My Soul is a Weapon

The first time the pieces of ********* ***** ***** activated, she was working on the Crescent Rose. It was, she later decided, rather appropriate. Her head burned with static, with a hill of swords that danced through her mind.

By the time the burning faded, there was a blade before her, a weapon and a gun, a sniper rifle and a scythe, the weapon she strove for but could not yet create. She reached for it, trying to hold onto the image, trying to keep it with her, but she could not retain it, and it faded from existence. But as long as it had existed, it had helped, and her fingers had danced across the scattered parts, creating the weapon that she had seen.

Only an hour later, she ran into Yang practicing on a pair of training dummies. Her fists struck out, Ember Celica spat fire, and Ruby understood. Every interconnecting gear flooded through her mind, every blow struck with it danced through her muscles, every bullet spat flowed through her soul. She wondered if she could remake them. Fake them. Her fingers twitched with the urge to recreate, to replicate, to trace a copy of the weapon she saw. The need burned within her, the desire to make it happen...

The shards of **l*****d *l*d* ***k* in Ruby's heart observed the concept of the gauntlet's creation, but could not pass judgement, for it did not know enough. The static in her heart and mind caused a firewall, keeping her from that field that held the knowledge she needed. Ruby let out a scream as she collapsed under the burning pain of her mind tearing itself apart, searching for the knowledge that it kept from itself.

It repeated again a few hours later when she awoke and saw her uncle Qrow's scythe. The knowledge burned through her mind, downloading itself straight into the U*li*i*ed *l*de *o*k* and that not-quite copy that resided in her soul. This time, when the forge in her heart awakened, she was more ready. The scythe was judged, and it's concept was accepted. It's structure was hypothesized, and not disproved. The material was duplicated, and the composition was perfect. The skill that made it was imitated, and the replication was learned. The experience of its growth was sympathized with but not understood as the processor failed to find the data, as the static interfered with it. It left her with a migraine and a fever, and Ruby once again lost consciousness.

When she woke up again, the two of them were waiting, worried. This time, although she saw the weapons once more, her soul did not leap to reconstruct them, or even to download them. It already had the data stored, and the growth they had experienced took only a moment to update.

After calling in a doctor, they decided that a bit of bed rest would be enough. So the day passed swiftly, the next morning came, and the two younger children made their way to Signal academy. It was her first period class when she saw the teacher's staff, and the Unlimited Blade Works in her head, that infinite field of infinite swords, drank it in, and fed a copy to her own archive. It was not a sword, but that was okay, because she was not that boy who had cast himself into a fire, only to be reforged within a sheath. She would never project her twisted reality upon the world, because her distortion was false, an inherited madness, tempered by her own sanity.

But even so, it was enough. The false hill of swords within her held the data that she required and more. This one had not just swords, but also guns and gauntlets, a scythe and this ruler. Swords still burned most brightly, leftover influence from EMIYA, most easily rising to surface, but these other weapons had joined them in truth, and could be called forth more easily than they once could. Even if swords were the most brilliant lights, these others were no longer flickering torches, but infernos.

And when she judged the concept of its creation, the staff with the hidden miniature cannon was found worthy. When she hypothesized the basic structure, she found no reason to disprove it. When she duplicated the composition material, there was no corruption. When she imitated the skill of its making, there were no shortcuts. When she sympathised with the experience of its growth, there came understanding. When she reproduced the accumulated years, each moment came neatly after the last. And when she excelled every manufacturing process, there were no mistakes. The forge in her heart roared to life, burning her flesh, her mind, and her soul, but creating a perfect copy of the weapon before her in her hand, bringing with it every skill of it's original user.

She did not faint that time, nor falter. She simply understood. She was a creator of weapons who wanted to be a hero, just as she had always been. The small things did not matter. They never had.

They called it her Semblance. Maybe it was. Who cared? Reality Marble, Semblance, whatever you called it, it was her very soul made manifest, it was the common sense of a distorted existence. Whether it was powered by Aura or Prana, her very essence burned, and her Element was absolute. She was a Weapon. No longer a sword, not without that Ever Distant Utopia to guide her forging. She had lost precision. She was not a sword but every Weapon she could possibly be. She spat bullets, she slashed, she cut, and she stabbed. She exploded, blasted, battered, and smashed. She had grown to encompass more things, and her reach had expanded. But with that expansion she lost focus.

