Consciousness came back to Pasha like a light switch being flipped. One moment she was in a sea of darkness and the next she was looking up at Nishka as the young woman held her hand over her stomach. "Nishka… what… what the hell are you doing?"
"Pasha! Thank the ancestors you're awake!"
Pasha forced herself up and grabbed Nishka by the arm, anger bubbling up inside her "Why aren't you wearing a respirator?! Why the hell are you even standing here?! You should be gone by now, you should have escaped!"
Nishka flinched at the grip on her arm, the action enough for Pasha to look closer and see the black stones working their way down her shoulder. "No… Nishka, how could…?"
"The bridge was blown wide open Pasha, everyone inside is already infected. I… I can do something out here to help instead of just running."
The sight of Nishka's arms formed a pit in Pasha's stomach but hearing her speak widened it into a chasm. Even if she knew what was coming from this whole plan, Pasha still had a hope that Nishka could make it out alive. Even now, knowing for certain who they were up against, some irrational part of her mind wanted to demand Nishka flee into the desert to have a hope for living another day.
A bitter laugh worked its way out of Pasha's throat even as tears welled up inside her helmet. "I should have forced you to go with the civilians."
Nishka shook her head and gently removed Pasha's hand from her arm. "I wouldn't have stood for it. As the one asking everyone here to fight, I wouldn't have let you send me away."
The pair stood, Pasha already steady on her feet after her intense round of healing. Nishka looked her Chief guard over, noting her removed gauntlets and the armor she had to discard. It was a shame to lose them but they were too damaged to heal Pasha properly.
Any further thoughts on Pasha's state ended when she noticed that Ozen was gone. Nishka cast her eyes around in rising panic until she ran to the ship's railing.
Out in the blood soaked no-man's land in front of the melee line stood Ozen, moving faster than she'd ever seen him as he struck out against the enemy general. Despite how impressive his moves looked, the enemy was weathering every strike with a soul crushing lack of response.
He was standing under Ozen's strikes and moving through them as though the very inertia behind the blows did not register. He would take a step forward despite a half dozen blade strikes to his leg and his gait didn't falter. He was moving without blocking and yet none of Ozen's blows were so much as making him flinch. Despite the complete lack of armor on his limbs not one hit had managed to draw blood or even break the skin.
It was a horrifying sight, the likes of which seemed to suck the hope and willpower from every Sargonian soldier watching. Weapons slid from numb fingers as everyone stared at one of their strongest, giving his all only to earn… nothing in response.
The only mercy of it all was that Ozen remained alive and whole, despite the impossible strength his enemy seemed to possess. It would have been beyond trivial to kill Ozen based on what was happening and yet the [Transcendent] was content to endure his strikes and casually move around as he was attacked.
With no warning or wind up though, that fragile status quo ended. One second Ozen was sending forward one more swing to add to the hundreds he had launched already.
The next second his right arm was sitting on the desert sand, cut cleanly from the shoulder even as the wound was charred and cauterized.
As Ozen stumbled back and was left reeling from his missing arm the enemy stepped forward keeping close to the now one armed youth. "I can certainly admire your determination, young man, but determination without the strength to act is nothing but delusion. I don't really care for delusions myself but it's at least a bit entertaining, enough to earn you a mercifully quick death from me." He drew back his hand in a flat chopping motion, prepared to lop Ozen's head clean off.
"Let it be known to the Gods above that I, Flavius, First Prince of the Sundom, consider you to be a delightful little pest worthy of a respectable death. May you find peace wherever you kind go to die."
Before he could swing his hand forward, a mass of lightning and rage slammed into his chest and tackled him away.
<~~~~~~~>
Shirou felt his legs go numb beneath him and he slid down to the sand. He tried to keep the grip on his blade as he fell but even that slipped open as he sat and thought back on what had just happened.
Flavius had been…impossibly strong. It was in another league from the way that the armored beast of an [Ascended] had been. That man had at least moved when you hit him, even if the blows didn't scratch his armor. That man at least bled when a [Reinforced] longsword slammed into his skin. That man could at least be seen when he attacked you, even if it was too fast to avoid.
Flavius though… He was strong enough that it didn't seem real. Like he was an ocean cliffside and Shirou was just a wave crashing and breaking against. Even that thought didn't do him justice though because a cliff can't kill the sea with ease if it wants to.
Instead the better analogy, perhaps even the best one, would be to compare it to the struggle of a mortal person… fighting a god.
