#((mercedes cast shut the hell up hahaha))

[ayma-nidiot]

The Ride - Sylvix fic Chapter 25

Also on AO3.

Chapter 25 – Proud Citizens

“Your Majesty!” One of Edelgard’s generals ran up to her as she contemplated in the throne room. “The Kingdom army has defeated Lord Hubert! My lady, what are your orders?”

“They are here…” Edelgard watched as the first Kingdom soldiers breached the palace gates. “But I won’t let you stop my progress… There can only be one true ruler of Fódlan, and you’re looking at her… Dimitri.”

“Emperor Edelgard! Orders!”

“A full head-on assault; use any means necessary, even the demonic beasts!” Edelgard took a deep breath, and even a woman as strong as her could hardly contain her nervousness. “I don’t want you to stay here… I can’t guarantee your safety if you do.”

“What do you mean, Your Majesty?”

“Ngh…” Edelgard grunted as she tapped into a dark power from within, slowly transforming her appearance. Hardly able to stand this painful process, she ordered, “Go! Now!”

“Yes, Your Majesty!”

As she stood in the throne room alone, and the power of the demonic beast had nearly taken her over, Edelgard declared, “This is nothing… compared to what my people have gone through… For all of Fódlan… For an equal future for everyone… Dimitri… Come to me. Come to me so I can destroy you, and finally bring Fódlan’s people the equality they deserve.”

Dimitri and a few of his soldiers were plenty strong enough to hold back the Adrestian soldiers that tried to enter the palace. After slamming the gates and locking them in place, the Faerghus prince was disappointed not to see Edelgard right away. “She must be in the throne room…”

“Dimitri, I know you want to battle her, but please be mindful of the surrounding forces,” Sylvain warned. “Especially the mages… They don’t look ordinary, and they certainly don’t look Adrestian.”

“I know, Sylvain, I know.”

“Not to mention the demonic beasts…”

“Sylvain, I will fight her with every bite of my lance, just as I’m sure you will with yours.” Dimitri braced his army right as the Adrestian troops rushed to greet them. “Now onward, my proud friends, to our final battle!”

“Hehehe… I’ll have lots of stories to tell the ladies when I get home.”

“I can’t believe you have the audacity to make japes at a time like this,” Felix spoke as he ran down the corridor with Sylvain. “But that’s how you keep up morale, and as odd as this is going to sound, I think I like it.”

“Oh?” Sylvain and Felix now stood back to back with their weapons at the ready. “It doesn’t make you jealous?”

“Of course not. I know you’re loyal to me as I’m loyal to my sword.” Felix scanned the area briefly before deciding on a maneuver. “I’ll take them from the right and you’ll take them from the left.”

“You got it, love!” And with that, Sylvain took off, using a combination of magic and lance attacks.

“Soon…” Dimitri thought as he charged on. “Edelgard, you will be gone… and I won’t have to see my loved ones killed again.”

“Dimitri! It’s a-”

Before Sylvain could speak anymore, Dimitri stabbed his enemy from behind. “Demonic beast, I know.”

“You boar, it’s not just any demonic beast!” Dimitri’s attack had done considerable damage, but was not yet enough to kill the beast, and Felix managed to hold it down by himself. “The beasts on this battlefield are unlike anything we’ve ever seen.”

“And so is… this!” Miklan lunged forward to protect Felix from an oncoming shadow ball. “Where did this dark magic come from? A dark mage?”

“If it is, it’s not a spell I’m familiar with,” replied Annette.

“It’s coming from the throne room…” Sylvain noted. “Could it be?”

“Sylvain!” Dimitri took after Sylvain after the redhead began to run. “Wait! Don’t just charge in there by yourself! I’m here, right beside you.”

“Your Highness…” Sylvain stopped in his tracks. He had hardly noticed the dark mage who attacked him, but managed to slay this enemy just fine.

“You two go on ahead! We’ll hold them off!” Miklan shouted as he swung around a full 360º to clear enemies around him.

“I promised Lonato that I would survive through this battle… You can count on me.” Ashe ordered his horse towards a demonic beast while shooting it with a Parthia arrow.

“May the goddess guide you…” Mercedes cast a spell, surrounding the two in a white light that healed all of their wounds.

“And here’s a little present from me, too!” Dorothea led the Opera Volunteers into a special dance, invigorating the two friends.

“Felix…” Sylvain shook in his boots, knowing full well his fiancé could fend for himself, but desperately not wanting to leave him.

“Go, you dolt! The boar’s already there!” Felix ran up to Sylvain, cutting down an enemy to his left, and gave him a kiss out of the blue. “We will live through this… or did you forget that we’re going to spend the rest of our lives together?”

