"Director..." Mash looked at her tearfully. Just as she was about to speak, she and Ritsuka Fujimaru vanished in a flash of light.
"Seems no one cares about me, huh." Watching them disappear, Daniel sighed softly, sounding rather disappointed. Still, he could understand Mash, Fujimaru, Romani, and the others. After all, he was a newcomer, while Olga Marie was their director.
"I still had so much I wanted to do... No one's ever recognized my achievements. Why do I have to die here?"
With Mash and Fujimaru gone and her soul beginning to dissipate, Olga Marie suddenly broke down, screaming with despair—completely different from the calm figure who had entrusted Chaldea to Romani moments before. It was likely that, having resigned herself to death, her true self finally broke through. Her dependence on Lev now made even more sense.
"Alright, stop crying. You're not dead yet. Spirit Binding—Summon!"
At last, Daniel stepped in. With a casting of Spirit Binding, he stabilized her crumbling soul. As she realized her soul had stopped dissipating, Olga abruptly stopped sobbing.
"Who… are you really?" Her tone sharpened. As her broken soul reformed, Olga instantly regained composure. As the daughter of a noble magus family, her public and private personas were drastically different. Her previous emotional outburst had only happened because of her total mental collapse.
"This isn't the place for questions, Miss Noble Lady. If we don't leave now, even I might be in trouble."
Unlike the seven other Singularities to come, Fuyuki was the origin—the source. That's why, after the Grail's disappearance, the place began collapsing entirely rather than restoring itself. As Daniel spoke, he had already opened a portal via arcane means. He had placed a marker on Fujimaru earlier, so once the two returned to Chaldea, he could lock onto their position and follow.
"Director!"
Inside Chaldea, where everyone was still grieving their failure to save Olga Marie, Mash and Fujimaru stared in shock at the sudden golden portal—and the figure that stepped out of it.
"Second Magic..."
Romani and Da Vinci immediately shouted in unison. Through the portal, they could see the crumbling remnants of Fuyuki. Olga, too, stared at Daniel in disbelief. As a Lord's daughter, her knowledge of magecraft was considerable. She recognized it instantly.
"Hey, long time no see." Daniel smiled and waved at Mash and Fujimaru.
"Director!" Mash rushed to Olga's side, tears of joy in her eyes. She tried to reach out—but her hand passed through Olga's ghostly form.
"Oh, right. Almost forgot. Here, use this vessel for now."
Daniel casually pulled out a prepared artificial body and transferred Olga's soul into it. In an instant, a fully restored Olga Marie stood before them.
"This is... incredible." Romani and Da Vinci stared in awe at her seemingly miraculous resurrection, momentarily at a loss for words.
"Romani, what's our status?" Olga, back on her feet, took a moment to appreciate her revival, then quickly regained her composure and asked about the situation in Chaldea. Daniel's power intrigued her deeply—but her priority now was the survival of humanity.
"The Mage's Association is still unreachable. As for the wounded Masters—they've all been placed in cryostasis."
Romani quickly reported Chaldea's status. The damage to personnel and infrastructure was severe. Worse still, they had no supplies or means to treat the injured.
"Just what kind of bomb did Lev plant? Only killed some staff and left all the Masters alive."
Daniel couldn't help but sigh. Including Fujimaru, there had been forty-eight Masters in total. Forty-seven were now frozen, awaiting future treatment. Realistically, Daniel could heal them all in minutes—but he had no intention of doing so.
Once he interfered too much, things could spiral. The butterfly effect could derail everything, and if the Human Order were destroyed because of him, there was a good chance the two greater forces—Alaya and Gaia—would send Counter Guardians after him.
And besides, if the A-Team Masters were awakened now, what would happen to the Lostbelts in the second arc? Judging by Kirschtaria's actions, those Lostbelts held secrets yet unknown—even to Daniel. If they were someone else's plan all along, awakening the A-Team could trigger unforeseen consequences.
That wasn't the only reason, though. Daniel had a personal interest in the second arc—specifically, meeting the version of Zheng (Qin Shi Huang) that existed in the Moon Cell world. During his training in Fuyuki, he had already made plans involving him.
"Only Olga Marie's body is truly missing. That's suspicious. I remember someone using her body later on... and Romani too, in the Lostbelts."
As Olga, Romani, and the others focused on rebuilding Chaldea, Daniel wandered around and discovered something intriguing—among the bodies recovered, only Olga's was completely missing. Not even a finger remained.
Chaldea's official explanation was that the bomb had been planted directly beneath her feet, vaporizing her completely. That seemed plausible—if not for the fact that the other forty-seven Masters had all survived.
Investigations showed they'd survived thanks to various mystic codes and magical protections. As the daughter of a Lord, wouldn't Olga have carried protective gear too? There was no reason for her to be vaporized without a trace.
Daniel didn't share this observation yet—Human Order Incineration had only just begun. Thinking too far ahead, like to the Lostbelts, wasn't helpful right now. It also wasn't clear whether Romani and Da Vinci had made the same deduction.
"Spiritron Calculation Engine, Earth Environment Simulator, Laplace Familiar... Chaldea really is full of good stuff."
