Well, might as well put a stone on top of this.
Yeah, fanfiction just doesn't capture me like it did when I was a teenager. Maybe that girl in the Breakfast Club was right and your heart just dies after hitting your 20s.
Though in hindsight, the problem was probably just ambition. I let it get too big and go on for too long. If there's one take-away for young aspiring writers, it's this: keep your stories short and manageable. I started this back in 2016, and it should have ended in that year. If you have an idea in your head that would take more than 10 chapters to pan out, write an actual novel instead. It's a better use of your time and enthusiasm.
To Robert: Sorry to your married couple; yeah, that fight would have ended with Saizo getting the kill, with an assist from Kagero. And Corrin: the story just kind of stopped being about her as it increased in scope so yeah, her chapters were hit almost as hard as the Royal Siblings in the North. Thanks for following along and taking an interest in them!
To GoodOldFaith: Thanks for the kind words, and the interest. The war aspect was one of my favorite parts of the story; showing how different people reacted to being placed in it. Some turning to further depravity to live with their actions (Corrin), some seeing that and rejecting it and focusing on just getting through it with their morality and loved ones intact (Silas, Sakura), some just keeping their head down and doing their job (the maids, Jakob), and some trying to exploit the circumstances for their own benefit (Gunter [spoiler :p ])
As for Hans; yeah, his story was one of the things that I'm actually the most proud of. Makes me think he was kind of wasted by being killed by Leo, but I kind of wrote myself into a corner and had no idea how to save him. But for the portion of him, Sakura, and Mozu escaping and growing together, I started to consider them, maybe not the main characters, but Top 10. And funnily enough, they were probably some of the least important to the overall war effort.
To Firefox178: You will never know how many plotpoints your reviews influenced XD
Thanks for taking the story seriously enough to theorize like you did!
To WADWA24s: I think writing cringe is kind of something every writer has to go through. It's part of the growing process. If you can look back on something you wrote in the past and still be proud of it, then you must have written something truly special.
To LeZnarkyZnezz: Welcome to the site! Inspiring future generations is truly humbling!
Glad to think I've provided a positive example, and maybe provided some sage advice!
To scarlet fever: Eh, Fire Emblem has never really been a perfect example on medieval lifestyles. Dragons and magic not withstanding, characters in these games have always been somewhat...modern, I guess?
To Aysin: Good idea!
So, unlike my story before this one, I didn't have as much of a solid outline for how things were supposed to play out.
Some plot points that I knew were probably going to happen:
The next few chapters!
Saizo would win the duel against Beruka, with a sneaky assist from Kagero. They would try to escape, but all exits were blocked. Cliffhanger.
Soon after, Corrin would arrive in the little village. The town guard, under the orders of the local ninja, would round up all the townsfolk to the dock to meet the new Nohrian occupation. Corrin would have done a little demonstration by welcoming any duel challenge; if anyone could beat her in single combat, the whole occupation would go home. Some big man would have stepped up, been provided a weapon, and Corrin would brutally cut him down to bleed out in the middle of town. The offer to accept any duel would remain open.
She would then meet with Kotaro. She'd ask where the two ambassadors were; Kotaro would have to sheepishly tell him that under his care, both Beruka and Serena had managed to be killed, about a few days apart from one another. The killers were nowhere to be found.
At this point, it would have been revealed that Saizo and Kagero were still hiding inside the fortress, in a tucked away corner, living off stolen food and medicine while Kagero recovered.
On Ryoma's side of things, he'd get some word back from Kaden about where the Nohrian's had stopped on the shores, and how many there were. Ryoma continues the march south.
Waaaaay to the west, Azura is palling it up in Nohrville with her evil father and her evil-aligned cinnamon roll half-sister, where she learns all about how Nohr operates...I had nothing planned for here.
Waaaaay to the north, Sakura and Mozu bury Hans along with the Harvest Orb (I regretted killing him so much, I actually debated on having the orb bring him back to life, being the sole exception to my 'no revives' rule.) Then Sakura and Mozu finally make it back to Shirasagi! Wherein Sakura has to start running the place and try to bring the Shoguns back on side.
