As Shirou Emiya's consciousness came back after… whatever had just happened to him, his mind started the slow process of putting itself back together. He… he recalled he was in his first nightmare. Which was some kind of trial people went through when they contracted the Nightmare spell. And he had gone to a local police station before he entered so that they could… protect people from his body if he failed.
If he knew where that police station was and knew the procedure for this process it would stand to reason that Shirou was a citizen of that city, and yet his memories of any kind of past were non-existent. He knew he had… lived in the city outskirts for a little while so perhaps he was a native? Or was he a visitor from somewhere else who came there recently? That thought seemed more familiar somehow and yet he couldn't draw on a single memory other than the last… 3 months or so he had spent in the outskirts of the Northern Quadrant Siege Capital. How could he have come from somewhere else if he didn't have memories of anywhere prior?
'Maybe it's a matter of my nightmare then? A side effect, or perhaps some way to elevate the challenge of the process by stripping some of my prior knowledge of things?' Even as he toyed with the thought of it though Shirou was unable to convince himself of that. There were industries he knew of around training people to face their nightmares so the idea of being robbed of that part of your preparation seemed particularly laughable. Not to mention why would his memories go back several months and then suddenly stop? If this was due to his nightmare wouldn't he either lose all his memories or more recent ones? Why was it retaining short and long term but dropping off to a blank before the three month mark?
The only meaningful scrap of memory he had from the last three months was the fact that he had a partner who had been with him the entire time. He knew her name was Rin Tohsaka, and he knew the two of them were close, much closer than two people who had only met three months ago had any right to be. Despite knowing that though, the only memories he could draw upon were the most recent ones from their time in NQSC and even then they were fractured and indistinct. Conversations that couldn't be understood, whole words that slid out of sentences as his mind tried to remember them.
Her existence in his memories was enough for Shirou to focus on and as he tried to wrack his mind he recalled the most recent memory he had of her. Just this afternoon he headed to the police station in order to go through the nightmare spell first before Rin did. Rin's own symptoms were still a day or two behind his own and so they both decided Shirou could go on ahead. The pair was exchanging far more words than he could remember but there were things he could understand like his own resilience, and being too stubborn to die. He had said that about himself and earned a… something from Rin which he couldn't remember. The sensation of it was like a zap from a taser and the emotions he had felt were strangely joyous at the thought of her being concerned about him. But the image of whatever she had done was bleached away just like half the words they had said. One part of that last exchange he could understand though was that for some reason he was supposed to be collecting some kind of intelligence while he was in here to give back to her for her own journey into the nightmare in the next two days.
Any further contemplation he might have had on the topic was banished from his mind when the stark whiteness of the void around him faded away and was replaced by the image of a vast plain of pale white sand stretching out across the horizon. The grains were painted by the deep hue of the distant setting sun and set swirling as the winds picked up. As Shirou was left staring at the vast expanse before him the sun began accelerating across the sky before rapidly plunging down behind the horizon. The endless night sky shone high above and countless stars shined in its embrace. They too were quickly streaking across the sky and even accelerating like the sun had until soon the sun moon and stars all were spinning across the sky like a kaleidoscopic dream.
As they did, the desert in front of Shirou twisted and changed. The now rapidly swirling and fading winds seemingly pushed back the expanse of the endless desert as grass began to sprout from a rapidly forming layer of soil. Soon the green dresses pushed the desert back entirely from Shirou's view and he was left standing in a field of green that was billowing in accelerated breezes so fast that it almost seemed to vibrate. For a moment he thought that time might be accelerating around him but when the decaying mass of a fallen tree began to rise up from the grass and then add itself to a swiftly reforming forest around him he realized it was the opposite. Time around him was moving backwards at a frankly insane rate. It must have been thousands or even tens of thousands of years ago that the rocky desert he saw was such a lush and vibrant place.
The shifting of time seemed to finally slow down as the forest around Shirou grew thick and strong, with the trees now hardy and thick enough to block the sun. The speed of the sun, moon, and stars began to slow down but just as the process properly slowed down Shirou noticed that bones began to rise up from the soil around him, along with well rusted arms and armors. Time continued to tick backwards as the bones became more and more intact and the weapons and armor regained their luster. Shirou had a strong suspicion of the reason he had ended up in a place like this now and it was proven correct when he looked down at the place his disembodied viewpoint was seemingly anchored to and found one more corpse rapidly having its time wound back.
