Alright guys, here's a new chapter in the Cyber Emblem saga of stories, and a new mindset. Previously, I was iffy about making this mini-series longer than three chapters and including the Whitewing sisters. After a long family trip and some time to organize my thoughts, I've decided that I am definitely going to do that. So I'm going to do the promised trilogy first, then a Whitewing trilogy, then a Julian x Lena story, and then leave this story marked as incomplete to come back to whenever I want to write about Archanean characters.

I am also doing something new on my profile page. Do you guys know how with most TV shows, the names of upcoming episodes are listed online ahead of time, along with a brief synopsis? Well, I've decided to do something similar to that on my profile.

My mentality is this. I have an utterly ridiculous number of plans for possible stories bouncing around my head at all times. Ever since I finished Crusaders Reborn I have been spending time at the start of each new story babbling about future plans in a frankly, disorganized fashion. Doing this, should help me plan better, and cut down the size of these opening crawls. I tend to feel obligated to tell my readers what I plan on doing. Now instead, of constant long-winded speeches, I just have to say, "look at my profile to see what I have up my sleeve".

Of course, it wouldn't be practical for me to list everything I've come up with, so there are two lists. One that only I can see that I write all my ideas on, and the public one, which will be updated whenever I write a new story/chapter, which will only list between 3-5 things at a time, because I realize that's being more realistic.

It also might help me feel less guilty if I want to alternate between stories as it would help my readers have a better expectation of when a new chapter of the story they are following is coming out. Instead of making them think "dammit, when is going to stop writing this other stuff and write what I want again?" I know there is a certain writer on this site that I'm following that I think that about. This way, my readers will have a general expectation.

Anyways, enough of my babble, I hope anyone reading this enjoys, and as always, please leave a review.

She had always been a dreamer; that was what defined her. Ever since she was a little girl, Marisha had been constantly constructing elaborate fantasies about the world around her and how it worked in her mind's eye.

Her parents were none to pleased about it. "Better put a stop to it now, or it shall cause her endless trouble in the future." warned her father. He was in favor of a good paddling if her daydreams got her to distracted from her work, or a heavy dose of hard but true words if the daydreams were outlandish but not immediately harmful to the task at hand.

Marisha's mother agreed with her father on this point and participated in quashing her daydreams where she could. However, HER mother absolutely refused to do the same. Marisha's grandmother pooh-poohed their fears, claiming that it was only natural for a young girl to have fantasies, and that it was a sign of a firm sense of optimism that would help to carry her through life.

While her grandmother did have a point, sadly it was ultimately proven that Marisha's parents had one too, for Marisha's fantasies went far beyond the point of mere optimism, and instead warped the young girl's perception of reality itself to its very core.

Perhaps if her parents had lived, a balance could have been found. After all, having an imagination and being prone to bouts of fancy are not inherently a bad thing. However, due to the death of her parents during the War of Shadows, she was left solely in the care of her grandmother, who let her imagination run rampant. Due to that, her imagination was left without balance, and she never properly learned how to discern the difference between what was fantastical, and what was realistic.

This tragic fact is what ultimately led her to her destiny.

At first, her imagination endeared her to others. It was one of the things that caught the attention of Lady Lena. After the war, the healer had gone on a tour across the countryside in all the territories, helping where she could. She had met Marisha and her grandmother and sympathized with their plight.

After an extended meeting, Lena had decided that Marisha's general demeanor; her natural optimism and hopeful dreamer nature could help to make her a likeable, if somewhat distractible, healer. Rena figured that she could help her gain some focus. So after discussing the career with her, Lena took Marisha under her wing.

Marisha's grandmother was very glad for this turn of events, for Lady Lena was a noblewoman and well known by the Emperor. Thus, if Marisha was her pupil, it was less likely for General Lang or his men to harass her.

However, one day, Lady Lena suddenly felt something…. sinister, in the air. She decided that Marisha was no longer safe under her care, and had her go home, much to her grandmother's consternation, as Marisha wasn't safe under her care either.

