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canonical-transformation · 1 year

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Celica gets Engaged(*) [A'lear Part 5]

(* but nobody thinks it's incest this time)

(Spoilers up to Chapter 4 of Fire Emblem: Engage.)

Chapter 4: A Land in Bloom

Florra Mill Town, featuring windmills and fields of blooming flowers, is on the road to Castle Firene. It's beautiful and... being attacked by the Corrupted, apparently.

Prince Alfred will not stand for this. Time to fight.

Meanwhile, near the centre of town, we meet Alfred's sister, Princess Céline, and her retainers Louis and Chloé. They're fending off some Corrupted.

(This pattern of "two royal siblings, each with two retainers" accounts for 2/3rds of the playable roster. Just like Corrin, I guess?)

Céline (unique class, swords+tomes and eventually staves) has the makings of a consummate stateswoman, one who would rule firmly yet kindly. She frets for the health of her brother, the Crown Prince, and in many ways has tried to shape herself to counterbalance his gentleness... despite being a gentle soul herself.

All this is entirely overshadowed by the writers deciding that "enjoying tea" is a quirky personality trait that should be, like, the one and only thing Céline ever talks about. Also the floof skirt. Between her petticoat and her hair, she is the walking definition of A-Line Silhouette. She's lovely, in other words.

Louis (lance armor) is a stocky gentleman whose eyes are permanently doing the ^_^ thing. He is a rather philosophical fellow who spends his time appreciating(?) pretty ladies(???).

Chloé (lance flier) loves fairy tales and will in due course be delighted to find herself living in one. She has enough girl next door vibes to paralyse my little lesbian heart is fond of folk food, the kind that uses whatever ingredients are around. Escargot, unagi, witchetty grub, hormigas culonas, she's into it so long as it's authentically rustic.

Chloé and Louis tell their Princess to run. It's imperative that she finds Alfred and warns him that the castle is under attack (oh no!, the castle is under attack!). Céline reluctantly flees, leaving her retainers to stand back to back and exchange quips. Louis opens his eyes (they're green) for two seconds, which is basically the only time we see them for the rest of the game.

This is more cutscene badassery than most of the other retainers get, which is very sad.

Céline runs straight into Alfred and A'lear, who are getting ready to fight. After getting over her shock at seeing A'lear awake and walking about, Céline fills them in. The Queen entrusted an Emblem Ring to Céline before bidding her to flee the castle.

An Emblem Ring? A'lear is something of an expert on those.

Meet Emblem Celica: princess, brother-wedder, and the only(?) female Lord before FE7. She detests war and violence, but she'll do what she must in the name of peace.

Celica is a dedicated magic support, offering a Mag/Res boost (and a little Str) to her sync partner. She offers damage reflection against Corrupted, and after a few bond levels, her Resonance skill(*) is pretty good. When Engaged, she gains a special skill, Echo (🥁), which allows her to perform two magic attacks in a row at 50% damage each. (60% for Mystical units.) (*) What's more, her Seraphim tome is effective against Corrupted.

Celica's ult(**) is Warp Ragnarok, which warps up to 10 tiles away and rains fire down on a single opponent. (100% hit, 0% crit, and no counterattack, like most ults.)

The battle begins with Princess Céline and her retainers unlocked. Céline is perfectly set up to Engage and Echo, killing an armor knight and significantly chipping down another. (She doesn't, because we're saving the Engage, but she could, and that's a lovely bit of hidden tutorial design.)

To begin with, Louis and Chloé are alone in the center-east of the map, fending off enemies from either side. They hint to the player that Chloé should deal with the incoming mages, and Louis with the incoming archers and fighters. They do exactly this, and buy themselves a couple of turns.

(...oh no i forgot to take screenshots during the chapter 😐 Um, have some photos of Céline and co. having drip)

A couple of turns is not enough for A'lear and co. to make it to them, not with the nearest bridge broken. Fortunately, the Emblem rings give us a way of getting there quickly.

First is Sigurd, who, when Engaged, grants an extra 5–7 movement, allowing for huge sprints. But that's not quite enough to reach Chloe and Louis in time, and Sigurd's wearer would probably get killed en route.

Instead, Céline&Celica use Warp Ragnarok to cross the river, helping Chloé fend off an enemy flier who had her on the ropes. Then, the two of them swing around to reinforce Louis. The retainers remark on Céline's changed appearance — glowy magical girl costume, red hair, etc. — while they hold a fortification.

