Nasuverse I'm back (X-posted from SB)

#1
“Haa, haa, haaah…”

The boy panted, hidden behind shadowed shelves. He breathed deeply and held it for a second, trying his best to control the noise of his exhalations. Out there, in the yard past his shed, was the Blue Man, with his Red Spear. The spear that had blasted his front door off its hinges. The spear that had put craters into his back yard.

The spear that had blown his chest all over the street earlier that day.

“I need something...anything, that I can make into a weapon…”

He discarded an old shovel. Too rusted. He pushed aside a rake. Too bent. He picked up a screwdriver. Too...inadaquate.

He picked up a broom. It would have to do.

Trace, on.

“You’re annoying, boy! Come out and I’ll show you the mercy of killing you painlessly!”

Analyzing composite materials.

“Fine. You asked for it.” The garden shed shook as the Blue Man pounded the door. Boxes fell from shelving left and right.

Reinforc-

One box announced its arrival with a painful crunch, landing on the boy’s head and shattering his focus. With a yelp and a curse, he scowled at the box as if it was personally responsible for his mortal danger. That glare turned into astonishment as he regarded the gleaming, sleek, and very, very deadly-looking rifle that clattered out onto the concrete floor. The boy picked up the gift that had seemingly fallen from heaven, his broomstick long forgotten.

“W-what? Father...it must be father’s…did he use this when he fought? But I thought...didn’t he use a pistol? Whose was this?”

The boy scrambled to the fallen box, emerging with a pair of magazines for the rifle. With the clumsiness of a novice, he loaded and cocked his new weapon - but loaded and cocked it was. Video games were good for something, after all.

Trace, on.

The shed shook a second time, this time half-filled with light, as the door simply disintegrated under the Blue Man’s foot. The boy hid, in a back corner, covered in shadows.

Analyzing composite materials.

“You know, you put up a pretty good fight. I still don’t know how you survived me the first time.” The Blue Man pauses to think. “You’d have gone far, if it wasn’t for your shitty luck.”

Reinforcing composite materials. 

His fierce red eyes turn unerringly to the boy’s hiding place. “Sorry kid. Orders are orders.”

Trace, off.

“Go to hell!”

Both combatants rose, hefting weapons from opposite ends of human history. The roar of gunfire shook the shed’s walls, suddenly cut off by a gasp of pain and a sickening squelch.

“Your Magecraft isn’t bad, kid. I thought I’d cut right through that.”

The boy grunted, shaking with the effort of holding the Blue Man’s spear from slicing any further into his side. He had managed to mostly deflect it with the Reinforced rifle - but only mostly. For a few moments, the only sound in the shed was the soft drip-drip-drip of his blood against the floor.

“Now...it’s finally time to do this properly.”

The Blue Man pulled his spear from the boy’s side, and with a thump, his nerveless fingers dropped his bloodstained rifle. A moment later, his legs gave out, and the boy followed his weapon to the ground.

“Nothing personal.”

“Damn it...”

The boy crawled backwards, grasping for anything to defend himself with.

“Damn it, I won’t die here so uselessly!”

A spear thrust. A burst of light.

“What!”

Lines of light spread across the floor, centered on the boy’s palm and the rifle. The boy’s whole body tingled with cold fire, and as he watched with astonishment, the marks on the back of his hand he had taken for scars burned with iridescent malevolence. As blinding as the sudden glare was, though, the boy had no trouble seeing a silhouette rise from the floor before him, the Blue Man’s spear casually deflected to one side.

“So...the seventh Servant. He was worthy, after all!”

A javelin whipped past the Blue Man’s head, and he stepped back, just in time for the sabre headed for his throat to bury itself in a shelf instead. Without even a second to breathe, arrows turned the ground he had been standing on into a pincushion, and he raised his spear, just in time to block the bayonet pointed at his left eye. At a disadvantage, he jumps back, out of the hut. He needs to observe this new enemy. To take a Heroic Spirit lightly is certain death.

