...A frelling UFO?! Just who the hell is Rider?
Also, the pink wig reference completely flew over my head. Can someone please enlighten me?
Also also: damn, this was a good update!
Also also also: damn it, Oliver, next time you say you can carry something, you better be right about it!
Seigi's hot gf was not exactly as #goals as one would hope.
Originally Posted by Arashi_Leonhart
...You lost me.
Oh, ok. Thanks, Raff!
Spoiler free-ish version:
In short back in February, a number of readers on the Questverse server noticed Seigi in Quest of Fate has gravitated towards love interests that have pink hair. This elevated to jokes that Seigi has a pink hair fetish and even further still of making edits of Questverse characters to give them pink hair. Most infamously one of Arwyn Penrith of Fate/Reclamation fame which inevitable has resulted in some edits of the two together.Happy pride month
kinda spoilers if you haven't been keeping up with QoF Raf
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Main Hangar and Launch Site, New Asgard
Severe Cold (-30 °C/-22 °F; external temperature)
(BGM)
Let us turn back the clock a little bit.
The soil from which the Fourth Reich is to spring and bloom, New Asgard, spreads irregularly beneath the hills of Valparaíso and deep beneath the sea floor. It is a haphazard realm of stone, steel and artificial lights, of oil and quicksilver, driven by a long-condemned ideology and ambition that long ago submerged itself into deep madness.
Not even ten percent of the materials used in the construction of this gigantic secret base were smuggled out of Germany as the war neared its inevitable conclusion. The amount of materials needed to establish and develop New Asgard was monumental, and all of it had to be acquired, transported and worked on in the utmost secrecy, away from the ever-more-thorough eyes of the world. The effort to build this underground base, and the effort to hide it…
Rider—rather, the man who is currently summoned in the Rider Class—has been there for every step of the process. It makes complete sense, then, that as the elevator brings him down to the colossal underground chamber, he looks upon the culmination of his efforts with pride.
A modern artifact to open the path to a new era. A flying throne for the
Warning! Not to scaleof the new world. An absurd Noble Phantasm for an impossible Servant.FührerLeader
The expected figure awaits him halfway along the tunnel connecting the elevator to the access hatch to the flying saucer.
“Herr Doktor,” salutes the short woman. The accompanying hand gesture is half-hearted at best. Rider makes a mental note to remind her of the proper respect due her superiors later that night. At the moment, there are more important matters at hand. Starting with the fact that he expected two people, not one.
“Where is Number Six?”
Hexensoldat IV, code name Ortrud, shrugs as lazily as she salutes.Spoiler:
“Senta took her along for the ‘Master Capture Operation’. I checked on her a minute ago; said she’s on her way back, but suggested you launch without her.”
Rider makes another note, this time to punish Number Five for reallocating one of their most valuable resources, Hexensoldat VI Elisabeth, without his express permission.
“Anything else from Number Three and Number Five?”
“They do not report to me, sir.”
Rider nods. That is indeed the case.
“Status.”
“Engine performance at 96, plus-minus 3 percent. All systems online and verified three times. I’d say you’re ready to go, sir.”
Rider catches the strange choice of words.
“You are my copilot.”
Ortrud responds with mock surprise.
“Well sir, you do me too much honor. You would share the glory with this lowly servant?”
Rider narrows his gaze. He can tell he is failing to catch something in those words. There is an unvoiced thought hidden behind that voice that exudes half-hearted mockery. Number Four and Number Five are very similar in the way they express themselves, even if (apparently, he really does not pay attention) they do not get along.
In any case, the woman before him makes a very valid point. He does not truly need a crew to pilot his Noble Phantasm—it is his Noble Phantasm, after all—, but a proper division of labor naturally makes things easier. Yes, the glory of slaying their greatest and final obstacle, Servant Saber, should be his and his alone. Unlike the former Führer, he will fight at the vanguard. He will prove that he is the one most worthy to lead the Fourth Reich, unlike the whack job calling himself “Sovereign”.
