Ch 1: Long ago…

I lied awake late at night, staring at the ceiling of my lightly steam-coated room. No matter what I did, sleep never failed to elude me. Eventually, I decided to at least do something. I got up and walked over to the wash room and splashed some water from the basin onto my face, a little bit of it evaporating on contact. I looked into the mirror to see a lean twenty year old man with wild, medium length dark brown hair that borders on black, piercing blue eyes, the color of storm clouds, and scars littered across his tanned body looking back at me and swaying back and forth. Don't even get me started on that wound… Anyway, he looked like he hadn't had proper sleep in weeks, like he would collapse at any moment.

'Wow, Nick, you've really had a hell of a time as of late, haven't ya?' I thought with a chuckle. I turned at the knocking at my door.

"Nicholas?" I heard a worried feminine voice call out from the other side. I thought for a moment whether I wanted someone to see me like I currently am.

"...It's open." I called out. I stepped out to see a woman my age with long, platinum blonde hair trailing down her back, soft red eyes filled with concern, pointed ears, and wearing a simple light blue nightgown coming through the door. I gave a soft smile.

"Heya, Corrin. What brings you to the Smaller Sauna?" I said. She rolled her eyes and smirked.

"'Smaller Sauna?' And here I thought you couldn't do worse than the 'Fiery Pits.' Can't you just call it a room like normal people?"

"Never. We both know very well that I ain't normal." I said with a grin. Her smirk faded and she let out a sigh at the exhaustion in my voice.

"Nick… How long are you gonna keep destroying yourself like this?" I merely gave a curious glance at her.

"What do you mean?" She gazed into my eyes.

"Look… I know you haven't been sleeping these past few weeks. You haven't been eating right. You've been training yourself until you drop near dead every day. I know you want to get her back. We all do too. And I understand we'll lose everything if we don't stop him. But you're the only one who can really hurt him. If you can barely stand right now, what makes you think you'll be able to actually fight a few days from now when we launch our final assault if you keep this up?!" I clenched my fists in anger… then calmed down.

"Because I kinda really gotta do the thing, you know, the thing that's gonna save everyone and kill him dead 'cause that's the thing that I gotta do 'cause it's gotta be done and when things have to get done you gotta get them done and this is a pretty big thing that's gotta get done 'cause he's kinda threatening everything we care about and he's also kidnapped the friend that we all hold dear and he's really pissing me off and I know he's getting stronger with each moment so I gotta get stronger so I can do the thing that involves punching him in the face and saving the friend and stabbing him dead and coming home triumphantly, Barry, are you putting all this up? You better, including the words 'Are you putting all this up? You better'…" I trailed off in my sleepy stupor. I felt a hand rest on my shoulder.

"C'mon, let's see you grit those teeth." I looked back at Corrin, wondering what she was doing, when she reared back her arm…

And slugged me right in the face.

I slammed into the wall and slumped to the floor in complete shock.

"You dumbass… You can't fight if you can't even stand. I have faith that you're strong enough. And even if you're not, you've got the rest of us at your back, so just take it easy, okay?" She said with a smile. I merely stared at her, wanting so badly to do so. However...

"But I have to get stronger, I don't know if I-"

"You may be leading us in this fight, but I'm still your commander. I order you to get some rest. Sakura and Elise will decide when you've had enough." She said. After trying to come up with a retort, I admitted defeat and reluctantly crawled back into bed. She sighed with relief and made to leave, stopping when she reached my door. "And Nicholas?"

"Yeah?"

"I believe in you. We all believe in you. Only you don't. Don't you remember what Kamui said?" I grinned at the memory.

"Yeah. How could I forget? He literally beat that into the both of us at one point." She started grinning as well.

"Just remember that." And she left with that. Now alone once more, I could finally feel the exhaustion settle in. It hit hard. And it hit so bad. I fell asleep within seconds, my dream becoming a flashback to how I got this far on this crazy adventure…

2 years ago…

I remembered I was back on Earth, with the 2nd Marines 8th Division, 2nd Battalion, H&S Company. We were in the middle of a tour through Syria, and I had volunteered for a routine patrol. One of our Humvees had hit an IED along the way, and a large group of ISIS forces began their assault on us. We were quickly able to turn the tide on them, though not without losses of our own. By the time we finished them off, there were only a handful of us left. After making sure everything was clear, we began collecting the remains of our comrades and loading them onto the other Humvees. I noticed one enemy troop still alive, and aiming at a friend a few feet away. Acting quickly, I pushed him out of the way and took the shot myself, the bullet tearing through my heart. Feeling the life rapidly leaving my body, I took aim and fired as many shots as I could before I collapsed, my vision fading. My last sight before everything went black was all my friends calling my name and trying to save me…

