Prologue

Sword in hand, a warrior clutches stone to breast

In sword etched he his fading memories

In stone, his tempered skill

By stone attested, by stone revealed

Their tale can now be told.

I am Arazlam, scholar of Ivalice's Darkest Age. You are familiar with the Age of Strife, yes?

It was a bitter succession of wars that drove Ivalice to ruin. The Fifty Years' War laid the foundations for Ivalice's collapse. The War of the Lions rent Ivalice in twain. The Succession Wars that in turn led to the Twenty Years' War.

It was a time that begat the greatest heroes.

A time of untold victims.

Much was lost to the flames of war. Generations of knowledge taken in blazes as cities burned.

What little remained, safeguarded by the Church's Knights Hospitaller, was kept secreted in the vaults of Mullonde. History spread only by mouth and recount—twisted each tell beyond all recognition.

No one knows who is the victim, and who is the aggressor. Everyone is a hero, and a villain.

Beoulve. Heiral. Tengille. Orlandeau. Atkascha.

These are but a few of the names associated with our history. Shrouded by myth and unmeant lies.

However, the recently unveiled Duroi Papers tell an unimaginable truth of their own. A set of documents said to be penned during the Age of Strife, they were only released from the Church's archives this past year.

Why have these papers laid dormant all these years, if they are but the truest account of the Age of Strife?

Join me in my search to uncover the answer.

"O Father, abandon not Your wayward children of Ivalice, but deliver us from our sins, that we might know salvation."

Thunder broke princess's prayer as the rainstorm assailing the Orbonne Monastery continued. Rain pattered against the stained-glass windows of the hall, consuming all light not set by candles.

"Lady Ovelia, is is time."

The princess kept to her knee, facing the altar inside the hall they shared. "I'll not be much longer, Agrias."

Every moment they lingered within the monastery's halls drew her enemies ever closer. "Your Highness, we are beholden to naught but your wishes, but I beseech of you, hurry." Four Lionsguards to protect the princess was a hundred too few. A year after His Majesty's passing and only now did Duke Larg elect to transfer the princess to his castle at Eagrose. All without a proper escort of Northern Sky knights. The princess's security was in grave danger; she would not be safe from Duke Goltanna's clutches 'til she arrived in Eagrose.

"Please," the elderly priest, Simon Penn-Lachish, stepped forward, "heed the good lady's words, Your Highness."

Her Highness, Princess Ovelia Atkascha, rose from her prayer. She faced those who urged her to haste. "Very well." She walked towards the priest; the two took hands. "The High Father watch over you, Elder."

"And over you, child. By the grace of the Gods will you arrive safely in Eagrose."

Lionsguard mythril would make certain of it.

Agrias retrieved the traveling cloak nearby the monastery's doors. It was all she could offer Her Highness to ward off the elements. Her scarlet cloak inscribed with golden insignia of the royal family, her pure-white dress, her honey-blonde hair tied in two braids would all be stained soon enough. They had no carriage, no set of chocobos to ride. Her dress would be covered in mud before they reached Dortor alone.

The doors burst inside—nearly striking Agrias—only for a Lionsguard knight to collapse into her arms! "Annabelle!" said Agrias. Her cape was soaked with blood and rain as both fell from open wounds with no stopper.

"Milady," the young knight gasped, "The Black Lion..."

The Southern Sky was upon them so soon? "Elder Simon, please look after her!" Agrias said before wrapping the fallen knight in the traveling cloak.

"I shall retrieve our best white mages at once!"

Agrias lowered her woman and rushed to meet the threat. In rain-studded darkness, five figures stood at arms near the end of the short road leading to the monastery's doors. Alicia stood to her left; Lavian to her right. Thunder illuminated her foemen's face. A fat-cheeked, dark-haired man bearing a patchwork of scars on his face. A knight bearing the crest of the Black Lion across his badge. Likewise his companions, three archers—arrows notched, and a chemist.

"Duke Goltanna must be mad!" shouted Agrias as she drew her sword. "Do you mean to start a war?"

"I believe such subtleties beyond you wench. Bring the princess forth and naught shall mar that pretty face of yours."

Insolent curs! None among them were the equal of a Lionsguard, but they near twice the numbers with a chemist's support. This would not be an easy battle, and lest of all no retreat could be enacted.

"Alician, Lavian, to my side, shields high," she ordered her knights. If they could but group the Southern Sky together...

The Lionsguard complied, the three women forming a poor makeshift of a shield wall in protection of the monastery's doors.

Southern Sky archers took their own orders, forming a line at the road's end. If the Lionsguard advanced, the archers would flee and strike. If any magicks were incanted, they would focus their attacks. It was a simple and functional plan that took advantage of their strengths and the enemies' weakness.

Their arrows soared through air—difficult to follow in rain's chaos, but also easier to nullify wholly. One went entirely off course, another sunk low and the third bounced off Lavian's shield. Yet, before the deflected arrow even sank to ground, another volley had been sent.

