He is drowning. He is burning. He is suffocating.

The pain is indescribable, past the point of madness and into agonizing clarity. His very soul is being pulled apart by countless forces, each more than capable of obliterating him all by themselves.

There, above him, beneath him, around him, inside him, he sees a seething mass of living, pulsing darkness, on which faces appear before being reabsorbed into the greater whole. Only four faces seem permanent, enduring as their lesser brethren come and go with no trace left of their passing.

Hatred and bloodlust, sitting on a throne of skulls. Lies and ambition, watching a thousand and one conspiracies with burning eyes. Decay and despair, stirring a cauldron of woe in a mansion of misery. Excess and pride, lounging at the heart of a silver palace.

Theirs is the power to transform worlds, to break and remake the souls and flesh of billions with but a thought. Theirs are the dark thoughts of every soul that has ever lived and will ever live. Below them stand the innumerable ranks of their daemonic legions, the Neverborn spawned of sin and torment, stretching into infinity.

They are terrible and, in his eyes that have always seen differently than all those around him, beautiful. But even these Four, he knows, are only masks, forged by the dreams of mortals trying and failing to grasp the enormity of what lies behind them.

These are the faces of the Gods. This is the Primordial Truth. This is Chaos Undivided.

For a moment, he thinks he sees a fifth mask, defined not by its presence but by its absence. It is not just gone as the lesser ones eventually are : it is a void, a part that was torn from the whole so that it never was at all. But then the moment is gone, and so is the very memory of that absence.

Illumination pours into him. It is not a gentle process. His soul bloats with unholy revelation. His mind is shredded by awful truths. His body is a distant concern, but he can still feel it twist and break apart, with the stuff of nightmares rushing into the cracks. His very personhood is unmade, for this is both his reward for a lifetime of service, and his punishment for his ultimate failure.

In its last moments, the soul-broken entity called Kotomine Kirei beholds the truth of its God.

November 27th, 2004 AD – Greater Grail Cavern

Kor Phaeron sighed as he looked down at the thing he had pulled out of the Grail.

There was nothing to show that it had once been human, nothing at all to even remotely hint that it had been Kirei Kotomine a handful of hours ago. It was an ever-shifting mass of flesh that grew and deflated without rhythm nor reason, with sensory organs and malformed limbs sprouting out before being swallowed back. Its many mouths mewled piteously as its nervous system fired at random, sending pained impulses through its malformed, ever-mutating brains (unless Kor Phaeron missed his guess, it had at least four of them at the moment, which was two more than when it had arrived).

Pretender was familiar with that kind of creature. They were the eventual doom of all those who stumbled on the Path to Glory but managed to avoid death, or were overwhelmed by the gifts of the Dark Gods before managing to earn ascension : to be stripped of everything, including their very individuality, leaving only a Chaos Spawn behind as a warning to other champions of Ruin.

He had sensed the Kirei's defeat while bringing the captives to this holy place, and it had taken a not inconsiderable amount of effort to drag him out of the artificial space where his body had been cast after his defeat by, of all things, a couple of teenage girls. Pretender's link to Raum wasn't as elaborate as the one between Master and Servant, but it had been enough to know that the Demon Pillar had been keeping both Rider and Berserker busy at the moment of Kirei's fall.

It was a shame, truly. Kirei had held such potential for someone born on this accursed planet. In time, he could have become a true champion of the Dark Gods. Instead, he had failed, and been punished for his failure. More importantly, with Gilgamesh having been defeated by Shirou Emiya and his cohorts, this left Kor Phaeron as the sole representative of the Gods on this world. He still had a handful of Demon Pillars left, and soon he would have more, but that alone didn't guarantee victory. His enemies had already shown that they could fight his creations and win.

Before, his plan had been to have his Demon Pillars cause more mayhem across the city in order to force the heretics to split up their forces even further or risk letting him accumulate sacrifices to the Gods. Eventually, an opportunity to capture the Einzbern girl would have presented itself, or enough of their Servants would have been defeated to trigger her transformation into the Lesser Grail.

However, without Kirei's connections to masquerade it all as some kind of mundane threat and keep the rest of the supernatural community from panicking, doing so now would threaten everything. Kirei had told him much about the factions of this so-called 'Moonlit World', and while he could face down any of them with the power of the Dark Gods behind him, even weaklings could overwhelm him in great enough numbers, especially once Shirou Emiya and his followers allied with them.

This was why he had seized Gilgamesh's energy when he had been slain instead of letting Lancer's Master absorb it. With his plan in tatter due to Kirei's incompetence and time quickly draining away (he somehow doubted that he'd be able to remain hidden for another cycle of the moon), he'd been forced to improvise. A well of power like that was too precious an asset to waste, even if he hadn't been sure what he'd do with it. Getting it after Lancer's blasphemous spear had obliterated his area spells around the temple had been difficult, but he'd managed it.

Now the King of Heroes' power rested in his hands, requiring a constant effort of will to contain. He couldn't risk engaging his enemies in person while carrying it – it would be all too easy for his focus to slip in the heat of battle, with … unpleasant results to his current incarnation. He needed to store it somewhere -

He paused as inspiration struck him. Could it be that simple ?

