History Fanfic / MariaCampbellOfTheAstralClocktower

* TheUglyGuysHotDaughter: While not ugly, Duchess Claes has sharper features and a quiet grace to her, unlike her daughter. And their villainous eyes are more prominent without Katarina's constant smile, making her look like she's constantly glaring. [[StrongFamilyResemblance Though she greatly resembles her happy-go-lucky daughter when she smiles.]]

* IncestYayShipping: InUniverse. In the second Katarina interlude, the Katarina Council mentions the existence of ''[[FictionalVideoGame Fortune Lover]]'' doujinshi involving "Princest" (Jeord / Alan) and "Ascest" (Nicol / Sophia) ships pairings.
* InsaneTrollLogic: During his rant at the end of the International Assembly, the Lord Presider simultaneously claims that the other nations are only willing to send "worthless crap" to La Sable ''and'' that any suggestion of reducing trade is an attempt to deprive La Sable of "essential goods". Several of the other leaders sardonically point out the inconsistency.

* AbsurdlyPowerfulStudentCouncil: The Student Council, which includes the Third and Fourth Princes of Sorcier, the son and daughter of the Prime Minister, several other high-ranking nobles, and [[TheLastOfTheseIsNotLikeTheOthers Maria]], who is rumored to have wandered the countryside, taking down Dark Magic-wielding mages. They handle most of the paperwork involved in running the school, and the only time the Academy's principal even appears at all is when Maria has to file for a [[WakeUpGoToSchoolSaveTheWorld retroactively excused absence due to needing to rescue Katarina]].

In this case, the canon [[IncorruptiblePurePureness Maria Campbell]] awakens her past life's memories as [[LadyOfWar Lady]] [[BloodMagic Maria]] [[BloodKnight of Cainhurst]] years before she and Katarina (reincarnated as per canon) meet.

* FemaleGaze: Maria got a lot of this during the sleepover on account of her being both being nude, and because how [[BoobsOfSteel endowed and well-trained her body is]], with the girls either staring at her breasts or her muscles when Maria unknowingly "shows off". Maria is also noted as having a really ''tight'' butt, both when Katarina was carrying her and when Mary decided to bounce a coin off her rear, much to Maria's indignation.

* StockholmSyndrome: Katarina is friendly to [[spoiler:Lady Berg, Larna Smith, and Rufus]], even though they kidnapped her. Then again, [[spoiler:two were unwitting pawns, and one was sent to protect her.]]

* ACupAngst: Sophia has this when compared to either Mary's "[[ICallHimMisterHappy Pride and Dignity]]" or Maria's "vials of blood".

* AlbinosAreFreaks: As in the ''My Next Life as a Villainess'' canon, albino Sophia was ostracized as a child. However, there's an additional reason here: [[VideoGame/DarkSouls Seath the Scaleless]], one of the ancient enemies of humanity, was an albino dragon, and he keeps reincarnating into new bodies every few decades. Albinos are referred to as "scaleless" and generally seen as nothing but potential Seaths. A few lines imply that the reincarnations turn albino once Seath's soul comes to the fore, but Sophia insists that there is no record of one of the reincarnations being albino ''before'' they became Seath. Of course, there's also a RunningGag that it's Sophia's [[CuteButPsycho personality]] that makes people think she might be the newest reincarnation of the Paledrake.

* BewareTheQuietOnes:
** Sophia expresses a burning interest in the firearms that Maria is making, even putting in a commission and asking if they can be made with multiple barrels, self-reloading, and big enough to "remove bridges, castles, dragons and inconvenient gods", a desire which makes Keith and even ''Maria'' feel disturbed.
** [[spoiler:Rafael]] takes Maria away to speak to her privately after the reveal of Larna Smith's many frequent and completely unrepentant rule-breaking and self-serving actions while [[spoiler:looking for Maria's mother]], leaving Larna alone in their carriage with Anne. When Maria has calmed down and they both return, they find that Larna now sports a ''black eye'' that she insists she got from tripping and is both cheerfully and enthusiastically apologizing to Maria and [[spoiler:Rafael]] for her many actions while admitting to many other illegal things she's done so she can also apologize for them, all with quite too-specific wording and details. All the while, Anne just looks on serenely, leading [[spoiler:Rafael]] to look at her with awe since whatever Anne did made the normally-unrepentant Larna actually ''repent and fearful''.

** Maria thinks very highly of Sophia Ascart because she is level-headed, rational, reasonable, intelligent, imaginative, bloodthirsty, and mildly terrifying. All of which Maria views as positive traits, especially in a [[spoiler: business partner]].

* RevolversAreJustBetter: Sophia not only comes up with the idea of a revolver, she commissions one from Maria, and later gains an exclusive permit to carry one for personal use.

