There was a flood of white.
"Gn… gh…"
"Hm… This won't be enough." An ancient, dusty voice that sounded like it came from a thousand throats spoke as it looked down at a limp form.
"Gh… ghh…" The limp form lay on the cold stone floor, eyes glazed over and body motionless except a twitch when another white, slime-coated creature entered it. Its breaths were labored and short, yet provided the limp creature with enough oxygen to not suffocate yet not enough to elevate its consciousness to the point where it could feel what was happening to its body.
A worm reached its appendages into the form's mouth to force it to take a deeper breath, forcing oxygen into the body so that the reservoir could be filled more thoroughly.
"...Haa… I truly despair for Shinji for being such a useless 'heir'. And for you to have such a frail body even after all this." The bald old man in a robe sighed with a thousand voices, paused, and continued with one voice while standing amongst countless worms.
The limp form couldn't answer, as it's body was filled by yet more writing, slime-coated forms that extruded concentrated od into the limp form, filling it up to the brim and flooding over with magical power that would be necessary for the ritual to complete.
Such an encounter wouldn't be the first for the limp body, and it wouldn't be last.
Zouken Matou acknowledged that at least Sakura had accepted her role eventually- Unlike her useless 'brother' who was a Matou in name only due to his inability to channel magic energy, Prana, either through Od, the innate power that grew from within living beings, or through Mana, the power drawn from Earth's Leylines.
"Ah. So it is starting." Zouken felt a wave of energy that pulsed over the city of Fuyuki in Japan, signaling the start of the Fifth Holy Grail War.
"Ghi… ng…" The limp form amidst the sea of worms let a rasping breath as her body arched to a bow, and then relaxed against her will.
"Hm… It appears that this is the extent of her body's ability to hold magical energy without rupturing. Now then…" Zouken produced a carefully sealed box from within the folds of his robes and opened it.
Within the box was a ring with a most peculiar symbol on it.
Zouken had tried to inquire Zelretch as to the origin or the name of the hero of old who could be summoned through the item, but had not received an answer.
Zelretch's antics didn't come as a surprise to Zouken, as he had been in contact with the ancient Kaleidoscope once or twice over his own considerably long life, and he was well aware that Zelretch was prone to flights of fancy and mischief- But at the same time Zouken knew that the Master of Second Magic was not a person who would go back on their word, nor would he outright lie, even if the truth was twisted to a breaking point. Even if Zouken had broken normal code of conduct himself by calling a long-buried favor Zelretch owed to the Makiri clan that was technically still outstanding despite the clan changing names and leaders a few times in between.
Zouken let the ring fall into the sea of worms, and be carried by the slimy creatures to the naked girl who lay at the center of the room, and then withdraw the worms en masse to reveal a magical circle that had been drawn well in advance for the express purpose of summoning a Servant.
"Chant." Zouken called to Sakura, ordering her to open her implanted magic crest's channels, and call upon the Grail to grant them a Servant to battle in the Holy Grail War, to grasp at the Holy Grail… Even though Zouken knew what secrets rot at the center of the whole war.
The lie that the Eisberns had concealed under layers upon layers of lies was known to Zouken, as he had been there when the rot had entered the Grail and tainted it with it's wrath, and he had been there when the whole system had been set in motion, even though he had forgotten much over the years and over countless reincarnations that taxed both his mind, soul and Crest.
Zouken had a plan for that exact problem, but before he could put that plan into motion, he needed to procure a powerful Servant…
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Sakura's body twitched and bent to a bow as the disgusting, writhing creatures pulled out of her body en masse, and she was given a moment to compose herself.
Her mind had withdrawn into a corner of her 'happy' memories, the warm corner, where she heard the voice of a young man and saw an image of a happy home, where Sakura was cooking food and doing mundane things while wearing warm clothes, where the young man was cooking with her or fixing mundane things and talking to her about mundane things.
Her body felt cold and lifeless on the cold, wet stones, and she cried without letting a single voice be heard from her body, lest she invite the wrath of her grandfather for disturbing his work.
A cold piece of metal was pushed against her hand, and she heard the voice of the old man, demanding her to complete her duty.
