ManyThings

Fate/Factitious Paradigm

Reiki Matou

Matou Manor Mk. II, Foreigners' Lowlands

---

Here, on the edge of the ruins, stood a small house.

It wasn't something that could be easily noticed from the outside, but if one stepped into the bounded field, they would see clearly a small, singly-storey version of the Matou home that was destroyed along with so many others the night before.

With that said, one who stepped into the bounded field would find themselves beset by a torrent of worms and runic defences.

Many bugs had been killed in the destruction of this district, but the still prodigious mass that remained felt somehow lighter, more flexible and manageable. This was probably nothing but an illusion of wishful thinking. There was no real benefit to losing so many familiars.

The Matou heir sat at the kitchen table in the sparsely decorated house, a few suitcases partially unpacked beside her. She dealt with bug after bug, infusing a select few with dangerous spells of binding and absorption that would make them individual points of great threat among the swarms.

Below her feet, in "Worm Pit Mk. II," worms who had found some vermin or corpse to feed on put that matter to good use, breeding additional units.

Her mind could not truly be in multiple places at once, for she lacked that special talent of Atlas alchemists. Nonetheless, her familiar manipulation could be compared to an "absolute real-time-strategy game master" who set up "paths" for her units to follow while she focused on other things.

And focus she did.

---

Ground Platoons and Air Squadrons

Fuyuki City

---

Their numbers had been greatly reduced. The pit which housed so many reserve units was gone, and so all that was left was the enormous network blanketing the city.

Tremendous losses of both human and worm life.

Men, women, and children struck down by the recent chaos would not have died in vain. They would factor in to the controller's goal, and that goal would in turn be key to the success of humanity.

The controller was experienced enough not to feel any distaste for such things. Bodies in the streets and in homes were ravenously devoured for the greater good. Normal scavengers, insects and vermin, who had come to feast were consumed as well with no change to the routine.

It was an exceptional amount of flesh, and while recouping the losses of last night was absolutely impossible, this feast would nonetheless produce an exceptional amount of worms.

---

Ground Platoon Fourteen

Outside Construction Project: ‘Tarantasio’, Foreigner’s Lowlands

@Phonic@Paradox Witch

---

They took on the form of the controller, as was often done in the past. The form with the delicate features of a young lady approached the sizeable project with what would be seen by most as stern confidence. An expression it had required extra focus from the controller to properly form.

Fourteen got as close to the unfinished building as possible, and as soon as one of the workmen came into view, it made to grab his attention. Truthfully, though, it was probably worth nothing but a formality to speak to someone who could be seen. There would likely be some sensor around that would alert Benita, wherever she was, of what Fourteen was saying to the construction worker.

"Call Benita. She can come out here, invite me in, or send some messenger, but it's high time we started communicating properly."

---

Scáthach

Einzbern Forest Outskirts, near Foreigners' Lowlands

@Undyingregret@BlueHelix

---

Her eyes were locked onto her target. The Lancer focused on the Avenger from a distance using Clairvoyance. Her body and the spear sticking into the ground just next to her bore many runic markings, some already activated, shimmering with multicoloured light, and some not.

She relied purely on her Master's surveillance to be sure that this woman had added something to yesterday's blaze that had made it noticeably harder to deal with. hile she wasn't the one who had started the fire, nor the one who had added the curses that set it on the path to Miyama's ruin, she would still be worth a handsome reward from Ruler for her part in the crisis.

She was not a member of the Assassin class, and so she could not truly snuff out the massive waves of energy that marked her as a Servant. Nonetheless, she employed a combination of runes and a miscellaneous stealth skill in an effort to minimize the degree her position between two small hills about 300 meters from her target could be detected.

From a satchel, she produced a handful of smooth stones with different runes carved into them, picked out a single one with her right hand. The physical strengthening runes on her right arm sprang to life with an orange glow as she wound up for a throw and hurled the stone at Avenger with functionally rank A power and speed.

