Location: Pinyang City, Level 1
Year: 2018
How long has it been since I became scared of women?
How many times since then have I imagined such a moment?
I don’t know. It’s been so long that I’ve lost count. Yet, deep down, I’ve always known a day like this would come.
“…”
I am struck with silence. Having opened up her heart, Saber is looking straight at me with conviction. I, however, can only shift my gaze away to the side, unable to meet her pure, clear eyes. The more she looks at me, the more the heavy feeling in my chest festers.
I can’t face her. I don’t have the courage. Nor can I accept her feelings. I don’t have the right.
Even so, Saber deserves some sort of reply. Regardless of how I personally feel about the situation, I have to respond to her properly.
“W-well, um… I’m flattered to hear that, I guess…” I squeeze out of my quivering throat. “But… I’m sorry, but I don’t really… feel the same way…”
Ugh, what a lame response. I try my best to let her down lightly, but the results are predictably bad. There isn’t a hint of resolve in my quiet, shaky voice nor do I look her in the eyes. But in my current state, it’s the most I can muster.
“I understand.” Saber immediately responds. A curt, emotionless remark, betraying no sorrow.
I can’t help but wonder if she really thinks nothing of it, or if she wasn’t expecting anything to begin with. With her robotic stance, it’s difficult to gauge how she’s taking the rejection.
“Um… s-still, I’m really happy that you spoke your mind to me.” I add quickly. “If you ever have anything else you want to share, please feel free to do so.”
“Understood, Master.” She answers.
“…”
“…”
Shit, now what?
An awkward silence now fills the air between Saber and me. I’ve run out of things to say, but I also don’t have the guts to try to move past the topic. With only the lingering memory of the recent confession and rejection in the air, we stand still by the street side with no sense of purpose or drive.
Are things between us gonna be like this from now on? Now that I know how Saber feels, I’m even more conflicted about how to handle her than I was before. I just said that it’d be good to maybe not isolate her as much, but would it be right now to do that? Maybe it’d be best to establish some space between us? But that’s a little cruel and I don’t want to punish her for speaking her mind… but I also don’t want to encourage her affection and lead her on but also also—
AAAAAAGGGGGHHHHH!!! I don’t know! I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know what to do.
Why is this even happening to begin with? Saber is in love with me? How could that be possible? I didn’t put that in her settings.
“Hmm…”
A bit curious, but also because I have nothing better to do, I take the chance to discreetly double-check Saber’s “Life”. It’s possible that during the heat of the moment back then, I might’ve made some sort of mistake in her input.
With keen focus, I perceive the invisible and gaze into Saber’s “Life”, the one I gave to her. It is a natural action, as simple as breathing. No switch is needed to be flipped; I merely have to stop ignoring it. And having created it myself, I am able to read the Life and see what I had dictated all those weeks ago.
Huh, as I thought, no such setting had been added when I first imparted Life unto her. Which means the reason for Saber’s affections must be entirely unrelated to my actions. I guess that means my Mind Break ability doesn’t affect a Servant’s status. Even if I break their mind, their Saint Graph – their soul – continues to assert its influence.
“…”
The tense silence continues. Having satisfied my curiosity, I look away once more while trying to think of what to say next. I see, right next to us, the still crowded street, bustling along with no regard to our affairs. These people walking along robotically, like boxes on a factory line… I wonder if they too have troubles like this? Troubles of love? Troubles of rejection? Troubles of uncertainty? Forgetting to dial back my powers, I blankly gaze at the crowd with wonder, seeing the Lives of half of them as they pass by.
“Huh?”
Suddenly, I notice something strange.
That’s… weird. That doesn’t make sense.
I wouldn’t have noticed it if I hadn’t had my powers turned on fully, but now that I have, I deliberately focus them harder to hone in on the anomaly.
There, on the other side of the road, just beyond the boundary of the marching masses, I see a Life. It is just another drop in the sea of Lives I can sense within this giant city. But this one is different. It’s nothing like I’ve ever seen before. For some reason, I’m not able to see it clearly. Though it can’t be described in terms of physical sense, it’s something akin to a hazy image. I know it’s there and I can sort of make out an outline, but the details are blurry, even when I focus my senses fully. This has never happened to me before.
But the truly strange thing, the truly alarming part, is that nothing’s there. I can sense a Life in that location but… I don’t see anyone standing there. No matter how much I strain my eyes, they see nothing but empty air. But my ESP can’t be wrong. Someone is there. But I can’t see her. But she has to be there. How is that possible? Unless—
“!”
The groceries in my hands fall to the ground as realization hits me. Shock and fear hit me so hard I lose any consideration for our surroundings; the only thing on my mind is the anomaly before me. I have to be careful and choose my next move carefully. There isn’t any room for mistakes here.
“Master?”
Before the grocery bags even hit the ground, Saber seems to notice my change in behavior. There’s not time to calmly explain to her what’s going on. If Saber noticed that I’m acting weirdly, then so will she. There’s no time left. It’s now do-or-die.
The strange Life I sense before me seems to flicker.
With panic and dread, I raise my arm, point to the spot, and shout out.
“Saber, someone’s there!!!”
My desperate roar echoes through the entire area.
In the very next instant, a sharp metallic sound replaces it.
It all happens in a flash.
The very moment I scream, the empty space I was pointing at is filled. A dark cloaked figure seemingly emerges from thin air. Its features are covered so that not even a clear silhouette can be made out, but my senses tell me it’s a woman and my instincts tell me it is Death.
