How had it come to this?

For the newly transmigrated individual, the last sixty or so hours were like a strange dream. That at any moment, he'd wake up back in his bed, or in a hospital bed, and be back in the 'real world'. But every time he closed his eyes, he opened them back to this place.

Place being a fictional world.

He even checked his left hand every so often to see if the tattoo would disappear. But the 'eye of providence' looking marking would always stare back. Etched in bright red upon his pale skin.

Skin that was not his, in a body he was shoved into by means unknown to him. It still surprised him when he looked in a mirror. What stared back was not him, but the face of some albino: pale skin, red eyes, white hair.

A female body.

No, it was worse than that! He wasn't merely in the body of a woman but a child!

A body that barely reached five feet!

Hell, Morgan had to rematerialize herself multiple times to stop some random pedestrians from calling child services at the sight of an unaccompanied minor 'alone'. She would hypnotize them, and they'd be off. Though to be fair, if he saw a little albino girl walking around at night in some Lolita looking get up, he'd either ask if she was okay, or walk away very slowly.

Honestly, he found the whole situation more annoying than anything else.

But it just kept happening!

It eventually reached the point where Morgan decided to just stay materialized next to him, and if prompted would claim that he was her 'daughter'.

Ugh.

So now here he was. A grown man whose mind (soul?) was shoved into the body of a little girl homunculus on a private jet off to Japan to compete in a battle royal between mythical heroes and mages in an anime world.

Fuck his life.

He groaned as he pushed his into the small window of his seat, feeling the vibrations of the engines against the aircraft's frame as he lamented his current situation.

Going by the fact that this was the 90s, not the 2000s, it meant he was in The Fourth Grail War. A quote-unquote "Normal" Grail War. Even if a Servant doesn't kill him, there is a good chance he'll be headshotted by Kiritsugu when he least expects it.

So, what to do?

Not going to Fuyuki is out of the question. Afterall, what would the rest of the Moonlit world see if he were to just wait for the events of canon to just blow over? At best, they'll assume Caster wants to just run amuck somewhere. At worst, they'll assume he is going to use Caster to run amuck somewhere. Either situation results in the same outcome, his death.

Maybe he could get out of the War by using a Command Spell to have his Servant kill herself after arriving in Fuyuki, then seek asylum at the Church. He wondered if Kotomine, the Father that is, would raise a ruckus about it. He is, after all, siding with the Tohsakas to rig the War in their favor. Even if a competitor up and giving up before the War starts is unheard of, he doubted either of them would complain if the number of competitors was reduced from seven to six.

'But then what about his son and Gilgamesh' he remined himself.

He seriously doubted that Kotomine, the son, would extend the Church's neutrality to him after he takes over following his Father's death. Or if he did, the homunculus had no illusions that he wouldn't just end up as a mana battery for Gilgamesh if he managed to survive the War.

Actually, speaking of servants…..

When the transmigrated youth was informed of his servant's true nature, he didn't know what to think. Morgan Le Fay was the archetypal witch: malicious, cruel, conniving, vengeful, and powerful were all words used to describe her. Her whole ensemble of black and blue didn't help the perception of 'evil' her legacy had cultivated over the centuries.

He expected to have to put up with some evil witch who would push the bounds of morality and ethics.

He had steeled himself for a constant tug of war for respect as she constantly does her own thing and undermines him.

And yet…

With a side glance, he could see the infamous Morgan Le Fay quietly lounging to her heart's content. Seat reclined, shoes off, book in hand, two empty bags of chips and a half-filled glass of orange juice next to her. Her icy green eyes read each page with a speed he had never seen before. A soft smile graced her lips as she noticed his eyes on her.

After they had initially reached civilization and acquired clothes for him, female clothes to the homunculus's eternal chagrin, Morgan had been insistent that they then go to a nearby bookstore and 'procure tomes'. By 'tomes' she apparently meant history and geography books. They were each thick enough to stop a bullet and, from what little he skimmed of them while he waited for Morgan to hypnotize the cashier to explain how a credit card worked, they looked like the driest texts he had ever laid eyes on.

And yet for the past six hours of their flight, on a privet jet that Morgan procured with a mix of hypnotized crew and money she acquired from that other magus, she had finished three of them! She stacked them up as a little tower next to her seat. He expected the next one to join her tower within the next hour or so.

"Master?" Le Fay's voice broke his thoughts.

"I'm sorry I-" his new damn voice still tripped him up. Far too high pitched and childish. "Sorry. What did you say?"

