While Rocco Belfeban was meeting with the final Master candidate, the prospective Masters of the Yggdmillennia clan were also contemplating the sudden abnormal situation.
Gordes accompanied Darnic on an inspection of Millennia City's most crucial core area, aside from the Great Holy Grail Altar: the Artificial Workshop.
After patiently making a round of the workshop, the short and stout Gordes couldn't help but ask, "I heard you let one of the invading magi leave alive?"
"Yes," Darnic nodded, "I gave him a suggestion that would allow him to exact revenge."
"Why did you do that?"
Darnic did not answer, which only increased Gordes' dissatisfaction.
The Musik family, from which Gordes hailed, was once renowned in the field of alchemy, on par with the Einzbern family. However, before Gordes was born, this family's bloodline as magi had already taken an irrecoverable path of decline.
Unable to achieve significant accomplishments for many years and unable to climb the ranks within the Mage's Association, the once-prestigious family had no choice but to merge into Yggdmillennia, which the Muzik family saw as a great humiliation.
From a young age, Gordes's parents repeatedly instilled in him the idea of the Muzik family's superiority. Even now, at thirty-six years old, he still struggled to distinguish reality from idealism, with the pride of "once being a noble family" growing robustly.
Gordes was the first child born to the combined Muzik and Yggdmillennia families, a long-awaited first-rate magus, which further inflated his pride in his lineage.
Undeniably, Gordes was indeed a top-tier magus who had made outstanding contributions to the Yggdmillennia clan's development and the current Holy Grail War.
Without utilizing Yggdmillennia's resources, Gordes had developed the Muzik family's magecraft to a new height purely through his talent. Additionally, he had successfully established a connection with the Einzbern family. After the Great Holy Grail was stolen, the Einzbern family, having abandoned their closed-off ways, began to interact with the outside world and became an undisputed giant in the field of alchemy.
Gordes had obtained valuable homunculus technology from the Einzbern family, and the mass-produced homunculi using this technology were indispensable assets to the Yggdmillennia clan.
More importantly, before the Holy Grail War began, he proposed an unprecedented system intervention—the division of the mana supply route—and made it a reality.
To sustain the summoned Servants in the Holy Grail War, a sufficient amount of mana was necessary, which was supposed to be provided by the Masters. Generally, magi would need to burn through their life force just to maintain the manifestation of these celebrated Heroic Spirits.
However, Gordes successfully diverted the vast mana required by the Servants to be supplied by homunculi specifically created for this purpose. This was the cultivation tank for these homunculi that Darnic and Gordes were inspecting.
No matter how excellent the magi dispatched by the Mage's Association were, summoning and controlling Servants was a significant burden for them. By eliminating this burden, the power gap between the two sides would greatly narrow.
Moreover, this abundant mana would allow the Servants to use their Noble Phantasms without restraint. Noble Phantasms, the trump cards of the Servants, possess the power to instantly overturn the battlefield, though they consume a tremendous amount of mana. With this restriction lifted by Gordes, it was no wonder he was so proud.
In his eyes, Darnic, who had single-handedly developed the weak Yggdmillennia into a giant without attracting any attention, was nothing but a politician who played with politics and had no other talents.
Thinking about the leaf he had prepared for the Holy Grail War, Gorde's confidence swelled unprecedentedly. He was the greatest hero in Northern Europe and even the world. Even in Romania, it would not lose to Vlad III.
Whether it was the Mage's Association that didn't recognize the Muzik family's magecraft, the Einzbern family that prided itself as the top in alchemy, or Darnic who acted like the head of the house, all of you, watch closely.
I, Gordes Musik Yggdmillennia, am the pillar of this clan, and only I can lead the Yggdmillennia clan to win the Holy Grail War.
◇◇◇
Of course, the other prospective Masters were not as arrogant as Gordes.
Celenike was venting her excitement in her workshop.
She was a practitioner of black magic, hailing from the ancient lineage of the Icecolle family. However, during the Middle Ages, due to the rampant witch hunts, they were forced to flee from Western Europe to Siberia. This exile resulted in the loss of their magical foundation, leading them into decline.
To the Icecolle family, Celenike was a long-awaited newborn in their waning lineage. The elderly women who had devoted their lives to the pursuit of black magic showered Celenike with love and thoroughly imbued her with their dark arts.
Black magic is a unique form of sorcery that requires more mental fortitude than magical aptitude. The first prerequisite for learning black magic is the ability to dismember a living sacrifice without hesitation. Whether it be a young beast, a human infant, a kind-hearted person, a tame animal, an elderly person, an old dog, a pregnant woman, or the fetus of a human or beast—one must be unmoved by pleas if suffering is necessary.