I woke up later on a bed in an endless black void. "Wait a minute, am I in a bed? Does Hell have beds?! You'd think they'd have beds of spikes… or spiders… or spikey spiders... spikers." After quickly getting up and standing on nothing, somehow, I took a look around to see nothing, don't know what I expected, really. I decided I wasn't gonna get anything accomplished standing around, so I began walking forward. After a few minutes I was blinded by two bright lights, one blue, one green. After a few seconds, during which my eyes suffered, the lights became two people. The green one became a woman with long green hair, green eyes, and pointed ears, oddly enough. She wore some dark pink corset kinda thing with an ethereal look to the color that really didn't do much to cover her, I mean it had these fang looking kinda things coming from the massive split in the middle but ANYWAY! ... Moving on, she had an ethereal blue belt that held up a long blue skirt that became more translucent the further down you looked. She also had gold ribbons trailing down her arms and around her waist. Finally, she had a cloth wrapped around her upper arms that sort of floated above her head. The whole appearance was rounded off with an ethereal blue glow that gave her the appearance of a goddess.

Meanwhile, the blue light had become a man. I couldn't tell you what he looked like due to the hood of his grey cloak casting an ever-present shadow over his face. I could see he had long blue hair and also wore black trousers with brown boots, and could assume he was a similar kind of being as the woman, given his entrance.

"...Judging by the fact that the bed back there wasn't made of spikers, I'm gonna assume this ain't Hell."

I saw the woman smile while I felt impassiveness from the man. "(sigh) We had to get a joker, didn't we?" He mumbled.

"Okay, for real, for real, what am I doing here? Shouldn't I be in Hell?" I asked, getting this conversation back on track. The man I think turned his gaze onto me.

"We have summoned you here, mortal, for we require… outside help, and have very few options for acquiring it. Allow us to introduce ourselves. I am known as Anankos, one of the First Dragons of the land of Ferevs, and technically the King of the Kingdom of Valla." He finished. The woman then stepped forward.

"And I am Naga, the Holy Dragon that watches over the land of Archanea, and some know me as a sort of deity, though their faith is misplaced." She said. Great. I'm chilling with a couple of half-gods.

"Ok, what kind of help am I supposed to be doing the giving of? And what did you mean, 'technically'?" I asked.

"This manifestation you see is merely half of me. The weaker half, to be specific, as I have spent too much power bringing in those three from Naga's realm. Indeed, once we are finished here, I will barely have enough power to exist. Like Naga, the mortals of my realm had once regarded me as a deity, for I had granted upon them many gifts and boons. However, we dragons, if we live long enough, will lose control over ourselves and surrender to our primal instincts. I held it off for as long as I could, but one day, I lost control and burned down a forest. After that, my people made an attempt on my life, forcing me to flee. In my isolation, my hatred for humanity festered and grew until I split my true self away from my draconic body, sealing it into a mortal shell. The very one you see now. My other half killed the king of Valla and took the throne for himself. He then began creating an army of both his subjects, and resurrected corpses. He now aims to instigate war between the Kingdoms of Nohr and Hoshido, and use the influence he has in the rest of the world to destroy it." Really? They tried to kill a dragon? Over a mother fucking forest? Fucking idiots…

"Okaaaay….. Cool story… Not- not sure where I fit in, but okay." I mumbled.

"You are here so that we may send you to Ferevs and stop the Feral Anankos by reuniting the two halves of his mind." Naga said. I assumed a thinking stance.

"Mhm, mhm, yeah, I see, I see, cool, so, how exactly am I supposed to do that? I'm still just a dude last I checked." My eyes immediately widened in panic. "WAIT!" I shouted as my hand shot to my balls. "Okay good, still a dude." I sighed in relief. "No, but seriously, what do you expect someone like me to do? I'm just… a not normal normal guy. And you want me to fight a god and his undead army?" I asked, completely stumped as to what they were thinking.

"That about explains it, yes." Naga said with a smile. "However, you are incorrect in thinking that we will send you there as you are." What the fuck is she talking about?

Then she and Anankos both lifted their hands and pointed them towards me.

"Wait, wut? What are you doing?" I said with no small amount of concern in my voice.

"We are merely granting you a new body, as well as new abilities. I believe you may find them useful during your mission." Anankos said as his hands began to glow blue while Naga's began to glow green. Seconds later, my body gained a red glow to it, and… was everything heating up?

Suddenly, my senses were completely overwhelmed by an intense pain, as if my body was being torn apart and put back together, as I was engulfed in an enormous column of flames. I let out an ear-splitting scream as the pain only grew. After what felt like an eternity, the pain gradually faded away and the flames dispersed. I collapsed to the ground, sweating profusely and gasping for air. After a minute, I staggered to my feet and took a good look at myself. Physically, I still looked the same, still had my close-cropped flattop hair style, was still the same height, everything, well, not quite, I did notice that my glasses were gone, yet I was still seeing just fine. However, my attire had completely changed. Instead of my woodland utilities, flak, and kevlar, I was now wearing a red sleeveless oriental style jacket with a hood, all with an orange accent and a flame motif. Underneath I wore a plain black muscle shirt. I wore black loose fitting trousers with a flame pattern of the leg cuffs, a pair of red boots, a wide brown belt that sat crooked on my waist and had a couple pouches on the right hip, and simple steel ...what were they called…. pauldrons, that's it! To round it all off, I wore a pair of red and orange gauntlets that appeared to be made of dragon scales.

