Chapter Text
“That was… something.”
“Yeah. That was definitely one of the endings of- wait, is that actually the end?”
Mumei pondered aloud alongside Kronii as soon as the movie ended.
They sat on the couch in Amelia’s living room, together with the rest of Council and Myth.
“So Mumei just dies along with you? Is that it?” Bae asked.
“I don’t think they died back there, it seemed a little more complicated than that.” Fauna guessed.
Amelia, enjoying the way her friends were bouncing ideas about the movie, smiled to herself and simply shrugged.
“You’ve been getting really good with the CG though!” Calli commented. “The effects were honestly insane. How the hell did you do the outer space part?”
“Yeah, they looked so real!” Kiara added, earning nods from Ina and Gura.
“Also, when do we get your backstory? It’s kinda been like 5 episodes already and we still don’t know anything about you here.” Gura said. “Or am I just getting impatient and you’re actually cooking it up in the next chapter? If it is, then you don’t have to tell me, I’ll just wait.”
“I’ve been wondering that too, actually,” Ina added. “But, yeah, you don’t have to tell us if it’s just spoilers. Besides, it really looks like you’re having fun with this project. Are you gonna upload this to your channel? I think the fans’ll love it — the Teamates especially!”
Amelia’s cheeks flushed a little each time her friends gave their thoughts. She was smiling a little wider each time too.
“Hehe,” she sipped her tea, “Thanks, guys. This was actually just supposed to be a one-shot but I guess I just had too much fun making it. Also, I really appreciate the feedback and all. You guys can be harsher too, you know?”
“Well, in that case,” Gura shot Amelia a cheeky grin, “when do we appear again? Do we even appear again? Is that really all we’re worth to you? All I’m worth to you, Amelia Watson, precious genmate of Hololive English Myth? Why is my role so little here? I barely scratch you, you somehow take me out off-screen, and then you leave me dying, not really sure if I’m actually dead or not, while you spend 4 chapters getting killed by Mumei over and over again? Is this an example of the author’s barely hidden fetish memes I see on the internet sometimes? You can tell me, I won’t get mad. I’m just very confused why we’re even trying to kill you in the first place. We need to know, you know!”
Everyone was either a little stunned by the rambling or laughing at it. Even Amelia was just laughing it all off.
“Yeah, what she said,” Kronii added cheekily.
“When do I appear though?” Bae asked eagerly. “It kinda feels like it’ll be a huge deal the second I appear on scene because you’ve just been keeping me tucked away for so long.”
“Yeah!” Mumei added. “And when she was mentioned, we were all quiet and scared and stuff. Why is that?”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah!” Bae nodded. “Am I, like, a wild card, or something? Actually, no, don’t answer that. I’ll just wait, hehe.”
“What if actually, you’re super weak, Bae?” Sana asked.
“Wha-”
“What if you’re actually super useless? Maybe that’s why we’re all quiet when you were mentioned. Like, you’re so weak that we’re worried you’d instantly die the moment you try to fight Ame.”
“Yeah, that makes sense.” Mumei quickly agreed.
“Bruh… if that’s true, I would just cry on the spot.”
“That’s okay, Bae.” Fauna gave her a commiserating pat on the head. “We still love you even if you’re weak.”
“Yeah, we just don’t want you to die, you know?” Kronii added, also giving Bae a commiserating pat, though on the shoulder. “Because that’s what friends are for.” She ended with a laugh.
“Bruh.”
While they were busy laughing at Bae, Ame prepared the next chapter for their viewing as well as more snacks and drinks (with Ina and Kiara’s help) for them to dig into as they watched.
“We ready?” She asked, catching everyone’s attention.
“Wait, there’s more?” Calli asked. “So that’s why there’s more food!”
“Yeah,” Ame laughed. “I actually prepared the next chapter this time too.”
“Cool! Let’s see it!”
“Disappointing.”
Time freezes over everyone on the isolated devastated planet.
“When you want something done, you should do it yourself, as they say.”
And it slowly reverses.
“Still, you did well against the Council. I’ll give you that.”
Mumei and Amelia’s light particles return.
“So, I guess I should give you a hand now.”
Their bodies were formed again, returned to the way they were before Mumei’s divinity took effect. Everything was as they were.
Mumei closed her eyes. “I’ll see you ar-”
“No, no. That’s unnecessary.” A hand reached out to grab Mumei’s wrist.
They all heard a familiar voice, forcing them to turn toward the source.
