Irisviel found herself troubled.
The magical ritual known as the Holy Grail War, held in Fuyuki City, was in essence a process of gathering the souls of seven Heroic Spirit Servants, using the power of their return to the Throne of Heroes beyond the world's outer boundary, and thereby opening a passage to the Root. That had always been its purpose.
Of course, if a wish was limited to "changing the world from within," if one simply desired to bring about a miracle within modern society, then there was no need for the Greater Grail, the vessel formed from the ancient Winter Maiden Justeaze's own body, to fully activate. It would be enough to defeat six Heroic Spirit Servants, harvesting their souls and magical energy, and a wish could be granted.
In theory, six Heroic Spirit Servants had already left the stage in Fuyuki City.
Even if the Greater Grail could not fully activate, the Lesser Grail, as a vessel, had taken sufficient shape. After all, the vessel that was her outer self had already been placed at the Fuyuki City Civic Hall, one of the four great leylines, and every required magical ritual had met the necessary conditions. It was more than enough to allow the victor to voice the wish in their heart.
But that was only in theory. The reality was strange, because Illyasviel von Einzbern, the Assassin, had frozen the moment of the Grail's descent.
She was a Heroic Spirit Servant who had already left the stage, and yet the girl somehow possessed a mechanism identical to that of the Lesser Grail.
She had not replaced Irisviel's own Lesser Grail. Yet Illyasviel had somehow collected souls.
Six of them. A full six. Including Illyasviel herself, the Holy Grail War system of Fuyuki City had absorbed the magical energy of six souls, along with the spirit origins of those Heroic Spirit Servants.
Yet each absorption had only reached roughly ninety-nine percent. The remaining one percent had vanished.
Saber. Archer. Rider.
Caster. Berserker. Assassin.
The souls and spirit origins of every one of these Servants had been transformed into those golden cards.
They had been intercepted. Kept from returning to the forming Grail, divided away as though someone were cutting their share of the spoils.
It may have seemed like only one percent, but it was already absurd. Because to the Grail system, imperfection was imperfection. The system's entire design was built on the pursuit of a perfect salvation, the materialization of souls. No matter how miniscule the deficiency, even one missing fragment meant a flaw in the entire system. And that flaw manifested like an error in a program, causing the Grail's descent to be delayed again and again.
Six Heroic Spirit Servants had clearly died, and yet the Grail system had misjudged all six as still alive. After all, if their souls had not fully returned, how could they truly be considered dead?
You die, your soul returns one hundred percent. You do not return one hundred percent, therefore you have not died. Rigid, inflexible, and utterly maddening.
"Is it the effect of a Noble Phantasm? But the spirit origins have already vanished, so why haven't the Noble Phantasms crumbled to ash?"
Irisviel could see where those cards had come from. To her, who had already become the Grail, the Noble Phantasms of every Servant in this war were no secret. But the more she thought about it, the stranger Illyasviel seemed.
A spirit origin was the foundation of a Servant's materialization. Just as Miss Illya had lost the ability to use many of her skills after burning through her own spirit origin, a Servant who had died naturally could not draw upon Noble Phantasms while inside the Grail. Noble Phantasms were, in essence, constructs of magical energy. No matter how formidable a Servant had been in life, losing their spirit origin meant losing everything in the Holy Grail War, both their own magical energy and any supply from an external source; there was simply no socket left to plug into.
The reason Miss Illya had been able to overcome stronger opponents time and time again was precisely because her spirit origin could connect to the leylines of Fuyuki City. Without that spirit origin, the whole of her would have been nothing but diffuse, ungathered magical energy with no way to converge.
The six cards were tents.
Miss Illya's ability to keep them intact and prevent their collapse was the frame holding those tents up.
What Irisviel, in her black-and-crimson gown, found most impossible to understand was where that frame was coming from. She understood every other aspect of the mechanism, but this part she genuinely could not see.
"...The black mud cannot approach her. No, wait. That's not right. It's not that it cannot approach. It's that the system's judgment has failed."
Resting her chin gently in her hand, Irisviel looked at the barefoot little girl who seemed to have already fallen asleep. After watching her for several hours, she finally began to understand something.
"It is an iron rule that a Servant who has died cannot maintain their Noble Phantasms, but that only applies to a normal Grail. Before a corrupted Grail fully connects with the Greater Grail, the system's judgment produces errors. Either someone must make a wish, or all seven souls must return, before my dear Illyasviel returns to the proper course."
The problem was not with Illyasviel. Under a normal Holy Grail War system, she would already have been gone.
It was simply that Fuyuki City's Grail system had developed a problem of its own, one that had connected the girl to the tainted magical energy within.
