The city had a name—Argentium—though we only learned it on our second day when Mash asked a baker while buying bread.
"You're not from around here, are you?" the baker said, amused. "Everyone knows Argentium. We're the crossroads of the eastern provinces. If it's being bought, sold, or traded, it passes through here eventually."
The city revealed itself slowly, like a book being read one page at a time.
We split up naturally that first full day, each drawn to different corners of this sprawling place. Cu found the fighting pits—not gladiatorial combat, but sparring grounds where warriors trained and tested themselves against each other. He came back that evening with bruises and a grin wider than I'd seen yet.
"They're good," he said appreciatively. "Really good. No神話的 powers, no magic weapons, just skill and grit. I lost three bouts out of five."
"You lost?" Emiya raised an eyebrow.
"I know, right? It was amazing." Cu flexed his shoulder, wincing slightly. "When's the last time I had to actually work for a fight? In Chaldea, everything was either too easy or scripted. But this? This was real."
Artoria had found the garrison—not to join, she explained, but to observe. "Their training methods are fascinating. Different from anything I knew in Britain, but effective. They focus on formation fighting, unity rather than individual prowess. I watched them drill for hours."
"Did you join in?" I asked.
She looked almost shy. "They invited me. Tomorrow, if I'm interested. I think... I think I might be."
Da Vinci had disappeared into the merchant quarter and returned with sketches, notes, and a gleam in her eye. "The craftsmanship here is remarkable. Not as advanced as what I could create, obviously, but there's an artistry to it. A potter showed me his workshop—he's been perfecting his glazing technique for forty years. Forty years of incremental improvement, just to make slightly better pots." She sounded awed. "That's dedication I never had to learn. Everything always came too easily."
Medusa had found the library—of course she had. "It's not as large as the one in Chaldea," she reported, "but every book there is real. Written by real people, read by real people, existing independent of anyone's observation. I could spend months there."
"Will you?" I asked.
"Maybe. Or maybe just days. I haven't decided yet." She smiled. "I like not knowing."
Mash had spent the day simply wandering, talking to people, observing the flow of city life. "Everyone has a story," she said wonderingly. "The woman selling flowers lost her husband to illness last year but keeps his garden growing. The guard at the eastern gate is saving money to open a tavern. The street musician used to perform in noble courts but prefers the freedom of the streets." She looked at me with shining eyes. "Master, there are thousands of people here, and each one is living a complete life. It's overwhelming and beautiful and—"
"Real," I finished.
"Yes," she breathed. "So incredibly real."
I'd spent my day differently.
I'd walked without purpose, letting the city carry me where it would. Through market squares where merchants hawked wares in a dozen languages. Past workshops where blacksmiths and weavers and glaziers plied trades passed down through generations. Down narrow alleys where children played games with rules I didn't understand but could appreciate.
Everywhere, life hummed with purposeful chaos.
And nowhere—not once—did anyone look at me with recognition or reverence or expectation.
I was nobody here.
It was glorious.
On the third day, I found the University.
I wasn't looking for it specifically, but I turned a corner and there it was—a sprawling complex of buildings surrounding a central courtyard where students gathered to debate and study. Stone archways bore inscriptions in languages I could read thanks to Chaldea's systems, though I wasn't sure they should still work here.
I stood at the entrance, watching.
A young woman was presenting something to a small crowd, gesturing enthusiastically while others interrupted with questions and challenges. Nearby, an older man drew geometric figures in the dirt with a stick, explaining something to attentive listeners. At a table, two students bent over what looked like a star chart, arguing about calculations.
Learning. Real learning, not pre-programmed knowledge, but the messy process of discovery and debate and gradual understanding.
"Interested in enrolling?"
I turned to find a woman in scholar's robes watching me with curious eyes.
"I—no, I was just observing."
"Observing is the first step to learning," she said. "I'm Professor Alicia. I teach natural philosophy and mathematics."
"I'm..." I hesitated. I'd been using my real name, but something made me want a fresh start here. "I'm Ritsuka."
