A Moment in Time (Frieren: Beyond Journey's End)
A Moment in Time (Frieren: Beyond Journey's End)
By Wanderer D
2 Weeks After The Hero Himmel's Death
Frieren had left behind most signs of civilization at this point, and although she was still within human lands, the heavy forested area she had walked into was so cut off from other specie's usual haunts, that she might've just as well been in the middle of the Northern Lands.
So far away, and yet here she was, standing in front of the collapsed entrance to a long-forgotten castle. So old in fact that she had no recollection of it, but not old enough for everything to collapse quite yet. It might have seen the last of its inhabitants roughly around the time she was born.
She could probably figure out who had lived there, but the thought didn't cross her mind for more than a second of curiosity. There were many places like this in the world, back when her teacher and herself walked the land together. Centuries before Himmel or Heiter, or even Eisen.
Instead, she made her way around the structure, taking it in, and studying the craftsmanship, figuring out the details of its last days through ancient marks left by weapons and the occasional discarded shield or arrowhead. Two days later, she finally made her way through the entryway, where she paused to examine the old, rusted hinges and the creeping vines that had slowly grown up and around the entire wall.
She knew, of course, that she was only trying to distract herself from the thoughts that really weighed on her mind, but she had time. She had a lot of time. Being an elf meant that two days to walk around a castle was comparable to a minute or two in the lifespan of a human.
Still, there was a chance the library in the castle was still sufficiently protected from the elements to justify a visit before she checked anything else. Life would continue and with it the castle's decay would also progress, but as beautiful as both were, the books shouldn't have to be eaten away by time and nature without at least a last read.
Maybe there were some interesting spells there, too.
She stepped into the courtyard. The cobbled stone under her feet was covered in moss and grass whenever it hadn't been completely buried under dirt and debris. To her left was a pretty large chapel for the size of the castle, with an effigy of the goddess adorning the top. Time and elements had weathered away all the careful carved details that originally humanized the goddess, and now it was simply a gray slab, vaguely humanlike in appearance where vines and flowers hadn't covered it completely.
Places like these always made her feel how fleeting a mortal life was, but they also fascinated her with how much history was tied to them for such an ephemeral amount of time.
She knew she was struggling with the concept of putting value to something that just faded in the blink of an eye.
'We only traveled together for ten years.'
And yet…
Frieren has finally reached the library entrance. She had entered the main hall and followed one of the passages on the side towards one of the towers. She now stood at the gateway, staring into a dimly-lit, dusty room with several broken down and rotting bookshelves.
There didn't appear to be a single book there that hadn't been damaged beyond recognition. But what held her in place wasn't the state of the books and shelves (she was used to seeing those destroyed by time over and over), it was the door at the other side of the room, flush against the wall of the tower that, she knew, had nothing behind it.
Unlike the rest of the castle, and indeed, all other doors she had seen thus far, this one was in perfect condition. The stone archway around it was carefully crafted and maintained, while the door itself appeared solid and lacking any indication of degradation.
A symbol at eyes-height for an adult was unlike those she had seen before. It resembled an effigy of the sun, clearly so by the circle in the middle with the flames around it, however the circle was split into two tear-like shapes one red, the other gold, with a single spot of the opposing color in the middle of the thickest part of each.
"Curious," Frieren said aloud, speaking for the first time since she had left Eisen and Heiter at the Capital.
She could sense ancient magic emanating from the door. Older than anything she had felt before. After a careful study of the door, she came to the conclusion that there were no traps around it. She stood back and considered her options.
The door was ancient, as she had determined earlier, which begged the possibility that the castle had been built around it, if it had been some sort of known magic. But it didn't make sense to build the place as they had if the door was that important, and a known factor at the time of construction. Surely something so magical and valuable would have been deeper in the keep. If it was knowledge-related it was possible it would have a library around it, but certainly not something so readily accessible.
So that meant that the door arrived here afterward, somehow.
Frieren shrugged. "Maybe there's another library through, and new spells."
