Ok so before you get into the chap this the longest i have ever written to date, it's an 8.2k word long chap
Second at one point I misspelled the word 'magazine' but lowkey the other sounds so funny im not correcting it
Third pls read the author note in the end.
****
BOOOOOM
An explosion lit up the street.
"Prepare yourself Rider." A young boy who looked no older than seventeen dressed in black from head to toe spoke with a long overcoat that was full of pockets draped over him spoke in a low voice as he looked in the distance using a pair of binoculars.
Beside him, a dark skinned woman, one that was much taller than he was, stood stoically as her cloak and long pitch black hair rustled in the wind. A cool smile marred her face as she stared in the distance for an instant before looking at the boy beside her.
"Are you sure that you don't want me to use my first noble phantasm to ambush him?" The tall woman, Rider, calmly asked in a leaved headed tone as she smiled at him.
"Yes, just charge at him normally. If you activated your Noble Phantasm by releasing the true name of your chariot the enemy would immediately notice it. Just engage and fight him while keeping your second Noble Phantasm activated as we agreed." Julius answered without even looking at his Servant, he had spent the last few hours preparing a plan for ambushing Yvette L. Lehrman and leave her no openings to escape to.
The sniper positions was the first, the three nearest to the enemy formed a triangle and the other two snipers stood further away in the center of two of its sides missing a single sniper to form an outer triangle that surrounded the first one.
A Servant, especially one who is a warrior type, possessed vastly developed senses that surclassed any normal human even if they didn't have specific abilities that enchanted their senses so he would easily spot all the snipers and notice the obvious opening.
Standing in the middle of an enemy encirclement is a deadly situation so from there the enemy, Saber, would have either one of two choices:
Break through using the formation by using the plain opening in sight.
Or attack in the opposite direction, right where the nearest sniper was positioned.
The side directions were too close to an obvious trap so he would steer clear from them in favor of a clear solution.
"Heh.
CLAP
If you say so." Rider sighed before slapping her master's butt with her right hand as her smile turned naughtier.
Julius's brow furrowed but before he could open his mouth further a sudden interruption from the intercom inside his ear stopped him.
[Argh.]
'So he chose the second option, excellent.'
He looked unblinkingly as his eyes locked on the figure of the swordsman cutting one of his subordinates in half, from the guts of the victim came blood and a white substance that covered the enemy Servant who stilled for a second once the liquid touched him.
'It stuck, perfect. Now which of the two snipers will you choose? Alicia? Or would it be Arnold?' Julius looked at him wondering his next move.
The fluid in question was fresh milk.
Saber didn't linger, as soon as he gave the liquid a sniff he was already jumping off in another direction with his Master still in his arm.
What a perfect opportunity indeed.
Of course, even if he was looking at the scene from a distance using binoculars it was impossible for him to keep up with a Servant's sudden speed bursts.
"He went east." But Rider was there to cover for that.
"He's coming Alicia." He immediately pressed on the button on his ear piece and gave a warning to Alice before addressing his Servant. "Rider, in place."
"Sure, Master." Rider expression changed to a still calm for a second before turning feral. She extended a single hand out of her long cape, raising it to her side as a pair of leather reins formed in her hand. "Come here bastards."
At her call two humongous horses that looked like the monsters told in children stories at night to make them obedient emerged from the night air out of nowhere. Behind them a chariot was connected to the two beasts by reins and sturdy ropes.
"NEEEIGRRRR" On the cockpit Rider held her horses back with a pull, making them trash as they fretted to be released and charge ahead.
Julius pocketed his binoculars and just looked at the general direction of where Hector should be heading at.
BANG
His ears picked the sounds of the shot from Alicia's rifle from his earpiece.
'Not yet.'
BANG
'Now.' He thought and just as he was about to remind her Rider preceded him.
"See you later." Without even waiting for the order Rider decided to go as soon as the second shot was fired.
"NEEEIGRRRREEEEE" The horses roared, stomping on the ground with such force that the ground below their hooves cracked all over and by the time they springed forward part of the rooftop started falling down on itself.
Standing on the edge of the slowly crumbling rooftop Julius calmly walked away at a slow peace barely avoiding the ground crumbling under himself that always missed him by a hair's breadth.
BOOOOM
Behind him the sky lit up with a massive explosion that made his hair rustle madly in the wind under the night despite standing more than two hundred meters away from it.
The light casted a shadow of Rider and her chariot traveling through the air before it lit up and accelerated even further away in the distance like a ray of light.
By the time Rider hit Saber Julius had just reached the door leading to the stairs. He swung the door open and started walking down the stairs littered with rabble that fell from the ceiling, his steps echoing in the empty stairway as he pressed on the button on his intercom once again.
