When the world went to hell, the nightmares never stopped.

They always begin the same way: with Cor Leonis in full prostration before the Lucii, the ancient spirits of the Old Kings. He dares not look upon their towering, armored forms — even as their own gaze upon him with cold, unfeeling judgment.

He cannot. He knows why. They know why.

Hands unconsciously clench into trembling fists. He silently bites his teeth into nothing. There were no excuses, no explanations, no possible way to shed light on his actions without further solidifying the crushing guilt that weighed his entire body down to the polished black tile floor, his own hollow face peering back at him from the haunted moors of his wretched past.

He had failed his duty to protect his King. Failed to protect the people of his homeland. Failed to protect the world.

He had failed his purpose in life.

He failed Regis—

Wrought with inviolable shame, Cor’s body sinks even lower to the floor. Every time, he always hopes they show him compassion, that they may be lenient in their assessment of him in all his visible weakness and piety.

Every time, they never do.

The Old Kings say nothing to him. There is no need. All of them share the same verdict. It reverberates inside of Cor’s mind with the sonorous fury of a thousand temple bells ringing all at once.

Guilty… Guilty… Guilty… Guilty… Guilty…

Always, without fail, the nightmare gets worse here. Cor dreads it every time it happens. Every aspect of himself wants to do nothing but cry and wail and scream and howl until nothing left of him remains—but, always, without fail, his body stays firmly rooted where it is, frozen in reverent fear of the ancient rulers of yore. He anticipates their righteous anger to rain down over his head, to end his pathetic life once and for all; after so many times repeating the same dream, a part of Cor even wanted to tell them to simply get it the fuck over with.

Instead, he simply remained put, like the stupid obedient mutt he was.

Only a single presence among the old Lucian rulers positions themselves before the despondent and helpless Marshal as a single blade of purest argent silver manifests from a glassy burst of reflected light, heralded by the sound of crystals tinkling in the wind like ethereal chimes.

It was all Cor needed to know what was about to happen next.

An invisible force would lift the Marshal into the air, then throw him backwards before he could allow himself to brace for the impact his body would feel afterward, as it slammed into a chair-shaped recess amidst the choking darkness of his own mind. It knocks the wind out of his lungs, every time.

Once it had settled, the blackness slowly dissolved away with a liquid-like suggestion, revealing a throne of peerless opulence and spectacle in its wake, cast in a pale blue light. Above it sits a hollowing where the Crystal ought to be, devoid of splendor and radiance, now but a decorative recess with nothing to show for it. It felt wrong for him to be on it, even against his will, but Cor can barely so much as sputter out a groan from the impact.

A choked gasp is what leaves his mouth next as a silver greatsword punctured through his abdomen with no resistance, pinning Cor securely to the Throne of Lucis. The pain that follows is unbearable.

One by one, the Lucii manifest their sacred weapons—the royal arms—and drive them into Cor’s body in quick succession, one after another. They give him no room to scream or cry as they pierce and skewer and impale his limbs, trapping them against the throne he failed to protect with his life, crucified for his role in bringing about the end of the world.

Shock sets in at this point. Agony ripples through every single wound on his body, leaving only his fingers to twitch on nervous reflex alone. His own breathing turns haggard and strained as blood and fluids pool into his lungs and trachea. Any capacity for speech had since begun to die along with the rest of himself here.

But none of this compared to the torment of what followed after.

The final specter of the Lucii, the one who had first summoned his royal arm, uses its tip to force Cor’s vision upward, even as it wavered in and out of focus. The lordly spirit had every intention of making sure he looked upon the face of the man Cor failed most of all, the one who he owed his entire existence to.

As he stared upon his hollow, mournful face, the Marshal could do nothing but weep.

He couldn’t even muster the strength to beg him for mercy.

His eyes watch the wraith lift his sword high, gleaming over its victim with looming finality.

