#axe and mace knight would have to be the protagonist

[gotogull]

Ancient Knight

[gascon-en-exil]

FE16 Blue Lions Liveblogging

Chapters 15-16. And so begins the killing of students from the other houses. 

...Eh. No big deal as far as I’m concerned.

The setting for Chapter 15 is Ailell, which when it was first mentioned by an NPC during the school phase I thought was just their church’s name for Hell. It turns out it’s a real place, and in folklore it’s more akin to Purgatory than Hell. Gilbert even remarks that stories of Ailell are not mentioned in their scripture, similar to how Purgatory is a distinctly Catholic belief that does not appear (except, possibly, very obliquely in the Apocrypha) in the Bible. I mention all this in the gameplay section because the overall effect had been squandered by the game’s earlier use of this same map for Ingrid’s paralogue, there with no explanation.

Chapter 16′s great bridge meanwhile had me dreading the thought that the developers might revisit Tellius’s bridge map with its hidden pitfalls and sandbags cluttering up the path. Thankfully not, but it’s a cluttered map with a lot of high movement enemies (including the boss, which is getting to be a regular occurrence) and surprise reinforcements.

Dedue’s back, yay. Granted he almost died twice to the aforementioned mobile boss doubling him. Considering how strong he was before the timeskip it really goes to show how much higher the enemy stats are in Part 2. I’m sure it won’t take him too long to catch up, though.

I was not expecting Dimitri to get both his personal Relic and second unique promotion so soon. I thought it would have made more sense to let him promote to great lord after he’d come to his senses a bit, but it comes along with Rodrigue.

In regards to Relics, Annette got hers from her paralogue...and it’s an axe or rather a mace but you know how it goes in FE. Even though it deals magic damage and she can use it at E rank I feel like I shouldn’t have completely neglected her otherwise inexplicable axe proficiency.

Killing Lorenz and Ferdinand was fun, both because they were a bit harder than the map’s generics and because they get full death quotes and all. I think there’s a way to spare and recruit characters you face like this, but it’s probably tied to their support level with Byleth or something.

Ingrid was the first to master a master class, but I quickly realized that she didn’t have the ranks to move to another one. I sent her all the way back to fighter to work on axes for wyvern lord, because it still makes use of her lance and flying ranks. Sylvain made it to dark knight and is doing surprisingly well despite his low MAG thanks to some strong spell options. Felix and Mercedes are just about ready for master classes, and the rest are still working their way through other classes to prepare for their endgame picks.

Side note, but I like how each character’s post-timeskip design is used for their model in their “default” class: Sylvain for paladin, Mercedes for bishop, and so on.

Story/Character observations

I was not expecting Rodrigue to have such a major story role. He even appears during monastery exploration as an orange dot, which led me to believe he was a recruitable unit at first.

I know I haven’t quite reached the point where Dimitri snaps out of his fugue, but when I read about how his recovery is just another symptom of FE Avatar worship it strikes me as an exaggeration in this instance. Gilbert, Rodrigue, Felix, and now Dedue have all played into exploring the prince’s mental state and pushing him forward. There’s even little bits with the other characters like Mercedes and Ingrid worrying over him and trying to either cheer him up or work around his fixation on revenge, all outside of supports (which he still can’t get). Byleth, hampered as a mostly silent protagonist, offers little by comparison.

Some good political drama to be had in all three nations, following in the footsteps of Genealogy showing how the holy blood houses have all chosen different sides and turned against each other. That’s the major subject of one of Seteth’s supports with Ingrid, that the same thing happened to Fódlan’s Ten Elites. And of course it has gameplay ramifications as well, with not just the house leaders but all the students fighting each other.

 Dedue’s return is, in Chapter 16 at least, a purely personal one between him and Dimitri, which... *coughs significantly* In what I’m pretty sure is his first instance of acknowledging the value of life since the timeskip, Dimitri makes Dedue promise him never to sacrifice himself like that again. Forget the weird bit at the very end with Dimitri letting the orphan girl join the army (which may or may not bite him in the ass later? Seems like a setup for a betrayal), his reunion with Dedue is really the moment where he starts to feel again. 

