1 Prelude: The Rusted Sword

Shink

A rusted blade, once used by a knight in medieval times had sunk into the desolate land. It was once wielded by a Sir McGuffling in a skirmish during the time of King Arthur, well past the Battle of Camlann when Arturia had been slain. It had seen blood, glory and defeat in war. Fitting for the memory it held within, especially when he had to make up for the man's slack.

Shink

A dagger, a kunai to be more precise, was stabbed into the ground. Once used by a Shinobi sent to assassinate an Emperor Go-Nara during the Sengoku period. The woman had surpassed all odds and reached the Emperor himself, only for EMIYA to appear and kill her using a projection of her own weapon.

Od coalesced into tanned, scarred hands. Cold, yet weary, steel grey eyes stared at the forming blade, processing the memories of his latest copy received from its mission under ALAYA. A fine katana of peerless make, an edge honed to attainable perfection yet within it resided a curse of sheer obsession. Memories of fire and steel flashed through his mind. Aiding a man in the middle of his thirties that looked unnervingly similar to him, his hair black instead of red or grey-white.

"Sengo 'Senji' Muramasa, eh?"

The katana sank into the ground with a soundless sigh, a testament to the Noble Phantasm and its maker's skill.

Well that explains a lot about the whole "Creation of Blades" thing I guess, EMIYA mused silently about his most probable ancestor as he trudged forward, sinking a new blade into the barren world that was his Unlimited Blade Works. A glint of pink-purple caught his eye.

It was a beautiful blade that he had come across before repeatedly during his endless journey. Clad in a decorative design of purple, the blade could be called delicate. Fragile even. But then came the edge, a void of black with sinister red crack running through the core of the blade, twisting into a mesmerising yet fear inducing pattern. Yet, the memory within that sword brought a smile to his face. The Heaven's Feel route, he dubbed it, where a stubborn idiot threw away his ideals, deciding to help the person closest to him instead of striving to save everyone in his sight.

Even now he could still feel a connection, a portion of his soul and Reality Marble ingrained into the Shirou Emiya of that reality as he sparingly used its power. And uptil now, that child did not disappoint. Imagine his surprise when instead of his arm invading Shirou's World, the kid had instead invaded his World in a desperate bid to use the Archer's power for himself.

"Can you keep up with me?"

His usual mocking smirk vanished, surprise wore away and all that was left was a grim smile, goading the red haired teenager as his form weathered against the storm that his arm brought.

"Keep up with you my ass!"

He felt it, Magic Circuits of the same person, yet so different reaching out to each other. A hum of green light in a void of black, splitting into twenty seven as they met midway. Steam smoked at the junction where Heroic Spirit met Man.

"Right back at you, you bastard!"

Archer felt his smile widen minutely.

"It's YOU who should keep up with ME!"

The boy in that moment, surpassed the broken mockery of man, escaping his Reality Marble as he broke through what limits he had. The border between Heroic Spirit and a Magus was broken through sheer will. All that was left on Archer's face was a proud smile as he gazed upon the back of the boy who changed.

A small smile flitted across his face at the memory.

He felt a tugging sensation, it was unlike the ones he had felt before during summons for Grail Wars. It was different from when he was called to fulfil his directive as a Counter Guardian, yet the feeling was unmistakable. He felt ITS presence behind him once more, using his existence as an anchor to materialize inside his Reality Marble. The small smile he had was replaced by a neutral scowl.

"Alaya"

"Counter Guardian EMIYA"

Silence prevailed for a few moments. One was spoken with a cold apathy while the other was just tired. But if anyone dug deeper, the only thing they'd find underneath that tiredness was steel and a will that warped and bent, but would never break or falter.

He turned around and saw the entity known as ALAYA, its appearance the same as the first time he had seen it. A blue sphere reminiscent of something out of science fiction with how it looked instead of the usual appearances of his loved ones it took to mock EMIYA.

"Must be my birthday if the great ALAYA is here in my world personally. So tell me, what massacre may I bring you today?"

Sarcasm overflowed from his lips, each word spoken dripped with his snark and evident annoyance at the being. It once would have been bone searing hate, but he had seen too much, felt too much and lived through too much. The only thing holding him together were memories of his past and snippets of lives his copies led during Grail Wars. From sacrificing himself to let his red haired past counterpart live, to failing to convince him into giving up his ideals, to seeing those ideals being thrown away willingly. That last one made his lips twitch upwards. Who knew that stubborn idiot could actually change? He even gave his arm to aid that red haired idiot save Sakura.

