A series of blog posts documenting one Dominique Allard's struggle with the gig economy.<<< First | <<Previous | Next >>——————————————————————————————————————————————
Dominique sat down at the edge of Limsa Lominsa's aetheryte plaza. Observing the shenanigans of the adventurers at that place is ever a source of amusement — on this particular day, the Lalafell were plotting and musicking to some unknown end. Nevertheless, t'was not amusement that drew our freshly-rearmoured warrior to the bench, but thoughts. A lot had happened on that day by means of an ever greater lot of ultimately pointless sidequests. Let us try to lay those events out as they came.
The day began with the Grey (or was the spelling Gray? Let us go with Græy) Fleet of windmills, presumably powered by Limsa Lominsa's ample supply of piratical windbags. One such piratical windbag was our first breadcrumb in a trail whose length would prove to put both Hansel and Gretel to shame. The ungentleman was supposed to be a former member of that Company of Heroes which put Titan back into the earth which he is supposed to lord over. However, the leopard-print on his armour immediately alerted Dominique to foul play. One boulder-smashing contest later, and our true destination turned out to be Costa del Sol, blissfuly unaware of the true torment to come.
The even less gentle man Wheiskaet who
was in fact a part of the Company of Heroes did not trust our accomplishments and needed proof before he was to send someone into Titan's maw. Ignoring the many miracles Dominique Allard had already performed and the much-welcomed remarks by lady Rhul over the nonsense that was to come, the next SEVENTEEN quests (and a dungeon!) would take us across Eorzea allegedly to hunt foodstuffs but in factuality to pass an arbitrary test of character. Dominique assures me that the food at the end was divine, but I think this was a coping mechanism. Frankly, I don't know how any of the meals made it through that helmet and I don't intend to ask.
For the sake of my (audience's) sanity, I will summarise: we killed a sea creature, stole a turtle egg, obtained stinky goblin gouda, rediscovered a crop of wine grape thought lost, thus making sure Wineport would never become merely Port, aaaand had a corporate-mandated luncheon at the end before discovering the kobolds also use aetherytes and Y'shtola once more proving herself as the Scions' Most Valuable Miqo'te by getting us right to Titan and bypassing a network of trap-filled tunnels that would have surely taken at least three more sidequests to deal with. At that luncheon, the Company of Heroes deemed Dominique "Titan's Bane." All I could think about is how:
#1: This is premature celebration.
#2: IF YOU NINCOMPOOPS DID NOT HAVE DOMINIQUE JUMP THROUGH MORE HOOPS THAN A BASKETBALL, TITAN WOULD HAVE BEEN DEAD TWO HOURS AGO.
In spite of my all caps, I must admit that I don't have
complete contempt for the Company. Brayflox and her little Longstop had been a fun diversion and that stinky cheese sounds like something I would enjoy if the description is to be believed. If it truly smells like a "warm, damp boot of a zombie after stepping in ripe chocobo dung" and people still want to eat it, it must be a delicacy unlike any other. The other Companion that endeared himself to me was the former adventurer, now novice vintner of Wineport. Ignoring the ominous Western Fortress of Garlea a stone's throw away from the city, it seemed a nice place to retire, and our Lalafellin friend did so after being blinded in the struggle against Titan; an explanation of the Company's approach with Dominique, if not justification. Wine had returned joy to his world, and the upcoming banquet needed some good stuff. However, he could not provide.
After some finagling, Dominique found out that a fellow by the name of Drest had nursed him to health in the past and that he knew the tricks of preparing some low-tech wine. He was living in the southern jungle, but upon finding his shack, the more appropriate verb seemes to "suffering". Drest was Ala Mhigan who had evidently served for some time with the Garleans and was now not welcomed by either side of the conflict. Doing some minor favours for him was the least one could do, and serendipity rewarded us by revealing that the Bacchus wine grape, thought claimed by the Calamity, still persisted in the jungle. Yet, for all my kvetching about the preponderance of sidequests, I feel sorrow that Drest remains in the jungle, alone with nothing but his nightmares and the buzzing of midges. Still, I cannot blame Dominique for wanting to get on with it already. I hope we will see that man again.
