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chiclet-go-boom · 3 years

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okay, so. FFXIV.

i’ve had super emotional moments in games before. if you play any sort of story game, particularly but not limited to JRPGs, and you pay attention to that story you’re going to find at least one thing that makes your lip all wobbly and you have to get up and walk away for awhile.

Aerith dying (FFVII). Bay or Bae (Life Is Strange). The whole of Shadow of the Colossus it feels like. Ico.

but man, i’ve never had a wrecking emotional moment in an MMO before.

[spoilers for the end of ARR and midway through Heavensward]

and it’s my own damn fault it feels like. because i sort of feel compelled to embroider on the given details of a story after years of fanfic reading and writing and the Main Story Quest throughline of FFXIV just begs for even more embellishment. Cid’s estranged friend-turned-enemy. The dire warnings from Gaius van Baelsar which make me wonder what the hell he knows that I don’t know. The ominous things attached to Urianger.

but here I am, tripping blithely through A Realm Reborn, learning to be who I need to be and I end up meeting Lord Haurchefant.

He’s a cold man, ruling a winter landscape and he’s got almost less than no time for me at the start. We’re in the way, he’s got more serious concerns than random adventurers who are no doubt stupid enough to trip off the local ice cliffs that he’s going to have to send out rescue squads for, and while he does permit us to travel through his lands you can tell he’s not best pleased by this.

but you end up moving through Coerthas a LOT and you end up talking to My Lord High Ice Commander On His High Horse more than a few times and he slowly starts to thaw. And he gets warmer and warmer as time goes on, his worry for you starts to come to the fore and honestly, as the player of my character, I actually start wondering what the two of them are getting up to in his cold halls.

Because I am pretty sure when we travel to his lands at some point there ends up being mulled wine and spices and a white bearskin rug in front of a fire to greet us, and winter kisses and the taste of ice to wash away the blood we’re wading through.

That’s me though, decorating things a little, making the world a little brighter to have someone to look forward to. Head canon, y’know. Actual canon just gives you Haurchefant’s eventual grudging respect and then growing admiration and a willingness to stand with you and help.

By the time it all goes tits up at the end of ARR, he’s a fast friend to the Warrior of Light and their cause and a loyal one above and beyond his not inconsiderable grip of his demesne.

Because when you come to him bloodied and reeling, he offers you safe refuge without question. Not only that, he offers you a place where no one can touch you, calling on his bloodline to grant you passage through the Gates of Ishgard which have been closed to outsiders for nigh on a thousand years, a bloodline of which you were previous to this moment completely unaware.

and i’m sorry. i just... like, okay. Haurchefant, you tight lipped bastard, you never told me during all those imagined kisses that you were the unacknowledged actual bastard son of a Lord of one of the High Houses. And unacknowledged in terms of the succession perhaps, but oh, so obviously loved and valued by your father. Your word to him and we are greeted with welcome and succor and strength of arms at our back.

Your word carries us to the Lord Commander of Ishgard, himself.

And Heavensward continues relentlessly apace and we take up arms for our new place that is starting to feel more and more like a home, and the Lord Commander becomes Ser Aymeric and then my friend and there are so many, many things that touch the heart. And our Lord of Ice returns as he must to guard the Gates and the lands that hold it sacrosanct, but comes when the need is greatest. To fight once more with us against the towering greed of a man who refuses to see what his plans will bring to fruition if he is not stopped.

And we’re all on that bridge, desperate to prevent the Archbishop’s escape with his exalted, corrupted Temple Knights, to end this civil war before it can truly start and it’s another bridge for us, just like the Gates, another chance to be shoulder to shoulder, together.

And the blade of light falls like a lightning bolt from on high.

Right for my heart, to pierce me to the ground and wipe away all hope and there he is somehow... my Haurchefant, shield raised and somehow, somehow holding back all that magic, that snarling lance quivering and snapping against the symbol of his House.

Mortal wood and riveted steel is not meant to hold back the brightness of aether. A second, two, it holds and I think oh, oh, he has saved me and his body is stretched above mine tall and proud and then, oh shit, oh shit no, the shield breaks, splinters, falls apart and it goes through his heart as it was meant for mine.

And he falls, my imagined lover and my certain friend and the one person I ran to when all else was lost and he tells me... the bastard fucking tells me to smile as he dies and goddamn you, FFXIV, for making me type out this entire thing on tumblr of all places, just so there is SOME record of how I felt watching him bleed out.

And the villain escapes and Ser Aymeric loses both his father and his friend to each side of that line of treachery and I lose something I didn’t even know I had.

My Lord of Winter, Haurchefant of House Fortemps, I miss you so much already. What do I have to look forward to now?

fanart by yy6242

#ffxiv #heavensward #lord haurchefant #ffxiv spoilers

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lily-blu · 3 years

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“I promise I’ll stay on my side of the bed” with Thancred. Can he keep that promise (doubtful hehe)

(Premise is that the Scions all know Mai and Thancred are crazy for each other so they purposefully put them in these situations, I would say this is in ShB when they reach Urianger, he does NOT tell them he has extra sleeping mats and thus, he takes the couch before either Thancred or Mai can and Ryne takes the guest bed. Also, I got way too carried away, hope you enjoy! And also, I suspect he would be able to unless she made the first move and then he would 100% koala onto her so here you goooo)

"I promise I'll stay on my side of the bed," Thancred smiled. Gods, I missed his smile-NO, no I did NOT. Mai's gaze shifted to the floor. How hard could it truly be? "Oh, come on Mai. We're adults! Unless you think you can't keep to your side," Thancred teased, waggling his eyebrows suggestively.

"Keep making faces like that and it'll stick that way," Mai huffed. Thancred lets out a low laugh and she can't help it when the corners of her mouth twitch upward. She sat on the corner of the bed and removed her socks and jacket. As close to the edge as she can she lied down with her hands straight by her side. This is fine.

"By the twelve, do you actually sleep like that?" Thancred asked. "You look like a corpse."

"Maybe I do, what's it to you?" Mai asked, keeping her gaze locked on the ceiling of Urianger's main room. Why in the seven hells would he fall asleep on the couch when he had his own room? Her heartbeat quickened as she felt the bed shift beside her. In order to appear nonchalant, she broke her staring contest with the overhead light and looked over.

"I highly doubt that," Thancred said, propping his head on his hand. "If anybody here needs to get a good sleep it's you, so if you're really that uncomfortable I'll go wake up Ryne and we can switch places so she's here instead." Mai frowned, the young girl deserved some alone time, and it was already late.

"No, no, I don't want to wake her," Mai sighed. "Fine, I'll relax. I trust you." And she did. Turning back over she shimmied her way under the covers. Although the problem wasn't her trust in him, it was her trust in herself. It'd been 5 years for him, he probably just remembered her as an old work colleague. Where to her he was her best friend that had collapsed like a week ago. She had been devasted. Because he was her best friend, nothing more. Then why am I so worried about keeping my hands to myself? She was not going to dissect that right now...or ever.

"Okay, well then goodnight sweetheart." Thancred joked. Mai's face went red. To hide it she turned away from him, and slowly, eventually, fell asleep.

....8-ish hours later...(in Spongebob Squarepant's voice)

Hmm, goodness this bed is warm. Did Urianger have some sort of heating magic blanket? She nuzzled into the warmth. She hadn't slept so well in a while, maybe she should ask what kind of pillows he had...then the bed moved. Her eyes shot open, remembering she was not, in fact, alone in this bed. Her face heated as she realized she was not curled up in a warm bed, but instead into Thancred's side. How dare he! Her heartbeat quickened as she surveyed the room. Oh, oh he hadn't dared. Her head dropped into her hand. She was completely on his side of the bed. He was almost falling off the edge. But, he was still asleep she could still move over.

Mai began to slowly, as slowly as she could, slide over to her side of the bed without waking him up. "Mmm, 5 more minutes..." Thancred mumbled. His arm around her waist (when did that get there) tightened. Pulling her back to his side and into his chest. He rolled over, fully engulfing her in a hug and burying his head in her hair. I'm going to have a heart attack, this is how I go. She thought as her heart raced uncontrollably. Gods, he was strong. And he smelled good. And honestly, if this was how she died then that wasn't too bad of a way to go. A string of curse words rang through her mental speech, she had to stop thinking like that.

Then she felt a soft kiss on her forehead. I'm going to pass out, this is it, this is the end. But, instead, a surprised squeak came out of her. She felt the lips freeze and Thancred's body go still. Mai stupidly tried to pretend that she was asleep. But, the next thing she knew the warm "bed" that she had been sleeping on fell with a thud onto the ground beside the bed.

"I'm so sorry!" Thancred scrambled up to standing. She was impressed by how quickly he went from sleeping to awake. "By the twelve, I'm so sorry I was asleep and I thought..." His voice trailed off as he noticed which side of the bed he'd fallen off of.

"Apology accepted!" Mai squeaked. Throwing herself with equal speed to the other side of the bed and out of it. "I think I heard Urianger walking around, we should go!" She said quickly, practically running to the door.

"URIANGER!!" She yelled, he was going to be awake now if he wasn't already, and she was never going to share a bed with Thancred again. She ignored the disappointment she felt at that thought, bolting down the stairs and chucking a book at Urianger's slowly awakening body on the couch.

#oc: mai aatsula #mai x thancred #god help me #asked and answered #thancred waters

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ofdragonsdeep · 3 years

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14: Commend

An acquaintance sits in a dismal gaol, and Ar'telan makes a courtesy call.

(Spoilers for SB, ShB sort of)

The sharp tang in the air of the Lochs accompanied Ar’telan on his walk across the great stone bridge to the capital. Beneath him, the vast expanse of the salt lakes stretched, now narrated by the hum and clang of machinery and hammers in the saltery at its edge. The rest of the land, though, still seemed like a skeleton resting where the beast had died, signal fires flickering to mark where it had fallen. The sparse forests of zelkova trees, stalked by manticores and ghosts, the bone-white fish which stalked the lakes, the uneasy fog that settled over the place, all of it added to the sense of decay.

The druvas had been cleared from the bridge in recent days, and so his only meeting was with the guards on the gate. In the many moons since Ala Mhigo’s liberation, the guard had been taught fast vigilance, both against the threat of primals and of Garlean incursion. He was so well-recognised that he was barely bothered on his way through, only a cursory check to ensure he was not an enemy of the state walking in under wicked glamour.