“Very well. Prepare the Feuerbälle for deployment on my command,” he says before walking past the woman towards his war machine.
“Aye-aye, sir—ah, sir!”
The woman hurriedly holds to his forearm in the epitome of insolence, but Rider does not get to say or do anything about it once his lips are fiercely captured by her own, a tyrannical tongue boldly lashing forward to conquer the space inside his mouth. It is a violent, lustful kiss, and it is returned in kind. When she bites his bottom lip, he pulls hard at her long hair until she moans in painful delight. When she smirks in response to his rough treatment, he pulls her into a second, even messier exchange. There is no affection from either part, merely the hedonistic desire for a moment of pleasure. They want merely the release of certain chemicals and the sensations that accompany them. It is this shared, simplistic desire which pulls them to the same bed every night.
“For good luck,” finally says the woman in the sultry voice of a woman who does not really know how to be “sultry”. Their hold on each other lingers, for their eyes reveal a shared dissatisfaction and a bothersome hunger for more.
“This victory will not be a result of mere luck,” responds a man incensed by lust and male pride.
“Don’t take too long,” says the woman once they finally let go of each other. “We hafta celebrate.”
Rider replies with a grunt, his eyes already set on the flying machine and his steps confidently taking him towards his destiny. The blunt dismissal makes the woman snort and shake her head.
The Servant rests a hand on the aircraft’s smooth surface. The feel of the miraculous metal, Luftschwamm, is dearer to him than the softness of silk or the touch of the woman a ways behind him. This machine is his joy and the embodiment of all his laments.
If only Himmler had siphoned more funds into the secret aircraft projects…
If only the Führer had not placed his hopes on von Braun’s worthless rocketry…
If only Barbarossa had not been such a waste of precious resources…
If only they had completedwhile the war was still ongoing…Die Glockethe artificial Grail
If only they had had more time…!
A complete squadron of aircraft like this one—how grand it would have been, having these decimate the RAF over the skies of London…!
Alas, it was not to be. They scampered like rats out of a sinking ship, hiding like criminals in this worthless country at the end of the world. For the sake of the new, better world only they can build.
Thinking back on it, how exactly did he elude the Allies and make it all the way here with the prototype? Rider cannot remember…not that it matters at this point.
He is about to set foot inside the machine, but he catches himself, aware that Number Four has not moved from her spot. For a moment he catches himself recreating this scene with himself as a flying ace of the Luftwaffe, his woman waving him off with pride in her eyes as he sets off for the dogfight. It is a ridiculous thought; he was never an ace pilot. He has always been and will always be first and foremost an engineer. Circumstances have granted him the opportunity to create the ideal Fourth Reich, and it is solely for that purpose that he has chosen to become a warrior.
Servant Rider is not a romantic. However…
“Number Four.”
“Herr Doktor?”
The stern man allows himself a vague gesture of departure. He will not allow himself to feel indebted to another, especially not an artificial being.
“Good job setting everything up. Thank you.”
With that he walks inside, not bothering to look behind and thus never witnessing the first truly authentic expression projected by Ortrud’s face. The woman stares at the last visible location of Rider in utter surprise. It lasts no more than a few seconds before she changes to a more natural smirk.
“Well who’d have thought? Isolde was right after all.”
She turns her back to and walks away from the aircraft following those words; she has no desire to be anywhere near that thing when it accelerates from zero to Mach 2 in fifteen seconds.
“Spread your legs and stoke their egos and they fall right on the palm of your hand.”
Her mind quickly dismisses all thoughts of the man who will not call her by her given name even after fucking her.
*** ***
Outside the Lutheran Church of the Holy Cross
Day 03
Evening Phase – 06a
Severe Cold (-30 °C/-22 °F)
(BGM)Character Status
“So…it’s a UFO.”
“It is clearly Nazi, Nomikata, so it is most certainly not ‘unidentified’ by any means.”
The unknown redhead who showed up with Sakura slowly turns to gaze at her austere profile.
