[Ego sum Robinus, homicida, proditor, peccator, sed adhuc ipse sum. Nemo a me potest auferre.]
Well, this is certainly a new experience. It's not every day that By comes up and shoves a book in your face and commands you to write. Honestly, I'm surprised she's even keeping up with this thing. I expected her to forget about it within a week or so. I'm…glad, though. She's been keeping her own thoughts cooped up in that brain of hers for way too long. Letting herself express her inner feelings is going to significantly reduce the chance that she will suffer a mental breakdown.
And now Byleth is shooting me a rather annoyed glare. She's probably realised that I'm not writing what she wants me to write at the current moment. I think she's still a bit peeved about me forcing her to stay out of the previous battle. I'd rather her be mad at me than risk what happened to Morgan to happen again. I've made my fair share of mistakes as a father and sometimes, I see myself slipping back into those habits. I was very close to letting Byleth back into the fight, but I've learned my lesson from Morgan. If you can't be sure if you can stay standing without the enemy, you shouldn't be fighting. That should go without saying.
Right, right, actually writing about what happened. I should start doing that before Byleth gets more mad and stops talking to me for a week. Though, she used to do that without even meaning to; she wasn't all too sociable up till around half a year ago. I blame puberty. She might be physically developed, but those changes have made their way up to her brain just yet.
As for the battle…well, there really isn't much to talk about. By the time I got back, it was mostly over. Oh, you want me to narrate it? That's…a rather weird request, but sure, I guess?
Honestly, I hate the dusty and all-together hot and dry climate of the Red Canyon. It reminds me too much of Plegia, with too little of the things that make Plegia bearable. Not a single bee or sweet melon in sight. Just sheer, dry cliffs and hot sandy, lifeless soil. Making my way back without the need to keep an eye on Byleth allowed me to take in my surroundings more and calm the swirl of thoughts that had been plaguing me for a while now.
By the time I got back to the front line, the bandits had finally gotten their act together and formed a rudimentary shield wall, the few pikemen they had up in the front forming a loose fence of sharp iron pointing at our line.
Considering that the infantry line had pulled back, I had guessed that Linhardt didn't know what to do and panicked, ordering the line backwards. I didn't need to imagine the rage that Solkis must be feeling at the moment. Byleth had done the same thing when I was training her to be a tactician, and the dressing down that the Srengian had given her will be forever stuck in my memory.
A bit of a tangent, but I find it strange the defaults that different places have. Without fail, whether it was Chrom, Frederick, Miriel, Virion, or gods forbid, Sumia, whoever I gave secondary commands to back home would always seek to charge the enemy. I gave Sumia command of the army for ten minutes in order to make sure Morgan wasn't hurt and I returned to half the army engaged in melee! Ten minutes! It took over eight for the reserves just to get to the front!
But the first reaction of everyone here in Fodlan…is a lot different. Everyone acts…a lot more defensive, almost as if they were stuck in a mindset that focused on defence. Now, I'm sure that there are exceptions to all generalisations, but it's been confusing me for a long time. Fodlan was always talked about in Zenith as a continent constantly at war, either against foreign powers or itself, but the tactics used here are…strangely primitive and defensive in nature.
Take that terrible Loog book, for example. The rigid command structures that it recommends are well suited to sieges, sure, but take them onto the field and watch your army be overwhelmed with sixteen different attacks and once and see the delicate and overly stiff command structure break apart. Or, how states that attacking retreating troops is 'unsportsmanlike' and 'against the principles of chivalry'. What utter nonsense. What point is there to calvary is you don't chase down infantry with them?
This attitude seems completely and utterly pervasive within the Fodlani armies and other military and quasi-military organisations. It doesn't just apply to the nations of Fodlan, either—Dagda loves her skirmishers but uses them as harassers when her own territories are in danger, rather than pushing them forward as a scouting force.
