"…"
Ise blinked a few times as he peeked out of his cover, the sweat pouring down his face and his heart hammering away from all the excitement that happened. Near him, Rias and the others also started to emerge from their cover, their eyes looking over the damage that strewn across the entire academy, the scorched schoolyard, a semi-conscious and injured Lyle, the unconscious priest, and finally the lone human magician who was standing in the middle of the battlefield holding the golden blade of the king.
No sign of Kokabiel.
"You are kidding me?" Ise turned to Tsubasa who was looking at all the damage before focusing her attention on Shirou. "Did Emiya-kun just take down Kokabiel?"
"Inconceivable." Koneko nodded her head while wincing from her pain.
"A high-tier Fallen Angel, from the first generation of Angels. And Emiya-kun took him out?!" Rias muttered as she started to take the information into her head. "That's amazing."
'You got that right. That was truly amazing.'
Ise shook his head slightly to rid himself of the lightheadedness that caused his vision to sway, before getting out of his hiding spot and sluggishly made his way to Shirou. He paused for a moment in front of some broken glass panes to take stock of his own injuries.
Boy, did he look like crap?
His arm was dangling lifelessly with blood running down the length of it, his legs were twisted at the joint in odd angles, and his neck was sporting a very big gash courtesy of Kiba's attack. His head was sporting several bruises and a deep cut that was bleeding quite a fair bit. He was feeling a little lightheaded from the blood loss and a little winded from the fight.
He was so going to feel all the pain in the morning.
Ise snorted as he continued to make his way to Shirou, noting his state as he got closer. On the surface he looked normal, if one was willing to look past the glowing lines that was running along his arm that gripped Excalibur and the torn portions of his clothes that seemed to barely conceal what looked like old injuries. But having trained with Shirou for some time, Ise have gotten enough intuition to look past that, and he got his conclusion.
Shirou was seriously burnt out and seeming in the throes of a painful collapse.
It was not hard to see the drops of sweat going down his face and the heavy breathing that he was making to tell Ise that Shirou had expanded a lot of his 'OD' and was running on fumes at the moment. He wouldn't be surprised that Shirou would drop face first to the ground. And the cause was likely to be that glowing sword. Based on what he was told by both Shirou and Kiba before, that sword was drawing a lot of his energy as fuel, and that was a very dangerous thing to do.
As he was within talking distance, Ise paused momentarily to watch a ball of energy descend from the spot where Kokabiel was last seen. It slowed its descent and hovered closely in front of Shirou, who looked at it with a close eye. Then with a tired sigh, he conjured up a small glass jar that sucked the ball into it and capped it before disappearing into that weird dimension pocket of his.
"Shirou, I think you can put the sword down now." Ise said as he dragged his legs to him. "The fight is over."
"Ha~ Ha~ Not yet…" Shirou panted hard as he turned his head, and Ise could not help but stop fearfully at the sight of his hard eyes that seemed to have turned a dark shade of gray. "There is… one more nearby…"
'What?!' Ise twisted his head around to find any other enemies around them. "I don't see any."
"There is one… right over there!" Shirou swung the sword in a huge arc and let loose another beam of light past Ise's right side and towards one of the buildings of the academy.
[Divide! Divide! Divide! Divide! Divide! Divide! Divide!]
"BOOM!"
An explosion smaller than before appeared a few feet away from him, sending out a wave of hot air that blew Ise off his feet and sent him hurtling to the ground. Blinking the dust out of his eyes, he turned to see a sight that could be described with two words.
Majestic, and terrifying.
The explosion created another crater in the ground despite the relatively smaller amount of power put into that attack, flames filling the innards like an illustration of hell brought to life. But the part that got Ise's attention was the glowing white figure that hovered above the flaming crater with its arms folded and looking down on them coolly. The figure was covered in white armor that greatly resembled his in design, with the exception of the jewels being blue and the wings on the back looking like a futuristic version of dragon wings. Aside from the cracks that appeared on the right gauntlet, everything else was pristine and untouched, making the figure looked like a god who has just descended from the heavens.
"Oh no~" A groan came out of the mouth of the brown-haired exorcist as he looked up from his angle. "Vanishing Dragon, Albion!"
