The city of Fuyuki was in ruins.
Its name, which meant "Winter Tree," supposedly derived from the long winters that plagued it. It was divided by the Mion River into two distinct sections: Shinto and Miyama, representing, respectively, the new and old parts of the city.
But now, all of that seemed irrelevant.
The flames consumed the buildings as if they were mere pieces of wet paper, devouring concrete and wood without distinction.
The sky was shrouded in a thick layer of smoke and ash, taking on a uniform gray hue, without clouds, without sun, just an opaque, suffocating mass that obliterated any sense of time.
There was no wind. Only the crackling of collapsing structures and the constant hiss of the fire devouring everything in a silence that felt like a muffled scream.
The air was heavy, saturated with the smell of soot and burnt flesh.
At the center of it all, standing atop the remains of an old plaza, was him.
A man in his mid-twenties. He stood motionless, as if the inferno around him had nothing to do with him.
His face was calm, but there was a hint of resignation in his expression.
There was something demonic in his perfection.
His red hair, long and straight, cascaded down to the middle of his back, gleaming with a deep hue that resembled dried blood under the sun. The bizarre, sinister red that unsettled people's hearts, making them anxious as if it held a diabolical power. His eyes were like rubies soaked in blood, devoid of any life, as if stained with pure red ink, without light, without emotion. They were the eyes of someone who had long abandoned feelings.
His skin was as pale as polished marble, flawless, and contrasted with the dark line of kohl outlining his eyes, an aesthetic legacy of the pharaohs, black strokes that further emphasized his inhuman gaze. He wore discreet yet elegant gold earrings in his ears.
His face was too beautiful. So symmetrical, so carefully sculpted that it didn't seem real. Refined Egyptian features, the kind of beauty that didn't belong to this era. His body possessed a perfect arrangement of muscles, not only extraordinarily splendid and refined but also capable of unleashing power to its peak. This was the most perfect form of a warrior.
He was dressed in white. A simple yet noble Egyptian outfit, with a visible gold collar at the top of his chest, part of it exposed by the open neckline of his clothing. Over it, a long cape of the same color, its hood lowered, letting his hair flow gently in a nonexistent breeze.
That man, with a hypnotic and simultaneously diabolical beauty, was named Malik S. Nefer.
"…I never thought things would end up like this…"
With the same resigned expression, Malik let out a sigh and murmured slowly, watching the flames consume the building in front of him.
He still wasn't used to his own voice.
It was strange to think that he was still conscious.
Even stranger was the realization that… technically, he had died?
The truth was that just before waking up here, in this place consumed by fire, smoke, and destruction, he had been in a narrow alley, trying to save three girls from being assaulted and killed by a thug.
Well, he wasn't a hero and never wanted to be one, but in those few seconds of pure impulse, he threw himself at the attacker. The knife fell, the girls ran, and after beating the thug with his fists, he also left, thinking the man was still unconscious. But then came the gunshots. Unbeknownst to him, the man had gotten up, drawn a gun, and shot him.
The world went dark soon after.
When he opened his eyes, there was no ambulance.
No wet asphalt, no sirens.
He was here…
In a city engulfed in flames.
At first, he thought it was hell, but suddenly, memories flooded his mind and merged with his core.
Two completely different sets of memories, to be precise…
The first set of memories concerned a "nameless man" who was an experiment to create a God, conducted by the Crudelis family of Atlas, Wuzhiqi of the Dome Court, and Ziz of the Wandering Sea. They united for this project, and the chosen body to host the creation was that of Alexander IV, son of Iskandar, a prince who died before his time, handed over by Ptolemy I Soter in a desperate hope to revive the heir of his empire. However, the experiment's result was something else entirely. Though the body was the same, he became something else, without human memories, shaped by the digestion of gods.
Three gods were fused into his flesh. Wuzhiqi offered Sun Wukong, the rebellious god; the Crudelis family provided Set, the lord of disorder; and Ziz gave Typhon. The reason for their selection was that all three gods shared the theme of "rebellion" in their myths.
The three mages fed the "nameless man" with these gods and left him digesting them for two millennia in a carefully prepared place. The first condition was because they foresaw that 2,300 years would be the lifespan of an era (from the end of the Age of Gods to roughly the expected end of modern magecraft). The subsequent condition was to facilitate the digestion process, akin to the 49 days Sun Wukong spent in the Eight Trigrams Furnace after eating the peaches and elixir of immortality, or the 49 days a soul takes to reincarnate after death in Buddhism.
