>>21608870Ash wins the Kalos League, or even loses, and we get one final arc: an invitational tournament between all the best trainers of every region. Ash is invited for his high placings in six regional tournaments.
Among all the combatants, all of Ash's rivals are there, whether he bested them before or whether they halted his progress in an earlier tournament. Gary, Ritchie, Drake, Paul, Tobias, Cameron, Virgil, a bunch of people whose names I can't remember because I haven't been actively interested in the anime in years and mostly know a few later names from shitposting, but it's just a dream tournament between all the best trainers in the history of the anime.
Go through the tournament, show all of Ash's battles and perhaps some battles of his rivals, and Ash comes out on top. Happy with this, he retires.
Really rough idea, it'd need to be smoothed out a lot with a lot of details filled in, but that's the gist of what I think would best end his journey. No shipping (though I suppose maybe in an epilogue someone could win the Ash bowl), it climaxes with just one hell of an all-star tournament.
