Fanfic / Fire Emblem Three Houses Quest

Fire Emblem: Three Houses Quest is a quest roleplay run on 4Chan’s /qst/ board by TreeHousesQM, set in the world of Fire Emblem: Three Houses.

You are Blair d’Rusalka, adopted child of Charles d’Rusalka, a Count of the Adrestian Empire. After her father enrolls her in the Garreg Mach Monastery Officers Academy in the year 1180, Blair soon gets caught up in the turmoil which sweeps across the continent of Fódlan, and eventually finds herself going up against an evil that has been lurking in the shadows for millennia.

Started in June 2021, an archive of quest threads can be found here.

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Fire Emblem Three Houses Quests contains examples of:

• And Here He Comes Now: Blair can't stop herself from mentally cooing about how amazing Dame Serena, the commander of the Monastery's Pegasus Knight battalion, is after the two of them meet. And her mind can't help but compare the Dame to some of her other superiors...
  If you had a role model that you aspired to live up to in your quest to become an esteemed Pegasus Knight, Serena would probably be the closest thing. She's more more charismatic and down to earth than...
  Leopold: Head in the clouds, Rusalka? If this were a battlefield you'd have an arrow between your eyes by now.
• Asleep for Days: Blair remains passed out for the entire five day march back to the monastery when she collapses after fighting Lonato.
  • After she's defeated by Kate, Blair stays unconscious for three days.
• As You Know: Hubert monologues extensively about Blair's past and family background during their first meeting, to show Blair that nothing and no one escapes his notice.
• Battle Couple: Blair and Ashe, which eventually leads to them getting a skill which boosts their damage if they're in battle together.
• Beast of Battle: The wyverns that belong to the stronger Hellwing members, such as Rex's own mount, can launch fireballs to aid their rider in battle. When Bradley of the Hellwings decides to go down fighting, he uses a crest stone to transform his wyvern into a demonic beast that still obeys his commands and fights beside him, to Blair's shock.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: Why Damian joins up with Blair after the fall of Garreg Mach: having lost everything during Edelgard’s purge of the Imperial nobility, he chooses to throw his lot in with the only person who showed him some measure of kindness during his time at the monastery.
• Berserk Button: For Ingrid, it's dishonourable behaviour. Blair exploits this during the Battle of the Eagle and Lion by mocking Ingrid's offer of a duel, which makes Ingrid so incensed that she breaks formation to charge after Blair and falls straight into a trap. Ingrid loses this button after five years of war, being willing to engage in tactics such as ganging up against stronger opponents, but gets a new one in the form of seeing her friends be hurt, after the rest of the Blue Lions are slain at Gronder field; when Blair later takes a near fatal injury after confronting Kate and Winona, Ingrid has to be physically held back from them multiple times.
• The Berserker: How Blair’s Fiery Blood skill manifests: once she gets hurt, the red mist descends and she starts to lash out without abandon. Leopold later points out how this can be a liability for her in the long run, and works with her so she can better harness that anger. This gives rise to the skill being upgraded to Fiery Blood+, that gives Blair both a damage and speed boost.
• Birds of a Feather: Blair and Ashe are both aspiring knights and the baseborn adopted children of nobility, which leads to them bonding very quickly during the academy phase.
• Black Mage: Blair spends the academy phase training to become a Harrier, a mage who launches aerial magic bombardments while riding atop of black pegasus. After the timeskip, the sheer destruction she rains down on her foes becomes so famed that she gains the moniker “The Witch”.
• Blood Knight: Corrine and the rest members of the squad Hubert assigns Blair to, much to Blair's consernation. Corinne later tells Blair this was because the four of them had been acting as Hubert's black ops squad long before they entered the Academy.
  You begin to find Hubert’s decision to lump you in with these freaks to be rather nasty.
• Blood-Splattered Warrior: Blair and Corrine end up covered in blood after fighting their way out of Garreg Mach during the Empire's attack. Their appearance quickly makes Duke Charon believe their tale of the monastery falling.
