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And again he is lying on the ground, God knows where. With only one difference. This time he remembers who he is.

"Senpai, get up!" A shout made him open his eyes, only to see Mashu next to him. Except this time Mashu looked completely different. Her old outfit disappeared, being replaced by an incomprehensible mixture of a fetish outfit and armor. One of those types that someone like Peroroncino would appreciate, her glasses disappeared, and she was holding in her hands...

Something big.

"Mashu?" slowly rising from the ground, Momonga shook his head then looked back at the girl. "What happened?"

"Rayshifting, I suppose" she gave her best guess, then looked over Momon carefully. "Is something

wrong?"

"Not that..." Momon sighed, thinking. It seems that even if he did not want to choose, the choice was made for him - "Rather, just ... Well, what can we say about what just happened."

A howl rang not far from Momonga that made him concentrate on a newly appeared enemy. After which his newly acquired Servant abilities let him understand the situation.

"Enemies!" Mashu responded instantly and practically jumped in front of the man, trying to shield him with a strange incomprehensible object in her hands.

"Not exactly..." Momon looked thoughtfully at the approaching creatures "Just skeletons."

Skeletons have traditionally been considered in all games to be the bottom of the undead hierarchy and one of the weakest monsters in general. So, in general, just as it was in Yggdrasil skeletons were usually no higher than fortieth level. However, there was one exception to this rule, the highest levels of the undead. Though they were not skeletons they often had an appearance very similar to that of skeletons. Considering how strongly the developers of the game pressed on searching and extracting information, it was not just one or two players that would meet, say, the Emperor of Death, taking on the guise of a skeleton in tattered rags, it became an unpleasant surprise.

However, specifically in this case, the skeletons that jumped on them were of insignificant strength. Satoru could hardly feel them with his Servant skills, so their level was even lower than the thirties. In other words, it was an adversary who could be ignored with no conequence.

"Senpai, they are attacking!" however, Mashu did not share the same view and therefore as rattling bones approached,the girl prepared herself. "What should I do?"

'Leave them.' Momonga wanted to answer, but the understanding that the undead would only ignore him, an undead like themselves, while Mashu would have to fight, made him reconsider the order. "Mashu... Can you deal with them?"

"Yes!" In spite of the fact that Mashu did not inspire confidence with the display of her own power to Momonga only a few minutes ago, now she looked completely different. In addition, her opponent was a low-level skeleton. If necessary Momonga himself could intervene in the battle.

However, this was not required.

The strange thing in the hands of Mashu was something akin to a shield, or a door, torn off from its hinges. But she had no problems trashing the skeletons. From every blow the bone soldiers flew in all directions.

"I suppose they really were very low level" Momonga said to himself, watching the girl cracking down on her opponents with avaliant look. "Although, using her in battle... I feel like an unfair boss who uses child labor against their enemies... No, hey, it's even worse, it's a kid fighting!"

However, Mashu seemed not burdened with such reflections. Easily dealing with the crowd of skeletons that had appeared and then with the final blow dealt turned towards Momon.

"Admittedly, you didn't look that strong before." Momon tried to think of a topic for conversation.

"I was not." sticking her strange weapon in the ground, the girl leaned on it. The idea that she had to spend so much energy on something that Momon himself could carry out in a blink of an eye with one spell confused the man a bit but he stoically made an attempt to ignore it.

"I am a researcher, not a soldier."

"This battle says otherwise" Although it was impossible to call it a battle. Just waving the thing to side to side, occasionally knocking bone skittles that approaches them l.

"The fact is that..." The girl tried to explain something, but before she succeeded a voice distracted them.

"Hurray, it connected!" The voice that came out that was familiar to Momon. "Chaldea is in touch!"

"Doctor Roman!" Mashu shouted into the air. "Here is Group A: Mashu Kyrielight, There is one person with me, Momon from Group D. Our current state is normal, Rayshifting is one hundred percent complete."

"Okay" Romani breathed out after these words. "Are you alright... Mashu, why do you look like that?!"

"I'm sorry, this is a transformation" after these words Momonga found himself listening carefully. "Otherwise I could not fight."

