Characters / Fire Emblem: Three Houses – The Flame Emperor Army

Fire Emblem: Three Houses characters index
Main Characters: Byleth | Edelgard | Dimitri | Claude | Rhea | Other Main Characters
Houses: The Black Eagles (Part One, Part Two) | The Blue Lions (Part One, Part Two) | The Golden Deer (Part One, Part Two)
Garreg Mach Factions: The Ashen Wolves | The Church of Seiros | Officers Academy Instructors and Staff
The Three Nations of Fódlan: The Adrestian Empire | The Holy Kingdom of Faerghus | The Leicester Alliance
Other: Historical Figures | The Flame Emperor Army | Those who slither in the dark | Other Characters

The Flame Emperor Army

A mysterious group of warriors working under the Flame Emperor, inciting violence across Fódlan. They seek to tear down society to build a fairer world. Though they share an alliance with those who slither in the dark and a mutual enemy in Rhea, their alliance is not entirely easy.

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Flame Emperor

Flame Emperor

Class: Flame Emperor

Crest: Goddess/Flames (Major)

^{Click here to see the Flame Emperor in Fire Emblem Heroes}

Bringer of War

"We will cross paths again. I am the Flame Emperor... It is I who will reforge the world."

A mysterious masked figure of unknown identity who appears only in Three Houses. The Flame Emperor works in the shadows with an ill will towards the Church of Seiros, and was in fact behind the brigand attack on the Officers Academy students at the game's beginning.

