'Twas a fine day at Garreg Mach Monastery. Summer heat was beginning to rear itself into the minds of the world's populace. Many of those who worked at the monastery were choosing to hang around outside in order to bask in the magnificent rays of the blinding sun. Students generally preferred to study outside wherever possible, hunching their backs over books temporarily lifted from the library.
Lucas was doing something similar. He parked himself on one of the benches in the courtyard next to the dining hall. Surrounded by trees, grass and some cool-looking flowers, Lucas felt at ease here. The light breeze of the wind messed up his short brown hair. He didn't mind it that much. He never did.
Sitting there, Lucas could almost forget about what had been happening recently and what was to occur very soon. Peace regaled him when he was full of stress. Although the knights were in a panic regarding the supposed attack on Lady Rhea, Lucas already reassured himself of the whole thing. He knew the Western Church was really after Sothis' remains (truthfully, the Sword of the Creator) so for him, it was only a matter of time until he'd have to get ready for the next battle.
As for now, he shrugged it all off as per the recommendation of Sothis and Byleth. He allowed himself to take in the naturalistic, calming environment of Garreg Mach. A warm, relaxing feeling enveloped him. His eyes even struggled to keep themselves open. As he was about to fall into a nap, a certain someone's feminine voice reached his ears, keeping him awake.
"Professor?"
Lucas mumbled as he rubbed his eyes, clearing his vision. "Oh, Dorothea. Nice to see you."
"You too, Professor. Say, were you just about to take a nap? I'm sorry for disturbing it if you were," Dorothea asked, a level of concern on her face.
"Nah, it's fine. Probably shouldn't nap in a public place like this. Who knows what sort of shenanigans can happen," Lucas responded after yawning. "How are you doing? Did our lesson earlier today make sense?"
"It did. I think I now understand a bit more about the different types of bow strings. Not that I ever really plan on using a bow, but it's nice to know."
"Nice rhyme," commented Lucas, still half-awake.
"Huh? Oh, I guess I did rhyme. Seems like I can't get my old songwriting habits out of my head," Dorothea giggled. "Anyway, Professor. I have something to ask you."
"Go right ahead, I'm all ears. Feel free to sit if that helps at all," Lucas motioned towards the other side of the bench, to which the student smiled.
"Thank you," she thanked as she sat down beside her teacher. "So, about last month's mission…"
"Our battle against Lonato and his forces? What's up?"
Dorothea paused, as if she was reluctant to speak. Lucas sat there and waited patiently since he figured this was a touchy subject of sorts. After all, that was the case for him. He had no doubt someone else would share his woes. Following a short silence, Dorothea spoke up.
"All those people we killed…" she began, looking down to the ground. "They weren't bandits. Neither were they particularly bad people. They were just normal civilians. So why...why did we have to do it, Professor?"
Lucas stopped to think of a good answer before replying. "Because of Lonato. He drove them to believe in him, to protect him under all costs. I don't know the specifics, but I'm sure he promised them salvation from the supposed 'wicked Rhea' or whatever he told them. It's...unfortunate. Very unfortunate. But they chose to march to their deaths. They chose to fight. It was either we get killed while trying to stop them from destroying society, or they die themselves. They wouldn't have been talked out of it, I'm sure. All because of Lonato."
His eyes twitched again.
"Is that so?" Dorothea sighed. "How is it possible for one man to drive so many to an early grave? I don't get it."
"He was probably very charismatic and smart. He preyed upon the needs of his people and manipulated them to join his war against the Central Church. Because he was so charismatic, people were able to buy into his words and thus find the spirit to join him."
"And look where that got them. Murdered by us."
Silence returned between the two. A general sense of awkwardness permeated through the air. Lucas and Dorothea sat in a shared understanding and general acceptance of what was said. The silence continued for some time.
Until it was broken, of course.
"Sorry, Professor. That was a little mean of me to say. I understand what it's like to only have a single way forward in life. I suppose I can't entirely blame them for choosing to fight with Lonato."
"It still sucks, though. If they hadn't signed up, they wouldn't have died. They'd still be with their families," Lucas' eyes twitched again, tears slowly rising. "D-damn...I thought I stopped thinking about this already. But it seems like it'll never leave my mind. No matter how hard I try."
"Professor…" Dorothea's brows furrowed in concern. "I'm sure you'll stop thinking about it soon. Life goes on, after all. You can't afford to let yourself be stuck in the past. You've got to move on or else you won't be able to stop thinking about things that hurt you. And that won't be good."
Lucas briefly glanced at Dorothea as she spoke, quickly returning his gaze to the sky after realising how creepy that would've looked. He stopped for a moment to think about her words. Sniffling to hold back his tears, Lucas smiled.
