Of Demons and Librarians end

It was quite something else how fast children went back to being happy even after such a traumatic event already they were playing around and returning to normalcy though looking at his right towards the only kid with a sad look on his face sitting on a nearby bench just looking at his arm as if it would return to normal by his stare alone, it would take quite some time for everything to fully return to normal. One of the kids' lives was irreversibly changed forever another one was still missing though considering no one asked about her he had doubts she was an actual resident of this village.

His thoughts were stopped after someone grabbed his sleeve.

"Sir Shirou I think it's time for us to leave." A bright smile greeted him.

"Sorry Rem, I was just thinking, do you have everything?"

She nodded leaning to her left to look at what had his attention "I see, Rem's sure he'll be fine Shirou."

Looking back at the kid he saw the brown-haired girl grab his arm to force him to play with the rest of them. "I'm sure he will." He said as he grabbed some of her bags, something she allowed though not before giving him a cute pout.

"Shall we go." he saw her nod with a smile.

They started walking back to the village entrance the villagers giving the pair a wide berth, seems they still weren't trusting of the maid by his side, the girl on the other hand simply smiled and continued walking side by side with him, either not caring or not even noticing the stares.

"So Shirou, what are you cooking today?"

"I don't really know." Shirou said as he looked at one of the bags on his hands "Maybe you have an idea."

Rem gave out a questioning noise as she tapped one of her fingers to her chin as if she was thinking very hard "How about you let Rem cook for once."

"Not a chance." Shirou said immediately.

Giving another pout to the male Rem simply grumbled "At least let me help you know."

"Pretty sure your sister needs the help more than I do."

"No need to insult others just because someone tried to encroach on your territory Shirou." Rem said her eye filled with mirth, this back and forth had been the new normal ever since they came back from the forest "That's not very knightly of you."

Shirou chuckled "Well that's good, pretty sure I was never one, honor, pride aren't really my thing."

"No, but putting other's lives above yours seems very knight-like, or at least it's enough for me."

For that, he had no response so he just looked at his companion for a second before sighing. They walked the rest of the way in comfortable silence.

(Afternoon)

His lessons with the explosive personality better known as Beatrice continued the next day of the attack and much to his health problems she had been rather grumpy.

"That's the wrong lettering, in fact." The little girl said as she hit his head with a stick she got from god knows where, it didn't really hurt as she didn't put much force into it but it was getting annoying.

"I got it, I got it."

She merely hpmed something he had gotten used to by now "Didn't your parents ever tell you that if you scowl too much your face will get stuck that way."

This stopped her from scowling as her gaze turned far colder towards him "Don't talk about my parents." she said even forgoing her usual catchphrases at the end.

Bitter spot got it "Sorry I didn't mean to..."

The little girl turned her gaze downward her hands clenching her skirt "I think we're done for today, I suppose."

Shirou sighed and got up "Tomorrow if I can come back, I'd like to ask you about something important I tried to do it on my own but I hit a wall, and I really need your help."

She didn't respond but gave a small nod. He turned to leave the library letting the little girl have her peace.

"Thank you, Bea…" Shirou said giving her one last smile as he opened the door and left.

Her eyes widened.

The image of a strong back appeared on her mind, someone who had protected her who would have protected her…

His smile was the last thing she remembered.

"I'll be back soon, little Bea…"

"No, you won't."

(Night)

"It's been so long since we've done this Shirou." Emilia said with a bright smile ear to ear her head leaning back towards the tree they were sitting on.

"It's only been three nights, you know."

"Felt longer than that, I guess." Emilia said hugging her knees closer to her chest "It wasn't fun having to wait for you mister, you owe me a lot and I won't be happy with anything less of perfection."

Was she really taking the role of a haughty princess, too bad for her he had lived with someone who did that naturally so anything she said only brought amusement to him. "Alright alright how about I cook your favorite dish tomorrow, would that please your highness."

"That would be a good start." she said her eyes set on the stars above her. "I'm sorry I wasn't there to help."

Shirou sighed "You still on with that, I didn't bring you for a reason, I didn't want you getting hurt."

At that, she blushed slightly looking back down, and started doing circles on the dirt with her finger "Do I… matter to you Shirou."

Shirou looked back at her though she didn't meet his gaze her eyes still firmly on the ground. "Why wouldn't you? You helped me when you could have just left me homeless, and you've been nothing but nice to me, so yes you matter to me, Emilia."

Emilia smiled at that finally meeting with his eyes, her own shining slightly "I'm glad."

They resumed their stargazing afterward, content with just being in each other's presence.

As I said this isn't really a chapter just a small epilogue to cap of the arc, I just wanted Shirou to have one last conversation with each of the characters that mattered in this part of the story.

Anyway, I kinda wanted to talk about everything for a bit, just in general about how I am feeling about this story and writing fanfiction in general, feels appropriate since this is the first time I managed to complete a bit of a story. So allow me to be a bit frank.

It's been 3 months since I started this whole experiment and like I said multiple times before I have never written anything creatively speaking, I have done essays and shit for work obviously but it's the first time I've written dialogue or thought about characters actions and stuff like, so I'm rather surprised by how popular my stories have become. Fake knight now has over 400 favorites and 600 followers and Salvation is coming along as well and this makes me happy but it also leaves me with quite a bit of fear because I want to make something the people who gave my stories a shot a reason to look forward to every update and you know as someone who never really posted a lot on the internet it leaves me with quite a bit of trepidation over posting chapters and just leaving them for public scrutiny that's not to say I don't appreciate every review I've gotten I'm very glad for everyone who commented on my story and hope you continue and many of them helped me get better and see where I've gone wrong with this story.

Overall I think I enjoyed my time doing this, it was fun to be creative or at least try to be and I hope I am able to make a story that you would want to reread in the future when it's over.

Thank you very much to everyone who gave this story a chance and me as well a rather novice writer.

Edit: This is merely the end of the arc not the whole story, the next chapter and the start of the next one will probably be next month, see you guys then.