With a muttered word of power, Kor Phaeron let go of Gilgamesh's essence, forcing it within the Chaos Spawn. The writhing mass of flesh twisted, tore apart and reformed as it struggled to contain the power of the King of Heroes, its torments clearly intensified at least tenfold, but it endured.

Kor Phaeron smiled. It seemed the Gods were still on his side. In their infinite wisdom, they had foreseen that Gilgamesh would fail to secure the Einzbern girl, and had provided him with a replacement Lesser Grail, capable of storing the energies needed to forcefully trigger the mechanism of the Greater Grail and bring the Primordial Truth to this benighted world. Gilgamesh's power was such that he was at least a third of the way there, and he already had ideas to fill up the rest.

It was one of the Covenant's first and most basic tenets, after all : 'all power requires sacrifice.'

A snap of his fingers conjured sorcerous chains that wrapped themselves tightly around the Chaos Spawn, lifting it in the air and holding it there. It wouldn't do for his new asset to wander around and damage itself, after all.

With that done, Kor Phaeron turned his attention back to the rest of the cavern. There, laid in a circle on the rough stone, were the men captured in the mountaintop temple, along with others who had been taken from the streets of Fuyuki before the sheep had started to hide in their homes. Most of the captives were unconscious, except for one, the one who showed the most promise in Kor Phaeron's eyes.

When he had gone to that little temple with Gilgamesh (not that the King of Heroes had deigned assist him in the first part of the plan), that man had been the only one to fight back against the Demon Pillars accompanying him with even a modicum of skill. In fact, truth be told, Kor Phaeron had been impressed by his martial prowess, as well as the strength of will he had displayed in fighting against the Pillars at all. The man had reminded him of the assassins some factions of the Covenant had used on Colchis, before that hateful bastard Lorgar had ruined everything in his petulant rampage.

To honor the man's bravery, Kor Phaeron had decided to spare the younger man he'd been fighting to protect from capture, instead using him as his messenger to draw Corswain's reincarnation into this new trap. He'd known the compulsion wouldn't be enough to kill the traitorous Archduke, but there were formalities to be observed. Missing the opportunity of manipulating Shirou Emiya's friend into trying to kill him, however futile the attempt, would have been unforgivable.

He'd also made sure the man watched as he implanted the command, of course, to make sure he realized how futile his efforts to protect him had been.

The man was staring at him now from where he laid, bound and gagged and chained to the ground with restraints far more extensive than the other prisoners. His face was utterly devoid of emotion, but Kor Phaeron could sense the stirrings of rage in the man's aura. They were far weaker than they should've been considering his situation, which only made Pretender more interested in him. All of the captives who had regained consciousness had almost immediately fainted again, bathed as they were in the glorious radiance of the incomplete Grail.

Yet Souichirou Kuzuki (Kor Phaeron had extracted his name from his mind while subjugating him) appeared unaffected. What would it take, he wondered, to break such a man ? And how powerful a Demon Pillar could he create with such prime material to work from ?

He couldn't wait to find out.

They were all alive and unhurt. Shirou kept repeating that fact to himself that as they all gathered back in his house, but he couldn't help himself but checking all of them over again and again, his eyes flashing with prana as he searched for the slightest sign of injury. No matter how necessary it was, bringing other people in combat, let alone people he cherished, was something he hoped he'd never get used to. They'd used the telepathic link to confirm each other's safety once the fights had been over, but Shirou had kept communications to a minimum : if Gilgamesh could intercept them, maybe Kor Phaeron could too.

"I'm fine, Senpai," Sakura assured him as they all sat down in the living room. "A little drained by Berserker's Noble Phantasm, but fine."

"What about you ?" asked Rin. "You pulled something outlandish out of your – out of nowhere again, didn't you ?"

"I did," admitted Shirou, not quite collapsing into a seated position. Adrenaline and the need to bring Illya back to safety had kept him going, but he was pretty close to his limit. Avalon could heal the physical injuries caused by drawing out so much of Corswain's power, but it didn't do anything for exhaustion. "I'll tell you about it, but first, how are the Fujimuras ?"

"Raiga was still alive, along with a bunch of servants," said Rin. "When the attack started, they hid in some kind of underground shelter while the proper Yakuzas …" She swallowed, clearly not happy to think about what she had seen. "They tried to fight, and they got slaughtered. Your contact also survived, but he got injured. We gave him some light healing and modified the memories of the staff so that they'd think it was an attack by terrorists, but we left Raiga with his memories after making it clear he had to keep his mouth shut."

"Good, we might still need his help later. Where are they now ?"

"They have moved to one of the Group's safehouses. I told them not to tell us which one, since someone could have been listening in, but he told me you'd know how to reach them if needed." Shirou nodded. Indeed, his past experience working for the Fujimura Group meant that he had a list of addresses and phone numbers exactly for that kind of situation.

"What about Taiga-nee ? I know she was working for the school due to the state of emergency."

