Chapter 693: Holy Grail War! The Disappearing Command Seal!
So humble.
It was almost terrifyingly humble.
Tohru stood frozen, her vibrant eyes widening in disbelief. She felt like she couldn't bear to watch the scene unfolding before her.
Her father, Damocles, the Emperor of Demise, the terrifying dragon whose very breath could scorch continents and whose roar signaled the end of eras, was bowing.
He wasn't just being polite. He was submitting.
Ren stood before the colossal presence of the Emperor, looking as casual as if he were ordering coffee at a convenience store. He did not make things difficult for the ruler of the Chaos Faction, merely nodding in agreement to the request.
"Very well," Ren said, his voice calm but carrying a weight that silenced the howling winds of the Dragon Realm.
This simple acceptance made Damocles breathe a sigh of relief. The tension that had been crushing the surrounding mountains finally lifted.
At least this powerful human—no, this entity disguised as a human—was not as extreme or bloodthirsty as the dragons of the Chaos Faction.
Damocles turned his burning gaze toward his daughter.
"Tohru, come back with me."
His voice was deep, resonating in their chests like thunder. The Emperor of Demise felt that he couldn't let his daughter stay outside in the human world anymore.
The world was too dangerous. He had let her go to see the world, to understand the frailty of lesser beings. Instead, she had provoked a being from an Otherworld who had effortlessly defeated her father.
This truly left him speechless. It was a humiliation, yes, but also a terrifying wake-up call.
"No!"
Tohru's shout cut through the air. She scrambled behind Ren, using his back as a shield, clutching his shirt tightly.
"I'm not going back!"
She poked her head out, her horns glowing faintly with defiance. "I want to be Ren's maid at his house! I don't want to go back to that boring life of destruction and sleep!"
Tohru was already tired of the endless, meaningless conflicts in this world. The fighting, the killing, the plotting—it was exhausting.
She had found something different. A warmth. A purpose.
Now, she just wanted to be a maid. She wanted to clean his house, cook his meals (even if it meant feeding him her tail), and be useful to Ren.
She squeezed her eyes shut, bracing herself. She originally thought her father would sternly scold her, perhaps even drag her back by force.
But the expected roar of anger never came.
"..."
Damocles stared at the human protecting his daughter. He saw the relaxed posture, the complete lack of fear in Ren's eyes.
His expression changed. The hostility melted away, replaced by a calculating, ancient wisdom.
He mused aloud, his voice rumbling like shifting tectonic plates. "Well... in that case, you should serve this adult well."
"Ah?"
Tohru opened her eyes, absolutely dumbfounded. Her jaw dropped.
"Fa-Father?"
Her father just agreed like that?
Shouldn't he be shouting about the pride of the Dragon Race? Shouldn't he be roaring about how a Chaos Dragon could never degrade herself to become a human's slave?
What a joke.
Damocles had pride, certainly. He was the Emperor of Demise. But he wasn't a fool.
His pride had already been repeatedly rubbed into the ground by Ren during their brief confrontation. Ren hadn't just beaten him; he had dismantled him with the ease of a master swordsman fighting a toddler.
What pride was there left to salvage?
He had heard a human saying once: "A wise man submits to circumstances."
Ren was far stronger than him. The gap was not a river; it was an ocean.
If he couldn't win, what was the point of forcing it? Getting himself killed would only leave the Chaos Faction leaderless and his daughter unprotected.
Moreover...
Damocles narrowed his slit pupils. This entity was stronger than the gods of this world. Perhaps, by following him, Tohru could gain benefits that the Dragon Realm could never offer. She might witness heights of power he could only dream of.
So, he accepted this fact.
Finally, after a deep, lingering look at his daughter—a look that conveyed a rare, unspoken fatherly concern—the Emperor of Demise tactfully turned around.
"Do not cause trouble for him, Tohru."
With a flap of his massive wings that shattered the sound barrier, Damocles tore open a rift in space and vanished, retreating to his domain.
"Uh…"
It wasn't until the residual magical energy of the Emperor of Demise truly faded that Tohru believed it.
Her father had really agreed. She was free.
A brilliant smile broke across her face. She turned to Ren, her eyes sparkling with excitement.
"Let's go! Take me to see this world! Or rather... take me to your home, Master!"
Ren smiled and patted her head, careful of the horns. "Let's go. But first, drop the 'Master' in public. It sounds weird."
"Okay! Ren-san!"
The space around them warped, and the duo vanished from the barren wasteland of the Dragon Realm.
