[[WMG:[[center: [- ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight'' '''[[Characters/FateStayNight Main Character Index]]''' | [[Characters/FateStayNightHumans Humans]] ([[Characters/FateStayNightShirouEmiya Shirou Emiya]], [[Characters/FateStayNightSakuraMatou Sakura Matou]]) | '''Servants''' ([[Characters/FateStayNightSaber Saber]], [[Characters/FateStayNightGilgamesh Archer 2]]) -]]]]]

This is a page about the Heroic Spirits appearing in the VisualNovel turned {{Anime}} ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight''

* For the human characters in the story, go [[Characters/FateStayNightHumans here.]]
* For their appearances in ''[[VisualNovel/FateHollowAtaraxia Fate/hollow ataraxia]]'', go [[Characters/FateHollowAtaraxia here]].
* For their appearances in ''Literature/FateZero'' and other Servants exclusive to the fourth war, go [[Characters/FateZeroServants here]].

'''Warning! As Servant identities are quite strongly tied to most of the characteristics of Servants, everything relating to a character's specific identity will be left unmarked. All other spoilers, such as for the story or Fate-specific character details, will be marked as necessary.'''

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!!Administrivia/CharacterSpecificPages
* '''[[Characters/FateStayNightSaber Saber]]'''
* '''[[Characters/FateStayNightGilgamesh Archer 2]] (major unmarked story spoilers)'''
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[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:General]]
* AchillesHeel: Even the most powerful Servants require a Master to provide them with mana and serve as their anchor. Their abilities nosedive as soon as they lose their mana source, and they'll fade away soon after if they don't find a replacement Master. This makes targeting Masters a more appealing option than trying to beat someone like say, Heracles in a fight.
* AllMythsAreTrue: ''Almost'' all myths are true, albeit with various historical and mythological liberties being taken. The Grail system is set up so that heroes who were ordinary humans in-life are [[EmpoweredBadassNormal bestowed superhuman abilities]] based on the myths and legends that center around them and the Servant class they are summoned into; mythological figures who may not have actually existed in-universe -- like Heracles and Medusa -- can still be manifested as Servants; and in the case of beings that are genuinely fictitious, the Grail summons the Heroic Spirit that best qualifies, [[spoiler:as seen with Sasaki Kojirō and Aŋra Mainiiu]].
* ArmyOfTheAges: The Heroic Spirits can be summoned from any time period, even the future, as long as someone has an appropriate catalyst. It's worth noting that most tend to predate the "modern" world, however, and any actual ones from the future, especially powerful ones, would be rare and special. [[spoiler:Archer is an example of the sort of circumstances a modern person has to go through to become a Heroic Spirit, or an existence similar to one.]]
* ArtisticLicense: WordOfGod establishes that not everything that recorded history and mythology say about the Heroic Spirits' backgrounds is (completely) true, and some parts of their legends may have even been lost to time, forgotten by future generations. That's why Cú Chulainn has blue hair and red eyes, Heracles is a nine-foot-tall monster, and many other liberties are taken with the legends of mythological heroes. There's also the fact that the Franchise/{{Nasuverse}} is different from our own, so history is fair game.
* BroughtDownToBadass: While some Servants [[EmpoweredBadassNormal obtain supernatural powers]] based on [[ClapYourHandsIfYouBelieve the legends surrounding them]] and the class they are summoned into, others -- like Saber and Berserker -- end up being much less powerful than they were even in-life due to their arsenals being restricted by their Servant class and/or incompatible Masters, though they are still enormously powerful supernatural warriors.
* CallingYourAttacks: When a Servant uses what's usually their most powerful weapon or distinctive skill -- their "Noble Phantasm" -- they shout its name. All Noble Phantasms must be called out to be used. [[JustifiedTrope This is explained as being required to unlock their power in the Holy Grail War system]].
* CharacterAlignment: All Servants possess [[InvokedTrope canonical alignments in their status pages]]. These tend to be points of contention among the {{fandom}}, particularly [[ChaoticGood Gilgamesh's]]. It's worth noting, though, that they're from the perspective of their respective time period of their legends, so DeliberateValuesDissonance is in full play here.
* ClapYourHandsIfYouBelieve: [[AllMythsAreTrue All Mythological Heroes Are Real...]] if their legend is popular enough. The more well-known heroes are in the time they are summoned, the more powerful they are. Though there are exceptions, as Gilgamesh, protagonist of the world's oldest surviving piece of literature, is the greatest Heroic Spirit despite being relatively obscure. Furthermore, historical aspects of a Heroic Spirit -- provided they previously existed as mortals -- can be overwritten by their legends, granting them access to abilities they never possessed in-life.
* CurbStompBattle: The typical result of a human fighting one, as even the weakest Servant is more than a match for the strongest human on a physical level. That's not to say a human [[DefeatingTheUndefeatable can't win]], however.
* EffectiveKnockoff: The Servants seen in story actually a mix between this and ShoddyKnockoffProduct. Even with an artifact as powerful as the Holy Grail, only the World has the Authority and power to summon the actual Heroic Spirits (in forms like the Grand Servants or Counter Guardians) who are much more powerful than the ones seen in story because they are summoned by the World itself. The Fuyuki Holy Grail summoning system is a vastly inferior version of the one the World uses to summon the [[VideoGame/FateGrandOrder seven Grand Servants]] which summons a copy of the Heroic Spirit and shoves them into a much smaller non-Grand Class vessel that constrains their abilities. What keeps them from being a full blown ShoddyKnockoffProduct is that even weakened as they are, they're still much more powerful than humans [[spoiler:and they aren't meant to fight at all]].
* EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep: {{Justified|Trope}}. The Servants are usually only addressed by their Class. Knowing a Servant's real name may give a clue to their weaknesses, so their names are kept secret where possible. Also, out of formality, most Servants refer to their Masters simply as "Master," but Archer and Saber go against common practice and refer to their Masters by first name.
* FightingAShadow: [[spoiler:With the exceptions of Saber and Archer]], Servants are mere copies of the Heroic Spirits contained in the Throne of Heroes. This means that even if a Servant is slain, they can be summoned again in a subsequent Grail War. Due to only being copies of the original Heroic Spirit, however, they will not retain memories of prior summonings.
* FishOutOfTemporalWater: Averted. Even though Servants came from various ages, when summoned they will automatically gain general knowledge about the era they are summoned in.
* HumanoidAbomination: Servants aren't just resurrected spirits, they're copies of "heroes" with such famous accomplishments that they were imprinted upon humanity's collective subconscious and were removed from the normal cycle of death and rebirth ("heroes" is in quotes because several only qualify for the title in horrifying, obtuse ways, as seen with Aŋra Mainiiu). It is stated over and over again throughout the visual novel that they are existences beyond what a human is capable of equaling or understanding. This can be best seen in the ''Heaven's Feel'' route when Shirou [[spoiler:gets Archer's arm transplanted onto his body]]. Not only does he only survive due to the constant presence of a holy shroud protecting him, but [[spoiler:it converts his living flesh into thousands of overlapping swords]], and accessing its memories threatens to destroy his mind. In some Bad Ends, it outright kills him.
* HumanResources: Servants can recover magical energy by draining the mana of humans. Depending on how much they drain, the process is either highly draining or outright fatal to the human in question. Most Servants who lack Masters capable of granting them magical energy do this often.
* HumanSacrifice: [[spoiler:This is their real purpose. The Greater Grail was designed to open a gate to the Root by using the souls of all seven Heroic Spirits collected by the Lesser Grail as fuel. Ideally, all the Masters were to use their Command Seals to compel their Servants into suicide upon summoning and then begin the ritual. However, only the Three Founding Families and their overseer Zelretch know the truth in order to maximize their own chances of reaching the Root. The Holy Grail War was the guise of a wish-granting ritual cooked up as an excuse to draw in potential Masters to summon the sacrifices, trick the Heroic Spirits into letting themselves be summoned, and to hide the Three Families' true goals from other mages who would likely steal the Grail away if they knew the truth. In ''Literature/FateApocrypha'', the truth does get out and the Grail is subsequently stolen away, ending the Three Families' ambitions.]]
* HyperspaceArsenal: Servants can have their Noble Phantasm appear out of thin air. {{Justified|Trope}} by the Holy Grail War system.
* LightningBruiser: All Servants possess senses, strength, speed, and durability vastly outstripping what normal humans are capable of. Servants ''can'' be fought and defeated by Magi or magically-augmented weapons, but in general it takes another Servant to defeat a Servant.
* {{Mons}}: The Servants are a humanoid version. A Master can order his Servant around, can make a contract with more than one, and a Servant can continue in the Grail War if they make another contract with a new Master.
* MundaneUtility: The Throne of Heroes is a collective of powerful historical and mythological champions who are meant to be used as agents or familiars in service of protecting mankind. Here, the architects of the Fuyuki Holy Grail War intended for them to be used as little more than supercharged human sacrifices.
* NighInvulnerability: Servants, even in material form, can't be harmed by weapons without spiritual or conceptual enchantments. Some have more defenses in addition to this.
* NoOntologicalInertia: Averted: Servants cease to exist if they stop getting mana from, or lose their contract with, their Masters. However, disappearing generally takes a few hours. In that few-hour window the Servant can save themselves if they can find a Magus to form a new contract. There are Servants with Independent Action (mostly a class skill of the Archer class, though Rider has it as a non-class one), who can survive longer; the second Archer with a Rank A can last for a whole week ([[spoiler:indefinitely due to the Grail mud giving him physical body]]), Archer, with Rank B, can last for three days without a contract, while Rider, with Rank C, can last for one day.
* OlderIsBetter: The closer the hero lived to the beginning of history, the more mystery is built around them, making them more powerful by extension. This makes characters like Archer 2, Berserker and ''Fate/Apocrypha'''s [[Literature/{{Mahabharata}} Karna]] freakishly overpowered. Heroes from the Bronze Age and before that lived in an age where gods frolicked among man and world-ending threats were a dime a dozen, and can do things that are BeyondTheImpossible even for more modern great heroes.
* OneManArmy: Any Servant with the appropriately named ''Anti-Army'' Noble Phantasms, or above, is a PersonOfMassDestruction capable of wiping out entire armies in a single attack. Even Servants with lower classifications are still more than a match for regular humans.
* OurSpiritsAreDifferent: In the Franchise/{{Nasuverse}}, most Heroic Spirits are the souls of heroes who achieved great renown in life and were sublimated into the Throne of Heroes upon death, cut off from space and time. Servants are copies of these entities created by the Holy Grail, and can switch from material and immaterial forms at will. However, Saber can't enter immaterial form due to Shirou's improper summoning. [[spoiler:Although this turns out to be untrue, this is because the Holy Grail regards Artoria as a human rather than a spirit.]]
* ParadoxPerson: Heroic Spirits are unmoored from the time-space continuum, and thus even Heroic Spirits from the future be summoned in the past -- even interacting with their past mortal selves. [[spoiler:Saber points out that this renders Archer's attempt to RetGone himself by killing Shirou pointless, since as a Heroic Spirit he's unaffected by causality.]]
* PopularityPower: A Servant's power is often influenced by their popularity and impact on history. This is how [[Literature/FateApocrypha Vlad III]] and [[VideoGame/FateGrandOrder Nikola Tesla]] became powerful Servants, despite their relatively recent conception.
* PsychicLink: Servants and Masters have the ability to see parts of each others' lives when they sleep, especially when they have a strong connection.
* PublicDomainCharacter: Servants are heroes from myths and legends, making it possible for Nasu to take certain liberties with their stories and portrayals.
* PureMagicBeing: Despite their appearances, Servants are spiritual beings and true incarnation is outside of their abilities. [[spoiler:This makes them collectible by the Lesser Grail who breaks them down into component mana as fuel for the wish granting process or the Greater Grail's true purpose.]]
* RandomPowerRanking: All Servant abilities such as Strength or their Noble Phantasm get a score ranging from E to A to EX, but the actual bearing on how effective they are in this area is rather vague and occasionally seem to contradict what we are shown, even varying based on what Class they're summoned into and who their Master is.
* RankInflation: We've got A...and A+...and A++...and then A+++...also EX... [[AllThereInTheManual It's explained]] that the E through A ranks are where a skill or stat rates as a quantifiable amount, with EX meaning "unquantifiable for various reasons, sometimes due to power", and plus marks indicating situational increases in rank. Rarely, minus marks on a rank are seen, and though those haven't been explicitly explained, it stands to reason that they're the opposite of plus marks. Which means that the rank can decrease in certain situations.
* RPGMechanicsVerse: The Servants all have stats such as endurance, strength, magic resistance, special abilities and CharacterAlignment, despite the fact that the visual novel is text-based and you can only make story choices. According to Rin, how these values are displayed in the book she loaned Shirou that displays these stats vary from person to person in appearance, but since Shirou is all but an outright {{Muggle}}, he sees it as this. [[AuthorAppeal Nasu is MASSIVE Dungeons and Dragons nerd]], which might also have something to with it.
* TooAwesomeToUse: Servants can overload their Noble Phantasms with mana to create an even more powerful version called a Broken Phantasm. The catch is as the name implies, they can use it only once then it breaks, never to come back again. Better hope they're great at fighting with their fists. [[spoiler:Archer can keep making Noble Phantasms as long as he has mana, so he can abuse Broken Phantasms in a way that no other Servant can.]]
* VampiricDraining: One of the ways a Servant can obtain power and restore their mana is by [[LifeDrinker draining people's life forces]], usually in the form of blood (though [[SexMagic semen is apparently a very viable substitute]]). Most of the heroes summoned as Servants don't approve of this method.
* YouDontLookLikeYou: A minor plot point is that Servants like Altria and Iskander don't look like what history says they did, though some Servants' appearances can also be altered by their myths and Class.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Archer '''(major unmarked story spoilers)''']]
!!Archer ([[spoiler:EMIYA]])

!!!'''Voiced by:''' [[Creator/JunichiSuwabe Jun'ichi Suwabe]] (JP), [[Creator/LiamOBrien Liam O' Brien]] (EN 2006 Anime, 2010 ''Unlimited Blade Works'' Movie), Creator/KaijiTang (EN 2015 ''Unlimited Blade Works'' Anime, 2018 ''Heaven's Feel'' Movie)
[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/archer_ryuji_higurashi_cut_in.png]]
[[caption-width-right:350:''"Atone for my sins?! I have no sins to atone for, nor have I forced such a meaningless concept on anyone."'']]

->''"Do not think about other things, there is only one thing you can do. So master that one thing. Do not forget. What you must imagine is always that you, yourself, are the strongest. You do not need outside enemies. For you, the one you have to fight is none other than your own image."''

