Dragon Princess of the Dawn Chapter 1: Littlest Sister, a Percy Jackson and the Olympians + Elden Ring Crossover fanfic

Littlest Sister

And here it is. Percy Jackson crossed over with Elden Ring.

In order to beef myself back up for this story, I went back and watched a lot of Zullie and Vaati lore vids to refamiliarize myself with a lot of stuff. That being said, given the vague nature of Elden Ring's lore, with so many unanswered questions and so many things left to interpretation and conjecture, there's a lot of wiggle room for creative freedom.

I want to put it out there right here and now that while a good chunk of this story will be based on what we know to be canon, there will also be some hefty areas that stem from my own interpretation.

It goes without saying that this is a fanfiction, so there's no need to get angry that something herein doesn't fit into your headcanon.

Also, I do not have a PC but I do have YouTube, and I have seen a number of videos of gamers playing the Convergence mod, and it does look like a ton of fun. As such, you can expect to see a number of spells from the mod in this story, and a few of my own because why not?

Now, without further ado, lets establish the lore.

Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson and the Olympians, or Elden Ring

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Before the Erdtree was the primordial Crucible; centered in the continent that seemed divinely placed between so many others. In this ancient time, life did not live in harmony, as there was death abundant as carnivores hunted their prey, herbivores fought back, and men waged war with other men for whatever reason was deemed necessary enough. There were many gods in this time, all with their own commandments and edicts, and they demanded as much from their devotees.

Then the Greater Will sent its envoy in the form of a great, golden star, and this golden star brought forth Order incarnate, the Elden Ring. Chosen to be the vessel of this new Order and bear the Elden Ring was Marika, the only Empyrean amongst the race of long-lived Numen from another world, and she became Queen and Goddess all in one. To assist in spreading Order, the Greater Will blessed Queen Marika with her shadowbound beast and eternally loyal half-brother, Maliketh, who would become known as the fearsome Black Blade thanks to his humongous sword and black armor, all with golden adornments.

Queen Marika's first action in what would be a lengthy campaign was to send Maliketh to do battle with another Empyrean known as the Gloam-Eyed Queen, because this rival monarch wielded the power of the God-Slaying Black Flame. Maliketh would emerge victorious, and he sealed the source of Black Flame, the Rune of Death, within his own black blade. With the Rune of Death, also known as Destined Death, sealed away, Marika's immortality and the safety of the Elden Ring was secured from their most serious threat, and the Black Flame lost its full power, going from vibrant red to pale white.

Every Queen needs a King, and the king that Queen Marika chose for herself was the most powerful warrior in the lands, Horah Loux, Chieftain. Honored by being chosen to be the king of the new queen, Horah Loux changed his name to Godfrey and took upon his back the King of Beasts, Serosh, the golden lion whose fangs and claws bit into Godfrey and satiated his endless lust for battle. Now he only did battle for his wife and queen.

The first of Marika's campaigns was against the Fire Giants of the northern mountains. Armed with her stone hammer, aided by her husband, his army of Crucible Knights, her brother Maliketh, and surprise reinforcements in the form of the Knights of Zamor, whose icy inclinations had put them at odds with the Fire Giants for generations, Queen Marika did battle in the frigid north, and scored a sweeping victory.

Even after borrowing the power of their Fell God and having its likeness stamped upon their torsos, the Fire Giants were defeated, their corpses left impaled in the snow to serve as macabre monuments. Only one was left alive, sentenced to forever be the lone guardian of the Forge to make sure it was never reignited. The whole reason for the war was because of this Forge, for within kindled the Flame of Ruin, a fire that had the power to upset the Golden Order, and so, like the Rune of Death, it had to be contained.

Marika's curse upon the lone Fire Giant was perfect, as he would never die, not of hunger, or disease, or exposure, or of time, and he could never leave his post, nor could he kindle the flame himself. He was rendered forever a prisoner, the bodies of his kin below him for all time.

However, the Fell God was not completely spurned. In one last act of defiance in the face of defeat, the god cast his own curse upon Marika. It was a rather petty and benign curse, as all the curse did was turn her golden hair red. Still, though, red hair was the trait of the Fire Giants, and this tainted the image of the rising Golden Order, and the Greater Will couldn't have that. It couldn't have its vessel, its emissary, its chosen goddess tainted by the enemy, and so it acted.

It separated the curse from Marika, but went even further, almost as if an amusing thought crossed its mind. Instead of just destroying the curse of the Fell God, the Greater Will altered the curse, and gave it life. Thus a separate but whole piece of Marika was created, a powerful man who would become champion, a champion who would be known for his flowing red locks.

This champion would be known as Radagon.

Not only were Radagon and Marika the same person, two minds in the same body, a body that could shift and transform based on whoever was in control, but they could separate, and where Marika could stand, Radagon could stand somewhere else, but at the same time. In the very far future, there would be an Erdtree Avatar in the north that was blessed with this same ability, to split into two different beings.

The secret of Radagon's origin would only be known by one other, and that was Maliketh. No one else, not even Godfrey, Marika's own husband, would know of how Radagon came to be. As for the official story of Radagon, he would simply be a vagabond that had caught wind of this mounting new religion, and wanted to devote himself to it. In reward of his faith and devotion, Marika would gift him her hammer, something that did not anger Godfrey, because he had his giant axe.

From that point, the Golden Order's dominance spread throughout the continent, which would officially be named the Lands Between by the queen, for these lands were between all the other lands that would become unified under the Golden Order.

One by one, Godfrey and Radagon brought down all that stood opposed to the Golden Order. All the devotees of the other gods, dubbed the Outer Gods because they were outside the Greater Will's tolerance, either died or changed religions. Soon enough, most of the Lands Between bent their knee to the Golden Order.