“Ow!” Then he slaps the back of her head in a most ungentlemanly manner. There is a past between these two, right then and there.
“Spare me the wisecracks, Edelfelt.”
“One morning you will wake up in your bedroom, Nomikata, and everything around you will be painted pink.”
“How come the Lady Edelfelt is not here with you? I guess she has more important matters to attend to with that fine gentleman, von Schlüβelstein?”
“And posters of Mister Adalbert and Mister Penrith. Posters everywhere.”
A past there indeed.
But I shouldn’t be listening to weird banter I can make no sense of. No sunlight reaches the frozen city at this hour, but the perennial aurora bathes the hills with its arcane glow, rendering any distinction between day and nighttime irrelevant. The impossible flying object continues its pointless flight here and there, as if the pilot were a young lad taking out his new ride for the first time.
Footsteps behind me. It is Senta, walking back inside the church. That does seem the sensible thing to do in these circumstances. I can only hope Fiore and Oliver think the same.
“Come on,” I say, and that fortunately enough to get them to follow me inside. The place is still filled with the stench of burnt flesh, all the starker after almost three days of not smelling much of anything.
“Right, do excuse my manners. Javier, right? I’m Seigi Nomikata.”
I shake the offered hand briefly. Seigi Nomikata…that’s a name I’ve heard before. Rather, do I have something on my face? I don’t like it when people stare at me so intently; it never means anything good.
“He is about as British as I am Finnish,” comments Sakura, drawing the man’s attention from me to instead scowl at her. “And his late father, whom I did not have the dubious privilege to meet, had the most unbelievable naming sense.”
“Quiet, you.”
“You two an item or something?” Damn it, why does the Nazi homunculus keep voicing my thoughts?
“Pfft! P-Please spare me the bad jokes, um, madam.” Nomikata is quick to refute, albeit clearly uncomfortable by the uniformed woman. Well, yes, I guess the sight of a person wearing a Nazi uniform like nobody’s business would bother most people.
“I do not satisfy Mister Nomikata’s exacting standards on a potential mate,” adds Sakura, now wearing a smirk I never want aimed in my direction.
“Can we please focus on the bloody Nazi UFO? Jesus, my head hurts just saying it…”
“Why bother?”
We all look at Senta with varying degrees of irritation. The girl making her way to the altar—even poking the massive corpse with her foot for the hell of it—will not be intimidated by angry looks, though.
“It’s not like you can fight that thing. You should think of hiding and waiting—”
Senta jolts on the spot, quickly bringing her right hand to her ear, as if reaching for an earphone she is most definitely not wearing.
“Uh, do excuse me a moment—oh, Herr Rider! Herzlichen Glückwunsch zum erfolgreichen Jungfernflug!“
My German is very basic, so I only got about half of that. I caught as much as “Rider”, though. The other two with me might have a better grasp of the language; not that it matters, all three of us are now silent and taut, as if expecting the enemy Servant to pounce on us from the church’s shadows.
“Ah, well, about that…” Senta continues, switching to English likely for our convenience. We can only hear her side of the conversation, though. “I failed, you see. So I’m kind of a prisoner now. Entschuldigung!”
What a cute apology.
“Kundry? How would I know where she is? You know how she is when she gets an idea in her head—no, wait, you don’t. Anyway, she went invisible and wandered off who-knows-where.”
Sakura tugs at my arm for my attention, mouthing the world “invisible” with mixed doubt and alarm. Nomikata is also staring at me. I nod, hopefully a gesture sufficient to confirm that, yes, they have someone who can turn invisible.
“Yes, sir, he is kind enough to let me talk like this,” continues Senta. “Saber? No, she’s not here. I was defeated by the man I presume is her Master.”
I don’t think Maria would like to hear me being called that.
“Yes, sir, he is a powerful magus.” Oh, so you’re just gonna stuff him with lies. “Many offensive spells, like ‘crackaboom’!”