• Body-Count Competition: Hubert's squad decide to hold one of these during their mission in Zanado, which Blair declines to take part in on moral grounds even though the prize is considerable.
• Bookends: The very first and last votes of the quest involve determining someone's gender. First Blair, and then her firstborn child.
• Brutish Character, Brutish Weapon: Inverted: in their first battle together Blair is very surprised see that Corrine, who looks to be the epitome of a proper noble lady, is wielding a battleaxe. Though when Blair gets to know the other girl better she quickly realises that the weapon matches the wielder.
• Combat Pragmatist: Blair subscribes to this, initially to get the edge over her Crested peers and later on to get through battles with minimal losses. Her decision to bring a fireball to a swordfight puts her at major odds with Ingrid during the Academy Phase.
• Crutch Character: Ingrid, who's packing both a Crest and a Relic Weapon. Word of God states that they're a Gotho archetype to make sure Blair has enough firepower for the battles ahead, as Blair loses several of her top aerial units at Gronder Field shortly before they join up.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Several battles over the course of the quest have been rather one sided:
  • Uriel beats his opponent in the Cúig Triail with a single blow, thanks to her being a dark mage.
  • Sylvian kills Raphael at the Battle of Gronder field in a single hit, due to his opponent being distracted by Blair.
  • Blair takes out both Bradley, one of the last Hellwing Captains left standing during the Battle of Enbarr, and his wyvern turned demonic beast with a single Forseti.
  • Kate vs Blair ends in Blair’s utter defeat, after Kate manages to get a critical hit with Gae Bolg.
• The Eeyore: Ava, the Blackwing’s Pegasus Knight captain, who is perpetually dour after losing a husband and two children in the Empire’s attack on Garreg Mach.
• Death by Irony:
  • Raphael squares off against Blair and Sylvain during inter-house mock battle. He once again does so during the Battle of Gronder field, but this time Blair’s actions cause him to meet his death at the hands of Sylvain.
• Deadpan Snarker: Blair, who often gets into Snark-to-Snark Combat with others who possess a similarly sharp tongue, such as Leopold and Damian.
  Damian : ...No one is in greater need of funds than I. I’ve been wearing the same cloak for three years now, you know?
  Blair: My condolences.
• Dead Guy Junior: Blair names her firstborn daughter Bronte, in honor of Anacharsis' own beloved daughter.
• Death by Childbirth: Blair's mother died after giving birth to her, leaving her to be raised by her father.
• Desecrating the Dead: After their first battle together, Corinne wipes the blood off her boots using face of one the people she'd just killed, which causes Blair to snap at her for being a bloodthirsty brute.
• Desperately Looking for a Purpose in Life: Ingrid is left utterly adrift after Dimitri and the rest of the Blue Lions perish at Gronder Field. When she finally opens up to Blair about this, Blair suggests that she joins up with the Blackwings until she figures things out, a proposal which Ingrid eventually accepts.
• 11th-Hour Ranger:
  • Leopold, who is given permission by the Church to join the Blackwings for their final battles once the war against the Empire concludes.
  • Kate, who joins the Blackwings during their assault on Zanado in order to fufill Rex's wish of putting down Charles d’Rusalka.
• Face Death with Dignity
  • Lonato, who calmly accepts that his time has run out and merely asks that Ashe be the one who kills him, rather than Catherine or Rhea.
  • Blair herself, who just lies back and awaits death after eating a critical hit from Kate during their bout. This saves her life as it convinces Kate to just walk away - per Word of God Kate would have finished the job if Blair had resisted.
• Fallen Princess: Gender inverted with Damian, who is Old Imperial nobility and thus loses everything once Edelgard takes power. It does set him on the path to becoming a better person, though.
• Fire-Forged Friends:
  • When they're at the Academy Blair has no qualms at exploiting Ingrid's weaknesses for her gain, which results in the latter absolutely hating her guts. The war and fighting side by side at the battle of Gronder Field turn them into staunch allies.
  • As they fight side by side through the school year of 1180 and the subsequent war, Blair goes from despising Corrine for her bloodlust and brutality to regarding her as a sister.