(here's a photo with a Levin sword)

Everyone else makes their merry way along the south bank of the river, watching their footing and fighting enemies like in a normal Fire Emblem game. Vander briefly cavorts off to stall an enemy cavalier, gets his ass handed to him, and runs back to ask for help from Alfred.

Then the boss suddenly decides to move in on Céline and Chloé and Louis, and the rest of the team is nowhere near close enough to help.

A'lear curses. "Everyone, this way! Emblem Sigurd, with me!"

But it's too late. By the time A'lear and the main force catch up, Céline and her retainers are having a tea party on the boss's smouldering remains.

A'lear pauses to admire the scenery, which is gorgeous. Truly the Land of Flowers. But in her musing, she lowers her guard, and a Corrupted nearly gets the drop on her.

She's rescued by a someone wielding a Fire tome. This mage turns out to be a small girl, who shyly introduces herself as Veyle (pronounced like veil).

Veyle has white hair with black highlights, which sort of feels like the devs stole my original character A'lear, but whatever. (It's less of a left-right thing and more evenly distributed.) She's barefoot, wearing a fascinating dress made of cascading white feathers. The feathers have very slight blue and red streaks, the only real colour visible on her besides her violet eyes. A matching headpiece encircles her protectively, obscuring a black circlet. The look is completed with dainty arm-length gloves.

To me, her design evokes "baby bird", or something in that vein.

A'lear thanks Veyle, who says there's no need—she's just doing what anyone would have done. But before they can speak much more, Veyle runs off while A'lear is talking to Marth. (Was she spooked by Marth's appearance?)

What an odd character. I'm sure we'll see her again. After all, this is not the first Fire Emblem game to introduce a mysterious little girl with an exotic hair colour and strange powers wander in from offstage right, seemingly on her own.

(I'm implying that, just like Ninian and Sothis and Tiki and Lilith and etc. and etc., Veyle is [TODO: finish sentence])

Wait, I hear you say, you said barefoot. Does that mean Veyle has feet?

Rest easy, dear reader. Veyle definitely has feet.

But are you sure?, I hear you say. Maybe that was a fluke. Remember Awakening? Intelligent Systems is bad at drawing feet.

Um, let me see if the lead character designer, Mika Pikazo, has anything to say on the subject.

...yep, can confirm, those are some well articulated metatarsals, and some pleasantly long phalanges. Oh, and look how pointy those toes are!

Truly, a vintage year.

Wait, what was I talking about?

----

(*) Resonance is mutual guaranteed damage, a la Echoes: equipping a tome causes Celica's partner to lose 1HP at the start of every combat in exchange for 2 extra damage. (At time of writing, forgetting about Resonance has caused me to get Céline killed in player phase multiple times.)

Echo is great for picking off multiple weakened targets (and/or Armor Knights), for exacerbating flat damage bonuses like Resonance or A'lear's passive or poison, and for triggering tons of Chain Attacks.

(**) The in-game term for a once-per-engage superpower is Engage Attack, but not only is this confusing to distinguish from Engage Skills like Echo, but also: not all "Engage Attacks" are even attacks! I'll go with "ult" because it's short and fairly common parlance.

I might not have mentioned, but Sigurd's ult is Override, which skewers through a group of enemies standing in a line, hitting each of them once and emerging on the other side. (100% hit, 0% crit, no counterattack.) You'll see a screenshot of this next chapter. It's brutal tbh.

Marth's ult is Lodestar Rush, which is more or less like Astra from other Fire Emblem games. It does 7 hits at 30% damage (100% hit, 0% crit, no counterattack). 8 hits for Backup units, 9 for dragons.

Marth's Engage passive skill, Divine Speed, makes an extra 50% damage follow-up attack, which is fine but honestly kinda forgettable.

#apostrophe a'lear liveblog #fe engage #fire emblem engage #fire emblem spoilers #playing engage #fe alear #fe céline #fe chloé #fe louis #cw: celica of zofia

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bigboobshaunt · 7 years

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A different name on your lips

Mathilda/Sonya comfort.

Post-canon.

CW: Character death (discussed).

~1700 Words

AO3 Link

Commission info

A succession of knocks, strong but slow, came at the door of Sonya’s small home in eastern Zofia, jolting the woman awake from her unfortunately light slumber.

