From Fake Dreams

1

He dreamed of that man again that night. The man that he condemned with his childish dreams moments before his own death. He watched that man's story once more unfold before him. Growing up stern and tall, faithfully following the dreams that he inherited from his father without question.

He watched as the man, as a teen fought and learned, pushing his way forward to help others without asking for anything in return. His friends and loved ones, who could not see things the way he did abandoned him as time went on, but he did not falter forging his path to become a hero, helping and saving everyone that was within his sight, not once truly valuing himself.
'Was it so wrong?' The man often thought to himself as people distance themselves from him. 'No... there is nothing wrong about wanting to help others...'
Yet before long he was alone. His selfless deeds were deemed too suspicious by the world. Surely a man who constantly put himself in such danger so frequently had some agenda. No sane man would be that selfless...
But the watcher and the dreaming hero both knew that he was... for the hero in this story was an empty human. He could find no sense of happiness from within. His only joy came from helping others.
So much was his love that the man had... after arriving at the scene of destruction that could only have been caused by some sick accident... made a deal with Alaya, the spirit of Humanity. In return for becoming a counter guardian and protecting the planet after his death, the lives of the 100 odd victims would be saved and restored...
If only he had known what he had truly condemned himself to at that time... for counter guardians were mere clean up spirits, summoned when the earth was on the verge of destruction and required a massive overwhelming force in order to counteract the threat. They were the cure...
And humans were often the disease. Time and time again after he was betrayed and murdered by one of the people he saved and put to death, the man's spirit was called to commit genocide against humanity. Guilty and innocent, man, woman, and child... so long as they were somehow involved, all who came across him were eventually put down in order to somehow protect humanity as a whole. He could not control his actions for his spirit now belonged to Gaia... all he could do was watch as his beliefs slowly eroded away, washed in the blood of those he had murdered until he became cold and bitter... desperate to escape the hell that he had condemned himself to unknowingly...
Despite the fact that the odds of it happening were borderline nonexistent... he deduced the only possible way to save himself...
Kiritsugu woke up to Shirou constantly nudging him with his foot. "Come on. Wake up already old man. I need someone to calm Fuji-nee down while I cook." The boy sighed.
"I'm up. I'm up." Kiritsugu grunted as he slowly picked himself up. "Taiga's here already?"
The boy pouted. "Already? She got here late if anything. You slept in again."
For good reason too... The man mentally commented as he rubbed his eyes. "I see. I'll be out in a moment, just... go ahead."
The boy sighed before walking outside the room again. "Please hurry up dad... you know how Fuji-nee gets when she's hungry and bored."
"Don't tempt me to take longer Shirou." The father laughed lightly as he waited for Shirou to get far enough away for him to do his next few tasks in private.
When the coast was clear, Kiritsugu reached for the notebook, which had evolved from that single piece of paper, from underneath one of the tatami mats in his room. It had been 3 weeks since the dreams started, and even though they occurred roughly every 2-4 nights the man had already discovered and deduced an extremely significant amount of information.
He determined that he was watching roughly 4 different potential routes of the 5th war. The first 3 were focused from Shirou's perspective... though on occasion he saw possible decisions or actions made in those 3 routes that ended in his son's rather unpleasant demise. It was fairly amusing... and disturbing to him when he realized that each of these 3 routes involved the boy... getting familiar with a different female, especially when he realized that one was his old servant Saber, and the other two were the daughters of Tohsaka... he could dwell on his son's potential love life later...
The 4th route however intrigued and terrified the man to no end. It did not cover the time of the war itself, but what happened afterwards. After this night's previous dream, he had no doubt that the enigmatic Archer of the new war was indeed a potential future of the boy he was taking care of. A counter guardian with the potential to be a heroic spirit in this day and age where heroic spirits were all but an impossibility... he didn't know whether to cry for joy or for remorse at what his son had become. To possess so much potential...
He shook his head as he continued to write his notes down. He had after a few dreams managed to train himself somehow into retaining all the random information he got while sleeping, and the results were not disappointing in the least.