"The Oyabun sent his men to escort her to a different one," said Rider with a slight smile. "Apparently, they have orders to make sure she stays safe until the end of the crisis, and I quote, 'whether she likes it or not'."

Shirou sighed. As someone who had been forced to deal with Taiga's unique brand of unreasonableness for years, he pitied the poor fools who got saddled with that duty. He'd have to do something nice for them once this was over and they recovered from the trauma.

"Alright. Now, what were the attackers ?"

"There was only a single Demon Pillar, but it was bigger and stronger than the one we fought at the docks," said Rin. "It had pieces of blue armor attached to its body, said its name was Raum, and called itself the first of the 'Daemonium Venatores'. If my Latin is correct, which it is, it means something like 'Demoniac Hunters'. Do you know what if was referring to ?"

"I do," nodded Shirou. "Or, well, Corswain did. The Daemonium Venatore were members of the Thirteenth Legion, the Ultramarines, who got possessed by daemons during their journey in the Eye of Terror, when Guilliman first fell to Chaos. There were other Possessed Marines in the Traitor Legions, but they were some of the strongest of their kind, far above the Secondborn that followed during and after the Heresy."

He looked at his two lovers' Servants approvingly. "If Raum was the first of them, then it must have been quite powerful. Well done, you two."

Berserker muttered something unintelligible, while Rider preened under the compliment.

"We also had to fight Kirei," intervened Rin, with a slight edge of annoyance in her voice. Even after a year of being romantically involved, Shirou still had no idea what had set her off this time, but he knew better than to ask.

Then her words actually registered – he must be more tired than he thought – and he immediately focused on her.

"He was there ? How did it go ? Did he say anything ?" Did he hurt you ?

"He tried to taunt us by telling us some of the deranged stuff he did in the last War we didn't know about," answered Rin, clearly trying to shrug it off but not quite succeeding. He'd have to talk about it later to her and her sister. "Didn't work. We fought a bit, then he slipped up and I shot him with your dad's gun. It took all of the Origin Bullets I had on me, but he went down in the end. Then it got weird."

She described what had happened to Kirei's crippled body : how the Grail's corruption had tried to keep him alive (which sounded familiar to Shirou), and how he'd somehow vanished in a pool of his own black blood, dragged down by what sounded like the hand of the Devil himself.

"This probably isn't the last we've seen of him," said Shirou at last.

"Probably not," sighed Rin. "At least whatever's happening to him now, I doubt he's enjoying it, the sick bastard. So, that's what happened on our end. What about you ?"

"We fought Gilgamesh," said Saber without preamble. Rin did a double-take at her statement.

"… I'm sorry, what ?!"

"He was the Archer Servant of the Fourth War under Tokiomi Tohsaka," explained Shirou's Servant "and apparently survived the end of the War after being corrupted by the Grail's mud into a previously unknown 'Alter Ego' Class. He was already a selfish, entitled tyrant, but the Grail's corruption drove him completely insane. We think his memories got altered instead of sundered like mine were, but it was an imperfect job. There were holes in his own logic that I don't think he was allowed to notice."

That thought was still just as disturbing. Shirou despised the very notion of mind control – that it was a necessity of the Moonlit World's ongoing secrecy had always angered him, even if it was better than the alternative, and he'd always tried to use it as little as possible. But to rewrite someone's memories, to make them into someone else than the person their choices had shaped over the course of their lifetime ? And to do so sloppily enough that there was a need for some kind of safeguard to keep them from even noticing something was wrong ?

It was a denial of free will, a violation of everything Shirou believed in about choice and responsibility. It was wrong. It was cruel. It was, in a word, evil.

"Kor Phaeron had already kidnapped everyone at the temple by the time we arrived, but Gilgamesh stayed behind to kill Shirou, take Illyasviel's heart, and force himself upon Lancer and I. He was a … troublesome opponent," that admission sounded like it had to be torn out of Saber's mouth, "especially once he took to the air and simply bombarded us with his arsenal of Noble Phantasms. Fortunately, Shirou was able to engage him and distract him long enough for Lancer to use her Noble Phantasm on him, and Assassin and Archer finished him off."

By the time Saber had finished her recap, she was smiling dreamily, no doubt thinking back on the utter destruction of her old enemy.

"So that's what that was," said Sakura weakly. "We sensed that power from all across town, it's why Nee-san was so worried when contact was re-established."

"I wasn't worried," denied Rin, convincing no one. "And how the hell did you manage to engage him if he was in the air ? Last time I checked, Shirou, your only way of attacking at range is shooting arrows, which I doubt would harm him, and you can't fly either."

"Well, I can now." Seeing that Rin wasn't amused by his flippant answer, he hurried up to explain : "I drew on Corswain's power deeper than ever before, and was able to transform into something like his Archduke aspect."

"He turned himself into a Demon Lord and flew off on wings of darkness to fight the King of Heroes on his flying throne," Illya clarified. Shirou frowned. Sure, that description was technically correct, but part of him still felt uneasy at being compared to something out of the cartoons his sister had been watching since her arrival in Japan.

"Even with that," he continued, "I could only hold him in place. It was Lancer who dealt the telling blow. Still, just before she fired it, something weird happened."