Brigid isn't much different; I've never seen a son or daughter of the Isles of Flame slip into the enemy's camp and assassinate their leaders. Naga knows the Plegians tried that multiple times during the two wars we fought against them. Odd, then, that Petra seems to be so aggressive. Extremely odd…
The only place that I feel has ever a small strand of aggression within their souls is Sreng, and even their near-insane (in Fodlani standards) warriors pale in comparison to Plegian Berserkers or the Varangii of the Feroxi.
Anyhow, I digress. I've talked too much about military theory, and By doesn't really care all too much about that. Don't think I didn't notice that your eyes glassed over whenever I decided to bring up anything relating to logistics. You might think that I'm too old to notice such things, but I just so happened to be the father of two incredibly sneaky and mischievous children. I know what I'm doing.
I find Linhardt and give him a rather loud and curt telling off and regather our forces. At this point, the bandits' moral is around the consistency of soft sand or burnt ash. Not much more effort is needed to break them completely. I'm honestly surprised that they've lasted this long as is. I'd thought that it would take a lot less to break them, but even a cornered mouse will scratch a cat, or so I've heard from Kiran. I don't think Ylisse actually has a similar saying. Honestly, we should. Even a desperate pegasus will kick a wyvern? Even a scared god will fight to the last?
That last one is a bit too blunt, but oh well.
"Professor Robin," Edelgard finds me as I'm organising the frontline to better counter the new shield wall. "How is Professor Eisner?"
"She's…" I bite my lip. "She will be fine. I'm just a bit concerned about her mental well-being."
"Mental well-being? She looked fine to me."
"Which is exactly what I'm worried about. No matter what, you, I, and Professor Eisner, we should be human. Humans usually have lots of emotions and irrational feelings. It's part of our identity as a species, after all. When someone suddenly loses or gains those feelings…well, that's reason to be troubled," I smile slightly but sadly. I may or may not be projecting a little here.
Edelgard furrows her brows and shakes her head.
"Sometimes…is it…no, it must be…Professor, I must ask—"
"Can it wait until after we deal with this situation?"
"Er—yes. Apologies."
"There is nothing to apologise for. Linhardt!"
The green-haired boy jogs up to me. He looks a lot worse for wear. There are lines beneath his eyes, testament to his stress. Creases and wrinkles marr his skin, and he looks ready to collapse into a heap on the ground and into a catatonic fit at the same time.
"Y—Yes, Professor!"
"Go tell Josan to gather the 7th company and find a campsite. Edelgard?"
The girl stands straighter at the mention of her name while the green-haired boy runs off to find the man from Brigid.
"Yes, Professor?"
"Are you ready? This is going to be the final push."
She nods, her eyes pits of steel.
I see the half-floating apparition of Corrin behind her, his signature warm (and ever-so naive) smile on his face. Einherjar are so weird. Seriously, they're a ghostly imprint of a hero's memories. How the hell does that even work? Are there any Einherjar cards of me?
Thankfully, due to the din of combat and the dust kicked up from hundreds of feet pounding at the ground, Corrin isn't very visible. It would be nearly impossible to tell him apart from the mirage that the desert heat create in the walls of dust that we create by our very steps.
"I am ready."
"Good. First Company! On me!"
My yell invigorates the mass of men, as it always does, and it doesn't take too long before we have charged the enemy. The few ranged units that the bandits have left fire at us, but the bandits' arms shake so much that many of these arrows and spells go extremely wide or extremely short, despite the short range between our two lines.
Of course, as always, my poor luck means that of the few arrows that actually do reach our line, one heads straight for my head.
Thankfully, I've dodged far worse before. I simply jump and cut the arrow in half, the heat from Mystletainn does the rest and reduces the wooden shaft of the missile to cinders. The steel arrowhead clatters lamely down onto the ground.
When I land back onto the ground, I realise that Corrin's smirking at me. A soft chuckle rings in my head, and I realise that he's speaking to me telepathically. I forgot that Einherjar could do that. Well, rather, I forgot that Corrin could do that. Most of the other ghost-like apparitions hadn't managed to figure out how to do this, though Corrin did mention something about being stuffed inside of an emblem ring? I'm not sure what that is supposed to mean, exactly, but it did give him cool powers.