Every time, just before the moment of termination, Cor would catch a glimpse of one more figure among the Old Kings, standing closely behind the shadow of the one that was to be his executioner, glaring back at him with vengeful contempt.

He knew why. It always cycled back to the reason he was here in the first place. This endless, repeating hell-within-hell.

Cor offers them both a pleading, sorrowful expression. “N...Noc—”

The sword comes flashing at him—


—before he wakes up gasping, drenched in a cold sweat.

Searing, blinding light overwhelms his sense of sight. “Ngh—!” Bombarded by sensory stimuli, his initial thought was to presume he was under attack, but as soon as his hand slapped against something soft and granular, hoping to reach for his trusted swords, the Marshal found the rest of his body rapidly shuffling around, spurred by the rush of adrenaline, until he could at least get to his knees.

His vision still blurred and out of focus, Cor had fully expected to hear the sounds of fighting all around him; weapons skewering into daemon flesh or spells frying the circuits of abandoned magitek troops.

Instead, a gentle breeze was all that rolled past his ears, along with the distinctive call of seagulls on the horizon.

Wait…seagulls?

That shouldn’t be right; I was nowhere near the coastline when I fell asleep, Cor tried to rationalize, still straining himself to try and make sense of the blurred colors and shapes, or the lack thereof. More importantly, the atmosphere felt…warmer than it should. Almost as if…

As soon as he mustered the inner fortitude to open his eyes, Cor turned his head upward.

What he saw left him mystified. “...What…?”

Five years. It had been five years since the world became cloaked in endless darkness, since the daemons took over and turned Eos into a living hellscape for humanity. But the longer Cor tried to stare upon the view in front of him, the longer he tried to process all that he could see, the less he was able to understand. But what he could not comprehend, above all the other details that lay before him, was one that directly contradicted everything that he had been led to believe, up until this very moment—


He wanted to ask the obvious question first: ‘Had Noctis succeeded?’ Maybe it was that part of him that still clung on to the prophecy. Maybe it was him simply trying to hold out for the sake of his friends.

But the more his senses began to adjust, the more it became apparent to Cor that something was gravely amiss with what he was now seeing, which made his theory less plausible in turn.

Which begs the question: Where exactly is he?

Immediately looking around gave Cor enough information to discern that this area was some kind of a beach or shoreline, not entirely dissimilar to the resorts at Galdin Quay, although the sand was a paler hue and seemed coarser to the touch, along with covering a noticeably larger stretch of space as white tongues of foam lapped at the edges from a crystal blue ocean.

For lack of a better word to describe it, the scenery was…peaceful. Almost unnervingly so.

In his endeavors to lift to a standing position and brush the sand off his clothes, Cor’s sense of hearing could pick up a soft laugh in the distance. Someone else was here, as well? He wasn’t entirely certain if this was an act of divine intervention or sheer luck, but either way, the sound of another person could only mean he hadn’t been surreptitiously killed, or worse. At least, he could only presume, anyway.

It didn’t take Cor much scanning for his eyes to fall upon another presence standing approximately a few dozen meters from where he was. Even from a distance, the Marshal could observe the figure’s bronzed complexion and well-muscled physique, but his clothing—what little he wore of it, at least—resembled nothing he’d ever seen before. Close to him was some kind of large black object that vaguely resembled a large sword, or perhaps a great iron paddle.

Feeling a headache threatening to develop, Cor rubbed his neck with a sigh. It was better than nothing, at least.

Taking a single deep breath to collect himself, the Marshal soon began making his way in the direction of the only other person visible within a mile of this place. He didn’t need to call for his attention. Simply lifting his hand up in a half-wave once he was close enough to stand out would be sufficient.

Jecht

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The sand was sufficiently dense enough to offer Cor some halfway decent footing, but still too loose to be walked over at a pace he could find comfortable, no thanks to the shape of his boots, which were better suited for flatter planes and surfaces. Worse yet, these were his oldest pair—rather, the only pair he had left—which also meant that, sooner or later, he was going to have to figure out a way to get them replaced. Somehow.