Wait, Albion? Wasn't that the name of Draig's dragon rival?
["Hello, Red One. It has been a while, hasn't it?"] A deep voice emanating from the white figure reverberated in the area.
["It certainly is, White One."] Ise snapped his head to the red gauntlet where the jewels were glowing a bright green. ["How long has it been? A few millenniums?"]
["Give or take a couple thousand years."] A tone of amusement was evident in Albion's voice. ["This is certainly an unusual setting to meet up after so long."]
["Indeed."] Draig agreed with the voice. ["So, are you here to continue what we have begun so long ago?"]
[Hmm… I would not mind, but your hostility is relatively low."] Albion remarked curiously.
["As is yours."] Draig replied back nonchalantly. ["Then again, we can guess that it can be attributed to this weird age and our current users."]
["So true, so true."] Albion agreed. ["My current master is very unusual even by our standards, he is… what is that word? Fickle."]
["Then why are you here?"] Draig asked with a notable tone of tension.
["Ah for that matter."] The voice paused as the figure lifted his head for a moment before continuing. ["As much as it vexes me, my partner is currently on a small assignment if you would. He is supposed to find and arrest a certain worthless Fallen Angel who has broken the treaty and declared war on the Devils while attempting to make the Heaven Faction bear the blame."]
["Ah, if that is the case, please direct your query to the human there."] Draig replied while the gauntlet forcefully pointed a finger at Shirou. ["You might get an unexpected answer."]
["You are certainly correct."] The figure turned to Shirou who was looking at him with a stern glare while Albion continued commenting with an interested tone. ["It seems we have encountered a very interesting individual in the process."]
"You are here for Kokabiel, huh? Well then, sorry to make you come all the way here and see him dead." Shirou replied back while the glowing lines started extending past his neck and to spread on the other arm. The figure looked at him for a moment before turning his head slowly towards Galilei and Lyle.
"They are staying with us." Shirou raised the sword and directed the tip at him. "There are some questions we want answers for, and you are not taking them back or killing them, got that?" The figure turned his head back to him with a slight tilt to the side, as though he was amused by the actions being directed at him. Ise could only swallow hard as he looked at the standoff in front of him. Shirou was in really bad shape and even he could tell that this was not a fight that could be won without some casualties.
Fortunately, that worry was rendered moot as the figure relaxed his posture to look at everyone before pausing to look at his cracked gauntlet. Lifting his other arm, he grabbed the gauntlet and pulled lightly to dislodge the broken piece of armor, dropping a few fragments on to the ground and revealing a slender arm covered in supposedly the sleeve of a black shirt.
He inspected it for a while before carelessly throwing it at Shirou who may have anticipated something he might do, as the gauntlet slowed down and small runes appear around it in a form of a netting, before going through one of his weird dimensional pockets that gave the effect of the gauntlet entering a still pond and giving off ripples. The armored user did not give any acknowledgement of that and merely repaired the missing gauntlet, clenching his fist to test it before looking back at Shirou.
The message behind that action was clear. Shirou got a 'consolation price' for damaging Albion's armor.
With that and one last glance at Ise, the figure turned around and shot off into the night sky, looking like a falling star going across the horizon. Everyone stood still for a moment, speechless at all that had happened and what was to come.
The only thing that knocked them out of the thoughts was the sound of Shirou collapsing to his knees and stabbing the giant sword into the ground for support.
"Oui Shirou, are you fine?!" Ise hurried over as best as he could and grabbed him by the shoulders, noting how pale Shirou seemed to have gone and the amount of hard panting he was showing, the glowing lines seemingly fading away to a light red.
"No… Not all right…" Shirou heaved heavily as his body started to shake violently. "Remember… what I said… about overusing… our 'OD'? This… is one… of those examples!"
"Shirou!" Ise let out a panicked tone as Shirou finally released his grip on the sword and he fell backwards, yelling out in pain.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
...
A/N : The Story Needs More Power Stones ;)
PS : if we can reach 400 Stones by the end of the week, I will throw you an extra chapter
...
if you want to read ahead of the public release you can go to my p atreon :
p atreon.com/Aerle