Chapter 10: The Trials of a King 9/9

When Dante woke up he was sitting in a chair in front of a decorated desk. Sitting behind the desk was a man in his late thirties, early forties. He had black styled hair with a clean cut to it, on the sides of his head were grey streaks right above his ears. His black crystalline eyes seemed to hold boundless wisdom and a bit of…sadness? His facial features had obviously not declined with age as his face was sculpted to almost perfection, his hair extended down into a beard to emphasize his age. Dante recognized the man as Regis Lucis Calaem, the 13th king of Lucis. "Greetings your highness, King Regis. My name is Dante, seeing as I have done all but two of the trials I must assume this is the Trial of the Father," Regis gave Dante a once over and gave a satisfied nod at his greeting. "You are correct young one, this is indeed the Trial of the Father, but this is not like what you may think. In this trial I only ask one question. Are you willing to sacrifice your family, friends, and kingdom, in order to secure a better future?" He gave Dante a long look waiting for his answer. "I must apologize but no, I am not willing to sacrifice them. I will never sacrifice those close to me just to secure a momentary victory. Should my kingdom be in danger I will face the army alone before I sacrifice my citizens." Dante's voice was calm, calculated, and confident. "You are a strong boy but not yet a man. You will realize in the future that some sacrifices are indeed necessary whether we want them or not. However, all the same I would have failed you should you had accepted the losses of the many to save the few that could change the world. Congratulations young man you pass the Trial of the Father. Say hello to my son in the next trial and remember that some lives cannot be spared nor saved." With this he turned into a crystalline saber with a decorated hand guard. "Of course, your majesty." With that white greeted Dante once more.

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When Dante woke up he was standing in the middle of a ruined city and in front of him was a youth with black hair and crystalline eyes. His face was a bit immature, but his eyes and posture screamed royalty, he was dressed in a black shirt and punk jacket along with some cargo shorts and punk boots. He was Noctis Lucis Caleam, the 14th king of Lucis. "I see you made it to the final trial, good work." Dante gave a nod and said, "What is my trial?" Noctis gave him a long look before speaking, "You probably know that sometimes a king must sacrifice himself for his people. In this trial your kingdom is fighting an impossible war and the other side has sworn an unbreakable vow that is your head is presented to them they will call off the war and take good care of your territories. Your trial is to kill yourself to show that you are willing to make the ultimate sacrifice for your people." When he finished Noctis pulled out a sword, it had mechanical parts on the guard that looked like an engine. He held out the hilt to Dante and waited for hi, to take it. "I will protect my people, but it will be at my own blade that I die." Before Noctis could react, Dante called out Rebellion and Yamato, he then stabbed Rebellion into his stomach and Yamato into his heart, but the thing is he didn't cry or get angry. Instead he had a happy smile that was filled with contentment knowing his people would be safe. Noctis was shocked by his resolve and gave a wry smile, "Good work, you pass the trial. Now come back to us True King." With this Noctis turned into a crystalline blade just like the one he tried to hand Dante and entered him.

When Dante stabbed himself with Yamato and Rebellion, he was nervous for a moment, but it quickly passed. After what felt to be about an hour he woke up and was looking at the 14 kings once again. Noctis was the first to speak, "Congratulations, you have passed all of the trial and in record time I might add. You now have full access to our powers, and I wanted to let you know that you may store up to 100 other weapons in her but no more as it would get a bit crowded. Also, each of the Kings' Arms have a unique ability but you will figure them out at some point. Now then let's wake you back up, shall we?" With this Dante felt his body become very heavy as he fell asleep and his body turned into blue, black, and red crystalline particles.

When Dante woke up, he found himself in his mother's lap with her stroking his head with her delicate hands. "Hey sleepy head. What did I tell you about overworking yourself? Well, whatever, I'm glad you are awake." When she finished speaking and saw something she never expected, Dante was crying. He quickly dashed up and pulled her into a strong hug of both love and fear. She was shocked, and her motherly instincts kicked in, "What is the matter Dante? Just tell me and I will do my best to help you." In between his sobs Dante said, "Sob..y-y-you..sob..a-already are. Just by being here, alive, happy, not broken, I love you mom." She was shocked. Dante had never acted like this even as a baby. Slowly calming himself down he managed to ask, "How long was I out?" Eve (Dante's mom), replied, "5 hours son. What happened while you were out?" Dante let out a sigh of relief before saying, "I unlocked one of my 3 sacred gears!" Eve was shocked, but that shock was immediately replaced with joy. Now her baby boy could protect himself. To demonstrate Dante used the basic form of his newly acquired sacred gear [Armigar]. All of his weapons were slowly rotating around him, his Kings' Arms were a dark blue, his Devil Arm was purplish-black, and his inheritance weapons were crimson red. Eve was mesmerized by the weapons. "They aren't just projections mom; I can summon them at any time." To demonstrate he willed the Sword of the Wise to come to him and it became a real sword just like he said. "They also mentioned that I could store up to 100 more weapons inside me. My only regret is some of the things I had to do or see when unlocking some of them." This caught Eve's attention and she looked at her son with a concerned and curious look. Seeing her unasked question Dante recalled everything that happened, and she immediately went into comforting mother mode when he recalled the Trial of the Fierce as he went visibly pale just recalling it, but he didn't mention Rose. After he finished, she had tears in her eyes and a proud smile on her face, "My baby boy is growing into a man faster that I would like but it can't be helped. I love you son and I want what is best for you, so I am going to ask something difficult for you." As she said this, she pulled out a necklace that had an uncut gem on it, the gem was a mixture of blue and red, but the colors never mixed like they were separate entities. Dante calmly put on the necklace and waited for his mother to continue, "I am going to pack you a bag of clothes and I want you to go live in Japan with a close friend of mine and your father. I will give you a credit card that is already transferred into yen and it has a little over 5.6 million yen on it so even after you move out you will be okay. Now I don't want to hear any back talk because we both know that this is for the best. Whether we like it or not is irrelevant. Now I want you to get up, stretch, then go pack your things. I am not asking you but telling you." Dante had a few tears in his eyes but simply nodded and did as he was told.

When packing Dante grabbed his clothes, jacket, boots, laptop, phone, headphones, wallet, and a picture of him and his mom. Making sure he didn't leave anything important Dante did a once over on his room before turning off the lights and closing the door for the last time.