Line #140 Fanfic/IAmSkantarios


1	->''From the Diary of Diadohos Skantarios, 1450 AD...''
2	->- Opening Line
3
4	The year is 1450 AD. The UsefulNotes/ByzantineEmpire -- henceforth refered to as Basileia ton Romaion, "Kingdom of the Romans" -- the last remnant of the glorious Roman Empire of the age past, is on its last legs. Surrounded by hostile neighbors who can crush what little land it has left and put an end to the lingering legacy of Rome for good, it seemed that there is little the the Basileia can do except for [[VestigialEmpire surrendering its arms and step down...]]
5
6	Or not.
7
8	Because against [[TheHorde the hordes of Muslim holy warriors]], [[CorruptChurch greedy Catholic rivals]] and [[DecadentCourt the heart of Constantinople]] stands [[ImplacableMan one man who will soon take history into his own hands]] and attempt to revive the Roman Empire of ages long past. Will he emerge victorious and revive Rome to its heyday, or will he be crushed beneath the weight of all her foes?
9
10	[[TitleDrop He is Skantarios]], and [[AntiHero he's not exactly the most chivalrous one out there]], but he ''will'' [[IDidWhatIHadToDo do what needs to be done]] [[CombatPragmatist by whatever means necessary]], and [[MagnificentBastard looking like a great hero while he does it]].
11
12	''I Am Skantarios'' is a ''VideoGame/MedievalIITotalWar'' fanfic/Let's Play. Look for this completed work [[http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=320711 here]] at TW Center.
13
14	The author also made a sequel, called [[http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?382915-SS-AAR-The-Legacy-of-Skantarios-Restoration-of-the-Roman-Empire-COMPLETE-(With-Compilation) Legacy Of Skantarios]], and a prequel, ''Fanfic/PaganVengeance''.
15	----
16	!!'''This work provides examples of:'''
17	%%* AfterActionReport: One of the finest examples.
18	* AllohistoricalAllusion: Plenty. For example, [[spoiler:thanks to Skantarios's actions in Italy, Martin Luther reformed the Catholic Church from within instead of starting the Protestant movement]].
19	* AltarDiplomacy: The Byzantines strengthen their alliance with their Hungarian allies via marriage, one general becoming BashBrothers with Skantarios.
20	* AlternateHistory: Aside from the obvious, ''Legacy of Skantarios'' begins with a brief history of the Laskaris family. Most notably, instead of dying in the Siege of Constantinople in 1453, Emperor Constantine IX is instead betrayed and assassinated by the ruling council in 1450. The commander of his bodyguard, Theodoros, and his son Skantarios, usurp power from the council and establish a new dynasty.
21	* AlternateHistoryWank: To a degree; the Byzantine Empire expands considerably under Skantarios' guidance, even reaching places it never conquered in real life. [[spoiler:And that's not getting to what his family and allies try to do after his death.]]
22	* AnticlimaxBoss: InUniverse. The final confrontation between Skantarios, representing the Orthodox Church and the Pope is... underwhelming, to say the least. [[spoiler:The pope is well into his 80s and has likely never wielded a weapon in his life. Skantarios is a lifelong soldier and a champion in combat to boot.]]
23	* {{Antihero}}: Skantarios is frequently downright cruel to his enemies. His acts of [[strike:genocide]] righteous retribution are [[strike: implied to be mostly forgiven]] glorified by his people, who more-or-less worship him as a living saint, and [[NecessarilyEvil since their enemies would do pretty much the same to them should he fail anyway]].
24	* ArtificialStupidity: A few battles were won owing to this, including many of the countersieges of Constantinople. Getting their men fried by GreekFire? Forgivable. [[IdiotBall Charging cavalry through a row of stakes]]? [[TooDumbToLive No excuse]].
25	* AuthorAvatar: Inverted. The author's user ID is named after the character, and he's occasionally mentioned regretting doing so, due to the occasional bouts of mild confusion it engenders.
26	* AwesomeMomentOfCrowning: [[spoiler:Skantarios gets one when his father is killed by an assassin. A rather inept one at that, for he gets hunted down and murdered by his network of (usually) insanely effective spies almost immediately thereafter.]]
27	* BadassArmy: Skantarios can be proud to say he owns the world's leading BadassArmy about ten turns in, and he eventually gets several of these. The Imperial Army ''is'' still the best, [[spoiler: as they demonstrate repeatedly during his genocidal campaign against Islam]], but [[spoiler: the campaign against the Ottomans and Rus]] show that his subordinates have some utterly invincible troopers as well.
