SS Chapter 17 Eirika: Dark Magic's Prince

With Renais liberated, a path has opened up to Mulan, making four routes from the Grado/Jehanna half of the map to the Frelia/Valni half. You shouldn't be trapped on one side no matter where the monsters spawn. Our next destination is past Jehanna.

Caer Pelyn is having a dog attack, apparently.

We really want you to know that, apparently.

...You defined it as vaguely as "evil would seek". Whoever's narrating this has gone too introspective.

This part, at least, is relevant.

We're going to be fighting near a river, and there may be some regrets, but the two facts have nothing to do with each other. I'd almost call the next map a more "regretful" one, but it wouldn't sound as nice if it wasn't a "river" of regrets.

We get a lot more flashbacks now we're in Act 3 and Lyon is relevant.

This time, we're looking at Lyon's engagement with the Sacred Stones.

Lyon doesn't entirely know what he's getting into (even without considering what would happen later), although he definitely knows the answer is "big". He is not to be dissuaded on this front.

Lyon must have experimented with multiple Sacred Stones, to make this conclusion. There is no way he could draw this conclusion about Grado's stone being special in some way without a baseline- although testing it on a single Stone would be spurious.

...I can't decide if this means Lyon must have seen Renais's Stone before, because it is the most likely nation to share, or if Lyon cannot have seen Renais's Stone before, because to claim it, Fado must reveal how to access it to Eirika and Ephraim, who are canonically clueless. If the former, that explains how Grado knew to attack the bracelets even if Orson didn't know.

Lyon's current goal is to heal his father's illness.

His long-term goal is to revolutionise the way sickness and healing are dealt with.

Lyon's efforts are... well, I don't entirely want to say they were a bad thing, but there was a risk. A rather great one, although much like the positive output, no one really has any idea what the negative consequences are likely to be.

Other than "big".

Every "adult character" who expresses an opinion on Lyon's actions is strongly against them. I personally think he was OK to do them, but he should probably have had more supervision than he ultimately did.

Let this be a lesson in permissiveness and teaching people to fail.

This one was probably a good call.

And this is a good reason why. Sure, Lyon may be right and the Stone can do these things, but without a practical basis for his reasoning (and, more importantly, how this might be applied practically), the risk/reward is far too unreasonable.

To Ephraim, this means basically the same thing as what he already understands of magic (virtually nil).

Lyon wants Eirika and Ephraim's opinions of his actions, as peers (neither yes-men nor worrywarts). Whether their opinion is informed is another matter.

Lyon's self esteem is... not great, and he immediately (although perhaps reasonably) assumes the worst. Both Eirika and Ephraim like Lyon, so him playing with a power beyond his ken is something that would be kinda daunting.

Ephraim points out half this conversation has gone in one ear and out the other. It's not that he doesn't care, he just doesn't understand.

He knows that "Lyon good", "Lyon smart", therefore, "what Lyon wants = good".

Perhaps not a ringing endorsement phrased that way, but very conclusively encouragement.

If anyone can do it, Lyon can. This might quietly be one of the more important nuggets of information for a later discussion.

Ephraim: "I want to frame this moment."

As a result of his low self-esteem and general unpreparedness to follow in his father's footsteps, Lyon's efforts to do something about it have been comprehensive.

Eirika seems to have confused morality for safety- saying that Lyon is definitely using the Stones for the benefit of others is a rousing endorsement of Lyon as a person, but says nothing about how likely it is he's about to cause an apocalypse. Other than, perhaps, pointing out it won't be his fault if he does.

Neither of them has really offered him anything other than, perhaps, "what he wants to hear". Kind words and good feelings make for excellent encouragement, at best.

This part is a key revelation, understated in part in just how small it is in scope. Lyon has already saved a life.

Well, OK, I always took this as "Lyon saved a girl from the brink of death", but considering the distance between Serafew and the Stone's resting place (because Lyon isn't allowed to carry thing thing on him), it's more likely the girl was facing a slower death that allowed for time for transport.

Also, Fire Emblem has a bit of a love-hate relationship between "Heal staves can cure you to full HP" and "characters who suffer injuries in the narrative should have similar repercussions to real injuries". In Fodlan, white magic is a good salve, but old-fashioned medicine works better for more dramatic injuries. Here in Magvel, healing staves seem to be the superior option, which leaves our medicine as first aid at best.

