(Rem x Reader) Re:Reader - Starting YOUR New Life in Another World

Chapter 171: Stand Up

A/N: I really do consider this chapter as the high water mark of the entire fic. I don't think we're going to ever get a chapter better than this, but I will try my darndest to write to this caliber in the future for other planned impactful chapters.

It was entirely how this chapter panned out, was the sole reason I even set out to write this fic this far. I had this entire chapter in my head for probably... The better half of nearly 10 years? (Whenever it was when the arc 5 WN was in its roughest translation I think in 2019 or 2020.)

I really tried my best to sculpt and craft and refine all the events and plot to reach this point in a way it all makes sense and ties together (especially for Reader's development). This one I really, truly, put my everything into writing to make it as emotionally profound as I possibly could.

I also really need to extend my heartfelt thanks to not just the artists who agreed to take commissions for this chapter's artwork, but for all the wonderful artwork this fic has been blessed to have. Mostly, my chapters have one, or maybe two artworks of a critical scene, but this particular chapter features a whopping TEN of them for everything it has. The first being from @ Notperf_Art (on twitter) and the other NINE towards the end of this chapter, from @ MagzanZaksylyk (also on twitter).

Like always, ffnet will not have the art on it because well, we know why at this point. WP will, and so will A03. I really do encourage you all to check out the art, as it really completes this chapter's entire appeal.

This chapter is the longest I have currently published. At nearly 40k words, I didn't split it primarily because so much of what happens flows right into the next. For the entirety of ACT V, I have one last chapter planned, which again, will feature two artworks. In other words, 172 will be the last of this batch of chapters, and the fic will again go into hiatus for ACT VI.

As for now, please enjoy this chapter, and feel free to leave a comment or kudos or a like or whathaveyou if I could so humbly ask for them, —especially for this chapter.

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Chapter 171: Stand Up

Uneven and erratically stumblesome footsteps marked his path over to her, each one dragging slightly against the pristine surface beneath him as though the weight of his own existence resisted forward motion.

YN: — — —

Though he was no longer waterlogged and cold from the rain he had died in, his unkempt disposition remained. The moment he had laid eyes on her upon arriving, shame had seized him so completely that he had instinctively pulled the hood of his cloak up and over his head, drawing it low enough to obscure even the wrappings beneath, burying himself beneath layers to somehow make him less visible.

Wearing the cloak she had made only made things worse. It was something she had crafted from scratch with care, —a precious gift from his beloved, one he had graciously accepted because he believed himself worthy of it. To wear it now, as he was, felt like a mockery of that sentiment. It clung to him not as comfort, but as a reminder of what he had failed to live up to, —a garment meant for someone better than who he had become.

Though she looked onward towards him, just as before, her eyes were glazed over with a passing of an unknowable amount of time. Seeing her here only fueled his previous fears that she was awake in this realm for the length of his absences, and thus, her body and mind, out of pure monotony, would go into a stasis or conscious hibernation of sorts.

With every sluggarded step he took close to her, his mind became weaker and weaker as he lived this fear of meeting her here like this. Anxiety and apprehension filled his body to the point he might burst, and he wanted nothing more than to collapse and vomit it all out all these apprehensive emotions. A pain of sorrow and shame gripped his heart, nearly strangling his ability to breathe.