Of course the problem with that is that Dedue’s survival is still optional so the writing has to be prepared for that. I don’t know how it plays out in the event that he doesn’t come back, but maybe I’ll have a clearer idea of it in a chapter or two.

[matarabarian]

I realized I haven’t posted much about any story other than the first two chapters of Throne of the Abyss and I’ve already talked a lot about Vica so I figured I’d post the first scene he appears in.

A few notes on the plot so far so no one gets lost:

Ruuno is the protagonist who works with the Lumen Dias Knighthood(LDK)

Anima are an antagonistic species

Izera was an anima overlord who was sealed in a necklace years ago

Izera is going to break out so Ruuno and a group of select knights are going to destroy the necklace he is sealed in.

In short, it sounds like a totally cliche story, but that’s the point, because I like to take cliches and spit on them. It’s kinda a sadistic pleasure So trust me when I say this story has a twist at the end. Anyway, enjoy! Please?

But as he looked off into the trees, a flicker of violet caught his eye. He stopped his horse, pulling back on the reins as he stared into the trees. A pair of purple eyes met his own and Ruuno's heart stopped in his chest. Looking a little closer, he saw the form of a man, dressed in a fashion similar to a noble, with a pitch black coat over a pale daisy yellow buttoned up coat with ebony buttons and a white jabot collar. He appeared to have dark gray, almost black, hair, but looked very young, maybe a year older than Ruuno himself. But the bright purple eyes told him this person wasn't even remotely human. The man—no, anima—cocked his head to the side, his eyes never leaving Ruuno's. His eyes shifted in color from purple to a bright blue and he winked. Ruuno's jaw dropped a little and the anima waved at him, smiling.

“Hey, what's the holdup, little blond riding hood?” Tiara called.

“That,” Ruuno replied, pointing to the anima with his arm trembling. “That is the holdup.”

The group followed his finger and a second later, a sword surrounded by a glowing purple light thrust through the air and almost impaled Guryon if he hadn't unsheathed his sword and blocked it at the very last second. The sword recovered from the block and went on the offensive. As if controlled by an invisible swordsman, it swooped around, thrusting and slashing at Guryon, but a few seconds later it retreated, floating next to the anima, who stepped out of the shadowy woods, along with several other blades and other weapons. The entire party dismounted, preparing for battle.

The anima held his hand up and waved at the group, although it was a bit more sarcastically than how he waved to Ruuno. “Why, hello there, noble knights! Care for a cup of tea? We can sit around, gossip, and eat biscuits around a table!” his voice was melodious, but possessed a distinct eerie tone to it because of how unhinged it sounded. His eyes had turned a reddish-purple in color and he seemed to be on the verge of giggling like a schoolgirl. “Hahaha, no. No, no, no, nono!” He sang the last part and burst out into gleeful laughter.

“Oh, shit,” Aegeus muttered.

“What?” Helen asked.

“I think know which anima this is, and it's not good,” Aegeus muttered.

Ruuno racked his brain from his anima studies class, trying to run through the names and descriptions of all the infamous anima before his internal monologue became something like claws on blackboards. His eyes went wide and he could hear his heart pounding in his throat. “Vica,” Ruuno whispered, wondering why the powers that be hated him so much. This got a reaction from everyone, even Fulbright. Apprehension graced their faces and fear slipped through some of the brave facades they had attempted to put up when they heard Vica's name.

Vica had been Izera's right-hand man back in the Spectral War. Izera trusted him above all others and Vica in return was devoted to Izera on an obsessive level. Ever since Izera fell, Vica had been a near-constant threat to the LDK but had been abandoned as an active target because almost every knight who faced him was killed. The ones who didn't either ran or Vica just kept them alive to mock them. That wasn't to say Vica didn't still go after the LDK on a regular basis. Vica was able to store and summon weapons from his aura and control them with deadly accuracy, making him one of the more lethal anima out there. There was even one recorded case where an entire regiment was sent to fight him, and were all killed. What was the icing on this doom cake? He was bloody insane even by anima standards.

