I ask Anya if she’d like to resume her Fates game.

Anya: YEAH! Maybe tonight we can defeat my father! Yeah! Maybe I can do mean SIDEKICKS, pow! Defeat him!



I load up her game.



Anya: Wait! Before we defeat him, Leo needs to teach me how to sidekicks! Because before when he was teaching me how to fight, he forgot to teach me how to do sidekicks!

Me: Sadly, we’re not fighting your father tonight.

Anya: Aw! Why? Why can’t we?

Me: Because that’s not how the game works. It has a story that we have to follow.



Anya is disappointed, but is soon distracted by Camilla. ‘I want to change my hair to Camilla’s! But remember, Mommy, we couldn’t choose Camilla’s hair when you created me? We chose my hair to be braided up when we first played Fire Emblem! With a butterfly clip!’



Before we start Chapter 16, we visit the treehouse and we chat to Leo, then Anya chooses to invite Kaze up, too. Afterwards she requests to change her hair back to the braids in combination with the butterfly clip.



We have a little chat about the Fates children. Anya asks what her babies’ names are, and I explain how we still have to recruit Soleil.



Anya: And when we get Soleil, she can teach Benny and Beruka’s baby to fight!



We have limited time in which to play - it’s already past Anya’s usual bedtime - so we have to skip any paralogues, and move straight onto the chapter itself.



Corrin and her crew are setting sail for Hoshido. Xander has finally joined the party! Jasmine and Peri welcome him back. Iago questions Corrin’s and Azura’s whereabouts on the previous night; Corrin deftly provides Iago with a satisfactory answer, and when Iago replies, ‘you are a role model to us all’, Anya takes Iago at face value and says, ‘that giggles me with pride!’



Me: Do you mean ‘fills you with pride?’

Anya: No. See, I’m giggling. He giggles me with pride!



Once on board the ship, Corrin and the Nohrians are set upon by Hoshidan ninja disguised as pirates.

Anya: Ooh, are we going to kill pirates? I want to kill a rock!

Me: A what?

Anya: A rock.

Me: Like… what’s a rock?

Anya: A big grey thing, mom. I want to hit it hard.



Sometimes you think you misheard your daughter, but it turns out she really was saying what you thought she was saying after all.



At other times, however, she can be genuinely hard to understand, still. I explain how the pirates are actually ninja in disguise:



Anya: Are they sy?

Me: Sy?

Anya: Yeah. Are the ninja hiding because they’re sy?

Me: Oh, you mean SHY?

Anya: Yeah! Are they shy?



We begin the battle. Only then do I discover that the last time I let Anya operate the game herself, she disarmed all of her army.



A quick reset later, and we begin the battle again. Camilla, Niles and Mozu kick some serious ass.



Anya: That butt lucky bow is working amazing for Mozu! And the fantastic butt bow is working just perfect for Niles!



Yes, yes they are.



She’s also impressed by Kana’s acrobatics: ‘Kana jumps like a flipping dolphin!’



Finally, we unmask and capture Shura, the leader of the piratical ninja.



Anya: How did that pirate sneak aboard? Maybe he’s a skirious pirate!

Me: Skirious?

Anya: Yeah! Skirious.

Me: What does skirious mean?

Anya, shrugging: I don’t know.



Now Corrin has to decide whether to execute Shura, or to spare Shura’s life and allow him to join her army. Leo and Camilla advise Corrin to execute Shura, which sends Anya into genuine distress. She kept saying, ‘I don’t know what to do, Mom! I don’t know!’



Luckily, Xander gives Anya some reassurance. He emphasizes that it’s Corrin’s choice to make, and I also add that it’s perfectly okay to spare Shura’s life if she wants to - he isn’t going to harm us. So, Anya chooses to let Shura live.

