Fire Emblem: Last of the Manakete
- Thread starter SoaringHawk218
- Start date
- Fantasy
- Location
- Earth
- Pronouns
- He/Him
The first time the laguz/taguel/whatever were mentioned, the consensus seemed to be that other people who shapeshift using some kind of magic rock would probably be in a unique position to help Ryza understand her own magic (and why humans need to take dragonstones from dead manakete to mimic their magic). I still think that's true.
- Location
- Israel
[X] You stare in fascination at the faded picture in A Nation United Under the Sun by Queen Solariana. Are those… humans and manakete… together?
I wanted everything... these options are so good...
I wanted everything... these options are so good...
- Location
- Internet
[X] Your fist nearly clenches as you un-crumple the scroll titled On Divine Right by Shyrolong. Why would his writing be here?!
[X] You stare in fascination at the faded picture in A Nation United Under the Sun by Queen Solariana. Are those… humans and manakete… together?
Gift
[X] You stare in fascination at the faded picture in A Nation United Under the Sun by Queen Solariana. Are those… humans and manakete… together?
Gift
[X] You stare in fascination at the faded picture in A Nation United Under the Sun by Queen Solariana. Are those… humans and manakete… together?
- Location
- Gainful Employment
- Pronouns
- He/They
[X] You stare in fascination at the faded picture in A Nation United Under the Sun by Queen Solariana. Are those… humans and manakete… together?
You are a cruel, cruel man, SoaringHawk, to force me not to pick the option that speeds up recruitment of a sassy catboy.
You are a cruel, cruel man, SoaringHawk, to force me not to pick the option that speeds up recruitment of a sassy catboy.
- Location
- scrabbling
[X] Your heart catches… Forged Magic by Lorenzhel… that's Father's handwriting! He made notes on this scroll! Notes directed at the author!
[X] The Uplifting of the Plains by Evelithe makes you cock your head. Why is there a detailed diagram of a human with cat ears and a tail? And what's that in its hand…
[X] The Uplifting of the Plains by Evelithe makes you cock your head. Why is there a detailed diagram of a human with cat ears and a tail? And what's that in its hand…
Entropy Judge
Recurring Bouts of Misanthropy
So, what do these offer ...?
On Divine Right is probably mostly backstory - the reasons for the manakete cultural suicide and/or the "war" with the humans are probably on it. How actually useful it is would largely depend on who, exactly, is in the background of the Empire. If they're related to the writer in some way, then it will probably give a clue as to how best to combat them, since it will indicate what their actual goal is. On the other hand, if the hand in the dark isn't related to the writer, then it might just provide history and understanding.
A Nation United is likely either a history of a country that - for at least some time - had a multi-species population, or it could be a thesis paper hoping for one. If the latter, it could shed some light on how the author viewed other species; it might be a 'manaketes serving as benevolent overlords' kind of thing, where the manaketes' innate magical superiority grants them higher privileges of some kind. And if the former, it might explain how that country ended and why it did.
Uplifting is interesting because the title implies that the Felinceians were created, possibly by the manaketes themselves. If so, it was probably an attempt to give humans a beast form the way manaketes have a dragon form, which ... might be kind of yikes, actually?
Forged Magic is likely to be about creating runes and magic items, considering her father's specialty seems to have been runes. This would accelerate Ryza's understanding of runewrighting and possibly improve human mages' understanding of runes and their maintenance/use.
- Location
- Earth
- Pronouns
- He/Him
You say that like understanding history isn't something both Ryza and the readers would want.
- Location
- Somewhere between here and there
[X] Your fist nearly clenches as you un-crumple the scroll titled On Divine Right by Shyrolong. Why would his writing be here?!
[X] Your heart catches… Forged Magic by Lorenzhel… that's Father's handwriting! He made notes on this scroll! Notes directed at the author!
[X] Your heart catches… Forged Magic by Lorenzhel… that's Father's handwriting! He made notes on this scroll! Notes directed at the author!
[X] You stare in fascination at the faded picture in A Nation United Under the Sun by Queen Solariana. Are those… humans and manakete… together?
[X] Your fist nearly clenches as you un-crumple the scroll titled On Divine Right by Shyrolong. Why would his writing be here?!