Lyon has succeeded.

Which can only embolden him from here.

One might ask "if he's already succeeded, why's he asking permission to do the research?" The answers are "to mollify his misgivings" and "to figure out the most practical means of dispensing the restorative power". Not all life-threatening injuries can make it to Grado's temple.

Lyon's research is far from over. As mentioned, he can only be emboldened from here.

As long as it's for the good of humanity, all is right with him...

And Lyon prepares to set his sights even higher.

A bit of a leap from stopping disease, but not an illogical one. One can assume the basis came from disease prevention more robust than "just avoid them, I guess?"

Eirika reminds him to not bite off more than he can chew.

I get the impression Eirika is the only person Lyon might've listened to.

From this general "lack of regard for his own well-being", Ephraim reasons (correctly) that Lyon is in dire need of a break.

Mandatory vacation time!

"What are they going to do? Fail me? I'd like to see them try. No, really, I would."

"I won't tell anyone" says a lot about the possibility of these three going into the public and coming out unrecognised. I suppose it may be more accurate to say no one is going to see them and tell anybody important about it. What, can peasant #2 go meet the King personally?

That he is.

Back to the regular crew.

Making a bit of an assumption that this is a question of merit. I mean, Lyon was impressive for researching the things his Stone can do.

The question L'Arachel answered seems to be "can you get access to your Stone?"

Innes called for reinforcements.

There they are!

...There they were. The unpromoted guys die spontaneously, without their wyverns even pretending to stab.

Lucky matchup, getting the guy with Fimbulvetr.

Aw man, you didn't even let the General try! No, seriously, the General didn't miss, he just ran up and got oneshot. Dangerous to assume this isn't what happens, but still. The poor guy didn't even get to pretend this was a fair fight.

We are down to one Falcoknight and some civilians to save.

The Falcoknight is a recruitable, but the civilians will never be more than civilians. I think those are unique colour palettes on their portraits, though.

Grado, the country, has been defeated, but the Grado Army, the people loyal to Lyon, are still going. Lyon's not done just because the country's been beat.

We get relatively little characterisation on the river folk (other than being defined by a river that doesn't look safe to drink from), but apparently they don't think too highly of the cannon fodder Innes sent.

I'm also not 100% clear what country we're in right now. The Renais/Jehanna/Rausten border we're in is pretty loosely defined. It's arguable that, for all practical purposes, these people bow to no King. Again, who's going to challenge them?

The fact their backup has been killed horribly is not encouraging.

As hilarious as this is, Syrene could do a decent job of it. The way this map is set up, the only way the enemy gets in is if they kill her, fly over the river, or break a snag.

Only one of those things is unlikely, though.

Not to worry, help is on the way!

It's what he lives for!

Innes does recognise the ambushed soldier. Syrene is personally relevant to a few of our characters, but I think she only really cares about Innes because he's the prince of her nation.

But this isn't a simple mission about saving a recruitable character and some civilians!

We were promised Lyon, and we will get Lyon.

...Good question.

Ephraim tells Eirika to curb her excitement.

We saw this in Ephraim route and only heard about it later in Eirika route.

Lyon remembers the incident about as well as an Eirika route player probably does.

That got Eirika's hopes up.

But Ephraim reckons things aren't quite so rosy.

Eirika sooner accuses Ephraim of being the misinformed one. As much as the reveal was rushed enough I can believe Ephraim's reveal hasn't sunk in... really?

Eirika has also been informed otherwise by Lyon himself. So one of them is clearly lying.

And Lyon will gladly continue to vouch for his version of events.

...Yeah, maybe we should step back.

Not normal. Not normal.

Starting to get the impression Lyon might be the one to distrust right now...

Definitely not normal.

As for what Lyon is, however...

It's probably a lot more dramatic in-universe, Lyon has just been stationarily staring at us and occasionally making textboxes.

Now that is intimidating. We saw this guy in Ephraim route, but it is now time to meet Evil Lyon formally.

Evil Lyon throws this rather self-referential line, to throw it in Eirika's face that she was wrong.

I think, if Lyon is speaking with white text-boxes, we are supposed to be hearing Lyon's voice. Perhaps a different cadence, but still the same man.

We are not talking to the same Lyon. Not anymore.

