Chapter 35

The sun was bright, the mansion pristine, and the air was filled with the high-pitched squeals of excitement that only one person could make sound both adorable and mildly terrifying.

Illya von Einzbern stood in front of the estate like a sugar-fueled missile ready to launch. She was practically vibrating with energy, white hair bouncing with every tiny hop as she peered down the long, elegant driveway.

And then—vrrrrrrroooooom—a red Ferrari roared up to the front gate like it had just come off a racetrack.

Illya's eyes sparkled.

The car screeched slightly to a stop, just short of the flowerbed. The driver's side door swung open, and a tall, striking woman stepped out, blonde hair swishing with a hint of green highlights that caught the sun like tinted glass. Her emerald eyes lit up when she saw Illya.

“Big Sister!” Illya shrieked, practically leaping onto her.

“Illya!” Shirō laughed and caught her in a tight hug. “You’re still tiny!”

“You got taller again!” Illya pouted as she crushed Shirō with all her Einzbern affection. “How dare you still look twenty when you’re thirty-two?!”

“Blame my diet of mana potions and bad decisions.”

Just then, the back door of the Ferrari creaked open and a very familiar figure stumbled out, looking like he'd just lost a fight with a blender and possibly a seafood buffet.

A now slightly-graying Archer stepped out, covered in faint traces of… something beige.

He gave Shirō the look. The look.

“Why the hell did you drive like that?” he snapped, voice flat and deadly.

“I was hungry,” Shirō replied as if that explained everything.

“I was sitting next to two ticking time bombs—!”

Right on cue, the two small passengers climbed out after him, each still slightly green but visibly improving.

The first was a bright-eyed blonde boy with wild hair and bright green eyes who immediately made a beeline for Illya. “Auntie!”

Illya turned, face lighting up. “Shino! Look at you, so big now!”

“I’m six!” he declared proudly, puffing up his chest.

Behind him, a small red-haired girl with soft brown eyes quietly followed. She looked up at Illya, gave a tiny wave, and smiled shyly.

“Kiri,” Illya cooed before pulling her into a crushing hug. “My sweet little cinnamon roll!”

Kiri made a tiny squeak as her ribs were promptly crushed.

“Help,” she whispered, flailing a little.

Archer, still brushing puke off his jacket with a damp napkin and an expression of long-suffering doom, muttered under his breath. “This is why I always say I should be the one driving.”

“Yeah, but your turns are boring,” Shirō grinned.

“Boring doesn’t make my kids hurl on me!”

“It builds character.”

“It builds trauma.”

Before the next round of parenting war could commence, a different kind of engine purred into the driveway, smooth, sophisticated, smug.

A black Lamborghini parked beside the Ferrari like a sleek predator. The door opened with that almost-arrogant elegance, and out stepped none other than Rin Tohsaka, sunglasses perched on her head like a crown.

“Hello, commoners,” she said dryly, waving at Illya with two fingers.

“You’re late,” Illya said, grinning as she ran up to hug her anyway.

Rin returned the hug with one arm, her other hand flipping open her compact mirror to check her lipstick. “Fashionably,” she corrected.

The back door of the car opened, and out stepped Sakura, still wearing her classic maid outfit—though blessedly no cat ears this time. She looked like she had long accepted this as her fate.

“Suitcase,” Rin said casually.

“Yes, Rin,” Sakura sighed, lifting the large suitcase with practiced resignation.

“I offered to let her retire the maid outfit,” Rin added as she walked toward the mansion. “She insists it builds discipline.”

Sakura didn’t correct her. Mostly because she was too tired.

“By the way,” Rin added, glancing toward the Ferrari, “which one of you told Shino he could mess with my laptop?”

Shino immediately froze mid-step. “Uh…”

“Trace On!” Rin mimicked sarcastically, twirling her finger in the air. “More like break on! Do you know how many encrypted formulas were on that hard drive?!”

“I was trying to install a game,” Shino muttered, hiding behind Shirō.

“Don’t worry,” Shirō said brightly. “He’s got the talent to rebuild the hard drive from scratch. He just needs… six months and a miracle.”

“I want compensation,” Rin said, crossing her arms.

“You can have Archer,” Shirō said.

“I’m not a currency!”