"On the contrary, Counter Guardian, this mission will not require a culling."

EMIYA's face soured.

So an assassination then. Must be one hell of a special target to use me instead of the other Counter Guardians. His distaste tinging his thoughts while being completely aware that the entity in front of him was reading his mind.

"Your mission will be to live."

EMIYA's thoughts ground to a halt, even the gears of his inner world stopped for a second.

Oh

So it was THAT kind of a mission

EMIYA didn't bother hiding his grimace behind his usual neutral facade. Memories of his time being summoned during the Warring States period came into mind, when he had to climb his way up the ranks, befriending and earning the trust of people around him, only to betray it in the end as he set up their doom.

"There is a Reality that has deviated from proper human history during the event of The Separation. The Age of the Gods should have ended, yet it still persists there."

His eyes widened and his body stiffened, mind reeling as he tried comprehending what was being said. An Age of the Gods persisting till modern times? By all means, the Counter Force should have responded and corrected the timeline via the flow of the Counter Force or through genocide using the Counter Guardians. EMIYA's eyes narrowed in suspicion.

...Unless...

"The Counter Force there is crippled, both Gaia's and mine. The Reverse Side is almost merged with the Outer World, and whatever prana is generated by the human subconscious is being absorbed by Divine Beings, most likely in the form of faith."

Yeah.. unless that happened.

EMIYA sighed, pulling himself up from his seat on top of a small boulder, readying himself for the headache that often comes with the injection of information and blueprints of weapons he would require, directly from the Akasha itself.

ALAYA continued, ignoring EMIYA's inner thoughts.

"And so you will be sent as a Nexus for the Counter Force of that Reality."

His mental preparation for a headache via bombardment of information was swept away by another form of headache. Namely disbelief. Never in the known history of Humanity has anyone heard of a Counter Guardian acting as a Nexus for ALAYA. A clean-up crew, yes. The Counter Force acting through key figures in history to complete Quantum Time Locks, yes. But a Nexus? EMIYA was stumped.

But even then, his sarcasm managed to lash out.

"My my, oh how the mighty ALAYA has fallen to end up using a third-rate Magus of all people as a Nexus. Go to the other Counter Guardians, we both know they would do this job better."

He knew well that despite his self-deprecating, yet true, words, ALAYA would not budge.

"Consider the Root as the source of rivers on a mountain. The closer you get to the source, the steeper the slope is, and so the difficulty of swimming against the current of the river rises exponentially. The Counter Force programme acts as a way of "correcting" this flow to fit Proper Human History by sending someone against the flow and fixing it where it deviates, but when an event fails to meet the Quantum Time Lock Event during the Age of the Gods that flow becomes nigh irreparable. Hence, an entirely different world compared to Proper Human History is created."

EMIYA sat still in contemplation. He was just revealed information that Magi would kill millions for, whether they were interested in the Akasha or not. An inner working of the flow of Human History that was only privy to those who touched the Root, the practitioners of True Magic. A memory of his time in the Clock Tower under Rin while she raved about Zelretch flashed across his eyes, making him stifle a snort. But even through the shock of such information being divulged to him, a single question pestered his mind.

If even ALAYA was unable to correct that timeline, let alone erase it, what did that have to do with him being sent there? At best it would be a suicide mission, which it wasn't considering at most a copy of him would be sent.

As per usual, ALAYA read his mind. "Your presence there will act as a hub for the ALAYA of Parallel Worlds to interact and strengthen the presence of the Counter Force. So do your best to not die early. Reincarnation without the cleansing of the entire soul is rather taxing, even for me."

For the second time that day, EMIYA's thoughts froze, his body following suit.

Reincarnation? Entire soul?

His eyes snapped to the floating futuristic blue orb behind him. His mouth opened to demand more answers to the sudden whirlpool of questions, only for a tug to stop him completely. It was a pull, similar to when he was summoned as a Servant, or when he had to fulfil his duties as a Counter Guardian, but on a more whole and fundamental scale.

My soul, he realised. Not a copy, but his entire existence as a Counter Guardian was being removed from the Throne of Heroes for this mission. But even as a soul, he felt the extremely uncomfortable sensation of his entirety being bent and compressed while feeling like he was being pulled through a vacuum while being squeezed into a straw.

