Chaldea is a strange place where heroic spirits from all across history gather to protect the world. Master Ritsuka Fujimaru wakes up one morning to find their pillow missing, the cafeteria transformed into a battlefield, and Dr. Roman cheerfully announcing that there's absolutely nothing scheduled for the day.
A free day. Finally.
Except it really, really isn't.
Artoria Pendragon shows up with a deadly serious expression to request that Ritsuka 'guard the cake.' Emiya starts cooking lunch fo
A Lively Day at Chaldea - Even if you fall, it's still the goal! Because the Master keeps running anyway.
The baton fit in the palm of her hand.
It was warm.
Warmed by everyone's running—the white baton. Ritsuka held it in both hands and couldn't move for a moment.
A hundred meters to the finish line.
Her feet were slow. Her knees, scraped raw over the course of the day, still throbbed. Her body, exhausted from an all-nighter, had long since passed its limit. And yet.
She ran.
The first ten meters were good. She felt the wind. The artificial lights of the training grounds illuminated the white lines of the course cleanly. The staff in the spectator stands rose to their feet and began to cheer.
Then her feet tangled.
Fatigue and tension hit all at once. Her right foot caught on her left, her body pitched forward—
CRASH!!
She went face-first into the sand.
Spectacularly. With sound. Sand dust billowed up, turning the entire training grounds white and hazy.
The spectator stands went silent.
Romani's voice leaked through the comms.
"Oh…"
That was all. No one could say anything.
The staff in the stands exchanged glances with their neighbors. "Is she alive?" "She's not moving…" "Is she breathing?" Voices rippled through the crowd.
Ritsuka lay face-down in the sand for a few seconds.
She tasted sand. Grainy, flavorless sand.
The scrapes on her knees had opened again. A dull heat seeped through the fabric.
(…I fell. I really fell hard.)
She lifted her face slowly. Covered in sand, she looked at the course. Still about seventy meters to the finish line.
The training grounds were silent.
The Servants, the staff—no one was making a sound. That silence felt somehow ridiculous. And she, covered in sand, felt somehow ridiculous too.
She started to laugh.
Ritsuka brushed the sand off and laughed despite herself. Maybe she was laughing because she was so exhausted that nothing scared her anymore.
The moment she tried to stand—
"Get up, Master!"
Altria's voice cut through the training grounds.
Clear. Decisive. The voice of a knight crying out on the battlefield.
A beat of silence.
Then—
"Run, mongrel. I grant you permission!!"
Gilgamesh rose from his golden sofa.
Gilgamesh, who usually sat with his arms crossed and issued commands, stood up. All the Servants in the training grounds noticed this fact a beat too late.
The air changed.
"Don't stop your feet! Show us the fruits of your training!"
Scathach spoke with her arms still crossed, her eyes serious. There wasn't a shred of jest in her voice. The Queen of the Shadow Realm meant every word.
Jeanne cupped her hands like a megaphone and shouted.
"Master, everyone's watching! Do your best!!"
Emiya held his camera steady, watching Ritsuka. The corner of his mouth moved slightly.
"…Honestly, what a handful of a Master. But I don't hate it."
A small voice through the camera. Barely audible.
Ritsuka heard it.
She heard all of it.
The Servants who moments ago had blown the ball-toss basket through the ceiling, cracked the floor during the pole-toppling game, completely refused the relay race, and smashed through a wall to disappear into the next room—all of them, in this single moment, were facing the same direction, calling her name.
That sight was ridiculous. And wonderful.
Covered in sand, Ritsuka laughed and stood up.
The staff in the stands began to rise. Voices overlapped. "Go!" "Run!" "Don't give up!" The entire training grounds became one voice.
She ran on slow feet.
It wasn't cool. Sand stuck to her cheeks. Her knee wounds were bleeding slightly. But she moved forward. One step. Then another.
The Servants' voices grew louder and louder.
The finish line tape came into view.
She burst through it.
The tape snapped.
—And no one had bothered to check the rankings.
Altria rushed over, her long golden hair swaying, her expression serious.
"A magnificent run, Master!"
"…How?!"
"You fell and got back up. That is true honor."
She nodded with satisfaction. She genuinely meant it.
Gilgamesh approached slowly. His sharp red eyes looked down at the sand-covered Ritsuka.