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• Adapted Out: Justified in Three Hopes, as Shez's impact in the timeline makes the presence of the Flame Emperor persona unnecessary given Thales' ousting from the Empire and Garreg Mach's closure means none of the academy phase events happen the same way.
• Big Bad Duumvirate: Serves this role along with Thales during Part I and II of Verdant Wind and Silver Snow. On the Crimson Flower route, it's eventually subverted due to Byleth switching to her side, while in Azure Moon, she's unquestionably the main antagonist after her forces take the center stage and ends up outliving Thales himself.
• Climax Boss: The boss battle with the Flame Emperor serves as the climax of Part One in all routes. The reveal of who is behind the mask and the subsequent fallout sparks the Wham Episode and represents the point after which the routes all greatly diverge.
• Combat Stilettos: Closer inspection of the concept art reveals the Flame Emperor wears steel high-heeled boots. Given who is wearing the mask, it's likely they're meant to increase and disguise the Flame Emperor's real height.
• Compressed Hair: After the reveal, you have to wonder how all that hair could fit under that helmet.
• Contractual Boss Immunity: Has the Commander skill, granting immunity to Lethality and status effects.
• Cool Mask: Wears a white and red mask and a helmet to maintain a secret identity and a distorted voice.
• Disc-One Final Boss: The main antagonist for the first half of the game; if you jump through the right hoops, it's possible for the two of you to ally against the Church.
• Dramatic Unmask: If you're a Blue Lion or Golden Deer, which reveals the Flame Emperor is Edelgard. Averted if you're a Black Eagle, where Edelgard reveals from the start of the climactic battle that she is the Flame Emperor and forgoes the helmet completely in the resulting fight.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Despite opposing the church, the Flame Emperor does not approve of what those who slither in the dark do to achieve their goals. Seeing what goes down in Remire Village elicits disgust and an offer of alliance, though this does little to dissuade a furious Jeralt and Byleth.
• Foreshadowing: The Flame Emperor's true identity is hinted at in several ways:
  • The Flame Emperor's color scheme is primarily black and red, similar to Edelgard's.
  • You can see the Flame Emperor holding an axe at the end of chapter 6, which is Edelgard's strongest weapon proficiency.
  • The second word in the title is Emperor, the selfsame title Edelgard is supposed to inherit. Edelgard's C+ support also reveals she has the Crest of Flames.
  • Should Edelgard confront the Death Knight in Chapter 8 or Kronya and/or Solon in Chapter 10, they express surprise, like this wasn't at all a part of some plan. Similarly, the Death Knight is particularly bemused if Edelgard is made to fight him in Chapter 4.
  • If you're a Black Eagle, after the Chapter 8 battle, Edelgard has a very suspicious conversation with you where she not-so-subtly hints that one day you might figure out the Flame Emperor's objectives and be able to look him in his unmasked face to decide whether or not you'll follow him. She doesn't even react negatively if you suggest that you might be interested in teaming up with the Flame Emperor (though she does note that it would be smart not to trust someone whose face you don't even know).
  • If you're a Blue Lion, the Flame Emperor leaves a dagger behind after "he" is caught talking with Kronya and Thales, right after Dimitri tells Byleth that he gave Edelgard a gift of a dagger when they were children. Dimitri visibly panics at the sight of this dagger, damning her further. As a final nail in the coffin, eagle-eyed players will notice that this dagger is the same one Edelgard used in the prologue to defend herself from Kostas.
  • In Chapter 11, the Flame Emperor shows up commanding Adrestian soldiers. (This is Five-Second Foreshadowing on the Black Eagles route, since Edelgard admits her identity immediately after this is established.) In addition, she has Charm (typically associated with the Lord class, which only the house leaders can access) and Seal Strength and Seal Magic (which Edelgard always packs for the Battle of the Eagle and Lion in the Golden Deer route) in her skill pool.
  • During the battle for Remire Village, if you fail to save the villagers in time, they will all succumb to Solon's experimentation and perish. Afterwards, each of the three Lords will be furious towards Solon. This is right after The Reveal of Solon's identity, and while Dimitri and Claude are still in disbelief, still thinking Solon to be Tomas, Edelgard immediately refers to him as Solon without question.
  • After the battle at Remire, when Byleth refuses to join the Flame Emperor, she remarks, "Pity." Edelgard used the exact same turn of phrase in Chapter 1 when Byleth got a job at the Officer's Academy instead of joining the Empire.
• Gender-Concealing Writing: The Flame Emperor is referred to using "they" in Heroes and on Sharena's "Meet the Heroes" profile. This is despite the fact that the character is exclusively referred to as male in Three Houses itself.
• The Heavy: In some way or another, the Flame Emperor is connected to most of the skirmishes that Byleth faces during Part I.
• Hidden Agenda Villain: For most of Part I and up until the Wham Episode, it's never made clear what exactly the Flame Emperor seeks to accomplish by attacking the Church or allying with those who slither in the dark.
• Identity Concealment Disposal: After the Flame Emperor's true identity is revealed, the helmet and mask are dumped for the rest of the game, and physically destroyed on Azure Moon.
• Implied Death Threat: When told by Thales that the Flame Emperor was created to bring "our salvation", the Flame Emperor responds with, "There will be no salvation for you and your kind." Considering the fact that the Flame Emperor is Edelgard, and she hates working with him, on the Crimson Flower route, she carries out that threat by having Hubert, Jeritza, Byleth, and the rest of the Black Eagle Strike Force wipe them out after they’ve conquered Fódlan.
• Inevitable Mutual Betrayal: The Flame Emperor's relationship with those who slither in the dark. Edelgard hates the Agarthans' guts for the horrible experiments they put her through while the Agarthans only see her as a tool to be used to destroy humanity, but they have to work together to defeat the Church of Seiros. Afterwards, they fully intend to kill each other, and Edelgard makes good on it personally in Crimson Flower, and posthumously in Silver Snow and Verdant Wind.
• It Seemed Trivial: Gives this excuse to Kostas after he accuses the Flame Emperor of not telling him ahead of time that the Church of Seiros would get involved in his attack against the house leaders in the prologue.
• Karma Houdini: If you go down the Crimson Flower route, the Flame Emperor gets off with only one quick beatdown for what went down in the first half of the game.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler: In Heroes, while the Flame Emperor Grand Hero unit tries to conceal spoilers, Legendary Edelgard has the epithet "Flame Emperor", which is a dead giveaway. The "Shattered Unity" Lost Lore event also unambiguously states the Flame Emperor's true identity as part of its recap of Part I of Three Houses.
• The Leader: Commands the Flame Emperor Army, and is the boss of the Death Knight, Kostas and Metodey.
• Leitmotif: "Mask of Fire".
• Life Drain: Due to the Crest of Flames, the Flame Emperor's attacks have a chance of recovering health for a portion of the damage dealt.
