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This is the fill for Prompt #27 of AUgust: "Mythical Creatures AU."
Another one that got away from me, though only a bit! The idea of entering some kind of competition with a mythical creature as a partner was my first thought, and then I realized that it was sort of a daemon AU. (It's not fully a His Dark Materials daemon AU, but the basic trope is there.)
This is certainly another one that is very much leading into more story, though I don' t yet know for sure whether I'll have a good chance to continue it!
Riku, Kairi, and Sora all have their own reasons for entering the tournament, but they all have the same goal: they're going to win, no matter how likely or unlikely anyone else thinks that will be.
For Riku, it was a matter of prestige.
His family had always chosen to compete, and they had historically done well. None had been champions, but his grandfather and his daemon had been part of the second-place team the year he competed. His mother had been fourth.
Making it to the team rounds at all was considered a lifetime honor, since it signified the participants had made it through all of the individual brackets to get there. As a global competition, that was impressive all on its own. Riku was set on obtaining his spot. He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t aiming to unseat his grandfather as the family’s champion, even if he expressed a more tempered goal when asked directly.
When his daemon manifested, it had been a mild surprise, considering it was fairly… mundane at first glance, at least compared to the much more exotic mythological beasts that were common in his family. His father’s was a bull made of fire, his mother’s was a feathered serpent. Riku’s was… a black dog.
She had quickly distinguished herself as one of the spectral black dogs of folklore as opposed to an ordinary pet. She was the protective kind rather than a death omen, but her ability to manifest far outside the usual range for a daemon away from its partner had surprised plenty of unsuspecting people.
Riku named her “Oblivion,” because he thought it sounded very cool and intimidating when she appeared to him at thirteen. Later on it felt like more of an inside joke between the two of them, even as he shortened it to “Liv” when he talked about her to anyone else.
They’d also embraced the striking black of her fur as compared to the pale silver of his hair, and played up what a contrasting pair they were.
When they entered the competition, Riku and Liv’s odds were good, by some metrics even favored to win the whole thing. All predictions favored him to make it through the individual rounds and into the team brackets, with reasonable odds to finish within the top eight.
For Kairi, it was a matter of reputation.
She’d long had to try and work her way out from under the shadow of a famous family. Her biological father, for all that he’d had no hand in raising her, had still been a champion when he’d competed. His daemon had been a dragon, enormous and awe-inspiring when he’d led his team to victory.
She’d had no idea they were related until later, after her own daemon had manifested. And by the time she knew, everyone knew, and she’d suddenly faced constant scrutiny and speculation about what she would do with her life.
Kairi could have taken a contrary route, deciding to never enter the tournament, just to ensure she could never be compared to the family she’d never known. Unfortunately, by that point she already had wanted to enter, to prove someone from the little town she’d been sent away to be raised in could do well. Of course, once her heritage was known, anything less than being part of the champion team would feel like a failure.
Sometimes she wondered whether knowing her father, or even knowing who he was earlier, would have changed anything. It might have changed her goals. Maybe even her daemon’s appearance, though that was hard to speculate on. Kairi would never have wanted to change her.
Her daemon was also a dragon… a tiny sea dragon, and she loved to twine like a small snake around Kairi’s arm or neck, displaying herself like the finest of silver-and-pearl jewelry. Hardly the commanding presence of her father’s famed fire-breathing monstrosity.
“Destiny,” as Kairi had named her—in what felt like a fairly dramatic irony later,—did not breathe fire. She was easy to underestimate, but the absolutely wicked venom in her fangs made it difficult to underestimate her twice.
Kairi and Destiny were ranked well when they entered, with it considered almost a given that she’d excel in the individual rounds and make it to a team. Almost no one expected them to finish in the top four, with most guessing she’d be knocked out within the first round of team competition. Kairi could have taken that as an insult, but instead it just felt like something else to push back all the harder against.
For Sora, it was a matter of the reward.
The prestige would be nice too, no question. But being part of the winning team also meant a financial prize, not to mention later sponsorship or advertising potential. It was the sort of thing that could go a long way toward helping a small fishing village. Sora wanted nothing more than to help his mother have an easier life, along with the rest of their friends and neighbors.
No one in Sora’s family had ever competed. His father had wanted to, but hadn’t been able to in the end. He’d been needed at home, needed for the fleets. He’d spent his entire life working those fleets, and he died at sea working them.
They’d had one competitor who’d gone on behalf of the village, decades before, and he was long gone by the time Sora was born. His daemon had been a sea serpent, and the accolades he’d received for having even made it into the team rounds had been a point of pride for the village ever since.
Sora had always been an oddity as far as the village was concerned. He liked the sea, but didn’t love it the way most of them did. He’d always been drawn more to the sky. It wasn’t the biggest surprise, considering, that his daemon manifested as a gryphon. Something that could take to the sky. The bird half of his daemon appropriately resembled an osprey, a fishing hawk, still tied to his village’s purpose.
He named his daemon “Highwind,” and started to plan for an eventual tournament run, setting up obstacle courses for them along the beach.
The odds when the pair of them entered were mixed. Highwind was an impressive daemon, which gave them points in their favor. The utter lack of regional or familial experience in the competition mostly counted against them. There was always the possibility that they would be the start of some new line of champions, but that was considered a long shot, intended only to appeal to those who wanted an underdog story. He didn’t let that bother him. He knew what he was aiming for.
