually is a Caster?", wanted Saber to know.

"There are no records of el-Melloi being capable of feats like that, so it has to be his Servant", Kiritsugu reasoned.

"But what class would that make the priest?", wondered Irisviel.

"The only ones who we can exclude are Saber, Assassin, Rider and Berserker. That leaves Lancer, Caster and Archer. For now we should focus on finding out the identity of the Servants with the given information. This includes Als ich ein kleiner Junge war and Disputatio pro declaratione virtutis indulgentiarum. Do we know the locations of Rider's and the priest's Master?"

"Negative", Maiya responded. "They both noticed the familiars following them. Rider destroyed it outright, while the priest used again his Noble Phantasm, so that I had to destroy it myself. If my deductions are correct, it can make any familiar and maybe even other remotely controlled constructs turn against their master. A dangerous ability for any puppet master."

"Do you think this works one Servants, too?", Irisviel asked, looking concerned towards Saber. Kiritsugu thought about it for a moment.

"It is possible, but rather unlikely. He showed it far too freely for it to have such an overwhelming ability. But we should refrain from using any familiars around him."

"So, how did you like it, Master", Saver asked Akage as they returned to the warehouse they've made their make-shift home. After leaving Akage's parents behind, the next thing on the list was to find a new home. (Saver actually had a real list, but he hadn't been tall enough to read it, when Saver crossed out the first point.) As they had no money, they couldn't just rent a room, but luckily there still was the abandoned warehouse Saver was summoned. They just had to tidy up a little and soon their new base was set. Saver put some paper slips with strange symbols around, proclaiming that they would hide them from their opponents. So far it seemed to work, as they had yet to be visited by any other people.

"It was great!", he answered the question enthusiastically. "They just – zack, wush – and then – bumm, krack. And then the giant spider: Awesome! And then you like a boss: 'Stop!' Incredible! " Saver chuckled.

"Great you liked it. It's good to know that if you're dying, you at last die flashy, right?" This put a damper on Akage's enthusiasm, as Saver effectively got him down to facts.

"Right", he exclaimed. "They are our enemies. They are the ones we have to defeat."

"Well, three of the seven."

"Do you think you can defeat them?"

"All at once? Hardly. But it seems like I have good cards against Rider. Lancer is definitely hiding something, Saber is going to be a pain to hit and Assassin never moved once."

"Assassin?!"

"Yeah, on the crane. You probably were too captivated from the fight to notice him. Now that I think of it, here for you!" He reached inside his coat, took out a small book and gave it towards Akage. He curiously accepted it.

"What's that?", he asked and Saver laughed.

"Why don't you open it?" Quickly Akage followed his lead and uncapped it. He looked at the first page. Unlike novels, which were written in prose, this looked more like a character sheet. On the upper right there was a picture of Saber, or rather his head and shoulders. On his face there was the smug grin he had displayed earlier, too. And next to that…

CLASS: Saber

Master: Irisviel von Einzbern

True Name:

Sex: Male

Strength: B

Endurance: A

Agility: B

Mana: C

Luck: D

Noble Phantasm: B

Class Abilities

Magic Resistance: B

Cancel spells with a chant below three verses. Even if targeted by High-Thaumaturgy and Greater Rituals, it is difficult for him to be affected.

Riding:

Skills

Noble Phantasm

Meikyō Shisui: Ripples on the Surface

Rank: C; Anti-Army; Range: 0-20; Targets: 200 people

A technique that shifts oneself into the blind spots of ones opponents.

Kyōka Suigetsu: The Moon Reflected on the Surface of a Puddle

Rank: B; Anti-Army; Range: 0-20; Targets: 200 people

Noble Phantasm #3

Rank: B; Anti-Unit/Anti-Phantasmal/Anti-Spirit; Range: 1-2; Targets: 1

A Japanese katana. After cutting, the sword places a curse on its victim, forcing it to rapidly losing health and refusing the wound to close.

Every new topic was written on a new page. The page "Skills" was completely empty except the title.

"Hey is that…", Akage began and Saver nodded.

"A magical book on the Stats of all the Servants you encountered. It gets updated every time you learn something new about a Servant. Handy, isn't it?" Akage nodded and mesmerized read the book further.

CLASS: Lancer

Master: Kayneth El-Melloi Archibald

True Name:

Sex: Male

Strength: C

Endurance: B

Agility: A

Mana: A

Luck: D

Noble Phantasm:

Class Abilities

Magic Resistance: C

Cancel spells with a chant below two verses. Cannot defend against Magecraft on the level of High-Thaumaturgyand Greater Rituals.