"I didn't say anything, but you have been staring vacantly in my general direction for the past ten minutes," she replied, marking her current page before softly closing her book. "Is something bothering you?"

'I'm in the body of a little girl, the fuck do you think,' he wanted to snap back.

"This whole situation is just a bit…much for me," he decided on instead. "The Holy Grail War. Seven Masters. Seven Servants. All fighting for a wish. Six pairs lose, one pair win." Not a lie, but not necessarily the whole truth.

"True," Morgan agreed, "though I wouldn't focus too much on that. We are going to win after all."

Wow, that's either supreme overconfidence on her part or gross underestimation of the other servants, he thought.

"Don't look at me like that," she reprimanded him in a playful tone. "I am well aware of the risks and dangers of the Grail War, I am merely confident in our odds of success."

"But your parameters…" he started.

A while back, when they were trudging through the forest to civilization, he had absently wondered how strong Morgan was, apparently that though triggered 'Master's Perspective'; an innate skill all Masters have that gave him a complete rundown of Caster's stats.

While overall, he assumed, it was a good spread for a Caster class with stats like [Magical Energy (A+)] or skills like [Item Creation  (EX)] one stat stood out to him: [Endurance (E)]. Basically, she was a glass cannon; capable of dishing disgusting amounts of damage, but brittle to a fault. One good hit, and that's it.

When up against the likes of (assuming the Grail War's other participants are still the same) Artoria, Gilgamesh, Alexander the Great, Diarmuid, Lancelot, and Hassan of The Hundred Faces, being brittle was not a good thing.

"My power will be more than sufficient to defeat any foe that crosses our path", Morgan declared with a small huff. "Instead of focusing on a possible defeat, why don't you consider what you shall use your wish for."

'My wish,' he groaned internally again. He almost forgot about that. The prize of this War, the Grail, is a damned monkey's paw in the form of a gilded chalice.

Assuming this is the 'main' timeline, that meant the Grail was already corrupted. Any wish he makes, no matter how the size, will just backfire on him. Wish to see the Root? It'll probably open a path that causes the whole world to be crushed by the gravitational force of a blackhole. Wish for world peace? It'll kill every human on Earth. Hell, even a simple "I wish to go home" thing will probably result in the two Earth's being smashed into one another.

He ought to just destroy it.

"My wish is for my birthright," Morgan's declaration brought him back to the conversation, seeing her Master's silence as indecision.

"Birthright?" he parroted.

"Indeed," Morgan nodded. "My sister stole the throne of Britain from me. My wish is to reclaim the throne that is rightfully mine."

"But-," he bit his tongue before he commented on how Camelot, or whatever the kingdom's name was before Artoria, is dead and long gone. If she meant just the crown of Britain, did that mean she wanted to replace Queen Elizabeth?

"Go on Master" she urged him on, "you have a question, no need to tiptoe around it."

"How," he had to word this the right way. "How…Why do you think the throne your birthright."

He swore to himself with how he worded that, and waited for an angry rant about usurpers and Artoria stealing her throne; the memory of what she did to that guy who thought he was summoning King Arthur with a shard of Excalibur, was still fresh in his mind.

But instead, what he got was a knowing smile. Without a word, she raised her hand before him. Before he asked what she was doing, he saw something appear out of thin air from her palm. A black, oily, mist slithered its way into existence. It coiled around her fingers and traced its way up to the ceiling of the cabin.

"This," Morgan motioned to the mist, "is the primeval energy native to Britain. When the Isle chooses its next king, it bestows the ability to use its energy to them. My father could wield it as well, though to a lesser degree than myself. Therefore, the crown should have naturally passed on to me. For what greater right to rule a land is there, than to be chosen by the land itself?"

'To be chosen by the people who live on the land,' he bit back that response. That would surely make her rage.

"Not only I my Father's eldest, but chosen by the Isle itself to be its ruler," she went on, though her smile slowly turned to a grimace. "It is nothing less that usurpation that my sister took the throne rightfully mine. What right did she have to my crown; a sword from a rock? When the very Mysteries of the Island chose me to succeed my Father, what more legitimacy do I need for myself. Sadly, in his old age, or from the whisperings of that demon, my younger sister succeeded him; my fate was to be the broodmare of King Lot in Orkney."

Ah! There was the venom and bitterness he was expecting.

"So, that is my wish Master," she dismissed the black mist with a wave of her hand and looked him in the eyes. "To claim the crown that was rightfully mine, to undo the mistakes of the past, and to right the wrongs inflicted upon me."