"Yes", ALAYA said out loud wi- was that humor in its voice? "Consider it a vacation Counter Guardian EMIYA. Spend it well."

His last memory of that damned orb was it contorting to a familiar face, with a familiar grin. Twin pig tails swayed in a non-existent wind while blue eyes twinkled in mischief

It was a strange feeling, to be able to comprehend your own existence yet while not being aware of anything about it. EMIYA could feel his soul tethered to something, yet he could not move his vessel. He lost track of how long he was stuck in this state of perpetual nothingness, at first he kept track of the seconds that went by. It stretched to minutes soon enough, then hours. Has it been years since he was kicked out of the Throne of Heroes by ALAYA? Or was his perception of time THAT screwed up after the process of reincarnation?

Either way, he had no way of keeping track. Even when he attempted to enter his Reality Marble, his only remaining solace that stuck with him when others could not was denied. For a few moments, he worried if ALAYA had deceived him. Yet the longer he entertained the notion, the less likely it seemed. Even during his time as a Counter Guardian, he was provoked by the nigh-omnipotent being, goaded and treated cruelly as he was apathetically forced to go against his previous ideals. But to torment his soul like this? It did not fit ALAYA's motto of "pruning once gone wrong."

And so he waited. Even if he could not move, his mind (soul?) could still think, he could still remember. And remember he did, of better times. When he was in his original timeline, the time he spent with his father, remembering fondly despite him leading to the ideal that led to EMIYA's doom. Of Sakura, the gentle girl who suffered silently as she put up a happy smile, just for him. Of Rin, the girl whom he looked up to, remembering how she could never be honest to herself. Of Saber, her stalwartness and ideals, yet kind countenance during the Grail War as he came to solidify his willingness to strive for his dreams.

It was when he basked in old memories, happy ones rather than the mountain of bodies he piled up throughout his duties, that he felt a twinge of something in him. He hadn't realised when he regained his ability to feel, or his ability to try and move against the warm confines of something as he pushed against the barrier.

When his body failed, he turned to his last tool. A familiar hammer was cocked back in his head, a mental image of a gun, loaded and primed. It was his mental trigger for magecraft.

Trace On.

The attempt was met with a lack of warmth that accompanied the activation of his circuits. If he had a face right now, it would have transformed to his usual scowl.

Then again, I suppose this would mean my reincarnation was successful. Otherwise I would have opened circuits already. He thought to himself absentmindedly.

His pondering was put to an abrupt halt when the walls around him constricted, suffocating him while pushing him downwards. Despite feeling something similar from the few times he was swallowed by something much larger than him, it was still a jarring experience.

What the hell?

A few seconds passed and the squeezing sensation came again rougher than before. Minutes later, he felt something different. The atmosphere around him turned from an uncomfortable constricting warmth to seething razor edge of coldness. His ears hurt, loud voices and screaming pounding against his ear drums. Any attempt at opening his eyes was immediately dissuaded when a blinding light burned at his retinas. He moved his body, only to find it to respond sluggishly, while feeling completely off.

His mind raced, the Eye of Mind (True) that he cultivated over the years of fighting, slaughtering and opposing foes much stronger than him raced as it tried to gather as much information as it could to produce a valid reason of what was happening to him.

Unfortunately, it also happened to latch onto a stray thought that crossed his mind.

Didn't reincarnation usually mean being born again?

He ceased struggling. A sense of dread crawled up his spine while his personal skill connected the dots almost subconsciously. Newborns were sensitive when being born, they weren't used to the new environment when born, nor were their nerves dulled to constant stimuli. Their necks were weak, ears were fragile and had eyesight till upto 12 inches in front of them once they were born. Yet his experiences as a Counter Guardian and as a Servant helped him hold in the urge to wail in pain. That was until the blurry object way above him moved. It turned out to be a giant hand.

The only response to being slapped on the butt as a baby was to cry. Loudly.

The wailing continued for a short while, until he fell asleep in the arms of the person who slapped him. It was natural, after all, how could the body of a newborn child hope to keep up with the will and mental energy of a Heroic Spirit?

"Well, former Heroic Spirit now", Archer mused as he appeared in that black void once more. But this time he saw a light in the distance. Noting how cliche the scenario seemed to be, EMIYA rose (?) up from his sitting position in the perpetual darkness and walked towards the light.