In the instant it took the rock to travel through the air, the rune inscribed onto it began to glow a brilliant white. As a keen-eyed magus might have recognized, what was about to come forth from the stone was an explosion of extreme force. Scáthach knew enough about her opponent to not bother with a burst of flame, so this rune would release something closer to thunder or a wave of air.

If Reiki's assessment of her foe's parameters was accurate, then a direct hit would surely spell death for Avenger. On top of that, avoiding a direct hit was a mighty task to begin with due to the speed at which the projectile moved and detonated combined with the A ranked Clairvoyance Lancer way utilizing. The rune was not one that would activate upon impact with something, but rather an attack that would go off at Lancer's own command, the moment it got close enough to its target. No doubt her enemy had some tricks to call on to improve her survival beyond her relatively unimpressive physical abilities, but things got more complex when one considered that her Master also stood in the projected blast radius.

For the opening move of a battle, it was nothing to scoff at.

Fate/Factitious Paradigm

Reiki Matou

The Study, Matou Manor --> Fuyuki Park

---

She had been ready. Her familiars mobilized for a new tactic against the blaze, Scáthach and the Tohsaka's Saber both at hand, bags packed in case the retaliation failed, and Shinji safely out of the area. Of course, with some tiny grain of clarity and control found in this wild situation, it was guaranteed something was bound to bungle it up.

That said, she hadn't been expecting it to be an ally that did it.

Saber had fled instantly. At the same time, Lancer came crashing in through the office window, wordlessly grabbed Reiki in one arm and her suitcase in the other, and continued through the hallway towards the back wall. She didn't crash through this wall, however. It parted into a swarm of winged insects at her approach, allowing her to land on the grass and progress over the wall.

Reiki hardly missed a beat. She hadn't been expecting to enact escape maneuvers until some effort had been put into her fire extinguishing plan and it had proven ineffective, but she was nonetheless prepared. Final orders were given to the various groups of familiars. Those on and around the lawn piled into the gazebo, those in the basement packed tightly and sought out the lowest crevasses, and those spread through the edges of the fire zone in position for firefighting simply fled and survived as best they could. The last was a vague order to evade and resist. Many would likely scatter to the winds, while some might collect and morph into more durable collective forms.

Her final commands having been laid out, Reiki cut ties with the lot of them.

She was jolted out of her familiar-control focus as Lancer rubbed a bit of ash on her cheek, clearly making to form a primordial rune. She had no time to ask about its nature before it came into effect, at which point Scáthach began moving at full tilt.

For Reiki, this was an impossible speed. She was used to an immense amount of simultaneous sensory experiences, but not so for incredible single concentration like this. As the flames became more scarce and the foreigners' houses zipped by, she realized the rune on her face was certainly a physical reinforcement rune, for there was no other way she could have survived in such a state.

She heard the explosion from the manor behind them, and then she saw it overhead. Lancer's greatest work. The gazebo.

It was unrecognizable. Walls of stone and ice enveloped it in an airtight egg shielding it from the great explosion, no doubt carefully aimed by Scáthach, that had erupted beneath the structure back on the lawn, sending it flying through the air at an angle that made its destination likely similar to their own. As she understood the masterpiece Lancer had toiled over for no small part of the time before the war, gravitational runes stabilizing the internal cabin would keep her worms intact despite the force of the flight while wind-force runes laid around the outer edges would repel the cure-ridden smoke of the flames that had started this whole problem.

Far behind the pair, she supposed, would be the barriers Lancer had claimed could withstand the release of a Noble Phantasm. They would be growing more and more numerous, appearing directly on top of each other until the border of the lawn became so saturated with energy that it was nothing more than a wall of blinding white light. Despite this, she was acutely aware of the difference in power between the barriers and the thing descending from above, and so there was no need for her to ask Lancer why she was not relying on those shields to keep them safe.

