Autor note : Sorry but the previous chapter I posted wrong 😅.
******
Rin Tohsaka POV.
At this moment, Rin was sitting in a train, unaware that her journey to Fuyuki City would prove far more dangerous than she could ever imagine—far worse than her counterpart in another timeline had faced. In her hand, she tightly held a compass, a birthday gift from her father before the Holy Grail War began. The small object carried memories that weighed heavily on her heart.
She recalled the day she had received it, back when she was training in Jewel Magecraft under the watchful eye of her father, Tokiomi Tohsaka, in the family workshop deep in the basement of their home.
"How was that, Father?" Rin asked, glancing at him eagerly.
"Hmmm… quite good. Well done, Rin," Tokiomi replied with pride. Even at her young age, Rin was able to store mana within a jewel—something beyond what Tokiomi himself had accomplished when he was her age.
But those happy days didn't last. Not long after, Tokiomi instructed her to take shelter at her mother's family home.
"Why must we move to the Zenjou family?" Rin asked innocently, staring at her father across the table.
"When the Holy Grail War begins, Fuyuki will no longer be safe," Tokiomi answered gently, hoping his daughter would understand the dangers that awaited them.
"But I want to help you win the Holy Grail War!" Rin protested.
Her mother, Aoi, sitting at Tokiomi's side, softly intervened. "Rin… don't put your father in such a difficult position."
"Are we… a burden, Father?" Rin's voice trembled, tears threatening to spill.
Tokiomi, however, spoke firmly. "It's not that. I will fight in this Holy Grail War, and this is for your safety. It's better if you and your mother stay away from Fuyuki."
Hurt, Rin had run off to her room, her face clouded with frustration. She didn't want to leave him.
"Ahhhhhh!" she screamed into her pillow. "I know I can help too! Why won't they let me?! Fine! If that's the case, then I'll just have to train harder on my own!"
Late at night, she snuck back down into the workshop, carrying only a small candle to light her way.
"I'll just study by myself," she muttered, her determination burning bright. She pulled down several advanced tomes of magecraft, but as she flipped through the pages, her frustration grew.
"What is this… I can't understand any of it! Ughhh, damn it!" Rin cursed, rifling through book after book, none of which made any sense to her.
Finally, she opened one last volume—only for it to suddenly come alive. Dark energy flared as the grimoire activated a curse. A ghostly hand shot out from its pages, gripping her arms tightly and trying to drag her inside.
"We'll be friends… once the gate is opened," a voice whispered from the book.
"Ahhhhhh! No! Help! Please, I don't want this!" Rin screamed in terror.
"Rin! Are you alright?!" Tokiomi's voice cut through the darkness as he rushed into the workshop. In a swift motion, he pulled her free and slammed the cursed grimoire shut.
"Phew… good thing I arrived in time," Tokiomi said calmly, moving the book to a safer place. Rin, still shaking from the ordeal, struggled to steady her breathing.
"It's far too soon for you to be reading this, Rin," her father explained, his tone elegant yet stern. "There are objects in this world that carry mana of their own."
He picked up an item from the table and showed it to her—a compass.
Her eyes lit up, curiosity replacing fear.
"This is a mana compass. Normally, it won't react unless it senses mana nearby. Here—try infusing this jewel with your mana and see for yourself," he said, handing her a small gemstone.
"Okay…" Rin replied, focusing her energy.
The compass needle immediately shifted, pointing toward her hand.
"Wow…" Rin gasped in awe.
Tokiomi then turned the compass toward the grimoire, and the needle trembled violently, reacting as if warning them of the dangerous aura it emitted.
"Be careful when you see a reaction like this," Tokiomi cautioned. "You're not yet ready to handle things of this scale."
Finally, he placed the compass into her hands.
"I'll give this to you as your birthday present."
"Thank you, Father," Rin said, her voice filled with wonder as she admired the beautiful compass.
"After the Holy Grail War ends, I'll teach you more about jewel magecraft," Tokiomi promised.