"The ambush was successful, supporting Alicia in disposing of the Master is now the top priority."
[Roger.] Arnold's voice answered from the other end.
***
BANG
The sound of a gunshot spread as a bullet traveled through the air aiming for the pink haired girl dressed in a half charred Lolita dress.
And it pierced right through her skull.
The crouching girl dropped dead on the ground before she even stood a chance at gathering herself.
Alicia stared at the girl for a second, her eyes narrowing suspiciously before she pressed her trigger once again.
BANG
And again.
BANG BANG BANG
And again until she emptied her megazord.
A magus from an old family usually had a magic crest grafted inside their body, it was a method to pass down the researches and mystery of the previous generations for as much as humanly possible down to the next generation.
All crests had different specializations but one shared common feature all of them had in common was the preservation of its host. In case the holder of a magic crest received life threading wounds they would autonomously act to either completely heal, preserve or prolong the state of the magus for as long as possible to keep them alive.
That's why in the world of magecraft the oldest families never took firearms too seriously after their emergence, even if you shot a magus in the brain with a bullet they would survive and heal themselves with enough time. As long as they have their magic crest a magus can live even while missing a good chunk of his brain and a few organs.
That's why Alicia didn't waste time firing more bullets to as many lethal spots as possible. After emptying the first magazine she reloaded her gun and started firing once again
She was not the legendary magus killer, who was said to be capable of killing any magus with a single bullet that destroyed their magic circuits and crests in a single shot.
But she could just fire until the enemy was definitely dead, magic crest might have had impressive life preserving functions but the performance depended on the age of the crest and the ability of its previous wielders so there was a limit to how much each crest could shoulder on itself.
And even if she somehow didn't completely kill her she just had to make sure she wouldn't be able to move away. After shooting all her vital organs she shot at the joints of all her limbs too.
Then her eyes saw the command spells on her left hand start to fade away.
If a servant died while the master was still alive the command spell would remain on the master despite the demise of the familiar; but on the other hand if the master died first then command spells would also disappear alongside them and would either be gone forever or be transferred to the next person to make a pact with the servant before it disappeared.
This clearly meant that the girl had definitely died.
'It was easier than I thought.' Alicia sighed in relief at the confirmation of her kill, at least she won faster than that whore.
[Here, Alpha Three, I have a clear view on the rooftop. What happened to the enemy target?] A woman's voice sounded inside the intercom, one of the three front line snipers had reached to provide long range support it seemed.
"I have killed the target Yvette L. Lehrman, I shot her a total of twenty four times, her corpse is now laying right in front of me." Alicia pressed on her earpiece without moving her gaze from the dead Yvette.
[…But I don't see anybody.]
"What?" Alice flinched and looked intently at the bleeding corpse before her. She neared the body and touched it with her hand and she could feel the texture of her skin with her own gloves. "Are you positive?"
[Yes, you are the only person I can see on the rooftop.]
'What is going on? I can see her and feel her too but someone else watching from a distance can't?'
[Reporting. I fear the vice captain's perception has been compromised, I await further orders.] Alpha Three reported mechanically over the shared channel moving her aim with the scope of her rifle to scout the area surrounding Alicia in case the enemy was preparing for an ambush.
[Here Alpha Two, I also got into position with a clear view on the rooftop, I can confirm there is only the vice captain present. I also await further orders.] Another reported, this time a man's voice.
'Is it possible? But I already checked my condition with my magic circuits, I'm sure I am not under the effect of a suggestive or illusion spell.'
[Alicia, stand still.] This time it was Julius who spoke directly in the shared channel. [Arnold, shot her with a taser at low intensity, she is likely under the effect of one of Yvette's mystic eyes.]
"Roger sir." From behind Alicia Arnold spoke to answer the order of his boss. Alicia had not even realized when the hulking wall of muscles approached, when it came to stealth the man certainly was a few steps above her.
She didn't resist as Arnold shot her with a taser that sent currents of electricity running throughout her body. It was the standard procedure of their team, after all the only reason Arnold even made his presence known before striking her was probably to check if she would attack an ally in her currently dubious state.
Her body gave in and she fell down but as she fell she realized something was different from before. The corpse had disappeared.
'Dammit.' That was all she could say but dared not speak it aloud, as the currents stopped she strengthened her body with Od for a bit and got back on her feet.
"Report. I confirm that I cannot see the previously mentioned corpse anymore, it appears I was under an hypnotic spell that was too strong for me to notice." Alicia pressed on her earpiece and reported sorely.
"She must have run away while you were shooting at her illusion, she shouldn't have gone far though." Arnold spoke from the side as he looked around to inspect the buildings and streets around their location.
