Kingdom Fate Chapter Five

                                     Kingdom Fate
                                     Chapter 5
                                Dream Eaters Shadows

    It had been a few hours since Sora and Ruler had managed to stumble upon the apartment complex after they had fled from the manor. To say the boy was relieved to find safe shelter after running into Berserker and that golden servant was an understatement. The complex had proven to be remarkably quiet and Ruler had chosen for them a small apartment. A long narrow corridor led into a small room with faded white walls and a dull red carpet. The musty scent of old stale dust and cleaner was a little off putting but it didn’t matter to the boy. So long as we’re safe, he thought while lying back on the black sofa, that is all that matters.

“Man that was a close one huh, Ruler?” Sora glanced over to his servant who was standing casually by the window peering down at the street.

   “A close one is putting it mildly master,” The blonde knight replied turning away from the window to face him. “It was fortunate that other servant took notice of Berserker and his master instead of us.”

   Sora bit his lip and was about to reply when he saw the stern look Ruler shot him causing the boy to shrink back. He sat up and turned to the servant giving a unsteady smile to which the servant scowled further.

“Look Ruler about…” Sora said to her when Ruler held up a hand.

  “Master, now that we are safe for the time being there are several things I would like to address.” Narrowing her gaze she pointed to him. “First off as my master I instructed you to stay out of the sight and let me confront our enemies. But you did not; instead you disobeyed me and charged recklessly into danger with no regard for your safety.”

“Yeah, but you don’t understand I couldn’t just…” The keyblade wielder cried his eyes widening in shock.

  “I’m not finished,” Ruler replied interrupting the boy. “Secondly, you tried to face an opponent whose abilities were beyond your limits. A mistake that could have cost you your life, and end your chances for the Holy Grail.”

Sora’s mind raced upon hearing his new partner berate him for trying to help her. Why was she angry with him? Sure he had disobeyed her orders, but the boy was far from helpless. If anything, while it was true Berserker was powerful, the boy had faced foes a lot tougher than him.

    “I will admit though,” Sora perked his head up hearing Ruler speak up. “You did display a strange array of abilities that are unlike those of a normal magus.”

“Well I’m not a magus,” Sora replied snorting, “and now that you’re done yelling at me it’s my turn to correct you on some things.”

Ruler frowned, “Oh?”

    Sora nodded, “First of all I’m not some helpless kid Ruler, and I’ve fought against guys a lot tougher than Berserker. Second I’m not the kind of person to leave a person alone against his rising odds.”

“What?” Ruler’s eyes widened as a drop of sweat flowed down her face. “You’ve fought against opponents stronger than Berserker?!”

  Sora nodded and held out his hand while a bright flash of light appeared before the keyblade appeared. The blonde knight arched an eyebrow upon seeing the mystical weapon to which the boy gave her a wide grin. Guess it was his turn to show her something. Twirling the blade around Sora held up the keyblade and pointed to it.

“You see I happen to be a warrior myself,” he said in a matter of fact tone. “And while Berserker is tough, I’ve face a lot worse.”

    After a moment of silence the knight stared at the keyblade and stroked her chin and walked over to him. Sora stared at her when he saw her extend out her hand and gestured if she could see it. Unsure the boy agreed and gave it to her as Ruler gingerly swung it around and examined it.

    “What a strange weapon,” she said. “What do you call it?”

“It’s a keyblade,” Sora answered.

    “Interesting,” nodded the blonde knight and handed it back to him. “But even if you have fought before master I would request that you let me do the fighting.”

“No way,” Sora shook his head, “I’m sorry but I can’t let someone else fight for me.”

   “Master, please listen to what you’re…”

  Sora scowled, “No, I’m not budging on the matter and also stop calling me master. Just call me Sora.”

Ruler blinked before she sighed and gave a small but warm smile which caught the boy off guard.

     “Well, you certainly have a lot of spirit,” she chuckled, “very well; I do like the sound of that a lot better, Sora.”

The boy stared at her his face turned a bright crimson red to which he looked away trying to calm down. Shaking it off, he plopped back down on the sofa and stretched back.

