Player Information
Name: Emily
Age: older than time itself, i have been here since before the sun and i shall be here after this planet turns to dust
Contact details:
deerleisureOther characters: Shiho Miyano (Ai Haibara)
Character Information
Name: Caster (True Name: Ea-nasir)
Canon: Fate/ (alternate universe with an original Holy Grail War)
Canon Point: End of third route, surviving the Holy Grail War
OU/AU/CRAU/OC: Canon OC
Age: 3,800 even. Appears in her 20s.
World Information: The world of
fate/. In this AU, the first Holy Grail War didn't happen until 2004, in Fuyuki, where an accident on the part of that War's Caster fucked up Fuyuki bigtime, and also fucked up the Holy Grail. The second Holy Grail War occurs in Vancouver Island in 2029, which is where Ea-nasir comes in. (So, technically, this is an AU of Fate/Grand Order.)
Personal History: In the city of Ur, in ancient Mesopotamia, Ea-nasir was a merchant, operating all along the Persian Gulf. During her life, ranging through the mid 1700-BC's, she was known as a merchant who regularly ripped off her customers. The first customer complaint in history is attributed to a customer complaining about Ea-nasir delivering low quality copper and refusing to give a refund. And it didn't stop there - complaints have been found about Ea-nasir and her dealings in real estate, kitchenware, clothing, second-hand goods, and more.
In truth (canon), Ea-nasir
was much like that in life. She was notorious, with good reason, but still successful - partially due to lack of easy and direct communications back in her day, but also due to her silver tongue and quick thinking. She ripped off men, merchants, and kings, and lived to tell each tale, even collecting their complaints in her home. She did this in the Age of Gods, when magic was abundant, evading curses and ripping off those with powers as easily as she did others. She even made it a point of pride to rip off those with great powers. But in the end, she passed away with moderate wealth and a terrible reputation. That should have been the end. But it wasn't.
During the many years following, and even preceding, mankind complained about her and other merchants. Swindlers, conmen. People who cheated their customers and laughed about it. These collected resentments would grow and take root in the world itself. These collected resentments, aimed at sellers and merchants and hospitality agents, continued to grow. While the life of a single merchant, Ea-nasir, faded into obscurity, this resentment took root in the Throne of Heroes as an anti-hero, a legend without a face. Resentment given form.
Things changed thousands of years later. In 1953,
a clay tablet was found in Ur during an excavation, a complaint from a merchant named Nanni to Ea-nasir. This would become known as the world's first letter of complaint. Shortly thereafter, other tablets began to be excavated, complaints to Ea-nasir.
A name was given to the nameless resentment that had built up over the centuries. Ea-nasir became the focus of all of this resentment that had built up within the Throne of Heroes, putting a name and legend. In this way, the spirit of Ea-nasir, the merchant, merged with the spirit of consumer complaints, the very idea of the bad merchant, the swindler. The Ea-nasir that existed within the Throne of Heroes was equal parts of both.
Meanwhile in the world, the First Holy Grail War was held in Fuyuki in 2004, matching the Fate/Grand Order timeline. However, Marisbury Animusphere and his Servant, Caster, also known as Solomon, ended up causing great damage to both Fuyuki and the Grand Grail. This doesn't involve Ea-nasir, but sets up the next bit.
Twenty-five years later, in 2029, the Second Holy Grail War is declared. A location similar to Fuyuki is sought after and chosen, and the Mage Association picks Vancouver Island, a large island off the coast of the Pacific Northwestern US and British Columbia. However, there are a couple further irregularities, such as the overseers sent by the Holy Church's Assembly of the Eighth Sacrament being killed, prompting a replacement to be sent in the form of Evan Goodman.
The child of those murdered church members, Kyrie, arrives in Vancouver Island to investigate, and stumbles across a summing ritual that her parents had not been able to complete. The ritual was meant to summon the King of Heroes, Gilgamesh. However, the focus of the summoning was a complaint sent by the King of Heroes about a merchant... and so when Kyrie completed the summoning, the Heroic Spirit she received was Caster, Ea-nasir.
The Holy Grail War was meant to be a death match between seven Servants, summoned as the classes Saber, Lancer, Archer, Rider, Caster, Assassin, and Berserker. The winning pair - Master and Servant - would receive a wish from the Holy Grail.