** This fic would like to (repeatedly) remind you that Sophia is ''[[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial not]]'' the latest incarnation of Seath the Scaleless. That would be silly.

* AccentSlipUp: After serving as a translator for the Ashina slaves, Katarina starts greeting people in Ashinago, i.e. Japanese, and putting honorifics like ''-chan'' on people's names.

* [[ArmorPiercingQuestion Armor-Piercing Comment]]: [[spoiler: Sirius Dieke]] goes utterly berserk the first time Katarina [[spoiler: calls him "Rafael Walt"]]. This also prompts the InternalReveal of [[spoiler: Maria realizing that Katarina is ''an idiot'' rather than a cunning and subtle seductress.]]

* BoringButPractical: Katarina's swordmanship style. It's very basic, and has little to no active attack capabilities because Katarina spent much of her time refining her defense and evasion at the cost of offense, and any method of attack is reliant on being able to parry, riposte or counter the opponent's attack. However, Katarina has diligently practiced this style every morning for years, to the point where her defense is practically unbreakable, and can dodge any sort of attack and quickly launch a strike back before returning defensive. Her cousin Matthew, a trained knight, has never won a spar against her no matter what weapon she uses (even a tower shield), forcing her to wear a helmet to avoid her nose being busted(again) by her. Matthew's teacher also quickly lost against her (and got [[RunningGag his nose busted]]), and even ''Maria'' is suitably much impressed by her skill.

* ChekhovsSkill:
** Katarina's training in swordsmanship, introduced in Chapter 2, doesn't get used properly until [[spoiler:the School Festival's play, where the heroine, played by Maria, has an epic final duel with the villainess, played by a disguised Katarina, to the amazement of everyone. It would later become one of the key factor for her becoming a squire under Maria's tutelage to become a knight.]]
** Katarina's Japanese, learned from her previous life, becomes useful [[spoiler:when Maria rescues a group of Ashina slaves, who can't speak Sorcier's language and require a translator.]]

* CovertPervert: Like in the canon, Katarina is supremely ObliviousToLove here. However, as seen in the second interlude, her past life seems to have a thing about IncestYayShipping of ''Fortune Lover'' characters.[[invoked]]

* TheCuckoolanderWasRight: Katarina is proven right in her guess that the Student Council President didn't really want them dead and in her refusal to kill him after he passed out.

* FearlessFool: Katarina steps unflinchingly into a cloud of Dark Magic that frightens Maria.

* FriendToAllChildren:
** The Third Prince towards the Wards of the Kingdom, i.e. the children Maria rescued, earning him the unintentional nickname of Uncle Prince.
** Katarina towards all the children [[spoiler:of Maria's estate]], due to her being seen as [[OneOfTheKids one of the kids.]]
** Maria towards the children she rescued, with some of them even regarding her as their 'mama'.

* GoodCannotComprehendEvil: Katarina is completely incapable of comprehending that she might actually be targetted by someone of ill intent.

* HiddenDepths: Contrary to her [[AttentionDeficitOohShiny personality]], Katarina's swordsmanship is BoringButPractical and she diligently practices in the early mornings before class.

* IncorruptiblePurePureness: How Maria sees Katarina, who always sees the best in people and helps other see the best in themselves as well, in spite of having been kidnapped or influenced by Dark Magic users several times. Though she notes that some people would wish to snuff out her light specifically because of this.

* OneOfTheKids: Katarina Claes, who is seen as a fellow kid by the Wards of the Kingdom and the Ashina children.

* SecretSecretKeeper: Katarina ([[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} of all people]]) ends up piecing together [[spoiler:Anne's secret relationship with Maria's mother and [[ShipperOnDeck voices her approval to Anne]] in private]].

* SimplemindedWisdom: Katarina observes that if Sirius had really wanted to kill her, he'd have killed her after putting her to sleep, so he probably is wants to talk about something.

* SternTeacher: Katarina to Maria when she's teaching her Ashinago. And later Diana, when teaching her Gerudosa.

* SuddenlyBilingual: Katarina is the only one who able to speak Ashinago initially in order to act as translator for the freed Ashina slaves. Everyone is both incredibly suprised, incredible confused, and incredibly shocked that ''Katarina'' somehow knows the langauge without seemingly any prior contact with Ashina. When anyone asked how she knows it, Katarina just replies "Why wouldn't I know it?", forgetting that she knew it from her past life.
** This also applies to speaking Hollow, because of a strange soul-swap between herself and Yamada Tae of Franchouchou.
** [[spoiler:This actually becomes somewhat of a plot point, where another reincarnator during the International Assembly Arc recognizes that she must be a reincarnate via her odd descriptions of how she acquired knowledge of the languages.]]