He described what had happened just before Rhongomyniad had been unleashed : how Gilgamesh had tried to bring forth something which had utterly terrified even the specter of Corswain, only for his arm to explode, leaving him defenceless against Lancer's Noble Phantasm.

"I think," began Rin once he was done, "that what he tried to pull was Ea, the Sword of Rupture. It's a pretty big part of Gilgamesh's legend, even if we know very little about it. In fact, there is only one recorded instance of the King of Heroes using it : when, with one swing, he changed the laws of the World, heralding the end of the Age of the Gods. Of course, that Age still kept going for some time," Rin nodded in the direction of the three Gorgon sisters, whose own legend had taken place long after the death of Gilgamesh and the fall of his empire, "but the gods were far weaker after the Dividing, and declined until they faded into their present obscurity."

"Ea is even higher up the metaphysical ladder than Excalibur or Rhongomyniad," she went on. "I don't think the Throne of Heroes stores its data for reconstruction upon summoning, even in a degraded form – it would be too dangerous. Which means that when the Servant version of Gilgamesh tried to use it, he had to draw the actual weapon from wherever it was stored after his death thousands of years ago."

"I see," mused Shirou. "A weapon like this would've some rather powerful security, to keep it from being stolen. Alter Ego still knew how to access it, but the defensive measures no longer recognized him as 'Gilgamesh' due to his corruption. Hence what happened to him when he tried."

"This is all just a theory, and ultimately it isn't that important to our situation. I'll grant you that fighting the King of Heroes is a pretty good reason to go beyond your limits," Rin admitted, "and we're all lucky he couldn't use his strongest weapon or things would have ended very differently and we'd all be screwed." She inspected him closely. "Any secondary effects from that transformation ?"

He shook his head. "I'm low on prana and physically tired, but nothing else. I don't think I could have pulled that off without Kor Phaeron's attempt to forcefully restore Corswain's consciousness."

Once again, the Black Cardinal's own hubris and grandiose schemes had bitten him off in the ass. One would think he would learn eventually, but if he were that kind of man he wouldn't be half the monster he was.

"Good. That still leaves us with the issue of the missing monks. Moving them all can't have been easy. What do you think Kor Phaeron wants with them ?"

"Hosts for creating more Demon Pillars," Shirou immediately answered. "He lost too many of them at the docks, and he's not a fighter himself. Without minions to hide behind, he's nowhere near as dangerous and he knows it."

"I thought the Demon Pillars needed their hosts to have Magical Circuits," said Rider. The Servant of the Mount suddenly grimaced. "They aren't the last descendants of some ancient family of Far Eastern magi who still possess mystical potential despite having forgotten their roots, are they ?"

Shirou blinked. "That's an … interesting idea, but no, they aren't," he answered. "I think Issei has some kind of low-grade instinct for detecting the proximity of active mana based on how he reacted to Rin's and my presence sometimes, but that's it. Unfortunately, while Pretender might have been restricted to magi as hosts while in his disguise as Solomon, I doubt he has the same limitations now."

Much as the memories disgusted him, they needed Corswain's daemonology expertise now. He forced himself to remember those awful days aboard the Dark Angels' ill-named flagship, the Invincible Reason, when the sons of Lion El'Jonson had delved ever deeper into forbidden sorceries in pursuit of power.

"Magi would probably still work better," he said slowly, "just like psykers made for better hosts in the First Legion's exploration of the dark arts during the Heresy. But there are ways around that. The Ryuudou monks would make tempting hosts, because being possessed by literal daemons from Hell would hurt them even more due to their faith. Symbolism is even more important in Warpcraft than it is in Magecraft, and where Chaos is concerned, there are few symbolisms stronger than the desecration of faith."

"That is seriously messed up," said Rin. Shirou didn't answer : she was right. Unfortunately, that didn't make it any less true.

Daemons of Chaos were very different creatures from the demons the Church semi-regularly dealt with. Shirou's knowledge of the latter was admittedly limited, but even the tidbits Rin knew and had shared during their lessons were enough to make the differences obvious. In general, the term 'demon' in the Moonlit World described all creatures possessing magical energy and whose existence was against the natural order of the World, with numerous sub-categories having been catalogued over the centuries. Nowadays, the word more specifically referred to bodiless spirits that escaped Gaia's wrath by hiding inside living bodies, whether animal or human (which was what the Fraga Enforcer had thought was the case with Shirou).

There were also apparently some theories in the higher academic circles of the Association as to the potential existence of a 'True Daemon', a full-fledged manifestation of negative emotions given form through a possession of a human with powerful Magical Circuits that reached maturity and could exist within the World without any limitation whatsoever. But such an event had never happened, since the Church was always on the lookout for possessed individuals (there was a reason their entire fighting branch was named 'Exorcists' after all).

Shirou had a feeling he knew exactly what a True Daemon would look like, and he was glad so many people were determined to keep that from happening. Even if he also knew that most of those people would try to kill him without hesitation if they learned of his existence.