You have something to say? I demand in my head.
No, not really. Only that I think you have a career ahead of you as a acrobat if being a tactician, a statesman, and a diplomat don't work out.
Why does it seem like you're teasing me?
Does it seem that way? Corrin sniffs. I don't mean to make you think that.
Also, Acrobat? Where's this coming from?
My eyes showed me one of the best running jump-into a 720 degree spin-back down into a run I have ever seen before.
I frown. Was it really that impressive?
I say as much to the King of Valla, and he laughs and shakes his head, returning to a more ethereal form as we smash headlong into the slightly hollow wall of shields that make up the current line that the bandits make.
The bandits did not last long.
Hells, even saying that would be exaggerating the defence of the bandits. See, guys, this is how you're supposed to deal with this kind of enemy! They're not organised at all, and they can't control any of their impulses!
Needless to say, the Demon Sword devoured many more souls that day.
The sight afterwards is a sight that every single commander wants to see. Not a single death. Not one. Not…one…
Nobody died.
Wow.
I didn't know that just writing that down would have such a massive effect on me. Hey, Chrom! I did it! We finally fought a battle where we didn't lose a single person!
Gods, I just scared By with my laughter. Of course, Chrom couldn't care less. Virtues in the present will never make up for the sins of the past. I'm surprised justice hasn't caught up with me yet.
I was able to gather By's students up in one place relatively quickly. Relatively being the key word here; it took me the better part of an hour to figure out where exactly Ferdinand and Mikal had fucked off to. Turns out, Mikal had gotten so frustrated with the young noble that he had dragged him away from the battle, stuck him on Gurren, and wouldn't let him off until Ferdinand was able to fight on horseback.
Well, at least the original goal was achieved, even if it ended up with a couple more mental scars on the inside of the young heir of von Aegir's brain.
The other students are in similar states of discomfort.
Caspar is nursing a rather nasty wound on his shoulder after he decided to chase after Solkis after explicit warning from Zonzi not to do so. I'm going to have to pound more sense into that kid when we get back. Seriously, he has the intelligence and stubbornness of an old ox. He's probably less intelligent than Chrom and more stubborn than him. Does blue hair always equate to idiocy? No, Marth was rather intelligent. Where did it all go wrong?
Bernadetta is cowering behind Yniffer and crying about something or other. I'm surprised that she's doing so well, but also glad that she's taken a liking to the Albenian archer, so I'm going to chalk this up as a win. According to the Bow Knight, Bernie had been a monster on the battlefield, with a body count higher than twenty. An amazing showing. The only problem is that Bernadetta hadn't even realised that she had actually hit anyone due to her habitual habit of closing her eyes when she fires. I'm going to have to have a conversation about killing with her in private, it seems.
Petra is faring the best out of everyone. She's just a bit winded from swinging her sword for so long. Josan had given me a rundown of everything he saw in the girl, and honestly, I agree with him that there really isn't much that she needs from us other than improving her stamina and technique. An excellent combatant, an intelligent woman, and an exceptional shot. Honestly, this feels like teaching Lucina all over again—even if those memories are from a different life.
On the other hand, Linhardt has had the worst time of it all. He looks like he's ready to throw up everything he's eaten over the past two weeks. He's sitting on a stump, one hand holding his stomach, one hand holding on to a stick that he's found…somewhere for balance. He's killed his first person today, and he's not having a good time dealing with the aftereffects of doing such a thing. I'll need to address his doubt today, and hopefully in a way that keeps his morale up. Gods and especially Naga knows how Donnel felt when he first took a life. Don't want a repeat of that happening again.
