tfw its the last chapter and all of a sudden u figure out how to italic on ffnet and there's exposition and a whole different format but u like it anyways
short chapter, but hopefully it blows ur mind
also, amazing job to everyone who guessed you-know-what before this; yall are geniuses
This is the end of the road.
This is the end of the road, and there is not much left to be said. What little remains are only secrets, some known to a few, and some known to none at all. Treasures, to those who know what they mean.
This is the end of the road, and the tale is over.
Because at the end of everything, and at the beginning of all beginnings, there are a million things Noct does not, and will not, ever know. Yet at the same time, there are a million things that he cannot, and will not, ever forget.
And Noct will never forget this:
In those ten years, drifting aimlessly through nothing, he sleeps. He sleeps, and for a long time he lives in nothing, is surrounded in nothing, is nothing.
But before that, before nothing, Bahamut, the Draconian, speaks to him. His words have long since been washed away, but their meanings still linger in Noct's mind.
Die, the Draconian tells him. Fulfill your destiny, destroy the Accursed. And so it is; the revelation of Bahamut.
(That's not really what he says, not word for word, but it's what he means and it's what Noct remembers. What he will always remember. He must die, as Providence dictates. He must die, and only then will Ardyn and the starscourge be put to rest.)
What happened to him, Noct asks. Ardyn.
He was once like you, the Draconian had said. And the scourge of the stars took all that he had away from him. We had given him everything, and in the end he had walked away with half of what he had started with.
It is a strange thing, the scourge, Noct learns, that corrupts everything in its way. Even the Crystal's magic, it alters and twists and warps, until the magic that had once held two bodies together withers away and snaps.
We denied him rest, Bahamut says. And we renounced him, and instead claimed him, once the same, but no longer.
Izunia.
And then he learns this:
The Astrals denied Ardyn rest. And by extension, by some twisted fate, Izunia could not rest either.
Yet, Noct will never know this:
A long time ago, at the beginning of all beginnings, when Izunia is forty-five years old, he wakes and comes to the realization that for the first time in over forty years, he sees only one thing at a time. That he has two arms, two ears, two eyes, two legs, and he has no idea what happened.
He finds himself, later, only it's not him anymore. What happened, he asks Ardyn, and neither have an answer.
A long time ago, at the beginning of all beginnings, Izunia steals the throne, the ring, and the dignity that comes with it from himself. Why must I do this, he asks the Draconian, but he already knows why. Ardyn Lucis Caelum is not stable. There is too much darkness in him, and he is no longer controllable. He is not containable. He is no one but himself, and he no longer listens to the gods the way he used to.
It is a cruel thing he does, something he balks at and cringes, but he does it nonetheless, because he is Izunia and he will follow the will of the gods.
When it is done, Ardyn screams, curses, rages, tries to kill Izunia.
Izunia tries to kill him too.
They both fail.
But he is cast out by the Astrals, and it is all over. Izunia takes Ardyn's name, and Ardyn takes his. Sometimes it strikes him rather funny, that they do so. Whatever will taking titles do, when it does not change anything at all? Izunia is still Izunia. Ardyn is still Ardyn. Nothing changes. Nothing ever will.
Because it's already changed, and all Izunia wants is Ardyn. He wants Ardyn back. He wants to be Ardyn again. It's already changed, and nothing will ever change it back.
But it's alright. It's all over. Izunia will rule, die. The peace in his country will be long and bountiful.
A year passes, maybe two or three. Maybe a few decades. Maybe centuries. Maybe eons. And maybe, there is a day or two that Izunia wakes up, forty-five years old, and then again, still forty-five years old. Maybe he changes his name a few times, or a dozen, or so many times that he's long since lost track.
But then the starscourge doesn't disappear. It spreads. Out of the ashes, a new empire emerges. Niflheim, with its advanced machinery and prototype magitek that has him written all over it.
It's not over. It's never over.
