Author Note: Hey all this was supposed to come out as some sort of creepy Halloween special but the website was acting up at the time so I held off. While I was waiting I decided that I wanted this to be longer than a one-shot so I took a break and thought about it some more. If any of you guys are here from my walking dead story don't worry I'll update that too later. Anyways on to the meat of this. I know I'm not the only one who thought that Elsa would have totally been the best girl if she wasn't so fixated on guts right? For those of you who thought that too I bring this.
Rating is subject to change.
Disclaimer: I don't own Re:Zero or any of its characters.
-Line break-
It's nighttime.
The moon hangs overhead but its light that would usually be shining upon the streets of Lugnica is instead drowned out by the flames that are burning far brighter than the moon ever could. Bodies litter the streets all men, women, and children. This was the product of mass genocide. Among the death and destruction, two figures stood facing one another.
One a black haired young adult and the other a redheaded knight. The black-haired one's face scrunches up into a grief-stricken expression as he looks around at the burning ruins of the once-great city of Lugnica. Finally, his eyes land on the knight, specifically the thing that lays at his feet.
It's a body.
The body of a young girl named Meli Portroute.
His breath hitches before he starts openly sobbing. With salty tears running down his face he drops down on his knees.
From an outsider's perspective, this may seem the knight is responsible for this madness, but it's actually quite the opposite.
The person who is responsible for this genocide is none other than the Return by Death user Natsuki Subaru.
"Why…why are you so strong?" Subaru asks weakly as the wind blows a hot breeze on to his tear-stained face.
Subaru's body falls forward and he has to catch himself with his hands to support himself. He feels the weight of his sins, his guilt, his regret utterly crushing him.
"So strong that I had to sacrifice everyone to match it?"
The knight says nothing. He steps forward and walks over the corpse of the young girl. However, Subaru doesn't react to the knight's advance. The knight then grips the hilt of his fancy looking blade and draws it from its sheath. If this were any other blade it wouldn't be a noteworthy feat, but this was the Dragon Sword Reid. A sword that is passed down through the generations only to be used by the Sword Saint. That meant that Subaru was talking to this generation's Sword, Saint Reinhard Van Astrea. The sword is also somewhat sentient and only able to be drawn when confronted with an opponent that it deems worthy.
It's only until Reinhard is just about to reach him that's when Subaru finally starts recovering. Subaru's hands start shaking as he clenches his fist tightly before striking the ruined stone beneath him. He struck it so hard that he had heard his knuckles pop and blood began to stream from the new wound.
Despite this Subaru didn't even flinch. His frequent use of Return by Death developed his pain tolerance so minor wounds such as this didn't even phase him.
Suddenly Subaru lifts his head and the raw amount of bloodlust and hatred causes the knight's feet to be rooted in place. Subaru glares at the knight with the most hateful look that he could muster. Tears are still streaming down his face but at a greatly slowed rate.
"It's your fault," Subaru says slowly as if he's having trouble believing that himself.
"It's your fault...It's your fault...It's your fault...It's your fault...It's your fault. It's your fault. It's your fault! Your fault! YOUR FUCKING FAULT." Subaru repeats the short sentence over and over again like a mantra. He says each sentence with more conviction than the last until he is able to completely believe the lie it told himself.
"IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT REINHARD VAN ASTREA!" Subaru screams his name like it was a curse while rising back on to his feet.
Reinhard looks like he's been slapped in the face.
"IF YOUR WEREN'T SO STRONG I WOULDN'T HAVE HAD TO DRAG THE ENTIRETY OF LUGNICA INTO THIS! YOU LEFT ME NO CHOICE! I TRIED EVERYTHING BEFORE RESORTING TO THIS! STABBING YOU, SHOOTING YOU, POISONING YOU, BURNING YOU, FREEZING YOU, SHOCKING YOU, DROWNING YOU, SUFFOCATING YOU! NONE IF IT WOULD WORK BECAUSE YOU JUST WOULDN'T FUCKING DIE! NOW LOOK! LOOK AROUND YOU! BECAUSE OF YOUR SELFISHNESS EVERYONE HAD TO DIE! EVERY MAN, WOMAN, AND CHILD THAT LOST THEIR LIVES TODAY COULD HAVE LIVED PROSPEROUSLY IF YOU WOULD HAVE JUST KEELED OVER AND FUCKING DIED!" Subaru lets all of his pain and frustration about Reinhard's existence out at once. Each sentence's frustrations and hate coming from the loops that he hadn't succeeded in killing the Sword Saint in.