Three humans blink in unison when the girl begins a sequence of poor onomatopoeias of action movie sounds.
“Ratatata-tah! Ba-bam! Kah-boom! Sorta like that.”
Sakura seems amused by the whole thing, but Nomikata at least is as befuddled as I am. Senta suddenly snorts.
“Um, sir, I don’t think he’s just gonna let me tell you where we are.”
The lightheartedness of her voice does not reach her eyes firmly staring at us. Her hand is making shooing gestures while she silently mouths the direst word.
“Run.”
The flying saucer zips over the hills of Valparaíso. The windows rattle ominously, and we look at each other, probably sharing the same trepidation.
“…of course.”
Finally, Senta’s voice has lost its humor. It becomes empty like her eyes, lacking fear, despair, or defiance. There is nothing there but morose resignation.
“Of course you don’t care, sir. Well, Herr Rider, I would say it’s been a pleasure working with you, but I’m a terrible liar.”
Her eyes widen insistently as she stares at each and every single one of us. Sakura grabs my left forearm. The man, Nomikata, is looking in every direction, sorting out escape routes. I get it already.
We have to run.
We have to run.
We will die if we stay here a second longer!
Senta crosses her arms before her chest, apparently having cut the magical communication or whatever. A distant, artificial hum fills the air with its wordless declaration of impending doom.
“Run!” She yells, and we all move.
All but Senta.
Danger! Critical Choice!
Catalog of Somewhat Original Servants
In Progress: Fimbulwinter Quest Project.
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Le- Oh. Well. Nevermind then.Rider makes a mental note to remind her of the proper respect due her superiors later that night.
1. Into the underground passage.
Yeah, that seems to be the best choice. I'm with Raff.
Agreed, no tractor beams sucking us into the UFO that way.
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Actually, I'm going to change my proposal a bit:
Run into the underground passage while dragging Senta along.
If it's allowed as a vote option then I'm all for Spoony's proposal.
Actually y'know what yeah, changing too. Dragging Senta along with us as well.
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Raff’s course of action is a cautious thing to do, but at the same time, if we do that, I think that we can say goodbye to all of the allies we worked so hard to get. Edgy or not, abandoning your allies after putting this much work into them would be kind of infuriating. Also, who says the UFO has a tractor beam?
Run toward the cannon, while dragging Senta along.
She might be able to show us how to make it work. Let’s shoot that flying saucer out of the sky!
Also, my speculation is that Rider is a person involved with the Thule Society, which was steeped in the occult and esoteric studies. UFOs could fit into that.
Last edited by Draconic; June 16th, 2019 at 07:16 PM.
Likes attention, shiny objects, and... a ball of yarn?
F/GO Supports
I joined two years too late...
Hm. In my case at least, after the last updates and actually getting more of an inner monologue and thought patterns, I'm about 78% sure Rider is:
Spoiler:
At least that's my current suspicion.
Last edited by Sunny; June 16th, 2019 at 09:24 PM.
I think you’re into something there Sunny.
- - - Updated - - -
What UFO doesn’t have a tractor beam?
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>abandoning allies
Everyone's running in the same direction lol
No, four of us are. Marco and Oliver are pushing a giant cannon, Fiore is all by herself with a now pretty useless machine gun turret, and Maria and Alicia are unconscious.
So, technically, two of the seven party members we started the day with are now running in the same direction.
"All"
Also, what underground chamber are you talking about? The one that the UFO came from? What would we achieve by going there?
- - - Updated - - -
The ones from:
- Close Encounters of the Third Kind
- E.T.
- Forbidden Planet
Those are some pretty important UFOs without tractor beams.
- - - Updated - - -
Also making an addendum to my suggestion:
1. Seiji and Sakura: Run toward the cannon to help Oliver and Marco while dragging Senta along.
__Javier: Go back to the Drakes' house and gives the Hero's Proof to Maria.
Maybe doing that will wake her up and give her some sort of new ability that'll help her take this thing down.
Last edited by Draconic; June 17th, 2019 at 01:21 PM.