So Izunia fights. He fights for his children, fights with his children's children, then under children's children's children, until his face is forgotten. But still, he fights.
(But he never fights Ardyn, oh no.)
And when Izunia is forty-five years old, having watched 113 of his descendants rise and fall to the Accursed, he wakes from his ramshackle apartment in Lestallum. He doesn't know this yet, but it's the night the new Chosen King of Lucis returns. He wonders if something will change today.
He wonders if today is the day it will be over.
And Noct will never forget this:
When Noct is thirty years old, he opens his eyes to a world of darkness. Umbra is there, waiting for him. He makes it across the stormy sea to Galdin Quay, meets Talcott (he doesn't recognize him until after reintroductions), who drives him to Hammerhead.
"They all split up, after you left," Talcott says, his voice subdued. "Prompto mainly hangs around Hammerhead while the other two are usually off hunting daemons, alone."
"... Any wives? Husbands? Children?" Noct asks.
"None," Talcott replies, and with a flicker of humor, he adds, "Although Prompto stills spends time mooning over Cindy."
When they finally arrive at Hammerhead, the others are waiting for him.
They're different. Prompto looks excited to see him, but his eyes are a little sadder and his face older. Ignis faces his direction, his eyes closed and his face sad, but he greets Noct warmly enough. And —
"Gladio," Noct whispers, who's standing there with a gobsmacked look on his rugged face, he and lunges in for a kiss.
Prompto whoops, and Ignis comments in a brief moment of dry wit, "I suppose it's safe to say I wouldn't want to see this."
"What took you so long?" Gladio asks him breathlessly, once they've somewhat broken apart. "And you need to shave."
"Tell that to Prompto," Noct responds without looking away, and Prompto gives a little yelp, covering his chin protectively.
"I like my beard! My beard is fine! Iggy, you like my beard, right?"
"It's not a beard, Prompto."
But Noct can't stop laughing, giggling in relief because it may have been a decade, passed in a quick slumber, but they're still the same as they were before. "Are you guys still wearing the same clothes?" He asks, taking a quick look at their attire. "You didn't think to change it up, even after ten years?"
"I could say the same to you."
"I have an excuse. You all weren't stuck in a hunk of rock for a decade."
It's easy, natural, to squabble as if nothing's changed, but Noct needs only to look down at himself to know that everything is different now.
He will never forget them, and he will never forget what follows.
"So you've returned, Your Majesty," Cor Leonis says, standing at the entrance to Hammerhead, and isn't that a face Noct hasn't seen in a long, long time. His clothes are dusty, practically threadbare. He's discarded his Crownsguard uniform.
"Cor!" Ignis exclaims in surprise. "What brings you here?"
"I received a call from Talcott here that our king had returned," Cor says, nodding at the boy standing at the side, and as always, he seems strangely sober. "It seemed only fitting that I meet with him one last time."
"'One last time?'" Prompto asks, confusion clear in his expression. Noct's friends exchange looks of alarm, because they don't know yet, they don't know about Providence. Noct's insides turn to ice.
"How do you know about that?" He asks Cor. There is absolutely no way Cor could have known.
He only smiles bitterly, and draws his katana.
But then, the sword glows a familiar blue, and its spectral illusion rises and pierces through Noct. The Armiger, now with 14 glaives, swirls around him.
"I led you to the first," Cor says quietly. "And now, I gift you the last."
"Your sword was a Royal Arm?" Gladio asks in surprise. "How did you get your hands on that, Cor?"
"That could certainly explain why you still retained your weapons after the death of the king." Ignis says thoughtfully.
And when his Armiger disappears, Noct is left frozen. Cor watches him patiently.
There is no reason why he should have been able to hold onto his weapons after his father died. Noct knows this, everyone knows this, Cor knows this. Royal Arm or not, Cor should not have Kotetsu.
There's only one way he could've done it— if he wasn't linked to the Crystal's magic through the king. But everyone's seen Cor fight, they've seen him materialize his katana in and out of existence. Noct had thought for a while that Cor might have been a traitor, working for Niflheim and trying to figure out how to manipulate the Crystal himself.