Kyrie was obsessed with finding a "Golden Ending", a way to end the war with minimum casualties, using kindness and hope to find a way forward. However, things didn't work out so well in this Holy Grail War. Assassin (Lu Bu) and his Master couldn't be reasoned with, and they ended up killing Lancer (Pheidippides) very quickly. Ea-nasir did attempt to negotiate with Rider (Marina Raskova) and her Master, but when those negotiations fell through, Ea-nasir used the power of her Noble Phantasm to ruin the copper circuits in Rider's plane, which would result in the deaths of both Rider and Archer (Simo Hayha.)
Things come to a head on December 1st. It was mentioned that the Holy Grail had been damaged, and this becomes relevant. The Grail is not meant to draw in more energy once a Grail War has started, but due to the previous War, it doesn't know when to stop, continuing to draw in more and more mana from the world. Evan, the Holy Church's overseer, is going to try and use all of this to overtake the Holy Grail War.
Ea-nasir confronts Saber (Jeanne d'Arc), who was summoned by Evan. Saber agrees with Kyrie's idea of trying to find a peaceful path, but cannot rebel against the wishes of his Master due to the number of Command Seals at Evan's disposal. Ea-nasir attempts to undo the Command Seals by way of her Noble Phantasm, but doesn't succeed, and is killed by Saber.
This all leads to the next confrontation, wherein Berserker (Galatea) and her Master, Rikka, face off against Saber. During this, Saber is forced to overuse the fires of La Pucelle, a secondary Noble Phantasm, and is turned into a dragon. Rikka is the one who ends this - she is an anomaly, possessing the soul of a Dead Apostle, a being which should not exist in this world. She takes advantage of this to summon the Dead Apostle Ancestor's Conceptual Weapon, Spear of Longinus, which annihilates Saber, along with Berserker and Rikka. With its activation, though, the Counter Force begins to eat away at the concept of Rikka's existence, even after death.
What does this mean? And what does it have to do with Ea-nasir, who's already dead?
Well, to answer that, we need to talk about parallel universes. In the world of fate/,
parallel worlds are a known phenomenon, and can be accessed through the
Second Magic, Kaleidoscope. But the Counter Force is the will of the planet itself, and it operates through parallel worlds. So when Rikka activated the Spear of Longinus, the Counter Force began erasing her existence in all parallel worlds as well.
In one Adjacent World (a parallel world from a very small divergence), the Second Holy Grail War was beginning. Ea-nasir fared much worse in this iteration, being sniped by Archer and killed in a single head-shot - likely traumatizing her master, Kyrie, who was next to her.
Kyrie would go on to fight through that trauma and still try and reach a Golden Ending. However, Rikka falls into despair in this timeline, the truth of her condition being revealed to her by Evan, memories of the previous parallel world coming back to her through her connection to it, and her very existence being erased. But Kyrie, Berserker, Lancer, and Lancer's Master, a homunculus named Mondial Ribbok Vardaman, stood against Rikka, Lancer's Noble Phantasm allowing him to soak up every hit even with the power of a Dead Apostle behind it. Kyrie manages to friendship speech Rikka down. Combining Rikka's connection with the Second Magic Kaleidoscope and Lancer's legend as a messenger who can deliver anything, they send several memories into (another) parallel world.
Enter the timeline that Ea-nasir is actually coming from. Using the memories of what happened in previous timelines, Lancer and Rikka form an alliance between their two teams, very quickly joining forces with Ea-nasir and Kyrie, who believe in finding a Golden Ending. Ea-nasir is fundamental in forming alliances with the other Servants, and this time is able to succeed due to the greater bargaining power of the alliance behind her.
However, none of this solves the issue of Rikka's existence being erased. Until Ea-nasir combines the powers of her Item Creation, Berserker's Noble Phantasm, and Rikka's connection to Kaleidoscope in order to create a fake "Rikka" to become the target for the Counter Force. This works splendidly, meaning Ea-nasir has successfully scammed the entire world. But the Counter Force is aware of this after the fact, and unable to do anything having already "killed" the anomaly. But gaining the ire of the world only leads Ea-nasir to gain far more mana then she ever has before.
The final confrontation with Evan, who is attempting to use the broken Grail for his own purposes, seemed poised to go swimmingly, having the Servants united against him. But a Grail War without a war defeats the purpose, so Evan enacts an emergency measure to call forth a Great Grail War, summoning seven more Servants, an event that would be catastrophic. But Ea-nasir is hyped up on the power from scamming the Counter Force, and can push her Noble Phantasm to new heights. Stopping the new summoning ritual is out of the bounds of her power.... but distorting it into something else? That she can do.