After those millennia, the man who devoured gods was born.
He was found by a mage during one of his travels and, due to worsening amnesia, ended up living with him for an entire decade. During that time, the mage taught him the fundamentals of magecraft while conducting experiments to replicate the process that had been done to him.
In the end, he killed that man…
Years later, during his travels around the world, he became involved in the Holy Grail War of Fuyuki. His wish was simple yet profound: to become whole again. He believed the void in his mind, his inability to remember who he was, was a flaw that needed to be fixed at any cost.
The very identity of the object called the Holy Grail changes from time to time, place to place, and person to person. In this war, the Holy Grail was not exactly the "sacred relic" as it is often imagined. It was said that the miracle called the Holy Grail appeared in the form of an omnipotent wish-granting device.
But it was only said to be so, for the moment the battle to claim the Grail began, the wish-granting device called the Holy Grail did not exist.
Before the Grail itself appeared, seven spirits manifested.
From all the stories, traditions, magics, and fictions of this world across every medium, "Heroes" were selected to be summoned into the modern world as "Servants." They formed the foundation of the Holy Grail War and were absolutely essential for the eventual summoning of the Holy Grail. These spirits, beings immeasurably stronger than humans, were called to destroy one another.
The mages who summoned these Heroic Spirits were known as "Masters." To obtain the Grail, a right only one of them could claim, they also killed each other. This carnage was precisely the Holy Grail War.
The spirits, once killed in battle, flowed into the vessel of the Holy Grail, and when that vessel was filled, the wish-granting device would be completed. That was the underlying system of the Holy Grail War.
That battlefield was perhaps the most deadly and harmful place in the world.
The participating mages had to hide their existence from the rest of the world, as always, so they moved stealthily at night, spreading the flames of battle while remaining invisible. As part of its mission to oversee the objects described as the Holy Grail, the Church dispatched its own supervisor. The battlefields glowed with blood as they were ravaged by those overwhelmingly powerful spirits.
After winning this bloody battle with the help of his troublesome Servant, he wished to be "whole" again to the Holy Grail.
But that's where the real problem arose: the true function of the Holy Grail was not to grant wishes directly; its true nature was to serve as a gateway to a metaphysical location known as the Root, or Akasha.
The Root, also called the Origin or Spiral of the Root, is a plane of existence that transcends all known dimensions and theories. It exists outside of time, being timeless and unchanging. Within it reside the Akashic Records, an absolute archive containing all information about everything that has happened, is happening, and could still happen. Past, present, and future are all contained there simultaneously.
Moreover, the Root is considered the final destination of all souls after death, the point from which everything originates and to which everything returns. For this reason, reaching the Root is the ultimate goal of all mages: to discover the ultimate "truth" of the universe. Seeing, touching, and understanding the Root would mean erasing the concept of "impossible," granting the mage power that many describe as equivalent to that of a god.
Naturally, it's almost unnecessary to say that such a feat is beyond the reach of even the most talented mages.
Initially, the purpose of the Holy Grail ceremony established by the Tohsaka, Matou, and Einzbern families was a means to reach Akasha, the Root. Thus, seven mages are chosen as Masters and, with the support of the Grail, can summon seven Servants for battle, spiritual copies of heroes from the past.
The winning pair should be able to claim the Holy Grail and use it to grant a wish for each of them. However, the true purpose of the ritual is to use the seven deceased Servants who return to the Root as a way to create a direct hole to Akasha.
Despite being described as an omnipotent wish-granting device, the Holy Grail of Fuyuki is merely a mass of magical energy and, therefore, not as omnipotent as people believe it to be. The sacred relic cannot fulfill requests whose method of realization is unknown, requiring the methodology of achieving the wish to be known in order to fulfill it.
Thus, wishing for something abstract like "being whole" became a problem for the nameless man.
As a result of this poorly formulated wish, he ended up becoming Seth, a manifestation derived from his origin, as he had been fed with the Egyptian God, who was the most compatible with him among the three he was linked to.
And so arose the second set of memories: those belonging to Set, also called Sutekh, Seth, or Setesh. Known by countless titles, he was the Lord of Chaos, God of Evil, Lord of Deception, Lord of the Southern Thunder, Patron of the Hyksos, God of the Sarcophagus War, Slayer of the Primordial Serpent, Protector of Ra, King of the Red Desert, God of Storms, of Foreigners… and many other names.
Although he carried the memories of a god in his mind and, technically, had become that god, there was one fact that deeply troubled him: this should have been impossible.