• Malevolent Masked Men: Terrorist operations against the Church of Seiros? Check. Face and identity hidden by a mask? Check.
• Mighty Glacier: Boasts high HP, attack and defense, at the expense of subpar speed and resistance.
• Moveset Clone: In Heroes, to Halloween Dorcas prior to their refine. They are both free armored axe units, they have nearly identical statlines (identical Spd and Def, and while Dorcas has 1 more Atk, the Flame Emperor has 1 more HP and 5 more Res), they both have Wary Fighter at 5* as their B skill and a two-stat Stance skill at 4* as their A skill (Sturdy Stance for Dorcas, Bracing Stance for the Flame Emperor). Their weapons, the Guard Axe+ for the Flame Emperor, and the Hack-o-Lantern+ for Dorcas, are identical in function: they both deter the foe from Special charges during combat, so the two axes are mechanically Palette Swaps of each other.
• My Name Is ???: The Flame Emperor's name is displayed as "???" before meeting the heroes.
• Noble Demon: The Flame Emperor is a major antagonist in Three Houses, but does not relish any villainous action or desire to commit unnecessary bloodshed, even expressing disdain towards those who slither in the dark despite having teamed up with them. In Heroes, they are perfectly polite and sympathetic to your cause despite having plans to violently upend the social order in Fódlan. In addition, Sharena notes in her "Meet the Heroes" profile that she doesn't believe the Flame Emperor is truly a bad person, just someone with a dream dear to their heart.
• Non-Indicative Name: Played with. Despite not having access to fire magic nor fire-themed weapons (at least as an enemy - she does learn Fire and Bolganone as Edelgard), the Flame Emperor's moniker likely comes from bearing the Crest of Flames.
• Not Me This Time:
  • After the Remire calamity, the Flame Emperor disavows any responsibility for the massacre, placing the blame squarely on Solon's shoulders. Jeralt does not believe this.
  • Right before the big showdown if you're a Blue Lion, the Flame Emperor denies being involved in the Tragedy of Duscur. Dimitri does not believe this, even when the mask comes off and it's revealed she would have been an early teenager at the time, and likely locked down in a dungeon and undergoing experiments on top of that.
• Painful Persona: It's implied that the individual wearing the Flame Emperor mask would much rather live a peaceful life as an ordinary person, but feels there's no other option for a brighter world.
• Palette Swap: Datamining the game reveals that the Flame Emperor class has identical stats to Edelgard's Armored Lord class.
• Pre-Mortem One-Liner:
  "Perish!" (Heroes and Three Houses)
  "Ready yourself!" (Heroes and Three Houses)
  "Disgusting!" (Three Houses)
  "The end comes!" (Heroes and Three Houses)
  "Feed them to the maggots." (Heroes)
• Promoted to Playable: The Flame Emperor became playable in Fire Emblem Heroes as a Grand Hero Battle unit. Though technically, the Flame Emperor has been a playable character in both Heroes and Three Houses under their true identity, just unable to make use of the actual Flame Emperor class in the latter case.
• Red and Black and Evil All Over: With the exception of the mask which is partially white, the Flame Emperor's attire is black and red, fitting for one of the game's main antagonists.
• Red Herring: Regardless of which house you choose to lead, the game leads you to believe that your chosen lord is the Flame Emperor. None of your lords are present whenever the Flame Emperor appears, such as in Chapter 6 and Chapter 8, the former more so due to the house leader being listed as unavailable for that battle. In Chapter 8, when the Flame Emperor talks with Byleth and Jeralt, Hubert, Dedue, or Hilda conveniently appears, allowing the Flame Emperor to vanish when Byleth and Jeralt's attention is drawn away. In addition, Edelgard hints that she knows more than is strictly sensible about the Flame Emperor's motivations, Dimitri makes it quite clear that he’s out for revenge against certain people who may be affiliated with the Church, and Claude is openly critical of the Church and shows a fixation on Byleth and the Sword of the Creator after the Flame Emperor states a need for more information about both. In addition, each of your lords is friendly with, and spends a lot of time with, someone who turns out to be evil and working with the Flame Emperor: namely, Edelgard and Monica, Dimitri and Arundel, and Claude and Tomas. Towards the end of Part One, each of the Lords have a moment that settles their innocence. For Dimitri, he eavesdrops on a conversation with the Flame Emperor and those who slither in the dark in Chapter 10. For Claude, he is present when the Flame Emperor attacks the Holy Tomb in Chapter 11. For Edelgard, it's subverted: she flat-out admits that it was her in Chapter 11 and spends the rest of the fight unmasked.
• Revealing Cover-Up: A meta version occurs in Heroes. To avoid spoiling the fact that the Flame Emperor is actually a woman, she is referred to with gender-neutral pronouns... but since she is consistently referred to as male in Three Houses, this makes it obvious that her true gender is a plot twist, which means "he" must actually be a woman.
• Samus Is a Girl: Presumed to be male throughout Part I, but is ultimately revealed to be Edelgard in disguise.
• Secret Identity: When not conspiring against the Church of Seiros, the Flame Emperor secretly lives a double life as Edelgard von Hresvelg, princess of Adrestia.
• Secret Identity Vocal Shift: The mask has a built-in voice modulator to maintain anonymity.
• Shaped Like Itself: The Flame Emperor's unique class is called Flame Emperor.
• The Starscream: Works with those who slither in the dark to accomplish their mutual objectives, but plainly intends to betray them once they outlive their usefulness. On the Crimson Flower route, with Byleth's help, she succeeds.
• Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Despite being allied with those who slither with the dark due to sharing a common enemy, it becomes fairly obvious as the story progresses the Flame Emperor is less than thrilled about this situation.
• This Is Gonna Suck: What the Flame Emperor's battle conversation with Byleth basically amounts to in some routes:
  You are the one person I did not wish to make an enemy of...
• Tin Tyrant: An enigmatic masked figure always seen wearing a full suit of armor.
• Tranquil Fury: After Monica/Kronya kills Jeralt, the Flame Emperor tells Thales that, in no uncertain terms, there will be no salvation for him or his kind. Depending on the route, she can make good on her promise as soon as the next chapter.
• The Unfettered: Willing to go to any lengths to change the world, including working with an evil cult with absolutely no moral restraints, who were responsible for pretty much every horrible thing that happened in her backstory. The Flame Emperor sums it up best in Heroes:
  Terrible power has its uses... and use it I will.
• Villain Teleportation: Makes use of this to escape after confronting Byleth, and also makes an entrance in Chapter 6 this way. If you're leading the Black Eagles and choose to side with the Empire, the Flame Emperor stops doing this and escapes normally when Rhea transforms into the Immaculate One and threatens to kill the party herself.
• Walking Spoiler: In Three Houses, the reveal of the identity of the Flame Emperor has major ramifications on the game's story and sets the stage for the majority of the rest of the game.
• We Can Rule Together: Tries to convince Byleth to join forces a couple of times, though by the battle in the Holy Tomb, the chances of Byleth actually turning coat are slim to none. On the Crimson Flower route, you take her up on her offer, to her surprise and gratefulness.