“Put it away before you hurt yourself…”
It was from the 4th Council member, the Warden of Time herself,
“...Mumei.”
Ouro Kronii.
“What?”
However…
Mumei’s head fell to the ground with a soft thud as her blood shot out of her neck and rose to the sky like a fountain, stunning everyone with the unseen blade.
“Let me hurt you instead.”
…this warden was different from the one they knew.
“What the hell are you doing, Kronii?!” Fauna roared in rage.
This warden was wearing a dark suit, her shoulders draped by a large black coat with a blue collar. Ignoring the angered Kirin, she took out a stick of tobacco from the tobacco pouch she kept in an inner pocket of her suit. She nonchalantly walked toward the trapped Amelia while lighting her tobacco and taking a deep breath. She stopped in front of Amelia and blew thick smoke at her face.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” She asked calmly while pocketing the lighter.
Amelia merely glared back, unable to speak thanks to her constraints.
“I didn’t give you the watch just so you can fuck up like this.” She shook her head while clicking her tongue. “Now look what you made me do.” She eyed her dully. “You forced me to show myself just to save your stupid ass.”
“Kronii…?” Sana called out confusedly. She’d been trying to feel out whether this was the Kronii she knew after all but she couldn’t tell. Her energy signature, her voice, her face, all of it was the same. But at the same time, her mannerisms, her speech, and the way she looked and dressed were completely different. “Are you Kronii…?”
Kronii turned her head toward Sana slightly, eyeing her at her periphery. “What do you think?” She took another deep huff of her tobacco. She sighed, closing her eyes and shaking her head.
“Kro-” Fauna tried to speak, however, she found that her voice was failing her all of a sudden. Her eyes looked down when she felt a sharp pain in her neck, finding a blade stabbed through it. Her eyes shot back up in front of her, finding Kronii just inches from her face, still smoking her tobacco.
She tried to move but found that she couldn’t. When she searched for her limbs, her eyes widened when she found them severed and suspended in mid-air. And when she tried to heal herself with her divinity, she couldn’t. At that moment, Amelia managed to free herself by burning the vines.
Sana watched in horror as Fauna was severed in the blink of an eye. She snapped her fingers to piece Fauna together but found that her fingers were failing her too. When she looked at them, even she was in pieces. She gasped, looking up at the looming figure over her, emotionlessly slaughtering them with as little effort as possible.
When Kronii raised her sword to cut Sana down, she paused just millimeters away from contacting her forehead.
Kronii exhaled the thick smoke out of her lungs and scoffed. “Minus points.”
“Get away from them!”
Swords clashed, pushing Kronii back as another figure stood in front of her with their back turned toward her.
“You’re slow.” Kronii shrugged, leaning on her sword with her elbow. “Aren’t you ashamed to call yourself the Warden of Time? ”
“Shut up.”
It was Kronii again. However, this was the Kronii they were familiar with. The familiar uniform that proudly showed off her curves instead of the conservative suit that the other one wore.
“I don’t know why you’re here, I don’t know why you’re even possible, but that’s enough. I’m taking the both of you down.”
Kronii, the one Sana knew, released killing intent so palpable she almost choked on it. She’d never seen the warden so angry before. She summoned her swords to her sides and stood proudly in front of the other Kronii and Amelia.
“I’m more than enough to handle you two,” She coolly stated despite the immense bloodlust gleaming from her eyes.
Kronii, the other, laughed — cackled, even — as she used her sword like a crutch while she lost herself. Eventually, she wiped a tear from her eye as she calmed down. She took one last deep inhale of her tobacco before dropping it to the ground and crushing it beneath her shoe.
“Oh, you stupid, stupid warden.”
Kronii, the original, prepared herself for an attack but was left with a raised brow when the other Kronii disappeared and reappeared sitting on a nearby boulder. Legs crossed, face leaning forward, resting on her hand as she propped her elbow on her knee — she was sitting looking quite excited at the scene before her.
“My job here is done. This was just a quick little errand.” She took out another tobacco from her pouch and lit it up. “But now that you know I exist, I have no more reason to hide. Maybe this way, Omega will stop being such a little bitch and show himself.” She grinned ear to ear. She then gave Amelia, who had been quiet the entire time, a sharp and cold look. “Don’t disappoint me again, Watson. If you can’t even take care of a bitch like that ,” she gestured with her head towards the original Warden of Time, “then I’m taking the watch back.”