There were any number of attractions within the walls of the capital to captivate a traveler’s attention. A small Ironworks outpost still worked on the question of the Weapons the Garleans had made to throw against both their traitor and their unruly territories, ready to ferry a would-be warrior to the main camp. Citizens played Triple Triad by the aetheryte, eyeing him as he passed to see if he would be amenable to a challenge. The palace, now the seat of a more democratic form of government, offered the chance to reconnect with old friends. And the Royal Menagerie, with its fields of beautiful flowers, suggested a chance for reflection on things long gone and events to come.

Ar’telan ignored all of them, instead walking down the terracotta streets until he was within the mountains the city backed, the guards on the door offering an uneasy nod of acknowledgement as he passed them. Under the rock, the uncomfortable pulse of the sky was easier to ignore, and the thoughts he carried with him were easier to find.

The royal gaol, repurposed into a place to hold the many prisoners of war that had not been killed in the war for liberation. Some of them resented their captivity, some of them would have betrayed their birthplace to the Empire without a second thought. Some of them longed for redemption, cells lying empty as they laboured in civil service under strict watch. And some…

He was not the man he had been when he had first been down here. He took a moment, centred his aether. For all the hell that Hades had wrung from him, he had learned a little, though he was not sure if it would be enough. For all they called the Resonance an artificial Echo, it was a strange beast only alike in the broadest strokes. But perhaps it would do the job.

The cell was still sparse, despite the time that had passed between Fordola’s initial confinement and now. Her clothes were nicer, less rough hemp, but the collar around her neck - dormant without a mage to activate it, but still abhorrent in its purpose - served as an unkind reminder of her station.

“You,” she said, her voice level. He nodded to her, and there was a moment of absolute silence. Her thoughts were a concealed mystery, but her feelings felt loud behind her wall, amplified by two Echo-likes in proximity. She did not flinch.

“I had hoped they would be treating you better, by now,” Ar’telan remarked, and Fordola scoffed, though it was clear she was still confused by the situation that had found her opposite the man who had put her here to begin with.

“Kill a few primals, slay a few beastmen. It doesn’t matter to them,” she said, venom in her voice, but it was tired poison now. “Why are you here?” It was a question, not one he could come up with an answer for, not an easy one. Now that the danger had passed in the First, he did not think it would be long until something surfaced to demand their attention, but for the moment they stood in the lull.

“I wanted to be sure you were ok,” he said, offering a tiny smile. “It’s my fault you’re in here, after all.” Fordola scoffed.

“I put myself in here,” she disagreed. “You and I both know that. Maybe it would have been easier if I hadn’t taken their devil’s bargain, but under it all I’m still the Empire’s Butcher.” Ar’telan sighed, sitting down against the wall opposite her cell door. They had been here before, more than once, and she never warmed to him - not that he expected her to, nor would ever want her to, unless she wished it - but every time things changed.

“Has it eased?” he asked her, and she winced at the question.

“What does it matter to you?” she demanded, even though both of them knew that he had taken every effort to shield his soul from her resonant eyes, to stop her from reliving the horrors in his past just this once.

“They don’t care to ask about it, do they?” he surmised, and she made an irritable noise. “I have-”

“I don’t need your help,” she spat. “And I don’t want it. You think they don’t relish in me seeing the hurt I’ve caused them?” Ar’telan held out a hand, a tiny spark of aether gathering in it. The Light suffused it, shimmering in the darkness of the prison complex, still there despite his victory over it. As she moved forwards, he snuffed it out.

“Perhaps I do not want your sympathy either,” he said, and she recoiled, surprise in the coil of her limbs and a scowl on her face. “It does not have to be a competition, or an exchange of pity. It does need to gain either of us anything, for good or for ill. It has been many moons since the war ended, after all.” Fordola made an irritated noise.

“Then I will consider it,” she said, a compromise he had not expected to achieve with her. “Bah, you’re both as bad as each other. At least it’s easier to tune you out than the boy.” Ar’telan stifled a laugh at that. He knew a little of Fordola’s work with Arenvald and the summoners working with the Flames, dealing with summonings out in Thanalan. Echo was Echo, even by a different name.

I wonder what Hades would think to that?

“I will give you time to think on it,” he said, pushing himself to his feet as she retreated back to her pallet. “Duty calls me back here more often than most would like, I think, so I shall call in when I can.”

“Don’t rush on my account,” she muttered, bitterness still in her voice.

---

It had been Arenvald that told him the story.

The young Scion was ever excitable, and he had been brimming with pride as he had relayed the story of their fight with Ifrit, holding back the Tempered servants who had summoned it, helping to rid the land of the scourge of the summon for just a little longer. It was a different story to the one that Jajasamu had relayed - a bitter man angry with himself for misjudging the convict, and the threat they faced, feeling lesser in his need to stay back from the full brunt of the primal’s fury. Ar’telan wondered if it would have helped them to know of his first fight with a primal, in the same summoning circle at Zanr’ak, blood drawn from the stone of desperation.

He had asked how Ar’telan felt. Ar’telan had offered a reassuring platitude, acceptance of duty and necessity, and he wasn’t sure that he had been believed.

---

The first time he had gone to see her had been after the war was over. When the Qalyana summoned their goddess into a council hall and he had held the line with Arenvald and Fordola, and she had thrown her blade to the floor and walked away. Rejected the idea of death, and shunned the idea of redemption.

The guards had tried to dissuade him as he walked past them into the gaol. He had stood in front of her and neither had spoken a word, her mind overwhelmed with every bitter memory in his mind, every wound the fight had inflicted, everything he mourned. She had looked up at him, hand over her resonant eye as if it would stop the flood, and asked him how he coped.

“I don’t.”

---

The second time he had been met with less protest, at least from the guard. Again he had sat himself outside her cell, her mouth shut in stubborn silence, his hands in his lap lest she think he want to dominate the conversation. The Echo had shown him, when they had been enemies yet, what had happened to her father for the crime of making do in an impossible situation. She waited for him to use it against her, but he did not. In truth, he already had - keeping the secrets close to his heart as he told Lyse that he did not want her to be executed, to the idealistic woman’s surprise. When had it ever been black and white, under the boot of the Empire? He had seen what happened to the people who resisted. Visited the graves of the soldiers, heard the stories of the collateral damage weeping in a half-empty village.

Maybe it was selfish. In the days since, when he had pleaded for mercy for those driven to awful, cruel things, when he saw them crumble in the cell, when the people demanded blood and received it, one way or another, he had thought it might be. The blasted fields of Bozja haunted him still, the memories of a broken Queen and Misija’s choices - one way or another, they were always chosen, even if the perpetrators convinced themselves there was no such choice at all. But still he had begged mercy, that if she had to face the headsman’s axe then it would be after fair judgement. He had stood and watched people break upon the battlefield, and known, innately, that there was no judgement that could be fair.

“You got nothing better to do, warrior of light?” Fordola had spat eventually. “I don’t need the theatre of your head to make my day worse. Got plenty of that already.” Ar’telan had shrugged.

“I thought you might like the company,” he replied, and she scoffed at him. Was the wound too fresh, he had wondered? Of when they had faced off on the field of battle, her resonance overwhelmed by Urianger’s siphon, her choices rendered meaningless in the dust?

“You know how many I’ve killed. Surely there’s better company to keep than me.”

“You know how many I have killed, too.”

She was quiet then, for a long moment, before shaking her head.

“Thought it didn’t count, for you. Killing the Empire. They’re the enemy, aren’t they?”

“As we were yours. The choice is the same. That I am on the side of the victor doesn’t make mine right, and yours wrong.”

“Was that why he wanted to fight you, then? Zenos, I mean.”

The question had caught him off-guard, but eventually he had managed to offer a shrug.

“I don’t know. I don’t think so. I presented an opportunity to him - a potential for challenge. If I could reach him and face him, then he would need to work to overcome the obstacle. It made him try - think, persevere, strive. It made him feel. I understand it in theory.” Fordola had sighed, shaking her head slightly, though not in disagreement.

“It’s all mad. All of it mad,” she had decided, and Ar’telan had not been able to disagree.

---

The fog had lifted when Ar’telan walked out into the streets of Ala Mhigo, the sun twinkling with the last few moments of the light before it set. It wasn’t perfect - what ever was? - but it was something, and he would let that be enough. If one day she would be able to accept what had happened to give her the gift, if she would go from stony to acerbic, if she would leave the cell and be allowed her freedom, then his plea to Lyse all those moons ago would have meant something.

He did not carry Arenvald’s hope, that she would heal, forgive herself, move on. He had been in the chamber where Krile had been held, where they had stamped the gift into the giftless through brute force. He had felt the aether, the dozens of souls whose lives blazed in her Resonant light. She would never forgive herself for making that choice, and to ask it of her was too much. All you could do was see the death that lined your path forward, and make do.

She would not think it the same, he thought. That the people he had killed - conscripts and volunteers and natives, all equal at the end of the day, on the other side of the Warrior of Light - were the same as the ones that she had damned when she had accepted the experiment. They did not see the world the same way at all, not any more. She was bitter and hard like stone, retreating inward at the cruelty. His mask was passive, the smiles genuine, the burden accepted if only to make sure that no-one else ever had to walk the path that he had. But she yet had room to heal. There was space for her and the souls that walked with her, for better or worse, guided by the hand of the Resistance until they trusted her to guide herself.

And when the day came, Ar’telan would welcome her with a smile.

#Fordola best girl #no I haven't played 5.5 yet why do you ask #ffxivwrite2021 #ff14 #Warrior of Light (solo story)#If she's not a Trust npc in EW I will riot #you hear me squenix #I WILL RIOT

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whispersafterdusk · 3 years

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Prompt #19: To Keep a Promise (pick your own)

"Remember...remember us... Remember...that we once lived..."

His words had echoed in her mind as she'd embraced him, and felt him melt away into aether within her arms, his fading lifeforce searing the front of her armor into a blinding silver.

In those words she'd heard so many things... To remember herself, and who she'd been. To remember herself and Hades -- for so long Emet-Selch had been hinting at something between them, and she had already guessed what that might have been based on the sadness in his eyes each time she'd rebuffed his request to join him.