Those words lingered in Rin's heart, a treasured memory of her father—one she carried with her as she left Fuyuki behind.
...
I couldn't help but wonder why that kid Rin was reckless enough to come to this city, even knowing there was a Holy Grail War going on. Was she just going through a rebellious phase? Well, I could understand—after all, I went through the same thing. A few years after being reincarnated into this world, my own childhood wasn't exactly stable either. Even now, at only ten years old, I was foolishly joining the Holy Grail War just for fun. Honestly, if I wanted to summon a Servant, I could easily do it with the Third Magic. Sometimes I forget things as simple as that.
"Well, since I'm already here, what else can I do," I muttered, walking calmly through the quiet streets at night.
Behind me, Medusa followed silently. She didn't say a word, even when she saw her Master talking to himself. She only focused on protecting me, though it felt unnecessary in my case.
A few police cars passed by, their lights flashing as they patrolled. With so many disappearances lately, the city had enforced a strict curfew, forbidding anyone from being out at night. Still, none of them seemed to notice me strolling casually through the darkness.
Not long after, I spotted a young girl with black hair tied into twin ponytails, wearing a red outfit, walking down the empty street.
"Oh? Isn't that Rin—the very person I've been looking for?"
She seemed to be following someone from a distance—and the worst part was, the person she was tailing was none other than Zouken, that disgusting worm. For a little girl, this was a nightmare waiting to happen.
From the shadows, I also noticed an Assassin stalking them.
"Tsk… what an annoying combination."
Meanwhile, Rin entered the dark sewer leading to the underground area of Fuyuki City. Allen didn't stop her and instead chose to follow her from a distance. At that moment, his body seemed transparent, his footsteps making no sound. Medusa also chose to follow her Master, fading into astral projection—an ability that every Servant possesses in order to conserve prana rather than maintaining a manifested body in the physical world.
As Rin walked, she noticed footprints and countless insects swarming throughout the sewer. When she continued forward, her foot tripped over something, causing her to fall.
"Ukh… what is this?" Rin muttered, pulling out a jewel. The jewel shone brightly, illuminating the dark space. It turned out that she had tripped over the body of a young girl with short hair. When Rin looked closer, she realized it resembled one of her friends.
But the girl's condition was pale, and several of her organs were missing.
"Ko… Kotone…" Rin almost vomited at the sight, but she forced herself to look at the girl's face. When she turned it over, she realized it wasn't actually her friend. A small wave of relief and gratitude washed over her that it wasn't truly her companion.
Rin stood up again and started running, as the compass showed that something was approaching from the direction she was headed.
"Hmmm, she's a brave girl, isn't she, Rider?" I asked through magecraft communication so our voices wouldn't be heard.
"Yes, Master, that girl is quite brave," Rider replied.
I then looked at the corpse of the girl floating in the sewer, closing my eyes for a moment and exhaling. Some of magus, after all, studied rather cruel branches of magecraft—things like malevolence—where they learned how to harm others in order to further their magical knowledge.
But there are also those who delve into something quite the opposite—a branch known as Benevolence. However, that discipline is mostly pursued to develop magecraft focused on protection, healing, and various forms of supportive art of magecraft.
In short, those two branches represent traits of magecraft—where magus either use their craft to harm or to protect.
Rin ran frantically, desperate to save her friend before anything terrible could happen to her. As she pressed forward, she came upon a chamber filled with writhing worms and insects. Among the piles of crawling creatures, she saw one of her friends unconscious, lying helpless alongside other victims.
"Kotone…!" Rin cried out, rushing to her side, trying to wake her.
But the swarm of insects, sensing Rin's presence, turned aggressive and lunged toward her. Reacting quickly, she hurled one of her jewels into the mass. A powerful explosion tore through the tunnel, flames consuming a portion of the swarm.
Yet not all of them perished. The surviving insects began to gather, twisting together into the form of an old man. That man was none other than Zouken Matou.