Most, as in one section of the map, Liurnia, home of the Carian Royals who headed the sorcerer academy of Raya Lucaria, proved to extremely difficult to break. So much so, that not one, but two wars were fought in Liurnia, and both campaigns ended in stalemates for the Golden Order and the House of Caria. But the House would fall anyway, in a sense, through marriage.

Rennala, Queen of the Full Moon, Head of the House of Caria and the Academy of Raya Lucaria, was a fearsome sorceress. Famed for her Full Moon spell, and renowned for her intelligence and prowess in battle, she became the champion of her magical people, and often met Radagon on the grassy plains of Liurnia. Their battles altered the landscape, the might of the Full Moon able to match that of the Greater Will's attack dog, but it seemed as if Radagon might just have a will of his own.

He fell in love with Rennala, and she with him, and so they wed at the Church of Vows with Pastor Miriel presiding. The venue was sacred and special because in view of the church was Raya Lucaria, and at the opposite end was the towering, golden Erdtree. Whether this love was genuine, or if it was nothing but a ploy by the Greater Will to bring down the House of Caria and the Academy, was unknown.

At least for the time.

The Second Liurnian War would mark the end of Radagon's campaign in the Lands Between, and Godfrey's campaign would end in Castle Stormveil when he defeated the Storm Lord in single combat. With these victories, the Lands Between were now dominated by the Golden Order and the Greater Will, but this was not the end of the conquest. There were many more lands across the seas, and they needed to know order as well, and so Marika armed her golden knights and sent them to spread the message of the Golden Order.

Their campaigns were successful, and Fundamentalism was spread through the known world to all the other Lands.

Thus, Marika became the official goddess of the world, and her Golden Order Fundamentalism became the official religion of everyone, whether they liked it or not.

Through her decrees that came from the guidance of the Greater Will, worship of any god besides her was blasphemy, and blasphemers were to be rooted out and destroyed to the uttermost. Further, other species such as the Misbegotten were now inferior lifeforms dur to their added features like wings, feathers, scales, and tails, and were to be slaves; another form of cursed being were the Omen, beings born with cursed blood and many grotesque horns sprouting from all over their body, without the Grace of the Erdtree. Omen babies born of plain blood had their horns removed, and this typically killed them, but Omens born of noble blood were spared this fate because, though cursed, they were still nobility in the furthest of definitions. These royal Omens were confined to the dank, filthy sewers beneath the capital city of the Lands Between, Leyndell, allowed to survive, but hardly live.

The nature of the Omen curse was unknown, as no pattern could be determined as to how one was born with cursed blood. Rich and poor alike could be born cursed. Even the divine could give birth to cursed children.

Yes, in the periods of rest between the campaigns, Queen Marika shared many passionate and loving nights with her husband Godfrey, and their unions produced children. The first of which was a son, Godwyn, born with beautiful golden hair, and some time later a pair of twin boys, firstborn Morgott and secondborn Mohg. These twins were born as Omens, and it was only because Marika was Goddess that she survived the labor. No partiality was shown to these poor boys, despite being demigod royalty. Like all other noble-born Omens, they were confined to the sewers beneath Leyndell, though their cells were quite comfortable compared to all others.

Marika made sure her cursed sons would at least know what clean beds felt like, and what good food and drink tasted like.

In Liurnia, Radagon and Rennala had children of their own. Much to Rennala's delight, their firstborn was a bubbly baby girl that they named Ranni. Their secondborn was a son, Radahn, and their third child was another son, Rykard. All three kids were born with Radagon's red hair, proving that the Fell God's curse was truly more than just magic hair dye, but a full attack on the bloodline. However, where the Greater Will stepped in on behalf of Marika to strip the curse from her, it did no such thing for the Carian demigods. Their red hair would remain, marking them all as the children of Radagon.

Of course, since Radagon and Marika were one and the same, though they could occupy two separate bodies at the same time, the question lingered in the mind of Maliketh as to whether that made his half-sister a lesbian. It was a question that would never be answered.

While the campaigns settled one by one in the far away Lands, the demigod children grew up year after year. Godwyn was raised in the direct embrace of his doting mother and powerful father, and the Carian children enjoyed a similar upbringing as their loving mother taught them sorcery, and their seemingly dutiful father taught them incantations. Godwyn would eventually earn the moniker of Golden, not for his hair, but for his harnessing of golden lightning. Ranni would find herself a personal mentor in the form of the snow witch Renna, Radahn would come to regard Godfrey as his hero, and sought to model himself after the Elden Lord, and Rykard, despite being the youngest and therefore the one that typically received the most attention of his parents and ended up spoiled, actually ended up strange.

And not the humorous and endearing kind of strange, but the disturbing kind of strange.

As in Rykard managed to find satisfaction in trapping rodents, carrying them in his hand as they struggled and squeaked, and then tossing them alive to this snake he found around his home of Caria Manor.

Eventually, the campaigns ended. Pockets of resistance against the Golden Order were few and far between, and that became the job of the Confessors. The golden armies were called back to the capital, and the Confessors became the silent assassins that quietly eliminated resistance.

One might think that this newfound peace would be a good thing, that Marika and Godfrey could settle down and raise their Golden Prince, and maybe give him some little siblings, and that Radagon could raise his own three children with Rennala, but it was not to be. For a reason no one knew, Marika divorced Godfrey, divesting him of Grace, and sent him away. The golden hue faded from Godfrey's eyes, and he took his kinfolk with him on what would be known as the Long March of the Tarnished, so named because their gold was taken.