And, of course, to remember those who had once lived... An entire world, gone - shattered into the world Gaelle knew now, and into the First, and all the other shards.

She'd first returned to Amaurot, beneath the sea; the city still stood and, as she'd hoped, Hythlodaeus still remained aware enough to tell her that eventually the spell that had created the city would fade, and he with it, without Emet-Selch to maintain it. And with Hythlodaeus's additional help she'd discovered that while Emet-Selch had made the city look and feel alive, it was mostly superficial -- the insides of most buildings were hollow and empty, if one could get into them at all. What she saw on the surface, and what she could already access, was all there was to this Amaurot...there would be no hidden knowledge or history to preserve here, no matter how much she'd hoped and prayed for it.

((Continued below cut))

Elidibus had taken all but her own memory crystal with him when he'd been drawn and trapped inside the Crystal Tower so whatever they had held was now beyond her reach.

So...it remained that, to keep her promise to him, the only way to do so was to rely on Azem's spell, to pluck Emet-Selch - no, Hades - from the lifestream, as often as she could and as often as he would tolerate, to get the answers she'd needed.

Her first use of it had been in a panic, and he'd answered her call and saved them. The second time was weeks ago when she'd been trying to figure out how to naturally cast the spell; he'd appeared but she didn't know how to hold him there so she'd barely managed to tell him why she'd called, and gotten his permission to keep trying, before he'd faded away again.

She'd tried again, immediately, and hadn't been able to sense that connection to the crystal again. As much as she hadn't wanted to she'd approached Urianger and Y'shtola for help and, as she assumed she would, had to endure a lecture on why this was a terrible idea and was not safe to do. But...she had a promise to keep. Eventually they gave in and examined the spell, and taught her how to properly cast it (it assuaged their fears somewhat that Gaelle could dismiss him at any time with a thought, and they did have to admit the ability to summon in help from anywhere would be immeasurably useful considering they had Fandaniel to contend with still).

Aymeric, gods bless him, had been so understanding; worried at first too but once Gaelle had explained her reasons he'd wholeheartedly supported them and was willing to do whatever was within his power to help, including having a group of scribes standing ready to help her record the history of the ancients.

However, those first few times that she'd managed to properly summon Hades she'd done it alone, shut away in the small room Aymeric had designated for her use. He'd appeared as he'd once been, so long ago -- tall (dwarfing her in size), clad in dark robes, long flowing white hair, a face that resembled his Garlean one but was...softer, and lacking the third eye. His eyes were still golden but paler, and his skin was paler as well. But it was him, without doubt.

And it was during this first handful of times that she'd learned personal things - about herself, and about him, and their relationship to one another. She'd been Eos, once, and he Hades -- they had been a couple for several years before either of them had been raised to a seat on the Convocation. She'd been his morning star, and he her slumbering lord. The earring he wore - a detail that had been present in every version of himself - had been a pair once, and Gaelle had worn the other...after the world was sundered it had been the only surviving physical reminder of her, and despite how Zodiark's will often pressed in on him to discard it and all distractions, Hades hadn't been able to part with it.

...and Zodiark... Hades's death had freed him of tempering. That was all he wanted (or could bear) to say on the matter, and had grown quite upset when she'd tried to press him for more details. She could understand that, she supposed... Even before their final confrontation she'd wondered how much he'd done (as Emet-Selch) that he perhaps wouldn't have done if his mind had been his own. It was clear that now, free of the primal's influence, he was acutely aware of all his sufferings, traumas, cruelties, and all he'd done to try and piece the world back together...little wonder he didn't want to talk about it.

But he was more than willing to talk about them, and the love they'd shared, and the nonsense they'd gotten up to with Hythlodaeus, or Mitron, or even Lahabrea. He was willing to speak on day to day life in Amaurot, and what sorts of creatures inhabited the world naturally and which the Convocation had created and why.

He was willing to talk about all of it, so long as he didn't have to admit to or confront anything he'd done in Zodiark's name.

Tonight was the nineteenth time she'd summoned him; he had his back against her knees and, as he spoke, sometimes leaned back into her lap to look up at her. She could barely detect something of substance where he pressed against her -- it was as light and delicate-feeling as a spider's web, and his head took up her entire lap considering the size difference between them.

She'd chosen not to have scribes with her tonight and her hand was cramping terribly; Hades spoke more, and also was more personable, when it was just the two of them. Gaelle could tell she was reaching the end of her endurance regarding the spell and knew she would have to dismiss him soon.

At her feet Hades stirred and sat up. "I can tell you're tired."

"Can you?"

He offered her one of his half-smiles. "No. But what I CAN tell is the passing of time and you've been holding me here for some time. Even you have your limits, Gaelle."

She rolled her eyes with a smile. "That is a line that keeps changing... But you're right, unfortunately. I AM tired."

"Then away with me so we both can sleep -- still my favorite means to pass the time, after all."

She smiled and sat the quill down, and massaged one hand with the other. "You don't truly NEED sleep, do you? Calling you here doesn't exhaust you in some manner, does it?"

He shook his head. "Death is and is not sleep. It's close enough for my liking."

With a nod Gaelle closed her eyes and let him go; she opened them in time to catch one of his little half-smiles and then, she was alone.

Flexing her hand Gaelle looked over the hastily written notes - it was hard to keep up with Hades as he spoke and she didn't want to have to waste time having him repeat himself. The writing was at least legible enough that the scribes could read and organize it with everything else; she stacked it all into a neat pile and tucked it under her arm as she stood.

She wobbled a bit as she walked through the house proper and soon had Aymeric's manservant helping her into a chair in the dining hall where he relieved her of the stack of notes and brought her tea. Aymeric would return from the House of Lords soon, she was assured, and dinner would not be long after.

As she relaxed into the chair she tucked the necklace that bore her memory crystal back underneath her tunic and wrapped both hands around the cup of tea; the warmth lessened the ache in her hand so for a time she was content to sit and hold it while she waited for Aymeric to come home. She had a lot to share with him tonight and she hoped that while she'd been busy chasing after the past that Aymeric wouldn't be bearing news of a grim future.

#ffxivwrite2021 #ffxivwrite #spoilers #shadowbringers spoilers #emet-selch

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windup-dragoon · 4 years

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I wanna hear more on the kind of parents Kiri and her princely husband would be 👀 -slides back into the Lurking Abyss-

AAAAAAAAA Thank you for humoring me. ;;;; This is actually one of my favorite topics between these dorks??? Because family stuff melts my rotten little heart. ;u; Yo this is going to be hella long though so sorry about that.

The News:

Childbearing definitely was never big on Kiri’s to-do list in life. Always busy running off into danger and going on adventures, who has time to raise kids? The thought of being a mother in any aspect never really crossed her mind, besides maybe adopting stray animals and affectionately referring to them as her children.

But with Hien in her life, her thoughts on this change. Seeing Hien interact with the kids that she helped in Revenant’s Toll, the way he spoke and laughed with them ends up melting a bit of her heart. He has such a way with children, even newborns around Doma when he’s out having social hours with his countrymen and women. Eventually Kiri surprises Hien by telling him she wants to have kids. With him. All of the negatives she used to see in having children become just another challenge for her to overcome, with Hien at her side, she can do anything.

It isn’t until after their official marriage that they finally achieve this goal. Kiri, while in Eorzea doing whatever it is she does, has stomach troubles and is a little alarmed by everything that’s happening. She doesn’t typically get sick, unless she’s in Ishgard for extended weeks in which she will develop a terrible cold, so these symptoms have her visiting healers of any sort or maybe even reaching out to friends for advice.

When she’s given the official news, she’s immediately stunned. Of course she’s aware of how children are made and all that jazz, but it didn’t occur to her that it would be so sudden. Kind of an ‘oh that’s right, that’s something that we did’ moment. At first she’s too shocked to say anything, or even move; the nurse who delivered the news worries Kiri wasn’t expecting to be pregnant. But it isn’t that the news is bad. Her mind is racing, her heart pounding while her stomach continues to feel queasy. After the initial shock, Kiri fully accepts her condition with a big, goofy ass grin.

She returns to Doma to tell Hien the news as immediately as she can, after of course settling whatever task she was in the middle of accomplishing in Eorzea. All of Doma is gathered for a festival when she returns, one that runs late into the night with fireworks shot off from the Dairyu Moon Gates and over the One River. It’s here that she tells Hien. She pulls him away from his merriment of drinking with friends and socializing, in between loud bursts of colored fire over head; Kiri tells him he’s going to be a father.

Pregnancy:

They’re both new to this whole situation. Neither really having much experience besides common sense and what they’ve been told by those who know about the pregnancy. Hien and Kiri decide to keep it quiet for the time being, the only ones outside of caretakers and themselves are the Scions who Kiri felt she had to tell immediately and some of their Eorzean friends who would otherwise try to recruit Kiri for more shenanigans. Hien is very affectionate during this time, never too far from Kiri if he can help it or enlists Yugiri and Az’hala to help keep tabs on his adventuring wife should he be called away to the Alliance or any of his other responsibilities.

At night they stay up and talk things over, to help calm each others nerves or any fears they might have as time passes. Kiri is relatively relaxed throughout the whole pregnancy, although she does have moments where she wishes Lynawyb could be with her. She wonders if Lynawyb would have been excited to be a grandmother, Eyriwolk would have made a fantastic grandpa. During these times, Hien also makes mention that he too wishes Mina and Kaien could be with them. And don’t you dare for a moment think they don’t try to send word to Gosetsu. Gosetsu is more apart of their family than anyone knows.

Hien often speaks to Kiri’s tummy, even in the earliest stages when she hasn’t even begun to show. She finds it amusing and usually wakes up to him speaking in Doman to her tummy. She quickly begins to recognize certain phrases like good morning.

When they finally announce it to all of Doma, mainly due to Kiri beginning to show signs, it’s a huge celebration. Their friends from Eorzea are invited to attend the festivities, even members of the Alliance are extended an invite.

After many requests from Sadu to come visit, Kiri and Hien eventually travel out to the Steppes. Sadu, believing she’ll get to fight with Kiri, is dumbstruck when she realizes what’s up. But instead of throwing a tantrum or getting upset, Sadu is very supportive of Kiri and asks that she visits more so she can help. Kiri briefly wonders who Sadu thinks her child will be the reincarnation of. Magnai dismisses the entire interaction as boring, pretty typical of Magnai, while Cirina, much like Sadu, is excited and supportive. Both Sadu and Cirina offer medicines and herbal teas for Kiri to try that their tribes often use themselves.

