Hi there, Reyson! We found your comatose sister/girlfriend/person of same race. (Sister, incidentally.)
Even if we wanted to find out on our own, not like she speaks our language.
[Reyson: Leanne!]
[Leanne: Reyson, my brother? Brother!]
[Reyson Is it really you, Leanne? This is no dream?]
We were hoping you'd know.
Tibarn asks if he's familiar to her.
[Tibarn? Of the hawk tribe, yes?]
I find it curious that Leanne does not identify Tibarn as the Hawk King. Perhaps his appointment is more recent than I had assumed? How exactly Tibarn, Naesala, Reyson and Leanne knew each other pre-Massacre is a little hazy, especially since Reyson called Leanne his infant sister.
Plot question, and about to be answered in indecipherable language. Hopefully the game's translation is as useful as the website Serenes's.
[I don't know...that night... My sisters took me and hid me in the small shrine. I'm sure they sang a galdr to me...And then I became so sleepy...]
I'm sure this detail comes out in non-Ancient lines. Not the ones coming up, though.
Sure, Reyson, the forest kept Leanne asleep.
[Thank you for...With all that I am, I thank you.]
I assume he's thanking the forest here.
Tibarn instantly starts using the politically correct term. Tibarn has such a strong presence as a friendly character in the entire Tellius series that it can be difficult to remember that he ever was antagonistic: the only reason he objected to Reyson planning to murder us all is that it would destroy Reyson too.
I'm also fairly confident that this is, in fact, Ike's first time meeting Tibarn. He'd only appeared in Chapter 13 out at sea and at the laguz meeting before now, hadn't he?
Pertinent question, something he's probably keen to be on top of.
Ike, as usual, states exactly what he's up to. You get exactly what you expect from this guy.
Tibarn, reasonably, doesn't believe his story.
What reason does he have to believe her word?
...Also, a fairly common mistake (for some reason), but Sanaki is Misaha's descendant, not her ancestor.
Sanaki can try as hard as she can, but if she wants to succeed, the people she's apologising and atoning to have to give her the time of day.
Reyson does not seem interested in doing that.
Well that changed things. Or at least made it more palatable to have a conversation.
"You appear to be a ten year old child."
(Laguz are longer lived, so this could make Sanaki seem older. Maybe. Not sure on maturity.)
Sanaki runs forward and gets on her knees. Despite Sanaki using an entirely unique class exclusive to cutscene characters (it's the same one Elincia uses!), this animation looks like her getting shot and slumping to her knees.
Getting right to business with this one.
...
...
I feel one thing that made an impact on me in regards to this moment is that Australia has had a similar moment of apologising for a crime long since past. Path of Radiance came first, of course, but to me, the moments share similiarities. Including the fact that the apology doesn't solve the problem.
Time and a place, Sigrun!
Also, didn't Sanaki tell you she was going to do this? Not on screen, but surely at some point in the drafting phase this would have come up.
Ike does what he does best. Yell at people who could kill him, or ruin his life some other way, for not doing their jobs properly.
Reyson is not moved.
[That is enough...]
[Please rise, Apostle Sanaki.]
Leanne, though?
[It is enough. It was not your fault.]
[Brother... it is enough, is it not? Forgive this child. Her apology is... so sincere.]
Reyson has had years to stew on his hatred. His runs deep.
[... I do know. The forests... told me everything.]
Despite being burned down, the forests are doing an awful lot of speaking.
[Everyone is... gone, aren't they?]
"Saying sorry won't bring them back". The heron tribe is functionally extinct now- Radiant Dawn suggests that cross-breeding with hawks and ravens is possible, but that doesn't change the fact that all the surviving herons are family.
[Brother... My loving brother, Reyson. The pain and sadness is in you, Brother. It clouds your very soul. To see you like this, to watch you. It hurts me. Please... do not lose yourself to hate.]
One thing it's necessary to know about herons is that they can read other people's hearts and discern their true motives- or even just their mood. This isn't isolated to each other, by the way.
[Leanne my sister.]
One small step for a child, one giant leap for beorckind.
Either that or they're absolving Sanaki specifically of guilt. I've not been in Reyson's shoes, I can't say what accepting this apology means.
Sanaki took it well.
When Ike praises you for a job well done, you can tell he means it. Especially since he has no frame of reference for any kind of politics. On the other hand, this was a very unique job.
A ceremony?
Turns out we're invited. So let's take a look...
Cutscene number 5! You can tell cutscenes were new when the stuff they're presenting is the sort of stuff I can largely skim over in this format.
Here are your summary images.
This is just a CG. Place has definitely cleaned up.
