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CRACK.
The sound of the high-caliber sniper rifle tore through the humid air of the Fuyuki tarmac.
Maverick, a veteran of a thousand First-Person Shooter lobbies, knew that sound. It was the distinct, thunderous report of a Walther WA2000. He knew the trajectory. He calculated the distance. And he knew, with the cold, sinking certainty of a gamer who had been spawn-camped before, that in exactly 0.02 seconds, his virtual brain matter would be decorating the runway.
He didn't even try to dodge. At this range, with the bullet traveling at supersonic speeds, human reaction time was a joke.
He closed his eyes.
It's over, he thought, a wave of bitter disappointment washing over him.
His mind raced through a dozen complaints in that fraction of a second. Maybe the developer, Max, was just trolling him. Maybe the game wasn't actually finished, and this "Online Mode" was just a torture chamber designed to make streamers rage-quit for clicks. It would explain everything—the impossible difficulty, the lack of a tutorial, the brutal realism.
Well, GG, Maverick thought. Back to the lobby.
He waited for the screen to turn black. He waited for the mocking "YOU DIED" text.
CLANG.
Instead of eternal darkness, a crisp, metallic ringing sound vibrated through the air. It was the sound of steel meeting lead, a high-pitched resonance that hurt his ears.
Maverick snapped his eyes open.
He wasn't dead. He wasn't staring at a respawn timer.
He was staring at a wall of silver and blue.
Standing directly in front of him, her back to the distant sniper, was Artoria.
In the blink of an eye, she had dismissed the black suit Maverick had bought her. In its place was her battle regalia: polished silver armor that gleamed under the harsh airport lights, and a heavy blue battle dress that billowed in the wind.
Her posture was perfect. Her boots were planted firmly on the asphalt. In her hands, she held a weapon that wasn't there—a sword wrapped in swirling, pressurized wind that distorted the light around it.
Invisible Air.
She had batted the .50 caliber anti-material round out of the air like it was a slow-pitch softball.
"Step back, Master!" Artoria commanded. Her voice wasn't soft or cute anymore. It rang with the righteous fury of a King who had just seen her liege lord threatened. "Leave this to me! What a despicable coward, to attack a Master from the shadows! Strike Air!"
She was pissed. To the King of Knights, this wasn't just an attack; it was a personal insult. A sniper ambush? On her watch? Absolutely not.
Maverick peered around her armored shoulder, his heart hammering against his ribs. He squinted toward the terminal building, four hundred yards away.
He saw the shooter.
Lying prone on the flat roof of the terminal, nestled between two industrial air conditioning units, was another player. They were using the exact same avatar as Maverick—Kiritsugu Emiya. Same trench coat, same messy hair, same dead-eyed expression.
Even from this distance, Maverick could see the other player flinch. They had clearly expected an easy kill. They hadn't expected a blonde girl in medieval cosplay to parry a sniper round with a gust of wind.
But the shock didn't last long. Because Artoria was already moving.
She didn't run. She launched.
BOOM.
The concrete tarmac under her greaves shattered into a spiderweb of cracks as she exploded forward. She moved faster than anything Maverick had ever seen in a video game. She was a silver blur, a streak of light tearing across the runway.
The gap was four hundred yards. She crossed it in three seconds.
"Holy..." Maverick breathed, lowering his rifle because he forgot he was even holding it.
On the roof, the enemy player panicked. Maverick watched through the zoom lens as the other Kiritsugu scrambled backward, throwing the heavy sniper rifle aside in a desperate motion.
The enemy reached into their coat and whipped out a submachine gun—a Calico M950 with a helical magazine.
BRRRRRRRT.
A tongue of fire erupted from the muzzle. A hail of 9mm bullets sprayed toward the charging knight, a wall of lead designed to shred anything in its path.
"Die! Die! Die!" the enemy player screamed over the proximity voice chat, their voice cracking with fear.
Artoria didn't even slow down. She didn't dodge.
She simply rotated her wrist.
The invisible wind around her sword spun into a violent vortex. It acted like a deflector shield, catching the bullets and scattering them harmlessly to the side. Sparks flew as lead met magic, creating a dazzling display of pyrotechnics around her charging form.
She reached the base of the terminal. She leaped.
She soared forty feet into the air, clearing the roof's edge with terrifying grace.
"First Blood!" Artoria shouted, bringing her invisible blade down in a massive overhead smash, aiming to cleave the sniper in two.
CRASH.
The impact was visceral. Dust and debris exploded outward.
But it wasn't the player's body that shattered.
At the last possible microsecond, Artoria's eyes widened. Her Instinct (Rank A)—a sixth sense that bordered on precognition—screamed a warning in her mind.
Trap.
She twisted her body mid-air, defying physics. She kicked off the empty air, using a burst of mana to propel herself sideways, turning 90 degrees instantly.