Sakura pulled the ring against her chest without question, with her body moving like that of a mindless robot, and she began to recount the chant that had been drilled into her head and chiseled into her very soul.
She felt something shiver and squirm in her heart in response, the opening of her implanted Magic Circuit… And she felt magic flow through her, depleting her, as the circle into which she had been placed began to glow.
Sakura felt a touch of a grave, an ancient mind that was full of regret, sorrow, and bitter love…
The magical circle flashed bright and there were voices, yet Sakura's ears did not hear it…
…And before her eyes dimmed from exhaustion, she saw a form standing beside her in the circle.
She was happy that she had managed to complete her grandfather's order, as she had been promised that she would be able to visit the Emiya household again if she acted her role and succeeded in the summoning of a Servant.
Sakura felt as Command Seals imprinted themselves into the back of her hand, and a faint, neglected part of her mind entertained vengeance for a brief moment, urging her to Command the Servant to unleash its power against her grandfather who tormented her… But that voice was quenched by the sheer power of the melancholy in her soul, and the feeling of powerlessness she felt when she even thought about opposing the withered old man.
Her magical energy had been drained, her Od all but hollow, and the mana of the area exhausted by the summoning, even though Sakura knew that the vast majority of the magical energy necessary to fuel the summoning of a Servant came from the Grail.
Her hand reached for something, anything… And fell to the cold stone floor as her body failed her.
A burning feeling came from her arm, and Sakura realized that her Command Seals were gone.
A void of emptiness rushed into her…
Sakura passed out.
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A moment was shackled to time, and from that stillness, came a form.
'...Where am I…'
He felt alien, a stranger in his skin, yet there was an eerie feeling of incompleteness.
'...I… remember…'
The form congealed from a memory, and from it, came a physical shape.
He opened his eyes.
"Greetings." The voice of an old man came from somewhere, but he was too occupied in realizing himself to care about what happened 'outside'.
'...I… remember… We… fought… we… won… we… were… and…' The flood of memories flowed into the form, creating a copy of the original, yet linked to it through means arcane and eldritch.
The darkness broke, and gave way to vision just as his eyes lit up with a scarlet glow.
'I remember… who I was…'
Ainz Ooal Gown straightened his back, and looked around himself with slow, deliberate movements.
The red glow in his empty eye-sockets illuminated the dark room in which he was, clad in a mundane dark robe that covered his skeletal body.
He glanced down and saw a female form with long and light violet hair. The form was broken and violated, sprawled on the stone flooring with her eyes dead and unseeing even though her body still drew breath.
'...[Silent Magic: Widen Magic: Detect Health]... Hm…' Ainz noticed a swarm of health-signs all around himself.
He did not feel threatened by them. He had a countless array of tools to reduce the worms that huddled in the corners of the room into ash if necessary, but first…
"...And you are?" Ainz asked as he looked at the old man who was standing amidst the sea of white worms, a cane in one hand and his other arm hidden behind his back.
"I am Zouken Makiri. Pleased to meet you… Assassin?" The old man spoke in Japanese, bringing back a flood of memories into Ainz's head.
"Umu…" Ainz paused to contemplate where he was, what was happening, and what had happened… And his consciousness almost blinked out as the crushing memory of loneliness that stretched eons returned to his mind, nearly extinguishing his psyche and almost reducing him to a corpse in the truest possible sense of the word.
His body flashed with green light as [Emotion Suppression] activated, locking his mind in place and preventing it from slipping to existential madness that would be his doom just as surely as holy fire would be.
"Could I ask your name, Assassin?" The old man spoke again.
"I am… Ainz Ooal Gown." Ainz spoke.
"...I see. Well met, 'Nine's Own Goal'. I am Zouken Matou." The old man narrowed his eyes slightly even though his tone remained level and cordial. "Very well. We have time to play these games. The Grail War has only just started, and I doubt many Servants have been summoned just yet."
'...Grail war?' Ainz pondered for a moment what the old man had said. '...What is that?'
The old man pulled out the hand that he had hid behind his back, and showed a glyph that Ainz recognized in the back of the old man's hand.
