Waking up with no memory in a digital graveyard designed to break you, you spend thirteen episodes watching reality itself become negotiable, then watching the show argue with you about whether that matters. Shaft animates this like a fever dream bleeding into philosophy class, and Nasu writes every conversation as if the answer to "who am I" could destroy you worse than any sword ever could. The story demands you hold contradictions in your head until they stop being contradictions, which either ruins the show for you or becomes the entire point.

Hakuno Kishinami wakes up in a pool of his own blood inside a virtual world, with no memory of his past. The setting is Tsukimihara Academy, an artificial school built by the Moon Cell computer to host a new Holy Grail War, a contest whose prize is having one's wish granted. Once the Masters are chosen, the academy begins purging everyone left over. Driven by a hatred he cannot explain, Hakuno refuses to die. While fleeing a pursuer, he pulls a crimson blade from the ground and summons his Servant, Saber, who destroys the attacker amid a storm of rose petals. With Saber beside him, he sets out for the Angelica Cage at the Moon Cell's core, facing friends and foes in deadly battles as he searches for the reason this world exists and for an answer to who he really is. Adapted from Type-Moon's Fate/EXTRA game, the series blends action, fantasy and psychological drama.