So, her wish was to go back in time and change the fate of Britain?

He doubted Morgan would like to hear how closely her wish mirrored her sister's.

"But what about you Master," Morgan changed the subject, "what would your wish be?"

"I don't know," he freely admitted.

The homunculus didn't say anything more on the issue, nor did his servant push for anything.

Soon enough, sleep took him.

--
--
--

Morgan smiled at the sight of her little Master drifting to sleep.

Turning her head to one of the bewitched servants on the plane, she gestured for the woman to refill her beverage. Eyes glazed over; the woman obeyed. Satisfied with the amount poured, she dismissed the serving girl back to her station.

Drinking the fruit drink, she mused about her current predicament.

If only she had been brought to this world sooner, she would have taken a detour before going to the far east. Morgan wished to see if her works in Blackmore had come to fruition; to see if her work bore fruit. To see if something of her's remained in this world so devoid of mystery. Alas, while she had no idea of when this war would begin, she could feel in her very being that it was soon.

Maybe it was for the best. Her nature as a heroic spirit allowed her to summon a perfect copy of the Holy Lance, so her combat capabilities would not be affected. Of course, one could wonder if she had two lances at her disposal; the world would surely tremble before her.

She spared one last glance at her Master, who as snuggled herself into a blanket, before returning to her own thoughts.

For a homunculus, she was remarkable human like. Basic awareness of social cues. Healthy sense of self preservation. Good capacity for critical thinking. Bit of a blank slate, but she's interacted with worse. And on a magical side, her Master held a very impressive number of magic circuits within her; ninety circuits of extremely high quality that would let Morgan use her true strength in the War.

Overall, she could not have asked for a better Master for the War.

But not everything was perfect.

For like all homunculi she has come across, her Master was created with innate deficiencies; the cost of creating life artificially she supposed. These deficiencies varied by homunculus. Some had weakened immunes systems that would cave to the slightest infection. Others had brittle bones; a well-placed punch could shatter every bone in their body. And other still had more bizarre complications, like missing vital organs, or were created with cancerous growths already in their bodies.

Her Master was both lucky and damned in equal measures.

Her body was fully function to the level of a human of an equivalent age to her size. All her organs were where they should be and functioning at peak efficiency. Her frame might be forever frozen in pubescence, and her physical strength might be weaker than most, but she knows that this is considered a resounding success by magus's who create artificial life.

Of course, that does not mean she does not have a life expectancy measured in months.

For as good as her body was, it was horribly optimized for the magic circuits crammed into her.

Her ninety extremely high-quality circuits, the envy of any magus, will be her death. If not from the heat they will generate that will cook her alive from the inside out, it will be the strain they will place on her body to simply have them there.

At best, Morgan would give her Master four months before her body begins to break down in earnest. But that was only assuming her Master abstained from useing her circuits for anything. Were she to use magecraft, in addition to passively supplying Morgan with mana her life will be measured in weeks.

But she supposed when considering that her Master's creator was planning on using twenty homunculi over the course of the entire war as disposable batteries, that fact shouldn't be too surprising. It was something she would have to investigate; prolonging the girl's life that is. If she proved loyal and true, Morgan planned to take her back to Britain with her upon their victory and give her some position at court.

Loyal service should be rewarded after all.

But another thought was nagging at her.

Given the nature of the catalyst used, the possible Servants that corpulent magus could have feasibly called upon was rather limited. With the shard of Accolon in his possession, there were only two possible Servants he could have summoned: Sir Accolon, or herself. It doesn't matter that he thought he had a shard of Excalibur, what matters is what you do have.

And then out of all the people in that room, she was chosen.

Ignoring the man who sought to be her Master in this war (or HER in truth), the rest of his compatriots no doubt also had delusions of grandeur and would no doubt salivate at the chance of attaining a wish from the Grail. Men and women who would gladly throw their families to the wayside for simply the chance of the Grail.

And yet still she was chosen, the supposed battery.

From what she knows, both from what she was told by the sniveling magi before they died or given to her upon her manifestation to the world, the Grail does not generally choose random people on a whim. A participant in the War must desire something to warrant their entry. Even something as simple as a 'wish to live' would be sufficient. If the participant has no catalyst, then the Grail attempts, if able, to match the most compatible personality to a Master.

So, the supposedly blank slate homunculus was seen as the most compatible with her. Morgan was unsure of what to say about that determination.

