Well, I'm glad people completely ignored what I asked last chapter. *sigh* Anwyays, welcome to the 24th (technically 25th) chapter of "The Otherwordly Soldier"! Enjoy, Read, and review.

Guest 2: I feel like we haven't had much filler at all in this story. I'll probably remedy to that especially in the timeskip, because I want to make at least two or three chapters about that. Sadly, I kinda cornered myself for any chance of filler (which isn't always a bad thing) the moment I decided that I would have the MC deal with stuff mostly on his own in this part…arc… thingy. And… "mad good" stories? Sugoi! You honor me too much :D

EDIT 07/03/18: This chapter has been completely rewritten because… Let's be frank. It was shit. It might still suck, but not as bad as before.

Chapter 24: Family reunions

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Francis screamed as he stared at the body in front of him, a sense of dread building up. The boy in front of him was, without the shadow of a doubt, dead.

*record scratch* *freeze frame*

You people are probably wondering exactly, how he had gotten to that point from the last time the fic was cut off, huh?

Well, let's start from the beginning…

If a depressed teenager fails to kill himself and gets transported to a fictional world-

No, that wasn't right. This wasn't how he had begun his adventure. He wasn't a teen, he was just moderately depressed on occasion, and he certainly didn't fail to kill himself. Or try, for that matter.

A long, long time ago…

No, that couldn't be. It was too old style, too fairy tale-eque. He needed something unique, something better.

This is the story of a-

No! Ugh. Who paid this joke of a narrator! That's it! He'd be narrating his own backstory. Lights! Camera! Action!

His name was Francis Marley. He was twenty years old, had just finished his first year at the university, knew two languages and was a bit of a shut-in, his social circle was never that big.

However, everything changed when the fire nation- erm, when his brother died. Perhaps his response had been a bit unorthodox, but nobody would fault him for it. He had suddenly become a lot more active, would be going out a lot more, had taken to jog around and threw himself whole into his studies with a renewed vigor. His room had been wiped clean of anything that had been into his brother's possession, not that he had much to begin with. A lot of the things he had were simply hand-me-downs from himself, after all.

To put it shortly, he had done everything in his power to ensure that he wouldn't be reminded of him at all.

And then it happened.

Casually lazing onto his old bed was, well, him. He had a blue aura around himself that was rapidly disintegrating into thin air, almost as if the air itself wascorroding him. He had been browsing through the phone with a bored expression on his face, casually checking out various fanfictions that Francis couldn't be bothered to remember. When the door opened he looked up at him with a disinterested, almost droll look on his face.

"Well, about fucking time you showed up." He casually told him. After that was that whole discussion that he didn't want to bother remembering. It was better this way. After that, he had fallen into the portal casually left into mom's room.

Most people would find the sensation of being dropped through a portal weird, and people with a more vast vocabulary would say that it's jarring, completely mind boggling, absolutely nuts, crazy, lacking a few screws in the brain and a whole slew of other synonyms for "crazy."

For him, it was a lot simpler. Simply put, the sensation could be described as-

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-"

Looking back on it, he would freely admit that it wasn't his proudest moment. For one who was supposed to be a medic, he wasn't that great at keeping a level head under stress. So he kept screaming.

For the first five minutes, anyways. A throat turns raw surprisingly fast, and he certainly didn't want that. After realizing that he wasn't hitting terminal velocity anytime soon despite the impossibility of what was going on, he started inspecting his surroundings. They were, to put it simply, blue. Blue as far as the eye could see, and probably a while beyond that. He certainly couldn't see.

Attempting to reorient himself so that he would fall feet down when he inevitably landed was an interesting matter, simply because, when he tried to, he realized that despite everything, he had no idea where he was falling. The rush of air was nonexistant and his air was too short to determine the direction. To be fair, he wasn't even sure if he was, in fact, falling. So he did what any reasonable person would do, obviously.

He spat into the air.