Death Knight

Death Knight

Class: Death Knight

^{Click here to see the Death Knight in Fire Emblem Heroes}

The Reaper

"One of us will die, the other will live. I will enjoy this dance of damnation."

A mysterious knight in dark Grim Reaper-inspired armour. Rumored to prowl the streets of Garreg Mach at night, attacking people and abducting them, he is revealed to be serving under the Flame Emperor and is a central fixture of their armies. Despite this, he acts of his own volition and seeks out those he deems worthy of fighting and killing even against the Flame Emperor's orders.

The Death Knight is a Recurring Boss the player will fight frequently regardless of which route they take. He is notable for his signature weapon, the Scythe of Sariel, which he brings with him wherever he goes, and always carrying a Dark Seal, a special Certification Exam seal that can't be found elsewhere, which can be stolen from or dropped by him upon defeat; it allows male units to unlock the secret Dark Mage and/or Dark Bishop classes. His personal ability, Murderous Intent, increases his Hit when initiating combat.

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• Above Good and Evil: He doesn't really care about the cause he's attached to or any of the people he works with or against, or the why of any of it; he just wants to fight and kill, and in the case of Byleth, potentially die at their hands.
• Achilles' Heel: His high stats and access to the Commander and Counterattack skills mean that almost anything that engages him in battle will lose, but he does have two small but notable weaknesses the player can take advantage of even during earlier encounters. The first is that he is a mounted unit that never loses his weakness to Anti-Cavalry attacks, making him vulnerable to the likes of Horseslayer, Knightkneeler (which any Lance user can learn at Rank C), and especially Dark Spikes T (which Hubert and Lysithea can learn). The second is that he has a relatively low Charm stat for boss standards, meaning that even though he takes reduced damage from Gambits they are a relatively safe option to whittle him down without fear of a counterattack.
• Adaptational Heroism: In Warriors: Three Hopes, due to the Flame Emperor being Adapted Out, he does not take part in a terrorist campaign against the Church and is simply presented as a particularly creepy and off-kilter Imperial general. He can also be talked into a Heel–Face Turn by his sister on Azure Gleam, something that was impossible in Three Houses.
• Alas, Poor Villain: On the Azure Moon route, if Mercedes and Casper's paralogue was completed before the final battle against him, when he dies, Mercedes cradles him, tearfully apologizing for being a lousy older sister.
• The Artifact: When you fight him in Cindered Shadows, he has his usual Dark Seal in his inventory. However, it's completely useless since you can't take exams. Instead, he drops a Crescent Sickle.
• Bloodbath Villain Origin: It's heavily implied the Death Knight was created after Jeritza snapped and murdered not just his father but all of House Bartels. He doesn't even remember doing anything, just blacking out and waking up at the scene of the massacre.
• Blood Knight: He sees the conflict with the heroes as a game, and the Flame Emperor in Three Houses tells him that he'll have "more opportunities to play soon". He is also obsessed with testing his might against Byleth's, and wholly welcomes death if it means it comes at the hand of a worthy opponent. His thirst for battle against Byleth is so strong in Verdant Wind he willingly lets Claude's deception plan succeed despite being aware of the ploy, just because it means he can fight the professor again.
• But for Me, It Was Tuesday: His unique battle dialogue with Balthus in Cindered Shadows has the Ashen Wolf asking how many people he's slaughtered, to which the Death Knight simply replies "Countless."
• Cain and Abel: Acts as the Cain to his half-sister Mercedes's Abel. ...Unless you poach Mercedes to the Black Eagles and stick with the Adrestians in Three Houses and Three Hopes' Scarlet Blaze, or recruit him with Mercedes' help in Azure Gleam. It's also subverted in Golden Wildfire, where he appears as an NPC ally and successfully talks her into a Heel–Face Turn.
• Card-Carrying Villain: In his summoning quote in Heroes, he calls his own deeds "ghastly".
• Climax Boss: On the Azure Moon route, he's fought right before the Kingdom forces can invade Enbarr and enter the Point of No Return.
• Combat Sadomasochist: Some of the Death Knight's lines makes it apparent that he wants to be at death's door while in battle so that he can experience some joy with his bloodshed.
  Death Knight: Good... Good! Let me taste the kiss of death!
• Dark Is Evil: His appearance incorporates this heavily, his armour including a Skull-helm with Red Eyes, Take Warning, Horns of Villainy and Spikes of Villainy. His horse is draped out in similarly intimidating regalia. And then there's the fact he always carries a Dark Seal, which can be used by male units to learn the secrets of dark Black Magic.
• Despair Event Horizon: Surprisingly, it's implied he goes through this in Three Hopes' Azure Gleam route after the Empire is taken over by Thales. Once the Death Knight is confronted by Part II in Ailell, most of his monstrous lust for bloodshed and willingness to die by the sword has been replaced by a desperate desire to be killed in battle — in a blaze of glory, naturally — and unlike in Three Houses' timeline, this makes it possible for Mercedes to convince him to switch sides upon being defeated.
• Died in Your Arms Tonight: On the Azure Moon route, provided you completed Mercedes' paralogue with Caspar, she will call the Death Knight by Emile and cradle him as he dies.
• The Dragon:
  • In Three Houses, he serves this role for the Flame Emperor in Part I, being their most powerful servant. However, by the time Part II rolls around, he's settled into the role of The Brute and either Hubert or Byleth becomes their unquestioned second-in-command (assuming the first one didn't outrank him to begin with and the second one defects to their side).
  • Averted in Three Hopes, as he firmly settles into being The Brute for his boss.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Despite being a brutal villain, he still cares for his elder half-sister Mercedes, and tries to convince her to go somewhere safe in her Paralogue in Three Houses so he doesn't have to kill her, but instead has to settle for giving her the Relic.
• Foe Romance Subtext: As Jeritza's supports reveal, the Death Knight's obsession with fighting Byleth to the death feels like something akin to a romantic attraction for him. Get Jeritza's S Support, and the "subtext" part goes out the window.
• Giant Space Flea from Nowhere: In Three Houses, he randomly shows up during the second chapter of the Cindered Shadows DLC, having been drawn by the battle going on in Abyss. Tellingly, the game changes its objective to "Defeat all enemies, except the Death Knight".
• The Grim Reaper: Part of their motif. Their Japanese name is quite literally the Grim Reaper Knight.
• Guest-Star Party Member: Due to Edelgard being the Flame Emperor, he becomes an ally unit in Chapter 12 of the Crimson Flower route.
• Heel–Face Turn: In the Azure Gleam route, he can defect to the Kingdom if Mercedes recruits him.
• Helmets Are Hardly Heroic: Or as heroic as the Death Knight can be, anyway. As an enemy unit both before and after the timeskip, the Death Knight wears an intimidating, face-concealing skull helmet with sizable fangs, a prominent set of horns and even glowing red eyes; the helmet deepens and distorts his voice. However, once he becomes a playable unit on Crimson Flower post-Time Skip, he sheds the helmet completely, as well as the white mask he wore around the monastery as Jeritza.