Lysithea isn't much better, but she looks much more stable from a mental standpoint. She definitely knew beforehand that killing was unavoidable, even if she would have preferred not to do it. Good, that's the attitude that I want to foster. What worries me more about her is, one, her dual crest, and two, her insistence on using dark magic. While Tharja would disagree with me, I still believe that such magic should be avoided due to its dangerous and corrupting influences and side-effects. Her hair is already white, I'm not sure how much more her soul can take. Even Henry had to resort to sucking the soul out of different animals for his hexes and curses to connect properly without blowing a massive hole through his chest. I'm just…a little worried, you know?
Hubert…why do I even want to talk about him? He doesn't even want to listen to me, much less take my advice. I have half a mind to learn dark magic just to bash his head in with information about it. I have no doubts that I can learn much faster than he can, if nothing else I have the accumulated knowledge of Khadeinese and Plegian dark mages stuffed into my head. It's in there somewhere, if I unlock that lore…brrr…I really don't want to think about that. Brings back bad memories. I still haven't gotten the stench of the undead out of my nose. Other than that, Hubert seems to be in good shape. Expected, if not ideal. I still think that he should chill out more. He and Edelgard are definitely hiding something. I've hidden enough from my own friends that I know exactly what it looks like.
Speaking of the heiress, Edelgard has the same face the Lucina made when she first went to convince me to commit suicide. A mask of defiance against her fate, a deep rooted anger finally able to be made manifest, and an incorruptible diligence to her duty. Unlike Lucina, however, I was only able to notice this due to her mask slipping slightly during the battle. She's hiding it a lot better than Lucina could have ever done. I'm scared for her. She's hiding something, and whatever that is has been eating her up from the inside out. I just hope I can help her.
Dorothea is going through NCMS—new combat mage syndrome— and is seriously rethinking specialising in fire magic. The smell must have gotten to her. While it is unfortunate, it is not unexpected. Most mages go through this when transitioning from purely theoretical to a more practical application of offensive magic. Rickten went through a similar process, but we were fighting a rather desperate war at the time, and he had always known that this would be his job in life. Even then, he quickly switched to specialise in wind magic and left Miriel and I to deal with all of the fire and fire derived tomes in our possession.
"So," I cross my hands across my chest and individually look at each of my students. "How…are…we feeling?"
Nobody answers.
"Ho…? Did everyone's vocal chords get ripped out? Does Linhardt need to check everyone's thoraxes?"
That gets people talking.
"N—No, Professor! That is unnecessary!" Lysithea says. "Um…what was the question again?"
"I just wanted to know how everyone is feeling."
"W—Well…how are we supposed to feel?" Linhardt's mumbled response is slightly concerning. "I don't even know what I am feeling right now."
"Well…I'm feeling alright," Dorothea tries for a reassuring smile, but fails horribly in my eyes. "Wow, battles, huh? Feels so different from the mock battle we had last month. Did you used to do this all the time, Professor?"
"At a much larger and much more chaotic scale, yes," I nod. "And with a lot more deaths, too."
Dorothea flinches slightly at my last sentence, and I silently chuckle to myself. Was I ever like this? In my previous life, I had been trained as a rather cruel and unempathetic mage, and that changed little, even after meeting Chrom, Tiki, and the rest of the Shepherds. In this life…well, I don't have those memories anymore. I probably will never know; Grima's fires are not something that most things, tangible or intangible, can survive.
"How…How much more of this will we have to go through, Professor?" Linhardt asks softly.
"I don't know. That will depend on how much the Archbishop wants to push us. Hopefully, not much. You all are all much too young to be fighting like this."
I shoot Caspar a stern look as he starts to reply, and the light-blue-haired boy immediately shuts up.
"Professor? Can I of asking a question?"
"Ask a question—yes, Petra."
"What is that sword you are carrying?"
"This?" I blink, raising Mystletainn, the black blade of Eldigan shining in the light.
Petra nods.
"Well…" I bite the inside of my cheek to give me more time to think of a response. "It's just a particularly fancy sword that used to be important, but fell into my hands as a result of many unexpected events occurring one after the other."
