Imperial Capital, Schönbrunn Palace.
Selene opened her eyes. After sending out her secondary consciousness, it was actively received by the Type-Moon world and led into its inner layer. The pitch-black and dim super-spatial network gradually stabilized...
"It's already inside... Mine, the primer; the secondary consciousness, the ladder; afterward, once the passage expands and stabilizes, that will be when the invasion begins."
"Beyond the solar system lies another world; beyond the universe lies another world; and other worlds are, too, other worlds... After establishing initial trust and communication, the understanding of the Type-Moon world—its operational mechanism—is quite peculiar and surprisingly lax..."
"The two great Counter Forces? The Root, or rather, the consciousness of the world itself... Asking me to participate in the Holy Grail War... A so-called omnipotent wishing machine, a little trick. I suppose I'll play along for now. I just wonder which timeline it will be— which Holy Grail War..."
"But it doesn't matter. Engraving my information into the Throne of Heroes... Do they think that once I reclaim the remnant concept of Mine, my true consciousness will leave?"
"Heh... Leaving my data shell there, inserting some so-called recorded personality that they believe to be real... using my residual data shell as their tool, their agent..."
"Although it won't compare to my true body's power, it still counts as a formidable force... quite the clever calculation."
"However, my wages are not so easily earned. When the grand invasion begins later—what do they call it? Armed wage collection... hah, that will indeed be... worth watching."
...
Type-Moon World, Throne of Heroes.
Heroic Spirits are those who, after death, have left behind their legendary feats, becoming objects of faith—heroes transformed into existences beyond humanity.
These heroes, after death, have their souls sublimated, transcending humanity, attaining power far beyond ordinary people, becoming beings detached from the flow of time—Heroic Spirits.
Once they become Heroic Spirits, they are freed from temporal constraints and move to the Throne of Heroes, located outside the world itself, unable to return to the mortal realm at will.
However, while Heroic Spirits are the result of heroes who gathered faith after death, they need not have truly existed—mythological and legendary heroes may also be born from the accumulation of belief.
Additionally, some individuals, by making certain contracts with the world during life, may in exchange become Heroic Spirits after death.
Each Heroic Spirit's Throne varies based on their experiences, status, and even the location and manner of their death.
For example, among the most famous figures of the Type-Moon world is King Arthur—or rather, the King of Knights, Artoria Pendragon. Perhaps because she could not let go of her lingering obsession, the space of her Throne reflects her final battlefield—Camlan Hill, the mountain of swords and blood.
And from the moment Selene entered the Throne of Heroes, her exclusive domain began to take shape—guided by the legends passed down from the world of Akame ga Kill and infused with her personal preferences and will, it gradually transformed into the Grand Palace of the Imperial Capital.
Within the seemingly boundless realm of her Heroic Spirit domain, a vast and majestic palace complex—far beyond the scale of human architecture—began to emerge, expanding piece by piece, coloring what had once been an empty world.
Magnificent halls and glorious spires rose one after another around her. Selene, adapting to her new data-formed body composed of faith and myth, quietly examined her appearance in the reflection of the polished, gilded floor.
Draped in a radiant robe of white, violet, and gold, her slender hands were encased in finely wrought golden claws. Selene couldn't help but murmur inwardly.
So this... is the form born from the combination of myself and the image the Empire's people hold of me...
Well... perhaps part of it stems from my own adjustments to the legend's transmission. Still, it seems that in the eyes of the Empire's citizens, I am indeed a being of overwhelming power—radiant, cold, and supremely arrogant.
Although there was a slight misinterpretation—she was quite kind, honestly—Selene was still rather satisfied. At least, she hadn't ended up like Vlad the Impaler, whose spiritual foundation had been distorted by a writer's excessive creativity.
In the Empire, if anyone dared write such slander, Selene would not just exterminate them and their nine kin—no, ten kin! She would grind them to dust and scatter their ashes to the wind!