Lyon himself would be happy to dispute that.

And kinda accuses the twins of not believing there was any more to the man than the meek fellow who could never be the villain standing before us today. In a derogatory way, rather than believing these traits are praiseworthy. Lyon never thought of them as such.

Ephraim would be glad to challenge that assumption right back.

They have the utmost in faith in Lyon to do the right thing.

So then... what are we dealing with here?

Definitely not normal.

I've always interpreted the black text boxes as being a voice wholly distinct from Lyon's own. Fire Emblem Heroes uses the same VA for both- at least, I'm assuming the two forms of Lyon I'm comparing are intended to be "white text box Lyon" and "black text box Lyon". It's certainly enough of a vocal shift to startle the twins.

"Black text box Lyon", as I've called him, is a wholly separate character and should be treated as such.

With that said, the fact he is in Lyon's body means he may have access to insight on Lyon we do not.

So who is it?

He points out there are very few candidates in the world of Magvel- there isn't really a need to ask.

After all, it's not like Lyon was playing with the chains that bound him or anything...

The Demon King. The very same creature Grado slayed in the legends.

And he is happy to do his job as villain, complete with monologuing and maniacal laughter.

Lyon and the Demon King's connection joins "the route split" as one of Sacred Stones most interesting narrative inclusions, one of the reasons I chose this game for the blog at all.

And yet, this is a pretty apt summary of the situation.

Good question.

And this is why Lyon is so interesting.

How true is this? Well, that depends on how you look at things, really...

Regardless of how true or how desirable these are, this is certainly not how they should be fulfilled, and we should do something about it.

Lyon flies over to this castle and will stay here, acting like a Seize boss. This is actually a Defeat Boss mission.

Inspecting the two shops here reveals that we have Nosferatu tomes, Killer weapons and Reavers (trust me on the latter two, it has the full set if I were to scroll around). Killers are the only kind available in the shop on the map version- although there are Reavers on the map later. This is, as far as I can tell, the only chance to buy a bunch of Nosferatus.

Of course, we don't have any dark mages here.

We have one space free, but of course, there's someone waiting ahead.

...That is a lot of enemies over here. I say "there's no way the enemy breaks the snag", but that Berserker is standing on mountains, the horse units might consider breaking the snag over dealing with that. I think promoted ones can cross them, though.

Those Heroes have nowhere to go but around. Or possibly through the water, some classes can swim in that muck.

Lyon's guarded by a bunch of druids and a Killing Edge swordmaster.

Pictured: Lyon. You might expect the fact he is appearing here to be a clue he's not really the big bad either, but no, he is. He's a lot less dangerous here- all his stats are a lot smaller and his weapons are weaker. With that said, that's the strongest non-legendary Dark magic spell here. Nosferatu is even worse.

Lyon has a massive weakness here: Fenrir is heavy. Its weight is exactly enough to zero out Lyon's Speed stat to give him 0 AS (a key part of making him easy to beat here). Nosferatu leaves him with 4 AS, but weirdly, I can never seem to get him to switch. I'm told he can (and if he does, he'll drop Fenrir), but honestly, I never use enough Dark mages to care. And even if I did, the Nosferatu might actually be better anyway. There's another Fenrir later.

The Berserker can be relieved of his Dragonshield if you brought a thief.

Remember that Heroes are not exclusively Sword units. This one has a Brave Axe for Amelia.

...I mean, I guess? I wouldn't exactly be promoting a magic unit now.

Looks nervously at freshly promoted Knoll in Ephraim route.

This guy has the semi-ultimate Anima magic. This is ice magic, and despite earlier implications, this won't deal super-effective damage to fliers.

Speaking of fliers, here's the last recruitable character in the main story! What, were you expecting an overpowered character in the final mission? Not in this game! Syrene is... not great. She can work, if you put in the effort (and she's surprisingly not a terrible recipient of the Metis's Tome), but if you want a Falcoknight, you really should have Vanessa or Tana. There is, however, a benefit to using all three- the Triangle Attack!

There's a bit of an asterisk on the Triangle Attack in this game- it only works if the attacker is accompanied by two Falcoknights. If one of Vanessa or Tana is a Wyvern Knight, the Triangle Attack only works if she is the one to initiate. If both are Wyverns, you're out of luck. I assume this is to not need a unique animation for the Triangle Attack after-images.