Even as Shirou sat reeling from the impossibility of the fight he just had a new fight had broken out in front of him. Pasha had been healed and returned to the field, now bereft of even more of her armor, including her helmet.
The lack of protection didn't seem to stop her and even without her gauntlets her blows were flying so fast that they were impossible for Shirou to see.
Despite the blows Flavius seemed to be elated, a smile blooming on his face as his own hands shot out to intercept each blow in a thunderous boom as they came. Even as Pasha picked up the pace and the lightning across her form grew more and more intense, Flavius only smiled wider.
His blows continued to match Pasha's as they both ramped up their speed yet against all reason Pasha managed to overtake him. As the lightning of her Ȁ̵̱̀ŗ̸̔t̶͔̎s̴̢̊̓ expanded more and more she was soon wreathed in a permanent cloak of azure light. The more it expanded the more that was fed into her strikes and soon she was landing real blows onto Flavius's body.
Far from being insulted by that fact the man looked positively elated. The smile on his face threatened to split it and only grew wider the more Pasha overtook him.
By the time her blows started landing and forcing him to take a step back Flavius was laughing with joy and happiness miles away from the cruel snickering he offered before. When Pasha dodged a blow and landed a kick on Falvius's gut that sent him tumbling away through the sand his own laughter rang out across the desert like ringing bells. The sight of it was unnerving to Shirou, especially for the fact that Flavius's happiness seemed so genuine.
Shirou's musing on the increasingly distant fight was cut off when he spotted movement at his side and turned to see Nishka running towards him, his severed arm in her hands.
The sight of her out in the battle field was a shock to Shirou but the pounding pain of his arm was still overcoming his capacity to react much more beyond open mouth shock. "Nishka…?"
Her own reply was decidedly more animated and as soon as she was close enough Nishka stepped forward and slapped Shirou's cheek, with his own arm no less! "You…you… you absolute ASS! What the hell were you thinking coming down here and fighting him?!"
Shirou was left stunned by the outburst and only managed to rub his cheek as Nishka placed his severed arm by his side and began to use her Ȁ̵̱̀ŗ̸̔t̶͔̎s̴̢̊̓ to turn back the clock. The shock of being slapped like that was more than enough to give him pause. That and his own mental fatigue was enough to leave him tongue tied. "I was…"
Any rebuttal was stopped Nishka's angry pout and tear soaked eyes. The sight of her out on the battlefield healing him after yet another act of foolishness on his part was eroding at Shirou's heart. The sight of the creeping black stone growing across her body as she healed him made that erosion turn into outright cracking. "Why…? Why do you always do this Ozen? Why do you always throw yourself into the fire?"
Shirou didn't have an answer to give. He was wearing a face that wasn't his own and in truth perhaps he should have valued this life more considering it was someone else's. It was all too easy to think of it as his own though, and from there it was practically a reflex for him to offer his life up in place of others. He didn't know why, or where the compulsion came from but he knew that he had to protect everyone around him.
"Nishka… I… I'm"
Any other words he might have given were drowned out by a thunder clap that shook the world.
<~~~~~~~>
Pasha was sailing through the air as soon as she saw Ozen kneeling on the sand about to be slain. She couldn't begin to fathom what that fool of a boy was thinking trying to fight a [Transcendent] but the why didn't matter. All that mattered was keeping the fool alive.
When she slammed into Flavius and knocked him away the first reaction she got from him was a wide smile and the pair rolled across the sands before jumping away from each other. "Well now! I must say I didn't expect you back here after my last strike. Another fight with you is pleasant enough but getting a chance to see you without that armor on is even better!"
His eyes raked up and down Pasha's form as she sank into a combat stance. Her chest place had been a wash with the damage to it along with her gauntlets. The last things would have been her leg guards and helmet but leaving the legs alone would throw off her balance. As for the helmet though… Pasha didn't have any reason to avoid breathing in O̸̝̕ř̵̺i̶̮̋g̸̰͒i̴̼͠ṉ̴̿i̴͚͗u̴͋͜ḿ̷̖ any longer.
"Take a good look you son of a bitch, This face is going to be the last thing you see when I'm standing over you."
Flavius let out a peal of laughter and stepped into a relaxed combat stance of his own. "I would welcome something like that more than you can imagine. Let's see if you can deliver."