And then another.

By fifth loosed they had narrowly avoided drawing blood. A few nicked air or arm, but no wounds serious.

This rain was sent by the Gods for true.

As they loosed their latest volley, Agrias burst forward—they panicked! Dropping arrow and formation from surprise. It did not last long.

But long enough.

Her sword swung through air.

The magick of Judgement Blade fell upon them.

It resembled ice that fell from heavens, chunks of nigh-transparent blue larger than a man that struck all three. But there was no lingering chill nor frost upon metal. A physical manifestation that struck as firm as any sword.

Unprepared to face a Holy Knight, the Southern Sky had banded together. The prefect target for her arts.

She claimed all three archers with the blow. One fallen on his face the instant he could, another stopped frozen by divine favor, and the last fell to his knees.

"Advance!" Agrias shouted as she led her knights forward to an even fight.

The Black Lion knight moved passed his wounded comrades to shield them as the chemist applied potion to wounded archer.

Agrias met blade with the leader, his arrogance replaced by impudence. "Damn wench!" he shouted. All the bluster he jeered with well and gone. "This would have been so much the easier if you'd simply stood aside." Their swords sought opening while battle continued around them.

Alicia took arrow to knee as she advanced but bore through it to strike in melee. The archer hastily drew a dagger and he defended himself with the chemist. The two were clumsy and unskilled compared to Lionsguard, but desperation bore a strength all its own. When she ran through the archer, his last laugh was sinking dagger into her shoulder. The chemist took advantage, tackling the man on top of her before taking flight towards archer Agrias had lain low. A red-feather phoenix down glowed in hand.

Agrias could afford no more distraction however, as the knight attempted to sneak around her guard. A deflection from edged steel to the blunt of shield, he tipped sword low to break under her guard.

She simply fell back, watching the sword rend nothing in air.

She watched, as Lavian came 'round and struck blow to his back, breaking his stance and forcing him forward.

Agrias pushed the advantage, thrusting towards his chest. The knight moved sword to defend, sending the deathblow to his left shoulder. He dropped his arm, and his shield, it clattered to the wet stone. Agrias pushed him away with hers.

His left was crimson, and his back was exposed.

But Lavian could not support as—with arrow now protruding from her back—she was in melee with two archers and a bleeding chemist. Alicia struggled still with her foeman laid atop, but the angle she'd fallen was awkward on stone step and lacking one arm working wrought difficulty.

"Damn! Damn! Damn!" The Southern Sky knight swore above the thunder. He raised his sword to the sky and charged like a fool.

What would one expect from charging Lionsguard from the front?

His blow was easy to read, if heavy, and Agrias received it with her shield. He brought arm back and rained blow after blow, each less in strength as red life escaped him.

Fifth swing back—she struck. Scarlet staining her sword from man's stomach.

Whatever ferocity remained, still pushed him forward.

But she simply pushed back, leaving him to rot. Blood sipping away, bloodfall down stone steps surrounding them.

Lavian had stricken an archer down for true, but the reddened cape she now bore slowed her. Ranked amateurs her opponents were but pressed her harshly.

Not for long.

Calling again upon the Judgement Blade, the strikes of ice ended the last of the threat in one breath.

The miserable day was theirs.

"Unhand me!"

Her voice cut clear through all the thunder—would through the earth's movements, the Gods' wrath.

Her voice came from the monastery's second entrance, a side-door to the rightside of the main. To a small balcony around the rear.

"The princess!" shouted Agrias, rushing back without concern for her knights.

A man's voice, loud enough to hear as well, helmet-clad echo, somewhat young, another kidnapper. "My end is upheld, so lest Atkascha word of honor dies with you, 'tis your words that we now follow."

Agrias cursed herself the fool for ever letting the princess out of sight. The frontal attack was the diversion.

Inside monastery Annabelle lay, eyes closed, wounds already mended. Agrias leapt to the side door beneath. Back to rain, wooden paths and misery.

Around back, the princess was forced unto chocobo—one of two. A knight bearing no colors but garbed in black armor hoisted her above, and a mounted man with Black Lion standard on cape. Face and brown hair bare to rain. The Princess struggled upon sight, but could not match the knight holding her. "Agrias!"

"Unhand her you curs!" Agrias shouted, sword in hand.

"We hold to agreement, Her Highness and I," said the knight in black. "Lest you treat your mistress's words as irrelevant, tend to your wounded."

"Agreement? Threat by sword's point is no agreement!" Would she not catch Her Highness with Judgement Blade... She edged ever closer to a strike...

"'Twould seem the lady knight agrees with me," the Black Lion knight said. "Should simply have taken her unawares and made to sleep a spell."

"What matters is it is done." The black knight slid into saddle behind the still-struggling Princess. "We ride!"

Agrias moved.

'Twas naught she could do before chocobo's speed.

The kidnappers fled into the distance, across river, far beyond her reach.

Naught she could do as the princess cried for her.

All she could do, was strike the ground. "How could this be..."