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Sylvain had joined the Black Eagles partially as a joke.
His childhood friends drove him insane and he wanted a piece of that ass, so why not?
It wasn’t like he was tired of shouldering everyone’s trauma, which caused him to neglect his own issues. He definitely wasn’t looking from an escape from his responsibilities. Definitely not.
Sylvain figured that he would conquer the heart of the esteemed songstress, Dorothea, while being able to hop over to the Blue Lion’s dorms and bother Felix and Ingrid whenever he wanted. He wasn’t quite successful at the heart-conquering, but he was doing okay with the “maintaining friendship” thing.
Well, up to this point.
But now? Edelgard was asking him to be a general in her army against the place and the people he called home. His childhood friends. Felix, Ingrid and… Dimitri.
Dimitri, the man with barely concealed anger issues. Dimitri, who would give his entire kingdom to save a child. Dimitri, who loved too much and could easily break if he found out about Edelgard’s betrayal.
He would be seeing Ingrid, Felix and Dimitri on the battlefield. He might even be the reason, the person who orchestrates their death. He would be siding against his own family and burning down the place he had called home for the last 19 years of his life.
But he looked at the Black Eagles again. At Byleth. At Dorothea. And he couldn’t.
He couldn’t fight against them.
“Will you help me remove the shackles Rhea has put on our country and lead humanity into liberation?”
He honestly didn’t really care about Edelgard’s self-righteous goals. But he couldn’t fight against the woman he loved.
“Yes. Yes I will.”