Orario's Dark Age was the kind of era where even breathing tasted like rust.
Survival wasn't a "daily routine." It was a luxury. And something like a warm, delicious meal? That was a myth people told themselves to avoid going insane.
"Boom!"
Emiya Shirou slammed into the wall again, pinned into a perfect "T" shape by an invisible wind blade.
How many times had it been now? Ten? Twenty?
"Too slow."
Alfia stood where she had been from the start. Her dress didn't even flutter. She watched Shirou struggle back to his feet with mismatched eyes full of boredom.
"Your craft is interesting," she said—meaning his projection. "But your reactions are late. If that glutton Zard were here, you'd already be chewed up and swallowed."
"Cough… thanks for the lesson…" Shirou wiped blood from the corner of his mouth and tried not to collapse. Alfia wasn't trying to kill him—she wasn't using anything remotely close to her real output.
And yet the control she had over mana flow was absolute.
It wasn't a gap.
It was a dimension.
"I'm done."
Alfia abruptly stopped. She turned and walked toward the church interior.
"Boring. And… I'm hungry."
"H-hungry?" Shirou blinked.
He remembered something. In the legends, Alfia was monstrously strong, but she carried an incurable illness. A body that could crush heroes… that still betrayed her. Even eating could be painful.
He spoke before he could reconsider.
"If you don't mind… want to try something I make?"
Alfia paused mid-step, then looked back at him like he'd just spoken an alien language.
"You can cook? In a ruin where clean water is hard to find?"
"I'm a blacksmith," Shirou said, forcing a grin through bruises, "and I can cook. Give me ingredients, and I'll make a miracle. That's… part of my 'infinity.'"
A warm fire burned in the center of the abandoned hall.
A battered iron pot—repaired and stabilized with reinforcement—bubbled quietly over the flames. The aroma that rose from it wasn't grand.
But in this blood-soaked era, it was sacred.
It smelled like life.
"This is… porridge?" Alfia sat on a broken bench, staring at the steaming bowl in her hands. The ingredients were pitiful: the rest of the apple she'd thrown him, a few strips of dried meat, some wild greens from the yard.
In Shirou's hands, those scraps became something else.
"Please." Shirou handed her a wooden spoon he'd carved on the spot. "This should be easier on someone with a weak body."
Alfia was quiet. She took one spoonful.
No dramatic glow. No ridiculous reaction.
But her pupils trembled, just slightly.
Warmth.
Not only in her stomach.
Even the part of her soul that had been frozen by despair seemed to feel something it had forgotten.
"…Not bad."
For Alfia, that was praise bordering on the impossible.
She ate faster.
Shirou relaxed a little, chewing the last of the dried meat.
It didn't matter what world it was.
A decent meal still mattered.
"You're strange," Alfia said after finishing. She set the bowl down, wiped her mouth with controlled elegance. "You carry that abnormal power… but you're content to cook in a place like this. And your eyes… don't look like someone drowning in this hell."
"Maybe." Shirou stared at the fire. "I just think… no matter how ugly the world gets, people still have to eat. If you're full, you can think about tomorrow."
"Tomorrow?" Alfia laughed softly, a sound like mocking fate. "In Orario right now, there is no tomorrow. There's only slaughter and tragedy—gods playing with lives."
"Then we change it," Shirou said, before he could stop himself.
Alfia froze.
She studied him—the boy who was barely standing, yet spoke as if "changing the world" was a normal plan.
For some reason, she didn't laugh.
In his shadow, she saw echoes of another kind of foolish brilliance—people who had once insisted on being heroes even when the world proved heroes wrong.
"Change it…" Alfia murmured. "Perhaps. If you live long enough."
A violent blast shook the night.
Then came screams. Shouts. The crackle of burning wood.
"An attack?" Shirou snapped upright. Mind's Eye flooded him with a situation map. "Civilians… and Evils."
Outside, black-robed thugs were chasing refugees through the street. Fires were spreading from building to building. Desperation was everywhere—crying, begging, the sound of people realizing no one was coming to save them.
"That's daily life," Alfia said, still seated, eyelids half-lowered. "That's the Dark Age. The weak get eaten. The fit survive."
"I'm going," Shirou said.
He grabbed the iron rod and bolted for the door.
"Boy," Alfia called from behind him. "Do you want to die? Those are trash, but they're still stronger than you right now."
"I know." Shirou glanced back and gave the kind of grin that made people angrier precisely because it looked so calm. "But if I don't go… dinner won't sit right."
He vanished into the firelit night.
Alfia stared at the empty doorway for a long time.
"…Idiot."
She rose. Her gray dress shifted without wind.
"But… I did eat your food."
