"What the hell are you two doing, fighting like an Enforcer?!" Olga-Marie flicks Kana on the nose, the girl smarting as she falls back into the burnt couch. "You are a Master! Leave the fighting for your Servants! They can't do anything if you aren't around, idiot!"

"Oh please Rits could have taken care of her, and he did! And I could have sworded her anyways."

"You did and you failed." She pinches her on the nose. "And why swords? Are you some sort of idiot? That would never work!"

"Sue… me… It's my affinity…"

"What?!"

The Caster Servant chuckles as the girls bicker before turning back to Ritsuka. "So, Chaldea was it? You're supposed to be protecting the timestream or something?"

"Resolving a snarl in history, yes," Ritsuka nods. "Apparently, what happened here will cause the end of the world in about 20 years."

"Ah," Caster nods. "Well, I can see why. Everything on this planet is dead except for us Servants, and you four I guess. The Grail is corrupted, and when it spilled it corrupted everything it touched. I managed to stay out of it, but everything else?" He points over his shoulder, at the crater where Lancer was. "Well, they went crazy."

Ritsuka nods. "I heard that the Holy Grail in Fuyuki was corrupted by Angra Mainyu, and it nearly overflowed at the end of the Fifth War... I guess this would be the result."

"Yeah, probably. Mud's basically a curse, except it's so strong it's materialised itself. Won't advise you kids touching it too, but for different reasons." Caster stands up, his staff over his shoulders. "Well kid, I've got a proposition. Make a contract with me and I help you deal with this nonsense."

"Done," Ritsuka says. He extends his hand, and the two men shake. "The contract is sealed. I am your Master."

"Nice," the Casters says with a wide grin. "Well, for safety reasons I'll hold onto my name. Anyways, that girl with the shield. Something's off about her."

"I'm a Demi-Servant," Mashu says as she walks over. She nods to Caster lightly. "Nice to meet you, Caster, I'm Shielder. Or, I should be..." She glances at Ritsuka, who nods at her. "...Well, the truth is I don't know my Noble Phantasm."

"Mmhm," Caster nods, "That is a problem. There isn't a Heroic Spirit that doesn't have something to call a Noble Phantasm. Even the ones without a proper ranked one have a sort of trump card; otherwise it's just a matter of who has the better stats, and that's boring."

"Wait, but I thought some Heroic Spirits were too young, or simply don't have the strength to have a true crystalisation of their legend?" Ritsuka asks, arms crossed.

"Eh, it's a trump card either way, fancy unique skill or some other crap. It's a game changer, it's a Noble Phantasm. Simple."

"...That's not how it-"

"In any case, the girl should have a Noble Phantasm, but doesn't!" Caster shrugs and pats her shield lightly. "Well, girl, this seems like a personal problem."

Mashu nods, but her expression turns downcast. "I expected as much," she says quietly. "I will have to find the identity of this Hero then."

Caster just looks at her with a wry smirk. He glances quickly to Ritsuka. "Hey, we should get going. I imagine Berserker's probably heard the commotion here already, and we do not want to be around him. We'll talk and walk."

"So, who can we expect to run into?"

"Hm..." Caster scratches his chin as the party heads on, walking through the woods to avoid further skeleton packs, the restless dead a certain magnet for hostile Servants. "...Well, Lancer's dead, and Rider died early in the War. Assassin won't bother us with me around, and Berserker is way on the other side of town... Which leaves Saber and Archer."

Ritsuka feels a lump form in his throat and swallows it down. From what he remembers of the stories, Lancer was someone else anyways... So surely, there are other differences too. "Where are they?"

"They're holed up in the mountain you say the Greater Grail is, which simplifies things if you think of it that way," Caster adds, shrugging with his palms up. Ritsuka laments his luck, but his expression remains impassionate. "We'll see when we get there, right?"

"Right," Kana interjects, "But do you know what they're like, how they fight, who they are, yadda yadda yadda?"

