The world swam back into focus one agonizing inch at a time. The cold, gritty texture of wet asphalt pressed against my cheek, and the reek of city rain filled my nostrils. My wrist throbbed with a dull, insistent ache, a constant reminder of the impossible brand now seared into my flesh. The cryptic messages from my 'System' echoed in my mind, a loop of warnings about unstable locks and the desperate need for an energy source.
Seek… energy… source… immediately…
My body felt like a drained battery. Just lifting my head was a monumental effort. My eyes scanned the glistening street, searching for… I didn't even know what. An exposed power line? A stray bolt of lightning? My mind, steeped in the logic of a thousand webnovels, tried to apply rules to a situation that had none.
That's when I saw it.
About ten feet away, nestled against the curb where dirty rainwater swirled into a drain, sat a cup. No, that wasn't right. It was a grail. An honest-to-god, ornate, golden goblet that shone with a soft, internal luminescence, utterly repelling the grime and rain around it. It looked like it had been plucked from a king's treasury and dropped onto the grimiest street in Queens. It pulsed with a gentle, rhythmic light, and with every pulse, the desperate craving in my soul screamed, There!
That was the energy source.
Ignoring the protests of my screaming muscles, I crawled. I dragged myself across the pavement, my soaked clothes scraping against the concrete, my eyes fixed on the golden artifact. It was the most beautiful and out-of-place thing I had ever seen. As my fingers brushed against its cold, metallic surface, a jolt, clean and pure, shot up my arm.
The effect was instantaneous. The pain in my wrist lessened, and the chaotic din in my head stabilized. The system panel, which had been a flickering mess, solidified in my vision.
🌟 DNA / ARTIFACT SCAN COMPLETE 🌟
➤ Target: Holy Relic – Grail of Convergence
➤ Acquired:
- Dimensional Energy Resonance (Level 1)
- Spirit Vessel Affinity (Basic)
➤ Potential Evolution: Realm-Core Synthesis
Cooldown Remaining: 23h 59m
Integration Progress: 4%
A wave of warmth spread through me, not just from the energy but from the information itself. Dimensional Energy Resonance. Spirit Vessel Affinity. These weren't just random words; they were concepts, abilities, slotting into my understanding like puzzle pieces. The system wasn't just giving me power; it was teaching me its language.
Another alert popped up, updating my status.
[Energy influx detected. Multiversal Lock stabilizing... 37%... 39%... 42%...]
[System functions partially restored. Vital signs returning to baseline.]
I felt a sliver of my strength return. But the scan, the sudden surge of energy from the Grail, seemed to have consequences. The air above me twisted. The sound of rain and traffic warped, stretching like old cassette tape before being silenced completely.
A tear ripped open in the fabric of the sky. It wasn't a hole; it was a corridor, a shimmering, unstable tunnel of fractured light that showed glimpses of a world on fire on the other side. And from that violent portal, something fell.
It was a person. A woman, clad in gleaming silver and blue armor that seemed to belong to a bygone age of chivalry. She had hair the color of spun gold, tied back neatly, and she fell with a strange, almost graceful poise, even as her body tumbled through the air.
She landed less than five feet from me, not with a sickening crunch, but with a heavy, metallic thud that cracked the pavement beneath her. For a moment, she lay still. Then, with a pained groan, she pushed herself up onto one knee.
My brain, already reeling, did a hard reboot. I knew her.
From countless hours of anime, from wallpapers and wikis and fan discussions. The pristine armor, the noble bearing, the invisible sword she clutched in her hand. It was impossible. It was absurd. It was Saber, the King of Knights, from Fate/Stay Night.
She looked around, her emerald eyes filled with disorientation, before they locked onto the golden Grail in my hands. A flash of recognition, of fierce, unwavering purpose, ignited in her gaze.
"The Grail…" she breathed, her voice raspy but regal. She tried to stand, to point her invisible weapon at me. "You… Hand it over, magus."