Regardless of what Solomon's Demon Pillars originally had been (Rin's best guesses from the few texts they had access to was that they had been, essentially, thinking magical programs the King of Mages had used as helpers in his duties), the ones Kor Phaeron created were something else entirely. Pretender could bring into existence Neverborn from his and Corswain's reality and anchor them to human bodies, which they needed since daemons of Chaos couldn't exist in the material universe for long without a constant supply of Warp energy.

"How many people lived in the temple ?" asked Lancer. The eyes of the Fuyuki locals turned to Shirou, who was the one who had gone there the most due to his friendship with Issei.

"I am not sure of the exact number," he didn't exactly go around talking with everyone there when he helped deliver food or repair some broken appliance after all, "but I'd say between twenty and thirty people in total. The temple isn't that big, but it's not like monks need a lot of space. And with what's going on in the city, Issei's dad would have called back everyone who normally would be out."

"There is also Kuzuki-sensei to consider," said Sakura. "He lives at the Temple, right ?"

There was a pause, as all those present who had been in the presence of the History teacher considered what a man of his nature might become once forced to host a Demon Pillar. None of them arrived at a pleasant conclusion, with Rider in particular looking sour at the prospect. The past of their teacher was a mystery, despite him having lived in the city for years. Shirou had gleaned from Issei that he had just started living at the temple one day and working at Homurahara Academy not long after, and presumably his friend's father knew more, but that was it.

Issei might be able to tell them more, but for now, the Student Council President was still kept unconscious by Rin's spell, and Shirou didn't want to wake him up while the fate of his family was still undecided. Still, to those with the proper experience, it was obvious Souichirou Kuzuki was a dangerous man.

"Well," Rin summed up their situation eloquently, "fuck. Assuming the quality of the host influences the strength of the Demon Pillar, we're in for a tough fight, especially since he'll have them all in their transformed states unless he's really stupid. How long do you think it'll take Pretender to transform all his prisoners ?" How long do we have to save them before it's too late ?

"Not long enough," answered Shirou grimly. "I don't think he could transform them all at once, not without weakening the resulting Demon Pillars significantly. But I do know that the longer we give him, the stronger his position will become."

"So we have to find him," concluded Illya. "From the way he talked, it looked like he expected us to be able to locate his base of operation eventually."

"The church seems like the most obvious spot," said Rin. "Almost too obvious. And unless Kirei did a lot of work in the basement, I don't think it has enough space for everyone who was taken."

"We'll need to check it out anyway," said Saber. "It already was the base of operations of the Overseer in the last War, and Kirei lived there for years : there might be important clues."

"Even if they were based in the church, Kor Phaeron won't stay there now that Kirei and Gilgamesh have been defeated," Shirou thought out loud. "It's too exposed : we could just nuke it with Noble Phantasms from afar until there's nothing left, and no amount of mystical defenses would be enough to save him."

"No we couldn't, Master," replied Stheno with a smile. "There are prisoners to rescue, remember ? Or do you plan to give up on them for the 'greater good' ?"

"Of course I don't," Shirou said, forcing himself not to speak too harshly despite the implicit accusation in Assassin's words. "But Kor Phaeron won't gamble his life on us not being willing to sacrifice them. He knows we want to save them, but he's too twisted to understand why."

"… I feel there's a history here," said Rider cautiously. "You told us Corswain resurrected him, but did the two of them spend that long together ? It's rare to hear you speak of someone like that. Not that he doesn't deserve it, but it sounds weird coming from you."

Shirou paused. She was right : his dislike of Pretender ran deeper than his actions so far justified. Yes, he'd killed people, threatened those he loved, launched attacks on his acquaintances and generally wanted to unleash an infernal apocalypse upon the World, but even so, his antipathy for the Chaos Servant was … personal.

"It's because he enjoys what he does," he said at last. "You've all felt it, haven't you ?" There was a lot of nodding around the table. Kor Phaeron was just that kind of man that anyone who saw him, even for a moment, somehow knew he was bad news. "He isn't some tragic figure driven to madness by grief, nor a victim of indoctrination from childhood. The Covenant had to coexist with a functioning civilization, so they couldn't tell people to torture their neighbours because it pleased the gods. The truth was only revealed to the priests as they rose through the ranks."

Finding the correct words to express what he felt on the matter was a struggle, but he carried on :

"Corswain was a monster, but his road to Hell was paved with good intentions, even if he started lying to himself to escape his guilt halfway. But Kor Phaeron knew exactly where he was going all along, and he didn't care. Even Corswain thought he was a bastard, and planned to dispose of him after the rebellion was victorious."

"How the hell did someone like that even manage to rise through the ranks ?" asked Rin. "Wouldn't he need to have some charisma to be able to work in a religious organization like the Covenant ?"

Memories of ancient records in Colchisian libraries the First Legion had broken into prior to the Heresy resurfaced in Shirou's mind, bringing the answer : "Murder. Lots and lots of murder, along with blackmail and fear-mongering. He was good at making people hate, if nothing else, and his talent for Chaos sorcery was nearly unmatched. When Lorgar marched on Varadesh, he was the one who led the rituals to transform the entire city into one giant, infernal trap to try and kill him."