'...The symbol of… of… M…. Momonga?' Ainz pulled the name from the crypts of his mind, from the jumble of half-forgotten memories that flooded into him from some external source that he didn't truly recognize. 'That was… my old… insignia… Before I became Ainz Ooal Gown…'
Ainz had thought that he had already forgotten all of his previous 'life', yet he began to recall bits and pieces, and the dribble soon turned into a flood as if a dam's gate had been unclogged and allowed water to flow through it unhindered.
'...I… remember… Touch Me… Peroroncino… Bukubukuchagama… Warrior Takemikazuchi Everyone…' Ainz's soul felt at peace as the memories filled him, and floated on top of the sediment of memories of loneliness and loss… And the memories soon sank into the bitter sludge of entropy. 'No! I… I refuse to…'
"Control yourself, Assassin." Zouken's voice came into Ainz's mind from somewhere, and was swiftly squashed as it got in the way of Ainz's desperate struggle to remember his warm memories of past life, and his life's past.
…But in the end, the memories dried up, and were lost like water in sand despite Ainz's grasping hands attempting to shift through the sediment of memories of loss, leaving him with half-remembered memories and a feeling of profound loneliness… Much like seeing an album of pictures of faces burning in front of him, only to replace memories within ash and burnt corners of pictures of loved ones.
And the dam of memories that had flooded into Ainz's mind ran dry, leaving his mind grasping at the puddles of memories that made his past life- That of the Sorcerer King, Ainz Ooal Gown, who had died alone after an eternity of vigil over his slowly withering tomb.
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Zouken narrowed his eyes at the hooded Servant who stood beside Sakura's limp body.
Zouken had already seized the Command Seals from Sakura's hand, and implanted them onto his arm- Initially he had planned to make a book that contained the Command Seals and give it to Shinji so that the boy could command the Servant, yet so that Sakura would supply prana to the Servant's Summoning as Shinji was unable to even supply a Servant with his Od, forcing whatever Servant was given to him to make do with what prana they could scourge through od of other humans and mana gleaned from the ley-lines… Likely though consuming souls of the living, but Zouken didn't much care about that.
However, Zouken had immediately realized that the Servant that Sakura had summoned would not be sated by whatever prana Shinji could scrounge up and would either disappear, or be so starved of prana that it would fail to be effective enough to fulfill its role.
Zouken was made aware of the drain through his monitors on Sakura's body, as he had implanted several Blood Worms into Sakura's body to monitor it, and thusly was forced to act more proactively than he preferred in order to not waste the fruits of the precious favor that Zouken had called from from the True Magician.
A Master of a Servant would be connected via a link that allowed them to see into each other's memories, specifically during rest and sleep, and Zouken used a self-trance to enter the mind of the Servant as it seemed to be stuck still while flickering, seemingly stuck in a trance of its own.
In response the Servant had flooded it's mind with crushing loneliness that spanned hundreds of thousands of years, and nearly destroyed Zouken's psyche from the glancing blow that he received from the mental counter-attack- And if it wasn't for Zouken's ability to draw his self-consciousness from one of his Blood Worms then he would have died there and then.
'...Hm. This one is quite dangerous. Old, and dangerous. Yet… I believe that was a skull I saw under his hood? Hmm…' Zouken felt quite paranoid after the close call with the Servant's mental attack and attempted to bring up the 'state' trance of the Servant to force it to reveal its 'characteristics', so to speak, which would also reveal it's class and potentially True Name as well.
…But the mental representation of the Servant's characteristics came out fuzzy and empty, as if the Grail itself wasn't sure on how to quantify the Servant.
Zouken contemplated for a moment… And decided to transfer the Command Seals from his hand to the worm implanted around Sakura's heart. Just in case, as Sakura served as both the ancient magi's backup plan and as a tool for his goals.
The Einzberns, who had come up with the Holy Grail War in the first place had intended for there to be only one servant per Magus, and that the Command Seals could not be easily transferred between Magi, even though there were ways to do so if one had time and will to do so.
However, Zouken had been one of the three Magi who had actually set up the whole Grail system in the first place, alongside the Einzberns and Tohsakas who had produced the Mystic Code and the funding for the project respectively, and he had spent many long years studying the system post-Third Holy Grail War from the shadows.