Another aspect of Serenes magic that's covered in more detail later on is that particularly complex galdrar require multiple herons working in concert to properly perform. Reyson needed Leanne to pull this off.
Sigrun's caught on.
Tears of joy all around.
Hahahaha... Nasir, we have a long way to go.
Soren doesn't seem all that cheerful either. Wonder what's gotten him all bothered.
The "Turns to Clear" Bonus is counting 30 turns for the whole four parts (so, 20 for the three you have control over). Part 1 was 4 turns, Part 2 was 6 turns, I had plenty of time to reorganise to end Part 4.
Next time, we... wait, hold on, there's a little bit more that didn't come out of the bottle. This comes after the Save screen and is technically part of Chapter 18, but before the map narration and chapter icon, so sure we can put it here. It is part of the Begnion plot for the review section.
Ike is a hero of Begnion, and all he did was be the right person in the right place at the right time! Sometimes, that's all you need. Sanaki, here, is much more realistic about the amount of work there is still left to do.
Her mission complete, Sanaki can now offer Elincia her services freely.
Where does that guy wander off to, I swear to Ashera...
I like the expression, but think that's just a blink frame. Begnion is such a large nation that this could mean anything.
Even Ike's not entirely sure on how much of a boon we just got.
Time to go over the importance of tolerance. I'm not sure if beorc and laguz really have the sort of yin and yang needed for "need each other to survive", but it's not like that's a wrong reason to support the unity between the two races.
Sanaki's parents are a bit of a weird outlier in the history of Begnion- we get a bit more of a solid timeline about the events surrounding Sanaki's coronation in Radiant Dawn, and it very much plays out without Sanaki's parents influencing events at all.
Ramon was the King that Did Something. The platitudes of his predecessors didn't mean much until him.
Sanaki's "...suggestions" sound like they will be of a different flavour.
I'm sure the Senate would gladly give up their laguz slaves and bow to your commands.
Despite the gap between Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn, this doesn't happen until after Radiant Dawn. I imagine it's partially because of the growing pains of rebuilding a nation after you've kicked out the tyrant.
Sanaki's ambitious, but also prepared to make a better world. Very much like Edelgard, all right.
Ike wonders why he's still in this conversation and excuses himself.
Oh?
Yeah, that's never going to change.
...Says the Empress of Begnion, not the Queen of Crimea.
Ike is not interested in peerage.
Everyone would raise a fuss, no matter how much this issue mattered to them.
Begnion troops are nutters for this kind of thing. I can't decide what's sadder: that I could believe their minds would break on being led by a commoner, or that they are not the worst examples of soldiers in Tellius's continuity.
Ike is not in the mood for it.
You won't, but it seems like Sanaki and the concept of Begnion will. Wonder who Elincia's second choice for General would be. Can I say Brom, or is that joke too on the nose?
The Begnion Senators have the funny hats needed for this joke to land. Crimean nobles, as seen in Radiant Dawn, have the same hat.
This is the leadup to both a knighting and a beheading, and while I'm fairly sure there are stories where one is mistaken for the other, having Elincia describe it thus kinda makes me wonder if Ike's thinking the same thing.
Ike has changed from "commoner Lord" to "actual Lord". I'm not even entirely sure how many of Fire Emblem's historical Lords are actually entitled to the noble title of "lord".
This is Ike's promotion, too. If you get Ike to level 20 before now (which in a casual run, you probably will), he caps his EXP and gains nothing. Alternatively, if you're like me and haven't used him since level 2, the game proceeds as usual despite promotion being a level 10+ thing.
In Radiant Dawn, that left shoulder guard just gets bigger and bigger. I'm told it's valid armour for a man who fights with a two-hander sword, but it's just so comically large in those designs that seeing it make its start here feels very peculiar.
Ike's stat screen! Sweet, sweet two-digit speed! (If you reference with Ike's bases, you can check out that level up Ike got and see how good it was.)
Ike's portrait even changes in cutscenes to accomodate his new title. This only applies to plot promotions, and I think Tellius was the only game to do it?
It must feel weird, to have undergone a complete costume change in a room predominately composed of women. Unless the Senators are here in the background. Not that that would be less weird.
This is a man who has been brusque with every noble he has ever met.
Remember what I said about that "room full of women" thing? I'm not sure if it's a coincidence, but the fact that every character to comment on this at this moment is a woman kinda feels like it's either evoking "fawning ladies surround a charming man" or at least tapping into it.
Ike, ever his usual self, completely ignores the shipping subtext. Whether or not this is an "sorry I'm gay" or "asexual doesn't understand social cues" joke depends on your interpretation. With the caveat that this game was made in 2005 and one of those jokes was more common than the other.
Next time: I think I missed getting new characters.
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