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It was a nightmare. The palace crumbling around her. Marble columns painted with ash and blood, flame wreathed banners billowing in air streaked with magic and darkened by arrows. Byleth holds her cloak over her nose and mouth and squints through the dust. The throne room is just ahead. She catches a man in regal blue in the corner of her eye, blond mane wild and face contorted in a rictus of hate as he runs a dark cloaked mage through. His lance drinks greedily of the blood and viscera its been offered. He turns, the madness glinting in his eyes.
“Byleth! End this!” Byleth nods, dirty green hair whipping against cheeks stained with grime. She pushes ahead, bone sword lashing out to ensnare the royal guards ahead and with a flick of her wrist, tear them apart. Running through the final portal, weapon flashing around her, she skids to a stop to take in the final act of this insanity.
Edelgard, her student, her friend, her betrayer. Bathed in light from the great windows behind the throne, her body is twisted beyond recognition. Skin darkened with beetle black carapace. Horned crown fused to her head above her corpse-pale face. She smiles.
“So good of you to finally join me, Byleth.” Her voice is death, the tomb breath of a girl Byleth once knew. “You’ve taken everything from me, my teacher, and now I will take you.” The monster’s grin is split open as her jaw dislocates. Fangs part and dark energy begins to coalesce between them. Byleth has a fraction of a second to roll out of the way before a beam of black magic pierces the space she occupied moments ago. Byleth doesn’t stop to take in the destruction wreaked behind her. Blocking out the screams and the stink of magic, she vaults a splintered audience bench and speeds towards the former empress. Screaming out her pain as her sword whip trails behind her.
“Edelgard! This bloody war ends here!” She ducks into a low spin, dodging the lash of a razor claw above. Chain whip lashing out to wrap around the limb, biting into the mass of pulsing black chitin. Edelgard roars in pain. The tail hidden by her dragon wings whipping out to slam her former teacher back into the wall. She inspects the gashes in her monstrous arm, already healing in a pall of black smoke.
“No Byleth, your foolish resistance ends now. I will drag this country into a new era. I will become the next conquering Nemesis if that’s what it takes to tear apart the wrongs carved into the bones of this earth.” Byleth struggled to her feet, blood dripping from a cut above her brow. “We could have done this together! If you had only talked to us, if you had trusted us. We could have stopped this mad war from ever happening!” Byleth stuttered in time, rewinding to avoid the crushing blow from the Hegemon’s tail. Jumping over the low blow, she willed her sword back to its blade form for a heavy two handed cut. A claw caught her in the chest right as she raised herself. Picking her up and slamming her into the ground, pinning her.
“Your goddess’ tricks won’t help you here, my teacher.” Edelgard’s face softened as she looked down upon the women under her. “I have given up everything for this, Byleth. you cannot worm your way through time to beat me.” Her gaze hardened, “My dear hated allies made sure that this twisted husk could defeat you.” Edelgarde chuckled, the hollow sound a broken echo of the girl Byleth knew. “The tool they laboured to create will be their great undoing, Fodlan will be free of their taint soon enough.” The Hegemon repositioned herself to bring them face to face. “And you, my teacher, will walk with me.” She leaned in. Their noses brushing as Byleth was forced to stare into those demonic black eyes. “I will prove that you should have chosen me.”
“Stay away from her you demon!” A thrown javelin was swatted away with a casual flick of the Hegemon’s great wing. Dimitri had finally broken through the ranks of imperial guards and stood, hair slick with blood and face ashen as he stared down the monster of his nightmares. “Byleth!” His cry was almost desperate, never had he seen his teacher beaten down.
“So good of you to join us, brother.” Edelgard’s purr of delight was ghastly with the echo of the husk on her breath. “Now I can end your silly rebellion and show my teacher the futility of fighting progress.”
“Dimitri get the fuck out of here!” Byleth sobbed, her divine pulse buzzing again and again as she strained against the eldritch hold the Hegemon had upon her. So much more than a simple claw holding her down, Byleth could feel the worm of her former student’s presence wriggling into her resolve. Eating away and sowing doubt and fear in its wake. Tears slid down her face as she wrestled in Edelgard’s clutches. The first tears since the day her father died. Now she would have to watch her best friend die too.
Dimitri was beyond words, his face contorted in rage and hate. He screamed intelligibly as he rushed towards his mortal foe, Areadbhar raised to skewer her. Edelgard buffeted her massive wings, pushing herself away from Dimitri’s attack. Byleth staggered into a roll as Areadbhar clove a massive gash into the floor that the Hegemon had vacated. Dimitri flipped the grip on the relic as he ran past, ducking into a roll to avoid the great claws that arced above him. Him momentum pried Areadbhar from the floor and sent it singing through the air. The husk barely had time to recover from her swing, catching the bone blade on her wing instead of it slashing across her chest. She screamed in rage as it cut a swath through her membranous limb. Flashing her jet black tail through the dust her wings had kicked up to impale the blue king. It was pulled away at the last second, barely grazing his cheek as Byleth’s whip chain wrapped around the tail and pulled it to the ground.
Edelgard snarled.
“This will not end well for you, my teacher. You only prolong the inevitability of death.” Her words ended in a rasp as the sword ensnaring her tail retracted, slicing through the armour plates as it pulled free. Dimitri took advantage of the distraction to extend into a massive swing, cutting down upon Edelgard’s head with his incredible boar-strength. However, the swing left him open to the front. The Hegemon before him arched her neck, Areadbhar cutting deep into a gold horn instead of the monster’s head. It caught. Byleth lashed out with her whip again in hopes of covering her ally’s mistake. Edelgard had not forgotten her; catching the whip in her claws. The husk’s jaw once again dislocated itself and split a gastly smile across pale white cheeks. Dimitri’s hands were fused to the haft of his weapon in disbelief as he stared into the abyssal energy that pooled in Edelgard’s mouth. His mouth opened as if to speak before his entire head and shoulders were washed in grey light. The beam cutting a stroke through everything in its path.