“Felix…” Sylvain held Felix close to him for one more kiss.

Felix broke away to kill a couple of mages coming at him – but not before pushing Sylvain through the throne room doors. “Get going, now!”

“Ah!” Sylvain nearly fell on his butt – and right in front of the emperor, no less.

“Hahaha…” Edelgard finally showed her face – her dark, warped face – to Sylvain and Dimitri. “So, this is the graceful heir of Gautier, hmm? How shameful.”

“Edelgard…” As far as Sylvain was concerned, this was not the Edelgard he knew from the Battle at Gronder. She was demonic beast with maybe a shred of what the emperor used to be. “So, you’d become a demonic beast for your people and your ideals… I guess the time of trying to woo you over is long gone.”

“You are… disgusting.” Edelgard held a dark ball of energy in her claw. “Just like Dimitri, the Church of Seiros, and the Agarthans!”

“But the Agarthans were helping you eliminate the Church! I thought you were allies!”

Sylvain didn’t know why, but these words set off Edelgard so badly that she launched a barrage of dark ball attacks at Sylvain. “Scum! How dare you compare me and my proud citizens to those filthy Agarthans! It’s because of them… that I… my siblings… The experiments we had to go through…”

“Just like Lysithea!” Sylvain exclaimed as he dodged these attacks. “I’m so sorry, Edelgard. You and your family didn’t deserve any of that.”

“Sylvain, we cannot afford this woman – this creature – sympathies anymore. This is the true final battle, after all,” Dimitri declared, pointing the Areadbhar at Edelgard. “I had hoped to avoid it coming to this, but… the time for deliberation is over. Raaaah!”

“Hah! Your Crest is no match for my twin Crests. Now, who was it that said that yours is a fourth-rate Crest?” Edelgard teleported behind Dimitri and would have attacked him, had Sylvain not blocked it. “You… Get out of my way!”

“I… will not.” Sylvain didn’t expect a bony-looking monster like Edelgard to possess this much strength.

“I said get out of my way!” Edelgard pushed Sylvain out of the way. “You’re not the one I’m after! And if you dare to get in my way, I’ll kill you, too!”

“Sylvain!” Dimitri was distracted for a brief moment but didn’t let it stop him from impeding Edelgard’s next attack. “Ugh… This is why I didn’t want you to come here with me. This witch is for me and me alone to defeat!”

“I will protect my prince – no, my king - with everything I have,” Sylvain declared as he jumped back into the fray.

“Oh, my dear, dear Sylvain…” Edelgard chuckled as she readied another dark ball. “You have clearly picked the wrong side. If you had sided with me, if you had joined the Black Eagle house all those years ago, you would have lived for a better tomorrow! Hiyaaaa!”

Sylvain stood his ground as he blocked this attack – only this time, the shadow expanded, turning into a shield-like weapon. “Really? You call ignoring the suffering of the poor and killing innocent people a ‘better tomorrow?’ Like hell I wanna associate myself with such twisted ideals!”

“You…You know nothing about me, you toad!”

“Don’t touch him!” Dimitri wanted to protect Sylvain from the full force of the attack – and he did, but was unable to parry it effectively. He fell to the ground as the dark magic started to sear his back.

“Your Highness!” Sylvain tried to heal Dimitri, but Edelgard’s attacks wouldn’t let him.

“Have I… Have I failed?” Dimitri tried to reach for his lance, but the pain radiated throughout his entire lance arm.

“By the looks of it, I would say so!” Edelgard smirked. “Now say goodbye-”

“The only one who’s going to say goodbye is you!” Sylvain charged at Edelgard again and successfully hit her this time. That’s it… Come on, just a little more now.

“Urgh…” Edelgard winced for a spell before continuing the fight. “You’re going to regret it… Your Crest may be superior to Dimitri’s, but now… Now it’s time to show my hidden Crest…”

Sylvain watched as the Crest of Flames appeared above Edelgard’s head. He would have attacked her, too, if an invisible barrier had not protected her. “That’s the same Crest that our professor has!”

“Yes, and it’s all thanks to those who slither in the dark! I may not be proud of their experiments, but I am thankful for one thing…” Edelgard paused to charge up more dark energy. “It’s thanks to this Crest that I… can defeat… you!”

“Aaah!” Sylvain doubled over as the even larger dark ball knocked the Lance of Ruin far out of his reach. He could barely lift his index finger, and in a moment of desperation, he tried to draw a Seraphim sigil.

“A little pretty magic isn’t going to save you now, Sylvain.” Edelgard raised her arm. “Not from this death blow, and not from your eternal damnation!”