Meanwhile, Soleil would be running to deliver the "get back here, we're going home" message to Leo, and end up stumbling on his severely wounded and barely alive body, and have to drag him back to camp.
Then the Nohrian siblings would debate going home, but then decide "wait, there's an unguarded route all the way to the Hoshidan Capitol, and we have a lot of bored soldiers...let's go that way instead." Thus finally reentering story relevance.
In the midst of all this, there'd be some development in the minor plots: Nyx would be teaching Odin some dark arts, Corrin would continue hating herself, Silas and his squad settle down in Hoshido and get to know the locals while getting in fights with some more evil fellow-soldiers. Y'know, the stuff.
Cyrkensia! Death at the Opera!
Garon would take Azura and Princess Cinnamon to Cyrkensia for the Opera. Corrin would attend, Xander and Camilla would be coming along, too (via Camilla's Wyvern), and they'd get to see how different she's become.
That night, Garon would have a dream. Unlike in the past, where in his dreams he did everything right, this time would be a perfectly accurate flashback of the night he stole Corrin. Peace talks with the Hoshidan king were going well, and then he brought out his young daughter, Kamui, to give a speech on how the war was affecting their ability to be good fathers, and afterwards, it would be nice if they could begin focusing on what's important; family. It was at that moment Garon realized that he could steal the daughter and win the war completely, rather than settling for peace. The decision that led to the continuation of decades of death and destruction. His greatest regret and fault: ambition.
He'd wake up feeling afraid, but strangely resigned. He'd go into the meeting with the Hoshidan shoguns, his children watching as he cowed them all into submission. He'd have Corrin would give her testimony on how all resistance in Mokushu was stifled, how they destroyed their own cities for disobedience. Kind of horrifying the other siblings, though only Elise would need to be dismissed.
Garon would dismiss them all to think about his offer; bend the knee, or die.
That night, Azura would be sitting alone on a canal, looking at her own reflection. After seeing how the war had corrupted Corrin, it was clear the war would only reap further devastation. But she had no idea what to do.
Then a voice spoke in her head that wasn't her own. "Just kill Garon, you indecisive bitch."
That night, she went up to his booth. Garon would dismiss his guards to spend time with his daughter as they watched the opera.
At the height of the play, Azura would untie her scarf, and stand behind Garon. Who would sigh. "What is it you want, Azura?"
"What...do I want?" She'd sigh, "I want this all...to end."
"...What I want...I want to sleep. I want to sleep the way that I did when I was a boy...I'm tired, Azura...so tired..." He'd sigh again, lean back, and close his eyes. "Would you...sing for me? One last time?"
Azura would hesitate, stifle a tear, and slowly wrap her scarf around Garon's neck. "...Embrace the dark...you call a home..."
"Gaze upon an empty white throne..."
King Garon, tyrant, genocider, warmonger. would drift to his eternal sleep with his daughter's song in his ear.
Azura would run and try to escape. The reactions of the siblings would be varied: Elise would feel devastated betrayal, the sister she'd just met ended up killing her beloved father. Camilla would be vengeful, thinking her a deceiver who planned this from the start (which...she's kind of right). Corrin would arguably take it the worst; she had just gained the paternal love she had so long sought, and now it was gone forever. Xander, however, would wonder if...maybe this was inevitable. He saw how they treated their conquered, how he threatened all the shoguns of Hoshido. He'd wonder if maybe being killed in such a manner might not have been...expected.
Camilla and Xander would have to return to their own front. Corrin would take her crew back westward, toward the conquered Mokoshu, to begin a campaign northward, and maybe hoping Azura went that way. Elise would have to stay with her.
In the dark, Gunter (the man with the creaky voice) would meet with a maimed, but alive, Hinoka and Takumui. With Garon dead, there was one less obstacle toward them taking the thrones of both Hoshido and Nohr.
Return to Mokushu! And the Dark Sky Follows!
On the way back to the village, Corrin's convoy would be attacked. They'd quickly learn that Ryoma and his army had conducted a surprise attack on their occupation in Mokushu, and now her entire army was being sieged inside the ninja HQ. The one they were trying to get inside.