Put simply: before her death, Illyasviel had been sustained by the leylines, drawn through the Grail and her own skills. After her death, it was the evil contained within the Grail that provided the possibility of her continued existence.
She had died, but she could not truly die inside a corrupted Grail, because the corruption had recognized her as one of its own, an innate affinity that made her unselectable as a target.
And because she had been classified as kin, even in her reduced state as a bare soul, she was able to draw the faintest trickle of magical energy from inside the Grail. That trickle was just enough to hold those six Noble Phantasm cards in place, preventing them from dissolving within the Grail, causing the corrupted Grail to produce a bug all by itself.
After all, the souls I've swallowed are also in her possession. She carries the scent of the corruption too.
We should be on the same side. How could I devour one of my own?
That was roughly the principle at work. It was similar to how Irisviel herself, even after being corrupted, had not been completely consumed from within.
At least in the corrupted Grail's judgment, Illyasviel, who also held six small souls, differed enormously in scale. But in essence, the two of them were equal kin.
"In other words, Illyasviel, as a Lesser Grail, and carrying the corruption within you, you can also make a wish. Is that right? Will you tell Mama what you wished for?"
In the gray-black world of the Grail's interior, Irisviel walked gently toward the small girl crouching in the black mud, bending slightly at the waist and asking in her warm, unhurried way.
"I can't. Because I am...a loser..."
Only the victor of the Holy Grail War could make a wish. That too was one of its iron rules.
The fact that she could linger here without vanishing was nothing more than the obsessive clinging of a child who desperately wanted happiness, compounded by the defective state of this particular Grail. Under a clean, uncorrupted Grail, Miss Illya would have already been gone.
"But you already made a wish, dear. You wished that you didn't want to die. That is why those souls granted your wish."
Irisviel blinked softly, gesturing at the golden cards floating nearby.
"Illyasviel. Stop running from reality. You already know, deep down, that you have died. You simply refuse to believe it. And your refusal to accept your own death is very naughty of you, because you know perfectly well that only the victor can have their wish fulfilled."
"I'm just tired. I haven't died. I'm only tired..."
"Think carefully, my dear Illyasviel. You were killed in the final great battle among the Servants. And now you have returned to the inside of the Grail. But this is not your home. You should be a good girl and let your consciousness return to the Throne of Heroes."
"There's nothing there..."
"?"
"That place, is not home. That place, has no room for me..."
"??"
Miss Illya tilted her head up slightly, her voice small and timid. The ruby eyes that had once been her most striking feature were dyed a hollow, lifeless black. She had no home. Death, for her, was truly and completely death.
She could not return to the so-called Throne of Heroes, because from beginning to end she had never felt the Throne's existence as anything real. It had never recorded her image, never held any trace of who she had once been.
"Lying is not becoming, Illyasviel. Making up excuses to avoid going home is very disobedient of you."
Irisviel, in her black-and-crimson gown, clearly did not believe her. If there was no record of Illyasviel on the Throne of Heroes, then where had she come from? The Holy Grail War system did not issue one-way tickets. Everyone else could return after leaving the stage, so surely she could not be the sole exception.
"Forgotten... everyone's forgotten... they've all forgotten me..."
Miss Illya buried her face between her knees again. A faint trembling, something close to a sob, had crept into her voice.
Even she herself was beginning to forget who she was. Death, for her, was a thorough and absolute ending, not just in the physical sense, but in the sense of erasure. No one would ever remember Illyasviel von Einzbern. Her death and her forgetting were bound together as one, and that was precisely why she had feared being killed again and again throughout the war, had feared that she would never be allowed to find happiness.
In a world where everyone can find happiness, Illyasviel will never exist.
"Soul fragments missing. She's gone and become a little fool. What a silly, silly Illyasviel."
Irisviel narrowed her eyes, her hand reaching out to stroke the shivering girl's small head. She understood, of course, why the girl had ended up this way. After arriving here and learning the truth of the Grail, Illyasviel had nearly gone mad, forcing herself to retreat inward, refusing to speak with or reach out to anyone, simply waiting for the final death to come.
After all, she had fought so hard, pushed herself so far, even burned through her spirit origin and her own body's systems just to keep going, and the prize waiting at the end had been something like this.
What happiness? The Grail cannot grant your happiness. Everything you did was for nothing.
Under the weight of that reality, how could a little girl whose soul was already half-dissolved possibly maintain her sanity? The self-deception, the shutting away of the heart, was, in its own way, a form of protection.
"But it's alright. If you have no home, then Mama's side is your home, Illyasviel. We'll be together forever and ever, and we'll be so, so happy. You just need to wait a little longer. Wait until the moment when you have no choice but to accept the truth."
Breaking this bug would be simple enough.