It felt right, adopting the name of the protagonist from the game. Like acknowledging what I'd been while choosing what I'd become.
"Well, Ritsuka, you have the look of someone with questions. Care to attend a lecture? We have one starting in ten minutes on the movement of celestial bodies."
I should have said no. We were only staying a few days, and getting attached to places or routines was dangerous when we'd soon be moving on.
But I found myself saying, "Yes. I'd like that."
The lecture hall was small, maybe thirty students scattered across wooden benches. Professor Alicia stood at the front with a complicated brass instrument—an orrery, I realized, showing the movement of planets around the sun.
She spoke about orbits and gravity, about how the universe followed patterns we could understand through observation and mathematics. The students listened, asked questions, challenged assumptions. It was messy and vital and completely absorbing.
I forgot to feel out of place.
I forgot to worry about being recognized or exposed.
I just... learned.
Afterward, Professor Alicia caught up with me as I was leaving.
"You were quiet, but you were following along. I could tell." She smiled. "You have education, don't you? From wherever you came from before Argentium."
"Some," I admitted. "Different from this, but yes."
"Come back tomorrow. I'm teaching about probability theory. I think you'd enjoy it."
I should have said no.
"I'll be there," I said.
That evening, I told the others about my day over dinner at the inn.
"A university?" Mash's eyes lit up. "Master, that's wonderful! Are you going to keep attending?"
"Maybe. For a while." I looked around at all of them. "We haven't really talked about how long we're staying."
"I've been offered a temporary position training with the garrison," Artoria said. "Three weeks, with pay. They're impressed by my... natural talent." She smiled slightly. "I told them I'd think about it."
"The library has a collection of poetry from the southern kingdoms that I've never encountered," Medusa added. "The head librarian said I could help catalog it. It would take at least a month."
Cu shrugged. "The fighting pits have tournaments every week. I'm not ready to stop losing just yet."
"The Artisan's Guild wants to commission some designs," Da Vinci said. "Nothing I couldn't do in a few days, but they suggested I might want to learn their techniques first. Cultural exchange, they called it."
Emiya had been quiet, but now he spoke up. "There's a food market that operates every morning. One of the stall owners is getting too old to run it alone. He asked if I'd be interested in helping. Learning his recipes, maybe taking over eventually when he retires."
We looked at each other.
"So," I said slowly. "We're staying."
"Looks like it," Cu agreed.
"Is that okay?" Mash asked, looking worried. "I know we said we were wandering, exploring. If we stay too long, are we giving up on that?"
"Or," Medusa suggested, "are we learning that wandering doesn't have to be physical? That you can explore new things, new aspects of yourself, even while standing still?"
"Besides," Artoria added, "nothing says we have to stay forever. Just... for now. Until we're ready to move on."
"If we're ready to move on," Emiya corrected. "Maybe we find we like it here. Maybe we put down roots. Would that be so bad?"
I thought about Professor Alicia's lecture. About the students debating in the courtyard. About learning things not because I needed them to save the world or complete a quest, but just because knowing things was inherently valuable.
"No," I said. "That wouldn't be bad at all."
The weeks that followed developed their own rhythm.
I attended lectures most mornings, soaking up knowledge about astronomy, mathematics, philosophy, history. I made friends with other students—people who knew nothing about Servants or singularities or the fate of human history. We studied together, argued over theoretical problems, shared meals in cheap food stalls.
One of them, a young man named Aldric, invited me to his family's home for dinner. It was chaotic—siblings everywhere, parents who asked too many questions but meant well, food served family-style with everyone reaching and laughing and talking over each other.
"Your family is wonderful," I told Aldric afterward.
"They're exhausting," he said, but fondly. "You're lucky you don't have to deal with that."
I thought about Mash and Cu and the others. My found family, scattered across the city pursuing their own interests but always reconvening at the inn each evening to share stories.
"Yeah," I said. "I'm lucky."