"Y-you're right. Y'know, that's the same thing my…" he cut himself off before revealing something about Earth. "The same thing someone told me once. To move on and stop thinking about the bad things in life. Instead, think about things that make you happy. I haven't seen her in a while."
"Her?" Dorothea noticed. "Is this an old flame of yours, Professor?"
"Heh, nothing of the sort. She was married," Lucas clarified, blushing slightly while laughing in embarrassment. "She was someone I used to visit whenever I'd get overly stressed. She's provided me with some useful advice about how to handle my mental health. However, I haven't been able to see her in a while. It's getting harder to remember the things she taught me. Especially with everything that's been going on lately."
"Oh. Well, Professor, I might not know what this woman has taught you, but don't forget I'm here if you ever need someone to speak to," Dorothea turned to Lucas and smiled. "Like I said after the mock battle, I'll be there to listen to you. So will the rest of our house. Maybe not Hubie, maybe not Lin either now that I think about it. Either way, the point is, if you need to talk to someone when you're stressed, I'll be here for you."
Lucas returned Dorothea's smile with one of his own. "Thanks. I'll be sure to remember that."
The conversation lulled into a silence once more. Nothing was left to be said between the two. Despite the calming winds introducing a cool sensation that juxtaposed the blazing summer heat, Lucas was feeling warm on the inside. Tears were nowhere to be found. Any stress Lucas had built up soon dissipated. He stood up from the bench.
"I should probably head out now. I need to get my seminars set up before Seteth yells at me. See you later-"
"Hey, Professor!"
A new voice interrupted him. Lucas and Dorothea turned to see a familiar red-haired student approach them. The latter groaned, of which did not go unnoticed by the new arrival.
"Dorothea, come on. Was that really necessary?" Sylvain of House Gautier asked, pouting slightly.
"Yes, it was," Dorothea replied sharply. "I'll be taking my leave now. Goodbye, Professor."
She lifted herself from the bench and departed from the area, much to Sylvain's irritation.
"Wow. I try to talk to her five separate times and this is how I'm treated? What did I even do? Anyway," Sylvain shrugged it off. "Professor. I have a proposition for you."
Lucas rapidly blinked his eyes, having not entirely processed what just occurred. "Uh, what's that?"
"See, this new game just came out. I'm looking for people to help me play it. I've already got two, I just want a fourth. You mind being that fourth?" Sylvain requested with a charismatic smile.
"Game? No, wait, he can't be talking about video games. Reel in your expectations there Lucas," the professor reminded himself. "What's this game called?"
"The Nobility's Game. It's all about buying properties and land while trying to make the most amount of money possible. It's really fun! From what I've heard, at least."
"Buying properties and land? Making money? This sounds familiar," Lucas paused to think. "Alright, I'm in. I'm not a noble, so I might be at a disadvantage."
"Heh, you don't need to actually be a noble in order to play. The name's just to make it sound fancy. Come on, we're already set up over here."
Lucas followed the skirt chaser, curious to see what the game was all about.
The wooden tables that were available in a different section of the courtyard were all but deserted, save for one. A pair of students were huddled around the last remaining bastion of the table kingdom, their eyes fixated on the square piece of cardboard resting on the wood. Several smaller pieces were scattered around the table, ones Lucas couldn't quite make out from the distance he was at. But there was something about that colourful cardboard.
When Sylvain led him over to the table, thus granting him a better look at the game, Lucas' eyes widened.
"This is just fuckin' Monopoly. Beat for beat, word for word, straight up Monopoly!" he exclaimed internally.
"Uh, Professor, are you okay?" Sylvain inquired, confused.
This snapped Lucas out of his trance of realisation. "Oh, yeah. I'm good. I just think I've seen this before."
"That's weird. This only came out the other day," Sylvain narrowed his eyes slightly in a somewhat accusatory manner. "Where could you have seen it before?"
"Maybe he's getting it confused with something else," Ingrid suggested, speaking up. "There's no need to be so inquisitive, Sylvain."
"I dunno, Ingrid. Teach here is definitely a strange person. Isn't that right, Teach?" Claude hinted, looking up at the professor in question with that charming smile of his.
"Strange is subjective," Lucas stated, shrugging. "Now enough about that. Aren't we here to play a board game?"
"You're right about that, Professor. Let me run through the rules quickly."
Sylvain coughed to clear his throat, doing so with an overly dramatic flair that caused Ingrid to voice a complaint. He picked up a piece of paper from the table.
"So. Each player picks one of the six available stone tokens. We then roll two six-sided dice to determine who goes first. The person with the highest amount goes first, the person with the second highest amount goes second and you get the idea. The goal of the game is to make every other player lose all of their money."