"Form a perimeter and inspect the area we are in. She might even still be hiding inside the building me and the vice captain are standing on so don't lower your guards, shoot at sight." Arnold pressed on his own earpiece and took momentary command of the situation.
Alicia clenched her fist in frustration briefly before turning to the side.
BOOOOM
An explosion appeared in the air not far away from there. Rider and Saber were probably still fighting but the situation was unclear from their position.
'Yeah, that's right, it's not over yet. I won't let her escape and I will not let some fossil dug from a grave surpass me.' She checked her newly reloaded magazine one last time before approaching the door to the staircase, her eyes as cold as steel.
"I'll be going up ahead."
Alicia had no time to waste, she had to fix her mistake as soon as possible after all.
***
"huff, huff. That was close." Yvette panted heavily as she hid behind a desk inside the building she and Hector had landed on before they got separated.
She had nearly died there twice in a row, her heart was now beating like crazy in equal parts of fear and excitement.
'I really don't like how much magical energy this eye uses.' She sighed as she removed the white artificial eye in her right socket. That was the reason she got away without having to fight.
When Hector threw her away she removed her eyepatch and locked eyes with the woman who sniped at them, this helped her plant in her brain the effect of her mystic eye of Enchantment. Then when she was distracted by shooting at the empty ground she ran downstairs, she might have tried to kill her but she fears that wouldn't have brought her too much time as she suspected that the group targeting her must have had some means of communication between each other.
If she killed her they would have known right away, or at least that was what she thought.
'But now what do I do? They are probably gonna come for me soon… maybe I should have just killed her. If only the cute little Gray was here, she would defeat all the bad guys for me.' Thinking about the cute, quiet classmate of hers, Yvette reached for her inner pockets inside her dress to retrieve pieces of various cut gems.
She threw one inside a trash bin, another toward the corner of the room and two below two different tables.
"That should be enough for this floor." She whispered under her breath while standing back up on her two feet, over the course of her retreat she dispersed a different number of cut gems throughout the various floors as she climbed down.
Yvette bit her lower lip and slipped a new artificial eye into her empty socket before pulling her eyepatch down again. The faint, unpleasant pressure behind her temple returned immediately, once again another reminder of how much magical energy she had already spent.
She turned on her heel and hurried toward the door leading to a different set of stairs, she slipped out into the dim corridor and began descending again, her hand brushing the railing as she breathed as quietly as possible to look out for the sound of footsteps following after her.
Every time she passed a floor she threw tiny pieces of cut stones all around in various places.
Beneath a vending machine, inside a filing cabinet, a toilet, a pot with a tall plant, etc.
'They won't notice… they won't notice… they won't notice…' She prayed inwardly, her heart still hammering violently inside her chest.
The deeper she went, the heavier the air felt, as if the building itself was quietly swallowing her. This feeling excited her but also made her sweat coldly, a single mistake would result in her death and yet she still couldn't erase the faint smile on her face as her lips trembled.
At that moment she was simply moving by instinct and seminating as many safety measure as she could think of but she lacked a plan, all she could think of was using a command spell to summon Lancer; but that wouldn't resolve the issue as the other Servant he is fighting against could just follow him here and they would lose a command spell without gaining anything from it.
'What should I do?' She pondered as she continued moving, her brain working in overtime to think of a solution. 'What would my classmates do? No, what would my professor do?'
***
"I'm not particularly talented in magecraft." Months ago, inside a lecture room in the academic city of Slur in London, more widely known as Slur Street, Waver El Melloi II was holding an extra lecture with his students and for once he remained in the classroom despite the lesson having already been concluded for more than five minutes.
In the room only a few students remained inside as everyone else went to their own business.
"Yes, we can see that the professor can only practice the 'looking majestic as hell' magecraft but that's not really news now, is it?" Henry, a new student who recently joined the department of modern magecraft to learn the basics after being apparently discovered as a talent for possessing a pair of mystic eyes by Lord Valualeta, snickered with a grin on his face.
"Pffft, that's definitely the Prof's strongest point." Beside him Flat also started snickering with him
"Take it back you bastard, Flat you stop laughing with the bastard." On the other hand Svin, seated a few seats back, howled at him. His comment meant no harm and it was just his way of joking around, everyone knew it but that didn't stop it from causing the two to have a beef.
"Ow, come on, Le Chien. It's just a joke, it's not that deep." Flat just waved his hand with a silly smile to Svin.
"I told you to stop calling me that!"
Looking at the situation from the podium Waver sighed tiredly at their banter.
"Anyway, I was talking especially for you Henry. You are new to all of this so I thought I'd leave you a few words before going away." The charismatic Professor's words shut up the argument among his students immediately.
"Last time you asked me what was the point in taking so much pride in magecraft when science is already going so far as doing what you called 'harnessing the power of the stars' or making a man land on the moon."
