Rin Tohsaka

Hailing from a world beyond our universe where magic and magecraft coexist, this young mage tirelessly hones her skills. She is the Sixth Head of the Tohsaka family, a prestigious lineage of Fuyuki City mages.

Currently studying under a renowned Clock Tower mentor with deep ties to the Holy Grail War, she finds herself hopping across dimensions and planes just to finish an internship project...

"Huh? Where even am I?? Why isn't there a single wisp of magical energy here???"

"The... Holy Grail? Oh, thank goodness, I'm saved! Sorry, don't mind if I borrow this!"

The Holy Grail War was a brutal massacre where mages fought to fulfill the victor's deepest wish. Now a student at the Clock Tower, Tohsaka rarely brings up this dark chapter of her past.

Her classmates, her little sister, her teachers at the regular school, and her former mentor in magecraft (who, by the way, turned out to be her father's murderer)... A totally random cast of characters who never should have crossed paths ended up weaving the messy web of that cruel struggle. It was such a convoluted nightmare to explain and so easy to misunderstand, it was honestly better to keep her mouth shut.

Whether she was the "winner" of the Holy Grail War or once the Master to King Arthur, if word got out, she wouldn't just be dealing with petty jealousy. If these Clock Tower snobs treated her like some clueless bumpkin from the Far East, the headache simply wouldn't be worth it...

...Yeah, right.

Tohsaka couldn't care less about stuff like that. "I've got bigger fish to fry. Better keep my head down and play the perfect student," she'd tell herself.

But of course, her mentor saw right through her little schemes. Thankfully, he was an eccentric softie... and her senior when it came to the Holy Grail War...

"Ugh, seriously... How many coincidences can one world have?"

Banter aside, the two clicked instantly. They completely disassembled the Holy Grail in Fuyuki City, finally putting an end to the centuries of torture this twisted magecraft rite had inflicted on the locals.

Naturally, to the ordinary folks living blissfully unaware of the magecraft world, it just meant the rate of "gas explosions" and "traffic pile-ups" dipped by a few measly percentage points...

But for Tohsaka? It meant her childhood had truly come to an end.

"I'm leaving. You know what you have to do, right?"

Today, she can finally face her father's parting instructions — hardly a proper dying wish — with an open heart.

It might not be the exact glory her father had originally envisioned, but as long as she carries the Tohsaka name, walking away with a clear conscience is the best possible outcome.

The Holy Grail of her hometown has been disassembled, but the work of a mage must continue.

Passed down through generations, the Tohsaka family's magecraft is rooted in Conversion. At its core, Conversion is the manipulation of power — its accumulation, flow, and alteration — using gems as the primary medium.

"Yeah, I know it's a massive money pit, but I don't exactly have a choice. You can't replace the energy density of a gemstone. If you want groundbreaking results, you can't go penny-pinching on experimental materials..."

"Ugh, okay, saying it doesn't hurt is a total lie... Of course it hurts! It hurts so much! Who the heck wants to pull in tens of millions a year only to end up living paycheck to paycheck!?"

"...Sorry, where are my manners? At the end of the day, I have my reasons. I just have to do it."

— "Conduct yourself with confidence and elegance." Such is the Tohsaka family motto.

Though, if Ishtar caught wind of that, she'd probably just suggest Tohsaka become a pirate instead.

Intimidation, robbery, fraud, these are perfectly standard ways to make a buck for the goddess of Venus. Threatening to demolish the netherworld, hijacking the house of heaven, getting the God of Wisdom blackout drunk to swindle a sacred vessel, letting Uruk citizens extort foreigners... Honestly, her rap sheet is quite the resume.

Considering herself a bit of a bleeding heart, Tohsaka has absolutely no idea how she ended up bound to a Goddess like that.

"It couldn't possibly be just because I'm desperate for cash and she happens to be insanely greedy... right?"

...While the truth of the matter is far from that, it's admittedly pretty hard to completely rule out the possibility.

Ever since forging a bond with the goddess, Tohsaka's journeys across planes and dimensions have taken a rather bizarre turn.

"How should I put this... It just feels like I keep ending up in weird places and running into weird situations.

"For instance, one time I accidentally stumbled into a military fortress belonging to some random interstellar empire... Just as I was scrambling to find a place to hide, I realized they couldn't see me at all! I could wander wherever I wanted, like a ghost.

"Another time, I visited a museum built on an asteroid, only to find it was full of fakes! The curator claimed that someone who looked exactly like me had stolen all the genuine artifacts four thousand years ago!

"Oh, and get this! There was this seemingly normal city where the law strictly forbade anyone from saying 'I guarantee' in public. Anyone who broke the rule would be forced to transcribe their philosophical treatise On the Unreliability of Promises by hand.

"I casually asked around about the book's origins. The locals told me it all started three thousand years ago as a note left behind by a passing goddess, which got continuously expanded by generations of philosophers until it became a full-blown treatise!

"And the very first page of that book only has one sentence: 'I guarantee'..."

...BUT!

Although it is quite unbelievable, to be fair, Ishtar is still a benevolent goddess.

At the very least, in the myths, she never directly robbed mortals of their belongings—

*Some smudged handwriting*

Whenever civilization needed a guardian, she would always step up to fight the enemy of civilization, even if she was full of insincere complaints and stubborn price-gouging.

Even rarer, when she realized she was actually aiding a tyrant, she could decisively abandon old pacts, retract her protection over the Assyrians, and help the Babylonians achieve their epic revenge.

*Author's Note: During the writing process, I was in no way hinted to, bribed, or violently coerced by the noble Mistress of Heaven, Ishtar, or anyone affiliated with her.*

"Some pretentious teacher at the Clock Tower claimed that THIS was the real reason I was able to form a bond with the goddess of Venus...

"Honestly, what kind of person does he take me for?"

Alright, let's just humor the idea that Tohsaka has never exhibited "insincere complaints" or "stubborn price-gouging," nor does she have any experience of originally intending to win the Holy Grail, only to resolutely destroy it in the end.

However, even so, there still seems to be some connection between Tohsaka and Ishtar that leaves us in wonder...

"...Huh? Are you trying to say we're both 'spoiled rich kids'?

"No. Thank. You. Phrasing it like that makes it sound like I was born just to leech off others... Though, if someone hated me for my background, I guess it'd make sense.

"Even if the one person who had every right to hate me didn't mind at all...

"...But I digress. Call me a 'spoiled rich kid' if you must.

"With great power comes great responsibility. Like I've always said: As the Tohsaka family head, I have things I simply must do."

"As for the goddess of Venus... Hmph, she definitely doesn't see things from that angle!"

"As the darling among the gods, she's probably never felt a drop of stress in her life. I mean, she's totally unapologetic about everything she does, be it blowing up mountains, descending into the underworld, proposing on a whim, or flipping out at the drop of a hat—

"Ugh, speaking of which, it's honestly no surprise she'd try to woo that arrogant Goldy!"

"But, if you really think about it... she must have her own principles, right? She can't be totally unhinged... probably.

"The Assyrians worshiped her just as devoutly as the Urukians did. If her whole vibe was just 'I help whoever pays the best,' she would've completely ignored those broke Babylonians when they came begging.

"Yet she actually answered their prayers and helped them ensnare the Assyrian capital...

"...Wait, why am I defending her? You saw it too! No matter who she helps, that goddess's ultimate goal is still just to rule the world and boss everyone around!

"As for why she meddles in things she could easily walk away from... at the end of the day, she's just being capricious, right?

"For her, it's always 'I'm doing this because it's fun,' not 'I'm doing this because it's right'... which makes her the exact opposite of someone with my strong sense of justice!"