It wore different armor from the other nine bodies around him, due to both being of a higher quality than the others as well as including some strange coverings on the head and back side that almost seemed meant to accommodate raised ears and a tail. Once the flesh began to reform and take shape Shirou's suspicions about the odd body were at least partially confirmed as an actual tail took shape underneath the armored plating in the back as the rest of the body also regained its flesh. And as the flesh was rewound the wounds that no doubt led to the death of this person were plain as day to see, giving Shirou a clear understanding of what had happened here.
One body was riddled with wounds from many sources, while the others each seemed to have been cut with a longsword blade. The very same longsword that was now shimmering with a mirror shine as it was stuck in the ground next to the bleeding body at Shirou's feet.
The rate of time's slowing was now down to a proper crawl but as Shirou felt his immaterial self be pulled into the slowly standing body below him he was still away of the fact that the nightmare was seemingly placing him into a vessel mere minutes before it had been fated to die. As a sole act of mercy the reversal of time did not stop when the vessel stood and instead the whole of the conflict that lead to its death was spun backwards, blades and arrows seemingly sprouting out from Shirou's body and pulling the wounds away from them as they did. Longsword strikes acting almost like mystic glue and patching wounds as they sailed in reverse. As the pitched fight was reversed, Shirou studied it all as desperately as he could, making note of each of the enemies who had attacked and would soon again attack him.
By the time the journey of the heavenly bodies at last crawled to a stop and time was permitted to flow once again Shirou's mind was fully settled into his armored vessel, a dark skinned young man wearing a suit of full plate armor including a helmet that obscured his face. Despite that fact the vessel was still striking due not only to the quality of the armor it wore but also the fact that it possessed a black furred tail that seemed to belong more to a jaguar than a person. And if the design of the helmet was practical rather than decorative, there were also two feline ears sitting on top of Shirou's new head. The small details of his new found and temporary appearance were not as important as the fact that Shirou's body was now standing up again and properly holding its sword. He was still lightly wounded but compared to the dozens upon dozens of injuries it had carried just moments ago into the rewound future it was a huge improvement.
Almost to signal the flow of time was restored, a leaf that had moments ago floated up from the ground in front of Shirou's face stopped and then began to drift down. Just as a longsword crashed down at Shirou from his back right side.
He had seen enough to know that blow was coming and shifted his body as it did, letting the longswordsman's surprise blow fall to the ground before Shirou put his boot on it and swung his own sword across the man's exposed elbows. The sword bit deep and although his arms were not cut off, the blow was enough to take the man entirely out of the fight, or any fight he might ever be a part of again.
As Shirou's slice sailed through the swordsman's arms and the clearing was filled with screams Shiro continued his spin and ducked down as an arrow that would have slammed into his shoulder instead drove itself into the tree behind him. Taking his boot off the man's blade, Shirou ducked past the screaming man and to the left, dodging the thrust of a spearman driving his sword forward and through the man's leg. With a twist and an upward slash coupled with another dodge to avoid the actions of another swordsman, the spear wielder was left similarly disarmed and bleeding on the ground.
The deadly dance that Shirou was subjecting the soldiers to continued on as Shirou made his way through their numbers. Granted the seemingly prophetic advantage diminished rather quickly and as a consequence Shirou earned a number of wounds across his body by the time everyone was left incapacitated but all the same things ended with him standing over a mass of bleeding and moaning bodies.
His own wounds were rather superficial compared to them thanks to what had to have been their own panic from his performance early in their ambush. The enemy soldiers meanwhile were sporting severed tendons, or cleaved muscles and were forced to the ground as Shirou stood above them.
One among their number stood out thanks to his slightly more ostentatious armor and the manner that he was holding himself. Even despite the fact he had lost some fingers and was pinned to the ground by his own sword stabbed through his leg the middle aged man was glaring defiantly at Shirou with a rictus of hate on his face.