It’s Time!:

As it draws closer to her delivery date, Hien is an absolute wreck. Nervous beyond belief and struggling to keep Kiri in one place. But she’s just as antsy as he is and tires of sitting in bed all day. Some of the elders encourage Kiri to walk around, but she ends up wandering. Yugiri and Az’hala both stick to her like flies, not so much worried about Kiri as they are with Hien. The poor guy. But again, they’re both new to this and have no idea what to expect next.

I haven’t decided where Kiri ends up giving birth to Hanami. I thought it’d be funny if she was visiting the Steppes when it happened, Sadu’s tribe and Cirina both helping while Hien tries not to pass out. Magnai scoffs but he would probably faint too.

Actually being parents:

Now that Hana is born and all of Doma is buzzing with excitement, both Kiri and Hien are over the moon with happiness. They both share the burdens of waking up in the middle of the night to hold a crying Hana, never asking the servants to do it instead. They’re both completely in love with this little bundle. Without question, it’s a tiresome job, but Kiri is rarely without a warm smile these days and Hien is always beaming from ear to ear. He’s very proud of what they created together.

When Hana gets older, Hien takes to telling her stories at night. He uses funny voices and puts on a whole drama for his daughter who claps and giggles in response. Kiri and Hana spend a lot of time together outside, usually occupying the garden, feeding any ducks or koi in the pond and watching the blossoms open and fall in the breeze. As a mother, Kiri is very soft and tender to Hana, some of her Eorzean friends might not even recognize her. The gruff, accented voice she once had has kind of fallen away, but her laughter remains the same. And her love of jokes.

If Hien leaves for an Alliance meeting, upon return Hana is always the first to greet him. It starts off as little sandals clapping against the stone, then a little giggling girl jumps at her father. Hien drops everything just to scoop her up in his arms and raise her up high. She’ll ask if he brought her back anything, namely sweets, and of course he does. While Kiri remains in contact with her Eorzean friends and allies, Scions included, she doesn’t partake in adventures quite as frequently as she used to. She stays with Hana and Hien in Doma; and when Hana is a non-stop talking toddler, Kiri and Hien are expecting again.

Hana and Hien frequently speak in Doman to one another, even in Kiri’s presence just to tease her.

Occasionally Kiri will take Hana to Eorzea with Isho as their escort; Hana quickly falls in love with traveling and wants to explore the world just as Kiri does. Hana loves meeting with Tataru and Krile, having tea together and gossiping. While in Isghard, Hana and Count Edmont talk for hours over more tea and hard little biscuits. Kiri has always explained to Hana that although her friends are not related by blood, every one of them feel like family to her and she hopes Hana will experience the joys of having such an extensive family.

Kiri and Hien end up having four kids in total. Hanami is the oldest and only daughter. (Unless I change my mind :V)

Thancred, Urianger, and Y’shtola have bets on how many children Kiri and Hien will have. So far Y’shtola is winning. Urianger secretly wonders if Hien and Kiri are trying to create an army. Ryne would absolutely love to meet Hanami some day! Alphinaud and Alisaie are still in shock that Kiri even had children to begin with, but also treat Hanami as another part of their little family.

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anchanted-library · 4 years

Text

FFXIV Prompt. 06. Pathetic

Olivier eventually spoke up. "I've got one," he announced, pushing his blue-black hair out of his eyes. "But it's a sad one."

"Then why bring it up?" Alisaie objected, sour from having her spicy story silenced.

"As a reminder that tragedies are just as important, for they have showed that we lived."

"Go on, then!" Thancred said, forestalling Alisaie's outburst, to which she glowered daggers at him.

But he ignored her, his eyes instead meeting Y'Shtola, Urianger, Alphinaud, E'Nisse, and Erika's one by one. Since it was Olivier speaking, they had a fairly good idea of which story he would tell. But it was like he said, it was wrong to discount tragedies. And perhaps the little girl might better grasp Ryosen's present state of mind, and why some were reluctant to bring him into this.

"This exchange I witnessed not myself," Olivier said. "But heard from Papashan, once a Chief Paladin in service to the Sultana of Ul'dah."

Thancred saw Erika bite her tongue and understood why. That was not even close to the kindly Lalafell’s official title, but there was no need to bring that up right now

Yuyuhase Luluhase sat at a table belonging to one of the ale stalls lining the poorer markets in Ul'Dah. He was going through his third mug of cheap ale right now, and in the mood for a hundred more today, to celebrate how he had escaped Halatali by the skin of his teeth.

"Oi, Stocari!" he called the proprietor. "One more!"

"But sir, you're going through too many drinks at once!"

Yuyuhase stuffed a fistful of coins in his direction and screamed. "MORE! NOW!"

Someone approached him from the nearby gate and placed a bottle of brandy before him. "Here," the tall man said. "It's on me."

"Ahhhh, thank you!" Yuyuhase grinned at the bottle, not even looking at his newest, bestest drinking buddy. "You, sir, know how to make a Brave feel special!"

"Think nothing of it, sir."

"Oh but I cannot!" Yuyuhase cried, wasting no time pouring one for himself. He barked for another glass and filled that too, roughly pushing it towards the other. "You see, I cannot be paid enough to risk my life like I do. And I am barely getting paid at all these days!"

The other man made a sympathetic noise. "That's such a shame!"

"Oh, but you have no idea, good sir!"

"What did you fight this time?"

"The traitors, the Scions! They were illegally attempting to save an accomplice and fellow traitor, former Flame General Raubahn, from his execution!"

"No!"

"Indeed!" Yuyuhase agreed heartily. "They are devils, the lot of them! They fight like men and women possessed! I don't often find myself fighting so desperately, but this time, oh boy!" He downed the glass in one. "MMMMMH that's good!" he cried. "Thank you for the drink, my good fellow!" he looked at his companion almost for the first time and his heart stopped. "You!" he hissed. He reached for his sword. "YOU!"

A blur of motion, a moment of pain and confusion, and Yuyuhase was looking up at the man from the floor. His own sword stuck out of his chest.

"Me," the Samurai said as he walked away as screams broke out throughout the plaza.

Ilberd Feare, Captain of the Crystal Braves following their betrayal of the Scions, stood before the Monetarist Council and raved. He incoherently ranted about Scions, traitors, Monetarists, money, and Scions again. He occasionally threw in the Garleans and Ala Mihgo in his tirade, because why not?

Lolorito was growing tired. He held up his hand. "Stop, stop!" he sneered. "You are making even less sense than usual. Why is it you are even here? Weren't you kicking your heels in Halatali? Didn't you kidnap ex-Flame General Raubahn—against orders—and take him for summary execution? Was killing a starved, one-armed prisoner beyond your meager abilities?"

"Hold your tongue, Lord Lolorito! After all I have done for you!"

"You botched everything!" Lolorito informed him coldly. "The whole episode was messed up so royally it's no wonder we didn't crown you 'King Botch'! The Scions were supposed to be contained, but you allowed every one of them to escape your clutches! How many of our men—yours and mine—died to stop a handful of escapees? The damage they caused cost several fortunes to repair! If I had been willing to part with so much money, I'd have just bought a fleet of yachts or the Sultana's personal chambers, or something of that sort! The only thing you succeeded in was capturing Raubahn, and even that was because I offered to let him see his beloved Sultana's body if he stood down!"

Ilberd growled. He foamed at the mouth. "So what? Didn't you get what you wanted? You rule Ul'dah unopposed! In exchange for my support, you promised to march on Ala Mihgo. Quit stalling! I demand you deliver on your promise!"

"You make no demands of me, backstabber!" Lolorito barked. "You were willing to sell your own grandmother for a vague promise to free Ala Mihgo! You are lucky the one whose promise you ultimately believed was mine and not Teledji! I will keep my promises. When resources allow it. That is a guarantee."

"It's not like I can ask for my money back!" Ilberd screamed, face going red. Heavens he was about to start off on another rant! "The day I turned my blade on the Scions I made an incalculably strong statement, one I can never take back even if I wished. All I've gotten in return are words."

"Well too bad, because my guarantee is all you will get for now," Lolorito said, studying his fingernails disdainfully. "Remember that had I been false, I would have eliminated you and your treacherous brethren a few Braves at a time but you first. For you are all massively loose ends. Yet you live. I have openly kept you in my service. I have protected you from Admiral Merlwyb and Elderseer Kan-E Senna. I have allowed you and your men to resupply for free from our armories and our food stores. I have authorized buildup of stockpiles near Baelsar's Wall. I will not have you question my commitment to our bargain again."

"Then why didn't you allow us to kill Raubahn?"

"Because he is useful to me!" Lolorito hissed so acidly that the Ala Mhigan revolutionary bared his teeth at him.

"I have had enough of your shite!" he grated. "When you wake up tomorrow, there will be no Braves to watch your back."

"The Braves will be where I pay them to be. You, on the other hand, are free to go. A free man. And bearing the equipment I paid for. In fact—" Lolorito hurled a bag of coins in his direction, the one he carried for his daily petty expenses. It was worth at least five year's pay for the average high ranking Officer in any army. "For your services. Don't spend it all in one place."

The man's features clouded with disbelief. He stood rooted to the spot for the next minute, but what he ultimately would have done, even he never found out.

What happened next would go down in legends.

The door exploded inwards with such force it knocked over the heavy council table. Several of the Monetarists screamed pitifully, and ducked, and fled to the far corners of the room.

"Isn't the room round?" Erika wondered, not able to take another wild inaccuracy.

"Shhh," Olivier shushed her. "I'm trying to tell a story here!"

"He is good at telling stories," E'nisse commented. "I can see why Lucia likes him."

"Please?"

"Of course."

"What is the meaning of this?" Lolorito demanded, having been the only one to hold his seat.

"Ryosen, the Samurai," Ilberd spat. "The one called the'Sword Saint'."

"And you," the Sword Saint whispered, his eyes burning, "are the one called the 'Rabid turncoat'."

"Mister Ryosen," Lolorito challenged him. "How dare you brandish weapons in here? This is a hallowed hall!"