He now knew how to train Shirou when it came to his offensive magic, and he learned a few other things about the boy in the process as well. His future method of projection and analyzing the structure of objects... Tracing... was in his own words absurd and brilliant. Because in his dreams the boy had focused on nothing but training in structural grasp and reinforcement for so long, he had developed his own advanced form of projection that was borderline sorcery if a real magus actually took the time to look at it. Being able to make borderline perfect copies just by looking at the original...
Other than Shirou's immediate combat potential, Kiritsugu learned some other things as well. Shirou's origin and element for example, were both 'sword'... which probably explains all the sword fighting and creating he had seen, yet he was unnaturally skilled in archery as well. He had made a mental note to have the boy train in both as soon as he could... preferably using Taiga as his trainer when it came to the bladed weapons.
The girl was downright relentless...
Shirou also had a surprisingly strong sensitivity for nearby magic. Most mages experienced this 6th sense by substituting it into one of their basic 5 sense in a way, most commonly by touch or by sight. Shirou on the other hand was able to "smell" nearby sources of prana to such a degree that Kiritsugu had on more than one occasion claimed the boy was part dog. The assassin was already thinking of training methods he could use to enhance the boy's skill with his senses in order to work with it more efficiently and quickly in times of danger.
In the mean time though, Kiritsugu had decided for the boy to focus on his strongest basic which while initially useless, enabled the boy in the future to use his greatest strengths... tracing. Time and time again he made the boy scan and analyze random objects to see how they worked. Washing machines, chairs, beams, computers, food. Every time he told the boy to look for their purpose and what they went through. For objects that had mechanical and electrical components, he told the boy to see how they worked and look for the parts that were wrong, even for the things that the child clearly had no idea on how they functioned or what their purpose was. These objects worked best for the boy's training since they had the most complicated internal properties, components, and purposes compared to others.
The boy was getting better with each passing day... he was no genius, far from it, however it was simply as if Shirou had been trying to figure out how to do those things in the first place and what and Kiritsugu was pointing him in the right direction. This was after all, the only spell the child could perform before he found out he had been making his circuits wrong after all so there was of course some proficiency shown in the spell already.
The Magus Killer was not a scientist by any means, however he did managed to scrape up a theory as to how Shirou managed to obtain the ability to copy any close ranged weapon he desired near perfectly just by looking at it. It had... in part, have to do with his other self not knowing how to use his magic circuit. By limiting himself only to 'tracing' and grasping the structure and properties of everyday items for almost 10 years, the boy had enhanced his ability to perceive and analyze physical objects to inhumane levels, going beyond the physical and enabling him to grasp history as well as intentional and mystical purposes and processes just as easily. While this alone was not truly something to brag about to the clock tower, when combined with his element and origin of 'sword', an unexpected phenomenon occurred at some point. Said phenomenon was that the boy somehow manages to subconsciously trace and store the data of anything that can fall even vaguely under the category of 'sword' without using any prana at all. This included axes, lances, pretty much any sort of short ranged weapon. His dreams indicated that barriers and shield like tools could be recreated as well... but at a higher cost. The boy could also trace other objects as well, including somewhat complicated ones like flashlights and television remotes, however they did not come as natural to him as say a kitchen knife.
And taken to its highest level... the boy would eventually be able to produce something that has only been done by humans a total of 6 times in recorded Magi history... he would be able to create a bounded field that reflected his inner world, temporarily overwriting the natural world around him and turning the land around him into the ultimate tool... a reality marble.
Unlimited blade works it was called. An endless empty field devoid of life save for those who were drawn into it. The sky was littered with immeasurably huge gyrating gears and the field was likewise littered with all the weapons jutting up like tomb stones that Shirou had witnessed through his life and stored here. The only distinctive landmark was a small hill covered in blades.
Even if Kiritsugu didn't train himself in keeping his memories from his dreams... he would definitely remember that image...
Faker. That was what Gilgamesh, the golden servant that had caused him so many problems the previous war, had called both Shirou and Archer, and that was what Kiritsugu intended to train his son to be... the perfect weapon against the King of Heroes...
