Vimana floated downward, its hull rotating mid-air to face a new direction. The emerald wings running along its length adjusted with millimetric precision, green circuits within them blazing brighter with each passing second.
Gilgamesh settled back onto his throne. His eyes peered across the distance, landing on cascading flashes of gold.
He smiled.
Vimana moved.
"Saber..."
...
..
.
Archer stood fifteen paces ahead of Artoria.
Kanshou and Bakuya rested in his grip. Raw, red lines wound across his shoulders and spine. Blood seeped steadily from those wounds, dripping from his elbows to the forest floor—drip, drip—like a clock counting down.
He drew a breath.
"Saber." His voice came out steady. "Where is your Master? I don't see him anywhere."
He adjusted his grip on Kanshou, feeling its handle shift against his palm.
"Don't tell me—is he scared?"
His words hung between them.
Artoria's expression did not change. Invisible Air rested parallel to the ground, its sheath of wind hovering above her shoulder, its tip aimed squarely at his abdomen.
And then—
Gold.
The earth beneath her detonated—vaporized into a crater. A shockwave slammed into Archer, shoving his shoulders back, stripping leaves from branches, launching wooden splinters in all directions.
A wave of light stretched toward him from that golden flash—and she was already beside it. Blade and light reached him in the same instant, crossing the distance faster than a blink.
Pure reflex threw his arms up. Kanshou and Bakuya shrieked forward, black and white steel stabbing at her face.
An inch from her eye—
Gold.
Air tore at his flank. Sparks bit his shoulder a heartbeat before her wind blade did. Armor cracked. Skin parted. Blood hit the air.
Bakuya twisted for a counter—
A second gash carved his chest beneath Kanshou. Displaced air reached the wound a moment later, tearing it open wider.
Archer's mind lagged behind his body. Kanshou carved an arc through a golden blur in his peripheral.
It connected. Then passed through. The golden silhouette dissolved like a mirage.
Twenty paces away, Artoria skidded to a halt, soil erupting from where her heels met the earth, but her eyes were fixed on a golden ship approaching them. Medea floated directly above her, magic circles already rotating toward the vessel instead of Archer.
Thirty seconds.
That was how long Artoria calculated it would take that ship to reach them.
She turned back toward Archer, who was similarly watching the ship. His gaze, however, soon snapped back to her with renewed vigilance.
Artoria took a step toward him—
Gold.
Kanshou moved on reflex, swiping in front of Archer in a wide arc.
Yet Artoria was already sliding beneath his swipe, spine parallel to the ground, Invisible Air held at her side.
Archer's arm tried to pull back as it passed over her. He took a step back—
Gold.
A point-blank burst erupted from the back of her shoulder, launching her vertically upward from her slide. No wind-up. No crouch. Just a raw, directional thrust that shouldn't exist.
She rocketed over his head, twisted mid-air, and brought her blade down.
Kanshou caught it. The impact drove his boots six inches down. Blood seeped between his teeth as the shockwave traveled through his jaw. Invisible Air ground against Kanshou, blade shrieking against blade.
He shoved. She was pushed back mid-air—then she wasn't.
A concussive thunderclap erupted from her palms. Twin bursts of gold detonated against the handle of her own weapon, force transferring clean through Invisible Air and into Kanshou. Archer's wrist bent past its limit, cracking. Kanshou spun from his grip—gone, tumbling into an underbrush nearby.
Bakuya came up in a diagonal slash to block.
Gold.
Her hip. A burst flared from her hip, spinning her entire body like a top. Her armoured heel smashed against his cheek, point blank.
Archer's vision went white. His skull rattled, his legs left the ground, and static buzzed in his ears.
His back slammed into a tree trunk. Bark behind him exploded. He dropped to one knee, choking on air. Bakuya hummed in his left hand. Where was Kanshou—
Gold.
Artoria was already closing in. A burst from her left knee snapped her leg forward like a piston, the thrust carrying her entire body in a low arc, Invisible Air tracing a silver line behind her.
Archer threw himself sideways. Her sword bisected the tree behind him, soil flying outward as she cratered.
He rolled across the ground, came up on a knee, and traced. Blue light crackled. A fresh Kanshou materialized in his right hand.
Two blades again. He crossed them over his chest.
Artoria walked out of the crater she had created. The golden afterglow of her mana bursts bled from her pores, curling off her shoulders like steam.
Archer's chest wound opened and closed with each breath, his wrist still throbbing where it had broken.
He sighed, blood covering his chin.
"As expected. Even weakened, I'm no match for you."
Artoria shifted her weight to her back foot.
Her rear shin. A burst detonated from it, launching her low and forward—not at him, but past him, a straight line cutting across his flank. Archer moved, Kanshou sweeping—
Gold.
Her leading shoulder erupted mid-stride, violently yanking her trajectory inward, toward him. The momentum that should have carried her past him transformed into a tight arc, Invisible Air swinging with every ounce of her accumulated, redirected force.
Kanshou and Invisible Air collided. Archer watched with widening eyes as fractures splintered across his sword. The impact hit him a second later; his arm buckled, the crack of shattering bone ringing out.
Gold. Gold. Gold.
Three consecutive flashes. This time from her entire body, turning her into a humanoid silhouette of pure light.
When the light faded, Archer was nowhere to be seen. A long trench stretched from her position for hundreds of meters straight. Countless trees were launched airborne. The earth sank in a spiraling crater, meters deep.
Artoria was about to give chase when her eyes snapped upward. A hail of Noble Phantasms rained down toward her.
"Caster!" Her voice rose.
Medea moved before Artoria even finished. Countless violet magic circles flared to life at once, bombarding those descending Noble Phantasms in an inverse rain.
Everything slowed. A golden lance reflected the violet of a magic beam. A violet beam refracted the gold of a Noble Phantasm.
Violet and gold bent around one another, a complex net of shifting shades.
For a single, suspended moment, the sky became a kaleidoscope of violet and gold.
Then—
White.
The Holy Grail War.
Its climax ignited.
...
..
.
***
[200 Power Stones = 1 Bonus Chapter]
[5 chapters ahead on P@tr3on = [email protected]/Not_Aaryan]
...
[Authors Thoughts]
Honestly, writing these 700 words of Artoria's fight nearly took around twelve hours. I saw that no one could do Artoria justice and show really how she fights. And as you all know, she is my favourite, so I had to go out of my way to show how she really would fight. I bet you've not seen something like this before, right?
It was one hell of a project, to search about her [Mana Burst], to watch anime and videos about how she fights, to consult others, and finally, how to bring all of it alive in words, on a page.
... I just love her too much. So I left no stones unturned to write a fight that really feels like Artoria.
Anyway, ignore my rambling. Have fun.