• Gondor Calls for Aid: While the majority of the church's forces are marching to Fort Merceus, Garreg Mach comes under a joint assault by the Dukedom and the Western Church. Defeat seems inevitable, until reinforcements arrive in the form of the Blackwings and the Sreng, the latter of whom who were convinced by Blair to throw their lot in with Byleth instead of Cornelia.
• Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: Inverted with Blair and Ashe, as she's the melee fighter while he uses a bow. Rex and Winona play the trope straight.
• Hellish Horse: Beathan gets a jet black coat as part of the process to allow Blair to become a Harrier. Blair is surprised to find that people in the more superstitious areas of Fódlan give him a wide berth, considering him as this trope.
• Heroic Sacrifice: A non-lethal example: in the mock battle, Blair boldly charges at Lysithea head on in a bid to draw her out from cover and allow Bernadetta to get a clear shot. The plan succeeds, but Blair takes a spell to the face and gets knocked out.
• History Repeats: Blair being gored by special lance, which occurs both pre and post timeskip: first the Lance of Ruin, and then Gae Bolg.
  Damian: Face it, Blair, you simply have an unhealthy habit of being impaled. Frankly…it’s unbecoming.
• Honor Before Reason: At Gronder Field, both Blair and Sebastian come to the bitter realization that the Kingdom's army is held together solely by the Knights of Faerghus' code of chivalry and vows of loyalty to their King and that those two things will prevent them from changing their course no matter how dire the situtation around them becomes. Sebastian, who admits that loyalty to one's liege is the most important thing to for Knight, finds himself disgusted at people using honor as an excuse not to speak up for what is right.
  • Kate refuses Blair's offer of surrender, even after both the Empire and the Hellwings have fallen, claiming that doing so will dishonor the memory of both her Lord and comrades. Unusually for this trope this actually pays off for her, as she defeats Blair by getting a crit with Gae Bolg which buys her time to escape.
• You Are What You Hate: After their first fight together, Blair starts berating Corrine for acting excessively brutal in battle. Corrine then shoots back by pointing out how Blair herself violently gored her enemies while under the influence of Fiery Blood, which takes the air out of Blair's sails entirely.
• Hunter of Monsters: Blair herself, who decides to dedicate their life to eradicating the Agarthan threat after Martha and Xavier are killed by Kronya. Though they actually mellow out somewhat after meeting and working alongside Anemone and the Arcadians, to the point that they later tell Seteth that they believe there must be at least a few good Agarthans out there somewhere.
• I've Come Too Far: The reason why Anacharsis rejects Blair's offer of a potential path to redemption, as he refuses to let all the planning and sacrifice made in pursuit of his goal amount to nothing.
• I Hate Past Me: All Damian can do is shake his head when he reflects back on how he was when he first entered the academy.
  Truthfully, when I think back to my former self, I can’t help but cringe. The type of person I was…believing I was superior due to the circumstances of my blood, it pains me.
• I Will Wait for You: Despite the two of them being separated for five years, Blair remains steadfastly loyal to Ashe.
• Jerkass: Damian, who calls Blair low-born piece of dirt during their first meeting. He gets better.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Leopold's introduction has him immediately dismiss the group of Blair, Corrine, Mercedes and Annette as nothing but useless noblewomen, and then go on to beat up Raphael for being late. His sparkling personality remains consistent throughout the years, but he's also shown to truly care about all those he teaches, taking Blair under his wing so that she can prove herself and praying for the souls of all his students who have lost to war.
• Killed Off for Real:
  • Martha and Xavier perish at the hands of Kronya, changing the course of Blair's life entirely.
  • Boleslav is the first named Blackwing to perish, falling at Ordelia.
  • The Battle of Gronder Field claims the lives of all the Blue Lions bar Ingrid, all of the Golden Deer apart from Claude, Roxanne, Nero, Shelley and Rex.
• Kill the Ones You Love: Lonato's last request is that Ashe be the one to kill him, which Ashe makes good on.