Following the banishment of Godfrey, Radagon unexpectedly and unexplainedly left Rennala to stand before Marika, where he became her second husband, the second Elden Lord. This left Rennala absolutely and completely broken emotionally and mentally, and the kids were certainly confused. Godwyn was also at a loss for words that his mother would just kick his father out of the continent, and then immediately took another man as her husband, a man that was just a champion, a man that also brought his three kids into the picture, three kids that became Godwyn's step-siblings.

Though they were actually biological, not that anyone besides Marika, Radagon, and Maliketh knew this.

The relationship between Godwyn and his Carian siblings wasn't necessarily bad, but it was awkward at times. Just imagine yourself in their position: your mom just divorces your dad, banishes him, and immediately remarries some guy that already has kids, and on the other side, your dad divorces your mom, ups and leaves her, and then marries the goddess, who already has a son.

It was a massive emotional roller coaster of confusion and betrayal.

Being the eldest ones, Godwyn and Ranni did their best to not let their own hurt feelings get in the way. It wasn't like Godwyn had wanted Marika to get rid of Godfrey, and it wasn't like Ranni had wanted Radagon to leave Rennala, but there were still those moments where it was just like, Your mom made my dad hurt my mom, and Yeah, well, your dad came in and replaced my dad.

Radahn found personal comfort in focusing on emulating Godfrey, essentially ignoring and not confronting his own hurt feelings over what his dad did to his mom. In fact, one might say that Radahn's deepening regard for Godfrey was his coping mechanism for what Radagon did, so scarred by his birth father that he took to adopting a new one. Godwyn had nothing against that, as Godfrey was a lot cooler than Radagon anyway. So it was through their shared love of Godfrey that the Golden Prince and the Red Lion found brotherhood.

Rykard…well, Rykard may have actually taken it the hardest, as he began to look upon the golden branches of the Erdtree with hatred and malice, and often thought of what it look like while on fire. Bit sad, really, because where Ranni could go to Renna, and Radahn found a brother in Godwyn, Rykard didn't have anyone to lean on because he certainly wasn't about to talk to Father for a long time, and he definitely wasn't about to talk to his stepmother.

To make matters arguably worse, it wasn't even a week after Marika and Radagon's wedding that Marika was pregnant. Months later, the twins were brought into the world. The first was a redhead, demonstrating the Fell God's curse had not waned, that was named Malenia, and the second a boy that shared his older half-brother's golden hair, named Miquella.

But there was something wrong with both of them.

Miquella's affliction wouldn't be discovered until much later, when it became apparent that he was not aging like he should've, but Malenia's was visible from the start: Scarlet Rot, a sick plague that destroyed everything it touched. How Malenia was born with such an affliction was unknown, as Scarlet Rot stemmed from the Outer God that was Rot itself, but that god was supposed to have been sealed away by the Blind Swordsman in the underground Ainsel River.

It was concerning for many reasons that a sealed god was able to curse the child of Radagon and Marika while in the womb, especially because Radagon is Marika, so it was more accurate to say that the twins were produced through parthenogenesis as opposed to sexual union. How could the goddess, the chosen vessel of the Elden Ring, be susceptible to the meddling of the Outer Gods?

First the Fell God, then the cursed Omen twins, and now another set of twins, one that would never age, and the other with super cancer?

It demonstrated a disturbing amount of fallibility regarding the one true goddess, and so it was, perhaps out of pride, or spite, or Marika's desire to just have another child of her own that wasn't cursed (because she had four cursed kids and one healthy one, while Rennala was over there cradling her amber egg with three healthy kids…which was ironic, because since Radagon and Marika were one being, that made all the Carian demigods her actual children as much as Godwyn, but anywho), she and Radagon tried for another child, and they were successful.

And thus does the story finally begin, with the birth of the youngest demigod, the littlest sister:

Marina.

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Everyone that saw the princess's name instantly thought of the place where a number of boats were docked, and they were wrong. Marina's name was actually pronounced with the consonant sound instead of the long "ee," so her name was "Mair-IN-uh."

It was something that would forever miff the young princess.

As for Marina herself, she was blessed with the golden hair of her mother and two big brothers, was of fair skin and terrific cuteness that would one day become enviable beauty. Cute right now because she was only six, and was about to be scarred for life.

"Come on, Malenia!" Marina urged her big sister, who was doing her best with her golden walking sticks and deteriorating legs. "Godwyn and Radahn are about to spar!"

"I am doing…my best…over here…" Malenia said in between breaths.

Today was especially difficult, because her right arm was in serious pain. So much so that she was heavily favoring her left.

Marina scampered back to her sister. "Is it the Rot again?"

"Sister, when is it not the Rot?"

In spite of the situation, Marina giggled. "You made a rhyme!"

Malenia couldn't help but smile. "Indeed. Go on without me. I can listen to their battle as I make my way to the colosseum."

"Uh-uh!" Marina shook her head. "Together!"

"Then you will have to wait on me."

Marina thought about this, and with all the critical thinking of a six-year-old, she came up with the great idea to try and support her sister that was already half a foot taller than she was by grabbing her right arm and pulling her over her slim shoulders in the fireman's carry, only for absolute disaster to take place.

It was a sound that neither sister would ever forget. A gut-wrenching wet ripping sound like a butcher slicing through meat, but so much worse. Marina grabbed Malenia's right arm and happily pulled, thinking she was doing a good thing, but instead of feeling Malenia's weight settle across her back, all the felt was a sudden loss of resistance that sent her stumbling. Her feet caught on the skirt of her dress, causing her to trip and fall to her butt.

Malenia dropped, instantly thrown into so much pain she couldn't even scream.