The silver bell chimed, announcing a visitor. Sunset, who had been reading a book on the counter, looked up and blinked at the white-robed elf that entered the bar. Her silvery-white hair—which was held up into twintails—had a very light lavender-tinge, all of which gave her a very innocent look. She wasn't too tall, and due to her youthful looks, it would have been easy to confuse her with a young girl.
Sunset, however, knew enough elves from many different worlds to not assume something like that, and her senses told her of the incredible amount of constant control this young elf had on her own magic. That spoke of many years of experience, which belied her apparent physical age.
"Welcome to Sunset's Isekai, my little bar in the omniverse!" Sunset smiled. "I'm Sunset Shimmer."
The elf studied her with a carefully inexpressive face for a few moments before nodding. "I am Frieren." She carefully sat down on one of the barstools, and kept her eyes on Sunset. "You look human."
"Been one for a while," Sunset said, leaning over to the side to grab one of the menus. "Not all the time."
"Reincarnated god?"
"Definitely not," Sunset said, "Former unicorn."
"Ah."
Sunset passed the elf the menu.
Frieren studied it for a time, and settled down for wine, then leaned on the counter, arms crossed, and watched Sunset fish out the bottle and uncork it. "How is the human life going for you?"
"It was disorienting at first, but I've had a lot of time to get used to it." Sunset put down the glass on the counter and slid it a bit towards the elf.
"I see," Frieren said, reaching over to take the wine. She examined it, but did not try it. "Maybe you can help then."
Sunset smiled. "That's what this place is about. What's troubling your mind?"
"I do not understand humans."
"My dear Frieren, no one understands humans," Sunset said with a smile.
Frieren understood the joke, but settled for shaking her head. "I do not mean that in a casual way." She looked at her hands, then up at the not-quite-human in front of her. She knew this Sunset Shimmer was the most powerful being she had ever encountered.
At first, when she had walked in, she had assumed the human to be a regular mortal, however, her keen senses soon told her the truth of the matter: she hadn't been able to detect Sunset's power from the beginning because the moment she had stepped into the bar, she was within Sunset's aura of power.
But now that she was aware of this, it made sense to her to ask Sunset about… humans. It wasn't as if Serie could be of help with this, and she would not burden Eisen or Heiter with educating her.
"Time is different for me," she continued, "I was a member of the hero Himmel's party. We defeated the Demon King a little over fifty years ago. I traveled with them for ten years, and yet I learned so little about them. When Himmel suddenly died…" She trailed off, a slight pang of something constricting her heart for the briefest of moments. She sighed. "...of old age… he said that that decade with them would stay with me forever."
Sunset considered this. "Well, without knowing the full story it's hard to understand, I suppose. But, besides the fact that you guys went against a Demon Lord and won, what made this different than your many years of life so far?"
Frieren tilted her head, thinking back on things. "I'm not sure. But, I had been on my own for centuries before Himmel and the others found me. Another hero even tried to recruit me before them, but I turned him down."
"I see," Sunset said. "Where would you be now if Himmel and your friends hadn't picked you up from where you were?"
"In the forest," Frieren responded. "Doing the same thing I had been doing all of those years after the passing of my teacher."
"Letting time pass you by?"
Frieren didn't answer. She didn't need to. She sipped her wine and smiled a little at the taste.
Sunset chuckled and shook her head. "I guess it can be strange breaking from something like that." She leaned on the bar. "Every fifty years or so Rarity and the others will force me out of here because I've spent too much time in the bar and I need an adventure or two. Maybe even go live somewhere for a century or something before returning to work."
Frieren looked mildly amused. "Being human and living so long doesn't make much sense."
"I suppose not," Sunset acknowledged, "but I think it's less the time one is alive, and more the mentality and appreciation of it that humans have. Even knowing that I have eternity, I still get restless. I have to find a bit of meaning to my time, whether it's learning a new skill or simply enjoying myself in a different way than before."
"Elves like me live too long to let that bother us," Frieren said.
"Maybe," Sunset said. "But, if you weren't doing something that brought you some sense of reward—doesn't even have to be physical, but rather, emotional or spiritual, what's the difference between doing the same thing every day by rote, and simply being stagnated?"
Frieren took in a sharp breath. Was that what her life was before Himmel and the others had invited her over?