Vica laughed and clapped his hands together as Ruuno said his name. “Bingo! Glad you all still remember me!” He brought one hand up and started waving it distractedly as he rambled. “I mean, I don't forget about the LDK, ever, although I don't know all of the names of it's members, but I do remember most of you because you're all, I don't know, complete scumbags?” Vica said this as a question, but it was clear there was no ambiguity about it in his mind. He giggled and pointed at them one by one as he named them. “Colonel Aegeus Euclid, Captain Fulbright Behnam, Sergeant Helen Manius, Major Guryon Haluk, Lieutenant Tiara Dobroslav, and a cute John Doe.”

Ruuno's mind drew a blank for a few seconds. “What?”

Vica smiled, the innocent smile jarringly out of place on an anima's face. “Don't worry, cute in a non-romantic, purely aesthetic way. Although, I would like to know your name. It would be really unfortunate if I had to go run around and burn and ransack LDK bases to find your file with your name.”

Ruuno gripped the hilt of his sword and pulled it out of its scabbard. “Ruuno. Corporal Ruuno Lykke,” he growled out.

Vica rocked back and forth on his feet as his eyes turned a blue-violet. “Ruuno. Rune no. Rune-o. That's a pretty name. Not like Fulbright or Guryon. The title doesn't sound nice with it, though. It's cacophonous. Ooh, that's a word some of you might have to look up in a dictionary! And Lykke. Like Lykke. Pretty.” Vica seemed to muse over this for a few seconds, like it was a riddle or something important, then smiled again and was in front of Ruuno in a second.

Ruuno's eyes widened and his hands holding his sword shook, having barely seen Vica move. He had never been this close to an anima, especially not one who Izera himself relied on. He tried to swing his sword, maybe chop Vica's head off, but his muscles just couldn't move. Vica reached over and tapped Ruuno on the nose. “Bop-boop!”

“W- what?” Ruuno stuttered, shocked that he both let an anima touch him and that said anima didn't even hurt him.

Vica beamed. “You are too cute to be a member of the LDK. Why don't you hop off that horse and let me give you a safe place to stay?”

That snapped Ruuno out of it. He slashed at Vica with his blade, who nimbly danced back. “I'll never join you, or Izera, or any of you monsters!”

“Aw, that's a shame,” Vica whined. “But don't worry!” He winked. “I don't give up, so how about I kill alllllll your little friends, and then you come with me because I won't leave you another choice?”

Ruuno gritted his teeth. “I would rather die.”

“Not an option,” Vica said, winking again. He reached over and patted Ruuno's head, one of his swords parrying the blond's attempt at stabbing him again. Vica turned back to the rest of the group. “As for you, I don't like you. You've killed a lot of anima, especially you, Captain Shiny! I think I want to hurt you, very badly.” Vica paused and thought for a second. “Yep, definitely want to hurt you. Oh, and you are trying to kill Izera! I really hate you for that!”

Aegeus' eyes widened. “How do you know that? That information was-”

“Classified?” Vica asked. He smiled and glanced up and to the right. “That's a funny word. Classified. Class, if, I, and Ed. Classes are where knowledge is dispersed, if means possibly, I means me, and I don't know who Ed is, but I don't think he has anything to do with restricting information either. Huh, weird word.”

“Hey! Looney bin!” Helen snapped. “Where did you learn about that?”

Vica played with a small white flower he had gotten from somewhere, smiling at it. “Oh, you know, I have friends. Some of which may or may not be in your organization.”

“We have a mole?” Guryon cried. “Oh, this day just sucks more and more.”

“He could be lying,” Tiara reasoned.

“He knew about our mission, he couldn't have found out without inside information,” Aegeus growled. “We can worry about the mole later, we have to deal with Vica now.”

Vica grinned maliciously, more swords and daggers appearing around him along with a few axes, a mace, and a club. “I won't let you hurt Izera, so I'll have to kill you.”

