Epilogue

[lesmodsalouette]

EPILOGUE

Your stopped time has restarted. Whether you were in the grassy field or fighting for your life on the castle grounds, you'll suddenly find yourself in an untouched area of the gardens. Ish is back, and so are the items, and the dead.

You return to Chateau Ambregris with the certain knowledge that come Monday, you will greet a new week, in a home of your own choosing. No longer will the chime of the clocks hunt you down, no longer will the oppressive scent of roses haunt your senses, no longer will you be forced to watch the death of those you've come to love and hate.

Parting is such a bittersweet sorrow, isn't it?

Make merry one last time, in this castle of illusions. Ironically, your memories of this stolen time that never existed are the one thing that will truly remain to you.

END NOTES

🔮 All dead are revived as tsukumogami! Congrats on your immortality(?)
🔮 Any other contracts made with Ish will be honored
🔮 Characters may choose to leave for any world they desire.
🔮 Time has not passed while you were stuck in this loop!
🔮 There will be no cross-dimensional world travel, except for on Samhain (Witches New Year October 31st/November 1st). On these dates, Ish will enable everyone to visit each other's world freely.
🔮 Universal Communication will be possible, courtesy of Manba and Ish. Everyone who wants one will be given a small fox that can communicate with other foxes through voice and video; the foxes can talk and are fairly simple creatures, enjoy them and give them fried tofu once in a while.
🔮 Powers are on for the finale, but Ish will step in and yeet anyone who gets too out of hand back to their homeworld, so play nice! (or relatively nice. )

[OOC: Welcome to your epilogue! The timeloop is ended, the evil has been defeated, and you have some time to catch your breath in the castle before the rest of your life begins! ]

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[the_obedient_servant]

[There is a bitter irony in it.

They see Homura in a new light, not necessarily as a reflection of themselves, but as a reflection of their counterpart. They have a lot of experience being more of an idea than a person - an ideal to be reached, a past to yearn for, something to strive to uphold... something worth killing over.

* Someone still needs to tend to these flowers.

Something stirs in the void inside their chest. Guilt? Hate? Envy? They look at the ground.]

I used to care deeply about saving the world in some sense, or maybe I just wanted to destroy the present state of things, or... maybe I just wanted revenge against everyone who had ever hurt me, and all the rest were excuses. [That's certainly what Asriel felt, when he took a glimpse at the hatred that had rested inside them since they were too young to understand why they were being punished.]

It doesn't matter. What I want, what I feel, what I think never matters. Only that I remain a faithful servant.

You remain to protect your world. I remain, committed to waiting eternally after having destroyed mine, following up on your initial suggestion and becoming the demon that I was always designed to be.

I wonder if we might have swapped places if things had turned out differently. [A useless hypothetical. This could only have ended one way.]

[antemeridian]

'If' is a matter beyond even either of us, despite everything. There isn't much point in attempting to dwell.

[ said the time looper to the other time looper. for all their ability to keep traveling through different 'ifs' ... they more than anyone know the limits of it, don't they? but then again, if pointlessness ever stopped anyone from doing anything then a significant part of either of them would not be who or what they are.

what they say, about committing themselves to waiting, waiting, and waiting. is that penance? is that duty?

both. neither. Homura can't say. ]

... when I was younger I used to believe in the stories. The ones where, despite everything, hope was something attainable. That what they wanted, and what they were trying to reach ... was in fact something that could be grasped.

[ past tense, once again. still, to bring it up if it isn't at least somewhat relevant would be foolish, and they know it as well as her. ]

Will you return yourself to whatever cycle you were caught in once more, then?

[ in a place where who or what they are and think doesn't matter, and are jerked around at the whim of something that wants them to struggle as much as it is endeared to them?

it's not accusing, or anything other than neutral, if questioning. Homura understands the weight of things owed, too, what is and isn't meant to be. ]

[the_obedient_servant]

[Despite everything.

* Despite everything, it's still you.

There is nothing left for them - not in their own world. Their only option is to return to oblivion and await a more satisfying escape, or to move on, declare all that they sacrificed meaningless, and accept a happy ending they never earned or asked for.]

I died a long time ago, driven to a purpose that I believed in.

I never asked to return. Now I stand here with a stolen body, a stolen soul - and a second chance that I alone got.

What would you do? If you were in my shoes? If there was nothing left of the world you once fought for, not even the memory of it or a legacy to protect? Do you think you could move on?

[They look up at her, and there is a look of genuine vulnerability in their eyes.

There is a profound despair in the hollow violence of their soul, but more than that there is a feeling they didn't know they knew anymore.

Fear.]