Her only real protection was her youthful appearance, and that wouldn't matter if the soldiers stopped caring about how old a girl looked. It was the appearance of the Altean army that saved her from the fate that her grandmother feared.

Her grandmother practically flung her into the arms of Prince Marth, commenting on how "good a bride" she would make. While Marisha told her that she wasn't ready for that sort of thing yet, she heard those words and latched onto them.

This statement on the part of her grandmother caused the formation a sizeable portion of her fantasies for most of the duration of the war. But it did not form all of her fantasies, for by the time of the royal wedding between Marth and Caeda, she had finally dispelled herself of the notion of marrying the prince, and she gave the two of them her full support.

No, by then she had a different fantasy to pursue, one that would thrust her into the spotlight, one that would see her remembered as one of the greatest healers that ever lived. A fantastical idea of hers… that in truth was so outlandish that the pursuit of it would ultimately doom her.

To understand her mad plan and her dedication to it, however, one must first understand the impetus, and the general set of factors and circumstances that lead her to believe that she was making a wise decision.

The first factor involved was her friendship with the incorrigible thief, Rickard. Upset over losing a friendship with someone he felt so close to, Rickard was desperate to find a way to get back into Julian's good graces.

Upon discovering that there was pretty, young healer of about his own age in Marth's army, who so happened to be the apprentice of Julian's lady love… well, Rickard saw an opportunity and struck a friendship with the young dreamer.

Marisha's tendency to believe that the romantic ideal reflected reality worked in his favor, and she believed his justifications for his criminal enterprises. He'd simply tell her some variant of "the ends justified the means."

One particular way that he said it once went something like this "When you know that something has to be done, or probably should be done, or even just can be done… just do it. You can regret it later, and by then it'll be to late and the necessary… unpleasant thing is done." This like stuck with her, and affected her ultimate decision.

This line of thinking was, of course, a slippery slope. Julian probably could have put a stop to it, however while he did take some time to call Rickard out on his return to thievery, he was distracted and did not actually pay the little thief to much mind, and he did not realize just how friendly the two had gotten.

The slope worsened for Marisha once the Altean army lay ahold of the thief staff and handed it to her. While the concept of the stave initially caused her some discomfort, Rickard used the previously mentioned speech to help ease her conscience. She was stealing for the good of the Altean army, and this unintentionally established in her mind that "smaller" crimes could be justified.

Then, at a later date, the Hammerne staff was placed into her hands as well. A staff that could immediately repair all the damages to any weapon that she decided to use it upon; such a fascinating concept! Marisha knew very well that it could not work on other staves, but that left a burning question in her mind. What if it could?

For a while, she merely pondered this question casually… until the appearance of the Aum staff. The appearance of such an item captured her imagination; a delicate staff that could only bear a single use, but could resurrect those who had fallen in battle. So fascinated was she by this concept, that she completely missed the part where it was explained that it could only be used in a certain place and by certain people.

She instead focused on the "it only had one use" aspect, and then regarded the Hammerne staff in her hand and her mind went into overdrive. She was sure that a way could be found to make it repair staves as well as weapons. What if she were the one to figure it out? What if as a result of figuring out how to make the Hammerne staff repair other staves, she were to discover the secret to endlessly repairing the Aum staff?

She began to fantasize about what that would mean for her, for the world. Her imagination and her idealism overtook her logic, and by the time of the royal wedding, she had made her fateful decision.

She would keep both the Hammerne staff and the thief staff, and use the later to steal the Aum staff at some point. She would go someplace secluded and study magic and learn the secrets of the staves. Then she would return home triumphantly, Aum staff in hand, and render war death a thing of the past. She'd be remembered as a savior, an angel of life.

As Marisha repeatedly replayed this delusional scenario in her mind, she became more and more convinced that if she acted, what she imagined would reflect reality. She believed that it was the right thing to do, so she was determined to do it.

