This Post is gonna be done in 2 parts, with the first being a musc score release and the second being a fanfiction recommendation ( Val don’t kill me >_<)
Part 1:
Done by Ken Hirai in 2004, this song was one of the major hits of his career, selling 893,000 copies. with soulful vocals and a falsetto that can swoon the ladies complimenting his odd appearance for an R&B/pop singer, has garnered him quite a following both locally and internationally.
The song has a rather sad background to it, but this is often par for the course with the story it was written for, and coupled with the piano notes softly complimenting his vocals, it immerses the listener into the lives of two individuals, living their daily lives but being pulled apart by fate. I personally recommend you watch the PV version on Youtube, or Veoh. ( and yes, it’s a damned old song.)
MP3 is available here.
The Score is Available here.
Part 2:
Going off on a different tangent now, I’m going to recommend a single fanfiction recommendation as a test bed for it being pending as a future category here. While i know Val dislikes fanfiction of any kind >_> some things are just too good not to share 😛
Fans of the Crazy Clover Club doujinshi Type Moon Complex X series ( which i will go into detail about in another post.) will rejoice that the worlds of Tsukihime and F/SN will merge once again, thanks to the free time and effort of a western author ( ironic how the influences tend to follow each other and vice versa eh?) Titled Legacies of Fate, the author immerses you into the life of Takara Aoizaki, whose daily life is suddenly turned upside down when she discovers she is part of a Grail War completely by chance. Kind of like how Shirou did it with saber, but with no less drama. With her new Servant Lancer (?) she begins the grail war in desire of a selfish, but no less important wish.
Despite not gaining any permission to redistribute it, i will now post a single chapter here. So please sue me as much as you like
After finishing with the laundry, Takara retreated to the attic. More specifically, the attic room that was used for the family’s rare guests, usually one in particular. Takara’s favourite aunt was a Gypsy-like wanderer who breezed in and out two or three times a year, a little brash in her manner, but always arriving with some wild story to tell, or a trinket for her favourite (and thus far, only) niece. She’d typically stay no longer than a week, just to catch up, and then vanish again for parts unknown. It used to disappoint Takara that there was no fixed address she could write to, or phone number she could call in order to converse with her aunt – but thinking back, the woman always seemed to show up when she was really wanted, didn’t she?
“I wish you were here now, Aunt Aoko,” Takara murmured into the empty room, before correcting herself quickly, “Sorry – Oneechan.”
The one time Takara had referred to her relation by her proper title, she’d been asked, “Are you trying to make me feel old, Takara-chan?” The question had been jovial enough, but the chill in the redhead’s eyes had convinced the girl that she never wanted to make Aoko feel old. Though, to be fair, she never looked that old. Aoko had probably inherited the same genes that kept her mother youthful, as well. Takara wondered if she’d be as lucky.
She wondered if she’d even be lucky enough to spend this Christmas with her family intact.
Shivering, Takara wandered around the small room, delicately picking up the small keepsakes and books scattered around – partly to dust them, and partly to remember where and when they’d come from, happier times that now seemed so long ago and far away.
A framed photograph of Aoko and her other aunt, holding a written certificate for winning some eating contest – Takara wasn’t sure what kind, but since her mother wasn’t there it obviously hadn’t been curry
. . . A small hand mirror, inlaid in pearl, with what looked like a highly-stylised “Z” on the back . . . a basket bed for Aoko’s cat, when she was brought along . . .
Mostly, they were all little things – small items to make Aoko feel at home whenever she stayed, but nothing too valuable, nothing she couldn’t afford to lose by leaving them at someone else’s house. The only real oddity in the room was a carved wooden sword hanging on the wall. At least, it appeared to be a sword – a foreign design, Takara thought, though given the pictures on the “blade,” the shape could be a coincidence.
The carving depicted a pack of wolves standing in a pine forest, howling at the full moon in a starlit sky. Bordered by thorny roses, it was a masterful work, and it never failed to catch Takara’s attention when she saw it. Aoko had brought it from some trip, saying she thought it would be a good decorative piece for the room in general. Seeing it now, her niece agreed.
She reached out to brush one of the wolves, and seemed to feel the ridges of fur under her fingertips. The carving had a story attached, didn’t it? Some old fairy tale of wizards and warriors.
“It was made by a master woodcarver, long ago,” her aunt had said. “A symbol of friendship for his comrade, who loved the wild places, and was a skilled warrior and healer – skilled enough to bring the woodcarver back from the edge of death.”
Takara felt tears start to burn hotly in her eyes. That was what her father needed now – a healer who could work miracles. Why did it have to only be a story? Why couldn’t someone stop her family from falling apart? Why couldn’t there be someone to save them?
“Why?” she demanded of the heavens.
* * *
The Call has come again, and the realm of legends trembles in its wake. Warriors stir from their repose as it spreads over them like a net, for this summons holds power like they have rarely felt. Yet, for all its strength, it is unfocused, uncertain. It does not truly understand what it seeks, yet will not yield the search for its goal – a warrior of power, who can make miracles come true.
He is not what he was, pained and confused by a death that was not so long ago. It would be easy to allow another to follow the shining beacon back to the realm of war. Though the Call is strong and the presence of the blade chains him to its path, though he still holds power enough to resist it. Were it only desire that beckoned, he would ignore it, as he so often has. But there is something else in the Call as well – a deep, soul-aching need. To be wanted is one thing . . . to be needed is another.
Very well. Though he is weak and ill-prepared, though the path is long and uncertain, he will answer the Call. Because there is need of him, and because it is what he has sworn to do.
And his word is his life, even in death.
* * *
The air split, not with a crack of thunder, but a scream, as though a thousand newborns had suddenly begun wailing in unison. In the rift, a colour that was everything and nothing could be seen, swirling chaotically with the potential to be any colour at all. Wind roared into the absence, and as it filled the gap, the light that was not light assumed a shape that was human, and the wind’s howl lessened, from the mournful cry of a lone wolf to the agonised groan of a merely mortal voice.
When all was calm, and Takara could see again, she was staring at a man in a hooded cloak as green as the forest leaves. Black leather breeches and boots emerged from the cloak’s lower boundaries, and a tunic of the same colour as the cloak covered what she could see of the upper area. Rough hands attached to muscular-looking arms lowered the hood, revealing an angular face framed by midnight-black hair and a rough beard. He seemed a young man, perhaps half again her own age, with high cheekbones, a hawklike nose, and green eyes that held hints of gold.
Those eyes stared almost angrily into her own, until Takara felt her own defiance rising. Why should he look at her that way when hewas the intruder? She spoke, her words matched precisely by a gravel voice that seemed to growl as much as speak.
“Who the hell are you?”
Disclaimer: I do not Own, Legacies of Fate, Fate/Stay Night, or any other Type-MOON series or related characters. Please don’t sue.
Link to the Fanfiction (Completed) is here
Enjoy!
Its ACGN that matters! 