But it's much more complicated than that, isn't it, yet at the same time, it's so much more simple than he could have expected. The real reason, the truth, and it's why he has a Royal Arm to begin with, is something else entirely.
"You…" He croaks, his throat dry. He swallows, and the others give him confused glances, because they don't get it, they don't see who's standing in front of them now. "You're the Immortal."
"Umm, Noct?" Prompto asks. "It's the Marshal, so… yeah."
"No, you're Immortal," Noct says, stressing the word again and looking straight at Cor. "Aren't you?"
Cor looks at him sadly, and his ageless face is older than Noct's ever seen it. With a wave of his arm, his Armiger swirls into existence, blue and shimmering, just like Noct's. All of them flinch. "You catch on quick," He says, and then, "Help Ardyn. Please."
"He… he said that you were jealous," Noct tells him, still in shock. "Of what he had, what the gods gave him."
"Did he?" Cor laughs bitterly. "That's ridiculous. How could I have been jealous of myself?" He adjusts his stance, and glances at the ground. "It's part of the curse. I can't kill him and he can't kill me. But I can't allow myself to die before him in good conscience, knowing that I was the one who destroyed the world."
He looks at Noct square in the eye, and says in utter misery, "So kill him, please. So I can rest."
So I can rest, Ardyn tells Luna, all those years ago, his voice dangerously quiet.
And Noct looks at him, and out a distant part of his mind wonders what it's like to be Cor, to be cut off, knowing that half of you is out there but they're not you anymore, they aren't even a someone, just something filled to the brim with darkness and hate, and forced to live on and watch your descendants die to that something over the centuries, helpless and powerless.
It must feel a bit like dying.
So Noct looks at the haunted eyes of Izunia Lucis Caelum I, and he tells him in absolute honesty, "Of course."
Yet, Noct will never know this:
As the years pass, Ardyn bides his time. He waits for his chance at revenge, against the ones who took it all from him. He nurtures his new empire, Niflheim, in the shadows, nudging at its military and technological advancements. He waits for the Crystal to choose another.
But despite all his patience, Ardyn does not wait needlessly. And he is clever, oh so clever, and he devises his own way of finding the second bodies of Lucian kings. And then he kills them, setting each murder up as if it were a mere accident. The shorter the rule of the kings, the better, and the sooner the Chosen shall be born.
(If he pretends that each king he kills is Izunia, drowned and beaten and crushed and mangled, no one needs to know. Izunia. Izunia. Izunia.
The very last one he kills, Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, looks at him with piercing eyes, and asks why.
Because of Izunia, Ardyn could have sneered. He stole what all I could have been. He is still there, is he not? He is still alive, and I will destroy him. This world he holds so dearly, his lineage and his oh so precious gods, I shall destroy them all. I will destroy him.
And then I can rest.)
And Noct will never forget this:
When Noct comes home, he meets six people; no more, no less. First is Talcott. Next are those he holds the closest. Next is Cor. Last is Ardyn. He doesn't see Iris, or Cindy, or Aranea, or Cid, or anyone really. There's just no time.
Just one more day, he begs no one, but that is the root of the problem.
There is no day.
At the last campfire, he tells them about his fate. About their fates, and then Gladio cries with all of them.
"You're a fucking bastard," He says. "We waited ten years for you to stop sleeping like a narcoleptic, and now you're going to go murder yourself."
Somehow, it's the funniest thing Noct's heard in a long time, and he laughs himself to tears. "Well, at least I won't die a virgin." He chokes out, and starts to cry as well.
(The past decade has been strange for Gladio. He waits, not sure what he's waiting for, not sure what he's been trying to protect, and he fights, not sure what he's fighting.
