#[So when X1 ends she actually lives with him and Ludger.]

[ofstarsandskies]

Xillia 1 + 2 AU -- A Gift For Julius...?

As Julius arrived home from work, he couldn't miss the pink giftbox sitting on the kitchen table. Likely a gift for the landlady, Julius thought. She's the closest thing Ludger would have to a mother. But those thoughts where shattered when the label addressed himself to him.

If it's for me, then there shouldn't be any harm in opening it. With careful hands, Julius pulled the ribbon off the top and lifted the lid off to see...! A GHS keychain that resembled Lulu to a T.

Just as the questions were about to run wild, his recent family addition came out of her room, "So, do you like it? I saved up my allowance to commission someone to make this!"

"I do, but I have one question-- why give it to me today? Father's Day isn't until next month."

Apparently Elize was ready for his question, because she answered him immediately, "It's cause you're like a Mom and a Dad combined! And Father's Day cannot come soon enough, so... I thought I could give you a gift early! Think of it as I appreciate you so much, I needed TWO holidays to tell you how I feel!"

At Elize's going rate, Ludger might have a rival for cutest family member. With his brother quest to be seen as a cool, responsible adult, perhaps he'd be celebrating the motions for his crown.

"Thank you, Elize. I'm glad you value me so highly, despite only knowing me for what seems like the fastest year of my life." Sometimes Julius forgot how many weeks' distance grew between now and his first proper arrival in the Prime Dimension's Rieze Maxia. Departing from the Temporal Crossroads felt no later than yesterday.

#m;; Big Brother #jau;; Otherworldly Seeker #d;; Fables of a Vacant Sky #[Soooo with no context I'm sure there's questions going on. lol] #[TL;DR my X1+2 AU ends with Julius adopting Elize as his daughter.] #[So when X1 ends she actually lives with him and Ludger.] #[And thus Julius is Actual Dad bby--]

[elympios]

I am so predictable.

So that ficlet I reblogged where Ludger accidentally gets stuck in X1 inspired me. Like I’ve seen one take on “Julius and Ludger get stuck in Rieze Maxia after the Zenethra incident” but the issue is largely that their ages are extremely hard to work out

But what if Chronos just. Chucks them through the Schism for funsies. I mean he’s enough of an asshole to do it just because.

So Julius is 20 and Ludger is 12 and suddenly they have to deal with being in an entirely different country and Julius has both pocket watches but he can only shift into Fractured versions of Rieze Maxia and it’s extremely dangerous because he might accidentally end up unable to reach the Catalyst because of the Schism and get stuck there forever until someone else destroys it. (Unlike when he was working for Spirius when Kudlak could tell if a Catalyst was in RM and it would be impossible to reach it through normal means)

So he scrapes together a plan, explains to Ludger about the RM legend, and coaches him on their new backstory as isolated country bumpkins from who-knows-where. Ludger doesn’t use spirit artes because when he was very young he was traumatised by the death of his mother and he’s too scared to use them himself, and Julius has simply never had an affinity for it. It’s a weak story but Ludger makes up for it by being pretty capable at cooking for his age and Julius is still a very good mercenary even without being able to use his Chromatus openly.

And eventually they bounce around Rieze Maxia, Julius trying to find the remnants of the Elympions who were stranded, and he eventually finds Derrick Mathis and talks to him. Derrick confirms that Exodus still exists but warns Julius against working with them, and basically tells him it’s futile to try and return to Elympios and that Julius should just try and live a peaceful life here.

And Julius is like. Yeah no. He’s not any ordinary Elympion and the Trial is still ongoing even if no one in Rieze Maxia knows it is. (He doesn’t yet know that thanks to Maxwell, RM is completely removed from the Trial, as far as he knows RM was separated exclusively because of the spyrix issue) and he still knows that Spirius is going to want into Rieze Maxia eventually because they can’t cross the Schism in Fractured Dimensions.

I have. Some vague thought of Julius secretly working with Exodus and Gilland while he and Ludger live in Leronde with Leia and Jude (Julius is probably a mercenary who occasionally travels but is extremely reluctant to actually leave Ludger alone, as Ludger is probably working as a cook at Leia’s parents’ inn) but... god I’m gonna have to play X1. This is how I’m gonna play X1? For a Kresnik bros fic?

I am SO predictable.

Anyway Julius probably looks to be the bad guy once Ludger gets caught up in Jude and Milla’s stuff. Considering the Elympios thing is a massive reveal I’m definitely gonna have to rework it and reveal it a lot sooner because Julius already knows stuff. (He’s actually intending on sabotaging the Lance of Kresnik project, for reasons) There’s probably a lot of arguing and stuff but eventually when Milla reveals that “she” sealed off Elympios, Julius explains Exodus is probably backed by Spirius in order to retrieve the last two Waymarkers.

