Disclaimer: I don't own RWBY, nor do I own Dark Souls or its sequels.
Just so any newcomers know what to expect, in this crossover, characters from one world (in this case, Lordran/Drangleic/Lothric) are adapted into the world of the other story (in this case, Remnant). There is no hopping between one world and the other, nor will there be. They were born in Remnant. They have all grown up in Remnant. They will all die in Remnant. Their backstories are certainly influenced by their game-canon counterparts, but altered as I see fit to suit the setting of Remnant.
This particular fic is a Great War-era fic set in the same Dark Souls-adapted Remnant as my other fic, The First Immortal (though you don't require any knowledge of that fic to understand this one).
Let's go, shall we?
Chapter I – The Ruins of Forossa
It was at Port Heide, on Sanus' east coast, that Pharis and I parted ways. We'd met in basic training back in the capital and formed something of a friendship, though I suppose we didn't really know that much about each other. Still, at the very least she'd been somebody I could joke around with, if not confide in, and so had been a small comfort in a rather trying time.
But then she'd been assigned to the Yellow Legion, and I to the Blue, and so while she would remain at Port Heide (which I'd visited a few times before the war) I was to travel with a supply shipment north then west to the Royal Wood (which I had never been to before in my life).
I said my goodbyes (I lie: there was only one goodbye) and departed with the supply wagons. There were perhaps a dozen of them, all drawn by horses; escorting them on this last leg was a squad of perhaps forty fresh-faced recruits (myself included) and a handful of more experienced soldiers led by Lieutenant Fern.
At first, we passed through the farmlands around Heide, inhabited with decent folk and with roads well-maintained. City guards were a regular sight, patrolling around the countryside in case of Grimm—or, more likely, to placate the townsfolk and stop them from attracting Grimm in the first place—occasionally accompanied by mercenaries and other less-reputable sorts, hired by wealthier farmers who wanted the extra security.
I even recognised a few of those mercenaries from home.
Then we came along the long stretch of road along Sanus' east coast that remained relatively Grimm-free. There were occasionally inns, and, within the first few days, a settlement consisting of little more than a handful of buildings, but for the most part the land was claimed neither by man nor Grimm, and the road was the only evidence that anybody had ever been there before.
We camped a night in the ruins of Forossa itself. It was a mediocre campsite at best for a number of reasons. For one, the shallow cliffs and deep ocean made it susceptible to attack from the sea by more dangerous varieties of Grimm—more susceptible than any other spot on the east coast, at the very least. Secondly, the town was built on more-or-less flat ground, affording us no easy high ground. And lastly—and this was the kicker—I grew up here.
"You!" I was setting out my bedroll when the lieutenant called me over. We'd set up camp in what was left of the town square; the well still worked, affording us fresh water, and while there were more avenues from which we could be attacked, it was also the only real open space that could hold our retinue. We'd blocked off the wider roads as best we could with the wagons anyway.
I left my bedroll and pack where they were and headed towards the lieutenant. "Ma'am?"
She was a stern woman, easily over fifty and with eyes that spoke of experience, and I withered under her calculating gaze. After a brief visual inspection, she turned to a fox-tailed faunus standing beside her, her face tired. "Another one," she sighed. "Do your thing."
Needless to say, I was somewhat confused, and more than a little worried. I looked old enough to be in the army, right? And my papers hadn't been turned down...
The lieutenant departed, making her way towards main street—what was left of it—to direct the construction of the ramshackle barricade. The fox faunus wrapped an arm around my shoulders and turned me away, his hand gripping firmly. "What's your name, kid?" he asked.
"Vengarl, sir," I said.
He glanced at me, a half-smile of bewilderment on his face. "I'm no sir," he said, "but go ahead! Scratch my ego behind the ears. Look, we've seen fresh faces like your own feeling just a little bit overwhelmed before, and the lieutenant just wanted me to make sure you're not going to, I don't know… lose it. Because that would be bad. You're not gonna lose it, are you Vengarl?"
"No sir."
"See, the lieutenant has an eye for these sorts of things—or, at least, she's been at it a while, so she must be doing something right. Bottom line is this: she says you have a problem, and I trust what she says. So, Vengarl, tell me. What's the problem?" His hand let go of my shoulder, and he turned in place, gesturing to the charred remains of my home town. "Now, I get it. We're all feeling a little jittery. Places like this tend to do that. But-"
"I grew up here," I said.