Pasha took the initiative and shot forward, her Ȁ̵̱̀ŗ̸̔t̶͔̎s̴̢̊̓ pushed past its limits until she was wretched in a cloak of crackling lightning. Every bolt that formed was pulled back inside her by her [Awakened] ability as fast as they formed and poured into her speed and strength. Even as the energy was drawn in she continued to pull harder and harder on her Ȁ̵̱̀ŗ̸̔t̶͔̎s̴̢̊̓ drawing from the newly forming and rapidly growing wellspring of O̸̝̕ř̵̺i̶̮̋g̸̰͒i̴̼͠ṉ̴̿i̴͚͗u̴͋͜ḿ̷̖ in her body.
The lightning around her answered her desires and swelled up even as she drew it in. The effect was clear to see as Pasha began catching up to and then matching Flavius's strikes blow for blow. The both of them were using hand to hand styles though their approach differed. Pasha's style was a mix of lightning fast jabs and targeted swipes with her fingers and razor sharp nails. Flavius while still playing a defensive battle was starting to let bits of his own realm style of fighting seep out as Pasha picked up the pressure. His strikes were slower and more telegraphed than Pasha's once she had picked up enough speed to match him and yet the strength within each was still beyond her. When he launched a proper blow Pasha was still forced to dodge it and from the wind pressure that followed, his hits would be devastating.
Her own strength was continuing to climb with her speed though and after one of her punches managed to push Flavius's open palm back into his own face she knew that she was getting somewhere.
His reaction to playing an impromptu game of why are you hitting yourself was one of wide eyed shock followed by nearly manic joy. "You're PERFECT!" He flew back into the melee with a renewed sense of purpose, his strikes speeding back up to match Pasha's and putting her on the defensive. "I knew you were different from the rest of this trash but I never expected you to be this different!"
The pace of the blows picked up and Pasha was forced to lean on her speed and switch her blows from aggressive strikes to reactive redirects. She was managing to hold her own as the tempo ramped up and she kept drawing on her Ȁ̵̱̀ŗ̸̔t̶͔̎s̴̢̊̓ but already the first signs of her newly gained sickness were showing. In faint patches of discolored skin and all throughout her body O̸̝̕ř̵̺i̶̮̋g̸̰͒i̴̼͠ṉ̴̿i̴͚͗u̴͋͜ḿ̷̖ particles were giving off energy and multiplying as they did.
It was a race against her own death now, and all Pasha could do was keep pulling to try and land a fatal blow. Anything less would leave Flavius free to destroy the entire caravan.
The man in question was grinning like a mad man as the fighting continued, and even when Pasha's lightning raked across his body he didn't flinch. Instead his mind was completely fixated on staring at Pasha as she fought, the look in his eyes gaining an affectionate weight as she continued to match him.
"Your beauty, your fire, your STRENGTH!" Flavius's words were a shout as he swept Pasha's legs out from under her. "It's all PERFECT!" He punctuated that sentence by ducking low and slamming an uppercut into Pasha's form. She blocked the blow midair and was sent rocketing almost a hundred meters straight into the air. "And you haven't even [Transcended] yet!"
Pasha flew up into the raging storm, her arms aching yet whole after blocking Flavius's strike. As she rose higher into the air she took advantage of her new position, drawing on her [Ascended] ability to whip the winds around her into a maelstrom. The storm around her was fierce, and already adding to her strength but with the winds moving even faster and the O̸̝̕ř̵̺i̶̮̋g̸̰͒i̴̼͠ṉ̴̿i̴͚͗u̴͋͜ḿ̷̖ carried through the air another option was open to her.
The storm winds gathered and swirled around her, holding her and lifting her higher as she arced into the sky. As she went the lightning arcing from her body grew more and more violent until the streamers of electricity were dying the sand storm around her blue. Wind and sand swirled around her, the force of every gust rushing into her in the same way that the lightning around her did.
At the apex of her ascent Pasha turned and faced down towards Flavius. The man was staring up at her with wide rapturous eyes and Pasha was more than willing to take advantage of his awe. She pulled every scrap of strength her Ȁ̵̱̀ŗ̸̔t̶͔̎s̴̢̊̓ could give her, even as O̸̝̕ř̵̺i̶̮̋g̸̰͒i̴̼͠ṉ̴̿i̴͚͗u̴͋͜ḿ̷̖ bloomed across and through her body, and the lightning around her exploded into a roaring star of thunder.