[X] Your fist nearly clenches as you un-crumple the scroll titled On Divine Right by Shyrolong. Why would his writing be here?!
Entropy Judge
Recurring Bouts of Misanthropy
My apologies; I'd intended it to be taken as "instead of a direct mechanical benefit," compared to both the previous possibility of combating a possible opponent and the other scrolls' clearer applications of the information within them.
[X] You stare in fascination at the faded picture in A Nation United Under the Sun by Queen Solariana. Are those… humans and manakete… together?
Well you made a Mogal more of a threat then the games. Wonder if any other monsters will be more threatening in this than canon.
Vote closed
Alright, pretty clear win for finding out about the time when manakete and humans shared a nation. Not overly surprising, but there were benefits to all the options.
Now, onto the crypts, and that which lurks within >: )
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- Location
- USA
I was highly considering switching my vote to the cat people.
TaliesinSkye
Occasional Editor
- Location
- Northeast Ohio, United States
Either it was fictional, or the civilization somehow ended so badly that it's completely gone and nobody's even heard of it. Take your pick.
Still, instructional to know, even if it's not a happy story. Learning from the past is how we do better.
Dragonmaster150
Firstborn of Dragonkind
- Location
- Dragendolan: Land of the Dragon Kings
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Whatever it is is going to be super cryptic, I just know it.
Into the Halls of Death
[X] You stare in fascination at the faded picture in A Nation United Under the Sun by Queen Solariana. Are those… humans and manakete… together?
"At the head of the horde, rising on broken wings and surrounded by a miasma of death, the arch-monster lifted a skeletal hand corrupted by fell magic and sought to destroy the grand Army of Cleansing…"
-Tales from the Scouring of the Black Forest
The first thing that stands out about the scroll is just how big it is! Most manakete scrolls are sized to be easy to carry, this one makes you grunt as you try to lift it from the shelf, your wings flapping wildly to keep you steady as you stumble back under the weight. Part of the problem is that the ends of scroll are rolled around golden bars capped with a pair of beautiful diamond-studded sunbursts. They're a little worn, but you remember that gold is pretty resilient, and so they survived and still look very beautiful.
The second part of the problem is that the paper is thick. It takes you a second to realize that it's not paper at all, but parchment, similar to what humans use. You figure that's why this scroll seems to be in relatively good shape while many of the paper-constructed ones you see around it have disintegrated to nothing. The spells and runes woven to keep the contents of the library safe must have failed long ago.
The third problem, of course, is simply the fact that there is a lot of parchment in the roll, more than usual. You're pretty sure this scroll was never really meant to be portable.
Still, you can't just leave it here; it looks far too interesting!
As you slump down next to the pile of mostly-intact scrolls and put the new one down, you decide to take a breather. The faint sound of flickering flames comes from around the corner, but just as your friends had said the stone shelves serve to shield the rest of the library from the fire of the burning corpses.
It does not shield you from the stench, of course. Trying to distract yourself, you unroll the new scroll to take a look at it.
You cock your head as you look at the picture just under the title. Most scrolls don't have too many images: they take up a lot of space and are much more time-consuming to replicate, meaning that there can be fewer copies made of a scroll. However, in this case the author chose to have a very detailed, if somewhat faded and worn by time, picture at the top. 'That must be why she made it so thick,' you think. 'So she would have space to put her pictures in.'
It takes you a minute to parse out what is going on in the image. The central figure is a woman… an adult manakete woman. Her spread wings have feather-like scales, marking her as a White manakete. Her face seems… kind, serene, as she delicately holds out a hand. Holding that hand, bowing slightly in front of her, is a man… and as you stare at him, you realize this man is a human. In his other hand is a long staff with a sun on the end.
The two seem to be standing at the top of a tower, and spread out below and behind them is a bright, happy-looking place. In the picture, you can see more people, both human and manakete, all over the place, without a single sign of conflict. They dress similarly, they're intermingled just like you'd seen the people of Agrithe and Legerius… as if they belong together.