Partly out of guilt, partly out an aspiration to better himself, he hunts alone. And sometimes, late in the night, he sees someone. She wears a white dress and always looks out place, standing in the woods and the plains and the wastelands. Her blonde hair is loose, untied. He wears a royal black ensemble, and always looks comfortable, standing in the woods and the plains and the wastelands. His black hair is wild, casually mussed.
He knows neither of them are there, and wonders halfheartedly if he's lost his mind. But this is how he lives through the world of darkness, lost without his king and love and haunted only by his imagination.)
Gladio holds Noct close his heart, and everything is still.
Yet, Noct will never know this:
It was never a coincidence, that of all people, Noct and Luna shared a soul.
Noct is Chosen. So was Ardyn.
O Chosen, healer of worlds, savior of the people. The ability to heal the sick, to use the Crystal's power, to fight back against the darkness— to what extent does the power belong to the King of Lucis, and to what extent does it belong to the Oracle?
Ardyn had it all. He had so much power housed in one vessel it physically corrupted him, and the gods learned from their mistakes, and chose to split the powers between the Oracle and the King.
But the Chosen— the Chosen will always have it all. It's fate that keeps Luna and Noct bonded to each other, and it's fate that keeps them apart.
And Noct will never forget this:
At the last campfire, Ignis cries with all of them. He does so silently, with a certain grace that is to be expected when speaking of him, but he cries nonetheless.
He cries because he has spent his whole life caring for Noct. He has spent his entire life by his side, supporting him, encouraging him. Noct knows this. He's always known this.
And now that it is the end, now that Ignis can almost see the end, a decade later than they had all expected it, yet at the same time far, far too early, it is too much. It is the end, and all he's ever wanted was for Noct to be happy.
"Are you satisfied, Noct?" He asks, and his voice shakes and shakes. "Are you satisfied with what you have earned in your life, and what you have gained?" He asks Noct this, Noct who has waited ten years to reclaim his throne and now he never will, has wanted so much and has received so little, who simply wished for a chance to live with them all in peace.
He asks Luna this, Luna who has waited her whole life to reclaim her home from the empire and she never will, has wanted so much and has received so little, who simply wishes for a chance to meet them all before it was all over.
And then he knows the answer.
Yet, Noct will never know this:
It's decades ago when the Crystal whispers to King Regis in its ancient voice, He is the Chosen.
King Regis' son, Noctis, is the Chosen King.
The Accursed must be destroyed, the Crystal urges him, its voice foreign, inhuman, dispassionate. It is his duty.
"And if… he refuses?" King Regis asks it, his voice wavering ever so slightly. He is young, almost thirty. Age has not harmed him yet, the way it will in the following years. His hair, barely a single gray strand, is short and slicked back.
He cannot. He must not.
King Regis loves his son, but he cannot protect him his fate. No one can.
So he accepts it, resigned, but there's faith in there, because maybe Noctis must die, as his vessel is filled with the Lucian kings of old and destroyed, but Noctis won't. Noctis, with two bodies. While one must carry the weight of the world, King Regis hopes that his other son, whoever they may be, will be able to live the way they wish to.
But he protects him as best as can— ignorance is bliss, he tells himself, and he doesn't have the heart to tell Noctis anything. He pleads to the Crystal, to the Astrals, that they do not tell his son what his fate means. What kind of father would he be, to burden a child with knowledge of his own death?
As a consequence, where she should have known everything, she knows nothing, nothing at all. Ardyn asks her, the gods really did tell you nothing, did they, and he was right.
King Regis wants his son to live. Maybe he will die, but his other body won't. Noctis will live. Noctis will live, and all will be well.
Two decades later, Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, with her shining blue eyes and strangely familiar demeanor, says, "I love you," and that hope shatters right before he breathes his last breath.
And Noct will never forget this:
Ifrit sits on his throne, regarding them in the flames with almost bored aggression, while Noct sweats, wipes his forehead quickly, and sweats some more.
"So you have met him," Ardyn says to him before that, looking at Noct with a critical eye. "It's been quite some while, Your Majesty. I shall await you in the throne room."
