Chapter 22: The So-Called Holy Grail
To defeat an enemy, one must first understand them.
For someone who watched Campione! before transmigrating and became a Campione after, this was an absolute golden rule. The original protagonist, despite being a "noob" god-slayer, relied on frequently kissing top-tier students for information to bulldoze through one "veteran driver" after another. Although in this timeline Hikigaya had intercepted the original lead's "class-change item," causing him to miss the last bus to becoming a god-slayer of this generation, his performance in the other timeline deeply influenced Hikigaya.
In this regard, the person most similar to Hikigaya was likely the Black Prince, Alexander. Though their goals and methods differed, it was undeniable that both loved reading mythology to find the origins of gods. In short: both preferred to finish their homework before going on a rampage.
As for the Queen of Witches having a God guarding her—though Alexander mentioned it—neither he nor Hikigaya actually cared. Either way, they were going to fight a God; it wasn't a question of "if," so it wasn't important.
While it was unclear why a servant of the King of the End would be protected by another God, Hikigaya had fought many gods and seen even more. He believed that Gods in a "wild" state were unlikely to have any master-servant relationship; relationships in myth simply didn't count outside of myth. If such a relationship did exist, then the God wasn't "wild," and their combat power should be factored at half-strength first—still terrifying to humans, but for a Campione, an object that could be crushed with a bit of effort.
So, there was still only one real opponent: that "whatever-it-is" King of the End.
Thus, after chatting for a long while, the two reached a consensus. Alexander decided to check out the European continent first, while Hikigaya would stay on "stakeout" in Japan. Given that their home bases were East and West and both possessed Godspeed, this was incredibly convenient.
Before leaving, Alexander recommended some books he believed were related to the origins of the Holy Grail. Hikigaya then began a massive reading project, the likes of which he hadn't undertaken in a long time.
About a week after Alexander's departure, Hikigaya was already reading Dido-Perceval and The Second Battle of Mag Tuired. Both books are regarded as key evidence for the pagan origins of the Holy Grail—specifically, the theory favored by most scholars that the Grail originated from Celtic culture.
The ancient Celts first appeared in Central Europe and, by the Roman Empire period, had spread across Western Europe, the British Isles, and southeastern Galatia. Both the Britons and the Gauls were branches of the Celts; the latter even famously gave the Romans a thrashing at one point. As one of the peaks of European prehistory, the Celts were the third
major source of Western culture after Ancient Greece and Ancient Hebrew. The preserved Celtic myths are most famous for their Irish legends.
According to this origin theory, the Celtic lands are the home of King Arthur and the Grail legends. A mixture of hundreds of Celtic stories and themes created the Grail legends familiar to later generations. The figures Lancelot, Perceval, Bors, and Galahad are believed to have originally been various sun gods in Celtic mythology. Furthermore, more than ten elements of the Grail legend—such as the Pentecost feast, the Siege Perilous, the Loathly Lady, and the Bleeding Lance—can find corresponding origins in Irish traditions from the pagan era, such as The Second Battle of Mag Tuired, The Ecstasy of the Phantom Seer, and The Fate of the Children of Tuireann.
In the 10th-century Irish story The Second Battle of Mag Tuired currently in Hikigaya's hands, the elements of the "Pentecost feast" and the "Siege Perilous" had already begun to take shape.
Even so, Hikigaya remained noncommittal. The links of transmission between Celtic, Old Irish, Welsh tradition, and French romance had long been lost; proving the Grail legend originated solely from Celtic myth was no easy task.
Hikigaya wasn't reading to appreciate how Irish myths successfully survived in a Christian world; what he wanted was the essence of the Holy Grail. Therefore, the first books he read weren't Irish stories, but much older ones.
The Epic of Gilgamesh was actually the first book he read.
Afterward, he read Parzival, the Alexander Romance, and One Thousand and One Nights, as well as Chrétien's Perceval. Relying on the powerful reading comprehension of a god-slayer and looking through the intertextuality of these texts, he discovered that all imagery, events, and symbolic meanings similar to the sanctity of the Holy Grail first appeared in Gilgamesh.
In this Babylonian epic, the themes of the stories revolve around humanity's desire for immortality. Subsequent books basically continuously reproduced this central image and its symbolic meaning.
In the story of Gawain's quest for the Grail written by the Welshman Bleheris, there are themes of the Waste Land, a slain king or knight, mourning, the role of women, and the restoration of the land's vitality—all filled with humanity's fear of death and imagery of life worship. Other ritualistic elements—such as red coffin lids, fury, and the mysterious banquet where doves appear—reminded Hikigaya of the ancient Mediterranean Adonis worship rituals.
That was a ritual for harvest worship. Adonis was originally a deity worshipped by the Semitic peoples of ancient Babylon and Syria, named Tammuz. In the 7th century BC, he was introduced to Greece; "Adonis" was a respectful title used by his worshippers, originally from
the Semitic word "Adon," meaning "Lord" or "Master." In that era, not many deities in the Mesopotamia region could be called that; the most famous among them was Baal.
Connecting this to how Athena's life force was continuously siphoned by the Holy Grail, it was clear that the Grail's sacred quality came from its symbolism of Life.
This explained why the Holy Grail was seen as a symbol of an "ideal realm" that is longed for but unreachable. For early humans, immortality was the greatest desire. As it became Christianized, the theme was replaced by God. For humanity, this theme could actually be anything; the physical form is just a vessel.
The secret of the King of the End being essentially unkillable in legend might lie right here.
The Holy Grail is not an object, but a part of the King of the End. In Christianity, the quest for the Grail is considered the quest for the "Body of God."
This was truly interesting. If this "brain-hole" theory was correct, then the Holy Grail could almost be regarded as the true body (ontology) of the King of the End. As long as the Holy Grail was intact, even if the King of the End was tired of living and wanted to commit suicide, he couldn't die.
Heretic Gods use divine power to shape their physical entities on earth; would the King of the End use this Holy Grail to achieve the same result? Judging by how this thing could literally suck a Great Mother Goddess "offline" given enough time, it would be an exceptionally powerful physical vessel.
With a clap, Hikigaya closed the book. He felt he could end his "study session" now.
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