Semper Ad Meliora: Always Towards Better Things
is a Crusader Kings-style quest hosted by Slayer Anderson on the Sufficient Velocity website, and based off the anime Code Geass.
In an alternate world where Marianne was never assassinated, Lelouch and Nunnally remained in Pendragon with the rest of their family. Now, it is Lelouch's time to leave his mark upon the world.
The quest was on hold while Slayer Anderson dealt with real-life issues, but recently began updating again.
Semper Ad Meliora features the following tropes:
- Adaptational Badass: Lelouch, at the very least, is a bit more skilled in using a Knightmare Frame in this universe. That being said, he's nowhere near the best pilots on the show - Kallen beat him in an offscreen battle, while Nunnally does the same five consecutive times.
- Adaptational Nice Guy:
- Lelouch gets hit with this - his handling of Kallen's family situation (which involves her father rather than her mother this time around) is far more delicate and personally involved than it was in canon, plus there's the fact he personally gets involved with it in the first place.
- Due to knowing that Lelouch and Nunnally are still alive, Cornelia and Clovis are better off mentally than in canon - the former is still a conquering general but is somewhat softer toward those she fights, while the latter is content with merely being a painter.
- Adapted Out: Shirley, Rivalz, Nina, and Suzaku are nowhere to be seen.
Word of God is that they exist, but have no impact on the story (and that Shirley is better off this way, since it exposes her to less danger). - Alternate Timeline: It's Code Geass, but this story goes into more detail about how Britannia has influenced the world.
- The Thylacine (a.k.a. the Tasmanian tiger) isn't extinct in this timeline (or even close to extinction, for that matter), as Britannians view them as exotic pets. There's actually thriving populations in North America that originated from feral pets, which have taken the role of wolves in many parts of the continent. They've helped to control the feral pigs, removing one incentive for trying to cull them.
- Britannia has also saved many other creatures that went extinct in our time, in part because they view them as exotic pets. Case in point, the Dragon's Blood Tree.
- Anastasia Romanov survived the October Revolution and somehow ended up in Britannia. She's now known as Anastasia li Britannia, Cornelia and Euphemia's mother.
- Alternate Universe:
- V.V. decided not to kill Marianne, as the latter is still alive and her children are still living in Pendragon.
- Additionally, The Pacific War and Invasion of Japan have not happened. At least, not yet.
- Big Brother Is Watching: A lowtech variation — Britannia heavily monitors the internet usage of its citizens (assuming you can use the internet), and also goes to great lengths to keep all commoners trapped in the towns/cities they were born in, so that they can mitigate any attempts at rebellion.
- Big, Screwed-Up Family: And how! Through a combination of Social Darwinism and Polyamory, the Emperor has 108 wives/empresses/consorts – while we don't have a count of the Emperor's total children, we know there are at least 40 kids, some of who run the full gamut from never having met, to bitter political rivals. Schneizel is the Prime Minister of a political party, and Guinevere his half-sister is his bitter political rival.
- Cadre of Foreign Bodyguards: Lelouch acquires Sayoko and her clan for this purpose.
- Canon Immigrant: Of a sort - Jeanne Rowe is already canon, coming from Code Geass: Akito the Exiled, but never showed up in the main series as she died at the end of the fifth OVA. Here, she's Lelouch's Military Aide and eventually becomes one of his love interests.
- Civil War: Tianzi kickstarts one in the Chinese Federation after having her corrupt High Eunuchs publicly executed.
- The Conspiracy: An unknown party opposed to Kenshin Jaeger's ideas and beliefs is trying to subtly eliminate him, and have begun backing pirates in the New Caledonia region after Lelouch brings Jaeger into his employ.
- Conspiracy Theorist: Lelouch's resident Mad Scientist, Kenshin Jaeger, believes he is being hunted by several who oppose him ideologically. At least one of these groups is real and indeed wants him dead.
- Crapsaccharine World: Britannia projects this image on occasion — while the nobility are all about public appearances and strive to show their best to the world, and the nation itself is hyper-advanced technologically, anyone who isn't in the nobility effectively belongs to a noble, with Lelouch being noted as an outlier due to his mother being a commoner.note Aditionally, much of its technology is mostly reserved for the nobility — most towns still have blacksmiths, and Britannia hasn't invested much into expanding the internet or even telephone lines.
- Did Anastasia Survive?: In this universe, she did. She's Cornelia and Euphie's mom.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Regardless of their morality, most of Charles' wives and children have made an unspoken agreement to avoid overt attempts to off one another so as to ensure they can build effective power bases. The catch being that, should Charles die, it's every royal for themselves.
- The Exile: The majority of the Shinobi Clans were exiled from Japan due to harshly clashing with the modern culture there, something Lelouch exploits to gain the aid of Sayoko and her clan. Sayoko's clan in particular was also exiled due to a Generational Feud with the Sumeragi family.
- Family Disunion: Allegedly one such family get-together involved a pair of Empresses nearly coming to blows over making one of the children cry. The fact that one of the pair was a former Knight of the Round piloting a Knightmare Frame, and the other was the former Director of OSI and the two were in a prolonged staredown... it was a tense situation, to say the least.
