- Silas -
"I agree. I want to help Sakura-chan win. What do we have to do?" Lavy asked.
"Y-yes. I want to help Sakura-san too." Orihime added.
Lavy and Orihime had returned from August-san's place an hour ago.
They had gone there to get Orihime to meet the other students and learn magic under August-san and stayed there overnight due to the insistence of the kids, Brandish and Dimaria.
Apparently, Mavis-san, August-san's mother had taken a liking to Lavy and Orihime too and agreed to teach them magic with her son.
We told them about everything that had happened last night and now and Sakura's decision to participate in the Holy Grail War, which was apparently the name of the supernatural battle competition to help Sakura out.
It was kinda funny and even more strange that no one, not a single one of the three girls wanted any wish of their own… or rather they were fine with not getting a wish because Saitama had something he wanted first.
"Good. Cid-kun hasn't come today so I can't talk to him but I will ask him as soon as he comes later tomorrow. Till then let's help you all enter the competition." I looked at Caster who was sitting in the corner of the Restaurant and reading a book which Lavy and Orihime had brought.
She noticed my gaze and kept the book aside. "Oh, are they ready? Alright, in that case, I will proceed. Who is going to go first?" She asked.
"I…" Sakura got up. "I will go first."
"Okay. Let's go."
Ainz and the group in the Restaurant were also present, watching the ritual since it was something new for us.
We went to an alleyway near the Restaurant in Sakura's world.
I put up a barrier to prevent any normal person from intruding upon the ritual and Caster got to work.
She drew a circle with some materials she had collected before and checked everything a few times and then looked at the girls.
Sakura took the initiative.
She stood in the middle of the circle and chanted. It was a chant which Caster had already told them to memorise.
"Heed my call, my will creates your body, And your sword creates my destiny. If you heed the Grail's call, and obey my will and reason, then answer my summoning!"
The magic circle lit up with a red light and a moment later a figure materialised in the space in front of us, covered in the red light of the magic circle.
She had very long purple coloured hair, and was wearing a blindfold resembling a visor like band over her eyes. She had a red marking of some kind on her forehead and wore a modified greek mythology short black dress. She also wore a purple coloured collar-like choker, bands and handcuffs with long black sleeves, cutoff black legging with purple armor to the legs, and black shoes.
But most of all, she was absolutely stunning.
I have seen many beautiful girls in my time running the Restaurant but this girl, she was definitely among the best. In fact, I would say she was almost comparable to the likes of Albedo, who was a succubus and that's saying something.
Just as I was thinking of this, I heard Caster speak. "Oh, so it's her. How surprising. Then again, maybe not since there were no catalysts used. I can see why she would be summoned."
I looked at her. "Do you know her?"
She nodded but didn't say anything else.
The woman looked at her but didn't say anything and then turned towards Sakura and bowed. "My name is Rider. I am in your service, Master."
"Hello, my name is Sakura. Nice to meet you." Sakura greeted politely.
"Alright alright, move aside. Next one. Get in line." Caster said quickly.
Both the girls stepped aside while she got to preparing the ritual again.
While she was doing that, I suddenly remembered something and asked.
"You said the servants summoned would have similar personalities or backgrounds as the masters, what exactly did that mean?"
I was worried about what kind of servant Sakura had gotten.
"Exactly that. The summoned servants will have either their personalities similar to the master of some of their lives might have similarities which makes them compatible with each other. The Grail has this function automatically added as it would increase the efficiency of both masters and servants working together if they had commonalities between them. Some people however bypass this by using catalysts, items which have a very close connection to the servants to summon them instead. For example, it could be a sword of a hero from legends or some other item belonging to them. This is done if they want something specific or a specific servant to be summoned. For example, I am pretty sure that the girl who summoned Berserker used some kind of a catalyst."
I see.
So this girl… I looked at the purple haired girl who was currently standing beside Sakura and listened to her explanation… she is someone similar to Sakura either in background or personality.
That's good then.
Caster soon finished the summoning and circle again and called the next person.
Surprisingly, it was Orihime who came up next.
I guess she was excited to learn new things.
Magic was interesting.
I remember being this excited early on too.
"Go on. You saw what to do." Caster said and Orihime nodded, stepping forward.
From the corner of my eyes, I noticed that Rimuru had a video camera out at some point and was quietly recording everything from the corner.
She imitated Sakura's pose and started the chant.