So instead of seven true Servants, Evan summons seven Shadow Servants, imitations of Heroic Spirits that have not called the actual souls in from the Throne of Heroes. The fight is won in the favor of Ea-nasir and Kyrie and their grand alliance, and then.... she arrives on a train platform.
Personality: Ea-nasir is a figure of
legend. As a Servant, she embodies, specifically, that legend - she is not just the historical figure Ea-nasir, the merchant who dwelled in Ur in 1750 BC, but she
actually is the legend, blended together with the person. More than that, due to the nature of how she was made, she embodies the very
idea of the conman, the swindling merchant, and of somebody who not only causes grief but revels in it. Because of this, she acts like the legend suggests. She cons, swindles, she sells substandard quality items and laughs when people get angry. It's important, too, that she is not
simply a merchant, or that she gets rich or cares for money. The dishonesty, the tricks, the lies and misleads and misdeeds are all important to the legend, and she acts them out. And if people get angry at her for it, that's fine, good even.
That's not to say that Ea-nasir is, by definition, a bad person though. Ea-nasir has her own moral codes she tries to keep to, only reinforced through her experiences in the Second Grail War. She makes sure that nobody gets physically hurt through her scams and cons. And, when she can, she tries to either pick out victims that deserve or can afford the losses she'll bring, or else choose a method of con that will naturally draw in that sort of victim.
And her morals have extended past simply not being as bad as she could be. Her master, Kyrie, has really rubbed off on her a lot. Kyrie was
adamant about finding a "Golden Ending," a scenario where nobody has to die, and everybody can be friends. The ultimate expression of kindness. And Ea-nasir helped to bring that about, coming to believe in the cause herself. While still more practical than Kyrie, Ea-nasir too searches for a path forward where more people can be alive, happy, or even friends.
Ea-nasir was predisposed towards feeling good about forming bonds, though, such as friendship. As mentioned, she embodies the legends of Ea-nasir, and when you're the living embodiment of the con, people are reluctant to trust you, let alone make friends with you. That's why she values the friends she does make, the people who can trust her or are just... willing to put up with her company. She hardly desires to be the most loved person in the world - that would actually run counter to her legend directly - but she
does greatly appreciate making friends, and cherishes those she gains.
Those are all deep-seated questions of Ea-nasir's morals and philosophy. But there's more as well. Ea-nasir
was a very successful merchant, and she carries on those traits as well. Simply put, Ea-nasir is incredibly smart, even if she's not always acting the part. She has an incredible head for numbers, of course. But she also comes up with very good, intricate plans. It was Ea-nasir who crafted the plan at the end of the Second Grail War to not only ensure the Master Rikka survived, but to then use the energy she gained from that to prevent a Grand Grail War. Doing either would be the work of a genius, and Ea-nasir wove them together while also carrying out the task of fighting in the Second Grail War itself.
Also due to her merchant nature, it's understood that Ea-nasir is very skilled at dealing with people. She can sell ice to the Inuit, as the saying goes. She knows how to please people, how to piss people off. That's the only way she can take advantage of her Skills. On top of that, during the First and Third routes of the Second Holy Grail War, Ea-nasir acted as a negotiator, dealing with the intense personalities of the Servants and Masters, bargained with them and befriended them in equal measures in order to get them onto the same side. These are no simple feats.
It can definitely be said of her that Ea-nasir is driven. Obviously, she had to be driven in order to become a successful merchant. But it means that she throws herself 100% into whatever task is in front of her. Sometimes that means scamming somebody out of their hard-earned money. And sometimes that means finding a way to reach a happy ending through a Holy Grail War meant to kill 80% of its participants. But when she decides on something, she sees it through. That much is certain.
Beyond that all, Ea-nasir shows herself as somebody with a sense of humor. She genuinely tries to lighten the mood of whatever room she's in. Just because you're scamming somebody doesn't mean you can't have fun! Her humor ranges from the dry and sarcastic to making bad puns and then immediately laughing about it. However, her humor can also be biting and snide, making fun of the people around her. This is, in fact, even more true for people she likes than those she doesn't.