"Transformation?" The doctor' voiced thoughtfully. "...What are you talking about?"

"Look at my vital signs!" After that Romani became silent as he started to search for something on the computer.

"Oh... Magic circuits, mana, physical condition... beyond the human max potential!" Romani's voice was shocked ,that was not surprising. Momonga himself realized the same thing. "You ... Are you a Servant?!"

"As a child, Chaldea saved me by fusing my body and the soul of a Servant that had lost his Master." Masha sighed. "The sixth experiment, Demiservant. Completed successfully."

"So is the Servant's consciousness in you now?" Romani asked.

"No." But Mashu only shook her head. "The Servant disappeared, leaving me with its weapon and abilities but no knowledge."

"Sounds familiar..." Momon said to himself then shook his head. "Although I had the opposite, it was not the Servant that disappeared..."

"Well, then I should check Momon's condition..." Hearing this, Momonga felt a rush of panic, instantly crushed by reason. He can not give himself away!

But what to do?

False data? He knew a few basic spells for hiding information about himself like False Data: Life or False Data: Mana. But there was no guarantee that Romani would not try to check something other than his HP and MP. Therefore, Momonga acted as logically as he could in this situation.

"Silent Magic: The Blockade of Observation" with silent metamagic, the spell instantly broke the already weak connection between Chaldea and the Singularity, without giving out his action to anyone.

"Doctor Roman? Dr. Roman!" Having found that the person at that end was silent, Mashu tried to shout several times into the void, but did not receive a reply. "Seems like the connection broke".

Sighing, the girl turned to Momonga again, forcing him to look at her.

"Do you know about Servants?" Asked Mashu first. To that,t the Servant in the body of a human nodded in the affirmative.

"Good." she sighed again. "Then you understand everything. I cannot sustain my body and abilities as a Servants for a long time, so I need a Master capable of supplying me with mana."

The meaning behind the phrase was obvious but Momon did not answer.

Yet another choice.

Even assuming that he can deal with the Singularity and escape, if he would form a contract with Mashu as a Servant, he will remain associated with her until... Who knows how long? Servants in the Grail War were always called for the Grail War and died before they reached their goal. In other words there are no concrete examples of just how long a Servant can exist. Presumably for as long as a Master can feed him with mana. In other words, until the Master dies.

Given that for Momonga death was not a determining factor at all, the offer to become a Master for Mashu was something like signing a contract for eternal servitude. And, to put it more bluntly, as a contract for eternal servitude of a girl more than half his age.

"Mashu..." he tried to hint to the girl about his special circumstances. "You see, a contract with me will be somewhat ... An unusual contract."

"In what sense?" The girl was guarded with these words.

"The thing is that..." Momon thought for a second. "It will not be possible to terminate it."

"I know." but Mashu, who did not understand the background of the question, just shook her head. "Otherwise, I will die without nourishment, I understand it…"

"Not quite so ..." Thought Momonga after which he sighed. "In fact, this contract is concluded until I stop feeding you with mana. In other words, as long as I can produce mana... But the fact is, I can produce mana for a very, very long time…"

"So, this is good." Mashu raised one eyebrow. "Is not it?"

"Yes, maybe..." Momon looked thoughtfully up at the sky "But, in general... A contract with me is a very bad idea in the long run."

"But... Do we have a choice?" She raised an important point forcing Momon to wince. She, too, was right, in a way. Even if Momonga can fight on his own without her help, Mashu will simply die without his supply of mana. "I cannot live long without a Master."

Momon raised his hand behind his head and scratched the back of his head, thinking about these reckonings of fate. Eternal service or death? A sadistic choice that made him look worse than he should be in this kind of situation.

"Well, apparently, we really have no choice." Sighing Satoru still held out his hand. "In that case... Mashu Kyrielight, do you accept this contract?"

"Yes, I accept this contract" Without a shadow of a doubt on her face, Mashu extended her hand...

To immediately fall to the ground in a second, when Momonga only felt the light touch of the contract.

"C..." The girl tried to breathe, instantly clutching her throat - "Can't... Bre... Ah ...Ath…!"

