Fate/New Life

Darker Night

Shinji's eyes narrowed and turns away rudely and scoffs, "Another one of the Association, hope you're not as bad as the priestess. Don't get in my way when things go bad."

Bazett draws her her hand to herself, her expression still remain stoic. However, Caster was offended with Shinji's behavior. He take a steps to him but Bazett lifts up her hand, signaling him to stay put. 

"I won't, you have my word", Bazett reasurred briefly. Shinji doesn't reply, his back facing her.

"We got to move, everyone's ready?", I asked as I take glances at everyone. All of them nod.

"Good, we got a long night ahead of us. Let's move out", I ordered as we all move out in a horizontal line as the sun is setting down, barely glimpses of sunlight left as the night is unfolding. 

As we walked to the outskirts of the city, Shirou explained his reason for coming. He left Saber in the care of Lancer, just in case if the enemy attacks them. Saber would be very useful in this moment but his reasoning seems good enough. Furthermore, having three mages with us would help us against any enemy mages that we may face. Bazett is capable of defending herself, despite the fact that we don't know her capabilities. Shinji says he has learned magic in the last two years, but doesn't go into details about it. Shirou may have improved but it's also uncertain to what level. They will be put to the test shortly, hopefully get out of there alive too.

As to the Servants side, we will be put to our limits, especially Caster and Assassin. Caster is an indirect support Servant, with runes and spells to his advantage but in a straight fight, he will lose quickly. Assassin is another issue, if she goes against Green Archer, she may have the upper hand, despite not knowing what she can do. But against Berserker? Let's just say she's no Saber, meaning that in a prolonged fight, she won't last long.

There are way too many unknowns and disadvantages, but if we do this right, we might just pull this off. Besides, the goal here is rescue and retreat, no need to risk anyone unnecessarily. This is going to get interesting.

Before we realize it, we arrived to the forest. The moon above is bright, shining the forest as much as possible. However, the trees are spacious and broad with their long branches, creating  some sort of natural roof with their leaves on almost all of the forest, seemingly infinite on sight. It's a beautiful sigh to witness despite the circumstances to which why we are here.

Bazett seems intrigued with the natural beauty of the forest, complemented with the moonlight. Her expressions remains mostly unchanged, however, there's a glimpse of a smile on her lips. 

"So, everyone knows the plan, right?", i asked as we formed a circle to discuss the last details. Everyone nods in understanding.

"Assassin will be scouting the area using her Presence Concealment to search the whereabouts of Luviagelita and Rin. Hopefully, she can spot the enemy Servants", I start the explanation as Assassin nods in understanding.

"In the mean time, I will be searching for traps to ensure the safety of the kids here. That's until we find the enemy, their hideout or Assassin signals us", Caster adds a he materializes his Servant clothing, along with his staff.

"Correct. I will help with that task too but be aware that my main goal is to recon our surroundings in hope of finding the hide-out while escorting them", I replied as I glance at Shinji, Shirou and Bazett.

"As soon as we find the hide-out, we three go and save Tohsaka and Luvia while you guys buys us time", Shirou concludes with the final part of the plan. 

I nod as I materialize my Servant clothing, "If everything goes well, we should be able to save them without any casualties. Keep in mind, there are unknown factors in play, we must adapt as we go. Everyone is ready?", I asked for the last to make sure everyone knows their roles. Everyone nods for the last time.

"Let's make them regret ever messing with us", expressed Caster fired up as he forwards his fist to me.

I hesitated in surprised for a moment before we fist-pumped as a smirk form on my lips, grasping hold some of his motivation.

With that, Assassin goes into spirit form and vanishes into the deeper parts of the forest. Caster gets some runes, lays them down and activated some sort of spell, which made the runes sparse out around him and the group. Meanwhile, the group follows Caster as he takes lead. I start sprinting,  distancing myself from the group to serve as the hidden guardian and scout. With my Clairvoyance, I can track them from afar without much issue and use it to destroy any traps that Caster might fail to see. 

3rd Person Shift:

After what what it seems like an eternity and a few traps disabled, thanks to Caster's runes and Archer's Clairvoyance and his arrows, the group remains unharmed. There was no talking in the group ever since the "mission" started, it was somewhat comforting, except when some animal makes noises in the tree-tops.

"Something's off", declared Caster as he stops and looks at his surroundings carefully.

"What do you mean?", Bazett asks as she tilts her head to the sides slightly. 

"The traps that we're disabling are too obvious. I was expecting some sort of struggle to disable them, but all of them were wide open. Very amateur if you ask me", explains Caster as he squints his eyes in search of something.

"Who knows? Maybe that Green Archer is not as smart as we thought he is. It makes thing easier", assumed Shinji disregarding the somewhat worrisome observation of Caster.

As soon as he said that, an explosion erupted in the vicinity, but it was not anywhere near them. The smoke from said explosion indicates that it's not far away from the group.

"Nice way to jinx it, kiddo", Caster mumbled to himself, "That must be Assassin. The fun finally began"

Appearing from the trees is Archer, as he lands near the group, "Assassin is up north engaged in a fight", informed Archer as I looks to the direction of the smoke.

"That's my cue then, watch the kids over, will ya?", Caster said, as he was about to take off in a sprint, "You better save the little lady and protect my Master"

Without a reply, Caster took off to where Assassin is, leaving Archer the rest of the group on their own.

Archer shifts his body in direction to the others, "I know where is the hide-out, it's north-west of here, about a mile and a half", informed Archer. Shirou's expression was one of anticipation, holding the urge to run off to where Rin and Luvia is. 

"Let's go, lead the way Archer", Shirou replied urgently.

"Keep up then", Archer countered as he went off running, the three young adults following close behind him. 

What Archer was not aware is that they were followed, from a considerable distance, by Green Archer, stalking them, waiting for the right time to strike as he knows that in the direction that they were going, they were bound to encounter some of his well-hidden traps.

"Well then, looks like my work is cut out for me. Let's see what they're made off", Green Archer mumbles to himself boringly, then he jumps off from tree to tree, disappearing in the wilderness.

End of Chapter 9: Darker Night

 (Thanks for the support, upcoming chapter will bring a lot of action, which it may oblige me to divide it in two parts as it's going to be quite long. Hope you enjoyed it and see you on the next chapter!)

(Writer's Note: fixed a typo of the current number chapters so far. Guess I wasn't paying attention to that. Sorry about that!)