Arthur was outside, sorting through his different tomes and organizing them to make sure he knew exactly where his special Thoron tome was. He was about to head into the fray of the Dozel army, hoping to defeat them as quickly as possible before Castle Edda fell. He and his sister, Tinni, along with Nanna and her brother Diarmuid, were some of the few people that were heading there.
Of course, he knew the fight to take back Dozel was not going to be easy. But he wanted to keep an eye on his sister, especially considering she was getting closer with Diarmuid, which worried him to no end. Though he also wanted to make sure Nanna would be okay as well, he had a feeling she would be alright, but he didn't want her to get into too much danger.
As he was lost in thought, he saw Nanna in the corner of his eye. What were the odds huh? She looked terrified, he could tell from her stiff posture. As soon as he was done sorting his items, he urged his horse to head toward her. "Nanna...are you alright? I've never seen you this scared." he asked her.
Nanna looked up toward the mage. "I am not alright if I must be honest," She replied. "We are finally at Grannvale...the end is near...but I worry for Diarmuid. I wish I could be useful to him, but he can do everything I can but better...even if I can heal, I doubt it'd be useful..."
"I see, I see. I am not the best at giving advice, but I will say. Maybe try using skills you've been avoiding, if you have any. I had a weapon I never really wanted to use, but recently I've decided to use it; it is a wind tome, to be specific. it has proved to be useful."
Following Arthur's advice, Nanna rummaged through her items and found a nice looking sword. Shiny and slightly curved, along with a sharp curved point at the end, it looked too distinct to be just a plain silver sword. Holding it in front of Arthur so he could see it, she hesitantly replied, "I have...this. It is a Brave Sword, it was a gift from my father to my mother. I have kept it on me for a while, but never used it...I feel like I won't be able to use it at its full potential, my skills with a sword are not great...that's why I limit myself to mostly healing."
"Well, I think you should use it!" He told her bluntly. "You have the opposite problem as I, you are scared to enter combat. And I say to hell with that, get out there into battle, and if you get hurt, you have that other funky looking sword of yours right?"
"Yes! Mother's Earth Sword. That could also be useful! You have a point Arthur, thank you!" Nanna giggled.
"That's the spirit! I'm glad something I babbled out of my mouth proved useful!" He joked, patting Nanna on the back.
Instantly, Arthur felt something in his heart flutter. What in the world? What was with that reaction? Nanna actually appreciating his time? Could this be a sign? No, no, he needed to focus, there was still much more he had to do. He still needed to kill his Father, and maybe reconcile with his half-brother. Regardless, he smiled, a genuine smile, he couldn't remember the last time he ever felt this happy. "It's no problem, Nanna. Now why don't you go talk to that brother of yours?"
"You are right, I will go talk with him!" Nanna agreed, putting away the Brave Sword and getting her horse, Asta, ready. "Thanks again, Arthur!" She said as began to get ready for battle.
And so, the battle to take back Dozel began.
It was easy at first, two different sets of axe knights that were accosting all sides, but they were no match for Arthur. He could easily take advantage of their weakness to magical attacks, plus Thoron was the most powerful of all of the thunder tomes; it could take anything down in an instant. Tinni, meanwhile, was using a Tornado tome, which increased her ability to dodge quickly and cast spells just as fast. So really, it was easy-at first.
The Nordion siblings in particular, while they had the upper hand, still had to take a good while to kill off each of the Dozel knights because of their superior defense. Fortunately, though, both of them had the same advantage thanks to their holy blood. But even so, Arthur and Tinni were both worried about them. That was why Tinni brought some staves with her, just in case something like this would end up happening.
Then, once the rest of the Axe Knights were taken care of, they were met by Duke Brian, the wielder of the mighty axe Helswath. From the looks of said axe alone, it looked like they would have a lot of trouble taking him down unless they had a holy weapon themselves.
"How dare these kids try to face me? You underestimate the power of the Helswath. Prepare to face the wrath of three different generations of House Dozel!" Brian said and swung his axe at Arthur, it was too fast even for him to think quickly and dodge it. So in the end, he got hit by the axe, causing him to get heavily injured. He was lucky he didn't get hit on any vital spots, otherwise he could've died easily.
Fortunately, his power only grew stronger, thanks to his injuries, that was a gift most Friege mages got, they could heavily injure, or even kill, their opponents back. That combined with his Thoron tome, he could most definitely inflict that same damage on Brian. So before Brian could do any more damage to him, Arthur cast his Thoron tome, and with all of his energy, he launched the spell at the Great Knight, causing great damage.
Diarmuid took the opportunity and used his Silver Blade to finish off Duke Brian. "Ghhh, I lost... even with Helswath I fell so easily? Perhaps I…" Brian said on his final breath.
Finally, the Dozel army was taken care of, leaving only the Castle in and of itself left, though there were a few Loptyrians guarding it, but what could those little mages do? Arthur, being the cocky person he was, was about to head over there and murder the Loptyrians at Dozel, however, Tinni stopped him, a staff clutched in her hands.