“Fine.” Amelia turned her back towards her and summoned her sword and shield. “I owe you one again but don’t think I’ll forget you pushing me around, Ouro .”
Ouro scoffed with a grin, she blew more thick smoke and leaned back to look Amelia down her nose. “That’s Lord Ouro to you, you fucking peasant.” She snapped her fingers and two people popped in out of thin air, a maid and a butler, both with clocks for heads.
Without a word, they somehow changed the boulder Ouro was sitting on into the most offensively ostentatious throne. The butler pulled out a small table with a clear square glass cup on top and a bucket of ice underneath it. The maid pulled out a bottle of liquor and popped the cork, dutifully pouring their lord a cup. The butler finished it off by adding two ice cubes before they both stood on either side of the throne on standby.
“I don’t even know how to react to that,” Amelia thought as she mentally shook her head. “I don’t even want to give her the satisfaction of a reaction.”
Meanwhile, Kronii thought, “I’ll deal with you later then,” as she shot Ouro with an irked look.
Ouro took a sip and ahh’d in satisfaction. “Well?” She eyed them with a smug grin. “Entertain me.” She tilted her head, just marginally widening her grin before taking another sip.
Amelia shook her head one last time before taking a fighting stance. Though before she could charge Kronii, she was stopped once again.
“Hold, on! Hold on.” Ouro called with a beckoning wave of her hand. “Come here.”
“What is it this time?!” Amelia yelled. “I’m in the middle of a fight, damn it!”
Ouro’s brows met in the middle as her eyes sharpened. She snapped her fingers and her servants retrieved Amelia by force. They appeared on either side of her, held her down, and dragged her back to Ouro, holding her head just inches from Ouro’s shoe. Amelia tried to fight back, but she couldn’t even muster her flames.
“I was gonna get you back to tip-top shape. You know, to before you got your ass beat by your dearly beloved friends? ” Ouro started, her voice had an immensely annoyed tic to it. “Is that any way to talk to your savior?” She said while rubbing the tip of her shoe on Amelia’s face. “ Huh? ” She quickly raised her shoe and used the back of Amelia’s head as a footstool. She wasn’t even looking at her anymore, she was busier looking at the grass waving next to her throne.
“You can help me…” Amelia replied, her teeth gnashed in anger as she forcefully raised her head to glare at Ouro. “...by fucking. Off. ”
Her head quickly snapped to Amelia, but instead of getting more annoyed, she was eyeing her with amusement. She laughed and waved her servants to let her go. “Fine. You do have the phoenix,” She said as she watched the liquor in her glass swirl along with her hand’s motions. “Go on then. I won’t stop you any longer.”
Amelia stood quickly, backing away while her glare never faded.
“Good luck~” Ouro mocked as she raised a toast toward Amelia before taking a sip.
Amelia walked towards Kronii while stretching her shoulders, the annoyed look on her face softening just a tiny bit.
“Done with your master-pet play? Get a room next time, why don’t you?” Kronii mocked with a tilt of her head and a smirk, her arms crossed under her chest.
“How about I get you a room instead? A neat little one-person wooden bunker 6 feet underground that leads to hell where you can replace Satan.” Amelia quipped back, resummoning her weapons. “Kind of you to wait for me, by the way.”
“Naturally.” Kronii summoned her swords as well. “I’m not a barbarian like you two. As proof of that, I allow you to make the first move.”
Amelia time jumped above Kronii with a swift downward slash, a bright, blinding flame trailing behind her swing. “Don’t mind if I do.”
Kronii, without moving a single centimeter, froze time before sighing. “They’re all the same.” She eyed Amelia for a moment with a bored look, observing her facial expression, the sword and shield she wielded, as well as everything else on her person. “They never learn.”
She shook her head with another sigh. She looked at her other self and wasn’t surprised to find that she was moving just fine within frozen time.
“Don’t act surprised,” Ouro said. “Want a drink?”
Kronii shook her head. “I’m not. And no, thank you, I don’t drink on the job. You’re basically me, you should know this.” She crossed her arms.
Ouro laughed again, louder this time. “You really think we’re the same person just because we’re both Ouro Kronii , don’t you? You stupid fucking warden.”
“Shut up.”
“It’s hilarious how much you don’t know. It’s also kinda offensive when you’re this fucking dumb while wearing my perfect face.”
“Why don’t you explain it to me then? We have all the time in the world , after all.” She grinned. “Though I can also just force it out of you.”