“Don’t be so dramatic,” Rin rolled her eyes. “I wouldn’t trade you for anything less than a Rolex.”

“Aw, you do care,” Archer said flatly.

Then came the loudest, most synchronized sound of the afternoon:

GRRRRROOOOOWWWWLLLLL

Everyone paused.

Shirō placed a hand over her stomach. Shino mirrored her. Kiri, wide-eyed, held her belly as it gave a second rumble.

Archer slowly turned. “You ate half a box of takoyaki twenty minutes ago.”

“I metabolize faster now,” Shirō said defensively.

“You vomited ten minutes ago,” Archer said to Shino.

“I’m growing!” Shino argued.

“I just… forgot to eat,” Kiri added quietly.

“Good god,” Archer muttered, pinching the bridge of his nose. “How do I live with three of you?”

“Four,” Rin said, tossing him a knowing smirk. “You live with yourself, too.”

“...Five, if you count Shirō’s fridge.”

Shirō nodded solemnly. “The real MVP.”

“Alright,” Illya clapped her hands, trying to regain order. “Everyone inside before someone passes out from hunger or says something weird that scars the children.”

“Too late,” Sakura muttered.

“Come on,” Rin waved toward the mansion. “Let’s get inside before Shirō tries to barbeque something with Excalibur again.”

“That was one time!” Shirō protested.

“One time was enough.”

As the group shuffled inside, Shino reached up and tugged at Archer’s sleeve. “Dad?”

“Yes?”

“I fixed Aunt Rin’s laptop.”

Archer paused. “Really?”

“I replaced it with a toaster.”

“...We never speak of this again.”

And with that, the door closed behind them, the last rays of afternoon light casting a golden hue on the path they walked—one filled with loud reunions, impossible children, and more than a little chaos.

Home, as always, was wherever they were together.

qoOop

In the grand drawing room of the Einzbern estate, sunlight filtered through tall windows draped in velvet, casting a warm golden hue across the polished floor and pristine furniture. The aroma of freshly baked croquettes and miso soup clung to the air like a comforting memory.

At the center of it all sat Shirō, Shino, and Kiri: each with their own plates piled high, mouths in constant motion as they devoured their meal with the sort of appetite only possible from half-divine mana-enhanced humans. The three of them were positioned like a well-oiled machine: Shirō cutting up Kiri’s food, Shino helping himself to hers anyway, and Kiri quietly poking him with a fork in retaliation.

Archer sat nearby, arms crossed, giving Shirō a tired side-eye. “This is the fifth meal since we arrived.”

Shirō wiped her mouth with a napkin and shrugged. “Metabolism.”

“That excuse died twelve years ago.”

Kiri, sweet and polite, raised her hand. “I didn’t even get breakfast!”

“You threw it up on my pants,” Archer grumbled.

“That was Shino,” she corrected.

Shino gave a proud thumbs-up. “Worth it.”

Across the room, Sakura was standing stiffly by the antique tea trolley, trying to balance a tray of fruit parfaits while carefully eyeing the looming mountain of muscle and fury standing like an ancient statue in the corner.

Berserker.

Illya lounged regally on the loveseat nearby, a cup of tea in hand and legs daintily crossed. She looked serene—until anyone so much as breathed in her direction, at which point Berserker’s red eyes would flare and his head would rotate slowly, menacingly, in their direction like an oversized security turret made of muscles and death.

Currently, Berserker was glaring at Shino, because Shino had said, “I’m gonna marry Aunt Illya one day!”

Illya had smiled sweetly. “That’s adorable.”

Berserker had not smiled. Berserker had smouldered with lethal intent.

“Illya,” Sakura hissed under her breath. “Please tell your Servant not to explode my nephew.”

“I didn’t say no,” Illya said with an exaggerated flutter of her eyelashes. “A girl has to keep her options open.”

Shirō, still chewing, pointed her fork toward Illya. “That’s cruel. He’s six.”

“So’s my love life.”

Meanwhile, the conversation had naturally drifted to the topic of him—the once-mad King, the Gate of Babylon himself: Gilgamesh.

“So, wait,” Shirō said as she licked a bit of mustard off her thumb. “Gilgamesh is running what now?”

