Honestly, I Don’t Know What I Expected: An Ending.

Honestly, I Don’t Know What I Expected: An Ending.

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Commissioned by Sivantic

Wordcount: 2500

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When someone returns to another person, a few trials and tribulations are expected, especially after they’ve made a mistake. The climax of a story involving a mistake between two people has some sort of physical challenge that needs to be surmounted, after the emotions and trauma have been figured out. It’s some to represent the overcoming of inner challenges via outward challenges, without saying the entire story outright.

It’s about as stupid as it sounds.

Running after a departing plane, sprinting to bus going the distance, and miraculously reaching the correct place with the help of friends and side characters… in real life people don’t catch up to the bus, the car, or the train. There’s no miraculous friend that pulls something out of their ass that has the situation neatly resolves so the two involved in the romance can be together.

You either reach the one you care about, they leave to ruminate on everything you’ve said, and your relationship can never be the same.

By pretending to die, by leaving behind the Loki Familia, I’d put myself on a path completely, utterly divergent from Ais Wallenstein. No matter how much power she had, no matter the titles given to her by the gods, and no matter what she could do… she was unable to surmount the gulf I’d made. Her friend in the Guild kept her alive, probably even taking care of her since she didn’t know how to take care of herself, but in the end, they didn’t pull of a miracle, find me, and send me straight back to her.

I didn’t count the Elf, Viridscent or whatever her name was, because she was a fan who went to lengths far beyond the norm to achieve her goals. In fact, it’s scary how she managed that. Friends don’t go crazy and obsessive for their friends. Without a doubt, the blonde elf who’d found me was some sort of freaky fanatic. Maybe her heart was in the right place, but that doesn’t change the fact that obsessed stringently for so long that she managed to find me.

However, that’s me attempting to distract myself from my body’s one-minded spring towards the Loki Familia castle. Since I was a Level 5, I was quite quick, and I was rapidly approaching the perimeter of the one place I should’ve been doing everything to avoid. I was bringing up everything I knew about love, about relations, and how fucked up they all are, yet I couldn’t stop my legs from plodding continuously towards where I believed Ais was.

Our relationship is conclusively, utterly over.

If someone did to me what I did to Ais, I’d be more likely to kill myself than forgive and let myself get lectured about staying safe. I’m not a good person, I deserved no measure of care or compassion, since I did everything that I did consciously and without hesitation.Ais was going to see the same way I did. I’d trained her since she could start fighting, so I knew what went on inside her head.

I was racing towards my doom on the word of a stranger I’d just met, because she told me Ais was going to get herself killed in her current pace.

As if a Level 7 can get themselves killed.

Really, I was just heading towards getting myself killed by a Level 7 instead of doing any sort of rescuing.

However, in the end, I opened the window to my room and let myself in.

Ais was there.

…

No one had been in my room besides Ais. It was obvious. My books, my notes, and even the treasury books were untouched. However, there was no dust on anything. Everything was where they were meant to be, as though I’d never left it in the dead of night and faked my death. It smelled like freshly maintained weapons, linens, and parchment.

Yet, the girl lying on the bed was clutching at scraps of a dirty, old jacket while she slept.

The moon cast a shadow on Ais, however I was still capable of seeing past the darkness. I saw what I’d tried to ignore everytime we passed one another and she hadn’t noticed me. There were a few scars one her arms and legs, lighter, freshly-healed skin that will fade as time passed. I had focused on those before, ingraining them into memory, while ignoring the rest Ais Wallenstine.

Her cheeks and eyes were sunken, hair wispy, and her nightgown hung loose across her whole body. The invincible Sword Princess was nowhere in sight.

Instead, I looked upon a girl on the brink of death who was fitfully asleep upon a tearstained pillow.

She was so tired that she couldn’t hear the commotion outside, the mobilization of the night guard, and slow awakening of the entire Loki Familia in the middle of the night. If they kept protocol, if they practiced as I told them to, the whole castle was going to be awake and on war footing in less than half an hour.