"Yeah, I guess I did." The boy nodded in confirmation.
"You shouldn't admit to that out loud, some people might put you on the naughty list if you do so, Hal." Seated on his right side Yvette joked as she called him out by the nickname that Henry's mother used for him that was divulged by Flat the day before.
"Yvette is right, don't do that. Anyway lets pick that topic back up. Henry, let's say you have to build a shuttle to reach the moon, what do you think is the most important resource to make it reach the destination?" The professor posed a question to his new student.
"Emm, the fuel?" Henry asked back.
"Yes but then tell me, and this a question for everyone still here if you want to answer, if there were no more fuel on Earth what would you do to reach the moon then?"
"What?" Henry and the entire class, Yvette included, tilted their head at his second question.
"If the fuel used to power the rocket to reach for the moon was to be completely exhausted and no more were to be found on the planet, what would you use to power up the rocket?"
"…" The entire class quieted up, unable to answer.
"In the modern era powered by technology, while research for possible new energy sources are always ongoing, the reliance on fossil fuel is never gonna diminish and at one point it's gonna be exhausted. The world of magecraft went through something similar as well in the past when the planet sealed away the True Ether on the reverse side of the world." Lord El Melloi II explained as he brought to mind a topic he had already previously explained.
In the past when there was a mythical source of energy called True Ether it was used by man to create miracles with the power of the gods. While the specifics are still unclear and subjected to various theories at one point the greater source that generated True Ether was either damaged or about to be exhausted from over exploitation which in turn caused the planet to split into the surface and the reverse side.
The surface, where they lived now, was a rather broad term but it referred to the entirety of the physical part of the planet and not simply on its bare surface.
The reverse side instead was the entirety of the metaphysical part of the planet, it was composed of various fantastical places such as the mythical castle of Brunstude the Crimson Moon that the texts left by the Wizard Marshal and the founders of the Clock Tower for the later generations talked about.
In this latter part the entirety of the remaining True Ether was being preserved by the planet without letting a single drop of it leak on the surface.
"Right now, the world of science has been making progress after progress at an astounding rate, ever since the end of World War II every few years new technologies were developed and with each one the time needed for the next decreased.
The world is already very different from a mere decade ago, by the next decade it's probably gonna be unrecognizable for the people in the 90s, that's how fast it has been progressing. To make a comparison it's like science is having its own equivalent for the Age of God in its full splendor.
That is especially so, as ever since the Illuminism movement, associations like the Clock Tower and the Church became slowly unable to stop scientific advancements anymore. Whether it is fossil fuel, electricity or nuclear energy made by uranium they all could be called the True Ether of science right now." Then the Professor stopped for a second to catch his breath, he retrieved a cigar from his long red coat and lit it up to take a long drag before puffing a small cloud of smoke.
On the other end the few remaining students in the room were all dead silent. Svin especially was already half transformed into a beast as he was looking out for anyone eavesdropping on the conversation. If someone excessively conservative heard the words the professor just uttered in a classroom of the Magic Association they might use them to cause trouble to his position as a lord.
But Waver was completely unbothered and completely at ease with the situation.
He could always just have someone else take care of it in the worst case scenario anyway, for example if he promised enough credit for it he knew that the poor soul who possibly overheard this conversation would rather open his brain to forget about it instead of being hunted down by the crazy people of the El Melloi class.
"Mmmmm, Prooof!" Flat who had been babbling to himself suddenly raised a hand to ask for permission to pose a question.
"Yes, Flat, what is it?"
"Isn't that just helping Henry's argument though?"
Flat rose a valid point, after all he first talked about fossil fuel being exhausted and then in the same breath said how there were already other possibilities such as nuclear energy.
"That's a fair point, but Flat do you know in how many years we would exhaust our reserves of fossil fuel? And in how many we would those of uranium?"
"Eeee, no, not really." Flat admitted sheepishly with a shake of his head.
"Well, I'm also not really a true expert on the field but give or take we would probably completely finish both in probably a little more than a hundred years. So after those hundred years what would you all do to power up the shuttle to reach the moon?" Waver once again asked the classroom.
"Professor." This time Henry raised his hand and Waver nodded at him. "What if they just, I don't know, found other alternatives in the meanwhile?"
"Sure but what if they don't? We can't see the future Henry but you aren't far off from the answer."
"… is this just your way of saying we could use magical energy, magecraft or whatever? It's not really convincing." Henry scowled at him.
"What? Using magical energy or magecraft to power it? Well, that's a funny idea for sure but no that's not what I meant."
"Then what is it?"