"How do you do that?" wondered Claude.
"Well, when the game begins, the first player rolls the dice again. The total of the amount on both dice determines how many spaces along they move. You're supposed to end up on these land tiles and buy them. Once you've bought a land tile, if another player has to stop on it, they'll have to pay you the rent amount listed on that tile's card. The idea is to buy as many of these land tiles as possible so people keep paying you rent until they have no more money and nothing left to sell. If that happens to anyone, they're out of the game."
"This really IS Monopoly! Jesus Christ!" Lucas remarked to himself. "So, uh, which ones are the land tiles?"
"The ones that have coloured bars at the top. Like these two," Sylvain motioned to the two spaces which had brown rectangles on them.
Much to Lucas' chagrin, both brown properties were listed as 'Duscur' and 'Almyra'. "No way that's not intentional."
Lucas tuned out the rest of the discussion. It purely pertained to the rules of the game, with some slight differences in names to reflect Fodlan as a whole. Chances were known as Divine Chances here, there were Divine Chests instead of Community Chests, train stations were replaced with churches, dungeon took the place of jail, free parking was swapped with free stables, Monopoly dollars were removed in favour of G (delivered to players in the from of specifically chiseled rocks), the old company spaces were replaced with the Knights of Seiros as well as a generic mercenary corps and all the property spaces were named after regions within Fodlan, such as Goneril, Aegir and Fraldarius.
What was notable was that each side seemed to represent a different side of the continent. Leicester, Adrestia and Faerghus each had a side dedicated to them. The fourth side seemed to be a miscellaneous one. It was where Duscur and Almyra were located. The only thing that stayed the same for this Fodlan version of the game were the tax spaces, though the image of the ring on the luxury space was different.
One thing Lucas found particularly amusing was the presence of a silhouette of Rhea on the "Go To Dungeon" space.
As soon as everyone was informed how to play, it came time to pick out some tokens. Ingrid gravitated towards the pegasus, Sylvain nabbed the horse and Claude grabbed the wyvern. That left the sword, bow and book (likely representing magic). Lucas chose the book.
After that was the dice roll. Lucas was able to roll the highest, Claude got second, Ingrid took third and Sylvain was stuck with last. Each player placed their respective tokens onto the omnipresent "GO" tile.
"Alright, time to begin!" Sylvain declared as Lucas rolled the pair of dice. "Roll 'em out, Professor!"
On command, Lucas released the dice. The game began.
A fist raised into the air. One of the players celebrated their victory in the round of The Nobility's Game the four of them played. Each of them bought up as many lands as they could, though Ingrid in particular was being a bit too spend-happy. Lucas, Sylvain and Claude played much more carefully.
However, even doing that caused issues for Sylvain. For some reason, the dice were not on his side for most of the game. He usually ended up landing on spaces owned by other players, therefore his money was quickly drained. Whatever properties he had were auctioned out amongst the remaining three.
Ingrid was the next to go. Her inexperience made coming up with strategies rather difficult. Not only that, Claude and Lucas were lucky enough to avoid her properties most of the time. But whenever she gained money from such an occurrence, it always seemed to her as if it went away the very next second.
Claude and Lucas went at it for a while. The latter was able to use his experience from playing the game back on Earth as both versions were almost identical. He even seemed to be a little luckier than Claude overall. Unfortunately, that did not last. Golden Deer's house leader played a more aggressive game, building houses and villages wherever and whenever possible. Lucas was overwhelmed, thus he failed to defeat Claude. That explained why he was the one raising his fist in celebration.
"Looks like I won. Good game everybody," he grinned in a nearly smug manner. "Though I've gotta say Teach, you did pretty well yourself for being a commoner. Are you sure you haven't played this before?"
"Nope!" Lucas half-lied, shaking his head. "Fairly certain I haven't. Would be weird if I did, seeing as it came out only a few days ago, right?"
"Fair enough," Claude raised both of his open palms, conceding. "But really, we should do this again sometime. That was actually really fun."
"Yeah, for you. You weren't messed around by the cruel mistress of fate," Sylvain complained.
"How ironic. The one who messes around with women gets messed around by the woman who controls fate," Ingrid jested with a smile.
"Hey, I don't mess around with anybody. They mess around with me," claimed Sylvain, rolling his eyes. "Anyway, we should totally do this again. Same time next week?"
Claude, Lucas and Ingrid murmured their assent. "Definitely. It should be fine, assuming neither of us are busy by then," answered Lucas.
"Great! I'll be sure to prepare all kinds of strategies for next time. I refuse to let myself be annihilated by chance again," the red-haired student pointed to the sky in an exaggerated fashion.