Archer is the Servant of Rin. Sarcastic but well intentioned, he tends to look down on Shirou's ideals and usually dispenses either cryptic advice or [[DeadpanSnarker razor-sharp putdowns]]. He is obedient to Rin, although to what extent nobody really knows; Though he does as she asks, he seems to enjoy pissing her off to the extent that she wasted one of her three Command Seals giving an order she knew would have little effect.\\
\\
His summoning was botched and as a result of this he claims not to remember his Noble Phantasm or true name. Instead, he fights primarily with dual short swords known as Kanshou and Bakuya despite supposedly being an Archer.\\
\\
Archer has a big impact in all three routes, but ''Unlimited Blade Works'' is the route in which he takes center stage. Archer's true identity is unknown for a large portion of the story, due to claiming to have amnesia.
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* AbnormalAmmo: Bows aren't normally supposed to launch swords turned into corkscrews.
* AloofArcher: He's stoic, analytical and always has a few tricks up his sleeve. Oddly enough, he doesn't think of himself as being an archer and most of the time he uses swords instead of a bow.
* AlternateCharacterReading: His twin swords, Kanshou and Bakuya, may not seem to have an obvious origins for the English reader, but this is because the blades use the Japanese reading of the two weapons. The Chinese reading of the two of them are [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gan_Jiang_and_Mo_Ye Gan Jiang and Mo Ye]]. This is one of few cases where the Japanese reading of Chinese names stays in the English translations.
* AlternateSelf: His true identity is an alternate future counterpart of Shirou, from a timeline that mostly followed the events of the Fate route.
* AntiHero: He generally fits into the PragmaticHero niche and it's occasionally noted that in life he did some pretty brutal things. [[GenerationXerox Just like dear old Dad.]] The ''UBW'' route pushes him into AntiVillain territory.
* ArmorPiercingQuestion: Delivers a lot of them to both Saber and Shirou in all three routes.
* AwesomenessByAnalysis: His "Eye of the Mind" skill compensates for him having the worst Luck rank possible and relatively mediocre physical attributes. During his battle with Lancer in ''Unlimited Blade Works'', Lancer is moving and attacking at speeds so inhumanly fast that even other Servants couldn't keep up with him; Archer manages to hold him off by deliberately making holes in his defense and then parrying every time his foe attacks those holes in order to prevent himself from simply being whittled down.
* {{BFS}}: The ''Overedge'' forms of Kanshou and Bakuya. They actually [[CanonForeigner originated from the DEEN Anime]] version of his final fight against Berserker, but Nasu was reportedy impressed by the designs of [[http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_iCnzf-y60cc/TJXawYqoRnI/AAAAAAAACOw/MT0vQVukWt8/s1600/character-weapon.jpg these swords]] that [[CanonImmigrant he incorporated it into canon]].
* BigDamnHeroes: For the finale of ''Unlimited Blade Works'' he is thought to have been killed by Gilgamesh in the Einzbern castle, but appears to help Rin escape from within the Grail and to finish Gilgamesh with one last sword in the head.
* TheBlacksmith: Also known as "The Blacksmith Heroic Spirit." His version of Unlimited Blade Works has steam and gears in the background, resembling that of a workshop. He likes to make weapons, LOTS and LOTS of weapons; it defines his very existence.
* BornUnlucky: He possesses a low Luck stat of E, likely as a reference to all the hardships that led to him becoming Archer Emiya.
* BowAndSwordInAccord: He can make use of any weapon, so he sometimes uses his bow to fire even swords.
* BreakingSpeech: In ''Unlimited Blade Works'' he gives a brutal one as he tries to break Shirou's idealism and turn him into a nihilist like him in their final battle. He fails.
* BreakoutCharacter: He's barely touched upon in ''Fate'' and ''Heaven's Feel'' and is primarily an antagonist in ''Unlimited Blade Works'', but is nevertheless one of the most popular characters of any Type-Moon work, appearing in almost every ''Fate'' spin-off to date. He's also a FountainOfExpies.
* BrutalHonesty: He is quite willing to call Rin out on her bad habits and personal shortcomings. This annoys her quite a bit.
* CanonImmigrant: Not Archer himself, but the "overedge" forms of his twin blades Kanshou and Bakuya were originally developed for the DEEN anime before being worked into the wider canon.
* CastAsAMask: Appears to be a straight example. At one point Shirou calls Rin on the phone without introducing himself and she assumes she's talking to Archer, so in universe they do have similar voices. Granted, considering Archer seemed to undergo a massive growth spurt in comparison to Shirou, it's possible that Archer's voice simply deepened as he got older, as implied he was at least an adult by the time he died as a human.
* CasualDangerDialogue: Archer speaks to everyone with the same bored indifference, even if they are much stronger and on the verge of attacking him. The craziest example was when he, near the end of his route, calmly threatened ''Gilgamesh'' with death at 1/10 of his original strength.
* CharacterizingSittingPose: When he and Rin first meet, he's slouching in the middle of her destroyed room with little regard for the havoc his entrance has wreaked.
* CharlesAtlasSuperpower: Archer was an ordinary person with average physical and subpar magical aptitude but through rigorous training he became able to hold his own against Servants and armies.
* TheChessmaster: In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', he set things up so that Rin would be able to win if his plan succeeded. He sided with Caster to break Rin's Command Seal preventing him from killing Shirou in order to erase himself from existence, but made sure that Rin would be able to contract with Saber and still win the Grail War. It failed thanks to two factors: Lancer getting involved, and failing to kill Shirou before Rin could make a contract with Saber.
* ChronicBackstabbingDisorder: In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', Archer doesn't have allies; he has ''goals''. Even when there's a definite person he wants to have win (Rin), he switches sides just like he switches weapons.
* ColdSniper: He can be pretty cold sometimes, and he can shoot an arrow from miles away.
* CombatPragmatist: Due to his stats being low, Archer relies on tactics and plans more then anything.
** One of the best examples is when Saber and him fight Berserker in the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' path. When it becomes clear he's going to be in danger, he retreats back, firing a powerful arrow that creates an explosion that's aimed to hit Berserker, Saber and Shirou at the same time.
** Also displayed in ''Hollow Ataraxia'', where he fires shots that put Shirou in danger so as to force Saber into limiting her range of motion to defend her vulnerable Master.
* ComboPlatterPowers: Part of the reason he's so tricky to nail down by other characters. He's an Archer, but he has the swordsmanship of a Saber, but his dual knives invoke an Assassin more than anything, but his crafting and creation skills suggest a Caster, but he also sometimes throws out a giant shield or a Reality Marble. Rin reacts with outright sarcastic surprise when he displays an actual Archer skill.
* ConsummateLiar: Part of what makes him such a competent chessmaster is his ability to lie with a straight face. In the his prologue fight against Lancer, he admits Lancer would have destroyed him despite his cocky attitude.
* ConfusionFu: Archer depends heavily on the fact that none of the other heroes can identify him, which usually leads to them underestimating his abilities.
* CurbStompBattle: His fight with Shirou has him holding the upper hand the entire fight and the only reason he hadn't killed him was because he trying to break Shirou's idealism. He only loses because, after being defeated in the emotional battle, he essentially gives up and concedes the fight to Shirou's stronger will.
* DarkAndTroubledPast: It's revealed that Archer was able to become the hero he wanted and was able to bring peace through destruction but due to his quiet nature, he was thought as the cause of the wars he ended and was executed. While that's bad enough, Archer made a pact with Alaya (the will of the World to protect mankind) to become a Counter Guardian, thinking he could save more lives that way but instead he realizes all he does is kill over and over again. In the end it's the realization that his own ideal made him a hitman for all of time that finally broke him.
* DarkMessiah: In life, Archer brought peace through heavy but controlled destruction, exactly like his father. Kill one to save ten, kill ten for a hundred, a hundred for a thousand and up. Even after death, he follows this way of life.
* DeadpanSnarker: He snarks quite often, even with Rin, who is good at teasing herself.
* DeconstructedCharacterArchetype: His existence is basically a challenge to the idea that trying to save everybody is practical, efficient, or even meaningful when compared to more direct methods.
* DeflectorShields: Rho Aias can block even the attacks of Trojan War heroes. However, it only barely blocks Lancer's Gae Bolg when thrown, and at the cost of his right arm and almost all of his mana.
* DefrostingIceKing: Most prominent in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' where he grows past his self-loathing cynicism to again become the optimistic hero he was as present-day Shirou. Even in the other routes, he does seem to still hold onto a small sense of idealism by saving Shirou and Rin when he has opportunities to let them die.
* DrivenToSuicide: This is essentially his goal, sick of being used as a tool to prevent humanity's destruction time and time again, he wants to erase his existence.
* DualWielding: He wields twin yin-yang swords, Kanshou and Bakuya. They always return to his hands.
* DyingAlone: In his back-story, he died because of the betrayal of an ally, though he was satisfied in the end. Then he had to face the consequences of selling out his existence to the World after death, thereby never having any peace of mind ever again.
* DubPersonalityChange: Downplayed. Though Archer’s consistent regardless of who voices him, both his English voice actors highlight different aspects of his personality.
** [[Creator/LiamOBrien Liam O’ Brien]] makes him sound akin to a tired soldier who’s worn down by all the lives he took, more prominent especially when he was fighting Shirou Emiya in a battle of ideals.
** [[Creator/KaijiTang Kaiji Tang]] voices him in a way which makes Archer sound like a smooth-talking DeadpanSnarker who isn’t afraid to be blunt with his opinions and views.
* DyingAsYourself: In his final moments in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' and ''Heaven's Feel'', Archer's hairstyle and facial features change and he speaks in a softer tone, even calling Rin by her last name, implying that he has become Shirou Emiya once more instead of the cynical EMIYA.
* DyingMomentOfAwesome: Taken to its logical extreme in all three routes;
** In the ''Fate'' route, he kills Heracles six times over without using his Reality Marble and with a broken arm.
** In the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route, he kills Gilgamesh with one last arrow after having survived multiple impalement wounds and mana starvation for days on end -- and he still hangs on just long enough to say one last goodbye to Rin.
** In ''Heaven's Feel'', he saves Rin from the Shadow at the cost of being impaled through the heart, but still manages to last long enough to have Kotomine replace Shirou's missing left arm with his own.
* EffectiveKnockoff: His Noble Phantasm, ''Unlimited Blade Works,'' is about creating copies of other Heroes' Noble Phantasms. While they can not reach the same level as the original, they're a close second when confronting those who don't bring said Noble Phantasms to their fullest potential.
* EnigmaticMinion: In ''Fate'' and most of ''Unlimited Blade Works'', he may help the heroes, but his goals, methods and identity are not something he's going to reveal willingly.
* FallenHero: He still pursues his ideals and desire to be a hero, but his methods repulse Shirou and to a lesser extent Saber.
* FascinatingEyebrow: He responds with this to Rin's early attempts at asserting authority over him.
* FieldOfBlades: '''[[TitleDrop Unlimited Blade Works]]''', his Noble Phantasm, summons a Reality Marble filled with swords of his own creation.
* FinishingMove: Triple-Linked Crane Wings, which throws out three pairs of Kanshou and Bakuya to trap the opponent, then finish with a final fourth slash.
* FirstNameBasis: With Rin. In ''Heaven's Feel'' and the ending of ''Unlimited Blade Works'' however, just before he dies, he calls her "Tohsaka" like in the old days.
* {{Foil}}: To various characters which become clear in the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route.
** Shirou Emiya: Caster even points this out, they both don't enjoy unnecessary murder and consider themselves pacifists. Shirou is idealistic to a fault, refusing to kill anyone even his enemies compared to Archer who is instead far more pragmatic, even willing to let innocent civilians die for the greater good. As the route goes on, Shirou and Archer's similarities continue to increase leading to the reveal Archer is a future Shirou who continued on his ideals until it broke him.
** Gilgamesh. They are both Archers summoned by a Tohsaka in their respective Grail War that don't fit the usual convention of an Archer, Gilgamesh firing swords from portals while Archer mainly fights up close with twin swords, but that's where their similarities end. Parallels are drawn further when one realizes that their backstories and skillsets are also complete opposites. Archer is very much an underdog Servant who has to play his cards just right to even make the cut compared to Gilgamesh's combination of being a BornWinner and TheAce who spends most of his time holding back and is still leagues stronger than the other Servants in the War. Gilgamesh is an ancient king who collected all of the world's treasures and is the first hero. His very existence proved that heroes exist in the eyes of mankind and celebrated by his people and the future people. Archer or Shirou Emiya in life was a regular person that traveled the world to solve various problems without leaving his name, leaving him unknown to the public and in the end due to his own morally gray actions and public unease about him, he was executed for a crime he didn't commit and only became a Heroic Spirit through a deal he made with Alaya. While Gilgamesh is the oldest Heroic Spirit, EMIYA is one of the youngest ones. While Gilgamesh fights with his treasures that he collected in life, EMIYA fights by copying and imitating the treasures and weapons of others, something that infuriates Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh and EMIYA are jerks, but EMIYA is ultimately well-meaning and still heroic despite his cynical and bitter attitude while Gilgamesh is an amoral hedonist who hates modern humanity and desires to cull them and rule over the survivors, even being indifferent to the possibility that there may be no survivors.
* FutureBadass: Archer is a version of Shirou from a BadFuture, one where Shirou's idealism and hope were slowly ground out of him over time, but where he became strong enough to forge and project thousands of blades.
* TheGadfly: Archer continually tests Shirou's, Saber's, and Rin's ideals and personalities with jokes and barbs and is at the same time capable of claiming with a straight face that he would use the Grail for "World Peace".
* GameBreakingInjury: In ''Fate'' and ''Heaven's Feel'', Saber nearly tears him in half on the 3rd day of the war, making his plans to kill Shirou impossible. When he recovers, he is killed shortly after by Berserker and The Shadow respectively.
* GenerationXerox: In the end he was just like his adoptive father Kiritsugu Emiya. He started out idealistic and trying to save everyone, but in the end realized being a PragmaticHero is more effective.
* GoOutWithASmile: In ''Unlimited Blade Works'' he finally disappears satisfied that his life wasn't a waste.
* GratuitousEnglish: The activation speech for his Noble Phantasm is in fairly mangled Engrish. The Japanese version clarifies its meaning.
* GuileHero: In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', at the very least, he displays profound manipulative skill.
* TheHeavy: In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', his conflict with Shirou serves as the plot's primary focus until he and the other Servants are revealed to be pawns in the [[BigBadDuumvirate Kotomine-Gilgamesh duo's]] plans.
* HeelFaceRevolvingDoor: In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', he works only and only for himself... And Rin's sake, even if she would end up hating his actions.
* HeroicSacrifice:
** In ''Fate'', Rin leaves him to stall Berserker with the expectation that he'll die. Archer kills Berserker six times over and refuses to retreat before falling. What makes this even more amazing is that according to WordOfGod he didn't use Unlimited Blade Works to do it.
** In ''Heaven's Feel'', realizing that he'd die soon anyway and Shirou had decided to reject his ideals for Sakura's sake, he gives his arm to Shirou.
* HeroWithBadPublicity: In life, his actions didn't make sense to anyone since he didn't seem to have any easily understood reasons for his behavior, which eventually led to his death by betrayal.
* {{Hunk}}: While not hulking like Berserker, Archer is still ''very'' muscular and broad shouldered, which is especially prominent once his cloak comes off to use Hrunting. Which makes it all the more hilarious when Shirou, despite being fairly muscular himself, complains about how scrawny he is.
* HyperspaceArsenal: He is able to pull his short swords back out no matter how many times he loses them.
* IAmNotLeftHanded:
** Thanks to Archer's relatively unknown abilities, many of his fights are won because he is able to pull out another badass trick that he'd been holding back until just the right moment. He's a lot stronger than he initially seems, being able to cut Heracles' stock of lives in half while handicapped in the ''Fate'' route, but he's aware that playing his hand too early will cause him to draw unwanted attention from the other Servants which could potentially interfere with his plans, so he prefers to keep his abilities unknown and stay under the radar until the right moment.
** In the Prologue, he does figurative (and in the anime a literal) version of the trope during his first clash against Lancer. Initially he starts by wielding only Kanshou in his left hand, but after Lancer's increasing intensity forces him to summon Bakuya alongside it he then switches to a right-handed stance. The entire fight pisses Lancer off because an ''Archer'' is engaging him in close-combat.
* IcyGrayEyes: Strong willed, gray-eyed cold and, if you ask him, with an ideal above peoples' mindset.
* IdentityAmnesia: Rin is frustrated when he informs her he can't remember his past or abilities due to her botched summoning. ''Unlimited Blade Works'' reveals he was lying about his memory, and is actually a FutureBadass Shirou seeking to kill his past self. He ''did'' forget Rin though, his memory came back when she gave him her name.
* IGotBigger: Compared to his present-day self, Shirou, Archer is eight inches taller and far more muscular to boot.
* IHatePastMe: To say the very least. Shirou's idealism has driven him to despair, to the point he despises him and is trying to kill him to escape his fate. When Saber points out the flaws in his plan, EMIYA admits he already knows how unlikely it is but even if he does fail at least Shirou is dead.
* ILetYouWin: In a manner of speaking. The game makes clear that his battle with Shirou in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' ended at a point where Archer could still have killed Shirou. But once Archer realizes there's no way he could make Shirou give up his ideal in the process and has 'lost' the battle on the ideological level, he gives up. The anime even shows that as Shirou charges for his last attack, Archer could have easily and quickly murdered Shirou right there and then but stops as he remembers Kiritsugu.
* ImageSong: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6cSKxSBKxpE "Rise"]].
* IronicHell:
-->'''Rin''': ''[narrating]'' The boy who stated that he just doesn't want to see anyone cry... could only see crying humans forever.
* {{Irony}}: Aside from some of the other ironies he finds himself in due to his situation, there's one in particular that can be a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment in ''Heaven's Feel'' that he himself dryly notes: he's been summoned as a Servant, rather than a Counter Guardian, but he's ''still'' facing off against the sort of supernatural horror that the World sometimes manifests Counter Guardians against and which he's apparently had to face before; in this case, the Shadow.
** Archer's plan is ultimately to dissuade Emiya Shirou from following Kiritsugu's ideal or -- failing that -- kill him. In ''UBW'', the route where Archer gains his greatest advantage and opportunity to execute his plan, all he accomplishes is Shirou openly disavowing his bitterness and pragmatism to his face. However in ''Heaven's Feel'', where things go completely off the rails and Archer feels he has to give up his goals for the greater good, Shirou ultimately makes the choice to abandon his ideals to protect Sakura, fulfilling Archer's wishes.
* ItsAllAboutMe: Archer's actions are driven by a need to [[ConfirmationBias prove to himself that he's right]]; he doesn't care that in all probability killing Shirou won't have any effect on his own existence, but continues to claim IDidWhatIHadToDo even in the face of Shirou's persistent refusal to back down.
* IWasJustPassingThrough: When rescuing Shirou from Caster.
-->"I just happened to drop by. Don't worry about it."
* JackOfAllStats: [[WeakButSkilled On the lower end.]] He has a solid Mana stat of B, average agility and endurance stats of C, but rather low strength (D) and outright atrocious luck (E). He does not have a proper Noble Phantasm rating on account of technically not having a "true" Noble Phantasm, but repeatedly shows the ability to whip out a varied arsenal of at least A-ranked Noble Phantasms using Unlimited Blade Works.
* JadeColoredGlasses: He's cynical and disillusioned with heroism. He wasn't always like this, but continued failures and betrayal brought him to this point.
* {{Jerkass}}: Badassery aside, Archer can be a real dick sometimes. Even before going through the HeelFaceRevolvingDoor. ''Unlimited Blade Works'' shows that he used to be nicer, but he's very bitter, pragmatic and sarcastic now.
* KillingYourAlternateSelf: Archer's goal is RetGone himself by killing Shirou Emiya, attempting to set things up for Rin to form a contact with Saber after he's erased from existence. Saber points out that this even if Shirou ''was'' Archer's genuine past self ([[AlternateSelf he's not]]) killing him wouldn't negate Archer's existance since as a Heroic Spirit he exists unbound by the laws of time and space. Archer's hatred for himself and Shirou runs so deep that he tries to do it anyway.
* KnightInSourArmor: Saber, and to a lesser extent Lancer, recognize him as a knight, but both are rather appalled at his manipulative nature, cynicism and ShootTheDog attitude.
* {{Leitmotif}}:
** [[https://youtu.be/YJhC70dPN2Y "The End of Reminiscence"]] serves as a ''de facto'' leitmotif for Archer, especially in the ''Fate'' route.
** In the [[Anime/FateStayNightUnlimitedBladeWorks anime adaptation of UBW]], he gets a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5VUXPsYm2c very distinctive theme]] simply titled ''Archer'' that plays during his first appearance and most of his major scenes. Its low-key similarities with ''Emiya'', Shirou's own theme, did not go unnoticed.
* TheLoad: In Rin's route in ''Unlimited Codes'', he refuses to help Rin, forcing her to win the Grail War on her own. He gets his comeuppance when Rin chibifies him as her wish.
* LockedIntoStrangeness: His dark skin, white hair and gray eyes are the result of his constant overuse of his magic. [[JustifiedTrope Justified,]] since it's a side effect of using Projection beyond his body limits, thus damaging skin and hair cells.
* TheLostLenore: It is heavily implied that Illya's death weighed heavily on him and was one of the main factors that drove him to become a full time "Hero of Justice".
* LuckilyMyShieldWillProtectMe: Rho Aias, the shield used by Aias/''[[Literature/TheIliad Ajax]]''. The shield is seven-layered and each as strong as a castle wall, making it able to resist even the spear throws of Hector of Troy. That said:
** It cannot hold against the full power of Lancer's Gae Bolg, however, and its collapse nearly tears Archer's arm off.
** The full WaveMotionGun fired by The Shadow during ''[[Anime/FateStayNightHeavensFeel lost butterfly]]'', understandably composed by the collective power of all Servants it has absorbed so far (plus the innate powers of the Holy Grail), is just too much for it to handle -- [[TheWorfEffect collapsing just a few seconds after it fully manifests]].
* MageMarksman[=/=]MagicKnight: Technically, Archer's skill is archery but he can also use swords and magecraft.
* ManipulativeBastard: Manipulation is his game. He pretends to join Caster's cause and has her and Kuzuki exhaust their energy against Shirou and Rin. This benefits him in four ways: Caster initiates him in by first using Rule Breaker to remove his tie to Rin's command seal, which means he's no longer weakened when disobeying Rin. He gets an almost effortless shot to bring down Caster whom had been notoriously difficult to actually stop for the entire route. It leaves Shirou defenseless. And Saber is available to make a contract with Rin in his place.
* MasterArcher: He's a ''supremely'' skilled bowman, able to snipe a man-sized target from kilometers away using an EnergyBow in the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route, and having the ability to create and convert his swords into explosive arrows on par with an A-rank Noble Phantasm — but his favourite weapon is a pair of shortswords and almost all his battles are done at short range. Archer is the FutureBadass version of Shirou, and his natural skill with the bow was a reason he was summoned as Archer.
* MasterSwordsman: WordOfGod is that he actually could have qualified as a Saber, had Artoria not been summoned instead. His skill with his twin blades is sufficient to get him through bouts with the likes of Lancer and Assassin. Archer doesn't consider himself to be either a Swordsman or a Bowman, but rather a Magus whose skills happen to be suited for mimicking both.
* MasterForger: Where most Heroic Servants use legendary weapons they were known to carry in life, Archer instead uses projection magecraft to "Trace" near-perfect copies of other heroes' weapons and wield them with similar skill. Gilgamesh, who has the highest claim to every legendary weapon, even those that became more famous in someone else's hands, derisively calls him "Faker" because of this.
* MathematiciansAnswer: When asked if he could follow his ideal to the end without regrets he evades the question by saying it's meaningless: he already met his end. The answer is both yes and no. He can meet his end without regrets, but after the end he sees the inevitable conclusion, which leaves him lashing out in ways he doesn't even fully understand.
* MetaphoricallyTrue: He often employs this, leaning especially heavily on ExactWords and MathematiciansAnswer, to avoid giving straight answers to Rin and others' questions when doing so would be inconvenient for him.
* MentalWorld: The Reality Marble Unlimited Blade Works is a separate boundary field within Archer's consciousness where he can use his ultimate power.
* MoralityPet:
** Illyasviel. He could have killed Illya during his fight with Berserker, but chose not to. Considering his past life as Shirou, Illya is likely one of the few people he still holds dear. In the 2006 anime, he even addresses her by her nickname in his final moments, much to her confusion.
** Rin as well. Had he been summoned by ''anyone else'', Archer would've abused every skill in his repertoire to ignore his Master and gun for Shirou at the first opportunity, consequences and collateral damage be damned. But because he cares for Rin, he goes out of his way to ensure she has a path to winning the Holy Grail War before trying to destroy his past self.
* MusclesAreMeaningless: ZigZaggedTrope. He is significantly stronger than his past self, to the point he can physically overwhelm Shirou using only a tenth of his actual power, which would make his greater musculature meaningful. But for a Servant his strength rating is rather low, at D, which would make numerous skinnier Servants much stronger than him instead.
* MyGreatestFailure:
** As the supplemental materials reveal, Archer's backstory had him saving Illya just like Shirou did in ''Fate'', only to see her waste away and die a year after the end of the Fifth Grail War due to her Homunculus body. It's one of the first real dents in his idealism, and the main reason why Archer never considers attacking Illya directly as an option, even if he could have very easily slain her in ''Fate'' to indirectly kill Berserker and survive their fight.
** Another great failure that he blames himself for is not being able to save Saber from her fate in his time.
* MysticalWhiteHair: Archer's hair is white due to the form of magic he utilizes.
* NarratorAllAlong: The very first scene in the Visual Novel is actually told specifically from Archer's point of view when he was Shirou. WordOfGod hinted at that in hollow ataraxia and later stated in his blog that he was surprised how no one figured it out.
* NervesOfSteel: Archer's strongest combat ability, Eye of The Mind (True), allows him to plan out strategies while trading blows and work out the most effective path to victory.
* NoGoodDeedGoesUnpunished:
** He willingly gave both his life and his afterlife for the sake of other people and it never brought him anything but pain and betrayal.
** Occurs in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' when he plans to kill Shirou and help Rin at the same time. The latter part of his plan is part of why the former part fails since ignoring Rin and Saber instead of killing them when he had the chance leads to Rin forming a contract with Saber, making her too powerful for him. That ''was'' his plan, though, only the order was mixed up.
* NonIndicativeName: Despite being called "Archer" since this is his Servant class, he uses swords far more. He does use a bow from time to time, but he shoots SWORDS with it instead. He can also fire swords [[StormOfBlades Gate of Babylon style]] when using Unlimited Blade Works.
* OriginalGeneration: He is the only Servant in the original game who doesn't hail from a myth, legend, or from RealLife in at least a small aspect. Later games in the franchise have examples like [[VisualNovel/{{Tsukihime}} Arcueid's]] Berserker appearance in ''VideoGame/FateExtra'' and the ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'' playable Servant appearances of [[Literature/TheGardenOfSinners Ryougi Shiki]], [[Literature/FateZero Kiritsugu, Irisviel]], [[Manga/FateKaleidLinerPrismaIllya (Prisma) Illya and Chloe]], and the lot of them are crossover bonus characters who can only Servant-ize for ''Grand Order''[='=]s specific circumstances.
* OutsideContextProblem: In the Holy Grail War, knowing the identity of an opposing servant will give you a ''huge'' advantage against them by clueing you in to their abilities and weaknesses. ''Nobody'' has a clue who this guy is and he shows off a ''multitude'' of identifiable Noble Phantasms which are clearly not his. Opponents start off being [[ConfusionFu confused by his fighting style]]--an Archer who mostly fights close-up with a pair of Chinese daggers--but they only get more confused when he nocks his bow with Northern European swords or defends with the shield of Ajax. As it turns out, this is because he's something utterly unique in the Holy Grail Wars--a Grail War veteran summoned from the ''future''.
* ThePiratesWhoDontDoAnything: Despite being summoned into the class of Archer, across all routes, he only winds up drawing a bow one or two times.
* PetTheDog: As he lays dying in ''Heaven's Feel'' after the Shadow nearly tears him apart in a giant explosion and having given his left arm to Shirou, he pats the unconscious Tohsaka on the head, before [[GoOutWithASmile Going Out With A Smile]].
* ThePlan: Depends a lot upon these. The entirety of ''Unlimited Blade Works'' is Archer playing a one-man round of XanatosSpeedChess against ''everybody'' at the same time and basically winning. Even if he gives up on his primary objective, he's basically one step ahead of everyone else for the entirety of the route. This is actually one of his skills: Eye of the Mind (True), which means the user can see every possible option for victory and take the best one, turning a near-zero percent chance of winning into a sure-win.
* PossessionImpliesMastery: [[TheUntwist Untwisted]], as he is stated to be a maker, not wielder, yet functions as Gilgamesh's natural enemy due to the latter's inability to wield his weapons to their full potential. Somewhat justified, as he copies not only weapons but also experience accumulated in them.
* PragmaticHero: A good example of his attitude can be seen with Caster. Shirou wants to kill her immediately for the damage she causes, but Archer says he can kill her at any time but can't beat Berserker, so he'll just let her do that for him. He justifies this by saying that Illya and Caster can't be trusted with the Grail so it's best to get them both.
* PrecisionGuidedBoomerang: Kanshou and Bakuya, his twin swords. As long as Archer holds one, the other will always return to his hands. This is their special abilities as Noble Phantasms, along with their Anti-Monster powers and AntiMagic wards.
* RealityWarper: That's what his Noble Phantasm basically does, letting him create weapons from thin air.
* RestrainingBolt: One of the characterizing traits of Archer-Class Servants is "Independent Action", which eliminates the Servant's natural compulsion to follow their Master's orders -- unless they're given via Command Seal. Rin, after Archer says to her face that he has no intention of following her orders, wisely invokes this.
** In the prologue during this argument, Rin uses a Command Seal with the simple-but-effective order of "follow my orders". Archer naturally blasts her for expending a Command Seal so casually, but privately admits that [[{{Touche}} it was clever]].
** In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', Rin's second Command Seal is used with the order "don't hurt Shirou" after the past and future selves get into an argument. Archer's response to this one was far less kind: Rin didn't know at the time that he has ''far'' greater reasons for wanting Shirou dead, and he proceeds to jump through hoops to outright break his contract with her.
* RulesLawyer: When Rin asks him about his identity after using her first command spell, he tells her that he doesn't know his name and origin. Both of these statements are MetaphoricallyTrue. Thanks to the fire at the end of the 4th war, he doesn't remember his name or origins before he took the name Shirou Emiya when he was adopted by Kiritsugu.
* SarcasticDevotee: To Rin. Eventually {{subverted}} in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' as he ends up betraying her to fulfill his own objective.
* TheScapegoat: Archer was blamed for a war he had tried to stop, by one of the people he had personally saved no less. This ultimately led to his death.
* SelfMadeMan: Unlike the majority of Servants who are mostly [[BornWinner Born Winners]] with tremendous talents and block-destroying magical weaponry, Archer went from a normal human with nearly no magic talent to one of the single most dangerous Servants one could ever summon.
* ShootTheShaggyDog:
** Archer's goal turns out to be this, as he desires to kill Shirou in the hopes of erasing himself from existence. However, as Saber points out in ''Unlimited Blade Works'', he is already a Defender-type Heroic Spirit and thus exists outside the boundaries of space-time and causality, so killing Shirou would do nothing. He admits this but he's just that desperate.
** Archer, in some way, receives his salvation from his cynicism in each route. However, he'll never remember any event from his time in the Grail War, so it's only a brief respite. Though later works, such as ''Videogame/FateGrandOrder'', go out of their way to [[SubvertedTrope subvert this]] not only is EMIYA shown to remember his role in ''Stay Night'', but his CharacterDevelopment sticks, thus making this a case of EarnYourHappyEnding.
* SignificantWhiteHairDarkSkin: His unusual tan skin and white hair cause him to stand out even among the other servants, and help obfuscate his true identity as EMIYA, aka the adult self of Shirou Emiya, a pale redhead. It's revealed that this is caused by the strain on his body from tracing, and overuse of magic and magical tampering in this series is known to cause DiseaseBleach and change peoples' appearances in general.
* SillyRabbitIdealismIsForKids: "Drown in your ideals and die!"
* SmallRoleBigImpact: In ''Heaven's Feel'', he dies rather early and without having accomplished much, but without his arm that he gives to Shirou in his final moments, the good guys would've been screwed several times later in the story.
* SourOutsideSadInside: OH BOY. Archer on a good day is snarky and abrasive but deep down he has major issues due to realizing how his ideals essentially turned him to a hitman that is forced to murder others for all of time. He only gets over it in the ''UBW'' route when he realizes that following his ideals were worth it despite his fate.
* SourSupporter: To Shirou, [[TeethClenchedTeamwork whenever they're forced to work together]]. He's not very fond of him, making it difficult to escape Caster's temple.
* SpontaneousWeaponCreation: In the prologue, Rin is impressed with him seemingly pulling a new pair of swords every time Lancer destroys them, as a Servant's weapon is supposed to be unique. It's easy for him to create weapons out of thin air.
* StealthMentor: Whether he means to or not, in all three routes he ends up making Shirou a lot stronger. This is most obvious in ''UBW'', where he helps to fix Shirou's magic circuits.
* StormOfBlades: Can shoot a rain of swords if he so chooses. Taken up to eleven with [[MentalWorld Unlimited Blade Works]], [[FieldOfBlades an entire WORLD of swords.]]
* TakingTheBullet:
** In ''Heaven's Feel'' he takes one of the Shadow's tentacles through the midriff in Rin's place, which makes it impossible for him to save both him and Tohsaka in time, opting to protect her instead of himself.
** Does this for Shirou after losing their fight in ''Unlimited Blade Works'', taking several weapons aimed at him by Gilgamesh. For unexplained reasons, he survived.
* ThanatosGambit: EMIYA's plan is revealed to be to erase himself from existence by killing Shirou, though he only gets to enact it in ''Unlimited Blade Works''. He tries to set things up so that Rin can still win the Holy Grail War by contracting with Saber, but things ultimately don't pan out as he'd intended and it's questioned whether the plan would have worked to begin with -- Servants are removed from the time-space continuum, so EMIYA would continue to exist even if he killed his past self. EMIYA himself admits this but he's just that desperate and states if he does fail at least someone like himself won't exist in this timeline.
* ThrowingYourSwordAlwaysWorks: He can fire infinite exploding arrows and Kanshou and Bakuya have a magical connection so that when thrown to the sides of an opponent they will loop in and chop them in half.
* TookALevelInCynic: Archer reveals that he was very much like Shirou in his youth, but his experiences in life and especially as a Counter Guardian caused him to be jaded.
* TragicHero: This is a guy whose original desire was to save everyone and is now forced to murder everyone in front of him forever.
-->'''Archer:''' Conflicts come into my view as long as I'm alive. It was endless. I didn't dream of a world without conflicts. [[DespairEventHorizon I just wanted the people I saw to not cry]].
* TrickArrow: He uses various legendary swords ([[StuffBlowingUp that EXPLODE]]) as arrows.
* TrueNeutral: InUniverse alignment, a reflection of his good goals and bad methods and of his nature as a servant of Alaya, whose sole purpose is to keep humanity in a stable state.
* UnusualEyebrows: Of the kinked type. He and Shirou are the only characters drawn with such eyebrows, which is actually a rather subtle hint of his true identity.
* UsedToBeASweetKid: He wasn't always so sarcastic and harsh but instead rather straightforward and honest. And then the Shirou he used to be got into some ''real'' shit.
* VillainousBreakdown: Calling him a evil is a stretch, but he's the main antagonist of ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route, along with Gilgamesh and Caster. That said, Shirou's refusal to let Archer break him starts to make that that stoic mask shatter.
* WalkingSpoiler: His identity and motivations are the central focus of the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route.
* WeakButSkilled: Archer had none of the superhuman abilities that heroes like Saber or Lancer possessed in-life, and even as a Servant his power lies in his versatility and unpredictability rather than straightforward power. With ratings of C, he has for a Servant average strength and speed, and no outstanding abilities relative to the other Servants. On the other hand, he's quite analytical, well-prepared, and always has a new trick up his sleeve. Across all routes he repeatedly gives [[TheAce Lancer]] a great fight, manages to kill Berserker six times over, bests Caster ''and'' outfights the even more WeakButSkilled Fake Assassin, outright demolishes the True Assassin, and at least briefly holds off Saber Alter. His lower physical stats compared to other combat-suited Servants means he is more likely to lose a fight if it carries on for too long, but if he can catch his opponent by surprise he usually seals the deal. It's also balanced out by the fact that he was summoned by [[TeenGenius Rin]], buffing him much more than he should have.
* WhamLine:
** To Shirou: "I see. Good thing you don't like me." This is when Archer suddenly lets out his killing intent and attacks Shirou from behind.
** To Shirou: "Farewell. Drown in your ideals and die." In the same scene. This line reveals to the audience how much he actually ''hates'' Shirou.
** "Trace on." He's already revealed his identity, and this line confirms it.
** To Illya in the 2006 anime: "You're still so merciless, Illya." Prior to this, Archer only addresses her as Illyasviel. While not touched upon in this route, this sense of familiarity with Illya foreshadows that Archer is actually a future incarnation of Shirou.
* WhatYouAreInTheDark: Archer still can't bring himself to stop protecting people, despite his cold, jaded nature. He could have killed Shirou very easily multiple times through the three routes. Due to the way the Archer class works, his independence would let him easily slip away and kill him and be done. Instead he helps his past self, grudgingly or not saving him multiple times. This is most obvious in ''Heaven's Feel'': Shirou is bleeding out, Rin is alive and well, and all Archer has to do is finish the job. Instead, Archer slices his own arm off, sacrificing his life to give Shirou the power he needs to keep fighting.
* WhenHeSmiles: At the end of ''Unlimited Blade Works'', he gives Rin a genuine smile before fading away, finally coming in terms with Shirou's ideology and confidant that the Shirou of now will not end up like him in the future.
* WhiteHairBlackHeart: His white hair and cynical AntiHero nature qualify him for this trope. Further, his actions and intent, in the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' arc grant him AntiVillain status.
* WhyDontYouJustShootHim:
** Specifically why he doesn't just kill Shirou. In order to be completely sure of a plan he doesn't even know will really work (erasing himself via TimeParadox) Archer can't just kill him. He has to break him, make him reject his ideals and never become a hero, and THEN kill him.
** In all the routes, but especially ''Fate'', he could easily end the threat of Berserker by just shooting [[KidWithTheLeash Illya]] dead, but he never does even as he's fighting a delaying/losing battle against Berserker on his own, which comes off as quite strange given his usual CombatPragmatist nature. That's because [[MyGreatestFailure the fact he failed to save his Illya from dying still haunts him]] and she's very likely the [[MoralityPet one person]] he could never bring himself to directly kill.
* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: Archer switches to Caster's side in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' in order to get out from under Rin's Command Seal. The moment Caster's guard against him is down, he impales her.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Lancer]]
!!!'''Voiced by:''' Creator/NobutoshiCanna (JP), Creator/TonyOliver (EN)
[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lancer_takashi_takeuchi_character_select.png]]
[[caption-width-right:350:''"Stooping to dirty tricks is a mage's role. My kind just fights where and when we're told.''"]]