As the light cleared, the silhouette became a man. Tall, lean, and clad in what looked to the boy’s inexperienced eyes to be some kind of military uniform. Flinty eyes gazed down on him from a weather-worn, scarred face, tracing down his arm to the three marks still clearly visible, though no longer glowing, on his hand.

“Servant Archer, reporting as ordered...sir.”


----------------------------------------------------------


Shirou half-lay, half-sat in a pool of his own blood. It was a small pool, but he felt that the melodrama was appropriate for the occasion. It had, after all, been a very long day. At first, he thought he had come across some strange sentai show being filmed on his school grounds. That was a very quickly dispelled illusion, leaving him bleeding out in a back street. Somehow, he had survived the attack, only to be set upon once more by the same man in his home. That hadn’t even covered the strangest part. Five minutes ago, the world of magi had been a veritable galaxy away. Five minutes ago, the Holy Grail had been a myth. Five minutes ago, a “Servant” was one who did the cleaning.


Five minutes ago, his backyard had been mostly intact.

He looked out the half-shattered wall of his hut, dismayed. The garden was in tatters. Craters covered the ground, some from Lancer’s spear, some from Archer’s arsenal. The man had deployed too many weapons for Shirou to even begin to count, dating from every age of human history. He could have sworn there was a stick. Not a club. A stick. It might have been sharpened. Lancer had fled after...after something his mortal eyes couldn’t begin to track. They did, however, burn one image into his mind. Archer, bracing a tall red rectangular shield. Lancer’s spear, buried in the half-shattered wood and iron of the same shield...with its tip a millimetre away from Archer’s chest. Cu Chulainn, he had named himself, before fleeing.

“You’re injured, sir.” A small bundle seemingly materialized in Archer’s hands as he shifted down on one knee. “Are you capable of healing yourself, or do you require first aid?”

Still gasping for breath, Shirou reached to unbutton his shirt, hissing with pain as he peeled the cotton fibres away from the gash between his ribs. The flow of blood had nearly stopped already, but Shirou felt a wave of nausea pass over him as he realized that the white he could see inside the wound was, in fact, his ribs.

“Ah, good. You caught it on your ribs. Waste of magic to heal something like this, just let me get at it…” In short order, Archer had withdrawn a small bottle, a packet of powder, and a small roll from his bundle. “Clean wound, no rips, no mud. No sense in taking chances, though. Clean it off, disinfect, and dress.” Archer looks up from his work to grin at Shirou. “Plenty of boys like you lived through worse. You’ll be fine.” With a flourish, he pulled the dressing tight, ignoring Shirou’s quiet grunt of pain. “Good to go, sir.” He stood up and extended his hand. “Up and at’em?”

Shirou reached out with his good side, still wincing a little as Archer’s strong arm effortlessly yanked him from the ground. “Archer...who-”

“Down!”

For several moments, Shirou’s world spun. Slowly, he registered that he lay on his stomach, with some sort of weight pinning him against the floor. The wound in his side burned from the sudden impact. He began to shift to the side, to try and relieve the pressure, but froze as the pressure on his back suddenly doubled.

“Didn’t I tell you to get down?” Archer hissed, shadows blurring over his crouched. His cold eyes scanned the sky through the fresh hole in the roof of the much-abused hut. Lancer already showed. Subtlety of approach and ranged attack rules out Saber, Berserker. Early in Grail War, Caster likely still preparing arsenal. Low probability of Rider. Likeliest Servant: Assassin. Poor direct combat ability. Ability to fight into ambush hindered by need to protect Master. Plan: flush enemy into open and destroy with superior ranged firepower. Plan B: engage in hand to hand using Noble Phantasm. If Rider: blunt initial attack and skirmish to prevent Noble Phantasm use. “That’s most likely Assassin, sir. Maybe Rider. Hope you don’t mind a little more collateral damage…”

“Wait, collateral…!”