Moments later, he found himself in his Reality Marble once more. Except it was different, vastly so.

The first thing he noted was the pillars of jagged circuits rising from each blade within his sights. It coated each sword, each shield, halberd, spear, every single weapon that he had stored within his Unlimited Blade Works, and later diverged from the weapons into a glowing pillar of blue as it rose into the blotched and hazy skies above. That's when he noticed something disconcerting. Those same pillars were attached to the gears above in the sky, decorating it with glowing, uniform lines of prana as it rose into oblivion. Almost as if something above his world was using it as an… anchor.

"Huh.. Well that explains why I was sent as a Nexus". His Reality Marble quite literally contained over thousands of Noble Phantasms and Mystic Codes tied to the laws and history of Proper Human Order, which in turn is an influence that ALAYA can use to encroach upon the Mysteries currently going on in this realm. Considering Heroic Spirits are souls that largely influence the mental consciousness and subconsciousness through the actions they took in their life, the Noble Phantasms they held contained no small significance to humans themselves, no matter which reality they may end up in. He swore he saw something beyond the gears in the sky for a second, but quickly dismissed the thought. Possibly another pillar of circuit-like constructs.

EMIYA sighed. His only place of peace was violated, used as a beacon for the entity he hated the most as a price for his lease on a new life. He dragged his feet to a nearby boulder and sat down wearily.

"Well, what could go wrong?"

Needless to say, the next few years would have EMIYA cursing his E-ranked luck.

"Farran, help me out here already!"

A red haired child dumped a questionable selection of clothes on a chair. Around him were women of varying ages clad in skimpy clothes bustling around, adjusting their straps, putting on wigs, fixing their makeup.

The boy sighed, but complied with the call. On his way to the grinning brunette, he grabbed the palette and brush.

"Honestly Amelia, you're asking an EIGHT year old to apply makeup for you. Have some shame." The boy chided while carefully applying eyeshadow onto the older woman in front of him who grinned.

"Why should I when we have the finest makeup artist around to put it on for us?" Amelia retorts, grin still not fading.

"She has a point there, runt. Maybe you should stop being so good at it, then she might finally get a sense of independence." A scratchy old voice called out. EMIYA turned to the side, meeting milky grey eyes and off white hair. A smile quirked on the old woman's face, the liver crinkling as she slowly trudged towards them with a cane in hand.

"I'll do you better old hag, I'll stop cooking dinner for everyone tonight onwards."

The bustling grinded to a halt. Four sets of eyes glared murderously at both the old woman and Amelia.

The granny chuckled. "Now now kiddo, no need to be so extreme. I'm pretty sure little Lily can finish up after herself, right?"

A subtle glare was sent towards the brunette in front of him, who blanched from the earlier threat and turned paler from the people glaring at her. She quickly snatched the brush and palette from EMIYA's hands and turned towards the mirror.

"See?"

EMIYA could only shake his head in exasperation. He glanced at the clock hanging on the wall.

Nearly nine, hm..

"Granny Clarisse", the old woman perked at her name being called. She sent an inquisitive glance at him.

"You forgot to send someone to get the groceries, didn't you." It wasn't much of a question rather than a statement

The minor flinch was all he needed for an answer. The boy sighed deeply, his fingers rubbing the bridge of his nose.

"This is the THIRD time this week Granny, I know you're old, but you could always ask someone else to remind you."

His annoyed stare was met by an apologetic gaze. He huffed in response and walked towards the door.

"Be safe kid, come back soon."

He looked over his shoulder with a smirk.

"It's just groceries."

With that said, EMIYA walked out, greeting the staff members of the night club as he walked past the bar and snatched the wallet left for him behind it's counter and left through the double doors that acted as the entrance to the club. A few minutes later, a man wearing a trench coat and a hat walked in through the double doors. The scent of smoke filled the air around him with a subtle hint of something metallic. The people nearby shuffled uncomfortably at the sight of the man.

"May we help you dear sir?" Clarisse emerged from behind curtains of the stage, her dull eyes managing to pick up the unease of her employees.

Blood red eyes peeked out from under the hat, a scar filled face grinned maliciously as the man's elongated canines glinted in the low light.