->''"It should be natural for you to drink until dawn with someone you get along with, even if he may be your enemy."''

Lancer is a carefree, laidback Servant always eager to get into a good fight, and will never back down unless commanded. When not being an enemy, he shows a playful attitude and loves to tease. He is most often seen fighting Archer throughout the whole story. Although easy to dismiss as being a mediocre Servant, he is in fact extremely fast and skilled in the use of the lance.\\
\\
His identity is revealed early on as [[Myth/CelticMythology one of the greater heroes of Irish Mythology, Cu Chulainn]]. Thus, his Noble Phantasm is easily guessable: The ''Gae Bolg'', [[OneHitKill which kills its target instantly]] by automatically piercing the victim's heart and then [[RealityWarper reversing cause-and-effect]] to create a reason for it.

-----
* AdaptationalBadass: In the original visual novel's ''Heaven's Feel'' route, Lancer is [[spoiler:killed by True Assassin in a matter of seconds while trying to escape the Shadow]], while in the movie adaption, he is [[spoiler:given an extended action scene where he chases True Assassin across the city, lands a few blows on him, and even manages to get his Gae Bolg off before finally being killed when True Assassin lures him to the shadow. It's made clear that had he either been given a second longer to activate Gae Bolg, or been fighting away from the Shadow, he would have easily killed Assassin.]]
* AlmightyJanitor: In a sense. Despite being part of one of the top 3 classes, Lancer is required by his Master [[IAmNotLeftHanded to hold back in all of his first fights]]. Even with this handicap, Lancer is still one of the strongest Servants in the series. [[spoiler:He even held Gilgamesh at bay for half a day. The same Gilgamesh who utterly [[CurbstompBattle decimated]] Rider in ''Zero'' and Berserker in the ''Unlimited Bladeworks'' route.]]
* AlwaysAccurateAttack: Both techniques of the Noble Phantasm Gae Bolg are this, with the single-target version twisting the laws of cause and effect to always strike the heart while the Anti-Army version moves with such a speed and covers such a wide area (by multiplying into dozens of spearheads, as seen in ''VideoGame/FateExtra'', ''CCC'' and ''VideoGame/FateExtella'' when used against multiple enemies) that it is practically impossible to avoid it without teleporting. The former can be avoided with extremely good luck, however.
* AmbiguouslyBi: Not in the visual novel (unless you count Gae Bolg), but in spinoff material. In ''VideoGame/FateUnlimitedCodes'', he calls [[Literature/FateZero Diarmuid]] beautiful, more or less due to some DeliberateValuesDissonance but he's always shown interest in women either way.
* AnimalMotifs: Dogs, as per his legend. He hates being compared to a dog, and in an anime-exclusive scene from the ''Anime/FateStayNightHeavensFeel'', he's represented by a toy dog in Sakura's dream.
* AntiVillain: [[JustFollowingOrders He's merely following orders]] from his mysterious Master and seems disgusted or annoyed at the more unpleasant things he has to do. [[spoiler:In two routes he gets fed up with it and turns on Kotomine.]]
* BerserkButton: Comparing him to a [[MythologyGag dog]] is a bad idea and he also hates traitors and liars.
* BigDamnHeroes: He saves [[spoiler:Tohsaka several times in ''Unlimited Blade Works''.]]
* BloodKnight: He actually doesn't care about getting the Grail at all. He just wants to fight. Hence his frustration that he's never allowed to do so. This trait is the only thing that keeps Archer alive when Lancer is finally allowed to go all-out against him during their rematch in ''Unlimited Blade Works'', as Archer is able to continuously bait Lancer's strikes by intentionally creating gaps in his defenses only to block them at the last second. Lancer is having too much fun to take the hint despite surpassing Archer in every way in close combat.
* BoisterousBruiser: Especially in ''Unlimited Blade Works'', whereas he's shown to love teasing ''both'' Rin and Saber, and he fights for the fight itself.
* BoringButPractical: Despite being not very flashy and useless against multiple foes or fortifications, the normal use of Gae Bolg can easily OneHitKill Servants and uses extremely little mana. Saber states he could probably use it six or seven times for the same amount of mana that an equally decisive blow from an "A"-rank Noble Phantasm would consume, and likens it to a man who can use a single arrow to win a battle most Servants could only win with an artillery barrage.
* BornUnlucky: Luck stat ''E'', the worst possible. It shows in-game too, considering all the messes he ends up in. It would cause him and almost all other Lancers to become CosmicPlaythings and Buttmonkies in the series.
* BreakoutCharacter: Not as much as Saber or Archer, but he proved popular enough to appear in ''VideoGame/FateExtra'', get PromotedToPlayable in ''VideoGame/FateExtella'', show up in ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'' with three extra variations (his [[StoneWall playstyle]] also helped boost his popularity), and appear as a major ally the ''First Order'' anime.
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: In ''Heaven's Feel'', [[spoiler:he has his heart ripped out by True Assassin and is then eaten alive by the Shadow.]]
* CurbStompBattle: [[spoiler:His second fight with Archer in ''Unlimited Blade Works''. Fighting to his full capabilities, Archer can only barely keep up with him and only survives since he was familiar with Lancer's style from their first fight, and even then Lancer has Archer on the defensive for most of the fight and quickly ends it with the thrown version of Gae Bolg. After Archer's Rho Aias gets destroyed as a result of barely diverting the lance, he only survives because Lancer figures out his plan and chooses not to kill him afterwards.]]
* CuteLittleFangs: It's most noticeable in animated adaptations. His canine teeth are more pointed than those of other characters to suit his dog motif. Apart from making his smile a little more feral than it might otherwise be, they're not at all disfiguring.
* DeliberateValuesDissonance: His attitude towards killing and being a FriendlyEnemy somewhat alienates the others, who are antagonistic towards him for it. In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', he spends a lot of time messing with Tohsaka due to these values.
* {{Determinator}}: He is rarely hit so he doesn't get to show this often, but his A-ranked Battle Continuation means he can fight long after he "should" have fallen. His legend involved him fighting against an army through a series of duels, which he fought until he was mortally wounded. Then he proceeded to ''tie himself to a post'' so he could stand up to continue fighting. He continued fighting and killing people until his last breath, including killing his killer, ''post-mortem''. His enemies didn't even believe he was dead until a bird landed on him. This trait isn't shown in two of three routes [[spoiler:since he was {{One Hit Kill}}ed by his own Gae Bolg in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' and the Shadow in ''Heaven's Feel'']] but it shows in the [[spoiler:Fate route, where he fights ''Gilgamesh'' for ''twelve hours'' before being defeated. For reference, even Berserker only lasted ''minutes'', and Gilgamesh had to use everything in his arsenal to keep Lancer from entering close combat, lest he be in actual trouble.]]
* TheDogBitesBack: After being forced to follow orders he considers disgusting throughout the Grail War, near the end of ''Unlimited Blade Works'' he [[spoiler:finally gets fed up when ordered to kill Tohsaka after protecting her for a day or two and refuses to do it. Kotomine forces him to stab himself in the heart, after which he gets back up and kills Kotomine, saves Tohsaka and lights the castle on fire before dying.]]
* DroppedABridgeOnHim: [[spoiler:He's killed by True Assassin and the Shadow in ''Heaven's Feel'' after their battle to establish True Assassin as a threat and give some mystery to the Shadow.]]
* DyingMomentOfAwesome: How he died in his legend. He basically dies after single-handedly holding off an entire army. [[spoiler:And he also does this in the VN, in ''Fate'', he holds off against Gilgamesh for ''twelve hours'' to save the heroes and in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' a mostly dead Lancer kills Kotomine, stabs Shinji, frees Tohsaka and burns down the castle they're in.]]
* EnemyMine: Teams up with Shirou and Rin in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' to [[spoiler:defeat Caster.]]
* EvenEvilHasStandards: While technically a villain, [[spoiler:he's disgusted by Kirei and Gilgamesh and betrays them in ''Fate'' and ''Unlimited Blade Works''.]]
* FightingIrish: He's one of Ireland's better known heroes, and he enjoys nothing more than fighting.
* {{Foreshadowing}}: Looking at all the other Master and Servant pairs, it doesn't look like he has much in common with [[spoiler:Kirei]]. [[spoiler:There's [[VisualNovel/FateHollowAtaraxia a reason for that]].]]
* FragileSpeedster: In ''Fate/unlimited codes''. Also has one of the longest reaches in the game.
* FriendlyEnemy: He actually ''prefers'' this kind of relationship and finds it odd when people feel they have to be antagonistic towards people they might end up killing. On the flipside, this does not get in the way of his killing when he must.
* TheGadfly: Only really apparent in ''Unlimited Blade Works'', but Lancer is shown to get a great deal of amusement from teasing girls he finds interesting. "Even [[TheTease Rin]]?", you ask? ''Especially'' Rin.
* GameFace: Usually quite easy on the eyes, but his features can be unsettlingly animalistic and feral sometimes. Which is probably a CallBack to his legendary [[BodyHorror Warp Spasm]].
* {{Geas}}: It's mentioned on the weapons page that he is under a geas to lose to a man from Ulster wielding Caladbolg. It never comes up. [[spoiler:With reason, mind you, since neither Archer nor Gilgamesh -- the former having a copy and the latter having the prototypical Caladbolg -- hail from Ulster, meaning Lancer has no reason to lose to them should they use it. However, this didn't stop Gilgamesh from chaining Lancer down with the Chains of Heaven and executing him with Caladbolg in the Studio DEEN anime adaptation, seemingly using that weapon out of a sense of irony on the King of Heroes' part.]]
* HeelFaceTurn: Lancer starts off trying to kill Rin and mortally-wounding Shirou. Later in ''Fate'' [[spoiler:he ultimately turns against Kotomine after learning about the existence of Gilgamesh and being disgusted by the King of Heroes himself, ultimately sacrificing his life to buy Shirou and Saber time to get away and regroup]]. In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', he shows up to [[EnemyMine help Shirou and Rin defeat Caster]], ostensibly on orders from his Master. [[spoiler:He admits he enjoyed working with them, saves Rin from being raped by Shinji, and is so outraged when Kotomine orders him to kill her that he turns on him.]]
* HonorBeforeReason: ''VisualNovel/FateHollowAtaraxia'' explains something that was only implied here. Namely, he made a vow that he would follow the orders of anyone he had sworn his allegiance to without question. Kind of regrets that one considering who he's working for.
* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Comes off as a bit of a cocky dick at first, but genuinely praises Shirou for surviving against him with nothing but a [[ImprobableWeaponUser poster]] and is actually a pretty good guy.
* LawfulNeutral: InUniverse alignment.
* LightningBruiser: At his fullest, Lancer is ''the'' fastest Servant in the war, strong enough to throw his lance with enough force to [[spoiler:dispel Archer's Rho Aias and break his arm]], and is arguably even more difficult to kill than Berserker, [[spoiler:given that he lasts exponentially longer against Gilgamesh compared to him.]]
* MagicKnight: As shown in ''Unlimited Blade Works'', Lancer is capable of performing RunicMagic, and his skill is sufficient to the point where ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'' reveals that he does qualify for the Caster class.
* MarkOfTheSupernatural: He has blue hair, as did his predecessor in the Fourth Grail War. [[spoiler:Like most Nasuverse characters, his unnatural hair color seems to be a hint he's not fully human -- and indeed he's not; he's a demigod, which helps in deducing his identity.]]
* NiceGuy: Is probably the kindest and most amicable Servant besides Saber.
* NormallyIWouldBeDeadNow: Lancer has the "Battle Continuation" ability, which allows him to fight effectively even when mortally wounded. [[spoiler:He uses it to his advantage in ''Unlimited Blade Works'', allowing him to live for a few minutes after having had his heart pierced by his own spear.]]
* OlderIsBetter: Compared to the 4th War's Lancer (who came from the 3rd century-based Fenian Cycle of Myth/IrishMythology), Cú Chulainn is a figure from the 1st century-based ''Ulster Cycle'', which is a good two centuries older. Also, based on performance and durability throughout their tenure in battle, Cú Chulainn does seem to be the superior warrior -- especially when you consider that [[spoiler:Cú Chulainn survives a spear to the heart [[TakingYouWithMe long enough to kill the one responsible]] (albeit only thanks to his Battle Continuation), while Diarmuid [[DyingCurse goes out in a very undignified fashion]].]]
* OneHitKill: The entire point of Gae Bolg's activated ability. There is no way for it to miss the target's heart unless their Luck stat is high enough, they have some form of attack nullification ([[spoiler:Heracles's God Hand which nullifies attacks of A-Rank and below, though WordOfGod states Lancer can get around this by using his Runes to temporarily boost his Noble Phantasm rank]]) or [[spoiler:they have special conceptual defensive Noble Phantasms, such as Archer's Rho Aias, though Gae Bolg manages to completely destroy it]].
* OutOfFocus: Ends up as this in the ''Heaven's Feel'' route, being among the first Servants to die.
* OvershadowedByAwesome: Poor Lancer gets this hard. He's one of the most impressive Servants you'll ever see in the Lancer class, but thanks to his Master's Command Seal, he is not allowed to go all out and has to retreat his first battle with any Servant if they even remotely have the skill to oppose him. Even his normally used Gae Bolg technique is much less flashy or effective than many other Noble Phantasms, since it's affected by Luck and he tends to use it quite early in the War.
* PrettyBoy: [[AdaptationalAttractiveness Surprisingly]] for the ''Fate'' franchise, it's mythologically accurate. When he wasn't in the middle of one of his infamous berserker rages, Cu Chulainn was described as being slim, wiry, fine-boned, and more beautiful than handsome despite his fearsome reputation and monstrous strength.
* PsychicAssistedSuicide: How he went out in ''Unlimited Blade Works''. [[spoiler:Kirei uses his Command Spell to order Lancer to commit suicide, causing him to stab himself in the heart with Gáe Bolg. His Battle Continuation skill gives him the last laugh over Kirei.]]
* PunchClockVillain: He appears to be a villain at first, what with killing Shirou and all, but that's only because his Master ordered him to. He's affable when he's not under orders, and even when he is, he makes it clear he's not enjoying doing so.
* RasputinianDeath: In life he was so notoriously hard to kill that his enemies had to resort to LoopholeAbuse to get it done, [[spoiler:so it's no surprise that his death in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' not only takes a while but gets him the last laugh over Kirei.]]
* RedBaron: "Cú Chulainn" means "Culann's hound". In-game, he's also referred to as "Ireland's Child of Light" on top of this.
* RedEyesTakeWarning: Ultimately subverted, though at first he looks like he's playing it straight. He may have quite a bit of bloodlust, and tries to kill Shirou, but he's actually not a bad guy.
* RedHerring: He first appears in the prologue near the boundary field set up at the school. While he denies any connection to it, he also says nothing to imply his Master didn't set it up and have him guard it. In all paths, it's revealed he had nothing to do with it.
* RunicMagic: Despite being a classed as a Lancer, he can still use the runes he learned in his life. Just not as much as when he's classed as a Caster.
* ScrewTheRulesImDoingWhatsRight: [[spoiler:After helping the protagonists out against Caster and hearing that Archer kidnapped Rin, he volunteers to help Shirou get her back, despite it going against Kotomine's orders.]]
* SemiDivine: Divinity Rank B, being the son of Lugh. It's what allows him to [[spoiler:be immobilized by Enkidu.]]
* ShipperOnDeck: For Rin/Shirou in ''Unlimited Blade Works'', in a sense. Despite his flirting with her, he respects Shirou's protectiveness of Rin. When she states that they aren't a couple, he tells her that they already act like one.
* ShoutOut: His bodysuit is based on D's from ''Manga/VampireHunterD'' (not, as fans sometimes think, the "Celtic blue bodypaint" stereotype).
* SliceAndDiceSwordsmanship: He uses Gae Bolg for both thrusting and occasionally slashing.
* SpamAttack: He has a penchant for rapid-fire spear thrusts.
* SuperSpeed: The fastest Servant of the war bar Rider, with swiftness rivalled only by Saber with her Mana Burst. Its depiction is taken to the extreme in the 2014 anime, where he is practically teleporting from Archer's perspective once he's allowed to go all out.
* TakingYouWithMe: [[spoiler:He kills Kirei after being ordered to kill himself for refusing to rip out Rin's heart in ''Unlimited Blade Works''.]]
* TallDarkAndSnarky: Snarking around his opponents seems to be one of his hobbies.
* TheTease: He flirts a lot with Tohsaka in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' even though he knows Tohsaka isn't really interested.
* WeaponTwirling: He does an awful lot of this in the 2014 Anime, sometimes as an attack but other times just to demonstrate his skill with a spear. It's also convenient way of getting into the proper stance to use his Noble Phantasm.
* TheWorfBarrage: For all its reputation as a OneHitKill weapon, Gae Bolg has a really poor track record at actually killing anyone with one hit, or at all. The primary reason for this is because everyone he uses it on happens to have some way to survive it. Saber has a high Luck stat and basically wins the coin toss and [[spoiler:Archer just happens to bring out a shield specifically made to counter missiles at the exact time that Lancer tries to use the thrown version of the attack]]. Basically, Lancer has really bad luck with his targets.
* WorfHadTheFlu: He's actually a high-class Servant on par with Saber or Berserker in ability, but is hindered by his lack of fame in Japan. Even with that, he still manages to trash almost anyone he faces in any route, and even [[spoiler:fight Gilgamesh for half a day]] in ''Fate'' route. In fact, he's held back only by his Master's Command Seal in almost every single one of his fights, preventing him from using his full potential. When he does have the freedom to fight without restraint, he able to casually SpeedBlitz Archer in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' in their second fight, and easily could have beaten him at that point.
* WoundThatWillNotHeal: Wounds caused by Gae Bolg do not heal naturally. Mana-based healing like magic or Servants' HealingFactor works, but a normal human struck by it is doomed. The curse can be lifted if Gae Bolg is destroyed or if Cú himself dies. Being struck in the heart with it is also fatal and even Servants cannot survive it.
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Rider]]
!!!'''Voiced by:''' Creator/YuuAsakawa (JP), Creator/KarenStrassman (EN 2006 Anime, 2010 ''Unlimited Blade Works'' Movie), Creator/MelissaFahn (EN 2015 ''Unlimited Blade Works'' Anime, 2018 ''Heaven's Feel'' Movie)
[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/rider_takashi_takeuchi_character_select.png]]

->''"You appear to be a brave person, unlike my master. I shall kill you kindly."''

