Chapter 2 - Plans for the Future
Negotiations
"Would you please put the gun down? I have no intention of hurting you." Irisviel asked Kiritsugu. He finally lost his baffled look, replacing it with a steely-eyed gaze suited to a killer. Magus-killer indeed. His fingers never left the trigger.
"I have two questions. How and why did you just do that? If you make any sudden movements, I will shoot you." He said threateningly. She believed him. There was no room for mercy in his line of work.
"Asking the how is asking me to reveal the secrets of my magecraft, which I refuse. The why I can answer easily enough though. The moment Jubstacheit mentioned disposing of me, my intuition told me he needed to die if I was to live. So I killed him, simple as that. Would you kill me for wanting to live?" Irisviel asked, knowing the answer. While he did not lower his gun, he also did not shoot her. Good, she was making progress.
"You were just born. Homunculi don't have desires like that at birth. It takes time for them to accumulate. Tell me the truth." He demanded.
"You heard Jubstacheit too didn't you? I'm defective. I was made this way. Born having emotions and desires of my own." She continued persuading him.
He thought carefully for minutes that felt like hours to her. "You were made to be the Lesser Grail. Will you be fulfilling that role, is it even possible anymore?" Kiritsugu asked, seeming to have moved on from the question of her guilt.
The Holy Grail ultimately boils down to being a ritual that allows burning souls to grant a wish. Normal human souls are not worth much as fuel, so higher grade souls known as Heroic Spirits are summoned as Servants assigned to seven classes. These spirits fight each other, which is why it is called the Holy Grail War. Through this process, the high grade souls are collected upon their death by the Lesser Grail, which used to be a cup. However, the last Lesser Grail was destroyed, so Irisviel was made as a humanoid Lesser Grail that could defend itself. Her existence boiled down to a humanoid cup to hold souls.
"The grail is corrupt, but achieving the third magic is too important. I will try to purify it and take control of it, but if I fail then the goal would be to dismantle the grail before it can actually grant any wishes." She answered. Convincing him to help her with her goals for the Grail would make things easier.
Frowning, Kiritsugu questioned. "What do you mean corrupted?"
"In the last Grail War, the Einzberns did something very dangerous. They tried to cheat the system and summon a servant outside of the traditional seven classes. They summoned Angra Mainyu, class Avenger. Unfortunately for them, he was very weak and died easily in the war. Unfortunately for us all, he corrupted the grail. Any wish granted by it currently will only lead to disaster. For example, wishing to be the strongest might result in all humans in the world dying except you. If you're the only human left, you're the strongest right?" She explained.
"If you managed to purify it…could it grant wishes?" He asked.
"It depends. What's your wish?" She asked back even though she already knew.
"Let's say I wished for world peace." He answered.
"Then it probably wouldn't work. Even if Angra Mainyu was out of the picture, the grail needs a method to determine how to achieve world peace. Do you know how you'd want world peace to be achieved? By killing all evil people? By changing the species of humanity to make it so that they are incapable of having selfish thoughts? Odds are those aren't truly the answers you want." She answered.
"Then one last question…why do you want the Grail? You were born moments ago. How can you be so certain you need to acquire the Third Magic?" He asked.
"I want the Third Magic so that I can turn it into the third magecraft. I believe if we analyze its workings we can replicate it with science. I have no desire to hoard it to myself." She stated. After all, in the world of Fate/Extra the Third Magic was partially unraveled by science, so she knew it was possible.
"As for why exactly do I feel that way? Hmm, you could say that the Einzberns have been seeking the Third Magic for centuries for the sake of leading humanity to a utopian future. It is the dream I inherited as a Justeaze-late model homunculi. Helping humans gain eternal life is a good first step towards world peace don't you think?" She lied.
It was Justeaze's dream, but not hers. Irisviel didn't really believe eternal life would lead to world peace. However, the True Magics were the final tasks of humanity. Odds are finding a way to replicate at least some of them via technology, maybe all, will be needed to reach the Age of Will. So it was close enough to the truth albeit not truly honest.
"Even if it means your death?" He wondered.
"It is worth the risk, but I don't intend to die. I have 10 years to find a way to survive the war despite being a lesser grail." She answered.