While Reiki had been boosted to withstand the speeds at which Scáthach travelled, her sense of time remained the same, and so it was a matter of a few seconds, hardly time to formulate any thought or response to the situation, before her Servant brought them to a stop just beside a park bench.

There was a quiet moment then. Lancer's focused gaze indicated she was likely using Clairvoyance to assess the damage and watch for nearby opportunists, but Reiki let her familiars run themselves for just a few seconds while she collected her thoughts.

It was an impossible tragedy. Even if she won the grail for Zouken and lived to see everlasting peace, this failure would likely gnaw at her for a long time.

Of course, the blame hardly fell on her shoulders alone. Jack, that Demon with her followers, the lightning wielder who had defended her, the woman who had poisoned the flames, and...

"What was that!? If Benita hasn't gone fully rogue, we'll be having a very serious talk about teammate coordination.

Fate/Factitious Paradigm

Ground Platoons and Air Squadrons

Foreign and Commerce Districts, Miyama

---

It was the most intense coordination the controller had ever attempted. No doubt most eyes in the area were on the fire, but another strange event had begun nearby only seconds after it had started consuming the area. Mailboxes, bicycles, chimneys, birds, plants, street signs, and various other neighbourhood items collapsed into swarms of insects, and in the next moment reformed on the streets into people. It would have been too much of a strain to instantly formulate so many appearances, and so a single one was chosen for the entire set, seemingly at random.

There was no delay. Alone or together, they forced their way through each door they came across, delivering the same message. "Your lives are at risk! Head east quickly!" Even in their unimposing bodies, they presented a frantic and demanding personality that quickly drove civilians from their homes, with assistance wherever needed, and towards the river.

It was a strange sight, even if it was unlikely to be the oddest thing spotted on any given day of a Grail War. Groups of dazed foreigners, some barefoot, many dressed for a lazy morning indoors, being ushered through the streets by dozens of seemingly the same girl. Their route had to be adjusted when the bridge became... unusable, but the group was fortunate enough to come across numerous lifeboats at the riverbank. Once the civilians had been herded on board, the facade was largely dropped, and the boats morphed into horrid rubbery sea creatures with numerous flippers, hastily depositing the passengers on the Shinto town riverbank before dispersing into a swarm and reforming into water vessels on the first side.

These evacuation efforts were concentrated in the foreign district, where the fire now raged, but individuals were appearing all throughout Miyama, warning residents of the incoming flames and advising them to collect a few valuables and skip town, meeting with mixed responses from the citizens.

There were a few places, though, where different actions unfolded. The first was as the Tohsaka manor, or rather, just outside of it. A worm-body in the form of the controller called out, hopefully earning the attention of those within. "I have the locations of those who I believe to be responsible for this!" No more needed to be said. Hideyoshi understood the magecraft of the Matous, and so he would know that he needed only to speak aloud while outside any bounded fields to gain the controller's attention and directions.

@Kyoka @Seirei No Hai

Secondly, a certain young girl on the streets of the commerce district received a visit. It was clear to the controller that this was the Master of the Servant responsible for last night's attack, as well as likely the addition to today's flames. Two bodies approached briskly in the marketplace, using the same appearance as anywhere else. There was no real effort at deception. As soon as her eyes fell on the pair, they spoke coldly in unison, "That was a dirty move last night. Is this more of your handiwork?"

They didn't wait for a response. Even as the final syllables left their lips, their bodies began to disassemble into blade-wing insects, spreading out and closing. Any given cut would be unlikely to kill Riyu, but they were quick, numerous, and arranged such that striking each one individually would be consigning oneself to a losing battle.

@Argonaut

---

Scáthach

Matou Manor --> Foreign District Streets

---

With her orders decided upon, Lancer made for the streets, leaving the house she had helped to repair overnight. Where there had been a hole, there was now a significantly lower area of roof composed of her Master's familiars. It was irritating to think that she might have to sacrifice the whole place if today's efforts went badly.