After taking a tour, Daniel finally understood why Olga's father had made a wish on the Holy Grail—for money. Chaldea was a black hole of resources. Even a powerful family like the Animusphere clan couldn't afford to maintain it. Only a Grail could fund something like this.
For instance, the Spiritron Engine came from Atlas Academy. Getting one required not just favors—but absurd amounts of money.
"You're the Second Magic user."
Once Chaldea's reconstruction was underway, Olga, Romani, and Da Vinci sat down with Daniel for a serious talk.
"I can travel between parallel worlds using my magic, but I'm not the Second Magic user. In fact, compared to me, the Second Magic is a bit... lacking. I'm just a traveler."
After some hesitation, Daniel gave them a simple explanation of his identity.
"Other worlds? That's impossible..." Even these three veterans of the Moonlit World were stunned into silence. They had heard of parallel worlds due to the Second Magic—but Daniel was talking about something beyond that entirely.
"This really is... something else." Romani sighed with a bitter smile. Any other magus would've tried to seal Daniel on the spot.
"This is fascinating!" Da Vinci's eyes sparkled with excitement. As a self-proclaimed genius, her curiosity was instantly piqued.
"This isn't the time for theory. Since you can freely travel between worlds, I'd like to ask a favor."
Olga, after some hesitation, revealed her request—to heal the frozen Masters.
If Daniel hadn't been here, she wouldn't even dream of it. Like Romani in the original timeline, they had no means or resources to treat the A-Team. Only once Human Order Incineration was resolved would the Mage's Association possibly step in to help.
"I could heal them. But not now."
"Why not?" Olga shouted.
"Simple. Restoring Human Order is something only Mash and Fujimaru can do. If others intervene, it could all go wrong."
"She's just an ordinary girl. Mash is only a pseudo-Servant. How could they possibly handle something this big?"
In Olga's eyes, only the A-Team had what it took. Each member was a top-tier magus. Even someone as modest as Kadoc was only "ordinary" compared to the others.
"Exactly because they're ordinary, they can save humanity. After all, most of humanity is ordinary."
Looking at the first few Singularities, Daniel could easily imagine how the A-Team would react. Sure, they'd succeed at the start—but by the Seventh Singularity and the Final One, raw power wouldn't be enough.
Kadoc once complained that Ritsuka had stolen his chance at glory. But with his mindset, he'd have abandoned Mash from the start. And if Mash died—who could say what Fou might do?
That was another Beasts of Humanity, after all. Only Mash had the power to stop him without violence.
"You saw this with future sight." Romani stepped in and cut Olga off. In the past, such defiance would've earned him a scolding—but not now.
"There are some things I can't tell you yet. Just know this—if you want to save humanity, you must trust those two. If you don't care whether humanity survives... then do whatever you like."
In a multiverse as vast as Type-Moon's, surely some timelines had failed to save humanity—just like the Marvel multiverse. Zombie apocalypses, universes consumed by Beasts—every kind of destruction existed.
"You..."
"That's enough. Calm down, Director. Right now, he's our only hope." Romani interrupted again, and Olga reluctantly sat back down.
"No need to sulk. If I hadn't shown up, you'd be dead—and Romani would still be relying on just Mash and Fujimaru."
"In that case, I'm officially activating Grand Order Operation."
Over the past few days, Chaldea had been working non-stop to identify more Singularities. They had now confirmed seven locations. The only reason they hadn't acted sooner was because they were busy rebuilding and training Fujimaru.
This was humanity's final defense. The stronger she became, the better their chances.
"Maybe in some world, Gudako really does beat Goetia with her bare hands."
Watching Fujimaru training, Daniel couldn't help but picture the meme of her ripping Goetia apart.
"So this is magecraft... Interesting. This Yin Qi Bullet is quite the killer move. I wonder how many people have died to it without even realizing it."
While Fujimaru studied magic with Olga, Daniel picked up some fundamentals too. Though he had learned Original Runes from Cú Chulainn, he had zero knowledge of modern magecraft foundations.
The Yin Qi Bullet and suggestion magic—Daniel learned them both. Many magi possessed these basic techniques. Against fellow magi, they weren't terribly effective. But against ordinary people?
That was another story entirely.
Yin Qi Bullets could disrupt a person's health, leading to slow and mysterious deaths. Infuse them with more mana, and they became as deadly as firearms. Rin Tohsaka had once used them in rapid fire against Shirou Emiya.
Magus ethics were practically nonexistent. Most saw normal humans as nothing more than mana batteries.
Some even consumed their own descendants in pursuit of the Root. In the words of fans: "Of all the sins in the Nasuverse, half belong to Tohsaka Tokiomi."
Only a few magi could be considered remotely moral—people like Rin, Shirou, or even Olga. If she'd been like Tokiomi or her father Marisbury, Daniel wouldn't have saved her.
"Jeanne, Hundred Years' War, Dragon Witch... Looks like I'll have to delay exploring other timelines a bit longer."
Now that he had entered the Nasuverse, Daniel had no plans to stay in Chaldea permanently. He would help when needed—but the multiverse of Fate was vast. There were plenty of worlds left to explore.
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