"Not so hallowed that you don't lie and cheat!" the Samurai grated. "Or betray the ones who have saved you and yours time and again! I think the Twelve will agree that a trouncing is long overdue. The Kami of my people certainly would." He raised his weapon, and everyone was startled to see it was a baton—no, a thick flute—not a sword. "Tell me where the Scions are, or no one leaves today alive!"

Some of the cowering merchant elites moaned and whimpered. Some prayed to a god they would have tried to cheat only hours before.

Ilberd stepped forward, a nasty smile splitting his face. "They are dead, all of them! I killed them with this very sword!" He unsheathed his magnificent scimitar, Lionshead and kissed it. "You have some guts coming at me with that flute! You don't even have a real sword, and you dare think to 'avenge' those traitors as you are?" He leered at the wooden Bokken at the Samurai's waist.

"On your guard, turncoat!"

The two men stood regarding each other for several long moments. It occured to Lolorito to look outside the hall. Hundreds of guards stood outside, looking on pathetically. Brass Blades, Immortal Flames, Crystal Braves, and even some of the elite, white-clad Sultansworn. Not a one of them had opposed the Samurai's explosive entry into the very heart of the city. What had happened? How had he managed to so utterly cow several armies?

Then the tense standoff ended. The Samurai became a blur, disappearing and reappearing behind his opponent, with several loud thwacks of wood on skin echoed through the room.

Ilberd roared with pain and his sword clanged to the floor from nerveless fingers. A heartbeat after, he fell to one knee, gasping for breath. One hand, the left one, clutched at his chest, where the flute—the damned flute!—had evidently struck at his solar plexus.

For the first time, real fear entered Lolorito's chest. He wondered if moving against the Scions hadn't been the worst decision of his life.

"Let's try that again," Ryosen said, his soft voice oozing with the menace of a dozen Garlean superweapons. "Where are the Scions?"

Cursing and glaring, Ilberd did not respond. After some time, he reached for his sword again, then got back to his feet. The Samurai made no move to stop him. Nor did his dangerous expression shift.

The Captain of the Braves issued a battle cry that resonated in the tall Council Chamber and assaulted his opponent with such reckless abandon that one would have sworn that the Samurai was his most hated enemy.

Ilberd was a skilled swordsman, that had been proven several times over. It had been proven when he disarmed the legendary Raubahn—distracted though he might have been. It had been proven—though to a much smaller audience, when he had been single-handedly responsible for his inner circle's escape from Halatali, where he had fought the Leader of the Merry Suns Legion, the mighty Eikon slayer. It had been proven in the dozens of battles he had fought in the thickest parts of the actions, and survived.

But it was clear to all how badly outmatched he was.

For one thing, the Samurai was using a flute to ward off attacks from live darksteel.

For another, that Samurai was barely moving. Only his left hand appeared to be in motion, knocking aside blow after blow after blow with such bored ease that it appeared comical. He did not even take a single step in any direction, absorbing the momentum of Ilberd's charge like it was nothing.

But Ilberd fought ferociously. He tried to flank the Eastern swordsman, to attack from below or above or behind, only to be thwarted without Ryosen even keeping his eye on him.

The divide between them only infuriated Ilberd further, and he took to ever more reckless tactics. He leapt into the air and slammed his blade down, only for the Samurai to actually catch the blade with his empty right hand. He clenched his fist, infusing his grip with the same demonic strength that kept his flute from breaking against a sword's cruel edge, crumpling the steel like it was wet plaster. He punched Ilberd in the jaw and sent him sprawling into the splintered table. But Ilberd wasn't done. With swords working to no avail, he took to words. "So you want the Scions? I'll tell you where they are!" He grinned again, broader and more evilly than ever before. "Dead. Buried under a hundred tons of rubble. Their bones are probably flatter than pancakes right now."

He tried to charge forward again, only to trip and fall on his face.

"Yda and Papalymo were cornered in the Royal Promenade. They fought well, of course, but it was only a matter of time. They collapsed the stairs. Quite messy!"

He suddenly stood again and closed in on Ryosen, swinging his broad blade faster than the eye could see. A sound of wood hitting metal, and another of wood striking flesh, and Ilberd was sprawled on the table again, one foot in an awkward angle.

"Y'Shtola and Thancred put up a fierce last stand in the tunnels underneath the city, but they too set off an explosion that caused a heavy avalanche. So heavy was the rockfall that it sunk sections of the wall. Nasty business!"

He stood again to his full height. This time, he advanced at a painfully slow pace.

"Some of the others escaped, of course—" and here his smile grew even more twisted. Before his next words were out of his mouth, Lolorito already knew that he was about to overstep.

"But Minfilia, precious Minfilia Warde, is missing! No one knows what could possibly have happened to her! Me? I think her bones rest in the sewers somewhere..."

What happened next, no one could tell. The flute had fallen from the Samurai's hand; he had unsheathed instead the wooden sword at his waist. He had, once again, gotten behind Ilberd in the blink of an eye, with only the cacophony of wood striking flesh, cloth, leather, and iron mail to hint at his ferocious attack.

"Eh?" Ilberd uttered before he fell onto the grounds as a dozen disconnected body parts. His expression was pure, soul crushing shock. Evidently the Samurai had sliced him up as easily with an edgeless, wooden blade as he would have with a sword. Why would the man even need one if he was so deadly?

Belatedly, the warning of the east-obsessed merchant Garumi Borofumi; "This man was introduced as ‘ Kensei ’—which roughly translates to ‘Sword-Saint’! It is a title far more illustrious and prestigious than all of us combined could ever accomplish! It is only given to the most gifted of swordsmen, with its bearers being considered to be of such skill far surpassing human ability! I don’t think there have been more than three bearing that title in the last six hundred years!" Time seemed to have stopped, but then it began to move again, and it came with the most curious sensations.

For a second, Lolorito fancied that he smelled some sweet flower—A cherry blossom?—But then the only smell filling his nostrils was Ilberd's blood and guts.

He thought he felt ice coating his skin, and the hairs on his moustache and beard; but it was just the cold grip of terror.

He imagined the sensation of moonlight falling on his outstretched limbs, but then he felt as if he had been tossed into the darkest hole on the face of the source, and far away from even the memory of light.

The Samurai now turned his attention fully to him. "Where... are... the Scions?"

Ryosen walked dejectedly out of the city of Ul'dah. No one tried to stop him. For better or worse, he had made his point. He walked up to the exit from the underground tunnels, the ones the surviving Scions had fled out from. His composure hung by a thread.

He had been helping the Kobolds at dig 789 for over three months. They needed help toughening up, and he was glad of the task. Teaching was one of the expected pastimes of his title, and though he had no longer any claims to it, he appreciated the brief return to his oaths.

He had found the Kobolds good students, eager to learn how to defend themselves. And he had a small something to look forward to upon his return to Mor Dhona—his official engagement to Minfilia.

Every moment had been fun, but also agony. He wanted to be with her again, to share their dinners. He had often wondered if she remembered to sleep. And then one day, Admiral Merlwyb had issued forth from Limsa Lominsa herself to bring him the news. She had been appalled that he hadn't heard what had befallen his treasured comrades. Her words, spoken in a gentler tone than he'd ever suspected possible from her, had shattered his world.

He had fallen unconscious from the ensuing panic attack, with tremors racking his body and his nerves on edge for days afterwards.

Merlwyb had told him there were survivors, but his memory of that conversation had grown hazy. So, he decided to get his answers from Ul'dah instead, after which he would teach them what the wrath of a Kensei felt like.

After that...

He hadn't planned that far ahead. Could not. His steps were faltering and pained. Pathetic. Too much so for one called the sword saint.

Truly, he had mocked that hallowed title enough with each blasphemous breath he took.

But what did that matter any more? Unlike most of the other Scions, there wasn't even a rumor of her survival. And in his heart, he already knew that he would not see her on this world again.

He would walk into the caverns, he decided. And he would die there. He would find a spot that felt like Minfilia might have spent her last moments. And he would wait there for thirst and dust to end his own miserable life.

#FFXIV #ffxivwrite2020 #ffxivwrite #ffxiv writing challenge #Minfilia x OC #canon divergence

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fheythfully · 4 years

Text

Putting all my thoughts on the 5.3 MSQ under the cut. Beware of course of spoilers! Overall I really enjoyed the patch. There were a lot of times where I sounded like an excited dinosaur.

So first things first, the way the patch started with the kids was so cute. I was expecting more with the Ardbert-esque kid, especially when he said he wanted to adventure with friends because he felt like he was missing something... but then they didn’t? I’m not sure what the point of that line of his was then. Ardbert’s soul is inside ours, and also has been shown to have moved on, but I wonder if some fragment of it--the part that is bound to the specific world’s Lifestream--can be reborn? Anyway. A bit bummed we didn’t get more with that train of thought but it was cute nevertheless. Also, apothecary. I was going “IS THIS A HINT?” the moment the kiddo said she wanted to be one as a WoL.

Also, I am totally writing a shortfic of the twins, Satella and Ryne hanging out in the Crystarium library with Moren bringing them books of interest while they sneak in tea and snacks. Ryne falls asleep and is eventually found by Thancred. Alisaie teases him for being a doting father. When everyone leaves, Satella is left cozily snuggled up as the evening turns feeling almost like home at the Arcanist’s Guild.

I really liked the bit where Alisaie’s desire to surpass the WoL and competitive nature is shown, and that some part of it is due to insecurity. I love the character depth and growth SE gives her over the patches. I just about had a heart attack when she started getting woozy with a noise in her head.

Elidibus feeling summoned by the WoL and seeing an Amaurotine in their stead gave me feelings, because it means we are whole enough now to form some sort of connection to the Ascians. Only sundered ones are left now though, so I wonder if that will still stay true.

I did have a heart attack at hearing Thancred collapsed. I was not expecting him to be okay when we got back to see him. Dawn’s Respite scene was very sobering and set me up for something entirely different than the ending we got (thank god).

Alisaie being stubborn and sullen with the Exarch made me wonder if she’s seeing the past with Louisoux in him, and Alphinaud’s comment about how she handled their grandfather leaving all that well all but confirmed it. That’s very sweet.