"Since you all don't seem to be attacking anymore can you tell me what is going on?" Shirou asked as he looked at the man in front of him who only grit his teeth and spat.
"First you disgusting scourge worshiping monsters run all the way out here and force us to chase you down, then you don't even have the decency to fight with honor and kill us properly, and NOW YOU WANT TO ASK QUESTIONS! " As he spoke the man leaned forward and reached for the sword impaling him to the ground which only forced Shirou to deliver a kick to him and force him back.
"I don't know what honor you're talking about but I'm not about to kill people if I can offer mercy instead." 'Especially if I don't even know what in the world I'm fighting for. Any kind of murder is a tragedy but if I kill them I might well be murdering heroic people without knowing it. As it is, these men and women will be spending the rest of their lives back home and away from battlefields which is probably a good thing.' As he stepped back from the man, Shirou looked down at him again and shook his head. "All the same, I can see talking things through with all of you isn't going to work though so I'm going to go."
As he began to walk away, Shirou pulled one of the few arrows that struck him out of his arm and tossed it to the ground before wrapping said arm in a strip of cloth. His footsteps were not slow but he was also not running off in order to avoid exacerbating his wounds any further. Because of his unhurried pace Shirou was more than able to hear the screaming and shouting coming from the commander as he walked away.
"COWARD! WRETCH! SCOURGE-WORSHIPPING MONGREL! YOU AND ALL YOUR KIND WILL SUFFER FOR YOUR SINS IN AGONY BEFORE WE WIPE YOU FROM EXISTANCE."
As Shirou put more distance between himself and the irate man behind him his mind was slowly freed to wonder what was going on. He'd managed to gleam some information about the situation he was placed into from what was said. Shirou was apparently something known as a scourge worshipper which was at least a little helpful but not much beyond that. There was more to be gleaned than just the spoken words though. The first thing that came to his mind above everything else was the fact that this vessel of his didn't even seem to be the same species as those people he had just met. The inclusion of a tail and what seemed suspiciously like cat ears was telling enough but there was also the fact that he was much more durable and strong than he should have been. The wounds on his body, light though they may be, should have been enough to have him swaying and trembling from the pain and blood loss and yet his footsteps were steady and unhurried. That alone made him think this vessel he was in was not human but there were also clues based on the state of his opponents and what they had said.
The commanders had called him a monster earlier and from what Shirou saw all the soldiers from before were regular humans. That made one point of separation between them and Shirou but there were others on top of that.
Based on what he could see of his gauntlets and breast plate Shirou's own armor was of a better quality that those of his opposition but it had the look and feel of something custom made rather than standardized. The enemy meanwhile had been outfitted in the same armor, and were wielding weapons of the same design. It implied that between his own group and these unnamed enemies, the unnamed foes were the numerically superior foes. A fact reinforced by the way the commander had said the scourge worshippers had 'ran all the way out here'. Taken together it seemed like Shirou was part of an inferior group attempting to escape some larger, more well established group.
Shirou's fragmented memories were not particularly helpful but he did have memories of himself and Rin trying to learn as much as they could about the Nightmare spell before taking part in it. Due to that preparation, he knew that the secret to his escape would be based on his ability to survive until a conflict that plagued the Nightmare was resolved.
With that much in mind the supposed conflict that Shirou was to resolve seemed rather obvious. He would have to either ensure that his own group escaped or ensure that they were all wiped out. And considering his own stance on needless slaughter, the choice was a rather obvious one to make. Sparing one last look at the clearing where he had nearly met his end, Shirou continued marching forward off into the east where he knew a desert would one day stretch.
***
It had been several hours since Shirou began his trek through the woods. The direction he had first picked had been based not only on intuition given that it was the direction he first saw when he arrived here, but also based on some boot prints he had found going in the opposite direction. A quick look showed they were his, or rather his vessel's very own boots, which meant he had come from here at some point, most likely serving as bait to lead that group of soldiers away while the main worshippers went elsewhere.
If the plan was carried out as it was no doubt intended then Shirou would meet them somewhere farther along rather than having to go back and track them but sadly any knowledge of a meeting location was not included in his new body. So instead Shirou was forced to make due trudging along through the foliage hoping that he would at least not have to double back too much.