• Hero of Another Story: For a very, very strained definition of the word "hero". Before version 1.1.0 on the Crimson Flower route, he is mentioned to be off fighting on another front while Byleth accompanies Edelgard throughout the game.
• Hidden Depths: The description of the Reaper Infantry and Reaper Knights' battalions reveals they were personally trained by the Death Knight himself.
• Hypercompetent Sidekick: At least on the battlefield. He's an obscenely powerful Lightning Bruiser who is generally far stronger than your party can reasonably expect to defeat until the very end of the game; his boss the Flame Emperor is fairly slow and gets ripped up by most mages and Anti-Armor weaponry, and The Reveal of their true identity indicates that they start off as a level 1 Noble that the Death Knight could brush off his shoulder like dust.
• Identity Concealment Disposal: On the Crimson Flower route, once he joins your party as Jeritza, he starts fighting without his helmet. Averted on the other routes, where he keeps the helmet even after everyone realises that he's Jeritza.
• Informed Attribute:
  • Downplayed in the case of his magic prowess. Despite the Death Knight class description stating it can use magic, in practice he only ever uses it to teleport from battle after being defeated. Averted once he becomes a playable unit, as Jeritza comes by default with the spell Thunder and can learn Thoron and Death Γ later on.
  • Zigzagged example regarding his Minor Crest of Lamine. On one hand, it's revealed in The Face Beneath that he bears this Crest, yet the Death Knight never displays nor appears to have it in any of his encounters against Byleth prior and after this paralogue. On the other, Jeritza's Crest is fully visible in his status screen and can be of use as a playable ally in Crimson Flower, suggesting he deliberately hides it when he's in full costume, similar to how the Flame Emperor hides their second crest in Blue Lions/Golden Deer. Granted, it's not like the Crest would do him any good, given its effects are at odds with his abilities.
• Jack of All Trades: While he primarily specializes in lances and riding, with the exception of faith magic he's got a little experience with everything.
• Jekyll & Hyde: The Hyde to Jeritza's Jekyll.
• Karma Houdini: On the Crimson Flower route, he completely evades punishment for aiding and abetting Flayn's kidnapping and the Remire massacre due to becoming Byleth's ally after their Hazy-Feel Turn. He also downplays this in regards to shanking Manuela; she mentions he sincerely apologized offscreen, and her comments indicate that the matter is pretty much settled. Granted, with the revelation that the Death Knight is a split personality from Jeritza that he visibly struggles to control, it's hard to figure out how mentally competent he was during these moments. This is averted in Mercedes and Jeritza's paired ending, where the latter willingly turns himself over to a prison in Enbarr to atone for the crimes committed by the Death Knight, and his time in prison seems to have rehabilitated him by the time he's let out.
• Kick the Dog: In his combat dialogue with Flayn, he mocks her for having been kidnapped and having her blood stolen in Chapter 6, which is something Flayn admits she has trauma over years after the fact.
• Knight Templar Big Brother: The Death Knight was "born" when Emile's father decided to marry his own stepdaughter Mercedes to make more children with the Crest of Lamine. Emile flipped out and slaughtered all of House Bartels. Though in this case, the Knight Templar is actually the younger brother.
• Large Ham: Unbelievably so, which is enhanced even further thanks to his voice filter.
• Lone Wolf Boss: In the "Cindered Shadows" DLC, he has nothing to do with the overarching plot. He just shows up to pick a fight with you.
• Love Redeems: On the Azure Gleam route, his beloved sister Mercedes can talk him into a Heel–Face Turn.
• Malevolent Masked Men: He's a horrifying villain who helps villainous schemes and enjoys nothing more than combat, and he hides his face behind a mask and helmet shaped like a skull. Jeritza admits in his Support conversation with Bernadetta that he designed the Death Knight's armor and mask specifically to invoke such horrifying and fearsome images of death.
• The Millstone: His desire for a fight with Byleth actively harms the Flame Emperor's goals on two occasions.
  • His military assistance of those who slither in the dark during the Remire massacre ties the Flame Emperor to a war crime that they had no part in and would have stopped if they knew of it, contributes to Dimitri's growing personal grudge against the Flame Emperor, and makes Byleth far less likely to join forces with the Flame Emperor.
  • On the Silver Snow and Verdant Wind routes, he warns the Resistance/Alliance forces about the "javelins of light", directly preventing them all from getting blown up. This allows them to invade Enbarr and kill him, Hubert, and Edelgard.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Whether "Grim Reaper Knight" in Japanese or "Death Knight" in English, their name isn't exactly comforting. This even applies to his weapon, as Sariel is one of the archangels of death.
• The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: In Three Houses, his attitude towards Byleth is arguably the closest he has to a personal goal in general. His singular desire, stated several times in support conversations, is to either kill or be killed by Byleth.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business:
  • When interacting with most characters, the Death Knight is either raring for battle, amused, or uninterested, depending on the character. Interactions with Mercedes are the exception, as early as the first encounter with him, where if Mercedes engages in combat with the Death Knight, he will ask in bewilderment if the encounter was a setup. This continues in a Paralogue involving Mercedes, where he is uncharacteristically nice to her (while also remaining somewhat vile, to the shock of everyone else present), leading to him giving her the Rafail Gem. A Justified Trope since he is her long lost brother.
  • When fought at Fort Merceus on Silver Snow and Verdant Wind, he books it once your army gets close to him, and the map's objective changes to preventing his escape, which seems oddly out-of-character for a Blood Knight like him. At the chapter's end, this makes sense: he knew those who slither in the dark were about to obliterate the fort with "javelins of light" and obviously wanted to be as far away from that as possible, and also to goad his Worthy Opponent Byleth into following so they wouldn't die in the blast.
• Orcus on His Throne: Despite the fact that he could very easily destroy Byleth and their students in early encounters if he was proactive in attacking them, he seems content to simply sit still and watch unless you deliberately provoke him. He will only start moving in later encounters once the team is more capable of taking him on, though he's still not to be taken lightly. On Maddening Mode, however, he's a lot more proactive as early as his first appearance.
• Pet the Dog: Three Houses only:
  • Before version 1.1.0, he gives a sincere apology to Manuela for stabbing her before he departs for the front lines on the Crimson Flower route.
  • He gives Mercedes their family's Relic in their paralogue, though not without saying he won't hesitate to kill her if they meet again.
  • In Caspar and Mercedes' paralogue, should Caspar best him in combat, he likewise bestows the Scythe of Sariel to him, implied to be because he sees him as a Worthy Opponent.