28	* BrokenAce: Skantarios is one of the greatest commanders in all of history, and a successful and popular ruler. Nevertheless, he is a deeply tormented man.
29	* BunnyEarsLawyer: Tiverios ek Konstaninoupoleos, the Bishop of Thessalonica, has odd habits, but he does his job very well. [[InformedAttribute The story doesn't dwell on him, though.]]
30	%%* ByronicHero: Skantarios
31	* CantStayNormal: [[spoiler:Late in the story, Skantarios tries retiring to Constantinople, only to find that he can't handle a peaceful life. [[SugarWiki/FunnyMoments He attempts to grow a vegetable garden in the royal palace, to... decidedly mixed results.]]]]
32	* CardCarryingVillain: Skantarios for the Muslims. He deliberately cultivates his reputation as the bane of Islam in order to provoke acts of blind hatred from his foes, and fear when appropriate.
33	* TheCharmer: General Vitos, who manages to seduce two foreign princesses.
34	* CheeseEatingSurrenderMonkeys: The French armies fought are less than impressive. Skantarios gives WorthyOpponent Godefroy the highest praise he can think of: "He did not fight like a Frenchman".
35	* TheComputerIsACheatingBastard: Playing on Very Hard is asking for this to happen, naturally. Entire armies repeatedly spawn from just out of sight to lay siege to Constantinople, and the Seljuk/Ottoman Turks repeatedly conjure up dozens of Jannisary companies, despite being flat broke and their cities smashed.
36	* TheConqueror: Skantarios. It becomes his title early on. Under his rule, the Roman Empire manages to stretch from [[spoiler:Italy to the Caspian Sea. He even manages to reconquer Rome.]]
37	* CoolVersusAwesome: Several ten-star generals including the best the Mongols have to offer, giants of the late medieval world themselves, crumble in the face of the even more formidable Skantarios and his generals.
38	* CombatPragmatist: Specifically targeting, ambushing, and ruthlessly executing enemy generals, isolating them from their armies and cutting them down, in order to break the enemy's morale.
39	* CurbStompBattle: Lots and lots, usually with the Romans doing the stomping. [[spoiler:The capture of Jerusalem]] is an especially strong example, since Skantarios and his troops suffer literally ''zero'' casualties.
40	* DeadpanSnarker: Some of the Romans. While Skantarios' fatalistic and grim outlook leaves little room for humor, he has his moments, as do many of his subordinates.
41	---> '''Skantarios:''' "Our scholars have received word of a peasant revolt in Germany. I cannot blame them. Were I a peasant in Germany, I'd be revolting too."
42	* DeathSeeker: Skantarios, in his later years. His [[spoiler:final]] journal entries report how envious he is that [[spoiler:Benedek]] was able to die in the field like a warrior, and ends his public report by begging God to take him, granting him the peace he's been denied his entire life.
43	* DeliberateValuesDissonance: The various prejudices of the era -- especially religious ones -- certainly aren't glossed over. Plenty of characters express sentiments that would generally be considered unbelievably hateful and bigoted today, to the point that the author ''felt the need to apologize''.
44	* {{Determinator}}: Skantarios, from the start, makes a point of emphasizing the unbalanced odds he faces. With just his immediate family and a small army raised in a hurry, he claws the Roman Empire back to its former glory from just two pathetic cities.
45	* DisneyVillainDeath: [[spoiler:Skantarios falls to his death in the Alps after being knocked off his horse by an earthquake]].
46	* DoubleInLawMarriage: Skantarios marries Maria Arpadhazi, a Hungarian princess, while his brother Vasileios marries her sister Judit Arpadhazi.
47	* TheDreaded: By the time Skantarios is in his mid-40's, the [[KarmaMeter Dread meter]] is maxed out. [[spoiler:[[AllThereInTheManual In the epilogue]], a historian notes that Skantarios' name remains feared by the Muslims for generations, and that even [[JustForFun/CandleJack speaking it aloud or writing it down might summon him.]] This reaches the point where any Muslim who states his name is lashed, and any Muslim who writes it is stoned to death.]]
48	* DuelToTheDeath: Near the end of the story, Skantarios has one of these with [[spoiler:the Pope, and shortly after with the French king]].