Putting his pen and paper away, Kiritsugu put off his planning again to eat some breakfast with the makeshift family he had inadvertently made these past few years.
He came into the dining room to see the teenaged Taiga gorging herself on the food his son had made with a burning passion. One just meeting the girl would never assume that she was actually the daughter of the local yakuza bosses... and his neighbor. "Calm down Taiga-chan. The food isn't going anywhere and you're already late for school." The reason why Shirou wasn't in a rush was simply because he was still in primary school and as such classes started a bit later than high schools so that all the schools could share the same busses.
"Urgh!" The girl grunted through a full mouth. "Buh a huha!"
"Words and sentences Taiga-chan." The man shook his head as he knelt down to the old fashioned table and began to serve himself. Perhaps cooking had something to do with Shirou's tracing ability as well. After all, it also possessed the process of taking basic components and turning them into something completely different. All the man knew was that Shirou's cooking had steadily been improving for some reason after his training originally started. Breakfast was no exception.
The girl attempted to swallow a few times, bordering on full blown choking before the food went down before her mouth was empty. "I'm hungryyyy Rugu-kun..." She moaned with teary eyes, calling Kitsirugu by the affectionate nickname she had given him. "I missed dinner yesterday cause I was out all night training for the Kendo tournament this weekend."
"You probably won't even fight though." Shirou added in a matter of fact tone. "You keep on forgetting to take off that pendant off the bottom of your sword. Every time you try to enter, you get disqualified for it." Said pendant the boy was referring to was a small pendant hanging off the pommel of the girl's kendo sword. Doing so was illegal in tournaments since it was disrespectful to the opponent. Still it didn't do anything to the girl's form and technique when she beat the living daylights out of her opponents in matches that she did manage to get in. Shirou had mentioned at one point or another that her sword seemed to have an unnatural bloodlust deep inside of it...
Perhaps once the boy was no longer scared stiff of the sight of the thing he could convince the red head to trace it to the point that said bloodlust is recreated as well...
"What was that brat?" Taiga roared in blind immature rage as she crawled over to where the boy was rapidly and put him into a headlock.
"Now now Taiga-chan." Kiritsugu laughed. Deep down he ached, wishing deeply his real daughter was here with him to experience this sort of environment. "You can play with Shirou later after school. You're late enough for school as it is."
"Ack!" The girl screamed as she looked at her watch to check the time. "I'm screwed if I'm rediculously late again!" Immediately letting go of the boy and dashing out of the house, not breaking step to grab her bookbag in the process. "I'll see you guys for dinner!" She yelled from the doorway before her footsteps quickly disappeared.
The two remaining males sighed as they finished their meal, grateful for the peace and quiet they got for now.
"... You know she's going to collapse from a cramp and be even later now right?" Shirou asked after a few minutes of content eating.
"I won't say anything to her about it later if you don't." Kiritsugu stated casually before finishing his meal.
o. o. o.
That night Kiritsugu and Shirou were once again in their shack which Shirou had chosen to be his workshop, the core of his research as a magus...
Kiritsugu was fairly certain that if any high ranking magus had actually seen the state and location of the boy's center of operations, filled with random mechanical rubbish and no magical appliances, they would either laugh their asses off and pass the whole thing off as some sort of joke... or more realistically kill him, the boy, and then torch the place down in order to make them repent to the insult they had inadvertently done to all of those who practiced thaumaturgy.
Still, the shack served its purpose well as once more Shirou started off the night analyzing over a dozen random objects inside and telling his father what he knew of the object and what was wrong if it didn't work, carefully going over each and every detail as he did so. Since Shirou actually knew what the hell he was doing now, he could actually trace more than at most 3 objects in a session without keeling over, and because of that they were making great progress.
"Alright Shirou." Kitsirugu nodded, pleased with the boy's dedication to his practice. "Now that we are done with your foundation training, I am going to teach you a bit about bounded fields."
"You mean like that magic security system you have set up around the house?" The boy tilted his head to the side curiously. He was a bit winded from his training so far, however his somewhat large number of now activated magic circuits had quickly replenished his energy.