Meanwhile, across the dimensions.
[Location: Fate/Zero World - Fuyuki City]
The air was heavy with the scent of ozone and destiny.
"Excuse me, are you my Master?"
That was the question every Mage longed to hear.
The Holy Grail War.
Originally, the "Spiritual Manifestation Ritual: Heroic Spirit Summoning" was a decisive, grand magic used to save the World of the Living from extinction.
It was designed by the Three Founding Families—Einzbern, Tohsaka, and Matou—to reach the Root, the Akasha.
Seven Heroic Spirits at the pinnacle of the seven attributes—Grand Servants—would appear to eradicate the great disasters hindering the development of humanity.
But humans, in their infinite greed and desire for shortcuts, corrupted this noble purpose.
They degraded this grand magic into a bloody battle royale system.
The Holy Grail War.
Approximately once every sixty years, the spiritual power in the ley lines of Fuyuki City would accumulate to a critical mass, sufficient to support the descent of the Holy Grail.
Thus, the Holy Grail, an omnipotent wish-granting device possessing the power to alter reality itself, would appear in Fuyuki.
However, a miracle is a finite resource.
Only one pair—one Master and one Servant—could obtain this authority.
Therefore, an unwritten covenant was established, written in blood and ambition.
Seven mages, chosen by the Grail, would lead their respective summoned Heroic Spirits into a battle for supremacy.
Kill the others. Be the last one standing. Obtain the wish.
This is the Heaven's Feel ritual of Fuyuki City.
Although, this history was merely the surface-level pretext for the carnage that was about to unfold.
Now.
The Fourth Holy Grail War has begun.
Masters from various corners of the globe, hiding in the shadows of history, have begun their Servant summoning rituals.
[Location: Einzbern Castle - Northern Europe]
Outside, a blizzard raged, burying the world in white silence. Inside the ancient castle, the air was cold, sterile, and filled with the weight of centuries of obsession.
Kiritsugu Emiya stood in the center of the ceremonial chapel.
His face was gaunt, his eyes dead and devoid of light, like deep pools of stagnant water. He checked the mercury circle on the floor for the tenth time.
Kiritsugu Emiya.
His father was Norikata Emiya, a genius mage designated for Sealing Designation by the Clock Tower due to his dangerous research into time manipulation.
Kiritsugu himself was supposed to become the fifth-generation heir of the Emiya family, a prestigious lineage.
However, fate had a cruel sense of humor. Due to a tragic accident in his childhood involving Dead Apostles on Alimango Island, he rejected the path of a traditional Magus.
He became a hunter. A "Magus Killer."
Because he was a mage himself, he understood their arrogance. He understood their logic. And he dismantled them using methods they found beneath them—C4 explosives, sniper rifles, origin bullets.
His unscrupulous actions made him infamous in the Underworld. To the Magic Association, he was a rabid dog, an outcast.
But it was precisely because of such ruthless methods that he was noticed and hired by the Einzbern family.
Jubstacheit von Einzbern, the patriarch of the clan, also known as Old Man Acht, stood in the shadows of the chapel. His red eyes glowed with fanaticism.
He demanded only one thing: The Third Magic. The Holy Grail.
"Kiritsugu," the old man's voice was like grinding stones. "Do not fail us. The Einzbern wish... the longing of a thousand years rests on this war."
The deal was simple. As long as Kiritsugu could summon a Servant and win the war, the Einzbern family would provide him with the resources and the vessel.
And they would marry Irisviel von Einzbern to him.
[Inorin's Note: Plot divergence detected. In this timeline, the marriage has not yet been formalized.]
At that time, Kiritsugu Emiya would represent the Einzbern in the Holy Grail War.
"I know," Kiritsugu replied curtly, not looking back.
Irisviel stood to the side, her pristine white dress blending with the snowy atmosphere of the castle. She calmly watched Kiritsugu Emiya's preparations.
She was a Homunculus. An artificial human created for a single purpose: to be the vessel of the Grail.
She didn't think much about her own fate. She only knew that if this man summoned a Servant, her destiny would officially begin. She would become his wife, and eventually, the Grail itself.
She looked at the back of his right hand.
The red, geometric tattoo of the Command Seal was etched there, throbbing with magical energy. Summoning a Servant was almost inevitable.
It was just a matter of the Servant's strength.
Old Man Acht was confident about this. He had learned from the bitter lessons of the Third Holy Grail War, where they had foolishly summoned the Avenger class.
This time, they would not make a mistake.