"Now then, continue telling me," she said imperiously. "Since your world's magic and magecraft differ so greatly, and there exists this so-called Holy Grail War and Heroic Spirit summoning... do the Heroic Spirits themselves differ from the literal meaning of the word? What is the mechanism by which they operate?"
Lowering her hands adorned with sharp, golden-clad finger guards, Selene raised her gaze to the front—toward a dazzling azure sphere encircled by two rotating blue rings.
Though she already knew quite a bit, Selene chose to ask the question deliberately.
The moment her voice fell, an influx of information surged into her mind.
The summoning of a Heroic Spirit refers to the ritual of pulling a Heroic Spirit down from the Throne of Heroes into the current timeline. A vessel known as the Saint Graph must be prepared—allowing a fragment of the Heroic Spirit's essence to be summoned as a Servant.
The Saint Graph acts as a container for the Heroic Spirit's soul or consciousness.
However, the soul placed within this vessel is not the Heroic Spirit's true self, merely a partial copy of their personality and power.
Under normal circumstances, the Heroic Spirit summoned by a human is merely an avatar of the original—not the true personality itself. After fulfilling its purpose, it dissipates and returns to the Throne.
Only the "World" itself can summon the true body of a Heroic Spirit; humans cannot. Those wishing to borrow a Heroic Spirit's power can only do so by summoning one of its avatars as a Servant.
The Heroic Spirit's true self is unique—it possesses no class. The classes apply only to its Servant avatars, which may take different forms and attributes. A Heroic Spirit itself has no class, only class affinity.
In other words, to use gaming terms: the Heroic Spirit is the hero, while the Servant class is merely a "skin."
Typically, there are seven main Servant classes: Saber, Lancer, Archer, Rider, Caster, Assassin, and Berserker.
Selene: "Good grief... so my true self resides outside even the world of worlds, while this so-called Throne 'body' is just a shell of legend and data that my will has inhabited... and now those Masters summoning Servants will split me again?"
You're nesting dolls at this point...
"Then... how should I respond to this summoning?"
...
Europe, Balkan Peninsula, Romania.
A small nation located in southeastern Europe, in the northeastern Balkans, Romania sits on the edge of the Black Sea, spanning just over two hundred thousand square kilometers with a population of around twenty million.
Trifas—a modest town with barely twenty thousand inhabitants, fewer than the population of some single apartment blocks in major cities. It lies in Romania's Transylvania region, on the outskirts of an ancient medieval landscape.
Modern Trifas is built atop layers of repaired and reconstructed medieval architecture. The old defensive walls, originally erected to repel the Ottoman Empire, still stand firm today, encircling part of the fortress and town.
The settlement preserves a distinctly medieval European atmosphere—mostly two- or three-story stone houses, devoid of skyscrapers or modern structures. A quaint little town, notable only for its historical and touristic charm.
At its center, on a gently rising hill, stood a grand European-style castle—Fortress of Millennia.
Its owners were a lineage of magi who had once migrated from Northern Europe to Romania—the magus family known as Yggdmillennia.
Tonight, the castle blazed with light.
A number of handsome servants of unknown origin worked with meticulous precision; others, wielding battle-axes far behind the times, patrolled the castle grounds. Walking stone slabs and glowing statues lent the air an eerie, supernatural tension.
Such vigilance, coupled with these strange, unearthly phenomena, revealed the castle's extraordinary nature.
Within the grand central hall—
"Yes, everything has led to this day."
Standing beside the throne at the hall's center was a tall young man with long dark-green hair and violet eyes. He spread his arms wide, his voice brimming with excitement as he spoke to the two men and two women before him on the steps below.
Despite his youthful appearance—perhaps twenty-six or thirty at most—his true age had long exceeded ninety-seven years. He wore an opulent family uniform of white and black, draped with a white cloak.
He was none other than Darnic Prestone Yggdmillennia, head of the Yggdmillennia family and leader of the "Black" faction Masters in this Holy Grail War.
Once, for the sake of his family's future, Darnic had participated in the Third Holy Grail War during World War II. When the war ended, he cunningly exploited the power of Nazi Germany to seize the Greater Grail of Fuyuki, then secretly claimed it for himself, transporting it to the underground chambers of Fortress of Millennia.