Rider is a tall, dark, silent and gorgeous Servant controlled by [[SmugSnake Shinji Matou]]. Rider is always seen with a blindfold and very long hair. Unlike Shinji, she is a little amiable; in fact, she dislikes him and considers him to be a coward. She wields a very long chain in battle with spikes on the ends. These chains make sounds like slithering snakes. Because Shinji is not a magus, he greatly holds back her true potential, making her one of the weakest Servants.\\
\\
As she is so quiet and her Master is so difficult to deal with, she remains quite mysterious until the third route when she begins receiving more focus, which is also where her true identity, the Gorgon Medusa, is revealed.
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* ActuallyNotAVampire: While Rider is of questionable humanity and both enjoys and is empowered by drinking blood, vampires are actually something different.
* AlwaysSaveTheGirl: [[spoiler:Rider's only concern is making sure Sakura stays safe. In ''Heaven's Feel'', Rider tells Shirou that if he's thinking of killing Dark Sakura to save the world, then she will gladly kill him on the spot and let the world burn.]]
* AnimalMotifs: Rider gets motifs of horses, for her ability to summon Pegasus, and snakes, as befits her real identity of Medusa.
* AntiMagic: Rider has innate magic resistance as part of her class, although it's not quite Saber's level. [[spoiler:Caster gets around this by having Kuzuki kill her in the route the two come to blows.]]
* ArousedByTheirVoice: Shirou thinks her voice is incredibly beautiful.
* TheBeastmaster: As the mother of the original Pegasus, she can summon it into battle by slashing her neck open as part of her Noble Phantasm, Bellerophon: The Bridle of Chivalry. It is far beyond the level of an ordinary pegasus thanks to its legend, approaching the level of a Dragon in terms of sheer power. It can lacerate people and warp buildings by simply flapping its wings. It also has the highest Magic Resistance in the entire war, able to brush off a blackened and overcharged ''Excalibur'' when combined with Shirou's Rho Aias.
* BecauseYouWereNiceToMe: [[spoiler:Why she eventually warms up to and develops respect for Shirou, the first man, if not the first person besides Sakura, to ever show her unconditional kindness and treat her as another human being rather than a monster.]]
* BerserkButton: Command Spells and those who use them. In one bad end, she immediately drops [[FriendlyEnemy her usual behavior]] and finishes Shirou off when he tries to summon Saber.
* BirdsOfAFeather: [[spoiler:Sakura summoned Rider without using a catalyst. In the event a Master does not use a catalyst to summon a Servant, then the Grail will use the summoner's personality as one and summon the Servant most compatible with the summoner. This affinity is what makes Rider so attached to Sakura, as she sees her Master as someone similar to her past self and to be saved before she too turns into a monster.]]
* BladeOnARope: She fights with a "Nameless Dagger", a long chain with a spike on each end.
* BlindfoldedVision: Her blindfold is stated in the Status sheets to seal all properties of her eyes, including vision, so she relies on her other senses for everything. It works well enough that her blindness isn't noticeable at all.
* BloodMagic: She can use her blood as a material component in a Noble Phantasm called ''Blood Fort Andromeda'', which dissolves its victims into a slurry that Rider can then absorb as Mana. Likewise, the blood spilled by stabbing herself in the neck is the summoning vector for her Pegasus, her most powerful asset besides (and arguably above) her mystic eyes.
* {{Bowdlerise}}: While ''Fate'' plays into the idea that Medusa wasn't always a monster, the angle of her being raped by Poseidon is not present and the curse placed on her by Athena is merely because she was jealous of Gorgon Sister's beauty.
* BrokenBird: Her backstory. She was teased by her sisters for being mortal, and because Athena sent her followers to attack them, Rider turned into a man-eating monster that devoured them. At the time of her death, she reminisced that they did actually love one another and accepted that she misses her time with them. One of the reasons she is so sympathetic to Sakura is because she is broken too.
* CainAndAbel: In her backstory, she was constantly bullied by her sisters and devoured them after she turned into a monster. As she died, Rider realized that not only she did love them but that they'd let her eat them out of guilt for her condition being a result of trying to protect them, and would later consider their time together as her fondest memories.
* CassandraTruth: Getting the good ending of ''Heaven's Feel'' is more or less dependent on whether Shirou chooses to listen to Rider when she tells him he is vital to Sakura's happiness. Ignoring her and reverting to his pointlessly suicidal habits leads to the BittersweetEnding.
* ChainPain: Her standard weapon is a nail attached to a long chain.
* TheChampion: She fights for [[spoiler:Sakura]] because no one else ever has.
* ChaoticGood: InUniverse alignment.
* CollaredByFashion: Wears a leather collar on her neck as part of her standard battle costume.
* CommonalityConnection: Rider shares many similarities with [[spoiler:her true Master, Sakura]], which is why the two of them get along and are compatible.
* DarkActionGirl: She embraces this image. She wears a black outfit, can be rather ruthless and being a chosen hero means she's more than competent in fighting. The only thing preventing her from showing how badass she is was Shinji's uselessness as a Master.
* DarkIsNotEvil: Her appearance and abilities based in blood and darkness just scream dark creature and is not helped by her vampiric traits, [[HiddenDepths but once you get to know her]], she's really not that bad.
* DeadlyGaze: Cybele, the Mystic Eyes of Petrification, which will leave you TakenForGranite.
* DreamWalker: Her blindfold, Breaker Gorgon, also allows her to enter dreams. [[spoiler:In ''Heaven's Feel'', she enters Shirou's dream disguised as Rin to seduce him and steal his energy.]]
* DressedLikeADominatrix: Rider wears a black leotard dress with matching high legging boots and gloves. Her weapons are two spike chains that she can wrap her opponents in. She also wears a eye mask. Though, that last bit is justified since she's actually Medusa and needs to cover her eyes. ''VisualNovel/FateHollowAtaraxia'' reveals the BDSM look is actually coincidental.
* DroppedABridgeOnHer: In ''Unlimited Blade Works'' Rider dies anticlimactically off-screen against Caster and her Master.
* DualWield: Armed with a pair of giant nails [[ChainPain chained]] together and wielded like daggers. They can also become invisible, allowing Rider to trap people with the chain.
* FacialMarkings: She has some sort of rune on her forehead.
* FriendlyEnemy: The only times she is hostile is when Shinji orders her to be. When she escorted Shirou out of the Matou Household in ''Fate'' she was surprisingly friendly. In the beginning of ''Unlimited Blade Works'' she compliments Shirou on his bravery in contrast to the cowardly Shinji.
* GlowingEyesOfDoom: When she takes the blinders off, her eyes have a strange glowing quality. Shirou describes them as too beautiful for any human to possess, and could either be art the gods admired or a nature they cursed.
* GorgeousGorgon:
** Her true identity is that of {{Medusa}}, the infamous gorgon of Greek myth. The original myths describe Medusa as looking hideous with snakes as her hair, but contrary to that, Rider has beautiful flowing hair and is even described as gorgeous in the game. Her backstory explains that her history is somewhat more complicated than the more abbreviated versions of her legend make it appear.
** This is clarified in ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'', where she explicitly states that the body she has now is either the same body she had before being cursed by Athena, or is at least incredibly similar. So, this is apparently the same beauty that attracted Poseidon.
-->'''Rin:''' To be blunt, she's really gorgeous. When a woman calls another woman gorgeous, you know it's true.
** Her human appearance here may also be for the same reason Archer of Black [[spoiler:whose real identity is Chiron, the famous centaur who acted as a teacher to many Greek heroes]] appeared as a human in ''Literature/FateApocrypha'' -- both Servants have true appearances that could never be mistaken for human and are so iconic as to make hiding their identity all but impossible. By having them manifest in human form, it makes it a great deal harder for their enemies to figure out who they are prior to their Noble Phantasms being unleashed. However, unlike Archer of Black, it's implied Rider's human form was her original one and that her monstrous form was a mutation born from a combination of being cursed, mentally breaking down over time and losing control of her power.
** Three other forms of her appear in ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'', under the classes of Lancer, "Avenger" and Saber. Her Lancer form is a cute, young girl and the form she had at the ''start'' of her career in defending the Shapeless Isle, while the second is flat out named Gorgon instead of her actual name and appears as a winged, scaled woman with hair that turns into snakes, the third is a slightly younger version wielding the golden sword Chrysaor and more as the mother of monsters as she is able to summon numerous Greek monsters through her relation to Echidna. A fourth blackened version appears in the ''Grand Order'' anime as a Lancer; this form is basically Rider with no physical changes and wearing an adult-sized version of her Lancer outfit and weapon, and the Evil alignment and disposition one would expect of a blackened Servant.
* HellishPupils: Rider has unusual, square-shaped pupils that are used to identify her GlowingEyesOfDoom.
* HiddenDepths: In contrast to her {{Dominatrix}} appearance and her "silent killer" and "dutiful servant" demeanour in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' and ''Fate'' respectively, Medusa's inexperience with social interaction beyond her siblings leaves her unsure of how to communicate with others. ''Heaven's Feel'' shows this off especially as it reveals that Rider is very self-conscious about her height, anxious about having people serve her instead of the other way around and seems to fret rather noticeably when [[spoiler:trying to correctly pronounce Shirou's name out of fear of insulting him. Shirou even lampshades this in the latter of these interactions, hypothesizing that Rider is secretly a klutz in her private life.]]
* HugeSchoolgirl: In ''Heaven's Feel'', she's revealed as being self-conscious of her height.
* ImageSong: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-Tyj6AocyQ "Shunji no Uzu"]] ("Instant Vortex")
* InhumanEyeConcealers: Her Breaker Gorgon, which also negates the effects of her Mystic Eyes of Petrification.
* InterplayOfSexAndViolence: In one BadEnd, she outright tells Shirou that she'll have an orgasm if she doesn't kill him off soon, because of his screams.
* IShallTauntYou: In a blink-and-you-missed PassiveAggressiveKombat moment during her exchange of words with Saber Alter before their final fight, Rider asks the Blackened Servant if the wording of her orders means that she won't attack Shirou unless he tries to attack her or get pass her. Saber Alter confirms this, but she adds that Shirou ''will'' advance even though he knows he can't defeat her because that's just who he is. Rider then breaks into her rarely seen smile and says "I see. You served him before me, after all. It's natural that you know his personality." This gets Saber Alter to narrow her eyes and wordlessly ready her sword. This hints that Rider figured out Saber still cares about Shirou at some deeply buried level and knew that she wouldn't take Rider calling herself his Servant too kindly. The taunt seems to work as it gets Saber Alter to prioritize defeating Rider, which helps Shirou's battle plan a lot.
** It's even more explicit in the film adaptation; [[spoiler:when she and Saber Alter clash in ''spring song'', Rider smirks and outright gloats that Shirou won't intervene because Rider has his trust - all but stating she's basically taken Saber's place. This gets Saber Alter ''very'' visibly agitated and she even has a snarl on her face when attacking Rider afterwords]].
* KissOfTheVampire: She does this because of Shinji's inability to provide her with mana. One Bad End in ''Fate'' has her sucking the blood on Shirou's neck.
%%* LickingTheBlade:
* LightningBruiser: Not as strong as Berserker or Saber, but trades power for sheer speed as the fastest Servant of the war while still able to snap spines as if they were twigs. Taken up to eleven once she summons Pegasus, with the highest Magical Resistance of the war (far surpassing Saber's), speed surpassing almost any other Servant, and force equivalent to a fortress wall crashing into someone.
* MagicSkirt: Extremely agile, jumping from wall to wall and across buildings with her skirt apparently glued to her thighs, never seeming to show anything no matter how many flips and jumps she does.
* MaleGaze: The Studio DEEN adaptation of ''Fate'' has a close-up of her butt during her fight with Caster, though of course it [[MagicSkirt doesn't actually show anything]].
* MamaBear: She cares ''very'' much for her true Master, and from the instant [[spoiler:she rejoins Sakura’s side her only objective is keeping her safe at all costs]].
* MarkOfTheSupernatural: Her long mauve hair. [[spoiler:Like most Nasuverse characters with odd hair colors, it's a good indication that she's not exactly human]].
* MercyKill: [[spoiler:In one certain Dead End, instead of letting Shirou suffer and melt under her blood fort, she drains him of his blood and quickly kills him.]]
* MindRape: [[spoiler:Played with, in a disturbingly literal sense; when Shirou has an... er, interesting "dream" about Rin in ''Heaven's Feel'', it's heavily implied to actually be Rider using Rin's image to seduce him and steal mana from him. This is due to "Rin" in the dream having Rider's inhuman eyes and, in one of the remastered variants, drinking Shirou's blood via neck-bite in the same manner Rider had with other students. It's even more literal in the original release with her actually flat-out having Shirou bend her over a desk and then mounting him immediately after he's finished, to the point the line between pleasure and suffering was heavily blurring in Shirou's narration. Even more disturbing is that, while heavily implied to be the former of these two[[note]]due to Rider knowing how important Shirou is to Sakura[[/note]], it's never explicitly confirmed in the novel whether this was all an illusion Rider created in Shirou's head or if she actually did brainwash him into having sex with her.[[note]]If one considers Hollow Ataraxia to be canon however, than it's revealed that Rider only went as far as drinking Shirou's blood; the dream just kept him passive during it.[[/note]]]]
* MiniDressOfPower: She wears a very short one-piece dress that doesn't restrict her from doing all kinds of crazy acrobatic stunts.
* MirrorCharacter: To Saber, as Shirou notes in ''Heaven's Feel'' when he mistakes her voice for Saber's [[spoiler:despite the latter being "dead"]]. Both [[DefrostingIceQueen started out as cold, unapproachable and devoted to their respective causes]], [[spoiler:not to mention having both sacrificed their humanity -- metaphorically for Saber, literally for Rider -- to protect what was close to them, only to get royally screwed by fate and lose everything they ever cared about anyway.]] They also both have surprisingly feminine sides, Saber getting embarrassed by her large appetite in an optional part of ''Fate'' while Rider in ''Heaven's Feel'' is revealed to have a complex about her height. [[spoiler:They are also the only Servants who have the potential to survive past the Holy Grail War; Saber lives with Rin and Shirou in the "Sunny Day" Good End of ''Unlimited Blade Works'', while Rider lives with Sakura and Shirou in the True End of ''Heaven's Feel''. It's also revealed that they both developed affections for Shirou for much the same reason; he was the first boy who not only treated them kindly, but he treated them as just another person as opposed to a monster or mythic figure. Finally, they both have contrasting "evil" alter-egos who are stronger than themselves -- Rider's is her monstrous Gorgon form which she can shift into if she overuses her supernatural strength, whereas Saber's is the Grail-corrupted and black-armored Saber Alter.]]
* MsFanservice: The most scantily clad long-haired StatuesqueStunner lady in the visual novel.
* MusclesAreMeaningless: This is an actual, in-universe ability of hers -- she's got the Monstrous Strength skill, which further erodes the already-tenuous link between a Servant's strength and mundane matters of physics and biology and makes their might mostly or entirely unnatural, letting even those with a slender build manifest bona-fide SuperStrength.
* NobleDemon: She describes herself in rather monstrous terms, can back it up easily and can take a sadistic pleasure in killing enemies, but she's disgusted by the likes of Shinji and isn't pointlessly cruel to anyone she has no grudge against.
* NoBodyLeftBehind: Is vaporized by [[spoiler:Saber's Excalibur]] in the ''Fate'' route. In the manga adaptation, she survives it [[spoiler:if only because Sakura used her last Command Seal to command her to save Shinji from falling to his death, [[DiesDifferentlyInAdaptation after which she fades away]].]]
* NoEyeInMagic: Played With. When her Mystic Eyes are activated, just not looking into them isn't enough, as they're powerful enough she can petrify people regardless. However, Rider ''does'' need to see the enemy herself to actually use them.
* NothingPersonal: She eventually realizes that Shirou is a good person [[spoiler:who's opposing Sakura's Shadow out of self-defense]], but she will still kill the shit out of him if he makes one wrong move.
* {{Pegasus}}: She summons and rides it for her Noble Phantasm, Bellerophon.
* PowerLimiter: Her blindfold, the Breaker Gorgon Noble Phantasm, which prevents her from using her GlowingEyesOfDoom. Later on, she gets a pair of glasses similar to [[VisualNovel/{{Tsukihime}} Shiki's]], the same ones fashioned by [[Literature/TheGardenOfSinners Touko Aozaki]], so she can have a more public appearance.
* PsychoSupporter: She cares about [[spoiler:Sakura's life far, far more than what Sakura actually wants. After two incidents where she almost kills Shirou or lets him die to achieve this goal, Sakura Command Seals her to protect Shirou no matter what]].
* TheQuietOne: She keeps quiet around Shinji, but some awkward situations in her more casual moments during ''Heaven's Feel'' suggest she generally doesn't talk much.
* RelatedDifferentlyInTheAdaptation: Pegasus is usually considered to be the child of Medusa and Poseidon who was born from her severed neck, but here it is merely a gift given to her by Poseidon. ''Fate/Grand Order'' confirms that Chrysaor does exist, but how they're related to Medusa is left vague.
* RestrainingBolt: Shinji would have died a ''long'' time ago if it hadn't been for his possession of the Book of False Attendant, [[spoiler:which Sakura gave him to allow him to command Rider.]]
* {{Sadist}}: Sometimes displays a lascivious response toward her enemies upon defeating them. [[spoiler:This is best exemplified in one bad end in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' where Shirou tries to summon Saber; Rider will cut off one arm and leave him strung up to a tree by his remaining one to bleed out, her parting words being that the only reason she won't stay and gouge his eyes out is ''because doing so would make her orgasm'']].
* SecretTestOfCharacter: [[spoiler:Appears to subject Shirou to this in ''Unlimited Blade Works''; in the bad end of their encounter, Rider will reveal she was deliberately toying with him to try and force him into using a Command Seal so as to test if he [[HumansAreBastards sees Servants as a tool to fall back on]]. If he gives in and tries to call Saber, she'll sever his arm and leave him strung up to bleed out, but if he perseveres she'll continue dragging things out until Rin intervenes and forces her to retreat.]]
* SemiDivine: Divinity Rank E-; she originally had a higher rank, but after being turned into a demonic beast, Rider's divinity was reduced.
* SoBeautifulItsACurse: In her backstory. Because she and her sisters were born out of mankind's wishes for perfect gods, their beauty earned them the ire of Athena, who sent her followers to attack them. She ended up becoming a monster out of her resentment for what humans did to them.
* SuspiciouslySpecificDenial: She says twice that she doesn't care whether Shirou finds her more attractive than Sakura, but her angry expression when he says he doesn't shows otherwise.
* SquareRaceRoundClass:
** Not quite "race", but it briefly comes up in the VN itself and sequels, adaptations and the like expand on the idea that this is another factor preventing her from performing as well as some of the other Servants. Many Heroic Spirits qualify for multiple Class containers, and while the Heroic Spirit who is Rider in this story ''qualifies'' as Rider, has the Noble Phantasms for it and is summoned as such, it isn't necessarily the class this Heroic Spirit is ''strongest'' in; if some of her Noble Phantasms seem kludgy and awkward, that's because in this form, they are. ''Grand Order'', in particular, suggests that she's far stronger as either Lancer (surprisingly)... or as "Avenger", a non-standard container that is not typically utilized in the Fuyuki summoning system. Avenger manifests her in the full, terrible glory of her Gorgon form permanently, further empowered by Grail corruption, giving her full access to the powers one more typically associates with Medusa the Gorgon, including a vastly more effective Bloodfort and the ability to utilize her Mystic Eyes in a way almost like a WaveMotionGun. Meanwhile, while a blackened version briefly shows up in the ''First Order'' OVA as a very similar Servant to the one seen here, her proper Lancer version in ''GO'' manifests as Medusa at the ''start'' of her career as guardian of the Shapeless Isle, when she was much closer to her sisters and her Divinity. In this form, she's a lot more like ''F/SN'''s Lancer, simply using the sheer power of her Goddess Essence, far higher Magic Resistance and [[{{Determinator}} pure determination to protect those she loves]] to overwhelm enemies and empower everything she does. As Rider, Medusa has access to ''neither'' of these advantages (having lost virtually all of her Goddess Essence/Divinity leaving it unable to empower her body and Cybele Mystic Eyes, but also being unable or unwilling to embrace the full monstrosity of her Gorgon form) and simply has to make do with a limited form of Bloodfort Andromeda, weaker Mystic Eyes and her awkward relationship to the Pegasus.
** [[spoiler:Interestingly, when he shows up in humanoid form in ''Grand Order'', Aŋra mentions that he could tell even early on that Medusa had the potential to be an Avenger within her and was a bit taken aback; during ''Heaven's Feel'', you can notice that The Shadow is somewhat less eager to engage Medusa. While this is also likely due to Sakura not wanting to hurt Medusa, in retrospect it comes across as Aŋra not wanting to risk Medusa overusing Monstrous Strength and calling upon the full breadth of her Gorgon form.]]
* StatuesqueStunner: Quite literally considering her powers. By far the tallest female in the game and described as beautiful.
* TheStoic: Rider's facial expression rarely changes even in the face of danger or Shinji's threats.
* {{Stripperiffic}}: A short black dress with cutoff black and magenta armour on the legs. The total amount of raw flesh exposed is actually fairly low, but clearly designed more with fanservice in mind than combat.
* StrongerWithAge: [[spoiler:When she summons Pegasus, she explains that Pegasus had never died, he survived all the way to the modern era. Since he's lived for so long, he's now as powerful as a dragon.]]
* SugarAndIcePersonality: She's a loyal and kind person but she does ''not'' look it. The first impression Shirou has of her is that she reeks of blood, but not necessarily in a bad way.
* SuperSpeed: The highest top speed of the war and incredibly agile, able to run straight up and across walls with ease. This also applies to anything she rides, allowing her to keep up with motorcycles on a ''granny bike!''
* SuperStrength: She typically doesn't use it, though, favouring her agility. The reason for this is that she might revert into a monster if she overdoes it.
* TakenForGranite: As Medusa, anyone she looks at will be turned to stone. One bad end has Shirou charge at her with [[WrongGenreSavvy his eyes closed]], but he still turns to stone.
* ThinkNothingOfIt: [[spoiler:An anti-hero example, but Rider -- at least initially -- does not ask for nor want for anything more than the safety and happiness of her Master, Sakura. To that end, she'll do anything and everything without question -- even put up with the likes of Shinji -- and regard any credit as having simply been her properly following orders. It's to the point that in ''Heaven's Feel'', even having Shirou and Sakura volunteer to cook her a meal leaves her awkwardly fumbling just on how to react, much less respond]].
* ThrowTheDogABone: After two routes as the weakest Servant due to Shinji and always being the first to be eliminated, [[spoiler:''Heaven's Feel'' shows the extent of her power if not being held back by Shinji and lets her survive ''the whole storyline, Epilogue included''.]]
* TragicMonster: Athena cursed Medusa and her sisters simply because she was jealous of their beauty. Medusa wanted nothing more than to protect her sisters (who bullied her constantly, but actually loved her in their own way), but ended up turning into the Gorgon and devouring them herself.
* VillainousCrush: She's almost as hot for Shirou as Sakura is, in part because of the courage he shows by fighting against her. In her previous life, the only mortal men she ever met were trying to murder her, so it's possible her romantic expectations are a bit warped.
* WallCrawl: She can crawl along walls and ceilings, and even casually walk on walls.
* WhenSheSmiles: Rider's smiling sprite is very rarely used. Out of combat, it appears exactly ''once'' in the whole visual novel at the end of an optional scene [[spoiler:(Shirou looking for her on the morning of the 11th day of the ''Heaven's Feel'' route).]]
* WorfHadTheFlu: In both ''Fate'' and ''Unlimited Blade Works'', she is weakened by Shinji's inability to provide her a reliable source of magical energy. In ''Heaven's Feel'' where she is [[spoiler:Sakura's]] Servant, she becomes far more powerful and is able to defeat True Assassin, go toe-to-toe with Archer, and briefly hold back [[spoiler:Saber Alter.]]
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Berserker]]
!!!'''Voiced by:''' Creator/TadahisaSaizen (JP), Creator/MichaelMcConnohie (EN)
[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/berserker_takashi_takeuchi_character_select.png]]

->''"▂▂▃▃▄▄▅▅!"''

