Title: Robcina Week 2019 - Day 5: World of Light

Description: After being freed from Galeem's control, Lucina and the other rescued fighters hurry to rescue those yet enslaved. However, in facing one particular puppet fighter, Lucina is forced to face horrible memories she thought long buried.

The last thing Lucina had remembered was the blinding light wiping away the world around her.

Of her captivity that had followed she recalled little, the time between her and the other fighters confrontation with Galeem and her eventual rescue yet remained a haze in her mind. She shuddered, recalled the vague sensations of that horrible eternity. The horrible chill that spread to her core as her mind and soul were invaded and copied into countless puppets bearing in likeless and abilities.

Then came the first cracks in the fog. She remembered the haze turning red as she was thrust into battle. She'd seen only shadows before her mind, a rage that was not her own driving her actions. Steel rang against steel, Falchion glowing in her hands as it strove against another burning light.

Then the haze lifted and she found herself laying on her back, the smiling face of the Hero King, her ancestor, standing over her with a hand outstretched to her. She'd learned after that it had been Marth who had battled to free her from Galeem's control, just as he had been freed by other actions of several of the other fighters. She had too learned that nearly half of the captured fighters had been rescued prior to herself. It was only then, searching the crowd, that Marth had informed her that both her father and Robin were among those they'd yet to locate.

This knowledge drove each step Lucina took forward, ascending the castle she and several others were now fighting their way through, granting purpose and urgency to her blade as she battled past one puppet fighter after another. She wanted desperately to save them, to free both her father and her love from the same horrible fate she'd been subjected to.

Rounding the final steps of a spiral staircase, Lucina came out onto the castle battlements. She was alone, she and the others having split up to cover more ground. Spotting an archway leading into tower at the far edge of the walkway, she hurried towards it, hoping to find another starway that would lead her yet closer to the castle's summit.

A bolt of lightning lanced out of the darkness. Reflexes kicking in, Lucina darted out of the way at the last second, the electricity striking the stonework next to her and sending dust and chips of stone raining around her.

Whirling to face the direction the attack came, Lucina was met with two glowing red point of light burning in the darkness. Footsteps echoed out, the figure hidden in the shadows stepping into the dim light.

Lucina felt her heart stop as she beld the sight she'd both hoped and dreaded to find.

There before her stood Robin, his form wreathed in a faint light of swirling sapphire and violet. His skin was deathly pale, cast in a gray hue that extended to the rest of his features and clothes. His expression was blank, as emotionless and dispassionate as his movements. Only his eyes betrayed any emotion, burning with anger as intense of the fiery red light head within them.

"Robin…" Lucina whispered, recoiling back a step. For an instant she no longer stood in the castle. She was at the Dragon Table, before her looming the twisted visage of her beloved that was Grima, shadows extending like wings from his vessel, his mocking laughter filling the air, daring her to strike down the man she loved.

Lucina raised Falchion before her, pointing it towards Robin as he continued to approach. The scene shifted again. She was in a field of grass, the golden light of a sunset casting the world in ethereal light. Gone was the twisted face of Grima, replaced the smiling, crying face of her love as he slowly approached, his arms spread wide as she continued to point her sword as his chest.

Lucina felt her hands begin to tremble, Falchion's tip wavering as tears began to stream down her face. The vision ended and again she stood on the castle's battlements, again greeted by the possessed form of Robin, tome and sword held at the ready as he prepared to fight.

She couldn't do it. How could she bare to raise her sword against him again?

"Lu...ci...na…"

Lucina blinked through her tears, gasping as she looked again to Robin's face. For an instant the anger seemed to vanish from his eyes, replaced with a pleading longing.

He was still in there. No matter her reservation, no matter how difficult it would be to relive those horrible memories. Robin was still in there. And she would have to face it all to see him freed and returned to her side.

Lucina's hands stilled, and she took another step, this time forward, falling into a fighting stance. No. She would no cower and dwell on the past any longer. She must push forward, for the sake of the one she loved and fought for above all else.

She would see him returned to her.

Lightening arced around Robin's levin sword, matching the azure light that burned across Falchion's blade. Drawing her resolve and courage, Lucina charged, letting an anguished cry tear from her throat as their blades met in a furious clash.

She would see him free. That she was certain. No matter how difficult, this was a fight she could not afford to lose. Not when it was for the one she loved.