• Knight in Shining Armor: Blair notes that, though Leopold certainly looks the part, his personality...leaves something to be desired. On the other hand Sebastian plays this as straight as can be, even managing to be a gallant escort to Flayn AKA Saint Cethleann in the midst of battle.
• Lady of Black Magic: Winona, the beautiful strategist of the Hellwings who boasts a very nasty Bolting even before she gets implanted with the Crest of Maculi.
  • Cornelia, a mage who is generally regarded as being one of the fairest women in the land. Though Cleobulus herself thinks the body she's using is nothing but a hideous husk when compared to her long lost true Agarthan form.
• Last Request: After being defeated, Lonato has one final ask to make: for his death to come at the hands of his son, rather than from Catherine or Rhea. A tearful Ashe ends up fufilling his request.
• Life Drinker:
  • Morag of Sreng, who maintains her youthful appearance by draining the lifeforce of others with her dark magic.
  • Morag accuses Clay of being one of these as well. When Blair questions them about this, she finds out that Clay is a first generation bearer of the Crest of Chevalier, which restores him whenever he damages his opponents. Clay regards himself as being different from Morag, as Morag's powers kills her victims while his regeneration kicks in even if he inflicts a non-fatal wound.
• Lovable Coward: Mina, who just wants to earn some coin far, far away from the front lines, but whose abilities as a dancer mean that all sorts of unsavory groups are after her. Her nerves finally get the better of her when Blair announces that the Blackwings are marching to Zanado for a final confrontation with the Agarthans and the Western Church, and she resigns from the company.
• Master-Apprentice Chain: Uriel trained Leopold, who then goes on to train Blair, and Blair herself later steps in to help Diana unlock her full potential.
• The Medic: Elizabeth becomes this for the Blackwings. Though for a good part of the story she's their ‘’only’’ healer, which bites them in the behind in the aftermath of the Battle of Gronder Field where she's run so ragged that she’s unable to heal the more complicated injuries which several Blackwings receive. Realising this, Blair later choses to recruit Kayla from Sreng to support her.
• Mentor in Sour Armor: Leopold is a brash, sharp-tongued jerk, who over the course of the quest becomes an invaluable source of guidance and support for Blair.
• Misery Builds Character: Damian is of the firm opinion of this, which he brings up while he and Blair are reminiscing after the fall of the Empire.
  Damian: I’ve experienced the heights of nobility, and I’ve experienced the depths of poverty. Hopefully I’ve picked up something along the way that can serve me well when it comes to leading the Empire out of this crisis.
• My Country, Right or Wrong: Blair defies this, as she turns her back the Empire once she realises that Edelgard is perfectly willing to work with the Agarthans.
• My Master, Right or Wrong: All of Blair's former Blue Lion companions are loyal to their king until the very end, and refuse to disobey his orders no matter how Blair pleads and barters with them. This leads all of them bar Ingrid meeting their deaths at Gronder Field, to Blair's despair.
• Paladin: Uriel, who not only boasts healing and white magic but also has a skill that grants him effective damage against demonic beasts and dark mages, making him one of the Blackwings powerhouse units.
• Penny Among Diamonds: Blair is the second commoner in the Black Eagles, which leads to her and Dorothea becoming fast friends.
• Playing with Fire:
  • Damian, who's eventual spell arsenal comprises of nothing but fire spells.
  • Charles d’Rusalka, who's packing valflame. When Blair and her compatriots fight him as Anarcharsis, he reveals that he can also summon flame elementals to do his bidding.
• Post-Victory Collapse: After fighting Lonato (which involved tanking a hit from a warhorse), Blair keeps chugging along just long enough to comfort Ashe before passing out.
• Pregnant Badass: Winona is pregnant during the Battle of Gronder Field and the Battle of Enbarr, and kicks a tremendous amount of ass both times thanks to her implanted Crest of Macuil.
• Pride Before a Fall: Happens to Damian, who starts the school year full of confidence in both his skills and his noble lineage, only to become the laughingstock of the Black Eagles after his dismal performance during the mock battle.