Your breath catches as you start rolling through the scroll, looking for more pictures… and they're there. A picture of a manakete with hands lit by healing magic, tending to a wounded human child… a picture of a dragon-form pinning down a gorgon with White magic boiling in his maw while human soldiers with spears cover his flanks from some attacking doogs… a little manakete girl riding on a unicorn with a human riding behind her, just as you'd done with Artemis…
"Ryza?" Lancel asks.
"Look at this…" you say, pointing. "Does this… have you ever heard…"
The yeoman crouches down and studies the pictures. It takes him a few seconds to notice what you'd spotted, and when he does he takes a sharp breath. "What is it?" he whispers.
You shake your head. "I don't know, I just found it, but…" Rolling back to the top, you start reading. The writing is occasionally faded and hard to read, but there's enough for you to understand.
The Mother is a goddess of love. So great is Her love that, when She beheld the self-inflicted suffering of our ancient draconic ancestors, She was filled with pity and came among us to model a better way. It is in this way that dragons grew hearts, became more than simple creatures of passion and instinct. It is by Her love that we became manakete.
However, not all of our draconic natures has been lost, and that is good. We retain our strength, our determination, our pride and our power. With Her blessing, we have taken this world as our own, have spread from our ancient homes to cover the continent. We have built a culture that encourages learning, deliberation, and kindness.
The continent, however, is not ours alone. Many other species share the world with us, both intelligent and unintelligent. Some are violent and destructive by their very nature, anathema to the Mother's will, and we call them monsters. Some are peaceful and magical, the unicorns, pegasi, thunderbirds and shades, and we admire and respect them. The wyverns even serve to remind us of what we once were, to keep us humble. Most creatures, however, simply are. They have no greater purpose than to sustain themselves, and we in turn sustain our bodies with their flesh.
One species, however, stands out. Alone among all the other species of the world, humans can match our hearts for intelligence, creativity, and capacity for self-reflection. It is undeniable that they even share appearance with our heart-forms. Some have even theorized that they are "fallen" manakete, though there is no evidence of this. All signs point to them having developed some time after ourselves, along their own natural path.
Most manakete, sadly, choose to see only the differences rather than the similarities between ourselves and humans. They focus on the fact that human lives are far shorter than our own or that they lack the innate magic that is the heritage of our dragons. All too often, they ignore and belittle humans at best, treat them as irritating vermin at worst.
However… were we in such a different position, once? Could the Mother not have looked at the arrogance, impulsiveness and pettiness of our ancient dragon selves and thought to have nothing to do with us? Could She not look at the flaws we still have, despite Her gifts, and despair?
She could have, and She still could, but She does not, for She is a goddess of love. Thus, it is through love, both to each other and our fellow mortals, that we best honor Her. It is by reaching out to others, by recognizing ingenuity, courage, determination, and the unifying hope for a better future that we continue to grow. Continue to become more than simply beasts, but people.
As you skim the rest of the scroll, your heart aches at the story. How the author, Solariana, had been badly injured as an adolescent. Her life had then been saved by the eldest son of a local human king. That young man had given her sanctuary and nursed her back to health, and she in turn had protected the city from a monster horde. From there, she eventually adopted the city as her new home, eventually becoming a respected leader. Over the centuries, she brought the people, both manakete and human, together to forge a nation dedicated to the brightest ideals of the Mother's worship.
Humans worshipping the Mother… that was a strange thought.
The path was not always easy. There were those, both human and manakete, who opposed Solariana and tried to prevent her from building her Union. However, with wisdom, understanding, and the occasional reminder that just because she and those who followed her didn't like fighting didn't mean they couldn't or wouldn't, Solariana guided first the city, then the entire region, into a brighter future. It was amazing. Wonderful.
It was extremely confusing.
"How have I never heard of any of this before…" you say to nobody in particular. "The timeline Solariana gives… she started building the Union about three hundred years before I was born. Four hundred before… before the Emperor happened. Why didn't my parents tell me about this!? It's so cool!" You look up to see that your own human friends have gathered around, looking at you with concern and confusion. "Have any of you ever heard of this? Of this… 'land where the sun never sets.'"
They glance at each other. "Certainly not like this," Belle says. "I hate to say it, but all I've ever heard about your people was the old stories that make you go all frowny, so I can't really help you."