Kiritsugu nodded. "Correct. A Bounded Field is a topographic type of Magecraft, or in layman's terms a long term spell spread over a given area. To make one you have to in a sense knit a network of prana and spread it on base area, such as a piece of land or a building, to create a mystic boundary line that separates the inside from the outside. The clearly advanced ones cover literal spaces, be it in mid air or underground, however that is something beyond what I can teach you." He scratched his head sheepishly. "Like you know, I'm unable to use much magic anymore, however I was rather good at setting up and especially good at tearing down fields. The one around the house for example is almost impossible to detect even by strong mages since it does not attack or defend, but simply informs us of when someone with ill intentions comes inside. This includes humans and non humans which is somewhat rare for bounded fields..."
Shirou's eyes however did not seem disappointed in the man in the slightest. "Cool! I knew you were awesome at this stuff!"
"Right..." Kiritsugu laughed nervously, knowing that all he was teaching the boy was stuff he could only remember since he had barely any magic text books on hand. "Anyways, bounded fields are what pretty much every magi use to protect their workshop. There are 2 ways to make an effective defense against a workshop. The first is to make the fields you construct so subtle that the invading magi won't detect them and their effects until it is too late, and the other is to make the fields so overwhelmingly strong that they can overwhelm any offense that the enemy can think of." He smirked lazily. "I have a different approach in using and looking at magic compared to other magi, so I was pretty good at finding the weaknesses in strong fields. I once broke through a very strong set of fields around one noble's homes in about 3 hours. According to my guesses, it would take even a strong magus to do the same about a year."
He was somewhat embarrassed and ashamed that the boy looking at him in awe since he was pretty much bragging about how well he was a mystical breaking and entering. He prayed that this wouldn't leave the kid with ideas in the future.
"So then." He coughed and getting back to his lesson. "Once made, the boundary line will limit the range of the powers of the bounded field, but it is possible to set magic sigils across a the inside of the field to expand the area of effect, strengthen it, and do other things. A magus can erase the sigils of course as long as they know what they are doing. As for the boundaries themselves by interrupting and removing the prana fueling it... so long as you know that the field is there and that you have the knowhow and prana yourself to do so. Some of the stronger fields are nearly impossible to destroy alone since they require certain methods to do so, or they rely on a nearby prana "battery" to support it."
Kiritsugu paused for a moment as he saw Shirou blinking at him. It was at this point that he remembered that he was talking to a 10 year old. He might have accidentally overwhelmed the kid with all the technical talk...
"So... basically." The boy said slowly. "You draw a shape with magic, and depending on the spell and how much prana you put in it you get different strengths and effects..." He began to put the lecture into his own words. "Then you can make the field better with those rune things... but the runes and the field can be removed by a guy who knows what they are doing... and they will most likely get rid of the runes first because it makes things easier."
Kitsirugu nodded. "Yeah. The guys at the clock tower would use more complicated words, but that's the gist of it." He sat down casually. "For now though, let's get back to your training. First you have to learn how to make the lines to shape your bounded fields. Now close your mind and access your circuit. Most fields are rather big, but for now we are just going to focus on making a small circle around the both of us..."
o. o. o.
It had been 2 months now and Kiritsugu was fairly certain he had more than enough information on the future war to start preparing for specifics now. He was aware of the identity of every master and every servant fighting in the war. Their powers, strengths, weaknesses, noble phantasms, personalities, desires... everything was written down in his notebook with as much detail as he could. He had no doubt that some things would change from how they were now. The war could start at an earlier or later date for some reason. Different masters or servants could be participating...
He had though a list of things that would be present in this current war though...
Shirou would for certain summon Arturia again. The boy possessed Avalon, the sheath of Excalibur inside his body after all. The grail was not a living being and had no consciousness... but with the constant presence of a potential master and a strong catalyst such as this there was no mistaking this would pass...
The master for the Tohsaka family would obviously be the daughter of Archer's original master seeing as she was the only one in her family with the name and the ability left. Who she would summon on the other hand was now up in the air though, as Kiritsugu's training of Shirou would have no doubt complicated things on that end. However... should the heroic spirit Emiya be summoned once more... he should prepare something just in case for that...