Gods carry more information than a human can withstand. For example, the "nameless man" with amnesia, every time he resorted to the powers of the three gods he had devoured, needed to make room within himself, and to do so, he removed parts of his memory and personality.
But now, it didn't feel the same as before. He had become Seth himself, for his mind held memories from the birth of the Egyptian God. At the same time, his human life was so vivid that even previously forgotten memories resurfaced. He also recalled the entire journey of the "nameless man" during the Holy Grail War and even moments he honestly preferred not to relive, such as the experiments conducted by the mage who found him in the Modern Era.
Thus, the slight strangeness felt when receiving the memories was quickly drowned out by an inhuman, serene, almost unnatural calm. Indeed, there was no rejection; the fusion of memories occurred perfectly, as if his soul had been molded for this from the beginning. He was simply Seth who had recovered his memories of a human life.
What made this "miracle" possible?
With absolute certainty, it was the Holy Grail of that world which, unlike what he remembered from the anime, was not corrupted. From what he recalled, the Grail was composed of two parts: the so-called Lesser Grail, which serves as the physical vessel, and the Greater Grail, the main core, which functions both as a wish-granting machine and as a gate to Akasha. A Master can only reach the Root by sacrificing their Servant during the process. However, there is the possibility for Master and Servant to fulfill wishes that do not involve Akasha.
In the first three Holy Grail Wars, the vessel was literally a chalice. However, the constant damage suffered during the conflicts repeatedly interrupted the ceremony. Thus, from the Fourth Holy Grail War onward, the Einzbern family began creating homunculi to serve as the physical embodiment of the Lesser Grail.
Irisviel von Einzbern acted as the Lesser Grail during the Fourth Holy Grail War in *Fate/Zero*, gradually losing her consciousness and body as the battle neared its end. In the Fifth Holy Grail War in 'Fate/stay night', two vessels were involved: the heart of Illyasviel von Einzbern and Sakura Matou, who had fragments of the previous Lesser Grail implanted in her body by Zouken Matou.
In the timeline of 'Fate/stay night', during the Third Holy Grail War, Angra Mainyu was summoned as a Servant, corrupting the essence of the Holy Grail. As a result, in subsequent conflicts, the Greater Grail ceased to grant wishes, becoming merely a receptacle to unleash all the world's evil.
But in his world, this didn't happen. He participated in the First Holy Grail War of Fuyuki, which took place in 2004, and until then, no other war had occurred before it.
When he wished to be "whole" to the Holy Grail, from his perspective—not that of the nameless man—he remembered seeing the Spiral of the Root. Perhaps he had passed through it when he was reborn in this world, and that made such a miracle possible…?
Well, he supposed it was truly a "miracle"…
However, what truly left him resigned wasn't the fact that he carried memories of different lives in his mind.
What truly left him resigned was the discovery made just seconds after absorbing the two sets of memories.
He knew, with absolute certainty, which world he had awakened in: 'Fate/Grand Order'.
Somehow, when the nameless man became a god in the modern era, his existence was ripped from the original reality and cast through different layers of the multiverse. And now, here he was, in the reality where the events of the mobile game he had recently played unfolded.
How did he know this?
Well, he came to this conclusion based on three factors.
The first was the sight of the city of Fuyuki completely engulfed in flames, something quite different from what he remembered from the end of the Fourth Holy Grail War in the anime that told its story. There, the fire had been caused by the mud of the Holy Grail, spilled from the path opened by the Greater Grail of Fuyuki, killing over five hundred people and destroying 134 buildings, but not consuming the entire city.
So, how did he know that now the entire city had been burned?
This brought him to the second factor.
The total absence of life around him was evident. There wasn't a single human within a radius of dozens of kilometers that his divine senses could detect. All he could perceive in that city were… distinct presences. Something he could only assume were Servants. Most of them, however, seemed corrupted by a source of evil he recognized easily, being a "God of Evil," though he detested that title.
From what he remembered, this only happened in the Fuyuki Singularity, where the Servants end up corrupted and transform into the so-called Shadow Servants.
And finally, the third factor, perhaps the most decisive, was right above his head.
Even with the sky shrouded in darkness and thick gray smoke, he could still see… a kind of ring of light. It was a phenomenon he recognized immediately, something he remembered from the days when he played 'Fate/Grand Order' in his past life as a human. In fact, he had only played up to the middle of the First Singularity, which came right after the one he was now experiencing, known as the "Prologue." But even so, it was still recognizable…
Well, there was no point in resigning himself to his situation, which was, at the very least, miraculous.