Like it wasn’t already hard enough in the middle of a damned apocalypse…

Of all the problems he had to contend with now, finding new footwear held the lowest priority. Nevertheless, the more he allowed his mind to ruminate, the greater the volume of questions came in turn. What happens now? What would become of Noctis and his friends? What about their families? What of the people of Eos?

For five long-suffering years, Cor spent each and every waking moment helping the last remaining vestiges of humanity keep themselves mere inches away from complete and total destruction, delicately balancing on a knife’s edge as they waited for the King of Light’s prophesied return. All the fighting he’d done to keep them safe, all the waiting he needed to do until Noctis returned to reclaim his throne and kingdom, all the hoping and the praying…

To have his entire way of life, however bleak it must have seemed, just up and vanish, and so easily, at that…

Put simply, the Marshal felt overwhelmed; not only by the storm of emotions that raged within him, or by the increasing intensity of his recurring nightmares, but by his sudden and inexplicable upheaval from everything that he’d come to know and quietly cherish. Such inner turmoil made it very easy for the expression on his face to appear distant and melancholic, symptoms of a mind unable to comprehend what was happening yet powerless to discover the answers without being deprived of further context.

For better or worse, this also made it just as easy for the bronzed muscular man to offer a piece of unsolicited commentary about being more comfortable on the beach, especially with regards to his ‘stiff getup’, as he called it.

Against his better understanding, it worked to pull Cor back into a more active mindset, just long enough for him to consider letting old habits take their course; his first instinct (or reflex, rather) being to explain the significance of wearing the full Crownsguard uniform. In his own mind, the answer was obvious: the battle garments of the Crownsguard are a display of an officer’s pride in their responsibilities and duties, just as much as they are meant to represent their commitment to safeguarding the Kingdom of Lucis and her people, both a badge of office and a symbol of loyalty.

“I—” Cor tried to speak, but could only chew on the words he wanted to say until the stranger took swift steps to apologize for their sudden forwardness, claiming that he wasn’t adept at starting conversation. It only took a cursory glance at his unusual apparel and the obliquely sword-shaped slab of metal in his grasp for the Marshal to simply let out both a sigh and a dismissive shake of his head, as he came to the bitter conclusion that trying to explain his predicament would only make him look unsound of mind.

Instead, he would return the other fellow’s lackadaisical expression with one of renewed awareness and straightened his posture out, feeling the pleats and seams of his uniform press against his skin in all the ways he’d found familiar and comfortable since fifteen years old. If nothing else, it would be a subtle reminder to himself to always put his best foot forward, even in a moment of uncertainty.

“It’s no trouble, really,” he spoke at last, in a tone of measured assurance for the other man’s display of humility. He then shifted his pale eyes to the sparkling blue oceans with a searching gaze. “As much as I hate to admit it, I haven’t the faintest idea of what this place is, or where it might be.” Or why he had awakened here, for that matter.

The True King was supposed to make his return and wield the Light of Providence to cast away the daemons and banish the shroud of eternal darkness. But now that the sun appeared to be fully restored, shining as if evil itself hadn’t blotted out its very presence, that its warmth and radiance beat down over a world he could not outwardly recognize left Cor wondering if he truly even deserved to experience this once-absent force of nature after five years of strife and struggle.

Some feelings are better left unspoken.

Jecht

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In times of uncertainty, Cor found it occasionally helpful to verbalize his thoughts before a third party, preferably to somebody without any emotional investment in the ongoing events. This way, whatever input he received from them would remain unbiased and free of preexisting prejudices, guaranteeing that the only decisions he made after the fact were also the most informed ones. This also allowed a wider degree of social participation, which came with its own merits.

Metaphorically, the Marshal had fully expected himself to be the only one stuck on this boat, as it were. He almost hoped it were the case, if he had to be transparent here. What he hadn’t counted on, was for the other man to get in and start casually rowing alongside him, so to speak; by his own admission, he also lacked any concrete answers regarding where they were, or how they managed to arrive here, or when they did, or why.