Caster shakes his head. "Unfortunately, since I'm a Caster in this War, I don't get to go out and fight like I'd be doing if I got half a chance. Didn't run into Saber after this nonsense, either, but Archer is an asshole who snipes from afar. Takes shots at me constantly, the asshole."

Ritsuka and Kana share a look. Well, that's a horrifying thought.

"Well, they never hit me anyways, but it's still ridiculous. Real men fight face to face!" Caster flexes an arm for emphasis. His muscles bulge. You could crush cans with those. "Look at me! I'm a Caster, but I'm still all for fighting in melee!"

Kana gives Ritsuka a sly smirk. Ritsuka scoffs. "Excuse me, Guda, I know martial arts!"

"And I know that and swordfights," Kana preens. "But, you know, go ahead and be a girly-girl with your magic and all~"

"And you go ahead and be a gorilla with a jiggly body."

She glares at him and hugs her chest tightly. "Too far, bro."

"Sorry," Ritsuka coughs.

Caster laughs, clapping them both on the shoulder. "Don't be ashamed of it, girl! Be both! Your Shielder is fairly curvy herself, but she's quite the fighter too!"

"Please don't mention it," Mashu says evenly, her eyes hard and cheeks red.

"Are you some sort of sexual predator?" Olga-Marie asks bitterly, to no avail. Caster just laughs.

"And then my master, man what a body," Caster says with a nostalgic smirk. "Demon woman, but what a body. Though, heh, let me tell you, my wife? Beautiful. Fairest lady in the land! I've got bad luck with women but man is it worth it sometimes." Caster sighs, and then his levity dies. "We're almost at the base of the mountain. Get ready."

The mouth to the Greater Grail is an unassuming cave mouth, well hidden in the foliage even after the end of the world. The trees are dying around it, but the cave is still protected. The Bounded Field that guards it is still active, after all.

Ritsuka breaks it quickly, with a single glistening blue gem. It explodes loudly, and a dome of invisible air around the entrance cracks and shatters like glass. The sound is lamentable, but they have to move quickly. Saber likely protects the Greater Grail... But she will see them coming anyways. She was always a little bullshit like that.

"Let's go!" Ritsuka shouts, his legs pumping under him. But then the world shifts. He feels his balance lurch to the side, just a bit, enough to send him falling over. He catches himself, feeling the world was different for just a moment.

And then the world snapped back together, and around them there was nothing but weeping earth, shedding molten red tears.

"What the fu-" He turns around, and finds Caster on his knees, one arm holding himself upright on his staff, the other arm a blackened stump. "CASTER!"

"Hey, relax," Caster smirks, waving him off with his stump arm. "Ah, damn... I thought I was prepared but still... Heh, how careless. That cheeky bastard still had more tricks up his sleeve, huh?"

"Caster!" Kana cries out. "Rits, do something about the-"

"Don't worry about me, just go!" Caster rises to his feet, drawing runes with his stump arm. Light and pressure wrap around him, holding him aloft. "I'll catch up in a bit. Just have to deal with a bastard with a bow." He looks over his shoulder, flashing a confident grin. "I wouldn't be much of a hero if losing an arm stopped me from kicking some guy's ass, would I?"

Ritsuka tries to say something, but Caster is already off like a rocket. Bolstered by rune magic, he is faster than anything Ritsuka has ever seen. Faster than even her.

Even her...

He looks to Kana, his expression grim. "Let's hope it's someone else," he says.

"I'll try," Kana sighs. She holds out her hand, and calls an english longsword of meteoric iron into existence. "I wish I brought Asriel along, bluh."

"...Still can't believe you named your Azoth Blade."

"Huh? You didn't?"

Ritsuka covers his face and sighs. "Nevermind. I'm low on gems and we're low on time. Director, try not to get caught up."

"Are you implying something, Tohsaka," Olga-Marie asks, smirking. "I'm going to discipline you when we get back."