"Ah." The fox nodded in understanding. "I see." He sighed and ran a hand through his greying red hair. "It's gonna be rough, but we'll be out of here come morning. I just need you to keep it together for one night, alright?" He turned to watch the sun; very little of it remained visible on the horizon. "You know how it is with the bad thoughts, don't you?"
"The Grimm?" I asked. "They're attracted to-"
"-to negative emotions, aye. They used to skip over that in basic training—it scares people off."
"They still do," I said. As far as I knew it was common knowledge. It had been in Forossa, at least, but I suppose in the inner cities things would have been different.
"Well, you've got a good head on your shoulders then," he said, clapping me on the shoulder. He drew forth a flask from his pocket and sipped a bit of it, then offered it to me. "It'll help," he said.
I declined. "I don't drink," I said. Really, I wasn't old enough, and wasn't yet ready to throw that coming-of-age milestone to the wind.
"Then you've picked the wrong career. Hah!" He snorted at his own joke, though I didn't find it quite as amusing. "Get some sleep, and try not to think too much about… all this. It'll all be over soon, Vengarl." He sauntered off towards the lieutenant, taking another sip from his flask before pocketing it once more.
I watched him go until his silhouette became hard to make out in the fading light, then made my way back to my bedroll for the night.
-\/-
Sleep came in short bursts, and what sleep I got was filled with terrifying dreams. Most were twisted renditions of memories: of my lonely flight to the capital from Forossa after its sacking; of a claustrophobic boat-ride back from Vytal over a decade ago; even of that very night, made even more petrifying by a dark figure moving amongst us soldiers. But despite my nightmares, dawn came without incident.
"Up! All of you," barked Lieutenant Fern. "New blood, you've got five minutes to get your packs ready. We've got a long march ahead of us yet. McDonnel, distribute rations. Robb, Gideon, you, and you," she said, pointing to the two closest recruits whose names she clearly hadn't yet learned (and likely had no intention to learn), "water the horses. Dol-"
The lieutenant was cut off by a loud crack that split the air; it had come from one of the wagons blocking main street. She whirled around, her eyes narrowed. "McDonnel," she said, addressing the man whose hands were held close to the wagon, a half-guilty half-panicked look on his face. "What did you do?"
"…I was getting the rations to distribute, ma'am." The wagon was noticeably slumped to one side, the back wheels crooked and slanted. McDonnel glanced down at it, ducked down to check beneath the wagon, then stood, declaring loudly, "Axle's broken, ma'am!"
Lieutenant Fern muttered something inaudible under her breath—likely cursing—and massaged her temples. "Robb!" she roared.
"Hold on, just- here." The fox faunus changed course and headed towards me on his way past the well, shoving a bucket towards me. "Make sure that trough is full," he said, gesturing to one of the troughs we'd set up when we'd made camp. Three of the horses were tethered in front of it. "We might be here a while."
I nodded. He dashed off, leaping over a few still-bleary recruits, and engaged in a quiet, rapid back-and-forth with the lieutenant.
I finished rolling up my bedroll—albeit rather shoddily—and got to work, making trips back and forth from the well.
Maybe ten minutes passed before the lieutenant's voice cut through the air again. "Alright," she called, "everybody listen up." She paused for a moment, her gaze panning over us all to see that she had our attention before she continued. "Wagon's damaged. Shit happens. Good news is, we're in a god forsaken wreck of a town, and I'll be damned if we can't salvage something useful from it."
She turned aside briefly to Robb and muttered something; he said something back and gestured towards me.
"You!" the lieutenant called. "Vengarl, is it? You're from here?"
I pursed my lips. "Yes ma'am."
"Good. Take five of the other fresh-faced idiots with you and go look for something to fix the wagon. You're their guide. If they don't follow your orders, they answer to me." She half-turned towards Robb and her other veteran soldiers, who'd clearly been working with her for a while, before looking back at me. "You know what an axle is, no?"
"Yes ma'am."
"I shouldn't have to thank the gods for that," she remarked dryly. "Get to it." She addressed the veterans, and after a short word they began to divvy up the fresh recruits between themselves and set out into the town.