The little glob of saliva went up for a while, in the opposite direction of where he was falling, which he was facing with his back. Before he could grin in success, however, it proceeded to then go left, turn back and finally decide to fall back towards where his down was, only to somehow hit him on the side of the head.

'Well, that was helpful.' He thought sarcastically.

At least, he reasoned, he had time to prepare for his not-so-immediate demise. What did he know exactly about the situation?

His little brother had disappeared three months ago, time dilatation between dimensions notwithstanding (he shuddered at the idea of his brother being older than him), and had gone to the fictional continent of Ylisse. Somehow.

When he arrived he started screwing with the canon timeline events by becoming a shepherd and doing Paralogue 1,2,4 by himself and saving Emmeryn in chapter 6, afterwards fleeing Ylisstol for… some reason.

The little shit had completely ignored Paralogue 3. Though he couldn't blame him, that was hardly an important one, but he digressed. He was still receiving punishment in the form of annoying for it.

Cordelia had died somewhere in between chapter six and seven… which hasn't happened at all because Emmeryn was bedridden and got later "dethroned" (however temporarily) by none other than King/Prince Marth of Altea. On that topic, Ni' had apparently been going around collecting Einherjars and incurring into the wrath of the Aversa who stole and scattered the Einherjars across time and space, which was another can of worms altogether. At least he now knew that the random encounters were completely canonical.

Then he had send an Einherjar to Earth (what was this dimension called, anyways?) to deal with the fallout of the situation and live his life. Fat lot of good that did, when considering Earth as a dead-magic-zone. That also means that either the Earth used to have magic and for some reason stopped, or… something.

After getting bored of making up theories, he reached into his pocket, grasping for his phone. Which he didn't have, for some reason.

After all of the preparations were done, he concluded that it was a complete mess, but he would be up to the challenge. He could say that he was ready, and he could say it out loud.

In fact, that's exactly what he was doing.

"Bring it on world! Come on! I'm waiting!" He taunted Murphy's law. By all means, that meant that he was about to get smited down. But nothing happened.

"I'm waiting!" He shouted once more. Nothing happened.

"I'm waiting." He crossed his arms, looking around for anything.

"I'm waiting…?" he muttered, unsure. Didn't murphy's law always work?

"I'm wai-"

*thud*

That was the sound that the collision with the ground from a 20 year old male could make. Specifically, a twenty year old male that hits the sand in the middle of the desert.

"What the fuck?!" a familiar voice sounded out from above him, clearly startled.

"That's what I'm supposed to be asking." Francis tried to reply, but with the sand still muffling his face it was reduced to a pathetic "Mlsmmhghm." He may have just rolled a 1 on a speech check. He wasn't sure.

A hand grabbed him from the back of his shirt, lifting him up in the air and putting him on his feet. Slightly concerned on how exactly his brother could be strong enough to do that (he was light, but not that light) he looked at the figure.

"Alright, who are you and what exactly what are you doing here?" in front of him was a foolish samurai warrior wielding- uhh, a short boy levelling a lance at his chest, before lowering as he realized who he was pointing it towards. He was wearing plain cotton clothes that probably were not suited for the desert, if the redness on his shoulders and neck on his otherwise pale skin means anything. One of his arms was in a cast, the other gripping tightly a lance.

So Francis decked him straight in the face. He was angry at him, both for threatening him with a lance and for all the sadness he had made him go through.

A flash of panic crossed Ni's face as he brought up his lance to defend himself when the pointy stick (the analytical part of his mind whispered that it was a Japanese naginata) suddenly disappeared before it could hit him. The fist went through and his face whipped to the side.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?!" Francis shouted at him.

"Alright, I probably deserved that. Don't do that again." Ni' said, before being taken by surprise by a Brotherly Hug™. After a bit of hesitation, he leaned into the hug and returned it (as best as he could've with only one arm) as water started to flow from both of their pairs of eyes as if their tear ducts were broken. "I missed you." Francis choked out, all the emotion that he had buried for months returning with a vengeance. "I missed you so much."