• Older Hero vs. Younger Villain: Morag, a nubile young dark mage, mocks Uriel about his age relentlessly when they're pitted against each other at the Cúig Triail, only shutting up when Uriel casually outs the nature of her youth.
• Old Soldier: Uriel, a veteran of the Knights of Seiros who once trained Sir Leopold, Blair’s own mentor, as well as Catherine. He comes out of retirement to protect the innocent from the Crusaders of the Western Church, eventually joining up with Blair after seeing that they share the same enemy.
• Once Done, Never Forgotten: Blair is never going to let Damian live down the fact that he called her a lowborn piece of dirt. He in turn will not stop reminding her that she makes it a habit of being impaled by fancy spears.
• Really 700 Years Old: Clay is centuries old, the regenerative powers of his first generation Crest of Chevalier being potent enough to stave off aging as well as injury.
• Red Baron: Blair's adoptive brother Rex has been called The Lion of the Empire. After the timeskip, Blair is dubbed The Witch.
• Redemption Rejection: When they finally reunite at Zanado, Blair begs her adoptive father to back away from his evil scheme and work alongside her to redeem himself. He refuses, on the grounds that he's he's come too far to abandon everything now.
• Reminiscing About Your Victims: The boys in Hubert's little squad immediately start bragging about their various kills the second Blair joins up with them, making her wish that she was anywhere else.
  You wonder how Bernadetta and Petra are doing. Hell, even Damian might be better company.
• Replacement Goldfish: It's eventually revealed to Blair by a third party that Anarcharsis adopted her was because she reminded him so strongly of Bronte, his own deceased daughter. In the immediate aftermath, Blair wonders if she was only ever filling in a gap, but eventually comes to the conclusion that she's greatful to him regardless. On his deathbed Anarcharsis confesses that he loved each of them equally, and that Blair was never intended to be a replacement.
• Sadistic Choice: Blair faces one during The Battle of Gronder Field. After her aerial unit is dragged into combat with the Hellwings, she realises that she can only provide support to one of either Ingrid, who is facing down Rex or her captains. She ultimately rushes to the aid of Ingrid, and as a result Shelley and Nero fall in battle.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: Blair refuses to heed her Empress' call to war once she learns that Edelgard is in league with the Those Who Slither in the Dark, instead choosing to defect from the Empire and dedicate her life to ending the Agarthan threat.
  • The philosophy that Sebastian ultimately subscribes to. When his Lord, Count Rowe, defects from the Kingdom, Sebastian refuses to follow him any longer and defects from him in turn. He's also horrified to discover his comrades' blind obedience to their King prevents them from taking a stand against Dimitri's leadership that has lead the Kingdom to ruin.
• Sibling Murder: Blair kills her adoptive brother Rex at the Battle of Gronder Field.
• Someone to Remember Him By: Rex gets a child on Winona before he dies at Gronder Field.
• Stronger Than They Look: When they first meet, Blair is rather surprised to discover that that dainty looking Corrine can swing a battle axe around with ease.
• Student–Master Team: In the final few maps, Blair rides into battle by the side of Diana, the Pegasus Knight who she took under her wing, Leopold, her own mentor, and Uriel, Leopold's mentor. Uriel lampshades this when Leopold finally joins up with the Blackwings proper.
  Uriel: It seems that we have three generations of education between us. I pity the enemy that finds themselves on the end of our spears.
• Squishy Wizard: Averted with Blair, who has one the of highest HP growths of the cast and gets the HP pool to match. Also averted with Anemone, who's HP pool rivals that of the Blackwing's Great Knights as a result of her Agarthan and Nabatean ancestry.
• Stern Teacher: Leopold. Brusque and no-nonsense, he drives students hard and (violently) reprimands lapses in discipline, but ultimately wants nothing more than for those he teaches to survive all their battles. Post timeskip he dips into Drill Sergeant Nasty territory when he has to quickly whip green recruits into fighting shape.
• The Stoic: Kate is as cool as a cucumber even when faced with atrocities such a Remire Village, prompting a frazzled Blair to wonder how on earth she does it.