Visions of his home turned into a smoking crater swam through Shirou’s mind. Whatever protest he planned to make, though, simply disappeared as Archer’s arsenal was given voice. A machine gun blazed from each of the Servant’s fists, shredding what sorry bits remained of the shed roof. To Shirou’s eyes, Archer’s motions were unnaturally spasmodic, the tracers from his weapons leaving crazed trails of light across the sky. Enemy accompanied by female Magus. Almost certainly enemy Master. Enemy possesses superior evasion. Highest kill probability achieved in instant of enemy attempting decisive attack and thus unable to counter. Must warn Master prior to enemy attack to allow for reaction time. Unconsciously, a thin, bloodless smile crossed Archer’s face. One shot, one kil-!

“Left!”

It wasn’t a commander’s order, but a veteran’s, backed by hard-earned experience in survival and accustomed to immediate obedience. Without hesitation, Shirou moved. He cried out as chunks of concrete left a dozen scrapes over his back, but the arrow meant to pierce his heart had completely missed its mark. After all, it was impossible for an attack dodged before it was completed to hit. Archer’s reply, though, had no such limitations.

Impact!

“Enemy Servant neutralized. Let’s go, sir. You’ll want to claim the enemy Master’s Command Spells for yourself. They are a critical asset.”

Shirou stood, staggering somewhat, and did his best to follow Archer. Images of what an enemy Master might look like flew through his mind. What manner of ruthless murderer could command a man like Lancer? How dangerous would the Master of the Servant named Assassin be? With a grimace of pain, he pushed onward. As they stepped out of his front door and onto the street-

“There!!!”

With a blur, Archer charged forward. A small figure in red and black was pinned underneath him, both by his size and by what appeared to be some form of sword to its neck.

“Surrender your Command Spells, magus, and receive the protections of a prisoner of war.”

Shirou stepped forward, seeking a better view of the first magus other than his father he had ever seen.

“T-Tohsaka?!?”








Servant Class: Archer

Name: Unknown Soldier
Alignment: Lawful Neutral
Master: Emiya Shirou

The Unknown Soldier is not a true Heroic Spirit. Rather, he represents the collective legends gathered by all nameless warriors. As such, he is physically weaker than true Heroic Spirits on a fundamental level, due to his human origins. However, with the accumulated combat experience of millions of lifetimes to draw upon, the Unknown Soldier remains a formidable combatant.

Strength: D
Agility: C
Mana: E
Luck: EX
Endurance: C

Skills:
Independent Action: EX
Clairvoyance: C
Eye of the Mind (True): B
Expert of Many Specializations: EX
Presence Concealment: B
Military Tactics: A
Projectile (Bullets): A
Bravery: EX
 

Azure

Well-Known Member
#2
So did the Unknown Archer just beat Emiya like that? Or did Rin summon something else, it was not really clear there. Overall, it's a bit short to really comment on it, but I am interested. Not sure how Shirou will handle being himself without the safeline that is Avalon, but I guess he will have to learn that people die when they are killed.

Also the sheet has too many skills, just roll most of them into his NP that symbolizes that he is the representation of all unknown Soldiers.
 

nixofcyzerra

Well-Known Member
#4
The Luck stat is essentially a representation of a Hero's ability to defy fate. Saying that it is immeasurable by giving it an "EX" ranking is kind of ridiculous.
 
#5
The forgotten returning to be remembered again? Sounds pretty fate-defying to me.
 

Azure

Well-Known Member
#6
I don't think that qualifies to be EX, I mean what about other heroes who have defied their fate countless times and cheated death a ton, most of them don't have A-rank luck and much less EX. Also I still feel you should drop some of the personal skills of that sheet and just pile them up in an NP to avoid cluttering the sheet.

Also, I am still curious if the servant this new Archer defeated was EMIYA or some other servant.
 
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