For all the build-up, Titan fell like the sack of rocks he was. There was some fear of getting knocked off the arena, but since I possess eyeballs, I could avoid all those spooky red lines and my party had no issues with the titanomachy. Much more interesting was everything surrounding the fight. For one, the Kobolds, who remembered the oathbreaking of The Maelstrom. I understand the need to have all the sidequests to build up to the Titan fight, but I would have much preferred dealing with the Kobolds up to this point instead of an international wild goose chase after some capital letter Heroes. For another, the music, where the soundtrack set down its usual array of instruments and picked up the electric guitar. For yet another, the Garleans.
While my theory of infiltration by the Ascians has not been proven, it does seem that the two factions are cooperating! There is talk of a secret weapon and aether signatures, and for once, this evil plotting is not confined to the cutscene realm as Y'shtola continues to carry the entire Scion cause on her back as she spots the ne'er-do-wells in the act. To what end do they plot? I cannot tell yet, but I know I'm at four out of six mysterious, powerful light crystals.
There is still some stuff to do for Dominique before retiring for the day. One is the crafting of fresh new armour for becoming a level 40 Warrior, and another a visit to Curious Gorge for much the same reason. Gorge had some berserker troubles which lie on the unknown edge between reality and perception. I blame these on the commonfolk, who cry "monster" at the mere glimpse of glowing red eyes. Cowards. Getting a bit carried away, I also complete the Realm Reborn Armourer sidequests, which feature interesting (and real-world accurate) worldbuilding about the etymology of the word "cobalt" being based on "kobold", as well as the absolute queen behaviour of Admiral Merlwyb bulletproofing armour with live targets. With that, it was time to collect some thoughts, and you find Dominique as seen at the beginning of this blog post.
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OPEN QUESTIONSAs ever, Dominique Allard would like to axe some questions.
WHAT IS LAHABREA'S AND THE GARLEANS' PLAN? WHAT IS THE WEAPON THEY MENTION? Their interests seem to be aligned for the time being! I'm guessing it's more an alliance of convenience than ideology, but I get to combine my two questions into one for the time being.
WHAT'S THE DEAL WITH THOSE SMALL CRYSTALS? Four out of six, now. Still no idea what the first one is supposed to be. Going with my elemental theory, that colour could be water OR ice.
WHY WERE THE WARRIORS OF LIGHT FORGOTTEN?WHAT IS THE NATURE OF THE ECHO? ——————————————————————————————————————————————
CRACKPOT THEORIESA singular theory again? Trust me, it's a good one.
The Ascians AND the Garleans want to bring back Bahamut, and they need the Primals as fuel. The bench /gpose was not just for show. Dominique and I were trying to put the pieces together. We are still missing a lot of the jigsaw, but we think we see the shape of the image now.
Dalamud was a Garlean plot. Not the current crop of them, I think it was a guy named Nael? In any case, they're the one who somehow dragged down the moon. The Ascians are some variety of evil, many of which could use a ruinous Bahamut. Waaay back when the Garleans were first introduced, I seem to recall something along the lines of this being a take 2 for what the Garleans were doing pre-Calamity. What might be the roadblock? Aether. What has a lot of aether? The primals, who some bastard might want to use as batteries.
Therefore, the evil plan goes thusly: I think it's a fair inference to think that Bahamut might just be a particularly powerful type of primal, one that might need a lot of aether. So, get the "lesser" primals to concentrate all the power, possibly somehow including Dominique, then use them all as juice for the resummoning of Bahamut, much like the beast tribes use crystals to summon their own. After that? I think both the Garleans and Ascians have their own plots, should their plan succeed, but their means align for the moment, and the means may well be Bahamut!
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My allotment of characters is running short just in time for me to wrap up. I bring you walls of text, and I do hope you like them. I will link no socials. To gain them, you must first fetch me a shrubbery, which will begin a 37-step quest chain.