What mattered now was figuring out how to deal with it.
Malik sighed and shook his head slowly, as if trying to rid himself of his own thoughts.
He lowered his gaze to his own hands.
For a moment, he remained silent.
He was now a living God.
In this world, Gods were entities formed from human thoughts, arising without being subject to the conscious will of people. They became more powerful as they gained more worshippers but were gradually reduced to mere Divine Spirits after the end of the Age of Gods.
The Age of Gods was when humans were few, and Sacred Spirits were active and more common; this period is called the Age of Gods. It is marked by the proliferation of Phantasmal Species, such as True Ancestors and Gorgons, and greater interaction between gods and mortals. This was the era of heroes and mythology, when the rules of the world and humanity were different, but this period ended approximately two thousand years ago…
In some cases, Gods became infamous figures, transformed into icons of terror. In these cases, their appearances were distorted by the very ideals and fears of the humanity that created them. Some still retained unique aspects: the Olympian Gods, for example, age over time and need to consume Golden Apples to maintain their youth. On the other hand, figures like Stheno and Euryale were born as immortal idols, never suffering the effects of time.
Gods are generally divided into two categories. The first comprises those who existed before being worshipped—natural and cosmic entities, such as the Sun, the Moon, storms, earthquakes, thunder, and winds, or even primordial concepts, like the "power of the planet that stabilized the Earth's surface." A good example of this category is Amaterasu, the Sun Goddess of Japan, who literally symbolizes the solar star. Another example is the Sumerian god Enlil, linked to wind and storms.
The second category includes those who were reborn as gods: beings originally close to humanity but who, for various reasons, distanced themselves and were elevated to objects of worship. Heroes and messiahs, for example, figures who function as "systems necessary for human prosperity," belong to this class. For instance, Gilgamesh, the ancient king of Uruk, was deified after his death and came to be seen as a semi-divine figure. Another case is Hercules, the Greek hero, originally human, who became a god after accomplishing great feats and dying.
To better understand this second category of gods, those who became divine over time, it's important to first talk about the gods of ancient Mesopotamia, who are classic examples of the first category: gods born as forces of nature with their own consciousness. These gods didn't arise due to human worship but existed since ancient times as manifestations of the natural world. A good example is Ea, a god who, according to myths, helped shape the planet in the beginning. After the Earth was stabilized, other gods began creating civilizations and kingdoms. For a long time, these ancient gods ruled as true living laws of the heavens, directly interfering in human lives, as in the case of the birth of Gilgamesh, which was planned by the gods themselves.
However, this control ended up turning against them. By trying to guide humanity with such firm hands, the ancient gods lost their influence. That's how their era came to an end, giving way to more modern gods, many of whom arose from humanity itself.
Even with all their power, gods are still subject to certain natural laws, such as the conservation of mass, meaning they cannot simply create matter from nothing unless they have special abilities called Authorities. These Authorities are like divine permissions that allow them to break the rules of reality. Extremely powerful gods, like Amaterasu, for example, have enough strength that even time has almost no effect on them.
He was also one of these examples…
But curiously, he couldn't access all his power at the moment. The reason was simple: the fusion between him, the "nameless man," and Seth was still in progress.
The human body of the nameless man, used to be reborn in the Modern Era, was slowly transforming into the true body of Seth.
He estimated he could use only a tenth of his power currently.
But he quickly became distracted by something else.
When thinking of the other "nameless man," he recalled the magecraft he had learned in recent years since awakening in the modern era. It was the only thing he had left. The rest of his memories were completely absent, as if he had awakened in a foreign body, in a time that didn't belong to him. What had happened…
[Magecraft] revolved around "Mystery," which is nothing more than a sliver of power of many different types that comes from the [Root], the source of all supernatural phenomena in this world. If one were to consider modern magic, [Magecraft] is, in essence, the "Mystery," and it is precisely for this reason that modern thaumaturgy was far inferior to that of the Age of Gods.
Back then, even the magical art itself is described as being closer to true magic, far superior to what it is today, which is simply a replica of what could be achieved through science by supernatural means. To explain why, it's simple: since the beginning of the Common Era, human history has been in the process of regularly expelling Mysteries. To the same degree that the light of science expands, the darkness of the essence of "Mystery" recedes.