"Arthur...please let me heal you up. You might have a lot of strength right now, but don't be too reckless," She told him and then she began to heal him with her Mend Staff.
Sighing, Arthur obliged, she was right on that after all. "Alright, but finish quickly. The sooner we take care of Dozel, the better!"
"I understand, I've the exact same feeling as you. But you know better," Tinni replied, looking at him with a frown on her face.
"Yeah, I know. I'm just...worried about heading to Friege, I guess." Arthur looked toward the way to Friege, which was northwest from Dozel. There was still time until they had to go, but it still made him fear the worst.
"Yeah...Hilda is waiting for us there, isn't she? And...Ishtar too."
Looking back at his sister, he nodded. "Exactly, and I've been trying to prepare myself for when it happens...I just want to get it over with!" He sighed. "And as for cousin Ishtar...what are we going to do if she's out on the battlefield?"
"Soon, Arthur. We'll get there, and we'll take Hilda down, Mother will finally be avenged. And Ishtar...I'll find a way to convince her, I promise!" Tinni said, finally done healing him as the staff's glow faded. "There we go, all better!"
"Thanks, Tinni," He said and looked toward castle Dozel again. Realizing that while he was being recovered, the rest of the group had already defeated what was left of Dozel forces. Well, at least he didn't have to worry about it now, which was good.
Suddenly, as he was about to say something to Tinni, a pegasus flew down and landed, it was Fee, along with Julia. Huh, the fight with Arvis must've been finished already, he thought. Then he realized that Fee in particular was panicked, desperately trying to help Julia off of her pegasus.
Impatient as Arthur was, he decided to ask, "Fee! What's wrong? What's happening?"
"There you are! I've been trying to find you and Tinni for a while now! Mahnya was being more of a jerk than usual…" She grunted, before continuing. "This is very important by the way...it's about my brother."
Tinni gasped, and Arthur just gave a confused yet annoyed look. "Ced, huh? What's he doing this time?" Arthur asked, not feeling any fear in the slightest.
Fee pouted at the mage knight's sarcastic reply. "Please try and take this seriously for once! Julia is panicking here!"
Julia, who was trying to find a way to speak in the conversation, went closer towards the Friege siblings and said, "He has been acting like a completely different person recently...I fear the Forseti tome is doing something to him...I know he would never even think of attacking the people who are dear to him...but..."
"WHAT?" Tinni suddenly shouted before Julia shushed her.
"Don't shout, he could notice us…" She said, quivering as she tried to calm herself down as well.
"So what are we going to do about this?" Arthur asked, but this time he felt a little more concerned about what was going on.
"I don't know! If even I couldn't stop him, then I don't know what we could do!" Fee said, still in a huge panic.
"I...think I have some sort of way," Julia said, before taking out what looked to be a piece of paper. "I'm not sure if this will be useful but, This…"
Fee looked at the paper in awe. "Is that…?"
Julia nodded, before showing the scroll to everyone. The green wind symbol at the center made it obvious as to what scroll it was. "It's the Sety Scroll Ced gave to me. I managed to find something about it when I was with Lord Leif. According to what I know, it can neutralize the power of Forseti. "
"Alright, I think I understand…" Arthur said. He had heard of how most holy weapons can be neutralized by their respective scrolls. The Book of Loptous was the exception as it never possessed a scroll. "How are we going to like...execute it, are we just going to give it to Ced or what?"
"That is what I do not know. But I would assume it would only be affected at the right time. Ced still has a bit of himself in him, so it might be a bit pointless to use it right now." The priestess pondered on the thought a bit more. "However, we need to do it at some point, otherwise…" after saying that her voice broke, as though in fear.
"You better not be saying what I think you're saying!" Fee raised her voice slightly, thinking the absolute worst.
"Y-You say that Ced still has some of him left?" Tinni asked. "Then...we can try and…"
"It won't work, remember?" Fee told Tinni. "I don't want you to get hurt too!"
"So we're just going to wait, huh?" Arthur asked rhetorically, sighing. "Well, I guess we still have to get through Friege and all that. Maybe we figure something out then."
"Yeah, exactly!" Julia said, putting the scroll away. "We just need to ensure we survive through this final push."
Fee meanwhile was feeling pretty glum. "Well...let's hope we can...oh, Cedsy."
Arthur looked at Fee, trying his best to reassure her at least a little. "We'll…" He paused, man he really wasn't the best when it came to trying to assure people. "I may not be so sure myself, but...I hope that we'll help Ced. Because he's...family, and I just want to see him under better circumstances."
"I...don't like what is happening with Cedsy...and I worry it actually won't be okay. But...thank you anyways, Arthur," Fee replied, giving a small smile.
There was still time left, Arthur decided. Fighting Hilda, and Ishtar too...and then Prince Julius. Then after that, when the war was all over, perhaps they could save Ced from whatever was going on with him.