- Feuding Families: The Shinozaki clan and Sumeragi family have had a feud going on for some time, which resulted in the Shinozaki clan being forced to leave Japan. Lelouch unknowingly got involved in this when he took in the Shinozaki clan, but was able to negotiate with Kaguya's father to put the feud on hold.
- Flawed Prototype: The Gawain is still this, to the point that Schneizel mothballed it. Lelouch obtains it at the end of the eighth year of the RP as a favor from Schneizel.
- For Want Of A Nail: A lot of things have happened that radically altered the timeline:
- Marianne was never assassinated, and her children never exiled to Japan. Amongst other things, this means that Lelouch and Suzaku never met.
- Related to the above, Lelouch ends up meeting Kallen for the first time in the Britannian Homeland as opposed to first at Kamine Island (which was a Forgotten First Meeting) and then again at Ashford.
- Additionally, his gentler handling of her family situation causes her to confess her feelings to him.
- Since Marianne is still alive, the Ashfords never fell from grace.
- Framing the Guilty Party: Lelouch, Kallen, and Isaac Stadtfeld frame the majority of the Stadtfeld family for planning to assassinate the latter two over an issue of inheritance. Said family is in fact actually guilty of treason, having sold secrets to the Rus Republic several decades prior and still having channels open with the E.U. Lelouch arranged for this framing to ensure that Isaac and Kallen would retain their titles as Duke of Westhaven and Heiress to said Duchy.
- Harem Seeker: It's implicitly acknowledged that any Britannian Prince who's serious about making a grab for the throne will take on multiple wives (no word on how this works for girls).
- In Spite of a Nail: Despite all of the butterflies that Marianne surviving caused, some things have remained the same.
- Kallen still falls for Lelouch, though this time around she falls for his true identity, instead of for Zero.
- Related to the above, Kallen is still friends with Tamaki, Ohgi, and the other original members of the Black Knights, but with Japan still being an independent nation, they're mostly just enjoying civilian life right now.
- Lelouch once again ends up with Sayoko in his services. This time, though, he also has the support of her entire shinobi clan. Later, this gets upgraded to every remaining ninja in existence.
- A few years into the quest's timeline, Lelouch manages to gain the aid of Kaguya Sumeragi. No word on if she's falling for him, though.
- Intra-Franchise Crossover:
- Elements from all three of the canon parts of Code Geass are present in this story.
- Code Geass: Lelouch is the main character, and as of this writing, Euphemia, Cornelia, Charles, Marianne, Kallen, Jeremiah, Clovis, Nunnally, Viletta, Marika, and Lilianna have all showed up.
- Code Geass: Akito the Exiled: Jeanne Rowe is Lelouch's martial advisor. Ashley is mentioned in Turn 9 as one of Kallen's subordinates.
- Code Geass: Oz the Reflection: Sokkia is mentioned in Turn 9 as one of Kallen's intended recruits.
- Code Geass: Nightmare of Nunnally: Nunnally is revealed to be in a relationship with Alice, who's given the surname MacDougall in this continuity.
- Elements from all three of the canon parts of Code Geass are present in this story.
- The Patriarch: Charles zi Britannia, the Emperor. Even his most beloved Empress and at-the-time favorite son have to follow strict rules to even meet with him in a fairly informal setting. It was seen as remarkable that only this Empress could openly express her disdain to the Emperor.
- Polar Opposite Twins: An Omake shows this to be the case with Charles and V.V., aka Victor zi Britannia - Charles is elegant, refined, and the pinnacle of royalty, while Victor is foul-mouthed and childish.
- Polyamory: Lelouch is currently in a relationship with Kallen, but the latter has admitted she is okay if Lelouch is involved with other girls (given that he is a Britannian Prince, this is practically expected). Jeanne becomes the second girl to admit her feelings to him.
- Lelouch later begins publicly courting Euphemia with the intent to officially marry.
- Richard Nixon, the Used Car Salesman: In this timeline, John F. Kennedy is a Britannian count, and married to Marilyn Monroe.
- Royally Screwed Up: Imperfection, sloth, and laziness are not tolerated among royals. ALL of Charles' children are shown to be highly competent in various fields: Politics, International Finance, Knightmare Piloting, Military Tactics, Psionics. Evil... is optional, apparently, as some family members have no problem slaughtering villages in their wake.
- Ruling Family Massacre: The Emblem of Blood, or how the Emperor ascended to the throne is seen as this, although details are vague it has been implied in canon omakes that the conflicts were quite violent and vicious.
- The Sociopath: Implied. While Schneizel hasn't shown any obvious signs of sociopathy, one of his traits, Heart of Ice, causes him to treat all social links as being five ranks lower than they are for the other end of the link (to put things into perspective, Social Links start to provide bonuses at Rank 4; Schneizel only gets bonuses starting from Rank 9).
- Too Hot for TV: Of a sort - one of the images a fan posted of Liliana, Marika, and Cornelia was removed (and the poster given a three day suspension) due to sexualization of a minor (Liliana and Marika are over the age of majority in the story, but in the image, they are both around 14-15 and are strategically position to protect Cornelia's modesty, as she is wearing a cape and nothing else. Also, they're wearing the very revealing uniforms that Luciano Bradley gave them). It was an official poster from 2008 by the show’s artist Kimura.