Unlike Cor, who grappled silently with his own inner turmoil, the other man seemed to care very little about their shared predicament, if at all. More telling than this, was how swiftly he was able to conclude what should have remained a very simple and most obvious truth: This wasn’t home. Even so, to hear it be spoken aloud, by someone else, felt…jarring, to say the least. Trying to reflect on it yielded nothing the Marshal could use to build so much as a raft back to Eos, let alone a working hypothesis that could sufficiently explain how they both came to be faced with this insoluble dilemma.

He figured that this, all of this, should have been impossible. For every intent and purpose, it was.

But what does a word like ‘impossible’ even mean to someone that the greater public refers to as Cor the Immortal?

From the perspective of his Lucian allies and compatriots, the Crownsguard commander was the human embodiment of dedication and excellence in the line of duty; the picture definition of a perfect soldier. To his enemies, the Marshal might as well be the Astral of War incarnate, having never lost a single battle throughout his long and illustrious military career to the point he was openly acknowledged as one of the realm’s three best fighters. Frequent and repeated cooperation with the Hunters saw him widely recognized for his ability to complete any task given to him, no matter how difficult the challenge. Talk to the numberless scores of people that Cor has rescued over the course of his service to Crown and Kingdom, and even they will tell you of his ability to successfully overcome insurmountable odds for the sake of his liege and fellow countrymen. At fifteen years old, Cor was the youngest person to ever serve on the royal security detail; he was also this age when he faced the trials of the Blademaster, becoming the first person to emerge from the Tempering Grounds wholly unscathed by the experience. Attempting to run through his entire list of successes here, innumerable as they are, would be well and truly impossible.

But Cor saw it much differently. From his point of view, he thought it was ‘impossible’ to eke out an existence in a ruined world for five years, transformed into a slice of Hell itself. He also considered it ‘impossible’ for that same Hell to run him through the grinder for that long, chewing on every aspect of his whole being for half a decade merely just to spit him out somewhere else.

Anyone else would have called these feats ‘impossible’, too, yet here he was: a ‘legend in the flesh’, living proof of humanity’s limitless potential for greatness, and a royal celebrity through and through.

Well, until recently, anyway.

Fleeting as the thought had been, for all its simplicity, it served to pull Cor away from his listless reverie and into a state of sudden blinking cognition, the kind that generally came about in a moment of immediate epiphany. Not only did the other man seem to accept their mutual plight with casual indifference, he had almost come across as overly familiar with whatever phenomenon had deposited them here. That he called his fatigues a ‘spiffy outfit’ only highlighted his apparent ignorance of Lucian culture, although the Marshal couldn’t exactly hold this against him, seeing as he was equally as uneducated about the shirtless fellow’s nation of origin, wherever it was.

Staring out into the nameless blue ocean before him as he pondered these thoughts, Cor barely caught wind of the stranger’s suggestion to move along and obtain a lay of the land. It was a shrewd idea, and sensible to boot. It’s certainly better than trying to grasp for answers where there are none, just to slip against the proverbial wet stones for his troubles.

With an irenic sigh, Cor rolled his shoulders around to stretch out the tension in his upper back, feeling tiny beads of sweat roll down his temple. Tepid, sure, but what beach wasn’t? A swift glance back in the direction of where he rose from his nightmares caused him to let loose a quiet snort of disappointment, not for what he saw, but for what he allowed to occur in the wake of his own confusion.

Resting half-submerged in the pearly sands were his trusted weapons, Kotetsu and Kikuichimonji, only visible on account of the gleaming silver light reflecting off their gentle curved forms. A wave of relief washes over Cor. Finding new boots was one thing. He couldn’t even begin to imagine replacing his swords for a second time, especially due to careless negligence on his part, and the possibility of somebody unknowingly injuring themselves with one of them was enough to spur the Lucian soldier out of inertia.