• Pragmatic Villainy: The first time you meet him, he is ordered to attack you but refuses — not on moral grounds, but because he sees fighting weaklings as beneath him. So long as you don't move into his attack radius and stay there by the time your turn ends or attack him first, you can go the entire mission without fighting him.
• Pre-Mortem One-Liner:
  "Squirm for me!" (Heroes and Three Houses)
  "Die!" (Three Houses)
  "Rapturous!" (Heroes and Three Houses)
  "Your life ends!" (Three Houses)
  "Your life is over." (Heroes)
  "Make them beg." (Heroes)
• Promoted to Playable:
  • He makes his playable debut in Fire Emblem Heroes as a Grand Hero Battle unit.
  • The 1.1.0 update made him playable if the player allies with the Flame Emperor from Chapter 13 onwards.
• Psycho for Hire: The Death Knight has no real care for the Flame Emperor's goals. He is only motivated by his desire for fighting and killing. Jeritza stays with Edelgard precisely because she gives him targets to sate the Death Knight, as he would otherwise go on an endless killing spree if left to his own devices. Despite this, Edelgard seriously overestimates how much control she has over him, as his lust for killing leads him to directly get involved in Remire, and will even leave all his men to die at Fort Merceus when the javelins of light are coming on Silver Snow/Verdant Wind, showing exactly why he has a weakness in Authority. Jeritza even questions Edelgard on their supports in Three Hopes over whether using the Death Knight as an asset for her war is even a good idea to begin with.
• Put on a Bus: In Three Houses, before version 1.1.0. on the Crimson Flower route, he is only mentioned in passing once or twice and spends the second half of the game fighting on another front. However, after the release of Wave 3 of DLC, Death Knight becomes a playable character under his other identity, Jeritza, after the timeskip in Crimson Flower, with his special Death Knight class included; and it's completely free.
• Recurring Boss:
  • In Three Houses, he is tied for the record for most appearances in one game as an enemy, with up to six confrontations in a single playthrough: you fight him in chapters 4, 6, and 8 regardless of the route, 12 on all but Crimson Flower, 20 in Azure Moon, and either 17 and 18 on the Silver Snow route or 18 and 19 on the Verdant Wind route. If you count paralogues, the count goes up to 7, as you also fight him in Mercedes and Caspar's paralogue. He even shows up in "Cindered Shadows" for another swing at you.
  • In Three Hopes, he's fought three times on the Azure Gleam route.
• Recurring Element: The Death Knight is essentially Three Houses' version of the psychotic attack dog archetype, in the vein of Kempf, Hans, and especially the Black Knight. He's a violently unhinged maniac who is mostly aligned with the Flame Emperor so he can sate his own bloodlust.
• Redemption Demotion:
  • Downplayed. He's still undeniably powerful as a green NPC ally in chapter 12, provided you chose the Black Eagles and sided with Edelgard, who can take on nearly any opponent on the map save maybe the Golem enemies by himself (even the stage boss Rhea will find herself on the losing end of their clashes), but he has an unfortunate tendency to go Leeroy Jenkins and get splattered into the ground by Catherine.
  • Averted with a vengeance when he's made fully playable as Jeritza, as he starts with very good stats and has excellent growths across the board, the exceptions being his below-average Charm and Resistance. He does lose access to the Counterattack skill when he's playable, but he can regain it by mastering the Death Knight class (which will happen very quickly thanks to having access to the skill Mastermind).
• Redemption Rejection: At the end of Mercedes' and Caspar's paralogue in Three Houses, the Death Knight rejects his sister's plea of fighting for their side, claiming his soul "has long departed".
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: His mask gives him glowing red eyes, and he's a very dangerous antagonist.
• Route Boss: In Three Hopes, he's fought exclusively on the Azure Gleam route.
• Secret Identity: When not conspiring against the Church of Seiros or in Three Hopes, the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus, he lives a double life as Jeritza von Hrym, fencing instructor of the Officer's Academy.
• Secret Identity Vocal Shift: His mask has a built-in voice modulator to sound more intimidating and protect his true identity.
• Shaped Like Itself: He has a unique version of the Dark Knight class, called the Death Knight class.
• Spared by the Adaptation: If he doesn't die post-recruitment, he gets to survive the Azure Gleam route in Three Hopes unlike what happens to him in all non-Crimson Flower routes in Three Houses.
• Sinister Scythe: Wields one as his signature weapon, called the Scythe of Sariel. For gameplay purposes, it's treated as a lance.
• Slasher Smile: The Death Knight has one carved into his helmet, complete with sharp teeth and everything.
• Spanner in the Works: During the battle to claim Fort Merceus on the Silver Snow and the Verdant Wind route, he starts fleeing the fort and points to the missiles launched by those who slither in the dark, giving the Church and Alliance time to escape its destruction. All to keep his Worthy Opponent Byleth from dying and giving the heroes the chance to eventually defeat the Empire and their allies.
• Split Personality: He is this to Jeritza, being a violent, psychopathic persona formed after he murdered his father. At times Jeritza can't control him, even threatening to kill Mercedes.
• Superboss: In Three Houses, the first four times (or three, if you jump ship to work with his boss) you encounter him, he's far, far stronger than your units can reasonably hope to defeat. He's not invincible, though, and beating him nets you a rare Dark Seal.
• Villain Forgot to Level Grind: Averted. He actually does get stronger every time you encounter him, it's just that the students will eventually start growing faster than he does.
• Villain Takes an Interest: When Byleth discovers and unlocks the power of the Sword of the Creator, the Death Knight is immediately intrigued. Afterwards, he becomes obsessed with fighting them again, and tries to trap them in a Masochism Tango with him. Jeritza suggests his feelings border on romantic.
• Villain Teleportation: Makes use of this to escape in his first three appearances in Three Houses.
• Villain of Another Story: In Three Hopes, he's an antagonist only in the Azure Gleam route as Jeritza is a playable ally from the start in Scarlet Blaze and supports Claude and the Alliance late into Golden Wildfire.
• Worthy Opponent:
  • Double Subverted with Byleth in Three Houses. The first time the Death Knight encounters them, he thinks of the professor as a mere weakling. After Byleth obtains the Sword of the Creator, the Death Knight comes to consider them a worthy foe and becomes rather annoyed when the Flame Emperor prevents them from fighting Byleth during the events of Chapter 6.
  • It’s implied during Mercedes’ and Caspar’s paralogue in Three Houses that he sees the latter as a worthy opponent, but only if Caspar actually manages to best him in combat. If the latter condition is fulfilled (both since the Death Knight is a tough opponent and the mission objective specifically says the mission can be finished without routing him), the following cutscene adds an extra bit after the Death Knight hands Mercedes a Relic where he hands Caspar the Scythe of Sariel, declaring that Mercedes should be safe until the Death Knight can kill her.