Flavius looked up at the newly formed star with eyes completely and totally captured by the sight before him. He was so captivated by the sight that even his [Transcendent] failed to capture the moment when Pasha finally moved again.
One instant a star shone on the battlefield.
The next second that star was gone, and Pasha stood inches away from Flavius, her fist punched through his chest and holding his heart.
<~~~~~~~>
Shirou and Nishka were forced to press themselves to the ground when the explosion rang out. Whatever Pasha did caused a shockwave so great that the air around the battle field was scoured of sand, and finally clear for the first time in days.
Shirou pushed himself back up from the ground, desperate to look around and find out what had happened. The sight that greeted him was perhaps the most wonderful thing he could imagine.
Pasha was standing in front of Flavius with her arm stabbed through his chest, his heart in her palm.
The man himself was seemingly at a complete loss for words and only stared mute at Pasha as she crushed the organ to pulp and raked her nails across his throat, severing his arteries and pouring blood onto the sand.
With a jerk of her arm Pasha pulled her arm out of Flavius and stumbled backwards, her legs teetering to the point of collapse. Flavius teetered in place for a moment, gently tapping at his wounds before he sank to his knees and then fell to the ground.
She looked absolutely terrible, with visible patches of back stone growing out of her body in dozens of places, blood dripping from them as she walked. Despite her state though when she turned towards Shirou and Nishka, Pasha's face broke into a smile.
She started taking shaky steps towards Shirou and Nishka, the desert sands now precarious and uneven as she slowly walked forward. The pair of them ran to meet her in the middle, looks of happiness on their faces.
As Pasha got closer to the pair though a sight behind her ripped all the warmth and hope out of their hearts. Nishka's knees gave out and she crumpled to the ground while Shirou felt the world begin to spin.
Standing back up from the desert sands was a man wreathed in ivory flames. Two gouts of it surged from his chest and neck and as they burned his injuries began to fade, the very wounds themselves being burned away by his fire.
<~~~~~~~>
Pasha was quick to notice the heat and looks on their faces and turned back around, yet the sight filled her with dread as well. That last strike had been everything she had, and her Ȁ̵̱̀ŗ̸̔t̶͔̎s̴̢̊̓ had taken the absolute toll from her. Her body was breaking down now and even living long enough to reach Nishka and Ozen would be a staggering task.
Fighting? That was so far out of the question now that it was a fantasy.
Despite that though, she still forced her stiffening body into a combat stance, newfound grinding noises echoing out as once supple joints ground into each other.
Flavius simply stood, wreathed in his flames for several seconds until he stepped forward from them looking pristine and unmarred. His skin was unblemished, and his clothes intact and the look on his face was as far from a beaten man as it could be. In fact the look on it as he smiled was one of absolute bliss. He quickly spotted Pasha and strode up to her, walking purposefully yet with none of the caution of a soldier.
He stopped mere feet from her and looked her in the eye before reaching into a pocket of his toga and pulling out a ring. "Truly there can be no woman as radiant as you fair war maiden! Damn the elders and damn even the god's decree! One such as you are surely not a scourge."
He waved his hands into the sky as he kept speaking, completely ignoring the paralyzed faces of the three in front of them as they felt their minds break apart. "That last blow, that last strike! If I were anyone other than the Prince of the Sun itself you would have surely slain me. Truly an [Ascended] with power such as yours must be a once in a millennium treasure." He bowed low and gently reached out grabbing Pasha's limp shock-numbed hand and gently brought his ring up to it.
"I can not begin to imagine someone more perfect to one day rule the Sundom alongside and with this ring I do so pledge my very soul to thee." He gently slid the ring forward, and onto Pasha's finger, but as he did the jewelry caught on a protruding shard of O̸̝̕ř̵̺i̶̮̋g̸̰͒i̴̼͠ṉ̴̿i̴͚͗u̴͋͜ḿ̷̖.
Flvaius was genuinely moving with care and grace now, and the minor catch on Pasha's finger would have normally been nothing of any note. But Pasha's body was hardly normal anymore.
Her finger cracked and fell to the ground, crumbling into flakes of O̸̝̕ř̵̺i̶̮̋g̸̰͒i̴̼͠ṉ̴̿i̴͚͗u̴͋͜ḿ̷̖ as it landed which were swept away by the wind.