Marina looked at what was in her hands, and it took her several seconds to comprehend that she was holding her big sister's arm, but the rest of her was over there. When it clicked in Marina's mind that she had torn off Malenia's limb, her horrified scream echoed through all of Leyndell.

Marika and Radagon appeared at the same time in twin bursts of golden energy, ready to atomize whatever was attacking their daughter, and they both paled at what they saw. Behind them, the massive doors of the colosseum were blasted off their hinges in an explosion of blue as Ranni came storming out, her silver scepters Inspired by her mother in each hand, her red hair flowing behind her. Radahn and Godwin were right behind her, and Rykard had gotten saddled with carrying little Miquella on his back.

And behind them were dozens of golden knights and nobles.

In a flash of gold, Marika was gone, and so were Marina and Malenia.

Radagon turned to the crowd. "My children are to accompany me. The rest of you are to return to the colosseum, and work on putting the doors back into place."

The Elden Lord had spoken, and in a flash of gold, he and his children were gone, and the rest were left to figure out how to repair the damage Ranni had caused.

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Marina was completely inconsolable. She was bawling her eyes out in her mother's bosom, Marika gently stroking her little back as she let her daughter burn herself out. Malenia was passed out in bed in her room, a golden glow around her as Marika attempted to put her arm back on, but if she could cure the Scarlet Rot, she would have done so by now. As it was, the only thing Marika could do was dull the pain and hope her power would reattach the limb. So far, no progress.

Much to her fury.

Radagon appeared in a golden flash with the other kids, and they were all smart enough to examine the situation and figure out what had happened. Ranni was the first one to Marina, cooing at her, trying to get her to calm down, and Miquella was at Malenia's side, staring at the situation with an unreadable expression on his young face.

The young Empyrean, same as his sisters, was already an enigma to all that knew him.

"Father? Why is Mother's power not healing Malenia's body?"

Radagon's expression was tired and heavy. "I do not know."

"I see."

The other boys stood off to the side, Godwyn and Radahn grieving for their sisters, and angry at how powerless they were to help, while Rykard just stood there, staring off into space.

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It took a while, about a month, before Malenia eventually was able to corner Marina and bop her on the head for avoiding her for so long. The crippled Empyrean gave her little sister a great big one-armed hug and told her Marina she wasn't mad at all, but was actually quite sad that she hadn't been able to talk to her little sister.

From there, things didn't at all improve for Malenia. The Scarlet Rot continued to steadily eat away at her body, eventually ensuring she would never have children as her genitals became afflicted. No period, though, which was the only comfort anyone could provide beyond magic painkillers.

As for Marina, she didn't do anything to further disfigure her big sister, but she did try to find ways to help her move around. One day, on a break from her brainstorming, she managed to run into Radahn at the stables.

"You are going to kill Leonard," Marina stated academically.

Her twenty-year-old big brother, approaching eight feet tall per the standard gigantism that ran in the family, which still put him two feet shorter than Radagon's 9'8, laughed heartily. "Nonsense, little sister! Leonard is a strong and sturdy steed that I have been proud to call my friend for many years now. Watch! He will be fine."

Radahn stuck his foot into the stirrup, hoisted himself into the saddle, and poor Leonard promptly collapsed with a strained wheeze.

Marina looked expectantly at her big brother.

"Oh," Radahn said. "Perhaps you are right."

"Mm-hm."

"There is a town in Caelid, called Sellia, and there they are practitioners of gravity magic-"

"Gravity? You mean that stuff that makes everything come down?"

"Yes, exactly."

"So…do you think that maybe they have spells that are like, reverse gravity? Instead of making things come down, things go up?"

"Well, why don't we journey there together and find out?"

Marina's golden eyes sparkled at the prospect.

And so the siblings traveled to the beautiful place of Caelid. Lucious grass, high cliffs filled with flora and fauna, crisp, fresh air with a beautiful blue sky, and more. The wilds teemed with friendly dogs and soaring raptors, and to the east was the greatest beach in the Lands Between. A glistening lake sat in the center of the region, the water sparkling in the sun, and on the bank of this lake was Sellia, Town of Sorcery.

Also the home of Master Lusat of Raya Lucaria, but he was at the academy as of right now.

Being the children of the goddess, Radahn and Marina were happily welcomed by the people of Sellia, and they were happily taken on by the head instructor of gravity magic, an Alabaster Lord with skin of stone. Indeed, the siblings learned how to manipulate gravitational forces, such as how to make things go up and down, which is all they were there to learn, Radahn for his beloved steed Leonard, and Marina for her beloved sister Malenia, but they also learned many other spells and techniques by the Alabaster Lord.

Their learning curve was steep as they soaked up instructions like sponges, and with their massive reserves of mana, they were able to practice their spells with an intensity and frequency that the normal folk could never hope to match. Perks of being a demigod, you see.

Curiously, despite the glaring difference in age, Marina was able to keep pace with Radahn, only falling behind him because she needed more naps than he did. But it made sense when you stopped and thought about it. Radahn was the son of Radagon, who was Marika, and Rennala—a god and a powerful woman. In comparison, Marina was the pure daughter of Marika, the goddess and only the goddess, a natural Empyrean with no affliction.

When you thought of Radahn as only half a god, and Marina as a technically full goddess, it was easier to understand why Marina would already be showing signs of being stronger than her half-brother despite being six and him being twenty.

Radahn paid this no heed, however, as some of his greatest memories were of him and his beloved baby sister flying through the skies together, having competitions to see who could fly fastest, and who could fly highest, though such competitions soon became scientific inquiry. In their play, they discovered that the higher they went, the colder it got and it got harder to breathe, and the faster they went, the hotter they got as the wind started burn.

