IBHJ 1399

Fujimaru Shirou didn’t know what was happening in the material world—but he could feel it, like static in his bones. A storm was brewing, and someone somewhere was holding a very sharp grudge. The Golden Universe had taken a direct slap from Gaia’s domain, and they were not the type to let bygones be bygones. But more importantly—

The Gate. The one they lost. The Golden Universe’s missing door to the First Cause. Shirou suspected it had something to do with the golden crew who once ran planetary experiments on the rest of the solar system. The kind of ancient knowledge that made even Origin Gaia squint and mutter, “What the hell is that?”

Now, their only hope lay in letting Origin Gaia decode the golden myth tablets and reverse-engineer the tale of the Root. Because until they understood where the Lord of Salvation actually came from, all they could do was flail and pretend they had a plan.

He reached for the Arrow of Akasha.

It gleamed under the pale sunlight, gold with just the right amount of smug. A relic among relics—said to erase anything it touched. Unfortunately, it only had one shot left.

“…Shirou?”

A soft voice floated to his ear. He turned, expecting someone behind him—only to find nothing.

But she was there. He felt it. Like the presence of an app still running in the background.

“…Moromaya?”

“Yes, it’s me.”

A beat of silence—if you could call it that—passed before she added, “You’re not supposed to be on the surface. What are you doing?”

Shirou glanced around. Somehow, he’d ended up standing by the sea, waves curling at his ankles like curious cats. “…Huh. Guess I came down.”

“What about you?” he asked. “What are you doing?”

“…Scattering primordial protein.”

“…Come again?”

“Yeah. Tethys extracted it from the Tiamat ship—y’know, the one from the Golden Universe? I’m helping her set up a nice little environment so it can evolve on its own.”

“Let me get this straight.” Shirou raised an eyebrow. “You’re launching another life experiment.”

“Exactly. Just good old-fashioned environmental pressure and hope.”

He scratched his head. “So basically, you’re playing cosmic zookeeper and hoping the petri dish doesn’t turn carnivorous.”

“That’s the spirit,” she replied, far too cheerfully.

“…A new Genesis.” Shirou’s voice dropped slightly as he looked out at the shimmering sea. Then, quietly, “You made a new Connection point, didn’t you?”

“Oh, you mean those seven anchored post-future spacetime domains?” Moromaya said, like she was talking about expired coupons. “Yeah, those are gone. We'll need to pin down new ones if we want even a slim shot against the Golden Universe.”

Of course they were. The clash with the Golden Universe had always been inevitable—Shirou had just hit the gas.

And right on cue—

A message blinked into existence, slicing across his perception.

—The tablet has been decoded. Come quickly.

Shirou exhaled through his nose. “Sorry, Gaia’s calling.”

“Sure. I still need to finish seeding the primordial protein.”

He gave her a quick nod and turned, heading toward Gaia’s throne.

“The tablet’s decoded,” she said. “And it confirms what I feared. This so-called ‘Lord of Salvation’—it isn’t a facet of the Root. It’s a human. A human who managed to contaminate the Root itself.”

She held out the mythos.

Shirou took it, flipping to the first passage.

His eyes scanned the lines.

Then stopped.

“What…? This is—this is the Holy Grail War?!”

…

Modern Day — Kanzaki City

Artoria stood at the edge of the Tohno estate, the bracelet of the Ideal King resting against her wrist like a brand. Across from her, seated beneath a flowering plum tree, a woman in a simple dress sipped tea. A crown of thorns circled her head.

“…Why are you looking at me like that, Saber?” the woman asked, her tone mild, as if commenting on the weather.

“Who are you?” Artoria’s voice was clean and cold, sharpened by instinct.

“As you see, I’m Shiki.”

“I’ll ask again.” Her grip closed around the wooden bangle. “Who are you?”

Shiki didn’t flinch. “My role hasn’t changed,” she said quietly. “I am the void that the Tohno bloodline could not contain.”

Her gaze lifted. Eyes like frozen glass met Artoria’s without hesitation. “And I am the true Grail of the Holy Grail War.”

Artoria’s jaw set. “That’s not possible. Sixth Seat was the true Grail. That was the end. There can’t be another Grail—let alone another vessel.”

Shiki smiled, and it was almost kind. Almost. “Then tell me, Saber... have you ever considered the possibility of a Holy Grail from another universe?”

“Another universe… another Holy Grail?” Artoria’s brows knit, her tone low with suspicion.

“The Grand Universe’s like a body,” she said, placing the cup aside. “The smaller universes are its cells.”

She leaned back slightly. “Each universe has a boundary—like a membrane. And just as cells must live, divide, and die, so must universes. Some are born. Others rot. One such world was the Golden Universe. It decayed. In its place, yours was born, the Azure Universe. The two are mirrors of each other. If your world has an Earth… so did the Golden one.”

Artoria said nothing. She didn’t interrupt.

“But the crucial difference between them,” the woman continued, “was ether. The Golden Universe had none. No mystery. No magecraft. No divine will. It was a purely scientific reality—humanity, stripped of the gods.”

Artoria had heard the name before. The Golden Universe. Tiamat had spoken of it with caution. Others called it the origin of their oldest enemy—the world that gave rise to the Lord of Salvation.

“If our universe replaced it,” she asked, “then why do we have ether?”

The woman answered without pause. “Because of Gaia. And the ones born with her.”

She lifted a finger, as if drawing in the air. "When a cell refuses to die, it becomes malignant. The body sends white blood cells to destroy it. On a cosmic scale, the same thing happened with the Golden Universe. As it began to decay, it summoned immune agents—entities your world would call Void Worms, Void Overlords. They tore through other universes, scavenging laws and phenomena to extend their lifespan."

She added, “But that was never going to last. Desperation replaced logic. In the end, they did what dying civilizations always do. They created a miracle.”

Artoria’s expression tightened. “What kind?”

The woman smiled. “You summon seven Heroic Spirits. You emulate the Third Magic. You craft a counterfeit Grail to reach your wish.”

She gave a short nod. “They did it first.”

“What they forged wasn’t a cup,” she said, “but the First Cause itself. Seven Cosmic Masters, drawn from seven nebulae. Each summoned a Cosmic Servant—avatars of their will. One, a fool, triumphed over the others. With their deaths, he completed the ritual.”

“He created a false First Cause.”

“The entire cosmos was the leyline. The ritual itself became their First Cause War.”

“And that fool,” she continued, “used it to wish for salvation. To destroy the Void. And he succeeded—once. One Void Overlord was destroyed. The rest remained. His universe kept dying.”

A long pause.

“Then he tried to merge with the First Cause itself.”

Artoria’s gaze hardened. “And?”

Her smile thinned. “His own Servant turned against him. And killed him.”