A very huge and very un-GentleGiant: The mad Servant Berserker. This is the Servant of Ilyasviel von Einzbern, who immediately invoked the "Mad Enhancement" skill exclusive to Berserkers to [[MinMaxing strip him of his sanity and speaking ability in exchange for boosting his (already unprecedented) statline]]. Despite his bouts of insanity and the Berserker class' reputation of killing their own Masters, Berserker is entirely loyal to his Master.\\
\\
His identity, immediately told by Ilya, is in fact Greek Mythology's WorldsStrongestMan and all around badass: Heracles. Due to his wide range of talents, [[TheAce Heracles could fulfill the role of any of the seven Classes except Caster]]. Unfortunately, he was summoned as a Berserker and is unable to use his Noble Phantasm ''Nine Lives'' or the ''Bow of the Hydra''. Despite this, his ludicrous speed, strength and resilience make him easily the most powerful Servant summoned to fight in the Fifth Holy Grail War.
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* TheAce: He can fulfill the role of any of the seven Classes except Caster. Despite the Berserker class being arguably his weakest class, he's still a NighInvulnerable LightningBruiser who's better at dealing with the effects of his mad state than most heroes would be owing to his episodes of god-induced madness and UnstoppableRage in life. Again, he's friggin ''Heracles''.
* AdaptationalAttractiveness: Once again, courtesy of the the ''UBW'' anime, he's much less Gonk, looking more like a extremely wild-haired BarbarianHero than the "Borderline rock man" from the original. This look is fine-tuned even further in the ''Heaven's Feel'' movie, where he looks like a monstrous humanoid straight out of ''Manga/{{Berserk}}''; This is probably a deliberate difference between portrayals as the ''UBW'' anime also explored the more humane side of Berserker [[AdaptationExpansion through Ilya's memories]], while in ''HF'' he's just there to ''fuck shit up''.
* AdaptationalBadass: Twice, in different manners.
** In the Anime adaptation of ''Anime/FateStayNightUnlimitedBladeWorks'', Berserker is shown as keeping his finesse in swordmanship and even close quarter combat in spite of his insanity, through pure muscle memory and instinct, much like the Black Knight did in Literature/FateZero.
** On the other hand, he is absolutely untouchable in the first ''Heaven's Feel'' movie, where he throws Saber around like a volleyball and uses the momentum from her only proper counterattack to blow her away with a single punch.
* AdaptationalWimp: Yet [[RunningGag again]] in the same anime, he's shown to be much less NighInvulnerable, and both his strength, speed and sheer endurance even ignoring his Noble Phantasm have been decreased to the point where Saber, who in the Visual Novel can't last more than a minute or two against him, can take him head-on. Although that's more a result of ''Saber'' being multiple levels ''more'' badass than Berserker being less so. Averted, however, in the ''Heaven's Feel'' movie, where he thoroughly trounces Saber with minimal effort. In ''Lost Butterfly'', [[spoiler:he initially seems to have completely wimped out, easily losing to Saber Alter and the Grail Mud, only to break out of said Mud and throw her around like a ragdoll before getting put down by several point-blank Excalibur Morgans.]]
* AdaptationExpansion: In ''Spring Song'', [[spoiler:Shirou tracing Nine Lives floods his mind with images of Herakles completing the Twelve Labors and shows him crying in despair over the death of his child due to Hera robbing him of his sanity, giving old-school fans and new ones alike a better look into Berserker's life in part because he's become a huge fan-favorite despite having all of ''three'' verbal lines in the Visual Novel.]]
* AdaptiveAbility: God Hand renders Berserker immune to any attack that [[spoiler:has killed him before, as long as he's got a life left to use for a regeneration]]. It's more of an InformedAbility than anything since nobody ever tries to use the same attack on him twice on-screen. At least until the second ''Heaven's Feel'' movie, ''Lost Butterfly''. [[spoiler:After Saber Alter kills him by stabbing and blasting him with Excalibur Morgan, she notices her attacks now have no effect. She simply increases her attacks' power every time she uses them until they can kill him again.]]
* AnimalMotifs: His mane-like hair, slitted pupils, letting off a deep purr that occasionally turns into an ear-rending growl when feeling threatened like a great cat makes him seem almost [[KingOfBeasts lion-esque]]. Fitting for the man who wore a lion's pelt on his head for a majority of his life.
* AntiVillain: He's only an antagonist in that he follows Illya's orders without question, but he has no actual malice towards anyone except [[spoiler:Saber Alter, The Shadow and Gilgamesh]] who he instinctively perceives as dangerous to his Master. In the two scenes where he is lucid, he shows that he is both level-headed and has a remarkable amount of insight, giving due respect to the opponents he had just been trying to massacre.
* AttackAttackAttack: Even though he was incredibly skilled with every weapon during his life, the Berserker class has made his mind give into madness so he can only swing the giant sword around. It works disgustingly well, and his natural instinct in the form of his Eye of the Mind still functions through the cloud of madness in his mind.
* AwesomeButImpractical: Berserker is a walking death machine who is borderline undefeatable in a straight mano-a-mano fight, but has a prohibitive mana expendature that's only solved by Illya being a living furnace of mana as a Homunculus. The biggest impracticality is that Herakles could also been ''a lot'' more than just a human blender invoking ChunkySalsaRule on whatever he touches if he wasn't Berserker, but the Einzbern are infamous for this trope in general and MinMaxing his already prodigious statline a bit more was never gonna be the thing that got them the gold medal.
* AwesomenessIsVolatile: His KillingIntent and sheer inhuman power is so intense that it makes people recoil or go into deer-in-headlights mode. When pushed to his limits such as against [[spoiler: Saber Alter]], it becomes so intense that it makes his surroundings ''explode'' while [[spoiler: smashing her head into the dirt.]]
* BackFromTheDead: God Hand grants him twelve extra lives, though powerful-enough attacks can take more than one life at once.
* BareFistedMonk: Naturally. He's the inventor of Pankration[[note]]A brutal early form of UsefulNotes/MixedMartialArts popular in Ancient Greece with no holds barred, and only eye-gouging and GroinAttack being banned (At least among the Spartans. Other Hellenic city states had rules in place and strict refereeing to avoid crippling or killing the opponent), fought in the nude or with a loincloth; Usually contests were resolved by wrestling, submission holds and dirty boxing, but one contemporary piece of Greek comedy alludes to a donkey winning the Olympic Games in Pankration, implying kicks were also a major factor.[[/note]], and as such is a supreme martial artist that is said to be the greatest Servant of all in hand-to-hand combat when sane. While he can still use a bit of it as seen in the ''UBW'' anime, he doesn't make more of it due to him becoming a Berserker.
* BerserkButton: Daring to attack Illya. [[spoiler:So much so that Gilgamesh stabbing her causes him to come back to life.]]
* TheBerserker: Completely devoid of rational thought because he was summoned in this class.
* BeyondTheImpossible:
** The Twelve Labors were considered this, even by other contemporary Greek heroes. Heracles didn't care, and as Berserker, he doesn't have the capacity to care.
** In life, he developed the technique Nine Lives, which turns an arrow into a RainOfArrows, and when used with a melee weapon, allows him to perform nine simultaneous strikes. Basically, three of Assassin's Tsubame Gaeshi at once, unleashed by someone ''just over four times'' Assassin's size.
** In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', [[spoiler:he utterly shocks Gilgamesh by coming back to life even though Gilgamesh had already killed him twelve times and by breaking the unbreakable-to-divine beings chain Enkidu.]]
** In ''Heaven's Feel'', he tears his way out of the Shadow by force and rips off his own skin just so he won't have God Hand after being eaten by the Shadow. In ''Lost Butterfly'' this is changed to [[spoiler:him initially going into the Mud with little resistance only to easily tear out and beat Saber Alter's ass when Illya calls out for him, losing all his extra lives in the process of his [[CurbStompCushion titanic battle with Saber Alter]], and reviving with only one live remaining. He still proceeded to do the impossible in such a pitiful state by stopping his final attack that would have chopped Shirou in half even after he pulled out all the stops to even fight Dark Berserker]].
* {{BFS}}: His weapon is referred to in-game as an ''axe''-sword, and for good reason.
* BlackEyesOfCrazy: He has black sclera and red irises when under the influence of [[PowerBornOfMadness Mad Enhancement]]. When Illya restrains him, his sclera are white and his irises are the same color as his skin -- though they're also sometimes drawn as being yellow.
* BladeSpam: Nine Lives is Berserker's second Noble Phantasm and can't be used in-story because his class ability [[WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity Mad Enhancement]] won't let him. The actual Noble Phantasm itself, derived from Herakles's feat of defeating the many-headed, nigh-immortal Hydra with his bow and arrows, was never used by Berserker himself in ''VisualNovel/FateStayNight''. [[spoiler:However, when Shirou in the ''Heaven's Feel'' route used his Projection magic to adapt the Noble Phantasm for his own use, the resulting "Nine Lives Blade Works" was composed of eight simultaneous slashes from different directions in one instant, followed by a stab to the center, all done with SuperSpeed.]] ''VideoGame/FateUnlimitedCodes'' resorted to depicting Nine Lives as butchering an enemy by hitting them ''one hundred'' times in a short span of time.
* BlessedWithSuck: Sure, when Mad Enhancement is active he's faster and stronger, but on the other hand it strips him of rationality and prevents him from using any of his Noble Phantasms apart from God Hand, which is passive. Thus, Berserker is actually one of his ''worst'' classes.
* BoringButPractical: Since he's rendered insane by the way of his summoning, he can't access the huge arsenal of weapons and god-given tools from his labors the way Cu can use his runes while being a Lancer, and simply destroys everything through overwhelming physicality and power from being a near 700 pound brick of demigod muscle. He's a pure warrior who is so physically superior to his competition that he ''doesn't even need the techniques he once had''.
* BreakingTheBonds:
** In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', he manages to break [[spoiler:Enkidu, which actually manages to shock Gilgamesh, since the chain is designed to trap gods. The chains that held down the {{Kaiju}} sized Bull of heaven snap like rusty wire when Gilgamesh goes to kill Illya.]]
** In ''Heaven's Feel'', [[spoiler:he's able to break out of the Shadow by ''pure brute force'' and HeroicWillpower, despite the fact that the Grail, and by extension the Shadow, should be something he as a Servant cannot resist.]]
* BruiserWithASoftCenter: Not that he gets to display it much, but he's ''extremely'' protective of his Master, who he identifies as an abused child who needs a guardian like him more than anything else. [[spoiler:Illya bemoans that she never got him to pick her up and hold her tight like a father would as she is dying in ''Unlimited Blade Works'', showing that she clearly recognized and loved this side of Berserker.]]
* CharacterAlignment: InUniverse alignment is [[UnconventionalAlignment Chaotic Insane]], which probably pegs him under ChaoticNeutral. He lacks the rationality to make moral judgments, but apparently under normal circumstances he would be ChaoticGood.
* CharlesAtlasSuperpower: His profile in-game and Archer's comments in the anime denotes that his lifetime of fighting in every avenue of combat and his godly physique means that even while Berserker is completely off his rocker with very limited higher functions, he is able to perform astounding feats of physical skill and agility because such moves are simple muscle memory to him. See UnskilledButStrong for details.
* CoolSword: Amusingly PlayedWith. His weapon is not actually one of his many weapons from his life, but a piece of rock from one of the temples dedicated to him shaped into a sword by the Einzberns to be used as the catalyst for his summoning. This only makes him clashing it against the other legendary weapons in the Holy Grail War all the more impressive; He's taking on things such as [[spoiler:Excalibur and the Gate of Babylon]] with nothing more than a ''normal piece of stone''.
* CounterAttack: Used to beautiful effect against Saber in the ''Heaven's Feel'' movie. She strikes his sword to parry him with all her might, blowing it back and in theory leaving him open to attack... Only for Berserker to use the backwards momentum to dig his heels in and punch her so hard her breastplate is blown to pieces, the impact almost knocking her out cold.
* CripplingOverspecialization: Madness Enhancement was meant to be used on weaker Servants as to make up for their lack of strength. The problem with applying it to Heracles is that he's already an absolute cream-of-the-crop Heroic Spirit who doesn't need it, especially since it costs him his fighting skills and ''several'' Noble Phantasms. This trade-off of all his combat prowess for more raw power results in him performing poorly in combat with God Hand and his (already insanely overpowered ''before'' Madness Enhancement) physicality being the chief reason why he's so troublesome to deal with.
* CurbStompBattle: His first fight with Saber in ''Fate'' and ''Heaven's Feel''. His sheer speed and strength completely overwhelm her leaving unable to mount any real resistance. She does better in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' as the fight occurs in a different place and she's able to lure him to area where the terrain favored her.
* CurbStompCushion: He hands out one of the most brutal beatings imaginable to his opponent in ''Lost Butterfly'', but [[spoiler:is ultimately unable to beat Saber's Shadow-induced StoryBreakerPower.]]
* DanceBattler: Notably pulls off a series of Capoeira-like spin kicks against Saber when she tried to disarm him, the force of which send her flying like a baseball.
* DeathIsCheap: He dies a number of times in his fight against Archer, yet goes on to face Saber. [[spoiler:This is because his Noble Phantasm possesses eleven layers of automatic revival magic, meaning he needs to get killed twelve times to die.]]
* DefiantToTheEnd: If Berserker senses any harm coming Illya's way, he will ''never'' back down until whatever displeases her is in bloody pieces or she is out of harm's way. [[spoiler:Despite being at a complete disadvantage against Gilgamesh, he refuses to stop charging at him in a straight line because any other form of attack would risk Illya being hit by the StormOfBlades flying their way. Even when he's swallowed up and brainwashed by the ''six billion'' curses of the Grail Mud, he instictively ceases his otherwise lethal attack on Shirou when Illya comes out of hiding.]]
* {{Determinator}}:
** In the visual novel, his character sheet denotes this with [[NormallyIWouldBeDeadNow Battle Continuation]] A, tying with Lancer who [[spoiler:could hold out for 12 hours in a LastStand against Gilgamesh because of this]] and [[BoisterousBruiser Bravery]] A+, which makes him immune to all Magecraft affecting his psyche and increase his melee damage from always being willing and able to push his insanely powerful body to it's limits even in the face of death and horrific injury to [[ChunkySalsaRule reduce whatever Illya needs dead to a paste on the wall]].
** Archer 2 outright calls Berserker ''unyielding'',[[note]]the exact wording is 不撓不屈, which is an old idiom that means, lit., "Unbent, Unscratched", which is used to denote a state of mind in war and martial arts where one will never give up no matter what even in the face of inevitable death.[[/note]] the shining example if not ''embodiment'' of human perseverance against overwhelming odds through their strength, will and ingenuity. [[spoiler:Considering he comes back to life and breaks a chain that is supposed to be unbreakable on a Servant of his divinity through sheer willpower, Gilgamesh wasn't exaggerating.]]
* DiedStandingUp: He never falls during his death. He always disappears standing, possibly because he's too huge to topple over.
* DiscOneFinalBoss: In ''Fate'', he is introduced early on as the biggest threat among the known Servants. He is defeated in a truly desperate and climactic battle, and no other Servant was thought to be on his level. That's when the bigger villains show...
* TheDreaded:
** Heracles is by no small margin the strongest of the seven Servants summoned and leaves Shirou and Rin with a ''very'' strong impression of his incredible power on the first night of the War, where he either [[CurbStompBattle dunks on Saber with ease]] or [[TheJuggernaut comes out completely unscathed from fighting Saber and Archer]], renowned as the strongest Classes, at the same time. Caster and Rider also give him a '''massive''' berth, ''never'' getting involved where Berserker is in any of the three routes [[spoiler:because they knew of him in their own "lifetimes", if you can call mythological figures like them that]]. [[spoiler:Even Gilgamesh has a brief cold-sweat when Berserker comes back to life from sheer willpower to try and tear him a new one for stabbing Illya.]]
** In a blink-and-you'll-miss-it shot in ''Lost Butterfly'', [[spoiler:even Saber Alter visibly hesitates to bring her sword to bear against him for a moment towards the end of the fight, in part from [[SuperScream the sheer wind pressure Heracles is exuding]] but also because [[StoryBreakerPower even stronger than she could ever be]], [[TheDeterminator the man simply ''will'' not stay down]].]]
* DyingAsYourself:
** In ''Fate'', he regains his sanity when Shirou and Saber defeat him for the final time. He uses his last moments to congratulate them on their victory and marvel on [[spoiler:the power of Caliburn.]]
** In ''Heaven's Feel'', he regains his sanity when Shirou kills him. He uses his last moments to ask Shirou to protect Illya.
* FamedInStory: Heracles is one of the most famous characters in literature and art both in and out-of-universe, no two ways about it. This works to his advantage in the story, as he can be summoned near the peak of his strength no matter where the Holy Grail War takes place, but he would get a noticeable boost in Europe and an especially sharp boost in Greece. [[AllThereInTheManual Later supplimentary material from Fate/Apocrypha relevant to bogus Grail Wars ran around the world after the basic setup for it was leaked by Darnic]] implies that the world literally ran dry of viable catalysts for Heracles because he's one of the first and most powerful figures you'd default to when you think of the word "hero".
* FasterThanTheyLook: One would think that the movements of a veritable hulk of a man like Heracles would be an antithesis of speed and agility, and yet that couldn't be farther from the truth. He is a LightningBruiser through and through, moving with such inhuman speed in spite of his sheer massiveness that Shirou initially goes into denial at the sight.
* FlashStep: In the ''Ufotable'' adaptations, he has a habit of [[PunchedAcrossTheRoom sending Saber flying into the air by just powering through their attempt at parrying him]], before doing this, vanishing from sight and appearing right behind her in a ridiculous display of both stealth and speed, before sending her into the ground with an overhead swing, to the point where it basically becomes a SignatureMove of his to just ''vanish'' and appear behind his next target.
* FlatCharacter: The only thing that can be said about him not related to his combat abilities is that he likes Illya a lot. The rest of his behavior you'll have to rationalize on your own based on his legend.
* GentleGiant: Towards Ilya. Even though he should be stark raving mad and kill anything in sight, he protects her and carries her around almost like a father. This was usually the case in myth as well (with his HarmfulToMinors incident explicitly being Hera punishing him for being Zeus' bastard son as harshly as she could), though you still [[UnstoppableRage didn't want to get on his bad side]]. Illya acknowledges as much in-universe:
--> '''Illya:''' ''"With you by my side, I can rest easy because you always protected me. You might have been scary, but really you were so kind. You were so big, like [[PapaWolf Father]]. In truth, I really wanted you to scoop me into your arms just once."''
* GladHesOnOurSide: In ''Lost Butterfly'', this seems to be the expression on Shirou and Rin's faces as they observe his titanic clash with Saber Alter.
* {{Gonk}}: The Berserker class's Mad Enhancement has some effect on his physique, notable after things like his head explodes, re-grows, and looks somewhat normal for a moment. Nasu clarifies that he would indeed maintain the same size under other classes, but his muscles would be a bit softer, he wouldn't have his elbow spikes, and his face would look less bestial.
* GracefulLoser: [[spoiler:Compliments Saber and Shirou on beating him in his final moments, where he has regained his sanity.]]
* HellishPupils: Some of his artwork in spinoff games and a closeup of his eyes in ''Anime/FateStayNightHeavensFeel II. lost butterfly'' shows that he has vertically-slitted pupils -- at least while under the influence of Mad Enhancement, though it's seemingly a common trait for demigods as Lancer and Archer II have similar eyes, though theirs are red as compared to Herakles' golden pupils.
* HeroAntagonist: [[spoiler:He very briefly becomes one in ''Heaven's Feel'', where he fights against the far more sinister [[EvilOldFolks Zouken]], [[LawfulEvil True Assassin]], and [[TheCorruption Saber Alter]]. ]]
* HeroicBuild: He is over 300 kilos of shredded muscle, to the point where he looks more like a walking dark-skinned marble statue than he does a man. The ''Ufotable'' animations make exceptional use of this with both posing and angling, making someone explicitly called the protector of mankind in Ancient Greek literature look decidedly inhuman, or perhaps ''too'' human for someone of Berserker's prodigious bulk.
* HeroicWillpower: He's explicitly able to NoSell Command Spells if he does not want to obey the order given to him, even through his madness. [[spoiler:In the anime, he outright survives death 12 times trying to defend Illya from Gilgamesh and revived one last time to take him down with him, despite God Hand only giving Berserker 11 extra lives]]. In ''Lost Butterfly'', [[spoiler:he initially looks to have been completely absorbed by the Shadow after Saber Alter strikes him only to reform his body through sheer will, break out of the mud and send Saber flying, completely unaffected by the Shadow.]]
* HopeSpot: Invoked by his Noble Phantasm. Just when you think you manage to barely make it out alive against one of the strongest demigods imaginable, his head will grow back. His ashen body will rejuvenate from incineration, he'll ''stitch his entire torso back together in seconds after being HalfTheManHeUsedToBe'd by a SwordBeam through the heart''. And he's now nigh-immune to whatever you did to him last time. You ''might'' be able to make him stay down if you can pull something similar off a dozen more times. Key word ''might''. If you're not [[spoiler:Gilgamesh]], good luck.
* HugeGuyTinyGirl: Extreme height difference between him and his Master, Ilya. Berserker towers 1.2 meters over Ilya, and is about five times as broad.
** For those of you who don't use metric here's some math; Berserker's height is listed at 253cm (8ft 3in), Illya's is 133cm (4ft 4in). Weight wise, Berserker is 311kg (685lb 10.203oz), Illya is 34kg (74lb 15.315oz). Yes, he is about ''four feet taller'' than his Master and ''nine times heavier'' than her.
* IAmNotLeftHanded: [[spoiler:Ilya has been holding back the boost he would be getting from his Mad Enhancement, meaning that his [[CurbStompBattle curbstomps]] until his final battle in ''Fate'' had been the same even if he wasn't a Berserker]]. [[{{Retcon}} Retconned]] in later Realta Nua edition. [[spoiler:Instead of negating actual stat buff, Ilya simply controlled him to the extent, and only during last battle, which conveniently happens in uninhabited forest, she finally allows him to cut loose. This actually makes much more sense, since Berserker's boosted statistics is clearly visible through Master's StatOVision even on their very first encounter.]]
* ImplacableMan: Bordering on full-on TheJuggernaut status, as he's NighInvulnerable and even if you could kill him he'll just get back up again. '''Twelve times'''.
* {{Irony}}: WordOfGod has stated that Heracles could make the most effective use of his Noble Phantasms if he was in the Archer class, but he was designated to the hand-to-hand, in-your-face Berserker class. [[spoiler:Additionally, the Einzberns did this to make sure they had a Servant that couldn't betray them, but given what glimpses of his personality we get through his cloud of madness, Herakles would have been remarkably easy to work with and a hardcore PapaWolf if he was sane.]]
* ItCanThink: Averted. He can only project simple surface thoughts that Illya can understand and otherwise acts on instinct, and he has lost his swordsmanship that could rival even Assassin's. However, the game makes repeated statements that with enough strength and agility, one can replicate things that would require incredible skill unintentionally, and combined with his still-remaining combat instincts, he can truly come across as still possessing his martial skill.
* ItOnlyWorksOnce: If an attack does manage to harm him, he will gain a resistance to it after healing (the example given in an interview for the ''UBW'' anime is that he'd receive "[[ShrugOfGod Fire resistance +100]]" if exposed to KillItWithFire). This means that not only does whoever is unlucky enough to face him will have to use powerful attacks, [[spoiler:they will also need to think of twelve ''different'' ways to kill him in order to put him down for good. However, Saber Alter shows that you can use the same technique twice; you just have to have enough mana to keep raising it's strength over and over until it's able to kill him again.]]
* KillingIntent: Radiates one so intense that it completely freezes Shirou and Rin in place the first time they see him. This is while Berserker is ''calm'', mind you.
* KingOfBeasts: He's more like a lion trapped in the shape of a man than a mere madman, and with his size and agility his fighting style is completely unrecognizable from anything a human might use and more like the attack of a huge predator mauling it's prey. Given the heroic figure [[NemeanSkinning Berserker]] [[GeniusBruiser was]] [[MasterOfAll this shouldn't come as a surprise]].
--> '''Archer:''' ''"He's more like an embodiment of savagery than a mad warrior."''
* TheLawOfDiminishingDefensiveEffort: Berserker is completely immune to all attacks beneath "A"-rank and consequently never bothers to go on the defensive except in the most extreme cases. He also normally has the ability to sense harm through sheer instinct, but can't use it because of his insanity.
* {{Leitmotif}}: The second ''Heaven's Feel'' movie gives him one in '''[[TheJuggernaut He Comes Back Again and Again]]''', an opera-esque that plays [[spoiler:as Heracles makes his desperate and valiant LastStand against Saber Alter to protect Illya with every fiber of his being]]. [[https://youtu.be/Ucs7X0SwKdw And then, he came back again]].
* LightningBruiser: Despite his hulking size that towers a good meter above all other characters, he completely avoids the MightyGlacier trope and displays both speed, strength and toughness greatly superior to any other Servant. Shirou outright refuses to believe that Berserker is able to [[FasterThanTheyLook move so fast]] at first after describing him as looking like he's made out of rock. Stats-wise he dwarfs the competition with A+ Strength and A in every statistic except Luck, which is still at a respectable B despite his life story as a CosmicPlaything.
* MadeOfIron: Even without God Hand, he's incredibly tough, as [[spoiler:Shirou tearing him to bits with Nine Lives Blade Works doesn't even slow down his assault.]]
* MagicallyIneptFighter: It's mentioned that the one class Heracles ''doesn't'' qualify for is Caster, thus making him this both as a Berserker and not.
* SuperScream: His roars are so intense that they produce hurricane winds, blowing up dust and debris whenever he gets vocal.
* MasterArcher: As in myth, he is stated to have been a master archer by the narration — sadly, he's summoned to the one class where all his combat skills are completely suppressed by madness. [[spoiler:Late in ''Heaven's Feel'', Shirou is able to use Berserker's sword to copy the original hero's skill, letting him adapt one of Herakles' bow techniques — said technique allows him to inflict ''a hundred blows on his opponent near simultaneously'', simulating how Herakles in the ''Fate''-verse used his bow to strike every head of the hydra off using a barrage of arrows.]]
* MasterOfAll: He'd be this even more if he was sane, but even when batshit crazy he's this when it comes to a melee. He's [[SuperStrength strong]] enough that buildings frequently cave in around his victim from the force of his attacks, ''murderously'' [[SuperSpeed fast and stupefyingly agile]] for [[FasterThanTheyLook his size]], and easily the most [[SuperToughness durable]] Servant in the war, in no small part because of his Noble Phantasm. Best displayed in ''Lost Butterfly'' where [[spoiler:even if Saber Alter is ultimately victorious against him, she's completely overwhelmed by him for the majority of their fight, only making it out on top thanks to her literally bottomless Mana source augmenting her defenses to a ludicrous degree and letting her spam her Noble Phantasm without restraint.]]
* MightyGlacier: In ''VideoGame/FateUnlimitedCodes'', he's this instead of full blown LightningBruiser for balance purposes.
* MonstrousHumanoid: Heracles' Mad Enhancement has done more than turn him into a raging berserker, warping his already eight-foot-tall hulking frame into a monster, turning his skin charcoal grey, giving him BlackEyesOfCrazy, fangs, and elbow spikes.
* MusclesAreMeaningless: Completely averted unlike with the rest of the cast, where even the most hardcore of melee fighter Servants usually have more of an athlete's build or appear outright waifish, but Heracles looks like he's ready to walk onto stage for Mr. Olympia's ''giga''heavyweight division and take the trophy, and is by a country and a mile the best of the bunch in physical attributes.
* NighInvulnerability: Only the best weapons/attacks can hurt him at all and he gains incredible resistance to anything that has already hurt him.
* NoHoldsBarredBeatdown: ''Good lord'', he hands out one of the most insane ones ever put on the big screen to his opponent in ''Lost Butterfly''. [[spoiler: It unfortunately didn't stick due to Saber Alter having NighInvulnerability, but it was still enough to ''almost'' make you feel sorry for her, the ''bad guy''.]]
* NormallyIWouldBeDeadNow: Like Lancer, Berserker has "Battle Continuation". [[spoiler:Like Lancer, he gets to showcase it in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' where it allows him to stand up to Gilgamesh long enough for Ilya to die in peace.]]
* NoSell: God Hand works by denying the very concept of an attack below 'A' rank being able to harm Berserker, meaning that as long as an attack isn't high enough rank Berserker won't even register it no matter how much power is behind it or how much collateral damage it does.
** Also hilariously no sells an attempted Excalibur by Saber in one Bad End where he just casually blocks it even as it incinerates the ground around him and kills her instantly.
* OneHandedZweihander: His "sword" is more like a massive chunk of rock with a hilt, but being huge and insanely strong makes it easy for him to swing it around as if it's nothing. His hands are also simply too large to have both of them on the handle.
* OneHitPolykill: The closest thing he has to a weakness. Sufficiently powerful Noble Phantasms (like [[spoiler:Caliburn]]) are capable of killing him multiple times with a single, fatal blow, reducing his number available lives quite quickly. Though its implied that Noble Phantasms capable of doing this are few and far between. In ''Lost Butterfly'', Saber Alter kills him a half dozen times before hitting him with an [[FantasticNuke Excalibur]] of unfathomable proportions, and Berserker was ''still'' [[DeterMinator trying to get back up to fight on despite being a just a burned torso afterwards]].
* QuantityVsQuality: In ''Lost Butterfly'', he is the Quality to Saber Alter's Quantity: [[spoiler:He's shown to be the far superior fighter, smashing Saber Alter around like a ragdoll, landing multiple hits that would've been utterly fatal to her normally, which Alter withstands due to her infinite mana source letting her use her Mana Burst defensively to a truly absurd degree. Any fatalities she manages on him he simply shrugs off with his God Hand, but he ultimately cannot bridge the gap against a Servant that is normally limited by her Mana having an unending supply of it, and is unfortunately defeated by one point-blank Excalibur Morgan too many.]]
* PapaWolf: '''Fiercely''' protective of Ilya far beyond what even a Servant would usually be. Even when she insulted him and blamed him for the extreme pains of [[ReducedManaCost summoning him before the Grail's surfacing]], he came to her rescue when the Einzberns literally threw her to the wolves without hesitation and holds her hand in the aftermath to comfort her. [[spoiler:He protects her with his own body from Gilgamesh's StormOfBlades]]. This may have something to do with how Hera [[TheAtoner made him kill his own children in life]].
--> '''Illya:''' ''"You didn't protect me because I told you to, or because you were a Servant. You did it because you wanted to... You're so strong, Berserker.''
* PassingTheTorch: In the manga, his final words are "Young me...I entrust this girl to you!" to Shirou, on Ilya. He does the same in ''Spring Song'', telling Shirou to "protect her in my stead." after sparing Shirou from getting subjected to the ChunkySalsaRule.
* PersonOfMassDestruction: He's not as outright destructive as some of the other Servant's Noble Phantasm, but he's essentially a walking bulldozer with a massive ax-cleaver and the agility of a coked-up monkey, resulting in SceneryGorn every time he fights.
* PowerBornOfMadness: The "Mad Enhancement" ability of the Berserker class increases all their stats in return for taking away their sanity and making them uncontrollable. Being that Berserker is [[TheAce Heracles]], it's noted that the stat gains are likely minimal in comparison to the loss of at least one Noble Phantasm and the inability to fight tactically.
* PowerOfTheGodHand: His Noble Phantasm (Well, the only one he can use anyway, due to his madness). A lot more "God," less "hand" than most examples.
* {{Protectorate}}: Do '''NOT''' mess with Illya.
* PunchedAcrossTheRoom: Battling Berserker up close is not so much a swordfight as it is surviving him turning you into a human pinball.
* RedAndBlackAndEvilAllOver: He has dark leathery skin and hair and red irises, and turns progressively red from a soft glow to a eye-searing crimson depending on how pissed off he is. [[spoiler:After being Blackened by Aŋra Mainiiu in ''Heaven's Feel'', he is blood-red with black vein-like markings.]]
* RedEyesTakeWarning: He has red irises and is one of the most powerful Servants. Archer outright warns Rin that he could probably take on the other six ''at once'' before they fight in the ''Ufotable'' anime.
* RequiredSecondaryPowers: Inverted. If Herakles is summoned, he ''will'' have a Noble Phantasm representing the Twelve Labors, his arduous dozen tasks considered BeyondTheImpossible even for other heroes of his time. Normally this would be in the form of King's Order, which gives Herakles ComboPlatterPowers and tools he gathered during said Labors, but since [[SanityHasAdvantages he doesnt have the brain functions to utilize them as Berserker]], he instead has God Hand, representing the immortality the Olympians gave him after his Labors.
* RestrainingBolt: Ilya herself acts as this for him, which says a lot about both how powerful she must be in order to keep freaking Heracles juiced up to the gills and how good-hearted Herakles is for letting a TykeBomb in need of [[PapaWolf protection and care]] direct him even at his own peril.
* ResurrectiveImmortality: His Noble Phantasm, God Hand, [[spoiler:grants him twelve lives, requiring him to be killed twelve times. Provided his Master can provide him enough mana (Illya can), he can regain a lost life once a day until he has twelve again. However, extremely powerful attacks like Caliburn can destroy multiple lives.]]
* SanityHasAdvantages: Mad Enhancement increases his already enormous strength, but strips him of his considerable tactical acumen and his formidable [[BareFistedMonk hand-to-hand skills]] (he invented [[WrestlerInAllOfUs Pankration]], and ''defeated Death with it'') and mastery over weapons ([[ImplausibleFencingPowers his swordsmanship allows him to strike nine times from nine different directions at the same time]]. With his bow, he can shoot a single arrow and hit you ''one hundred times'').
* ScreamingWarrior: His attempts at vocalizing are completely incoherent and sound more like animal roars than something a human could produce.
* SemiDivine: Divinity Rank A, the highest normally achievable rank, being the son of Zeus and having ascended to the Olympic pantheon as he died. Comes back to bite him back in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' where it allows [[spoiler:Gilgamesh to restrain him with Enkidu and impale him with Gate of Babylon]].
* TheSpeechless: While insane he only roars and the visual novel makes a point of emphasizing the wordlessness of his roars by always denoting them with "▂▂▃▃▄▄▅▅!". No "GRAAHH", no "RRAAARR", no any of the usual "stock" SFX for screaming/yelling/roaring. Just ''blank rectangles''. He only speaks ''twice'' in the entire {{visual novel}}, when [[spoiler:Saber kills him in the ''Fate'' route, and only for the half minute he has before his body completely vanishes and when he tells Illya to "Run" away from Dark Sakura in ''Heaven's Feel'']].
* SpellMyNameWithAnS: Though most people use the more common Roman spelling of "Hercules", Berserker's name is pronounced in the Visual Novel like the original Greek name "Herakles".
* SquareRaceRoundClass: Ridiculously powerful though he might be, Berserker is probably the worst class he could have been summoned in. It magnifies his physical abilities, but that's not a big upgrade when you're already the WorldsStrongestMan, and SanityHasAdvantages: the actual Heracles was an omnidisciplinary GeniusBruiser with a downright ludicrous range of talents and incredibly powerful weaponry, but as a Berserker, he's just ungodly tough and hits things ''really'' hard. [[spoiler:A flashback shows that after Saber and Kiritsugu betrayed the Einzberns' purposes for the Holy Grail in the 4th War, they stopped taking chances and instead summoned a mad pawn that couldn't turn on them.]]
* StealthyColossus: He's eligible to be summoned as ''Assassin'', despite being roughly twice the height and 3 times the width of anyone else (though there is some implication that the Berserker class is, in addition to everything else, making him "hulk out" much more literally). However, his extremely clever use of trickery and ability to be stealthy when required to in his original legend makes this more than justified.
* StrongAndSkilled: In the Ufotable adaptations, Berserker, while still an unthinking brute, retains his instinctual skill at combat and at least ''some'' degree of strategy beyond AttackAttackAttack. Even if he's just swinging for the fences and beyond all the time, he's able to make use of {{Improvised Weapon}}s in the form of pillars and entire castle sections in ''Lost Butterfly'', and pulls off some absolutely disrespectful Capoeira-like kicks after [[NonchalantDodge casually ducking Saber]]'s CounterAttack after she disarmed him.
* SuddenlyVoiced: He only speaks twice, once in the ''Fate'' route [[spoiler:after Saber and Shirou deal him a lethal blow]] and in ''Heaven's Feel'', when he tells Illya to run from [[spoiler:Dark Sakura.]]
* SupernaturalGoldEyes: When he's calm, his natural eye color seems to be a dull gold, with slit pupils no less, signifying his divine heritage.
* SuperpoweredEvilSide:
** The Mad Enhancement of the Berserker class augments Heracles' physical parameters, but physically warps him into a monstrous form and robs him of his sanity. It's [[ClippedWingAngel the least-effective class for him to be summoned under]], as his stats are already sky-high and he'd be a GeniusBruiser if sane; The class he'd excel the most in would be Archer. In the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' and ''Heaven's Feel'' anime adaptations he retains his combat skills despite not possessing Eternal Arms Mastership like his precursor from ''Fate/Zero''.
** Averted in ''Heaven's Feel'', which sees Berserker [[spoiler:taken by The Shadow like Saber, but Blackened Berserker is blind, lacks his Noble Phantasm, and his ''skin.'' He is also slower and weaker than regular Berserker. He's also not under control of the Shadow[=/=]Sakura but simply assumes Shirou is his enemy and is thus not considered a distinct character like Saber Alter.]]
* SuperStrength: In terms of raw physical strength, he's easily one of, if not ''the'' strongest Servant summonable in a normal Holy Grail War; This is the man who choked out several Greek {{Kaiju}} with ease and held the heavens on his shoulders. The narration says his blows can flatten mountains, and in one Bad End [[spoiler:he's able to easily swat down a poorly charged Excalibur.]] Virtually all of his fights have his opponents getting tossed around like ragdolls from taking the brunt of his hits and Saber is completely overwhelmed by him in every route. [[spoiler:Even with an [[InfiniteSupplies infinite mana source]], she takes an ungodly amount of punishment that would've killed ''anything else on earth'' a dozen times over.]]
* ThrowTheDogABone: An adaptational case. In the visual novel, his fight against Saber Alter is downright pitiful, and he barely gets to put up token resistance despite his already established incredible power. ''Lost Butterfly'' gives him much more of a chance to shine [[spoiler:even though he meets the same fate.]]
* TragicMonster: In life he was TheParagon and a magnanimous IdealHero looked up to for generations, then ''millenia''. As a Servant, he's reduced to the mad dog of a TykeBomb Magus.
* UndyingLoyalty: Utterly protective of Illya even though she initially hated him, and is called a Servant completely satisfied with his Master by Archer. [[spoiler:Even when prompted by Gilgamesh and told by him that he only stands a chance if he stops protecting Illya, Berserker stands his ground and defends her to the end, even managing to break out of Enkidu in the process despite it being seemingly impossible.]]
* UnskilledButStrong: Being incapable of any strategy more complicated than AttackAttackAttack usually doesn't matter when you can shatter entire buildings with a single blow and move faster than the human eye can follow. Interestingly, he is said to have completely inhuman levels of skill with all weapons if he was sane, far surpassing even Saber, but naturally, this is never shown.
** {{Invoked|Trope}}, in a character profile that identifies this trait in-universe; Even if he ''was'' able to use his old skills, he'd never need to against a human being because he is just astronomically stronger than anything left on planet Earth when he's summoned.
--->"Although he lacks technique, [[ReadingsAreOffTheScale his abilities are so beyond normal standards in power and speed that there is no room for the idea in the first place]]. 'Technique' in battle is something invented by humans to compensate for their natural weaknesses, so such is unnecessary for he who possesses no such weakness."
* UnstoppableRage: The only thing he really feels is rage.
* WalkingShirtlessScene: He wears a kilt and not much else, though the Berserker class leaves him deformed and insane, negating any fanservice value.
* TheWorfEffect: He's a ''monstrously'' powerful Servant that takes a combined effort from Archer, Rin, Saber, and Shirou to defeat in the ''Fate'' route. In the other routes he falls to prove how dangerous [[spoiler:Gilgamesh and the Shadow/Saber Alter]] are. Despite this, he never approaches {{Jobber}} status and [[DefiantToTheEnd always goes down swinging]] [[DeterMinator while exceeding his own sky-high limits]], even getting within spitting distance of pulping [[spoiler:Gilgamesh]]'s head like an orange in ''Unlimited Blade Works''.
** Amazingly subverted in ''Heavens Feel 2: Lost Butterfly'' where he is initially easily beaten by Saber Alter [[spoiler:only to burst out of the Grail Mud and give her an ass-beating that [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill would've killed her a dozen times over]] without the Shadow's help and mana.]]
* WorfHadTheFlu: [[spoiler:By the time Shirou faces him in ''Heaven's Feel'', Berserker is down to his last life, is blind, even more insane, and his skin is ripped off, all factors that made it easier for Shirou to finish him off with Nine Lives Blade Works (with the addition of Illya's presence preventing Berserker from attacking them further). Nasu later confirms in the ''Heaven's Feel 3: Spring Song'' Q&As that Berserker would've easily countered Shirou's onslaught even while insane if it weren't for those factors stopping him. Case and point, he still nearly cleaved Shirou in two with his last attack if Illya hadn't come out of hiding to make him stop mid-swing.]]
* WorthyOpponent:
** In a very brief moment of lucidity during the Fate route while recovering from [[spoiler:Archer wiping out six of his lives]] he wordlessly laments that the battle with him deserved better and that were he not Berserker he would have been delighted to exchange sword techniques to their hearts' content.
** In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', [[spoiler:Gilgamesh acknowledges him as one right off the bat, well-aware of his fearsome strength and reputation, and [[CharacterFilibuster his long-winded diatribe on Herakles' might]] that replaces any conversation the two of them could have had if Herakles was sane spells out that Gilgamesh is genuinely saddened that such a great foe, that without the turn of fate of being summoned in the modern day he would ''never'' have had the chance to fight, is reduced to, as Gilgamesh puts it, "playing nursemaid". The episode is even titled '''A Battle of Legend'''.]]
--> [[spoiler:Gilgamesh]]: ''"What an unbelievable man. To the very end, you surpassed your own legend..."''
* WrestlerInAllOfUs: To be fair, chokeslams become ''very'' easy when you have [[GiantHandsOfDoom hands large enough to encapsulate a man's torso]]. [[spoiler: Saber Alter]] was on the receiving end of a full ''combo'' of them.
* YourHeadAsplode: In ''Fate'', Rin makes a gamble and lets him grab her so she can unload a bunch of jewels into his face all at once, which successfully blows the top half of his head off and leaves his lower jaw barely connected to his neck, taking one of his six remaining lives. Illya even admits that if Rin used maybe five times the amount of jewels, she could have taken all his remaining lives in that one strike.
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Caster]]
!!!'''Voiced by:''' Creator/AtsukoTanaka (JP), Creator/TaraPlatt (EN 2006 Anime, 2010 ''Unlimited Blade Works'' Movie), Creator/MeganHollingshead (EN 2015 ''Unlimited Blade Works'' Anime, 2018 ''Heaven's Feel'' Movie)
[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/caster_takashi_takeuchi_character_select.png]]
[[caption-width-right:350:Caster with hood]]
[[caption-width-right:350:[[labelnote:Click here to see Caster without her hood]]https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ufotable_hf_casual_caster.jpg[[/labelnote]]]]