The first way was for someone to make a wish upon the manifested Grail as a whole. At that point, every soul held within, whether by Irisviel or by Illyasviel, would be consumed entirely, and Illyasviel would lose her protective coloring.
The second way was for one more Servant to die. With seven great souls to suppress six small ones, those cards, even if they could hold back the black mud, would be forced by sheer weight of numbers to yield and merge into the Grail.
The Grail's descent ritual was already nearly complete. The missing soul fragments were only a delay.
By tonight at the latest it would begin to take shape, reaching the point where a wish could be granted.
So, my Illyasviel, there's no need to hurry.
This Mama of mine, will very soon swallow you whole. Your body and soul will merge with Mama's, forever and ever.
With your malice added to mine, we could even accomplish...
A brand new chapter of human history. One that would trouble and terrify even the Counter Force itself...
"My lord. There is no longer any magical energy response. Francesca Prelati should be dead."
After securing Kayneth in the blind spots and gaps of the building's lower levels, Diarmuid had finished scouting the ruins of the collapsed structure and returned. He knelt on one knee in respect, bowing toward the blond man leaning against the wall. Within the rubble, every trace of magical energy had gone completely silent.
Nothing remained but dust and broken stone. The surrounding environment, too, had already settled back to stillness after the violence, as was the case with most modern mages. Even in the Age of Gods it had been the same: high offense, paper defense. Without a workshop to fight from, they were nothing but brittle glass figurines.
Caught off-guard by Kayneth's scheming, disadvantaged by the information gap, struck at point-blank range for catastrophic burst damage, even a great magus had no choice but to die in bewildered resentment.
After all, who could have possibly anticipated it? That the Lord of the Clock Tower's Mineralogy Department, a genius magus of the magical world, would be carrying around that sort of modern weapon that mages universally looked down upon. Never mind Miss Francesca being blindsided; even Diarmuid, Kayneth's own Heroic Spirit Servant, had been completely at a loss. Where in the world had that grenade come from?
"Hmph. She didn't die. She ran. Being able to kill Francesca doesn't mean you can prevent her from coming back. The Clock Tower's rumors have records of her being killed more than once, and yet that woman has a habit of turning up again out of nowhere."
"Then should we pursue her? At this range, after taking your surprise attack, she..."
"Pursue her? You think the moment you dare go after her, Emiya Kiritsugu's bullet wouldn't be in my skull a second later?"
Kayneth glanced at the worsening tear in his thigh, snorted with cold contempt, and turned his head away through gritted teeth.
Old hag. You wait. Once I'm back at the Clock Tower, I have ways of dealing with you even if you crawl off to Yukihara. You had the nerve to run a con on me.
"I understand."
Diarmuid nodded with genuine agreement.
He did not know much about Miss Francesca, but he knew Emiya Kiritsugu, the man who had blown up their original hotel. That man was a mage-killer with no moral floor whatsoever. The type to talk about a fair magical duel while lobbing a rocket launcher at you from behind.
"That said, if Emiya Kiritsugu had not fired his warning shot, we would never have seen through that illusionist's trap. And since Saber has not appeared, she has most likely left the stage. Emiya Kiritsugu now is simply a participant who has already lost..."
"You think I need you to tell me that? Hah. He was only afraid that illusionist would be harder to deal with than me. You think a man who set up a sniper position aiming at my head has any good intentions?"
Another cold, dismissive laugh. Kayneth saw through Emiya Kiritsugu's intervention immediately. He had no intention of counting on the goodwill of a mage-killer who had gone from declaring an alliance to playing dead on the floor in the span of a single moment.
It came down to a simple calculation of threat levels. His own condition right now was extremely poor.
From Emiya Kiritsugu's perspective, it was better to deal with a crippled Clock Tower Lord than to confront a mage of the Age of Gods whose depths were unknowable and who had already managed to deceive him. After all, who could guarantee that the peak magus of the Age of Gods, who had nearly carved a path of carnage through the entire Holy Grail War, had left nothing for her own Master in reserve? Setting aside things like magical artifacts and prepared tools, teaching a few accelerated Age of Gods spells was hardly difficult. With that imbalance shifting, if Emiya Kiritsugu wanted any realistic chance at victory, he had no choice but to expose Francesca's trap. Otherwise, what he'd have to face later wouldn't just be one broken-down Servant hovering at the absolute bottom of the rankings.
Though Kayneth had said all of this, the fact that he had amplified his voice with magic to warn Emiya Kiritsugu earlier already made clear enough, in its own way, that he had quietly accepted the favor...
"Bring Emiya Kiritsugu to me. And be careful not to kill him."
"I want to know where he found the nerve to keep fighting after losing his Servant."