"I'm sorry." He replied. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry…" he kept repeating like a mantra, burying his face in Francis' shoulder who simply hugged him tighter, barely aware of the moistening on his shirt from both sweat and tears.

After what felt both like hours and not nearly enough, they broke apart, Francis' hand getting caught in Ni's broken arm. "Sorry!" He yelped, retreating the offending appendage, but the boy simply looked unfazed.

"Who did this to you anyways?" He asked his brother. Maybe he wasn't a match for them in combat, but he certainly wasn't gonna leave the person who did this unpunished.

"Don't bother." Ni' snorted in dark amusement. "They've become a modern art ice sculpture anyways." He winced at the careless tone, a few moments passing awkwardly between them. Suddenly, Ni' looked at him.

"Why are you here anyways? I don't mind the company, but… you know… giant portal…" He asked, heading towards a pillar that was half-sunk into the sand for shade.

"You know, the usual. I tripped and fell into a portal after talking to your ghost thingy." Both of them began laughing at the improbability of that phrase combined with the fact that it was actually happening, before Ni's expression suddenly turned angry.

"Hold on, I had Anna make that clone barely a day ago and it already outed itself? Seriously?!" He scoffed in an overly dramatic manner. "It would've been fine if it held for even a few months or something, I would've wrapped things up by then."

"It was dying. "Francis shrugged, prompting a raised eyebrow from Ni' before he dismissed the thought with a wave of his hand. "Whatever. So, what… uh…" he started gesticulating wildly before settling for thrusting a hand at me.

"I'm here to take you home." Francis replied, matter-of-factly. His eyes widened in surprise for a moment before his usual deadpan took place on his face. He stared at him for a few seconds before sighing. "So… tell me… how do you think you could've taken me home, even assuming I want to go?"

"You don't?" Francis replied in surprise, before the rest of the phrase caught up with him, before he assumed a "does not compute" face. "Oh."

Ni' facepalmed. "Oh indeed."

"Hold on, you're telling me I'm stuck here as well now?!" countless scenarios started racing through his mind. His brother sighed.

"Well… at least I can meet an Anna. I still have a favour to cash in. I didn't expect to blow it on that, but…" he sighed.

"What are you even doing out here?" He asked him. He raised a finger into the air as he was answering… and promptly lowered it as he realized something.

"Holy shit" Francis bit down a "Language" that was starting on the tip of his tongue "What am I doing here?" He clutched at his head in a panic.

"I'm not a Shepherd because I left them, I'm not a soldier because I'm loyal to no nations, I'm no brigand because fuck that, I'm no thief because I only ever stole two books, I'm not a scholar, a court mage, a blacksmith, a noble… I mean technically yes but nobility was abolished in Italy a long time ago, what the hell am I?!" he fell to his knees, clutching his head.

"What the hell are you doing?" Francis asked. Sure, his brother was usually overdramatic, but not this much.

"Can it, Fra'?! I'm having an existential crisis over here!" Well okay then. Guess he had to step in to save the day.

"You're a… a wanderer, I guess?" He told him, finding the first suitable option, though it came off more as a question.

"A wanderer!" He snapped his fingers, nodding victoriously as if he had just found out the secrets to the universe. "That's right. Thanks."

"By the way, what have you been doing lately? I haven't seen you in months. You basically know everything I've been through but I know nothing!" he exclaimed, throwing his hands up in the air.

"Well, a bit of this and a lot of that." Francis answered, smirking as his brother's face reddened up and he fought to keep the scowl off his face, though if in anger or because of the heat he didn't know.

"Oh. That must've been nice." He said, trying to sound nonplussed.

"It wasn't." he contradicted evenly. A few seconds passed before Ni' finally snapped, groaning.

"Come on, tell meeeeee…" he whined.

"Fine. It's not that interesting." he started recalling the events following the nine weeks that had passed since his disappearance. Life hadn't actually changed all that much, despite everything. It simply felt a lot… emptier. There was supposed to be someone lying in the bed next to his, cracking stupid jokes, whining about going to school, reading fanfiction like it was nobody's business. And instead… nothing. Empty. Gone. Just like that. Mom was also a hell of a lot sadder.