The drunken mob was barely a thought in her mind. She disabled a few on her way out of the grounds with quick taps that sent them flying unconsciously down the street simple because it was as easy for her as doing nothing, but the bulk of the work was done by the runes surrounding the manor, which had been set to "stun". A pile of charred but living drunken arsonists now lay just outside the manor walls, and they would only be met with more nonlethal electricity and wind if they managed to get up for round two.

Lancer reached the decided upon position, an intersection on the edge of the forest whose area was being given special priority during the worms' evacuation efforts. Looking right, there was a sizeable stretch of road before things would get even a little difficult. She held one spear, and on both that spear and her arms there glowed runes of strengthening. Suffice to say, her first swing was a potent one even by the standards of Servants. The road was less than sand to her spear as it passed through, making some nice headway for the ensuing trench-digging. Of course, it would be horribly expensive to use such a method with every strike, but used sparingly it made for rather efficient work as a wide stretch along the middle of the road was slowly crushed into an extended pit almost a meter deep and bereft of any fuel.

Of course, her forceful destruction was not done carelessly. She would make an obstacle between the flames and the manor, and then work to protect the forest and greater Miyama if there was time to spare. During all this, her clairvoyance would remain vigilant for sneak attacks, as she had already heard from her Master of the difficulties the Saber from last night was experiencing. She longed to head that way and aid him while taking vengeance on the Assassin for his attacks, but she had work to do here and felt she could rely on Saber to at the very least last a long time against any opponent.

She was a good distance from the fire. Her goal here was not to save as much of the area as possible, but to gurantee the safety of the area she had time to properly protect.

Smash, smash, smash, went the wise queen.

✧ Adventure Must Continue ✧

@HueMan I think I'll have to drop out. It's a bad week for me so I can't be taking much time to plan with you guys even if I get my characters done.

✧ Adventure Must Continue ✧

Putting this WIP here for now. Questions, comments, and criticism welcome in the meantime.

✧ Adventure must go on... ✧ (Overlord RP)

Interesting! If this gets off its feet I'd like to play, though I guess it depends a little on this fantasy system of yours.

I see you're checking in advanced as well, so hopefully I can hold up to your standards.

Fate/Darkened Moon

Romeo Tallis

The Clock Tower

---

Being an executioner, Romeo had seen plenty of mages in vulnerable and human states before, but this was different. The flustered lady, the polite guy, and the disappointed old man. It was like a sitcom or something. That being the case, he thought, it would be best to strike while the iron was hot and start interacting with mages in a friendly way for the first time in his life. "It's true that a Servant is the best tool to rely on in battles like these, but even so..."

He stood up and quickly approached Cassandra. "...I'd love to know what kind of magecraft you guys are good at!" Before he even finished that sentence he remembered his superior was in the room and tried to wear a face with a little more seriousness. "I mean, when you work with someone you have to know what they can do for you." Even when he tried his hardest to be professional, he still sounded a little bit like a nerd asking about the powers of a comic book character.

"I myself am partial to sneaking around, then running up and going for a hand-to-hand takedown. It's not the kind of thing mages are used to, so it tends to be sorta effective against them." As he described each part of his "battle plan" he made mostly unconscious hand motions to illustrate them, tensing up and shifting his head from side to side as if sneaking before raising his fists to about neck level like some sort of terrible boxer. "As for questions to you, Director, do you have any clue who the head of the family is or what kind of structure they have beyond that? The average family as I understand it will have the head, their spouse, and one, maybe two kids. That's not enough to support a full Servant roster unless they call in a bunch of aunts and uncles or favours from allied houses."

"Beyond that, who else are we waiting for? If this student of yours has already been cleared with you then there's not really much reason for her to be here, so that leaves me, father Anderson, Leon and Cassandra. My plan is mostly to take out the enemy Masters and let their Servants disappear, but it's good to have a full team, right? Especially when the bad guys are hiding in an illusion forest." Now that he was standing again, Romeo's body language exuded energy as he shifted repeatedly from one foot to the other.