->''"If the Holy Grail has infinite wealth, it should not run out no matter how much we split it. Then can you not share the Holy Grail with those you trust?"''

A mysterious wizard operating out of the local temple. Caster is a heretic who has made a personal enemy out of Tohsaka due to her draining the townsfolk of mana and nearly killing them in the process. She is ruthless, talented and determined. Assassin guards the gate of her base of operations and is her Servant. Despite this, she shows a level of interest in all of the protagonists and desires to take Saber for her own.\\
\\
Caster is one of the physically-weakest Servants and relies mostly on her powerful anti-Army magic, her Territory Creation skill and her skeletal golems when fighting her opponents. [[SquishyWizard She does less well in single combat]]. Her true identity is Medea, a famous witch from the Greek era.
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* AccidentalMurder: Her first attempts to siphon the energy from Fuyuki's people accidentally end up fatal for her first victims, as she never used this spell before and she couldn't control it at first. Later on, she only takes enough to ''not'' kill them, although in her anger, she poisons several men with hemlock, making them impotent.
* AdaptationalHeroism:
** Her depictions in works that followed ''Fate/stay night'', like ''Fate/hollow ataraxia'' and even ''Carnival Phantasm'', have her character soften significantly.
** [[spoiler:Both played straight and subverted in the ''Unlimited blade Works'' anime. While she's shown to have a compassionate side (albeit briefly), as she destroyed the facility of her former Master and frees the children he was planning to sacrifice as fuel, she still serves as a major antagonist for most of the route and goes on to drain the mana and life-force from nearly everyone in the city. Her regression into a villain is likely due to her new found goal [[LoveMakesYouEvil to stay with Kuzuki]] longer.]]
* AlasPoorVillain: [[spoiler:Her death at Gilgamesh's hands in the Fate route is [[CruelAndUnusualDeath so horrifyingly brutal]] that Shirou describes her death as a "tragedy".]]
* AndIMustScream: Let's just say, agreeing to Caster's proposals is a ''[[BadEnd very bad idea]]''. Getting trapped into a glass jar as her puppet is par for the course.
* AntagonistAbilities: A major aspect of her threat level, and deliberately {{Invoked}} on her part -- while Caster has diverse magical powers, she has little chance against any of the other Servants in open combat due to her lackluster physical abilities. To that end, she does her best to even the playing field through any means necessary, including [[TheMinionMaster minions]], [[FieldPowerEffect traps]], [[DoppelgangerAttack diversions]], [[SinisterSurveillance mystical surveillance]], [[LoopholeAbuse subverting the rules of the Grail War itself]], and when all else fails, [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere getting the hell out of dodge]] via {{Teleportation}}.
* AntiMagic: Her Noble Phantasm, Rule Breaker. [[spoiler:It can nullify every magical contract, including Master-Servant binding.]]
* ArcVillain: Of the first half of ''Unlimited Blade Works''. [[spoiler:Her defeat spells the point where Archer and Gilgamesh's own plans come to the forefront.]]
* AttemptedRape: In the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route, Caster uses her magic to sexually torture Artoria in an attempt to break her. In the expanded DVD version of episode 13, she actually starts to feel her up.
* AwesomeButImpractical:
** Rule Breaker. You have a Noble Phantasm that can [[spoiler:null any and all contracts,]] but it's a dagger meaning she has to get close to her opponent to use it when she has the physical defense of a wet paper bag.
** The Golden Fleece. She could use it to summon the dragon that originally guarded the Fleece, which would make her mid-tier amongst the Fifth Grail War Servants, and not the weakest, along with Assassin. Unfortunately, while she knows the spell necessary to ''summon'' the dragon, she doesn't know the one that would let her ''control'' it, meaning it would be useless save as an attack animal on a powerful enemy like Berserker.
* BattleCouple: She does the high-speed spellcasting, her Master handles close-range physical combat and shields her.
* BeamSpam: In fights she simply spams instant A-rank spells from the sky, riddling the area with lasers that leave the ground scorched as if it had been bombed.
* BerserkButton: Calling her a witch is an amazingly easy way to piss her off.
* BigBadWannabe: She's practically the Shinji Matou amongst the Servants, albeit actually being a credible threat. All her schemes to win the Grail come undone in all the routes, with ''Fate'' [[spoiler:having Gilgamesh just nuke her with his StormOfBlades when she tries to claim Saber (after he apparently attacked the Temple himself to kill Kuzuki and Assassin)]] and ''Heaven's Feel'' [[spoiler:having her, Kuzuki and Assassin be killed by True Assassin as the first casualties]]. ''Unlimited Blade Works'' has her last the longest and get the furthest along in her goals [[spoiler:only for her to become the UnwittingPawn in Archer's own plans.]]
* BrainsAndBondage: Being a SquishyWizard, her attacks focus more on the mental than the physical, but that certainly doesn't stop her from enjoying seeing [[spoiler:Saber tied up and tortured.]]
* BrokenBird: Her life as a mortal has left her fairly twisted. Her real identity is that of Medea, and people cursed her as a witch who would go so far as to kill her own brother to get what she wants. But that's not why she's half killing townspeople. She never did that in life.
* BullyingADragon: Mocks Archer by claiming that she's impossible for him to hit. [[spoiler:She's eventually ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice after he out-gambits her.]]
* CapeWings: She can extend her cape to turn it into a giant pair of wings, which she mainly does when using her Rain of Light spell.
* CheatersNeverProsper: [[spoiler:Her ImperfectRitual to summon Assassin has unforeseen consequences in the ''Heaven's Feel'' route when Zouken invokes an ObviousRulePatch to ''properly'' summon an Assassin into the Holy Grail War. Assassin ends up completely overwritten by True Assassin right where he stands, and both Caster and her Master are slaughtered in turn.]]
* CombatPragmatist: Seeing as she's one of the two weakest Servant classes, Caster is not above fighting dirty. She takes hostages, [[spoiler:turns allies against each other]], sends minions to distract people while she fulfills her goals and engages in some good old fashioned torture.
* CurtainsMatchTheWindow: Her hair and eyes share the same color.
* DeathFromAbove: One of her favorite tactics is to BeamSpam anti-army class spells from overhead.
* DemBones: Makes use of skeletal animal {{Golem}}s as scouts and cannon fodder. The same skeletal creatures that Jason had to contend with in the Greek myth that Caster/Medea originates from, at that.
* DepravedBisexual: Caster manages to prove both aspects of the trope in one scene, as she gets aroused by [[spoiler:magically torturing Saber into obedience (having put her in a revealing white dress) and contemplates exactly how far she can get Saber to be a slave to her lust. The DVD version of the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' anime shows her groping Saber before Kuzuki stops her from going any further]]. [[WordOfGod Nasu]] mentions in [[AllThereInTheManual Fate/side material]] that a hypothetical "Caster" route would have had Caster seducing Rider before setting up a trap to stab her in the back.
* DiscOneFinalBoss: In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', she controls the game by taking over a number of Servants, but in the end she is defeated and the [[spoiler:Gilgamesh-Kotomine duo]] take center stage.
* DoesNotLikeMen: She detests men by default thanks to her experiences with Jason in her past life as Medea, but she seems to have some measure of respect for Shirou's honesty. [[spoiler:She's also motivated by her genuine love for her Master, Kuzuki.]]
* DoppelgangerAttack: She can create tangible copies of herself and others for remote combat or creating diversions, though it usually only takes one good hit to destroy them.
* DramaticIrony: She thinks [[spoiler:Kuzuki]] doesn't return her feelings. He does, he's just ''really'' bad at emotional expression.
* DrivenToMadness:
** In ''Fate'', she abruptly attacks Shirou's house, intending to take Saber and kill everyone. [[spoiler:Whatever happened with Kuzuki and Assassin is not known, except that the latter disappeared. ''hollow ataraxia'' actually reveals what happened. While Caster was away, Gilgamesh decided to visit the Ryuudou Temple and bombarded it with Gate of Babylon, killing both Assassin and Kuzuki. Kuzuki's death drove her mad and she decided to take as many Servants as she could with her before she disappeared. [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill Unfortunately for her, Gilgamesh finishes his attacks after he starts them.]]]]
** In ''Heaven's Feel'', [[spoiler:Saber finds her with a bloody Rule Breaker in her hands and Kuzuki's dead body right next to her. When Caster regains consciousness again, after seeing that she just killed the man she loves, [[LaughingMad she laughs]] and attacks Saber, very likely intending to die.]]
* DroppedABridgeOnHer: [[spoiler:Is abruptly killed early into the ''Heavens Feel'' route by True Assassin, making her the second Servant to die in that route.]]
* EvenEvilHasLovedOnes: [[spoiler:Truly loves Kuzuki and her goal is to be able to remain in the world with him.]]
* EvenEvilHasStandards: While her character is aligned to NeutralEvil, using children as cattle to create mana gems is something she would never lower herself to do, unlike her first Master.
* TheFaceless: When shown without her hood, she is only shown from behind, [[spoiler:until she dies.]]
* {{Familiar}}: She herself is technically a familiar, but this is referring to the dragon tooth golems she uses. She also turns Shirou into a familiar in a {{bad end}} or two and has some Servants herself in ''Unlimited Blade Works''.
* {{Flight}}: One of her spells and a central part of her skill in running away.
* GetBackHereBoss: While Caster is the weakest of the seven Servants in a straight-up fight, actually pinning her down to score a finishing blow is incredibly difficult due to her flight, teleportation, and SelfDuplication abilities. Pretty much the only ways to definitively beat her are to take her by complete surprise (as Archer did by pulling out a new technique during their duel at Ryuudou Temple, and how [[spoiler:Rin ultimately defeats her in the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route, by mixing martial arts into their WizardDuel]]), or burying her under overwhelming firepower (per her death at [[spoiler:Gilgamesh]]'s hands in the ''Fate'' route).
* GodzillaThreshold: All of the frightening and destructive spells she uses during the story? She never used them in life. But she's so desperate to [[spoiler:remain with Kuzuki]] and obtain the Grail that she's willing to go to any length to do it.
* GorgeousGreek: Her true identity is the Greek witch Medea, and she's very attractive.
* HomoeroticSubtext: With [[spoiler:the captured Saber]]. She really seems to enjoy dressing her up and in the expanded DVD version of the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' anime is shown molesting her as well. ''VisualNovel/FateHollowAtaraxia'' and ''Anime/CarnivalPhantasm'' have a lot of fun with this one.
* HotWitch: Without her hood, she is a beautiful spellcaster. Her true identity is Medea, the beautiful sorceress from Greek myth.
* HumanPincushion: [[spoiler:Her ultimate fate in the ''Fate'' and ''Unlimited Blade Works'' routes, courtesy of Gilgamesh and Archer respectively.]]
* ImageSong: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uU-OYRRWUcM& "Sasoi"]] ("Temptation").
* InstantRunes: She can make 'em, easy. Her high-speed divine language skill means her spells take effect immediately, and no magus can replicate it as the language of the gods is lost in the present day.
* InTheHood: She keeps her face hidden within her hood 95% of the time, even when she's getting the crap kicked outta her.
* KryptoniteIsEverywhere: Caster unfortunately suffers from this. Although her spells are ludicrously strong and can easily vaporize a Servant with a single direct hit, more than half of her opponents in the war possess some kind of [[AntiMagic Magic Resistance]] that lets them almost if not completely NoSell it, while Berserker can tank it with his ResurrectiveImmortality. Even Archer, whose Magic Resistance is low enough for her to affect him, is protected by his swords which ''do'' have enough resistance to deflect her spells.
* LadyOfBlackMagic: Beautiful and merciless, she creates skeletal-like golems and has a thing for torturing people though her magic.
* LaughingMad: As Gilgamesh kills her in the Fate route she's reduced to madly laughing at the brutal death she is being subjected to.
* LoadBearingBoss: In the {{anime}}, her elaborate temple turns out to have NoOntologicalInertia. Saber and Tohsaka also agree that she'd totally blow up her base if beaten while in it.
* LoopholeAbuse:
** Her first Master's Command Spell was used so she couldn't use Rule Breaker on him to escape their contract, [[spoiler:so she used it on herself.]] This also works on other Servants.
** Servants aren't supposed to be able to have Servants of their own, but Caster found a way to fudge the method by using the Greater Grail to give herself bootleg Command Seals for a bootleg Servant. Assassin was the result.
* LoveMakesYouEvil: While her love for her Master, Kuzuki, let her find a kind of happiness and peace she never enjoyed in life, it also made her desperate to prolong it, to the point of striking out against the protagonists and endangering the lives of innocent civilians in the city. In short, Love made her more selfish, and all the atrocities she committed were just a desperate attempt to prolong her time with her Master.
* MagicalIncantation: While she can mostly avoid this thanks to being a true sorcerer from the age of the gods, she ''does'' have to verbally invoke her strongest spells. It's just that the language she uses to incant them (which is [[TranslationConvention rendered in Ancient Greek]]) makes it take nowhere near as long as it would for a modern day magi to do so.
* NeutralEvil: InUniverse alignment. While Caster has lines she won't cross, she wants the Grail [[spoiler:so she can stay materialized longer to be with her Master, who she has fallen in love with]]. To do so, she does anything she can to secure power, regardless of who she has to screw over to do so.
* OneHeroHoldTheWeaksauce: By default, Servants have to hold themselves back in combat to some degree, as they are reliant on their Master's limited mana reserves to both utilize their own abilities and maintain their physical forms. Caster, on the other hand, has functionally unlimited mana thanks to mastering a spell that enables her to non-lethally drain mana from human beings around her, enabling her to spam her most powerful spells and attacks as frequently as she wants -- as well as maintain some additional Servants of her own while still allowing them to function at full capacity, as seen with Assassin [[spoiler:as well as Archer and Saber in the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route]].
* OneToMillionToOne: Can teleport from place to place by dissolving into a swarm of glowing butterflies and reforming somewhere else. Her copies also dissolve this way when they're destroyed.
* OutGambitted: By [[spoiler:Archer in ''Unlimited Blade Works''. While she intended him to be a disposable pawn in her attempts to get the Grail, he ends up riddling her with swords while she's occupied with Rin.]]
* PointedEars: Without her hood, her ears are shown to be pointed and elf-like.
* PowerFloats: She floats while in the temple as she receives special power within her lair.
* PragmaticVillainy: In the ''UBW'' anime, she pointed out that her Master's methods of creating mana were inefficient. It took him six child sacrifices in a state-of-the-art laboratory to create a tiny mana crystal, when she could create one several times larger with barely any effort at all.
* ProperlyParanoid: [[spoiler:When she takes Archer as her Servant in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' she knows that he's someone not to be trusted and posts him far away from her as precaution. Unfortunately it's impossible to keep an eye on him 24/7 and he riddles her with his swords the moment she's distracted.]]
* RescueRomance: A villainous example with her Master [[spoiler:Kuzuki. Caster was originally summoned by a magus from the Mage's Association, but she killed him with Rule Breaker. On the verge of her spiritual body dissipating, she stumbled upon Souichirou Kuzuki at the foot of the Ryuudou Temple. He then brought Caster into the temple and attended to her recovery. While initially planning to use him as a puppet, she instead quickly fell in love.]]
* ScrewThisImOutOfHere: Archer notes she is particularly skilled in running away.
* SingleWomanSeeksGoodMan: She fell in love with [[spoiler:Kuzuki]] because he was the first man to show her genuine kindness, dedication and loyalty.
* SmugSnake: {{Subverted}}. [[spoiler:While she acts like a SmugSnake, she knows what she is doing is wrong and doubts that it will actually work out. Her one interlude even reveals that the forbidden magic she's using is something she would normally never use if she wasn't so desperate to stay with Kuzuki.]]
* SquishyWizard: Caster has incredible magical power, with spells that rank in both power and diversity head-and-shoulders above any of the mortal magi in the story. However, she lacks the superhuman strength, speed, and toughness possessed to varying degrees by all of the other Servants, meaning that any kind of physical confrontation is equivalent to suicide for her. [[spoiler:Exploiting this weakness is how Rin wins their WizardDuel in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' -- unlike Caster, Rin is trained in martial arts, and isn't afraid to incorporate Strengthening magecraft and a good old-fashioned physical smackdown into a battle of magic.]]
* SuperEmpowering: Her use of Reinforcement magic on Kuzuki, making him strong enough to shatter blades with his bare hands and deliver blows that hurt even the toughest of Servants. Combined with his unique fighting style, Caster's magic makes Kuzuki roughly as dangerous as a Servant in his own right. Unlike other mortal users of Reinforcement, she can maintain the effects at a distance and with seemingly no effort or concentration.
* TakingTheBullet: How she meets her end in the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route, [[spoiler:intercepting a barrage of swords fired by Archer meant for Kuzuki. It's a SenselessSacrifice in the end, as Kuzuki attacks Archer to avenge her death and gets cut down all the same.]]
* TragicVillain: Despite being an antagonist in every route, all she really wants is to be with the man she loves.
* UnholyMatrimony: She genuinely loves her Master and together they form an evil duo. Judging by his actions and ''hollow ataraxia'', her feelings are reciprocated.
* UnwittingPawn: [[spoiler:Archer joined her in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' for one reason only; to get rid of Rin's Command Seal that prevents him from hurting Shirou. Once the Seal was removed Caster was nothing more than an inconvenient loose end to be tied up before he could pursue his personal agenda. To Caster's credit she knows that Archer isn't to be trusted but she bit off more than she could chew.]]
* VillainRespect: Initially has a firm PunyHumans stance, but eventually starts to express interest in Shirou's bravery and unique magical skills, and also develops a degree of admiration for Rin's cunning after their first duel at Kirei's church in the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route.
* WeakButSkilled: The Caster class is usually considered the weakest of the seven Servant classes due to their [[CripplingOverspecialization overreliance on magic]] and the fact that out of the six remaining classes, four have natural [[AntiMagic magic resistance]]. Nonetheless, Caster still manages to be a very dangerous antagonist thanks to her cunning and resourcefulness, as well as having some of the most powerful magical skills and attacks due to being a Servant summoned from the Age of Gods. [[AllThereInTheManual If serious, she can give]] [[Literature/TheGardenOfSinners Touko]] or even [[VisualNovel/{{Tsukihime}} Aoko]] [[VisualNovel/WitchOnTheHolyNight Aozaki]] [[AllThereInTheManual a very difficult fight]]. ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'' later states that Medea is one of the top five most skilled magi to have ever lived.
* WeCanRuleTogether: She tries to recruit Shirou and Archer to her side during "''Unlimited Blade Works''. For Shirou, [[BadEnd agreeing is not a good idea]]. Archer declines after concluding it's not necessary for him to win. [[spoiler:He later takes the offer, but he only does this so the Command Spell from Rin which prevents him from attacking Shirou can be nullified.]]
* WouldntHurtAChild: The whole "killing her kids to spite her unfaithful husband" thing didn't happen in this universe, and every other evil thing she did was the result of having been driven mad with a love forced upon her by Aphrodite. In the modern day when presented with [[spoiler:her original Master's]] [[PoweredByAForsakenChild means]] of producing powerful magic gemstones, she calmly gives him an alternative that requires no killing. When he doesn't listen, she destroys the entire sacrificial chamber and kills the staff, but lets the would-be human sacrifices go unharmed.
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Assassin]]
!!!'''Voiced by:''' Creator/ShinichiroMiki (JP), Creator/DavidVincent (EN 2006 Anime, 2010 ''Unlimited Blade Works'' Movie), Creator/ToddHaberkorn (EN 2015 ''Unlimited Blade Works'' Anime, 2018 ''Heaven's Feel'' Movie)
[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/assassin_takashi_takeuchi_character_select.png]]

->''"My role is to guard this gate. I won't let you through alive, nor shall I let you out alive."''

