Originally written: 1/21/2022
The True Spiral Nemesis (The Starting Point, The World of Despair)
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Description:
In a world where Simon doesn't meet Nia right after Kamina's death, Simon is left to wallow in his own despair and misery. But even so, Simon keeps moving on.
He has to move on, or his own guilt and misery would crush him under its own weight.
And so he grows, and grows, and grows, growing drunk on Spiral Energy to forget his own pain and guilt...
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Bro was dead.
And it felt as if someone had a dug a large hole into his heart, with nothing left to fill it.
Wallowing in own misery, Simon had no recourse for his own emotions and his own despair.
But as time passed, instead, he found that he turned what he could use into RAGE.
Somehow, through countless trials, he finally managed to defeat the the spiral king, in his own time and his own way, after learning how to properly use his anger as fuel for his own immense wells of untapped Spiral Energy.
As the spiral king faded away, Simon could only ask, "Why? For what reason?!"
But the only answer he got in response was...
"Heh. Why else? For my own amusement, of course."
Simon let out an anguished cry of pain, as the spiral king faded.
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Time passed.
Simon and Yoko found comfort in each other.
Simon was viewed as a hero, at first.
But gradually, by his increasing demands of more and more Spiral Energy to syphon off the people for himself, he become renown as a tyrant, even worse than Lord-Genome.
At some point, he became so lost in his own pursuit of Spiral Energy that he even proposed building spiral energy harvesting plants, using humans as cattle, much to everyone else's shock and disgust.
The ones that opposed were all easily quashed and crushed underfoot.
All the remaining former members of Dai-Gurren started leaving Kamina city, one-by-one, no longer being able to support Simon. At the end, only Kittan, Yoko, and Rossieu were left.
Kittan was the first to leave, not before trying to smack some sense into Simon, but to no success. He left, frustrated and saddened.
Yoko was the next, leaving without a word.
But Simon was so caught up in his own activities and megalomania that he didn't even notice until weeks after. And even then, only as a side-note. 'Ah, Yoko's gone.' He thought. And then, he though no more on the matter.
Finally, Rossieu left.
He was the one that stayed by Simon's side the longest, the one that had supported Simon the most, the pillar of support and rationality that the people of Kamina City looked to for their problems.
But even he could no longer support Simon once he actually put into motion the construction of Spiral Energy farming plants.
He thought about saying something to Simon, giving Simon some kind of speech like Kittan did before he left, but he knew it would be no use.
Simon was already too far gone.
[]
First, it was energy-harvesting from the planet.
Then, the sun.
Then, the whole solar system.
And eventually, their whole galaxy, and onto other galaxies soon thereafter.
When he first started, all of the remnants of The Dai-Gurren team (including Yoko, Rossieu, Kittan) joined together again, to oppose him.
And they put up a good fight in one last hurrah, for what it was worth.
But he mercilessly slaughtered them, without any mercy.
"All those who oppose me are traitors."
Eventually, he came to be known as tyrant throughout all the galaxies, and his name was uttered in fear, far and wide, through all reaches of the Universe.
Mothers would warn their children that they'd have their spiral energy stolen if they didn't behave.
Ironically, little did they know that they were right.
Only, it didn't matter if they were good or bad.
Because, "Simon the Spiral Tyrant" would come after them, all the same.
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Many resistance group of many different spiral races, of different plants, of different solar systems, and even different galaxies, fought against him.
However, seeing that their individual efforts were little more than a fly's worth of nuisance to "Simon the Spiral Tryant", they started banding together, unifying their forces and their effort.
They began calling themselves "The Multi-Spiral Alliance", and tried many, many times in vain to oppose Simon.
But in the end, it was no use.
No matter how much they tried, no matter how many futile attempts they waged, they were absolutely no match for the Spiral Tyrant. Eventually, even the whole of all the other galaxies, all the stars in the sky, turned against him.
Simon walked out on deck to personally assess the situation. He smirked, wistfully. It was as if all the Stars in the Sky were his enemies.
But, it didn't matter.
All the better then, with which to prove his own dominance and superiority.
It resulted in a long battle to crush the whole rebellion. But by the end of it, he was able to defeat and dominate them all, easily,
And in the end, none survived but a radical splinter group of Spiral Races, now calling themselves the "Anti-Spiral", whom had taken to extreme measures.
Having taken it upon themselves to oppose Spiral Energy in all it's forms, they opposed the one they now called the "Spiral Nemesis".
With their combined technological prowess, sealed themselves away on a planet within a pocket dimension (a special thought-space, defined by their own imagination) that not even Simon was able to reach, and vowed their eventual vengeance against him, and against the progression of Spiral Races altogether.
For Simon, it made no difference.
Even if he could no longer drain that select few for Spiral Energy, it was a negligible amount anyways.
And as long as they weren't going to oppose him, it didn't matter.
And so, Simon reigned, unquestioned and unopposed, as the Multi-Galactical Tyrant of The Spiral Universe.
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On a certain plant, in a certain galaxy far away from his home-planet,
Simon met a girl named Nia.
An insignificant girl raised in the wilderness of her planet, one that didn't put up a struggle when he captured her personally, for her incredible Spiral Energy reserves.
But, in handling her as his personal toy, he actually started to find himself with a strange fondness for the girl, despite (or perhaps because of?) her docile nature.