Flavius looked at Pasha's hand with wide confused eyes but soon plastered a smile onto his face as he held his hand forward. "Think nothing of that, my soon to be wedded wife. My flames can heal just as well as they burn." With a thought a mantle of his flames roared to life and swept over Pasha's body covering her in a layer of snow white heat that was bizarrely pleasant rather than burning. "Regrowing something like a finger or healing even grievous wounds is nothing… I can't… manage?"
His bravado tapered off and died along with his levity and cheer as the flames danced over Pasha's body but did absolutely nothing to reverse or even slow the spread of O̸̝̕ř̵̺i̶̮̋g̸̰͒i̴̼͠ṉ̴̿i̴͚͗u̴͋͜ḿ̷̖. The petrification that had claimed Pasha's finger had spread to her hand, and stones claiming her legs grew and spread to the point that her right ankle broke entirely.
Flavius's eyes were wide with horror as he reached out and caught her, desperately increasing the strength of his flames yet getting nothing for the effort. "NO! This… this is madness! My flames can heal anything!"
Pasha struggled feebly in his grip, her condition accelerating to the point her limbs were betraying her even as the damage in her organs rapidly grew fatal. Even as the flames grew stronger, and the sense of warmth and peace they carried grew ever more intense, Pasha still felt herself dying. The Oripathy she had gotten and then exacerbated was beyond the final stage now and she had pushed it so far beyond the redline that there was no hope left.
With the last bit of flexibility and strength Pasha had in her arm she lifted her hand up to Flavius's face. The motion was enough to draw the now tear stricken man's attention and he turned to her, perhaps thinking it a final caress.
Instead as Pasha felt the life drain out of her and her body hardened completely, she raised her middle finger, then crumbled to dust.
<~~~~~~~>
Shirou stared at the space his temporary mentor had just been. He felt his knees fall to the sand but it seemed distant compared to the hole that was opening up in his heart. Even the screaming wail that echoed out beside him felt distant.
All he could think about was the way Pasha had… faded away.
Death wasn't new to him, He had created many of the corpses on the field around them afterall. But seeing someone he knew so well die like that. It was something else entirely.
Nishka was crying and screaming as she looked at the patch of black dust that was already blowing away into the sky.
And Flavius, the man who had caused this very outcome was looking down at the pile of dust in his hands and on his knees, with a suddenly blank look. All the excessive emotion, the joviality, and lighthearted cruelty from before were gone. Now all that was left was a dull blank look.
He ran the O̸̝̕ř̵̺i̶̮̋g̸̰͒i̴̼͠ṉ̴̿i̴͚͗u̴͋͜ḿ̷̖ dust between his fingers, idly feeling its texture as he let it slip from his hands. When the dust all fell away from him he slowly stood up and walked towards Nishka and Shirou, his steps measured and unhurried.
When he reached the pair he simply continued past them until he reached the melee line of the fleet.
Everyone on the battlefield had stopped moving, and each of the defenders looked out at Flavius as he stood, unsure of what would happen next.
Flavius looked up at them all, seeming to take a measure of the entirety of the caravan before he let out a sigh and slowly shook his head. "I've had enough. I'm not having fun anymore."
With those words he held up his hand and the world went up in flames.
<~~~~~~~>
Consciousness returned to Shirou in fitful bursts, his eyes fluttering open first followed by the rest of his senses catching up.
When he was fully awake he realized that his hands were bound behind his back, and he was laying on his side on the battlefield.
He could see that he was surrounded by the forces of the enemy, all gathered in place and forming a large semi-circle some dozen meters wide. Nishka was sitting next to him, equally bound, though looking much worse for wear as her Oripathy had spread even further across her shoulders and arms. The last thing he could recall was the pair of them being blasted away by Flavius's final strike.
The aftereffect of that attack and the man responsible dominated Shirou's field of vision. The enemy behind him left a perfect view of Flavius's form and the remnants of the Sargonian fleet.
Three landships had been there, more than a kilometer long and hundreds of thousands of tons of metal. Each had been crewed in the thousands even with those that left with the civilians.
What was left was a lake of obsidian glass and three lumps of steel, molten and twisted like melted candle wax then flashcooled by the desert winds. The molten sand had flowed down into the valley basin behind the Sargonian battle line and collected into a mound of obsidian glass. Each of the three warships was now recognizable only by the trails of liquid metal that had flowed and mixed with the obsidian before cooling back into steel, and by three misshapen piles. Each looked like little more than a gleaming mound of slag, the last remnants of the ships after everything else was melted away.