Despite the apparent dullness of this chapter of his dream Shirou had still managed to be productive. As he was walking he had ended up managing to access the runes of the spell and got his first proper look at them. Which ended up being a rather strange sight for the amnesiac man.
Name: Shirou Emiya
True Name: —
Rank: I̴̲͍̒̚n̷̛̺̓t̷̨̤͝ř̷̠͔̕ų̵̳̍̉d̴͓̱̎ē̵̝r̴̝̦̽̍
Soul Core: Sealed
Memories: —
Echoes: —
S̵͔͒̕k̵͕͐̚i̸̯̒l̷͎̰̒̀l̸̗͊̒s̴̺̉͂: —
Attributes: [Distant], [Third rate ?????], [Feline Heritage], [Scion of Steel], [?]
Aspect: [Somber Steel]
Aspect Description: [You stand alone on an empty battlefield. You held tight to a contradictory ideal, and refused to give a single inch. And as your grips tightened you crushed everything you loved and it slipped from your fingers like sand.]
The mechanism by which the spell managed to display things was rather impressive to Shirou at first glance but once he started looking though things a bit more he got the oddest feeling that the spell wasn't functioning properly. His rank was apparently something that could barely be written and when he got a headache trying to understand it he was forced to give up. The same thing could be said for some extra category that he hadn't ever heard of before tucked under his echos slot. Then there were the smattering of runes in his aspects that were entirely replaced by question marks which left him extremely confused. The spell should have pulled up information from his own soul to form them so how was he of all people unable to read them.
None of his issues with the readability or missing text could compare to the confusion and twinge of foreboding he felt when he read the description of his aspect and attributes though.
The aspect description itself painted a grim picture about someone who stood alone on a battlefield. With no details beyond that it was hard to figure out what it really did, although Shirou could attest that the vessel he was inhabiting was certainly fierce and fit. Even discounting the tremendous boon that came from watching a fight rewind in front of him, most would not have been able to move like he did or fight well enough to incapacitate so many people.
But the rest of the aspect seemed meaningless. The simple fact that Shirou had spared those people and allowed them a chance to return to their families was proof positive in his eyes that he would be more than able to save people. Even if he couldn't quite understand why that fact mattered so much to him.
Beyond the aspect itself the details of his attributes afforded him even fewer answers than before and carried even more mysteries.
[Distant] Attribute Description: "You are a distant entity, far removed from this world. You bear echoes of things that should not be, yet you carry on despite them. You have forced your way into the spell and been accommodated by it, but are not loved by it. That said it is nothing if not fair."
Nothing about this attribute made sense to Shirou and the most he could figure was that it was somehow related to his unreadable rank and category. The description of it though was still certainly a troubling thing to see attached to his soul.
[Third rate ?????] Attribute Description: "You were once counted as kin to a select group. Even if you were in their lowest rungs and looked on by them as little more than trash, you still managed to learn some simple tricks."
This was one of the instances where the word obscured was outright omitted rather than being blurred and mind numbing to read. He had no real clue what in the world it could mean or what his simple tricks were and so was forced to simply ignore it all together for now.
[Feline Heritage] Attribute Description: "The vessel you inhabit is not of this world. It carried with it a twisted heritage from a land beyond the boundary and differs from normal humans in ways both good and ill."
This one was a rather clear explanation for the strangeness of his borrowed form, though the complete lack of detail on the differences was rather unhelpful. The simple added appendages were clear enough to understand but the mention of unknown ills left Shirou confused and somewhat nervous. If he was stuck in this body and had no idea of what weaknesses it might have he would be at a rather steppe disadvantage.
[Scion of Steel] Attribute Description: "Your existence began in a blaze and was shaped like a blade in a forge. You possess a strange acumen for arms and armor, particularly bladed weaponry."
Scion of Steel lacked just as much context as the other did but at least it was kind enough to offer some sort of explanation that Shirou could link to a real tangible outcome. It was certainly true that during his fight Shirou had found himself shifting between his and his enemies weapons with a degree of ease, or even having the subtlest inkling of where the steel was moving around him as he made his way through the clearing he arrived in.