Battle Continuation: A

Makes possible to fight even with deadly injuries and can remain alive so long as one does not receive a decisive fatal wound.

Skills

Collector: B

The talent to collect high quality goods.

Lancer can collect weapons, magical potions and amulets below B-Rank.

Noble Phantasm

CLASS: Rider

Master: Waver Velvet

True Name:

Sex: Female

Strength: C

Endurance: B

Agility: A+

Mana: A

Luck: D

Noble Phantasm: B

Class Abilities

Riding: A

All creatures but those of Phantasmal Beast and Divine Beast-rank can be used as mounts.

Magic Resistance: B

Cancel spells with a chant below three verses. Even if targeted by High-Thaumaturgy and Greater Rituals, it is difficult for him to be affected.

Skills

Noble Phantasm

Noble Phantasm #1

Rang: C; Anti-Army; Range: 1-99; Targets: 1000 people

A giant spider-like construct with wheels, capable of high-speed movements and turns. It is also capable of firing an unlimited amount of macaroons from its mouth.

CLASS: Assassin

Master: Kotomine Kirei

True Name:

Sex: Male

Strength: D

Endurance: D

Agility: C

Mana: B

Luck: C

Noble Phantasm:

Class Abilities

Presence Concealment: A+

It is possible to disappear completely and become almost impossible to be detected. However, efficiency will decrease once preparations to attack are taken.

Skills

Noble Phantasm

"That's funny", Akage commented. "You are depicted, too." He looked closer. "But you are the one, I have most information over."

Saver snorted.

"Well, duh, maybe it's 'cause I am your Servant. But be careful! This book depicts everything on the same level of your knowledge. So, even if someone is depicted as a Saber, because he stated he is one, doesn't mean it's absolutely true. And some things are ranked lower than what they actually ar, because of some sort of circumstances. Take as an example the Noble Phantasm-Parameter. It doesn't show up, unless you see them using one and even then he might still have a Noble Phantasm of a higher rank hidden. So, be careful while using that book!"

Akage nodded.

"Thanks, Saver."

"Don't think anything about it. I am just being a good Servant. Now get to bed, tomorrow you are going to have a very taxing day!"

"Yeah, 'day' is good."

"Just go to sleep already!"

Chapter 8: Collector

"Wakey, wakey, eggs and bacey", a loud noise sounded through the warehouse. Akage shifted and slowly woke up. His nose was greeted with the alluring smell of breakfast. Quickly he washed and clothed himself, before walking into their make-shift kitchen.

"What are you cooking?", Akage asked Saver, who was standing at the stove. He was wearing a red apron which was decorated with some kanji. It read: 'My body is coated in gravy.' Akage had to chuckle, when he saw that.

"I already told you", Saver answered his earlier question, "bacon and eggs. A western-type breakfast."

"Really? I never had a western breakfast before. By the way, where did you get that apron? Did you create it?"

"I collected it. Now sit down and look at the newspaper." Akage was surprised.

"We are getting a newspaper?"

"I meant the one I gave you yesterday. You still have it, don't you?" Akage nodded.

"Wait! I am going to get it!"

Soon he was back and finally started to eat. Saver took the rolled paper and smoothed it.

"Here!", he said, "I am on the title page!" Saver pushed it towards his Master, who curiously looked at it. Then he frowned.

"I can't read that", he proclaimed and Saver looked at it closer. Then he laughed.

"Sorry, my fault", he exclaimed. "You don't get a gratis translation from the Grail like we Servants!"

He took out another book laid it open next to the newspaper and said:

"Lutherbibel (So That Even the Uneducated May Hear the Word)." At once the empty pages filled with kanji. Loud Akage started to read:

"Battle at the docks

Yesterday night a giant battle er-how do you pronounce that?"

Saver just took the newspaper and the other book from him and began to read himself:

"Battle at the docks

Yesterday night a giant battle erupted at the docks of Fuyuki City. Not just two, but four Servants found their way towards the pier. Attracted by a challenge issued by Lancer one after another three Servants showed up. The first one to arrive was Saber. He and Lancer quickly engaged into combat, both refusing to use their Noble Phantasm at first.

