Ballad of the Nameless Soldier

by Rigo Senhedro

Not every soldier in the war have had their stories told. This story follows a group of Class First Agito Cadets and how they view the war from their perspective, and their interaction with Class Zero and other characters.

1. Chapter I

Three Hours that Changed the World

Kazuki was woken up by the sound of explosions. Something was going on. Naomi raised her head from the pillow in her bed right across from when Kazuki was lying. "What's going on?" Kazuki heard her say. "I don-" he was interrupted by Ren storming into the dorm, "Milites is attacking us!" he shouted. "What!?" both Kazuki and Naomi said in tandem. Kazuki sat up in bed and bent his head so he could see the window. Clearly he could see three huge imperial dreadnoughts with their horrifying cannons and White Tiger symbols painted all over the looming ship. The cannons fired again, and again he heard explosions that could only mean a conflict was starting. "Oh no.." Naomi muttered and Kazuki could see she was about to have a panic attack. Seconds later the alarm rang, and both Naomi and Kazuki threw on their uniforms before dashing out of the room with Ren.

They were all members of Class First, the most talented class of the twelve Agito Cadet classes. Each and every class had their respective role, and all shared the same black and red uniform, the only way to distinguish one class from the others was that all cadets wore a short scarf around their necks, and the color of the scarf depended on what class the cadet was in. These three had their scarfs colored light blue.

The trio quickly found themselves in the main hall of Akademeia, their magic academy. Everything was at chaos, they could see cadets from all classes as well as "Legionaries", the standard soldier in Rubrum. Unlike soldiers, the cadets were not trained for war but to be symbolic guardians of the Vermilion Bird Crystal, and only be used in war under extreme circumstances. This seemed to be one of those circumstances, as everyone was storming out from the building. Kazuki, Ren and Naomi decided to follow the stream and ran with them, past the thirteen-hour clock that showed it was still morning and Kazuki recalled that the date was Aquamensis XII 842 RG. Once out of the academy they had a view of the garden, where a fountain used to stand, but now it was blown to pieces.

Akademeia was the name for both the capital city of the Dominion of Rubrum, and the magic academy that trained Agito Cadets. The city was built upon an island only connected to the mainland, Orience, by a long bridge in the north. The island Akademeia was build on was actually a very steep mountain, but it had been carved down so the bridge touched upon flat ground with the main city, but on the sides of the city that didn't connect to the bridge there were hills going up, giving a somewhat tall wall around southern parts of the city and on the very south point the hill wasn't carved down at all, because on the top were the academy, with a lookout that could see the entire island and the bridge. That's where Kazuki, Naomi and Ren were standing right now together with hundreds of other cadets and legionaries, and the numbers pooled up.