Even so, she still retained just enough common sense to realize that if she told anyone of her plan, they would try to stop her (Though sadly she did not have enough sense to think long and hard about WHY they would try to stop her).

Thus, she told nobody, not even Rickard, even though she greatly desired his expertise. In his case, it wasn't necessarily because she believed that he'd try to stop her. She hadn't spent time around him in a while, but she still knew that over time, several members of the army had gotten wise to his ways, and so she figured, he'd be watched and would crack under pressure if Julian got involved in interrogating him, which would be really dangerous for her plan.

So she decided to come up with the heist on her own. That would certainly impress Rickard, wouldn't it? How unfortunate it was that she chose not to speak to him, as for despite how cheeky and full of gall the young thief was, Rickard still retained enough common sense to know that Marisha's scheme was utterly hare-brained, and he actually would've burst her bubble.

If he had told her off and she had ignored him, and gone off and done it anyways, then later her companions would've gotten a lead on her. Perhaps Rickard would've finally learned of the consequences to his actions. As it was, he never knew, and he never learned his lesson.

Shortly after the royal wedding, Marisha finally put her plan into action. Lady Lena was visiting the royal couple at their palace in Archanea, and Marisha was accompanying her. At the same time, Marth's sister, the Lady Elice, was staying there for an extended visit. As Marisha's luck would have it, she had brought the Aum staff with her and was keeping it in a locked chest inside of her chambers. That would make stealing it with the thief staff convenient. As for an escape clause, she had one readily prepared.

Ever since the war had ended, Marisha had been very noticeably restless. Noticeable enough that Lena had actually made a passing comment on it once or twice. However, she was unaware of the cause. She had not been around during the War of Shadows in order to witness how Marisha had changed, and Julian had never paid Marisha much mind, and so he hadn't realized how she had been influenced during the war.

Thus, Lena was under the mistaken assumption that Marisha's restlessness was related to an independence issue. That her pupil had been without her for so long, that she was chaffing now that she was under her hand once more. Lena actually said as much aloud.

Thus, when Marisha told Lena that she wanted to travel to Khadein on her own, Lena simply took this as an indication that her fledgling pupil wanted to leave the nest and wanted to go in her own direction. Thus, the humble healer reluctantly arranged a trip to the magical capital. She never suspected the trick.

The night before Marisha was set to leave, she used the thief staff to steal the Aum staff. The thief staff promptly broke. Undeterred, as her staffs were usually carefully and thickly wrapped anyways, she hid the broken staff in her cloak, and covered the Aum staff in the thief staff's usual coverings. Then she went to the lady Elice's chambers to say her goodbyes.

As fate would have it, the theft of the Aum staff had yet to be noticed, and while they were talking, Elice was called away, leaving Marisha unattended. She seized the opportunity to quickly put the thief staff back together and place it in the Aum staff's box and secure it. All of this she managed with time to spare.

Soon, she was on her way to Khadein. Nobody was the wiser that she actually wasn't. Oh she was going to stop at the desert country's capital for a short time, but a part of her was worried about her theft being discovered. Thus, in actuality she was going to the port and taking a ship to Valentia.

She was in the magic city for about a week before she boarded a ship, and while she was there, she actually met a young mage from Valentia. He was a bit cold in demeanor, and Marisha couldn't quite remember his name (It was Ridge or Precipice, or something similar), but he was apparently old friends with the new monarchs over there, and his reports of the magic from his homeland captured her imagination and settled in her mind that going to Valentia was the right decision.

Magic that didn't require the use of breakable tomes with expendable ink? Fountains that could raise the dead? Staffs that didn't break after a set number of uses? That sounded exactly like what she needed. So with renewed purpose, she set sail.

In the meantime, the theft of the Aum staff was discovered. Initially, there was confusion over the identity of the staff that had replaced it, for the thief staff had not actually seen use or the light of day in quite some time. Lena and Elice had never actually seen Marisha uncover it before, so they did not recognize it.