Ritsuka shrugs. He looks at his Demi-Servant, the girl standing strong and confident despite everything. "Let's go, Mashu!"

"Yes!"

They arrived at the great cavern of the Greater Grail soon enough. Ritsuka had never seen it in his life - as he understood it the Grail was dismantled around when he was six - but he heard stories of it when he was younger. It was a massive structure, so tall that you couldn't see the ceiling no matter how good your eyesight was. And it was long and wide, too, almost big enough to build a town in. To a younger Ritsuka, it seemed like an excessive waste of space. Knowing what he does now, it is a miracle that the Einzberns, Makiris and Tohsakas were able to fit it into such a small space.

"This is…" Olga-Marie gasps, "...The Holy Grail?"

And all this time, he hoped beyond hope, dreaded with every step, at what would be waiting for them. He and Kana heard about the Fifth Holy Grail War, of course. Their parents lived it. It defined them for the rest of their lives. They were never told much of the details, but they knew about the seven Servants that fought in it, the seven Heroes that inhabited each of the classes. General descriptions, basic ideas of their legend, physical features that would be useful to remember. He always knew to be wary of people with gold hair and red eyes, for instance.

It was why when he saw Lancer and Caster, Ritsuka was actually a bit overjoyed. Being turned to stone is not fun, of course. He would rather never do that ever again in the history of Fuck That Shit, but what it meant to have Lancer petrifying him instead of Rider meant a great deal to him.

It meant that this war was different. Singularity F wasn't literally his past, the days before he and Kana were born, when their parents were teenagers caught up in a war neither of them were ready for. It was something else. It was something he could detach himself from. And more importantly, it meant Saber could be anyone. Literally anyone at all.

Anyone but her.

"Oh-ho?"

But when they came to the cavern, and saw Saber standing atop the cliff, his hopes were dashed. Kana's too; her expression was as crushed as crushed could get. Her hair was golden-spun, her skin pale as death. Her armor seemed to grow into her, metal veins creeping around her jawline and over her cheeks, turning into red veins. Her pale yellow eyes were bitter and ruthless and devoid of compassion. Her features were as delicate as he remembered, doll-like and delicate. Cute, even, if he could bring himself to call her cute.

It was her. Changed. Corrupted by the mud Caster mentioned. But it was her. The black sword she wields is proof enough.

"Ritsuka-senpai…" Mashu trails off. She shakes her head and stands at the head of their pack. "Get behind me, Master. I'll deal with her."

"Don't!" Olga-Marie says, her voice short. "You won't last against her! That sword in her hands… That's-"

"Excalibur, the Sword of Promised Victory," Kana says, her voice flat. Olga-Marie looks at her, surprised she could tell with but a glance. But of course they could; the two of them saw it so often when they were little. "It changes nothing, Director. We fight."

"Trust me, Mashu," Ritsuka says. Kana is right. It changes nothing. The fate of the world is at stake. It doesn't matter who they have to fight, they will resolve this Singularity.

"So you know who I am," the fallen King Arthur intones, her face emotionless but her voice rumbling with barely-contained fury. She raises her sword, the demon blade hazy with power. Unhampered by a human Master, the full might of the King of Knights is bared for the world to see. A dragon in human guise, in awesome strength and majesty. "It matters not. Is your shield true, girl?"

"I won't let you touch them," Mashu snaps back, her voice a low growl.

"I did not ask for an answer," Saber snaps. Her sword becomes a black cross, a blazing tempest that will blow the world away. Ritsuka fumbles for his gems, and finds only two left. Damn, damn, damn! It won't be enough! "Prove it to me! EXCALIBUR-"

"Get behind me!" Mashu shouts. She plants her shield into the ground, the heavy thud soundless before the roar of a dragon. Ritsuka crouches behind her, behind the bulk of the shield, even though he knows it will not stop her. The Sword of Promised Victory is a weapon of mass destruction. An Anti-Fortress Noble Phantasm, something used to break nations in a single stroke - and highly ranked at that. Nothing can stand before it.