"You talked about an alternative, when I said you weren't far off I meant that you already said half the answer already. Even if the known forms of energy were exhausted it's not impossible to research another one. The only issue would be the efficiency but it wouldn't be impossible, would it? What I wanted you to say was moving forward from it."
"That's literally what I said Prof."
"Is that so? Well, coff, I see it as a paper thin difference but still a difference. Magecraft is the same, even when we lost our fossil fuel and uranium we still found a new method by using the magical energy in our bodies and passing down parts of our flesh as crests to our descendants. Sure we don't make anything as easily as when we had True Ether but the road is not closed." El Melloi II gave an awkward cough before continuing with his lecture.
"Also just because science is revealing more truths that doesn't really mean mystery is as hopeless as you think, for every new discovery in science a thousand more questions are always raised, aren't they?" Waver smiles when said that, his hand resting on the ashtray as his cigar released a thin line of smoke in the air.
"Wait, Professor are you saying that magi should switch their focus to the mysteries in science?" Yvette asked with furrowed brows, she seemed to have anticipated the question of her classmate Caules as he lowered the hand he just raised as soon as she asked the question.
"I'm just saying it's one of the many possibilities." The professor clarified.
"Before, I told you that in a decade the world might become unrecognizable from what it is now. I also believe that magecraft in a decade could become unrecognizable. Whatever its science or magecraft they are both equally limitless, that's the reason why I believe magecraft is still something worth taking pride in and it's especially so in our time where changes are happening so fast. A movement like the New Agers being accepted in the Clock Tower for example would have been unthinkable long ago and yet here we are now.
Old families may look at people who attempt to research new thaumaturgical foundations with an eye of disdain and it's a reason why New Agers are so looked down upon. But the road ahead is not necessarily limited by old thaumaturgies and arts, if it was then there would be no reason for the Modern Magecraft Department, Slur, to even exist." El Melloi II took another drag from his cigar, he moved his gaze to the classroom's window as his eyes took on a nostalgic look.
"Long ago when I was a student I remember writing a rather dumb thesis for my professor Lord Kayneth El Melloi Archibald, back then I used to think that he was being unfair in his assessment of it but after I participated in the Fourth Holy Grail War of Fuyuki I realized that maybe he wasn't really wrong about it.
It was the usual New Age thesis that dismissed many of the Clock Tower that refused the necessity of long bloodlines and the such. My professor was right though, I was definitely delusional. It was an impossible task for someone of my talent to accomplish. But he was also wrong in his own way." Waver extinguished his cigar and walked to the front of Henry's desk.
"I'm not good at magecraft and no matter how hard I try I will probably never be able to cast a decent spell for all my life. But even someone like me found his own by teaching what he can never achieve to others who have the talent to. This is my way of advancing magecraft Henry. Think carefully on your path ahead from now on, regardless of the situation you have to face, move on the way that fits you the best as that is the most sensible thing to do no matter what."
At that, even Yvette, who was usually quite sarcastic, felt inspired by her Professor's words, he might have stumbled a little at the end but he always ended up delivering his points one way or the other.
Looking around she noticed that her classmates were pretty much the same, especially Caules, his eyes seemed to be shining under those glasses of his.
"Well, that's it for today. I hope I answered your question Henry. Goodbye everyone. Make sure to hand in your assignments in two days."
"Yeah, but I'm still convinced my answer was pretty much the same as what you said after that though."
Unfortunately for him, Henry would be forced to see reason soon afterward when the legendary El Melloi iron claw frontal rise took hold of him.
***
'My own way, huh.' Smiling to herself Yvette looked at a nearby signboard with the number ten on it.
'This building had a total of twenty nine floors, I'm on the tenth right now, I could go lower to prepare even more traps but… that's how a loser would think, totally not my style, right guys?' She snickered quietly as her hands started rummaging through her pockets.
'Getting any lower than this would just be greedy and I can't possibly hold on that many floors anyway, matter of fact I will probably not even be able to hold onto half of those I already passed by so who cares.' Yvette threw three more tiny gem pieces and turned back toward the stairs leading upwards. She had been preparing to be pursued and originally only laid some traps but now she changed her thoughts on how to make use of her preparations.
'They are far more than me either way, might as well try to use what i have on hand to fight back in a place where they can't shoot me from a hundred meters away at least. Just wait and see, I'll show you all the results of all the shopping these past few days.' Yvette brought her hand to her covered right eye and removed her eyepatch to reveal a purple gem inside her eye socket. 'Now let's see where you guys are coming from.'
***
Alicia stood with her back glued to a wall as she silently walked beside it with steps as light as a cat's while inspecting the hallway of the eighteenth floor. Then she closed both her eyes to concentrate on her hearing.
'I don't feel any presence on this floor, there is also no sound coming from any living being at all. She's not on this floor, but traces of her passage are still here.' Alicia mulled to herself inside her mind as she opened her eyes once again.