Likes attention, shiny objects, and... a ball of yarn?
F/GO Supports
I joined two years too late...
Again, let us turn back the clock a little bit, and take a look at one who prefers to not be seen.
Approaching the Drake Family Residence
Severe Cold (-30 °C/-22 °F)
(BGM)
Hexensoldat III, Kundry, takes slow, measured steps as she approaches the house where she knows her target rests. It seems a waste of effort—her steps do leave a trail in the snow—so this might be more of a personal habit than any actual desire to remain hidden. Her magecraft simply conceals her from visual perception; she can extend her obfuscation to the other senses, and even to detection magecraft, but that would be a waste of effort at the moment.
The streets are empty. She has already tested it that Senta’s walking dead cannot see her. Is her spell as effective against Assassin’s undead? She does not know. Assassin has betrayed the Fourth Reich, which makes them enemies, but Kundry has not yet been attacked.
The two-story home looms before her. There is nothing stopping her from walking inside, but she stops to take it in for a moment. The second floor windows are boarded. The overall look of the building suggests the common model of family business on the ground floor and family residence upstairs.
Kundry is wary. Should she be on the lookout for traps? The house is likely to be inhabited by magi; should she expect a warding bounded field protecting its interior?
Nobody can see her, but her right hand reaches for the opposite sleeve. Her posture is cautious and hesitant. It would be trivial to merely expand her magical veil to hide her from such arcane protections, but she hesitates to do it nonetheless.
Kundry is more afraid of her spell than she is of whatever defense she might find inside.
Her instructions were to support Senta, capture Saber’s Master and use him to restrain the Servant’s actions when Rider attacks. Her support would have been to slay anybody who impeded their capturing the Master, but they were fortunate enough to catch the man alone and lure him to their trap.
Kundry frowns in front of the house as she thinks of Rider’s instruction. His command to kill anybody who got on the way conflicted with His Majesty’s command not to harm the humans currently subjected to the Trial of Fimbulwinter, except for self-defense. She guesses not having to kill is the better outcome, but she cannot deny she is a little frustrated by the lack of achievements to call her own. That is probably why she is setting foot into this house at this moment. Senta should be able to handle the Master of Saber—and the red-haired man she saw approaching the church, if it comes to that—, and if she isn’t then she deserves whatever happens to her. Kundry believes she can achieve the major objective on her own. Would that not be more meaningful? For one of them to destroy the enemy Servant, rather than Rider or Archer or Lancer or His Majesty?
She is inside. Nothing explodes. The charred lump of a burnt corpse adorns the very center of the room, and she can see other burn marks on the walls. The furniture in this room—display cases, cabinets and drawers—have been piled together to make a barricade blocking access upstairs. A door on the back leads to some private room of whatever business this once was. Did they not have a report on the city´s magi? Not that she ever got the chance to read it.
The barricade is an issue. She does not have the luxury of time, so she acts quickly yet cautiously, moving the pieces in the proper order to clear out a gap without making the whole thing collapse noisily at her feet. As soon as she can make the leap over the barricade, she sneaks her way upstairs.
Before her spreads an ordinary home, pulled out of the ordinary by the fantasy world it has been immersed into. The house is wrapped in darkness except for what little of the aurora seeps through the gaps in the boards covering the windows…no. There are additional, point-like sources of light. It is easy to identify them because all the doors are open. She idly glances at the counter blocking most of the view of the small kitchen, but her attention is placed on the two sole bedrooms. The lights, dull orange in color, are emitted by objects she notice resemble antique oil lamps, except these contain no fuel, and the light in fact comes not from a flame, but a small glowing gem embedded on top of each. Some sort of simple mystic code, she presumes. She can count six of them: four in the empty guest room, and two in the main bedroom where her target rests. It is just as Senta told her: Saber passed out for an unknown reason in the middle of the street, and she was carried to this house where she remains unconscious. Rider does not know this yet.
