10 - [Dreams]

Shirou opened his eyes, and the first thing he noticed was that he was now colourblind.

The second thing he noticed was his surroundings, it wasn't the interior of Fuyuki Church, nor was it his house.

And the third was that he was now black.

...Not African black, more like middle-eastern, but he was definitely no longer a loud and proud Asian.

He wasn't in his body anymore, this was like...like Freaky Friday!

Honestly, with all of the time travel bulshit and magical schadenfreude enthusiasts running around, switching bodies wasn't nearly as weird as it would have been to Shirou.

'Where am I...?' He wondered as he looked around the room and tried to move.

But he couldn't, for he found himself tied to a chair with tight ropes.

'...What are these tattoos? They look...familliar.' Shirou thought as he looked down again at his body.

From head to toe, this new body that he was suddenly occupying had inky black tattoos etched onto the skin, tattoos depicting various occult symbols and leering demonic faces.

'Aren't these...?' That's right, it was the same kind of tattoos Saber possessed.

Not the same pattern, actually, but very similliar in design and aesthetic, albeit black in colour instead of Saber's distinct blood red.

"Ah...!" He let out a groan of pain as he felt a stinging burn spread to all portions of his body, as if he was a landmass that had all of its volcanoes simultaneously erupt in blazing fire and magma.

"Is it painful?" A voice called out to him, a male voice, one that silenced him and brought upon him a great, terrible fear, the terror crawling down his spine.

"...W-What?" He couldn't help but ask, but the voice merely snickered at his question, a snicker that quickly devolved into a maniacal laughter, like that of a starving hyena.

"Is it painful? Are your sins painful? Are the weight of all those souls you damned painful for you? Then that's what you deserve, Angra Mainyu." The voice said with a vicious venom only a person bearing great hatred could have.

"I-I'm not...Angra...Ma..." Shirou tried to speak out, but his voice couldn't flow out like how it usually did, his throat was parched and dry with the only thing moistening it being his blood.

"Hm...? Cat got your tongue or something?" The voice snickered with a sinister tone, one not unlike that of a demon, "I know what you are, we know what you are, even if you try to hide it."

Shirou widened his eyes as a figure emerged from the shadows, a tall, and lanky man, his face was obscured by a cloak while his body was covered in a great many clothing, as if he was in the middle of the North Pole.

"What did they call you again? That false name you adopted...?" The figure placed his hand on his chin, seemingly in contemplation, "Ah, yes! Ahriman..."

"T-That's..." Shirou stopped as he thought about the words that were about to come out of his mouth, then he continued, "...M-My name!"

He remembered, it was his name, the name of the person he was inside of.

Shirou was inside of Ahriman, but Ahriman is still in the body, so...the two have become one.

"Which just so happens to share a linguistic origin with, you guessed it, Angra Mainyu!" The figure snickered as he stepped closer, "Coincidence? I think not! These eyes can recognize your smug hints even if you became a frog, Demon!"

"W-what are you e-even talking about!? I am not—" But Ahriman's words were silenced.

-BAAM!

A slap so hard that it made a slight shockwave in the air was sent to his face, breaking his jaw whilst leaving a red handprint.

"Can you still yap now?" The figure sneered, "As if a dog like you deserves words."

Ahriman couldn't help but feel tears running down his face as he desperately tried to stop, not wanting to show any weakness whilst greeting his teeth.

"You make a funny expression." The figure commented, "You know, I once knew of a little boy who once made the exact same expression."

"Why? Because you killed his family, his village, and ran off after saying some cryptic-ass words." The figure spat out with venemous words, as if he was the boy in that story.

He was.

"I guess this is just divine punishment, oh, how grateful I am to have this opportunity." The figure basked in the pious light.

"I-I never...never...ever...killed...anyone..." Ahriman tried to speak, but found his words falling flat atop his tongue, with only the most bare bone sentence slipping out of the hole between his lips.

"Really?" The figure said in a mocking tone, it was obvious that he didn't buy it.

"Such nonsense is unbecoming of you, Angra Mainyu!" He said with an invicible grin.

Then there was a short silence as the figure stood there without a word, seemingly in contemplation.

"I've heard of a legend, for all those killed by the Demon's blade, none shall reach the afterlife..." He said with a sneer.

"I suppose my family is burning in whatever hell you put them in right now, huh?"

"Yo-you'll join them—" At this point, there was no way to convince the figure that Ahriman was in fact, not Angra Mainyu, so some spiteful worda could be excused.

-BAAM!

Unfortunately, every word containing a droplet of spite uttered must have a painful consequence.

It was just inevitable that the cloaked figure would strike given the chance, and some rude words certainly did give him the chance to slap the shit out of Ahriman.

-BAAM!

Again.

-BAAM!

And again.

-BAAM!

Then again.

-BAAM!

Shirou opened his eyes as sweat trickled down his brow, his breath was ragged, and his heart was thumping.

He could still feel the pain of those slaps, yet they gradually faded away once he realized that he was fine, the mind catching up to the body.

"I'm...back?" He muttered in confusion as he looked around the room, his room.

That was a dream!?

"That was way too realistic, what the hell..." Shirou complained grimly as he sat on the edge of his bed, glancing at the messy sheets as he clutched the side of his head in phantom pain.

"And who on earth is Ahriman?" He asked out loud, not getting an answer since there was no one else in the room. "Wasn't he like a Warhammer character or something...?"

Probably, with names like Abbadon, it was obvious that those Chaos Marine characters were based on real world legends.

Shirou wasn't stupid enough to believe that was just a simple dream, there had been no stimuli as to why he would have such a dream...

A dream about Saber or the other Servants, okay, maybe that was just his brain being weird, but a dream about some random villain from a legend?

He'll have to ask Rin later, she would probably know a thing or two about this...actually, where is she?

The memories of last night's shenanigans hit him like Thomas the Tank Engine as he recounted what had happened.

Right, almost died, then almost died again, and of course, almost died again.

He would think he had protagonist plot armour were it not for that fact that he didn't do much besides merely existing...

The truth felt somewhat bitter, Kirutsugu always taught him to prioritize survival, but being a background character sure wasn't nice, not at all.

Last night was a lot, he almost got killed by the blue-haired spearsman, managed to run away by being dragged by his future self, fucking future self, this is ridiculous...

And then, what happened?

"Saber..." He muttered as the image of that marked man flashed in his eyes.

Right, Saber fought off the spearsman, and...

Then Shirou passed out.

He remembered that feeling, like getting his heart ripped off and eaten by dog, it was so much that he was instantly knocked out.

It was like something was severed from him, only for that thing to be replaced by a new, parasitic organ...that was the best way he could describe it.

He glanced down in contemplation as he thought about what—

"Huh?" He widened his eyes after looking down.

He now had three Command Seals again, and...

"Wait a second..." Scratch that, he had 5 Command Seals now.

2 in the original hand, and 3 more in the other hand.