"Very well—let us begin. Summon the Heroic Spirits who will become my brethren in arms!"
Upon the throne sat a tall man, well over one meter ninety, his hair gleaming like white gold, his sunken amber eyes radiating depth and authority. Though his figure appeared somewhat slender, the faint golden beard at his lips gave him an air of regal dignity.
"At once, my lord," Darnic replied respectfully, bowing low.
That monarch was Darnic's greatest trump card—the Servant of the Black Faction, Lancer of Black, Vlad III.
A national hero of Romania, feared by the Ottoman Turks and known as the Impaler Prince. To the world, through a distortion of legend, he bore another infamous name: Dracula, the Vampire Count.
Yet the man standing before them bore no trace of vampiric corruption.
He was a man of devout faith and noble will. Though his country had been small, he ruled it as a true king and hero. Especially in Romania, his victories against the invading Ottoman Empire had made him the symbol of independence—a revered national hero.
Within Romania, his fame stood unrivaled. Thanks to his inherent skill [Demonic Defender of the State], his power, when within his homeland, reached the very pinnacle of ordinary Heroic Spirits.
"Ah... a Heroic Spirit sung of in legend. I am truly eager to witness this," Vlad III declared with a composed smile.
Meanwhile, below the throne steps, four men and women stood solemnly before their respective magic circles, each extending a hand marked with crimson Command Spells.
"—I declare."
As their solemn chants filled the hall, blue mana surged into the summoning circles. Bzzzz! The intricate and complex arrays lit up, releasing a brilliant azure glow.
"Let silver and steel be the essence.
Let stone and the archduke of contracts be the foundation.
Let red be the color I pay tribute to.
Let rise a wall against the wind that shall fall.
Let the four cardinal gates close.
Let the three-forked road from the crown reaching unto the Kingdom rotate.
I shall declare here. Your body shall serve under me. My fate shall be with your sword.
Submit to the beckoning of the Holy Grail. If you will submit to this will and this reason... then answer!
An oath shall be sworn here! I shall attain all virtues of all of Heaven. I shall have dominion over all evils of all of Hell!
From the Seventh Heaven, attended to by three great words of power, come forth from the ring of restraint, Protector of the Balance—!"
As the incantation concluded, a torrent of magic burst forth, forming a tangible whirlwind of raw power. The mercury-drawn circles shone with even greater brilliance, their overwhelming energy saturating the grand hall.
When the summoning ended, the dazzling light gradually faded, the fierce winds subsided—and three silhouettes now stood within their respective circles.
Three... Wait—why only three?!
"Celenike Icecolle Yggdmillennia! What happened?! Why is your summoning ritual malfunctioning?!"
Darnic's composure shattered. Sixty years of preparation—sixty painstaking years—and before the battle had even begun, they had already lost one Servant?!
The magus named Celenike had long gray hair and wore black-rimmed glasses. Her beautiful face contrasted sharply with the thick scent of blood that clung to her, exuding a cruel, sadistic aura—a woman whose presence felt utterly at odds with her refined appearance.
"What's happening?" Celenike herself panicked, staring at the empty space before her—the only unlit magic circle among the four.
"Wait... ah—ahhhhhh!" Just as she stepped forward to investigate, the magical circuits across her body flared violently, blazing with blinding light. Though the workshop's cloned homunculi provided supplementary mana, the primary mana conduit was still her own body.
The pain of mana being forcibly extracted, coupled with the terrifying vision projected through her Command Spells—fear rooted deep in her soul—broke her will. Body convulsing, Celenike collapsed to her knees, trembling uncontrollably.
"She's coming! She's almost here! Aaaah! I need more mana—more mana!! AAAAAH...!"
Hearing this, Darnic's expression changed instantly—his excitement barely suppressed. "Mana insufficient?!"
Such an overwhelming magical demand could only mean one thing—
This Heroic Spirit's power was beyond imagination!