A Servant summoned by Caster to guard the gate of the Ryuudou Temple. Assassin is a solemn character who delights nothing more than having a good fight. As a result of being summoned by another Servant he is, however, an incomplete or fake Servant, thus he is linked with the gate and cannot travel further than the areas in the vicinity of the gate.\\
\\
Assassin freely identifies himself to any opponent as the legendary swordsman UsefulNotes/SasakiKojiro. He is very different from normal Servants, and as such doesn't really have a Noble Phantasm. The closest thing that could be called his Noble Phantasm is ''Monohoshi Zao'' (lit. The Laundry-Drying Pole, a derogatory nickname that almost literally means "Really damn long sword"), a simple nodachi, and his ultimate technique, ''Hiken Tsubame Gaeshi'' (lit. Swallow Reversal Technique), a sword technique that allows him to strike multiple points at the same moment.
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* AbsurdlySharpBlade: His sword can cut falling leaves in half just by holding the blade in their path, and slice cleanly through Saber's armor -- all the more noteable because it's ''not'' a Noble Phantasm, just a mundane sword wielded in his immensely-skilled hands.
* AchievementsInIgnorance: Tsubame Gaeshi is a technique that approaches True Magic, but he himself claims it's just a sword trick he practiced a lot.
* AffablyEvil: Even if he's somewhat snarky, he's always polite and has respect for his opponent. This is taken almost to extremes when he openly introduces himself to Saber (revealing your identity often lets opponents gain an advantage just by knowing what your history was) and when Saber realizes she's forced to reply due to knightly honor he stops her from doing so affirming that he only did it as a courtesy, not as a way to influence the fight.\\\
The reason he is listed as evil is actually due to his own beliefs that anyone who takes a life is evil, and so as someone who had done so, he can only see himself as evil. He is closer to LawfulNeutral in actual practice, fulfilling his duty as he can and holds his honor and values close to his heart, though as seen below, he is still very willing to stab someone in the back if they offend him or his sensibilities.
* AntiVillain: He's a villain because he works for Caster. That's about it.
* AwesomenessByAnalysis: He was able to tell exactly how long Saber's invisible sword was just by observing how she was holding it and feeling the wind from her sword swings. For comparison's sake, the [[Literature/FateZero previous Lancer]] only achieved the same feat by using a Noble Phantasm that ripped the invisibility away.
* BadassNormal: Or at least the closest thing to it among the Servants. Although he has superhuman physical abilities, his "noble phantasm" is just a really advanced sword technique reached through pure skill rather than any magic. Stated to be a nameless samurai who is similar to the Sasaki Kojiro of legend, he developed an ultimate technique on par with an anti-personnel Noble Phantasm simply by practicing. And with his lack of a proper Noble Phantasm, he nearly manages to defeat Saber in a sword fight twice. He also somehow managed to fend off all the other Servants as well offscreen, even Berserker somehow.
* BeyondTheImpossible: His Tsubame Gaeshi technique is just absurd in-universe as it is outside of it. In the Franchise/{{Nasuverse}}, the Second Magic is able to traverse the dimensional barrier. Assassin does this by swinging his sword three times in one swing from three different angles, defying all logic, as he has absolutely zero magical prowess.
* {{BFS}}: His Monohoshizao is 150 cm long and the name translates to "Laundry Drying Pole," mocking just how absurdly long it is. No one else could have wielded it but him because of how impractical it is.
* BloodKnight: Assassin has no wish and probably could not get one even if he tried. All he has is the satisfaction he gets from fighting a WorthyOpponent.
* CharlesAtlasSuperpower: Tsubame Gaeshi. While acknowledging that cutting a swallow out of the air would be impossible, he just kept practicing and he eventually got it to work. The final version of the technique somehow intruded into the territory of not magecraft but actual dimensional distortion magic.
* CompositeCharacter: Assassin is the person closest to the being known as Sasaki Kojiro. This makes him a combination of three people: he's a samurai who could perform Tsubame Gaeshi, he has that name, and finally he wields Monohoshizao. In the Nasuverse, these were attributes of three different people.
* {{Determinator}}: In his past life, he kept swinging his sword to hit a swallow, even though it was supposedly futile, until he actually managed to do it.
* DroppedABridgeOnHim: In ''Heaven's Feel'' Assassin dies almost instantly with no impact on the storyline as True Assassin is summoned. [[spoiler:As an improperly-summoned Servant to start with, and a being closer to a Phantom than a Heroic Spirit, he didn't have even a ghost of a chance against True Assassin, who simply emerged from his body]].
* DyingSmirk: In ''Heaven's Feel'' [[spoiler:he's being devoured from the inside and smiling is his way of showing contempt for his killer and going out with dignity.]]
* EnlightenmentSuperpowers: Invoked in the form of his personal skill, Vitrification. It is a mental state acquired after reaching the pinnacle of arduous training. With this ability, Kojiro is able to maintain a cool and collected heart, regardless the situation as such he will never be overwhelmed by his emotion. This skill also gives him immunity to all sorts of magic and effects that target his mind. In simpler terms, he is immune to MindRape.
* ExactWords: Pulls this twice on [[spoiler:Archer]] in rapid succession during ''Unlimited Blade Works''. First, Assassin tells him that since he told Saber and Shirou to leave, he won't let [[spoiler:Archer]] stop them from doing so. Second, he reminds [[spoiler:Archer]] that as the protector of the gate, he won't let anyone enter ''or'' exit, attacking him.
* ExtremeDoormat: Beyond his desire to duel Saber, he has practically no drives or desires of his own. He allows his Master to walk over him and tear him apart for making fun of her, and seems to treat his life as expendable.
* FaceDeathWithDignity: A big-time believer in this trope. He may disappear, but he ''will'' have an honorable duel with the ultimate swordsman first.
* FailureIsTheOnlyOption: Quite literally. Assassin, unlike the other Servants, is physically incapable of winning the Holy Grail War: Even if all the other Servants killed each other off he'd be unable to move from his summoning spot and reach the location of the Grail -- never mind that it wouldn't respond to him without his Master.
* {{Flynning}}: [[spoiler:Averted. Just like real-life Japanese swords, his sword chips and breaks much easier than Western swords, especially magic ones like Excalibur. This ultimately leads to his defeat in ''Unlimited Blade Works'' when he chooses to block an attack instead of parrying, as his opponent had other things she needed to be doing. Since he didn't have much time to live he didn't care if he won or lost.]]
* FriendlyEnemy: Mainly towards Saber. He respects her and wishes nothing more than to duel her, bearing no malice. He even warns her that somebody is watching their duel and helps her get away with Shirou when [[spoiler:Archer]] is trying to kill her Master.
* TheGadfly: Only around Caster. He likes teasing her with snarky remarks, since he isn't very fond of her manipulation and backhanded tricks. It really pisses her off.
* GlassCannon: His defining sword technique is an instant kill attack if all three blows land. On the defensive side he has no armor, an "E" rating in toughness, and dies more or less instantly if struck even once by another Servant. Compared to regular humans he's still rather resilient, though.
* GoOutWithASmile: He does so in the anime version of ''Fate'' and ''Unlimited Blade Works'', [[spoiler:having fulfilled his wish of having a climactic battle with Saber.]]
* GracefulLoser: [[spoiler:In the anime version of ''Fate'' and ''Unlimited Blade Works''. He got his wish of having a fight with Saber, the outcome didn't matter to him.]]
* HandsomeLech: To the point of flirting while battling, even though he later admits that he isn't very lucky with the ladies.
* HomeFieldAdvantage: While Assassin is in pure strength weaker than most Servants, he can keep up with them since not only are [[FieldPowerEffect all Servants slightly weakened while inside Caster's territory]], he is blocking the only possible entrance to the Ryuudou Temple and can use the fact that [[GeoEffects he is standing above his opponents]] to his advantage. The only problem is that the steps do not allow him to perfectly execute his instant-kill technique, but since he only has to drive off the enemy, he is a very frustrating opponent to deal with.
* ILetYouWin: [[spoiler:In a sense in his second fight with Saber in ''Unlimited Blade Works''. He intentionally makes a bad move where he blocks one of her strikes instead of parrying it which costs him the fight. He knew she needed to reach Rin and Shirou, so he made a move to insure the fight would end sooner. He didn't have much time to live so he didn't care if he won or lost.]]
* ImperfectRitual: Caster summoned him by cobbling together some fake Command Seals using the Holy Grail. While this resulted in a stunted iteration of a Servant that needs more mana than normal and is bound to the Ryuudou Temple gate he was summoned at, this is of little concern to Caster as all she needed was a guardian for the Temple.
* ImplausibleFencingPowers: Even more so than Saber by performing abstract combinations of attacks with a sword taller than most of the characters in the game. Taken to absurd levels with the previously mentioned Tsubame Gaeshi, where [[BladeSpam he breaks the laws of physics by attacking from three different angles in a single swing]].
* KatanasAreJustBetter: [[SubvertedTrope Nope]]. Assassin's sword is not some legendary Noble Phantasm, it's a cheapo sword that happens to be long. The blade gets damaged when he's forced to meet Saber's sword head on, [[spoiler:creating a weakness in Tsubame Gaeshi's normally inescapable strikes]].
* KilledOffscreen: In the Visual Novel's version of ''Fate'', he is no longer seen after his initial encounter with Saber. During Caster's ambush, she mentions that Assassin is already dead. ''hollow ataraxia'' reveals that it was [[spoiler:Gilgamesh who destroyed the Ryuudou Temple, killing Assassin and Kuzuki in the process and driving Caster mad]]. [[AdaptationExpansion Averted in the anime version]], which instead borrows his and Saber's final duel from the ''UBW'' route.
* LetsFightLikeGentlemen:
** In ''Fate'', he calls off his fight with Saber, because he does not wish for outsiders to observe his fight with her to learn her identity. [[spoiler:The observer is Rider, who was sent by Shinji to kill or at least lead Shirou to Caster so she can kill him, which does happen in a Bad End.]]
** In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', he calls off his first fight against Saber, [[spoiler:due to a wounded Shirou being pursued by Archer stumbling into the middle of their fight]].
* LongHairedPrettyBoy: He has very long blue hair, and is almost effeminate in appearance.
* MajorInjuryUnderreaction: He still manages to snark at Caster even as [[BodyHorror his ribcage was ripped open by her]] when she was annoyed one too many times.
* MasterSwordsman: He's even better than Saber, who is supposedly the strongest of the Saber class, and can outfight her even though she's superior to him in every other attribute like speed and strength simply because he is that skilled, along with the terrain advantage. He's probably one of the two best swordsmasters in the entire franchise considering his ultimate technique breaks reality, with only Miyamoto Musashi capable of matching him in skill and countering Tsubame Gaeshi blow-for-blow.
* MusclesAreMeaningless: During their first duel, Saber comments that he is surprisingly strong for such a skinny guy.
* NestedOwnership: He was summoned by another Servant.
* NeutralEvil: In-universe alignment.
* NeverLearnedToRead: His backstory says that since in life he was a simple Japanese farmer turned swordsman, he never learned to read and write.
* NobleDemon: He seems to be okay with his evil image, but when he makes a deal he sticks to it and even defends apparent enemies against those who would interfere with the deal.
* OffscreenMomentOfAwesome: [[AllThereInTheManual According to the Character Materials]] he fought Berserker to a standstill. The same Berserker he's physically incapable of hurting, which according to [[invoked]][[WordOfGod Nasu]] is proof that "Whoa, Assassin's amazing."
* {{Samurai}}: Sasaki Kojiro is supposed to be the archenemy to Miyamoto Musashi, complete with the samurai robe, katana and samurai hair.
* SamuraiPonytail: Assassin has very polite speech patterns, if a bit flirty. Similarly, his long hair matches his samurai outlook emphasizing grace.
* SarcasticDevotee: Assassin doesn't particularly like his Master and makes no attempt at hiding this.
* SimultaneousBladeSpam: Before he became Servant Assassin, he created Tsubame Gaeshi, a sword technique that twists dimensions so that he can strike from three directions at the same time. He did this by... swinging his sword. A lot. And kept doing with utter determination until [[BeyondTheImpossible reality essentially gave up]] and granted him what he wanted, via [[spoiler:partial access to "[[AnotherDimension multi-dimension refraction phenomenon]]", also known as the Second Sorcery.]] This makes it an instant win condition since it's obviously impossible for someone with two arms to guard three directions at the same time, unless they're Berserker whose Noble Phantasm lets him laugh off such feeble attacks.
* SpiritedCompetitor: Assassin seems to relish the act of competing with Saber more than he does the actual act of battle itself. Dueling people he doesn't consider worthy competitors, like Archer, offers him no enjoyment even if they're quite good.
* SquareRaceRoundClass: If you actually look at his tactics and legend, he seems a lot more like a Saber than an Assassin; standing guard at a gate and fighting a powerful opponent head-to-head in the open isn't a very Assassin-like strategy. He should probably be a Saber, but the Grail purposely brought someone unqualified for the assassin class as part of Caster's punishment for violating the rules.
* TheStarscream: Don't let his calm demeanor and ExtremeDoormat status fool you. Given the right situation, he would try ([[VideoGame/FateUnlimitedCodes and at one time succeed]]) to kill Caster, not because he wants to usurp her, but because he dislikes her. It seems that his NeutralEvil alignment is not wrong after all. ''Unlimited Blade Works'' shows that he used his duel with Saber as an excuse to let Archer into the Ryuudou Temple, so that Archer can give that 'vixen' a scare.
* UnusualEyebrows: For some reason, his eyebrows ''fork''.
* VillainousRescue: In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', Assassin holds off Archer to give Saber a chance to escape the Ryuudou Temple with Shirou.
* WeakButSkilled: The most extreme example amongst Servants. He still has far above human strength or agility, but all that actually makes him a threat is his inhuman skill. His physical stats are close to bottom-barrel for a Servant (not helped by the fact the Assassin class isn't normally suited for direct combat) and he has no true Noble Phantasm, but his advanced swordsmanship prevent anyone from outmatching him with their greater physique and his most advanced sword technique practically defies reality in a way that it can be deemed on par with an anti-personnel Noble Phantasm.
* WorthyOpponent: He thinks very highly of Saber and relishes any chance to fight her. He even gives away his identity when he first meets her, which is a big no-no among servants and refuses to allow her to do the same.
* WreckedWeapon: [[spoiler:Blocking Saber's sword causes his sword to slightly bend, which creates a blind spot in his Tsubame Gaeshi technique that allows Saber to dodge it and strike him down.]]
* YourDaysAreNumbered: Having been summoned into the world without a Master granting him mana and only a limited supply by Caster, Assassin is slowly wasting away and fully aware of it. [[spoiler: In ''UBW'' he actually manages to stick around for quite a while despite Caster being dead. It's implied that he was reaching his limit anyway when Saber finally killed him.]]
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:True Assassin ('''Major Unmarked Heaven's Feel Spoilers''')]]
!!!'''Voiced by:''' Creator/TetsuInada (JP), Creator/PatrickSeitz (EN)
[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/true_assasin.png]]

->''"It looks like your weapon is a projectile weapon as well. Would you like to try a match?"''

An Assassin-class Servant who was meant to be summoned for the Fuyuki Holy Grail War, but was denied because Caster broke the rules and called in her ''own'' Assassin. He is only summoned in ''Heaven's Feel'' by Shinji and Sakura's grandfather Zouken Matou in order to take the Holy Grail for themselves and grant their shared desire for eternal life.\\
\\
Like all Assassins, he is a master of moving about undetected and prefers to fight using thrown knives. His Noble Phantasm is a curse known as Zabaniya: Delusional Heartbeat.
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* AccentUponTheWrongSyllable: Only at first, when he was still unstable. After devouring Lancer he begins talking normally.
* AffablyEvil: While he looks ObviouslyEvil, he's not ''that'' bad.
* BadassLongrobe: He wears a tattered black one on a few scenes.
* BeatStillMyHeart: His Noble Phantasm works by cursing the enemy's heart, allowing True Assassin to make a perfect replica in his cursed right arm. He can then crush the fake heart, destroying the enemy's real heart; though this can be resisted with enough magic resistance. However, his cursed arm can bypass this by extending to great lengths in order to touch the enemy's body and replace the real heart with the fake, allowing him to devour the enemy's heart to boost his intelligence.
* TheBlank: When Dark Sakura decides to kill him, she removes his mask to see what his face looks like. He had no face at all. That said, his debut appearance in ''Anime/FateStayNightHeavensFeel'' shows him eating by removing his mask, which exhibits that he at least has sunken cheeks, a really narrow jawline, plus rotting teeth and gums like [[Film/TheLordOfTheRingsTheReturnOfTheKing the Mouth of Sauron]].
* CannibalismSuperpower: He becomes stronger and increases his intelligence by eating other Servants' hearts.
* ChestBurster: When Zouken summons him in ''Heaven's Feel'', he materializes inside Assassin's body and gruesomely tears his way out of his chest, killing him.
* CombatPragmatist: Due to his relatively low parameters, he does whatever he can to win. Best exemplified in the animated adaptations that feature him shamelessly fighting alongside the Shadow to neutralise Lancer and Saber.
* CreepilyLongArms: Already LeanAndMean in general with the proportions of an orangutan, his wrapped-up Zabaniya arm has ''at least'' three elbows and can painfully extend like a whip, and he only needs to tap you on the chest with it to [[AndShowItToYou pull out your heart]].
* DarkIsEvil: Played with, and arguably [[DarkIsNotEvil subverted]] in the long run. Sure, True Assassin works for the most horrifying, frightening character in the entire work and does his bidding without complaint... but it's made rather blunt that he's a PunchClockVillain. He doesn't follow Zouken out of any real love for Zouken or alignment with his goals; he follows Zouken because Zouken is his Master, and he kills because killing is his job. Compared to someone like Gilgamesh, he may as well be a saint.
* {{Determinator}}: All things considered, having been once the leader of ReligiousBruiser {{Professional Killer}}s who lived in the mountains in a desert during a time of war and extreme famine, True Assassin respects someone with an unbreakable will to survive most of all. If any, his distaste for Zouken's methods is balanced by his respect for the old geezer's endurance and determination.
* DissonantSerenity: Despite his ''very'' scary appearance and being a ProfessionalKiller so legendary that the very word "Assassin" comes from your order, Assassin is remarkably soft-spoken and polite, only raises his voice [[OhCrap when things start going sour]].
* TheDragon: He's Zouken's Servant, assisting him in his schemes and acting to defeat the others Masters and obtain the Holy Grail.
* EvenEvilHasStandards: He doesn't really approve of some of his Master's crueller actions, but he also knows his place.
* EvilDuo: He and Zouken team up because they both want some form of immortality
* FlechetteStorm: His go-to way of assassination is the forty or so throwing knives he carries around with him, which he can throw with the speed a small-arms handgun fires bullets at, only [[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome the bullets are much bigger and sharper]]. If his target can block them, he'll save the last few for an UnblockableAttack by combining the throw with immediately activating his Noble Phantasm.
* ImAHumanitarian: Increases his intelligence by ''eating'' other Servants' hearts.
* InfiniteSupplies: Averted. Assassin has to manually create new Dirks and only carries around forty at a time. [[CharacterTics After a battle, he will meticulously go around and pick up the ones that weren't destroyed, as it's considerably easier than making new ones and destroys evidence that he was there]].
* {{Invisibility}}: His ''Presence Concealment'' skill does exactly what it says, allowing him to go near-totally undetected by others. That includes passing through the boundary field around Shirou's house.
* TheKillerBecomesTheKilled: Dark Sakura kills him for attacking Shirou twice. [[{{Yandere}} In her head]], [[HypocriticalHeartwarming she's the only one that gets to harm him]].
* KryptoniteProofSuit: Assassin has a high rank in "Protection from Wind", an enchantment he got in life to counteract sandstorms and Jinns. This gives him immunity to Saber's Invisible Air.
* LargeAndInCharge: One of the leaders of the vaunted Hashshashin order, and one of the tallest to ever hold the title of "Old Man of the Mountain."
* LawfulEvil: In-universe alignment. He's a contract killer, but he's not some PsychoForHire sadist. He's a religious man following the rules of both his order, and his summons in the Grail War.
* LegacyImmortality: According to True Assassin's back-story, anyone who becomes leader of the Hashashin takes on the name and persona of Hassan-i-Sabbah. Thus, the True Assassin Heroic Spirit is a compound being made up from the deeds of all the Hassan-i-Sabbahs. ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'' [[AdaptationExpansion expands]] upon this idea, and the backstory of this ''particular'' Hassan considerably, but between his odd summoning and ''GO'' technically being [[TheMultiverse a different facet of the Kaleidoscope]], it's unclear how much of it is meant to be directly back-ported to ''F/SN'', if any.
* MercyKill: In one of the last Bad ends, True Assassin kills Shirou after he catches him trying to infiltrate the Einzbern Castle, stating that it's far better to die by his hand than at Dark Sakura's. If you have encountered any of [[CruelAndUnusualDeath those bad endings]] so far, you'll agree.
* OneHitKill: His Noble Phantasm destroys the opponent's heart, killing them instantly. Doesn't work well against targets with high magic resistance or those with superhuman constitutions who can survive losing their heart, even temporarily.
* OutOfFocus: Considering how he and Assassin cannot exist together at the same time and him being the Servant of the very unpleasant Zouken, True Assassin very rarely appears alongside other ''Fate/stay night'' cast. Pretty much the only work he shares spotlight with others is in ''Fate/tiger colosseum''. He does have a chance to have his spotlight outside of ''Fate/stay night'' related works, however.
* OvershadowedByAwesome: His knife-tossing skills are impressive, but many of his opponents have either the "Protection from Arrows" skill or powerful battle instincts that let them foresee the projectile's path and block. His stealth is potent enough to fool magical barriers, but Saber's Instinct passively overrides it. And his trump card flops because he has the bad luck to run up against foes that have the magic resistance or weird constitution to NoSell it. Frankly, even Lancer should've been able to no-sell Zabaniya for a bit thanks to Battle Continuation, but he had the bad fortune of landing right in the tentacles of The Shadow while recovering from the shock. It's a testament to his lethality that he comes across as menacing as he does considering the sheer bad luck he has in his matchups all game.
* RedRightHand: He has jet-black skin, is skeletally thin, and has a skull mask sewn to his face. He also has a very-literal one under those wrappings. They come off when he uses his FinishingMove.
* ScaryBlackMan: Averted. While he displays many features common to the trope, it's made clear that Assassin's jet-black skin is not natural, and all but stated to be a sort of body modification members of his order undergo to better hide in the shadows.
* TheSpeechless: During the few hours after he is summoned, he speaks essentially in screeches.
* StealthExpert: The whole point of "Presence Concealment" ability, which allows the Assassin class to remain undetected when spying or preparing an ambush. True Assassin is particularly skilled in this accord, being even capable to sneak into Shirou's house without alerting any of its other occupants or triggering the bounded field that serves as a perimeter alarm.
* TragicVillain: Only expanded upon in ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'': He gave up a happy life with his family to become a Hassan, defacing himself and cutting off one of his own arm's to attach a Demon's instead, and... became another anonymous leader of a cult of assassins whose name did not ring throughout the annals of history more than any of the ones before or after him. No fame, no glory, no fortune, at the cost of all he ever held dear.
* WeakButSkilled: His stats on paper mark him as one of the weakest Servants in the Grail War; the only things that puts him above Caster is his powerful Noble Phantasm and stealth skills. In fact, Lancer would ''easily'' kill him in a fair fight, but Assassin takes advantage of [[CombatPragmatist every dirty advantage possible]] until he can go for the kill with his Noble Phantasm, which is strong enough that it could kill a good number of the Servants he encounters.
* WhyDontYouJustShootHim: He asks Zouken this exact question when the latter is amusing himself by watching Shirou and Rin's futile attempts to find a solution to the predicament involving the "Shadow" consuming people left and right. Zouken replies that [[ComplexityAddiction it would be more fun]] to let Sakura's SuperPoweredEvilSide do the job for them. Although Zouken is lying, he actually needs Shirou and Rin to break Sakura completely.
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:The Shadow ('''Major Unmarked Heaven's Feel Spoilers''')]]

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/black_shadow_6.png]]

->'''IT IS NOT ENOUGH'''