“Ugh, who’s dropping by at such an ungodly hour?” she asked no one in particular, rubbing her temples and throwing aside the covers of her bed.

With a swipe of her hands, Sonya lit up the dozens of candles in her room, checking her small mirror and hurriedly tucking her hair in what she perceived as a more respectable, less mane-like style. “I’ll be there in a minute!”

Choosing a light and simple black coat to cover herself, a look appropriate for the warm nights of the Zofian coast but decidedly more drab than the clothing she was used to, Sonya felt ready to face this small mystery.

No voice came to answer hers, but this only served to rush the mage even faster out of her groggy stupor and towards the wooden door, where the knocks still continued.

She swallowed dryly, noticing the monotone of the knocks, as if displaying a worrying lack of energy, as well as an illogical repetition. “Who is this? And if it turns out it’s that absolutely unpleasant lady telling me how to dress again, I might consider opening the door just to cast a spell on-”

“It’s me, Mathilda.”

“Mathilda?” Sonya raised an eyebrow and took her hand to the knob. She recognized the unmistakable voice of her former ally, someone she had met during their group’s final confrontation with her father and Duma himself. One she’d went on to exchange a few conversations with, but hadn’t seen in a good while.

When Sonya opened the door, she was met with an almost unrecognizable figure.

Wearing a ratty cloak over her armor, Mathilda hugged herself and seemed to be trembling, clutching her abdomen with her hand. Her eyes looked red, dull and unfocused, and her mien didn’t at all resemble the unbreakable warrior Sonya knew.

“Dear gods, Mathilda… what happened to you?” Sonya asked, before taking the other woman by the hand and pulling her inside. “I don’t mean this as an insult, but you look terrible, dear.”

Mathilda bit her lower lip, seeming unable to simply vocalize it, and after much hesitation, shakily handed the mage a letter she held against herself. She was directed towards a chair to sit while Sonya read its contents.

Once finished, Sonya covered her mouth and dropped the letter over her table, before rushing to hug her friend. “You poor thing... I can’t say I knew him well, aside from what you had told me, but this is simply too much for you to bear by yourself.”

“I just got this letter and... I’m unsure if I can fully understand it. I still hope he’ll come back to me, somehow,” Mathilda admitted, before hiding her face in Sonya’s shoulder, sobbing. “Pirates? What manner of pirates could take his life? He was always so strong, Sonya.”

“I know, my friend, I know. I also wish things hadn’t turned out this way… but I’m here for you,” Sonya told her, making her hug tighter and gently patting Mathilda on the back. “I apologize for the cold greeting, but I can’t say I was expecting to see you.”

“It’s alright,” Mathilda wiped the tears off her eyes and tried to compose herself. “I had heard from Queen Celica that you settled close by, and there was no one else I could think of. Thank you.”

“Like I said, I’m here for you, so you don’t have to thank me. I know of loss, and you don’t have to go through it alone as I did,” Sonya reassured her, before moving to remove her dirty cloak and place it on the chair.

“The people, they… need me to be strong. I have to be back on my station in the morning, but how will they react if they see me like this. Oh gods, how will I explain it to them? And what of Clair?” Mathilda parted her hair and leaned into her palms, shaking.

Sonya held Mathilda’s hand firmly. “Now, now… you don’t have to hide your tears, Mathilda. Let them out, and please, think of yourself a little before you worry about the rest of the world.”

Mathilda simply nodded, without giving Sonya an answer, but complied to her requests, sobbing openly and loudly.

“You’re a very strong woman, Mathilda, and you’ll get through this, no matter how difficult it seems right now. Crying won’t make you weak, darling,” Sonya told her, cupping her cheeks and helping her wipe her tears. “If you want, I can… accompany you tomorrow to deliver the news to everyone. We’ll probably have to arrange a ceremony, even if his body was lost to the sea.”

Mathilda agreed amidst sobs. “I don’t want to impose on you more than I already have, but I would appreciate that. You’re very kind, Sonya.”

“Contrary to what many others say, flattery can be a very worthy reward, sometimes,” Sonya winked. “Now, let’s get you cleaned up, and then I’ll brew you some tea. You’re also going to need some sleep, but we can share my bed. It would be a total waste to keep your beauty from the world, after all.”