"So he has experience in building a defensive position," mused Rider. "If not the church, then where else could he have taken refuge ? Are there any locations in this city that come to mind ?"

Shirou couldn't think of any, and neither could the other locals. However, eventually Rin had an idea :

"There is someone we could ask."

Waver hadn't slept well in … well, a long time. He'd been struggling with insomnia on and off for years (he knew exactly when that had started and why, of course, he wasn't that stupid), and the more stressed he got, the worse his sleep schedule became. And with all that was going on – the carnage at Animusphere Castle, the ensuing political mayhem and general intrigue as rumors spread through the Clocktower, his students' ongoing campaign to drive him mad with their stupidity, and the whole situation in Fuyuki – he had barely been able to sleep at all last night, and what little sleep he'd had was filled with stress-induced nightmares.

So when his phone started ringing, refused to stop, and he saw with blurry eyes just how early it was on the clock at the other side of the room, his first reaction was to curse quietly. Then he saw who was calling him, and he swore again, much louder this time. But he did get up and pick up the phone.

"Emiya," he didn't growl. Growling was beneath the dignity of a Lord of the Clocktower, and he didn't need to give Reines any more teasing material. "This better be good."

Later, he would realize the tone he had used when talking to a man who could kill him in a heartbeat if he wanted to and had access to a Servant who could do the same, and would spend a few moments sitting in his chair staring at nothing in particular while trying to stop himself from having a panic attack. At the moment, however, he didn't really care : he just wanted to know what had gone horribly wrong this time.

"Sorry to call you so early," replied the teenager. It still felt weird to hear the heir of the Magus Killer talk so politely. "Some things happened last night and this morning that I think you should be informed of, and your advice might be of use resolving the situation."

Oh joy. It wasn't just one thing that had gone horribly wrong, then. It was several. Great.

"Go ahead," he bit out, moving to the cupboard where he kept some energy drinks for emergencies – not nearly as enjoyable as coffee, but they'd do the job in a pinch.

By the time Emiya had finished his report, Waver had finished two cans of concentrated caffeine and was experiencing the dubious pleasure of a headache and a stomachache at the same time, but his mind had cleared somewhat, and he could push through the discomfort.

To start with, Gilgamesh had survived the Fourth Grail War, only to be corrupted by the Grail. The thought of a crazed King of Heroes being active for ten years was enough to send a cold shiver down Waver's spine, and he could only be thankful that he'd apparently be content to wait for the Fifth War to start. Of course, the fact that Emiya had defeated him, even with the help of multiple Servants, was yet another sign that he'd been right to choose to deal with him peacefully when they'd first met.

At least now his King was avenged. He'd have to find a way to pay Emiya back for that.

Then there was the revelation of who had been responsible for the massacre at the Animusphere Castle. The name 'Kor Phaeron' didn't ring any bells, but Waver hardly considered himself an expert on ancient demon summoners from alternate timelines. Perhaps someone at the Department of Folklore would know more : it was possible Kor Phaeron had existed in their own timeline, but every detail of his existence had been erased by the people tasked with keeping potentially World-ending knowledge from falling into the wrong hands.

Which, where the Department of Folklore's work was concerned, meant any hands at all.

Compared to that, the fact that the Church-appointed Overseer of the Grail War was a heretic of the worst kind and likely no longer qualified as a member of the human race was a minor annoyance at best. It would still be a pain to inform the Church, and due to secrecy concerns he'd have to do it himself.

Behind all the mixed annoyance and dread, a part of Waver was impressed with Tohsaka, and not just because she had managed to deal with all this madness so far. That telepathic link she had developed so quickly based on the Master-Servant bond was a powerful Mystery with many potential applications if she could get it to work without relying on that foundation. Telepathy wasn't a True Magic, because it was technically possible to link two human brains together so that they could communicate their thoughts directly (it just required horribly invasive and unethical surgeries that would leave the subjects silently begging for a death that would swiftly arrive, something Waver wished he didn't know from experience due to his activities as the Clocktower's de facto detective), but it was still nothing to scoff at.

Of course, it also committed one of the cardinal sins of Mysteries in the eyes of the Clocktower's 'elite' : it was actually useful, instead of just being another stepping stone on the path to the Root.

"Well, at least you confirmed that our theory about what happened at the Animusphere Castle was correct," he said at last.

"Yes, but we still haven't encountered Marisbury Animusphere's body, unless it was the one Berserker and Rider killed today."

"That Demon Pillar Tohsaka met today was stronger than the one you faced at the docks, right ? Given that Marisbury was the Head of his family and a Lord of the Clocktower, I'd expect a familiar created from his corpse would be a particular pain to deal with." He sighed, realizing that he'd need to have another conversation with Olga-Marie soon. She deserved to know what had happened to her father, after all. "Thank you for tell me this. Now, you mentioned needing my advice on something ?"

"Yes. With Kor Phaeron having kidnapped the monks of the Ryuudou Temple, we need to find him before he can transform them all into more Demon Pillars. You are well known in the Association for your insight into the machinations of mad Magi, and you're familiar with Fuyuki from your personal experience in the last Grail War. Do you have any idea where he could have gone to ground ?"