I picked my five at random, not knowing any of them by name, and, at my word, we set off towards the harbour. I figured that it was likely the most untouched part of the town, and if anything like a handcart had survived we'd have an easily salvageable axle for the wagon. If not, any long, sturdy, round piece of wood or metal would suffice—assuming we had the tools to cut it down to size—and the harbour seemed as good a place as any to look for something of the sort.
It wasn't far. Forossa wasn't that big, after all, at least not compared to the likes of Heide, or of one of the capital cities. But, before it's fall, it'd had the third-largest harbour on the east coast. Before the war, it'd been perfectly positioned to be a resupply point for the Mantle-Heide trade route. Afterwards, it had been both a strategic asset and, at the same time, something of a neutral zone. Tensions had risen until, well…
We picked our way down one of the narrow staircases cut into the cliff face towards the harbour. Abandoned docks stretched further north, giving way to a wide ramp that led up and back around into the town. To the south, the cliffs rose higher and higher, and more narrow staircases (such as the one we descended) were cut into the cliffs to provide quicker access for those with little or no cargo. They'd been built around an unfinished sculpture carved into the side of the cliff—the effigy of a helmed and cloaked hero facing oncoming flames. It was a relic from a generation past, when the northern king's reach had stretched all the way to Sanus. As a child, I'd often wondered where the flames where coming from. I suppose I'll never know.
"Some say it's one of the great manmade wonders of the world," one of my men said; a pale-faced, dark-haired fellow. He was so focused on viewing the sculpture I was worried he'd slip on the stairs.
"Who says that?" I asked.
It wasn't anything I'd ever heard. Not that it was something I paid attention to. I was only aware of the Tower of Flame being on that prestigious list. I was a little more knowledgeable about natural wonders, and had even seen the Emerald Cliffs, the White Tree, and (from afar) Forever Fall with my own eyes.
"I do, for one," the man said. "Or, at the very least, upon beholding it for myself I agree with them, whomever they are. The lieutenant said you lived here, no? What's your take on it?"
"It's lost on me," I said shortly. "I grew up with it."
"Oh." He got the message: that I wasn't entirely comfortable being back here. "I'm… sorry," he said.
The right thing to do would be to ignore him, I mused. We were vulnerable now more than ever to the Grimm. Getting angry wouldn't help anything.
"It's not your fault," I muttered.
"You know," the man said, "before this place was called Forossa, it was called 'Faraam's Jaw'? And before that, even, it-"
"It didn't have a name," I grumbled.
"No, it was called Cape-"
I stopped in my tracks. We were nearing the bottom of the stairs at this point, but the drop down to the harbour was still enough to break bone, should someone fall. I whirled around at the pale-faced man and grabbed the collar of his tunic. He stumbled, and it was only by my grip that he didn't fall. Though he was clearly older than I, I had a few inches of height on him, and he cowered a little beneath my glare. "It didn't have a name," I repeated. I knew that Mantle had named it after some Faraam-era cartographer, and that the name had caught on a little with historians in the other kingdoms. I also knew that it was Forossan tradition to refute anybody who tried to call it 'Cape Kennedy', and there was no way I was going to let that tradition end.
I let him go and continued down the stairs. I wasn't sure if I felt better or worse for it.
"It seems we've started off on the wrong foot," he said, catching up to me, and I became certain that I was feeling worse. "I am Orbeck."
"Vengarl," I responded curtly.
"I-"
"Oh, come of it," one of the other soldiers scoffed. "He's having a rough day."
Orbeck seemed to want to say more, but after realising that the rest of our little party was glaring at him, he subsided.
The remainder of our journey downwards was taken in silence. When we reached the harbour, we all fanned out on my order, checking the crumbling storehouses for anything we could use. The storehouse I searched had already been stripped bare, presumably by looters. A wooden beam poked in through a hole in the roof. Light spilled across the floor, highlighting a thin film of dust. I took a step deeper into the storehouse. Dust spiralled up around my feet.
I rushed back outside, take a gulp of fresh air. This was Forossa, now. This was what was left of it. At least Orbeck's insensitive chatter was better than the silence, the stillness, the deadness in the air.
"I got something!" somebody called.