The master for the Mato family would likewise be the sister of Rin... the adopted girl Sakura, whose body was flooded with crest worms and her mind and body being corrupted and defiled by the remains of the previous holy grail. The girl was the definition of a wild card at this stage, posing as a great threat or ally either way... especially with Zoken still surviving somehow. His best bet was to nudge the boy into archery club in middle school since from the dreams they both attended it, and likewise push him in her direction with a few suggestions afterwards should he still be alive at the time. Still... she was a difficult card to guide, maneuver or control.
The master of the third of the great families that created the ritual would be... his daughter, Illiyaseviel Von Einzbern. The thought of which both flooded him with dread and joy due to the fact that putting the girl into such a situation that would most likely kill her was also the best bet he had at separating her from the oppressive magus family in the first place. He had no doubt in his mind as well that her partner would be the Berserker of the war in the form of the legendary Heracles as well. The Einzbern family was always very thorough in their attempts in obtaining strong servants by finding the appropriate catalysts to summon them through. He could attest to that first hand when the family had delivered to him the actual long lost scabbard of Excalibur itself so he could summon King Arturia as Saber. It was a shame he had seen what the fate of the monster had become in each of the 3 scenarios. He truly was the mightiest of servants in this war alone even if his mind was no longer present.
Then there was Kotomine. Kiritsugu had no doubt that the despicable priest would somehow make himself a part of the wars in one way or another and force himself to be the master of one of the other servants... secretly manipulating things from behind the scenes. The Golden King of Heroes was not much better, flaunting his power as soon as he saw it appropriate. Kiritsugu knew that making a move against either one of the two before the war was the equivalent to suicide. Even if he had a sniper rifle and a clear view of the church, the man had no doubt that the priest would either be protected by some church devised bounded field or by the servant himself.
Speaking of the uncertainties however, there were more than a few that had him unnerved to a degree. The first of which was the identity of Archer in this oncoming war. Having the future version of his son would be an immense boon to his efforts, but even then the man would most likely try to kill Shirou in an attempt to create a paradox and not be a counter guardian any more. If another Archer appeared... well Shirou would just have to deal with that when it happened.
The Matou family in general was another wild factor. Keeping Sakura alive with the possibility of becoming a dark grail was a very big risk... one he really didn't like. Zoken was just as bad, being a withered old demon barely in the shape of a human... That did not mean however that he had not prepared plans with them in mind.
The identities of the servants Lancer, Caster, Assassin, and even Rider were uncertain to him. He did not know how or who summoned them in particular for the most part, and if different catalysts would be used. For now though he would just have to assume that they indeed were the ones that would eventually be summoned.
Kirei and Gilgamesh... well there was more than enough to say about them... Thankfully though, it seems as if Kirei at least seems to want to stay back and watch for the beginning of the war...
Kiritsugu had already formulated several plans for the battles, each one depending on certain factors and possible outcomes of steps that occur. Some were more important than others, yet the end result and the main goals would be the same:
The grail war would end.
Ilya would be saved.
Shirou would not die.
As few innocents would die as possible.
What happened to the rest of the participants was really up to the heavens and how things turned out. He had given... most of them at least... a chance in his plans to survive, but their survival was up to them in the end...
Shirou had been getting the hang of his training for a while now. He had begun to practice his projecting in earnest in addition to his structural grasping training. When Taiga was around the two would practice sparring in the dojo... much to his amusement and the boy's reluctance, and Shirou in the mean time still went out of his way to help others in school without asking for any compensation even though he's only in 5th grade...
The base for the boy was there now. So long as he kept in those habits the boy would at least be in satisfactory condition for when the war comes. Kiritsugu had no doubt that should the archer in the war be the boy's future self still, Shirou would no longer take so long to inherit and adapt to the man's memories physically or mentally.
Still... that was not enough to ensure victory by a long shot. A few years of slightly specified training for a boy going into his teen years would not protect him significantly from an experienced magus, let alone a Heroic spirit. Shirou's abilities would not be able to pose a significant threat unless he laid eyes upon a noble phantasm or at least trained to project Avalon, and that was still years from now, years the ex-assassin did not have.
