Chapter 23: Budding Feelings

Medea concentrated on taking notes. She could’ve used her 'Item Construction skill' to create a mystic code for Haruki. However, having known Haruki’s goals of battling alongside her, she went an extra mile to give the mystic code an extra boost. Even she had to wrack her brain to make something durable enough to clash against a Noble Phantasm. Even her level of reinforcement wouldn’t provide durability to last a few minutes against a mid-tier servant. From what she heard, all the Servants in this war were powerful.

Haruki felt like he could watch her all day without getting bored.

‘Love is a powerful emotion.’

As much as he wanted to watch his beautiful servant, he had to sleep lest he ended up collapsing inside the dungeon. He couldn’t kidnap Shirou under Rin’s watch, so sleeping was the best use of his time. He immediately thought of going to the infirmary to steal a nap but shook off the idea. Medea would wrap her ‘shop’ and follow him around. Sleeping here was a little price for having Medea’s handmade mystic code.

‘Arch, can you create the tasks for summoning another servant and killing Zouken.’

Task #5: Third Summon

Objective: Summoning another servant.

Difficulty: D-Rank

Rewards: 1 X High-Rank Gacha Coupon

Would you like to accept this Task?

The difficulty drastically dropped this time around. It was easy to guess who was responsible.

Artoria Pendragon.

She will make things easy for him, instead of raising the danger level.

Task #6: Payback

Objective: Kill Zouken Matou.

Difficulty: B-Rank

Rewards: 1 X Premium Gacha Coupon

Would you like to accept this Task?

B-Rank difficulty meant the old magus won’t go down easily. He will have three servants at his call in a battle. The last thing he’d want is making a stupid mistake in overconfidence.

‘What’s high-rank gacha? What are other ranks?’

“Wait… let me find my list…”

Haruki imagined Arch fumbling around her room for a tier list. It was a funny and unbelievable picture.

Rates of Gacha drops

—Premium: Mythic item - 0.8%, Legendary item - 3.2%, Epic item - 10.4%, Super-Rare item - 85.6%

—High-Rank: Legendary item - 0.5%, Epic item - 2.5%, Super-Rare item: 6.8%, Rare item - 90.2%

—Mid-Rank: Epic item - 0.4%, Super-Rare item: 1.6%, Rare item - 5.9%, Uncommon item - 92.1%

—Low-Rank: Super-Rare item: 0.3%, Rare item - 1.2%, Uncommon item - 5.5%, Common item - 93%

‘What are these shitty pull rates?!’

Even the Fate game had better rates for 5 stars than this system.

“I didn’t want to give any Mythic items at all,” Arch admitted. “but I can’t go against my authority. You’ll rely on the items instead of becoming strong yourself. Items are tools. What matters, in the end, is your fists.”

He could understand what Arch wanted to convey.

“At first,” Arch whispered. ”I didn’t expect you to give in to the temptation of power and rape women for authorities… I knew the type of man you would be after death.”

‘And?’

“I still had some doubts… but you didn’t let me down.”

Getting acknowledged by Arch made his chest giddy.

‘Glad to hear that. And I accept the tasks.’

He leaned his back against the wall and made himself comfortable. With a deep breath, he closed his eyes and tried to sleep.

***

The fourth period of the class ended, then came the break. Sakura’s most awaited moment in school time, where she could show off her cooking skills to Haruki. Today, she had worked super hard on preparing the chicken ramen for him.

With a smile, she walked toward the door, only for a classmate to take her hand.

“Matou-san, Matou-san, are you going out with Hayashi-Senpai?”

It was a cute girl with short black hair. Despite being classmates, Sakura didn’t remember her name or the names of the girls around the cute girl.

‘I wish I was going out with him.’

Sakura gave a bitter smile. She had long realized Haruki never saw her as a woman, only as a family figure. Perhaps the worms writhing under her skin made him hesitate. She’d do anything to get a normal body.

‘If only Grail could grant two wishes...’

Sakura pushed back the painful thoughts. “No. Haruki-Senpai is single…”

“Ehhhh. I thought you two were dating.”

Everyone in the school thought that. Sakura had gotten used to this peculiar relationship between her and Haruki. Closer than friends, yet not still a family.

