Chapter 65: The Price of a Dream

After recovery, shirou remembered his past in snippets. He remembers the woman who used to be his mother and the man who used to be his father but both of them are faceless. The scene of the day the Grail war ended was vivid in his mind, the woman woke up the sleeping boy and was coxing him for something.

Then suddenly the thunderous noise echoed and the world was stained red, the man ran to the window and pushed the boy out instructing him to run and not look back. The boy instinctively ran away but when he turned back he saw the world burning, the house he grew up in was no more and his parents were caught in the burning wreck. Shirou and kiritsugu went to the burnt site of his house years back and there he pretended to open the door that didn't exist and pretended to smile at the woman who was now ashes.

(image of Shirou's og mom)

From that day forward he never mentioned them again, whoever the boy was died in that fire. The miracle of the planet, the forever-distant utopia saved the boy but death can't be reversed as the idea of that boy was burnt to ashes and in its place was born Shirou Emiya the son of Kiritsugu Emiya, now who has a single basic desire the desire of survival programed in all of us.

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Time passed by and Shirou's progress in swordsmanship came upon a barrier and following it so did his progress in magrcraft. Shirou`s real talent in swordsmanship was average he is not someone like Miyamoto Musashi but an average man. He was progressing rapidly till now because, during his magecraft practice, he formed a bond with the sword and some of its recent movements became clear in his mind so the mediation was a product of this but still copying could take him to a particular point.

His swordsmanship was mainly defensive focused on some counter-attack, this ticked Taiga off for some reason. Well, taiga`s swordsmanship was offence-centred and she loved to execute a barrage of attacks rather than defend so when her supposed student accrued like a turtle in his style she was irked off.

She made it a point to let the boy know her opinion by complaining a lot but then again she herself said that he should practise in a way that feels the best to him. He could instinctively feel attacks coming at him but most of his attempts at offence were easily thwarted by the female tiger in front of him hence in his mind shirou liked to call the teaching sessions as beating sessions.

December came and another year ended in peace and the next war was coming closer as well. At the new year the emiya, Fujimura and Ryuudou family celebrated the occasion together. This time issei and shirou were sitting together as the older Ryuudou brother had called Taiga to discuss something with her in private and the adults were busy drinking shake. He had invited the Matou siblings as well as Rin to come with them for the festival but all of them declined.rin straight up said that she didn't want to come because of secrecy and things but Sakura politely declined stating their family had some work to do hence shirou didn't wait for an answer from Shinji.

Later that night Rin visited the emiya residence and shirou cooked dinner for the 3 of them. She had pretty much become addicted to the food cooked by shirou, her cooking was horrendous as she had a record of burning her own kitchen numerous times and setting the kitchen at emiya residence on fire when shirou tried to help her learn to cook.

Following this trend, shirou packed 2 lunch boxes for school nowadays. In case he and Rin met he gave her one or else he shared it with Shinji and Issei. This made Rin very much ashamed at first but slowly this became a habit for both of them. Rin`s initial attempts to maintain distance due to Magus's style were all futile now as the both of them had grown very close and were working on a lot of projects together.

She is conflicted about this as this proves her right that magi don't become one by following rules but rather make them after becoming one, but this idea stands against her father's ideal of her becoming an independent pillar in history. She is not an idiot so she had already guessed that kiritsugu was likely a participant in the 4th Grail War and even might be involved in her father`s death but she didn't bring that up deliberately for fear of breaking the current scenario going on. 

A few months later rin`s birthday came and she took a leave of absence from school. Shirou waited for her to come back and then invited her to the emiya residence one night. When the figure of the little girl covered in a white trench coat came to the gate of emiya residence shirou opened the door for her and welcomed her in with a smile containing secrets.

As she stepped into the living room she caught the sight of kiritsugu standing in a corner wearing colourful clothes and a party hat, hw was holding a party popper that he burst as soon as she stepped in and the flakes fell on the girl as soon as she took another step inside.

Looking at the food and cake on the table the girl was stunned for a while as her dead father was not the kind to waste time on this kind of thing and her mother kept silent while following her father. In her eyes, Kiristugu looked like he too shared her dead father's sentiments but unlike her shirou had somehow convinced him to go through with this.

Shirou dragged the stunned Rin to the cake and under the burning candles and the girl was half out of it during the ceremonies. Rin snapped back to her senses when shirou gave her a blade with its seath and handle wrapped in ribbon flowers. She didn't hear any explanation about the sword he gave rather she sprang forward and tackled him into a tight hug.

(image of the sword)

The boy now trained as well as the supplements from the German family fully in effect could easily take a tackle from her, he put the gift back on the table and hugged her back rather than ask questions. With her face on his shoulders, her eyes moistened as she remembered what the fake priest did on her birthday when he sent her a princess dress and pink decoration for her room as well as a set of Disney princess accessories with weird notes and an instruction package for the dress. He also added a note on the box which said 

"Follow the instruction to not set the house on fire."

Then she began crying profusely as she remembered the condition of her mother, the paralysed woman's life was hanging by a thread and they had tried both normal and magi treatment on her. Doctors said that her nerves were severely damaged and her living till now was already a miracle and the priest being the best spiritual healer around said that her soul was already damaged and he could only prolong her life for an uncertain amount of time.

This left her in loneliness as she couldn't see her sister and others at school were just normal people, not someone from the moonlit world and hence different from her. This led to the bond between shirou and her being that strong as both of them got a dependable friend who they could share their complete problems with.

After the emotional moment, rin blushed brightly not unlike her sister. She stuttered during the rest of the time and after dinner, she took off at the 1st chance after thanking the emiya family. 

The sword shirou gave her was a replica of the phosphoric fang but it was far weaker. The formation of the demon blade was a lucky incident and a fluke as shirou tried to replicate the process but he ended up with very inferior blades that applied a curse when activated at the instant of touch rather than being a cursed blade. The difference between both was the amount of mysteries they held the former was a mystic code that applied to a simple magecraft curse that any magus could shrug off while the latter applied the same curse but as a part of a cursed sword wound that would easily hold even on people who have their circuits active.

(A/N: what a fucking headache it was but I finally found a way to allow shirou to use swordsmanship and also a simple way to implement some murderous ways into him. Well and for those who don't know Aoi is alive but completely paralysed so the priest is like a representative of the tohsaka and her resident doctor.

Later when she dies he will be the legal guardian of Rin and start stealing more money than now. Yeah, I also had to include that stupid lack of talent in the swordsmanship in the plot without any plot hole as it had been established that shirou could learn some recent stuff about swords after he made his blade and before that, his combat sense did the heavy work to establish his foundation. This is also the reason why he is a defensive style user as the archer and also the reason for his "eye of mind(False)" skill. I will change this and also give him other styles that he would train in too. I mean when wyrens are just bigger swallows and punches can beat up dragons.

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Thanks for reading :)