Vanessa and Tethys are going straight to Syrene. She's not going to run to her death, but those druids have uncomfortably high odds of killing her for magic users vs pegasus knights.

In addition to both being Frelian pegasus knights, Syrene does have a personal connection to Vanessa.

You can also recruit Syrene with either of the Frelian royals.

Syrene takes orders only from whoever's in charge, and as such, she'll be joining the blue army now, instead of leaving the map and coming back afterwards.

Syrene also takes a personal moment with Vanessa.

She's Vanessa's older sister. She's also Tana's pegasus knight tutor and Gilliam's love interest, although I don't think that last relationship is developed enough for Gilliam to recruit her on this map.

Neimi, who can cross this river (slowly), gives Eirika a boost so she can fight these Heroes for EXP.

L'Arachel comes over for Support.

Natasha breaks a snag and gets a Light Rank.

Amelia and Lute will be doing the fighting.

...Where are you two going? I'm starting to doubt past me's strategies.

Eirika's doing just fine.

And the poor axemen have nothing on her. Yes, her horse animation is ridiculous as anything in GBA.

...Well, it's Strength.

Brave Axe just means he misses twice. Somewhat annoyingly, there are no special animations for rapidly successive animations in GBA- although to be fair, that'd probably lead to the Wyvern Knight glitch en-masse. It wouldn't be until RD that Brave doubles felt more natural.

Well, that's ours.

Lute's own success is just fine, if a little more scary. She's also the healer in this squad.

Her level is less mixed. Woo! (Although some Avoid would be nice.)

Wow, these guys break this snag.

The Druids are going this way, though.

Hi, Valkyries! Clearly Lute was the wrong choice.

Amelia is not much better, though. She won't kill you back, at least.

L'Arachel fished over. Poor Neimi, missing out on some EXP to go do this.

Myrrh was holding some less delicate weapons for Syrene to use on the druids. We need to train her up badly.

Tana's coming in for Support.

Thankfully, the druids cannot hit any river folk right now.

Vanessa's going to start on these guys. They're a little tougher, despite being less promoted.

Also this.

Marisa doing covert ops.

And Natasha's here for Lute. No healers on Syrene's side is risky business, though.

The exact kill is not necessary.

Not like this guy is any better.

I'm more impressed this guy is putting up so much Avoid just for standing on a mountain than anything else that this screenshot depicts.

There's the avoid.

And thank the wyverns for killing themselves on me rather than going for the river folk.

This guy's not in range yet, and I don't like his square.

This guy did damage to Vanessa! I thought it was a myth!

This guy got caught attacking from 1 range.

Mine now.

Syrene is still dodging things, thankfully.

Tana, of course, is popping them like pinatas.

Syrene has to take two hits. At least the druid is inaccurate.

L'Arachel can heal, I guess. This was a relatively high-effort tactical decision- I feel like Vanessa/Lute or Neimi/Amelia was a better pick for this front.

Speaking of Neimi, here she is wondering how to get somewhere interesting.

Sending reinforcements over to this side!

At least Natasha can still take out a problem wyvern.

All these lucky points I can squeeze in a 2-range hit.

And fortunately, this guy comes to us too.

Axe rank! I think I'm too used to the Devil Axe being "really, don't bother". It's not without risk, especially playing legitimately, but Amelia has a massive Luck stat and can mitigate the chance of backfiring. It cannot be understated how much the boost to weapon EXP helps Amelia's axe rank.

Meanwhile, the fact Natasha is still functionally similar to many characters in my army despite being decidedly worse off in the stats department says a lot about Sacred Stones' demands. The ability to grind is often posited as the way this game deals with not having Casual Mode in terms of "appealing to modern fans of FE", but there's a lot to be said about how generous the difficulty curve is, and how bad the enemies are. Outside a few cases, the risk of death is that much lower- although there is no mitigating it entirely.

This snag is now broken. When that mage dies, it's no longer a concern- everything else on the map wants to go the other way to my army.

Speaking of which, new druids have replaced the three I've killed. This map is filled with reinforcements, and since I'm using this map to grind another Support rank, we'll see plenty of them. We were two enemies short of having routed the non-Lyon enemies that started on this map.

Syrene is not particularly good at making it one.

...

Take that, Killing Edge guy!