I made a very loud note as I was playing at the fact that a Rejoining soul must recognize its part on the Source as itself. Not sure if that was just for the Exarch’s case (though there are comments about how we and Ardbert fused very easily too) but I have Filed This Away.

Seeing Shtola collapsed gave me another heart attack but she’s definitely possessed of nine lives. The duty with Elidibus was fantastic, though the lack of voice acting caught me off guard (covid? are duties never voiced?). Fighting the baby Scions made me full of glee and then it got even better from there. Answers playing over the city, and then the HW theme, and then SB--fantastic. I especially paused when it started snowing. I appreciate a lot what Elidibus was doing, which was trying to show to us that the people who seem so ancient and recreated only as puppets had once meant something to him and his own. The fight was a lot of fun. I took a screenshot of berserk-Ardbert for kicks.

Also, the bit where he calls you by your name, and the name is switched from Elidibus to Ardbert. My heart. I have a lot of notes about this for future writing.

Elidibus as Zodiark’s heart and primal weren’t a big surprise as it’s been confirmed before (I think?) BUT he’s basically the primal for the idea of the Warrior of Light and I think that is magnificent. I still don’t have a full grasp on Elidibus as shown in this patch: his memories are fractured, whether by age or Zodiark; he’s driven both by his own ambition and Zodiark’s influence. He’s all over the place and I’m going to have to take better measure of him as I replay everything in NG+.

I have a note that says, “Ella why are you picking up random things off the ground that your enemies have dropped???” but it all turned out even better than okay. I don’t understand how he could have dropped all those Convocation crystals other than as a plot point but whatever. It was a great sequence. “All that remains is to pray. To pray that we will one day meet again, beneath a blue sky.” Made me tear up. The twisting of the Convocation from the gentle, kind Amaurotines to what they are today is brutally heart breaking.

I made a note of how the trees in Amaurot are starting to wither--I am not sure if we’ve always had that? But if not, definitely a small sign of Hades’ magic fading?

Bear with me now but I CAN’T STOP SCREAMING ABOUT AZEM. I of course didn’t get the title right (my 14th is Altima), but I got the duty/job so almost right. My Altima is the Shepherd, though to the souls on the planet living and departing to create and live alongside the Lifestream. The entire scene with Hyth had me shaking in my chair with excitement over how perfectly it described my headcanon 14th--down to her wandering the planet when she wasn’t in the city. Granted it fits with all our WoLs and is specifically made to be so, but I am so excited. Not sure what I’ll do with this when I write, whether I will alter my canon to fit the game or plow on ahead, but we’ll see. I’m just so excited. And the new TITLE fits my OCs to a T. God, thank you, SE. I also love that we are the “sun” and can’t wait for the future connections and theories about the 14th and Azeyma and Azim.

“After all, I cannot say whether I act of my own volition or by the will of my recreator!” Made me laugh-cry.

Scions confirmed that seeing Amaurot awoke a great grief in them, which was then supported by the random Eulmore NPC crying at the sight of it. So, it’s not even reliant on how whole your soul is: everyone who sees it feels something, a soul-genetic memory, maybe? I can’t wait to use this. Also makes me wonder if this is why in the patch the Scions are more wont to encourage you to talk things out with Elidibus, as in SHB they were pretty set against Emet-Selch.

The new dungeon was okay. I need to replay it again and look around more (is there a hint of Hildibrand there??). The Necromancer and Berserker class, though the latter may be Warrior same way Arcanists are called Ink Mage, made me pout a little. I want Necromancer. Also, THIER White Mages get Protect? Pffft.

I didn’t take any notes for the trial but. It was brilliant. The run through Crystal Tower with the Exarch was a wonderful callback (there were so many callbacks, it was great) and then when he told us to go ahead I was like, you better mean it that you don’t plan to play your trump card unless we’re present! The trial itself was breathtaking. When the Amaurotine first showed up I thought it was Azem, then when they snapped their fingers I was like cool we can do that too, and then they did the Emet-Selch wave and I lost it. HOW!? Shtola has a theory that even she admits is far fetched but. Wow. I am wondering which one it may be: Emet-Selch truly somehow having his soul live (we were just in the space where Ascians’ souls go between bodies) and assisted us; or was he called by Azem’s crystal as a memory; or was it a memory entirely? Just. That cameo. I miss you, Emet-Selch. For yours is the seat of the fourteenth broke me also and I’m just all over the place. Elidibus as the Warrior of Light was great.

I don’t understand why he went Baby in the end there. I can’t imagine the Convocation recruited and sacrificed a child. My headcanon is that it’s just meant to represent his childlike devotion and drive to his goals. He wanted to help his brothers and sisters so badly he detached himself from Zodiark. Seeing him sitting there cradling the crystals and talking about how it’s a beautiful day and they’re not there to see it was heartbreaking. The Amaurotines lost so, so much--and there’s no way to bring any of it back. I am glad the Unsundered have finally a chance to rest.

The goodbye scene with Ryne was a little lacking to me. I wanted Thancred to hug her, damn it. At least he told her he’s proud of her. She’s so brave with how she tries not to cry before them. She’s coming into her own, with her own ideals, but also so like Minfilia’s that it made my heart full. I will act as her post moogle to Thancred any time, kupo.

Also the one line she has in Twine about how Gaia is her friend who will be there for her is sweet and I laugh at the idea of Gaia’s reaction.

Okay, so, the ending. Probably the thing I did not expect at all. I expected death. No one died. The animations were beautiful, and Alisaie was such a joy to watch. Just. I don’t have words for it. I was so overcome with happiness at how perfect they all were: Alisaie sinking into her chain in a sulk, the Archons fondling their weapons, Alphinaud with tea and a book. Alisaie jumping off to go find a fight and Alphinaud’s brotherly exasperation. The banter between Urianger and Y’Shtola. My heart is so, so full.

On to the topic of the Exarch, which I did not expect to have this many feelings on: first of all, I expected him to die. We all did. How can one man survive SO many death flags!? When our WoL ran out of the Stones like a wound up mammet I was there with her, heart pounding praying for it to have worked. I am bummed that we didn’t get to experience him actually waking, but that means I can write about it... which I already did, actually. Because: I came out of this with a very unexpected, slowly unfurling Ella/G’raha ship. This was a surprise because ARR G’raha was not someone I even remembered all that well, as I played CT when it came out, but I remember thinking he was a bit too immature for romantic ships; and the Exarch always felt too distant and too much. I was fond of him in SHB but in a passing way, also because I was a little bitter that he put the Scions in such danger in the first place (though I understand all the good that’s come as a result, like uncovering the true Ascian plots). Seeing him at the end there, as a fusion of G’raha and the Exarch, somehow turned my view of him on its head and in that moment, I could easily see Ella and him running off and having proper adventures together. The driving attraction to all my ships is a form of shared experience, or at least understanding of what it’s like to bear a heavy burden on your shoulders. The Exarch was again, too much in his role, and I couldn’t see Ella feeling comfortable being close with him. But now, with this ending? Watching the two of them run off together? Oh, I am excited.

I even wrote four pages of fluff on how he got those bobby pins in his hair and I never write fluff. Please look forward to it being posted soon.

Lastly: Ardbert. If you’ve been around my blog long enough, you’ll know that I’ve been an Ardbert shipper since HW. SHB was so good to me in that regard. Personally, I got closure regarding him in the scene of him offering us his axe and was happy with it. I was overjoyed to see him get closure with Seto now, too. I’m not happy with Elidibus using his body and then tearing it apart as he did, but: it made for great angst and sometimes that’s actually okay with me. The confirmation that he can talk to and through us is interesting and I imagine that he does so rarely, as his soul is finally at rest with his friends--where it truly belongs. He lets us live our life, and a part of him is always with us, now. I imagine him and Ella at one point having a conversation about her burgeoning feelings for G’raha, as in my canon she’s never felt quite a strong enough connection or level of comfort with anyone but Ardbert, and him giving her his “blessing” and encouraging her that it’s okay to chase after the comfort and happiness G’raha can bring her. Especially since all of SHB she was in a very very bad place and this ending we got gives me such a sense of respite, no matter how fleeting.

Speaking of fleeting: Zenos and Asahi/Fandaniel. I am still hoping Zenos gets more interesting because I just can’t bring myself to like him, and seeing him destroy the Garlean empire before we even step foot into it is making me a little pouty. Fandaniel is interesting on a few accounts: he’s a sundered Ascians, so what will that mean? Clearly he’s been unhappy with the Unsundereds’ plans. He’s also pretty crazy for “the bringer of order”, if we follow the FF12 Espers. We didn’t get a lot so I am hesitantly interested. But also, Asahi? I hate that kid...

My last thoughts on this are: the Ascian storyline was meant to come to an end with this patch, but clearly we’re still getting content. So I am hoping that was for the Unsundered Ascians and we’ll find out more about the summon of Hydaelyn and all that. I... have exhausted myself typing all this. Wow.

BUT I AM VERY HAPPY WITH THIS PATCH AND WILL REPLAY THAT HAPPY ENDING MANY TIMES. I can’t wait for the future.

#this is VERY VERY long #5.3 spoilers #sasha rambles

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eremiss · 5 years

Text

Little Things

(takes place roughly during late 2.2/early 2.3)

Simulacrum.

Urianger used the word in a lecture the other day, and it’s been harrying Thancred like a particularly persistent mosquito. The scholar had been talking about... er… Ascians, yes, that was it.

Simulacrum.

It hadn’t been emphasized, nor barbed; Urianger hadn’t directed it specifically at Thancred, nor cast him any sort of look to imply that his wording was purposeful or backhanded. It had just been part of the rambling explanation.

But it had struck him just right and clung like tar.

Thancred doesn’t care for the word. It’s so clinical and negative. So detached.

And so damningly accurate at describing his actions of late. Because responsibility, good judgement and his own ignored emotions have a habit of getting in his way and making his life difficult when it comes to a certain, specific person, and the best way he’s found to deal with it has been to...make due with someone else.

Many ‘someone else’s at this point, each of them reminding him of that certain person in one way or another. He can only remember a few off the top of his head, and makes no attempts to consider how he should feel about that. There was the Auri woman he’d met in Ul’dah, her flowing tresses a familiar shade of ash brown. And a blonde Miqo’te most of a fulm shorter than him with deep green eyes that had sparkled just so when she laughed at his wit. There was even a tall, lean Elezen man in Gridania with a gentle, patient mien that belied his perpetually stern expression. He had been something of a surprise, truth be told. While Thancred has been attracted to men before, the motive beneath his recent desires for companionship has had him leaning more towards the fairer sex.