Kostas

Kostas

Class: Thief (Three Houses), Brigand (Three Hopes)

Voiced by: Yoshikazu Nagano (Japanese), Brad Venable (English, Three Houses), Brent Mukai (English, Three Hopes)

The bandit leader of the Iron King's Thieves, who attack Edelgard, Dimitri and Claude at the very start of the game. Turns out to have been working for the Flame Emperor.

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• Beard of Evil: One that runs all along his chin, with prominent muttonchops, and a thin moustache, underscoring his status as a violent bandit.
• Cornered Rattlesnake: In Chapter 2, the second time you face him, he's backed into a corner at Zanado and resolves to go down swinging. One of his men wants to run away, but Kostas shoots him down, pointing out there's nowhere they can run to at this point.
  Kostas: You can't be a thief if you fear death!
• Dies Differently in Adaptation: In Three Hopes, Kostas dies to Shez in the prologue chapter instead of during the Garreg Mach students' first mission the next month.
• Dirty Coward: He's noticeably more confident and menacing when he's up against Academy students, but loses his nerve when he faces Jeralt or Byleth.
• Face Death with Despair: His dying words are to mutter to himself about what a mistake it was to get into bed with the Flame Emperor.
• Flat Character: He's little more than a violent thug who has contempt for the nobility.
• Ironic Echo: Shouts, "You'll die!" before he nearly kills Byleth and Edelgard at the end of the prologue. When the job he received from the Flame Emperor goes awry and he demands to know what's going to happen to him now, the Emperor simply replies, "You die." This is foreshadowing that Edelgard is the Flame Emperor.
• Irony: Almost kills Edelgard at the end of the prologue, seemingly unaware that she was the one who hired him to attack the students in the first place. Later, depending on your route, you can even have her finish him off, herself.
• Oh, Crap!: If Jeralt engages him during the tutorial, Kostas instantly recognizes him as the widely-feared Blade Breaker.
• Pre-Mortem One-Liner:
  "Hate me yet?"
  "Die!"
  "Ngh!"
  "Just die already!"
• Recurring Boss: In Three Houses he's the boss of the Prologue and Chapter 2.
• Red Baron: A variation; Three Hopes reveals he's in charge of the "Iron King's Thieves", but it's unclear if this is a moniker Kostas himself has assumed or was given.
• Slasher Smile: His happy portrait (that goes unused) gives him a very deranged smile, that combined with all the teeth he's missing becomes even creepier.
• Small Role, Big Impact:
  • In Three Houses, it's his attack on the students of Garreg Mach that leads to Byleth getting noticed by the Officers Academy, thus kickstarting the entire plot.
  • In Three Hopes, it's his premature death during the game's prologue that kickstarts the chain of the events that radically changes Fódlan's political landscape.
• Starter Villain: Kostas is a small bandit leader fought in the prologue after unintentionally kickstarting the games plot and is then finished off two chapters later while he's trying to flee.
• Unwitting Pawn: The combined events of Three Houses and Three Hopes suggests the Flame Emperor hired Kostas and ordered the attack on the three lords to scare away the teacher the Church planned to hire in order to have a mole of their own take his place, and that he was expected to fail his mission once Jeralt's Mercenaries and the Knights of Seiros got involved. The latter is noteworthy as in Three Houses, both Kostas himself and one of his surviving minions found in Abyss make clear the Flame Emperor deliberately omitted the Knights' involvement.
• Warm-Up Boss: He's the first boss of the game, and he's fairly easy compared to what's to come. The same applies when you face him again as the boss of the first "real" mission with your house. He retains this role in Three Hopes, being your first real challenge after the Hopeless Boss Fight against Byleth.
• You Have Failed Me: The Flame Emperor leaves him out to hang at the beginning of the game after he fails to assassinate the lords. Depending on the route, she can even kill him with her own two hands.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: In Three Houses, when Kostas asks the Flame Emperor what they are going to do, given the botched attack in the prologue, the Emperor's response is a laconic "You die," before teleporting out, leaving Kostas out to dry.

Metodey

Metodey

Class: Assassin

Voiced by: Takahiro Miwa (Japanese), Todd Haberkorn (English)

A bloodthirsty bandit hired by the Flame Emperor. When Byleth is requested by Rhea to make a trip to the Holy Tomb beneath Garreg Mach, he tracks them down in order to seize the Crest Stones hidden within.