The infiltration thus far has been without significant issue. If anything, it has been too easy. She knows the magi helping the Master are skulking around, perhaps seeking the way to retaliate against a power that cares not for them. Did they not leave a single person to keep an eye on the one they verily know is their enemy’s main target? Is that not a little too careless?
It cannot be. There has to be a catch.
Kundry grits her teeth. Her time is running out—
A muted shriek escapes her lips when ocean ice shatters in the distance. She looks around furtively—was she heard? Is there even somebody in this house who can hear her? More importantly, Rider.
Rider has launched. She has really run out of time.
Even if she remains silent, Senta will inform him of Saber’s location, and Rider will obliterate this building and everything inside it with his Kraftstahlkanonen. Saber’s Master might not even be necessary at this rate. She thinks of contacting Senta, but her brain yells at her to remain silent. What if Saber wakes up?
Kundry wants to claim this kill. She needs to. Otherwise, what does she even amount to?
But what if there is some hidden defense she has not noticed? What if there is a trap right at the doorframe of that bedroom? A rune hidden beneath the wood of the doorframe, or under the floor tiles? Perhaps those mystic codes based on magecraft are set to release a spell if she gets close to Saber? But then why would they leave four in the empty guest room?
Kundry wipes sweat gathering on her forehead. She is overthinking this. Saber, the first and foremost enemy standing in the way of the Fourth Reich, is right there, and she is unconscious. Kundry wields a curved dagger ensorcelled with runes suitable for inflicting harm on spirits of all kinds, including Servants. She has no time left. It is now or never.
The invisible Hexensoldat III, Kundry, takes a deep breath, grits her teeth, clenches the weapon in her right hand until it hurts, and shakily steps forward into the Servant’s bedroom.
*** ***
Lutheran Church of the Holy Cross
Day 03
Evening Phase – 06b
Severe Cold (-30 °C/-22 °F)
(BGM)Character Status
As if possessing a single mind, Sakura, Nomikata and I all look in the same direction: the displaced Ambon near the altar, and the vertical shaft it revealed; the one the Dutchman and half a dozen soldiers came out of, and the one through which Elisabeth made her departure.
We act in unison, but we all do different things. Sakura is by far the fastest, not hesitating to run and then leap straight into it. If there are steps or any other sort of climbing aid, Sakura just does not care about them.
“H-Hey!”
Seigi Nomikata and I exchange glances. In the time he took a single step and grabbed Senta’s arm, I have already flung her over my shoulder. Apparently we had the same idea.
“Wha-wha—what are you idiots doing!?” exclaims the girl—damn it, stop flailing around!
“Saving you,” is the only answer I can afford as I make my way to the tunnel, Nomikata closely following me.
“I hate your uniform and everything it stands for, but I am not in the habit of leaving people to die,” growls the other man as he goes first.
It is a wide shaft—it had to fit the Dutchman after all—with simple, rough steel handles hammered into the rock. Has this secret passage under the church always been here, or is this some weird feature like that cave at the base of the hill?
“Aaaah, damn it all! Thorn! Bar-Björk!”
“What are you doing—stop her—” I hear Nomikata’s demand, but too many other things are happening at the same time. My heart stops for a moment when I see the hulking figure of the Dutchman, charred head and all, jump to its feet with absurd speed, but any attempt at complaining to Senta is choked in my throat when the barrage begins.
Beams.
Not bullets nor rockets.
Goddamn beams like concentrated lightning. They fall upon the building in a diagonal trajectory, piercing through wood and brick like it is not even there, striking with the speed of machinegun fire.
I died.
I should be dead.
Humans cannot dodge a barrage of beams traveling at the speed of lightning.
Yet, I am unharmed, falling down the vertical shaft with Senta—and Nomikata after we crash on him. The last thing I see is the Dutchman looming over the mouth of the tunnel after pushing me inside, its huge body unraveled as it is pierced by dozens of lightning beams in an instant.
We fall into darkness.