Mash took to city life with surprising ease. She volunteered at a community center that helped new arrivals adjust to Argentium, using her natural kindness and organizational skills to coordinate resources. She came home each day with stories about the people she'd helped—refugees finding housing, families reuniting, merchants negotiating language barriers.
"I'm making a difference," she said one night, wonder in her voice. "Not saving the world or anything grand. Just... helping people, one at a time. And it matters just as much."
Cu spent his days at the fighting pits and his evenings at taverns, where he'd accumulated a following of people who appreciated his stories and his willingness to buy rounds. He was becoming a fixture, a character in Argentium's ongoing narrative.
"People know me here," he said, sounding almost surprised. "Not as a hero or a legend, just as Cu, the guy who's good in a fight and better at drinking songs. It's nice. Being known for who I am, not what I represent."
Artoria's work with the garrison had evolved into something more. She was developing new training protocols, teaching leadership alongside combat skills. The garrison commander had started consulting her on strategy.
"They listen to me," she said quietly one evening. "Not because I was a king, but because my ideas are good. Because I've earned their respect through action, not birthright. I'd forgotten what that felt like."
Da Vinci's commission work had exploded. She was designing everything from more efficient water systems to decorative architectural elements, always careful to stay within the bounds of what the culture could actually build. She came alive in the challenge of working within limitations.
"Creating within constraints is harder than creating from nothing," she explained, covered in clay from a pottery workshop. "But it's more satisfying. Every solution feels earned."
Medusa had become the library's unofficial expert on ancient texts. Scholars sought her out for translation help, historical context, literary analysis. She'd formed a small book club that met weekly to discuss philosophy and poetry.
"I'm teaching," she told me, still sounding amazed. "People come to me to learn. Not because they're forced to, but because they want to. Because they value what I know."
And Emiya... Emiya had found something close to peace.
He ran the market stall now, the old owner having gratefully retired. He rose before dawn to prepare, spent the day serving customers, experimenting with new recipes, teaching cooking techniques to anyone who asked. He came home tired but content.
"This is enough," he said one night when I visited his stall. "Just this. Making food that people enjoy, one meal at a time. No grand purpose, no saving anyone. Just... feeding people. Being useful in a small, ordinary way."
"Are you happy?" I asked.
He considered the question seriously. "I don't know if I've ever been happy. But I'm at peace. And maybe that's better."
Two months into our stay, I realized something had changed.
We'd stopped talking about leaving.
Not consciously—we hadn't decided to stay permanently. But the future had shifted from "when we leave" to "if we leave." We were building lives here, connections, purposes.
We were becoming real in a new way.
Not NPCs following patterns.
Not wanderers without anchor.
But people, living lives that mattered because we chose them.
I brought it up one evening when we were all gathered at the inn.
"Are we staying?" I asked simply. "In Argentium. Is this home now?"
They looked at each other.
"I don't know," Mash said finally. "Does it have to be all or nothing? Can't we just be here for as long as it feels right?"
"Nothing's permanent," Medusa added. "Not really. We could stay for years or leave tomorrow. The important thing is that we're choosing."
"I'm not ready to leave yet," Artoria admitted. "There's still so much I want to do here."
"Same," Cu agreed. "Though I wouldn't mind taking a trip to those mountains we saw in the distance. Just to see what's there."
"Maybe we could do both," Da Vinci suggested. "Maintain a base here but take journeys out. Argentium could be home, and the road could be... home too. In a different way."
I liked that idea.
"So we stay," I said. "For now. And we see what happens."
"For now," they echoed.
That night, I stood at my window—the same window I'd stood at two months ago, feeling lost and powerless and uncertain.
But now, looking out at the city I was learning to call home, I felt something different.
I felt found.
Not because I'd discovered some grand purpose or destiny.
But because I'd found something better—ordinary life, lived moment by moment, surrounded by people who chose to be here just as I did.
The city lights flickered in the darkness, each one a story, a life, a choice.
And I was one of them.
Just one light among thousands.
Small, ordinary, real.
And that was enough.
That was everything.