The teachings she received emphasized concealing one's exterior and controlling one's interior. To indulge in the joy of killing would disqualify one as a black magus.
If killing is necessary, then kill. If suffering is necessary, then inflict only the necessary amount of suffering. Celenike was indeed an excellent black magus. When offering a living sacrifice, she could control her rationality with an iron will and flawlessly complete all the brutal rituals.
Yes, she truly and thoroughly suppressed her passions, whether it was the joy of inflicting harm or the pleasure of torment. These emotions are highly dangerous elements for a black magus.
Thus, when she sheds her identity as a black magus, Celenike completely indulges her excessive desires. She lived by hexing and existed on the boundary between magus and magecraft users.
Her indulgence involved defiling and tormenting those who interested her, mostly beautiful boys, causing them pain and licking their tears. Not a single person who spent a night with her emerged unscathed.
Now, she gazed with an incredibly innocent expression at a boy who was covered in wounds from her tortures. In an almost ecstatic tone, she whispered in the boy's ear, though his eardrums had already been destroyed and he could hear nothing.
"The Holy Grail War was originally a ritual initiated by the Servants fighting each other. But Darnic tampered with the structure of the Holy Grail War, making all seven Servants belong to a single faction, successfully claiming the Servants as exclusive to our Yggdmillennia."
"The magecraft of mere humans cannot compare to the power of the Servants. This way, we have enough strength to oppose the Mage's Association—impressive, isn't it?"
The woman, exuding a thick scent of blood, reached out to touch the boy's face, only to find his body already cold.
"What, already dead? How boring."
Celenike looked disdainfully at the corpse on the floor, then turned towards a heavily protected storage cabinet.
Inside was a glass jar, with some residual grime making it appear as though it contained some liquid. The mere thought of the Servant about to be summoned made Celenike's body tremble with anticipation.
Truly, I can't wait to see you. Truly, truly, I can't wait to defile you! (This girl is a real pervert; it's such a shame she's so cute.)
◇◇◇
Roche, who had just entered adolescence, arrived at the battlefield where Vlad III had annihilated the magi yesterday.
Although the battlefield itself had been pierced by Vlad's Noble Phantasm and was no longer dangerous, it remained at the edge of Yggdmillennia territory, where enemies could attack at any time.
It was unclear whether the boy's appearance in such a place alone was due to ignorance or because he had something to rely on.
Roche's gaze did not linger on the bloodstains or the marks left by the "stakes" on the ground; all his attention was drawn to the destroyed automatons previously damaged by the magi.
Picking up a piece of an automaton's remnants, the boy wrinkled his nose in dissatisfaction.
"Tch~ As expected, my automatons can't hold up against magi with even a bit of skill."
Indeed, the automatons used for vigilance and engaging invaders at the border were Roche's creations.
The Frain family, from which Roche hailed, was quite famous in the field of automation engineering. The children of this family were raised by dolls constructed as nursemaids and rarely left the workshop or saw their parents until they were old enough for magic crest transplantation. Even their education was completely hands-off.
Thus, the children of the clan become intimately connected with the dolls. The children come to recognize the human-like actions, speech, and tireless labor of the dolls as commonplace.
Growing up with this peculiar education, they live as magi who use dolls as their standard rather than humans. Though they can't even remember their parents' faces, they can recall the shapes of the dolls that cared for them without missing a single detail.
Roche was no exception. He had no interest in humans, not even in the greatest magus. Of course, he sometimes conversed with people. Sometimes he made deals, and sometimes he fought others for precious materials. But none of these interactions involved any emotional connection between people or magi.
What intrigued him, what made him smile like a child, were only the dolls—and those who surpassed him in the same field. The Servant he summoned was such an entity; he had already summoned his Servant two months ago.
Adolescent moods change quickly, and soon Roche no longer cares about the performance of the dolls. He cast his eyes beyond the Millennia Fortress, his face filled with boundless anticipation.
"Although it's great that Darnic-sama managed to bring all seven Servants into our faction, for the Holy Grail activation ritual to work, we still need to kill a certain number of Servants, which means we have to fight among ourselves."
"But now, the Mage's Association will supplement this part, summoning seven Servants for us to kill."
"Hehe, hahahaha, summoning seven Heroic Spirits is already amazing, and now there are twice as many!"
"I can't contain my excitement!"
Stretching towards the direction of Trifas, the boy had never been so eagerly anticipating the arrival of the Holy Grail War.
Note: FATE is ultimately an ensemble drama, and it's necessary to provide background and character traits for the Masters, or else the story development would become somewhat troublesome. Additionally, this segment serves to set up several plot points.