They'd escape and make a camp elsewhere, and try to think up a way to break the siege.
During this, Nyx would confront Gunter. She saw his manipulative handiwork, turning a daughter to kill her father was just his style, according to her. She demanded to know what his game plan was, he said he wanted Nohr to win but had just organized the death of its leader.
Just as they're about to fight it out, the skies above them darken. The dark clouds of Nohr stretched over the landscape, covering them in the dark.
Everyone looked up in horror as the sun was blocked out once again.
Gunter would disappear, and Nyx would be left in a panic. "I've forgotten something..."
She would call her apprentice Odin down, far away from everyone. She needed his help with a very dangerous ritual.
Who is Nyx?
"I'm old, Odin." Nyx would tell her apprentice. "Very old."
She would reveal to her apprentice that she was, in fact, over 10,000 years old.
"But...we're supposed to die. We, human beings, aren't meant to live this long. In order to stay sane...we have to forget some things." She could only really hold a human lifespan's worth of memories at a time. Everything else became blurry, occasionally glimpsed in dreams, but through a dense fog.
But if she were to figure out why the darkness had followed them to Hoshido, she needed to go back to how it started. So she needed to conduct a ritual that would allow her to go into her own subconscious, to see the entirety of her past. And she needed Odin to go in with her, lest she forget when she was and be eternally trapped in her own mind.
They'd go back, over 10,000 years.
Not entirely clear on the details, but it would be revealed that Nyx was a prodigy of magic, gifted beyond anyone had ever seen. Outpacing masters 10x her age.
Her name was Anankos.
She was brought before the then King of Nohr, and pressed into service. Even then, Nohr was among the strongest nations in the world, mostly through their practice of Dark Magic. It was demanded that the young Anankos would propel them to new heights of power, and thus be trained by his best mage.
Gunter.
Gunter would put her through a vicious, ruthless, and Machiavellian training scheme that was really intended to turn her to his way of thinking. Gunter had much the same backstory as before; never wanted to serve the king, had his family killed, pressed into service. He wanted the king dead, Nohr destroyed, and for himself to rule. And he intended to use Anankos for that purpose.
So using her, he developed his own ritual. A ritual to absorb the lifeforce of others. Upon activation, it would create a field of death that would drain everyone outside the very center of their health, vitality, and magic. He had intended to cast it in the center of the castle, and after draining everyone inside, use the stolen power to usurp the throne.
However, when the night of the ritual came, Anankos realized his plot and interrupted the ritual, causing it to misfire in a catastrophic way.
Rather than steal the life from everyone in the castle, it conjured a dark shadow that covered the entire land of Nohr. Every section of the world in which a Nohrian flag was planted. That cloud sapped at the life of those who lived under it, weakening them, shortening their lives in ways that seemed natural, and ensured no life could ever grow before it was devoured by the cloud.
All that life was stolen, and given to the two at the center of it all. Gunter and Anankos.
Fact became legend. Legend became myth. Until the only thing that remained of the tale was the Dark, and the name: Anankos. Destroyer of Worlds.
"I could have killed him." Nyx would cry, upon waking up. "On the boat...I had hunted him. I hunted him for so long...but when he was finally in front of me...I forgot why. Worse...I let him convince me into working together. Again!"
Nyx realized what had happened. Everywhere the Nohrian flag was planted, the cloud would follow. Continue to drain the life of all living things under it, sapping them of their life, hope, and will. Leaving only emptiness and bitterness behind. It would do this...until the two people it was feeding finally did what humans were meant to do, and die.
Battle for Mokushu
When the cloud came over Mokushu, Ryoma believed that it was a Nohrian ritual and ordered a retreat before they were destroyed by it.
They stayed nearby, ready to halt the Nohrian advance. Corrin would take the opportunity to reunite her forces and push Northward.
At around this point, Kaden would talk with Ryoma. After seeing the cloud now covering Hoshido, he'd realize that his people can't afford to be neutral in this fight. As it turns out, a win for Nohr would actually kill nature. So he and his skulk will try to attack Nohr. Ryoma would also bring together some of the clans. With all of them, they would put a solid halt on the Nohrian advance.
