I create a world of finite somethings

Still staring down what I have to finish for Neir and SRoPE. The story for Neir actually has me wanting to do that idea I tossed out in the fic ideas thread, about Shiki and Shirou's schools having a joint field trip that turns all eeeeeebil and having Arihiko, Ayako, Shinji, Satsuki, and Issei all be the center to a fic. I think it probably also has something to do with Kokoro Connect having settled in my brain and weird things happening to (relatively) normal high schoolers. At the same time, though, I really don't want to do this, because I already have two more serials that I want to do.

On that, I think I have an ending for The Hearts of the Suffering. In rereading Last Episode, it is vague enough that I think this works. See, I conjured up this entire thing with the idea that I'd find a way to bridge that gap between the end of Fate and Last Episode without ruining the bittersweet aspect that makes the ending of Fate so wonderful. Also, you know, the whole thing of how everyone in fanfiction seems to take LE as being "Shirou dies and meets Saber in the next world" or something, and how that's both wrong and, at least for me, ruins some of the best aspects about Nasuverse. I like the idea that Shirou is barred from the Throne, that "heroes" can't really be born in modern days. I also like what Extra implies, that if, beyond the Counter Guardian contract, the only way he can actually become a Heroic Spirit is becoming more and more of a concept, to the point where "Shirou" stops existing and "Ally of Justice" is what is actually there, like how Kojirou-wraith isn't actually Kojirou, just a spirit that hijacked the preexisting container. I mean, you know, a fake. Anyway.

So, I have something that fits in line with LE. It works in line with what I want to do with how the Grail system is handled to begin with.

Spoiler:

I always knew I wanted to make the reverse association: if F/HA has Avenger hijacking Shirou in a way, I wanted to do the other way around. So to rid the system of the taint that resists all attempts to destroy it in the first place, we get a sort of metaphysical bit where Shirou trades places with Angra and takes on the burden of the Evils of the World. Though I'm not sure if I'd go so far as to give Angra a new life--I've thought of the idea where ambiguously, Caren encounters a person that resembles Shirou without memories, but I wonder if that isn't being too heavy-handed with the Avenger GOOD END deal.

Shirou, somehow, ends up in an endless world where he battles with metaphysical representations of mankind's evil, disappearing as the Grail is destroyed for good. The last chapter/epilogue then would be Shirou constantly fighting as implied in LE, down a path where he loses sight of what he is even there for and what he even is anymore. He just keeps fighting the worst mankind has to offer. But as also touched upon in Saber's narrative during LE, I'd be jumping back and forth from that to the good he's done. That he would, say, fight with the evils set upon the world by Zouken, but be reminded of something I'm gonna have Sakura bring up earlier in the story. That he would fight the memories of Kiritsugu, but be reminded of the happiness Illya had at the end of her life. I kind of touched a bit on that in Fate/Far Side, though it'd sort of be a bigger thing than just a couple of personal issues Shirou still had with said characters. It might even hark back to things we know about from Fate/Zero, like Uryuu/Caster's kid torture or Gil and Kotomine trolling Aoi and Kariya.

So it goes on and on and on, not explaining exactly why Shirou is subject to this, or how, until we get to the very end: what was "metaphysical" before is actually a fairy realm. If he's becoming the concept of "Justice" then he's "stumbled" into the elemental barrier since concepts are Gaian. Also, he was standing over a body of water when this happened, haha. So the path he has taken has both metaphorically and literally been one that is connected to Saber's resting place. There's some daoist philosophy in here, especially when it comes to the whole Gaia/Alaya issue, and also the evils of the world/justice thing, but I'm too saturated with stuff right now to really want to talk further on that. But, well, the through-line of this story was completely from To the Beginning lyrics.

Sadness alone will not disappear.
With my very own hands
I will tear apart the rules governing the hearts of the suffering!
Down to zero we go.

/Madoka hijacking Fate

Anyway, it probably wouldn't end on LE, but would heavily point to the idea of LE. And it would be able to touch on my response to some people's reviews of I Am Not There, since some people read that and think that Shirou could actually become a Heroic Spirit from it. I mean, yeah, I wrote it to be ambiguous so people can think that if they want, but really, I'm not a good enough writer to convince myself that such a thing would actually work.