But soon it became clear that Lancer was inferior in pure skill, so he had to result using his Noble Phantasm. It was a spear capable of creating lightning, but we were unable to gather more information on it, as he didn't utter its name. Saber retaliated using his own Noble Phantasm. First he used Meikyō Shisui (Ripples on the Surface) that made him invisible, but proved ineffective against Lancer. Kyōka Suigetsu (The Moon Reflected on the Surface of a Puddle), his second Noble Phantasm, on the other hand was. It created an illusion of the Knight of the Sword and hid the real one even from the prying abilities of Lancer. This Noble Phantasm, which sure would make every Assassin green with envy, allowed him to score a damaging blow against the Knight of the Lance, as Saber's sword seems to curse everybody it cuts. We couldn't deduce the type of curse, but it put Lancer in a mild panic and made him use some curse-lifting potion at once.

But before we could witness how the battle between these two would turn out, Rider appeared and attacked Lancer with sword, shield and boots with wheels. Now Lancer used a great variety on abilities to escape Rider's onslaught, before the latter was stopped by Saber, who wanted to finish the fight with Lancer. Now Rider's Master showed up and it was soon revealed that he stole the catalyst that was originally owned by the Master of Lancer and after the latter threatened the thief, Rider attacked Lancer with new fury, completely disregarding her own Master while summoning a spider-like construct, possible her Noble Phantasm. It was capable of high-speed movements and shooting oversized macarons, a type of sweet.

Lancer again used a variety of abilities, until the fourth Servant showed up. Unlike the others he didn't gave clues towards his class. He just showed up next to Rider's Master, promptly redirecting the Servants ire towards him, yet when she summoned an army of smaller spiders, he used a document called 'Disputatio pro declaratione virtutis indulgentiarum (Ninety-five Theses)' and made them turn against their owner. And when she used her construct, he took out a book called 'Als ich ein kleiner Junge war (Not Everything Seen by Children Should be Told to Children)' which absorbed the macarons. Now in an incredible faint he stopped all the fighting, as he made it look like, he summoned the police towards the place, putting an end towards all combat activity. The whole time the fight had been witnessed by Assassin, who never once moved to intervene.

Now dear readers, this concluded the first great battle in the fourth Heaven's Feel and there are still more questions than answers. Who is this mysterious Servant? How did Assassin survive? Please be sure to read our next edition, as this Holy Grail War is definitely going to be interesting!"

Akage just looked aghast at Saver.

"But that's exactly what happened yesterday!", he exclaimed. "Even though you gave me the paper before they even started! Is it a self-writing newspaper?"

"Yep. The Daily Universal Register (The Londoner Times). It would be a really great Noble Phantasm, if it wouldn't come so delayed. And if it isn't finished until midnight, you have to wait another day for it to appear in this newspaper!"

"But if you knew that it would be written, then why did you even bring me to the port? We could have stayed home and read it all today."

"That's true in a sense. The Daily Universal Registergives you information about what occurred. But that's it. It doesn't depict, how insanely strong and fast Servants really are. How serious Rider was trying to end Lancer. It neither went into detail about Lancer abilities. I can tell you, first-hand experience is always better than second-hand one. You understand?"

"Yes. Yes, I do. Please, let us continue our training. As it stands now, I wouldn't even be able to survive an encounter with any Servant. So, please let us continue our training." Saver smiled.

"We can continue as soon as you are ready."

"I am ready!"

Kariya awoke from his make-shift bed, if you could call it that way. Since summoning his Servant and leaving the Matou residence, he had been constantly on the move, to make it harder for an enemy Master to track him down. He, too, had felt Lancer's challenge and had made his way towards the docks. But he had had no intention of accepting. Not yet anyway. But he had hoped that the Servant of Tokiomi would show up. That was the second of his goals: To defeat Tokiomi! What father would give his own daughter to the likes of Zouken?! What kind of father would willingly give his daughter away, at all?!

When he had seen Aoi happily engaged with Tokiomi, he had decided to give up on gaining her affection, but he had never thought that Tokiomi would hurt her and her children that badly. He would definitely save Sakura and reunite her with her mother and sister. And for that he would kill Tokiomi. And if the mountain won't come to Mohammed, Mohammed must go to the mountain.

"Big!", exclaimed Avenger, when she first saw the Tohsaka mansion. Volquart wasn't as surprised as she was. He had seen palatial residences before, after all, his sister was living in one. And he had to visit her more times than he would have liked.

"Good evening!", Tokiomi personally greeted the newcomers, "I, Tohsaka Tokiomi, welcome you to my home. Let us together reach the origin of all existence!"