Subaru is catching his breath when he takes a look at Reinhard's face and is satisfied with what he sees. The light in the Sword Saint's eyes is completely gone.
Whatever hopes the man had are completely absent.
"Even if everyone's dead, the least I can do is avenge them."
"Then do 'em a favor and fucking kill yourself." Subaru snaps back mercilessly and spits.
It looks like the projectile is gonna land on his cheek before it suddenly defies the laws of physics and completely changes its trajectory, completely avoiding its intended target.
"Tsk…OP bastard."
Reinhard steps forward to deal the final blow but is interrupted when a black-clad figure flings itself at him and he is forced guard with his hand.
The blade crashes into the palm; but instead of ripping into his hand, the blade whines before it shatters. The blade shattering causes metal shrapnel to go flying and embed itself in the upper arm and right side of the attacker's face. The figure immediately does an acrobatic flip to avoid being struck by an otherwise fatal counter-attack by the Sword Saint and lands in front of Subaru.
"Don't give up so easily Subaru-sama, that isn't like you."
"Elsa?" Subaru says with surprise and relief in his voice.
Elsa quickly picks up on the tone and it makes her heart skip a beat. Despite all the time that she spent with the young man he had always wanted her dead, but kept her around because she was useful. She didn't know why he wanted her dead and probably will never know. That's why it surprised her to hear him say her name like he was glad to see her. Even if it was just to save his own skin.
She feels butterflies rise in her stomach and her heart starts to feel all fuzzy again. When she first felt this emotion she couldn't quite identify it. It was kind of like the feeling she used to get when she tore into the bowels of her contracts, but far more intense and lacked the usual killer's instinct that came with similar emotions. Elsa began to notice that she was often craving the young man's attention, which was strange because she didn't care for anyone else's attention. She would do stuff like asking way more questions than necessary while he was coming up with a plan. All of it just to be able to interact with him more often and just being near him whenever it was possible. She went as far as to stop ripping into the bowels of her targets because Subaru found the act disgusting. To her surprise, it was easier to stop than she expected. The feeling that she had around him couldn't be reciprocated by simply ripping into someone and if he could tolerate her longer if she stopped. It was an easy trade-off for her.
In her heart, Elsa Granhiert, the former bowel hunter, knew she was in love with Natsuki Subaru. Even if her feelings would go unrequited.
"Elsa I-"
"Go." Elsa pushes Subaru before he can say anything else.
Subaru tumbles down the slope made of rubble and is snatched up by a mabeast. The mabeast has him by his cloak and flips him on to its back before running off.
"Woah!" Subaru shouts as he recognizes his mabeast.
This particular mabeast was a hornless guiltylowe simply named Law. Law was a birthday present from Meli. She had given it to Subaru because it was oddly affectionate towards him so on his birthday she allowed him to break its horns so it would be completely loyal to him.
Thinking back on it Subaru feels a pang in his heart as he remembers the girl's current state. He shakes it off before he realizes where Law was trying to flee the city with his master in tow.
"No Law, I'm not trying to leave! Find me Emilia, the silver-haired half-elf!" Subaru shouts.
Law roars before changing his course to go deeper into the burning ruins of Lugnica.
"Come on, come on, she has to be here somewhere…"
Law is running for about a minute until his body jerks to the right, narrowly avoiding an icicle that was meant to strike him in the abdomen. In the next instant 2 more are sent his way, and since the mabeast is recovering from his last dodge Subaru uses one of his unseen hands to swipe another out of the air giving Law time to dodge the last one.
"That's enough villain." A feminine voice calls out.
Subaru spots the person who shot the icicles and beams.
"Emilia!" He shouts with glee.
"You know me?" Her eyebrows shoot up in surprise.
Before more dialogue is exchanged, Law growls before his white mane starts to shift to red. Before Law could fully enter his enter his Attack Hue, Subaru puts his hand on his mane and tells him to stop before hopping off.