Thus it took a little while before the identity of the staff and the identity of its owner were confirmed. Once they were, however, panic ensued, and Lena finally realized that her pupil's restlessness did not have the root that she had believed it had.

At first, they were confused that Marisha had the capability to do this, but then Marth brought up her use of the thief staff of the war. He also mentioned how once when he had asked her if she needed help with any guilt feelings she might be having, she told him that she was already "getting help from someone who knew what it was like to steal", and he had presumed she meant Julian.

With that, Julian finally connected the dots about who Rickard had been hanging out with during the war and began to berate himself for missing that. So while Rickard was called in, and messengers were sent to the magic city and as they waited for them to arrive, they tried to rationalize her actions.

Maybe she had gone to Khadein in order to try to study it in secret and improve upon it! Well that did sound like an outlandish scheme that she would come up with, and while she did steal, it would be hard to judge her if her motives were purely driven by goodwill and irrationality.

Then word came to them that Marisha had been in the magic city for about a week and then vanished. Thus, they began to think and fear the worst about Rickard's influence upon her. Thus, and international girl-hunt was initiated for her, but to no avail, for she was no longer anywhere in Archanea.

If they had started their hunt earlier, they might have gotten a lead from Kliff, but by the time the hunt had started, he had already forgotten about her. The way she had questioned him about his homeland had indicated to him only normal fascination, not a desire to go there. Thus he was not able to provide crucial information to the searchers.

She started her research on the isles to the east of the continent. There were plenty of mages there, and they had the abilities that she had been promised, but when it came to actually learning spells from them, she was just to impatient. She already knew the variants from back home, and these were just basics, why would she need to learn them anew? So, simply because it wasn't exactly what she was looking for, she moved on to the mainland.

She wandered north, towards the desert, and then she got lost. Then she was met with some friendly travellers who brought her before a man who referred to himself as the king of the mercenaries.

An odd concept in her mind, but he was genial enough, if a bit flirty. Once she explained her cover story to him, he was willing to help her out, and he recommended to her a couple of places where she could search. He mentioned a village of mages somewhere in the western part of Zofia, he wasn't certain of its exact location. He also brought up the northern kingdom of Rigel and how militaristic it used to be and how that factor might or might not be useful.

He mentioned a hidden village in a place called the Sage's Hamlet were he met a few mages that might be able to teacher her something. Since it was clear to Marisha that this was closer and he actually knew where that was, she would go there.

She also noticed that one of his men mentioned someplace or someone called "Nuibaba" and was immediately hushed. She decided to keep that bit of information tucked into the back of her mind for later, as it might prove useful.

So, she left the "court" of the mercenary king and followed his directions north into Rigel and to the Sage's Hamlet. They were a bit suspicious of her motives, but they were willing to let her study under observation. So she stayed there for several months.

She studied the properties of her staves, and she also got the opportunity to look at one of the infamous resurrection fountains at one point. This achieved nothing.

Eventually, she got fed up with her own lack of progress. She should've realized that she was undertaking an impossible task, and that should have broken her delusions, but still she held onto them as strongly as ever. She decided that she wasn't going to learn anything there, so she decided to move again, and so she chose her final destination.

In her time at the Sage's Hamlet, she had found out what Nuibaba's Mansion was. Though the witch had been slain during Rigel's war of conquest a couple of years previously, most still stayed clear of the place.

There was a lot of bad memories and dark magic surrounding that manor, and it was rumored that the remnants of the Duma faithful were hiding out nearby. Ignoring all warnings and common sense, like avoiding the place called "Fear Mountain", Marisha decided to see if she could find any research by the old witch hidden in the shelves of the manor that she could be used.

After all, wasn't it rumored that she had lived for over a century and yet remained young and beautiful? She once again decided to leave without telling her true motives or destination to anyone, though this time, however, she packed her things and silently left the village without saying a word to anyone.