Flavius was standing amidst the ruins of it all, staring out at the catastrophe storm raging to the east as the sun began to set.
Shirou couldn't guess what the madman was thinking while he stood there but the moment didn't last long. Flavius turned away from the east and walked back towards Shirou, stopping when he was only a few meters away. "Part of me feels compelled to say something right now. Some last bit of monologue to bring this farce to an end. But it doesn't really matter. You don't really matter. None of this really matters in the grand scheme of things does it?" he turned away and gestured for one of his soldiers to come forward. "Anemious, you're the one that led us to this prey, I suppose I can force the choice of how to end it onto you."
The man who stepped forward was middle aged, and wearing the armor that all of the [Awakened] soldiers were sporting. He didn't have any particularly noteworthy traits and would have been all too easy to ignore and overlook, save for the fact that Shirou recognized this man.
The man smirked, a cruel and gleeful smile etched across his face as he stepped forward and leered over Shirou. "I told you, you scourge worshipping abomination, that you would suffer for your sins in agony before we wipe you from existence! And now here I am to make it so!"
The man, Anemious, lacked any noteworthy traits but Shirou still recalled the fury filled screams of one of the first people he fought when he entered his nightmare. That whole fight seemed so distant these last few days, so meaningless and trivial, to see him standing here now…
"What… what are you doing here? How are you still standing?" Shirou couldn't understand why the man was here, or why he looked so hale and healthy. His fingers had grown back for Gods' sake…
"My liege is the greatest healer to ever live, those mercy wounds you gave me were meaningless! As for why I'm here, I was given a glorious purpose in this fight, Mongrel. Leading my brothers and sisters right to you." As Anemious spoke he held up his hand which glowed a faint green.
His words opened up a pit in Shirou's stomach at the same moment an itch that had been nagging the back of his mind for days flared up. He had been quick to ignore it over the days, chalking it all up to a lingering arrow wound. Now though a horrifying thought was taking hold in his mind. "You… can track me. I… led you all here?"
Anemious leaned back and belted out a laugh, loud and hateful before he leaned down and stared into Shirou's grief stricken eyes. "That's right! You led us here and helped us kill your kinsmen. Your mercy let us follow with ease and run you down like hounds hunting a rabbit. And now at the end of it all I get to be the one to decide how it all ends for you."
Anemious dropped a blade to the ground in front of Shirou and then walked over and dropped another in front of Nishka. "My terms are simple and straightforward. The two of you must fight one another. The winner will be permitted to live while the loser must die. Neither of you may leave until you slay the other and should either of you try to flee we'll kill you both."
With his piece said two soldiers stepped up and cut away their bindings, though any chance of escape beyond that was blocked by a wall of [Ascended] troops marching to the forefront of the circle around them. The soldiers around them were smiling and jeering as they watched the two Sargonians, save for Flavius who looked on at it all with an empty stare.
As the ring closed around them Shirou stared at the blade at his feet with a sense of muted dread in his stomach, his mind still reeling from leaving that he was the cause of the disaster that befell the caravan.
Shirou slowly knelt down and grabbed the blade, the faint tingle he gained when touching the steel meaningless compared to the weight of what he was being asked to do.
Across the field Nishka did the same, her hands trembling as she loosely held the blade and looked over at him with wide eyes, "Ozen… I… I can't."
Shirou felt the same, there was no way they could do this, the very idea of killing the other to save themselves was completely off the table for both of them but that didn't leave any other option.
Shirou could go down fighting, perhaps take one [Awakened] enemy out with him before the [Ascended] troops killed him but that would sign Nishka's death warrant.
Doing something that would get her killed wasn't something that he could allow. At the same time she cared about Ozen and therefore him, so Shirou couldn't force her to end his life and escape.
Fighting their enemies was off the table, so the only option was one of them dying. Nishka dying was off the table so Shirou would have to die. Shirou couldn't have Nishka kill him without making her sad.
The conclusion Shirou's mind came to was at once heavy and also logical in his own warped and distorted way of thinking.
With a slow breath Shirou clutched his knife and slid it across his neck.
<~~~~~~~>
As Shirou slid the blade against his throat he felt a sharp stinging pain that was swallowed up by a spreading sense of weightlessness. His blood flowed quickly from the wound and drenched his armor and hands, the slickness combining with his weakness to let his knife slip from boneless fingers.
