Sunday 26 December 2021

RD Part 3 Ending: The day Tellius stood still

This room is not supposed to glow blue. This is concerning.

Apparently Mist is not the only person who collapsed.

...Hey wait, when did you two get here?

I think it was obvious, but to make it explicit, Reyson, Rafiel and Leanne are all as conked out as Mist.

Well, considering Mist and the herons are both Order and this is the biggest lump of Chaos this side of your dad, there are certainly worse guesses.

While this dialogue box is on screen, Mist is singing the galdr of release very, very weakly. Yes, you have to listen to the whole thing before we continue. This is a theme of this update.

...We're... we're doomed.

The dark god is about to awaken.

Pay attention to your sister, Ike.

"The dark god is about to awaken. Summon the apostle and get it over with!"

It's either that or let it happen, and on the whims of fate, we are being advised against the latter. A random voice in a little girl's head is better than nothing, I guess.

Ike, please, you're embarrassing yourself.

Ulki is not in this room- this is Tibarn invoking Vigilance. Wherever Ulki is, he will be able to drop what he is doing and obey this order without having to worry about the same channels of communication as everyone else. Frightfully convenient. At least for Tibarn.

Ike is concerned about the obvious. To be fair, it's pretty damn obvious.

Tibarn reckons doing what Mist says beats not doing it. Honestly, I think this is how Tibarn makes most of his decisions.

If the people whose job it is to be rulers agree on a solution, it's probably a good solution. Even if they are laguz and this is a bit of a reckless choice.

"Take too long". That's the problem we have. Our four galdr singers are all unconscious.

…現状では
それが最善だと私も思う。
戦いの渦中に
いきり立ったラグズたちを鎮め
退かせるには時間がかかる。
追い詰められたデインも
何があろうと退きはしないだろう。

Nailah's talking about calming down all the laguz and telling the Daeins to stop fighting. Both of which sound pretty impossible.

Ike doesn't want to be standing next to this thing when it blows.

And yeah, seems weird that we averted this in the nick of time in PoR only to open it in RD anyway. From the perspective of "PoR as a standalone game", the fact this plot point is introduced and then the dark god just... doesn't awaken is actually remarkably restrained on the developers' part. Throw it on the pile of "evidence RD was always going to happen."

Tibarn has no idea whether now counts as "safe", dark god or no. Besides, if it's going to blow, it's going to blow.

This is a good question that probably should have been asked sooner than this. We have this thing we do not want to release at any cost... and we also have a key to release it whenever we want. There's something we're missing here, but one thing that's definitely true is that if we were given this key, we should probably use it rather than not.

I'd ask if you'd want to live with yourself not knowing what would've happened, but something's telling me "live with yourself" is going to be a very short time.

Beats nothing.

Thanks, Ulki!

...Baggage? Who was with the apostle that-

...Oh yeah. We now have Naesala in this room.

Whatever it is he's up to, he's reverted to his base instincts- protect his best friend and girlfriend.

Although Tibarn apparently looks ready to pummel him for what he did to Phoenicis.

You ever wondered why I'm so visceral describing what Tibarn's instincts are? Because Tibarn's instincts are gruesome as hell.

Sanaki has other plans for Naesala.

Not that Tibarn cares. He is very angry.

We can hash all this out when the apocalypse isn't about to happen.

...Yes ma'am!

Tibarn can do "common enemy". So long as he's still allowed to at least kick Naesala in the most sensitive spot later.

Sanaki has not yet been briefed about why she's here- Ulki didn't get anything of the sort.

"And then from Sephiran to you. With any luck."

Sanaki is very concerned about this outcome, same as us.

Just quickly going over that argument again...

Sanaki accepted that quick. Then again, I'm sure she's familiar with "we need it done now, questions later.

Sanaki's turn for the galdr.

...Fat lot of good that did us.

...A bird?

...Yune?

Who are you to question us?

Oh, Micaiah, Aran asked me to tell you the front line is collapsing!

...Hold on, back up, good question.

Ike recognises Sothe. Admittedly, the Maiden of Dawn isn't really using her physical appearance in her title anymore, but still.

Sothe has noticed that there's something big going down if about a million important people are all in this room.

"...That doesn't even begin to answer my questions, Commander."

Micaiah and the dark god, together at last.

...Just as long as we're not about to see you become a vessel for calamity...

Micaiah has an animation here. Looking closely, I think she's picking up Yune, but the bird doesn't appear on her following sprites.

The song Sanaki sung to the medallion was not the true galdr of release. The galdr of release, since it's a song, is a lyrical composition.

Don't blame Sanaki, Elena's probably the part where the words got lost. Although if Lillia didn't know them, perhaps the problem was a little more fundamental.

...Micaiah, what are you talking about? Are you even still Micaiah at this point?

Sothe is just as confused.

Ike tells him now is not question time.

And Micaiah sings the true galdr of release before the medallion.

...The room is now no longer ominously glowing. In the absence of the light, its presence got so much more overpowering. The entire room being so blue was definitely unusual now that we can see the room not blue.

Quite frankly, I think you're someone important. Just how so?

...Hey, I was watching that! Dangit, Micaiah got cut off again. Although... that pattern on the ground looks...

…旋律を耳にした途端、
体の奥から詩がほとばしった。
わたしは知っている。
生まれるより以前から…知っていた。
わたしは… わたし…は……

She got cut off in JP, too. Although it looks like she was about to get cut off in-universe as well.

...Are you the dark god?