“Fat chance, psycho,” Guryon growled and lunged at him. Vica dodged then sent three swords directly at his head that Guryon barely managed to block. Ruuno thrust his sword directly at Vica's chest, wanting to tear the anima's heart out but Vica parried the blow happily then knocked him back with the club.

“Sorry, Ruuno!” Vica sang. “But I can't have you getting in the way of the fight! Don't worry, I'll pay attention to you later.”

“Wow, that borderlines on creepy,” Tiara commented.

“Borderlines?” Ruuno demanded. “Just borderlines?”

“Oh, hush up, I need to deck the cuckoo anima,” Tiara said, grinning confidently, but there was a quiver in her lip. Like a ninja, she dodged around Vica's blades and delivered a vicious roundhouse kick that Vica somehow blacked with his forearms, smacking her leg off to the side. He grabbed the back of her neck and pulled her to the ground blocking another kick in the process, this one with a sword which left a deep cut in her leg. She fell on her back and Vica stood over her, fighting everyone else off with his army of blades.

“Aw, you don't think you're the only one who knows martial arts, do you?” Vica smirked and held one of his swords above her body. “So sweet, but so futile. Bye-bye!” With that he thrust the sword down but at the last second, it was knocked to the side. Vica frowned and his eyebrows rose, looking both surprised and annoyed at the same time. Tiara glanced up and saw a familiar pair of green eyes mixed with blond hair and smiled in relief.

“Leave her alone!” Ruuno shouted.

Vica crossed his arms and looked like a petulant child. “Ruuno, please stay out of the way. It's distracting to fight and have to worry about you being in the middle of it. What if I hit you?”

“And he's just doing this because he thinks you're cute?” Guryon asked while trying to avoid being hit by a pack of daggers. “Jeez, how far gone is he?”

“Vica's obsession gives us an advantage so I'm not looking a gift horse in the mouth!” Aegeus yelled as he dodged a golden sword, trying to knock it out of the air. “Ruuno, try to get in and stab him! Vica doesn't want to hurt you for now and we might as well use that!”

“Oh, you want to use my love for Ruuno against me?” Vica cooed, frowning at them. “That’s so cruel.”

“Says the anima who gets off on murder,” Ruuno said scornfully.

Vica sighed, twirling a strand of hair around his finger, looking bored. “It's amazing how you could twist a story around so much. If a normal man started screaming bunnies want to kill all of humanity, people write him off as a crackpot. If he starts acting on his beliefs, people call him insane. When a knight started screaming the same thing, somehow people paid him attention. When he started acting on it, they joined in.”

Guryon gave him an incredulous look. “Did you just relate murdering, bloodlusting lunatics to bunnies?”

“No, I related them to knights,” Vica replied.

Ruuno could not believe Vica had just said that and neither could any of the others. Ruuno’s hands clenched into fists and he started to tremble in rage at Vica’s callous brush-aside of all the harm anima had caused and his scorn at those who only wanted to protect people. “You son of a….”

“Before you finish that, know that my mother was actually an anima who could morph into a dog and speak to canines, so it wouldn’t actually offend me,” Vica said with a smile. Ruuno felt his anger boil over as he lunged at Vica, his sword slashing faster than the human eye could see. Vica looked ever so slightly surprised as he repeatedly blocked Ruuno’s strikes with five different swords. “Wow, you’re really good when you get angry. Maybe we can train sometime? I could show you some moves, if you want.” Vica winked at him again before blasting him to the side with a purple light. “But for now, just sit over there and watch me turn your friends into shish-kebabs like a good boy.”

Ruuno winced as he got up, every muscle in his body protesting. “I won’t let you hurt them, I won’t let them fight you on their own.”

“Famous last words of the meat shield, everyone,” Fulbright muttered.

Vica’s smile faded from his lips and his eyes turned pure red. “Excuse me, Ruuno. I need to take care of someone.” In the blink of an eye, he was right in front of Fulbright and lifted him up by the collar. “I don’t like people who diss their own allies and comrades. It’s wrong and it’s mean. People like that don’t deserve to have their comrades watching their back, and if any of you get in my way except for Ruuno, I will kill you as well, extra bloodily.”