"Call it a post-meal walk."
"Ha! Run! Keep running!"
A thug raised his sword at a girl who'd fallen in the road.
Clang!
An iron rod reinforced to the limit blocked the blade.
"What the—who are you?!"
"A passing… ally of justice," Shirou said, standing between the girl and the sword. His arm trembled from the impact, but his gaze didn't.
"Picking on the weak is a bad habit."
"Level 1?" the thug snarled. "Then die!"
More of them closed in—ten, twelve, more. Many of them were around Level 2.
Shirou inhaled, and his circuits groaned.
He was out of mana. Out of stamina. Out of time.
But there were people behind him.
So he stood.
Then—
BOOM!!!
A storm of red fire swept down the street, blasting the thugs off their feet like leaves.
A bright voice cut through the smoke.
"Justice has arrived!"
Figures leapt through the flames.
At the front was a young woman with crimson hair and light armor, sword in hand, blazing with confidence and energy.
Alise Lovell.
Captain of the Astraea Familia.
Behind her came a black-haired eastern swordswoman, a dwarf with a heavy shield, and—
A green-cloaked elf with calm eyes and a wooden sword.
Ryuu Lion.
Younger. Unscarred. Still carrying the clean certainty of justice.
Shirou's heart skipped.
This was Ryuu before the tragedy.
Before her world broke.
"Are you alright?" Alise landed and struck a pose that would've been ridiculous in any era except this one—because hope itself was ridiculous here. "Astraea Familia is on the scene! Leave the bad guys to us!"
"Stop posing and finish them," the black-haired swordswoman muttered, blade already out.
The fight became a one-sided purge.
Their teamwork was crisp. Their movements practiced.
But Ryuu stood out the most—like a green wind threading between chaos, striking pressure points and joints with precision.
She didn't kill.
She disarmed. Disabled. Ended violence without becoming it.
Shirou watched her and felt something tighten in his chest.
This was who she had been.
A clean blade.
A guardian.
Not the lonely avenger the future would forge.
The battle ended quickly.
Alise walked up and clapped Shirou on the shoulder.
"Nice block earlier! That was cool." She grinned. "I'm Alise. Captain here. What's your name? You don't look local."
"I'm Emiya Shirou," he said. His gaze flicked once toward Ryuu. "A… lost blacksmith."
"Blacksmith?" Ryuu stepped closer, eyes narrowing slightly. "You smell like blood… and your mana is strange."
"Ryuu, don't scare him," Alise laughed, pulling the elf back by the sleeve. "He protected that kid. He's a good guy."
"…I know." Ryuu lowered her wooden sword and nodded to Shirou. "Apologies. Thank you for acting with justice."
Shirou stared at her—this version of her—and made a silent vow.
If he had been thrown into the past…
If he was seeing this…
Then he would not allow the coming tragedy to repeat.
A pressure exploded from the shadows.
The air stiffened. Even the flames seemed to hesitate.
Alise's expression changed instantly.
"What… is that?"
At the end of the street, a woman in a gray dress stepped forward—mismatched eyes, ash-colored hair, and a presence that made the world feel smaller.
Alfia.
The Dark Age's quiet nightmare.
"This," Alfia said softly, voice carrying to everyone, "is your 'justice'?"
She looked at Alise, then at Ryuu, with something that wasn't hatred.
It was contempt.
"Too weak," she said. "This pretend justice… what can it protect in this hell?"
The eastern swordswoman's hand shook.
"…Hera Familia," she whispered. "That monster."
"Monster?" Alfia tilted her head. "A fair label."
She lifted a hand.
The air compressed into visible pressure, forming a killing storm.
"I'm bored after dinner," she said. "Let me measure the weight of your 'justice.'"
"Run!" Alise screamed, voice tearing. "All of you, retreat! This isn't an enemy we can fight!"
But it was already too late.
The storm had formed—an overwhelming spell that belonged to a realm far beyond them.
A despair made of pure power.
In the instant before it struck—
"Trace."
A red-haired boy stepped forward.
Emiya Shirou.
Iron rod in hand. Circuits screaming again.
He stood in front of Alise and Ryuu.
He swallowed, mouth twisting into a bitter smile.
"I don't know if I can stop you," he said, looking at the woman who'd fed him, "but I can't watch you hurt my… 'friends.'"
Alfia's eyes narrowed.
Surprise.
Then amusement.
"You want to dance too, boy?"
Her voice cooled.
"Then I'll crush you with them."
In Orario's Dark Age—under the gaze of a goddess of justice—
The "infinite" that came from the future collided with the "strongest" that ruled the past.
And the first crack in this era's fate was about to be carved.
....
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