*** ***
Unknown Location
(BGM)
Back to the present. We’ll need to jump around a bit longer until all these threads catch up in time.
A lone girl watches the gloomy night sky bathed in an unearthly aurora. The Servant all address as “Lily” stands alone in the common area of the hostel she has claimed as her “sanctuary”. The sweet child she has taken under her wing has listened to reason and now rests in one of plenty available rooms. Liria rests, but Lily wells knows she will not find sleep. How could anybody sleep with all this noise, anyway?
The litter model of the Lutheran Church is no more, undone along with its original. Lily now stands by the window, looking at the artificer of such destruction. A flying saucer rains beams upon the sacred structure, as if unsatisfied unless the building is reduced to dust. Anybody inside it has either pulled off a miraculous escape, or is long dead.
Seigi Nomikata still lives, however. This she knows from her bond she has with him as her current provider of magical energy. She wishes she could be as certain of the other young man’s fate.
“How I prayed you would not become part of this, beloved child,” she murmurs, pained words becoming condensed vapor on the window.
Unfortunately, she cannot ascertain Javier Lucero’s fate with her spells now that he has accepted a fragment of divinity into himself. Liria’s walking dead would be a more useful asset by this point, and Lily would bet anything that the girl is desperately looking for Javier through her many eyes on the city now that the bounded field keeping her zombies away has been undone by her disciple. Lily instead ponders on Rider’s revealed Noble Phantasm.
“So this is what you built from the lore attained by that pitiful medium. How unsightly.”
Her voice and her face both show her utmost disappointment with the human race.
“That girl was wounded in mind and soul, condemned to live the rest of her life in terror of what she had seen, and the best humans could make with the fruits of her sacrifice is this second-rate vimana?”
She shakes her head.
“I do not approve of what is happening here, but I cannot say I do not understand it.”
She is a practiced liar, so lying to Seigi and Liria was effortless. More than the British “gentleman” and the Chilean prostitute, she wants to step out there and fight. She wants to resolve all issues, make everything better, and bring relief to everyone’s faces.
But she cannot. She would achieve nothing by acting bold and stepping into the field of battle. The one who can put an end to this whole farce…
Lily pays close attention to whispers of the wind rushing through the narrow streets in the hills of frozen Valparaíso. The dance of the wind is the dance of all living things, and the wind always carries within itself the reverberations of conflict.
“We are missing something,” she murmurs. The identity of “we” in that sentence is unclear. “There is something we are not seeing. Everything is accelerating. Perhaps the end will come before the evening of the sixth day.”
Lily has many reasons to be worried. As long as there are people who believe, rely, and count on her to protect them, however, she will stick to her act, pretending to be a wise and powerful Servant.
She is a most practiced liar. Giving the appearance of confidence and strength is no effort at all.
*** ***
Underground Access Point C-01
Severe Cold (-30 °C/-22 °F)
We act in a split instant because the alternative is to freefall to a nasty landing at the bottom of this shaft.Character Status
“Grab on! Nigredo!”
A moment later our messy fall comes to an abrupt halt, Senta clingling to me clinging to the man, Nomikata, who grunts as his body is pushed to the limit of its strength. It is completely dark, so I have no idea what he is doing, but right now he is bearing with the weight of two additional people.
“Senta!” I hiss. The girl is smart enough to read my intent, and a moment later I am relief to tell she has found the steel handle and is now properly climbing down. Soon enough I do the same, and eventually all three of us reach the bottom the proper way of proper people, all the while enduring the incessant rumbling and the constant drizzle of debris on our heads. However, the fact remains we are in complete darkness—oh.
(BGM)
Spoiler:
The light comes not from lightbulbs—no, they might as well be called such. Spheres seemingly made of thick glass are embedded into the rock ceiling at regular intervals, providing lighting for the entire passage extending as far as my sight shows.
“It was easier to set up magical lighting than equipping everyone with Vampyrs,” says Senta to answer a question never asked.
We…are really inside Concepción Hill.
“Was this…how long has this been here?”