It was somehow charming, her innocent and ignorant nature.
Eventually, she would somehow manage to drill her way into a special place in his heart, filling in the spaces that had been left hollow for so long.
But he himself wouldn't realize that until much later.
After she had been taken hostage and he had to save her, himself.
"Lord Simon, you didn't have to..."
"What are you saying, Nia?! Don't just go off on yourself like that! You idiot!"
"..."
She looked upon his face, almost on the verge of tears,
His next few words were almost too soft to hear...
"Don't leave me all alone again..."
For once, the Great Spiral Tyrant looked so small and fragile.
"Lord Simon..."
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Eventually, he succeed in harvested and monopolizing all the Spiral Energy he could find, not only in his galaxy, but in all Galaxies, everywhere.
The entirety of the Universes' Spiral Energy was within the palm of his hand.
But, as a result, the Universe itself was coming to an end, something Simon never even considered the consequences for.
As the Universe began to collapse in on itself, readying itself for its rebirth, Simon looked down at Nia, his gaze piercing into hers.
"I hope...When it's all over, I'll be able to see you again, Nia. In the Next life, in the next universe."
"Yeah." Nia looked up at him, and smile. "Me, too, Lord Simon."
Maybe Nia could be the one to save him from his despair, just as she did this time.
And as Everything came to an end, Simon had one last thought of contemplation.
Maybe, the next time around,
Instead of being one who oppressed others, maybe, just maybe...
His drill could be the one that helped others, the one that dug a path for others to follow.
A drill that would create a path to the heaven, instead of piercing through it and destroying it.
Simon chuckled to himself, softly.
"Yeah, that doesn't sound so bad." He said, staring out into the collapsing space ahead of him, his remaining hand gripped on his small, personal, glowing drill.
"Being Simon the Digger doesn't sound so bad at all..."
[]
And so,
The Anti-Spiral slept.
They slept for so long that they even forgot the face of their dreaded enemy, the Spiral Nemesis.
In their sleep, they had even forget even their own faces and features, unable to visual themselves now as nothing more than faceless black creatures.
But with the destruction of the universe, and the recreation of it in a spiral of spacetime and karma, they were awoken once more.
And harnessing the remnants of that unspeakably massive energy (the energy of the formal Spiral Tyrant, the Spiral Nemesis), they swore to use it for their own means, for the good of all peoples and spiral races everywhere.
To ensure that no spiral race would ever cause such a grievous disaster ever again.
And such was the true birth of the Anti-Spiral, the tyrant of the New Spiral Universe.
Author's Notes:
So, I wrote this because I had some questions (mainly because of question 2), but I think it answers all the questions I had quite succulently.
It answers 3 questions:
1. Why was Simon, at the beginning (prologue), fighting off all the stars (other spiral races)?
This interpretation is that it was not a mistake (even though it likely was a director/story writer mistake lol), but an actual prequel.
Of course, that would either mean that Simon and Kamina weren't underground in the prequel Universe, or that they were, but for a very different reason (maybe still because of Lord-Genome, but without the Anti-Spiral to drive his forces.)
The spiral king might or might not be Lord-Genome, and Simon and Kamina might or might not have been underground in this iteration, but if they were, and it still was Lord-Genome that had them underground, it would've been for very different reasons, and not acting under the influence of the Anti-Spiral (which don't exist in this iteration until long afterwards).
2. How does the Anti-Spiral have enough Spiral Energy to match Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann (or even Super Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann for that matter), despite being a supposedly Anti-Spiral race. After all, if generating that much spiral energy, or even generating any spiral energy at all, isn't that going against their own principles?
Answers this question, that they aren't generating their own Spiral Energy, but instead manipulating the energy of destruction and recreation of the universe, and of the former Spiral Nemesis (i.e. the previous Simon, "Simon the Spiral Nemesis")'s leftover Spiral Energy, instead of their own.
(Even though, likely just because writers didn't think of it, and just wanted an epic climatic showdown without considering the hypocrisy lol. But this interpretation makes a lot of sense, too, doesn't it?)
It's a very fitting conclusion that also fits incredibly well thematically with the original series.
Basically, that Simon is overcoming his old self, his former-universe version, "Simon, The Spiral Nemesis".
And in that sense, Simon would also actually literally be overcoming the Spiral Nemesis, not just in a figurative or long-term future goal sense.
As a bonus, it also explains why the antispiral are featureless (making use of the "thought-space" explanation.)
3. Why did Simon (in the main story) come across Nia so conveniently, and at just the right time?
Of course, from a story's perspective, there doesn't have to be any particular reason, and it just happens. I don't think the writers were thinking about any particular reason for this convenience, either. Maybe they were thinking that Nia was planted as a spy on Lord-Genome, but even so, the fact that Nia would come across Simon (who would become the new major force of Spiral Energy after defeating him) is a bit too convenient. And nothing is mentioned with regards to that, as far as I can recall.
In this interpretation, however, they meet each other because they wanted to in the previous iteration of things, and because they were karmically tied to each other, especially as their universe ended. So instead of being something that just conveniently happens out of nowhere, it's reinterpreted here as a karmic fated meeting, as a result of faithfully and sincerely swearing their eternal souls to each other.