[Reporting. We reached the fifth floor safely, no traces of the enemy yet.] From the intercoms the three men team that was climbing the building from the ground floors sent news of their condition.
There was also another two men team checking for the underground floor but they already determined it to be clear and are now waiting at the ground floor in case Yvette slipped past the three men squad.
From the rooftop going downward Alicia was the only one descending with Arnold staying on the last floor in case she slipped past Alicia.
Those were all the people they had available for now, apart from their boss Julius, and they were all in this building to get rid of Yvette L. Lehrman. The rest of the teams were busy managing the bounded fields keeping the people away from the area.
'I tried sensing her with magecraft but there is something obscuring my scrying spell. She probably dispersed something throughout her retreat to achieve this but I don't have the time to find out what that is.' She noticed there was a very faint mist like mana in the air that made it hard to find her target but she couldn't just stop at any hurdle in favor of being cautious.
She descended another floor and reached the seventeenth, she did not find her target once again but instead this time she noticed a very small cut piece of a gem in the shape of a four sided pyramid. She did not even try to pick it of course, she took out a small monocular (it was actually the scope of the sniper rifle she discarded on the rooftop) from her jacket and used it to inspect it visually from a distance.
She couldn't really get much from simply looking at it but she wanted to avoid alerting the enemy by interacting with it any further than that. The small pyramid was around twelve or thirteen millimeters tall by her estimate and each of the three visible sides had something different carved on it, almost like it was a four sided dice but with letters of the western alphabet instead of numbers.
The three visible sides respectively had a different amount of letters too, one had the single letter the "M" on it, another had the four letters "a r g" e and the last had the two letters "j K". The fourth side was not visible without flipping the pyramid over but Alicia wasn't about to take the risk, she couldn't gleam much about it's working other than it definitely working with other ones as well, a single object like that would usually need to be paired with others of the same kind to achieve the desired effects.
She also noticed that a few letters were written in uppercase while most of the letters on the dice were in lowercase.
"Reporting. I found a suspicious pyramid shaped mystic code laying on the seventeenth floor. It might be responsible for our difficulties in locating with magecraft its observed specifics are…" Alicia quickly recounted her discoveries on the object she found with a low tone as she continued exploring the rest of the floor with swift steps.
Not long after she finished recounting the details she found another such pyramid under a chair, this time though the letters inscribed were different. The three faces this time used had the letters: "f B r" for the first, "e t t u" for the second and "d w" for the last one.
'One of the letters even appears twice on the same face, could they be abbreviations? No, that cannot be, using only initials wouldn't create enough base for a meaning, not unless she wasted a load of magical energy, which she obviously didn't as there are no traces of it.' Alicia analyzed the second pyramid not intent on letting a single detail escape her, she reported the second object as well through her intercom before moving forward with her search once again.
The floor showed no traces of someone being there, so she didn't linger further and went down to the sixteenth floor. She stepped down the stairs quietly as she gripped her gun at the ready, the moment she descended down the stairs Alicia's sixth sense started ringing ominously, she could feel something.
She walked around the hallways while hiding in the shadows of the walls, the rooms were already dark save for the light of the moon passing through the windows so it wasn't particularly hard to hide in this darkness.
She searched through the entire floor finding nothing but the usual emptiness of the other floors up until she saw it. From the door leading to the other staircase the shadow of a person was peeking through.
Alicia didn't rush to action, she slowly tried to creep toward the door making sure to make absolutely no sound as she approached.
As she peeked through the door she saw a streak of pink.
'There.'
Her finger immediately tightened on the trigger.
BANG
The bullet whistled downward, hitting a section of the railing behind where Yvette had been just a split second earlier.
"Tch." Alicia clicked her tongue in annoyance. Right before she fired her shot the girl had turned in her direction and ran downstairs.
From below her feet, Yvette's hurried steps could be heard as she briskly retreated.
"I met the enemy target. She's retreating to the fifteenth floor." Alicia reported calmly through her earpiece. "Engaging pursuit. Maintain a perimeter on the lower floors, do not allow escape."
[Roger.]
Without waiting for further orders, Alicia began descending once again, her steps unhurried and measured despite the urgency.
When she reached the turning point of the stairs she vaulted over the railing instead of turning around it. As her boots landed on the ground she caught sight of Yvette once again.
BANG BANG
Without wasting a second she shot at her head once again. The figure of the girl cracked as she was shot by the bullets before shattering and falling to the ground like shattered glass, no, it was actually pieces of glass.
'Another fake.' Alicia looked at the fragments littering the ground, they shone dimly before dissolving to dust, the mirror must have been made using magecraft. Now she remained apparently alone in this empty stairway. So the girl had either gone downward again or inside the office.