Simulacrum.

Thancred really doesn’t care for that word, but that doesn’t make it inaccurate or untrue or unfair.

The acknowledgement makes a thorny tangle of guilt and other things weigh on him that would surely take a toll on his mood if he didn’t work so hard to ignore it.

Seduction as a tool aside, as his work for the Scions is an entirely separate matter, he’s never enjoyed feeling as though he’s using his lovers.

It’s not upsetting, per se, just the same way he’s not upset to hear he’s been on the receiving end of such a thing, rather it’s like… a dent or a chip in a statue. It’s still a statue, it’s still lovely, and it’s still everything it’s claimed to be and everything it’s supposed to be...

But it’s also, suddenly, less than ideal. Minorly, maybe, but noticeably. And going about trying to fix it, if even possible, is never worth the effort.

Eventually Thancred bit the bullet and just acknowledged the truth of it (to himself, anway): he’s seeking others for want of someone else.

“Someone else.” As if feigning ambiguity is actually helping at this point.

Gwen. Guinevere. ‘Dove’. His friend. Thancred has known that all along, but even so the admittance hits him oddly. It makes something squirm and clench at the back of his mind in a way that feels a lot like what his nerves would do if he stood with one foot off the edge of a tall cliff.

Being honest with himself didn’t change his situation much, except perhaps giving the whole thing a sharper edge. It certainly didn’t ‘lessen his burden,’ or whatever it is that admitting the truth is supposed to do.

Thancred still dances around her name like it’s his swiving job whenever he’s able, because willful ignorance doesn’t twist at him or put him off-balance the same way.

It’s one problem of many, and it points right back to the main complication that is… whatever sort of relationship the two of them have at present. Thus far they’ve left it undefined.

No matter what they call it, Thancred knows he’s doing it an injustice with the habits Urianger so perfectly, unintentionally labeled. He spends time with Gwen, for reasons that are ultimately selfish, before running off (subtly...ish) to spend the night with an ill-fitting imposter.

That’s what he’s doing, plain and simple, and no he can’t phrase it any more delicately or fairly because it’s indelicate and unfair by nature.

It isn’t fair to her, or the nebulousness that is ‘them’. Thancred knows the surest way out of it all would be to scrounge up the sense of decency he claims not to have lost and just… just step back-- to go back to simply being friends and comrades like they were before. Uncomplicated. Simple.

But.

(There’s always a but that gets in his way like a brick wall. His head is a veritable maze at this point.)

But he can’t bring himself to let go of all the little changes that have accumulated since she let him closer. He can’t say he’s entirely happy with where he’s at, which he knows is entirely his doing, but he doesn’t want to leave it, either.

Gwen is a good and dear friend to him, for some reason he can’t fathom, seeing how he can recall shockingly few things he could have done to deserve being any more than her amiable colleague. And has only become more so

Gwen is just so...easy, though not in the derogatory way such phrasing leads one to assume.

She’s easy to be around, to talk to, to sit in silence with, to work with, to ask for help, to lean on, to feel safe around--literally and metaphorically, in the sense that misspoken words or a bad day won’t be held against him, provided he makes appropriate amends or humors her rebuttal.

She’s easy to balance when her level head tilts, and easy to soothe when she’s overdrawn. She’s tight lipped about her troubles and concerns, but they’re easy to pull apart and straighten out with a bit of extra insight.

Easy. He’s not used to easy. Which is probably what’s making it all so difficult.

Most of Thancred’s struggles pertain to grappling with everything beyond their friendship and trying to hold it all in line, though it’s taken him far too long to finally get around to parsing them all out.

Gwen has become a master of lifting his mood and giving him a bit of confidence, because she smiles and laughs so readily. Even when he’s scraping the bottom of the barrel for patience he can get a smile and a little banter out of her. She’s practically using his own flirtation against him-- drawing him in with smiles and jokes the same way he draws in whomever happens to strike his fancy.

There’s a certain smile she gets when he comes up with some new inane compliment that throws his head into chaos, alarms echoing at the back of his mind at the same time as his mood jumps up a few notches. It’s not terribly different than when any fair maid is receptive to his flirting, except for the accompanying sense of satisfaction when it’s Gwen.

Gwen is such a stickler for her own personal space that simply being allowed to stand or sit closer to her than anyone else --she’s grown more comfortable with all of the Scions but still doesn’t let them so physically near as him-- feels like something with weight.

He’s accustomed to more physical contact from those he’s intimate with, and even his friends, though that’s more a matter of them allowing the occasional whim to invade their space. Yet he somehow isn’t touch starved. It has to be some sort of quality over quantity thing, even though that doesn’t make any sense. An embrace and a kiss on the cheek feel nearly intimate and leave a fidgety sort of warmth under his skin.

A kiss on the cheek. Feels intimate.

Is he certain he’s Thancred of the Scions, who flirts as easily as he breathes? Thancred of the Scions, who surely holds some sort of (infamous) record for all the desert flowers he’s plucked, so to speak...? Or is he some besotted sodding schoolboy?

When Gwen leans against his shoulder, when he lays his head in her lap and she runs her fingers through his hair, it feels like something. Her getting comfortable with such things was a sort of a learning process, but over time it became nearly second nature. Even after it’s practically commonplace, cuddling still manages to feel like something that matters.

Thancred had never considered simple, little gestures like that to be things of consequence, easy and thoughtless like idle conversation or waving hello. And then the struggle to put himself back together in Lahabrea’s wake had left him... drawn. When days were too long and his patience was too short and even being pleasant was difficult, nevermind being charming, the closeness of others or the weight of an arm around his shoulder could burn like hot water against chilled skin. The little things, fingertips lighting on his knuckles or a conversation started at arm’s length and brought closer, had begun to mean something then, like whispers he hadn’t been able to hear until everything else had gotten quiet.

Gwen has an entirely separate approach to closeness, to fondness, to intimacy, than him, which he thought would ward her off from the start. After all, they clearly wanted different amounts of different things. To try and combine such misalignment was surely an accident waiting to happen.

Instead, Thancred had learned that all of that simply meant Gwen… took everything a little slower. She would get there eventually, just over weeks rather than days or bells. And in the meantime, all she demands --no, asks; she doesn’t demand anything of anyone-- of him is his patience and a bit of his time when they both happen to be at the Stones. Patience, time and understanding. Not endless praise, not a shower of gifts, not promises of devotion.

Not even exclusivity.

In fact, Gwen had made sure to explicitly state that, rather than leaving him to wonder and assume.

The conversation they’d had to establish that had been... something. A roundabout, stumbling, awkward something that he’d gone into fearing a confession or proposition he’d have to reject for both their sakes. Best to put an end to things immediately, like ripping off a stuck bandage, rather than let them fester and cause grief that could jeopardize their professional relationship as members of the Scions of the Seventh Dawn, and friendship besides.

Instead, much to his surprise, their talk had simply been… a sort of clarification and negotiation of expectations, so to speak. Because Gwen has always been an anxious sort that, not unreasonably, finds comfort in surety and specificity, particularly in instances that involve openness on her part. She also proved herself to be far more open-minded and relaxed in regards to others’ relationships and intimacy than what her own reserved and, in a word, selective nature had led him to expect.

While non-exclusivity is his preference, Thancred can’t help wondering if Gwen’s willingness in that regard has more to do with the aforementioned misalignment of needs than her own tastes. She’s never offered to elaborate, and he’s never asked.

The biggest point of their discussion wound up being that: she’s the Warrior of Light, just as he’s a Scion, first and foremost, and their responsibilities are their top priority.

They’re friends second, and anything else, more or less, is a distant third, and regardless of wherever their...this went, those priorities could not change.

They both had their own limitations and needs and, so long as they were comfortable with the arrangement and could agree that they would efforts to remain amicable should they go separate ways (because she was always so consumed by ‘what ifs’ and being realistic couldn’t hurt) as well as respect one another’s duties to the Scions and Eorzea, then… well, she was fine seeing where it went.

If Thancred was willing, of course.

He was willing. And he’d said so, even though it made something a little unsettled, like warning or those things he’d buried, start ringing and pulling at the back of his mind. In his defense, he’d still been a little off-balance from winding himself up in preparation to gently, delicately, rebuff the confession he’d expected.

It was all good in theory, at least. And even in practice...so far. And knowing that has kept Thancred (and maybe Gwen, he isn’t sure) from trying too hard to affect much change, lest the whole thing fall to pieces.

General awkwardness aside, the talk had given him an unexpected sense of relief, easing a bit of tension he hadn’t even realized he’d been carrying. Even though relaxing and loosening in one place tended to mean somewhere else grew tense and strained instead.

Gwen didn’t expect him to change or be someone or something else, just as Thancred didn’t expect her to suddenly drop all her nervousness and hesitation and jump into bed with him.

...Not that he would have complained, mind.

In fact, they’ve been moving more into his realm of intimacy of late. Really, it’s no surprise to think Gwen wouldn’t be satisfied with the most basic physical closeness forever. Their intimate moments are always slow, things that start with a lingering touch or look and gradually build until she’s pressed flush against him and his hands are twisted in her hair and clothes. Often as not it’s nearly torturous, in the best sort of way, to take his sweet time until her shy touches grow bolder.

It’s not too dissimilar to their relationship, from meeting in Ul’dah up to now, in that way.

But there’s never any relief for the tension they build, because they always, without fail end up interrupted one way or another. Either the last shreds of their own better judgment or hesitation jerk them back, or fate itself decides that is the moment one of their linkpearls should chime or someone should come rap on the door.

Thancred is convinced some higher power is conspiring against them at this point.

Teeth-grindingly frustrating as it is, in the end he knows it’s for the best. To go any further would risk upsetting the balance they’ve struck between keeping their priorities firmly in order and being more than mere friends. To push for more would be gambling with that stability and everything that has come from it, which they can’t afford to do. Not to mention the fact that the vague sinking feeling he gets at the thought of Gwen withdrawing from him far outweighs the temptation to go any farther and take, or give, any more.