“Okay, now that we’ve gotten that out of the way,” he frowned, “Ruler you said there are other servants out there right?”

      Ruler nodded, “There are but right now our priority should be coming up with a proper strategy for the battles to come.”

  Sora agreed knowing full well that this Holy Grail War was going to be a bit of a challenge if his skirmishes with Lancer and Berserker were any indication. But it didn’t matter the keyblade wielder wouldn’t give up he would see this through to the end. So with a heavy sigh, the boy let out a low yawn and stretched out onto the coach. Tomorrow would bring with it a new challenge and perhaps a new answer to the question burning within his mind. Why were the Thirteen Seekers of Darkness here?

   Ruler quietly walked over and gently set his head on the pillow and resumed her vigil by the window watching for any threats that may try to breach into their hollow sanctuary.

  This was not the scene Archer was prepared for when he, his master, along with Saber and her idiot of a master arrived at the manor. Large craters and cracks littered the ground looking like a war zone straight out of one of the conflicts in history. The red bowman gently traced the ground with his fingers his grey eyes narrowed in speculation. There was no question a battle took place here, but the question was who were the fighters in question? Behind him Rin stood on the sidewalk hands on her hips as she stared at the scene.

“Wow, looks like someone had quite the brawl,” She remarked staring up at the manner. “Archer, can you tell who it was?”

   “You know as well as I that I don’t have that capability,” Archer snorted, “but from the amount of destruction I’d say it was likely Berserker.”

“That seems logical,” Saber added, “but it leads to question who was he fighting?”

    Archer curled his lip, because in truth he didn’t really care who the hell it was. But in the corner of his mind he had to wonder if the mystery master and servant were beaten. Though from the faint traces of magic energy, it didn’t seem likely they were beaten. So who the hell could it be? He wondered.

“Maybe there was more than one servant here,” They whirled around seeing Shirou kneeling in front of one of the craters.

“What are you getting at Shirou?” Rin scowled at him.

    Shirou in response pointed to the smaller scratches and holes in the ground, “See those holes, from what I can see it looks like someone attacked from up on the roof.”

Rin gave him an annoyed look, “Emiya-kun just because someone attacked from above doesn’t mean it came from a third servant.”

    Archer had to agree with his master’s logic but from the trail of magic energy he began see the boy was onto something. Though, he would never admit it to the idiot. Seeming to hit a dead end the red bowman was about to suggest leaving when he noticed something moving out of the corner of his eye near one of the corners of the manor.

“Archer?” Saber spoke up seeing his frazzled expression before she also noticed it as well.

   The red bowman narrowed his eyes held out his hands as Kanshou and Bakuya appeared and he dashed forward. As if waiting for him to attack, a large figure erupted from the shadows and came at him. He swung in a vertical arc feeling the blades make contact with the enemy. A low inhuman wail followed as the being fell to the ground completely split in two. He spun around to see what attacked him.

“What on earth?!” cried Rin to which Archer looked down and saw the most freakish sight.

    Lying on the ground was a bear or some kind of creature that looked like one only larger with the reminiscent traits of a panda. Only strangely, the creature had a sickly greenish blue color with glowing pink eyes. Even stranger was the cartoonish appearance the creature bore making it look like something from a kids show.

  The bear-like creature let out a low moan before it slowly burst into flames and disintegrated. Was it some kind of familiar? He wondered when suddenly a loud crash came from out of nowhere and several figures emerged out into the open.

“Shirou!” cried the blue knight as she pushed Shirou out of the way and slashed another panda-like creature leaving it cleaved in two.

  Almost as if on cue several more of the strange creature appeared each bearing a strange coloration unlike anything he had ever seen. But they weren’t alone for at their side were what looked like a stylized version of cats each bearing a cartoonish grin and a musical note shaped tail.

“Just what the hell are these things?” Rin cried.

  “Looks like someone left behind a little surprise for us.” Archer snarled. “We need to clear them out.”

Saber nodded, “Shirou, stay back with Rin.”