However, no real thought came of the siblings' flights simply because why would they want to keep going higher and higher if they only got colder and colder, and couldn't breathe, and why would they want to go faster and faster if their clothes caught fire?

Marina was not happy about her dress bursting into flame one day because of air friction.

The Alabaster Lord eventually ran out of things to teach the siblings, and it was only a day after three months that happened. It was terrifying really, that the demigods had only come to Sellia to learn gravitational techniques to help others, but now they had enough spells, and a mastery of those spells, and the power to use and enhance those spells, to be a credible threat to the continent.

Remember, Marina was only six, but she was also a pureblood Empyrean demigod with no afflictions to hold her back from her full potential.

That being said, as powerful as she already was for her tender age, Marika could still throttle her daughter like a redheaded stepchild.

The siblings returned to Leyndell, and the first thing Marina did was terrify her big sister.

Malenia was reading a book with one arm when her door was nearly blasted off its hinges.

"Salutations!"

"AHHHH!"

An appropriate reaction when your little sister was hovering around your room while wreathed in purple sparks of magic.

"Look what I can do!" Marina cheered. "Wheeee!"

She flew laps around Malenia's bedroom, and eventually came in for a landing at the end of Malenia's queen-sized bed with her hands on her hips and proud smile on her face.

"Gravity magic," she chirped. "I can also do this."

A purple sigil depicting an orb surrounded by outgoing circular lines briefly appeared above Marina's head as she called upon her magic. She extended her little hand at her big sister, a bolt of purple light struck her. Malenia gasped, but not in pain, just shock of the new sensation as little purple sparks began dancing around her.

Then she started to rise from her bed. "M-Marina! What is this?"

Marina gently set her back down. "Gravity magic? I-I learned it so I could help you move."

Malenia stared at her sister. "You spent three months at Sellia, learning a whole conspectus of magic…so you could help me move around?"

Marina eagerly nodded.

Malenia burst into tears and did her best to launch herself at her sister. It didn't work very well with her crippled form, but Marina met her halfway.

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Marina's adventure in Sellia awakened within her a love for magic. It helped a lot that she could do it easily, because she was just six, after all. Six-year-olds weren't known for their eagerness to do things that were hard or difficult.

As such, Marina wanted to be taught the incantations of the Golden Order simply because she wanted to and they looked cool. Marika allowed this, but like any self-respecting mother, she didn't just hand awesome power to her little daughter. Marina was the princess—well, more like she was the princess, since Godwyn, Ranni, Radahn, and Rykard were all half-blood demigods, Morgott and Mohg were shackled in the sewers, Malenia was afflicted with rot, and Miquella was showing signs of there being something wrong with him since he hadn't grown at all in almost two years now, meaning Marina was the only full-blooded demigod that was pure.

As such, Marina had to be better than the rest, and while being well-versed in magic was certainly important, a proper princess was also well-versed in other areas of study, such as arithmetic, history, the sciences, the languages, decorum, etiquette, religion, etc. So, if Marina wanted a new incantation, she had to reach an academic milestone that Marika set for her.

An ideal arrangement, rooted in the immutable law that if you want something you have to give something, but Marina was a child. Children did not obey any logic but their own. She was a bit spoiled, being the daughter of Marika and Radagon, and the word "no" was hardly one she ever heard. Her experience in Sellia only worsened her disposition, since the Alabaster Lord had never denied Marina a request since she was a demigod.

He hadn't wanted Radagon or Marika to swoop in and scatter his atoms.

Following this, Marina's eagerness to learn incantations clashed with her mother's desire for her daughter to be educated. Marina would want instruction in a new incantation now, but Marika would want this assignment done now, and then you had the stubborn ire of a child against the unmoving will of the goddess. Thus was the balancing act of being loving and kind to your offspring in order to foster a healthy relationship, while also being firm and resolute in order to foster discipline and respect.

Despite being the one true goddess, Marika did have her moments with the young Marina.

But there was one particular day in which it all exploded.

It was Marina's eighth birthday of all days, and two years of life hadn't done much to improve her maturity in terms of wanting more instruction in magic versus academics. Since it was her birthday, she definitely expected a new spell from her parents, but Marika had already made it abundantly clear that would not be happening, because Marina was guilty of skipping several of her lectures for the past two months to play hooky.

The classic scenario of a child wanting something they hadn't at all earned, but actually squandered, and expecting it anyway because of the special occasion of their birthday. Marika wasn't having it however, and she'd literally brought the hammer down on the subject, slamming her iconic stone weapon into the floor hard enough to rattle the whole of Leyndell. She also made it abundantly clear to her other children that if they offered Marina any spells, there would be severe consequences.

There was still a grand celebration, with nobles and dignitaries from the other Lands bringing gifts and offerings more in the hope of favor and for the sake of appearance than because they actually cared about the princess. Marina was visibly grumpy during her party, and Marika honestly should've rescheduled it, but she wasn't going to cave to her daughter's attitude. Marina was expected to suck it up and put her personal feelings aside because she was the princess, and she had duties and responsibilities befitting her station to fulfill, the biggest of which at her age being to properly represent her divine family.

She did not do this.

No, just like you'd expect of an angry child with an attitude problem, she decided to act out and show her ass for the sole purpose of pissing off her mother, and the only way she could've shown more of her ass with the stunt she pulled is if she actually hiked her dress up, dropped her smalls, and literally showed her ass.

One older nobleman brought the gift of a very beautiful dress. An elegant item of the finest white silk with delicate and intricate golden embroidery that must've taken months to sew in. It had the whole crowd oohing and awing, with many people genuinely awestruck by the dress's beauty and already talking about hiring the nobleman to make similar items for themselves.