"Okay. You'll just be annihilated by me, then," Claude smirked.
Sylvain responded with mock surprise, feigning offence for the sake of humour. Ingrid and Lucas giggled while Claude retained his smirk. The four helped clear up the game before dispersing. As he was walking away, Lucas looked up to see the sun edging ever closer to the horizon.
He groaned, for he knew what he needed to do next.
For the sixteenth time that session, Lucas was flung to the other side of the training room thanks to an immensely powerful kick from one Jeralt Eisner. After rolling along the ground following the kick, he found it very difficult to get back up. All of his limbs felt as if they had been shattered through repeated torture. He remained there, face on the ground, unable to deal with the overwhelming pain.
"You're getting better. That much is clear," Jeralt noted after a sigh. "But your attacks are too obvious. I could tell what you were planning to do long before you did it. Like I've said, stop thinking too much about what you do. Instead, just act. You'll be a lot less predictable that way."
"B-but…" Lucas could barely speak. He swore he could taste something akin to iron.
"There's no room for buts in battle. Quickly think about what move makes sense for the situation you're in and then go for it. A moment of indecision could lead to your death," Jeralt advised, a stern look on his face. He pulled a Vulnerary out from his bag and offered it to the heavily bruised student of his. "Here. Take it and we'll have a break. You obviously need one."
Lucas coughed in response. He nodded and took the Vulnerary, drinking most of it before splashing the rest of the bottle upon his entire being. Most of the aches dissipated, though some remained. It was at least enough to allow him to get off the floor and sit properly.
"Thanks, Jeralt. I don't know what I'd do without you," Lucas thanked once he was able to.
"Don't mention it, kid. This is all for the betterment of Fodlan, right? According to what you've said. I still don't know if I should believe you entirely, but I'd be a damn fool to let the monastery's newest professor run around with barely any combat skills. That, and it seems like you're the only opportunity I have to see my son again," Jeralt said upon taking a seat of his own.
"If at all possible," Lucas reminded him. "I don't know if I can ever get Byleth to separate with me, but if I find a way to do that, I will. It's the least I could do to repay you."
"Well, I'm sure you'll be doing a lot more than that."
"...You're right."
Lucas stopped, thinking about the future and all the things he'd have to do to ensure everything goes smoothly. Jeralt sensed the younger one's doubts increasing.
"Alright, time to get back up. You've been resting for too long."
Sighing, Lucas nodded. He slowly did as he was told, powering through the numerous strains across his body. Picking up the training blade he'd been using, the professor held it in such a way that its pointed end was directed towards his opponent. His arms and legs kept shaking. Yet, he continued.
With a motion from Jeralt signifying the beginning of the bout, Lucas charged forward and attempted several forceful stabs to which Jeralt evaded by leaping backwards. The older man retaliated with a lance jab. Lucas was barely able to dodge it. He almost stumbled while doing so, but quickly found his footing. Launching a downwards sword swing while aiming at his training partner's head, Lucas stepped forward a little to put some more power into his attack.
This forced Jeralt to go on the defensive. The trainee grinned as the master blocked the swing with the stick of his lance. A small struggle then occurred. Jeralt was rapidly gaining ground against Lucas, whose lacking muscles were failing. It also didn't help that he was still aching from all the previous training bouts.
Getting a cheeky idea, Lucas copied one of Jeralt's previous strategies and tried to kick him whilst the struggle was still going on. However, Jeralt predicted this. He sweeped Lucas with one of his legs, forcing him into the air. Then he placed a hand on Lucas' chest, pushing him onto the ground.
"Seventeen to zero. Come on, you have to get at least one," Jeralt playfully taunted. He offered a hand. "We're not gonna stop today until you get that victory."
"Even if it takes over a hundred tries?" Lucas wondered, wincing at the idea.
Jeralt chucked. "Even then."
Lucas smiled in return. He always dreaded the physical torture he'd be put through in these training sessions, but there was something about Jeralt's general demeanour that made it worthwhile and sufferable. He grabbed Jeralt's hand and got back to training.
There was no other choice. Especially considering what was to happen at the Holy Mausoleum very soon. Lucas hoped his plan would work without any issues.
Author Notes: Sorry this one took so long to come out! I just haven't been feeling like writing recently. I should be back into it, I think. Anyway, to make it up for y'all, I'ma try to get Chapter 10 out by Sunday. I hope that's okay!
Also, Monopoly but Fodlan. Why not?
Don't forget to join the Fanfiction Treehouse Discord server! I'm there along with a whole load of other cool writers! Here's the invite code: 9XG3U7a.
See y'all next time!