49	* TheEmpire: Everyone surrounding the Byzantines, especially the Turks and Fatimids. [[spoiler: By about midway through, Byzantium itself, especially given Skantarios' [[AntiHero murky]] modus operandi.]]
50	* {{Expy}}: Skantarios is essentially [[Franchise/CodeGeass Lelouch Lamperouge]] born several centuries early.
51	* FemmeFatale: Anna Laskaris, although she is far, far more patriotic than your average FemmeFatale has any right to be.
52	* AFatherToHisMen: The title character... to a point. He's fond of his troops and certainly won't throw away their lives needlessly, but he recognizes the necessity of sacrificing them at times and views getting too close to them as potentially handicapping him. Averted big time with his treatment of the various mercenaries he hires. His most common reaction to ''them'' dying is something along the lines of "the more of them that die, the fewer we have to pay."
53	* FreudianExcuse: Skantarios' hatred of Muslims is catalyzed by the murder of his father by an Egyptian assassin.
54	* FromNobodyToNightmare: Skantarios' father was originally just a cavalry soldier, whose usurped the throne of the Byzantine Empire.
55	* GameBreaker: The Siphonatores are treated as such InUniverse. Having a unit of these at the gates of a city ensures no one gets in. In meta terms, their sky-high attack stat which pierces armor and their ability to [[AntiCavalry deploy stakes at city gates]] makes defending from sieges a total joke.
56	* HaremSeeker: Vitos, who manages to attract the fancies of foreign royalty. Skantarios arranges for him to be married to his daughter before a foreign princess can lead him away from his duty to the Romans.
57	* HeirClubForMen: Skantarios is continually frustrated by his inability to produce a son.
58	* HeWhoFightsMonsters: Hundreds of thousands of dead enemies, dozens of massacres and sackings, and years and years of warfare reduce Skantarios to a man filled with nothing but hate, even for himself.
59	* HitAndRunTactics: Some time into the war, Skantarios struck a deal with Hungarian cavalry mercenaries. These mercenaries become the core of his Imperial Army, and [[ChekhovsGunman repeatedly turn the tide of battle]] for him.
60	* TheHorde: The dozens of Muslim armies rushing Constantinople give this kind of impression. Unfortunately for them, [[RedshirtArmy all they do is expand the burial pit outside the city.]]
61	* IdiotBall: A Doge of Venice strolling into the Balkans hundreds of miles from Venice with only a small bodyguard to be fought and captured may be an [[AcceptableBreaksFromReality Acceptable Break From Reality]], but his successor doing ''exactly the same stupid thing'' one year afterwards is too much.
62	* ImmigrantPatriotism: Benedek is Hungarian by birth, but is extremely devoted to Byzantium.
63	* InNameOnly: InUniverse. Skantarios' opinion is that the Golden Horde are not really Mongols, as their armies consist of poorly-to-untrained militia and mercenaries, rather than the legions of horsemen Genghis commanded.
64	* InsistentTerminology: Like in real life, the Byzantines prefer to call themselves the ''Roman'' Empire.
65	* InvincibleHero: Skantarios never loses on the battlefield, despite frequently unfriendly odds. [[spoiler:At the end of the first Jihad, Skantarios tallies up the thousands of fallen Jihad warriors in the burial pit outside the city. Recalling the Islamic tradition that every fallen Jihadi receives 72 virgins upon entering heaven, he calculates that Allah will need to find over a million virgins to satisfy that fallen warriors' needs.]]
66	* IShallTauntYou: Skantarios taunts enemy soldiers, particularly Muslims, to get them to sally out and attack. At one point he claims himself the father of the next generation of the city. When that doesn't work, he presents what he claims to be [[spoiler: the ashes of the Prophet]] to a Turkish garrison, and [[spoiler: puts them inside a pig's corpse]]. The Turks go ''berserk''.
67	* KickThemWhileTheyAreDown: Skantarios kills prisoners in sight of their comrades, in order to demoralize the remaining enemy armies.
68	* KillItWithFire: The Byzantines have GreekFire, and Skantarios uses it to devastating effect by burning entire units of enemy soldiers to a crisp with his flamethrowers and siege weaponry, and showing no remorse for it, to counterbalance his constant disadvantage in numbers.
69	* KingInTheMountain: [[spoiler:These kinds of myths are raised about Skantarios after his death in an earthquake]].
70	* TheKingslayer: Skantarios' father, Emperor Theodoros, ends up getting fatally poisoned by an Egyptian assassin named Abdul-Yaqzan al-Hanzali.