Not long after, most of the cadets - including our trio - were standing on the top of a broad staircase that was the main street, having taken the teleporter from the top of Akademeia to the main city. Cadets had established a base on the southern end of the main street, and imperial soldiers were rushing in from the north, being dropped off the dreadnaughts with Magitek Armors, or MAs, terrifying battle armors piloted by imperial engineers. The cadets on the southern end had conjured their most famous defensive spell, Wall, a simple spell that put up a transparent light blue wall that could be used as cover, but didn't last very long. Cadets that weren't focusing their power on fixing the barriers as they got shattered by fire from imperial troops were firing offensive spells towards the endless mass of soldiers that came running up. It was a terrible sight. "What about the people living in the city?" Kazuki heard Naomi cry. "Couldn't the imperials let them evacuate first?" It was true, the northern parts of the city that was so-to-say under imperial occupation was all on fire, and it's not to be taken for granted that people made it out, or wasn't killed in the crossfire. "Ren, what do we do?" Kazuki called out to his group leader, but he received no reply. "Ren?" Kazuki looked around in all the chaos, but couldn't spot his leader anywhere. Kazuki was an orphan, and didn't have a care in the world for anyone outside his class, but Naomi must have been terrified about her parents and younger sister. And Ren… he never talked about his personal life. Just as Kazuki called out to Ren, he could see five cadets from Class Second running towards the frontline, which was the main street of Akademeia, indigo scarves flickering around their necks. They paused just behind one of the Wall spells and held hands in a circle. A magic glyph appeared under their feet and everyone nearby backed off, and seconds later the five of them fell dead over. A heroic sacrifice, summoning an Eidolon required such a huge amount of magical power, most of the time it killed the summoners. A few skilled summoners could summon Eidolons without dying, some even managing to stay conscious after the act, but regardless of that it took a large toll on the body. Being part of a summoning squad was therefore signing up a suicide pact. The Eidolon summoned this time was Bahamut, one of the strongest Eidolons in existence. Summoning this Eidolon alone was impossible for any known summoner. Bahamut was a huge wyvern, and from where the Class Second cadets had stood moments before, he rose up, black clawed wings lifting him into the air where he became a target for dreadnought cannon fire. This didn't hurt Bahamut the slightest, and with a roar he opened his mouth and let out a beam that penetrated the dreadnought, sending it crashing into the sea. When Kazuki saw one of the magic barriers falling and the respective magician falling exhausted to the ground, he rushed over to replace him, dragged him out of the way and was about to conjure Wall himself when someone else did it for him. A cadet with a pink scarf - a Class Seventh cadet - had taken his place while a Class Fourth cadet with an orange scarf had begun healing the exhausted cadet that had collapsed before. Kazuki rushed to stand between an opening in the array of the summoned Walls, held out his hands, closed his eyes and imagined a fireball. When he opened his eyes again, a fireball rose out from his palms and hit an imperial trooper that tried to get close. 'They're all rushing to their deaths' he thought for himself. The spell he had just conjured was one of the most basic spells, Fire RF. Kazuki was just about to conjure Firaga RF-II, a much stronger version of the spell when Naomi appeared next to him in the gap between the Walls. "W-Why did you leave me back there?" Naomi nearly cried out. Kazuki had all forgotten how she hated noise, was easily startled and had frequent panic attacks. He couldn't imagine how hard this was for her. Before he could answer a stray bullet hit Naomi in her arm, and she screamed out. Kazuki dragged her behind one of the Walls, the one held up by the Class Seventh cadet that Kazuki had helped in place. Naomi didn't stop screaming so Kazuki had to drag her out of the frontline and into a back alley.

"Dammit, what the hell is this!?" Kazuki didn't know if he was talking to himself or to Naomi, but she was in so much pain she probably didn't hear him over her own screams. Kazuki didn't know what to do. He could have had the wound fixed up in a few seconds with a simple Cure spell, but what about the bullet still stuck in Naomi's arm? He didn't know if he should just seal the wound with the bullet inside or try to get it out some way, but that would definitively be more painful for her and he didn't know any painkilling spells. He suddenly got an idea and readied his hands for a spell. He closed his eyes, aimed at the wall and imagined a solid ball of ice. When he opened his eyes again, he had shot out a basic Blizzard RF spell, and the ball of ice shattered on the wall, but that was exactly what he wanted. He picked up one of the larger clumps of ice left and put it on Naomi's wound, hoping it would help lessen the pain of what he had to do. She flinched hard when he applied the ice, so Kazuki had to hold her arm still. He moved the ice clump away from the wound itself to get access, got his multitool out from his pocket, folded out the pliers and didn't hesitate to put it into Naomi's wound, causing her to scream and flinch with her entire body. Kazuki only used a moment to get a hold of the bullet and dragged it out. Expanding ammunition, the worst kind. The kind of bullet meant to expand after hitting the target so the bullet would end up exactly like this. After dragging the bullet out, Kazuki let go of everything he held, the multitool and the clump of ice, and focused all he could on conjuring Cure on Naomi's bleeding wound. Like usual, he closed his eyes, held his hands over the wound, and imagined the wound closing. He could feel the wound close under his hands, and when he opened his eyes, he saw Naomi sitting there with heavy breath but clearly calming down.

Not long after, while Kazuki and Naomi were still calming down, no one had said a word. But suddenly they felt something was wrong. They lost what they had seen as their sixth sense, the feeling of magic. All the magic in the air around them disappeared, and moments after they could hear the Wall spells on the frontline shattering like glass, following by the heavy marching of imperial troopers. "Kazuki, what is this?" Naomi asked. "I.. I don't know." he replied, and then they heard screams from the frontline and could observe the cadets being mown down by gunfire. "Shit." Kazuki muttered and dragged Naomi with him further into the back alley with a growing feeling of anxiety. He had not yet grasped the full picture of the situation, but soon they encountered two armed imperial troopers a little ahead of them. Kazuki instantly tried to conjure Firaga RF, a strong fireball spell, but nothing happened, and the troopers had now seen them in the narrow alleyway and were rushing towards them. "Run!" Kazuki said and both turned to run in the opposite direction, towards what used to be the frontline and the end of the main street of Akademeia, but a bullet hit him in his foot and he tumbled over, accidentally dragging Naomi with him. He rolled around and saw the imperials calmly approaching with their rifles and bayonets. One of them aimed his rifle on Naomi, who had started to get up but now sat frozen in place, and the other took aim on Kazuki. He could hear one of them give a short laugh and was disgusted. Who could find pleasure in killing? He closed his eyes and moment later heard a gunshot together with the scream of one of the imperial troopers. He heard a second gunshot and opened his eyes, and there stood Ren, katana in hand.