The room was quiet but for Byleth’s gasp. Dimitri’s smoking body crumpled. The sound of it folding to the ground loud enough to ring in the heads of both of the women.
“Farewell, brother.” Edelgard’s words were enough to shake Byleth out of her shock, and her vision buzzed as she felt the familiar static of a divine pulse overtake her. But as her vision cleared, the same grisly sight greeted her. Two of her former students. One a monster in every meaning, bone blade still embedded deep in her crown of horns. The other, black and purple smoke rising from where his upper torso once was. Tears filled her eyes. She pulsed her divine magic once again. Static filling her being and leaving her numb and trembling. The same sight greeted her.
“I’m sorry, my teacher.” Edelgard’s words were soft, the fight abandoning her in the face of her step-brother’s death. “Your magic will be of no use. You are not the only one to have the Crest of Flames. After having ascended I can feel the flow of time running through me as easily as I can feel my own heartbeat.” The Hegemon looked up at her former teacher. There was sorrow in Edelgard’s eyes, but there was also the spark of victory. Bright and vicious. “Can you hear the battle that rages around us? The screams of my people in the city below?” Byleth shook her head, it hadn’t even registered how quiet the throne room was. She was so far gone in battle that it never occurred how unnatural it was. Edelgard brought her claw up, and tugged the relic from her horn. Letting both the weapon and the piece of her body clatter to the ground. “This room is an eddy in the river of time.” The Hegemon continued. “I didn’t want our reunion interrupted after all.” A bleak laugh forced its way out of her monsterous throat. “It seemed like a fine time to deal with the boy king without any of his friends confusing matters as well.”
“Edelgard.” Byleth’s voice was broken, there were no other words for what had happened. The Sword of The Creator dropped from her trembling, exhausted hands. It was over.
Not quite. Edelgard’s slumped form drew up again, tired shoulders falling into line and wings lifting themselves off the ruined marble floor. Byleth watched in trepidation: realizing suddenly that dropping her sword might have been a bad idea. But those awful claws didn’t plunge into her, nor did that hated light burn her away to nothing. Instead, the Emperor heaved a great sigh. She wrapped her massive arms around the former teacher and butted her horned head into Byleth’s chest.
“Ouch.” The remaining horn poked her.
“M-my teacher! I’m sorry I did not mean to harm you! Let me check are you-.” There was a mighty thunk. in her haste to pull away the Hegemon knocked her head against Byleth’s chin and rebounded away, breaking the impromptu hug.
“Owie- Oh no! Professor, here I have some-” Edelgard licked her thumb before smearing the saliva on the red mark on her teacher’s neck. Unfortunately she had forgotten her thumb was currently a giant claw. Clumsily she rubbed the claw over her teachers neck, rubbing more red into the skin. “Ouchie, h-heh all better my teacher, no problem.”
“It’s fine, El.”
“M-my teacher!”
“You won, you beat us, he’s dead. You don’t have to fuss over a war prisoner.”
“My- Byleth, I…” Edelgard cleared her throat, the sudden elation of hearing her pet name from her favourite person dying in shame. “I didn’t want it to end like this. But it had to, you know that one of us had to die. This war would never see it’s end otherwise. You call yourself a war prisoner my teacher, but there is no more war.” The outside corner of the room took the opportunity to cave in to ballista fire. Rubble shot across the room like crossbow bolts to beat harmlessly against the wings drawn hastily around the duo. “Well, I mean. Once I finish up around here.” Edelgard managed to make a ton and a half of unholy chitin and bone look sheepish.
“What do you want, Edelgard. Why aren’t you turning me to ash like the rest of your enemies?” Byleth’s face was hard, her expressionless mask descending once again.
“You.” Edelgard tilted her head in confusion. “I thought I made that obvious when I said I would show you that your path was beside me?” Byleth’s face scrunched up in thought. There might have been something like that in all the screaming and dark fire. An unpleasant thought sprang into Byleth’s mind
“El, is this how you conduct all your diplomatic overtures?” The shocked look on El’s face was the only answer Byleth needed. The collected stress of this pointless war forced its way out of her in a mighty sigh. “Fine. You can have me. I ask only that you spare the rest of the forces that are sieging Enbarr. Swear it on the Goddess. Or whatever you hold in your heart.”
“I swear it on the ghosts of my family, Byleth. No more harm will come to the people of my realm. No matter which king or god they worshiped before.” She offered one clawed hand to her former teacher. “Now, let us end this war together.”
OMAKE:
“Um, I’m not sure I can walk.” Byleth’s face was pale, a stiff breeze could have knocked her over. It looked like every grain of will was bent to holding her up.
“Easily fixable, my teacher. Please excuse me.” Byleth squeaked as the Hegemon hefted her into her arms. Byleth felt strangely at ease cradled in her captor’s arms like a babe. until of course she remembered they were returning to the battlefield.
“Wait, Edelgard. El, Put me down! They can’t see me-” The words died on her tongue as the emperor crossed whatever threshold of the barrier Edelgard had erected. The sudden return of sound around them was cacophonous. Edelgard paid it no mind as she strode confidently to the nearest possible high ground. Then, in her mightiest voice called out: “Lay down your arms! Your wife is mine!”
OMAKE OMAKE:
“Uh, l-life. I mean life!”