No matter how much mages resist this fact, this law remains inflexible. The Mysteries of the Age of Gods have become so distant that even temporarily perceiving them in the modern world is almost impossible. This is because humanity has reached a point where everything is explainable through human knowledge, from the workings of nature to the operation of the cosmos, which was once the domain of the heavens, anything that was previously beyond human reach.
This greatly affects [Magecraft]. Something whose nature has been revealed cannot become a "Mystery," which is practically the crystallization of the unknown, no matter what kind of supernatural method it uses. Now it is nothing more than another mundane method.
The reason he was thinking about this was simple: according to what he knew, a God in the Modern Era could mark the beginning of a new era for mages.
He remembered something he read in the *Lord El-Melloi II Case Files* during his free time. A mage named Heartless had stolen Iskandar's cloak. Using the cloak as a catalyst, along with the connection between the Railway Zeppelin and the Child of Einnashe with ley lines linked to the Greater Grail in Fuyuki, he managed to create a distorted imitation of the Holy Grail. Through this, he was able to summon a false Servant of the Faker class: the Shadow of Iskandar.
He had planned for a long time before heading to the heart of the Spiritual Tomb of Albion, a place carved out ages ago by the Dragon of Albion itself, a colossal creature the size of a mountain. This dragon, unlike other Phantasmal Species, refused to migrate to the Reverse Side of the World when the Age of Man arrived.
The Reverse Side of the World is a hidden layer of reality where the laws of the Age of Gods still reside. It is where surviving Phantasmal Species dwell instead of humans.
Also known as the Inner Sea of the Planet, or Layer D, this place holds the soul of the World itself. A legendary and supernatural domain, unreachable by ordinary means, mentioned by various cultures as the land of immortality.
Throughout history, it has been called by many names: Utopia, Garden of Eden, Tír na nÓg, Avalon.
With the retreat of Mystery from the surface, the gates leading to the Reverse Side were sealed. Still, the Dragon did not yield. Determined to reach this other world even without the aid of Mystery, it tried to physically carve a path, using its monumental body to dig into the depths of the Earth, where traces of ancient Mystery still lingered.
However, it never completed the journey. It died during the excavation, and its colossal corpse slowly fused with the soil. Over time, its body formed a labyrinth: the Spiritual Tomb of Albion.
It was there that he sought to perform a ritual he called the Ascension of Shadows, aiming to elevate the Saint Graph of Faker, bringing it closer to the level of Iskandar.
As an essential part of this ritual, Heartless used everything he had obtained from Norikata Emiya, employing Innate Time Control to accelerate Faker's time billions of times. During this process, he would maintain a constant prayer directed to Iskandar, whom he spiritually represented. It is said that Iskandar carries the blood of Zeus, and continuous prayers accumulated over an "artificial time" of thousands of years would serve as a catalyst. He also fed it with an enormous amount of magical energy, as during the ceremony, the Dragon's heart in the Tomb was opened, releasing a wave of Mystery directly connected to the Inner Sea of the Planet. This release represented the highest possible mystical density in the modern world, the ideal environment to transform a Heroic Spirit into a Divine Spirit.
At the end of the ritual, Iskandar ascended as a Divine Spirit in modern times. With this, he acquired an Authority, the divine right that is the source of the Magic of the Age of Gods. Once this Authority was obtained, the ideal magic would be restored, making the pursuit of the Root unnecessary and marking the beginning of a new era of Magic.
Unfortunately, Lord El-Melloi himself stopped him in the end, using a Command Seal to banish Iskandar, thwarting the mage's plans…
"If I were in a normal timeline, would the new era of magic be ushered in by me?" Malik gave an ironic smile as he set the thought aside and decided to start walking.
Standing there thinking about everything wouldn't help at all.
As he walked, he couldn't help but let his thoughts continue to wander. He found it ironic how the Age of Gods, the Reverse Side of the World, and the rituals he had just been thinking about seemed, in a way, interconnected with the magecraft of this world, something that only came to mind after reflecting on the Gods themselves.
Continuing his reasoning about magecraft, the body used to become the nameless man, the one who devoured Gods, was that of Iskandar's son. After acquiring the power of three Gods and awakening in a new era, he learned a bit of magecraft in the Modern Era. It was then that he discovered he possessed a quality and quantity of magical circuits absolutely unparalleled among the mages of that era.