She never reached her destination proper. As it turned out, the rumors about the remnants of the Duma faithful lurking near the mansion were true. Even though their god and their high priest had both fallen. A small number remained and were looking for recruits, willing or otherwise, hoping to attempt some kind of resurgence.

While not a strong unit in of themselves, they had recruited a number of ruthless mercenaries to aid them. Whether she was willing or not, a young woman with clear magical potential was to good an opportunity passing alone near their territory was to good an opportunity to pass up.

She couldn't fight the thugs off, and she was taken prisoner and put in a cell with the other young ladies that the Duma faithful had captured recently. Luckily for these girls however, they weren't under heavy guard, and Marisha's time with Rickard had taught her how to pick a lock. Thus she helped to engineer their escape.

While these girls had their priorities straight and escaped to freedom, Marisha went hunting for her precious staves and "research".

Just as she found her things and laid her hands on the Aum staff, however, she was discovered and forced to flee, with only that single staff and a fire tome she managed to scoop up in hand. A large thug chased her outside and onto some scaffolding where she found herself trapped without any options of running.

She flung a fireball at his face "Stay back!" she warned

"Now lassie, why'd you have to go and make yourself so troublesome?" asked the thug, who'd been simply annoyed by the flame. "I'm going to have to take you back now, and you can bet that the bosses are going to be a bit less friendly with you from now on. Neither are the men, they're going to have to let us…"

The man stopped and then, a wicked grin crossed his face "I have to bring you back, but at this point, I don't necessarily have to bring you back undamaged, and considering what you've done, I don't think that anybody will mind." then he rushed forward and seized her.

It took her a few seconds, but not many, before the horror of what he intended dawned on Marisha. She desperately began to look for a way out. She looked at the edge of the scaffolding and got an idea.

There was a narrow outcropping to the cliff near the end and the support structure looked burnable. She could set the structures on fire and distract the man and let him fall while she jumped to safety. The girls would come back with a rescue team, and she'd be heralded as a hero.

Maybe this is what she needed. Maybe she didn't need to achieve something with the Aum staff to be somebody! Maybe she didn't need it to do something important. Visions of a happy ending flashed before her eyes, and so she executed her plan.

With a few well-placed kicks and fireballs, she was out of the man's grasp and the scaffolding was aflame. She started to run and prepared her legs for her leap… and reality chose that moment to come crashing back down around her.

As she neared the edge and bent her legs, the platform gave way beneath and flipped. The thug was flung at the cliff wall and crashed into it at full speed, and then fell onto the ledge that Marisha had tried to jump to. He hit it with such force that it crumbled and gave way beneath him and he tumbled head over heals down the cliff face.

Meanwhile, Marisha fell through the scaffolding, which collapsed under the sudden added weight of its top portion burning and collapsing onto the rest of it. Girl, staff, and scaffolding all plummeted to the ground.

Marisha had survived the impact, but chronically delusional or not, even she knew that she would not survive such injuries for long.

The Aum staff was still tightly gripped in her hands, and one last desperate, fantastical idea entered her head. Since the Aum Staff could revive the dead, then it must also have the power to heal any injury! It could save her! She tried to use it… but nothing happened.

With the last of her strength, she turned her head, and she saw that she was only holding onto part of the staff. It had shattered upon impact.

Finally, Marisha's bubble of fantasies burst and the full reality of the situation she had gotten herself in hit her all at once. She spent her last moments crying out in remorse, asking for everybody she knew to forgive her for her foolishness.

Shortly after she had died, the thug's friends came down from the mountain to collect his body in order to give him a proper burial. When they saw that she had died too, they collected the pieces of the Aum staff, thinking that they may still be valuable, and then gave their last disrespect to the girl who had caused them so much trouble.

A day or so later, a revenge party sent by the escaped girls came by and found Marisha's body in a deplorable state. They made her presentable and brought her back to the village where she was buried with respect, to be forever remembered as an unknown hero by those who lived there. Meanwhile those who knew her in life never knew what had happened to the whimsical healer that they had feared had become a delinquent.