Mathilda mouthed a thank you, trying her best to force a smile, though she meant it with all of her heart. Taking Sonya’s hand, the pair retreated inside.

xxx

“Damn you, Sonya, wait for me!” Mathilda’s plea went unheard in the wide expanse of the grove. She picked up the pace of her dash and kept her eyes peeled for any traces of the other woman’s location.

A few muffled giggles betrayed Sonya’s position from behind a tree, and Mathilda circled around it, before tackling her companion into the soft, grassy floor and then climbing on top of her.

“So... the noble paladin has to resort to such tactics to pin down the feeble mage, I see,” Sonya teased, with one eyebrow perked up, while making no effort whatsoever to escape. “What will the villagers say when they hear that the legendary knight of Zofia can’t even run very well, what with all that armor on?”

“Do you suppose I should take it off?” Mathilda asked, feigning a puzzled look. “Either way, I don’t mind fighting dirty if it brings results, and I can only hope my fans will understand.”

“Oh yeah? And what results, exactly, did your underhanded methods bring you?” Sonya questioned, scratching at her chin and giving the other woman a sly smile.

“A giggling fool, a villain and a knave. You, the rogue who stole my heart,” Mathilda whispered, inching closer and closer until the very tips of hers and Sonya’s noses were touching.

Grabbing a handful of Mathilda’s long, golden locks, Sonya brought her even closer until their lips met, her giggles not even subsiding while she contended with Mathilda’s tongue. “I wasn’t expecting it to get that serious…. if truth be told.”

“Well neither did I,” Mathilda said, dismounting and then helping Sonya to her feet. “It was a pleasant surprise, though.”

“Do you mean our relationship, or this particular outing?” Sonya questioned with a teasing smile, throwing her arms around Mathilda’s waist. “In any case, I agree.”

“Hah! I’m glad you do, and it’s a little bit of both, though I still don’t know why you brought me here today,” Mathilda laughed, shaking her head in joking disapproval.

“I was planning on keeping you in the dark just a little bit longer… but I suppose I can tell you, if only so you’ll continue helping me,” Sonya replied, seeming pensive.

“Oh, you do know you have me wrapped around your little finger, don’t you?” Mathilda asked, brushing Sonya’s gorgeous violet hair to the side of her face. “You’ve helped me more than you’ll ever know.”

“Once again, you just keep bringing out the heavy weaponry, huh?” Sonya giggled, letting go of Mathilda and motioning towards the oldest, largest tree out of all in the grove. “I need sap from that one today, not from you.”

Rolling her eyes, Mathilda accompanied her girlfriend up to the ancient-looking tree. “And just what use will you have for this sap, anyway?”

There was a pause filled with palpable heft, before Sonya spoke again. “According to all those stuffy old books you helped me procure… this one’s sap might be a component to a potion that wrests back the souls of the women who’ve been turned to witches by magic. It’s but a theory, for now.”

“Oh, Sonya...” Mathilda whispered, placing a hand on her girlfriend’s shoulder. “So you’ve decided to go through with your quest to try and restore them, then?”

Sonya shot Mathilda a solemn look. “No matter what I do, I can’t bring back my sisters, but I know there are still witches out there, and I can’t just let them go through what we went through.”

With a nod, Mathilda unsheathed a dagger she always kept handy and promptly started slicing up a small spot in the tree’s bark. “You shouldn’t blame yourself for your father’s actions… it just isn’t your fault, and I hope you know that.”

“Oh, I’m well aware… and I won’t blame myself, so long as you don’t do the same regarding his death,” Sonya noted, bringing out two small containers and leaning them against the golden sap that had began to seep through.

“I will not, not anymore…. I do still wish I could have stopped it from happening, somehow, but it’s been two years and I have to move on with my life,” Mathilda reassured her, with a deep sigh.

Sonya smiled at Mathilda’s determination, placing the containers in a small travel bag. “I do appreciate the help, dear, but you don’t have to walk me with me all the way. It’ll be a treacherous path, I’m sure.”

To that, Mathilda simply replied. “And why shouldn’t I? You’re my future, after all.”

“It’s going to be a bright one, for both of us,” Sonya agreed completely, before pulling her girlfriend close for another kiss.

#Mathilda #Sonya #Mathonya #Fire Emblem #FE15 #my writing

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