"Hi, I am Avenger and this is my Master! Where's Archer?"

"Inside", Tokiomi explained. "He is resting."

"Why would a Servant needs to be resting?", Avenger wondered out load, but when her Master thought back at how the Servant had reacted to them, he could guess, why he would "need" to rest. It was kind of funny. Tohsaka got a Servant who doesn't wanted to fight and he got a Servant who was way too eager to fight. But at last he found a reason and way to fight. Although he really would have liked to know, why Archer did respond to the summon, when he saw fighting as just a bother.

"Do we have everything?", Saber asked his "aunt" while they were shopping.

"I think we still need some udon", Irisviel answered, happily carrying grocery bags. Grocery shopping had always been was of the things, she had wanted to do and so Saber had been ready to lead her. Given a map by Kiritsugu he quickly found the corresponding places. And while he guided her, Irisviel demanded to carry the bags herself. At the beginning. But soon enough she tired and Saber had to bear the weight. Yet the whole time, Irisviel never once lost her good mood and cheerfully walked beside her Servant. But suddenly a little girl ran into him, nearly knocking him down.

"Ah, I am sorry!", she quickly apologized, bringing some distance between them. "I wasn't looking where I was going!"

Saber looked at her closer. She had blond hair and was wearing a black jacket with a hood that had two appendages, looking like snakes. At the front of the jacket there was a white symbol, resembling a circle with a vertical line inside. She wasn't wearing any shoes or skirt, but at last he didn't have to find out, if she was wearing no panties, as the jacket was long enough to cover her bosom.

"Don't worry about it", Saber responded. "But why were you in such a hurry?!"

Her face took a panicking expression.

"Oh, no, I am late!"

Quickly she ran off. Saber just looked after her bewildered. From her attire he had thought of her as a Servant, but he couldn't feel any prana from her. And she couldn't be Assassin, as his appearance was already known. So, no matter what his instinct said, she had to be human. Yet something told him that this wouldn't be the last time, they would met.

Caster was surprised. When she had seen Saber's Master walking carefree down the street, she had been aghast. Shouldn't she be a bit more careful? Or did she really thought that she wouldn't be attacked because it was still daytime and they were in the middle of a crowd?! Gullible fool! But to her luck she really didn't want to arouse that much attention, yet and so the woman would live.

But what interested her more, was the nephew she had brought with her. They didn't look alike at all and for a moment she had thought that this boy was actually Saber in disguise. But when you thought about it logically, what were the chances?! You could explain nearly every difference in his appearance with make-up and similar, but how was someone supposed to be able to change their height? He had to be a Caster-class Servant for something like that. But to be sure she took a gamble. She interacted only seconds with this boy and she could already tell, he wasn't Saber. His demeanor was completely different. But since he was the nephew of Saber's Master, she would kill him later on regardless.

"Oh, there you are!", Avenger exclaimed. "Have you been here this whole day?" In front of her on a red couch was Archer resting, just like Tohsaka had told them. Slowly the white-haired Servant opened his eyes and looked at the intruder.

"Cheh. What do you want?", he asked her, his voice clearly showed his annoyance.

"Oh, nothing big. I just thought, we should get to know each other a little better, now that we will fight together." Archer snorted.

"You sure you want to do that? Even if we are allies right now, we are still going to fight against each other over the Holy Grail. Do you want to become friends, just to kill each other later on?" She became quiet.

"Maybe you are right", she admitted, "but I still would like to talk a little."

"Tch. You are an idiot, you know." He sighed.

"Then what the hell do you want to know?"

"Ehm." After his initial response she hadn't thought it would be that easy to make him talk, so first she didn't knew what to say. But then… "Is your hair natural? I thought, human usually didn't have that hair color!?"

"So, you never heard of an albino?"

"Albino?"

"Short, an albino refers to someone who doesn't have any pigments in his skin, hair and eyes. It doesn't matter if there are human or any other kind of animal. I could get technical, but that's the gist of it."

"Oh, I see. Then you are human." She sounded a little disappointed and he raised an eyebrow.

"What? You aren't?" But before she could answer, he tensed and put his hand towards his choker, activating a switch that was on it. His choker was actually an electrode, helping him with calculations. And to use his ability in battle he had to switch the mode, just as he did now. And the reason for that was the fast approaching enemy, he could feel. A Servant. He suddenly shot into the air, bursting through the roof as if it wasn't there. He looked at the Servant who didn't even got slowed down by the barriers that Tokiomi had around the mansion. And he wasn't even using any ability, just raw power.