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• Ain't Too Proud to Beg:
  • If defeated by Edelgard in "Cindered Shadows", he pathetically begs for mercy. Edelgard spares him, stating that he isn't worth her time (although she's actually making use of the thug's skills for her own ends).
  • An intentionally pathetic version in Three Hopes as his dying quotes have him begging to be rescued or pointlessly bargaining after committing atrocities.
• Ascended Extra: He shows up in "Cindered Shadows" as one of the leaders of the mercenaries invading Abyss. He also serves as a Recurring Boss in Three Hopes.
• Death by Adaptation: In Three Houses, he is a Skippable Boss. In Three Hopes, however, he is written to die in all three routes.
• Dies Differently in Adaptation: In Three Hopes he's fought and killed during the War Phase as opposed to one of the last bosses of White Clouds.
• Dirty Coward: Sadistic and cruel as he may be, the very second the tables are turned against him, he wastes no time pathetically groveling for mercy and trying to worm his way out of punishment for his crimes.
• Foreshadowing: Two examples in Cindered Shadows, though mostly concerning Part I rather than the side story:
  • When he's confronted during the sidestory, he almost lets slip that he was hired by the Empire.
  • Metodey starts sweating bullets should Edelgard initiate combat with him, and the latter pretends not to know him.
• Fragile Speedster: Due to being an assassin, Metodey's strengths lie in his speed and avoidance. In Cindered Shadows, he also has the skill Alert Stance+, which enhances his dodging capabilities even further.
• Hate Sink: There is nothing redeemable about this guy. He's a Psycho for Hire who loves to inflict torture upon innocent people and whenever he shows up as a general for someone, it's only to provide assistance to them and not because he is appreciated. This is more apparent in Three Hopes where his psychopathic tendencies are more front and center due to him spending more time as the leader of his own bandit gang rather than as a general of any faction.
• I'm a Humanitarian: Several of Metodey's quotes hint at cannibalistic tendencies, with him throwing around rhetoric involving cooking his victims or dressing them up with spices.
• Just Following Orders: When he's defeated in the Holy Tomb, he tries to desperately play this card as he dies.
• Karma Houdini Warranty: In "Cindered Shadows", he suffers no punishment for kidnapping Aelfric and attacking the heroes. He isn't so lucky in the main story.
• Karmic Death: In Three Hopes on the Scarlet Blaze and Golden Wildfire routes, he and Pallardó take advantage of the riots in the Hrym and Ordelia territories caused by those who slither in the dark to plunder the villagers. Being there is what leads to their deaths.
• Lone Wolf Boss: In Scarlet Blaze and Golden Wildfire, Metodey isn't hired by any of the factions and he's never hired by the Flame Emperor since Edelgard abandoned the disguise long before she ever had need of his services. Instead, he and Pallardó are leading their own bandit gang to loot and pillage everything they can get their hands on in Hrym and Ordelia territory.
• Pre-Mortem One-Liner:
  "Your work here is done!"
  "Hahahaha!"
  "Writhe in pain!"
  "I'm going to make this hurt!"
• Poison Is Evil: In the main story, he has the Poison Strike skill and wields a Venin Edge. In Three Hopes, he attacks Leonie in Hrym territory (on Scarlet Blaze) or Dorothea in Ordelia territory (on Golden Wildfire) with a poisoned dagger while either of them tries to evacuate the citizens from his and Pallardó's bandits.
• Psycho for Hire:
  • Cindered Shadows makes quite clear that while he's a hired muscle for whoever can pay his services in gold, he also relishes doing his job. One Rogue NPC notes that she's seen him before, and states that he's the type to slaughter an entire town if he could profit from it.
  • Three Hopes emphasizes this as during the War Phase, even without some sort of employer, he's little more than a leader of thugs and bandits out to kill and steal with abandonment.
• Recruiting the Criminal:
  • In Three Houses, he's been hired on by the Flame Emperor both for extra muscle and to help sneak into the Holy Tomb to steal the Crest Stones inside.
  • In Three Hopes on Azure Gleam, after Thales and Duke Aegir brainwash Edelgard and take control of the Empire, Metodey is hired as an Imperial general to fill out the ranks.
• Recurring Element: From what little characterization he had in the original game, it was made quite clear that he's a throwback to 'self-serving scumbag Psycho for Hire that relishes killing and humiliating his victims', which dated back to Kempf and was made more apparent with Valter and Caellach and Hans. His reappearance in Wave 4 DLC further solidifies his status as this, and his appearance in Three Hopes outright confirms it where he's just a bandit leader on two of the routes while on Azure Gleam he's hired as an Imperial general after Edelgard is Brainwashed and Crazy.
• Saying Too Much: During his appearance in Cindered Shadows, he almost blurts out that he's working for the Adrestian Empire.
• Skippable Boss: During Metodey's appearance in Three Houses' Holy Tomb map, it's entirely possible to finish the chapter while ignoring him entirely. He's close to the Flame Emperor, but it's possible to take the other set of stairs up to the exit to the Holy Tomb and defeat the Flame Emperor without engaging Metodey.
• Slasher Smile: He shows a really deranged one when he initiates battle with everyone (save for his boss).
• Smug Snake: Talks a big game when he gets into a fight and boasts about his intent to kill, but once defeated he begs for mercy and tries to claim he was Just Following Orders.
• The Sociopath: A low-functioning example. Metodey is a cruel, sadistic maniac who revels in murder and torture and views other people as his playthings to hurt as he pleases. His non-existent impulse control often leads to him picking fights he can't win, resulting in his death.
  "These people are simply begging to be hurt!"
• Villain: Exit, Stage Left: He escapes once Byleth and co. defeats him in "Cindered Shadows", because he's meant to reappear (and possibly die) later in the story.
• We Hardly Knew Ye: Prior to the Wave 4 DLC, he was only introduced immediately prior to the battle in the Holy Tomb, only to end up likely dead by the end of the chapter.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: If he is left alive in the Holy Tomb (seeing as you only need to defeat the Flame Emperor to finish the battle), he makes no later appearances whatsoever and is never seen again, even on the Crimson Flower route (where you side with Edelgard).

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