As Nincy rushed to Vel, Odile knew what she had to say. She blocked Nincy with an outstretched arm. "Stay back! I know what to do! Aster! Cover me! Nincy, take the child!"

"No!" Bonnie exclaimed, "I can help! I can fight!"

"It's to dangerous!" Aster demanded. "Come on Bonnie! You trust me, right?"

Bonnie hesitated, before yelling, "Fine, but you better not get hurt or I'll hate you forever!"

"Do you know what you're doing?" Nincy demanded.

Odile nodded, "I do."

Vel screamed and lunged for Aster with her blades as Nincy and Bonnie fled. Aster deflected the blow with their own dagger, leaping back before her second blade could connect. The threads of their cloak, torn by the blade, danced away in a cold breeze.

Vel cried out as his body began to morph and change. "Our nation is gone because of me! Everyone is gone because of me! You can't even hear it's name can you? You can't even hear me say-"

Odile coughed up red blood as the word hit her ears, it was like being hit in the skull with a hammer. It left her dazed and she needed to collect herself. Aster rushed to her aid, helping her back to her feet, "It's OK. It's just a word."

Vel continued to ramble, "How many died because I was a child with a power I shouldn't have had?" His body swelled with power, hulking muscle and raw Craft allowing him to tower over the remaining duo, eyes aglow with crimson Timecraft. "Because people wanted to use that power to their own ends? Wishcraft has to die! I have to die!"

"Please tell me you have a plan," Aster begged. "He can wipe us out in one blow like this!"

"I do," Odile nodded. "I know how to negate her power. Just... cover me."

Aster nodded as Odile approached. All her power, all her Craft meant nothing now. This was not a monster to slay, but... more or less a friend. At the very least a good person lashing out in pain.

Odile dropped her weapon, allowing her tome to fall to the ground and extended her open palms to the air, hands up. She made clear she was unarmed.

"What are you blinding doing?" Aster demanded.

"Trust me," Odile pleaded. She turned to Vel and declared, "Vel. You don't want to win."

Vel was flabbergasted, demanding, "Of course I do! I have to win! I have to end the pain I caused!"

"You would deprive the world of something wonderful," Odile retorted. "Just cause something can be dangerous doesn't mean it has no value. Even the very water we need to survive can kill. It's how it's used, and you seek to deprive the world of the good Wishcraft can do because of false self blame. If you were to win here, you would kill Aster, someone who, whether you admit it to yourself or not, you've grown close with as a friend. You will shatter the heart of Nincy, whom you genuinely love as a partner. You would shatter the hearts of a nation who you have helped become something wonderful, and will leave behind only despair of those who cared for you. Don't you see? You winning IS a disaster."

"Shut up!" Vel screamed, tears flowing from her eyes not unlike those of The King. It was then Odile's plan came to fruition, as the glow of Vel's power left her eyes. This was it. In convincing Vel that her victory was a disaster, her power would no longer secure her victory, as doing so would go against her wish. Her power would not assist her in causing disaster, only evading it.

"Aster now!" Odile demanded.

Aster understood without another word, they leapt into the air in the blink of an eye, stabbing Vel in the shoulder. Vel cried out and fell to his knees. Odile scrambled to grab it.

"I have to win..." Vel pleaded as he struggled to get back up.

"I promise you," Odile assured. "You'll feel better after this. Just trust me."

"I'm going to find them," Vel growled, to consumes by self hatred. She cried out in a blind frenzy of despair. "I'll kill Siffrin. I'll kill Aster. And I'll. Kill. YOU!"

Vel gave one final lunge for Odile, who staggered back, dropping the concentrated Wishcraft. Aster grabbed it as Odile took a blow to the stomach, coughing up blood. Aster panicked, and gripped the orb tight. They had to stop this. They had to save their aunt and Siffrin and the only way to do that was to go back.

Go back...

Of course!

"I wish Siffrin never died in the first place!" Aster screamed holding the orb high in the air.

There was a flash of brilliant starlight and...

All returned to as it was.

Siffrin became a titanic being and was calmed by his family.

They agreed to continue to travel together.

Aster...

Had to follow the script, and attacked Siffrin under the Wishing Tree, even if they didn't want to anymore, even if they weren't Loop anymore. They had to follow the script.

The family left Dormont.

Siffrin lay under the stars that night, unable to sleep. They felt like they were being watched, as cicadas rang through the cool night air. "Hey stardust!" A voice eagerly greeted.

A figure lay beside Siffrin, wearing a face similar to their own. "You will not believe the week I had..."

"Loop?" Siffrin inquired, a smile of relief on his face.

Aster winked, "It's Aster. Listen you uhhh... well I remember some things the others don't anymore."

"What do you mean?" Siffrin inquired. "How are you here? Why do you look... different?"

"Oh I just took an old form back at the tree to follow the script," Aster assured with a smile. He looked away, gaining a more serious expression. "And... I made a wish that brought me back here. Listen... we have to head to Ka Bue."

"What's wrong?" Siffrin inquired, concerned now.

"Someone is planning to kill us..." Aster explained.

Vel awoke with a start, memories flashed in her head of a wish. A wish Aster made, and a job left unfinished. Vel's eyes glowed with that blue impossible shade.

She had a lot of work to do to get this right this time...

Author's Notes

Finally Jesus Christ. This fic was tough to finish man. Lemme go ahead and over my thought process and the themes for everyone.