"Well, this guy doesn't looks like he's human", he commented about the arriving Servant, who ran through the air, as Avenger jumped next to him onto the roof with one leap.

"But what class?", Avenger wanted to know.

"▄█▀██▄▀█", the Servant roared.

"Guess that answers that question", Archer stated and suddenly four black vortexes burst from his back. This Servant was too strong to fight using normal methods. Avenger just looked surprised at his back. Wings?! And indeed, from her point of view they really looked like wings made out of wind.

"▀██▄▀█", roared Berserker again and shot towards Archer, swinging his black sword.

"Kill them all", ordered his Master, who was watching from below, as the crest worms inside his body wriggled under his skin.

Berserker slashed his sword down and smashed the roof, but both of the Servants had already evacuated the spot. Archer had flown into the sky, while Avenger had jumped aside. The latter quickly turned around to punch the mad Servant, but he turned around even quicker, giving her a kick that sent her flying. In a nosedive Archer was soaring towards Berserker. His eyes sparkling mad and his mouth distorted into a menacing sadistic grin.

"Hjeeeehehehehe", he was laughing like a maniac as he thrust his fist towards his opponent.

"▀█▀█▄█▀", howled Berserker and swung his sword around.

Weapon and skin collided and Archer was blown away. But Berserker didn't wait for him to land. With some sort of static noise he disappeared and reappeared just above Archer, ready to slice him in half. But before the sword could hit him, the black vortexes erupted in a blast of even greater wind, sending Archer up, hitting the mad Warrior. Now suddenly Berserker was pushed up high into the sky.

Archer used this short break to regain his bearings. For the sword to not break by touching him, there could be only one explanation: the occult. Fuck. Why does the Heaven's Feel had to be a fucking magical battle? The vortexes suddenly vanished and in their stead two black wings erupted from his back. Not unsteady like the wind, but hard like metal, yet they didn't shimmer but were dark as shadows.

"█▄█▀▄▀█▀"

Right on time Berserker showed up in front of him again, but this time, Archer didn't move at all. Instead the wings on his back split into infinite ends and shot towards his opponents like living beings. But Berserker swung his sword, destroying them with ease, while advancing at the same time. Yet Archer didn't stop as more and more black lances attacked the Servants, but every time they would be cut down faster and faster.

Archer clicked his tongue. Usually a Berserker shouldn't care about getting hit, but this guy seemed to have an especially high Instinct that allowed him to react to danger as if he was sane! Within moments he made his way towards Archer, but before the mad Servant reached the Knight of the Bow an angry voice shouted:

"Don't count me out yet!" With all her might Avenger jumped towards her enemy, as he suddenly vanished with a static noise, the black lances hitting thin air, and reappeared directly above her.

"▄▀█▀█▄█▀", he roared and swung his sword down at her.

Deftly she brought her hands up and captured the blade right between the palms of her hand so vigorously that the blade started to crack. Left and right beside her the air was pushed away from the shock of the attack so strongly that it resulted in craters at the ground. Strained she lead the blade past her, spun around in the air and kicked Berserker in the face, the force big enough to send him flying through the air. She did a back flip and landed on all fours, before running after her adversary. The foe in question had already regained his bearing, even his sword had repaired itself. He looked at the charging Avenger and between his horns suddenly a glowing red orb appeared. It became bigger and bigger.

"Get out of there, you idiot!", Archer shouted as suddenly Berserker disappeared from their sight again and reappeared directly behind Avenger. Panic showed in her eyes, as she turned around, but it was too late. The red orb was released into a bright red wave of destruction, disintegrating everything in its path. When the light vanished there was no trace of Avenger.

"Hahaha", Kariya laughed madly looking at the fight in front of him. "Look, Tokiomi, who is the failure now! You with your lineage are getting bested by my make-shift thaumaturgy! Hahahaha – cough, cough." He stopped laughing, as he vomited blood. The crest worms inside of him took their toll, as his Servant was continuously using his mana.

"This is bad", Saver conducted on top of his flying book. "If this continues, people will notice that something is happening!"

"Then what should we do?", Akage asked concerned.

"Well, catch!" Instinctive he brought up his hand to fetch whatever his Servant just threw at him, when suddenly…

"Ouch!" He let go of the object Saver had thrown as he had stabbed himself. The item was sharp and looked like a pointed stick wrapped with strings.