Even Marika was genuinely impressed with the dress, and Ranni was honestly jealous.

When Marina took the dress in her hands, she looked at her mother, smiled, and proceeded to rip it in half.

The crowd gasped, Marika and Radagon were beyond furious, Godwyn, Ranni, Radahn, and Miquella all palmed their faces (Malenia being up in her room since she was still very much blighted and therefore wasn't allowed in public places for obvious reasons), Rykard wasn't even paying attention, Marina was smug, and the nobleman who brought the dress was driven to tears.

The last one there might've seemed like the least important of the reactions, but it was truthfully the most sorrowful once you understood who this nobleman was.

William de Sable was his name, and he was actually not just a nobleman, but the king of his Land. His wife had been taken by sickness some years ago, and she had only been able to conceive one child, a daughter, but even she was no longer living, having died three years ago at the age of fifteen. A schemer in the court of de Sable wanted the throne for herself, and so she orchestrated an uprising against her king.

The were raidings, fires, and famines throughout the Land, along with artificial scarcity created by the schemer to turn the people against her king. She nearly succeeded, but the king's daughter had been perceptive, and she had investigated the secretive matters, and she discovered the truth. She was able to get to her father, and he was able to mount a defense of his castle since there was an impending sneak attack.

While the defense was successful and the rebels were exterminated, the king's daughter had still been found, raped, murdered, and her body desecrated, since the schemer had friends on the inside that she commanded to fo horrible things as revenge for her plot being foiled.

William de Sable's heartbroken anguish at finding his daughter's ruined body fueled his drive to find those who plotted against him, and they were found. The friends of the schemer met with excruciating fates, such as being tossed to the starving pigs and eaten alive, boiled in oil or dropped in acid, being bound, force-fed coffee and olive oil, and left to stew in their waste until infection or flies killed them, pulled apart by horses, and sawed into pieces then forced to watch as those pieces were cooked to perfection before being forced down their throats, unwilling self-cannibalism.

The schemer herself was not executed. Her arms were severed at the shoulder, and her legs at mid-thigh; her eyes were gouged out; her tongue cut out and all her teeth pulled from her mouth; her nose and ears were filled with glue, and her vagina was melted shut with glowing metal. Reduced to armless, legless, blind, deaf, mute thing unable to have children, she spent the rest of her days imprisoned, eating slop, dragging herself around her cell through piles of her own filth, with the only attention she ever received being from the king if he was angry about something and needed to vent, and so he beat her to his heart's content, or whoever was assigned to feed her, or the guards if they had an itch they wanted to scratch and thought her toothless, tongueless mouth was good enough.

Or her ass if they felt like going the extra mile to actually clean her up.

Eventually the king's grief and rage burned out, and so he just went to the cell one day and caved the schemer's head in with a hammer. Then he had the body burned and the ashes thrown into the sea.

What any of this had to do with why King William was distraught over his gift to Marina being torn in half was that he was a man bereft of his wife and daughter, and he had no other family. When he recalled that Marina's birthday was steadily approaching, he decided to allow himself to play something akin to pretend, in that he liked to tell himself he was ordering a dress made for his own daughter.

Just to recapture for himself the look on a girl's face at seeing a beautiful dress.

Just to recapture what it felt like to give his daughter a present.

So, when this cynical, sad, and jaded older man allowed himself to be happy, allowed himself to fantasize about better times, he knew he was setting himself up for failure. This was Princess Marina, not his daughter. She might not even like the dress. Still, he just wanted to feel a little happy for at least a small instance of time.

Then Marina ripped the dress he had made for her in two, and that just hit him like a projectile from a catapult. In his mind, it was like he had failed his own daughter, and she hated him, and that was her revenge for disappointing her. He just couldn't take it, and he broke down into sobs right there in front of the divine family.

Once that information was given to the queen, Marika knew just how to punish her rebellious daughter. In a terrifying move, she locked Marina's mana away, leaving her with zero magic, and sent her away with King William to be his servant for a year.

It would become a life-changing experience for Marina, so much so that when eight months had passed and she came to wake the king from his daily nap but instead found he had passed away in his sleep, she cried in a way she hadn't cried in two years, not since she had torn off Malenia's arm by accident. While so many other servants and guards had come running at hearing Marina's anguished cries, none of them had anything to say or offer when Queen Marika the Eternal appeared in a flash of gold, towering over them all as she stood at over nine feet, and she drew her daughter into her embrace to console her.

Even from an ocean away, the goddess was still very much aware of what was happening with her daughter.

This would mark Marina's first encounter with death, and she did not like it.

Since her king was dead, her punishment under him was over by definition, and she returned to Leyndell a different person after having lived with William de Sable as a true little girl with no powers for eight months. She was much more composed, calm, and patient. She was more willing to do what others wanted her to do, and so she dutifully resumed her studies with incantations being the third thing she was worried about.

As time passed, she eventually ran out of incantations to learn, and when that happened, she turned to sorcery. Sellia was her first taste of sorcery, but there were more schools than the gravity town, namely Raya Lucaria. And who better to teach Marina sorcery than her own big sister Ranni?

Only Ranni was hit and miss. Sometimes she was more than eager to teach her little sister a few spells, sometimes she couldn't be bothered and would get quite ill-tempered when forced to do so. When Ranni wanted to be left alone in her Rise outside Caria Manor, she wanted to be left alone and didn't appreciate anyone bothering her. Of course, being a grown adult of 26, Ranni was a lot harder to intimidate or threaten with a spanking if she was a bad girl.

