Common LegeicaWhen Nephenee was barely fifteen years old, Crimea had been caught flat-footed against an aggressive Daein army, so the Crimeans needed more soldiers, and fast. Against her family's wishes, Nephenee sneaked out of her home in the dead of night to the nearby village, hiding out with one of her father's friends, a farmer named Brom. At dawn, she and Brom and numerous others from Ohma enlisted in the Crimean army and made a long day's walk to a camp where they were all split up. Nephenee was made to share a tent with three other girls, and was given a helmet and a bow, which she was told to share with one of the other girls. Neither one of them knew how to work a bow. None of them did.
The camp was chaotic for the next couple days. The officers there were frazzled, and desperately tried to control the rowdy country folk and turn them into some semblance of an army. Nephenee learned how to stand at attention when an officer walked by, but that was all she learned before Daein forces bowled over the camp in the middle of the night. Anyone who tried to fight back was killed, and anyone who surrendered was taken prisoner. Being unarmed at the time, Nephenee had no choice but to surrender, and she was swept up into the back of a wagon and carted off to the captured Castle Canteus, where she was thrown into a jail cell in the dark dungeon. She wasn't the only one in the dungeon, though. She had heard Brom, as well as some other voices, one speaking prayers in an unnaturally serene voice, and another shouting all sorts of obscenities and profanities every time a guard walked by. She heard other voices too, but day by day they tended to go quiet. The guards provided food whenever they felt generous enough, which wasn't often, and though water dripped from the ceiling, it was barely enough to quench her thirst.
She wasn't sure how long she had been in the dungeon by the time she heard the locks opening and the creaking of cell doors. She was grabbed firmly by the arm, and an older woman's voice, stern but soothing, said, "We're getting you out of here. Stay close and stay quiet." It was still impossibly dark, but she stayed close to the woman as instructed, until they reached a set of stairs. "Go," the woman said. "We chased the Daein soldiers out already. Wait upstairs for us."
How did she even know she could trust this woman? She hadn't even seen her face. But what other option did she have? Nephenee only nodded, before starting to climb the stairs carefully, doing her best not to make a sound, though she wouldn't have been surprised if her pounding heart was loud enough to be heard echoing down the stairs. Regardless, she made it to the door at the top of the stairs and found it already half-open. When she pushed it all the way open, she recoiled faintly at the sunlight that shone through a broken window. Immediately, her stomach growled.
She was one of the lucky ones. Many of the prisoners apparently hadn't survived. Out of the dozens she had seen being placed in the prison, apparently she, Brom, a fiery-haired cavalier who had a similarly-fiery attitude, and a monk from Begnion were the only ones left. Their rescuers were apparently a mercenary group, led by a young man named Ike, who looked maybe a couple years older than her? It was surprising that he was leading such a band of hardened mercenaries at his age. Ike said he had a goal to chase the Daein army out of Crimea, but he couldn't do it alone. The cavalier said he was actually a soldier in the Crimean Army and would be happy to help until he got back to Melior and could rejoin the army proper, but Brom and Nephenee, not ready to just lay down their arms and go home, agreed to join as well. The monk, while grateful, did not wish to take part in the violence, and insisted that he return back home to Begnion as soon as he had his strength back.
Nephenee became part of the mercenary band and was given a set of armor and her choice of a weapon. She wasn't quite sure what she would be good at, and explained that she was only a farm girl. When she mentioned that she used to stack hay for her father, a lance was immediately shoved into her hands, and she was told it was very similar to handling a pitchfork. Sure enough, Nephenee had a talent for handling the polearm, and became a valuable ally of the army.
Nephenee never wanted to speak up. She felt so out of place in the mercenary band. Everyone around her was a professional soldier, a knight, a mercenary, someone who had lived a fuller, more adventurous life than she. She felt so strange, with her odd way of saying things, the way she'd be regarded with confusion when she spoke up. So she kept quiet. She only spoke when spoken to, and in as few words as she could manage when having to come up with answers on the spot. She learned to fight, though, and she found she was far better at it than she had initially thought when the Crimean militia shoved a bow into her hands. She was sturdy, she could take hits pretty well, and she was light enough on her feet that she could dance around heavier, slower opponents, though faster ones got the better of her. Magic still absolutely confounded her, too. But even when she was knocked on her backside in training, or when she was injured in the thick of a battle, she was always reassured that she was still learning. She'd never been a soldier before. But spar after spar, battle after battle, she, and the others in the mercenary band, could see her improve.
Nephenee is from the games Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance and Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn. These games were made by Nintendo and Intelligent Systems.
The art used is from the game Fire Emblem Heroes, and the background art is from Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance.
The profile was made by
Majesty and coded by Marine.The story was written by
Majesty and a lot of help from the Fire Emblem Wiki and a couple runs of Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn.