But he believes in her in spite of that simple fact. Ritsuka puts his faith into the small body before him.

"By my Command Seal, Mashu, protect us," he whispers, and another red brand burns itself from his hand. "And do your best," he adds. His last Command Seal fades in a burst of Authority. Ritsuka closes his eyes, and doesn't seem to notice the pale glow that has settled over the Demi-Servant.

"-MORGAN!"

The wind comes. The fortress breaker is swung.

The black storm swallows the world.

"Well, girl, this seems like a personal problem."

In that instant, when Excalibur Morgan is swung, Mashu Kyrielight realises what Caster's words meant.

The identity of that Hero is irrelevant. His power is now her power. To become worthy of it, she must delve within herself. To find meaning for herself.

And within herself is the shield that protects the world.

"You… won't… BREAK ME!"

A dome of energy expands from her shield, as tall and wide as a castle wall. Clear and dazzling, she sees the storm come - and she meets it head on. The sword they call the Strongest crashes against her barrier like a punch to the gut. It knocks the air out of her lungs, threatens to make her black out. It is like getting hit by a train after running headfirst towards the light at the end of the tunnel.

But she does not bend. Her shield stands tall. She is Demi-Servant Shielder, but even half a Servant could never abandon those who stand behind her, who rely on her, who believe in her! She will defend them to the end of days, if it comes to that! They will not die by Saber's hand this day!

The wind ends. Colour returns to the world. And Mashu remains standing, her shoulders slump, her shield heavy, her chest burning and gasping for air. But standing all the same.

And Saber stands tall, none the worse for wear - and still burning with the majesty of a dragon in all her glory. "So you bear that shield," she says contemptuously. "No matter. How many times can you weather death? Once? Twice?" She raises her sword again, Excalibur once more burning black with darkness. "Will my blade break your shield? Or will your shield hold back the darkness? Show me and die."

"Mashu!" Kana cries out, voice cracking with emotion. "By my Command Seal, KICK HER ASS!"

The Shielder moves, seized by an inviolable order. She moves with incredible speed, closing the distance with Saber. With a rising cry she slams the face of her shield into Saber, ending the next invocation of the black storm before it comes again. Ritsuka and Kana follow after her at superhuman speed, arms and legs blazing with green.

Saber forces Shielder back with a headbutt and a slash from below, then throws a blazing black fist at her to widen the gap. Mashu catches it immediately, the shockwave splitting a gap in the ground beneath her shield. They continue to clash, their dangerous dance ringing and crashing with every punch and swing.

Kana, always the more fit of the two, arrives first, eight seconds and thirty blows after. She arrives with a leap, a battlecry on her lips as she throws an overhead swing at Saber's head. Saber bats the girl's longsword aside with Excalibur and nearly splits her head on the backswing, but Ritsuka charges in from below. His fists are green and clenched, hardened by continued practice.

Saber swings at him instead, momentum carried seamlessly as if she planned it all along. Even as his punch turns into a spin as he bends lower beneath her slash, the King of Knights compensates flawlessly. Only the ends of Mashu's crossed shield keep Ritsuka's head intact - and then he connects his blow.

All the force in his body, channeled from his legs and back and every major muscle group, directed with focus achieved only through tireless training in chinese martial arts, is driven through Ritsuka's elbow and slams into Saber's lower abdomen, below her metal cuirass. His bones shatter from the force. Humans of this era should not strike like thunderbolts. Ritsuka Tohsaka roars through the arm-shattering pain and completes the strike. This battle is do or die: an arm is an easy price to pay!

Saber Alter gags as she is hurt for the first time in ages. Organs pulped, flesh shredded, everything gets violently shaken apart by the strike like a god's blow. She has few options, bent over with pain as she is. Her sword is still locked in by Shielder, and the force is enough to have briefly lifted her up off the ground.