Instantly and instinctively, Momonga reduced the strength of the connection after which Mashu stopped gasping for air with her mouth and dropped her body powerlessly to the ground.

"Wh... What..." Slowly moving her eyes around toward the sky, gradually she managed to concentrate on the slightly worried face of her senpai "What... was that?"

"Please forgive me." Suzuki tilted his head guiltily. "Apparently you can't stand all my mana yet..."

"All your... Mana?" Barely catching her breath, the girl looked at Momonga in disbelief. "How... How did you get so much?!"

"As I have already said, the contract with me will be for you... An unusual contract" Sighing, Momonga put his hand behind his head. "By the way, new skeletons are approaching us".

"Uh...Yeah" Slowly rising from her position, Mashu clutched at her strange weapon that

was apparently a shield then looked at the approaching crowd of skeletons.

"So, I wonder where we should go now?" At the moment when Mashu rushed into battle herself, Momon thought 'Hmm, if only…'

In Yggdrasil, when it was still a game, there was a whole school of all kinds of spells aimed at obtaining information. About goals, objects, events, quests. And so it happened that, thanks to his strange preferences in building his character, Momon knew several spells used as trails to the goals of the quest or boss in the dungeon. Two exactly, Blessing of Titania and Lead of Yatagarasu, that could point the way to his goals. However, it was in the game, in this reality, it was not known what spells with the lore of 'pointing the way to the most cherished goal' would do.

"'But what's the worst that could happen if I used them now?" The magician said thoughtfully, watching the girl cracking down on another bundle of low-level undead. "In that case... Blessing of Titania!"

A moment later a firefly appeared in front of him that slowly moved forward.

"So, I still have some kind of purpose in this place..." Said Momonga thoughtfully, watching the firefly flying ahead. Blessing of Titania was a high-level spell that showed the safest path to a goal, so Momonga might had relaxed. At least, as relaxed as it was possible in such conditions.

However almost instantly Momon felt something strange touched his left hand. The hand which he had just sent his spell with. Moving his eyes Momonga was very surprised.

Because he suddenly found that he no longer have a hand.

Though not exactly, more precisely he had a hand even more familiar to his gaze. It was the bone hand of his in-game avatar, which continued to function and obey all his thoughts. But there was no human hand there.

"Apparently, this body cannot withstand high-level magic." Said Momon thoughtfully, then bent his bone arm and held it to his chin. Apparently, he will have to hide this.

Pulling off his jacket and tearing it in a hurry, Momonga built himself something like a bandage with which he hid his bone hand completely.

"Senpai!" Returning after a couple of minutes, Mashu was walking a little awkwardly, slightly hobbling on one leg. It seems that despite all the weakness of the opponents, one still managed to injure her. "Senpai, you... Senpai, what's wrong with your hand?"

"Nothing special" Momonga replied as calmly as possible. "It just got hurt a bit."

"Senpai, let me see!" Mashu tried to rush to help him, but Momon only took a step back.

"It's all right." After these words the man tried to change the topic. "I determined where we need to go."

"Senpai?" Mashu frowned a little but continued. "So where?"

"This way" Not being able to answer the question, the man decided to fake assertiveness and just moved forward to the way in which the creeping firefly left.

"Senpai, wait!" Mashu shouted when she realized that she did not get any answers about her earlier questions. "Senpai, stop, senpaaaaai!"

"Senpai, please tell me where we are going!" Mashu, who was plunged into an increasingly strange world over the past few hours, was desperately trying to get at least some answers from Momonga "Where are we going, what happened with your hand, where did you get so much mana, what happened here…"

A resounding girlish scream interrupted Mashu's tirade.

"Someone in trouble!" The girl instantly realized. "We must hurry!"

Judging by the fact that the firefly of the spell continued to hang in the same place, exactly where the cry of a certain girl was coming from, it was obvious that that is where they should rush.

A second later, Mashu practically flew out to the site only to see her friend, desperately fighting off the attacking monsters. Momonga, who had followed out after her, also recalled the girl's appearance. white hair, dropping below the shoulder, sharp features, a snub nose, a black jacket draped over her shoulders, turning into a white skirt — there was no doubt.