Ouro grinned wider before eyeing the dwindling liquor within her glass. She downed it in one gulp before the maid quickly filled it up again and the butler added two ice cubes. She leaned back in her throne and reversed her crossed legs.
She sipped as an idea lit up in her mind. “Tell you what, if you kill Watson, then I’ll answer your questions.”
“Hmph.” Kronii “Normally, I’d be offended if some mongrel had the guts to order me around but since you’re me , I’ll let it slide.”
“How gracious of me .” Ouro rolled her eyes, breathing in the thick smoke of her tobacco before releasing it.
The smoke she breathed out stopped moving at a certain point after leaving her system.
“I’d look behind me right now if I were you.” Ouro pointed with her tobacco.
“Please.” It was Kronii’s turn to roll her eyes.
“I warned you,” She said with another wide grin before taking another leisurely sip.
Kronii tilted her head in confusion. As she looked behind her and felt a chill travel down her spine when she saw Amelia’s eyes meeting hers. Her hands gripped her swords tightly before she swung, slicing Amelia’s head off her shoulders.
Though not a second later, her flame burst forth, and slowly but surely, Amelia began moving within the frozen world.
Kronii didn’t wait any longer despite her confusion. She sliced and diced the rest of Amelia’s body before unfreezing time once more.
Amelia’s bits and pieces burned brightly. Before she hit the ground, her body had pieced itself back together. So she quickly swung up at Kronii while releasing a wave of fire from the sword.
Kronii froze time and moved aside to slice Amelia into cubes once more. Only for her to return to normal a second after time moves forward.
This exchange happened a few more times as Ouro watched in boredom the longer it kept going.
“How dull… everything’s going as expected.”
She used her Eyes of the Timelord to peek at other timelines branching from the battle before her.
In virtually every single branching timeline resulting from this moment, Kronii will grow tired of their endless exchange. In an attempt to finish it once and for all, she forces time to go through Amelia as decades, centuries, and millennia pass through her in a blink.
The result was as expected.
Amelia burns up the phoenix core as she aged.
She dies and turns to ashes.
The process of reincarnation begins.
But Kronii takes the core exactly as Amelia stole it from Takanashi Kiara.
There was no future from this moment forward where Amelia won at all.
So Ouro sighed again, taking another sip of her liquor and another breath of her tobacco.
“I don’t know why I even saved her anymore. This is a waste of my Time.”
She yawned for a bit, slouching in her throne as she mechanically looked at more branching timelines.
“I should take the watch now, I suppose. Such a shame. I liked this Watson, too. All the others lacked her grit.”
As she was about to stand, an idea struck her mind — a small one. She sank back into her throne, took another sip, and another breath. Using her Eyes, she looked at other branching timelines during a previous moment. That moment being the one when Mumei rewrote Amelia Watson out of humanity.
Her eyes widened from what she saw. Her mouth hung agape as she was forced to lean forward with both hands gripping the arms of her throne with enough force to leave cracks. Her glass broke as a result, her liquor spilled all over her glove and the sleeve of her black suit. Her tobacco was crushed between her fingers too.
As she watched further along, her mouth slowly twitched into a mad grin.
She looked at her present timeline, Kronii was about to force time through Amelia. Then, she looked back at the timeline she found and it revealed…
…a burning planet.
The rest of the remaining Council members were gathered together and they were all burning in the fiery rage of Amelia’s flames.
Tsukumo Sana was crying and thrashing in mid-air, her wild movements causing tears in the fabric of space.
Ceres Fauna was on her hands and knees, gnashing her teeth as she tried her damnedest in a futile attempt to neutralize the flames eating her body. Realizing that there was no success for her, she could only glare at the perpetrator. Her tears couldn’t even roll down her cheeks as they simply evaporated.
Even Ouro Kronii was in flames. Her attempts to freeze and reverse the flames bore no fruit much to her great chagrin. She could only guess that her Divinity had become inferior to Amelia’s flames. She tried to keep herself standing tall and proud, with her sword stabbed into the ground as both hands gripped it tightly. However, even she could not keep herself from taking a knee.
Rageful eyes looked ahead of her, the perpetrator standing beside the time traveler. Her stomach churned in disgust as her blood boiled from more than just the flames that were eating her alive.
Heartbroken, a tear almost formed at the corner of her eyes as she yelled her rage with all her heart.
“HAKOS BAELZ! YOU DAMN TRAITOR!”