It was a fifty-fifty scenario but Alicia's instinct told her she was on the fifteenth floor. She was sure of it.
Alicia exhaled slowly and stepped onto the fifteenth floor with her guard raised to its utmost. The interior was a classical office with many desks, piles of papers, folders and computers. At a glance there appeared to be no one else apart from her.
Her finger tightened slightly around the trigger.
'She's here.'
That certainty did not come from any sound nor sight of any signs of her enemy, but from the same instinct she refined throughout her work. She narrowed her eyes to try look for any signs of her but then–
TAK
She heard the sound of something hard hitting a surface behind a desk, she had to restrain her urges to shoot at that exact moment as it could have been a diversion.
She approached the source of the sound then she whipped her gun in the opposite direction behind her back.
BANG
Turning around she caught sight of the girl she was searching for crouching down, above her head on the wall behind her a small hole had pierced through the plasterboard.
"Hehee, you got me there." Yvette mumbled with a drop of cold sweat running down her temple.
BANG BANG BANG
As soon as they confirmed each other's presence they moved at the same time. Alicia shot at her while avoiding eye contact and Yvette had bolted from her position to hide behind any object she could use as a shield continuously, barely avoiding being shot.
"Gear." Alicia switched her magic circuit on then used them to reinforce her left arm, she picked the desk she had walked to when she heard that sound previously and used her newfound strength to hurl it straight in the direction of the table Yvette was hiding behind.
BAM CRACK
The two tables exploded into a mass of splinters of various sides. Yvette tried escaping as soon as she noticed her enemy's movement but her cheek still ended up getting cut across it before she hid behind a thick square pillar.
Yvette sucked in a sharp breath as the sting spread across her cheek, warm blood trickled down to her jaw.
"Haaa, you sure act like a gorilla throwing things around. You better hope this doesn't leave a scar." The girl taunted Alicia from behind her cover.
BANG
Another shot rang out interrupting her. The bullet chipped a piece off the pillar just beside where her head was by Alicia's estimate going by the sound of her speaking. Yvette nearly yelped as concrete dust sprayed across her hair.
"Damn, not a single shred of hesitation, huh… Hey, you're not even taking cover, are you not scared of my mystic eye?" Yvette couldn't help but marvel at her guts.
And of course Alicia wasn't scared.
After the previous incident, they had already confirmed that she possessed some sort of perception interference ability and Yvette's mystic eye of Flame was already widely known thus she was prepared for them. Alicia was now deliberately avoiding direct eye contact, firing by estimating the position of her upper body based purely on movement prediction and sound.
She was a true professional after all.
Her magical ability might not hold a candle against someone like Yvette who was a prodigy in magecraft but as a fighter she wasn't any lesser.
TAK
That particular sound Alicia had heard before rang again from behind the pillar.
Alicia was about to dash to another location to shoot behind the cover of the hiding spot Yvette was using but then she noticed something , the sound coming from behind the pillar was also coming from behind her.Turning around she saw something on the ground, it was a writing done using white chalk and a piece of said chalk lying beside it, moving by itself as it wrote on the ground.
Burne the wytche
And then fire burst inside the room.
BOOOM
***
The last few days Yvette and Hector's shopping(stealing) trips helped Yvette gather a not so small amount of gems from here and there. She then cut them into four sided dices with different amounts of letters ranging from one to four in number.
Using them she initially utilized them to distort the ambient mana using the random variable numerology and letter symbolism using gematria of the dice thrown to by time for herself before maybe detonating the gems, however she had a sudden epiphany during her retreat.
She realized that by using the current environment to her advantage in the enclosed space of the entire building she could just use the dices to cast magecraft instead.
She was running rather low on mana and didn't have the time to replenish herself using a mana filled gem as she was more concerned with running away.
She realized she could just bypass the problem by using a last ditch method with the thing she had already thrown.
She opted to stack thaumaturgies to do most of the heavy work for her, lowering the toll on her own reserves to the bare minimum. Each dice had four faces but by only taking the side that won the throw for each one as a work of divination and making sentences using the letters obtained by the throws to create meanings she could make it work.
That was the very basic workings of the mechanism, then by using the rule of enforcing proper grammatical form, which dictated that uppercase letters could only be used to start a sentence and not being able to use the same letter twice unless multiples of the same letters were drawn the meaning of period is more strongly established.
Over the course of her retreat she passed by a total of nineteen floors and she threw four dices on each odd numbered floor and five in each even number floor. She passed by ten odd numbered floors and nine even ones, thus the total number of dices she threw amounted to eighty five and the range of letters at her disposal was between eighty five in the worst case scenario and three hundred and forty in the best one.