So he battles the last of the Six, the Infernian, the fallen. Bahamut trumpets his call from the air, and Shiva turns the flames to deadly ice.
"Ardyn," Noct says to him before that, looking at the man with a critical eye. "All he's wanted is to save you."
Ardyn's face twists in an ugly sneer, and he seems to look at Noct with an expression of what do you know, what could you possibly know, and surprisingly, he says nothing in return.
But Ifrit falls at last to Shiva's cold embrace, and in one last glance, she speaks again to Noct.
(The words aren't important. Die, she tells him, and that is not what she says but it is what she means.)
Walking up to the Citadel, Noct's heart thrums in anticipation. Their footsteps echo, clacking on the marble floor, dusty but still mostly untouched, worlds apart from the wreckage outside.
He acquires a pair of daggers before that, glinting in one of the alleyways near the Citadel. When he bends over to pick them up, Prompto whistles. "That's a nice find, Noct. Ignis could probably use those."
When they arrive at their destination, Ardyn is seated on his father's— his— the king's throne. The Crystal has been placed directly above him.
Before that, Noct picks up the daggers with shaking hands, because it may have been years ago, but he still remembers.
"Nyx Ulric," He whispers aloud, and the kukris say nothing in response.
"Ulric? Who's that?" And Noct shakes his head, because how strange it is, to know that someone had saved your life, and thousands of others, yet no one knows his name. Forgotten, just like that.
"It's nothing."
Ardyn laughs, stands up. With a wave of his hand, his friends are knocked out in some inexplicable use of magic and horrifyingly familiar bodies hang from the ceiling, chained and limp.
The— emperor? It must be. And speak of the devil, the Glaive himself. In the center, his father, and—
They never found the body, his mind reminds him.
Luna.
But he doesn't want to think about this right now, not right now, not in front of Ardyn, but he forces himself to look past them with a burning question written on his face.
"Bodies will rot," Ardyn tells him, almost gently. "So I hope you enjoy my imitations."
Noct follows him outside, warping back down to the ground.
"And so, let us end this, just the two of us." Ardyn says, and his own Armiger appears, a strange violet-red.
Noct's fists clench, and he thinks of the others, fallen to the ground. He thinks of everything he's lost, and everything he's gained.
"Let's," He agrees, and steps forward.
Yet, Noct will never know this:
Cor was someone, once. Ardyn was once the same. They've both changed. They're not the same as they used to be.
Cor Leonis is a hero. Ardyn Izunia is a monster.
Ardyn Izunia is a monster, but he is a human monster. Cor Leonis is a hero, but he stopped feeling like a human a long time ago. Ardyn doesn't want to destroy the world. Cor doesn't want to save it.
They both want to die.
That's all they want, isn't it? They're two different people now, no longer able to understand each other's motivations. Ardyn does not know that Cor Leonis cannot let himself die until he can lay his guilt to rest. Ardyn Izunia was created through a mistake, and he's a mistake Cor will never be able to make up for. So he tries, by fighting and fighting, gaining praise and glory, and it only leaves him more empty as the centuries pass and the darkness spreads.
Ardyn Izunia wants revenge, he wants to destroy the gods and the accursed ring and the Crystal. But Cor does not know that he will never achieve that until Providence is complete, for it wipes the Chosen, the ring, the crystal, and all Astral that have formed a pact with him for existence. And Providence means he will die. He wants to die. To him, it is not a necessary sacrifice to achieve his goal. He welcomes it. He is human, achingly so. He simply wants all of it— including himself— to end.
Yet they've been circling around each other for eons, millenia, neither able to confront the other. Cor Leonis fights against the magitek and the daemons, but not once does he look for Ardyn. Ardyn creates his empire and kills one king after the other, son after son, but not once does he look for Cor.
(A long time ago, at the beginning of all beginnings, Izunia raises his sword to strike Ardyn down, and Ardyn raises his. And neither can bring themselves to do it, and eons pass and yet, they still cannot bring themselves to do it.)