He had found out during the Fourth Holy Grail War, which he had mostly spent in the shadows and just observed the battles from afar, that there were several loopholes that one could use to manipulate or hijack the entire system's master controls- Or rather, the master 'container'- from Einzbern's control- And thus had prepared a vessel for precisely that purpose.
Zouken clacked his staff against the stone floor to draw the Servant's attention- There was one more thing that needed to be done that night, and there was no need for 'Zouken's Servant to be present for it. "Assassin. I invite you to explore your surroundings and familiarize yourself with the lay of the land. Inform me if you find a Servant, but do not engage them in combat just yet."
The skeletal figure cloaked in a simple dark hooded robe was looking up, revealing a clearly inhumane, jagged skull beneath the dark hood, with sinister red lights shining in his empty eye-holes… And then the Servant disappeared from Zouken's senses and view.
The sea of worms converged from the dark corners of the room, and covered Sakura's limp body once again to penetrate into it and discharge Od into her form, filling it up once again to Summon one more Servant.
This time Zouken planned on having Sakura Summon a lesser Servant, one that could be given to Shinji and thus obscure the fact that the Matou family had not one but two Servants- After all, as no sane Magus family would risk both their heirs by having them both participate in the blood-game that was the Holy Grail War, and there was no way for a single Magus to summon two Servants.
That was, if Zouken played by the widely accepted rules of the 'War', and didn't tamper with the system itself- But after the trick that the Einzberns had pulled during the Third Holy Grail War, he no longer felt no such obligation…
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Ainz felt… Confused as he crashed on top of a roof after falling ten or so feet after blindly teleporting straight up.
There was a constant string of memories trickling into his head, but unlike the vibrant memories of the past that flowed like water from the dam, the current trickle was like shifting desert sands blowing through the dam, covering his memories with the entropic weight of decay that was like a shifting desert flowing and covering the flowering lowlands with sand.
'...Albedo. Demiurge. Aura. Mare. Cocytus. Shalltear. Victim. Pandora's Actor…' Ainz recalled the names, determined to not forget them. 'Albedo, Demiurge, Aura, Mare, Shalltear, Pandora's Actor… No, there was one more- who… Hng… C-... C-Coooo… Cocytus? He… was a warrior… heh… He was the son of… of… Warrior… Warrior, hng… T-take- T-take-something?'
Ainz fell to his knees and put his skeletal hands on his face, clawing at the bony skull to try to force it to remember, to pull the memories through the sand of time that covered his mind.
…And then he started to remember why he was where he was, and where that was. '...Fuyuki city? I was 'summoned' to participate in the… Holy grail war?'
..."Would you like one last adventure?" A cloaked figure spoke.
A flash of regret and feeling of loss passed through Ainz's head, piercing the eternal melancholy into which he had fallen ever since the vibrant halls of Nazarick had fallen to ruin through the entropy of time…
He remembered a time, a gentler, more carefree time that he had squandered in his cowardice…
A flash of a memory that was almost lost, that of a warrior Momon of Darkness who adventured alongside Nabe in a world that was vibrant with color…
"...With all my heart."
A skeletal form dry-heaved as Ainz performed the utterly organic motion, but nothing came out of it as the 'emote' was purely acted since he had no organs required to actually complete the heaving motion. However, it was what instinctively conveyed his shock the best, at least until [Emotion Suppression] locked his mind in place and prevented it from slipping further. '...I see… This is… I am dead. Truly dead. This is… a dream, a last adventure of some sort- A recreation drawn from the Holy Grail.'
Ainz realized why his confusion had lasted so long- Apparently, at least according to the foreign memories he had in his head, the Holy Grail implanted memories of local culture, language, and the knowledge of the Holy Grail War into the Servants who were summoned, and the fact Ainz's existence had continued for such a long time compared to regular Servants that the Grail had been hard-pressed to actually stuff all of the memory-data into the corporeal form that it had made out of magical energy.
'...Ha, so my confusion was due to mystical bandwidth running at maximum capacity and failing to download all of my memories at once into this…. vessel…' Ainz felt nausea as he got up on his feet and looked down at the city below.