"*sigh* Maybe next time you can give me a bit of a warning? You know, so I can brace myself?" I said as I looked back at the two of them to see them enjoying the fact that I just went through pain. "What did you guys even change? I still look and feel the same." I asked.

"We have given you a new body, as we said. This one is stronger, faster, more durable, is alive, and, as I'm sure you inferred from your transformation, has given you control over fire. You're going to need it to face the trials ahead." Anankos said with a bit of pride. My eyes went wide and I let out a squeal of absolute joy at the fire bit as I punched to the side, and lo and behold, a jet of flame shot out. "I do believe you may be our greatest work yet." Then something clicked in my mind.

"Wait a minute….. I thought you guys said you couldn't create things?" I asked. Naga smiled at this.

"That is true, we cannot… but we CAN alter what already exists." She said with a smirk and a small hint of sass.

"Yeah yeah yeah, whatever, now what do I do, anything I need to know before I go off into the middle of bumfuck nowhere?" Anankos nodded at my question.

"Yes. Once you arrive in my world, do not, under ANY circumstances, directly name myself or my kingdom, for if you do so, it will activate a curse that will wipe you from existence. Also, there are a pair of individuals that would be beneficial to your quest if you seek them out." I tilt my head at this.

"Really? Who?"

"My children, Prince Kamui, who resides in the Kingdom of Hoshido, and Princess Corrin, who was taken by the Kingdom of Nohr." My eyes widen at this. I have to seek out not only members of the royal family of two different kingdoms, but members that are also technically demigods?! "Yes, you do." Fuck, did I say that out loud? "Yes, you did." ...I really should stop doing that. "You probably should."

"Fine. If that's it, I'm ready." I said with conviction.

Naga smiled. "Good." She and Anankos raised a hand, and a swirling portal of many colors appeared behind me. Anankos suddenly collapsed.

"Oh shit, you alright?!" I said, rushing over. He started coughing, causing his hood to fall off, letting me see his face at last. I could see red eyes with a pale face, though I'm pretty sure the paleness was from his current condition, as well as a small yellow gem set in his forehead. A small smile formed on his face.

"I'm afraid reconstructing your anatomy and creating a portal has drained the last of my power." He said. "Naga, if you would." Naga nodded and pulled a small blue charm that was shaped like a tear drop tied to a brown rope. "Human, listen to me carefully. When the time comes, I need you to place this charm in contact with my other half. That will allow the two of us to reunite once more." I nodded, taking the charm from Naga.

"You got it, boss man."

"Good." Anankos then laid his head back and closed his eyes. His body started turning into what looked like glowing drops of water that sped into the crystal. After staring at it for a moment, I tied the charm around my neck and tucked it into my shirt.

"I advise leaving soon, young one. The portal will not remain open forever." Naga said before disappearing. I turned to the portal and thought about what the fuck just happened.

"Okay, so I guess I died and was summoned by a couple of almost-gods. I got a quest to take down one of the gods in exchange for merely living, got a new body with fire powers and new clothes, and find out I have to find a couple demigods. I also find out I can't really mention the god's name or his kingdom, or I'll die. I'm a guy with fire powers and no idea how to use them and I will be leaving now, goodbye." I said, walking into the portal and holding up the bird. I start tumbling through the portal at high speeds, quickly feeling dizzy from the sensation of traveling through dimensions. After what seemed like forever, I landed in what felt like a pool of water with an intense urge to throw up. I quickly leaned to the side and, feeling some kind of rim, gripped onto it for something to focus onto while I waited for the feeling to pass.

"Hurp….Huuurrrgh….!" I groaned as I successfully (barely) suppressed the urge to vomit as I finally opened my eyes to a wooden floor. After a couple deep breaths just to be sure, I sat straight, not prepared to see someone else with me. I saw a young woman around my age with platinum hair that trailed to about the bottom of her shoulder blades, soft red eyes that were filled with shock, fair skin, and pointed ears… pretty sure that last part isn't really common. I realized that she was naked, immediately followed by the realization that I had wound up in a bath tub. We stared at each other for a pretty long time in shock before I decided to brutally murder the awkward silence.

"'Sup?"

"KYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" She screamed as she scrambled to cover herself, reaching for a sponge.

"Ah. Shit."

Edit 10\28\2017- THIS ENTIRE CHAPTER.