The Shadow is a horrifying pseudo-Servant tied to Zouken Matou that appears in ''Heaven's Feel.'' It devours anything that it can, though its source and origins are enigmatic. It does not seem to be a truly sapient being and is instead ruled by its hunger.\\
\\
The Shadow is a particularly spoilery entry in the story, so beware.
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* AdaptationalWimp: While still a threat the ''Heaven's Feel'' movies make it noticeably weaker by having Saber, Berserker, and Archer be able resist being corrupted by it, with the former two needed to be forced into it by True Assassin and Saber Alter respectively for them to actually be corrupted by it and the latter being effectively immune to it due to being a Counter Guardian.
* AlmightyIdiot: The Shadow is ''purpose-driven'', but calling it intelligent and not just a ball of instincts with severe magical hunger pangs is probably putting it nicely.
* AnimalMotifs: It is likened to some sort of deep sea creature by Shirou, most likely a squid or [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stygiomedusa the Giant Phantom Jelly]] (also known under the Latin name ''[[CommonalityConnection Stygiomedusa]]''), the latter of which it greatly resembles in it's [[ConfusionFu shape and movement]]. Even invoked somewhat when Lancer discovers it hiding in the lake of Ryoudou Temple and is eaten by it after being wounded by True Assassin.
* AntiMagic: ManaDrain variety: The Shadow absorbs all mana in anything it comes into contact with, which makes Servants completely useless against it. The drain is so powerful that it ate through Lancer's runic barrier, a spell on level with Caster-class Noble Phantasms, in about 4 seconds. The resemblance to the Matou family magic (which also specializes in draining mana) is ''not'' a coincidence.''
* ArchEnemy: For reasons unknown, this thing absolutely hates Rin. Just seeing her sends it into a frenzy, and it'll drop everything it's doing just to kill her. It's actually an expression of Sakura's resentment towards her sister corrupted by Aŋra Mainiiu's hatred for humanity.
* AssimilationBackfire: Is nearly devoured itself when it attacks Gilgamesh in ''Heaven's Feel''. This is why you don't see him corrupted: The Shadow had to break him down quickly instead of corrupting him.
* TheAssimilator: Can devour Servants and instead of breaking them down turn them into its own defenders.
* AxCrazy: The Shadow is directed by a combination of Sakura's subconscious and Aŋra Mainiiu's eternal hatred and is thus on a rampage with no way to reason with it.
* CapturedSuperEntity: While it is an almost mindless monster, Zouken is able to direct it to some extent, but only somewhat. It is an imperfect manifestation of Aŋra Mainiiu, which he manipulates a little by using the Crest Worm in Sakura, but it nearly kills him early on.
* CastingAShadow: It blankets the ground in shadows and black ooze that attempt to devour anything they touch.
* ConfusionFu: Part of what makes fighting it so dangerous is its unpredictable, alien fighting ways of attacking potential prey. ''No'' two attacks will ever be the same, but you can bet your ass that they will be ''absolutely horrifying'' and frighteningly hard to figure out despite being an AlmightyIdiot.
* TheCorruption: It corrupts the already fragile psyche and emotions of its host. Said host is Sakura, ultimately causing her to consciously accept the corruption after killing her brother in self-defense, turning her into Dark Sakura and gaining conscious control of its immense power at the cost of her sanity.
* DarkIsEvil: Is a darkness-based EldritchAbomination.
* DemonicPossession: It is the result of Aŋra Mainiiu possessing Sakura Matou through the shards of the Grail in her body, initially taking over her while she sleeps and gaining increasing amounts of influence over her. Consciously accepting All the World's Evil causes her to transform into Dark Sakura.
* TheDreaded: It becomes this in ''Heaven's Feel'', as it quickly becomes obvious that it is a threat far beyond the actual Grail War. Any encounter with it also comes with bone-deep terror for our heroes, as it soon becomes obvious it's far too alien for them to fight and difficult to even escape from. Later materials would reveal that entities like the Shadow are either fought with seven "Grand Servants", Servants which are Heroic Spirits meticulously summoned into empowered vessels of their absolute best Class, similar to seven World-manifested Counter Guardians. Team Shirou consists of some scared, confused teenagers and a handful of bog-standard Servants that weren't summoned particularly well, and so they largely don't have a prayer of fighting it in this form.
* EldritchAbomination: It is an incomplete manifestation of Aŋra Mainiiu, who was once summoned as the evil Heroic Spirit Avenger but has since become the embodiment of All the World's Evil and is the being corrupting the Greater Grail, using Sakura Matou's body as a medium. Later sequels, such as ''Grand Order'', would expound further on entities like Aŋra Mainiiu, but for ''F/SN'''s purposes it's enough to know that most individual Servants are virtually helpless against an entity like the Shadow, and only someone on Gilgamesh's level even has a prayer alone (and a mere ''moment'' of carelessness is all the Shadow needs to defeat even him).
* EvilerThanThou: Kills off Gilgamesh when he let his guard down while trying to kill Sakura, who is subconsciously giving it a way into the world.
* FantasticNuke: In an attempt to kill Rin, it sucks up an enormous amount of mana from its surroundings and lets it all out in an explosion so powerful that it powers through Archer's Rho Aias and leaves a massive crater in the forest.
* FetusTerrible: The Shadow, given a chance to grow and merge with Sakura, eventually becomes the "embryo" of Aŋra Mainiiu, the source of the Grail's corruption itself. It has no mind yet and, therefore, no sense of morality, but it has the potential to be born as a Beast of Retribution, which would cause untold devastation.
* FightingAShadow: Besides the obvious, this is the main reason why it's normally impossible to defeat. The Shadow is Aŋra Mainiiu using Sakura to project itself into the world, allowing it to use her abilities. Destroying the Shadow means nothing if the host remains unharmed, which is why Gilgamesh cuts to the chase and targets her when he gets fed up with its rampage.
* TheHeavy: In ''Heaven's Feel''. Its [[TheJuggernaut unstoppable power]] and increasingly deadly attacks on the people of Fuyuki serve as the preeminent source of conflict for most of the plot.
* HeroKiller: The Shadow is more of a force of nature than an antagonist, so it's pointless to try to fight it.
* HorrorHunger: The Shadow feels as though it is constantly starving and begins absorbing hundreds of townspeople and several Servants in an attempt to sate itself.
* InvincibleVillain: The Shadow is impossible to fight due to it melting and devouring anything that comes close. Gilgamesh nearly destroys it by attacking the host directly, but lets his guard down in the last second and gets eaten for his trouble. Sakura is still a mangled mess afterward, saved only by the near-instant regenerative properties Aŋra possesses as a (former) Servant with access to vast quantities of mana.
* KnightOfCerebus: When the Shadow appears, the story takes a definite turn for the darker, especially when it eats Saber herself.
* LivingShadow: It can manifest itself from its host's shadow.
* MadeOfEvil: It is a manifestation of All The World's Evil.
* MindRape: Coming into contact with The Shadow causes the unfortunate soul's mind to be flooded with pure, concentrated madness and hatred before being eaten alive. Not even Servants are immune (though those with [[HeroicWillpower incredible power of will]] like Herakles and Gilgamesh can resist it). Shirou only avoids death because the Shadow is powered by ''Sakura's'' subconscious. About a fourth of the entire visual novel's Bad Ends are dedicated to showing just how horrifying it is.
* NiceJobFixingItVillain: By mortally injuring Archer and tearing Shirou's left arm off, it inadvertently gives Shirou the means, namely Archer's arm, to defeat Berserker, Saber and ultimately sever its contact with Sakura.
* OhCrap: Everyone's reaction when it appears. The Shadow itself reacts like this upon encountering Gilgamesh and is almost slain before managing to take advantage of his carelessness.
* PreExplosionBuildup: It's SignatureMove is taking a few seconds for it to build up mana in itself which then explodes in all directions, killing anything it touches.
* RedAndBlackAndEvilAllOver: It's a solid, inky black mess with red stripes.
* RunOrDie: There is no fighting The Shadow. There is only escaping from it, intact or otherwise.
* SilentAntagonist: It doesn't speak. It just shows up and both confuses and terrifies everyone. The monologues it does spout are the result of it corrupting Sakura.
* SpaceMaster: It can access Imaginary Number Space to redirect attacks like it does with Caster's fireball or store the Blackened Servants Saber Alter and Berserker when they're not needed because that's Sakura's Elemental Affinity.
* ToServeMan: It happily eats people by breaking them down into their component mana and hoovering it up. During ''Heaven's Feel'', it ends up depopulating entire ''blocks'' of Fuyuki.
* VaderBreath: Combined with a female thirsty-sounding rasp the few times it does talk.
* YouRemindMeOfX: Shirou is reminded of the Great Fuyuki Fire when he sees it, particularly a large tower-like thing looming over the fire. This gives you a hint that it is actually the embryotic state of the Grail's contents, Aŋra Mainiiu/Avenger, and the tower is the fully manifested Greater Grail, corrupted by Aŋra Mainiiu.
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Aŋra Mainiiu ('''UTTERLY MASSIVE UNMARKED SPOILERS''')]]

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/angramainyu.PNG]]
[[caption-width-right:350: Clockwise from top left: Aŋra Mainiiu's form as All the World's Evil, Avenger's shadow form as a Servant, the Grail partially incarnated in the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' anime, the fetal Beast of Retribution in ''Heaven's Feel'', the effect of the Grail's black mud]]

Aŋra Mainiiu is the Eighth Servant, belonging to the [[Characters/FateHollowAtaraxia Avenger]] class, and a holdover from the Third Holy Grail War. It was once a man living in the 6th century Middle East, chosen to be persecuted and tortured by his people as the incarnation of "All the World's Evil". His peoples' veneration of him as such enabled his soul to become a pseudo-Heroic Spirit upon death. During the Third Holy Grail War, the Einzberns summoned him as a Servant while trying to summon the Zoroastrian GodOfEvil Aŋra Mainiiu, who they mistook him for. Avenger was slain due to his abysmal weakness, but when his soul was taken into the Greater Grail, it granted the wish of the people who had sacrificed the man and transformed his soul into the incarnation of All the World's Evil. Contained within and corrupting the Greater Grail, Aŋra Mainiiu waits to be reborn so that it can fulfill its own desires: the destruction of humanity.\\
\\
While it appears in all three routes in the form of a corruptive black ooze, Aŋra Mainiiu's role in ''Fate/Stay Night'' is greatest in "Heaven's Feel", where it forms a Master-Servant pact with Sakura Matou, manifests through her as the Shadow, corrupts Saber and Berserker, and ultimately blackens Sakura into Dark Sakura.
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* AdaptationDyeJob: The ooze its curse of hatred manifests as is described as being black, but ''Literature/FateZero'' and [[Anime/FateStayNightUnlimitedBladeWorks the UBW anime]] depict it as a very dark red for the purposes of visual distinction. Even in the game, it does possess notable red highlights.
* AdaptationExpansion:
** Aŋra Mainiiu's role in the ''Anime/FateStayNightUnlimitedBladeWorks'' anime is expanded, with it manipulating Illya via hallucinations of her mother, and using the avatar it manifested with Shinji as a host to attack Gilgamesh.
** In ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'', it's noted that Aŋra Mainiiu's All the World's Evil -- the cursed mud that digests people and blackens Servants -- is extremely similar to Tiamat's Sea of Life, positing a connection between Avenger's EldritchAbomination state and the Beasts. Gilgamesh in the [[Anime/FateStayNightUnlimitedBladeWorks 2015 anime]] also compares Aŋra Mainiiu to them by calling it an Evil of Humanity[[note]]"Akusei", or Evil Lifeform[[/note]] as well. It was eventually clarified that Aŋra Mainiiu -- at least in the ''Heaven's Feel'' arc -- would have been reborn as the Beast of Retribution.[[note]]Whether this would have been the case had he incarnated through a different host, like Irisviel in ''Literature/FateZero'', Illya in the "Fate" route, or Shinji in the "Unlimited Blade Works" route, is unknown.[[/note]]
* AnswersToTheNameOfGod: Similarly to Assassin (a single member of a LegacyCharacter), Aŋra Mainiiu isn't ''actually'' the Zoroastrian GodOfEvil, but someone who took on its identity; in this case, a random guy who was turned into a scapegoat and declared to be Aŋra Mainiiu embodied so that people could take out their frustrations on him. ''Fate/Grand Order'' reveals that this is because the Grail can't summon deities (at least not without significant workarounds), so the grail looked for the next best thing, which turned out to be a powerless human who only qualified as a Heroic Servant due to a technicality.
* BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor: Aŋra Mainiiu can be seen as embodying this. The ancient Zoroastrians wished for him to become the embodiment of All The World's Evil, and with the help of the Greater Grail that wish came true.
* TheCorruption: The black sludge it produces -- a lesser version of Tiamat's Sea of Life, according to ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'' -- contaminates the souls of anything it touches, giving Servants a physical body and limitless supply of mana but turning them evil, a process referred to as "blackening". It's how Saber is transformed into Saber Alter and Berserker into Dark Berserker in ''Heaven's Feel''. Gilgamesh resists being blackened in ''Fate/Zero'', attaining a physical body but not being driven insane due to his ego.
* TheCorrupter: In the anime adaptation of ''Unlimited Blade Works'', it appears before a young Illya in the form of Irisviel and feeds her lies and half-truths about Kiritsugu, twisting her from the sweet child seen in ''Fate/Zero'' to the bitter and vengeful girl seen in ''Fate/stay night''. This doubles as AdaptationExpansion, since Ilya's StartOfDarkness wasn't shown in the original visual novel.
* {{Curse}}: Its hatred is so powerful it manifests as a cursed black ooze [[TheCorruption that corrupts and destroys everything it comes into contact with]].
* DeadPersonImpersonation: In the 2013 ''Fate/Zero'' anime and the 2014 ''Unlimited Blade Works'' anime, it appears to Kiritsugu and Illyasviel as a hallucination in the form of Irisviel.
* DemonicPossession: In ''Heaven's Feel'', it forms a Master-Servant pact with Sakura Matou and takes over her while she sleeps, manifesting as the Shadow. When she accepts her bond with it, Aŋra Mainiiu fully corrupts her into its avatar, Dark Sakura.
* DevourTheDragon: In ''Unlimited Blade Works'', it attempts to use Gilgamesh as a host. This attempt backfires and it ends up eating him instead. It also devours him at Sakura's behest when manifested as the Shadow in "Heaven's Feel", though Gilgamesh almost manages to destroy it from the inside through his unshakeable willpower.
* EffectiveKnockoff: Revelations in ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'' retrocatively imply that Aŋra Mainiiu after it was transformed into "All the World's Evils" was one of these of the true [[GodOfEvil Gods of Evil]] in the Nasuverse, the seven Beasts. Considering that the Fuyuki Holy Grail summoned Servants using a bastardized version of the system that summoned Grand Servants, who themselves were based on the Beasts, it can be inferred that the Holy Grail took in the embodiment of the wish for a GodOfEvil and granted it using the knowledge it was based on as well as the protocols it was programmed with to transform Avenger into an inferior derivative. Of course, being a weaker copy of incredibly powerful world destroyers means Aŋra Mainiiu is still a dangerous threat in its own right. The Q&A with Nasu in the third ''Anime/FateStayNightHeavensFeel'' blu-ray confirms that if Aŋra Mainiiu had united with Dark Sakura and been allowed to fully manifest during ''Heaven's Feel'' he would have become a Beast representing the Evil of Retribution. Whether this would have applied had it been reborn through [[Literature/FateZero Irisviel]] or Illya, or applies to his other partial manifestations -- like in the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route using Shinji as a host -- is unclear. It was stated in a 2017 interview for the last one discussing how ProductionForeshadowing in ''Anime/FateStayNightUnlimitedBladeWorks'' for this very concept was Gilgamesh trying to incarnate an Evil of Humanity, so in-universe, he seemed to be under the impression it could work.
* EldritchAbomination: While it WasOnceAMan, once Avenger was slain the Fuyuki Grail attempted to grant the ancient Zoroastrians' wishes that Aŋra Mainiiu become the incarnation of "All the World's Evil". The result of this "black miracle" was the weakest Servant in the Third Grail War taking over the Greater Grail and corrupting it to be reborn as a Beast-class entity representing the Evil of Retribution and desiring nothing less than to destroy humanity; with the black ooze it emits in this state either corrupts or destroys everything it comes into contact with. In the 2014 ''Unlimited Blade Works'' anime it uses Shinji as a host to manifest a massive humanoid torso with two glowing red slit-shaped openings, one in its chest and one in its head; and in the ''Heaven's Feel'' route it partially manifests as the Shadow using Sakura as a host, and when it is almost completely reborn it takes the form of a massive multi-eyed creature with gangly arms. The Counter Force considered Aŋra Mainiiu a great enough threat that it would have taken direct action had Avenger successfully been incarnated. According to Nasu in the ''Heaven's Feel III spring song'' interview, Aŋra Mainiiu incarnating as the Beast of Retribution through Dark Sakura would have drowned half the world in its black mud before the Grand Servants showed up to stop it.
* EldritchTransformation: As exposited in ''Fate/hollow ataxia'' and interviews with Nasu, "Aŋra Mainiiu" was once a mortal human scapegoated and ritualistically sacrificed by the ancient Zoroastrians as the incarnation of All the World's Evil. [[InspirationalMartyr This belief led to him being recorded as a "Hero" of sorts]], and he was summoned as an Avenger-class pseudo-Servant by the Einzberns -- who were hoping to cheat the system by summoning the Zoroastian GodOfEvil -- and was almost immediately killed due to being pathetically weak and not even having a Noble Phantasm. Due to Aŋra Mainiiu's unusual nature, the Greater Grail recognized him as a human and attempted to grant the wish of the ancient Zoroastrians who'd sacrificed him -- for Aŋra Mainiiu to become the incarnation of All the World's Evil. This corrupted the Grail System into a womb for Aŋra Mainiiu to be reborn as a Beast-class entity embodying the Evil of Retribution, though the closest it came to this was in the ''Heaven's Feel'' route with Sakura Matou as its host, Shinji Matou only producing an imperfect manifestation in the ''Unlimited Blade Works'' route.
* EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep: "Aŋra Mainiiu" isn't its real name; its original name was completely erased from the annals of history, and the man himself has forgotten it after getting punched one too many times in the face by his fellow villagers. Most simply refer to it as the Greater Grail.
* EvilTowerOfOminousness: Its most iconic manifestation is as an organic black tower with jagged prongs at the top and a black hole floating overhead, vomiting out its black ooze.
* FightingAShadow: Despite partially manifesting in all three routes, Aŋra Mainiiu remains inside the Greater Grail until ''VisualNovel/FateHollowAtaraxia'', where it is expelled and reverted back to being Avenger.
* FromNobodyToNightmare: In the distant past, it had no supernatural powers at all. The reason being that it was an ordinary man chosen to be a scapegoat for every evil in the world and brutally tortured for the rest of his natural life until hedied of old age. Naturally, the process drove him insane with hatred and enabled him to be summoned in the Third Grail War as Avenger. However, he wasn't a true Heroic Spirit and had no Noble Phantasm, meaning he was immediately and easily slain. It wasn't until his soul was taken into the Greater Grail that his people's wish for him to become the embodiment of All the World's Evil was granted and he was [[EldritchTransformation transfigured]] into an EldritchAbomination.
* GodOfEvil: Supposedly. Turns out he's not actually a Divine Spirit but some random schmuck who had the dubious honor of being branded Aŋra Mainiiu, and eventually came to be the incarnation of the wish for a god to embody all the world's evils, but it wasn't until Avenger was placed in the wish granting Holy Grail that he could live up to his name.
* GreaterScopeVillain: This thing's the evil that corrupts the Holy Grail, and is responsible for antiheroes and villains being summonable as Heroic Spirits.
* HatePlague: It enflames the negative emotions of those who are connected to it or inundates them with its own hatred, corrupting them.
* HijackingCthulhu: While the Greater Grail itself technically had no will of its own, Aŋra Mainiiu took over and corrupted it.
* IncendiaryExponent: Its black ichor can set things on fire. It's what caused the Fuyuki Fire, granting Kirei's vengeful dying wish.
* JerkassGenie: One of the biggest spoilers is that Aŋra Mainiiu has taken over the Greater Grail. While the Grail system is still capable of granting the wishes of whoever touches it, it only does so in a way that ensures mass destruction and death.
* JokeCharacter: Aŋra Mainiiu was slain rather quickly in the Third Holy Grail War due to how weak he was -- not even possessing a Noble Phantasm until his revival in ''Fate/hollow ataraxia''. This is reflected in ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'', which has him have some of the lowest stats in the game (originally, it was going to be that the entire Avenger class was incredibly weak; however, it was instead decided to make them a GlassCannon class and just have Aŋra Mainiiu be incredibly weak instead).
* KillAllHumans: It's third behind [[VisualNovel/{{Tsukihime}} Primate Murder]] and [[Literature/AngelNotes Type-Mercury/ORT]], [[AmbiguousSituation whichever celestial body the Type is actually from]],[[note]]The databook makes the lore ambiguous and ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'' further muddies it.[[/note]] in the "Entity best suited for wiping out humanity" contest, as they can kill humans at much faster rates. Furthermore, [[JerkassGenie any wish it grants is twisted to result in death and destruction]].
* MadeOfEvil: It is literally the incarnation of All the World's Evil, the embodiment of several billion peoples' worth of curses and hatred.
* MindRape: Those who are blackened by its ooze are overwhelmed and corrupted by its raw hatred and turned evil.
* MuckMonster: Its primary manifestation is as a cursed black sludge variously called "All the World's Evils" or ""All The Evils of The World", which corrupts or destroys whatever it touches.
* OminousObsidianOoze: The black/red/purple sludge it produces, "All the World's Evils," is the liquidized form of its hate, 6 billion curses that targets all people in the world. The sludge itself is retroactively revealed to be a knockoff of the primordial goddess Tiamat's Sea of Life, which has the same appearance and properties but on even higher scale.
* OutsideContextProblem: Only three of the characters -- namely Kirei, Gilgamesh, and Zouken -- know of its existence at first, and summoning it is the driving force behind their actions. It doesn't become directly involved in the Fifth Grail War itself until the end of all three routes. On the larger scheme of things, the whole mess started because when Aŋra Mainiiu was drawn into the Greater Grail after his defeat in the Third Holy Grail War. As he was so weak, the system didn't recognize him as a Servant, who are supposed to be broken down for the Grail's mana. Instead, it thought it was a human, and thus, the winner of the Holy Grail War. The corruption of the Grail started when it attempted to grant the wish that was the origin of Aŋra Mainiiu -- namely, the wish to have a singular entity be responsible for All The World's Evils.
* ThePowerOfHate: This thing thrives off of it, and when you've been tortured for a lifetime over superstitious cruelty, you won't be a happy camper either.
* RedAndBlackAndEvilAllOver: Its cursed ooze is described as black, but in the ''Fate/Zero'' and ''Unlimited Blade Works'' anime is colored as being black with pulsing patches of red, or just as dark red.
* RedBaron: It is referred to as Aŋra Mainiiu, Angra Mainyu, All the World's Evil, or All the Evils of the World. Its manifestation in ''Heaven's Feel'' is called the Shadow. Those who don't know what it truly is refer to it as the object which it has taken over and corrupted, the Greater Grail.
* TheScapegoat: This is how he became known as Aŋra Mainiiu. The village he grew up in was a very superstitious bunch and wanted someone they could blame for evil, as well as inflict some payback on.
* SealedEvilInACan: Its essence is sealed away, and it seeks to be reborn to destroy humanity. Said can is the Greater Grail, which it has corrupted and taken over. The true purpose of the Grail Wars has been hijacked by it from opening a gate to the Root to providing enough energy for it to reincarnate.
* SelfDisposingVillain: After the manifestation it created using Shinji Matou as a host is destroyed by Saber, Avenger tries to steal a wounded Gilgamesh's body to manifest in the real world during the finale of ''Unlimited Blade Works''. In vain, Gilgamesh tries to remind Avenger that he can't use another Servant as a host, but he's too desperate to listen and winds up consuming Gilgamesh instead, with the portal to the Grail closing.
* SpellMyNameWithAnS: While most fan- and official English translations prior to 2018 render his name with the modern spelling "Angra Mainyu", the English translation of ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'' officially romanizes his name "Aŋra Mainiiu", which more accurately represents the original Avestan spelling.
* SuperEmpowering: Servants that come into contact with its black ooze are blackened, granting them physical bodies, mostly-augmented abilities, and limitless mana as long as they remain connected to the sludge, but turning them evil.
* ThenLetMeBeEvil: Before becoming what it is now, it was human who was designated as the embodiment of evil by his people and was subsequently subjected to hideous torture. After he died, he decided that he might as well become what he was perceived to be, and thus Aŋra Mainiiu was born.
* TragicVillain: All it was before being corrupted into an EldritchAbomination was a man who had the rather unfortunate fate of being scapegoated as the source of all things evil in the world, and as a result lived a life of torture and misery. No wonder it acts the way it does.
* VillainOverride:
** When Illya's heart is stabbed into Shinji Matou's body in the "Unlimited Blade Works" route, Aŋra Mainiiu claims him as its host and tries to use him as a means be reborn. Shinji proves unsuitable for the task, resulting in a bloated mass of flesh uncapable of doing much beyond vomiting black ichor everywhere. After Shinji is removed from its manifestation, Aŋra Mainiiu attempts to nab Gilgamesh to replace him and then reshapes its avatar into a towering humanoid torso before being vaporized by Saber.
** It tries to pull this on Gilgamesh in the climax of "Unlimited Blade Works", attempting to use him as a host when the manifestation it created using Shinji is destroyed by Saber. Unfortunately for Aŋra Mainiiu, it can't use a fellow Servant as a host and it ends up consuming Gilgamesh instead before the portal to the interior of the Greater Grail closes.
** It pulls this on Dark Sakura in the climax of ''Heaven's Feel''. Once Dark Sakura realizes the error of her ways and turns against it, Aŋra Mainiiu exploits their connection to use her powers as it wants against her will, turning her into a glorified magic wand. Shirou stops it by using Rule Breaker to sever their connection and free Sakura.
* WalkingSpoiler: Due to its nature as the entire saga's GreaterScopeVillain and OutsideContextProblem.
* WasOnceAMan: One of the most shocking revelations about it is that it used to be human. Specifically, it used to be a literally nameless man living in the 5th Century who was scapegoated as the incarnation of all the evils in the world and tortured until he went insane with hatred. After he died he became an evil Heroic Spirit and was summoned as Avenger during the Third Holy Grail War, but upon his defeat his soul took over the Greater Grail and was transfigured into the embodiment of All the World's Evil.
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