"F-funeral?" He asked.

"Mmh. The police declared you dead and gone, so…" and wasn't that a weird phrase to say to someone, especially when they're alive and well?

Hold on. He was alive, right?

He poked him in the cheek, finding a bit of moisture left on his finger. He definitely hadn't become a ghost, but he had, quite literally, froze up. Air started to colden up, to the point where his irregular breath was coming off in condensation.

"H-hey, we're gonna prove them wrong! You're gonna have a grand entrance, there's gonna be a welcome back party… well, as soon as we can assemble one, and everything, it'll be great!" He tried to reassure the boy who had now lowered himself to sit on the ground hugging his knees. Ice began to creep under him.

"R-right… right…" He whispered. Then, even lower, under his breath he mumbled "I truly have nothing left now…" he hung his head miserably before mumbling "by the way, catch. It's… like, july or something? A bit late, but happy birthday." And suddenly, two objects were being tossed towards him, barely catching the first while the second clattered into the sand. One was a simple pendant with a golden chain and a pretty huge red gem (A ruby perhaps?) embedded into it. It was beautiful in its simplicity. He liked these kind of things. He didn't know what it did (if it did anything at all) but he wrapped it around his neck all the same. A gift was a gift. However, he soon was engulfed in a shower of golden sparks as the pendant vanished. He felt… slightly safer, though he couldn't quite place how.

The other, however, was a small statue, no bigger than my hand, made out of marble. It depicted a woman with a crown of thorns around her head. Saying it was a statue was a bit of an exaggeration; it was barely a bust, lacking anything besides the torso and the head. It had fallen into the sand, thankfully not breaking upon impact. He guessed this was what Divine Icons looked like, if the previous one was a Talisman. He was a tad sad that it had just disappeared, but it was whatever.

As he picked it up, he asked "What am I supposed to do with this?" The talisman was kind of obvious. It was a pendant, and it had activated upon being wore. But this? It was a statue. No immediate use for a statue came to him aside from putting it on display or using it as a blunt object, though the latter definitely didn't feel like the correct use.

"Hell if I know. I'm warning you though, any Dracoshield or Seraph Robe we come across is mine." He mumbled, still not removing his head from in between his knees. He had, however, stopped breathing raggedly and the frost on the ground was giving in to the deadly lazer that was the sun. That was good. He nodded nevertheless. If the amount of diseases he had as a kid was anything to go by, he was probably pretty frail.

But then he shook his head, sighing dramatically with a smirk on his face.

"Great, as if that wasn't enough, now I'm stuck babysitting my brother too while I wander…"

"Excuse me?!" I asked, half angry and half taking the opportunity to change topic for what it was. But still, I did not need babysitting!

"Can you hold your own in a fight? Because we're into enemy territory here." he asked me.

"Can you?" Francis asked back. He had a freaking broken arm, how was he gonna fight? Unless-

With a deadpan on his face, he raised his right hand into the air and water appeared in his hands, before quickly moving into a shape that was…

"Real mature." He deadpanned, staring at the ice floating in front of him who was flipping the bird while his brother casually sipped water from a mug, also made of ice.

"How are you doing that anyways?" Francis asked. Tossing the now empty mug behind him and letting the water from the hand fall onto the ground (if that was a non-repeatable spell Francis would've punched him for wasting water in a desert) he raised a hand, waving his fingers dramatically. "Magic." He said with a smug look on his face.

"So… you're a wizard? Mage? What class are you anyways?" he asked.

"What? No. I'm just Harry." He pointed out, prompting a groan from Francis.

"Basara." Which only prompted a confused sound from the back of his throat. "Uhh… Hoshidan class that wields long pointy sticks and uses magic?"

Visible

He sighed, running a hand over his face and finally getting up. "This is why you should've played Fates. You never know when you could drop into a fictional world and the knowledge of it may be the only thing that leads to your survival." He said with a perfectly straight face.

