Throughout its history, Fire Emblem has featured an enormous number of characters. Whether they be playable units, enemies, or assorted NPC and background characters, the Fire Emblem roster has been growing rapidly for years. It makes sense that fans would want a Fire Emblem entry that highlights the franchise’s star-studded casts. A few games have tried to offer that before, including Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE and Fire Emblem Warriors, but they didn't scratch quite the same itch as the mobile game Fire Emblem Heroes.
While not quite the same as normal Fire Emblem title, Fire Emblem Heroes has done a stellar job of bringing together the entire series' extended cast. Nowhere else can fans find such a concentrated amount of love for the entire franchise, including games that did not make it out of Japan. One of those got a bit more love on January 28, 2022 when Elimine: Scouring Saint was added to Fire Emblem Heroes as its 25th Mythic Hero. She technically originates from Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade, but the truth behind her Heroes appearance is much stranger.
Saint Elimine’s In-Universe Backstory
Elimine was one of the Eight Legends, or Eight Generals, who brought an end to The Scouring, a terrible war between humans and dragons. This event is pivotal to the history of Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade and The Blazing Blade, and both games’ plots ultimately involve dealing with some manner of fallout from it. These games take place over 1,000 years after The Scouring, so only a couple of the Eight Legends are alive in The Blazing Blade - both have died by the time Binding Blade starts. Toward the end of The Scouring, the Divine Weapons were forged to combat the dragons, and the Eight Legends were judged powerful enough to wield them. Elimine was given the Aureola tome, and she was already using the Staff of the Saint.
After The Scouring, Elimine went on to start the Kingdom of Etruria. She also founded the Elimine Church, which would become the dominant religion of the continent of Elibe, and dedicated the rest of her life to doing the work of the church's god. Numerous parables of her exploits and sermons arose and were spread by the church, such as "the story of the owl and the eagle." Aside from that, Elimine has very little impact in the games that introduced her, only being brought up as part of larger stories or as the focus of a parable. She does have a rough design courtesy of The Blazing Blade, but was not playable or referenced in any Fire Emblem prior to Heroes.
Elimine’s Odd Path to Fire Emblem Heroes
Elimine does not have any more substantial reference material in the Fire Emblem franchise, which is a problem for Fire Emblem Heroes. A lot of Elimine’s personality, beliefs, and abilities had to be extrapolated from the limited information found in The Binding Blade and The Blazing Blade. The amount of work Heroes has supplied raises confidence that all the Eight Legends could be added eventually, but there is one other source that Elimine’s portrayal took from.
In 2003, pre-orders of the Nintendo GameCube game Mario Kart: Double Dash!! from certain retailers were packaged with a promotional disc. It contained trailers and demos for various games, as well as special transferrable content for Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade - known as Fire Emblem in the West. This mostly consisted of special items unavailable in the main game, as well as two exclusive songs. When the option to transfer this content was selected from the disc's main menu, Elimine appeared to confirm the process, calling the transferred items and songs her "sacred gifts."
The character's design in Fire Emblem Heroes draws heavily from the half-body artwork seen in the bonus disc, meaning this version of Saint Elimine has finally been canonized in Fire Emblem. It’s fun to see Fire Emblem Heroes reference such an obscure piece of trivia now that it’s in its fifth year.
Fire Emblem Heroes is available now on Android and iOS devices.