...Please come back I need Strength badly. Not that 15 Speed isn't concerning.

Tana's going to be Syrene's Support buddy, and considering how late Syrene joins, Tana's going to need to squeeze every point she can get out of it.

Speaking of the enemies that are not reinforcements, Marisa has her eye on that Berserker.

Cavaliers and Paladins will be spawning from these fortresses, and it is the duty of the people stationed here to deal with them. There's also Wyverns from the north-west, so this isn't as disproportionate as it appears, but still. Maybe Tethys should've stayed with Syrene.

Marisa handled the Berserker admirably.

Syrene, doing just fine with the small fry.

Tana is obscene enough that, if I didn't care about Syrene, she'd just be cleaning house.

At least the Luna guys are all choosing Syrene. Syrene can handle Luna.

Warriors come down here, which is where Eirika and L'Arachel come in.

They'll do just fine.

Whatever it is that's going on over here, it's clearly working.

There we go. There's just no substituting for Strength here. Syrene is Thunder affinity, so she doesn't get +3 Atk from the Tana Support.

Somebody's getting a free kill.

Wow. Now that's a level.

Light rank! Probably more valuable on L'Arachel, her stats are bonkers.

Vanessa's putting in a lot of work here.

But it's time she helped Syrene some. I also want Vanessa/Syrene as a B Rank.

Marisa's got her covered.

...Technically.

Wow, go Neimi.

The thing about no dancer over here is that whoever deals with the middle guy has to have a plan for Lyon.

Myrrh's still working on her good stuff.

Tana apparently went with the "just face tank it" plan.

I can't challenge that.

However, I would posit that you would be a more feared evil overlord if you actually knew how to hit things.

See what I mean about L'Arachel not really needing the level ups? She's not the greatest of L'Arachels (her Magic could be better), but...

Make up your mind, past me!

Gotta get that wyvern cred, apparently.

At least it's good cred.

Lute continues to be perfectly fine.

Eirika, meanwhile, forgets her Support isn't giving her any Avoid.

L'Arachel's now oneshotting these guys.

So's Syrene, I guess?

There are good and bad Myrrh levels, but it never really practically shapes her.

Neither does Tethys, really.

OK, that was a hit. Disengaging snark.

I sometimes wonder why I celebrate levels with Defence in them.

Tana's going to back up and Vulnerary. Let's face it, I'm never using them otherwise.

Now Vanessa's on the go.

Amelia will be happy to axe the wyverns all the questions.

Paladins and Great Knights!

I remember Neimi also wants Bow EXP.

And this may quietly be one of the better level ups all around.

Huh. Amelia doesn't kill something without a crit.

She got the crit.

Vanessa is here!

...

OK, I'm confused, who the hell did Neimi Rescue and how did they get here?

...Huh. Everyone is here now. The reinforcements must be done. That took a long time, I assure you, but considering how boring it would be to narrate "and then we got another bunch of horrible units I kill like Metal Slimes", we got spared.

Support grinding. Syrene has two C Ranks, and I think this is A for Tethys/Marisa and Eirika/L'Arachel.

And Tethys's last levels. I'm glad she got that point of Strength in the end, it'll really round her out.

...

Well, I guess it couldn't hurt to try?

It got her crucial EXP.

Right, time for a real challenger to Lyon's demon power.

I think this might be the boost to L'Arachel's ego she really needs: She's not going to die like her parents if she's shrugging off the Demon King's power with a cheeky smirk.

And a wink.

And the kill is secured by Tana. Who else has the power to punch that hard?

Tana snuck out of the castle to prove she was just as strong as Eirika. She somehow got even stronger.

Eirika: Lyon, please! You must stop! I… I have no wish to fight you!
Lyon: Heh heh… Wretched girl. Are you listening, Lyon? Is this truly the girl you loved? Then I will use these hands to tear her limb from limb!

The Demon King loves playing on how Lyon had a crush on Eirika, but he never seems to make up his mind on whether he plans to crush her with Lyon's hands or toy with her (...also with Lyon's hands). Probably depends on what Eirika is trying to do to him.

Free money!

Lyon flees a short distance to complain about having lost despite being the final boss.

Although coming back as Lyon is the only way he comes back at all, it is still definitely inferior to having come back in his old shape. He hasn't figured out all the kinks yet.