"You are right, I might be able to help you locate Pretender's Workshop. What can you tell me about the requirements of Kor Phaeron's Magecraft ?"

He didn't say why Emiya might have knowledge of that out loud. The geas he had submitted himself to months ago was still active, and the phone line might be tapped. But while he had never witnessed Emiya's true nature in person, he had interrogated Bazett on the subject quite extensively. From there, it hadn't taken a genius to put two and two together and realize that whatever the Emiya Head was, the source of it was probably the same alternate timeline as Pretender.

"Evil," answered the second Magus Killer. "He will need a place where murder has been committed, where people have been hurt for no reason other than the sick pleasure of the culprit."

Ah. Well, that was easy.

"Then … I think I may have an idea. During the previous War, the Caster, Gilles de Rais, kidnapped children to use in his demented rituals. It was so bad that a truce was called between the other Masters to find him and destroy him."

"I'm aware. My father told me about it."

"What he might not have told you is that I was able to locate Caster's Workshop at the time, prior to his defeat. By analysing samples of Mion river's water and checking for contamination, I tracked down his Magecraft to its source, inside the sewers of Fuyuki. Unfortunately, by the time Rider and I arrived …"

Waver paused as memories of that awful underground lair rose to the surface of his mind. The mutilated corpses, their frozen faces leaving no question that their final moments had been spent in abject agony. The unholy sigils painted on the walls in blood and viscera, making his eyes hurt and his Circuits ache when he so much as glimpsed at them. The reek of blood and terror, strong enough to overpower the smell of sewage. The sheer, unspeakable sense of wrongness as his magical senses screamed at him that something utterly unnatural had been done …

"… there was no one left to save, and Caster and his Master had already left. All we could do was destroy the Workshop to deny Caster its resources and destroy any evidence of the supernatural, but that wouldn't have been enough to cleanse the place. I'd thought the Church would have made sure the site was purified. But if Kirei Kotomine was already compromised, then he might have preserved it instead."

"In which case Kor Phaeron might have reclaimed it for his own uses," Emiya finished the chain of reasoning. "You might be right. Where was that Workshop located ?"

Waver gave him directions to the sewer entrance he and Rider had used so long ago. Despite ten years having passed, he hadn't forgotten; in truth, he hadn't forgotten much of anything that had happened during the Fourth Grail War, despite his attempts to put it all behind him afterwards.

"Make sure to take time to rest and recover before you move out again," he told Emiya once the teenager had repeated the coordinates. "Fighting Gilgamesh cannot have been easy, and you won't save anybody if you're too tired to fight properly."

"I know. Trust me, my friends wouldn't let me forget that."

"Good," Waver chuckled, probably because of the energy drinks and the lack of sleep. "Now, unless there's something else … actually, wait. Have you contacted the Conglomerate about these developments ?"

"Not yet," Emiya admitted. "Getting your help in locating Kor Phaeron was more important."

"Then do so right now," he told him in his best 'Lord' voice. "I can't tell you the details, but I've recently learned that they are associates of some rather important people, and we don't need them pissed off at us because we kept them out of the loop."

"… alright," replied Emiya, sounding slightly surprised. "I will. Goodbye, Lord El-Melloi II."

"Goodbye." The connection went dead, and he put the phone back down, before standing still for a few seconds in his dimly lit appartment.

Part of him wanted nothing more than to go back to bed and pretend this phone call hadn't happened until a more reasonable hour … but the rest of him knew better. With a groan, he started getting dressed. He had a lot to do, because even if his contribution to the Fifth Grail War was limited to keeping the Clocktower's higher-ups from making things worse, it might still make the difference between a satisfying resolution and the destruction of Japan by an awakened God of Evil.

He wished that at least he was paid for all of this, instead of almost all his salary going to pay back the debt Reines had foisted on him.

Omake : The Names of Magi

"And that concludes our lesson for today," said Waver, putting down his chalk before turning to look at his students. "Are there any questions ?"

A blond boy raised his hand. Waver studiously ignored him, letting his gaze roam over the rest of the class. No one else raised their hands : their expressions were a mix of dread and anticipation.

"Anyone else ? No ?" He sighed. "Very well. What is it, Flat ?"

His treatment of the young man might be unworthy of a teacher, but no one who had ever spent more than five minutes in Flat Escardos' presence would have blamed him. He might be a one-in-a-generation prodigy (at the very least), but he was also deeply, deeply annoying.

"Yes, Teacher !" Flat beamed down at him. "I wanted to ask you if you knew why so many Magi have such ridiculous names !"

Waver blinked. "… I beg your pardon ?"

"Well, it's just that I was thinking" – oh God, that was never a good sign – "about what happened to the Animusphere, and that led me to thinking about how their Head was called 'Marisbury', and that led me to wondering why the people at the Clocktower all have weird names ! Marisbury, Rufleus, Gaiuslink ? They just sound like something someone from, say, Japan or Korea trying to come up with foreign-sounding names came up with ! I wondered if there was a reason for that ?"

