Normal POV
To say Nanami was pissed was an understatement, he was in fact furious.
He had finally tracked down the location of where Ryunosuke was after inspecting the crime scene of where the two adults were found.
That alone had taken longer than he'd wanted. The bodies had been moved before he arrived, processed through official channels that knew absolutely nothing about what had actually happened to them, and the residual mana at the site had been partially contaminated by the presence of too many mundane officers walking through it before he got there.
He'd worked with what remained using a combination of spells to pick up the trail of where the serial killer could be.
His phone had buzzed twice during the process.
He hadn't looked at it.
When he finally did, standing beside his car with the trail now established and his direction set, both messages were from his superior at the station confirming details about the new missing persons cases that he'd already deduced from the site.
Wasting no time at all he began driving towards the general location. Yet imagine his surprise that once he got there, the place was completely in ruins, the children that were taken rescued, and not too far away were the sounds of battle.
Nanami was quick to instruct the children on where to find the nearest police station before going over to where the fight was taking place.
Then he felt it....that same familiar energy full of malicious intent.
What was Yuji doing here!
Nanami ears cringed at the large booms that were being made.
The former clocktower hunter continued following the sound of battle until he finally found where the pink haired boy was. Along with who he could easily guess to be the serial killer, his servant, and eight kids clearly surrounding Yuji while a ninth one held him in a pseudo full nelson around his torso.
Nanami didn't know why but a gut feeling told him that those 'kids' weren't actually kids anymore.
Reaching back, he drew out both of his cleavers and activated his signature Ratio Magecraft technique that was engraved on his goggles.
The Ratio technique worked by dividing his target with lines and forcibly creating a weak spot at the ratio point of seven to three.
Against the creatures occupying the children's bodies it worked differently than it would against an ordinary target.
Instead of targeting the 'kids' body his magecraft allowed him to see the concentrated eldritch mass that had taken up residence inside of the dead child and identify where the ratio point of it was rather than its dead host.
In a way his googles were quite similar to a pair of mystic eyes and has been something that the Lehrman family wanted to study. But given the type of man Nanami was he of course denied any offers they made.
The cleaver found the point on the shape wrapped around Yuji's torso then the next second the creature's host body was cleaved in two.
Yuji drops to his knees and glanced up to see..."Nanami?" a smile makes its way on his face.
"You and I," Nanami began giving a small glance over at the pink-haired boy, "are going to have a very long conversation after this...Itadori," Nanami finished in a very serious tone.
'Forget calling him by his first name, the kid had just lost that privilege.' the mage thought to himself.
Yuji winced at the tone in his voice.
Gilles meanwhile turned those horrible popping eyes toward Nanami with an expression that moved from surprise into something considerably less pleasant.
"You," he began, the wet layered quality of his voice sharpening by a degree, "are interfering with something sacred!"
"I don't give a shit," Nanami bluntly replied before rushing forward into the first creature's guard before it could even make use of the advantage reach.
In the next second his right cleaver found the ratio point of the creature inside
It exploded everywhere.
The second shape tried to use the interval and Nanami's left cleaver came across in a short redirecting slash, pushing its outstretched arms off-line. Meanwhile the right was repositioned and found the ratio point on the follow-through.
Two were now down.
The third and fourth were fast. Considerably faster than the previous ones, the creatures inside them apparently having learned something from watching two of their numbers went down in under four seconds. They split their approach trying to force him to choose a side.
Nanami chose neither.
He stepped into the gap between them and both of his cleavers worked simultaneously. The right flew high for one ratio point, the left dropped low for the other, but the timing required was on point enough that a half-second error in either direction would have left him exposed from one side.
Nanami didn't make any error's though.
Two more down.
Four remaining.
This was where it now started becoming difficult.
The four remaining shapes had been watching. Whatever passed for tactical intelligence among the creatures occupying them had apparently concluded that the pattern of his attacks. Inside the reach, ratio point, and clean exit was now something to be accounted for.
They spread to maximum coverage, forcing angles that couldn't be dealt with sequentially, and when he moved toward the nearest one the other three immediately began to converge on his position from three different directions.
Nanami struck the ratio point on the nearest one and then the three incoming ones attacked him simultaneously.
Two cleavers couldn't cover three angles.
He covered two and tanked the third.
The impact caught him across the left side, below the ribs, the force of an eldritch-enhanced body striking without restraint forced him sideways two full steps putting something unpleasant in his breathing.
Thankfully nothing was broken or cracked at most a large bruise or two but nothing he couldn't handle.
The three remaining shapes repositioned.
Nanami looked at them for a moment before glancing down at his left palm where a black marking could be seen.
'Ah,' he inwardly sighed 'it's going to be one of those days, isn't it?'
"It's not often that I am pushed to this, but I am going into overtime now. So prepare yourselves," he announced clenching his hand into fist and then with the right steps he broke the tattoo seal on his palm.
.
.
.
The Kento family had developed the seal some generations backs.
The logic of the seal was simple in concept and extraordinarily difficult in execution. Rather than expending mana as it was produced a practitioner would divert a portion of each day's output into the seal, compressing and storing it over weeks and months until the accumulated reserve reached a density that the body's normal channels couldn't safely carry.
At that point, releasing it produced an effect that wasn't quite a standard reinforcement but rather a full cloak of mana.
Blue mana expanded outward from Nanami's left palm in a concentrated wave and then drew back inward. The density of months of accumulated reserves compressed into a continuous output that made the air around him faintly luminous.
The three remaining shapes took a step back.