“Want to have lunch with us?” asked a girl with tanned skin.

Sakura bowed. “Thank you for asking, but I have plans with Senpai.”

“Okay…”

The girls quietly left her, whispering things to each other.

Sakura sighed and walked to Haruki’s class, only to find Rin standing outside, leaning against the wall with her arms crossed. She seemed to be contemplating something.

Sakura couldn’t find the courage to initiate a conversation. Having Haruki by her side helped a lot. She didn’t disturb Rin and peeked into the class.

“Senpai isn’t here,” she whispered.

Standing a few meters away, Rin naturally heard Sakura.

“He is on the roof,” Rin said, a tinge of frustration in her voice. “Having fun with his servant.”

Sakura’s mind went blank. Not all Masters shared a perfect spiritual bond with their Servant. They had to resort to sexual activities to share mana. That’s why Masters preferred a servant of the opposite gender.

‘Senpai wouldn’t fall for that witch… right?’

She was skeptical. After all, she had seen him dating women in the area. All of them were older than him and more experienced. Medea gave her the same vibes.

‘I don’t have any right to stop him…’

She could still warn him about the legends of Medea, the Witch of Betrayal. He most likely knew about his servant. A wake-up call wouldn’t hurt anyone.

Rin saw Sakura’s serious expression and covered her smug grin. ‘It’s my revenge, dummy. Sakura will hate you now.’

Even if it wasn’t sex, Rin was confident Haruki would be doing something shady that he didn’t want to show anyone.

“Rin Nee-san. I’ll see you later.”

Sakura bowed briefly before she turned and hurriedly walked toward the stairs. Rin followed her in a hurry to watch the drama unfold.

Sakura found the door locked, so she knocked. “Senpai.”

Medea, on the other side of the door, frowned. She could feel Sakura and Rin’s presence.

‘Annoying bugs…’

She glanced at Haruki, who was sleeping with a soft smile on his face. He did it all because he didn’t want to disturb her during her work. A strong urge to spoil him grew in her heart. She was quick to realize her growing attachment to the young man.

‘Gods, he is barely a fraction of my age. Am I really falling for a man this young?!’

She sighed and threw the feelings to the back of her head.

‘I’ll think about it after winning the war.’

Nothing would come to fruition if they didn’t win. Her master had sworn to resurrect Kaede, and he might even sacrifice himself to achieve that.

‘Extreme love is the most dangerous thing in this universe…’

People in extreme love knew no limits. Whether it was slaying her family or burning a whole town, she had done it all before under Eros’s spell.

“Senpai,” Sakura called once again.

Medea stored the tools in the imaginary space built inside her robes before opening the door. Sakura and Rin walked past her and looked at Haruki sleeping soundly.

“Rin Nee-san, you’re a liar.”

Rin scratched her head. Of all things, she never predicted Haruki would be dozing off on the roof. His soft smile raised her heartbeat for some reason.

‘He is really good-looking…’

“Master, I never expected to hear it from you,” Archer commented, chuckling in her head.

Rin blushed a little. As Rin reached out to wake Haruki, Sakura grabbed her hand. With a finger on her lips, Sakura shushed Rin.

“Let Senpai sleep.”

Rin couldn’t help but shudder. Sakura’s soft smile had this frightening atmosphere that could shake anyone’s will.

“Yes,” Medea agreed and cast a bounded field around the roof, cutting off any sound coming from outside. Her skillful magecraft was only noticed by Archer, who simply conveyed it to Rin.

Sakura put down her bag and carefully sat beside Haruki. She was going to wake him before lunch ended.

Medea looked at Sakura sitting so close to Haruki. She could feel the maggots wreaking havoc inside the purple-haired girl. Despite being a gifted mage, she couldn’t provide any od to her servant since the maggots fed on her magical energy.

‘Master would want to save her as well.’

Medea could use Rule Breaker to sever the link between Sakura and the crest worms. But doing so would leave them in a berserk state, and they will most likely kill Sakura.

‘I’ll need to make preparations before Master asks me. It’ll make him happy…’

Medea’s lips curled up. Covering her mouth, she giggled.

Rin and Sakura heard her creepy laughter and looked at her in confusion.