I visited the orphanage first.
The moment I stepped through the gates, the familiar atmosphere washed over me, the noise of children running around, the sound of small arguments that never really escalated into anything serious, and the quiet presence of Miss Ayaka moving between them, making sure everything stayed under control without ever needing to raise her voice.
Miss Ayaka noticed me shortly after I arrived.
"Eiji." she called, walking over with her usual calm expression. "You're back."
"Yeah." I replied with a small nod.
Her eyes lingered on me for a moment, not in a way that felt intrusive, but more like she was checking whether anything about me had changed since the last time I was here. It was subtle, but she always did that.
"You look tired." she said gently.
"I've been helping Miss Nozomi with her work."
"I see… make sure you get enough rest, alright?" she replied, her tone calm but firm in a quiet, caring way.
I gave a small nod. "I will."
She seemed satisfied with that answer, though her eyes lingered on me for a moment longer, making sure I wasn't just saying it to end the conversation. It wasn't unusual. She always spoke like that, simple words, but with an underlying concern that she didn't bother to hide.
Soon enough, the kids gathered around me, their voices overlapping as they asked questions, each one trying to get my attention before the others could. Some of them recognized me right away, others took a moment, but it didn't take long before I was surrounded.
It felt… normal.
Too normal.
Because somewhere in the back of my mind, I couldn't ignore what was coming.
The Holy Grail War in Fuyuki wasn't just something confined to magi fighting each other. There were always people who got dragged into it indirectly, people who didn't even understand what was happening around them until it was already too late.
And among those people… were those who would cause problems simply because they could.
Ryuunosuke and Gilles.
People who didn't care about the Grail, or power, or any sort of goal tied to magecraft.
For them, it was something else entirely.
Kidnappings wouldn't be done for a purpose that made sense in the way magi understood it. There was no research, no experimentation, no structured intent behind it. Just a distorted sense of "art" something driven by curiosity twisted beyond recognition, where human lives were reduced to something disposable, something to be taken simply because it could be done.
My expression tightened slightly as the thought settled in.
I glanced back toward the orphanage building, watching the children continue playing without a care in the world, their laughter carrying across the yard as if nothing outside could ever reach them.
If I left Fuyuki now and stayed away during the war, then there would be no guarantee that this place would remain untouched. And if someone like Ryuunosuke or anything connected to him ended up operating in this city…
No one here would be prepared to deal with that.
I looked back at the orphanage building, then at the children again.
This place had become something I couldn't just ignore.
"I'll stay." I muttered quietly
If something was going to threaten this place during the war, then I would be here when it happens.
I turned away from the yard, the voices of the children fading behind me as I walked off.
There was still a lot I needed to train.
...
By the time I returned to Touko, the sky had already begun to dim.
She was where I expected her to be—either in her workshop or somewhere nearby where she could work without interruptions. As soon as I stepped inside, the familiar scent of tools, materials, and faint traces of prana greeted me.
Touko looked up from whatever she was doing, glancing at me briefly before returning her attention to her work.
"You took your time." she said casually.
I just gave her a nod.
I walked a bit closer and stopped at a comfortable distance, organizing my thoughts before speaking.
"I'm going to stay in Fuyuki."
Touko didn't react right away.
Her hand, which had been moving a moment ago, stopped mid-motion, and she slowly set her tools aside before finally turning her full attention toward me.
"Stay?" she repeated.
"Yeah." I replied. "I'll be staying here during the war."
Touko studied me for a moment, her expression unreadable as she processed what I had just said. It wasn't the kind of decision I usually made lightly, so she understood there was a reason behind it.
"Have you thought this through?" she said after a brief silence.
"I have."
Another pause followed.
Then she leaned back slightly, crossing her arms as a faint smile formed on her face.
"So you've decided to plant yourself in one place instead of running around with me." she said. "That's new."
"…The orphanage."
Touko exhaled lightly through her nose, as if that explanation made everything fall into place.
She turned back toward her workspace, picking up her tools again as if the matter had already been settled in her mind.
"Just make sure you don't get careless." she added.
"I know."
"Good."
The conversation naturally moved on after that, but the decision itself lingered in the background, already shaping what was to come.
...
After leaving Touko's workshop, I returned to the same open stretch of land outside the city, the kind of quiet, unclaimed space where the absence of people made it easier to focus without distractions, and where the faint sounds of distant traffic and wind became the only reminders that the rest of the world still continued to move.
The sky had already begun to dim, the last traces of daylight thinning into a muted gradient that slowly gave way to the deeper shades of evening, and as I stepped into the center of the clearing, I allowed myself a moment of stillness, letting my breathing settle while I adjusted my grip on the katana in my hand, feeling the familiar weight of it anchor my awareness back into the present.