Though, given that the mage did have a catalyst, her best guess was that ritual he intended was preformed incorrectly. Or more likely performed it in reverse. Basically giving the girl Master status and made the magi the battery. It would explain why Morgan felt more powerful after killing the man, once she disposed of the lout her Master would have reverted to being her primary supplier of mana.

But something still nagged at her.

Compared to the other homunculi, her master was clearly an anomaly. None of them were of the mage's own design. From his staff's own admissions he bought the template from another magus in the lands of Romania (who themselves stole it from yet another family), then tinkered with it until he had his desired creation.  

In essence, all of them were copies of inferior copies. None of the homunculi, her Master included, were the genuine article; no matter how desperately the man wanted others to believe as such by dyeing the homunculi's hair white and eyes red. All other homunculi in that workshop had limited cognitive capacity intentionally worked into them. Their mental facilities were no more than mere children at best. Capable of some autonomy, but no real capacity for critical thinking or self-preservation.

Of course, this didn't count the small army of combat homunculi he bought by the dozens the man had stashed away at the estate they were going to.

That said, he did extensive work on her master's 'model', mostly just shoving as many magic circuits in them as nature would allow him to.

'More than enough to sustain HER,' the back of Morgan's mind insidiously whispered, reminding her of the mage's intended Servant.

Morgan waved the thought from her mind before wrath set in.

Now as not the time to be wasting any though on HER. Arotria's time would come; all the traitors who followed her banner would be brought to answer for their crimes of treason. Justice would be meted out. She would have what was stolen from her.

She would accept nothing else.

Morgan felt a smile grace her lips at the thought of a Britain under her rightful rule.

But for now, she would relax and acquaint herself with this strange new world she found herself in. While the Grail gave her all the knowledge to not gawk at passing automobiles like some backwater commoner, it did not inform her of all the historical events that occurred to her homeland in the times since she passed on. From what little she read, her land became a cauldron of war and conquest following her passing pushing the Britons off their ancestral land: First it was the Germans, then Northman, then the Frankish Northmen (would that not make them German again?) and so on. Though from what she has read, Britain does eventually become the center of a world spanning empire, so the situation is not as bleak as it appears at face value but she would have to read more before she reached her conculsion on that issue.

So for now, she would busy herself with learning what has happened to her homeland.

Then it would be time to plan, and plot, and scheme her and her Master's way to victory.

--
--
--

"Caster was summoned."

Tokiomi Tohsaka, patriarch of the honorable Tohsaka Family, drummed his fingers along the fine oak of his desk as Father Kotomine's words echoed through the jewlcraft instrument off to the side.

"Later than their Master would have wanted I imagine," Tokiomi mused as he made a note on the matter; a small record he kept of the order in which the servants were summoned.

Even without knowing their true identities, knowing which class was summoned when was still a powerful tool. While the three knight classes, Saber, Archer, and Lancer, were all around powerful, the cavalier classes, Assassin, Berserker, Rider, and Caster, all had unique quirks to them.

And of the cavalier classes the most dangerous, if summoned far enough out from the start of the Holy Grail War, was Caster. While the class is regarded by the wider Moonlight world as the weakest overall, Tokiomi believed the class was less about overt strength or killing power and more centered on timing. Specifically, the time to use abilities like "Territory Creation" to the fullest. Tohsaka records from the previous three Wars confirms as such; with special mention to the Caster of the Second War who was able to sustain themselves beyond the death of their Master.

He believed if given enough time, a Caster can turn even a mundane hovel into an impenetrable fortress protected by mysteries long since lost to the world.

Thankfully, as he noted, that was not the case for this war.

Caster has been the fifth Servant summoned. Assuming the Master Servant pair will spend an amount of time traveling to Fuyuki, they will have less then a week to fortify themselves. And if the summoning occurred near Fuyuki, they would have only a week. The matter was simple then, have Kirie send in Assassin at the first opportunity to eliminate them; lest Caster wait out the War as the other Masters and Servants battle each other. Only emerging at the last moment when the victors are exhausted.

'Assassin, Saber, Lancer, Archer, and now Caster,' Tokiomi thought. 'Only Berserker and Rider remain.'

"Perhaps," the Father continued. "But so far, the situation regarding Caster and their Master is…Unusual."

"Oh? In what way," Tokiomi inquired. "Was the Summoning abnormal in some way?"

