Fate/Apocrypha

Chapter 1.2

In a way, this piece of news was far more shocking than the previous revelation of the Fuyuki Holy Grail War's true purpose. After all, it just should not be possible.

Generally speaking, the Association of Magi is divided into three groups. One is the Atlas Academy - an organization centred around alchemy, having existed since before the Common Era and based in the Atlas Mountains of Egypt. Another is the Wandering Sea, which roams the coastal lands of Northern Europe, and can be said to be prototypical thamaturgical organization. Last is the Clock Tower, the central pillar of the Association and the newest and greatest research institute.

Even within the Association, there are certainly those who defect due to heresy... or perhaps, due to being so powerful that they had to be designated for sealing. The act itself is not so rare. However, that is not the case when an entire clan secedes.

"They all defected at once? What the hell?"

"You know that the Yggdmillennia clan are not Lords."

The quality of a magus is influenced by how much time they have spent with thaumaturgy - in other words, their history. One of the oldest of the royal families, those who have studied thaumaturgy since ancient times, is said to have a history which dates back over two thousand years.

There are three royal families, with twenty clans related to them. But the clan of Yggdmillennia does not belong in nor has any connections with either groups. The reason for this is not certain, though they certainly did not have a short history. It is rumored that they lost a power struggle in the past and have been on poor terms with the three royal families ever since. Others say that they were estranged from the others due to the poor quality of their magic circuits.

Whatever the case, they are often not recognized as a noble thamaturgical family. But they did not sit down and take this without a fight.

The clan abandoned the common methods among magi of thickening the blood of thaumaturgical potential over generations, and mastering the thaumaturgical system chosen by the first generation. Instead, they scraped together all the magi who had the faintest of connections to them from all over.

They aimed for the clans who had little history and possessed weak magic circuits. Or clans which have begun to decline, their magic circuits becoming weaker with every generation. Clans which have been defeated in power struggles and were forced into ruin. Or those magi who had a price placed on their head as punishment by the Association. In other words, those who have strayed from the core of the Association and yet refused to give up the path to the Root.

The Yggdmillennia whispered to them. Do you not wish to leave behind the legacy in your blood? Do you not wish to proclaim ownership over the fruits of your own research? Do you not wish for your clan to leave its mark upon history?

The middle name of each Yggdmillennia comes from the names of the clans they have absorbed. Even their thaumaturgical crest is not unified. The family crests of past clans continued to be passed down.

As for thaumaturgy, the area of their study is also broad: Western alchemy, dark arts, witchcraft, astrology, Kabbalah, runology, even the Onmyodo of Japan - each has one member of the clan pursuing it.

Be that as it may, they are in the end simply a loose alliance of the new, the weak and the dying. The Lords laughed and let them be with their trivial, insignificant arts.

On average, most Yggdmillennia magi can only reach second-class, except for those rare cases of first-class. They are many in number, but pose little threat. Of course, it was mostly due to Darnic's political finesse that they were left at large, but in the end, the only merit to their clan was that of quantity - or so it should have been.