"Go on now. Get outta here." Law obliges before giving his master one last passing glance and leaves.
Subaru then turns his attention to the girl in front of him and opens up his cloak...
-Line break-
Elsa looks longingly at Subaru's retreating form before turning her attention to Reinhard and charges at him. She raised her remaining black kukri in her left hand to her side to swing at his stomach but feints and leaps to her right past the knight. She lands on a dilapidated pillar and launches herself at Reinhard's exposed backside. She swings her kukri in a diagonal arc to decapitate him.
Swish
Elsa suddenly feels lighter. She attempts to use her catlike maneuverability to land on her feet, but then she realizes something.
Her left arm along with the lower half of her body is missing. Reinhard had bisected her without even looking.
Her blood and viscera, propelled by the force of gravity, start to fall onto the knight but defy the laws of physics and soak the rubble around him. Elsa's upper half is sent a good distance away from the knight because of the force that she put into her previous leap and tumbles onto the ground to his right and her lower half lands on his left side. She hacks up a large amount of blood and tries to use her right arm to prop herself up but fails because of the immense blood loss. Then she realizes something strange, her blessing Curse Doll isn't working.
Now that she thinks about it, the wounds that she had received from her white kukri that shattered on impact with Reinhard's palm still haven't healed. She would have noticed if she wasn't so distracted by Subaru's presence.
Unbeknownst to her, she was under the effect of the Divine Protection of the Death God. This divine protection made it so wounds inflicted by its user can't be healed by any means. Thus this was the perfect counter to Elsa's blessing Curse Doll.
Since Reinhard fought Elsa before he knew about her impressive regenerative abilities and because of the Divine Protection of The Sword Saint, he merely thought to himself that he wanted to stop her from regenerating and was given suitable divine protection for the situation.
In reality, the difference in power was just far too great for Elsa to realistically be able to do anything.
Elsa stops resisting the inevitable and takes solace in the fact that Subaru would be getting what he wanted, her death. Despite this, she feels her eyes start to water. She regrets not being able to obtain Subaru's affections.
'Goodbye...my beloved...'
Elsa Granhiert "dies" thinking fondly of Natsuki Subaru, the young man she grew to love.
Reinhard steps forward and looks for Subaru but isn't able to spot him.
He steps down the rubble slope and starts to search for the mad man. While searching around he feels nauseous when he notices the numerous corpses at his feet. Some crushed underneath the ruins of what used to be a building, others sporting terrible burns or other mortal wounds.
He looks to his right and sees a boy no older than the age of ten with half his burned off. The boy died with his face contorted in an agonized expression.
"It's your fault!" Subaru's voice plays in his head.
Then he sees a knight whose legs looked to be cut clean off by wind magic and another that was completely decapitated.
"It's your fault!"
From his current position, he can spot the bodies of an older man and a small younger girl. The older man seemed like he was attempting to shield the younger girl with his body but is impaled through by a greatsword. The blade is pierced through his upper torso and is embedded into the younger girl's skull.
"It's your fault!" That wasn't Subaru's voice but that of his own father.
The scenery changes and Reinhard finds himself looking at the furious expression of his father, Heinkel Astrea.
"It's your fault!" Heinkel shouts into the face of a 5-year-old Reinhard.
The child flinches at his father's furious tone."First, you take my wife away, and now my own damn mother! Why did you take mother's Sword Saint divine protection?" His father said with his scornful gaze burning into him.
Reinhard can't seem to find his voice and stutters which causes his father to glare at him.
"Go on boy, spit it out."
"I-I didn't mean to..." The younger Reinhard says weakly. His father's eyes narrowed and Reinhard feels himself shrink under his scrutinizing gaze.
"You didn't mean to? You didn't mean to!" He repeats, his voice on edge like he's trying not to say his next few words.
"You...you stupid…selfish brat..." Heinkel's eyes are tightened and his lips are pressed in a fine line.
"I wish..."
The 5 years Reinhard looks up at his father. Heinkel Astrea looks straight into Reinhard's eyes.
"I wish you had never been born."
Reinhard feels sick, his heart contempt and self-hatred. "This is my fault," Reinhard says finality in his voice.