But her threat was empty. As she pushed herself up, the armor on her side shifted, revealing a grievous wound beneath. It wasn't a clean cut. It was a festering gash leaking not just blood, but a foul, blackish-purple energy that seemed to writhe like living smoke. It was actively corrupting her, eating away at the edges of the wound. My system flared with a notification.
[Warning: Target is afflicted with Chaotic Law Energy. Physical form destabilizing.]
Saber's face went pale. Her body trembled, and she collapsed, her armor clattering loudly on the street.
My mind raced. This wasn't an anime. This was real. A real person was bleeding out on the pavement in front of me, suffering from something my own power recognized as a transdimensional corruption. I couldn't just leave her here.
Scrambling over, I got a closer look. The corrupting energy recoiled slightly as I approached, seeming to shy away from the faint glow of the symbol on my wrist. A faint, pure light from my brand seemed to neutralize the very outer edges of the black smoke, but the wound itself remained, bleeding freely. The Omnitrix, or whatever this thing was, could suppress the supernatural element, but it couldn't perform surgery.
Panic gave way to adrenaline. I tore off my jacket, then ripped a long strip from the bottom of my t-shirt. My hands were shaking, but I forced them steady, balling up the fabric and pressing it hard against her wound, just as I'd seen in a hundred movies. She gasped in pain, but didn't fight me.
"Hold on," I grunted, my voice tight. "Just… hold on."
Getting her home was one of the hardest things I'd ever done. Heroic Spirits, apparently, were dense. She was far heavier than she looked, a compact mass of muscle and metal. I half-dragged, half-carried her through the deserted, rainy streets, my own recently-recovered energy draining with every step. I must have looked like a madman, hauling an armored knight through Queens in the middle of the night.
When I finally stumbled through the door of my apartment, I was panting, soaked to the bone, and covered in a mixture of rainwater and her blood. I maneuvered her into my room and gently, carefully, laid her down on my bed.
The moment she touched the mattress, something bizarre happened. The air in the room shimmered, just for a second. The space around my bed seemed to deepen, to stretch into an impossible dimension. A faint, almost imperceptible scent of fresh pine needles and cool river mist filled the air, and then vanished as quickly as it came. It was a whisper of the Mountain and Rivers Soul I'd been told I now possessed, a fleeting glimpse of a realm within a realm.
"Alan? Is that you? Did you get my boba?"
Chloe's voice cut through the strange stillness. Her footsteps padded down the short hallway, and she appeared in my doorway, a frown on her face.
Her words died in her throat. She stared. At me, soaked and bloody. At the unconscious, armored woman lying on my bed. At the ornate, glowing golden Grail I had placed on my nightstand. Her jaw dropped.
"What… the hell… did you do?" she whispered, her eyes wide with a mixture of terror and utter disbelief.
"It's… not what it looks like," I said lamely.
"Not what it looks like?" she shrieked, her voice rising. "You leave to get bubble tea and come back looking like you mugged a medieval fair! Who is she? Is she dead? Did you kill her? Oh my god, the air in here feels… heavy."
She took a step back, her hand flying to her mouth. The sarcasm was gone, replaced by genuine fear.
I raised my hands in a placating gesture. "She's not dead. She's hurt. I found her like this." I took a deep breath, trying to project a calm I absolutely did not feel. "She's going to be okay. I just… need to figure some things out."
Chloe stared at the sleeping knight on my bed, then back at me. The fear in her eyes slowly subsided, replaced by the familiar spark of sibling suspicion. But she didn't run. She didn't scream. She just stood there, watching me, her protector.
I felt a wave of relief. She was scared, but she trusted me. For now, that was enough. The apartment was silent again, save for the hum of my laptop and the gentle breathing of the woman on my bed. It felt like the eye of the storm.
Then, a silent, urgent flash of text appeared in my mind's eye, cold and stark against the backdrop of my thoughts.
[Energy source acquired… Dimensional Beacon Active… Incoming signature: UNKNOWN HEROIC ENTITY. ETA: 2 minutes.]