They've been circling around each other for eons, millenia, neither of them able to give what the other wants, because Cor Leonis does not understand Ardyn Izunia, and Ardyn Izunia does not understand Cor Leonis.
They stalk each other in the shadows, never quite catching a glimpse of the other, and Noct and Luna are stuck in between.
And Noct will never forget this:
After Ardyn finally falls to the ground, there is an odd sort of silence.
"So," He says to Noct. "What shall you do now? Kill me?" Do it, he seems to say. Destroy me. Fulfill your destiny. Die.
Looking at the wretched man in front of him, Noct closes his eyes and lets his shoulders droop. He's tired, and it's almost over.
"I'm going to let you rest, Ardyn," He says, just as Luna had said at the trial of Leviathan. "Know peace."
I will hold you to that, Ardyn seems to say, and he holds the promise close to his unbeating heart, until there is nothing where he once was. But he is not quite dead. Not yet; there is one last thing Noct must do.
He finds the others, meets them at the steps of the Citadel, and tells them this. One more thing. Just one more.
"We shall hold down the fort, so to speak, while you do so then," Ignis says, and he turns his sightless eyes, once again, on Noct.
"It's almost over," Prompto breathes out, and there's a guilty sort of relief behind it all, yet the more Noct listens, the less relieved he sounds, and the more shameful he looks.
Gladio is the first to bow, then the first to rise. There's an intent look behind his gaze, and a warstorm of emotions that flicker in and out from his eyes.
He doesn't say anything. But to Noct, words have stopped being important long ago.
He bids them farewell in his own way, and he's pretty sure they're all holding something back from each other, because there's no point in saying it if they all already know.
Unspoken sentiment, unsaid regrets, unstated knowledge that everyone understands far too well.
There is no fanfare when he walks back up to the throne, up the stairs, his shoes making sharp sound each time he reaches a new step.
What an odd ascension, Noct thinks to himself. In a way, it's almost amusing.
(Everyone knows what happens next.)
But here is what Noct knows, what everyone knows but does not say, burned deep into his mind, and he will never, ever forget it:
The Crownsguard and the Kingsglaive are linked to the Crystal's magic by the King. When the King dies, their magic is gone. Their weapons are gone. Even their potions and elixirs are gone, the magic glimmering away from the infusion.
Noct dies.
He doesn't really, not at this moment, but the fake-imposter-apparition of his father stabs him in the chest, and Noct stops breathing. He is dead.
And because he is dead, they are dead too.
Noct can't venture through Insomnia by himself, he's not strong enough. His friends needed to come with him. But there's that moment between the void and true death, before dawn can break, where he will face off Ardyn in the dreamscape of the Crystal, where his body stops breathing and— and he's dead, but not yet.
But they are, because they can't fight all those daemons unarmed and without healing items, and they don't have any of that.
And Noct will never forget this:
At the last campfire, Prompto cries with all of them.
Noct has never seen Prompto cry. Ever. No matter what it is, even when he's scared out of his wits, even in the dark halls of Zegnautus Keep, Noct has never seen Prompto cry.
"I just wish," Prompto sniffles, and he looks more scared than Noct's ever seen him. "That all those times I— all those times I said I felt like I was in an RPG— I wish it were true."
"That's what you're crying about?" Noct gasps out. "I can't believe it. Prompto Argentum, crying because he's not in a video game."
"You gotta be kidding me," Gladio grumbles, and he surreptitiously wipes his eyes. "You've reached a new low."
"I mean it," Prompto sobs, and now he's just straight up bawling. Noct doesn't know whether to laugh or cry harder. "I really, really mean it. Maybe— maybe video games aren't the right way to say it. I just— I just don't want to be real. Maybe in books and movies, things don't end that well. Maybe the main character dies, and maybe things are sad and it's painful. But there's an ideal behind them; there's always a message. You die, and maybe someone else gets the chance to live on, and the characters always accept it because they know it's for the best."