"Anyways… I'm a promoted unit." Which explained the strength he used to pick him up so easily… sorta. Not really, unless reality decided to take a backseat to game rules. On that note, he wondered, what class was he?

"Anyways… you need an affinity for magic. I don't know if you have one." He said. "Actually, if Earth is a dead-magic zone…" the realization hit him like a ton of bricks, before the obvious counterargument did two seconds later.

"Then how did you get it?!" he asked, enraged. There was ONE good thing that could have come out of this whole thing, and he would've not have it taken away from him!

Well, aside from his brother obviously. That was a good thing too.

An infuriating shrug is all he got in return, another mug appearing seemingly out of nowhere in Ni's hands.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA-"

"I can test your magical prowess, if you'd like." He said, blatantly ignoring the fact that he was screaming like a bald eagle high on freedom.

"Do it. Now."

"Alright then." He closed his eyes, his face scrunching up in concentration (though he looked as if he had just ate a lemon). After a few minutes that were all the longer by the constant heat and the anticipation.

"As it turns out, a tree probably has more magical capability than you." His brother announced, finally speaking up. Francis was about to give a rebuttal when- "And no, it's not like some fantasy settings where trees are really magicky."

His excitement deflated like a balloon. Kicking a rock, he grumbled "Let's hurry up and get back home then." This was such a scam. In a world where everyone could shoot magic from their fingertips with a simple Second Seal…

…Hold that thought.

"Could it be possible to use a-" but they were cut off by someone suddenly screaming. "Huh?" A little blonde and scantily clad girl was currently barrelling towards them. Specifically, she ran right into Ni's legs, hugging them tight.

"What the-" he started, but he was quickly (not to mention surprisingly) picked up by the little girl. Like, just basically picked up the same way you would pick a crate. Was everyone in this universe ridiculously strong? In the meantime, a ginger and a pinkette had also made their way over here; one trying to explain the situation to the other.

"Gregor doesn't know what took her over! You know Gregor is good fellow, yes? He set you free!" A swell sword and a jailbait… and someone else. He didn't know who, though.

Then Nowi started swinging my little brother ala baseball bat, trying to hit Gregor shouting "WHY!" Swing. "WON'T!" Strike one. "YOU!" Strike two. "JUST!" Strike three. You're over Nowi. "LEAVE!" Ouch, she nearly hit him. "ME!" This was probably not good for his brother's health. He couldn't bring himself to care beyond making sure that he didn't hit his broken arm. "ALONE?!" And now she tossed him towards Gregor, the latter thankfully jumping backwards to dodge, simply making his brother roll into the sand.

Meanwhile, the pinkette had made her way over to him, eyes wide with tears threatening to spill. He had already his fair share of teenage drama to deal with with his brother, geeze.

"D-daddy?" has stopped working.

So this could be interpreted in a number of ways. For the sake of keeping his sanity, and the rating of the story he'll just go with the safer option and assume this is actually my daughter and not a thot who likes to call people daddy.

Which begs the question: what the hell?

"… Who are you?" he asked, confused before memories rushed him.

"Francis. You. Have. A. Daughter." The ghost said.

"So what if I ha- WHAT. I have a wh-what?"

"A daughter. Her name's Rose."

Oh. OH. OHOHOHO FUCK HIM SIDEWAYS WITH A LUNCHBOX.

Thankfully she seemed to share a brief glance with Ni', who made a cutting motion across his neck. Right, he doesn't know that he knew.

What a confusing situation.

"Oh, nothing, hehe!" she giggled nervously. "You just reminded me of someone, that's all! Yes…" she then marched straight over to his brother, probably eager to get away from the situation. He probably would do the same if I were her too.

Well, actually he wouldn't, but he could understand the sentiment.

"Nick!" she shouted. "How good it is to see you again!" She hugged him in a very awkward way because of his arm. Francis stared at the duo oddly. However, the chance to act upon it was taken from him when from atop a dune a man shouted "Get them!"