I can run away, as long as I didn’t reinforce my current situation anymore, my psychosis will end and I’ll be able to function like a regular human being.

Instead of doing that, my body sat at the edge of the bed and took Ais’s hand and turned it over.

It was covered in calluses on the underside, from the rigors of cointously training every day, and never letting up after. Even after I left her, she continued to work hard everyday, thus her hands didn’t change in the slightest. And, even though she was obviously weakened, when she unconsciously grasped my hand in instinctual return, I had to wince as she held onto me for dear life.

“Hachima…” My name left her lips in a whisper, but it was followed by a whimper slowly after. She stirred awake, before looking upon me while the moon framed her features within the open window that overlooked all of us. I expected relief and anger in her gaze, but instead there was only happiness and acceptance. Not the reaction of a person with their own will, but someone almost completely, utterly lost. “Am I… with you now?”

Though I’d lied to her, though everyone believed that I lied to her, she chose to believe that I died, because I “said” that I did.

Without a doubt, our relations were utterly, completely messed up. All these years of me ignoring the signs, of being the person she needed, culminated into this mess where she believed that I could do no wrong. That the only mistake that could possibly make me go away was her own. Inadvertently, in my pursuit to go home, I turned a little girl who lost her family into a weapon that sought to destroy itself the moment that I was gone.

Maybe, I’d even done it on purpose.

All my years spent in Orario, seeing so many people die and suffer, made me want to leave it. However, the very thing I helped make kept me back. Everything I gave to the Loki Familia, all the changes I helped instigate into the world, chained me down to the world itself. As I made more advantages, I gained more responsibilities and prestige, until the whole world looked to me with respect, admiration, and want.

Subconsciously, I yearned for that.

However, subconsciously, I also sought to destroy it.

And, what better way to do that than leave and leave behind a broken hero, so that the whole world hates me completely and afterly after I did?

If not for Lefiya Veridis’s words, I would’ve continued to walk that path, even though I returned.

I knew that all I had to do was tell Ais a half-truth, that I left because I was angry at her, but returned after someone explained her situation after I left. If I did that, then everything would return to the way it was. She would remain the weapon I’d made from a little girl who lost everything, until the day came where I had discarded her leave her to suffer.

But, I didn’t.

I was aware that I was betraying my family and my friends back in my world.

That I was choosing Ais Wallenstein above everyone else.

Yet, I said the words I needed to say anyway.

“No, you idiot. I’m here to apologize and beg for another chance from you, Loki, and everyone else who’ll care to hear me out.” I took a seat on my own bed. Already, after saying those words, broke a little of what I’d made over the course of the last few years and didn’t dare look too closely on. The rosy glasses I’d forced on her vision could only crack, as I admitted to my own faults, and I saw the embers of anger spark within her gaze as pieces fell where though should’ve fell the night I left. “I’ll appreciate it very much if you and the others don’t hurt me too much.”

It didn’t take long for those small embers to catch onto the tinder and alight the bonfire that I’d made in my absence. Ais Wallenstein was a bit dim, but she was well-educated by yours truly. That included how to realize what manipulation was and how to fight against it.

Unfortunately, all I knew about how to fight manipulation was with actual, physical violence.

I didn’t get a chance to see how the attack began, but once the rose-tinted lenses and the rest of the façade fell away, Ais Wallenstein put all her ability into capture me and hold me down.

Needless to say, given her Level, it was overkill.

At least, I was going to find out how well they maintained the hospital ward after this.

…

No one ever thinks that they’re doing the wrong things. Everyone is trying to do their best. There’s a reason why it’s hard to write a hard villain, someone that everyone can hate, because if they’re written too well, they become the protagonist of the story. Why is that the case? That’s because every protagonist is a villain in someone else’s story. Disrupting the natural order, creating new things, and achieving goals natural makes enemies, tramples over the lives of others, and leaves many people miserable in the shadows.

