Kiritsugu Emiya

Kiritsugu Emiya (衛宮切嗣, Emiya Kiritsugu?) is the Master of Saber in the Fourth Holy Grail War in Izumogakure and the Fourth Pescan War in Mega Man ZX Shippuden.

Appearance
Kiritsugu Emiya wears a black suit and trench coat. His face is blank and his eyes are vacant. As a boy, his shining eyes and tanned skin make him look cheerful.

Personality
In his youth, Kiritsugu wishes to be a Hero of Justice that protects the weak. He is often haunted by Shirley's question about what he wants to become and how she believes him to have the ability to change the world. His hesitation to kill his first love when she became a Dead Apostle has resulted the death of the whole Island. Kiritsugu, realizing that his father was the cause of this and he would continue his Dead Apostle experiment, hardened his resolve and killed his father to prevent more deaths. Kiritsugu's goal was initially to make his actions on the day of killing his father by his own hands meaningful and worthy. Only by hunting and assassinating all heretic magi like his father could he truly prevent such tragedies from occurring again. He lost all traces of youthful innocence after having spent his life going through countless battles while trying to obtain a utopia that could never be fulfilled. After finding out about the existence of the Grail, he wished to use it to obtain that utopia. He feels no emotion from personal victories over his targets, seeing them as nothing more than successful taunts with calculated resolutions. In order to pursue his dream, he attempts to kill off most of his emotions, acting as the "machine that is Emiya Kiritsugu." He has managed to become completely devoted to any duty without showing any emotional wavering, though he is prone to fall into moments of extreme emotion and despair occasionally. When he admits that he is afraid and terrified of Kirei Kotomine, it is partly because of Kirei's bizarre personality and also because of the fact that he fears that Kirei might be the one and only person who can kill him. When examining the Contender, he begins to wonder if he will remember the touch of his wife and daughter after the Grail War ends, and falls into self-derision upon realizing the eight year old Ilya weighs less than a rifle. He dislikes such emotions interfering with his work, believing that his interactions with his family have made him more susceptible to sentimentalism in viewing the figures of his own wife and daughter in a passing mother holding her crying child.

Kiritsugu tries to hold to the belief that there is no differentiation in sacrifice, that all life is equal and choosing the path leading to a smaller sacrifice is for the best. With a target that must be eliminated in order to save the world by obtaining the Grail, killing one thousand people to save at least five billion more should be easy for him. He finds himself unable to do so when planning to destroy the Hyatt hotel. He hates the idea of fatal romanticism like the hope that the innocent tenants will be able to escape the hotel in time impeding his abilities. Such ideas and sentiment would kill him on the battlefield, so he feels that he must rid him self of them as much as possible. He has a close connection to Maiya that is older than the one with Irisviel, sharing a blood-stained existence not even his wife has ever seen. She acts to help balance his emotions, as she is often even more emotionless than him. Despite being close and having had a sexual relationship for a long duration of time, he shares no romantic feelings for her and attempts to simply regard her as a tool that will eventually die to serve her purpose. Because allowing his wife to sacrifice herself to complete the Grail is a betrayal towards her love, no matter what others say, it is necessary that he does not hesitate in this betrayal. Kiritsugu sees his sexual relationship with Maiya as a rehearsal before this betrayal, a form of self-abuse to steel his nerves while walking down this path. It is probably the sorriest excuse to have an affair, and it is essentially a negative spiral downward without an end.

During the last moments of Maiya's life, he attempts to calmly tell her that she has nothing to worry about because her tasks are complete, and simply state "you will die here." He finds himself unable to speak, and instead he almost finds himself crying for her. She eventually reminds him of his purpose and tells him to save his tears for Irisviel, allowing him to say "Maiya, your task is complete." He stopped smoking while with the Einzbern family, but takes it up again during the Grail War. Partly because he couldn't find his favorite brand, but mostly out of consideration for his wife and child. He instantly buys a pack out of habit and once again begins smoking as if hadn’t been ten years. Being a Japanese native, he feels better while in the country despite being used to travel. After rescuing Shirou, he found salvation in his despair. Before his death, he found a glimmer of hope as Shirou inherited his ideals and he believed Shirou to archive this. He once told a young Shirou that "boys who make a girl cry will end in ruins", something he experienced prior to his death.

Early Life
Due to his father, Norikata Emiya, fourth family head of the Emiya family and a magus who received a Sealing Designation, Kiritsugu lost his mother shortly after he was born. Father and son were on the run from the Mage's Association, and thus Kiritsugu spent his youth wandering around the world with his father. hey settled on Alimango Island for a year. He became friends with - and had a crush on - Noritaka's assistant, a local girl called Shirley who was four years older than him. However, disaster struck when Shirley became a vampire after she drank a potion, intending for it to prove that Noritaka's research would save the world, and pled for Kiritsugu to kill her but he refused and fled. Their village was overrun by Executors from the Church and Enforcers from the Association, both groups having arrived when they heard rumors of a magus researching into vampirism. Kiritsugu was the only survivor of the 'cleansing', saved by Natalia Kaminski, a freelancer and part-time Enforcer who wanted information on the magus responsible.

Returning to the hidden Emiya residence, Kiritsugu confronted his father on his research and Shirley's death. Norikata explained that he wanted to become a Dead Apostle to continue with his research on Magecraft longer. In the Fate/Zero novel version, just as Noritaka was planning their escape, Kiritsugu shot him in the back with a pistol; in the animated version Kiritsugu stabs Norikata with the dagger Kiritsugu received from Shirley and then shot his father, who was highly shocked at his son's betrayal, to death with a pistol that Kiritsugu found in Norikata's drawer. To this end, Natalia figured that the only person who could prevent Noritaka from escaping and ensure his death was his own son and she wound up taking Kiritsugu with her.