Power High

As he smashed his armoured fist into Archer's face, flinging him through the air as he had a number of times over the course of the past few seconds, Aston found his current emotions a bit lacking as compared to what he should have been feeling.

"As it was work, I am certain there were no personal motivations for your actions." He spoke to his assailant calmly as he grabbed him by the throat and spun around to add more momentum when threw him to the skies, "Perhaps it is because I 'get it' or because too long has passed, my hunter."

People would either be enraged or terrified when met with someone who had almost stabbed them to death in the past but Aston only felt mild annoyance at Archer being an obstacle, "Was there truly no other path than wagging your tail to a machine?" The collective subconscious of man was just that as he saw it, and it's dogs even....worse.

With his voice strained by pain and cracked ribs, "I am... the bone of my sword." Archer began his chant, drawing two shortswords from thin air and holding them together to block a fist that would have otherwise increased his altitude even further. He couldn't possibly see a sort of understanding crossing the Lancer's eyes under his helm.

"I see." Aston could only purse his lips at the irony, hadn't he been the same?

How many had he slaughtered and destroyed at the behest of a King that had abandoned his emotions?

"Steel is my body.... ugh.." Archer's arms quivered under the brutal onslaught of strikes they'd begun struggling to block even when supported and empowered by Rin making use of a command seal, "And fire is my blood."

"We're somewhat similar I suppose." Aston chose not to insult his foe any further, grabbing onto a shortsword with his hand and attempting to rip it away from Archer's grip before using the slight opening created to shove his spear through the man's heart.

Or well, at least that was the intention.

Archer forcibly moved aside his torso, only narrowly avoiding the spear piercing through his heart but in doing so, letting Aston rip it out vertically and with it, almost his left arm.

"Unknown to Death, Nor Known To Life."

"If you were a comical hero, I believe you would suffer through pain and barely manage to finish chanting for your phantasm." Aston sighed, forcing Archer's own blood to his throat and smashing his fist into the grey haired man's gut, forcing him to spit it out alongside all the air in his lungs, "But unfortunately, getting such a spotlight is only reserved for a few."

The Lancer felt him and Archer weren't too dissimilar, just that he hadn't been stupid enough to let go of his freedom. They'd served emotionless beings, done some messed up stuff and been labelled accordingly, only that he didn't regret his actions as the man he faced did.

The rapidly intensifying lightning emerging from his armour alarmed Archer but before he could act on it, the dark night sky was lit up once again, this time by raw blue lightning.

Just before Archer completely disappeared from the world once again, he uttered a silent few words to Rin Tohsaka and turned to his former target and current murderer, "Use your own..speed. If anyone can drain a leyline, it's you." Perhaps it was because he wasn't truly living that he could speak even when his lower body had dissipated into the air.

Understanding immediately, Aston gave a short nod of acknowledgement, "I believe we could have been friends." He wasn't a man that asked for much, just companions. Archer appeared to be in dire need of one too.

"Heh.. Maybe." Archer seemed to barely register the brutal mutilated state of his own body and smirked, wondering for a moment if he should ask a knight of the Round Table to knock some sense into his foolish younger self.

*

Smirking wide enough that it appeared as a grin, Medea was every bit of the witch he was portrayed for a singular moment even if only for the sheer malice emanating off her figure, "Splendid." She'd truly been gifted with a winning card, so she believed, "Now come, Lancer! Deal with this brute!"

The growling Heracles didn't appear as the companion he was supposed to be to the Witch of Betrayal but instead as a wall made of muscles that was stopping her from getting what she wanted, a life with her real beloved, "You brute, let's see you overcome this trial."

"A brute? Berserker? I would say you're the brute miss, he doesn't harm innocent strangers." Illya crossed her arms under her non-existent chest, smiling at the thought of victory, "Well, not that those people truly matter."

Their 'conversation' was interrupted by an amused Assassin, "And here I thought Caster would be the one having troubles with her vision considering her choice in fashion." He walked out of the shadows with light, inaudible footsteps, only stopping when he arrived right in the middle of the rather small distance between Caster and Berserker.

The rain, even if light, had made the soil under them wet and muddy, something not one person appreciated even when it served to accent their conflict.

"Little one, do you truly believe yourself to be in a position of superiority?" Sasaki wondered out loud, slightly tilting his head to convey his confusion as he readied himself for any sudden attacks.

"Come now." Medea waved her hand dismissively, refusing to believe such idiocy, "She's still a magus. Being idiots is a job for physical fighters."

With his smirk morphing into a shit-eating grin, Sasaki bored into her eyes, "I had the impression your 'beloved' was a physical fighter as well."

He forgot to account for Medea's sensitivity combined with her current power high and found himself flying through the air with a hole in his chest as soon as he finished his sentence, "Well this is... certainly mature." He coughed blood, wheezing in a subdued manner, "Me and my... mouth."

"Trash." Medea turned her ahead away, he was just weak baggage that refused to obey commands, living off the magical energy from the leyline underneath them. With Lancer's mental state in tatters, possibly gone, he was but a pawn for her to employ with the command seals, "This is what I get for being nice." She shook her head in disappointment, unamused.

Her bounded fields being destroyed didn't mean that the very soil under their feet was infested with HER magecraft, nor did it remove the multitudes of trigger spells placed all over the mountain. It also didn't negate the fact that she had enough magical energy to use spells that bordered the territory of True Magic.

Medea snapped her fingers with a smirk, blowing away Berserker, "For one, I fail to see how this day could possibly go wrong."

Unfortunately, she forgot that Murphy was a motherfucker.

* * *

Feedback?

Is it just me or have most newly released anime been trash? It's to the point where I've stopped watching most even if recorded.

*

You can find up to 7 chapters ahead at patre0n.com/bleap

Finally, I've ended this fucking arc (though you could argue I didn't do an amazing job of it.) but hey, at least I get to begin the Camelot arc now, hyped for that.