Right and wrong do matter.

They’re not just simple, stupid words that edgy, teenage protagonists spit on and turn their noses at.

Right and wrong is relative.

There’s no defining, universal definition that all of creation acknowledges is correct.

However, everyone likes to think that what they think is right is right and what they believe is wrong is wrong.

This is just a long-winded way of saying that there’s no way to live life without regret. There’s no such thing as a perfect, completely happy existence. Pain, sorrow, and hate exists. They don’t exist to give reason to feel positive emotions, of course. There’s no invisible scale that metes out equal amounts of suffering for every single moment of joy that exists. Everyone just had to live with their situation, whether that means being happy or sad, and that’s all there is to it.

So, after sleeping for the first time in weeks, overcoming moment after moment of absurd mania as I tried to ignore what I did Ais Wallenstein when she started breaking records and becoming strong in earnest, I’ve decided that all I can do is live with my decisions, pursue my goals, and see what I can do about limiting the regret I bring to myself and others.

The words feel wrong, they’re going to continue feeling wrong and there's probably going to a point in the future where I might go back to the old way of thinking that got me incarcerated to a bed.

However, after waking up in Orario, in the Loki Familia castle, and surrounded by many, many people who were angry with me… I couldn’t deny the utterly simple fact that I couldn’t throw everything away.

Especially, the blonde, angry, and armed young woman who watched me with baggy, drooping eyes while seated at my bedside.

I had responsibilities here.

Things, projects, and people that I would harm by being inconsiderate, inattentive, and even just be uncaring.

Another life in another world. 

…

“I’m sorry, Sensei, but I won’t leave Hestia-sama for anyone.” Bell Cranel bowed while biting his lip. As I expected of the boy, he was likeable even when he refused. Hmmm, aren’t those thoughts suspiciously like what a Shoujo villain would think after being refused by the MC? Questions to bury forever and never think about again, I suppose. “Thank you for the offer, I really appreciate being given the chance to join the Loki Familia, but I want to stay with my Familia.”

I was about to accept the decision, but Ais decided to speak up for the first time since we entered the abandoned church.

“Sensei… apologized to you… but you still don’t accept his offer?” Huh? Why was I hearing boss music? No. Ignoring the situation was only going to make it worse. Ais still thought highly of me, even after everything that I did, so she naturally didn’t like it when Cranel refused my offer. “You are a foo--

I placed a hand on her head, then initiated patting.exe.

It was very effective.

Ais lost her ability to speak, became embarrassed, and became unable to act in an instant. She glared at me for interrupting her, for not letting her protect me, but the outcome was worth the price.  I didn’t want anyone’s relationship to be bad because of me. In fact, I’d be happier if their relationship was better in spite of me. However, in this fucked up world where being strong and capable is all that mattered, being me didn’t matter as much as my ability. 

“That’s fine, Cranel. Don’t let Ais tell you otherwise. I won’t be able to support you more than I already am without you being part of the Loki Familia, but I’ll keep teaching you as much as I can.” 

“Ah, thank you, Sensei!”

Loki was adamant that I had months of work to catch up on. Gareth, Deimne, and Alf all agreed with her. The amount of work that I now had was obscene. The only silver lining was that I was behind a desk, instead of going down into the dungeon for the foreseeable future. Even then, that little bonus was hampered by the fact that Ais stayed beside me the whole time. 

It was better than her trusting me completely and utterly, but no sane individual wouldn’t complain about being joined to the hip with another person for an indeterminate amount of time.

However, I had to be responsible for my actions and be honest with myself.

I would do everything I could to regain the trust I’d wasted.

From Deimne, Gareth, Alf, Loki, Cranel… and the girl sitting beside me and glaring at me while I paid attention to another person.

As I expected, being with other people is difficult… but I wouldn’t not want to be with them.