“An underworld empire,” Rin replied, casually adjusting her sunglasses on her head. “Back in Japan. Tokyo, to be exact. He deals in art theft, magical contraband, rare spirits, and illegal grail memorabilia.”

“He’s selling what?”

“Oh, you know. Fake Holy Grails made from coconut shells. ‘Blessed by the King,’ he says.”

“That can’t possibly work.”

“It shouldn’t, but morons keep buying it,” Archer said, pinching his nose. “He’s got a TikTok now.”

Shino perked up. “I follow him! He made a sword-shaped popsicle and called it ‘Ea-cream.’ It was awesome.”

“And that, children,” Rin said, raising her glass, “is how you survive the end of an era with style. You monetize the trauma.”

Sakura set down the tray carefully and added, “He hasn’t even mentioned the Grail in over a decade.”

Shirō leaned back, propping her foot on Archer’s knee to annoy him. “Probably because I nuked his ego with five thousand Excaliburs that day.”

Archer sighed. “You know, the Grail never recovered. Like, literally. The magical circuits collapsed. No more Wars. No more summoning rituals. That’s it.”

“The world has moved on,” Rin said with a nod. “Matou family’s gone. You’re a maid now, Sakura.”

Sakura, setting down more tea, replied, “Don’t remind me.”

“Tohsaka and Einzbern get along.”

“Mostly,” Illya added. “Except when Rin criticizes my wine collection.”

“Because you collect fruit wine in boxes!” Rin barked.

“It’s called vintage!” Illya snapped back.

And then the elephant—or rather, the dual-colored, timeline-scrambled elephant—in the room reappeared.

It had been twelve years since Shirō had become human again. She still had mana, still had that glint of heroism in her eyes, but she aged, smiled more easily, and no longer glowed like a sword reactor about to detonate. Archer too had stayed. When he’d admitted that he was Shirō Emiya from another timeline, after dating her for a year, it had been… tense.

“You what?” she’d screamed.

“Just listen—”

“NO! YOU ARE ME?! WE DATED OURSELVES?!”

“Yes but no but—”

She’d nearly blasted a crater in Stonehenge.

Only Illya’s heartfelt, awkward intervention and Archer’s long, panicked monologue about destiny and regret had calmed her. That, and him saying:

“I fell in love with the part of myself I never got to be.”

She had thrown Excalibur at his head.

But she hadn’t missed on purpose.

One year later, they got married. No lavish ceremony. Just a messy, strangely romantic affair with Rin officiating and Sakura crying into a cat-shaped napkin.

Now they had these two: Shino: loud, reckless, wild and Kiri: quiet, observant, terrifyingly intelligent. Perfect mix.

Emiya family now lived in Fuyuki, not far from Rin’s estate. Shirō taught magecraft in a small private school. Archer ran a little restaurant called “Steel & Spice.” The food was great. The signage was terrible. Shino had designed it with crayons.

Back in the drawing room, Shino was currently trying to convince Berserker to give him a ride.

“Please?” the boy begged, looking up at the mountainous figure with awe.

“Shino, no,” Kiri muttered, holding onto his sleeve. “It’s a bad idea.”

“I’ll wear a helmet!”

Berserker, surprisingly, didn't seem opposed. He looked down at the boy, blinked once, then crouched and held out a massive hand.

Illya blinked. “Wait—he likes him?”

“He likes bold idiots,” Sakura murmured.

Shino cheered as he was scooped up and placed on Berserker’s shoulder.

Kiri folded her arms. “When he breaks an arm, I’m going to say ‘I told you so’ and take a picture.”

Shirō, finishing her fifth croquette, leaned into Archer’s shoulder with a sleepy smile. “You think this is weird?”

Archer watched Shino riding Berserker like a roller coaster while Illya clapped in delight and Sakura tried not to faint. “This is our normal.”

Rin sipped her tea. “Weirdly enough… it’s kind of peaceful.”

Sakura, trembling, added, “I’d call it ‘barely managed chaos.’”

Illya leaned back with a sigh. “I call it family.”

And so the day went on, filled with laughter, threats of mild violence, and the strange but perfect kind of joy only this family could create.

Life was good.

And cut! Finally, what a journey it has been. I'm so glad that I wrote this story, for those of you who have read it, thank you.

See you next time, in another strange Fate story.