Unwilling to pollute the serenity of these new environs with needless shouting, the Marshal gave the departing shirtless man another wave of acknowledgement before he suddenly started moving in the opposite direction. At a glance, it appeared as if he had simply chosen to walk away for reasons only Cor might have been able to understand, yet refused to (or could not) explain. Waiting for a few seconds eventually showed the well-dressed soldier stooping low to the beach so that he could reach for whatever lay in the sands, a telltale sign that he had actually gone back to retrieve his personal effects.

Kikuichimonji, the shorter of the two elegant weapons, would be what Cor picked up first, slipping the blade’s ornately embellished scabbard through a loop on the back of his trousers that connected to a pair of small leather straps, which he had retrofitted during the Long Night to function as an auxiliary frog for hanging appropriately-sized weapons at his waist. He would resolve to simply hold on to Kotetsu, the longer blade, as a matter of habit. Not like he could simply will them in and out of existence anymore, but it made them less vulnerable to petty thieves all the same.

He feels his fingers wrap around Kotetsu’s saya, the scabbard, mentalizing its inner strength returning to his body as though it had physically been drained away. The sword is an extension of his mind, a tool to enact his will upon the world, and the means with which he uses to protect those he loves and cherishes.

With a final mollifying breath, Cor Leonis straightened his posture out once he had returned to standing fully upright, then turned to start walking back in the direction of the other man. This time, he did so with reinvigorated composure, as he had narrowly avoided the crisis of being completely stranded somewhere unknown with no means of defending himself against danger.

It was valid to consider inaction the enemy of progress, given the circumstances, but the Crownsguard also has a saying that proves equally relevant here: “Discretion is the better side of valor”. A mantra that even reflects itself in the Marshal’s impassive and stoic expression.

Jecht

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As he patiently trudged his way across the bleached white sands of this unfamiliar landscape a second time, Cor’s hold on Kotetsu’s polished saya offered a degree of subliminal comfort to him, to say nothing of Kikuichimonji’s added presence; small tokens of safety in the face of a world he knew nothing about, and people who had yet to earn his full trust. For now, simply having them in his possession afforded the Marshal access to his full strength, which he could use to their combined advantage in case he and his new acquaintance happened to be set upon by wild creatures, or scoundrels, or…whatever else occupied this area, really.

From beyond the distant vaults of faded memory, Cor had recalled an old aphorism, often spoken by the venerable master who had trained him in the ways of the sword. ‘Always respect the gods, but never count on their help.’ His teacher’s words echo in the back of his mind, carrying that haggard and hoarse laughter with them as though his very spirit came back to taunt him from beyond the grave. A relevant maxim to consider here, if anything; the Marshal had to figure that if the Six were responsible for expatriating him to a world outside of Eos, then it also stood to reason that they weren’t liable to reverse course on this decision anytime soon.

Like it or not, he was here now, and that’s all there was to it. He would have to figure out the rest on his own, with or without aid.

Once he had finished shrinking the gap between themselves, Cor was immediately treated to a sample of the muscular man’s burgeoning impatience, which was expressed in the form of an annoyed question. Although the old Crownsguard veteran never liked to consider himself skilled at reading the emotions of other people, it didn’t take a seer to notice that the stranger was wanting to take charge of the situation; he had meant for his words to push the old soldier into action, like digging the spurs of one’s boots into a chocobo to make it sprint.

Without a word, Cor turned his face back to that dip in the sand, staring at it for several palpable seconds, as though he were genuinely considering going back over there for a third time. “Not from what I can see, no,” he would finally say in a reserved tone, like the Marshal had no intentions of acting on this thought whatsoever. He didn’t. “I have everything that I need with me.” He held onto Kotetsu with a firm and unyielding hand. It was the closest he was going to get to being ready. “We can start heading out at your discretion.”

Jecht

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