I proceeded north along the docks, bellowing an order for everybody to group up once more. One of the soldiers emerged from a storehouse carrying an empty handcart; it had a great big chunk blown through its left side, but its wheels and axle seemed in good shape. Hopefully it was big enough to repair the wagon.
"Good," I said. "We'll get it back to the square before we take it apart." I gestured to the northward ramp. "Let's go."
It was a longer route, and partway up the ramp I struck up conversation with Orbeck once more, looking for a distraction. I asked him about the man-made wonders, of which I knew little, and he talked at some length about those that interested him the most: namely the Emerald Council deep within Vale's royal palace; and the ruined cathedral in Vacuo's Old Oasis. He wisely kept the conversation away from the carving in the Forossan cliffside.
We came to the end of the causeway and proceeded back through the town, taking a different route now. It became clear that somebody had returned to Forossa after its fall and buried (or taken) the bodies, for we had yet to see any corpses. I wondered to myself if any of them had been missed. Was there a lonely skeleton somewhere in the town, unable to find peace? Was it somebody I'd known?
As we passed by a particular house, which once had windows that were stained blue (a rather expensive luxury, if I recalled), I held my hand up to indicate that the group should pause.
"Vengarl?" Orbeck asked. His eyes flickered to the surrounding buildings before settling on the one that I was vacantly staring at. "Do you need a moment?"
The door was hanging slightly ajar, I noted. If anybody had been hiding in there, they'd surely met an ill fate.
"I won't be long," I said. The group nodded in understanding. I was glad they understood. I wondered if they'd lost people like this too.
The wall over the old fireplace had collapsed inwards a little. The kitchen table still was still host to the deep red tablecloth that mother had bought from the markets down at Heide, though now it was dusty and frayed, rather more brown than red from all the dirt and grime, and weighed down only by the cracked remnants of a vase. I carefully pushed them away and dragged the cloth off the table, giving it a flick to relieve it of as much dust as I could, before folding it up and hanging it over my arm.
I tried to open up my old room, but found the door jammed. I didn't suppose there was anything of real value to me in there anyway. That room belonged to a much different man, though it had been only a few months. A cursory glance into my parents room revealed that it had been thoroughly ransacked.
I descended into the basement. It too was empty, save for a few empty crates and the cracked remnants of a spear. Somebody had fought down here.
My eyes caught a dark red stain in the corner.
Somebody had died down here.
My jaw clenched and I averted my gaze, doing my best to ignore it. I ran my hand along the wall until I found the loose panel; after a push, a bit of the wall was clicked outwards. I moved over to it and pulled; there was a great grinding sound, but the hidden door eventually opened up enough for me to see inside.
It wasn't a large room; it was more of a closet really. Within, still hanging on the wall, was the armour my father wore on Grimm hunts: a leather gambeson over chainmail. His sword was missing, though that hardly surprised me; my father would have gone down fighting.
He'd want me to have it. It would keep me alive just a little longer, after all, and he was dead now. It was certainly better than the standard-issue equipment, at least—the armour was little more than two metal plates held together by leather straps.
It took me a few minutes to don the armour. While I'd have liked to think that I was the spitting image of my father, but I had the sneaking suspicion I looked more like the little kid trying on his father's clothes.
I suppose I was the little kid trying on his father's clothes.
I tucked the cloth into my belt and made my way back to the group.
Welcome to Special Beings Have Special Souls, or, henceforth, SBHSS, which is an acronym I'm never going to get right first go.
Now, in RWBY canon literally the only characters I have to work with from this era are the monarchs of each kingdom and Jaune Arc's ancestor, only one of whom is given any special role and none of whom are named. I don't have enough Dark Souls characters to fill every bit role, nor would I want to do that, so yes, there'll be a few OCs in minor roles, such as Lieutenant Fern and her merry band of supply-shipment-guarding men who will likely never appear again.
I do actually have a map .png for this fic to keep track of all the locations, and I'll probably put an edited-down version with only the already-mentioned locations online on Friday for those interested.
Have I shamelessly begged for followers/favourites/reviews yet? Well, I am now. Follow/favourite/review to your heart's content and then some.
At this point, I don't have a hard-boiled update schedule for SBHSS, and likely won't until TFI goes on hiatus, so just keep your ears to the ground.