Her knowledge of herself was no longer as absolute as it had once been. This was no longer the soul of the man who had forged himself in war and bloodshed, who had refined himself in the flames of the corrupted Grail, who had been shaped by the sheath of the King of the Knights. This was the soul of a young girl, who had been born in what passed for peace, who had not looked into the eyes of a savior and wondered to herself, "How can I smile like that?"

She could not impose her soul upon the world. She could not reject the reality of Gaia (though Gaia did not reject her, nor her magecraft here, but instead helped it along) and impose her own truth, because it was no longer her soul to project, no longer her element, no longer her origin, no longer her distortion, no longer her common sense. She knew his soul well enough, but if she tried to reach for it, she would fail. It's very concept was beyond her grasp, for it was not her soul. She did not know her own soul enough, though she had already begun to learn. His knowledge, the knowledge of one who had sold himself to the collective will of humanity, was still a powerful tool, and his own soul had left traces within hers. His armory for one, had been added to her own, though beside the raging infernos that were weapons she had seen, his were flickering fireflies, dancing out of her grasp until they could drink in the original archive and return to their former glory.

She did not know if the archive that was hers and not his was even called Unlimited Blade Works. Had that been lost as well? What name had it taken in this rebirth? What form had it taken? She knew what it had once been, she felt it even, an afterimage of a world she had once lived. It had awoken her, because back then, it had defined him, defined Shirou Emiya in a way that nothing else could. It was in his Aria, after all, or one of them at least. His life had always been Unlimited Blade Works. He had prayed for Unlimited Blade Works. He was nothing but Unlimited Blade Works.

But Ruby Rose was not. No matter how similar, no matter how close, in the end, her soul, her element, and her origin were different. No matter how it haunted her dreams now, burned in her mind, in her flesh, in her soul, it did not belong, not really. It was... a loan of sorts. From one weapon to another. A desire to see another take up the dream that he had long cast aside (for he had found reason to take it up once more when he fought himself in that shattered castle for one of the woman he could have loved and to find the faith that he had lost, for he was Shirou Emiya and EMIYA and a Sword and he would never lose to himself) for he could no longer bear it. A desire to see everyone saved.

That was the legacy she had inherited, and Unlimited Blade Works was simply the tool that she would need to fulfill it.

So... this is a thing that happened.

Basically: Ruby Rose is the reincarnation of Counter Guardian EMIYA post the Unlimited Blade Works route, because reasons. If I ever continue this, I'll come up with one. However, unlike in 90% of reincarnation fics, Ruby Rose isn't overriden by EMIYA. She just has bits of his soul hanging around and messing with hers. So she awakened Unlimited Blade Works, but since her element, origin, soul, and distortion aren't a perfect fit, it's just kinda... sitting there, feeding her own mental Armory.

She's never going to develop a true reality marble. It's simply impossible for her. What she can do, however, is replicate the lesser effect (Epic level projection due to mental blueprints) due to her own element and origin getting close enough, and having bits of Counter Guardian EMIYA's soul hanging around in her own. She can try to project stuff from his armory, but until he own one assimilates it, she projects at a 3 rank reduction (meaning nameless blades are impossible, and a normally C rank blade is reduced to the power of a nameless one). Once she assimilates it, the penalty burns away because her own archive has the record.

Also: The personality in this fic (if it gets continued) is mostly going to be Ruby. She'll have traces of EMIYA in her, but frankly, I'd totally buy it being the Canon explanation for her oddly appropriate competence in canon. For example: She has no common sense, but manages to be oddly good at tactics and fighting. I'm sensing the Eye of Mind (True) skill here. :P Anyway, yeah. If this does get continued, it'll be Ruby being Ruby, and then crossover elements happening more and more as she recovers more of EMIYA's magecraft and artifacts, gets noticed by a by-then user of the Kaleidoscope Rin who's like, "Wait a second, is that a girl version of Shirou? Must gather blackmail material!" And then forces a true crossover when Rin drags Shirou and Saber through the Kaleidoscope to chat with her. And then possible antics when Rin decides to add Ruby to her harem. Depending on what direction I (possibly) decide to take this, it's either going to gain the Humor tag or the Drama one. Pretend it gets both, my writing style is weird. Actually, no. Ignore the tags on this. Seriously. My writing just happens, and tags are a thing that doesn't stay accurate.