Ayaka Sajyou (アヤカ・サジョウ, Ayaka Sajō?) is the "True" Master of Saber in the True and False Holy Grail Wars of Fate/strange fake after usurping the summoning from Saber's original Master, Cashura. She is the subject of an urban legend ghost story in Fuyuki City. Described as Person A (A氏, A-shi?), she is said to have disappeared in the past after a family suicide in the apartment next to her.
Profile
Background
Ayaka was a student who moved to Fuyuki's Shinto in the beginning of spring shortly after turning twenty. She rented room two on the eleventh floor of Semina Apartments. There was a family suicide during the fall, and she went missing a month later. Although the police were asked to start an investigation, it turned up nothing, Kaede Makidera claiming that Person A only went on a journey of self-discovery and that she will come back when she becomes stronger. The story later become told as a ghost story by Ayako Mitsuzuri with an unknown amount of embellishment. The "Little Red Riding Hood of Semina Apartments" is a common ghost story known by students in Homurahara Academy, to which Taiga Fujimura has banned them.[1]
Appearance
Her exact age is unknown but she appears in her late teens to her early twenties. She wears a thin-framed pair of glasses and she has dyed her hair blond.
Personality
Ayaka is afraid of taking elevator as she suffers from illusion of Little Red Riding Hood.
Person A is an introvert by nature, so she has little issue living alone. Comfortable without others, she does not care about having few friends or the prospect of living around only strangers. She prefers such solitude, not caring to be disturbed by either friends or family. She does not like simple living, so she prefers larger living space to act as a "fortress" against the outside world. Rather than liking being alone, she instead has a fear of other people coming near her and intruding within her space. The place she lives needs to be large, solid, and hard, almost "impenetrable", to reach for her to feel comfortable living there. The hallway of the apartment is particularly ideal for her, acting as a "boundary" to the outside. She does not care about the outside world so long as it does not interfere with his lifestyle, so even remembering the name of a person she often meets is of no interest to her.
Role
Fate/strange fake
In order to not directly observe the world line and fixate it as truth, Kischur Zelretch Schweinorg decided to chose Ayaka as an outsider to participate the Fake Holy Grail War, with her playing the part of the Person A in the Semina Apartments ghost story. Ayaka was a Fuyuki native and she had travelled to the United States. She was gifted with five command spells and at the same time cursed by a mysterious woman. The mysterious woman tells Ayaka to go to a certain opera house. Ayaka was captured by Cashura, who is a magus working for the US government. He thinks Ayaka is a spy and he was planning to summon King Arthur with his catalyst and have her kill Ayaka. However, as he was about to do his summoning, he was killed by Assassin when she used Zabaniya on him. Assassin questions Ayaka if she is after the Holy Grail. Before Ayaka can respond, Ayaka saw the opera stage enveloped with light and she saw multiple figures. However all but one of them disappear with the light. Saber who appears from the light, instantly recognizes that Assassin is one of the old men of the mountain. They engage in a fight and eventually Saber uses Excalibur, which destroyed parts of the opera house. Ayaka only heard parts of the Excalibur name and after witnessing Saber using Excalibur, Saber asked if she was his master. Ayaka who was confused with the situation, she rejected him. Ayaka stubbornly refused to participate in the Holy Grail war, therefore she does not form a proper formal contract with Saber. Saber disappears after her rejection.
When police arrives, they discovered the deceased body of Cashura and the ruined opera house. As the police about to rescue her, Saber reappears again and admits he was involved in the opera house. Both Saber and Ayaka were taken to the police headquarters. Assassin targets Saber, she infiltrates the police headquarters and challenges Orlando Reeve Clan Calatin force. Ayaka and Saber make use of this commotion and make their escape.
Other appearances
Fate/hollow ataraxia begins with Ayako Mitsuzuri telling of the ghost story based around Person A with an unknown amount of embellishment. Person A is a pseudonym given for the purpose of the story to hide his real name. Moving for the first time, living alone for the first time, and finding himself in an unfamiliar area for the first time, even he as an introvert by nature felt lost and had to take some time to adjust to life in Fuyuki. He was satisfied by the state of his life, except for the strange nature of the hallway leading to the door of his apartment and the family next door to him. Although he chose the apartment due to the hallway providing a great distance between the door and living room to act as an "obstacle" to the outside world, he felt uncomfortable with it for many months before realizing the simple fact that it had no lights. Feeling foolish because of it, it could be said that was when he had made a "wrong turn" due to not noticing it.
His second issue, a family of three, moved into the next door apartment during fall, and he only greeted them once while moving. Only knowing their surname and the name of their daughter, he would occasionally meet them in the entryway of the building and sometimes the daughter by herself in the elevator. She would always ask him to push the elevator button for her. Although such a young girl being by herself was strange, especially finding her at the entrance both the eleventh floor and first floor, he always did as she asked whenever he came upon her as he left or returned. Although he learned her name from their various meetings, he did not remember it due to his nature as an introvert, instead nicknaming her Little Red Riding Hood.
One particular day after they moved into the apartment, he heard an especially loud commotion from their apartment, including a panicked banging on his own door. While he was initially going to answer, he simply turned up the television to drown out the sound and ignored it. Believing that others need to solve their own problems, he felt it would be troublesome to get involved. After awakening the next day, he learned that there had been a family suicide in the apartment due to the police questioning him. Lying about having not heard anything, he asked about the daughter's state. The officer explained that she fled the scene, knocked at his door desperately, and then went towards the elevator where all traces of her disappeared
The girl in the hallway
He began hearing knocking on his door every night at two A.M. after several days had passed, initially believing it to be a minor sound coming from his window. As he determined it to be coming from the door, he tried the intercom to find out who was knocking, but that only caused the noise to become louder. As he tried to see through his peephole, he could only discern something red just below it. As the knocking became even more noticeable as the days passed, he eventually decided to answer it, finding nothing initially. Feeling that it was just the guilt building up in him, he closed the door only to find the blood-stained girl at the end of his hallway. Believing that it would be the last sight he saw before death, she began to ask him to push the button, where the story ends after Kaede Makidera's scream interrupts it.
While discussing the validity of the story, Rin Tohsaka confirms that Kaede was so scared because she personally knew about the event. It is a known fact that there was a family suicide and that he later disappeared. Kaede claims that it is a distasteful rendition and that Mr. A's brother claimed it to simply be a "journey of self-discovery." Ayako mentions that she likely had not needed dramatize the story because retelling the rumors themselves would have been scary enough.
Abilities
Ayaka was granted five Command Spells by a mysterious woman, the command spells are located to her right hand, right shoulder, back, left shoulder and left hand.
Development
Creation and Conception
In the PS Vita version of Fate/hollow ataraxia, Person A was voiced by a male voice actor. However, this must be because who was telling the story was Ayako and she imagined that the mysterious Person A could be a man, since no one knew the true identity of the Person A and if it was a man or a woman in this case.
Ayaka has taken on the role of the original Player character from the original version of the novel series. Although this Ayaka is based on Fate/Prototype, her existence is closer to her counterpart in Fate/school life.[2]
References
- ↑ Fate/strange fake - Novel 2: "The Little Red Riding Hood of Semina Apartments", p.020
- ↑ Fate/strange fake - Novel 1: Afterword