Then she stacked her own specialization, gematria, in which she assigned a numerical value to each different letter of the alphabet ranging from one to twenty six by using the standard English gematria.
Gematria was originally supposed to be practiced using Hebrew but a few centuries back English gematria was created on the same principle. This weakened the metaphysical weight of the gematria itself but made it far easier to mix with other arts as well, thus surpassing the original result someone could bring forth from it.
The word she drew on the ground Burne the wytche was an ancient motto from the witch hunts back in medieval England, the meaning of course didn't need an explanation but something else did.
In gematria this phrase had a value of 177. This by itself didn't really matter much but that's where the true value of gematria came in, while just using this value like this wouldn't produce any strong effect Yvette could associate this phrase to other phrase with the exact same value that were somewhat associated in meaning even just remotely despite not necessarily having the letters to write them.
For example to Burne the wytche Yvette could associate phrases like From dark to light, Solar prominence, etc…
She even connected the name Elizabeth Bathory whose name had a value of 177 as well to empower the starting sentence.
Thus a fairly strong fire type magecraft spell was created on the spot, it targeted directly those that could fit into the rather broad term of a witch from the medieval times. Thus Alicia who was her enemy and was a woman who could use magecraft fit in perfectly, which was good news for Yvette.
But there was bad news as well, Yvette herself also fit the requirement.
Flames swallowed the office in an instant, engulfing the both of them.
The air roared in a blast as it was set ablaze, desks igniting one after another, papers curling into black ash before they even touched the floor. Heat slammed outward in a violent shockwave, bending the metal frames of the computers and breaking the windows by cracking the glass into fragments.
As soon as the flames took her Alicia didn't waste any time and sprinted to the back of the pillar and tackled the burning Yvette.
BANG
She fired a bullet in her stomach but when she tried to fire more her gun stopped firing. It probably got compromised by the fire raging around.
"You crazy bitch!" Alicia screamed as she was shrouded by a cloak of flames.
"You can bet I am." Yvette's laughter came out ragged and half choked, the heat was suffocating, searing the air in her lungs every time she inhaled. She smirked and moved her legs, kneeing Alice straight in her guts.
"Urgh." Alicia's breath left her lungs in a harsh grunt but she didn't loosen her hold.
Her training screamed at her to disengage, to create distance from an area entirely affected by a spell like and to regain a firing position. Instead, she doubled down, slamming her forehead straight into Yvette's face.
BAM
"Gah—!" Yvette's head snapped back, stars exploding across her vision as they danced wildly. She quickly tried to change her position to shift into a grappling position on the arm holding her but Alicia was faster, she let go of her, getting back up on her feet and then kicked her in the chin.
But then something Alicia did not expect happened, Yvette's head which she kicked into the ground, plunged through the pavement as if it had been made of some sort of liquid cement. Then the liquid segment expanded and started sucking in the rest of Yvette's body and Alicia as well.
Soon Alicia and Yvette fell from the liquid like pavement that now became their ceiling as they were thrown to the floor below the one they were on previously. The ceiling quickly dried and turned back into a solid, now the two stood on a floor not flooded by fire like before and the flames that were burning their bodies were extinguished by the liquid they just passed through.
Yvette herself didn't even appear that scorched despite her dress now being completely black, before she lit up the entirety of the floor she made another sentence to protect herself alone as much as possible. On the other hand she could see her enemy was as lucky, her entire skin was charred black, she couldn't even clearly see her face anymore from how charred black it was.
"Sorry, I think I ruined your pretty face, opsie." Making a V sign Yvette mocked her opponent.
At that Alicia though simply reached for her face with her right hand and grabbed the charred skin on her before–
RIP
–she tore it off like a lizard, revealing from underneath a perfectly pristine face like the one she had before that didn't have a single trace of being burned.
"Hold up. What the hell? You can do that?" Yvette's face turned from smug to unadulterated shock.
****
Hello, I hope you enjoyed the chapter.
This was released before because Bleap convinced me to.
Anyway many of you probably noticed the Fate/World ref, originally it should have been a post mystic eye train flashback but when i wrote this chap Bleap just finished Fate/World and somehow Henry made a proper appearance in this fic too.
The original scene this was inspired by is a scene where the main charcter Henry The Bum once asked Waver what was the point of acting all proud in magecraft when they have to hypnotize themselves to light a match when science was doing things that looked inimaginable with magecraft by using the term 'harnessing the power of the stars'.
This question wouldn't be answered explicitly in the fanfic by a character but rather by the story as a whole with Henry first hand experiencing how much magecraft could go in many directions without apparently any limit. I took it and elaborted it for this flashback where waver ended up yapping for 2k words 😭😭😭 holy yapper