The three of them broke into the closest house and got the bullet out of Kazuki, who made much less noise than Naomi, even though he had to bandage his wound with his scarf and a piece of wood because they couldn't heal it. "Ren.. I don't know how to thank you." Kazuki said after they had positioned themselves in the basement of the house and locked the upper door. There were no windows in the room, so they had lit an oil lamp to reveal it was the average scrap basement with tools and planks and all kinds of carpenting utilities. A cold "Be more careful next time." was the only reply Kazuki got. Naomi was having a panic attack in the corner, and Kazuki didn't blame her. "What have they done to our magic?" he tried to ask, but Ren only replied "I saw them drop some machine down in the arena just moments before all magic short circuited." Slowly it sank in that this must be a crisis for the entire country. What if no one could use magic anymore? Then Rubrum would be under Militesi control in a few hours. The Militesi Empire… why would they attack Rubrum just out of the blue like this? "Do you think Lord Zhuyu will save us?" they heard Naomi say from the corner. "If there is no magic, Lord Zhuyu is just another helpless citizen." Ren replied. Lord Zhuyu was a Vermilion Bird Primus l'Cie. Each of the four nations in Orience had a magic crystal located in their Peristylium in their capital city. The crystals regularly picked out servants, granting them eternal life and superhuman powers at the cost of their freedom as humans. These servants were called l'Cie, and Kazuki knew there was a l'Cie in Rubrum that was over five hundred years old. L'Cie was categorized as either Primus l'Cie, who mostly had raw attack power and other offensive abilities, and Secundus l'Cie that didn't have the superhuman strength but had other useful abilities. Lord Zhuyu was somewhere between a hundred and two hundred years old, but he had earned himself the title of the strongest l'Cie in Orience. Could he really be neutralized so easily?

None of the three dared to exit the basement, and time went on, they could hear screams, gunfire, cannons, explosions… all the terrible sounds of war. However, suddenly they heard a massive explosion that stood out from the others, followed by something crashing in the sea. "What was that?" Kazuki asked, Ren only shrugged and Naomi seemed to just become more scared of it all. Nobody else knew, but Kazuki had a crush on Naomi, and since they were so close, people had questioned their relationship but only to be met with replies like "We're just friends" or "It's not like that". In the light from the oil lamp, Kazuki couldn't see Naomi's long light brown braid she had her long hair tucked into. His own hair was short and dark brown, nearly black. But the one with true black hair was Ren, who had a long smooth ponytail, pitch black. Surprisingly, it matched his thin and tall body. Like the average citizen of Rubrum, he was a little tanned. Kazuki turned back to Naomi. He wanted to go and console her, but he knew he would only make things worse. Helping Naomi in her earlier panic attacks had never worked out, and he didn't think he could help this time either. No matter, he tried anyway. Kazuki walked over to Naomi and sat down next to her. "Hey.." he tried to make her talk. "We're all going to die." was her reply. "You won't die.." Kazuki didn't want to make any promises he couldn't hold, but he felt like he had to. Naomi began silently crying again, letting out some quiet sobs. Kazuki had no idea what to do, but he wrapped his arm around her back and pulled closer to her. The two of them sat like this and didn't notice Ren leaving the basement and heading up to the first floor of the house. He returned with a whole bread, a knife and a big round cheese. "Are you two hungry or what?" Kazuki hadn't noticed, but he was very hungry. After all, they hadn't eaten the whole day. Suddenly he began thinking what might be happening outside… what if imperial troops are investigating each and every house to see if there are still people left? What if they just set the entire city on fire? Is the government taken captive? "Hello? Are you hungry?" Ren said in a slightly sarcastic voice and Kazuki's mind returned to present time. "Yeah, yeah.." he pushed out. They put the bread and cheese on a block of wood and cut it up. The food was dry, but they couldn't ask for luxuries right now. Kazuki noticed Naomi didn't eat, and he tried to console her by saying "Don't worry Naomi.. when this is all over, Rubrum will stand victorious, we will return to Akademeia and meet our families there.." but Naomi began crying again and managed to get out the words "I can't remember... my parents".