"As far was we can tell, the summoning ritual was preformed properly. We are not dealing with an Avenger-like situation," 'this time' went unsaid. While Avenger was the weakest class of the prior War, that did not mean other non-standard classes would share its frailty.

"No, the issue at hand is that we are unsure of who is in control."

"Explain."

"We know where the general area where the Servant was summoned, but the only sign who might have performed the ritual is buried under a burnt down warehouse with the charred remains of a dozen magi and homunculi."

"So, the Servant killed its first summoner and contracted with another?" Tokiomi proposed. Unusual, but not unheard of. Should a Servant be so disgusted, or dismissive, of their Master for one reason or another, they could kill their summoner before a command spell is used to enforce their loyalty.

An issue that Tokiomi was all too aware of at the moment. The prideful King of Heroes was currently helping himself to his mansion's amenities. In all his years, he has never met a more petulant and arrogant individual. It took all his willpower to not snap back at Archer's condescension and dismissal of his worth. But, for as much as he despised paying the role of a meek man, having Archer cooperate with him willingly was worth any momentary humiliation. He would gladly humiliate himself if it meant acquiring a route to the Root; thus, securing the dominance of the Tohsaka family for future generations.

So, Tokiomi resisted the urge to use a Command Spell to demand Archer hold his tongue; no matter how many times he was tempted.

He could hear Kotomine grimace through the connection. "When the Church's investigators explored the site of the phenomenon, they found a registry and inventory book under the foundations of the building. It gave us a wealth of information that greatly aided the investigation. Despite the state of the remains, we've determined that all the magi that worked there died in whatever happened. More importantly, while there were twenty homunculi noted in the workshop's inventory, we only recovered the remains of nineteen."

It took Tokiomi mere moments to understand what the Father was implying. "Your saying Caster forcibly transferred the command seals to the homunculus, who now is both their source of prana and technical Master in the War."

"That's the theory our investigators reached," Kotomine agreed. "And the lead magus at the workshop, a man named Daniel Norton, is very active for a dead man. His bank accounts have been constantly withdrawing money in the days following his death."

"Wait, Norton?" Tohsaka interrupted.

"Familiar with the name?"

"By reputation alone," he explained. Even in Fukyki, the grandstanding boasts of the Norton family's self-proclaimed titles of 'Emperor of the United States' and 'Protector of Mexico' were well known. Naturally, no one at the Magus Association recognizes or acknowledges either title. At best, he was 'Master' of San Francisco; but only when no other magus was there. "The man is a fourth-generation magus with delusions of grandeur far beyond his station. Now that I think about it, I heard from my contacts at the Clocktower that he was talking about the Grail War. Dropping quite unsubtle hints of his own participation in the conflict."

"Apparently not mere boasting," Kotomine added. "But instead of being the Master, he was a casualty of his own hubris."

"Such is the path of a magus." The Tohsaka head solemnly noted. For to walk the path of a magus was to walk a bloody path.

The priest cleared his throat. "That being said, we still have the issue of a Caster acting along the lines of a participant rather than a Servant now. How are we going to proceed?"

Tokiomi drummed his finger again.

"You said that money was being withdrawn from Norton's accounts."

"Yes. Recently, his account paid for an upscale home here in Fuyuki City; but that was before his death. However, a private passenger jet was paid for this morning for a flight to a small airport in Honshu. I don't think I need to explain what all this amounts to Tokiomi."

The magus digested the information and sighed. "If Caster is on their way here, then we do nothing."

"Nothing?"

"Despite their seeming autonomy, Caster is still acting within The Holy Grail War's rules," Tokiomi rationalized. "No matter how unusual the situation is, there is a Servant summoned by the Grail, and a Master who feeds them prana to sustain their form in this world. Despite the rather, macabre events surrounding the summoning, no rule has been violated. Both Master and Servant are on their way here to compete in the War; just as six other pairs will."

He could hear Father Kotomine sigh over the instrument, "As head of one of the three families, I shall defer to you on the matter; though I still have my reservations."

"Have some faith Father. With Archer and your son's Assassin, the War is as good as concluded," Tokiomi told the holy man.

He didn't think the Father was as convinced as the Tohsaka head, but he did not raise the point again.

Truthfully, deep down, Tokiomi would be lying if he said that the thought of meeting a Servant of the Caster class didn't intrigue him. To have a conversation, no matter how brief, with a heroic sprit of a long dead mage who lived during the time when magic was a greater force in the world. Under a banner of truce naturally.

He could only imagine what sage and august mage was called forth by the Grail.