I stepped forward and drew the blade in a clean horizontal motion, letting the movement travel naturally through my body rather than forcing it, allowing the weight of the katana to guide the arc of the strike as it cut through the air with a steady, controlled motion.
The sound it made was subtle, more of a faint whoosh than anything sharp, but the consistency of the movement mattered more than its force.
I reset my stance.
Another swing followed, this time slightly angled, adjusting the trajectory to refine the precision of the motion, ensuring that my posture remained stable throughout the execution.
Again.
And again.
Each repetition was deliberate, not rushed, with attention placed on the alignment of my shoulders, the rotation of my hips, and the timing between my steps and the blade's movement, until the motion itself began to natural to me.
After several swings, I came to a stop, lowering the blade slightly as I exhaled.
"That's better."
Now… the ability I copied.
I shifted my stance slightly and looked ahead, the empty space in front of me feeling less like just air and more like something that could be shaped if I approached it correctly.
Up until now, I had been treating the spatial distortion as a tool for movement, something that allowed me to reposition, to slip through space, to adjust distance in a way that bypassed normal limitations. It's useful, but limited in scope if that was all it was used for.
That wasn't enough.
If I was going to rely on this in actual combat, then it needed to function as more than just mobility.
It needed to be something that could influence attacks. Something that could be applied offensively or defensively depending on how it was shaped.
After a brief pause, a memory surfaced, something from a past that didn't belong to this world, yet remained clear enough to influence how I interpreted abilities like this.
A character.
Uro.
If I remembered correctly, her ability involved manipulating space in a way that treated it almost like a lens, distorting, redirecting, and warping the trajectory of incoming attacks so that they missed their intended target, not by physically blocking them, but by altering the space they traveled through.
I exhaled slowly as the idea took shape.
"If only I can recreate something similar"
I took a step forward and raised my right hand instead, opening my fingers slightly as I focused on the empty air ahead, thinking of it as something that could be reached into and interacted with.
I let my prana flow outward, not forming a wide distortion this time, but concentrating it into a much smaller, more controlled point between my fingers and the space ahead.
Then, instead of activating displacement immediately, I tried something different.
I imagined the space in front of me as something tangible.
Something that could be grasped.
My fingers curled slightly.
And as I did, the distortion responded.
It felt… unusual.
Not physical in the traditional sense, but there was a distinct sensation of "holding onto" something that wasn't supposed to be held, as if the space itself was being compressed and pulled under my control.
"So this is possible."
With both hands now raised, I tried to extend the effect, shaping two points of distortion and attempting to stabilize the space between them, creating a controlled boundary that could be adjusted at will.
The strain increased, but the structure held for a brief moment before flickering.
"…Still unstable."
If an enemy expected standard magecraft, or even movement-based techniques, they would naturally prepare defenses and countermeasures around those assumptions.
But this—
This operated on a different layer.
I flexed my fingers slightly again, as if testing the memory of that sensation, then slowly closed my hand into a loose fist.
If they don't know it exists
They wouldn't know how to react to it.
An ability that manipulated space directly, applied through simple gestures rather than obvious activation, would be difficult to read in the middle of combat—especially if I could conceal the buildup of prana until the moment of use.
The only thing to do now is to refine it.
...
6 months later
Time passed faster than I expected.
Training, refining, repeating the same processes over and over until the distortion no longer felt foreign, but something I could call up with minimal difficulty. And eventually, I showed Touko.
Touko was someone who rarely showed surprise, even when faced with things that went beyond expectation. She had seen enough, understood enough, and experienced enough to remain composed in most situations.
But this time—
For a brief moment, her eyes shifted.
"I see."
That was all she said at first, though the faint change in her expression made it clear she had properly taken in what I showed her.
It was the first time I had managed to genuinely surprise her.
"Don't get careless with it." she added. "Abilities like that tend to give people a false sense of control."
"I won't."
She didn't respond immediately after that.
Instead, she began preparing for something else, packing, organizing, handling whatever tasks she needed to take care of.
Only then did she mention it.
"I'll be leaving Fuyuki again."
The words were said casually, almost like a routine statement rather than something important. But I knew better. This wasn't unusual for her. Touko moved when she needed to, without being tied down by place or time. This time, however, I wasn't going with her.
"You're gonna stay here aren't you?"
"Yeah, I'll keep the place clean"
She nodded.
There was no further discussion. No long explanation. No reassurances about when she would return. That wasn't her way, and because of that, I didn't ask.
Still…
As she finished her preparations, I realized something. From this point on, I wouldn't know when she'd come back or where she would be in the meantime.
For the first time since I started learning from her—
I would be staying in Fuyuki alone.
I watched her leave, the familiar presence that had been a constant during my training gradually disappearing as she stepped away.
The house started to feel empty.
"Guess it's just me now."