This was one of the many things the crystals did for us. They erased the memories of those who were dead, so we couldn't feel any sadness. A saying went like this: "The memories of the dead are the shackles of the past. We must forget in order to break free". But now it didn't give a feeling of freedom for Naomi to know her parents were dead. Kazuki didn't know how that felt like. He had lost his parents when he was just a baby, but how was it for a sixteen year old to lose her parents? He knew it was a lost cause to try to console Naomi right now, but still it didn't feel right to let her be alone with her misery. "Naomi.." Kazuki reached out to Naomi with his hand, but she suddenly snapped back at him nearly shouting "Leave me alone!" and then she got up and ran off. Out of the basement, and Kazuki and Ren could hear her open the front door and leave. "Is she really that stupid!?" Ren got up and showed the most emotion he had ever shown this day. Kazuki was about to run after her when Ren gestured to him to remain still. "You remain here." Ren was back to his cold demeanor. "But-" Kazuki tried to intercept but was cut off by Ren "Would you rather sacrifice your life for hers, only to find out it was for nothing?" Kazuki understood what he meant.

Naomi ran through the alleyways, hearing gunshot and screaming all around her, both near and distant. She didn't know how long she kept this up, but eventually she found herself in an alley facing an imperial trooper with his terrifying rifle and bayonet. Naomi was practically stunned for a moment, but then set off running in the opposite direction before she heard a gunshot and felt a horrible pain in her back. She screamed as she fell over and hit the ground hard. "Got one." the imperial trooper sounded so cold.. so indifferent. She heard another gunshot, this time from something that made less noise and came opposite direction, then everything faded black. "Hey? Hey, you okay?" Naomi opened her eyes and the first thing she saw was the red skirt of an Agito Cadet uniform. The girl who spoke stood right in front of her, and when she raised her head she could see the girl's face. The girl had short red-brown hair that went down to her shoulders and a confident smile on her face. In addition, instead of the regular scarf she wore a bright red cape. Naomi could also see the straps of a backpack around her shoulders. "Name's Keito, you?" the girl called Keito reached out a hand to help Naomi up. Her wound was gone, and she suspected this girl to have healed her, and as if prompted by her thoughts, Keito said "Don't worry about your wound. It's mostly healed up now." Whatever 'mostly' meant. When Naomi was on her feet, still all shaken up from her near-death experience, she uttered "Naomi", almost so quiet she was unsure if Keito heard her at all, but she heard and loudly proclaimed "Naomi, huh? Well Naomi, consider yourself to be lucky today," Keito's voice was full of confidence. "'Cause if I hadn't been here right now, you'd be frickin' dead." With extra pressure on the word 'dead', Keito sure knew how to scare the girl she just saved. They both stood in silence for a moment, when they heard a boy's voice saying "Keito, you there?" followed by another similarly dressed cadet jumping down from the rooftop to Naomi's left. This boy had short chestnut-colored hair and like Keito, didn't wear the usual Agito Cadet scarf but this boy had tied his crimson colored cape in front so it hung down his chest like a tie. "Oh, hi Eito. How did your little... special operation go?" Keito turned to Eito, who rolled his eyes replying "The prisoners were a lost cause. I took a beating for nothing." Naomi couldn't help but remark upon how similar their names were, but how different they spoke. Eito was calm and collected, while Keito was blunt and talked so loud she must have had alerted a dozen militesi troopers by now. Eito's reply seemed to upset Keito a little, judging by her facial expression, but regardless she told him "And say hello to Naomi, I saved her from that imperial trooper over there." Keito nodded over to Naomi and the dead imperial trooper behind her. She hadn't thought much about that. Eito offered a handshake to Naomi, who automatically extended her hand and grabbed his. The boy had a very solid handshake for a person his size. "Hello Naomi, I wish we could have met under better circumstances." "Uh, you too." She did an internal facepalm when she realized what she had just said. But that wasn't new, she just couldn't handle meeting new people like this. Naomi was about to follow up by saying something else but was interrupted by a COMM calling. Eito answered the call "Eito here." Naomi couldn't hear the other voice, but judging on Eito's expression, it was good news, because she could see a smile forming on his face. "Great, I'll be there in twenty minutes." Eito hanged up the call and turned to Keito. "Esu called in. They have taken down the Crystal Jammer unit." And that was followed up by Keito exclaiming "Great!" 'Crystal Jammer'? What were they talking about? Could it be..? "What's a 'Crystal Jammer'?" Naomi asked the duo. "It's some machine the Empire deployed to take down our defenses. I haven't seen it myself, but it creates a field that neutralizes the magic sent out by the Vermilion Bird Crystal. They weren't dumb and deployed it so close to the crystal they neutralized the crystal itself and therefore the entire nation's magic power." Eito explained in a way that Naomi understood perfectly, and moments later she could feel her magic returning. "We're not affected, though. Our magic comes from elsewhere." Keito added, and a pistol of sorts materialized out from thin air in her hand with a bright light, and she began spinning it around her fingers. This was one of the most advanced magic tricks one could master, the ability to store away a weapon and summon it out from thin air when needed. Once mastered, though, the user didn't even need a source of magic to summon his or her weapon. So maybe this ability could still be used when a Crystal Jammer was in effect? Naomi was broken out of her thoughts by Eito exclaiming that he was needed at Akademeia. "I'll be off then." And then Eito set off running, faster than anyone Naomi had ever seen before. Whoever this boy was, she thought, he must be some extraordinary athlete.