"Good, it worked!", Saver exclaimed and took out a book. "Kinder- und Hausmärchen (Once Upon a Time)."

"What was that for?!", Akage demanded to know.

"I just put everyone without magecraft in this city to sleep. Since you are not a girl, yet a princess, they will wake up tomorrow. But they won't wake up while Berserker is going wild. Now let's go and visit the Asterion-look-alike!"

"Avenger! By the power of this Command Seal I order you, to come to me!"

"Where am I?", Avenger wondered and looked around. She was standing in front of the Tohsaka mansion and next to her…

"Good, you are alright!", Volquart let out relieved. "For a moment I thought, I wouldn't make it." She looked at him perplexed.

"How? Wait!", a thought struck her and she looked towards the hand of her Master. The red lubrication in place of the missing key of the key ring confirmed her suspicions. "You used a Command Seal, to save me?! Why?!" He laughed dryly.

"That's a stupid question", he opined. "If you are dead, who will fetch me the Holy Grail?!"

Avenger didn't know, what to say. Tears threatened to fill her eyes and she quickly wiped them off. This words meant more to her than anything else, because it finally meant that he had accepted her as his Servant! Even though he had said, he would team up with Tokiomi to reach the Holy Grail, in her subconscious, she still had believed, he would have been content with just serving the other Master. His actions clearly indicated his inferiority towards him. But now with this words it was clear that he was not just content with helping someone reach the root, but would do everything to be the one himself! That meant, he would finally help her getting her dearest wish fulfilled.

"Yes. Master", she shouted firm, "I will definitely bring you the Grail!" She jumped again on top of the roof. Archer was soaring through the sky, with his black wings trying to keep Berserker at bay.

"Hey, ugly!", Avenger screamed and jumped into the air, getting the attention of both other Servants. Archer was mildly surprised and Berserker just rushed at her again.

"▄▀▄█▀▄▀█"

This time he didn't even swung his sword and instead stroked with his fist, which she blocked with her arm. Now they were both sending a fury of punches and in his case sword strikes at the other. It was a rather interesting sight. Even though it was a mid-air fight, it was different from others. Berserker had an ability, which allowed him to stay on top of the air, as if it was solid ground, called Air Dance. So, he should have the upper hand against someone who couldn't fly or levitate.

But not with her. As Avenger she had no class skill and she had only two personal skills. But one of them was Acrobatics. It allowed her movements in mid-air greatly above a normal Servant, which made her more dangerously in the air than on the ground. Now you could argue that every Servant was capable of movements in mid-air. Well, that just showed you how good hers were, when she had them noted as a skill. So each of her rolls, back flips and somersaults where as dangerous as a sledgehammer. All while she was using her opponents attacks to keep herself in mid-air.

Yet she couldn't dominate the fight. Every blow she stroke connected, but only because her opponent was a Berserker. And that was the problem. Mad Enhancement. Berserker's class skill. And it was exactly what it sounded like. Exchanging your sanity against higher parameters. Berserker didn't care about any damage they would take, but he didn't need to worry about that, as Avenger had to constantly evade the onslaught of his attacks. And the only reason why she was actually capable of evading them were her skill and the fact that the mad Berserker didn't think about stepping back and using the reach of his blade.

Suddenly Berserker disappeared and just a moment later black blades occupied the same space Berserker had been before. Without thinking Avenger grabbed onto them and surprisingly they turned from sharp blades to smooth poles. As if they had planned this the black wings shot towards Berserker's new location, together with Avenger. And this time they didn't attack him outright, but instead provided platforms and rods for Avenger to jump between them, like a monkey.

"█▄█▀▄▀█▄█▀", roared Berserker and madly cut after the fast-moving Avenger.

But every time she was able to block with her fists and every time she did that his katana cracked a little. It repaired itself quickly after, but it was a sign that something in her legend was making her punches more effective against his sword.

"▀█▄▀▀█▄▀█", he howled again, but this time instead of attacking he vanished once more.

Avenger grabbed the next rod and in a swift movement landed on top of it.

"Where is he?", she wondered looking around, when suddenly the black wings coiled around her upper waist.

"Wa?", she shouted out, as she was jerked back. But this allowed her to glance above her, where Berserker stood there, a red orb between his horns.

'Damn', was all, what she thought, when the orb exploded again.

"Als ich ein kleiner Junge war (Not Everything Seen by Children Should Be Told to Children)."