Saber counterattacks anyway by driving her off-hand into the side of Ritsuka's head. Already numb with pain from his mangled arm, the Master cannot even try to block. He collapses like an unsteady bookshelf as she hits the ground further back, breathing heavily as her lower intestines regenerate from the fatal wound. Even in such a state, it is trivial to parry all of Kana's follow up swings, and Saber Alter easily sends her flying as well with a burst of mana.

In all of twelve seconds, Saber Alter has the advantage again. She raises Excalibur, and it burns as a black cross to herald the storm. "Valiant, but futile," she scowls. "This is your limit, Chaldea."

"I beg to differ!"

Saber's attention shifts immediately as her instincts howl, warning of a new threat. She looks to the entrance, watching for a man in blue. Even he cannot cross the cavern in a single bound.

Her instincts scream again, a second too late thanks to the fury that clouds them. She feels the head of Caster's staff pressing up against her chin, burning where the wood touches her armor. Too late, she realises that the man teleported here, through the rune he placed upon the Shield - but when?

"Sorry about this, Saber," Caster says with a cocky grin, a trail of blood leaking out a corner. "We'll have an actual match next time. The one who destroys - WICKER MAN!"

The staff grabs her by the chin. Or, rather, the world grabs her whole. She feels heat, burning heat and crushing pressure all around her as a wooden claw grabs her and balls her up. Saber resists against the wooden doll, but it tosses her into the cage in its chest quickly, and detonates without a moment of fanfare. The fireball is large enough to pierce the roof of the cavern.

She rises as the dust settles, the wooden doll fading back into mana by the crackle-pop of its own flames. Her broken and mangled limbs regenerate from fatal wounds with speed, her fingers still gripping onto the black sword through sheer will alone. Given time, minutes at most, she will be whole again, and they will be dead.

Caster is upon her immediately.

She dies quickly, speared through the heart with the base of a wooden staff, tipped by a runic spearhead. What a shameful, juvenile mistake she made. It was a technique after all.

Her spiritual cores broken and death imminent, in her last moments, Saber Alter smiles, lamenting her lonely death once again.

Saber Alter fades into mana soon enough, right as Caster falls to his knees, his spear clattering to the ground and fading immediately. He coughs as Ritsuka and Kana run up to him, and he looks disdainfully at the red staining his palm as he draws his hand away. "Dammit, this is disgraceful… Coughing blood is so cliche…"

Ritsuka looks at him in bemused horror despite his own injuries, not sure if he should even laugh. Caster is a mess. His arm is still a charred ruin, and now he can see a hole through his chest where a heart would be. Caster is missing one of his spiritual cores, and is due to fade soon. The man forces himself to stand and turns around, revealing the gap in his belly where his entrails are hanging out. Caster looks down and tries to cover it up with a hand, to no avail.

"Sorry about that, kids," Caster says with an unapologetic smile. "By the way, do any of you know where a big boulder is? I could try that trick again, but this time with my ribs as bracing."

This time Kana barks a laugh, one she quickly stifles by covering her mouth. Ritsuka shakes his head. "Caster, I can heal you. Hold still, I just-"

He shakes his head. Caster puts his hands on Ritsuka and Kana's heads. They are cold and dead. "Summon me as Lancer next time, yeah?" He says softly, with a smile. "That asshole with the bow won't be so cocky the next time I see him if I have that…"

Caster dies standing up, wearing a smile on his face. He fades, still smiling, having once more surpassed his legend.

Olga-Marie catches up with them soon, panting heavily. "Seriously, what the hell… You are both idiots!"

She chops both Ritsuka and Kana on the head, but the two are too tired to even bother. The Director sighs and shakes her head. "Whatever, it's done," she says, as she casts a spell that binds Ritsuka's arm against his chest like a sling and immediately begins the healing process. Olga-Marie smiles at the two of them, sincerely and appreciatively. "Good work, the two of you. Saber is dead by your hands."

