Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon Part 12: Vengeance is a Dish Best Served with Pegasi

In which Marth gets revenge on the kingdom of Gra, who betrayed and murdered his father.




Chapter 14: Land of Sorrow

Introductory text explains that until they betrayed Marth's father in the fight against Dohlr, Grabs had been a trustworthy neighbor and ally. Now Marth descends on a Gra bastion and faces King Jiol, the man who robbed him of his father.

I pick my units. Linde is in, Minerva is in, Roger switches for Draug, otherwise going with standards. Marth of course, Abel and Cain, Caeda still as a paladin (because she looks so cool! ... and also has a decent chance to raise her strength as a paladin) Lena, Julian because I see treasure chests, Barst and Ogma, Maria, Merric and Gordin.

The opening scene is a random Gra soldier informing Jiol about our approach.

Have some respect man, we are a group of about 20 people who have conquered two whole nations!

I like the random soldier. I'm sorry he's probably one of the knights guarding Jiol who will die before I'm done here...

Maybe he ran off after this and went to ground. He is a messenger it seems like...

Jiol asks about the reinforcements he requested from Dohlr, and is enraged to find that they sent Macedon's pegasus knights. Apparently he has an anti-pegasus bias, and demands another request be sent for the dragoons or the Sable order. After all, doesn't he deserve the same protection as everyone else in Dohlr? Besides, betraying Altea was all Gharnef's idea, let him handle us! Please Jiol doesn't want to die! 

Yeah, so apparently he's kind of a coward. Too late for regrets man, I don't think Marth is in the mood to forgive your betrayal. Also you're pretty arrogant otherwise, so I don't much like you either.

We start the map in the Northeast corner, just north and east of a river. There is a bridge that is drawn up to the south, guarded by an enemy ballistician, and another bridge to the west. Further west is a village. So Marth goes West. I'll send Abel and Lena to accompany him. Julian walks to the bridge and lowers it. Apparently the controls were on our side... and then Burst walks up and murders the ballistician with a critical hit. So much for that obstacle. Two enemy knights rush the main force, one of whom almost dies to Barst's counterattack (his strength is maybe overpowered...) and the other DOES die immediately when he throws a javelin at Merric across the river and takes a pair of fireballs in response.

Merric levels up to 14, gaining HP, Skill, Resistance and Luck, and Barst hits level 14, gaining HP. 

The knight on his last legs gets a very long range heal from an enemy bishop, hiding in a fort to our west surrounded by archers. Marth needs to walk past that fort to get to the village... hopefully he doesn't eat too many arrows on the way.

Marie heals up Merric, leveling to 4 and gaining Speed and Luck.

I move people across the bridge, leaving Roger up front with Caeda nearby, and sending Cain and Minerva to the east side of the map south of the river. The rest of the place is set up as a large castle, with a hallway leading inside to the east, and a locked door directly south of the bridge. The fort in the northwest also opens up on a sort of courtyard between it and the big castle. Jiol is in a room in the southwest, and the treasure is guarded by a sniper behind a locked door in the southeast. I see two enemy thieves moving towards the treasure, so I want to send some fast people to stop them.

Two enemy cavaliers ride through the courtyard and attack Roger and Caeda, but they don't last long. Caeda kills one, and Roger and Ogma take out the other.

In the northeast, Abel rides next to the walls of the fort, armed with a javelin. Two archers attack him, one with a longbow (from range three) but misses, the other hits but is killed by Abel's javelins as he sights in on their firing positions. Lena is next up, and two more archers attack her, but she is so awesome she just dodges their arrows, and murders one of them with fire. Abel is then able to finish off the longbow. 

In the east, Cain is attacked by two more cavaliers, but he and Julian are able to kill both foes, allowing Minerva to fly past and barricade the way against the incoming thieves. Minerva levels to 7 and gains HP when she kills one of the thieves with Merric's help, and Julian moves in next turn and kills the second thief.

Two enemy pegasus knights spawn just above the boss room... it's Catria and Palla, Minerva's WhiteWings! 

Marth visits the village and meets a strange man with no name.

What a dashing blond man in a nice jacket. Who could he be?

He explains that he has a book of magic that belonged to Boah, the bishop we rescued from prison a few maps ago.

So you stole it?

He asks us to return the book to Boah for him.

No seriously, who are you, and why do you care about Princess Nyna?

He takes his leave without an introduction, but says our paths will cross again. Dun dun dun?