Still, Marika was a goddess, and since she also wanted Marina to learn sorcery so she could be like Radagon, who also learned sorcery on top of incantations, Marina was going to learn sorcery, and Ranni was going to help because Marina wanted Ranni to do it. Sister bonding, you see.

Ranni did a great job teaching Marina the Carian and Glintstone sorceries, and just like she naturally picked up gravity and Golden Order magic, she naturally learned the other conspectuses as well. However, there was more to sorcery than just firing blue projectiles at people; there were many other things, like illusory walls, physical projections, cloning, and transfiguration, to name a few techniques.

Marina learned it all as she continued her other studies.

While at Caria Manor, she met Iji, Ranni's old babysitter turned loyal friend and ally, and Loretta, the Carian knight that served the lunar princess. Despite having her own Rise with her very name on it, Renna was no longer present. Where she went, not even Ranni knew, and so Marina was bereft of meeting the snowy old crone.

Another two things that Marina found when she was at the Manor was the treasured Sword of Night and Flame, and a Carian knight's sword without an owner. Marina decided that these swords would now be hers, and Ranni, the official head of the House of Caria and therefore the final authority on such treasures, did not care. She didn't do swords anyway, and the swords were better in Marina's hands than some vagrant's.

Of course, this opened up a new avenue of study for the princess: melee combat.

She'd been doing magic for three years, but now she had new toys.

And certainly plenty of teachers, as the Lands Between had no shortage of swordsmen and women. Marina was taught how to use a sword in just her left hand, just her right, how to use both hands, how to use a sword in a hammer grip and one in the icepick grip, both in the icepick style, and the other sword in icepick and the other in hammer. Though she favored the hammer style power stance.

Interestingly, Marina despite having what was considered a legendary armament, she refused to ever use the flame aspect of her Night and Flight sword, because fire was bad for the Erdtree.

Since Marina liked to power stance swords, you might be wondering how she managed to use magic if she had neither hand available for a staff or a sacred seal. The answer was simple: Marina had no need for such crude devices. She was just built different.

No, seriously. Just like she was a natural magic sponge that also learned very rapidly how to swing a couple of swords because of her demigod blood (that she had a great respect for following her eight months without magic), she was also powerful enough that she didn't need a catalyst to transfer her mana from within her body to the corporeal world. Her father also didn't need a catalyst, and nether did Marika.

Comparatively, Ranni needed a scepter, Radahn used his black swords, Rykard used his greatsword, and Godwyn had to use a sacred seal for his lightning. Conversationally, Miquella also didn't have to use any kind of catalyst. It seemed the difference between the full-blood demigods and the half-blooded ones was quite apparent.

Speaking of Godwyn and Miquella, Marina did have a special relationship with her big brother that was founded solely on the fact that the three of them had golden hair. Marina found it hard to connect with Godwyn given the huge age disparity between them, which was seventeen years. That being said, just because it was hard to connect didn't mean it was impossible, and Marina and Godwyn did have a fair number of fond memories together, a number of which revolved around Godwyn teaching his little sister how to use golden lightning.

Fire was bad for the Erdtree, but golden lightning wasn't because it was gold.

Yes, it was literally that simple. The Greater Will had said so to Marika.

As for Miquella, he was weird. His golden gaze was always piercing, like he knew things about you that even you didn't realize. He always spoke elegantly and gracefully, and was always eerily and unnervingly calm. Marina honestly couldn't recall a single time she had seen Miquella get angry or raise his voice. He also always knew what to say, when to say it, and most importantly, how to say it, and that was why he was so beloved by the people of the Lands Between, and why his reputation was so favored by those in the other Lands.

The wisdom and allure he possessed brought him affection from many.

However, Marina always saw something in his golden eyes whenever he had to be in the presence of people: boredom and disdain. Sure he smiled and said kind things, but it was clear that he wanted to be gone from everyone as soon as he could. Of course, Marina always thought that was because he was trying to get back to Malenia's side as quick as he could.

Her Scarlet Rot hadn't stopped in the slightest. Now she was missing her left leg below the knee, and her right leg was on its way to being gone as well. Miquella was busy with an experiment, something to do with gold, and he was certain that it would be the key to stalling the Scarlet Rot.

His experiment with gold would be the key.

Not the Fundamentalism of the Golden Order.

Marina didn't understand that, how Miquella could put more faith in himself than in the Greater Will, and it scared her on a level. Wasn't that blasphemy? She didn't want to see Miquella punished because he would rather lean on his own efforts to cure Malenia's Scarlet Rot, instead of the teachings and power of the Greater Will.

(The Greater Will that had been unable to prevent Malenia's being born afflicted, and hadn't done anything to cure her condition since she was born, but anyway.)

Miquella liked to tell his little sister that his experiments with gold were okay, since if the Greater Will allowed Godwyn to use golden lightning, and lightning was inherently harmful to trees, then it was okay to use gold in order to stymie the meddling of Outer Gods. After all, Scarlet Rot was tied to the Rot God. Marina wasn't entirely convinced, but she didn't get in the way.

She wanted Malenia to be cured, too.

As for the final sibling that Marina knew about…

"Uh, hey, Rykard. Wanna go do something together?" Marina asked one day.

In the dim candlelight of his room, the bearded Rykard turned to the door where his little sister stood, his golden eyes wide, dilated, and bloodshot. "Familyyyyy," he rasped.

Marina paled. "Never mind! I, uh, just remembered I had something planned with Uncle Maliketh today. Bye!"

She went flying down the hallway, leaving Rykard by himself. He pouted a little bit that his sister didn't want to spend time with him, which meant he couldn't tell her about the merits of snakes, blasphemy, and blasphemous snakes.