Just a few hours after this encounter, the Militesi Empire was successfully repelled from Akademeia, though the rest of Rubrum had fallen meanwhile, and they had lost most of their army. Naomi was reunited with Ren and Kazuki, and the two new Agito Cadets that Naomi had stumbled upon had been enrolled into a new class, Class Zero. Apparently, they were the smallest group, with only twelve members, but their abilities were said to be extraordinary, and Naomi wondered if there would be any struggles between Class Zero and Class First on who was the strongest.

A few days later, Aquamensis XVI 842 RG, Naomi met this girl, Keito, again. This was in one of the many gardens of Akademeia, and she sat on a bench searching for something in her backpack. "Hi Keito." Naomi said while walking down the paved pathway under cherry blossom trees. Keito looked up. "Hey, what's up? Your name was Naomi, right?" Keito sounded just as blunt as when she had encountered her during the initial invasion. "I just wanted to thank you for saving me the other day." Naomi replied with a bow. "Oh, it was nothing. Here, have a seat." Keito moved a little to the side and patted the space next to her on the bench. When Naomi had sat down, Keito was on the topic at once. "So what do you think of Eito. Cute, right?" She had no idea how to answer. "Yeah, sure.." And with that she did another internal facepalm on her stupid response. "I wish I could have been a cadet in times of peace. Y'know, having a normal student life, finding new friends, falling in love.. I think I'm missing out on a lot because of this war." Keito acted like she had known Naomi since childhood. Not that Naomi would complain, Keito was a person she wanted to befriend. "So, are the rumours about Class Zero true?" Naomi finally asked after sitting in silence for a while. "Yep. We haven't been officially registered yet, but we're the newest class of Akademeia." The new girl didn't even seem to consider if this might be information she shouldn't be sharing so openly. Naomi had a question she had thought of for some time. "Is it true that they are deploying the cadets to the war, then?" Naomi asked, a little bit more concerned this time. "Hell if I know. I sure hope not, but things seem to be going in the opposite direction. The consortium must be really desperate to throw us out on the battlefield." That was not the answer Naomi had wished for. "But hey, if we're being deployed to war, I'm at least going to have some fun here in Akademeia first." Keito continued. "Alright. So about Eito.." Naomi started up what was to be a long conversation, and when it was over, it was because Naomi had to hurry to a meeting with the rest of Class First. On the way through the fountain courtyard outside the main building, something sank in. She had made a new friend. She didn't ever think she would make any friends outside her dorm. For both better and worse, this was the beginning of something new.

Author notes
So this was it. The first chapter of "Ballad of the Nameless Soldier" (The reason for the title is a plot element that will be revealed later). The first work I publish on here. I expect this story to have around ten chapters, more or less depending on how much focus I give on individual events. These three characters, Kazuki, Naomi and Ren are original characters that I have made up. Their names were made up at random, and if the names are present in any other media, that's a coincidence. And note that for the original twelve Class Zero cadets I'll be using their Japanese names instead of their western release names. As always, I'd like to hear your opinion on this story, and especially on how I can improve my storytelling. Thanks for reading.

First published: 28.06.2016
Some grammar fixes: 08.08.2016