"BECAUSE OF YOUR SELFISHNESS EVERYONE HAD TO DIE!" Subaru's voice echoes in his mind.
He looks at the corpses surrounding him. Each one of their agonized faces is being burned into his mind. Reinhard falls to his knees and his eyes are empty.
He knows it now. It's because of him, his selfishness. His mother will never wake up because of his birth, his grandmother was killed by the White Whale because he took her powers, and the people of Lugnica wouldn't have to have died if he would have simply died in their place. If his grandmother was here she probably would have done a much better job in his place.
She was the hero of the Demi-Human War and what was he? A failure of a knight who couldn't even protect his kingdom despite all the power he possessed.
A dry laugh humorless escapes Reinhard's lips. He was the worst of the worst despite having all the power in the world he couldn't save anyone.
He was truly selfish and slothful.
Reinhard felt the familiar sense of being granted a divine blessing and immediately knew what it was. This was the Divine Protection of True Death and it simply made killing blows from his weapons negate all forms of resurrection and revival. The reason he received this divine protection was obvious.
Reinhard Van Astrea wanted to die.
He looks at the Dragon Sword Reid in his right hand and turns it on himself. The blade starts to emit white-hot light as Reinhard draws the mana from the world around him. The space that Reinhard occupied became distorted as if the power he possessed transcended that of both space and time.
The light continues to get brighter and brighter until it's blinding. The ruined ground around Reinhard's feet begins to repair itself and streaks of white mana leak from his sword.
Finally, he lifts the sword and plunges it straight through his abdomen. The results are instantaneous. Hot white mana arcs to the ruins around him restoring them to their previous states. They began striking the bodies but instead of restoring them, they were vaporized because they were already dead. This continued until the arcs of mana struck Elsa's body and something strange happened. Because of the fact that she was a Curse Doll she never actually died. Being a Curse Doll comes with the added bonus of being immortal, so even though she was under the effect of the Divine Protection of the Death God she didn't truly die. Sure it stopped her from regenerating and completely put her out of commission, but to truly kill her one would need to burn her body. Because of these unique circumstances, the powerful mana didn't disintegrate her but instead tries to restore her body.
Her body is lifted into the air, and the massive amount of mana is siphoned into her body but nothing happens. This because the divine protection preventing her from regenerating was persisting divine protection. Since there is so much mana gathering in one area another distortion appears centered on her body much like Reinhard's.
Unfortunately for her, she was no Sword Saint. The distortion doesn't last long before it starts to collapse on itself pulling her in and ending her time in that world.
But whose to say that she doesn't have time in another?
It only takes about a minute for Elsa to regain consciousness. She opens her eyes and is confused about how she's still alive. At first, she is saddened that she failed to accomplish what Subaru wanted but then she notices something that throws her in a loop.
She stands up and sees no traces of destruction from Subaru's masterful plan. She also notices that she wasn't inside of Lugnica's capital but in its slums. The only sign of destruction was right where she stood because the floor appeared to be scorched.
"W-wha…" she hears a child's voice behind her. She turns and sees a young boy with ragged clothes flat on his butt. She walks towards him but sees the boy's eyes fixate on something in her hand. Elsa follows his gaze and sees that she was holding her white kukri in her right hand.
"Oh, this? It's nothing, in fact, do you wanna see a magic trick?" She asks the kid but doesn't get a response.
"Look!" She points her finger at her kukri in her right hand and starts spinning it fast. The kid looks alarmed before she starts talking again.
"Faster, Faster, annnd POOF! It's gone, wanna see?" Elsa gestures to her right hand that was now empty. The child says nothing but is relieved that the weapon is gone.
"Anyway~ could you tell me today's date? I would appreciate it if you could."
The child opens his mouth and mutters out a response. It takes a moment for Elsa to comprehend what the child said.
She was sent back in time.
Elsa feels her cheeks flush as she grins widely. The child, frightened by the look on her face, runs off but she doesn't react.
All she cares about is that she has another chance to make Natsuki Subaru her own.
-Chapter end-
Author note: BTW I need a beta and someone I can shoot ideas with so if you're willing send me a DM. Also, does anyone know when the hell does Subaru arrive in the world of re zero?