Magical circuits are a pseudo-nervous system that spreads through the body and qualifies an individual to practice magic. Their function is essential: through them, a person can convert their Life Energy, Od, into Magical Energy, necessary to perform magecraft. Though associated with the body, this is merely a form of expression; in reality, the circuits reside in the individual's soul and determine their magical capacity, whether called mana, prana, or simply magical energy. They are limited and defined at the moment of birth.
And above all, they are what qualify someone as a mage.
But after becoming a God, these human definitions became practically irrelevant. His amount of magical energy had increased about a hundredfold, and he could use it whenever he wanted, without relying on the activation of magical circuits through a mental trigger, as human mages need to do.
To activate magical circuits, it's necessary to channel magical energy into them somehow, awakening them. At the same time, the mage must create a mental trigger, an image or concept that allows immediate access to their circuits whenever desired. The speed of circuit activation is directly tied to the realism of the mental trigger. For this reason, many mages use traumatic experiences or near-death situations as an anchor…
All that said, he despised human magecraft, though he knew quite a bit about it. Godly pride? Yes, so what? If it were true magic, he might be a bit interested.
The Five True Magics, also known as Sorcery in other translations, are the highest class of Mystery that surpasses magecraft and all current sciences of this era. They represent the realization of events impossible to reproduce in a given era, whether by man or the planet, even with an infinite amount of time and resources. Acquiring the ability to perform magic is considered the ultimate achievement of a mage, only attainable by those who have accessed the Swirl of the Root.
"Magic" can be distinguished from "magecraft" in that its consequences are ostensibly "impossible" or "miraculous." Concepts like Time Manipulation, teleportation, spatial distortion, and the Resurrection of the dead are miracles considered possible only through the application of "Magic."
Those known are only "five," and all have absurd powers.
Thinking up to this point, he couldn't help but consider the possibility that his arrival in another world, as well as the entire situation surrounding him, might be related to Kischur Zelretch Schweinorg. Zelretch was the holder of the Second True Magic, known as [Operation of Parallel Worlds], a magic that allowed him to observe and interact with other timelines and alternate universes.
With it, Zelretch frequently traveled between realities, even able to see the final outcomes of different timelines if he wished. However, he avoided interfering directly or observing excessively, as the mere act of seeing one possibility among many was enough to restrict it, inevitably making it the only viable one.
For this, Zelretch used a special room, considered a separate world. Within it was a book of thousands of pages, capable of writing and erasing information in real-time about different universes and timelines. This book also allowed for the precise analysis of an individual's characteristics. Additionally, if necessary, Zelretch could transfer his soul to a different temporal axis, usually using a jewel golem as a substitute for his physical body during the journey.
He also played a fundamental role in the origin of the Holy Grail War system in Fuyuki, acting as the supervisor of its creation. The founders of the three main families that created the Holy Grail—Zouken Makiri, Justeaze Lizrich von Einzbern, and Nagato Tohsaka—were his direct disciples.
In other words, perhaps to prevent a new era of magic from arising in that world due to the resurgence of a God, he sent him to a world where that wouldn't be a problem. Though this was just his theory now to explain why he was sent to a burning Fuyuki.
"…I wouldn't doubt it has something to do with that troll…" Malik murmured, letting out a sigh.
In any case, he was nothing like the Faker of Iskandar who ascended and became a Divine Spirit in that era.
Divine Spirits are basically the "living remnants" or limited manifestations of ancient gods. Though they are the highest classification of Nature Spirits, they are like a diminished copy of a God: they still retain part of their essence but no longer have the same freedom, power, or influence as before.
If a God was a star in the sky, a Divine Spirit is like its light traveling alone through space.
The main difference between a God and a Divine Spirit lies precisely in how they exist in the present. A full God could only manifest with all its power in the ancient Age of Gods, when the world still allowed it. In the current era, with more "rational" laws dominating reality, it's practically impossible for a God to appear in its true form. A Divine Spirit, on the other hand, is an adapted version of that divinity, able to exist even in this modern world, albeit with limitations.
Thanks to this, Divine Spirits can even be summoned as Servants in Holy Grail Wars, but with strict rules: they usually need to have their powers reduced or use human bodies as vessels, what we call Pseudo-Servants.
This happens because the Grail system, by default, cannot summon a god in its pure form—it would be too much power for a world so weakened in magic. There are cases where very weak Divine Spirits, like Stheno and Euryale, can be summoned normally because their divinity is so worn out that it no longer threatens to break the system's balance. Other entities, like Brynhildr or Chiron, only managed to become Servants by giving up part of their divine nature.
It's worth noting that, like Heroic Spirits when summoned, Divine Spirits are also a copy of the originals when summoned as Servants.