Then uhh...some stuff would happen.
Maybe Corrin would be killed by Saizo, maybe he'd have a duel with Kotaro. Kind of on the fence about which side would win here. I know Gunter would be trying to install Hinoka and Takumui, both mind controlled by him, as the ones in charge of the Hoshidan army, which would probably involve killing Ryoma.
Something like that probably.
In the North
The Nohrian siblings would be moving west, and about to hit the capitol of Shirasagi. Leo and Camilla are all like "let's go sack it!" But Xander is starting to have second thoughts. "Father's death taught me...how we fight and what we fight for are not so easy to separate as we thought."
As he's marching up, they surround Shirasagi, fully capable of destroying it at this point. However instead he calls to parley with the ruler of the city.
Xander and Sakura would have a meeting. Xander is eager to hash out a peace that's good for both sides, and Sakura is somewhat relieved. At this point, her brother's army to the south is (maybe) destroyed, their country is fragmented, Hoshido is doomed. She's willing to surrender for the good of the people of Hoshido. To prevent more atrocities.
Her term for surrender is that she and Xander marry, so she can rule alongside him as Queen Consort over their united nation. Ensuring that the bad blood between their nations can be slowly mended.
At this point, an army from the south would begin marching. The forces that Ryoma took southward, however now headed by Takumui and Hinoka (I'm leaning toward Ryoma being dead by Gunter, and Corrin also having been killed by Saizo). They respond to no birds from Sakura telling them that they hashed out a peace; they are on the march to fight.
The Battle of Shirasagi
The final battle. A Nohrian army fighting to defend Hoshido, against a Hoshidan army under the control of a spiteful ghost from Nohr's past.
Gunter would be watching the battle from a safe distance, using his magic to empower his army.
A safe distance. Right where Nyx knew he would be.
"You said you wanted Nohr to win," she says at the start. "And I believed you. The king of lies."
"That would make you my queen. We are linked, after all. I don't suppose you've come to watch with me. What is it you think you're doing?"
"Taking responsibility."
So, little break-down of Gunter's plan here. Gunter had been trapped on the Nohrian side of the border when Mikoto put up the barrier. So he signed on to serve in Garon's army, and ended up being the captain of the guard in Corrin's little fortress.
At around the point that Nohr was pushing Hoshido off its shores, he realized that they were about to make a push toward Hoshido and maybe finally end the war. However, when they captured Hinoka alive, a plan began hatching in his mind.
He gathered up the fallen Hoshidan siblings and used the ancient magics to put them under his direct control. Then he started weakening Nohr in ways that couldn't be tracked back to him. Manipulating Azura to kill Garon, turning the shoguns against them at Cyrkensia, helping Saizo kill Corrin.
Then when an opportunity presented itself, he sent Takumui and Hinoka forward to take control of the Hoshidan forces and, once the Nohrian attack to the South was properly beaten back, marched them back up to the capitol.
There he would have installed them as rulers of Hoshido, under his magical control, making him the de facto ruler of Hoshido. When they had children, he'd control them, too. And down the line. The eternal hand behind the throne. Allowing him to rule over a vibrant and rich kingdom, while feeding off the suffering of Nohr's population through the dark that covered them. The eternal war between them would rage on, unending.
He hadn't expected the Nohrian siblings to be up in Shirasagi with their army, but that was an easy enough barrier to break down. With him strengthening the Hoshidan forces, they couldn't lose.
However, just as it was 10,000 years ago, he had failed to account for Anankos' interference.
The two would have a magical battle of proportions unseen in over 10,000 years. However, in the end, victory would be achieved not by a show of force or a beam struggle, but by well calculated measurements. When Nyx manipulated the fight into just the right spot for Odin to activate a trap that would encase them both in a barrier.
In the barrier, Nyx would say one final goodbye to "the best student I've ever had. And soon, the greatest Dark Mage in the world."
Nyx would encase herself and Gunter in a dark fire that burnt them both down to their very soul. Until nothing was left. Nothing to mark their existence; just a burn in the soil.