He hasn't teleported so far away that he's freed from another conversation.

Although he would very much like to.

He plans to deal with the whole "limitations" part of being Lyon by removing him from the equation.

It looks like you already have. GBA villains especially have a fondness for teleportation, and in cases like this, we're apparently led to the conclusion that it's possible to track them down after they warp away, which assumes a set of limitations to teleporting magic that are rarely backed up. Tellius's warping villains, by contrast, have limitations, even if they're relatively minor in the grand scheme of things, and it is also never really a good idea to chase a villain who fled by teleporting. Either they're too powerful (Black Knight in PoR) or fighting them won't solve anything (the Senate in RD).

At least the game acknowledges the absurdity of the premise by highlighting how it's an expression of rage from Ephraim (and also, because it's Ephraim, rationality doesn't enter the picture), but still. The fact remains Innes manages to fulfill this order.

Anyway, something about this being Eirika route?

Yes, it is Innes who will be doing the hard work of "actually finding Lyon". It's not like this was an established skill of either Lord- Eirika is an expert in the sorts of skills that don't require you to leave the castle.

Innes has some rather important news for Eirika:

Hey, remember that world element we suddenly introduced in Chapter 14? We're never going back to Frelia as part of the plot, so we quickly need to squeeze in a way for us to get Frelia's Twins.

For how often they mention Grado plundering the Sacred Stone but leaving these unharmed, you'd think there'd be a plot point to it, but no.

One of the criticisms of Sacred Stones' means of distributing ultimate weapons is that the player has too little agency in the acquisition: They just get dumped in your lap for free. It's a little difficult to argue that when the role in the lore is so shaky. The comparisons here are the other two GBA games, which have the ultimate weapons in side missions you have to unlock (FE6) or held by dangerous enemies wielding them you have to defeat to get them to drop (FE7).

Jehanna got a sword for Joshua, Grado got a Dark tome for Lyon and an Axe for Duessel, Eirika and Ephraim got Prfs, and now Frelia has a Bow for Innes and a Lance for Tana. Considering the clues offered in the prototype (and even final version) that Tana was a late addition, it's funny how that turns out.

Innes says this as if 75% of players aren't just going to immediately hand these to Innes and Tana.

Well, OK, it's probably much lower: Many players use no archer instead of Innes and have other Lance users in mind than Tana (either Vanessa or a Paladin). But if you're using either, there's basically no point in not giving them their Regalia.

Eirika treats this as if Innes were giving up something. Presumably, "the chance to use the ultimate weapons of our ancestors".

Innes don't care. Innes would rather win than do so with glory and honour.

Nidhogg, the Serpent Bow would be the closest the series came to referencing Yggdrasil until Heroes, but the continent FE4 is set on is supposed to be named after it too. The serpent reference is cute, although we don't see enough of this bow up close to say if there's an ornamental snake design. The bow itself gives +5 Luck and is the most accurate Bow other than Iron in addition to being strongest, held back by the fact only Neimi and Innes are ever going to use this thing. Even assuming Ross, Garcia or Gerik get a Bow rank, are you grinding their Bows to S (and forsaking S in Axes/Swords) just for +5 Luck?

Vidofnir, the Winged Lance loses a bit of its appeal when compared with Siegmund- it has 2 less Might in addition to not having the +5 Str bit- but in exchange, it gets a +5 Def bonus and can be used by any Lance user, a weapon type that practically no player will ever go without someone who should S Rank, let alone can. Def is a bit of a weird bonus for Tana for the same reasons I highlighted in the run of this chapter- namely, Tana is rarely getting hit by things- but maybe you'll want this for a more bulky Great Knight like Kyle.

...Something had to get the +5 Def bonus.

The river folk are personally thankful to Syrene in particular.

Syrene points out how little she did- she would've met the same fate as the rest of the Frelians who went ahead of us if Vanessa hadn't put her under our command.

Eirika tries not to act like it's true.

All they can give us is a single staff.

And their gratitude.

This is the only Rescue staff in the main story (and I kinda doubt you can get more in the postgame). It allows a staff unit to take any unit [Mag/2] units away and set them adjacent to the user. It has uses, especially paired with Warp, but it suffers somewhat from the lack of Elincia to really abuse it with.

Next time: The most infamous chapter in all of Sacred Stones.