"Stagnation, as weird as it sounds, has its own momentum," Sunset continued, "you are not challenged, yet do a few things that keep you distracted without really changing anything around you. It's a constant repeat of the same day. Humans can't function like that for too long, at least not in a healthy way. And I don't think elves can either, but because of the continuity of it, this stagnated momentum is hard to break."
Frieren blinked. "So Himmel, Heiter and Eisen pulled me out of that stagnation?"
"That's what I believe, yes," Sunset said.
Frieren looked down at her wine. "I suppose being broken out of a centuries-long cycle is something worth remembering," she admitted.
"Not only that, but I imagined traveling with them had its challenges, right?"
Frieren smirked. "Traveling around with a corrupt, drunk priest is pretty challenging."
"And yet you say that with such fondness," Sunset replied, crossing her arms.
"We did go through a lot together, and Heiter was pretty good at his job," Frieren admitted reluctantly. "He was also… empathic."
"That's always a good thing in my book," Sunset said.
Frieren allowed herself to smile a more gentle and genuine smile. Flashes of memories fluttered through her mind as she recalled the first time she'd found what a 'birthday steak' was, or that time they'd found the abandoned temple to the goddess, or even when they fled particularly strong monsters.
At the end of each of those adventures, they would still sit together, eat together and laugh together. Even if she hadn't been cackling like Heiter or Eisen, or even laughing aloud like Himmel, she still recalled the warm feeling of companionship that the antics (and their resolutions) evoked within her.
"There are very few elves left in the world," she said to Sunset after allowing the memories to take her back to those not so ancient times. "We seldom see each other, if ever. The last time I saw an elf—my teacher's teacher, Serie—was several hundred years ago. We spend entire human lifetimes in solitude with no problems. It seems silly that a decade of travel would change my understanding of the world so much."
"Hm." Sunset nodded. "I guess another way of looking at it is that it is an instant that changes the trajectory of your life, right? For me, it was a princess from the land I had abandoned that brought me to my senses, saved me, and set me up on the path I am today. After a thousand years it feels like just a moment, but I see the evidence of how impactful it was every day."
"Huh." Frieren thought back on how she was before Himmel and the other, and her outlook right now. It was as Sunset said… she had stagnated, fallen into the immortal trap of contentment by remaining in a single place, doing the same chores as always. She had survived, and she couldn't say she regretted those years of peace and quiet exactly, but had she enjoyed that, or had it just been simply existing?
Glancing at her travel case and her staff—and considering the fact that she had managed to find herself in an interdimensional bar with an immortal former unicorn—she could admit to herself that no, it hadn't been a fulfilling existence.
"After my master passed away, the joy of adventuring left me for a long time," Frieren confessed. "I passed on invitations from heroes and other visitors to travel with them until Himmel pulled me away from my routine."
Sunset didn't say anything, simply sitting next to her at the bar and focusing her attention on Frieren.
"I don't know if I will ever be able to understand the feelings of humans," the elf admitted, "but I can acknowledge that those I have allowed into my life changed me. From my teacher, Flamme to Himmel and the others. If it hadn't been for Flamme, I probably would have died a long time ago, and if it wasn't for Himmel, I would still be plucking herbs from the forest." She picked up her staff and looked up at it, smiling. "But unlike after my teacher's passing, I now find myself with the willpower to continue traveling. Thanks to him and Heiter and Eisen, I have a new purpose to seek understanding and knowledge for. One day, they too will be gone, but if I can keep adventuring I will do them honor, and if I keep learning new spells, I will keep doing honor to my teacher."
Sunset smirked. "I think you're a little bit closer to understanding humans than you think, Frieren."
The elf blinked and turned to face her, slightly confused, but Sunset simply laughed. "I won't spoil the surprise for you, for when you figure it out," she said. "Why don't you tell me about your teachers and your friends? I'll treat you to lunch."
Frieren put down the staff and smiled. "I can do that."
Frieren left the bar and found that no time had passed since she had stepped into the door. She turned around to face it, only to discover it gone. She shook her head, and looked down at the only proof that it had ever existed: a small, silver card Sunset had given her.