"Then I suppose I won't cancel the contract to be the representative of the Einzberns in the war just yet." He said, finally lowering his gun.
Irisviel smiled, she had her first ally! Well, it would take time but she was sure he'd help her once he understood her mission. She couldn't agree with his morals, but he did have them nonetheless. He wasn't the type of person who'd let the world end without even trying to save it.
"Then I'm going to go get dressed." She excused herself, tiptoeing around Jubstacheit's corpse and walking to a storage area loaded with clothes. An understanding of the Einzbern holdings, magecraft, manor layout, and general knowledge were all part of the homunculi knowledge package. The grail was designed to impart knowledge in a similar way to servants. She wondered if the same method could be used for mass educational purposes. Something to determine at a later date.
Assessing the Damage
After getting dressed, she met back up with Kiritsugu and assessed the state of affairs. Every homunculi except herself was dead, and the estate could not be maintained with just one person even with magecraft. On the plus side, as the sole inheritor of the Einzberns she was loaded. Incredibly loaded. She'd burn through it like paper though with the goals she'd had in mind, so establishing a business was vital.
It was the year 1984 and from her understanding many critical modern technological advancements had not been made yet. They were prime targets for exploitation. Thankfully, with the class cards available to her propelling humanity's tech level decades or even centuries ahead of schedule was quite viable. Still, to enter the scene she still needed connections and manpower, which she sorely lacked.
"Do you know any good ways of acquiring a lot of loyal employees? I want to start a business, their skill is less important. Their loyalty is more so." She asked Kiritsugu.
"A magus oriented business or public facing business?" He questioned.
"Eventually, maybe both. But for now primarily public facing." She answered.
"Then the easiest way is to pick homeless people off the streets and bind them with a Geis - assuming their education, skill level, or health doesn't matter too much. It's easiest to operate these kinds of businesses from third-world countries. Their regulations are less stringent, and it's easier to hide evidence of mage influence. But if you have the cooperation of the mage organization in a given country you can do it anywhere. The key problem is that most areas where you can exercise that much power over common folk are either already monopolized by some existing mage families or dead apostles, or they are incredibly unsuited for magecraft." He explained.
She needed to get in on the tech and space industries. "Would you say my odds are better in Russia or the United States?" She asked. As far as she knew, both had the more advanced space programs currently.
"United States, for sure. They're way more lax about their administration of mages. It's not a land steeped in much Mystery so there's not as much fighting for resources. The only problem would be manpower, but if you work with their organization you could probably easily arrange something. What I don't understand is why do you need manpower? Homunculi are ideal for the circumstances you described." He questioned.
"I refuse. The idea of creating living, breathing, sentient beings just to serve your desires…I loath it. Homunculi are people too, if born they should be treated like human children. That's my personal belief." She said with a bit of anger coloring her tone.
"It makes sense that you feel that way, being a homunculus yourself. But I've never met any of your kind whose mental state was developed enough to feel the way that you do." Kiritsugu accepted her reasoning with the faintest smile.
"I think we've already gone over this, I'm defective after all." She remarked.
"You seem defective as a homunculus. But not defective as a person." He countered.
"I suppose I'll take that as a compliment. Would you by chance have any contacts in this American organization you mention?" She asked.
"I can call some people. They call themselves the Illuminati. But to arrange what you want will cost you." He said. Of course they were called the Illuminati.
"Ah yes, at the end of the day you are a mercenary. I will compensate you accordingly." She acquiesced.
"I meant the Americans will probably charge you to arrange the establishment of a business, facilities, legal work, and any identities you need created. But me getting a cut of that won't hurt either I suppose. Thank you for your generosity." He said slightly mockingly.
'Don't let him get to you.' She chanted in her mind. She could see where heroic spirit EMIYA may have gotten his snark from. Still, it was only fair. Magi liked to operate on equivalent exchange, and it would have been much harder for her to contact the Illuminati otherwise.
She left him to his business and began the long process of burying the dead. She did not need to go out and buy any gravestones. While most mages would consider it a waste of magical energy, she could just use magecraft to dismantle the walls of the wasteyard for supplies. She went to the storage area and grabbed some steel wire, it was one of the few ways Einzberns used alchemy as a weapon.
