Because of the tear mark on his face, Diarmuid naturally charmed women. It was easy for them to fall for him.
Sola was no exception.
But for now, she did her best to hide her feelings for him, so Kayneth had no idea.
Tia had no intention of getting involved in their drama. After chatting with Kayneth for a bit, she left.
Kariya went home to prepare, while Tia went looking for Waver. But when she arrived at his place, she remembered that Waver wasn't home—he was out shopping with Alexander the Great.
Tia scratched her head, not sure what to do. Maybe she should just head home and work on making the rest of her Noble Phantasms.
Just then, Waver and Alexander returned, both carrying loads of stuff.
Tia's mouth twitched.
The Emperor really did love shopping.
"Hey! Tia, kid! You're here!" Alexander shouted the moment he spotted her.
"Emperor, teacher!" Tia greeted them.
"How come you're coming from that side? Isn't your place the other way?" Waver asked casually.
"I just came from Kayneth," Tia replied.
"What? What happened with him?" Waver asked in shock.
"Nothing much. It's just that Kariya couldn't let go of Sakura being taken to the Clock Tower, so he wants to go too," Tia said with a light laugh.
"With teacher's personality, he'd never allow Kariya to tag along," Waver said, surprised.
"He paid a price for it," Tia shrugged.
"A price? Don't tell me he handed over the Matou family's magic crest?" Waver asked.
Tia shook her head. "The Matou family are the ones who invented the Command Seals. Or to be exact, that old worm Zouken did. Kayneth got detailed records on how to make and study Command Seals, so he agreed to let Kariya come."
"C-Command Seals?" Waver was already shocked enough today. "Just for that… sigh, never mind. The fact that Kariya could cut off his own hand and transfer the Seals to you without caring shows he never valued them much anyway. But for teacher to get the Matou family's books on creating Command Seals… that's going to cause huge waves in the Clock Tower."
Tia could already imagine how far Kayneth might take the study of Command Seals once they were in his hands.
But that had nothing to do with Tia for now. And besides, there was no telling if Kayneth would even survive.
After all, Kayneth's hotel had already been blown up by Kiritsugu. With Kayneth's personality, he would definitely retaliate. Tia had accidentally messed things up last night. Tonight was the banquet of kings. Tomorrow night, Gilles de Rais might take action. Which meant that by the night after tomorrow at the latest, Kayneth would make his move.
"Hmm… so that old worm was the one who created the Command Seals to control Servants? Looks like he was something in his day," Alexander said, most interested in the Command Seals. "I wonder if they could be modified to run on electricity instead of being granted by the Grail. That way, as long as there's power, I could stay in this world forever. Ah, now I suddenly want to ask that magus about it."
What he meant was asking Kayneth if he could make that possible.
But when Tia heard it, her mouth twitched again.
Wasn't that basically the way Chaldea summons Servants?
Come to think of it, when was the Chaldea summoning system completed? 2004, right? Around the Fifth War. That was when the old director of Chaldea summoned Solomon and won the Holy Grail War.
Tia knew that Marisbury Animusphere, the old director, was the real founder of Chaldea and the one who created the system.
But that timeline wasn't the one she was in now.
In this timeline, ten years later when Marisbury joined the Fifth War, he found that the Holy Grail was nothing but Angra Mainyu and had already lost its wish-granting power, so he gave up.
But in another world, Marisbury's Fifth War had an untainted Greater Grail. In that world, there were no Fourth or Fifth Wars at all—Fuyuki only ever held one Grail War. The reason was unknown. But in that one war, Marisbury won by summoning Solomon, who became Chaldea's first official Servant.
After winning, Marisbury wished for endless wealth—literally endless money—so he could build nuclear power plants to supply energy for Chaldea. That energy was what powered the Servant summoning system and provided mana to the summoned Servants.
By the way, after Marisbilly's servant Solomon won, he also wished to become human.
But this confused Tia. Did the Greater Holy Grail really have enough power to grant both the Master's and the servant's wishes at the same time? Or maybe in that world's system, the Greater Grail just could.
According to the story Tia remembered, Marisbilly should still be researching the Chaldea summoning system around this time, since Tia knew he had already created Chaldeas Prototype No.1 back in 1990.
Chaldeas was built on the idea that a planet also had a soul, trying to copy that soul and run a virtual version of "another Earth's data" projected one hundred years into the future.
By observing the duplicated soul of Earth in Chaldeas, Marisbilly could confirm that humanity would still continue its civilization for the next century.
Tia thought maybe she could find time to visit Marisbilly. Maybe she could even help him with something.
Speaking of which, how old would Olga Marie be now? Was she even born yet? Probably, but she'd only be one or two years old.
Ahh… suddenly I really want to go see her, what should I do…
Tia felt like she was acting strange.
"Tia, what are you thinking about?" Waver, who was now back in his room, looked at Tia with a puzzled face.
"Nothing, I was just thinking about… Command Seals." Tia, who had followed him into the room, snapped back to herself and gave an awkward laugh.
"Command Seals, huh… come to think of it, the first Holy Grail War started about 200 years ago, right? Tia, are you saying that old worm has lived for 200 years?" Waver suddenly realized.
Uh… somehow I dragged this out into another chapter.
(End of The Chapter)