She set down her travel case and opened it, sliding the card carefully into an interior pocket. Closing the lid, she secured it and stood up, wiping her pants with her hands before nodding to herself and looking around.
Her journey had just begun, and things were looking up already. She had many more things to do before checking on Heiter and Eisen in the coming years, and although she intended to take her time, she still felt the sense of urgency for her new mission.
As she turned to leave the room, a single apparently abandoned chest caught her attention. "A treasure?" she wondered as she approached it cautiously. She couldn't see any traps around it, so she smiled and leaned in, ready to open it. "Fufufu, people of the past were so careless to leave something like this here!"
It took her almost the whole day to escape the mimic.
Stats
Page generated in 0.029 seconds
Total duration
710 users online
704,416 hits today, 2,244,100 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
I may not watch or read Frieren, but I do get a gist of it and planning to watch that after the anime finished. That being said, I like the two having a conversation of the how time pass and the human and life.
Also, about month ago, I put the two suggestions in your forum, and I ask is, what you think?
Can you imagine Fern somehow coming across this and asking Sunset how to fix Frieren's habits? That'd be great-
i have no idea what Frieren: Beyond Journey's End even is, but still a very fun chapter
Frieren need to see Maud and she will understand that she is more human, aka has more emotions, than she think she is.
Am human, can confirm.
*raises hand*
Can you do one with helk?
And no thats not a typo it's litterally the dudes name....he suffers from depression from every human being betrayed by the human king and such....has his own anime so it won't be to hard to find him...dude watched his brother who was also a hero die and such....he could probably use a drink and someone to listen.
It wouldn’t be a Frieren crossover without at least one mimic attack.
Lovely meditation on the traps of immortaility and the different perspectives of different lifespans. A lovely reflection of the source material in that regard. Thank you for it.
11789710
An elf that thinks like a human would end up with that Mimic either as a pet or a Familiar?
I call it, Luggage.
11789971
I remember reading a mlp isekai with a human turned unicorn ended up with a mimic following him around after he repaired it. Can't remember what it was called. Just that he found it in a faux village that was really a changeling outpost.
This is truly the only way a Frieren adventure can end.
Quite nice. :)
What a fortunate coincidence that I just happened to join in on an anime watch party for this last week otherwise I'd have much less of an idea of what's going on.
And not understand what a zinger of a chapter ending that was.
I'm hoping to get one for "SHY" since the protagonist is a new hero and doesn't have that much confidence or experience. Visiting the Isekai would be an interesting experience.
Wish we could see some of these adventures, particularly those she's been stated to go on with Freya.
Thanks for writing!
Also, this chapter reminded me of this, and I though you might find it interesting if you'd not seen it before:
https://existentialcomics.com/comic/353
11789971
In a Dark Sun game I was in with friends many moons ago, after clearing out the bad guy's fortress, we stumbled across three mimics in the basement. The thief carefully crouched near them, and explained that we had just finished killing everyone in the castle. If they stayed, they'd starve. If the attacked the party, they'd get killed. But, if they chose to accompany the party to their castle, they'd set the mimics up in the depths of an old dungeon in their basement, and the mimics would be fed regularly.
The mimics sort of thought about it for a moment, then happily surrendered the loot they'd been holding on to. The trip back to our castle was a weird one that time, as we had three mimics in a wagon all the way back!
God, this was great
11789664
Basically, 10 years after setting off, an adventuring party has finally stopped the demon lord. They return to the kingdom. They watch a meteor shower. Frieren, an elven mage, promises to meet them back there to witness the meteors again 50 years later. She returns, barely changed, while her old friends have greatly aged. Its only after the death of the hero of the party, Himmel. who was not so secretly in love with her, that she, alongside Fern, a war orphan and the adoptive grandaughter of the priest of the party Heiter, and her eventual apprentice, that she sets off to learn more magic, in the hopes that one day she can reach the afterlife and meet one last time with her old friends.
11802136
interesting
An awesome chapter for an awesome manga/anime.
11790019
Hold it Together by OverUnderCookened
11820644
Could be an interesting crossover for the Isekai. If only to see him try to bullshit his way through the experience.