The night was relatively warm, considering autumn was approaching. Any trees he saw near the streets had their leaves turning yellow at the edges. Brown-gold eyes looked straight forward, but did not miss the slightest twitch in the shadows. It was not for a lack of trying, but more of a habit than anything. One does not simply forget years of fighting, espionage, assassination and semi-orbital bombardment after reincarnating once after all.

EMIYA, or Farran, as he was known in this life, sighed deeply. A nod of gratitude towards the clerk behind the counter, and he left the warm confines of the store into the cold streets with bags of ingredients in hand. Usually an eight year old would have trouble carrying one bulging bag, much less four of them but his new life had… circumstances which led to him being mostly independent despite living with his mother.

He pushed back the scowl that threatened to form on his face. If anyone had seen it, they'd have probably glomped EMIYA then and there from the cuteness his anger exuded.

His thoughts wandered towards his birth parent. That's right, "parent". He never knew his father, and considering that his mother slept around for extra cash almost regularly, he'd probably not ever guess which country his father came from.

The most probable case of his other parent would be when his mother tried to strike rich when his sperm donor came through the doors one day. Apparently it was a contingent of Japanese people who visited Italy during a business trip. Their boss had struck a fancy for his mother and she knew he was rich. They went to a hotel, fucked and never saw each other again despite his mother's clinginess and attempts to milk more money out of him. No, instead of money, she got me. The half Japanese, Half Scandinavian kid who got her hair but looked more Asian than she liked.

And as my E-ranked luck would dictate, she happened to hate me for existing outright. Hell, if the stories he overheard from the other strippers in the bar were true, she tried killing him via pills and even considered abortion. The other women there convinced her otherwise, and she endured several more months before popping my sorry ass into existence. Lo and behold, a suspiciously perfectly healthy, which I blamed and thanked my magecraft for.

In his previous life, he had a family he could not remember after the Fuyuki Fire, only to get a new one afterwards.

Here? He got a family he'd rather forget. And even then, he could not bear running away and abandoning her. EMIYA, or Farran as he was called now, was no stranger to getting a bad hand at life, and as his Tracing allowed him to see, she had pretty rotten luck herself. And so, he helped around in the night club, Derriere's Chateau, that his mother worked in. It didn't take long to integrate with the staff there, considering his cooking and cleaning skills. He even tried his hand at applying makeup and was considered the third best there now.

Throwing that train of thought aside, he looked down and mused on what to make for tonight's dinner. He mentally went through the cookbook's worth of knowledge ingrained in his mind when he smelt a scent he'd hoped to never come across again. Fire, smoke and blood. His eyes snapped towards the source, a pillar of billowing smoke and orangish light in the distance. His heartbeat quickened, not even registering he had dropped his groceries as his feet pounded against tarmac.

The flames came from the direction the nightclub was.

His breath turned ragged, muscles burning as they protested against Farran while being pushed beyond their limits but he didn't care. Instead, he sped up as he got closer while pushing away the mounting dread and prayed to every single deity he heard off in his short time alive (and long time dead).

The world laughed at him.

The nightclub burned. The streets were eerily quiet. The distant sounds of cars that should have been present were muted, along with the suspicious lack of pedestrians nearby. Acrid smoke entered his nose, snapping him out of his horror fuelled reverie, enabling him to smell something that should have not been there. Sulphur, blood of the people he grew up around intermingling something that resembled malice and evil.

Compartmentalizing the thought that his usual method of sensing magic had returned, Farran rushed towards the burning building without a thought. Old instincts returning coupled with the lack of self preservation and human body rendered him incapable to react to the sudden explosion from the fiery nightclub.

He soared through the air and slammed into the wall behind him head first.

The last thing he remembered was a glinting cross with a deafening wail as malice filled eyes crumbled away in a pillar of light.

Farran was struck by a sense of nostalgia as he woke up, looking at a distinctly familiar looking ceiling with the smell of antiseptics and sterility hanging in the air. He recognized he was in a hospital within seconds.

Then crashed the throbbing ache from the back of his head.

"Oh? He's awake! Miya, fetch the doctor quickly!"

Evidently, he must have let out a groan from the pain to have someone else notice. Or it was the flutter of his eyelids when he met the bright, yet dimmed, lights. Moments later, when his eyes adjusted, EMIYA noticed that he laid on a bed, saline dripping into the needle stuck in his vein with moonlight entering the room softly.

His mind finally caught up.

The fire!

He tried springing to his feet, only to find his body responding sluggishly, if not at all. He could barely make his feet twitch, much less move.