71	* LaserGuidedKarma: By mid-story, both and we and Skantarios realize that [[spoiler: Skantarios never actually got a biological son and had to adopt his lieutenant]] because of his lack of empathy and his [[WhatTheHellHero morally questionable decisions]]. In fact, Skantarios' job as [[spoiler: Emperor]] dooms his chances of a normal, happy marriage. [[spoiler: Near the end of the story, he admits to his wife Maria that his constant absence due to his military campaigns made him a terrible husband; she agrees, but recognizes that [[IDidWhatIHadToDo it was necessary]] for the survival of the Empire, even if she was upset that she could never have a son.]]
72	* LastStand: So, so subverted with multiple [[SubvertedTrope successful]] defenses of Constantinople. By the time the Jihad rolls along, the city of Constantinople has survived so many along those lines that it is rather expected.
73	** This eventually reaches the point where it is [[LampshadeHanging mentioned in the text]]:
74	--->'''Skantarios:''' I ask my interpreter with some curiosity if this is how you write "Constantinople" in Arabic. He looks at the sign for some time and shakes his head.\
75	'''Skantarios:''' He says, "No... The rough translation is: 'The land where Muslims go to die.'"\
76	'''Skantarios:''' I think that is as fitting an epitaph for the Jihad as any I could write.\
77	- page 8: "Picking up the Pieces and the End of the Jihad" - February, 1492 AD
78	** Unsurprising, considering that the fact that Constantinople had never fallen to enemy arms was used to justify its status as a HolyCity, moreso than Jerusalem.
79	* LeaningOnTheFourthWall: Genessios at the end indicates that he's ordered the publication of Skantarios' journal and battle reports. He notes with some irony that the scribe hired for the task was also named Skantarios, giving the author a place in the emperor's story.
80	* LeaveNoSurvivors: Skantarios wins his battles by doing this. All the time.
81	* LeeroyJenkins: Many battles are won because of the enemy general charging headlong without waiting for the rest of his troops. Many other units are eliminated piecemeal in this fashion.
82	* ModestRoyalty: Deconstructed. Due to spending most of his life on campaign, Skantarios feels more at home in Spartan surroundings, even preferring a rough cot to a comfortable bed. Unfortunately, this makes it very difficult for him to transition to being a "stay at home" emperor.
83	* NecessarilyEvil: It's a cruel world, Skantarios knows this, [[CurbStompBattle and he is not afraid to do grievous bodily harm to those in his way ''repeatedly'' to make his point]].
84	* NeverFoundTheBody: The only evidence found of [[spoiler:Skantarios's fall]] is his horse and [[spoiler:the Sword of Constantine.]]
85	* NotMeThisTime: Skantarios first suspects the Byzantine nobility in his father's assassination (which makes sense, considering they'd been involved in many intrigues throughout Byzantine history), but he realizes they're blameless when the Egyptians start celebrating their assassin's success.
86	* OldSoldier: Skantarios himself becomes this over time as more and more of his contemporaries start dying around him.
87	* PhraseCatcher: No less than three characters describe the mercenary Monster Bombard as "the largest cannon I have ever seen (or heard about)."
88	* RapePillageAndBurn: Skantarios often sacks captured cities and looting everything of value within to fund his war machine. He ''does'', however, spare a few towns [[PragmaticVillainy that he needs for future campaigns]].
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90	* RedOniBlueOni: Skantarios and Vasileios, respectively.
91	* RousingSpeech: Skantarios and his family are the [[GratuitousForeignLanguage Basileioi]] of this trope.