Fate/Darkened Moon

I'm on vacation with limited internet so I'll write while offline and then post when I can.

Fate/Factitious Paradigm

Reiki Matou

The Gazebo, Matou Manor

---

She felt it. Saw it. But that was mostly through her bugs. The sound of the explosion was muffled enough under the tub that she probably hadn't even needed to cover Shinji's ears. Did that mean it was weak? No, the damage was clearly serious, it was just that the bomb had gone off only after sliding down a hallway to the back of the house. On top of that, the familiars that had been in the area had taken the full brunt of the curse in that projectile. Quickly, Reiki broke off her contracts with them, leaving them to flop helplessly until she could find a safe way to dispose of them.

Tentatively, she dismissed the swarm surrounding her and Shinji and lifted up the tub to look around. With the immediate threat gone, the gazebo's defences swiftly destroyed themselves. They hadn't even been touched by the blast, which had been highly concentrated. Nonetheless...

Lancer, there's been an attack at the manor. Please excuse yourself from the encounter with that Saber and return here hastily.

...The area that had been hit was absolutely decimated, although those outside the property wouldn't have heard or seen a thing. Stepping out of the gazebo and circling the building with Shinji following timidly at her heels, Reiki was able to observe damage better. It seemed that by a stroke of fortune the damage had been limited to the least valuable parts of the house. The upstairs bathroom, a pair of empty guest rooms, the dining room ceiling and half the attic were simply gone. Indeed, it could have been so much worse. Her room, the study, the workshop, Benita's room, the safes, and the worm pits all remained completely intact. After that villainous Master's bank robbery it was no longer possible to use wealth as a tool as Reiki had once hoped, but the Matous would at least be able to stay comfortably afloat as a family with what was kept in their house, if such a thing was even needed in Zouken's perfect world.

However, the home she had spent her entire life in had been severely damaged. There was no way. It was close, but she wouldn't cry. If Benita were around she would have requested Lancer Prime hunt down the culprit posthaste, as she had caught a glimpse of his appearance through her bugs before the attack, but in this case a little more diplomacy would be required.

---

Ground Platoons Eleven and Twelve

Miyama Streets

@Vocab

---

Their target was in sight. Not the target of a sneak attack, but rather the recipient of a message. In an alley just ahead they took on the required forms, Eleven as the controller and Twelve as a rough likeness of a plain man from the controller's memory. Stepping out onto the street, Eleven quickly approached the two, looking exactly as another double had earlier that evening. "Excuse the interruption, I'm sure you're having a productive night, but I thought you should know that there is a Servant in the area, presumably an Assassin, who briefly attacked my home just now before vanishing without a trace."

Twelve emerged from the alley at that point, after double-checking that all the features of its form were as accurate as possible. "His appearance was something close to this, and he materialized and vanished with no warning or trace." It gave a slow spin, as if showing off new clothes, although the intent was actually to make entirely clear the enemy Servant's appearance.

"This is a warning, as the Assassin appeared and vanished with no warning or trace. In addition, it is a request to do away with this person on sight, as they are obviously a remorseless killer and enemy of our group." With that, the worms with the appearance of Reiki Matou moved back into the alley and fell apart once out of sight.

"If you have anything to share, just speak up. My units are all around." The group appearing as the unknown Assassin soon did the same, leaving things just as they had been.

---

Scáthach

Foreign District Streets

@Reflection@Sageage

---

It was a disadvantage of the Clairvoyance Lancer was making use of compared to something like Instinct or Mind's Eye that the information provided to her came with no instruction concerning a response. So, while she was not surprised in the functional sense when Saber let loose a flurry of masterful kicks, she still found it surprising that such a thing happened at all. Still, her eyes which pierced the body and the mind provided her with a good idea as to what was happening.