She manipulated the wires to begin carving up the earth, creating rows upon rows of empty pits. One by one, she buried each body in the pile and cut off a piece of the wall to form a gravestone. Most of these homunculi never even had names, or those names were lost to history. It felt sad knowing they would live and die namelessly, so she chose a name for every body she buried. She didn't know when, but at some point Kiritsugu was there assisting her in burying the bodies. A wordless nod of thanks from her, a grim nod of understanding from him, and they continued until the yard and the castle were both empty of corpses.
"I'm sorry some of you died because of me. But I promise I'll never make homunculi to act as tools like you were. And most of you probably don't care about that. But that's okay. I'll accomplish the dream you all held, were made to hold. I'll achieve the Third Magic for you, and use it to help humanity. Thanks for all your service to the Einzbern name, may you rest in peace." She told them. Exhausted, she picked an empty bedroom and collapsed into a deep sleep.
The next morning, she woke up feeling much more rested. As a homunculi, she could sustain herself on magical energy rather than food. But it felt nicer to eat. She'd never known how to cook in the past, but the Einzbern data dump proved its worth once again. From the maid section of abilities she could make a several-course meal. Heading down the kitchen, she spotted Kiritsugu lounging on a sofa reading a book. "Good morning!" She said cheerfully.
Glancing up from his book, he said a more curt. "Morning."
"Do you want anything to eat for breakfast? I can whip something up real quick." She offered.
"Sure, anything's fine." He accepted.
There were still enough groceries to last about a week, so she just prepped some scrambled eggs and the pair ate at the dining table discussing their next steps.
"I've managed to talk to my contact, when I mentioned it was the Einzberns wanting to make steps into the United States he seemed quite pleased actually. I don't think you'll have much trouble setting up there, but you'll have to call him and hammer out the details." Kiritsugu commented.
"Thank you Kiritsugu. I appreciate it. While I'm doing that, I wonder what your plans are for the upcoming years? The war is not for ten years after all. Besides this business venture, I plan on researching exorcism and cleansing rites, securing some alternate catalysts, and improving my combat ability." She enquired.
"Mostly business as usual. Take on smaller contracts. Keep my eyes peeled for information from the Clock Tower about potential participants. Scope out Fuyuki, that sort of thing. I understand the need for your first two points, but why do you need alternate catalysts? From what I understand your current one is top class." He wondered. The Einzberns had already acquired Avalon, wouldn't that be fun to tinker with.
"I have my reasons. It'd be a bit hard to explain right now, but trust me in saying that a couple of innocent people will be spared from being victims of a certain tragedy." She said cryptically. It'd be a bit hard to explain why she knew Morgan le Fay had set up a ritual to resurrect King Arthur using a clan from the Blackmore Cemetery in Britain. While the resurrection aspect was not problematic, the fact that a child would be used as the body for such an endeavor didn't sit well with her. So she would simply avoid summoning Artoria. From her understanding it only triggered because the soul of Artoria was summoned via the Grail in the canonical Fourth Holy Grail War.
Still, she supposed that's something worth checking up on in the future. Along with quite a few other individuals. If she couldn't even save a few unfortunate children whose fates she knew, how would she have any chance of saving the world?
Speaking of which, this was supposed to be an AU. What timeline events were different, she wondered? From her knowledge dump, she knew of the myth of Pandora's box being opened. Plus, there were no Ainsworths involved in setting up the Fuyuki Grail. So it's at least not Miyu's world from the Prisma Illya series.
But the 27 Dead Apostle Ancestors did exist and Zelretch was a vampire, meaning this timeline could have elements of Tsukihime and Melty Blood. Considering that in those worlds normally heroic spirits could not be summoned, this must be some mixture of the two. She supposed there were a great many people to keep an eye on.
"I will ask you to elaborate on this eventually, but for now I'll leave it be. Here's the number of my associate in America, and you should have my own number already. I've got business to get to, so I'll head off for now." Kiritsugu stood up and walked to the door, and for the first time she noticed his bag that had been already packed and rested by the exit.
"Alright, safe travels. Thanks for not ending the agreement. I'll keep in touch." She waved him off, and it finally settled in just how alone she was in this great big castle. Shaking her head, she headed off to her workshop. Things were so much harder before personal computers and the internet became mainstream. She sighed, there was so much to do.