I lie…if only to keep Jugdral's secretes secret. What, I'm a responsible person! I have only gotten drunk three times in my life! And two of those times were under the express supervision of my wife!
Let's not talk about the first time. Bad memories.
"Any thoughts? Anyone?" I smile wryly. "Come on, everyone should reflect on their actions, right? I want to hear what happened, since I wasn't there to keep tabs on everyone here."
I stare at Ferdinand as I say this, and the ginger-haired boy adverts his gaze in embarrassment.
"Ferdinand. How about you start?"
"W—What? Professor? What do you mean by that?"
"Well, I just wanted to ask what happened to you. You're obviously fine, but I wasn't able to observe you with my own two eyes, and as much as I like the guy, sometimes Mikal isn't the best narrator. So, I'd like to know the truth from your own mouth."
"I see…and why?"
"Oh, because I want to make some suggestions," I shrug.
"Alright…Um…Professor…is it…possible…" Ferdinand chuckles nervously and shoots a couple of glances towards Mikal's turned back. "For me…to…tell you later?"
I blink. Man, was it that bad?
"Sure. You're the only person that I need extra information about. I must say, it was a slightly surprise to see you—"
"Professor—!" Ferdinand wails. "Please don't!"
"Alright, alright," I sigh. "Let's turn towards a different subject, then. Edelgard!"
The Empress-to-be looks at me with steel in her eyes.
"You did well, much better than I would expect for someone's first battle. Good job."
"Thank you, Professor."
"However…you were rather reckless. I saw you charging that cavalier before By got that headache. While I understand the need for aggressive actions—" I almost snort in the middle of my dissertation. Oh, the irony of me telling others to be less aggressive. I really have come full circle. "—there is a rather dangerous line between controlled aggressiveness and bold stupidity. You charged without even checking if the frontline was following you or not. If I hadn't gotten to you in time, I doubt it would have ended well. Remember, we're in an army fighting against an organised and numerous army. This isn't a mock battle."
The silver-haired princess nods her head in understanding, but the look in her eyes tells me that she hasn't truly taken my advice to heart.
Oh well. I did just leap into the heart of the battle without much regard for my own well-being, so this is really just telling her to do as I say, and not as I do.
Look, I used to be a lot more careful with my life. That was a long time ago, and I've killed and/or helped to kill three insane dragons since then. Those experiences have lowered my self-worth…somewhat.
"Other than that…well, I've already told you more than enough about your form last week. Remember to practise that new axe stance I taught you, alright? It took all of ten minutes for you to go back to your old form, and honestly you were probably better off taking a sword from one of the fallen and using that instead of your axe."
This seems to surprise Edelgard more.
She must have thought that her form had improved, but in the heat of battle, she probably didn't notice her body going back to her old form which was basically a two-handed sword form—combined with scythe forms for some Naga-damned reason. I'm surprised such an archaic weapon still has enough practitioners for someone to teach it. And she's not even bad with one! That's probably the worst part—from what I can tell, she would be quite handy with a scythe!
"I—I understand, Professor."
She takes it to heart this time around. More than my suggestion to curb her aggressiveness, at the very least. Satisfied, I turn towards her second-in-command, and suppress the urge to sigh loudly.
"Hubert. Will you follow my directives for once?"
"It is my duty to protect Lady Edelgard from any dangers that might befall her person," The dark mage replies, nonplussed about the entire situation.
"Well. That's all well and good," I nod. "That kind of loyalty will make you a very useful and relied-upon vassal once she ascends to the throne. Good play."
"I am not doing this out of—"
"However!" I interrupt him. "That is firmly in the future! Right now, both of you are my students, and on the battlefield, my wards. And a mage is not supposed to be fighting with a dagger. You are a mage. You are not supposed to be on the front lines! What good is a bodyguard if the principal has to protect the bodyguard!? Stay back, damn it!"
It appears that my verbal berating has had its intended effect, and Hubert doesn't have anything to say back to me for once. I'll take that as a victory.