Speaking of Uncle Maliketh: he was, essentially, Marina's favorite horsey.

"Faster, faster!" the princess cheered as her lupine uncle sprinted almost as fast as he could across the Altus Plateau.

Maliketh smirked, then accelerated. Marina screamed in utter delight.

"We are approaching the cliff!" Maliketh shouted.

"Go, go, go!"

Maliketh didn't break stride in the slightest, and he jumped right off the edge into freefall without an ounce of fear or hesitation. He let out a howl of joy to match Marina's as they descended with all the acceleration of gravity. Now, as to whether they would actually die on impact with the ground would remain unknown, because Marina called upon her gravity magic, turning their descent into momentum for their ascent, and they went shooting higher than Mt. Gelmir, higher than the mountaintops, and even higher than the Forge of the Giants.

They went so high it got cold and hard to breathe, and so Marina leveled out.

She buried her head into the back of the wolf's neck. "I love you, Uncle Maliketh."

The Black Blade turned his head as much as he could with his anatomy, and nuzzled his niece. "I love you as well, Princess Marina."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Time passed, and Marina began to feel inadequate.

Her eldest brother Godwyn was revered as the Golden because of his lightning.

Her eldest sister Ranni was known as the Lunar Princess thanks to her powerful Dark Moon sorcery that she utterly refused to teach anyone, even Marina.

Radahn had become not just the general, but also the Starscourge, thanks to him stopping a meteor shower from destroying Sellia. Marina would have been there too but she was in another Land doing religious stuff. To make things better for Radahn, his actions earned him a whole army of loyal followers that called themselves the Redmane Knights after their general.

Rykard had been given the title of Praetor, basically became a super confessor, and was known as a ruthless justiciar that brutally punished all who would live in defiance of the Golden Order and the Greater Will.

Miquella had managed to perfect his golden experiment, earning himself the name Unalloyed, as his Unalloyed Gold was what allowed Malenia to finally function. She had prosthetic legs and a right arm made of Unalloyed Gold, and her left arm was practically gold itself. Now that she could move by herself, something that made Marina both a little sad and extremely happy, she had quickly garnered a fearsome reputation for her terrifying battle prowess.

Despite barely having one functional arm, Malenia was a goddess of combat. She met the Blind Swordsman of all people, and through his training, gained wings of unparalleled strength. Armed with a huge katana of Unalloyed Gold, Malenia's physical combat skills were truly unmatched. Radahn could not defeat her in a contest of pure melee combat, and neither could Marina, despite the two of them having had years more combat training than Malenia did.

It honestly rather stung a bit, that Malenia, relatively soon after getting her arm and legs back, was able to easily contend with Radahn and Marina.

Malenia even assembled a following of her own, the Cleanrot Knights.

Marina didn't have an army of devoted followers, or even a fancy title. Everyone knew who she was, of course, but despite her powers and skills, she hadn't done anything so outstanding as to be given an epithet. So she decided to change that.

Since Malenia had the latent potential to kick everyone's ass, Marina sought to improve her melee skills by traveling West across the ocean to the Land of Olives, where King Troy reigned as the greatest warrior on three continents, a title well-earned because he defeated Marina in less than twenty seconds during their first battle.

King Troy was a tall man of powerful muscle, long, stringy, light brown hair, dark eyes, tan skin, and a jaw sharp enough to be a sword all on its own. He wore a black tunic underneath a black breastplate with a design of chiseled pecs and abs on the front, black bracers, black greaves, and around his waist was an armored skirt called pteruges. His weapon of choice was a sword with pronounced indentations on either side called a xiphos, and in his other hand was a round shield with half-circle sections cut out on either side for visibility.

"Timing beats speed, and precision beats power," was the king's motto for fighting.

His whole combat strategy did not involve overpowered attacks or fancy techniques, but patience and observation. He watched opponents, got a feel for them, and as soon as they left an opening, he struck. That was how he had defeated Marina in swordplay so easily: there was a natural opening in her attack sequences, and he just waited for her to make said opening.

King Troy became Marina's equivalent to Malenia's Blind Swordsman, and he took her fighting skills to a whole new level. Before, Marina mostly fought with a caveman mentality, simply hack and slash and spam magic until whatever she was fighting was dead. Now there was a degree of maturity in her style, in that instead of brute-forcing her way through an opponent, she actually took the time to examine how they fought and waited for the time to strike.

It made her look so much more professional.

And it saved a lot of energy.

Marina's time in the Land of Olives wasn't all spent fighting, though. King Troy had a son, Prince Roman, and Roman was hot. A younger version of his father with a feminine touch from his mother, Queen Helen, and he was perhaps more nervous around Princess Marina than she was around him.

After so many days of awkward small talk after "coincidentally" running into each other, the king and queen finally just took it upon themselves to make the kids go on their first date together. It was a wonderful night, with good some clothes, nicer food, and a walk through the countryside under a brilliant sky filled stars.

There was even a group of thieves who thought they could take the young couple.

"But why, though?" Marina asked of the group, easily two dozen strong. "Are your children sick? Or your wives? Are your families poor and struggling?"

"Marina?" Roman asked under his breath. "What are you doing?"

"Well, a long string of events had to happen for all these men to think it is worth it to try and rob the prince and princess. I want to know what they think they have to lose, or what they have to gain, by being so daring." She turned back to who she thought was the leader. "What is it then? Why are you willing to rob us?"

"Cause you're rich," said the leader.

Marina blinked. "Yes, obviously. But is that it?"

"Yes."

"None of you have any sick family members that you're fighting to save?"

There were a bunch of shaking heads and utterances of the word "no."

"No poor and struggling families that you're just trying to make a better life for?"