“Get the hell away from him!” Guryon roared, charging forward and stabbing at Vica with his sword, which Vica blocked as usual with one of his many swords, but Guryon didn’t stop.

Vica glanced over at him for a second and narrowed his eyes. “So be it.” Eight swords surrounded Guryon and attacked ruthlessly, with the brown-haired man barely hanging on.

Ruuno breathed heavily and he limped over to the fight. He couldn’t let Fulbright or Guryon die. His arm feeling dead, he started to throw his own strikes, weak as they were. Vica gritted his teeth and looked honestly annoyed as he blocked Guryon’s and Ruuno’s attacks, as if he was straining himself. Ruuno focused on a drop of sweat trickling down from Vica’s forehead and saw Vica’s constant focus for blocking so many strikes so close to his body was taking its toll on him. Ruuno took a deep breath and yelled, “Guys! Attack him so he has to block you! It’s harder for him to block

Aegeus, Tiara, and Helen looked at Ruuno in bewilderment, then saw Vica’s face. Aegeus met Ruuno’s eyes and nodded solemnly, then ordered, “Everyone, attack now!” Tiara pulled out a knife and started slashing the blades themselves and trying to hit Vica when she had the chance to force him into blocking and Helen threw fireball after fireball at him with his swords barely able to absorb the blows. Aegeus took up the role of defending the others when Vica tried to counterattack.

Ruuno’s hopes lifted up as he saw Vica struggle to stay on top of everything, the anima’s eyes darting around like a trapped animal before his lips drew back in a vicious snarl. He threw down Fulbright and curled his hands into fists that began to glow with a purple light as he shook in rage. “You’re all meanies!” Vica screamed, a flash of purple energy throwing everyone back. Ruuno slammed into a tree and felt a new wave of pain wrack his body and a quick glance at the others’ faces showed him the fear that had crept into his body wasn’t just him. Vica stood up straight and moved his angry, unstable glare from Guryon to Tiara to Fulbright to Helen and finally to Aegeus. “I will hurt you,” Vica seethed. “You’re meanies! You people hurt Izera two hundred years ago and you’re trying to hurt him again! No, you’re trying to kill him! I’ll never let you kill him! If Izera’s going to be strong enough for his seal to break soon, that means he’ll come back! I want him back! I need him back!”

“Yeah, to wipe out humanity,” Tiara snapped.

“No! I just want him back!” Vica cried, shaking his head and stamping his feet like he was throwing a temper tantrum, tears falling from his eyes. “I want my Izera back! You won’t prevent him from coming back!” He suddenly laughed, the merriment sounding unhinged and twisted. “You will never win! Izera will be back! Izera will live through this, and in three months, I’ll see him again! Izzie will return! Izzie, Izzie, Izzie, Izzie!” Vica started to giggle and he suddenly seemed a lot more dangerous than he had a few minutes ago. “I miss Izzie, and if I kill you, Izera won’t be in any danger.” Vica glanced over at Ruuno, madness glinting in his eyes. “Oh, Ruuno! I hurt you! I’m so sorry! But you seem to want to put your faith with these people, so I guess I’ll have to cause you pain before things get better. But I’m not giving up, I’ll make you reject them and everything they stand for! You’ll be mine in the end!”

Aegeus scrambled to his feet and sheathed his sword, looking panicked. “Retreat! Retreat now!” he cried, then mounted his very spooked horse and rode off a gallop. No one disagreed in the face of a livid anima who was five seconds away from murdering everyone minus a certain blond and as if a hive mind, the other five got on their horses and rode off at lightning speed in a pack formation.

“Oh, you’re running now?” Vica yelled behind them. “Well, the LDK has always been a bunch of cowards. But don’t think I won’t follow! Izera will return!” Vica’s voice dissolved into chilling, maniacal laughter that echoed in Ruuno’s ears as he urged his horse to go faster.