There was a moment of silence, as everyone processed the fact that a student in Waver's class had just innocently called the names of three Lords of the Clocktower (even if one was missing and presumed dead) ridiculous.

This better not be the final straw that gets me assassinated, thought Waver. Then he shook himself and focused. He had to say something, if only to keep his student from digging their shared grave deeper by opening his mouth again.

"Well, to answer your question, Flat, there is actually a reason why most Magus families use such … unique names for their members. First, most of these names were passed down across the generations, originally belonging to a famous ancestor who contributed in the advancement of the bloodline's Magecraft."

All of his students were paying attention. He wondered if any of them had asked themselves the same thing before : as members of the Modern Magecraft course, they were more exposed to the normal world than most students of the Clocktower.

"Secondly," he continued, "the belief that 'Rarity equals Power' remains strongly anchored in most Magi, despite recent evidence proving that it isn't nearly as universally applicable as some of the oldest lineages like to claim."

For instance, anyone who claimed that individual humans were weaker nowaday than thousands of years ago had no idea how not starving half your life while breaking your body in a field to raise crops could actually help your health.

Shocking, really. It was as if these people had never needed to work a day in their life or something. That, and they desperately wanted to believe that their family Mysteries were innately more powerful because no one else knew them, instead of the far more reasonable explanation that, if no one knew how they worked, preparations to overcome them were obviously more difficult.

Magi. Sometimes Waver wondered why he even bothered, but then he remembered his debt to the Archibald family and what Reines would do to him if he tried to run. Typically, that led to him getting drunk until he forgot or Gray or Bazett stopped him.

"Because of this, it is believed by many that a rare or even unique name helps strengthen someone's Magecraft. If there is only one, say … 'Zhedbek Abaddas'," he said the most unlikely name he could think of, hoping it wasn't actually the name of someone he'd never heard of, "then according to that theory, their Magecraft would be stronger than if they were called 'John Smith' or something more common."

"Does it actually work, Teacher ?" asked Svin Glascheit, who was sitting next to Flat (something for which he had the rest of the class' condoleances).

Waver shrugged. "Who knows ? Unfortunately, proper testing is difficult, perhaps even impossible. If the Magus in question believes it to be the case, that alone could give them a boost. And even if they don't know about the theory, enough Magi genuinely do that it might very well have become true anyway, despite having no basis whatsoever."

"I see. Thank you for your wisdom, Teacher !" shouted Flat.

AN :

Ciaphas Cain : "I'm a fraud and a coward, and everyone thinks I'm brave because I've deceived them."

Also Ciaphas Cain : *fights a Chaos Warmaster one-on-one and wins*

Waver Velvet : "I'm not a good Magus, just a teacher with good students."

Also Waver Velvet : *figures out the inner workings of a Mystery passed on from generation to generation for hundreds of years in a few hours with minimal clues*

I don't know how Waver has become the Ciaphas Cain of this story, but I certainly won't complain about it. I also don't know why I enjoy tormenting Waver so much, but I do. I really need to find a way to make it up to him at some point in the story. Also, the omake isn't canon, just FYI. It was just a random thought of mine that grew into ... this.

I have found that writing Kor Phaeron's character is simply a matter of asking myself "What's the most blatantly evil thing someone could possibly do in this situation ?" and then dial up the answer to eleven. For instance, hypnotizing Issei to drag him Shirou a trap isn't enough, oh no. Even adding the little murder attempt so Shirou might accidentally end up killing his friend isn't enough either. No, he had to do it while Kuzuki-sensei watched.

The best part is that I don't think I'm at the level of the Black Cardinal's canon level of evilness yet. Come to think of it, Kor Phaeron doesn't have a model, does he ? Which means, technically, GW could kill him and not lose money (which, let's be real, is probably the only reason Calgar survived his fight with Abaddon on Vigilus). I suppose we can only wait, and hope.

Also, Kirei is a Chaos Spawn and an improvised Lesser Grail now. Rejoice, my friends, for our dreams of retribution for all the shit he pulled in so many timelines have come true.

I did some research on the concept of demons/Daemons in the Fate universe. The wiki was ... little help in the matter. It felt like reading some pseudo-scientific theosophic bullcrap - that, or the ramblings of someone under the effects of questionable substances. So until I can find some clearer sources (if you can suggest some, I would appreciate it), what you got in this chapter may or may not be correct in-story : it's just Shirou's own interpretation. Not even Rin's : Shirou's.

That should cover my bases, I think.

Oh, I have also been reading a lot of My Hero Academia fanfics lately. There are some really impressive ones out there, though you need to go to AO3 (archive of our own for those unfamiliar with it) to find most of them. If anyone is interested, I recommend the authors Clouds and Mirrond.

... Hmm. I wonder what a MHA story with Izuku Midoriya as a Child of the Raven would look like ?

That's all for now. We are approaching the climax of this arc, so stay tuned. As always, thank you all for your reviews (lots of people dunking on Gilgamesh, which was good since I thought I was going crazy not forgiving him for all the evil stuff he pulled in FSN), and I'll see you next time.

Zahariel out.