"Lev!" Taking a step back and chanting spells, trying at least a little to reduce the number of attackers there was the chief of Chaldea on her own. "Lev, save me! Lev, please!"

"Olga Marie!" Memories of the strange name of a friend made Momonga sigh. And then people with a name like Olga Marie Animusphere consider the nickname Touch Me strange!

"Mashu?!" Turning to the voice, the girl immediately noticed first the Servant and then Momon. "What is happening?!"

"No idea!" With these words, Mashu crashed into a group of skeletons, frantically waving her shield, demolishing several skeletons at a time.

It was over quickly, the pure power of Mashu and her huge shield did their job in a couple of minutes. Turning the advancing skeletons into heaps of bones.

"Interesting." Thoughtfully Momon saw the last skull flying off with a complicated gaze. "Should I sympathize with the undead being destroyed? We are of the same species, after all."

"It seems that it is over." After that Mashu stopped for a second, catching her breath. "Chief, are you injured?"

Glancing at Mashu, the chief blinked several times.

"Chief." the Demi-servant immediately tried to explain. "The thing is I..."

"You merged with a Servant, I know." Marie immediately cut her off and looked at Momonga. "You! Why the hell did you become her Master?!

"What?" Looking at Animusphere, the man looked surprised.

"Why did you agree to his demands?!" Having looked at Mashu, the chief immediately tried to lecture her as well. "Do you at least understand what you now doomed yourself to?!"

"No, chief, you got it wrong!" The carrier of the shield tried to defend him. "I forced Momon to become my Master — he tried to dissuade me!"

"Chief, we are in a critical situation!" Realizing that the brief respite in the accusations was short, Mashu tried to instantly describe the whole situation. "We were dragged into reyshifting and so we all came here. The remaining masters either died or are in a critical situation. However, chief, if you're here…"

"There is no one beside us." The Animusphere instantly responded to the unspoken assumption. "If we are here, then it only means that no one could be here except us. Reyshifting without a capsule is possible, but its probability is very low, so the device would not have launched it without a capsule if it were possible to send a capsule here. In other words we ended up here only because no one except us could be here."

"So we are alone." Momonga concluded.

"That's correct." Looking at the man, the Animusphere frowned. "Hey, you! You are the forty-eighth master who came here by accident! How could you even be here?!"

"Are you in a position to insult your rescuers?" Momonga wanted to protest, but he only breathed and exhaled. "Just like you. Through reyshifting."

"Well seems like in any case, I have no choice." With a sigh, the girl shook her head. "I recognize your contract with Mashu as valid and from now on you will be under my command! And my first order is the arrangement of the base. We need to establish contact with the headquarters and a powerful source of mana, such as the leyline…"

"By the way about a powerful source of mana…" After these words Mashu glanced at Momonga, but he only slightly waved his head at it.

"What?" Nonetheless Mashu drew attention of Animusphere.

"You're standing on the leyline." The girl immediately changed her thoughts.

"Huh?" Uncomprehendingly she responded. "And... And I knew it!"

Olga Marie took a step aside, then commanded, trying to recover from her mistake. "Put the catalyst on the floor! I will use it to create a connection!"

In fact, Momonga could just send the girl home, using a spell like Gate, but the memories of hi skeletal hand forced him to wait a little with this option.

"Senpai?" Mashu turned to Momonga, to which he only affirmatively shook his head. "Okay…"

The spell circle is instantly drawn on the floor, after which Olga took a step towards it, stretching out her arms.

"Au, headquarters, headquarters in touch!" -Rang out a voice in from the drawn circle in a couple of seconds. "Oh, chief, you are alive!"

"Romani!" The shout of the chief spread throughout the area. "Why the hell are you in charge, Romani?! Where is Lev?!"

"Chief, how did you survive?! You were in the very center of the explosion!" Roman was unable to keep his surprise, but he nevertheless shook his head and was able to start talking. "Including me, only twenty people from all of Chaldea survived. Professor Lev was in the very center of control room when the explosion happened, I think…"

"N-no..." After the last phrase she heard, the girl's eyes filled with tears "Lev, he..."

