A/N:

Alright, a fair warning to everyone. Many people have let me know that they dislike this chapter. That's fine and everything, I can even understand it to a degree, but it still provides information that I would have put into an author's note otherwise.

It contains a lot of information that is handed to you right away, in the form of shameless fourth wall-breaking. But like I said, these were matters I was getting a lot of questions about, and I wanted to answer them, but not in a boring note at the end. So this chapter was born as a result.

You are of course not required to read it. If you dislike Fourth-Wall-breaking and a lot of telling instead of showing, feel free to skip this chapter. I can't guarantee though that you'll understand everything from this chapter on in the story.

This note was added to the chapter because people complained about it, mainly its style, but I don't want to remove it. Maybe I can rewrite it sometime, when my writing-skills have improved, or when someone has a better idea of presenting all this information, but no guarantees.

So hereby the warning: INFODUMP AHEAD!

Thank you for your attention. Please enjoy your reading of this chapter, or the next.

The Two Brothers

The Omniverse was a crazy, mindboggling place. It held an infinite number of worlds, verses, dimensions, realms and more. Some of the dimensions were very much alike, with only mere details being different. Other verses were so completely unlike each other that one would think they belonged in different realities altogether. Yet for all of its immeasurable vastness, the Omniverse had a distinct shape. It was roughly shaped like a sphere.

In the middle of said sphere, in the heart of creation, sat a three-faced golden man. He was seated on a throne, feet on the ground and arms on the armrests. He was shaped roughly like a human, but his size was that of a mountain.

This was the Living Tribunal. One of the two first beings created by the One-Above-All. He was subsequently also one of the two most powerful beings of the Omniverse, with the other being his insufferable brother.

He was the Guardian of Reality, the spill that kept it all going. He had been charged with maintaining the Balance of the Omniverse, to make sure it was possible for creation to keep existing as it did.

Being the Living Tribunal was a busy existence. He was billions, if not trillions of years old, and had never had a single day off.

He had to deal with Universes obtaining more power than they had the rights to, and with species of sentient and non-sentient beings alike becoming too advanced and battle-crazy for their own good.

There were Elder beings that should have died in previous universes that had to be culled, and chain reactions resulting in the death of important planets that had to be stopped.

All that had occurred during only the previous second, with hundreds of disasters happening alongside them. He alone had the power to stop it, and he alone was thus burdened with the task.

He was the Living Tribunal, the oldest. Nothing would stop him from carrying out his duty. Nothing could stop him, nothing could impede him. In his task, no one could stand in his way…

"Hello brother-dear!"

Except one.

His thoughts interrupted, the Living Tribunal looked up towards the only being that could in fact hinder him, the only being as powerful and old as he. His 'dear' brother: The Beyonder.

"Greetings yourself, brother." The front face responded calmly. "I take it you know why I have summoned you here?"

His brother's grin widened, and the Living Tribunal could already sense this conversation was going to be unpleasant.

It was a glaring difference between the brothers. Whereas the Living Tribunal was made to be the perfect judge, objective, omniscient, and mostly emotionless, the Beyonder was created as a force of chaos. Always making trouble for everyone everywhere, with no end to his mischief.

The latest example being the successor of the Odinson.

The Living Tribunal had felt and seen the demise of Thor, and he had to admit that even he felt a bit of sadness at the Asgardian's passing. He did not let it impede him, but he did feel it.

He was well-aware of the plan their Lord had conceived, to pass on the Skyfather's power to a worthy wielder as soon as possible. The Living Tribunal had not been informed beforehand as to who this new wielder was supposed to be and had thus followed Mjolnir until it had arrived at its destination. This new wielder was now revealed to be Emiya Shirou. It was an interesting choice, but the Living Tribunal approved of it.

Still, it was because of matters surrounding the new god of thunder that he had called his brother to appear before him. The Living Tribunal and the Beyonder had agreed not to interfere with Mjolnir's process of choosing, even going so far as to shroud their own vision.

Yet his brother had now directly interfered, going against their agreements, and had placed a cloak and shield around the boy. The Living Tribunal had a good idea as to why his brother had done so, but still thought it prudent to summon him. If the Beyonder had a good reason, then all would be forgiven. If he did not, then the golden being would have to give his sibling the cold shoulder for a while.

"Of course I know why you summoned me here." His brother spoke up again, continuing the conversation. "I knew you'd call me, I already anticipated that from the moment I reached out to little Shirou to aid him for a bit."

The Living Tribunal leaned forward at that.

"Good. Then you most likely have a good reason for your actions, or at least an excuse prepared." He rumbled. "What exactly did you do?"