In his case, he didn't give up his divine nature and didn't become a Pseudo-Servant, though he existed within the same mechanics; since his body was that of a human slowly being elevated to the "divine status of Seth," he was still a full God slowly recovering his total power, not a mere Divine Spirit or even a copy…
In other words, he was basically a bug in the world.
A sarcastic smile appeared on his lips as he thought about it. He murmured to himself again: "…If that's the case, how haven't I caught Alaya's attention? She would've done everything to remove a bug like me… Wait… Ohhh, now I get it!"
He clapped his closed hand into his other palm.
"In this world, she doesn't have much influence because humanity was destroyed at the start. She must've been severely weakened… If it weren't for that, I don't doubt she would've already sent her Counter Force dogs after me…"
What is the Counter Force?
The so-called Counter Force is a safety mechanism formed by the World to defend against extinction, with two branches: Gaia and Alaya.
While Gaia is the will of the Earth, the intrinsic desire of the planet to survive and prosper, Alaya, on the other hand, is the collective unconscious will of humanity to avoid its extinction.
Thus, as humans were inhabitants of the world, initially there was only Gaia. However, as humanity began to develop independently of nature, a divergence occurred, forming Alaya. Now, the two Counter Forces are no longer aligned and may occasionally conflict.
Though considered wills of humanity or the planet, the Counter Forces carry no emotions and are described as spirals of energy that respond to threats of world destruction or human extinction. Normally, Gaia and Alaya act indirectly but are always active, constantly guiding humanity and the planet away from potential danger in some way.
Gaia is the will to survive of the planet, protecting all creatures of the Earth using nature spirits. As humanity became independent, Gaia increasingly saw humans as a threat due to their reckless destruction of the environment. Thus, in response to the human threat, Gaia also employs beings capable of defeating or governing humanity, such as the True Ancestors, extremely powerful vampiric nature spirits.
However, humans can also make a pact with Gaia, as in the case of Artoria Pendragon, who, before dying, forged a contract with her to try to obtain the Holy Grail, allowing her summoning in response to threats to the planet.
Moreover, through the Counter Force's intervention, the destruction of the planet by creatures born on Earth is essentially impossible due to the measures already put in place by Gaia.
Alaya is the collective unconscious of humanity and the impulse for its survival as a whole, constantly steering humans away from extinction. Normally, it interferes only indirectly, guiding and empowering a certain individual to eliminate a threat. However, when indirect intervention is insufficient, the Counter Force will send Counter Guardians or Heroic Spirits.
It's also tied to the so-called Human Order as the fundamental principle by which Alaya operates, the principle that "humanity must exist for as long as possible." Thus, parallel worlds where humanity destroyed itself or advanced too quickly and thus stopped progressing are, under this principle, eliminated, allowing only the most promising timelines to survive to ensure humanity's future.
Though intangible forces of will, each uses physical agents to deal with events too dangerous to be resolved with indirect intervention. Thus, Gaia uses elementals, some divine spirits, and spiritual species as agents, while Alaya uses Heroic Spirits and the so-called Counter Guardians, human spirits who pledge eternal service to the Counter Force in exchange for power or favor.
One of the main differences between Heroic Spirits and Counter Guardians is that the former are summoned by humanity's hopes and are famous beings in legends, while the latter are summoned by humanity's despair in the face of extinction, acting without autonomy, appearing in response to a specific event, becoming Counter Guardians by forging a pact in life to act as protectors of balance, even without being known heroes…
"…Well, it's plausible that she can't act in a world where humanity was incinerated. Or maybe I'm overthinking it, and my existence is only possible because of the Root, which I remember seeing. The Spiral of the Root probably erased the 'impossibility' of a God being born in the modern world somehow, and here I am…" he murmured to himself, concluding his monologue.
Malik sighed, shaking off his thoughts as he adjusted his hood to cover his head and continued walking.
There was no point in pondering the purpose of being there, nor the fact that his miraculous existence hadn't been erased from the world like a simple glitch, a "bug." What mattered now was finding a way to resolve this Singularity. And for that, he needed to wait for the arrival of Chaldea.
The Chaldea he referred to was founded by the head of the Animusphere family, one of the Twelve Lords of the Clock Tower. It was he who created the Organization for the Preservation of the Human Order, Finis Chaldea, with the goal of preventing the inevitable extinction of the human race.