Since arriving in the modern world, Ea-nasir has come to love modern life. Modern technology is convenient! There's a wealth of food all around, all easily accessible. Plumbing exists. Vaccines are a thing. And air conditioning! What's not to love? Plus she finds adapting to new customs, logic, and life to be an invigorating mental challenge. The same scams she used to run might need a modern facelift - instead of selling low-quality copper ingots, she might pretend low-class wine is actually extremely expensive to sell to a collector. Or she might invent her own cryptocurrency, an idea that wouldn't even make sense to explain to somebody from her time. These things are great, and Ea-nasir genuinely appreciates them.
Overall, Ea-nasir walks the line between person and legend, trying to find the happy medium where she can be both true to herself and true to what she represents. She'll grasp happiness where she can - scam some people out of their money, and then go celebrate with friends.
Key themes: Bonds: Due to the nature of Ea-nasir's legend, it's hard for people to trust her, grow closer to her. But through the bonds she gains early on, especially with her Master, Kyrie, she begins to place greater value on them. And later, it's only through Ea-nasir's negotiations that bonds can form between all of the Servant and Masters involved in the Grail War.
Adaptation: Ea-nasir comes from ancient Mesopotamia, circa 1750 BC. Despite the Throne of Heroes providing modern knowledge, she has no practical experience in modern life, and she
actively attempts to correct this. She wants to adapt to the modern world, learn its tricks and secrets, how people act, how modern technology works, all of it. A good merchant adapts to the times.
Good: More specifically, Ea-nasir's journey involves
Discovering and Redefining What It Means to be Good. She is not, by definition, a Good Person. However, she challenges just what that means, when "bad" actions might not be so bad and how to counteract them with good. And she learns how to balance the needs of her legend and as a person with doing good thanks to the people around her.
Main Motivation: Greed: Ea-nasir wants everything. Money, yes. Power too. And she wants love. Friendship. She wants to protect people she cares about. She wants to live without a single
iota of compromise. And she won't accept anything less than all of it.
Skills:All Servants are superior to humans in terms of power, endurance, speed, and in the case of a Caster like Ea-nasir, magic. A Servant's power comes from their legend, and Ea-nasir's legend is
ancient, accruing power for almost four millennia. Because of this, Ea-nasir can face a powerful, world-famous legend, even though her own legend isn't as well-known - not to the point of guaranteed win, but she can expect a more level playing field, especially when combined with her other abilities.
In terms of stats, all of her physical stats are E-rank. As a Servant, this means that she's superior to a normal human, but can be bested by any supernaturally gifted human fighter. Her magical energy stat is B-rank, meaning in normal circumstances, she has about as much magic as your average Mage. Her luck, however, is ranked at A+, almost the pinnacle, meaning she is supernaturally lucky.
As a Caster, it's usually required that Ea-nasir possess magecraft, or genuine magic as seen through her legends. However, in Ea-nasir's case, she can't use proper magic. What she can harness instead are Curses. Curses are typically not the domain of humans at all, and are instead malignant abilities brought forth by hatred, ill will, or by beings of evil such as demons. Curses are typically manifest as debilitating the body, bad luck, or otherwise indirect effects - in other words, nothing so direct and obvious as a fireball or self-propelled flight. They might weaken one's muscles or magic, cause one's health to deteriorate, or make one fall down every time they break into a run. More powerful examples can include magically binding contracts, sealing an area until the person inside is dead or unconscious, or feats of that nature. Ea-nasir usually requires external mana through her Grievance Power skill (listed below) to use any curse above the bare minimum level of power.
Servants also possess Skills, which embody their special abilities, as well as the abilities of their summoned Class. Ea-nasir's Skills are as follows:
Territory Creation: Rank B
Normally, this allows a Caster to create a "Workshop" using mana, where they can create spellcraft and magical items to their heart's content. However, Ea-nasir cannot make a "Workshop". Instead, Ea-nasir can either create or designate a space as a "Shop," a "Warehouse," or a "Negotiating Space." Items displayed inside a Shop appear higher quality, a Warehouse preserves goods stored inside, and a Negotiating Space is supernaturally recognized as neutral grounds by all who enter (though doesn't compel them to act accordingly.)
Item Creation: Rank D
Normally, Casters get Item Creation to create genuine magical items or powerful weapons. Ea-nasir, however, can only create non-magical trade goods of low quality. However, items created with Item Creation appear to be of higher quality and rank than they are.