He had teleported out of the strange dungeon where he had regained consciousness and ended up some ten feet or so above the top of the building, and in his confused daze had failed to use [Fly] to regain his footing mid-air- But it didn't matter, as he had not taken any damage from the fall, and the only thing that had been hurt from the confused stumble had been his pride.
Ainz looked around himself from the roof of the building and saw the lights of a city that seemed vaguely familiar to him- Like a mirage from a past life that Ainz barely remembered anymore. '...The lights, the buildings… I've seen these before… Or… Something like that…'
…A businessman who wore a tidy suit over a form-fitting toxin-proof skin-suit hurried to catch a tram, stepping over the corpses of orphans and homeless who had died on the street from exposure to elements, avoiding staining his shoes in the viscera and rot of the bloated bodies that had burst and covered the streets in rotting organs and biological waste…
…His rebreather fed him stale air as he moved through the streets, having completed his twelve-hour workday- A shorter day than usual due to the boss getting a promotion and letting the rest of the workers off the hook earlier than usual…
…The neon lights of the city shone brightly, advertising various products and casting light into the eternal gloom that was brought by the unbreakable smog-cloud that filled the sky with radioactive dust particles, micron-scale ash and plastic smoke, blocking sunlight from entering the lower levels of the city of Neo Tokyo…
…He entered his home, and removed the rebreather to draw in more stale, recycled air from his five-by-five foot rented apartment in the massive corporate-owned megabuilding. At the center of the single-room apartment was a high-tech netrunner-grade DDVR chair. He sat on the chair as soon as he had finished his chemical shower, and plugged the wires and blood-circulating systems of the machine into his cybernetic interface ports as soon as he could- Today was the guild's raid night in YGGDRASIL, and he had some extra hours to spend, so he would probably spend it decorating Nazarick…
…The end came, and he closed his eyes as the time ticked down, yet no lurch came, and when he opened his eyes, the dream had become reality…
…He stepped out of Nazarick, and cast [Fly] to hover into the air well above the clouds. He saw the bright stars cast against the background of the dark sky above the fluffy white clouds, and he drew a deep breath of the fresh air- Something that he had only dreamt about until that point…
…He compared the sky to a box of jewels… And a demon bowed, misconstructing his words in a way that only he could.
…And hundreds of years after all of it had ended, after the blast of Wild Magic that snapped the neck of the very soul of the World in order to rend the Tier Magic system impotent, he pondered on his throne if all of it could have been avoided had he just realized what he had said when he first rose above the clouds alongside the demon, if he had cleared up the misconception at the cradle before it could be allowed to spread… If he could have corrected the course that led to the ruination of all things…
Ainz realized that he had been frozen still for a long, long time that he had spent looking down at the city around him, and saw that the night was slowly starting to make way for a dawn as he saw a faint light begin to shine in the horizon.
He took in a breath of fresh air… And felt a strange feeling of something tar-black and moist running down his cheekbones. '...Am I crying?'
"...Kheh… The morning sun is quite the sight from here. The Matou residence happens to be on a quite tall hill- It was here even before the city was built, so you could say that we had the first pick of the property." A voice came from beside Ainz and he looked in the direction to see the old man from before, standing beside Ainz and looking at the sunrise while leaning on his cane with one hand and the other hand behind his back in a pose that practically screamed 'frail and elderly Japanese man with long and honorable lineage'.
'...[Silent Magic: Detect Mana]. [Silent Magic: Detect Health].' Ainz didn't buy the old man's pose for a second.
"Oh? Curious about me?" The old man cackled a bit while looking at the slow sunrise in the horizon. "I suppose I can't fault you."
"Your counter-divination measures are acceptably strong." Ainz commented off-handedly as he noticed a sea of life signatures around him, just as he had done before, but the old man himself returned utterly 'normal' values that made Ainz hundred percent certain that the person beside him was a magic caster of some sort who was an expert at using [False Data: Health] and [False Data: Mana].
"And your magic reveals your true Class, Caster. Please accept my apologies for mistaking you for an Assassin." The old man coughed a bit to his hand. "Now then, shall we return inside if you are content with your observations. The light irritates my skin."
"Hm…" Ainz considered just ignoring the old man and going his own way… But he found himself curious of the situation where he had found himself in.