Suddenly the path of the energy wave changed towards the side. It hit a certain book and was absorbed inside of it. Both Avenger and Archer knew this book. They had never seen it, but they had heard of it from Assassin. And so they knew the owner.

"Saver?", Avenger said unbelieving. The priest in question waved towards them.

"Hi there", he greeted. "I would like to stop and talk…" He didn't even got to finish his sentence as Berserker roared again and charged towards the next threat. Within the blink of an eye, Saver had dismissed his book and instead took out two others.

"Desconhort (On the Superiority of Reason)!"

But before Saver even uttered the first syllable of the next one, Berserker suddenly stopped.

"█▄█▀██▄▀▀█▄██▀█▄█▀█▄▀█▀█▄█▄▄▀█▀█▄▀█▀"

Berserker started howling even worse than before. He was bending over backwards and his left hand gripped his left horn. Suddenly crack started around his neck, going down all the way to the hole in his chest. Then suddenly he ripped his bull face away, revealing under it skin that had actually the peach color of skin and brown eyes. His hole in the chest got filled with a white substance and all over his body cracks appeared. Suddenly the white skin burst and under it was a black kimono with a red-rosary-like strap across his chest. His black sword vanished and suddenly appeared on his back, but it looked different. Its blade was wider and it was wrapped in white bandages. His eyes clear and devoid of madness he said to someone who wasn't there:

"Don't go around deciding things on your own again, bastard!"

"What the hell!"

Everybody thought that but only one voiced these thoughts. Surprised Archer turned around to face Saver, who had an even more flabbergasted expression. His eyes bulged out, his mouth wide open. How come that the one who used the Noble Phantasm, was the one most surprised? Berserker ignored them all and was mumbling to himself:

"Seriously, in what kind of situation did you brought us now! Holy Grail War?! You've got to be kidding me!"

Then he suddenly noticed the state his Master was in. Providing mana for Mad Enhancement together with two attacks that were clearly above B-Rank, had been too much for the last-minute magus to keep consciousness. Quickly the now sane Servant ran towards Kariya and picked him up. He still didn't know anything about what was happening, but even he knew that he had first get this man to a safe place and treat him. So just as quickly as he had attacked, he vanished.

"Alright, that had been unexpected", Saver commented as he put away his books and turned towards the other Servants, especially Avenger. "But it's certainly interesting how you found out my class. I can't remember telling anyone."

"Tch. Just a lucky guess. Putting that aside, what the hell do you want?" Archer didn't thought for one moment, he was just here to chat. And if it came to a fight, he would prefer, if it was, before his thirty minutes were over.

"Oh, I? Just stopping a fight!"

"I can see that! But why? Why are you so content on getting in our way and stopping the fights?!"

"Now, that's not nice saying to someone who just drove away your enemy. I am just doing my job as a Saver. You know, I am like the extra enemy that appears when you set the difficulty to lunatic. Making it harder for you to finish this Heaven's Feel."

"Is that so?" Archer didn't buy that excuse for a moment. He was hiding something. In his life Archer had to deal with a lot of shady people and businesses, resulting in his skill Discernment of the Poor, which let him see through his opponent's true nature, giving enough information.

"Well, I am also rather curious about your friend there." Avenger pointed surprised at herself.

"Me?"

"Yeah. You know, we have already seen Assassin, Saber, Lancer, Rider and Berserker. That leaves Caster and Archer. But none of those classes really fit at you. You fight with your fists, not with a weapon or magic. And even if we take a lot at all the other classes that are already taken, you don't really fit into any of them, to be exact. So, what class are you?"

"Em…", she shifted nervously. "am I am not supposed to hide that from my enemies?" Saver laughed.

"True, true, well then, I'll be off."

"Wait a minute!", Archer stopped him.

"Yeah, what is it?"

"There is something I wanted to ask you as well."

"Sure, go ahead."

"Are you Martin Luther?"

"Oho, you have figured out my identity? Congratulations."

"Tch. Cut the crap", he demanded annoyed. "You can't be him!"

"Why? I think I fulfill a lot of the requirements to be him!"

"First you are using fucking way to much different Noble Phantasm for one Heroic Spirit and your surprise while using Desconhort, your 'own' Noble Phantasm betrayed you. These aren't your real Noble Phantasm. No, you are a damned collector." Avenger looked surprised, while Saver smiled rather satisfied.