"I'm sorry, chief" Roman said with regret.

"No, wait." But only after a couple of sobs, Olga still managed to take control of herself. "Twenty people... Why are there so few?! But what about the masters?!"

"All the capsules are either destroyed or permanently damaged." Said the man in a dark voice "Unfortunately, we had no opportunity..."

"Call in the cryo-storage facility immediately!" Animusphere Instantly reacted.

"But, chief, this is a matter of jurisdiction..." Mashu tried to get into the conversation, but she turned out to be cut sharply.

"Better I end up in prison later than let them die now!" Olga Marie's answer was instant and certain. "Lev... If only Lev was here!"

"Chaldea has lost four fifths of its functionality." However, Romani continued the report. "The remaining people are divided into three jobs; controlling reyshifting, repairing Chaldea and supporting S.H.E.B.A. We are trying to establish contact with the outside world. If we succeed, we will be able to get supplies and a rescue team."

After a moment of silence, Roman tried to say it as gently as possible ."Chief, we will build everything back and pull you out. Everything will be fine, chief…"

"Do not reassure me as if I am hysterical!" In the contrary of what is implied, the girl shouted into the air. "Of course, we will rebuild everything! So, although I don't like it - Dr. Romani Akiman, before my return, you are appointed as my deputy and interim director of Chaldea!"

"It's my honor, chief!" Trying to convey his joyful smile through speaking, Roman disconnected after these words.

"So, in the meantime, we are going to solve this problem!" Raising her finger in the air, the Animusphere solemnly uttered. "Our goal is to find the cause of the existence of the Singularity and the cause of the disappearance of humanity!"

"Upon returning, another battle for Chaldea awaits us!" But after bravado, the girl's voice suddenly died out. "Now, with the financiers and magicians..."

"But the right to serve and fight during the greatest difficulties is the honor of the Animuspheree family!" Proudly raising her chin the girl then sighed. "And so now we are going to solve the mystery of the disappearance of humanity!"

Status: Grand Servant

Grand Servant status is given only to those Servants who left an indelible mark on Earth that remained in all cultures, like the wisdom of Solomon, or those whose strength cannot be contained within the frame of understanding of ordinary human reason. It is impossible to say exactly what happens earlier - the Servant receives Grand status and become powerful, or it achieves incredible strength first, but the correlation of these two things is undeniable.

All Grand Servants have the power and ability beyond even the most powerful of ordinary Servants - and usually are such important historical and mythological figures who themselves are the center of whole epics, like the Magus of Flowers, that the very faith of humanity in their importance allows them not only to become the strongest, but also to maintain their existence independently without the help of not only a Master, but also without the help of third-party systems, such as the Throne of Heroes or the Moon Cell, appearing simply because in the mind of the observer they exist on their own.

Usually, using these same forces, Grand Servants easily avoid an unenviable fate - it is impossible to limit its power or to erase from the World the history of someone who left such a powerful mark, it is as impossible as to kill a creature that in the mind of the observer it exists not as a separate myth, but as the central basis of the mythology itself.

The main function of the Grand Servants is to preserve the history of humanity and fight with Beasts or Evils of Mankind. Usually, Grand Servants are called by the World itself to protect itself, as a counterweight against creatures of such destructive power that threatens the World itself, but still, in some cases, the Grand Servants can be called in other situations, however only when it involved a power comparable to the will of the world itself.

There are only seven Grand Servants at a time, one for each class — however, the servants who are suitable for becoming Grand Servants are much more than that, and therefore, if one existing Grand Servant ceases to be such — for example, in the case of its own death —the Grand Servant status simply goes to the next possible candidate.

Despite the fact that there are only seven Grand Servants at a time, embodying the highest manifestations of the seven standard classes, Grand status only means that this Servant is most suited to incarnate in its class, possessing strength, history and mythology sufficient alone to incarnate each Servant of this class, therefore, theoretically, the status of a Grand Servant is possible for any existing class, and their maximum number is not limited.