It also might force Thancred to confront and sort out all of the things he’s been stifling and shoving down in the back of his mind for… longer than he wants to think about. But, honestly, that’s more of an afterthought.

It’s safer and smarter to stay as they are. It’s better for Thancred to keep the walls and tangles and buried things cluttering up his head to himself and settle for substitutes, lest he ruin... everything. It works, in one sense. And not in others. But it’s better to play it safe, isn’t it?

So he grits his teeth and does his best to see they stay as they are.

They talk, they cuddle. Thancred's heart lifts a little and he gets a bit of easy banter or quiet relaxation with her head against his shoulder or his arm around her waist. Gwen gets...the same, he supposes.

They flirt. Gwen does little things like press her forehead against his or trace the lines and calluses of his hands, and his thoughts ease and his skin tingles. Thancred murmurs little things against her ear and lets his hands linger here and there, and she blushes and shoots him looks ranging from amused to interested.

And when his thoughts wander too far they butt up against his self-made hurdles and kick up a clamor between his ears.

Eventually, after bells or days, it’s too much to ignore.

So he slips away to find someone to ease his tension, someone to quench the burn he’s left with after they get interrupted again.

Someone else who, somehow, some way, reminds him of Gwen.

Gods.

Damnit.

-------------------------------

Thank you @rhymingteelookatme for beta-ing for me and all the suggestions! Particularly “OH BOI U GOT IT BAD THANC HAHAAA” *showers you with confetti and flowers*

Thancred doesn’t know how to feelings you guys

I’m kinda torn between the more lackadasical flirt and more duty-minded interpretations of Thancred I’ve seen in various fics because I love them aaaaaall. People are amazing at writing him and writing amazing stories and amazing WoLs. I’m really trying to shoot for somewhere in the middle (like everyone, I think, haha)

I think I hit that mark fairly well in Heal. And this! :D I really like how this came out.

I plan to write a lot more about this time in the game/their story. Especially the part where Thancred stops being such a dingus but it’s really probably most definitely gonna involve other NPCs which means I have to figure out how to write them first

Fun fact: I don’t have a completely concrete idea of the in-game timeframe from 2.1 to 2.55, and on top of that the start of Gwen and Thancred’s relationship is relative to a sidequest (Ifrit Bleeds, We Can Kill It) except for the part where they were still at the Waking Sands (so 2.1 fo sho).

This means I CONTROL THE TIMELINE!

But also ...I control the timeline?

oopsnotegotlongsorry

#FFXIV #Thancred Waters #FFXIV writing #ARR #Guinevere Ashe #My writing #Gwencred #feelings how do they work #angst?#yeah kinda #in want of something #trying to do the right thing #except he's just kinda fucking it all up #MY CONCERN WAS UNNECESSARY WEEEE #I'd been worried about my portrayal #but TOO worried #and let it get at me too much #'s all good

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catleha · 5 years

Text

POST - SHB TEXTS; 1 / ?? (minor) canon divergence.

While I like to stick to canon as close as possible in regard to Y’shtola’s arc there are several petite changes I would like to make on this blog. Especially post - Rak’tika, I will go mainly hc- based / canon-divergent to a certain degree. Needless to say, it was very disappointing to see Y’shtola’s entire involvement being narrowed down to a few one-liners & occasional quest giving.

The list below contains some changes to Y’shtola’s arc before & after leaving the Greatwood to join the Warrior of Light in their endeavors. -- more will probably follow in the future once I re-watched the entire msq.

1. Her relationship to Runar & the rest of the Night’s Blessed is strictly platonic / a motherly kind of love; up until her involvement with the Warrior of Light, Y’shtola spent her time (around one and a half year) in the company of the Night’s Blessed. She learned their customs, their rituals & adapted their lifestyle to eventually become their sage. -- she serves as a bearer wisdom & as their leader whenever one is required. Other than that she dedicated most of her time to a) the defense of Slitherbough / the forest, b) her studies & c) meditation.

In regards to her status as sage / “mother”: Y’shtola is the hero of the Great Fire, their savior, their caretaker, their guiding light. Nothing, I repeat, nothing hints at a romantic relationship to any of the Night’s Blessed what so ever. -- on the contrary, Y’shtola’s final scene (in which she reveals her true name to Runar & the rest) reminds one on a mother gathering her children; period.

2. Urianger helps her back on her feet post - lifestream retrieval; the Runar hug thing does never happen. The Warrior of Light stops Runar from rushing towards Y’shtola, while Urianger helps her back on her feet / serves as a prop (I cannot believe that @scionsect & I fixed this terrible scene). Her connection to Urianger is furthermore significantly stronger than SE dared to show. I will elude on that in a detailed character relationship post in the future. DISCLAIMER: not only was Runar’s approach cringy & simply inconsiderate of Y’shtola’s status as a blind person (never touch blind people without their permission it’s simply disrespectful) , their “romance” was also terribly developed. -- I have nothing against Runar as a character; I simply refuse to support shoehorned romantic sub-plots / the “strong dude, weak damsel” trope.

3. The second “Flow” cast messed up Y’shtola’s aether; while the consequences of the second “flow” cast are by no means as severe as the first one, they still had an effect on her soul / being in general. Ever since the loss of her eyesight, Y’shtola has been constantly connected to the lifestream in order to both, see & access deeper layers of magic & understanding of the planet. -- over time, Y’shtola also became more sensible to change in the planet / aether itself, resulting in her being able to comprehend / see into the past in a pretty peculiar manner (read: whenever she dwells in a city or place that holds the lingering aether of a passed away soul, she is able to access said souls’s memories / history via meditation or focus).

Ever since arriving on the First, said “memories” have long become more tangible, common &, to a certain degree, overwhelming due to the shard’s aether supersaturation. While living in Rak’tika, she is able to access the swamp akin to Toph Beifong in LoK; she is connected to the Greatwood’s very Fauna & feels every twitch / every pulse of the beings living within. -- the second flow cast messed with an already sensible balance between her own entity / soul & the aether around her. She can no longer 100% distinguish between the memories of others & her own, leading to periods of oversensitiveness & fatigue that leave her vulnerable. In moments like these she seeks utter solitude, trying her utmost to calm herself -- Y’shtola’s identity is becoming more & more vapid.

4. Her conflict with Thancred has actual gravitas; Thancred & her argue whilst both stay in the Greatwood, causing Y’shtola to confess her resentment towards the other & a refusal to talk to him until he has sorted his “issues” out (shoutout to @hisburden). Their conflict worsens upon the arrival of “Ryne” due to Thancred’s depression & agony which the finite death of Minfilia prompted. They have their final discussion post their fight against the third lightwarden in the well, ending with Y’shtola & Thancred agreeing on a truce. -- their relationship is no longer as “cordial" as it has been before.

5. Urianger’s betrayal causes a rift between them; whilst Urianger becomes her most trusted & dearest friend upon arriving in the First, his betrayal in lieu of the Crystal Exarch’s true purpose leaves a deep mark. Upon returning to the Crystarium, she confronts Urianger in her grief & anger. Unlike her conflict with Thancred however, this argument leads to tears & a temporary reconciliation; mainly due to both being emotionally & mentally exhausted / fearing for the WOL’s very life. -- Y’shtola still retreats to spend time in solitude not approaching Urianger or anyone else until they leave to confront Emet-Selch. After the defeat of Hades, she approaches Urianger to further solve their conflict (tag along for pain featuring your local goth cat & @scionsect).

6. The “Hydaelyn is a primal” twist leaves a deep mark; she openly searches Emet-Selch out several times during her stay in the Crystarium. She is conflicted & stands between “two chairs” -- albeit being a true believer of Hydaelyn’s ways she cannot deny that doubt has festered & sprawled where once was fierce dedication.

7. She has issues with immediately accepting “Ryne”; similar to Alisaie, Y’shtola struggles to fully embrace what Minifilia has become. Despite a positive attitude, she still has her doubts & indulges in slight mistrust. This strains their relationship until Y’shtola decides to aid her in her power struggles. -- in lieu of the event of Amh Araeng, Y'shtola willingly distances herself from the group due to feeling misplaced & quite frankly, lost.

8. Y’shtola teaches “Ryne” / Minifilia to use her powers; instead of being written off as insignificant (as further above stated above), Y’shtola plays a huge part in helping a struggling Minfilia how to harness her aetherical powers & abilities by teaching her how to use them properly (shoutout to @hyethla for not only being my exclusive Minfilia but also the inspiration for their beautiful but tragic dynamic). Similar to Thancred, she first struggled to accept her presence but made her peace by confessing her guilt during and earlier visit in Ill Mheg (hence why she gives Thancred a lot of ‘shit’ later). Even later upon chasing down the last remaining lightwardens, she plays a pivotal role in saving the Warrior of Light alongside “Ryne”. -- she also taught her how to read, write & comprehend the workings of the lifestream before the arrival of the WOL. Their relationship is, in fact (at least until “Ryne” surfaces) a close one.

9. Alisaie, Alphinaud & Yshtola’s Amh Araeng arc will be discussed in detail; needless to say, I will write a long post about their endeavors & relationship development in Amh Araeng in the future. -- not only did they fight the Eulmorian army, but also discussed the future of the scions, the WOL, Minifilia, etc.

10. Y’shtola suffers greatly under mental strain of both, her powers & the second flow cast; instead of brushing literally everything we learned about her struggles aside like SHB & SB kinda did, I will dedicate a lot of time & attention to her mental & physical struggles (growing “blinder”, losing herself, burning her body’s life energy, etc) & explain what role her job change plays in this very regard. -- an example for her struggles is Y’shtola’s wanning lifeforce. She burns herself up to both, see & further access necessary powers. Doing so for three years resulted in the waning of her aether powers to a certain degree & a rapid, mental aging through burning her energy. I will elude on this in the future -- while physically young, Y’shtola has the soul of an almost 50 year old woman.

#[[ a long overdue post #I certain forgot sth but #well. This is the general framework on which I will base my hcs on. Most of this prob isn't even that divergent & more of an indepth #explanation of certain stuff that SE did not care to further develop #BUT WELL. It was about time I posted this ]]#✦ › 𝐀𝐑𝐂𝐇𝐎𝐍'𝐒 𝐃𝐄𝐂𝐑𝐄𝐄. :: psa.

15 notes · View notes