I want to hear you sing again(Annette x Felix, also known as Netteflix)

Growing Stronger

Many people would call Felix Hugo Fraldarius many things. Sarcastic, determined, difficult, I would personally call him an asshole. He was rude to everyone, and he often got scolded by his friend Ingrid about his duties as a noble man including needing to be respectful to his peers and considerate to his guests. Useless tripe, all of it. Why does he have to care about what other people think of him? Their opinions can't hurt him.  Their opinions can't keep food off his plate or stop air from reaching his lungs. The only thing that he must care about is his swordsmanship. "Grow stronger to live, live to grow to stronger," that was his motto in life.

The only reason he even bothered coming to the academy was to grow his strength and to keep on living. A building staffed by some of the most powerful fighters in all of Fodlan seemed the best place to do. It also helps that his... are they even his friends at this point? All they seem to do is annoy him with their bickering and nonsense. It helped that his... Dependable allies were attending too. And the Boar.

There's Ingrid, as was mentioned before, whose annoyance came in the form of scolding's and speech's about ideals and Felix's duties and Knighthood. Yet more tripe. Chivalry is the practice is the process of worshiping the dead for dying, of reducing their sacrifice to some fantasy about loyalty and devotion. Felix had experienced this first hand at the Tragedy of Duscur when his brother died to the hands of the people of Duscur, or so the story goes. He had seen the horror of the aftermath, he had seen how shaken Ingrid was at the loss of her fiancé, and he had seen how both her and his father had chosen to think of it as some great display of chivalry. He wasn't going to waste his life on anyone, especially not the Boar Prince. 

While Ingrid at least was just misguided and foolish, Sylvain was a different of foolish and annoying. He was a philander, a skirt chaser, whatever insult you care to use. He would come up to some woman on the street and say a few stock lines Felix had heard hundreds of times before that still somehow always worked, taking them to a nice time to whisper sweet nothings into their ears, before leaving her to another to do it all again. Sylvain would often miss training to this infuriating hobby of his that never even got anywhere and made him grow rusty with his lance. He was throwing his life away for nothing.  Felix knew better than to waste time that could be spent practicing his sword on some woman.

But, even then, at least Sylvain... At least he was dependable and had some sense of morality. He was infinitely better than the Boar Prince, Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd of the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus. Sure, on the outside, he was an upstanding young man, handsome, kind, concerned about the needs of the commonfolk, but Felix knew better. He had seen what Dimitri really was. It was 2 years ago, 1178, he and the Boar were sent to quell a rebellion in the western Faerghus, near Empire territory. It was there that Felix saw an indescribable horror. Dimitri had widened eyes, a devilish grin on his face, and he wielded his lance better than he ever had before. He moved quickly and efficiently, killing everyone one of the citizens he claimed to be concerned for. He was ruthless and cruel and he loved every second of it. At least when Felix killed he didn't look like he was about to drink their blood.

Looking at the classroom roster he had received when he arrived at Garreg Mach, he looked for any other faces he recognize. The only other person he knew was Dedue, a lap dog for the Boar. During the aftermath of The Tragedy of Duscur, Dimitri took a liking to him and prevented his execution, and Dedue has been following him around like a stray ever since. I assume you already know Felix's thoughts on loyalty at this point, and he saw Dedue as a mindless fool. There were 2 people he didn't recognize at all. Mercedes and Ashe. He didn't want to ask around about them, so the best he could do was hope they weren't going annoy or pester him like his... Dependable allies. The only other person on the list was Annette Dominic. He only recognized the name of her house, as the house of the western territories. 

Now the came the fun part of the academy experience where everyone stood around and waited for the speeches about the importance of diligence(as you would ever need to remind Felix to keep up with his training)and how they were all going to go on to do great things and it just went on forever. About 4/5ths of the way through, Felix just strait up left because he didn't care anymore. This was going to be a free day to get to know their way around the monastery anyways, so who really cares if he started 30 minutes before everyone else?(it was more like an extra 5 minutes, but time is relative)

Of course the guards wouldn't let him leave, and while he could just force his way outside, that would cause a big commotion, and then he pulled aside to briefed on correct behaviour by the staff, and Ingrid would definitely give him another lesson about it, and Felix couldn't be bothered. So he stood listening to Rhea repeat the same things she already said over and over again like a good student and when she was finally over he didn't come to whatever class meeting the Boar was planning. He marched up to one of the Knights of Serios and said "You. Where are the training grounds?" 

The woman, with tanned skin and messy blonde hair, remarked "Well, since you asked so nicely, keep going left till you reach the green house, and then keep going up until you see big yellow doors." 

"Thanks." Felix said quickly. 

"Oh, and one more thing..." 

The woman put her hand on his shoulder and turned him around. 

"I don't care how powerful your house is or how strong you are, but when you're here, you're just a student. You can at least treat me with some common dignity." She said with a look in here eye that wasn't angry, but more authoritative. 

"Are you challenging me?" Felix responded, choosing to focus on her comment about his strength. "If so, meet me at the training grounds whenever you're ready. I'm curious to remember what actual competition feels like."

Felix walked off with a smug look on his face and didn't for a moment consider that challenging a Stanger and someone on the equivalence of a mid-level administrator to a battle is a weird thing to do. He went to the training grounds to grow stronger to keep on living, and to live to grow stronger.