"I decided to drive away any being that might want to claim Mjolnir for itself of course. Now that Thor is dead, many creatures, foolish creatures, will try to obtain his power. I merely scared them away for now."

"Why though? Should the new wielder not be able to take care of any challengers himself?"

"Maybe, but I reasoned that giving him more time to get acquainted with Mjolnir would be better for his growth than making him fight blustering fools from other universes right away. There are already plenty of those on his planet, let him deal with those first before forcing him to fight interdimensional threats."

The Living Tribunal frowned, mulling this over. He could see what his brother was going for here and it wasn't like he disagreed with the sentiment. It was perhaps indeed wiser to let Emiya Shirou be for now, and to let the protections his brother had raised remain in place.

"Very well." He intoned. "But be aware that as soon as he is done in his own universe, we will take him to serve the Omniverse at large. That means you will have to remove your spells. Letting challengers come to him is the better option."

"If he agrees to it." The Beyonder said, a serious look entering his eyes, even as the grin remained in place.

"Is there any doubt he will agree?"

"No, but remember it is important to ask people for their opinions when you are planning on doing something that involves them. We can't just rip him away, declare him a hero and then throw him into the deep end. You know that."

The Living Tribunal nodded, he did indeed know that.

One could wonder at this moment as to why heroes would be needed to protect reality when the Living Tribunal was already on the case. The reason for that was relatively simple; In the grand plan of the One-Above-All, it had to be mortals who dealt with mortal matters. The three-headed being could indeed deal with all threats, but some, or actually, most, threats were beneath him. They did not warrant his attention, like a mosquito did not warrant a nuclear bomb.

Heroes, like Thor, Iron Man, Doctor Strange, and now Emiya Shirou were needed to deal with those threats.

"Heheheh" The Beyonder let out a sudden chuckle, gleefully rubbing his hands. "So Shirou-chan now has the hammer, hah? Good, very good. I have no doubt he will do great things with it. He can become a real hero now much sooner. The powers and abilities he has will see to that."

"I am aware."

"He will no longer be a human of course. Thor sent his Skyfather-essence along with Mjolnir, so Shirou will eventually become a Skyfather as well. He is not a Skyfather yet of course, but as of now, he is no longer human either. He's slowly turning into a Marvel Asgardian, going from an ordinary one to a royal one and further, until he can go the full distance to become a Skyfather."

"He was no human even before Mjolnir came to him." The Living Tribunal reminded his brother. "The Fire of Fuyuki, Angra Mainyu, and Avalon saw to that."

"Right. In any case, becoming Thor's successor helps Shirou in more ways than just gaining power. Like with little Gaia." The Beyonder continued. "Now that Shirou's no longer human, she, as well as Primate Murder and those vampires, will find him rather difficult to deal with. It helps that Thor, and now Shirou by default, is the son of Marvel's Gaia. It will grant him immunity to the effects she normally has humans under. Not right away of course, that too will develop slowly, as over time Shirou-chan will become more and more like Thor, but he will soon find that his Magecraft, especially the kind he gets from Mjolnir, will be a lot easier."

"It does not matter whether he is Gaia's son or not." The Living Tribunal declared. "Emiya Shirou was chosen and he must remain alive. If Gaia chooses to hinder his progress overtly, we will destroy her consciousness and simply anchor her Reality Marble to her Earth with our own power."

"Damn, you're harsh!"

"And you waste my time. Why do you continue to speak about Emiya Shirou? Why do you question me on these matters? You know all there is to know."

"Oh, right, forgive me, brother." The Beyonder held up his hands in an apology, though he was stll grinning. "It was not my intention to cause you grief. I merely wanted to help a bit."

"Help?" This did not clear the Living Tribunal's confusion. "Who do you wish to help then, if not ourselves?"

"Who, you ask?" Now the grin became face-splitting. "The readers of course."

The Beyonder almost burst into laughter at his brother's perplexed face. No doubt the grouch did not see that coming. It was hilarious, really. Totally worth the wait.

"The readers?" Soon though, the Living Tribunal composed himself again, and started glaring once more. "Truly brother, ever since you met that hero Deadpool, your fourth wall-breaking has been getting wildly out of hand. Why must you do this so blatantly? No one likes it."

"Well, you see, I wanted to help the author a bit."

"And why did you deem that necessary?"

"Because there was confusion about his story apparently. Some things needed to be cleared up, so I decided to make an interlude. Just a bit of kindness."

"He is the author." The Living Tribunal bristled. "He should be capable of conveying his intentions and story by himself, without our help."

