"Calamity God—Eight-Branched... Great Serpent!"
Within the city, humans and Heroic Spirits standing amid the wreckage looked up at the approaching demonic god. Their bodies trembled, their pupils nearly contracting to pinpoints.
The Servants and residents native to Japan's four main islands, in particular, could not help but feel an instinctive fear.
The Eight-Branched Calamity God, also known as Yamata no Orochi, was a colossal monster from Japanese mythology—a Demon King who surpassed the Three Great Yokai.
According to the records of the Kojiki and the epics passed down since ancient times, this Calamity God was synonymous with "death" and "disaster." Wherever it went became a dead, swamp-ridden land; all things decayed into dust. Almost all of them had grown up listening to its tale.
Legend said that when the sea god Susanoo-no-Mikoto was exiled to the mortal world, he encountered the rampaging Great Serpent. To save the beautiful maiden Kushinada-hime, who had been offered as a sacrifice, Susanoo-no-Mikoto took advantage of the Great Serpent's fondness for alcohol, got the Calamity God drunk on strong liquor, and beheaded it while it slept.
The fact that even Susanoo-no-Mikoto, one of the three principal gods of Japan in the Kojiki, had needed to defeat it through cunning made the Great Serpent's strength self-evident.
Crack!
After only a brief moment of contact, the Magic Barrier outside the city, formed by the Holy Grail's power, shattered. It had not even managed to slow the Great Serpent's writhing advance.
Eight heads the size of mountains rose over the walls. Sixteen crimson vertical pupils overlooked every corner of the city, while red-black tongues hissed in and out, carrying a grim and savage aura that hit them head-on.
The flood of shock and awe burst open the gates of memory, and panic spread.
"Today, the feast has begun!