"Heed my call, my will creates your body, And your sword creates my destiny. If you heed the Grail's call, and obey my will and reason, then answer my summoning!"
Just like the first time, the magic circle lit up with a red light once more and a figure covered in red light slowly materialised above the magic circle.
She was a young girl with purple hair in a twin tails hairstyle, a black and white headdress and same coloured neckband and was wearing a white coloured gown with black borders. She looked incredibly pretty too.
Were all servants supposed to look pretty or something?
"Oh my, this is a surprise." Caster chuckled.
"How… this…" Rider stepped back, almost as if in fear as she saw the figure.
Was this girl dangerous?
I was about to step in between them when the new girl spoke. "Oh, is that you Medusa? Are you happy to see me? Now come here and help me out."
We were taken aback by several things.
First was the behaviour of the girl. It was obvious that she and Sakura's servant knew each other.
The next was the name.
Medusa.
Wasn't Medusa supposed to be the snake haired lady from the Greek Mythology who could turn people to stone with a gaze?
This girl looked nothing like the legends of Medusa.
And then I recalled the description of Caster.
Servants were all heroes of the past who were summoned in this fight to aid a master. So was Medusa a hero of the past too?
What exactly was her history in this world?
I am not aware about Greek Mythology that much apart from the one or two names and stories here and there.
But I knew the name Medusa. That was obviously a big name.
And this new girl was calling her like that, not to mention the so-called Medusa actually looked scared.
What exactly was the relationship between them?
"Sister!" Medusa blurted out, throwing us into an even greater confusion.
Her sister?
Medusa had a sister?
"Oh! So you do recognise me. Then why haven't you followed my order? Don't make me say it again." The new girl commanded.
Was she a bossy elder sibling bullying her little sibling?
Medusa was flustered but her escape came in the form of an unexpected… or in this case, an expected person.
"Ano… who are you?" Orihime, the supposed master of the girl asked.
"Hmm, are you my master? Nice to meet you." She bowed gracefully, holding the sides of her gown, almost like a noble. "My name is Stheno. I am the Archer under your command." She introduced herself.
"Ah, h-hello. My name is Orihime Inoue. Nice to meet you too." Orihime bowed quickly.
"Nice to meet you too, Master. Now if you will permit me, I have met my adorable little sister after a long time. I would like to have a talk with her."
"Eh, s-sure." Orihime agreed and went to Sakura's side where Stheno looked like she was having fun teasing her sister, who in turn looked flustered.
Good.
At least they were getting along well.
It would help teamwork later.
Still, her behaviour was completely different than when she was talking to Medusa. She went from a graceful young lady to a tease immediately.
"Well now, the last turn." Caster didn't wait for anyone and started the work directly.
In minutes, the Magic Circle was ready and Lavy was in front of it using the same chant as before.
Unlike Sakura and Orihime, Lavy was already well versed in chants and rituals and it was visible in both her posture and confidence.
"Heed my call, my will creates your body, And your sword creates my destiny. If you heed the Grail's call, and obey my will and reason, then answer my summoning!"
The magic circle lit up for the third time but this time I noticed something different. The light of the magic circle suddenly became blinding.
"What is going on?" I asked Caster as I stepped in front of the girls and beside Lavy.
"Something is wrong with the summoning. The ritual was alright from this end then it can only mean something happened from that end." Caster said, a rare tone of seriousness in her voice.
Did something happen because we were trying to fix the whole competition? Did someone discover this?
Rimuru, Ainz and even Saitama were all prepared in case something happened.
The light slowly formed a figure above the magic circle, just like before.
It looked like the figure of another girl, just like Stheno.
The light cleared and it was indeed the figure of a girl. To our surprise, she looked extremely similar to Stheno. She had similarly twin tailed long purple hair, almost reaching the ground and was wearing a similar white dress with black borders, headdress and neckband.
After seeing her, I didn't even need to guess.
She was also related to the two sisters summoned before.
Caster looked at her and frowned as she spoke. "As expected. It was a problem from the other side. She must have sensed their summoning and hijacked the summoning. After all, she does have some divinity too."
Hijacked the summoning?
They can do such a thing?
As expected, the two girls summoned before this looked at her with different expressions. Stheno had a smile on her face while Medusa looked even more terrified at the sight of her.
"Euryale."
"Sister."
What was this?
A supernatural competition or a family reunion?