Starting with the basic premise I just had the thought of "what if Siffrin died you know for pain!" And I began to develop that concept with a focus on Odile cause I related to her almost slightly protective nature.

On that note I wanted Odile to explore a toxic martyr complex and how that can make you lash out at the people you love most. From there I added Yancy as a foil and to make Ka Bue feel more alive and fleshed out. I do like most of how I executed this but she almost felt like she fixed this issue to easy and I accidentally pivot into Aster as the protag and I feel this fic partially betrayed its premise. I could have done this better but it still works as a "hey don't do that" theme.

On the note of Aster, Aster is about self discovery and learning who you are. There was a body horror element to their transformation. This was originally intended to be like "Wishcraft is both beautiful and scary" but this concept was scrapped for a moreso "discovering yourself can be scary but it's worth it" theme. Aster's dynamic with Vel is something I'm genuinely proud of. They're kindred spirits in a way and it creates a really compelling dynamic. I'm honestly pretty content with their arc and dynamic with Bonnie as well.

On the note of Bonnie aside from being cool with their dynamic with Aster, they kinda aren't written well here? Like I originally wanted each character to have a "rival" and each of the five days before the Festival of Fortune was to focus on one but this concept rapidly collapsed and it left a lot of Ka Bue's worldbuilding and Bonnie's arc undercooked as it were.

I'm at least content with Mirabelle's arc and how zealots suck. I consider myself religious but I believe a good atheist will enter Heaven long before any homophobic "Christian" will so much as see the gates. Zick matches with this theme well, fitting into Mirabelle's crisis of faith and serving as a genuinely menacing antagonist and powerful foul that ties back to the main plot. I'm genuinely really proud of this plotline and character arc.

Now we get into why this took so long. Jince, while how he is defeated was clever and I'm proud of that part, (not having infinite stamina I wanted every antagonist to have a loophole in their wish the cast have to find and exploit to win cause it makes for cool and compelling fight scene and readers can try to find the weakness themselves) lacks the nuance Zick had in execution. While he has a fun fight with Isabeau, it just doesn't have that weight to it cause he's just a shallow punching bag to dunk on transphobes. Which, yeah, that's always correct, but I could have done so in a better, more impactful way.

This is where I began to feel a deep feeling of... dissatisfaction with this work. That I failed to execute it properly. Yeah it's still good but it doesn't live up to its potential. Ka Bue lacks depth and Yancy doesn't give her own arc; she's just a foil of Odile.

There are good parts though. The train fight with Zick is great and so is Vel as a whole. I feel content with how I tied him to the secondary antagonists and explained his ties to the base game. It all comes full circle perfectly. All that was planned from the start. Vel isn't so much evil as much as he's lashing out in self hatred and pains

So I tried to do a crossover with a more self serving fic called Datatraveler Pure Mode. Mainly for fun, but it was pretty hated from what I gathered and that was the last nail in the coffin for this. It just made me feel like I had failed this premise and it could have been a ton better if I didn't screw it up. It's still good but I just failed its potential in the execution of Ka Bue and some of the side characters. Vel was good but Bonnie, Jince, and the world building of Ka Bue were weak.

Nincy is also kinda shallow, much like Yancy. Another failure to be honest.

The endings were planned from the start but even there I feel I missed up. The outcome of the first ending, bad execution aside, was just a "it's base game canon tie back". Plain and simpleX not much to say there.

The second ending was always planned to be Odile basically failing to be a better person. Becoming obsessed and lashing out one final time. An older version of this ending had Odile gain the power to revive the dead followed by killing and reviving her family over and over after become a monster akin to Siffrin at the end of the original game. This would end with an endless loop of eternal suffering but I felt Mirabelle alone in a dying world was more tragic and impactful.

The third ending is meant as a good but not true ending. Yeah Siffrin is back but Wishcraft is gone, and I kinda went for portraying Wishcraft as something that can be good when used properly. There's no one to one allegory for it but you get the basic idea. Something that could have done a lot of good for the world, something beautiful, was lost.

And the last ending, the "true" ending, loops back to the original game with Aster and and Vel remembering the events of the fic. The original game happen, but Aster is only playing along when they attack Siffrin before reuniting with Siffrin in earnest to earn them of Vel. This is why Vel doesn't get a happy ending. In my mind this ending leads into a squeal fic/fangame with Aster as the protag trying to reconnect with their

Family and save Vel from herself, having grown to see Vel as a genuine friend despite everything and this is where Vel would get her happy ending. It also reveals Vel's weakness which I am proud of cause it's clever. Vel's wish lets her avoid disaster, but since her loosing IS a diaster her wish won't protect her form losing. Genuinely proud of that I felt it was smart. However, given how I dropped the ball and have lost motivation I don't intend to write this in the foreseeable future.

Do I regret this? No. It was a ton of fun.

Will I expand it? Probably not.

Did I screw it up? A but yeah. This whole thing is just oozing with this feeling of dissatisfaction in my own execution.

Sorry I kinda screwed up on the execution. There's also huge themes of found family in addition to the self discovery allegory, zealots bad, and showing the toxic ness of self blame with Vel and Odile (another way they work as foils) and overcoming V succumbing to it but I feel I've explained all the major themes well.

I'm free. Have a great day I hope you enjoyed.