92	** Theodoros matches his son in the field of oratory, as he demonstrates in this speech just before the first of many sieges of Constantinople:
93	--->The emperor strode out before them and spoke in a clear, calm voice:\
94	"You have all been judged and sentenced to death."\
95	A murmur of incredulity rose up from the ranks. Numerous whispers could be heard from the ranks: "Why?!?" "For what?" Was it a joke? Had they not heard him correctly?\
96	Theodoros continued, thundering now above the murmurs: "You may be asking yourself for what crime you are accused and then sentenced. Your 'crime' is being born a man and being conscripted into this army. Your crime is that you belong to a nation at war. There is no judge, procedure, or appeal to this sentence. This sentence is final."\
97	"There is hope, however. You can gain clemency by defeating your foe. Pass your sentence onto the enemy. Buy your life by taking his…for yours is already forfeit. By crushing him and driving him back to the steppes that spawned him. For, if you fail, you are dead. If my own men don't kill you, the enemy surely will. If you fail, you not only condemn yourself to death, but your wives, your children, and all that you hold dear. Death, enslavement, and ruin are all that await you should you falter or fail today. The enemy will have no mercy and neither will we. Better to die here than to run."\
98	"Make no mistake, there are no other alternatives. Win today, or die today. It's an easy choice. You are already dead. Today, tomorrow, ten years from now; we all wind up in the same place. Buy your life today and that of your family."\
99	"Win."\
100	- page 1: "War with the Turks Begins" - June, 1455 AD
101	** Parodied in the Third Battle of Ankara. By this point, we're accustomed to Skantarios' eloquent speeches. He goes to the men to deliver a speech to get them in the right frame of mind. [[spoiler: It consists solely of "Kill them all!"]]
102	* RunningGag: In his first encounter with a Persian army containing elephants, the Roman general makes a comment afterward that elephant meat is pretty tasty. Every subsequent encounter with hostile elephants inevitably has the commander conclude their report by agreeing that elephants are, in fact, delicious.
103	* ShootTheDog: Exterminating every Muslim who crosses his path, [[spoiler:tearing down the Dome of the Rock, torching the Kaa'ba (and the faithful Muslims still inside with it), and burying the caves where Muhammad received his revelations,]] in order to make sure that Islam never threatens the [[strike:Byzantine]] Restored Roman Empire again.
104	* SpareAMessenger: A tactic used by the Byzantines: they let the shattered remnants of an army regroup and run away, following them until they reach a city. Usually the city refuses to open its gates to let the survivors in, leaving them to be slaughtered by the Byzantines until they are conquered as well (helped by the severe morale drop caused by the survivors' deaths).
105	* TheStrategist: Skantarios. His first chapter of the story outlines his plan to break out of the extremely limited starting position of his empire. After establishing a foothold, he convenes a meeting of his generals to lay out a four-pronged assault on the Turks and Egyptians, tearing out the economic centers of both simultaneously.
106	* SuicideByCop: Al-Khawalanis demise is like this, the man being a 70 year old general who marches out of cover into a Byzantine arrowstorm after seeing his entire bodyguard shot to pieces.
107	* TooDumbToLive: Several enemy commanders make ''incredibly'' stupid mistakes.
108	* TookALevelInBadass: Some of the generals and Skantarios' sons prove themselves to be ''very'' competent figures over the course of the story. Vitos in particular goes from simply being a casanova to becoming one of the Empire's best commanders.
109	* UnfortunateNames: Skantarios says that "ibn Mahbub" (the name of a Moorish general) is "more of a joke than a name."
110	* TheUsurper: Theodoros overthrew the previous emperor and founded his own dynasty.
111	* VestigialEmpire: Best sums up the state of the Byzantine Empire at the beginning. [[SubvertedTrope Of course,]] [[{{Determinator}} a certain protagonist named Skantarios Laskaris]] [[DefiedTrope decides that he'd rather not watch Byzantium fall the way Rome did]], and it ''shows''.
112	** To show just how well Skantarios [[DefiedTrope reverses this]], [[http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=320711&page=35 look at]] the two maps of the Restored Roman Empire in the section titled [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin "The End"]]. For comparison, the last remnants of the Byzantine Empire fell in 1461. [[spoiler: [[AllThereInTheManual According to the epilogue]], the Restored Roman Empire survives for several more centuries, and only falls when civil war divides it into multiple successor states in the late 1800s.]]
113	* WarElephants: Byzantium fights some of these, and eventually gets a herd of their own.
114	* WarIsHell: There is much description about the ongoing war and its impact on Constantinople and its enemies. It's not a pretty sight to behold. [[KillItWithFire Oh, and there is Greek Fire somewhere in the middle too]]. Do the math.
115	* WarriorPrince: Skantarios. His father is Basileus, and he leads his armies from the front.
116	* WeHaveReserves: Mercenary units are deliberately used to draw out enemy soldiers, take hits from enemy arrows, block cavalry charges, and to wear down enemy numbers prior to elephant assaults. Skantarios even worries about this somewhat, as overreliance on mercenaries is one of the reasons that the original roman Empire failed in the first place.