Ultimately, it's just a scam. The true power of Ea-nasir, a reviled merchant who nevertheless was able to maintain a living as a merchant until her death.
Because she can only create "trade goods", Ea-nasir can create base materials herself out of mana, such as wood beams or copper ingots, since those qualify as trade goods themselves. Anything more complex requires base materials and time, as per usual for the Iteam Creation skill.
Grievance Power: Rank EX
The unique skill of Ea-nasir. Any anger, contempt, hatred, or ill-will aimed towards Ea-nasir will be converted into mana. This allows Ea-nasir to generate far more mana than most Casters, and potentially function even without a Master.
Its power is highly dependent on the amount and level of negative emotion towards her, but has no upper limit. In her canon, she once accrued rage from the will of the planet, allowing her enough power to tamper with the Holy Grail itself.
True Appraisal: Rank B-
A skill derived from her status as a merchant. When Ea-nasir has the chance to observe something with artistic or historical significance, she has a chance to discern its true nature, abilities, and Name. This chance is raised the more time she has to study the subject or the more famous it is, and the chance is lowered the higher-rank or more powerful the subject is. Because this Skill is magical in nature, she doesn't have to have prior knowledge of the subject.
Merchant's Discernment: Rank C
When in a conversation where the other party believes Ea-nasir holds bargaining power, Ea-nasir can gain a sense of what it would take to negotiate with them. This is not mind reading, it's a supernatural knowledge. The sense Ea-nasir gets through this skill might even reveal an avenue for negotiation that the subject wasn't aware of.
Every Servant also has access to a Noble Phantasm, a magical ability or item of incredible, possibly world-altering powers. Many powerful Servants even have access to several. These Noble Phantasms are the embodiment of their legend, a crystallization of what makes them powerful or unique or famous. Ea-nasir has a single Noble Phantasm, the following.
PROMISE OF COPPER
Complaint Tablet to Ea-nasir
Type: Anti-Goods, Anti-Economy
Rank: EX (Cannot be quantified)
Range: 1~50
Maximum number of targets: 999 people
An ability derived from Ea-Nasir's fame as a merchant with poor goods. Manifesting physically as a series of tablets engraved with complaints at Ea-nasir. The presence of these tablets is not necessary to invoke the power of this Noble Phantasm, they only need to exist and be considered Ea-nasir's property to function. Though it lacks direct combat power, its ability makes Ea-nasir a surprising dark horse, the ultimate trump card against Servants who rely on treasure and arms.
When invoked, that which Ea-Nasir has decided as 'her own goods' rapidly deteriorate in quality. Noble Phantasms are reduced to E-Rank, and items without magical protection are reduced to bare shells of their former selves. Though it only applies to what Ea-nasir considers her own goods, the items in question do not have to belong to her, and in fact is more often her enemy's weapons. The true requirement seems to be "Ea-nasir (I) can make something like it" -> "Therefore, that thing may as well be mine". Truly the ultimate in unreasonable cons.
Some magi believe this ability to be an antithesis to Reinforcement Magecraft, and possibly the reason Ea-nasir was summoned as a Caster, as this would then be an ability she had in life. Ea-nasir herself, however, refutes this. "What kind of idiot would make perfectly good copper worse to sell it? What kind of scammer do you take me for?"
Her Noble Phantasm can be amplified further with enough mana, usually brought in through her Grievance Power Skill. When possessing the extraordinary power derived from the anger of the world itself, Ea-nasir was able to alter the summoning on the Holy Grail itself and downgrade the Grand Grail War, a magical act far beyond mankind's ability.
More mundanely, Ea-nasir is a skilled merchant, negotiator, conman, and swindler. She's good with numbers, with goods, and with people. Ea-nasir also, despite being from Mesopotamia circa 1750 B.C., has a solid grasp and working knowledge of modern concepts, a boon granted to all Servants pulled from the Throne of Heroes.
Item: Ea-nasir's cell phone
Sample: How many do you want?Notes: The name on the roster/etc. will probably be "Ea-nasir" in keeping with the convention of previous Servants in the game.
Also, being a Servant, Ea-nasir requires mana to remain in the world, but I've been told the way it worked with previous servants was that the SCA provided the minimum to exist but no more, so that's what I'm rolling with too, unless you say otherwise. She can gain more mana through her Grievance Power Skill anyway.