Ygnaiih, Ygnaiih thflthkh’ngha,
the Silver Key is in my hand.
Come forth from the void and touch me with the tips of your fingers so that I may become an incarnation of your essence, my Father God.
Cross the slumber of roses, to the Ultimate Gate.
Qliphoth Rhizome.
the Silver Key is in my hand.
Come forth from the void and touch me with the tips of your fingers so that I may become an incarnation of your essence, my Father God.
Cross the slumber of roses, to the Ultimate Gate.
Qliphoth Rhizome.
— Abigail Williams
Full title: "Pseudo-Singularity IV - Forbidden Advent Garden, Salem [Heretical Salem]". Written by Meteo Hoshizora.
The final pseudo-singularity has been detected in modern times, as a mysterious black expanse with a height of 600 meters and radius of about nine kilometers blankets the area around modern Salem and Danvers. All modern forms of surveillance and communication have been unable to penetrate it, with only a mage's automaton being able to retrieve any data and return back safely. From this limited data, the Mage's Association has extrapolated that anything from the 17th century and onwards will not be able to penetrate the barrier and that Salem has mysteriously reverted back to the Puritan village of colonial times. Due to the pressing need to keep things covered up with the U.S. government, the Church, and the Mage's Association working behind the scenes, Chaldea has been authorized by the Association and the UN for one final Rayshift to investigate the dark expanse.
View the trailer here
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Tropes appearing in this episode:
- Anachronism Stew: It's made apparent that this Pseudo-Singularity isn't the true late 17th century Salem but a twisted recreation with the appearance of Matthew Hopkins, a witch hunter that died nearly half a century before the Salem Witch Trials began.
- The Atoner: Raum reveals that the town of Salem he created is filled with the ghosts turned ghouls of the town folks of Salem during the infamous witch hunts that desired redemption for their actions, Abigail included. That's what drew Matthew Hopkins' spirit to the false Salem, hoping for redemption as well.
- Back from the Dead: Due to the particular bounded field around the fake Salem, death for a servant means a complete erasure of their memories of their time in Chaldea thus the big deal when Sanson lets himself be hanged near the end of the chapter. In the epilogue Abigail is able to find the Sanson that died in Salem and return him to Chaldea with his memories intact minus his experiences in the fake Salem.
- Book Ends: The chapter begins with Sanson eating breakfast and Robin waking up after a late night, and ends the same way, but with the two on much better terms after the ordeal of Salem.
- Break the Cutie: Abigail loses both her friends Lavinia and Sanson within the course of this Singularity, with Sanson's death being the catalyst for her Eldritch abilities to awaken and Lavinia's death being the trigger for said powers to run completely wild.
- Burn the Witch!: Subverted. Sanson reveals that despite what pop culture would lead you to believe, most "witches" were hanged, as public burnings were seen as too inefficient and more as torture than an execution.
- The Cameo: The plays the protagonist group puts on involve various servants not involved in the story in the pseudo-singularity. The list includes: Solomon, Jeanne, Jeanne Alter, Jeanne Alter Santa Lily, Caster and Saber Gilles de Rais, Amakusa as Santa Island Mask and Medea Lily.
- Mephistopheles actually drops by to drop a hint about the true nature of the Singularity.
- Cheerful Child: Abigail Williams is quite cheerful, despite the grim circumstances going on around her...
- Corrupt the Cutie: The ultimate goal of the singularity was to subject Abigail to this so Raum could try to start Goetia's plans for mankind again.
- Cosmic Horror Story: The story introduces elements from Lovecraft's writings as well as the Foreigner class.
- Dead All Along: The entire town of Salem is revealed to have been ghouls this entire time but due to Raum messing with everyone's perception and thoughts the town folk appear and act like regular people in the morning.
- Debut Queue: Nezha, Circe and Abigail made their debut with its release and the Queen of Sheba can be summoned after this story's completion.
- Denser and Wackier: The second play acts as a breather from the depressive main story. It is much sillier than the first play being a variant of the three little pigs with the three Jeannes, the original Jeanne de Arc, Jeanne Alter and Jeanne Alter Santa Lily, as the pig siblings with various servants acting as wolves, Jeanne Alter regularly pointing out the various issues with the play. It happened just after Tituba was arrested for witchcraft and happened right before she was executed. This is intentional on our heroes' part because Hopkins wishes to use the play to plant fear toward witches in the townspeople's heart by requesting a Burn the Witch! story, and the heroes', wanting to buy time to save Tituba from the gallows while also giving Hopkins a middle finger, makes a story so ridiculous that the townspeople can only see it as a comedy piece. Hopkins simply uses the play as a distraction and executes Tituba anyway.
- Foreshadowing: In the end of Salem the Gentleman states he left his physical form while on a mission chasing after the God of the Abyss. Turns out he was talking about Katsushika Hokusai's trial quest where he appears in the beginning and end.
- "Groundhog Day" Loop: Raum reveals that he has the false Salem in a time loop, each time bringing in new "guests" in the hopes of breaking Abigail. By the time the protagonist gets involved, Raum is on his seventh loop.