"…I acknowledge you. You are worthy of being my Master."
He paused.
"Barely, though."
He snorted.
Jeanne's face lit up as she ran over.
"Master! Master, I'm so glad, so very glad!!"
"Please don't cry!"
"I'm not crying! …I'm crying just a little!"
"Which is it?!"
Scathach stood silently beside Ritsuka.
"Treat those scrapes later. Sand will make it worse."
"Thank you very much…"
Emiya raised his camera.
"Got some good footage. Permanent record material."
"What's that supposed to mean?!"
Romani's comms came through.
"Ahaha… Um, Ritsuka, good work. Really, good work."
Laughter mixed with his voice. But there was something else in it too.
As the training grounds filled with warm voices, Emiya glanced at his camera's LCD screen. It showed everything—Ritsuka falling, Ritsuka lifting her sand-covered face, Ritsuka stumbling forward, Ritsuka crossing the finish line. All of it, captured perfectly.
A staff member whispered to Romani later. "Um, Emiya… he recorded all of it…" "Yeah." "Permanent record…" "Yeah." Romani's gaze grew distant.
---
Night fell.
Ritsuka's private room—eighteen square meters on the second floor—was quiet.
Her entire body ached. Her elbows, her knees, and she could still feel the faint texture of sand on her face. She'd showered and cleaned up, but every muscle seemed to have its own complaint.
(How many kilometers did I run today…)
She collapsed onto her bed.
She stared at the ceiling. A plain white ceiling. Nothing else.
Then she noticed.
The pillow was gone again.
Right. Since this morning—or rather, since yesterday morning—the pillow had been missing. It had vanished when she woke up and stayed gone all day. She'd been running around so much she'd completely forgotten about it.
(…Maybe I can roll up a towel.)
She tried to sit up.
A knock—without knocking.
The door opened.
It was Gilgamesh.
Gold and red hair in two tones, sharp red eyes, that usual arrogant bearing. And in his right hand—her pillow.
"…I have been managing this."
Ritsuka stared blankly from the bed.
Gilgamesh entered the room. He didn't ask permission. Pure king behavior.
"The reason."
He held the pillow in one hand, looking directly at Ritsuka.
A beat of silence.
"…I thought you would come looking for it. If you came to my room, I intended to return it. But you never came."
He turned away.
"Well, it matters not. I return it to you."
He tossed the pillow toward Ritsuka.
She caught it.
For a while, she couldn't say anything.
Holding the pillow, she watched Gilgamesh. He was looking out the window. Not at her.
(…Was this guy sulking over a pillow the whole time?)
Since morning. Before the ball-toss game even started. The whole time. Had this three-thousand-year-old king been waiting for her to come to his room?
Laughter bubbled up. Her strength drained away, and the laughter wouldn't stop.
"Hehe… ahaha…"
Gilgamesh's brow furrowed.
"What is amusing."
"Sorry, sorry. It's nothing. Really, nothing."
Still laughing, she hugged the pillow to her chest. It felt soft. A sensation she'd been missing.
"Thank you, Gilgamesh."
Gilgamesh said nothing.
He turned on his heel, still facing away. He walked toward the door.
"…You need not thank me. I merely did what was natural."
"Is that so."
"It is."
The door closed quietly.
He'd come without knocking and left without knocking. Pure king behavior.
Ritsuka sank into her bed.
She buried her face in the pillow. It felt right. Soft, and it smelled like her.
Voices drifted from the hallway.
Altria was shouting something. "We should hold a reflection meeting on tomorrow's relay—" "The relay is already over." "It's not! We should review that run!" Jeanne saying "Scathach, you can't go through there, save training for tomorrow!" Scathach saying "The hallway is a training ground." Emiya's sigh was palpable. "Can't be helped. Everyone gather in the dining hall. I'll make a late-night snack."
It was loud.
A complete mess.
Ritsuka, face buried in her pillow, whispered softly.
"…It wasn't bad, today. Couldn't rest at all, but…"
Voices still drifted from the hallway. Someone was laughing. Someone was arguing. Someone was asking Emiya "What's for the snack?"
Noisy.
Chaotic and messy. But somehow, a warm place.
Ritsuka, face buried in her pillow, fell asleep almost immediately.
In Chaldea's hallway, someone was making noise again tonight.
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