Noct doesn't feel like laughing anymore.
"This isn't it. I really don't think this is it. This isn't the ending I was looking for. You guys are my only friends," Prompto says. "I don't want you to die. I don't want you to die, and I don't want to die either."
Yet, Noct will never know this, for it is something no one knows:
I don't want to die, Prompto tells them sadly. It's the only time Noct sees him cry. He wants to be in video game. He doesn't want to exist. He wants to be fake, so he can keep holding on to something, that message at the end of the story— everything's going to be ok.
All of it nonsequential, its ambiguity clear out of context, but isn't that what they've been saying this whole time? It's going to be ok. Everything will surely be alright, in the end. The sacrifices must be made, but despite all the sorrow, the pain, they always move forward because it's going to be alright, things will get better. They have to get better, otherwise what was the meaning of it all?
I don't want to die, Prompto tells them sadly.
Don't we all, Prompto? Don't we all.
Yet, Noct will never know this, for it is something that no one knows:
This is insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
The fact of the matter is, Noct is not the one most know. He is a bit softer at the edges, he holds himself with less of a slouch. He is more confident, he falls in love with someone else.
The fact of the matter is, Luna was not the one most knew. She was more quick to argue, more easily shaken and more uncertain. She was scared, and she fell in love someone else.
But they're still the same person, aren't they? Noct and Luna are still the same person, yes, but the crucial point is Noct is still Noct from before, and Luna was still Luna from before. Noct is still quick to fight, still quiet and not liking vegetables, still being the King he is born to be. Luna was still strong, still doing what was right no matter what, still being the Oracle she was born to be.
A long time ago, Luna is four years old and Noct is only a newborn.
You are the Oracle, her mother says and gently strokes her hair. You are the Chosen, his father says and sets him on lap.
And already, it is the end of ends. Luna must die. Noct must die. Luna must die because Ardyn will always kill her, knowing the threat she represents. Noct must die because he is the only one that can stop Ardyn, and in doing so he must always sacrifice himself.
Luna is four years old and Noct is only a newborn, and they are already dead. They've been standing at the end of the road all their life, and their tale was over before it began.
All these words have been written, have been read. Have been changed, have been added and removed. Noct and Luna. Gladio and Prompto and Ignis. Ravus and Sylva. Regis and Clarus. Cor and Ardyn.
The world is the same. The people, although different, are the same. The magic is the same. It's different, yes, but everything is still the same. The same rules apply, the same consequences will take hold.
It's madness, it's insanity.
And then it is the last; the end of everything.
And Noct will never forget this:
By the time he opens his eyes, he's back in a dreamscape of colors and nothing.
Well, perhaps not quite nothing yet. Ardyn is there, waiting for him.
What are you waiting for? Ardyn seems to ask him, yet all he does is smile. Kill me. Die.
So Noct holds out his arm, and he reaches. Reaches and reaches and reaches, until his back arches and he gasps in pain, and fourteen swords split through him, shining and flaring white-blue.
All around him are people, people he knows—people that are dead, his father, Ignis, Prompto, Gladio, and— and he breathes in, and she breathes out.
Luna and Noct hold out their hand, and they scream, indecipherable, incoherent, and all around them, the Kings of Lucis take their arms to battle one last time.
And they will never forget this:
There's a sort of permanence in death that no one likes to think about, where all the sacrifices and struggles and the loves and cares of life are forgotten, and everything becomes obsolete because you're dead, so what does it matter?
Because you're dead, and what does it matter that you went blind and learned through sheer will to survive in darkness?
Because you're dead, so what does it matter if you spent your whole life feeling that you were never good enough and then learning to overcome that, to become confident and proud of who you are?
Because you're dead, and why does it matter that you were proud of what you did your life, protecting people, and you fell in love and you cared—
Oh, but others will remember you, and you will live on through them, through memory. Your loved ones, your friends.