The following dialogue is also between two people, distinguised by which side of the screen the ??? label is on.

There are many questions one can ask from this question. Honestly, the one I want to ask is "why do I remember this cutscene being voiced?". It's not, but we'll see some more voice acting later, and I must be confusing it.

This is referring to when the conflict between Ashera and the dark god ended.

Hey, I wasn't informed of any promise, why can I be blamed for people breaking it 560 years before I was born?

That's my new excuse for everything.

Well, this is... well, this is something that only really makes sense when you understand what the hell this conversation is talking about. Really, it's a wonder it makes any sense whatsoever to a new player.

...That doesn't sound good.

At least Mist is all right!

...OK, starting question, what is the last thing you remember?

...Then what was the whole... this raises questions I suddenly don't remember having answers. I think I can finagle one later on...

Well, at least you're back to normal now...

We only get the two of these scenes, at least. Leanne and Rafiel aren't about to do the same skit.

Well, that's not exactly what you expect to see after being woken up from being knocked out.

Naesala knows he's beyond forgiveness. But there are things he must do before he can pay for his crimes in peace.

Of course, we'd better work that out after we've asked and answered the question "what now?"

At least Reyson feels OK about Naesala. I think it's the heart-reading.

Tibarn's run out of patience, in comparison. You'd think Reyson would be joining in.

This isn't a good time.

Indeed he did- this was how Tibarn and Naesala were supposed to get along in 3-2. That "..." cost Naesala big time.

Tibarn marches to the beat of his own drum, and only because this whole "dark god" business is a big deal is he putting this matter to one side.

...Huh, they're still out? They are much less willful than Mist and Reyson, I guess. Leanne's probably next to rise.

...Who are you, what are you talking about, and how do you know that?

Oh yeah, Micaiah seemed like she knew a lot about what was going on down there. Although wait a minute, her eyes have suddenly changed colour...

...You what?

Sothe goes straight into overprotective mode. And promptly runs into the question "...who the heck do I get mad at here?"

So you just happen to know the goddess? And are... on good terms?

...I think we need not yet rule out the possibility that Micaiah has taken leave of her senses.

Cutscene time!

Ranulf had a headache about 70 kills ago, and presumably he, too, was massively affected by the Chaos, as a figure of Order like Mist and the herons. We don't actually learn how much so, but I'm inclined to think "much worse than just a headache."

Whatever it is, it's gone now.

Skrimir's feeling better, too. Although he doesn't seem as clear on why.

With good reason, too- there's nothing that could possibly explain why.

This instance of "negative energy" is probably referring to Chaos, but I think in this case, it works as "negative".

Skrimir doesn't really mind what's going on.

As long as everything's going well, the details of the how can get smoothed over by people smarter than him.

Ranulf wonders if we can change the situation here.

Skrimir starts saying something that honestly feels really powerful, but when you just read what he's saying, it's just super simple. I think it's because it's coming out of Skrimir that it has its power.

Skrimir can understand war just fine. It's a numbers game, and we have the power of math!

Once a war has been won, you begin the long, arduous journey of establishing why you just fought that war in the first place, what each party wanted, and asking how exactly one can get those things to happen. The true challenge in being a peaceful ruler is not in abstaining from war, but from being able to conduct these negotiations without needing to use war to back them up.

Skrimir could never do that. The tools just aren't in his toolbox.

...Honestly, now that I've typed it out, I'm starting to think this is a very relevant speech in the context of the plot sandwiching it. Even if it is as short and shallow as his 3-P speech after taking Flaguerre.

Whatever witty retort Ranulf had for it (he didn't seem like he was about to make one) has been distracted by Ranulf's sixth sense going off. His ears twitch and he starts looking around.

Skrimir teases him a little bit about how he's looking at the sky.

Something's about to come from the sky. Whatever it is, it's not rain. It must be snow!

Whatever it is makes a ringing noise that distracts the soldiers from their battle to investigate. Although they seem as ignorant to its cause as Ranulf.

And the ringing suddenly... stops.

...I think I liked it better when it was ringing.

Something weird happened.

Ike: "But is Mist OK?"

...Honestly, natural reaction, but still.

Whatever that giant light was, Ike and Mist are still here. That's worth commenting on, at any rate.

...That... might just be faint praise, though, if there's a list of people "not here."

Ulki, use your Vigilance to tell us just how quiet "too quiet" is.

...Even you can't hear anything?

...Well, it's clear something went down.

Well, this was a weird two-line scene. Well, if you count Sothe's line as a line.

Ike and Ike alone appears in this second cutscene. I think the thing I like most about this scene is that they animated Ike's misty breath. Really helps sell the mood.

(This game has eight cutscenes and two of them are right next to each other here. Don't worry, it gets worse.)

Well, that's...

...Oh. Ashera.

Ike even touches one to make sure. One has to wonder whether or not these people are aware of their petrification or not.

Ike starts calling out into the aether.

But no one answers.

And the snow starts to fall on the poor, petrified people of the battle.

...That's the note we're ending on? We just got the near-complete annihilation of humanity?

...OK, I'll admit it, if I just do the text, this narration is much better about spoilers, or at least spoils only as much as I'd have to do a preview. This is a (slightly edited for text purposes) transcription of what the game went with:

Order and Chaos- a goddess divided. Judgement, hope, and an ancient covenant. All march towards the Goddess's Tower to learn what has happened to their world.

Well, I guess we got the turncount? I mean... what am I supposed to say?

Next time: So literally what are we supposed to do now?

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