As the figurative dust settles and the mirror-like world fades after the Elden Beast, the puppet of the Greater Will, is slain for a time, an all too weary Tarnished warrior stows his chosen weapon, a fragment of the legendary bolt of Gransax, and takes slow steps towards the broken body among the golden leaves in a dark chamber. He is not surprised nor careful in his approach. Just weary and drained.
'Has it been one hundred? Two? One thousand? Maybe more,' He thought, 'I have seen this scene so many times I have lost count.'
Yes, this Tarnished warrior has been through this too many times to keep track of. Dying countless times along the way, though not much as of late. Unless in his tedium he grew slightly too careless. Though, even the careful footsteps he placed couldn't make this short walk take longer and he eventually stands before Queen Marika the Eternal's broken form once more. Looking down at her head ever so carelessly on the ground, he walks past it. At this point his only want is to break this endless loop and cease being stuck in this perpetual journey.
The memories are hazy as to how this all started and how the first loop ended. Though for the longest time he chose only to assist Lunar Princess Ranni in her endeavor, hoping in vain that in any of those attempts the loop would break. It wasn't a pointless endeavor however, as over time he gained knowledge on how to make use of the Elden Ring himself.
"This time for sure," he muttered, his voice echoing slightly from within the armor of the crucible knight of the ax variant he grew all too fond of, never removing any pieces of the set aside from times of personal caretaking as of late.
The Tarnished carefully decouples the Elden Ring from the broken god in front of him, pulling it into the open yet preventing it from falling apart completely. He had collected all of the lost great runes in his journey throughout the Lands Between this time, as well as the mending rune created by the Brilliant Goldmask's understanding of the true nature of the ruling God as it was the most stable rune of mending. Though not every demigod was slain by his hands, most were.
The prime examples were the Lunar Princess and the Undefeated Swordswoman. Malenia gave the most trouble between the two as there was no clear path to sparing her. But with a little effort and a lot of luck, the method of severing one from the Frenzied Flame and the Three Fingers also worked in completing Miquella's Needle as a whole and proved effective. Though it would need to remain a long while for the rot and the outer god's influence to be entirely expunged, it was all in time.
The Tarnished thought carefully about his travels as he took his time reassembling the fragmented Elden Ring. Every moment he could remember, every true ally he had made, and every item he has collected. It was all so blurry, after reaching the fullest potential of his semi mortal body, he could scarcely differentiate the loops. The one detail cemented in his mind was the moment he learned that his guide had sacrificed herself at the Giant's Forge for the first time. Even if they might never be on speaking terms again, dabbling in the Frenzied Flame this one last time was worth it to keep Melina alive.
These trips down memory lane cannot last forever as in his intense focus, the Ring at the center of everything had been reconstructed.
"Finally..." He said, going over his plan repeatedly in his mind, "perhaps this will be the final time I must repair you."
As the final touches on his repairs on the Elden Ring we're being put in place, he hurriedly took it into himself. He made the preparations, the calculations, and all other things that could get him ready for it. However at the end of the day, it was still an excruciating process. One which he could endure thanks to his repeat journey. It still took a lot out of him mentally by the time it was over. As he looked up towards the crumbling God from his position on the floor resting on his knees, he sighed.
"May you at least take your repose and leave your suffering behind," he said quietly to the remains as his consciousness faded after his work was complete, "and may I at last move on to a new journey. Maybe... Maybe even a new world if I were to be granted such luck."
Those were the last thoughts that crossed his mind before he heard an indecipherable noise that seemed to force him into a dreamless unconsciousness.