Like Nyx Ulric, a snide voice whispers. Yes, who remembered him?
Your brother's dead. Your father's dead. Your mother's dead. You've never known your other parents, the mother that died from childbirth, or the father dead from war, the ones that have long turned to ash.
Gladio is dead. Ignis is dead. Prompto is dead.
They all died for you, and now you are going to die.
But some of them still aren't; vague recollections through a blurry haze of people you can't quite remember in the midst of fading, but voices of a young girl calling for her brother, a precocious young boy, a warrior with a fierce look on her face, a girl working at the garage… who else? They'll see it, though, they'll see the sun.
But you're still dead, so why does it matter that you saved the world if you aren't there to see it?
When Noct is thirty years old, Ardyn dies and he slips. He doesn't trip on anything, he wasn't standing on anything before, and he won't land on anything in the end.
It's finally over, a part of his mind cries in relief. Everything is done. He's succeeded.
But there's a smaller voice too, and it speaks, confused. But I did everything right, it says, oddly quizzical. I did everything right.
I succeeded, the louder one says insistently.
But I did everything right, the smaller one responds, louder this time, less confused and more hurt.
It's finally over, the louder one repeats.
But I did everything right, the smaller one repeats, only dozens of others clamor in, speaking as one, until they are an overpowering feeling. But I did everything right.
I succeeded, the one alone says weakly.
But I did everything right, the crowd cries. But I did everything right.
When Noct is thirty years old, he only falls for a split instant. While his vision and his mind are clouding, he thinks with wild clarity, I don't want to die,
because he did everything right, he did the right thing, always, so why is this the end — because there is so much that he hasn't done, that his friends haven't done, that he never got the chance to do as luna. there is so much, and he'll never see lucis or tenebrae rebuilt — because the people will remember lunafreyanoxfleuret the oracle of tenebrae and noctisluciscaelum the chosen king of lucis as the ones who saved the world, but who will remember noctandluna, the one and the same, who simply wanted to live and thrive with the ones they loved — and they're all dead too, aren't they, promptoargentum and ignisscientia and regisluciscaelum and sylvanoxfleuret and ravusnoxfleuret and gladiolusamicitia everyone they ever loved, they died for noctandluna and now they are going to die too so was it all for naught? noctandluna fought to save them, but now they are all dead and what did i do all of this for—
and that is the last thing he ever thinks, as his body shatters into a shower of sparks, and he and everyone he holds dear to his heart disappear from the world.
.
.
.
.
.
(end.)
This is an exercise in futility.
Yet, they will never know this, because it is something no one knows:
I hope all of you are bitter and upset because this ending was terrible and i hate it so fucking much. I hope you throw fucking flames at me and send me hate mail because fuck this, fuck you ending, ffucc you square enix, you can suck my ass
Also fuck that post-credits scene. I don't believe in the goddamn afterlife, and it was a cheap way to try and make things better. They're dead. They're not coming back. There was no point to this game because they're all dead, ok what the fuck were you thinking devs. I hate the chosen one trope and it should be abolished.
Literally the only reason I wrote this 70k piece of fucking trash was to tell everyone that. Like y'all thought it was some cool ass AU, but no, it was just me being salty. Am I the only person in this fandom that actively hates the ending of the game? Because I see way too many people being sad about it and I'm like no, do not be sad friends hate them hate the game developers because that was crappy.
Fight me, hoes. Me and my trash fanfiction will beat everything up and I hate this shitty game, it literally forced me to find my inactive AO3 account and create an ffnet user so I could write this. DO ALL OF YOU SEE HOW UPSET I AM.
(And now that this is done, I'm hopefully gonna write an AU of this AU and then I'm going to make it chapter 16 of ffucc because people actually need to read it, it's somewhat important to me unlike 'writers block af' and also I'm a greedy hoe that loves traffic.
also thank you everyone for reading this far and being nice to me, y'all are very kind but that doesn't change the fact that this fucking game sucks)