"Also, your casting form is off. Whoever taught you dark magic obviously didn't bother to tell you how to cast spells efficiently. Pick up a tome and use that for a while, you'll get a better feel of the way mana naturally flows. You're trying to force it in a straight line when a curved pathway is not only more energy efficient but also much faster to cast," I add with a sigh.
Moving on to the other mages in the group, I realise I don't have much to say here. Dorothea already looks rather traumatised from this experience. Right, I had forgotten that this is probably the first time she's actually killed anyone. Unlike the Shepherds who were all rather experienced killers, these are all incredibly gree—I shouldn't use that phrase. They're all incredibly innocent people, without ever even thinking about killing. Petra, Edelgard, and Hubert not-withstanding, of course. Lysithea will probably need some calming down afterwards, but she's in a better position than Dorothea is at present.
Really, what I have to do is probably get them used to the smell of burning flesh. Other than that…well, apparently the therapy for NCMS syndrome is best decided by the patient rather than any doctor. They have to choose how to deal with their specific set of problems, and you can only support them on that. Rickten was rather adamant about this.
So, in keeping with that philosophy, I'm going to let Dorothea and Linhardt's misgivings run their course. Of course, if they try anything rash, I'll be there to stop them, but they'll have to tell me how I should help them.
"Dorothea, your spells got a bit loose at the end. When you form a vector, make sure that you know in advance where the endpoint is going to end up, especially if you're providing close support," I smile slightly. "Don't want to be hitting our allies in the back, right?"
The brown-haired singer nods intensely.
"Lysithea, you have a similar problem. Be careful with area-of-effect spells in such a confined space, especially if you add a lingering sub effect," I continue on. "It's one thing to target a massed formation of infantry while they're yet to engage, but once swords start-a-swinging, it's hard to know whether or not that nice puddle of angry dark magic will be a help or a hindrance to the infantry."
The white-haired girl shoots me a steely gaze and nods her head confidently.
"I'll get it next time, professor," She replies firmly.
I smile. That's the kind of confidence I like to see.
"Linhardt…you need to read more. I have some Lewyn or Oifey if you want some better tactical advice than that hack Loog. Other than that, I think you're fine."
That's all I can say. Linhardt is extremely shaken after what happened, and I doubt pushing him any further than he already is at the current moment will only make it worse.
That leaves me with Caspar, Bernadetta, Petra, and Ferdinand left. Unfortunately, all four of them weren't present with me during the battle, which means that I wasn't able to see them fight with my own eyes. That means I have to wait for the report that comes out from my company commanders to make a judgement.
I ask Ynnifer to make that report the top priority and praise Petra—I have no doubts she did flawlessly—and adjourn the group.
We have a long journey ahead of ourselves to get back to Garreg Mach, after all, and nobody wants to travel after being chewed out.
The rest of the journey back home was thankfully uneventful. We didn't travel too far from the Monastery in the first place, which is probably why it wasn't too much of a deal to get there and back. The entire trip took the better part of two days when it probably could have been cut down to one. But hey, these are students, not professional soldiers, so I can cut them some slack.
What I can't cut them any slack is their seeming inability to learn how to put up a tent! Seriously, how is Linhardt the only person who can pitch a tent? Where did he learn that skill?
Oh, I didn't know that Petra can't put up a tent. She can build a shelter in around half an hour with large branches, leaves, and some rope, though, so it's not like she can't survive out here alone. Makes sense too; tents and rainforests don't usually mix very well. I remember trying to get a canvas tent to stay dry and failing miserably during my rather short stay in Brigid. That's most of what I can remember, despite Jeralt almost losing a leg during that campaign.
Everyone else…
Well, the less said the better.
Let's just say the first morning out here in the wilderness was a wakeup call to so many of my students who couldn't pitch a tent. I have never seen Dorothea so dishevelled.
Camp life wasn't much kinder on these bluebloods either. The lack of plumbing was a big issue to everyone involved, and Lysthea even tried to hold it in until we reached one of the towns surrounding Garreg Mach. Then I reminded her we had another day and a half to go, and she just wilted.