An instant later, it is already in front of me, a sharp weapon pointed at my throat. Like lightning parting clouds, it speeds past the crowd of people, blowing them away, and solely drives its blade into my neck. Being lightning, I cannot dodge it, nor can I even notice its approach. By the time I’m able to process what happened, it’s already over. Her attack was instantaneous and therefore unstoppable. One second, one hit, one kill. Those are the rules of her perfect attack.
And yet, what can be heard is not the sound of piercing flesh, but the metallic ring of matching blades.
The lightning that tried to pierce me is stopped by the storm that swore to protect me.
“S-Saber…” I find myself gasping in shock.
Only centimeters in front of me is the side of Saber’s sword, extended to block the enemy attack. Somehow or another, it seems that Saber managed to respond and defend just in time.
Woah, what a close call. A single millisecond late and I’d be a corpse already. It was a good fortune that Saber noticed my reaction in time, or she might’ve responded too slowly to the sneak attack.
No, the true good fortune was the fact that I happened to have had my ability turned on at that moment and accidently noticed the invisible assailant. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have seen them coming at all.
“Tch.” The cloaked woman seems to click her tongue, before jumping back.
Saber, however, doesn’t seem willing to let her go. The moment the opponent makes some distance, Saber closes it and seamlessly transitions from defense to offense. Her twin blades slice through the air and slash at the retreating figure.
But her attacks are blocked easily. The two famed swords which I’ve seen slash through countless enemies are deflected to the side. In the opponent’s hands are now two small daggers, as black as the night sky. Despite their size, those blades managed to fend off Saber’s superhuman strike.
There’s no doubt about it then. This cloaked woman has to be a Servant!
The two Servants begin to fight in the middle of the narrow street. The civilians nearby quickly disperse away from the battle as both sparks and killing intent fill the area.
Even during the heated brawl, Assassin’s cloak doesn’t fall, and her face and body remain hidden. The only thing that can be seen are two small hands in gloves wielding those black daggers with superhuman dexterity. Considering her fighting style and her initial attack, it’s probably safe to assume that she is the one who ambushed the Emperor yesterday. In other words, she’s the assassin we’ve been after this whole time.
The fact that she was able to get so close to us without us noticing is a true testament to her stealth abilities. In fact, it’s possible that she’s been right beside Saber and me this whole time without us noticing, perhaps spying on us before deciding to kill us. Unfortunately, I managed to sense her before we got home. I don’t know what ability she was using to make herself invisible and undetectable, but it seems that it doesn’t take into account my sixth sense. And so, the moment I noticed her, she launched her attack. Did she panic because she was suddenly discovered or was she trying to silence me? I don’t know, but it’s clear she isn’t someone to be trifled with.
“S-Saber, be careful. She’s strong.” I call out, having analyzed the enemy’s parameters.
“Master, please stay back. I’ve got this.” Saber replies through breaths and grunts. The rest of her focus seems spent on the intense back and forth between her and Assassin.
Though I don’t doubt her abilities, I can’t help but worry about Saber. Even though she has the physical advantage, it doesn’t seem like this will be an easy victory. If only there was something I can do to help.
… no, there is. There is a way to end this battle instantly.
I don’t know why but I can see the enemy Assassin’s “Life” clearly now, even though it was blurry before. It probably wouldn’t work while it was blurry, but right now… I can break her mind. I can not only defeat her without Saber getting hurt, but I can also add another ally to our team.
But if I do that, she’ll end up just like Saber.
Clang!
Another sharp ring interrupts my thoughts, followed by a dull thud. When I look at the source, I find a dagger fallen by my feet. It seems that Saber managed to disarm one of the Assassin’s blades. It should only be a matter of time now before she wins…
Or so I thought. But the moment things are turning up, the cloaked, dagger-wielding figure suddenly disappears.
“Huh?” I gasp at the strange sight.
The way she vanished was weird. Instead of going into spirit form like I’d expect, her figure seemed to cave into itself until it wasn’t visible anymore.
“…?” Saber pauses and begins looking around frantically. It seems she’s at a loss now that her opponent has disappeared.
Was this Assassin’s stealth ability? Somehow or another, she seemed to just vanish from sight completely. If she was just in spirit form, there were ways to track her, but the cloaked figure was just gone now. It was a truly quintessential Assassin ability. No one could possibly find her now that she had vanished from all sight.
That is, except for me.
“Saber, she’s running away over there!” I declare and point down the street.
I don’t know the reason behind it, but I can still sense her while she’s invisible using my ESP. The moment she disappeared, I was still able to see her Life as she retreated hastily. Unfortunately, her Life has become blurry again so I need to fully focus to track her and I don’t think I can break her mind right now. Dammit, did I miss my chance due to hesitation?
“Master, your orders.” Saber quickly asks. It looks like she wants to give chase, but more than that, she’s awaiting my instructions.
Shit, what do we do? I wasn’t expecting a situation like this.
Should we give chase? But it seems rather suspicious how Assassin retreated. It’s possible she’s leading us into a trap or something. Plus, right now, only Saber and I are here to fight her; the others are still at home. I don’t like those odds.
However, if we pass up this chance, we might not get it again. The enemy Assassin’s stealth is superb. It was only luck and coincidence that she revealed herself and we found her this time. If we let her go now, we may never even see her again or she may find a way to assassinate us without us noticing next time.
Can we split up somehow? Have one of us go get the others while the other one follows the Assassin? But I’m the only one who can sense her, so it’d have to be me to follow her alone while Saber gets the others. Would that be a good idea?
Ahhhhhh, there’s no time to think. Every second I ponder; Assassin gets further and further away. What do I do!?
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Originally Posted by the god of world-0