So there's a sniper guarding that treasure with a silver bow. I am now terrified of enemy snipers with silver bows after all the resets, so I need to be careful here. I check a few options, but the sniper would kill both Linde and Merric... but Barst has 32 HP, and would only take 14. Barst can deal 15 damage with a handaxe... at 70% hit chance. The enemy has 29 HP, so if Barst can hit twice... and Maria can heal him in case he misses, I think I can pull this off. At least the sniper has a 0% chance of a critical hit on Barst so no chance of a surprise death here. Just one I see coming if I mess up.

Damn, the first throw is a miss, but Barst takes his damage on the chin. He hits with the second retaliatory attack though! Barst is at 4 HP, and the sniper at 14. One more hit and I get it, but if I attack like this and miss Barst dies on the return fire. Maria uses her mend staff to heal Barst back to 20 HP, and... Barst wins! Sniper is dealt with. I guess that's my new method of killing snipers when my knights are too far away...

Catria flies straight up to Marth and talks to him.

Hi Catria! Welcome back!

Catria explains that she and her elder sister Palla heard that their commander Princess Minerva had joined us, so they came here to find us. They've absconded from Macedon. She joins us! Yay!

On my turn, Marth is able to move forward and talk to Palla.

Nice to get a proper introduction Palla.

Palla says they left Macedon as soon as they heard Maria had been freed. They had been forced to fight for Dohlr against their will, and are happy to follow their consciences now. However, Palla is concerned for their youngest sister Est, who went to Grust some time ago but has yet to return...

Two unnamed enemy pegasus knights spawn at this point and fly at us. Maria levels up to 5 healing people, and gains Speed, Luck and Resistance.

Gordin shoots into the boss room through the wall and kills the bishop sitting in there, leaving Jiol guarded by just two enemy knights. I move Minerva just into range and she lures them out.

In the north, the first pegasus knight attacks Lena, who dodges the attack and burns the foe out of the sky. The second pegasus knight manages a hit on Lena (the first hit of like 5 attacks on her... Lena is awesome) and meets a similar fate. 

Linde moves next to Minerva and burns down the first enemy knight. The second knight moves to take the first one's place as Minerva is blocking the doorway, allowing Linde to kill him as well. Linde reaches level 14, gaining HP, Magic, Skill and Resistance. A good level up.

More enemy pegasus knights spawn, both of them dying immediately when they attack Abel. Neither even hit him.

Minerva is able to move up and talk to Catria and Palla!

She talks to Catria first. Minerva is distracted, and Catria has to call her several times to get her attention.

Earth to Dracoknight! Loyal subject reporting!

I thought she'd be more surprised to see Catria, but I guess they did plan their defection...

Minerva is pondering the different choices she and her brother Michalis made, she to rebel against Dohlr, he to serve them... but she resolves to follow her path through to the end.

Next up is Palla:

I don't know Minerva, your personal battles seem to involve the fate of your nation...

Palla reassures Minerva that it is ok, she and her sisters are happy to serve Minerva.

Sounds like the different paths she and her brother took are affecting their kingdom., and civil war has broken out in Macedon.

Again, Palla reassures Minerva:

This is a tight-knit group. I like this character development.

More pegasus knights keep spawning, so I move my people around and grind some levels.

Abel hits level 15, gaining HP, Strength and Defense. Roger reaches level 8, gaining HP and Luck. Maria hits level 6, gaining Magic, Skill and Speed. Cain levels up to 14, gaining Strength, Speed and Defense. Finally Gordin achieves level 13, gaining HP and Strength, and the reinforcements finally dry up. Time to attack Jiol.

He has a Killer Bow, with massive grit chance, so even though he's a general I'll want to hit him in melee. Minerva hits him first, I use a weak weapon so she only deals 6 damage bringing him down to 28... which is exactly the damage Marth can deal with an Armorslayer sword. Marth kills Jiol. I figured that was appropriate. 

Add another kingdom to our conquests! I know we're supposed to be liberators, but I can't forget that isolationist kingdom whose king we killed just because he didn't want us there...

Marth levels up to 12, gaining HP, Skill and Luck.

Princess Nyna congratulates Marth on this next step towards freeing Altea, the next kingdom over, but Marth is troubled. He had been told Gra had taken the sword Falchion when his father was killed, and without Falchion we cannot defeat Medeus. However Falchion is missing. Malledus enters at this point, saying he discovered that Gharnef had taken Falchion from Jiol, so we need to go next to Khadein, the Kingdom of Magic. Marth isn't pleased with this detour before freeing his homeland, but we need Falchion for final victory...

To be continued!