Scarlet Blaze: The End of The Great War

Intermission: What Breaks a King

 It hit the King of Faerghus like a wave crashing down on the shore. One moment he was locked in fierce combat with Claude and the next he was doubling over, unable to move. His lance, Areadbhar, called a lightning ward around him, serving as both a shield and a prison. Inside he fell deep into his own mind, floating through an abyss of darkness before landing squarely on what appeared to be ground.

A figure of pure shadow crept towards him latching onto his shoulder. Through a low hiss it whispered, "You feel it don't you? You know what happened to all your Loyal soldiers?" Dimitri tried to shake it off but another latched onto his arm. "They're all dead." It hissed, "Every last one of them."

Dimitri attempted to strike one of the beings but his hand merely passed directly through. Unbalanced from the miss he fell to his knees, mumbling to himself "No...they can't be..."

"Oh but they are my "King"" the creatures mocked relentlessly, "They followed you, BELIEVED in you, they thought you and your strength would be enough to carry them to victory." Several more shadow beings arose from the enveloping darkness. Some small, some large, but they all would carry on each other's sentences forming a complete encirclement of the King's hearing. Dimitri held his hands to his ears, yelling out "I will not listen to another word!"

The beings did not show any sign of caring, "You will listen coward! Face what you've done! You've led thousands to their deaths, dozens of close friends and allies, all for what? For your own kingdom to be destroyed!"

"It is not my fault! I did the best I could! How is one man in charge of a broken kingdom supposed to defeat an Empire and an Alliance with little assistance from anyone!?"

"We do not care for excuses. Do you believe those that died for you wish to hear "I did my best"? Gaze into their eyes and say it to their faces then." The shadows began to morph into humanoids, then into full humans, until Dimitri, to his shock and anguish, could recognize each of them. Dedue, his lifeless broken body being torn at by a wyvern. Sylvain, sinking into rising lava at Aileil. Ingrid, lying against a tree with 3 arrows in her chest. Felix, his body burned laying on his back reaching to the sky. Annette, a pile of mutilated, barely recognizable flesh. Mercedes, on her knees, holding the area where her right arm should be. Ashe, looking skyward, asking "Why did it have to end this way?" The shadow creature on Dimitri's shoulder asked "Why indeed?"

Any resistance Dimitri had to the shadow beings was lost in that instant. His desperate defiance gave way to despair. His arms planted hopelessly on the supposed ground beneath him. Through shaking lips he stammered, "Is...is this what has befallen all my Lions? My friends?" If the shadow creatures could they would be smiling, "Yes, but you already knew didn't you? You wouldn't be here if you didn't know that you failed. You let them all die in horrid ways. Those who didn't are subject to terrible trauma. Left with one question." Before a second could pass all the bodies sprung up at once, as if renewed with life. However, their wounds were not healed, those too broken to walk merely turning their heads with an instant snap. Then he heard it, in the voices of all his fallen friends, the one question he knew they all held: "Why?"