Lancel, meanwhile, looks thoughtful. "I certainly never heard of any manakete involvement, but I can't help but feel that I've heard… something… something about the name…" After a moment, he shakes his head in frustration. "I can't think of it, but I'm sure I've heard something. I'll remember after we get out of here."
"How are you feeling, Ryza?" Claire asks.
You stare back at the scroll. "I… don't know," you say. "I mean, this is great. If this is all true, and since Father and Mother kept this, put it in the shelves reserved for non-fiction writing… then I can't see how it's not true." You look around. "If it's true, then it's great. It shows that humans and manakete can get along, have gotten along in the past! Solariana… she built a kingdom where manakete and humans respected each other, cared for each other, helped each other when they were in trouble! But…" You unroll the entire scroll to look at the end. There's no hint in Solariana's final words of any sign of impending catastrophe. She'd written it only thirty years before you were born, and she spoke of her hope that other manakete would reach out to their human neighbors in friendship, to make a better, kinder world. Not only for her newborn daughter, but for all children, human and manakete alike. "Where did everything go wrong? What happened?!" Clumsily re-rolling the scroll, you heft it in your arms. "This is everything I wanted to read, but I need to know more."
Kelton pats your head. "One thing at a time, kid," he says. "Let's clear out these monsters from your parent's basement, then you can give think about how to save the world."
You can't help but smile a bit at Kelton's irreverent optimism. "Thank you," you say, working to force the scroll into your bag. "Well, the good news is that there's a lot of stuff that survived. The bad news is that there's too much for me to carry out, so I tried to get as much important stuff as I could." You try to lift the bag onto your shoulders, only to squeak as you stumble, trying not to collapse under the weight.
"You should probably leave those somewhere safe," Belle says, grabbing the top and easily slipping it off your shoulders and carrying it herself. "They're too heavy for you to carry around quickly, and in a monster den you can't afford to slow down."
"I guess that makes sense…" you say, looking sadly at the backpack full of knowledge. "Will it be safe?"
The thief rolls her eyes. "Other than the giant eye, I figure monsters aren't much for reading, so they probably won't notice it if you stick it in a corner. Or, if you're really worried, we could briefly detour back to the stairs and leave it there: or at least part of the way there."
In the end, you do backtrack to a junction that leads to the stairs and tuck your bag of scrolls carefully under some rubble so that nothing and no-one stumbled over them and damage them. Then, once your first set of prizes are safe, you lead the way towards the crypts.
You'd only been down that far a few times, and unlike the Deep Library you'd never wandered here on your own. Instead, you'd occasionally accompanied your parents to visit the graves of your ancestors, just to make sure that there was no damage that needed to be repaired. The silent rooms always gave you the creeps, filled with countless sepulchers for the seemingly numberless dead.
"You have nothing to fear here, child," your mother had told you gently as she led you among the graves. "These are your ancestors, the manakete whose shoulders you stand upon. They are your family and your blood; it is only right that you honor them."
You can only hope that the graves are still safe. There was a nice big door that might have been able to keep the revenants out, so maybe… maybe things will be safe.
It takes several minutes, a few skirmishes with single wandering zombies, and a couple of detours around collapsed areas, but finally you lead the way to the doors into the Crypt. You let out a breath of relief as you see that the door is still sealed tightly shut. True, the runes are completely gone, but there's no way the monsters would have closed the door after getting in.
Right?
"Is everything alright, Ryza?" Kelton asks.
You shiver. "I… I don't know…" you say. "There's… something's going to go wrong, I'm sure of it, but I don't know what…"
"Hey, don't be so pessimistic," the soldier says. "If there's anyplace that the Sentinel would have protected, it's a graveyard," Stepping forward, Kelton puts a hand on the doors. "Come on, let's get these open."
It takes a while. The doors are big and heavy, and without the magic to open them it you're worried that you might have to use your dragon form to do it. Thankfully, in the end Belle brings out a pair of metal rods with wedges on them that, when carefully inserted between the two doors, allow Kelton, Claire, Sir Octavio and Axton to force the door open, bit by bit.
As you step into the first of five rooms of the Crypts, a wave of nausea sweeps over you. You'd sensed something wrong when you were in the Deep Library, but this was worse… so much worse. It was as if your innards were trying to crawl out of your body and escape and you feel almost physically ill. Looking around, you take some vindictive pleasure out of the fact that the others also seem to be uncomfortable. "Was it… always like this?" Lancel asks weakly, gripping his bow tightly as he looks around.