Kana shakes her head. "Caster did it, not us… She would have wiped us out without him."

"But you bought him time, didn't you? Just accept my praise and get on with it already." Olga-Marie clicks her tongue and then turns to Mashu. "And you… I see you've managed to use your Noble Phantasm! Did you learn of the Heroic Spirit that gave you his powers?"

Mashu shakes her head. "Sorry, Director… But when she swung Excalibur Morgan at us, I just… knew."

Olga-Marie shrugs. "Well, there was always the risk. I'll just have to think of a cool name for it instead!" She looks in the corner of her eye. "How about… Lord Chaldeas?"

"That's stupid," Kana reflexively says, and earns another chop on the head.

Mashu looks at her shield, smiling. "Lord Chaldeas… Thank you, Director! I'll cherish it!"

"You don't have to use if you don't like it, you know? It's just an example!"

"I think it's a nice name," Ritsuka says quietly. "You know… If anyone cares."

Mashu looks down, and then nods again. "I like the example, Director. Lord Chaldeas it is."

Olga-Marie sighs and shrugs. "Well, I guess if you're okay with it… Let's pick up the grail and-"

She trails off, as clapping echoes throughout the cavern. A looming presence walks up to the edge of the cliff where the Greater Grail rests, a man in green who wears a top hat.

"My," Professor Lev Lainur says, his body backlit by the Grail, "I never thought you would all get this far."

"...Then he said some crap, flung Olga-Marie into the sun, told us we sucked, and then fucked off. Then we got back to Chaldea, Dr. Roman told us about the Grand Order, the seven Singularities that we have to resolve to save mankind, and asked us to shoulder the burden to save mankind." Ritsuka Tohsaka pauses to take a sip of his tea, and then leans back into his chair with a sigh. "And that's about everything that happened. I'll tell you about France afterwards." He smiles lightly. "Any questions?"

Arturia Pendragon, Once and Future King of Britain, nods at him with stars in her eyes. "I have a question, Ritsuka!"

"Yes, Aunt Arturia?"

"Do you think you'll ever see Saber again?" She asks, a wide grin on her face. "I mean, you and Kana seemed to know her from sometime before, and I want to know more about your relationship!" She cups her face, rocking from side to side like a lovesick teenager. "I mean, this mystery… It's so interesting! I need to know it gets resolved, Ritsuka!"

Ritsuka looks flatly at her, like she is for real.

"...Saber," Cu says blandly beside her, "Are you for real right now?"

Arturia gives him a dirty look, scoffing at his uncouthness. "Have you no sense of romanticism, Lancer? Even if it is unlikely they will meet again, I can dream!"

"...No, Aunt Arturia," Ritsuka says dryly, as dead as the dead sea, "I have never seen Saber since, and I doubt any of us will ever see her again."

Arturia wilts, even her stubborn reverse scale atop her head faltering. "I suppose we can't be so fortunate," the King of Knights sighs. She pumps her fists and energises herself. "Still, Ritsuka! I believe you will meet her again! Fate has a way with these things, you know?"

"...Yeah," Ritsuka nods, talking to the woman in question, "I'm sure it does."

"Indeed, Ritsuka! Indeed."

She nods happily to herself, picks up her tea, and takes a long drink from it. Arturia Pendragon remains blissfully unaware of how literally everyone in the same room is looking at her oddly, like they're waiting for the other boot to drop.

She lowers her cup, sighs in satisfaction, and holds it out. "Another, please." Arturia looks around and frowns. "Why are all of you looking at me like this? Is it because I'm a Saber as well?"

Ritsuka sighs. "Aunt Arturia, the Saber we met was you."

Arturia looks at him. She looks inside her teacup. She looks at each of the servants seated around the lounge, from Cu to EMIYA to Medea and even Herakles. She looks at Ritsuka again. "You lost me."