“You’re the one who will be eternally damned… Haha.” Even in this moment, Sylvain managed to let out a laugh, droplets of blood on his lips.

“Shut up… Shut up, shut up, shut up!” Edelgard shrieked higher than ever before.

Sylvain closed his eyes, hoping that someone – anyone – could save him, if only so he could uphold his promise to Felix. In the distance, he could hear the clattering of metal. At first, he thought that more enemies started to trickle into the throne room – that was, until he heard Edelgard say, “No way… You?!”

“Hands off my baby brother!”

“Miklan…” Sylvain teared up, not hearing Miklan call him that in many a year.

“It’s not possible… You don’t even have a Crest!”

“Oh, but I do… For once, it’s a good thing I do.” A flimsy version of the Crest of Gautier appeared before Miklan as he yelled, “Let me show you what it can do! Ruined… Sky!”

“No… way…” Edelgard could feel her strength leaving her.

“Hehe… Pretty cool, huh, Dimitri?” Miklan turned his head to the slowly rising Dimitri. “Though my Ruined Sky could never match up to Sylvain’s… Why don’t you do the honours?”

“With pleasure.” Dimitri shed a tear before declaring, “Atrocity!”

“Ah…” This attack ripped Edelgard’s demonic wings clean off and left a giant gash in her back. “So… Is this how it ends…?”

“She’s not dead?” Dimitri stood still, watching Edelgard’s demonic features crumble to dust.

Edelgard didn’t say another word; she only looked to the ground in front of her – and to the hand Dimitri held out for her, as if it were one final attempt at parley.

“El…”

Despite everything she had done to him, Dimitri still had a mind to show his stepsister mercy – a mercy which the emperor did not accept. And in the blink of an eye, more blood had been shed as Edelgard threw her dagger at Dimitri’s shoulder.

“Dimitri!” Sylvain called out, thinking that his liege had been seriously injured. “You’re okay! But how?”

Without so much as a grunt, Edelgard lurched forward as Dimitri removed the Areadbhar from her chest, and at last she had died.

“I’m sorry it had to be this way.”

“Save the sympathies, Sylvain…” Dimitri sniffed, feeling a headache coming on.

“Dimitri… My friend, it’s okay to cry. I know how necessary this war was, and I know you have to be strong for the Kingdom… but it doesn’t mean you can’t cry.”

“Hehehe…” Dimitri let the tears flow now as Sylvain consoled him. “Some king I am, right?”

“Okay, okay, that’s enough of the male bonding already!” Miklan tried to lighten the mood. “You have newly freed citizens to greet, Your Majesty.”

“Miklan…” Dimitri stopped crying. “I’m sorry for what you had to go through in your youth, and how all of Faerghus has treated you… I’ll be sure to make it up to you in the days to come.”

“But it still didn’t give me any excuse to treat Sylvain as horribly as I did.” Miklan could feel a tear coming on. “H-Hey, don’t get me teary-eyed now!”

“Hahaha! For once, Miklan Anschutz Gautier sheds tears of joy!” Though he wanted to get caught up in pleasantries, Sylvain knew that this was the perfect opportunity to bring up an important subject. “Your Majesty…”

“Come on, Sylvain, you were just calling me by my name a handful of minutes ago. You’re my friend; Dimitri is just fine!”

“O-Okay, Dimitri…”

“Sylvain, what’s wrong?”

Sylvain took a few more deep breaths before continuing, “Dimitri, now that Fódlan is free, there’s a confession I have to make… Now, this is going to sound a bit crazy, but-”

“There’s nothing crazy about wanting to marry your best friend,” Dimitri said point-blank.

“You mean… You knew this whole time?”

“Well, yeah! Did you really think that I wouldn’t find out sooner or later?”

“But I was afraid that if you found out, you – and all of Faerghus – wouldn’t accept it.”

“Why did you think I wouldn’t accept it?”

“Because my father-”

“The margrave is just a little old-fashioned. As long as you have the respect of Gautier – and you do – then what’s the issue? In my new Kingdom, I’ll see to it that everyone gets treated equally, no matter if they’re gay, or Crestless, or whatever it is.”

“Th-Thank you…” Sylvain began to cry without warning. “For the longest time, I thought that you would force me into exile, just like that one noble from King Loog’s time.”

“Oh, come now, that’s nonsense! And for the love of the goddess, stop crying! I’ve had enough of it today. Now come, your father is going to want to see you. He probably wants you to take over House Gautier, soon if not immediately.”

“Oh!”

“Is there something else on your mind, Sylvain?”

Sylvain smiled. “No… I mean, yes, but it can wait until that special day.”