The boy needed an ace before the fighting even started... and after much thought and planning...and experimenting a small amount with the boy's projection abilities one day a week earlier... Kiritsugu had come up with a solution...
"Are you going again?" Shirou moaned as his father closed his bag filled with clothes, notes, and a small wooden box.
"Yes." The father smiled gently, knowing why the boy was so down trodden. He tended to be gone for spans lasting almost a month at a time whenever he left in his attempts to see his daughter again. Unfortunately his efforts were constantly stopped by either the Einzbern's guards or the barriers surrounding the isolated castle that took forever to get to and from... they never bothered to listen to his warning that the grail was corrupted by the spirit of Angra Mainyu... the source of all the evil in the world...
A small smirk appeared on the man's face. He wondered if they still had that computer he had set up in the middle of their cathedral still. He remembered how irritated he had made the elder of the family, bugging him about how it would increase his chances of victory in the 4th war if he had it until he had finally given in... Odds were that it was utterly destroyed upon word that he had betrayed them. Oh well... these newer models were much better than the one there anyways.
"Is it the same place as always?" The boy asked with a sigh, already resigning himself to the fact that his dad would most likely be gone for a long period of time again... even though Kiritsugu never actually told Shirou where he went in the first place.
"No." The father shook his head. "I have some business I have to take care of elsewhere this time. I should still be gone for a while... but not nearly as long as I normally do. Be good and keep Taiga-chan out of trouble." He patted the boy gently on his head, knowing exactly what he had just said. "Keep to your studies and your routine. Don't try any difficult magic while I'm gone other than your projection, small bounded fields, and reinforcing objects. If you can show me some improvements when I get back, I'll start to teach you how to reinforce your body..."
Shirou's eyes widened in awe and excitement. Reinforcing a living body was exceptionally difficult and dangerous for most magi to do... though doing so properly had some very interesting results including but not limited to enhanced strength, speed, and sight. It was one of the first things the boy wanted to try to do when he learned about the particular field, and as such it was of course one of the first things the man had forbidden the boy from doing. "Really!" He asked excitedly, no doubt wondering about all the things he could do to secretly help people once he learned the art.
The man nodded with a kind face. "Yeah, but you have to show me how much you've improved... and not die... when I come home."
Ah the life of a Magus. Your research was so likely to kill you at times that at times it truly was difficult to tell if one was joking about such things...
The boy nodded with vigor. "Yeah! Just you watch! I'm gonna project something awesome for you when you get back! And it will work too!" He looked at his dad with conviction.
"Well then I better make sure to have something else good to teach you as well when I get back or else I might run out of things to teach you." Kiristugu laughed as he began to walk out of the house. "Stay safe Shirou."
"I will!" The boy responded from the door. "Where are you going anyways?"
The Magus Killer had half a mind to leave the location of his trip a secret, however in the end he decided to tell the boy anyways. Unlike the Einzbern's castle, Shirou might actually go there at one point in the future when all this was behind him...
"England..." Was all he said before closing the door behind him.
o. o. o.
A/N:
12 reviews for the first chapter in a few days. Not bad. Not bad at all.
So for those of you who want to know what Shirou's new ace will be... I'm not telling. People who have read YAWALEH will know that when I make a weapon... a make a fucking epic weapon that actually fits the storyline and the character... and this ladies and gentlemen... will be one fucking monster that even I am particularly giddy about unleashing. Scratch that, when I finalized the idea, I had to actually take a step back and laugh maniacally in awe of what I had created.
Other than that, yeah. Kiritsugu is going to the Clock Tower next chapter and things will get interesting. There will be more tense moments and deals will be made. The man among men in this series isn't going to go through his last mission without making at least a few people piss themselves in some way.
So once again, this chapter was more of an info dump than anything really. The pre-war chapters will probably last another... 3-5 chapters before heroic spirits try to gut each other like it's going out of style. A bit long yes but I like to be thorough with these kinds of things.
So anyways. Review! Worship the log! Be relieved that Shirou won't be a complete pussy in this series! And Review again!