"That's really harsh. A little bit of help has never hurt anyone. Just clearing up a few matters, such as Shirou slowly becoming an Asgardian, Gaia losing her power over him and his Magecraft, him becoming the strongest being later on in the story. The basics."

"Hardly the basics."

"I had to think deeply about how to bring the information out there, you know. I had thought of a few options, like 'sexposition', á la Game of Thrones, where someone is telling important plot information, while on the background you have naked people doing naughty things. I couldn't think of a way to bring that to a written story though, and writing smut while giving out details doesn't really work all that well. Oh, and Author's notes are boring as hell."

"So you decided to do it yourself then? By speaking to me about the plot points." The Living Tribunal narrowed his eyes slightly, but did raise his hand in assent. "Well, if it is that important, I shall allow it. Say what you must."

"Thanks a bunch brother, you won't regret it, promise."

The Beyonder recollected his thoughts, took on a rhetoric pose and spoke:

"… "

"Hm, where was I again?"

"Space Vampires and Gaia."

"Ah yes, well, those Shirou will fight aplenty. He shouldn't have too much trouble with it. He will have many adventures involving them of course, some exciting, others thrilling and some full of awesome ass-kicking. Then there's the people he will meet on his journey. Plenty of them, some even from other series of the Nasuverse. Why, and so much will take place before the Grail War, like…"

"Do not reveal too much. I cannot allow you to already lay out everything that happens in the future."

"Oof, alright then. I'll wrap it up for now. Important to note is that no more characters from Marvel or otherwise are going to be appearing any time soon. This story is about Shirou and his adventures in the Nasuverse. No other crossover-elements are allowed."

"What about the two of us then?"

"We are beings that exist throughout all of the Omniverse, we are everywhere. And if we are present anywhere in the Omniverse, then wouldn't it be normal for us to be in every story ever, without making it a crossover?"

"I see your point." The Living Tribunal nodded, before holding up his hand again. "This is all that you are allowed to say, but I must admit that I have a question for you. You added a small feature to Mjolnir, one the hammer was glad to accept. What did you give it?"

The Beyonder now lost his grin. Something that shocked the Living Tribunal. Its place was then taken by a small, almost evil smile, one that made the Living Tribunal feel pity for whoever that smile was meant for.

"I gave Mjolnir an enormous boost against worms, body-stealing parasites and mind-control spells."

"… A wise decision. I take you added mind-control resistance too? Emiya cannot be mind-controlled. That would spell disaster."

"No no, of course not. He was almost impossible to control in such a way before the hammer arrived, through his strength of will and partial loss of humanity. His metamorphosis into an Asgardian has made him altogether completely impossible to control."

"Good. Then I believe we have covered everything for now? Or are there more matters you wish to speak of?"

"As a matter of fact, there are a few. Namely the others chosen for this project. The ones Mjolnir passed up on but were still enough for at least some consideration?"

"I know of them. Though they did not receive Mjolnir, they will be enhanced in their own ways."

"Indeed, and unlike with the Power of Thor, the Boss has left this matter in our hands."

"I already have some candidates that I will bestow power on."

"Just make sure you don't take the ones I have chosen. We will need quite a few, so I hope the author is up to some writing. That said, do you need my list?"

"I already know your list, brother. And no, you will not be repeating it in here for the readers. They will have to find out for themselves."

"How fun."

"Indeed."

"But all this talking about stories and power has gotten me thinking brother. What if we, The Living Tribunal and the Beyonder, were to join other stories? Like, join for real, to help fix all the trouble on other worlds. Would people be interested?"

His golden sibling mulled that over for a few seconds, but then shook his head. "No, we are omnipotent and omniscient, we can do everything and there is no one who can hurt or hinder us. Any being we encounter would not dare to fight us, except for some fools that we would crush easily. No one wants to read about us. Do not suggest it again."

And with that said, the Living Tribunal turned away. The Beyonder could see that the conversation was truly over now, and that no more would be discussed today.

He left, as quietly as he had arrived. Calmly, he made his way over to the chosen ones. Those who were supposed to serve and protect the Omniverse in a few years' time.

Despite the seriousness of his task, the weight that rested on his shoulders, he felt his grin widen further than was possible on a human face.

How fun indeed.

Author's note:

So, a small chapter explaining some things. There seemed to be confusion about the subject, so I tried to clear it up a bit for you all.

I think the Beyonder already told you everything else.

If you disliked the chapter, then that is completely understandable. It is not my best work ever, not by a long shot (I have written worse things though). It is the last chapter of its kind, I hope.

Bye.

Edited later for better flow and choice of words.