Fuck.

His companions had similar yet completely different reactions. Since they didn't go to Prometheus' school of running away from things, or more likely because a quick glance revealed that they were completely surrounded, they sprung in a sort of battle formation.

And he said sort of because the only two that at least seemed battle-ready were Ni', who was flipping a card in his fingers hisbrotherhislittlebrotherfightingformecan'tdefendhim, and the ginger-haired mercenary who held his sword in his hands. However, due to my meta-knowledge, he knew that the trembling blondie was probably going to be one of their greatest assets. As for the pinkette…

"Shit! I don't have my staff!" she cursed. He was gonna have a talk with her about that later. It didn't matter how old she was, she didn't have the right to curse like that in his presence.

"Stick to us, then." Nick replied. All the humor in his voice was gone, replaced by dead seriousness. He chucked a card at her, which she caught in her hand with ease. "If anyone gets too close, use this. I trust that you know how it works?" She nodded. "Good. Now" another card appeared in between his hands. "Lilina!" he raised it into the air, shouting. Light filled the air, forcing me to turn away. When it stopped, a little girl stood next to him. "Don't let anyone close in on my brother. That's him." He pointed at me. She nodded and skipped over.

"Hold on, what about me?!" He asked. He was so not gonna be left out. He could help! Somehow…

"Stick to the backline with Rose." He ordered, in a no-nonsense tone.

His mind was racing at a thousand paces a minute by now, looking at their enemies. They were slowly closing in, having the numbers advantage. Some of their mages were preparing what he assumed to be dark magic, though thunder looked to be present as well. Their group had come from the south, and there were a few houses here and there.

Something clicked in his mind; this was the map of chapter eight.

And they were where Gregor and Nowi would usually spawn. A quick glance around him only strengthened the theory; there were huge remains of what no doubt used to be dragons, some villages around us and an oasis nearby.

"I… I think I got something." All of the attention was directed towards him now as he gestured. He pointed towards the north, indicating a small Plegian encampment.

"You see that part where the bones are separated? We'll get over there as fast as possible, breaking through their cavalry. They should be incapacitated a bit from the sand anyways, it's probably gonna be easier than it sounds. There should be a village or something there, if memory serves correctly. Then, uh…" He squeezed my mind for any sort of advantage that we could get. "The villagers probably like these people as much as we do. Which is to say, not at all. We could probably get at least some resources, or hell, if we're lucky someone to back us. Who is our strongest fighter?" He asked. The voices of three members of our group came out.

"Me." Gregor, Nowi and Nick said confidently at the same time. They all looked surprised at each other, but Gregor was quick to point out something.

"Broken arm isn't good to fight, yes? Leave fight to Gregor." His brother made a noiseless 'O' with his mouth and simply stared at his arm.

"Very well. How did that quote from Ephraim go? I don't pick fights that I can't win?" Francis asked himself rethorically. "Well, I certainly seem to be doing that now. Let's just hope we can tip the scales, as Robin would say, or even the odds, or-"

"We get it! Can we just go now? We're about to get killed." his brother groaned, pointing at a dark mage that had shot a blast of dark magic at him. He simply batted it aside as if it were nothing.

"Fine. Let's break the north. Everyone, go!"

And so it begins with our second protagonist. To be honest, he won't be for a while, but it's the thought that counts. I also wanted to try and portray Nick from the perspective of an outsider with his weird quirks like lack of reaction to pain, suddenly zoning off with a deadpan on his face and such. I think I did pretty well. This is all for today, Ninni51, out. *drops mic*

Francis

LV4 EXP 00

Class: Archer

HP: 22/22 80% Str: 10 55% Mag: 0 0% Skl: 9 (+2) 70% Spd: 11 60% Lck: 13 65% Def: 5 40% Res: 0 10%

Skills: Skill+2; Thicker than water*

*When within three spaces of a related unit, both units deal/receive +3/-3.

Weapon rank: Bows (D)

Bond support: Nick 10%, Rose 10%