• Superhuman Transfusion: Clay was saved from the brink of death by receiving a blood transfusion from the Apostle Chevalier... in 721. The Crest of Chevalier's regenerative powers has kept him ticking along ever since.
• Tempting Fate: After being blindsided by Blair's magic during the mock battle, Felix mentions that he won't be tripped up by something like that again. Years later, his reanimated corpse finally gets put to rest when the Blackwings' spellcasters gun him down after Blair stuns him.
• Terse Talker: Kate, who tends to give one word statements if she's not being directly addressed by her superior officer.
• This Was His True Form: Deliberately averted with Anarcharsis, who dies in the form Charles d’Rusalka as that is who he wants Blair to remember him as.
• Took a Level in Kindness:
  • Damian, who becomes a much nicer person after finding a place to belong with Blair and the Blackwings and seeing firsthand the horrors of war. Blair eventually lampshades this.
  It was hard to believe this was the same man that once called you a ‘low-born piece of dirt’.
  • Leopold becomes increasingly more respectful of Blair as she continues to impress him which eventually culminates in him claiming her as his sworn sister after she saves Garreg Mach from an attack by the Dukedom.
• The Unfettered: Edelgard, as per canon. This is ultimately what drives Blair from her side, as Blair point blank refuses to side with someone who is willing to work alongside Those Who Slither in the Dark.
• Utopia Justifies the Means: Blair does not subscribe to this way of thinking. It is why she defects from the Empire; though she acknowledges that Edelgard aims to build a better world for the lowborn and the Crestless, Edelgard accepting the "help" of the of Agarthans in order to make that world come about disgusts her.
• Violence is the Only Option:
  • After Lonato raises his rebellion, Rhea assigns Ashe to go along with the Black Eagles so that he can attempt to talk his adoptive father down and prevent any further bloodshed. Blair manages to get Ashe face to face with Lonato but despite Ashe's pleas the knight remains steadfast in his convictions and refuses to stand down, which forces Blair and Ashe to take him out by force.
  • Blair finds this out the hard way during the Battle of Gronder Field, when she comes face to face with Raphael after being thrown from Beathan. Reluctant to fight someone she considers a friend, she desperately tries to talk Raphael into retreating. But just as his resolve seems to be wavering, he takes a fatal blow from Sylvain, who had come across their standoff and rushed in to get the "enemy" away from Blair.
• We Used to Be Friends
  • During the battle of Gronder Field, Raphael becomes absolutely distraught at having to battle Blair. For her part, Blair tries her best to talk him into quitting the battlefield, until the decision to fight is taken out of her hands entirely.
  • Dorothea and Bernadetta, who side with Byleth against the Empire, end up having to fight and kill both Caspar and Petra over the course of the war.
  • During the final battle at Enbarr, Blair finds herself crossing spears with Kate, who has become a Hellwing Lieutenant. This is ultimately a battle which Blair loses, after Kate manages to get a crit with Gae Bolg.
• What the Hell, Hero?:
  • During the Battle of Gronder Field, a heartbroken Raphael asks Blair why she chose to turn her back on the Alliance, whom she’d been working with for five years, in favor of the Kingdom.
  Raphael: You didn’t have to fight for us, but why are you fighting against us?!
  • While the company is reeling from the aftermath of Gronder Diana calls out Blair for prioritising saving Ingrid over her own men, wondering what Ingrid had which put her above Shelley and Nero.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are: Blair comforts Bernadetta this way, after the latter starts beating herself up for taking so many lives in her first battle.
  Blair: ''You’re not a monster, Bernie. You’re a sweet girl that’s been forced into a situation that you wanted no part in. It’s natural to do everything you can to try and survive. And I’m glad that you did.”'
• You Are Not Alone: Blair's first major interaction with Ashe is in the aftermath of Lonato announcing his rebellion, where she insists that he does have people in his corner.
  Blair: I don’t really know why I came to seek you out. I don’t know the whole story of what’s going on in Gaspard right now. I just felt that you should know, for what it’s worth, at least someone here is praying for you.'