Without the control of Gunter, Takumui and Hinoka regained their will and memories of what had happened. Their spirits broken, they ceased giving commands, and their army faltered.
Soon, the Hoshidans surrendered.
The End
The Battle of Shirasagi, and the Forever War, ended in a victory for Nohr.
However, under the union of Xander and Sakura, the war ended not in blood and bitterness, but in agreement and hope for a future without war.
Historians would wonder what it was that caused the dark clouds above Nohr to finally dissipate. All they knew was that Nohr was only freed from their curse after the war finally ended; perhaps there was a link there. Though most people didn't mind too much.
Nohr could heal, and with their loose unification with Hoshido, they had the resources to bring life back to their barren land.
Not all was well. The shoguns continued to quarrel. There were border disputes. Some bitterness remained between the East and West, and the tensions between them would go on for many generations. It would take just as long before the West became a land that could farm anything, after thousands of years of barrenness. And Xander had his work cut out for him trying to fix the corruption in his kingdom and the hatred the common folk had for the Nohrian monarchy after his father's draconian rule.
Time would pass. Dynasties rose and fell, conflicts sparked, peace reasserted itself. People lived, and died.
History would become legend, and then myth.
Where Did They End Up?
Xander and Sakura would rule as King and Queen Nohr. Through their union, they would spend the rest of their lives easing tensions and preaching unification to all the peoples they ruled over. Never consummating their marriage, their line would be continued by Leo's offspring.
Sakura kept Mozu as her bodyguard and aide, and the young girl was eventually able to heal after the destruction of her home. They would both remember, fondly, that violent Nohrian man who saved them all those years ago, and who would never be gone from their memories. (I'm sorry, Hans :'( )
Camilla, Elise, and Leo served faithfully as enforcers of the crown's will, as was befitting of their station. Elise would be the outlier among the three, in that she would spend most of her time in the East, enjoying the fruits of Hoshido and becoming a beloved figure among all peoples.
Takumui and Hinoka never fully recovered from the mental torment put upon them by Gunter. They remained mute, and were cared for in the gardens of Castle Shirasagi. Sakura would often dine with them in those gardens, without a word exchanged between the three of them. Reina, who had failed to protect both her queen and the king after her, became the caretaker of the few who remained of Hoshido's royal bloodline.
Azura would be...somewhere. I dunno. Probably dead.
Corrin was...dead, probably. If not, then she probably retired or faced war crime trial, or something.
Jakob would move on from butlerin and become an administrator on the royal staff, bringing along most of Corrin's cadre. He would end up working closely with Orochi and Yukimura to try and enforce some form of system of feeding the West without depriving the East.
Silas would continue to lead his squad with distinction. After retiring from the military, after 20 years of service, he and Charlotte would be married and buying a house in Hoshido that her family could move into. Benny would end up being the Godfather to their first child.
Keaton went back to his Wolfskin tribe with a lot of cool stories to tell.
Odin and Laslow would meet up for drinks one night to toast their fallen friend, Selena. However, Laslow noticed a significant change in Odin. He seemed older, despite only being apart for a few months. It felt like he was talking to a completely different man. They went their separate ways, and never met again. Laslow and Soleil would remain as just friends, blissfully unaware of their connection.
Niles returned to Leo's service. He continued to serve Leo in all his necessary skullduggeries.
Kagero never fully recovered from the injuries she suffered underneath Mokushu. She was forced to retire from field work, and instead became a teacher for the new generation of shinobi to serve at the behest of Queen Sakura. As Saizo began to age, he also found himself retiring to Mokushu, as the new clan leader. Where he and Kagero could work closely together, and in a far less dangerous environment.
Kaden and his kitsune lived much as they did before. Nature remained unchanged.
After his last drink with Laslow, Odin Dark disappeared. He carried with him the knowledge of all Nohr's history, the truth behind the war, and the one who truly brought it to a close. Anankos was gone from the world, all her influence removed, save for in Odin's memory. And there it would stay. Odin drifted the world, never under the same name. Never able to be pinned down, but always where he needed to be. Saving the day, with exact and proper measurements.