The creatures inside the bodies, apparently had enough instinct to recognize a change in what they were dealing with.
Nanami rolled his left shoulder once.
'I haven't done this in some time, not even sure if I'll be able to unleash a Black Flash,' he coldly thought to himself.
Black Flash.
It was a powerful technique that had been taught to him by his father and his father before that. At the time of learning and using it Nanami had simply thought one of his many ancestors developed it but after doing research for Yuji he had found out it's point of origin.
Just as the God of War, Hachiman had once blessed the first Kento family head with a mana core he had also taught them the powerful combat technique.
Originally one needed a mana core to even have the potential of using the technique in the first place.
Black Flash is a distortion in space that occurs in 0.000001 seconds of a physical hit and is equal to a normal attack that is to the power of 2.5.
Being able to distort space at all like that from a punch was a miracle by itself. As it is the ability to manipulate or affect space is on the level of a grand ritual possibly even a semi-true magic/miracle.
However, to land and produce the black sparks the user needs to be incredibly lucky as it can only occur under the right circumstances.
Mental Conditions.
Temperature/Humidity conditions.
Physical Conditions.
These were all things that had to be accounted for a Black Flash to ignite.
The highest record amount Nanami had ever landed was 4 which was higher then any of the previous modern heads of the family.
Nanami exhaled once and let the accumulated amount of mana find its own level.
The three remaining shapes came forward.
He went left first because left had the most direct line and direct lines were resolved fastest. The cleaver found the ratio point and the shape exploded in the next second.
He turned already moving in time to miss the bloody chunks and slammed his right cleaver through the second shape's outstretched arms while his left repositioned.
The final one struck him before he could fully reset, the eldritch-enhanced mass connecting with his reinforced forearm, and the impact large enough to be felt even through the mana cloak.
However the collision bought the creature close enough for his cleaver's working range and he found the ratio point from half a meter out.
It exploded as well.
Nanami stood in the road with the accumulated reserve still burning blue around him.
Gilles was still at the road's far end, his expression having moved through several ranges of emotions in the last thirty seconds until he arrived at something that resembled something like silent fury.
Rynosuke on the other hand was attempting to stand at the lamppost base, one arm missing, the tentacle-tissue working to restore it.
Nanami locked eyes with the serial killer and began walking towards him while sheathing his weapons.
Rynosuke got one foot under himself and looked up his eyes widening as the impending figure of Nanami approached.
"Hey now lets-," he began only to suddenly release a gasped shout of pain.
Nanami's had in one step lifted him up by his hair and then connected his right fist with Rynosuke's sternum.
The Black Flash ignited on contact.
The distortion lasted 0.000001 seconds and in that window the space around the point of impact bent, the black and red colored sparks crackling outward from the collision.
"Black Flash!!" Nanami's body and mind was re-energized giving him just a slight high before he relaxed.
Rynosuke flew backward with a velocity that put him through the decorative fencing along the road's edge and into the wall beyond it and through that too. The dust and debris that followed him settled slowly in the air.
Nanami remained where he was cautiously watching to see what the mad Caster would do.
Gilles took two steps forward towards Rynosuke but stopped.
The two of them stared at each other across the road.
Nanami's right hand was still open from the release. The black sparks had faded and so too did his overtime storage. Despite knowing he might not stand much of a chance against a servant the former enforcer reached over behind his back withdrawing one of his cleavers.
Gilles stared at the cleaver and then back at what remained of Rynosuke embedded in the wall at the road's edge.
The awkward silence stretched for three full seconds.
Then a sound came from the rubble where Rynosuke had landed. A loud cough, then a groan, then the wet working sound of the tentacle-tissue beginning its repairs.
The bastard was still alive, Gilles looked at this for a moment.
Then he looked at Nanami again with those horrible popping eyes and his hands clasped in the grotesque pantomime of serenity and said, "we will continue this another evening Magus."
He moved towards his master.
"And you will find," Gilles continued, reaching down and taking Rynosuke's remaining arm to lift him,j "that I can be extraordinarily patient when I want to be. Yuji Itadori." those eyes went past Nanami to where the boy was. "I will see you again and when I do I want to see more of your hatred towards God!" he exclaimed towards the end tears welling up in his eyes.
"Ugh!," Yuji cringed back in disgust from somewhere behind Nanami's left shoulder.
Gilles smiled widely.
Then the shadows at the road's end made room for both of them and then they were gone just like that.
Nanami stood in the road for a moment and let the accumulated reserve settle back to baseline, the blue luminance fading from the air around him by degrees. His elbow was flaring from the hit it had tanked.
Seeing that the danger was gone the detective sheathed his weapon and took off his goggles carefully folding them into his breast pocket.
He sighed something Nanami found himself doing a lot more often.
"Come on Itadori we need to go now," he called to the boy in a stern tone.
He began walking to where he had parked the car.
After a moment Yuji soon followed.
'I am seriously getting too old for this shit,' Nanami mentally complained to himself.
-end of chapter eighteen-
it's been a while since I've updated this fic, was only able to update this one because I had half of the draft done when I stopped. But anyways I've been dealing with Uni classes and trying to balance out my workouts and by the end it just leaves me with zero energy to write these days. I am also at that point where I've been doing fate work for so long that I've become burnt out.
Now I do still want to continue this fic...but I just won't be super consistent with it as I try to think of a new project to work on that has zero connection to fate so I can recover from my burnout.
A Reverse Cursed Technique if you would.
Also a quick thank you for all my supporters/readers who still read this fic it means a lot to me.