If his memory was correct, in that world, a few months ago, thanks to the inventions of this organization, Chaldeas—a miniature replica of the Earth's planetary body, capable of displaying the state of the world in past and future eras—was created. However, precise observation of specific locations in space-time was only possible with the aid of Sheba, a special lens that functioned as a kind of satellite. Together, these devices allowed the collection of alarming data: the extinction of humanity, previously predicted to occur in a hundred years, was now set for the year 2019.
That would happen just one year later.
The likely cause? An anomalous event in an "unobservable location" that manifested in the city of Fuyuki in 2004, later classified as Singularity F. From this, the Grand Order was declared, with the purpose of interfering in the past and correcting the course of history. Forty-nine Masters were summoned from around the world, tasked with preventing the extinction of the human race.
That was exactly the Singularity he was in, the [Prologue] he referred to.
With this in mind, a long-term plan was formulated in his mind.
In his situation, all he could do was resolve the Singularities and help humanity. But that was because he found it amusing…
Though portrayed as an Evil God, Seth… or Malik, is closer to a trickster, someone sarcastic and belligerent who believes all disputes should be settled with force. He enjoys playing pranks and causing confusion wherever he goes. Like any God, he is proud and arrogant, often disdainful of mortals. Yet, this contempt isn't limited to humans; he also harbored the same sentiment toward other Gods.
In truth, he is a being as free as the wind and as inconstant as the tides, someone who lives in the moment, seeking to cause as much chaos as possible. He's always after what amuses him, unconcerned with rules, consequences, or those who get in his way.
He smiled faintly as he suddenly stopped.
He could sense something approaching him, coming from the staircase leading to the plaza where he had been earlier—
*Creak! Creak!*
A dry creaking echoed in the air, like old wood being twisted, followed by rhythmic clacking: *clac, clac, clac*, the bony sound of bare feet striking the hard ground.
The metallic clinking of rusted armor and worn blades mixed with the hollow noise of ribs knocking against each other with every step. It was like hearing bones dragged by chains, accompanied by a low, almost hissing sound from fleshless jaws trying to grind.
With each movement, the sound grew clearer: *clac… clac… tin… clac… rrrack…*
Dozens of skeletons rose around him, their bony forms emerging from among the stones and flames consuming everything nearby. They were armed with rusted spears, chipped shields, and made no sound beyond the faint clattering of their bones.
Malik looked around unhurriedly. His gaze was calm, almost lazy, as if this was nothing new.
"Tch…" He clicked his tongue. "They pop up out of nowhere like cockroaches, and they don't even have the decency to announce their arrival…"
The skeletons began to advance. Slowly, but without hesitation.
Malik didn't step back.
On the contrary, he tilted his head slightly to the side, a smile dancing at the corner of his lips.
His eyes gleamed for an instant in a shade reminiscent of the golden sand reflecting the sun.
Without making a single gesture, the skeletons began to crumble.
The sound of breaking bones filled the air. One by one, they disintegrated. Skulls cracked, vertebrae came loose, and in seconds, all that remained of them was dust.
Fine sand.
A breeze blew right after, scattering the grains into the air, carrying them away as if they had never existed.
Though far from accessing his full power, he could still use one of his Authorities, the one that governed the desert.
As the God of Deserts, he naturally had absolute control over sand, able to generate devastating sandstorms, manipulate sand freely, and even turn entire regions into deserts, even the ocean itself, negating Authority over water. He could also turn most living beings into sand within his field of vision, as he had just done. Another application was that he could apply sand to others' bodies and absorb any liquid from them until they became completely dry and turned into sand. The sandstorms he generated could cover cities and even entire countries if fueled with enough magical energy.
Authorities are a unique category of ability, undoubtedly on the level of creating a World, including altering events, manipulating the flow of time, and constructing kingdoms, among others. While normal abilities "achieve a certain result based on some process or logical principle," Authorities "obtain a result simply because the user has the right to do so."
The use of Authorities existed primarily in the Age of Gods.
From the Common Era onward, the advancement of human civilization made Authorities unnecessary, turning them into relics of the previous era. Servants who are Divine Spirits possess their Authorities, but using them in the Common Era requires compensation in the form of strain and damage inflicted on them, and they are much weaker. His Authorities had no such limitation, though he couldn't use them at full power…
After getting rid of the skeletons, Malik continued descending the plaza's stairs and walked toward the streets, delving deeper into the flames burning everything around him. Fortunately, as a God, he didn't feel the effects such an environment would have.
He vanished into the horizon of a street without any hurry.
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