SPLASH.
A massive, high-pressure water cannon blast slammed into the spot where she had been a fraction of a second ago.
It wasn't normal water. It was highly pressurized, mana-infused water that hit with the force of a wrecking ball. The concrete roof disintegrated, leaving a steaming, water-filled crater where Artoria would have been standing.
Maverick, watching from the tarmac, gasped. "What was that? A fire hose?"
"Are you alright, Master?" Artoria called out, landing gracefully back on the tarmac beside him. She was breathing slightly harder, her green eyes locked on the roof.
"I'm fine!" Maverick yelled, checking his own body for holes. "Thanks to you! But what the hell was that?"
"Master," Artoria chided without looking back. "I told you not to use my True Name on the battlefield. It gives the enemy an advantage. Call me Saber."
"Right, sorry, Saber," Maverick stammered. "But look!"
On the roof, the dust was settling. The enemy player—who had been knocked onto their butt by the shockwave—wasn't dead. They were being helped up by their own Servant.
Maverick zoomed in with his scope.
The enemy Servant had blonde hair tied in a bun. Green eyes. A regal, dignified face.
But that was where the similarities ended.
Instead of silver armor, she was wearing a white bikini top with blue bows, denim shorts, and a white jacket tied loosely around her waist. In her hands, she held a massive, futuristic-looking water gun that hummed with blue energy.
"Is that..." Maverick squinted, trying to process the visual data. "Is that... you?"
Saber (Maverick's Artoria) stared at the woman on the roof. Her face turned a bright, furious crimson. Her knuckles turned white on the hilt of her invisible sword.
"You..." Saber hissed. "You shameless woman!"
She took a step forward, pointing her blade at the roof. "Wearing such a scandalous outfit in public! Have you no dignity?! You are dragging the name of the King through the mud!"
The other Artoria—Archer Artoria (Swimsuit Version)—laughed. It was a bright, carefree sound. She flipped her wet hair back, striking a pose that belonged on a magazine cover rather than a battlefield.
"Oh, lighten up, me," the Bikini King teased, her voice echoing across the tarmac. "It's summer! This Spirit Origin is optimized for fun and aquatic warfare. Unlike you, wrapped up in that heavy, stifling quilt of metal. Aren't you sweating in there? You look like a baked potato."
"WHAT did you call me?!" Saber sputtered, steam practically coming out of her ears.
[Chat]:[KekW]: TWO ARTORIAS?! [Spider_Man_Meme]:Insert Spider-Man Pointing Meme Here.[Lore_Master]: WAIT. I GET IT. [Lore_Master]: Think about it! Everyone is playing Kiritsugu. Everyone is using Avalon as a catalyst. That means EVERYONE is summoning Artoria! [Game_Dev_Stats]: But the dev couldn't have 100 identical Saber models running around. It would be boring. So he used the variants! [Gacha_Hell]: ARCHER ARTORIA?! THE SUMMER VERSION?! [DownBad_69]: I want the bikini one. I need the bikini one. How do I reroll my account? [Simp_Alert]: Saber is cute when she's jealous. Look at her blush! [Tech_Wizard]: This is genius. There are enough Artoria variants—Saber, Lancer, Archer, Rider, Assassin, Berserker, Alter—to fill an entire lobby. It's not a Holy Grail War. It's an Artoria Battle Royale! [Maverick_Fan]: "The Legendary Battle of Artoria." This is peak content. I am never watching another stream again.
Maverick lowered his rifle, staring at the chat logs. It made sense. Max, the developer, had solved the matchmaking issue with the wildest solution possible: Just use every version of the most popular character in the franchise.
He looked at his dignified, armored Knight, trembling with indignation. Then he looked at the enemy's bikini-clad Archer, radiating confidence and summer vibes.
He felt a pang of fierce loyalty.
"Don't listen to her, Saber!" Maverick shouted, stepping up beside his Servant. "She's just trying to tilt you! Class is better than ass! You look way cooler!"
Saber's posture straightened. The red faded from her cheeks, replaced by a look of steely determination. She glanced back at him, a small, proud smile touching her lips.
"Thank you, Master," she said softly. "Your taste is truly impeccable."
She turned back to the roof, her mana flaring. The wind around her sword began to howl, picking up dust and debris.
"Now," Saber declared, her voice booming like thunder. "Let us punish this immodest impostor. Prepare yourself, Archer!"
On the roof, the Summer Artoria grinned and pumped her water gun. "Come on then, Saber! Let's see if that armor rusts!"
Maverick gripped his Glock 17. The absurdity of the situation washed over him—he was about to get into a gunfight while two versions of King Arthur fought a magical death match over dress codes.
And honestly? He wouldn't want to be anywhere else.
"Let's get her, Saber!" Maverick yelled.
"STRIKE AIR!"
The battle of the Kings had begun.
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