Emiya Kiritsugu's earlier shots had already betrayed his position. And now that Kayneth had moved to a safe blind spot, he quickly laid down a simple magical barrier.
He pushed himself up from the wall with an impassive effort and settled into the wheelchair Diarmuid had retrieved from the first floor, issuing his orders.
"As you will, my lord."
Diarmuid withdrew respectfully, magic sword in hand, fully aware that his Master was being tsundere again.
Saying all manner of things about what was wrong with Emiya Kiritsugu, and yet the favor had already been accepted. That was simply how his lord was. The more Kayneth sang someone's praises, the more it meant he looked down on them. The more he criticized someone, the more it usually meant he'd already recognized their worth. Otherwise, Emiya Kiritsugu would never have received the treatment of being brought along with a fully-equipped Clock Tower Lord last night.
"Hmph. Emiya Kiritsugu. What a rat. And stubborn as a cockroach. No matter how many times you hit him, he just won't die."
Kayneth pressed another needle of anesthetic into his thigh. Exactly as Diarmuid had read the situation, he spoke disparagingly of Emiya Kiritsugu's character and methods.
But that did not mean he failed to recognize the man's capabilities. A mere mage-killer who had killed over thirty mages by this point was, in itself, a statement. A Lord of the Clock Tower could be arrogant. Could be prideful. Could be difficult. But he could absolutely not be stupid.
Dismissing Emiya Kiritsugu as a person was perfectly reasonable. But ignoring his actual ability would be nothing short of foolishness.
You could call someone useless. But if someone truly was useless, he wouldn't waste even a glance on them.
"My lord. Emiya Kiritsugu is gone. All that was left at the scene were several large firearms and a single radio transceiver."
Two minutes later, Diarmuid returned to report.
As expected. Seeing that things were settled, Emiya Kiritsugu had simply vanished, true to form. Meticulous. Cautious. Never allowing himself to come face to face with a Servant whose strength far exceeded his own, even one on its last legs.
This was also the flaw in Miss Francesca's performance. She had known Emiya Kiritsugu was an extraordinarily cautious mage-killer, but she had never imagined just how thoroughly he could play dead.
"Emiya Kiritsugu. What exactly are you trying to do?"
Kayneth took the transceiver. As a Lord of the Clock Tower, he was hardly well-versed in modern technology, but a communication device of this kind was at least something he knew how to use. He wasn't like the Tohsaka household, who had once apparently tried to keep a robotic vacuum cleaner as a pet and then managed to kill it.
"Don't think that helping me this once means I'll be grateful. A loser should have the awareness to accept defeat. Refusing to acknowledge even that will only make me look down on you further..."
"Hand over Irisviel. Kayneth. It was you who abducted my wife."
"?"
"I've already checked everywhere I could think of. As a Lord of the Clock Tower, your intelligence network is beyond what I can imagine. I can guess that you already know Irisviel's secret. But I'm asking you, all the same, to return her to me."
Secret? What secret?
What is wrong with you, Emiya Kiritsugu. Your wife goes missing and you come to me?
Yes, I'm the blond one, and yes, I'm the only one left with a Servant, but you think I, the Lord of the Clock Tower, kidnapped the homunculus wife of a mage-killer?
Hearing the exhausted voice coming through the transceiver, Kayneth first blinked, then erupted in fury. What was the meaning of this? Would he really stoop to something so graceless? Being accused of kidnapping another man's wife was an insult to the entire Archibald family line. A flagrant and outrageous slander against the honor of a magical family's head.
"Your wife goes missing, and that has what to do with me? You actually suspect that I kidnapped her? My own fiancée Sola-Ui is currently suspected of being kidnapped by that wretched Francesca woman. Do you think I have any mental capacity left to kidnap your wife? Ptch. I would never have the capacity to kidnap someone else's wife!"
My own fiancée isn't even found yet, and you come asking where your wife went.
Does that even make sense? Last night we were both beaten half to death.
Do I look like I can split myself in two? Where would I find the energy for a kidnapping after a battle like that?
"It's truly not you?"
A note of gravity and suspicion had entered Emiya Kiritsugu's voice.
"It is NOT!"
Kayneth ground his teeth, rage boiling over. He genuinely could not understand what basis Emiya Kiritsugu had for suspecting him. His own fiancée was a thousand times more beautiful than the other man's wife, for one thing.
A mass-produced homunculus. The Einzberns had sold how many of those things over the years.
"The idea of Kayneth El-Melloi Archibald kidnapping your wife is even more laughable than the idea of my worthless student Waver Velvet one day becoming a Lord of the Clock Tower!"
"...Is that so. Then you no longer have any leverage."
"?"
"Your fiancée, Sola-Ui, is in my hands. You wouldn't want anything to happen to her, would you