FATE/Probability

Chapter 69: Chapter 66: The Price of a Dream (2)



Still, shirou could do this because of his lineage from both technique and blood originating from the same source. The conceptual weight of a direct disciple and a blood relative is pretty similar hence magus families combine both to maximise their ability in one direction, hoping for the achievement of magic in their lineage.

Shirou instinctively knew that he could create replicas of phosphoric fang but he was missing something, and what that something was he didn't know. So finally leaving the problem up to time to fix he went along with his days. The atmosphere at the school was heating up as the term exams were coming nearer, and all students were increasing their focus on academics.

 The whole week was free for shirou as Tatsuo spontaneously left one day, after ending the class he said to the boy 

"I have taught you all I can and I have nothing more to teach you. Your talent far eclipses mine in this field and I hope you will achieve the height you seek and forge the blade of your desire."

"Take this as a gift and let this be our parting, don't worry I have done all the paperwork for you to get a master swordsmith certificate. Officially it needs a minimum of 5 years of apprenticeship under another master smith before you can take the exam to be a qualified smith."

He tossed a ball of crumpled paper at his and promptly walked towards the door as he said 

"In 2 years the people from the related department should contact you, and then you are on your own. As for when you can polish your craft and become a master smith is up to you."

Shirou opened the ball of paper and inside it was a small bronze bell. It looked like a Buddhist or Shinto prayer bell and the paper had some scribblings on them. The paper said that the bell was a mystic code that sensed the presence of bounded fields and notifies its owner by chiming. The intensity of the chiming shows the intensity of the bounded field encountered. The function of this mystic code is very basic but this is also what makes it effective as the simplicity makes it very hard to mislead.

Shirou noted that Kiritsugu`s spontaneous training plans had decreased in frequency and their extremity had significantly dropped. Before the exam, the emiya family took a trip to London to meet Melvin and finally transfer all of the crest to shirou. When they reached the tunner they were disappointed as Melvin said that Shirou's body was not in the perfect condition to receive the crest as it was still treating the crest as something not a part of itself.

The older man kicked his son out of the room claiming he had some serious discussion to do with Melvin and closed the door. As both men sat down, the room was filled with a curious silence. Melvin picked up a bottle of red wine poured himself a glass and offered another glass to kiritsugu who just shook his head, seeing this Melvin pulled out a glossy black cigarette case and slid it open revealing a collection of about a dozen cigarette sticks from 6 famous brands. 

The ex-mercenary reached out his hand with practised ease clearly revealing that the pair of men were habituated to this action. As he took a stick instead of lighting it up, kiritsugu hesitated and put it down on the table and rather pulled out a pack of dragon smoke cigarettes from a pocket on the inside of his coat.

( images of cigarette )

He fondly stroked the packet which had some sticks missing and pulled one out. The tunner curiously watched the magus killer smoking a different cigarette, when the word from the man`s mouth echoed from behind the haze of white second-hand smoke. He said 

"I can only hold on for about a year at most."

"Don't lie to yourself, as long as your will is strong enough you can easily hold on for another few years with the remaining piece of the crest and if I transfer the remaining parts back from your son then you can live for more. Your body can survive for about a decade if you discount the bedridden condition."

Suddenly he paused as he inhaled the second-hand smoke of the cigarette his eyes bulged and he swiftly covered his face with a handkerchief.

"Cough! Cough! What the *bleurgh* FUCK! Is this stuff?"

Saying this Melvin removed the handkerchief and threw it away as he pulled out another one from the same pocket. The cloth he threw away moved in a parabolic path leaking red droplets, which were indistinguishable if they were red wine, blood or a mixture of both.

With his eyes clouded with emotion kiritsugu caressed the cigarette as he remembered the one who gave them to him and spoke 

"Dragon smoke is their name and they are not produced anymore."

"It's a natural course of action for them to stop as if their product remaining smoke smells this vile i can't imagine its taste. You are abnormal for even smoking them," said Melvin.

After this kiritsugu explained that these were not about taste but he had some memories related to them and who gave them to him. After Melvin`s repeated pestering kiritsugu revealed that these were made by a lone craftsman in the southeastern part of the world, who made these as a kind of experiment hence there existed only 1 crate of these. The whole crate was bought by a woman suspected to be a magus and hence these became pretty rare. This case is more of a memory for him rather than an indulgence, gradually they remembered that they were getting sidetracked and Melvin brought them back to the topic.

"The problem is your mind, Kiri! You don't want to live anymore as now you feel that the boy is trained enough," said Melvin sharply with an unsettling slight smile on his face that he didn't realise.

The magus killer just nodded his head and said 

"I know it better than you, but I can't take it anymore. As you promised all those years back take out this final piece and transplant it onto shirou when his body is prepared"

Both the men talked and kiritsugu left the tunner with 2 sealed suitcases. Melvin watched the man leave and felt complex emotions watching his back. For him Emiya Kiritsugu had stopped being a simple client and had become a friend hence he will take the promises very seriously, but on the other hand watching kiritsugu fail the bet of his life and wither away made him feel giddy with excitement. Taking a last look at the father and son pair he thought 

Shirou was unaware of the sightly mentally ill side of his elder brother figure Melvin and they went back to Japan. Shirou firmly encountered Bottle next in most of his skills hence after he talked about it to Taiga in an indirect way she said that he should try something else of equal importance and then come back again with a fresher perspective. Their lessons are now suspended but her tuition under kiritsugu has reached an all-time high as she was about to graduate from high school and was about to begin her life in earnest. 

She wanted to be a teacher rather than run her family business. Life is ironic sometimes as a yakuza princess was inspired to become a teacher due to a bounty hunter who had the blood of 100s on his hands. Taking her advice to heart shirou just did the minimum of practice and approached Rin about this problem after one of their spars.

After contemplating his problem for some time she said,

"Your most glaring problem is your lack of mana, normally confrontations end quickly so it's not a big problem most of the time but can be a handicap in prolonged battles. Second, is your lack of ranged attacks, bullets are effective as an ambush but prepared magi can take cover and nullify your advantage."

Rin`s concerns were true as shirou was more of a frontline fighter than an ambush camper. Then again Shirou's target was to fight competent fighters and servants who likely had climbed out of plies of corpses not pompous and arrogant researchers who think they can fight like his father. 

(A/N: and the chapter ends. For those who do not know about the cigarettes, it's the same one as the one Touko smokes, and yep she is the one who took the crate. Then there is the power level of Kiri and it's like he is a glass cannon in terms of magecraft, he is like an ambush predator. If he got you 1st you are fucked and your coming generations are likely fucked too and your ancestors too as their work literally just went down the drain.

Kiri is no match for an actually capable magus who knows how to fight. Then there is stuff like dead apostles, the church, atlas alchemists and witches, werewolves and other phantasmal so no following Daddy plus the archery shirou uses is special which is why he never misses and is either blocked or dodged.

I have decided to add some Chinese sword philosophy as that's the way we can have good swordsmanship as the theory of the sword being your companion doesn't increase the average swordsmanship of MC. So sword-man unity it is.

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THANKS FOR READING:)


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