This technique is not his own, exactly. Is this another of his abilities, or..? It mattered little. Since Saber had elected to give the battle a hand-to-hand twist, she left her spear in the knight's grip and prepared to counter-

She felt the alarms before her Master sent the message, and so Lancer changed her tactics to allow for a quick exit, leaning with her foe's first kick before jumping sharply backwards where the following storm could not reach. A moment later, the red spear dematerialized, vanishing from Saber's grasp.

"I hate to leave just when you're starting to show off your abilities, but my Master needs me" She leapt to the top of the hill, "Next time we meet, I will kill you before you start gathering strength." It was largely a lie, but if he displayed no immortal-slaying abilities against other foes then it would probably be best to make quick work of him in a sneak attack.

With that, she begain moving quickly the way she had come. It had been several minutes of walking from the Matou manor when she had moved with the speed of a human, but at this rate it would likely be less than one. Saber, the stalwart defensive fighter, had picked up speed during the match, but he would still likely have a hard time catching up to her.

Fate/Factitious Paradigm

Reiki Matou

The Front Yard, Matou Manor

---

"What is this, seaweed? Oh poor Shinji, where have you been?"

Reiki was down on one knee out on the lawn. She was combing through her beagle's filthy fur and looking warily at the plant matter which had become brutally tangled up on his head. Next to the pair sat a metal tub filled with water and a few bottles of bathing products. "Don't you worry though. When I'm through with you you're gonna be as squeaky clean as-"

She paused.

Oh no.

There was no time for proper decision making. Only her basic understanding of safety and danger could dictate her actions in the following moments. What would provide safety? Having lugged the thing outside when it was empty, Reiki was perfectly aware that there was no way she could run with the tub while it was full, not to mention ensuring Shinji came along. As such, she would need a helping hand.

Nearby flowers and shrubs dissolved. The Matous kept a respectable lawn, but most of the flora aside from grass were actually familiars in disguise. With less than a thought, an instinctive command to help Reiki, Shinji, and the tub towards their destination, and a veritable wave of worms pushed the two from behind and below. There was a moment of slowness at the start, but once the swarm tipped the tub the loss of water allowed them to quickly pick up speed. It wasn't far. Just a few more feet to safety.

Overhead, a sort of light-show had begun. By some power of the manor's attacker, the runic defences had been delayed in their activation. Now, however, they had begun to come into effect. Fire, lightning, ice, gravity, blasts of mana, and pure kinetic energy culminated from the runes littering the yard into a prolonged stream with the intent of both pushing back and annihilating the dangerous object in midair.

Reiki, along with Shinji, narrowly made it to the spot she had been aiming for. The two were thrown to the ground by the swarm and Reiki quickly grabbed her dog and curled up as tight as possible. There was still some water in the tub as it came crashing down on top of them, surrounding them, and so the pair immediately became soaked and blind in the darkness under the metal container. Around the tub, the worms that had moved it continued the motion on their own until they completely covered its surface, serving as shock absorbers.

Of course, these were all minor efforts to boost Reiki's and Shinji's chances of survival. The real protective measure was the spot where they had landed.

The gazebo.

This was among the safest places on the Matou property, and likely the one with the highest density of runes. During the meeting with the Whitehalls, Lancer had been confident that even the mighty Berserker could have been safely invited inside without risk to Reiki. Therefore, it was Reiki's first instinctive pick for a safe place. Walls of super-dense ice and stone, protective wards, and even more of the same barrage of offensive magecraft all sprung to life in preparation for the incoming blast. In another second, their strength would be tested.

With the speed of the attack, there was no time to wait and see if the runes in the yard had worked, so the command was given to those familiars inside to brace for impact. Countless objects in the matou home dispersed into slithering worms or buzzing insects that moved as fast as their bodies would allow from the presumed area of impact. The reserve troops in the underground worm-pits retreated into the deepest recesses they could locate. In one particular room, the movements were quite different. This was where the bomb was projected to land, and so they would throw themselves on top of and around it in an effort to cushion the initial blast.

All this with just a few thoughts from Reiki. Knowing she had less than a second until the moment of truth, she covered Shinji's ears.