"Tohsaka brat… what are you doing here? Did you lose your way?" Zouken's heavy voice echoed through the sewers.
"Who are you?! Why are you doing this to them!?" Rin shouted.
"hahahaha this is because your father refused my offer… he would not hand Sakura over to the Matou family. So I had to find another way. And as luck would have it, you've come here yourself. That means this matter no longer needs to be drawn out. Come here, child. I'll release them—so long as you agree to come with me. What do you say? Will you accept my offer?"
"What kind of idiot would ever trust someone like you?!" Rin retorted, fear tightening her chest, but she forced herself to move. She lifted her unconscious friend onto her back and tried to run.
"It's useless. You won't escape that easily," Zouken said coldly, before continuing, "If you won't come willingly, then I'll simply take you by force."
"Caster, stop her," Zouken ordered his Servant. At once, the figure appeared and summoned a swarm of writhing, tentacled monsters that lashed out at Rin.
Rin desperately tried to evade their attacks, clutching her unconscious friend tightly. She hurled her final jewel to blast apart the monsters blocking her path.
BOOM! The tunnel roared with another explosion, the flames scattering through the air. But her effort was in vain—the creatures regenerated almost instantly, their twisted flesh knitting back together.
A tentacle lashed out, wrapping tightly around Rin's leg and dragging her down.
"Kyaaa! Help!" she screamed, clutching Kotone's limp body as both of them were pulled backward.
"Hahahaha… it's useless, child. There is no one who can save you here," Zouken mocked, his voice echoing like rot in the sewers.
From the corpses littered around them, fresh swarms of worms began crawling out, writhing across the ground. The stench was unbearable. Rin gagged and vomited, horror seizing her as the insects began crawling toward her body, wriggling to force their way inside.
"Please… no! Anyone—please!" Rin cried out in despair.
Medusa, watching through astral form, glanced at her Master. Allen looked utterly uninterested, almost bored by the scene. She could feel he was ready to act.
"What is it, Rider? …Ah, that's right—I nearly forgot the reason I came here," Allen murmured, as if amused. In truth, he had wanted to see just how far Rin's luck would carry her. But it seemed this was as far as it went.
With a snap of his fingers, a massive fireball—five meters wide—burst into existence, engulfing the swarm of insects and tentacled abominations surrounding Rin.
Boom!
The flames tore through the tunnel, burning everything in an instant.
Freed from the monster's grasp, Rin scrambled to her feet, frantically brushing away the worms still clinging to her legs.
"You…!" Zouken's eyes turned, narrowing in fury at Allen.
"Rider, deal with Caster. Leave the worms to me."
"Yes, Master."
Medusa shot forward with blinding speed, her weapon thrusting straight through Caster's chest—only for the figure to dissolve into nothing. A clone.
"Tsk." Rider clicked her tongue in annoyance.
Rin, meanwhile, watched the clash of Servants for the very first time. Her eyes widened in awe as Medusa's movements cut through the confined space with elegance and deadly precision, slashing down countless monsters in a single stroke.
"Hey, kid," I said flatly, "you'd better get out of here unless you want to die in a miserable way."
Allen was already irritated. The stench of the sewers clung to everything, and he wanted to reduce this entire place to ash without delay.
"But… my friend is still here! And there are still people trapped inside!" Rin shot back, clutching Kotone tighter.
"Oh? So you want to play the hero?" I gave her a mocking smile. "Fine. Go ahead, march forward. When you die, I'll make sure to avenge you."
The words dripped with sarcasm, a deliberate taunt. In truth, Allen couldn't care less if the girl fell here—he could always seize her soul and bring her back whenever he wished. But perhaps letting her taste death once… might serve as a small lesson for Rin.
*****
I need coffee here, do you want to buy it for me?.
👉 suport me to buy me a ☕ link at: Patreon.com/RRam784
You can also support this FF by throwing your power stone at me.
Every bit of support means so much and helps me keep creating consistently. ❤️