You shake your head. "No… no it was never like this…" you whisper. Swallowing, you look around. "There's… something wrong…" You don't even have the heart to say "I told you so."
"We could leave," Claire says. "Seal up the door…"
You shake your head again. "No… not unless we have to," you say. "These are my ancestors… if somethings wrong, I should help them." Steeling yourself, you take a closer look. "Now, what's… oh no… oh Mother NO!"
"What is it?!" Kelton asks as you sprint towards the wall, your wings extending and allowing you to jump and fly over the shrine set into the wall.
"Nononono…" you whimper as you stare at the blackened, cracked dragonstone sitting amidst images of one of your ancient ancestors. "What happened… How…"
Your friends hurry over, their eyes scanning the area. "Ryza, talk to us, what's going on?" Belle says sharply.
Swallowing, you reach out to touch to stone, only to moan as it crumbles into dust at the slightest brush of your fingers. "This was a Stone Shrine…" you say weakly. "These manakete… they left behind their most precious treasure for those who came after. They left their stone available, in case any of their descendants should ever need it." Looking around, you groan as you see the other four shrines in this room are similarly blackened, their stones lost in darkness. "Mother… what happened… how could this happen…"
Kelton kneels down and wraps an arm around your shoulders. "Easy, Ryza, easy," he breaths. "I know this is bad, but we're gonna need your help to fix it, we can't." Turning you to face him, he stares into your eyes. "So think, Ryza, what could do this?"
Taking a slow, deep breath, you look around. "I… I don't know," you say slowly. "The stone…" you swallow and steady yourself. "Dragonstones don't… fade, naturally. After the manakete dies, the stone remains. It's never as powerful as it once was, since it only truly answers to the one it was born for and of, but so long as it remains whole, it will continually gather ambient energy and refine it to maintain itself." You look back at the stone. "I… something damaged the stone. Something was… draining it? Draining it to the point where it could not sustain itself, and it broke down?" You frown. "But… no, that's not right, that doesn't work. Even when humans break our stones and turn them into tomes and staves-" (your friends flinch slightly,) "-they don't do this… They don't… fail like…" Your eyes widen. "The magic… it must have corrupted the core of the stone. Whatever was draining it, eating the magic, it must have not only taken all the energy, but twisted what little was left into something unwholesome, something corrupted…"
The humans look at each other. "Monster of some sort…" Sir Octavio says. "Gorgon?"
Axton frowns. "Maybe;" he says. "They're certainly powerful enough, but how would it have gotten in? Those doors were solid, and I doubt Mistress Ryza's people would be careless enough to leave an unsecured path into the burial place of their revered dead." You nod. "So what else could have happened?"
Belle looks around. "We're not gonna find out just by sitting here," she says grimly, flipping her short sword to herself. "So, if we're gonna do something here, we should go searching. Come on, everyone, let's go find out what sort of horror-"
"Sssttttoooonnnneeee…"
You squeak as a dry, raspy voice echoes through the room. "Wha-" you gasp, pulling away from Kelton and backing yourself against the wall, staring around wildly. "Who's there?!"
"Sooo huunnngrrryyy… foorr soooo looonnnnggg…"
"Ryza?! What's going on!?" Kelton calls, spinning in place with his shield and spear set. "What's are you hearing?!"
You stare at the humans in shock. "Can't you hear it!?" you wail. "Can't you hear it's call?!"
"Sstttoooonnneeee…"
"I hear something, but it doesn't make any sense," Axton snaps. "Just random noises."
You tense as the darkness seems to gather at the center of the room. "Words… I hear words, how can you not…" Your eyes widen. "Makashi! It's speaking in Makashi!" Switching to that language yourself, you call out. "Who are you? What do you want?!"
As if summoned, the darkness swirls, and a moment later a figure stands at the edge of the torchlight, hovering at the center of the crypt room, over a sarcophagus that you suddenly realize was open all along.