I'm honestly confused how we ever got here so fast. Seriously, I didn't have a problem pushing them to get to the Red Canyon in under half a day, but leaving the Red Canyon takes nearly four times that time? Really?
Anyhow, I digress. Progress was made, roads were tread, and we managed to get to the outskirts of Garreg Mach by the afternoon of the second day of march. The companies went off on their own in the town while Byleth and I—with our students—headed off towards the Cathedral to meet with the green-haired archbishop. I still find her hair suspicious. I haven't met anyone with that specific shade of hair and not have said person turn into a dragon of some kind. Then again, I've also never met anyone with Lorenez's shade of purple hair who didn't turn into a dragon, but I doubt he's a dragon. For one, he seems like too much of an asshole to not have gotten himself killed if he was a dragon.
The Archbishop was a bit too happy to see us, I think. 'Overjoyed at our success' and all that. Though, she focused mainly on Byleth, for some reason. I always found it odd that the Archbishop seemed to…well, I can't find any better word than 'dote', but that's not quite right, is it? Hold in high regard? Overly trusting despite the conditions of their positions? It's almost like Archbishop Rhea knows Byleth or something…but I have been with her since she was young and had never seen Archbishop Rhea in my life before I came to the monastery.
Other than that…not much has actually happened since our return back into the walls of the monastery. It's right after lunch at the current moment, so I have a decent chunk of time before I have to get to my next class.
I think that's going to be it…uh…let me check with By to see if I've written enough…
Why did I write that down? Seriously, habits die hard…
AN:
There comes a time where an author realises that what they're doing isn't working. Usually, it happens when you can't seem to write effectively for a while. Of course, I am not the sharpest tool in shed, so it took me a while to understand that I've long since hit that point. When was that point? Let's see...this is the 5th version of this chapter...which means that I should have stopped around August? Anyhow, the fact that I was already writing the next chapter instead of working on this one was probably a large red flag, that I completely failed to understand.
Anyhow...hello there! Acardia here! Sorry for the three months that it took for this rather mediocre and honestly all-too short chapter. Life has decided to deck me in the face with a haymaker that I haven't recovered from yet, which has lead to the current state of affairs. Ugh. I hope I can make things up to you all next chapter...but that might take some time to write as well...
Thankfully, we still have reviews! Huzzah!
Blackplant: The Gremlin must be at full Gremlin capacity! Send more aspirin!
BushidoWookie: That's what I thought too, but Pagan usually refers to unorganised faiths like Tengri or Asatru rather than fully organised faiths like Islam and Judaism, which are considered Heathens instead. But...they're still Abrahamic religions? I've never heard any organised non-Abrahamic religions like Hinduism or Buddism be referred to as 'Heathens' so I'm not what the technical term is here. Plus, the Church of Naga is more like a parallel church than an outright hostile one, which didn't exist in the medieval European mindset. I dunno.
SirTypesaLot: (Holy shit I forgot how much you're capable of writing...) Right. Let's get to it then. Hehehehe...it is a part of something bigger. How big it's going to get...well, you'll find out. If I manage to write to there. And hey, this is Acardia of the future, the SI is perfectly fine! It might even surpass this fic! Surprising. I was going to have different POV's for this but I just couldn't bring myself to write it all. I'll probably have something in a couple of weeks/months. Maybe.
StellarLupine: Hey! Welcome back man! Unforutantly, mother nature isn't the only one giving me problems. I'll see if I can sort things out, but life has been rather tiresome recently. I'll be back...I dunno how long.
candel06: Hello! Man, 200k words in 2 days? How fast do you read? [The pile of books that you have read in under a day stares back at you] Alright, fine, I read that much as well. I hope you stick around! Sorry for not updating in three months!
Well folks, that appears to be all I have time or energy for this time around. Uh...how did I end off this fic again? Oh, right.
Acardia out.