It is morning.
I wake up too late to go to school, so I decide to skip it. Besides I’d rather talk to Changer in a lengthy fashion, and take him for a test drive if I can; maybe show him around the city, or make him show me what he can do.
I get up, put on my daily clothes, and go downstairs. I don’t know where the servant is, and honestly I’m still too sleepy to bother trying to locate his magical energy. I simply go to the living room to see its final state.
“Wow. He really cleaned up the place, didn’t he?”
The living room is just the way it was.
He must have felt bad about making such a mess of the living room or he wouldn’t have done this.
I should call him admirable or maybe just a nice guy.
“Good morning master. You must have been quite tired, eh?”
Yeah, a nice guy all right.
“––––Morning. Yes. The summoning tired me more than I would like.”
He smiles and scratches his head. I wonder, doesn’t that hurt with those gauntlets on?
“I would have prepared a breakfast for you since you’re tired and all, but the ingredients and the kitchen in general were so different from what I’m used to that I gave up.”
I raise an eyebrow. As a servant, he is summoned to fight in the Grail War. I thought he would care only about the Grail. Having a distinct personality and maybe sometimes cracking jokes, I would expect, but caring about my breakfast, no, I wouldn’t expect that.
Although, if he really thought about that, I can’t really get angry at him, can I?
“Doesn’t matter. I’ll buy something outside.” I say.
“Outside? We’re going out?”
He looks surprised. I guess he expected me to stay cooked up in the house.
“Of course. You have to get used to the battlefield, so I’ll show you around town today. Get ready.”
He folds his arms. The moment I said ‘battlefield’, he got a serious expression on his face.
“That’s a good decision. I can talk to you in spirit form anyway, so I’m already ready to go.”
“Wow, that’s useful. What’s the drawback?”
“Drawback to staying in spirit form? There is none. I can come with you. I can see, listen and talk. I make you spend considerably less energy. And I become invisible to human eyes, including mages.”
That’s too useful!
“So, how do we locate enemies, then?” I ask as I start walking, and I gesture him to follow me. He vanishes and I start only hearing his voice.
“Mages can feel other mages’ magical energies, right? Servants are the same. We can feel each other if we get close enough. Except for Assassin of course. Their whole deal is about not being noticed, so hey, good news, Assassin could be in the house right now for all we know.”
I stop and glare at him. Actually I just glare at where his voice was coming from since I can’t even see him. I wonder how serious he was.
“But don’t worry, master. Assassins’ presence concealment skill’s effectiveness drop harshly when they attack, so as long as I’m with you, I can protect you and get him. Shortly after he attacks, our enemies would be reduced by one.”
He spoke very confidently. I admit, hearing him talk about Assassin got me a little worried, but I can keep him constantly with me in spirit form anyway. So, there should be no problem.
I get outside with him in tow and activate my house’s defences; I get a compliment about their quality while I do so which makes me involuntarily blush (Seriously, I need to get used to this guy soon.) Then we go on our way, talking all the way.
“So, what is a Changer? How do you change?”
“Well, I don’t actually change. It’s just that, due to a certain aspect of my life, I qualify for this special class. It allows me to use the abilities of all the classes I qualify for at will.”
We walk around Shinto city, and I show Changer all the spots I consider important. Then we pass through the bridge and start touring Miyama city. Meanwhile, I have him tell me all about his class, and who he was in life.
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“A curse to erase your existence from people’s memories?”
“Yes. Of course, no such curse is strong enough to affect the world itself, so when I died I was still accepted to the Throne of Heroes. But there is absolutely zero chance for there to be any stories about me.”
“That’s…”
“Oh, don’t look sad, master. This is good. It means you can freely call me by my name, and not worry about our enemies figuring out my identity.”
I pause momentarily. Indeed that is actually a useful condition. But-
“Yeah. But that also means I can’t know about your strengths and weaknesses.”
"Well, you can see my stats. You can wait until I face my first enemy to see my skills in a fight.”
I close my eyes for a few seconds to look at his stats again.
Master Rin Tohsaka Sex Male Class Changer Height/Weight 179cm 71kg True Name Alignment Lawful Neutral Strength B Magical Energy A Endurance B Luck B Agility C Noble Phantasm ? Class Abilities Magic Resistance A Cancels any magic A-rank or below. Riding B He can ride most vehicles and any beast below demonic or holy beast rank with above average skill. Indepentent Action C It is possible for him to stay in this world for a day after losing his master. Territory Creation B Creation of a "Workshop" becomes possible. Item Creation C He can imbue small items to use them as pre-designated targets for spells cast later.
The way masters see the servants’ status should be different from person to person. Letters, numbers, colours... I bet I see it like this because, as a student, I’m used to grades represented by letters.
When we reach our final destination, it is seven in the evening, and the sun has already set.
We are standing below the highest building in whole of Miyama.
“Let’s go,” I say and start walking towards the building’s front door.
* * *
[Interlude]
“Enemy detected.”
Bazett and her servant had been patrolling the city when Bazett suddenly stopped and closed her eyes.
“Hooo… You already found one. Where?”
“The Center Building. They’re going up.”
“That’s that highest building, right?”
“Yes. Let’s go, before we miss them.”