  Shirou gave a nod and together with Rin headed back out into the street as Archer and Saber charged into the group of strange creatures.  The air became filled with the heavy chorus of battle the sound of steel slicing through flesh followed mixed with the cries of agony from the strange beasts. Archer mowed through the waves of panda-like beasts weaving and ducking beneath the heavy paws of the beasts.  The twin blades bit with the savagery driven to take out the strange creatures. Not too far from him, Saber was laying waste to the beasts in mass swinging her invisible blade with the force of a typhoon.

    Loud bangs came as the invisible blade blew away row after row of the bizarre creatures sending tremors of cold air that tore through the creatures with little effort. Then just as the attack had begun another bizarre creature appeared this one looking like a fusion of a ram and a deer sporting a sickly greenish fur coat with bugle-like horns. Archer and Saber paused before the creature let out low shrieking trumpeting from the horns which drew the creatures’ attention. Then just as they had appeared the strange creatures vanished into small dark portals leaving the two bewildered servants alone in the front yard.

They…” Saber stopped her eyes scanning the yard, “retreated?”

 Archer nodded and gave an irritated snort, “Their master must have sent them here to test us.”

    Rin and Shirou stepped back into the courtyard staring at the now empty yard again having witnessed the battle that had taken place. But that didn’t matter to Archer as he looked out back into the city and reached out once again to sense the strange cheerful energy that was present before at that battle scene in the road. Slowly he reached out letting the energy brush his senses until the warrior began to sense the trail.

    While he was busy the others were talking about the strange creatures they had encountered. Most of it was wild speculation ranging from some kind of low class nature spirit to a new type of familiar but one thing they did agree on was the strange heart shaped symbol that had been displayed on their bodies. It almost resembled a command spell but judging from the black coloring it was more accurate to say the mark was natural. And the demonic wings that were attached to the sides of the symbol gave it an almost foreboding sense to it.

   But Archer knew better, the creatures were anything but low ranking in terms of power. Maybe the ones they fought before were not very strong but something told him there were stronger ones out there. A bead of sweat poured down his face and slowly the red bowman glanced over to his master and wondered if the mystery master and servant were connected.

      “Archer,” He snapped to attention upon hearing his name, to see Rin fixing him a puzzled look.

“Yes?” he replied,

“You’ve been quiet for the last couple of minutes,” she frowned, “What’s on your mind?”

Archer sighed, “I have a feeling our mystery master and servant maybe connected to those strange creatures.”

    “We were thinking the same thing,” Saber replied, “Do you believe they left those creatures waiting for us?”

Archer frowned, “Maybe…”

“Archer?”

   The red bowman sighed knowing full well he couldn’t go on his gut feelings not just yet. Giving a low grunt he pointed to the city and kept his gaze locked on it.

“While you were talking I managed to sense the magical energy from earlier which seems to be heading toward Shinto.” He snorted, “And from the thick residue our mystery servant and master won’t be hard to track.”

    “Then we should get going,” Shirou said aloud. “If we can follow the trail they we can find them before morning.”

Archer scowled, “Don’t be stupid, if our enemy did send those creatures then it is likely there will be more of them lying in wait for us.”

“Yeah…but…”

   “He’s right Emiya-kun,” Rin sighed, “even if we follow the trail we would only exhaust ourselves fighting those spirits. And besides we’ve been out long enough let’s call it a night and head back.”

“But Rin,” Saber began to protest causing Archer to roll his eyes, “if we have a lead shouldn’t we protest it?”

  “No, besides if we do follow the trail then we should do it during the day,” she answered, “This way the enemy won’t have the advantage.”

Having seeming to see reason Saber seemed content with the explanation and with that she, Rin, Shirou, and Archer began heading back to the house to rest for the evening. But as they moved Archer began to think of the strange events that had taken place. First a man in a black coat, a mysterious servant and master, and now strange spirits it was almost like the war was being thrown for a curve. Shaking his head he couldn’t help but wonder if the mystery servant and master were not the ones they should look for but the man in the black coat. With that in mind the warrior joined with the others having had enough for tonight.