Senta shrugs.
“Don’t ask me, I’ve just been around for a year. But I guess he’s been building this underground base since the late forties, so…”
Late forties? Is she saying that Nazis have been digging under the hills of Valparaíso since the end of the war?
“Who is ‘he’?” Nomikata then inquires.
“Rider.”
Wait.
“Rider? That, no, that doesn’t make sense,” Nomikata gives words to my thoughts. “He’s a Servant, right? He couldn’t have been around all this time.”
Senta gives out a wry look.
“Well, I mean, the person who is currently Servant Rider.”
Nomikata nods, but we both can tell Senta is not telling us everything. However, she takes the initiative before we can inquire further.
“Now what was that stunt up there, Javier!?” She says, insistently poking my chest. “If I hadn´t moved my Dutchman in time, you´d be dead!”
She is absolutely right, but…
“It wouldn’t have come to that if you had jump in straight away.”
“I wasn´t going to just let you die.” It sounds lame when I say it like that.
“Oh, come on!” Senta is not moved; in fact she is rolling her eyes. “My maker can kill me at any moment! If anything I don’t know why I’m still alive! Better to be destroyed up there than whatever it is they are planning for me now!”
So that’s it. This girl has already accepted for a fact that she is going to die.
“Hey,” calls out Nomikata, his firm voice slicing through my argument with Senta. Not that I can think of a response to that right now…
“Where’s Edelfelt?”
…that’s a very good question.
We look around like idiots despite being well aware she is not in sight. Senta suddenly looks absolutely livid.
“Don’t tell me…!” she gasps out, looking up at the shaft above out heads.
“No, no! She was the first to jump in, I saw her!” I am quick to dismiss that idea. Indeed, I clearly remember Sakura jumping into the rabbit hole well before any of us.
“Then…” Nomikata looks down the tunnel. “She went ahead? In the dark?”
That does sound like a strange decision to make in this situation. What the hell, Sakura?
“…huh.” Senta also does not seem entirely convinced. Sakura´s absence is truly strange. “Well, not much we can do about that. And we can´t climb back up, so…I guess I should take you to the nearest exit. Come on.”
“Wait!” Nomikata and I call out in unison. Senta, who does not seem in the best of moods anymore (because we didn´t let you die? Seriously?), crosses her arms and glares in a half-hearted manner.
“What now?”
“How many of these exits do you have?” I am the first to ask.
“Six major ones; you know, for the tanks and other vehicles. A whole bunch of smaller ones like this one. Ah, and the saucer’s launch pad, but you saw that one is under the ocean floor.”
The ocean floor! Just how large is this Nazi base?
“Stupidly so,” Senta answers when asked that very question. “I mean, there’s only His Majesty, Rider and the other Servants, me and my siblings, and The Maid.”
“…maid?” murmurs Nomikata. The Maid. My teacher. She does belong to the Nazi faction, after all.
Senta, however, seems to have caught herself in the midst of answering.
“No, wait, now there’s…ah, never mind. Anyway, the soldiers do not really live in here; they are built as needed. Everything else is for research, construction and storage.”
“So, we can get to the base proper from here.”
“Well yeah, but—oh, no way.” Senta groans. “You just barely made it out of that,” she says, pointing upwards. “You cannot possibly be thinking of sneaking into New Asgard. You’ll just die.”
“New Asgard…” Nomikata looks and sounds a little ill by now.
“Anyway, we’re doing nothing standing here,” Senta keeps holding the initiative, urging us to walk with her. Maybe she feels more confident now that she is back in her territory?
“Come on, the nearest exit should be the one leading to the graveyard...”
Choice Time
Catalog of Somewhat Original Servants
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- Be bold and explore the depths of this tunnel network.
Leaving Sakura alone is just asking for something terrible to happen so we gotta supply backup. And anyways Javier and Seigi should be able to handle anything crazy pop up
- Write-in.
This however I am not sure on, I'll get back to this one later.
Quest of Fate
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