It's a tall, spindly creature. Wrapped in the dirty remnants of a white shroud, you can see thin, fragile bones through the tears. Some are broken, but still they float, as if connected to the whole by invisible tendons and flesh. Red eyes peer at you from the pale skull of a manakete, piercing the darkness even as black-purple lightning flickers around long, claw-like fingers. Slowly, a small pair of tattered, skeletal wings spread behind the creature as it lets out a rattling hiss.
"Sentinel save us… LICH!"
You yelp at Axton's shout, stumbling away. The monster's eyes track you… and you realize that it's not staring at your face, but at your clothes… at your pocket…
"Stone!" it howls, blasting forwards with hands outstretched, dark, evil magic gathering around it. "STONE! STONE! FEED ME!"
Screaming in terror, your lightning lashes out without your command, slamming into the oncoming lich. It snarls, but its own corrupted lighting rises up, the horrific parody of Black magic twisting and scattering your anima power.
"GET AWAY FROM HER!"
Two steel lances slam into the lich's thin chest, shattering ribs and causing it to jolt to a halt as it tries to rush past Kelton and Claire. A moment later, Belle snarls as she steps to its side and tries to slash her blade through its neck.
However, just as the iron starts to cut through the burial shroud, the creature vanishes in a pool of darkness. A moment later, the shadows reappear next to one of the other Stone Shrines, and the lich reforms, clutching its damaged chest. Hissing furiously, it reaches out a spindly hand and grabs the stone.
"So hungry…" it's voice echoes across the distance. "So hungry… feed me feed me YOU WILL FEED ME!"
As black lightning crackles around the stone, you swallow at the sight of the stone flaking and crumbling as some of its remaining energy is leeched out and into the monster that had overtaken the remains of one of your family. "Well, that's our answer to what's draining the stones," Claire snarls, hefting a javelin and chucking it across the room. "Die you foul-"
The lich hisses, and an instant before the javelin can hit magic swirls and knocks it aside. The power does not fade, remaining as a shield around the lich as its bones start to knit back together, blackened and twisted.
"Intruders… die…" it says, gesturing with its other hand.
Bolts of black lightning slam into several of the sarcophagi, the more damaged ones, and a moment later black mist starts to leek from them. For a moment, you're terrified more of these lich monsters are about to appear, but instead the mists simply form themselves into twisted, formless parodies of a heart-like form, tiny motes of redness forming their eyes. They hover, soundless and terrifying, in your direction.
"Wraiths…" Axton says. "Beings of dark magic…" He grits his teeth.
"Looks like we've got a fight on our hands."
How do you plan to fight these monsters who have defiled your people's tombs?
Pre-Battle Phase:
Your Forces:
Ryza (Level 4, Thunder's Cry / Mother's Hymn)
Kelton (Level 3, Steel Lance, Javelin)
Belle (Level 5, Iron Sword)
Axton (Level 2, Iron Bow, Iron Dagger)
Lancel (Level 2, Iron Bow, Iron Dagger)
Claire (Level 3, Steel Lance, Javelin)
Sir Octavio (Level 4, Steel Sword, Iron Lance)
Items:
Dark Elixir
Light Elixir
Enemy Force:
Group 1: Level 10 Lich (Currently invulnerable)
Group 2: 7 Wraiths (4, 4, 4, 2, 1, 1, 1)
Battlefield:
The entrance hall of the crypts is the biggest of the five rooms, and it is full of countless sarcophagi containing the remnants of your ancestors. Scattered around the room are four Stone Shrines, one of which is being drained by the lich. You know that the other four rooms also have Stone Shrines, though you don't remember exactly how many. Not too many, though. The lich is currently draining the corrupted stone in the shrine it's at, and is surrounded by a shield that you think will protect it from any attack.
Primary Objective: Defeat the Lich
Secondary Objectives
[] Write In (Plan)
Strategy
[] Write In (Plan)
AN: Bit of a short chapter, but combat 2, coming up. You also get to meet the first and second of my own FE monsters. I was originally going to have the lich commanding some bone walkers, but I decided it'd be a decent time to introduce the wraiths.
One thing that I've been meaning to mention for a while: whenever you're in a battle, you can always attempt to retreat. It might not always work out well, and there will be consequences if you do, but you can always try.
Not saying you should in this case, but I just wanted to be sure you knew.
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