"Oh, you really figured it out. Yes, I have Collector A+, a skill that allows me to draw goods towards me and keep them. But it only works on books and documents or other things that are containers of knowledge, but it works even on Noble Phantasm, making it hard for everybody to figure out my identity. Even my appearance in not real. So, good luck finding out my true name." He waved towards them, turned around and walked away.

"Wow, you are really perceptive!", Avenger exclaimed in awe, but Archer shrugged it off.

"Not really", he said and jumped. Right through the devastated roof onto the red couch. But there he didn't laid down and instead took out some kind of gadget. Luckily as a Heroic Spirit he wasn't dependent on the network to walk, but he still needed to switch the mode on the electrode if he wanted to fight. And he still had a time limit until it was depleted. But as a Heroic Spirit he didn't need power to charge his battery, but still had to use the same gadget, even if it wasn't necessary to plug it in.

"What are you doing?", Avenger, who followed him, asked interested.

"I am charging the battery of my music player", he lied. Even if they fought together he would never forget his objective.

"Really?! Is this some kind of music player that makes you stronger the louder the music is?!"

"Where the hell did you got that idea from?!"

"Don't know, just appeared in my mind."

"Avenger, are you alright?" Volquart went into the room, followed by Tokiomi.

"Yes", she shouted, "but seriously this Berserker is so strong! I don't think I can take him alone!" She turned to Archer. "But we are a really good team. Don't you think so, too?!" Archer snorted.

"Yeah. The next time I fight together with someone with 'Violent Doughnut' I am going to remember it.

"DOUGHNUT?" He looked surprised at Avenger whose eyes looked dreamily and… was she drooling?

"That has to be the worst cosmic joke ever", Archer exclaimed. "Someone with Violent Doughnut having fucking doughnuts as his favorite foot?"

"Of course! After all, doughnuts are the treasure of the real world!" Real world?

"Avenger, you didn't answer my question from earlier", Archer noted. "Are you human?" Avenger shifted uncomfortable. Without the knowledge about this era, she had received from the Grail, she would probably have talked without restraint about her nature. But now…

"That's not possible", Tokiomi stated. "Only humans can become Heroic Spirits."

"Actually, he is right." Avenger butted in. "I am not human. I may be summoned as a Heroic Spirit, but no matter how you look at it, I am not a human."

A/N:

Hi guys and gals.

Remember how I said something about a lucid Berserker? Well, looks like we got one now. Although, when I decided to keep a berserk Berserker, I hadn't yet created that Noble Phantasm, but after that I thought, why not?

Regarding Saver, we hear now that he definitely is not Kotomine Shirou. He just took on his appearance.

And just like promised, here are the Servant parameters, except for Berserker, because after he lost his Mad Enhancement, his whole skill set was shuffled anew.

Also, most importantly: From my latest reviewers like Legends Storyteller and Planeshunter it has come to my attention that my interpretation of Archer's Noble Phantasm is not entirely correct. I apologize for that. Usually I would change that but considering how many chapters I already wrote and how often he fights with his ability, I don't know how to change that without completely rewriting half of the story. I hope you enjoy Fate One Savior regardless.

Gashadokuro Amanojaku

CLASS: Avenger

Master:

True Name:

Sex: Female

Strength: A

Endurance: E-

Agility: D

Mana: E-

Luck: E-

Noble Phantasm: D

Class Abilities

None

Skills

Acrobatics: A

Is the ability to use acrobatic feats in air combat.

Additionally the Agility of Avenger is raised by two ranks, as long as Avenger is airborne.

Noble Phantasm

CLASS: Archer

Master: Tohsaka Tokiomi

True Name:

Sex: Male

Strength: E

Endurance: B

Agility: E

Mana: E

Luck: C

Noble Phantasm:

Class Abilities

Magic Resistance: B

Cancel spells with a chant below three verses. Even if targeted by High-Thaumaturgy and Greater Rituals, it is difficult for him to be affected.

Independent Action: A+

Servant can remain in this world indefinitely even without a Master. However, in order to activate his Noble Phantasm, it is necessary to first acquire an extra supply of prana from alternative sources.

Skills

Eye of the Mind (True): C

Capable of calm analysis of battle conditions even when in danger and deduce an appropriate course of action after considering all possibilities to escape from a predicament. So long there is even a 5% chance of a comeback, this ability greatly improves the chances of winning.

Discernment of the Poor: A

He will not be deceived by excuses and deceptions from words.

Noble Phantasm