Exhaustion filled his veins once more as he struggled desperately, voices failing to register in his ears as he reluctantly dozed off once more.

The spectacle repeated itself over the course of a few days. His periods of lucidity grew longer, his re-establishment of control over his body got stronger each time he woke up, until the day he managed to stay up for more than a few hours straight,

It was then he was probably deemed recovered enough for questioning.

A portly old man, the doctor judging by his coat, walked into the room followed by an officer. They introduced themselves, the doctor being Erman and the officer, an inspector by the name Ahsan. Generic questions regarding his health followed, followed by the scribbles of notes by the doctor while the inspector remained behind him quietly.

That was, until the inspector asked his own inquiry.

"Can you tell us what happened?"

EMIYA opened his mouth to answer, but no words came out. His bodies subconsciously stiffened and faces flashed across his eyes.

His face tightened into a frown.

He should have been unfazed by what happened. His mother was never the best parent one could dream off. Her abuse, crippling alcohol addiction and almost daily mad ravings pushed his patience everyday, yet he still cared for the woman he called his mother. He cared for the people that he grew up with in the nightclub. Granny Clarisse, Amelia who pestered him for makeup, Kanna who always tried braiding his hair when it got too long and the others whom he got to know over the years. And even then, his experience as a Counter Guardian should have let him shrug their deaths off.

He had grown to genuinely care for them.

He looked at himself in the mirror. A face that was almost a practical copy of his original one, full with copper red hair and amber eyes, stared back at him. It was weird looking at that face again, one that he was extremely familiar with, yet so foreign after having tanned skin and white hair for a better part of what accumulated to be centuries of memories. However, there was one thing that stood out. A scar that peeked out from his hairline, almost unseeable if he were to keep his hair down.

No.

To throw away his past would be a sin on par with Artoria's own wish. Understandable, yet it would spit on the lives of others. In Arturia's case, it would have been the lives she influenced, the Knights of the Round, old Britannia and the subsequent legends that spawned from her rule and took inspiration from it. For him, it would be denying the countless lives he had slaughtered, some justified and more than a large portion who were innocents that were caught in the crossfire.

The rusted sword of a man looked out of the window. The full moon shone brightly, clouds teetering on the edges of its edges as it added to it's ephemeral visage. He closed his eyes. The screams of people, the overpowering smell of blood and charred flesh, the weight of the souls he had put to rest.

No, he decided. I will carry it all.

Every memory he had, the sea of black of roiling regrets with specks of white that held his hopes and happiness, the broken ideals that stabbed him mercilessly repeatedly on end, the wishes of his friends that wanted him to live echoed through his mind.

After all.. If I don't remember, his hands clenched subconsciously, his resolve fortified with the very steel that his aria mentioned.

Who will?

"Are you alright?" The kindly voice broke him out of thoughts. Concern was palpable in the dark brown eyes that peered at him from behind his glasses. Even the inspector behind him shifted uncomfortably.

"I.. Yes. I'm fine."

The doctor nodded. The inspector behind him took it as his queue to step up. Raising a notepad with a pen in hand, he cleared his throat.

"If you're ready for it, I'll ask a few questions. Is that alright with you?"

EMIYA nodded.

"Can you tell me your name?"

He stilled. The name he was given at his second birth never held much meaning. Having the same name as his parent never appealed to him, and he never used the name Farran Amerralo Quintus in the first place. But.. did he really deserve to hold that name once more? To don that old mantle of red when he had shunned it with his entire being at several points of his existence?

Memories flickered in his mind, his yet not his. From his promise with Saber, a miracle of one who waits eternally and another who chases eternally, another where Rin fought to take him off his path of self destruction, and lastly the path where Sakura had been saved. The furthest from his future, yet the one he approved of most. Memories of what could have been, if things were a bit different, if he chose different words, different gestures. But in all those memories, three things remained constant. Shirou Emiya at his core, was a person who created blades and one who would save others. And the other was that Shirou Emiya was fine with losing, but the only person he could not bear to lose to was himself.

"My name… My name is.."

Even now, that remains the same.

"Shirou…Emiya."

The gears bound by ALAYA as anchors broke free, the World of Blades shifted once more as the sound of steel grinding echoed through the forests of steel on that desolate hill.

In the corner of that hill, in the crack in the soil left behind a blade, grew a hint of green.