Not to mention, Ainz remembered the 'adventure' that he had been promised, and felt as if it would be boorish of him to go off track as soon as the adventure started. "...So, are you to be my wise wizard mentor, hm?"
"Khaha!" The old man's cackling laugh echoed in the air as he disappeared into shadows cast by the morning sun.
'...Rude. Well then, let's see what this is about…' Ainz thought and teleported after the old man.
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"Hmm."
"I'm guessing that you felt that as well, Kotomine?"
"...Indeed. How peculiar."
"'How peculiar' tch…" A blonde man leaned back while being lazily strewn on a church pew. "I could feel a prana burst like that with ease, but I thought that you would be oblivious to it."
"I am the Church Overseer of Fuyuki after all. I may not be as mighty as a Servant, but I am not blind." The tall priest who arranged the flowers at the altar of the church spoke with a voice that was entirely devoid of emotion. "It would appear that the first Servants have been summoned already."
"Good. I hope that there are some that have at least a shred of class this time around." The blonde man stood up from the pew and began to walk out of the church.
"...I hope I do not need to remind you that your continued presence in this plane should stay a secret for now?" The priest, Kotomine Kirei, reminded the blonde man while turning around to look at the man, with both of his arms behind his back and body at complete ease.
"Tch, and I hope that you have not forgotten your place, priest." The blonde man's face scrunched up with displeasure.
"Of course. In that case we have no problem." The priest turned away and continued to tend to the flowers.
"...Hey, Kotomine?"
"Yes?"
"Weren't you planning on going to ambush that woman? You're either running late or you're planning to ask me to do your dirty work for you- Either of those make no sense so explain to me what you are doing." The golden-blonde man paused at the doorway of the church that was slowly starting to be illuminated by the rising sun.
"Oh? I thought I had asked you to not go through my official papers?" Kotomine asked in turn while still tending to the flowers.
"And you told me that you would not bother me with commoner's tasks. So what is it?"
"I've happened to hear through various grapevines that a certain Magician has been seen at the Clock Tower recently, and that Zouken Matou was not in Fuyuki at the time." Kotomine spoke while moving from attending to the flowers to spreading the white cloth for morning prayers once the church would receive its attendees. "I had planned on participating in the Fifth Holy Grail War through… 'acquiring' a Servant, so you are correct in your assumption that I would have asked you to distract the Servant in question while I attended to the Master and seized her Command Seals… But it would appear that I do not need to go about things in such an overt way to participate in the war 'officially'."
"How so?" The blonde man narrowed his eyes and leaned against the doorframe while crossing his arms.
"Since Zouken Matou is making his move, we can only assume that he does not plan to adhere to the rules of the War as set by the Mages Association and the Church- Therefore there is no red tape preventing me from getting involved once the Matous engage in their ploys to subvert the War." Kotomine explained calmly.
"What makes you think that way?" The blonde man asked, this time with a tone that was closer to curiosity than annoyance. "Moreover, if that putrid worm shows his face to me, I shall turn him to ash- His very existence is offensive to me."
"I expect nothing less from the King of Kings." Kotomine commented idly while moving on to preparing the communal wine. "Zouken Matou has a habit of interfering with the Wars, in small ways yes, but he has a history that has been documented long in the past by the Church, even if he likely is unaware of all of it. And since the Matou bloodline is all but dead already, I have no doubt that Zouken is pressed on both time and opportunity to get his hands on and use the Grail. These coincidences are too close to be a mere chance, and knowing the Matous, I have little reason to believe that they will play fair."
"Ha, true. I saw that worm during the last war." The golden-blonde man's face contorted in extreme disgust. "But you are lying to me."
"Not quite. I am omitting the full truth. Yet, my goals have not changed." Kotomine finished his chores, and took his place in front of the altar. "That is all that matters to me."
"Tch… Do as you please." The blonde man walked off while scoffing, leaving Kotomine to tend to his church.
'...And If Zolgen is making his move… Then the rumored Lesser Grail of Makiri will be revealed.' Kotomine Kirei looked up at the large fresco that adorned the end of the church…
And for the first time in a long time, a small smile graced his lips, if for a brief moment.