- Heroic Sacrifice: When the villagers demand Chaldea give up the "Witch" responsible for the chaos in Salem, Sanson gives himself up as the "witch", knowing he will be hanged, in order to save the others. He gets better.
- Interface Spoiler: The first play, "The Queen of Sheba and Solomon," all but spoil the fact that Tituba is the Queen of Sheba, complete with her using her in game sprites.
- Let's Get Dangerous!: While Circe provides humor throughout the event, she still is the teacher of Medea and a Caster on par with the Queen of Sheba.
- Lovecraft Country: The singularity taking place during the Salem Witch Hunts would naturally be the one that involves explicitly Lovecraftian elements.
- Murder Is the Best Solution:
- Nezha's suggestions for how to solve the cast's problems are always violent ones.
- Hopkins almost immediately goes to the "arrest and hanging" option whenever an accused is brought forth. And while sometimes he'll bother with a trial, he's often already made up his own mind about the guilt of the accused and is just going through the motions.
- Near-Villain Victory: Raum was the closest one out of all the surviving Demon Pillars to enact their twisted plan of "saving" humanity, as he managed to summon an Elder God and reality did in fact begin to break apart at the seams. Without the timely intervention of the Queen of Sheba and Circe, it would have been over.
- Never Trust a Trailer: The preview video for Salem is rather upbeat, featuring Servants having fun and Abigail being adorable. The Salem in the game is nothing like this.
- New England Puritan: The story takes place in Salem, Massachusetts, which naturally is populated by Puritans. It shows that the town was a powder keg even before Raum started meddling with history.
- Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Early on it's stated that SHEBA for some reason was able to view into the Salem pseudo-singularity despite it being in the present day when it was made to see into the future. Raum reveals that SHEBA has a hidden feature made by Flauros to monitor the Demon Pillars and intervene if they go against Goetia's objectives. As a result SHEBA not only picked up on Raum's actions but it also summoned the Queen of Sheba and later Circe to stop Raum, both of whom were instrumental to stopping an out of control Abigail.
- Not Quite Dead: "Tituba"/Queen of Sheba and Mata Hari are executed by Matthew Hopkins but survive. Mata Hari pretended to be dead and with Circe's help was able to survive, while "Tituba" really did end up being corrupted into a ghoul-like creature but managed to snap out of it after fighting the heroes and remember who she really was, even creating a hideout with her magecraft, though she admits she was on her last legs and probably would have faded away pretty soon if she didn't contract with the protagonist.
- Odd Friendship: Abigail Williams with... Lavinia Whateley, of all people.
- Older Than They Look: A bunch of sailors think Circe is a child, with one even thinking Medea is her mother. In actuality Circe is Medea's aunt.
- Plucky Comic Relief: Circe provides much needed levity in an otherwise very dark and dreary story.
- Public Domain Character: A man strongly hinted to be H. P. Lovecraft's Randolph Carter (his physical appearance strongly resembles the actual Lovecraft of which Carter was famously an Author Avatar for, Raum uses "Carter" as his host body's name while possessing him, and he briefly mentions his alternate identity, Chandraputra) but is not actually named as such, only referred to as "The Dimension-travelling Gentleman".
- Real Time: The story takes place over the course of seven days, with the story divided into three blocks and released over the course of a week.
- Remember the New Guy?: Nezha suddenly shows up in Chaldea, having been summoned off-screen prior to this episode. She is referred to as "new guy" at the start by some of the allies.
- Salem Is Witch Country: The main setting of the story has strong elements of this, with some Lovecraft Country mixed in for good measure.
- Surprisingly Happy Ending: When all is said and done, the Sanson summoned by Chaldea is seemingly Killed Off for Real, and Abigail as a Servant should not survive the end of the Salem Singularity. It looks like the epilogue will be a somber affair where Chaldea comforts Abigail in her last moments. But then the Cosmic-Travelling Gentleman appears and reveals to all that Abgail, due to the bizarre circumstances of her creation, is an exception among exceptions — a full-fledged Servant that DOESN'T need external mana or a contract to continue existing in the world. Not only does Abigail get to happily depart with the Gentleman, free to live as she chooses, but she later returns the favor by bringing Chaldea's Sanson back (albeit with no memories of Salem).
- Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: There is noticeable tension between Robin Hood and Sanson with Robin repeatedly taking pot shots at Sanson and even calling him frog many times. After Sanson sacrifices himself to protect the protagonist, Robin has a better opinion of him and lets up on most of his hostility.
- Witch Hunt: This pseudo-singularity takes place during the most famous witch hunts of them all, Salem.
- Would Hurt a Child: Räum is relentless. He doesn't just try a game of Corrupt the Cutie with Abigail, he also created Lavinia as a Sacrificial Lion to finish Abigail's corruption by killing her Only Friend.
- You Remind Me of X: Mash grows protective of Abigail after the Queen of Sheba saves the protagonist group seeing how Abigail's current situation is just Mash's like when humanity was incinerated.
- Your Princess Is in Another Castle!: Once Raum is defeated, Chaldea assumes the crisis has been solved, but then Räum kills Lavinia in his last moments and sends Abigail over the Despair Event Horizon.
