#like. listen I love Yunia/Ranni and their relationship is very sweet at times

[goddevouringserpent]

thinking about them... (Yunia AUs)

not-a-Tarnished AU: remains a knight of the House of Caria, earning their respect and something resembling affection thanks to years upon years of loyal service. her competence and dedication lead her to climb in the ranks, so to speak, and earn a closeness with the Carians that she could've only ever dreamed of—with time, she even becomes Ranni's confidante, after a fashion. not quite Blaidd-level, but Ranni trusts in them as someone who is thoroughly and relentlessly dedicated to her, and who unlike Blaidd is not "programmed" to turn against her should she betray the Two Fingers; if Blaidd is Ranni's right hand, Yunia is her left hand. (or like. hands. there's four arms in there after all. or there will be.) worth mentioning that Yunia's hopeless puppy-love-crush on Ranni is still every bit as present as it is in their canon. girl is down bad, and in this AU it's even more hopeless unfortunately.

anyway, fast forward to Ranni's Night of the Black Knives scheme. this time around, as her Loyal Knight, Yunia is in on it—or as "in on it" as Ranni lets anyone be, anyway—even if, more likely than not, they didn't play any part in it. still, after the deed is done and Ranni's gone dollmode, Yunia gets to join the Caria Manor Inner Circle & continues to work for Ranni, towards the goal of the Age of Stars, alongside Blaidd and Iji (and allegedly Seluvis but we know how that goes, don't we). she'd be there when the Tarnished arrives, and... honestly I'm not sure she'd have a questline of her own because Yunia's quest is, ultimately, Ranni's questline. but they would be available as a summon for Radahn's fight if—and only if—the player has pledged their service to Ranni, then somewhere down the line they would also be available as a NPC summon for... Astel, Naturalborn of the Void, maybe? still have to figure that one out.

non-Tarnished Yunia's endings are always tragic. girlie does not get a break. if the player goes through with Ranni's questline to the point where they become her consort / give her the ring at Manus Celes, Yunia pretty much dies of heartbreak. the next time the player goes to Ranni's Rise, they'll find Yunia standing near the place where Ranni used to sit, as though keeping watch, and if spoken to she'll say:

"And thus, my service, my duty, my purpose... it all comes to an end, and I am left hollow. A severed sword-arm. No worth in me." "Ah, Tarnished... I did not think I would see you again. You have fought bravely. More than I could." "If I may be so bold, be good to lady Ranni, please. Take care of each other." "I know her moon will rise, brighter than star and sky. If only I could witness it one last time... but I have not earned the privilege. My silence is my oath, unto eternity."

then if you rest at a Grace/port out and come back/etc etc, you'll find Yunia's lifeless body leaning against Ranni's chair, and you'll be able to loot her armour (an unique variant of the Carian Knight armour) & her signature weapon.

on the other hand, if you reach the Mountaintops of the Giants and burn the Erdtree without having pledged your service to Ranni / unlocked Age of Stars as a potential ending, Yunia will invade you in Leyndell. killing her this way also lets you claim her armour and weapon.

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Lord of Frenzied Flame AU: less meat in this one, but the gist of it is that I asked myself "what ending would Yunia go for if Age of Stars wasn't an option?" and the answer was that she would succumb to the temptation of the Frenzied Flame lol. or... to the grief of it, more like. the hopelessness.

because, like, in the Frenzyflame AU, Yunia loses all her loved ones, all she has ever worked for, the only sense of purpose she's ever had, and gains nothing. she has to see the way in which the House of Caria—which she had devoted her entire pre-exile life to—has fallen into disgrace and disrepair, and there's absolutely jack shit she can do about it. & in her canon, working alongside Ranni makes up for that at least, but in the Frenzyflame AU they don't have that (I'm picturing it's some sort of domino effect of things going very wrong, where they don't go all the way up towards Caria Manor because they're terrified of the state it'll be in & it's not as if anyone would be there, anyway, and therefore they never encounter Ranni; Rogier's quest would bypass that so I feel like he would die before he could decipher the whole deal behind the Cursemark of Death and therefore give Yunia any hope, no matter how small, of Ranni being alive and active).

and, man. Yunia would be left purposeless and adrift and THIS close to just saying "whatever, fuck everything". a sensation that would only increase as people around her—people she's grown to respect and, in certain cases, genuinely like—keep dropping like flies. so yeah, she goes off the deep end. may chaos take the fucking world. (also slightly motivated by the fact that she feels a world without Ranni in it is a world that deserves to be purged and started anew but shhh let's not mention that. let's pretend Yunia is well-adjusted and not at all an obsessive clingy individual with a crush so devoted it wraps around to being toxic. leal hound of the Dark Moon Princess my beloved.)