Welcome to The Lotus King project page. This is a Sacred Stone hack with an original story and characters. This is very much a work in progress and it will be a very very long time until the game is in full working order.
Last year out of the blue, I revived from an eleven-year hiatus the Decay of the Fangs hack by filling out the second half of the game and making some general improvements to the base game. Rather than keeping this project in the dark and doing a sudden release like my last project, I thought I’d get it out early to vet ideas and get improvements along the way. I’m still pretty new at rom hacking and am very open to collaborating. This game itself may change drastically before it settles into its final shape.
Credits
I’m working alone on this project at the moment but I have used animations from the sprite repository and spliced some portraits I found on there. The impression I got is that these are okay to use. I’m going to keep adding to this list as I add things to the game.
7743 for being the absolute legend to put together FEBuilder
Spud, TBA, Black Mage, Temp, Wan Suhayma’s alternate second class ameila knight sprite
TBA, Spud, MeatofJustice Bakwena starter class soldier
GabrielKnight, BigMood Samurai animation
Jj09, Pikmin1211 for Dark mage animation
FE7if for Vorvo animation
Mercenary Lord, NYZGamer, Pikmin1211, Maiser6 Bakewna second stage
RedBean, Jj09 Kezia Lotus King
Spud, Leolink, Iscaneous, Nuramon Templemen
Leo_link, Spud, MeatOfJustice Ruhi and other archers
Nuramon Cricket sniper animation
Marlon0024 Jackal Sage
MK404 Knights animation
Obsidian Daddy, Rexacuse, Leo Link Promoted Elijah
Blade Skin tones
Caringcarrot for some splicing content for Kayvan, Astr and Yazdan, hair pieces on some others
SomeDenseGuy for splice hair used on Astr
ZeMedic for armor used on Astr
JT for Suhayma splice material
JT for Vampires Marzanna and Mora
L95 for Skeleton mug
Nuramon various armors
Nobody for splice content on Tarcin
Blademaster splice content armor for young Shaddai and old Shaddai
MrGreen3339 for splice content taken from Diane
Rasdel, Spud Deserter class portrait used for Templemen class portrait
Flasuban, Jj09 for the fire used in Mik3 class portrait
Yoshirider I think I spliced a shoulder spike from OC6
MarioBro for Wicke and kickstarting Black Fang
Olechandserif (imo probably the best fe portrait spriter) for hair and face splice material taken for Attalid
RedBean, Jj09 for Fir animation used for Kezia
Spud, Leolink, Iscaneous, Nuramon for Templemen animation
TBA, Spud, MeatofJustice for Halberdier used for Bakwena
MercenaryLord, NYZGamer, Pikmin1211, Maiser6 for Dragoon animation
Nuramon for Cricket sniper animation
Leo_link, Spud, MeatofJustice for archers animation
IS, MK404, MakeFEGayer for pegasus knight sword animation
Flasuban, Greentea, RobertFPY for Astr animation
JonoTheRed for supplier animation
Dolkar for the rifleman gun
Pikmin1211, Retrogamer for hexer animation
Flasuban, eCut Helmetless wyvern
With the preface complete, let’s get into what this hack is all about.
[UPS PATCH] Updated 6/16/2022 (Lotus King.PATCH.20220616203359)
If you downloaded the first patch, please update. There was a progress blocking bug in chapter 4.
The Lotus and the Spider's Thread
One fine morning in Paradise, Buddha was taking a walk alone around the Lotus Pond. The white lotus flowers filled the air with a sweet fragrance. Buddha stopped and looked down below through the lotus leaves. The floor of Hell was right below the Lotus Pond, and he could see the Sanzu-no-Kawa and Hari-no-Yama. There he saw a man who was having a hard time along with the other sinners. The man’s name was Kandata. He was a bad man. He killed many people in his life. But he did one good thing.
One day, when Kandata was walking through a forest, he saw a spider. He was going to crush it with his foot. But he thought, “No, no. Although it’s a very small spider, it has life, too. I can’t kill it.”
Buddha remembered this good deed and thought, “I’ll give Kandata a chance to escape from Hell.” Buddha saw a spider which was spinning a beautiful thread on the green lotus leaves. Buddha carefully took the spider’s thread in his hand, and through an opening among the lotus leaves he let it down into Hell.
The World
The Lotus King is set in the empire of Xsaca (Kh sha thah). If Elibe is influenced by Greece, Xsaca is the Persian Empire. It is grander, more modern, and heavily militarized. The Empire is effectively a republic in the sense that specific councilmen have the ability to nominate the emperor. This nomination right extends to all people. Functionally however, one family has not been contested for a century. An alleged bastard known as The Great Pretender claims the lineage of the dying emperor and contests the throne against his stoic cousin. Of course, things turn out far more complicated than a simple family squabble.
Other factions gain prominence on the continent. One, a private military which has harnessed the dragon amber of dead manaketes post-Bern war. Another guild of assassins setting a railroad like network of warp staves making instant travel and regicide possible across the continent.
The game has callbacks to the Black Fang romhack but it is not required at all to play this one. You’ll simply have “oh, snap, I got that reference” moments if you’ve played both.
The Characters
Though this conflict draws in our cast, it is a tale not told through a lord’s journey but the idealistic peasant children swept up in his campaign. The story is largely a coming of age story about our protagonist, Elijah. Elijah finds himself suddenly appearing in this foreign land, somehow able to speak the local language. He is quickly indebted to the kindness of strangers, overwhelmed by the pressures to fulfil a role which puts the practical needs of others over his own emotional needs, and a mysterious doomsday clock ticking away all magic from the continent.
Chapters
Presently there are eight playable chapters including the prologue. Six from Elijah’s perspective and two from the perspective or Shaddai, a supporter of the establishment candidate Kayvan III. Supports have not begun but will be in play later. Talk conversations are “hidden” in various chapters and can reward valuable items and even skills.
The game is not adequately balance tested.
Content Warning
This game will contain emotional manipulation, specifically of child soldiers for political purposes.
Some adult language is used (but far less than Black Fang - in that game the characters were based on coal-union blue-collar guys so they used a lot of it. A few people apparently had an issue with it.)
In order to later subvert it, the game is going to give the impression that this is a White Savior story. It’s not.
Every chapter is named after a Queen song… if you were wondering what was up with that.
Chapters
Prologue: Now I’m Here
1: The Great Pretender
2: Leaving Home Ain’t Easy
3: Killer Queen
4: Living On My Own
5: All God’s People
6: Breakthru
7: All Dead - All Dead
8: Made in Heaven
Spoiler
Our protagonist Elijah is trans. Always a compassionate character, Elijah will continue to be kind but will grow firm and resolute in his principles. Rejecting half-measures and platitudes. I want to be as respectful as possible with this character and could use advice from time to time.