"The Catalyst is prepared," Acht said, gesturing to the altar.
Lying on the velvet cushion was a scabbard. It was ancient, inlaid with blue enamel and gold.
Avalon. The Everdistant Utopia.
The scabbard of Excalibur. Excavated from Cornwall, it was the ultimate catalyst for the King of Knights.
But Kiritsugu Emiya looked at the holy relic with a frown of dissatisfaction.
He lit a cigarette, the smoke curling up into the high ceiling.
"Saber..." he muttered, disdain dripping from the word.
He was very dissatisfied with the Saber class.
He believed that what suited him was the best tool for the job. He was a killer, a pragmatist. He won by shooting people in the back, by blowing up hotels, by poisoning water supplies.
He needed a tool that could work in the shadows.
Assassin or Caster. Those were the classes that suited his methodology.
In contrast, Saber? The King of Knights?
A symbol of chivalry, honor, and fair duels?
It was nauseating. It was incompatible. He was very worried that his actions would clash violently with a Servant bound by a code of honor. It would be like trying to perform surgery with a broadsword.
But for now, this was all he could do. The Einzberns wanted the strongest class, and Saber was widely considered the strongest.
"Begin," Acht commanded.
Having prepared the ritual magic, Kiritsugu stepped forward. He felt the prana in the ley lines surging beneath the castle.
He began to chant the Servant summoning spell, his voice echoing in the stone chamber.
"Silver and iron to the origin. Gem and the archduke of contracts to the cornerstone."
"The ancestor is my great master Schweinorg."
The mercury on the floor began to glow, emitting a blinding green luminescence. The wind picked up inside the closed room, whipping Irisviel's hair around her face.
"The alighted wind becomes a wall. The gates in the four directions close, coming from the crown, the three-forked road that leads to the kingdom circulating."
Kiritsugu could feel the drain on his magic circuits. It was like opening a vein.
"Shut (fill). Shut (fill). Shut (fill). Shut (fill). Shut (fill)."
"Repeat every five times."
"Simply, shatter once filled!"
The light intensified, turning from green to a blinding gold. The magical pressure was immense, cracking the stone floor tiles.
"Here is my oath. I am the one who becomes all the good of the world of the dead, I am the one who lays out all the evil of the world of the dead."
"You, seven heavens clad in three words of power, arrive from the ring of deterrence, O keeper of the balance!"
The incantation ended with a shout.
BOOM!
A shockwave blasted outward from the center of the circle. Smoke and magical residue filled the room.
Old Man Acht leaned forward, his eyes wide with anticipation. "Come forth! The King of Knights!"
The light burst forth, blinding them for a second!
Then, it slowly dissipated.
It was expected that a powerful Servant, clad in armor, would be standing there, asking the iconic question.
But after the light faded…
There was nothing.
The circle was empty. The scabbard lay there, untouched. The mercury was scorched, but no heroic spirit stood within the diagram.
"Hmm?"
The silence was deafening.
"How is this possible?"
Old Man Acht saw the empty ritual room and immediately bristled, his beard trembling with rage. "Kiritsugu! Did something go wrong with your summoning ritual? Did you mispronounce the chant?!"
"..."
Kiritsugu Emiya was silent. The cigarette fell from his lips to the floor.
He was an extremely meticulous person. He didn't make mistakes in procedure.
Recalling the details, he was certain he hadn't made a single error in the aria or the circle geometry.
But the scene before him was inexplicable. The prana had been consumed. The connection had been established. But the line had been cut at the very last second.
He walked over to check the ritual circle.
Still no structural problems.
"Is it a problem with the incantation? Or the Holy Relic?" Old Man Acht paced back and forth, his cane tapping furiously. "Did we receive a fake catalyst? Impossible!"
Irisviel, however, was not looking at the circle.
She was looking at her future husband.
Her red eyes widened in shock as she noticed something terrifying.
She pointed a trembling finger at Kiritsugu Emiya's right hand.
"Kiritsugu... your hand."
"The Command Seal... it's gone."
"What?!"
Old Man Acht and Kiritsugu Emiya froze.
They quickly looked at the back of his right hand.
Kiritsugu frantically pulled up his sleeve, rubbing the skin.
Upon it… there was nothing.
Smooth skin.
The three vivid, red geometric strokes of the Command Seal—the absolute proof of a Master's right to participate in the Holy Grail War—had vanished without a trace.
It wasn't that he had used them. They had been taken.
"The qualification..." Kiritsugu whispered, a rare look of horror dawning on his face. "It's been stripped away."
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