(Basically, AU where the first three Waymarkers were already acquired in Elympios, but the final two are Long Dau’s Dust and Maxwell’s Temporal Blade, so after figuring that out, Spirius has been working on entering Rieze Maxia and once they get it they’ll be able to complete Origin’s Trial right then and there)

So Julius talks to Wingul and Gaius (I know they meet w Jude’s party at some point in X1 just... Work with me here, I don’t know X1’s story very well at all and I definitely need to play the game before I do anything...) and explains everything and suggests that if they just give Spirius the last two Waymarkers, they’ll stop trying to break down the Schism and leave Rieze Maxia alone. Of course there’s still the issue of spyrix technology killing spirits in Elympios, and Alvin is NOT on board with this plan because my dude wants to go the fuck home, whereas Julius is like 100% okay with both never going back to Elympios and allowing Elympios to suffer the death of spirits or fail the Trial, hence his attempts at sabotaging the Lance, because Exodus shenanigans aside, he and Ludger have a pretty okay and safe life in Rieze Maxia, and he’s tracked down lore about Maxwell refusing to partake in Origin’s Trial and handling soul purification outside of Origin, which Milla seemingly corroborates.

Unfortunately for him, the rest of the party may not like Elympios but they still have qualms about implicitly allowing another world to die out via their inaction, especially when they hear between Milla’s recollection of the Genesis Sage (who is not named Milla and does not look like Milla but she still had an importance to Maxwell at least) and Julius’ understanding of Origin’s Trial that it all just seems... really unfair to Elympios too.

But Julius is obviously very okay with it because “destroying another world to save the one I care about” is literally what he’s been doing almost his entire life. And he has zero affection for Elympios beyond what role Ludger played in it. And Ludger is with him and safe so...

Unfortunately Ludger is also very freaked out by everything Julius has hidden from him and also his total acceptance of risking the lives of everyone they once knew in Elympios. Sure, Ludger didn’t really know anyone besides Julius but still... seeing his brother appear that okay about genocide is...

Either way there’s a back and forth but he? convinces Wingul (or Gaius convinces Wingul) to give over the dust used for his booster and Julius’ presence as a Chromatus user reveals it to indeed be a Waymarker so he hands that off to a DODA agent part of the Elympion army and makes an offer to Spirius that they will get them the final Waymarker in exchange for leaving RM alone.

This either works and it’s just a trek to find Maxwell’s blade along with the requisite revelation that Milla isn’t really Maxwell, or they waffle on the morality of abandoning Elympios to the Trial and the party decides to save Elympios anyway (Ludger eventually convinces Julius to care, obviously), putting them at odds with Muzet

And after stopping Muzet and dispelling the Schism they head off to complete the Trial and beat Bisley’s ass so he doesn’t enslave all the spirits anyway and like, wish for all the Chromatus users to stop being able to use their powers, so Catalysts stop being created and new FDs stop being created and Origin just has to deal with soul purification for whatever dimensions are still left, and we don’t have to commit even MORE genocide.

And maybe punch Origin a little because I hate him now.

WAIT FUCK I STILL NEED TO FIX THE SOUL BRIDGE THING SLSHSKSHSKS you know what we’re un-nerfing Milla. She can build the soul bridge herself. Fuck Chronos and the sacrifice. Something something the soul bridge becomes a metaphor for cooperation between Rieze Maxians and the Kresnik clan.

(Honestly I don’t think it’d be that hard to keep Ludger and Julius from overtaking X1’s original plot. Their Chromatus isn’t even as OP because Julius neeeeeeeds to keep it hidden and is literally incapable of just murdering his way through the plot for once. He CAN jump into FDs but it’s so dangerous to risk getting stuck separated by the Schism (and he would have to explain the whole thing to Ludger if they were to hide in FDs that eventually got destroyed) that he doesn’t bother. And I imagine Ludger is pretty good friends with Jude and Leia and grows up with them as this quiet chill older kid friend but he’s lying to them about Elympios and even in X2 canon he doesn’t really have friends besides Nova so he’s still pretty codependent on Julius, and vice versa. So as an X1 fic it’s gonna be disappointing but as a Kresnik bros fic I’m gonna have fun!)

Optional storyline, obviously, where before Julius joins the party and reveals everything, Ludger is in possession of one of their pocketwatches and activates his Chromatus in a crisis, spurring a subplot about wtf it means, which Julius eventually comes around to explaining. Julius obviously freaks the hell out about it though.

So I guess I’m playing X1 someday...........

#v #x2