[?] Attribute Description: [Neither the flames of an evil God, or the machinations of a twisted weave can strip your soul of its first and purest instinct. You may forget, but even when wrapped in steel and drowned in molten metal, your soul will still remember]
And then lastly came the real mystery. No name given and no details of any kind other than some somewhat relevant mentions of memory and remembrance. It was certainly something that was related to the vast chunk of memories missing from Shirou's mind as well as the smattering of holes in what remained but despite that fact the mention of an the flames of an evil god were a rather foreboding thing to be included in here and made the idea of digging deeper somewhat unappealing for now.
Not to mention some inkling that there was something to that aspect even deeper than his own first guess. It was hard to express in words but something about it seemed to hint at something more deeply tied to his soul than anything else he knew of.
Aside from a brief bit of time spent reviewing his runes and getting familiar with them, the rest of Shirou's time was steadfastly focused on continuing his trek. The sooner he was able to make it to the worshippers the sooner he would be able to resolve the situation and make it out of here.
And as his luck would have it, after having hiked for only six hours after leaving the battleground Shirou found himself in a large clearing that showed clear signs of habitation. They were old at this point, at least several days old from the looks of things, but given that it was on the same trail as his boot prints it was a clear success.
Shirou's plan to continue his journey was quickly running into an issue though as the sun set down beyond the horizon and the forest was bathed in darkness. Shirou seemingly knew enough about tracking to follow whatever trail the scourge worshipers left behind but in the dead of night he wasn't going to make much progress. The source of said knowledge of tracking, and the corresponding knowledge that doing at night were futile, was still a mystery to Shirou but it was sensible enough to follow. So seeing as he had found a former campsite he decided to rest for the night until the sun came back up.
What he cobbled together would in truth not really be considered a campsite so much as him using the last few strips of cloth he had to make a simple rope so he could climb a tree and sleep in the branches. With no one to keep watch he somehow knew that sleeping on the ground would be too much of a risk, not to mention the fact he had no equipment with him anyway. A quick climb up a sturdy tree was enough to get him off the ground, and after lashing his makeshift rope around his chest and the tree trunk he was able to sit and shut his eyes confident he wouldn't roll off the branch.
Before Shirou could even settle in and shut his eyes though the sound of rustling leaves echoed out from the forest the leaves near his tree. Shirou's eyes squinted through the gloom of the night as he zeroed in on the rustling leaves and grass, as whatever was making those sounds moved towards the clearing. Seeing that whatever it was seemed to be heading towards him Shirou untied the rope and grabbed his sword. He had been lucky so far to avoid any nightmare creatures but that kind of luck wouldn't hold, not to mention the other possibility of more enemy troops coming.
As the sounds grew closer Shirou sat up on the branch and readied his sword to jump down on top of whatever was making those sounds. With any luck he would be able to kill any beast that might be there or disarm any possible threat in a single strike.
When the rustling was right below Shirou and he saw the shape moving through the grass he stepped off the branch and fell down on top of it, forcing what turned out to be a person down onto the floor of the forest before pressing his blade across their neck.
As Shirou's mind settled from the brief surge of adrenaline and he got his first clear view of the person beneath him his eyes widened and the questions he planned to ask slipped his mind entirely. Rather than a beast of an enemy soldier Shirou was sitting on top of a very young brown haired girl dressed in light silken robes. The girl looked to be around 12 years old by Shirou's own reckoning and the robes she was wearing seemed to be well embroidered and stitched, with a number of different colors being layered together purely for visual flair rather than practical need. Even more surprising that the clothes she wore, or even the very fact that a girl her age was in the forest alone at night, was the fact that like Shirou's own vessel she had a tail just like a cat's as well as a pair of feline ears on the top of her head.
The sight of those traits along with the clear fact the girl was nothing like he had expected was enough to distract Shirou from even speaking or issuing a demand as he held the blade to her neck which left the girl staring up at him with an absolutely horrified expression in her slitted yellow eyes.
Or at least that was how things started off before she flicked her gaze across his body and settled on both his helmet and a broach he was wearing on his chest. The sight of them seemed to be enough to make her even forget the fact she had a sword to her throat and instead caused a smile to bloom across her face.
"Ozen! You… you made it out alive!"