117	* WhatASenselessWasteOfHumanLife: Skantarios remarks often at the waste of so many good men in the Egyptian generals ranks, but a particularly [[TearJerker heart-wrenching]] one is [[spoiler: the pointless death of seventy year old al-Khawalani, who charges out in the face of withering arrow fire and actually makes it to the safety of the gatehouse... only to turn around and see his entire bodyguard lying dead. With nowhere to run, he simply [[SuicideByCop marches out into the Byzantine arrowstorm...]] The general remarks at the unworthy death of this old man.]]
118	* WhamLine:
119	** [[spoiler:My... father... is... dead]].
120	** And much, much later: [[spoiler:The Army of the West has been destroyed.]]
121	* WorthyOpponent: Skantarios's opinion of the French King Godefroy. Also of Yahya, an old general defending a city with only his bodyguard. The man kills no less than ''four'' of Skantarios' own bodyguards, who later reflects that the Sultan did not deserve such a man fighting for him.
122	* YourMom: Early on, Skantarios provokes a teenage Venetian noble he's besieging into sallying out by, among other things, saying his mother was a whore.
123	* ZergRush: Attempted once by a Mongol Jihad corps comprised of ragtag soldiers. [[CurbStompBattle Skantarios isn't amused]]. In fact, the entire Jihad is built around this strategy... [[RedshirtArmy with predictable results for the armies of the Prophet.]]
124
125	!! Tropes for ''Legacy Of Skantarios''
126
127	* AllohistoricalAllusion: The Roman empire is finally ended in the 19th century by a Roman general by the name of UsefulNotes/NapoleonBonaparte, who took it over and was killed shortly after.
128	* ArrogantKungFuGuy: Ioannis. While his talent is recognized by his peers, he's still not as good as Genessios or Vitos. He begins signing his reports as "Ioannis the Conqueror," then "Ioannis the Invincible."
129	* BittersweetEnding: On the one hand, a bloody civil war has cost the empire [[spoiler:Genessios, Vitos and Ioannis]]. On the other hand, having a young Emperor at the head of the vast Empire allowed nearly-worldwide peace for far longer than Skantarios ever did.
130	* CheeseEatingSurrenderMonkeys: Exaggerated compared to the previous AAR, not one battle against the French goes by without going on about their cowardice.
131	* {{Egopolis}}: Several conquered cities are named after Skantarios.
132	* EvilUncle: Vasileos to Skantarios' adopted sons. Everyone knows he's behind [[spoiler:Genessios]] dying of "natural causes."
133	* {{Foreshadowing}}: On meeting the new Hungarian king, Vitos remarks that he's cunning and opportunistic, and bears watching closely. [[spoiler:The Hungarians turn on the rebels in the final battle.]]
134	* FrenchJerk: ''Evrart''. [[spoiler:He has his wife -- a Roman princess -- hanged from a rope made of her own hair, for no reason other than to spite her family.]]
135	* LaResistance: [[spoiler:At the end of the story, official state position is that Vitos and Likenia are dead, and that reports that a rebel Roman state in the far north are obviously false and impossible. TheStinger at the end of the posts shows an unknown settlement far beyond the northern borders in Finland, claimed by the Romans, which was never visited during the story.]]
136	* ManlyTears: Shed in the aftermath of particularly wasteful battles.
137	-->'''Efthymios:''' I cried many tears that day. Tears for my brother, for father, and for the thousands of valiant soldiers led astray to their deaths. Mostly, I cried for our great failure to live up to Skantarios’ dream. If Skantarios had been here, I know he would have wept with me.
138	* OrphanedEtymology: Roman generals occasionally describe battles in terms native to the New World, which had not been discovered yet in-universe. Isidoros once describes the hunting down of fleeing Spaniards as "a turkey shoot," and Likenia refers to the use of Greek fire as "barbequing the French."
139	* UnwantedAssistance: Genessios and Vitos do ''not'' appreciate Vasileos getting the Pope to order a Crusade against the Mongols when they'd done most of the work already, and finish off their empire before they arrive to prove their point. The Hungarian king, aware of the dissension between the two, tells Genessios that as an ally of the Romans, he will not stand in his way if he makes a bid for the throne.
140	* WhatASenselessWasteOfHumanLife: Efthymios gets hit with this hard in the aftermath of the final battle against [[spoiler:the rebels.]]
141	* WellDoneSonGuy: Markianos the Bastard.
142	* WhamLine: The death of [[spoiler:Genessios.]]
143	----
144	->''From the Report of Troper, 2010 AD...''

Context Fanfic / IAmSkantarios