His sight grew dim far faster than he imagined and the image of Nishka's wide horror filled eyes as she ran after him was the last thing he could make out before darkness spread across his vision and his body crumpled to the ground.
Everything was growing distant, muted, and terribly cold. He could faintly feel his body spasming as consciousness slipped away but all the sensations were becoming distant. As his consciousness began to fully slip away Shirou heard the distant words of the spell echo in his soul, the canned announcement of a slain foe ringing out in his dying mind.
[You have slain a Dormant Human, Shirou Emiya]
[You have received a Memory: Fragment of Home]
Those words echoed so faintly in Shirou's dying mind that he hardly even noticed them, every part of himself crumbling and slowing as death took him.
As the final flickering flame in his soul was about to give out and burn away a blazing white flame surged through Shirou's entire being and ripped him away from death.
He awoke with a gasping breath in Nishka's lap and reached his hand up to his severed throat, expecting to find a bleeding wound but only meeting mended flesh. The blood on his armor was burned away and the lightheaded ness and pain he was feeling were gone as well.
His mind reeled trying to understand what had happened and if the moments before were all in his head, yet the cause of it all was evident in the alabaster flames dancing across his skin.
Looking up from his healed form Shirou saw Flavius looming over He and Nishka both with a rictus of pure rage on his face. His hand was pointed at Shirou, still wreathed in white fire and as soon as Shirou saw it Flavius jerked his hand to the side and wrenched the healing flames away.
"I won't tolerate something like that you damn mongrel. Of all the ends… of all the ways to go… I won't permit you ending yourself like that." His words were delivered slowly and coldly, leaving no room for argument but also explaining nothing about why he stepped in.
Shirou couldn't make sense of it, couldn't understand the logic behind the action. "Why… why does it matter if you're still going to kill us both? If I can give my life to save her then I want to."
Flavius stared down at Shirou, taking in his words with cold indifference before he turned towards Anemious. "You had your fun welp, hurry up and kill these two properly so we can set off. I've indulged in this… farce more than long enough. I'm tired now."
Anemious was left fuming as he stared at Nishka and Shirou, eyes filled with rage and his face flushed red with anger, He strode forward into the circle until he was standing right in front of Flavius. "My lord… this… this insect shamed me. Granted mercy of all things to a follower of the War God herself! Such a disgrace must… must be answered with cruelty and vitriol to make it right! Simply killing them like common enemies isn't enough to make right their…"
Flavius raised his hand and gently swept it through Anemious, the same way one would brush aside a cobweb or a mote of dust.
And just like a mote of dust Anemious's body crumbled into ash the instant Flavius's hand brushed against him, a terrible, impossible heat rising up from inside him and burning his entire body to dust. "I said I'm tired and done with this farce."
Flavius turned back to Shirou and Nishka, the pair still on the ground looking up at the death they just witnessed with wide eyes. The sight of them was almost enough to stir some emotion from the flame wielding madman, but his passions were well spent and burned out now. Instead he simply sighed and walked towards them. "You asked me why it matters, didn't you boy?"
As he knelt down in front of the pair they moved to scoot back from him, but a wall of [Ascended] Soldiers blocked their path. "You only have one life to live, and casting it aside is a disgrace to everyone you fought beside. Even if all of you are worthless scourges whom my Gods have marked for death, all of you fought alongside each other. That perfect war maiden I battled gave her life fighting me all for the sake of saving you, and you would toss that life away like it's worthless?"
Flavius shook his head and lifted up his hand, the palm glowing an incandescent white as he raised it up to Shirou's face. "If you are going to meet your end it's better to have that life at least be taken rather than thrown away."
His fingers inched closer and Shirou felt his entire world boil down to the glowing fingers in front of him, paralyzed by the surety that he would be vaporized just like Anemious moments ago.
Before the fingers could brush against him though Shirou's body was jerked to the side, shoved out of the way by Nishka.
Flavius's fingers continued on and brushed against her back.
And Nishka crumbled into dust.
Shirou stared at the crumbling flakes of dust that had been his first companion in this strange land. The girl who had saved him whenever he was hurt. The one he was tasked with defending and protecting.
As the dust and ash drifted to the ground the world around Shirou faded away and he was pulled into an empty abyss.
A familiar voice echoed out from within his mind, offering a heart wrenching congratulations.
[Wake up, Shirou! Your nightmare is over.]
[Prepare for appraisal…]