Imperial Palace
-Four minutes to wander the palace and convince as many soldiers as I can that peace is a god idea. Go.
-Whew! Tense. Got 20 soldiers. They reacted in a wide range of ways.
Returner resentment.
Kefka hate.
Sorrow at the cost of war.
Some were relieved at the idea of peace. Some hated the idea of working with Returners. Some fought me. (Though not to the death; they mostly wanted to know that the Returners weren’t soft.)
But even more than that, they wanted to separate themselves from Kefka. They were disgusted by his poisoning of Doma, and I imagine they saw a lot more where that kind of behavior came from. They’re happy he’s out of power.
-Speaking of Kefka, I got to see him in his jail cell. He’s bored. Hee! Enjoy, Kefka. We’ll visit.
Kefka pouting on the john. Yeah.
We’ll bring you cookies that taste like poison and mass murder. Your favorite.
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Banquet
-Aw. Cid’s sitting with us.
-This is awesome. It’s like a conversational diplomacy minigame where I get lots of dialogue options. I’m not sure how I’ll be judged or scored exactly, or if it’s purely flavor and none of these responses will affect the game, but I love the set-up of it.
-We get options for a toast. To our homelands! A part of me wants to say “FOR THE RETURNERS!!” but my goal here is to cool things down.
-What should be done with Kefka? Jail.
-What about Doma? “That was inexcusable.” This is probably my harshest option here. Another option is “Apologize again,” but that sounds, well, pettier and less useful.
-What abot Celes being a spy? I choose to say that we trust her regardless of whether she was a spy. I’m still not sure whether she was or not, whether Kefka was lying.
-BUT NOW I AM! Gestahl confirms that Kefka WAS lying! Celes! Yay! Unless Gestahl is lying here, but the only way I could imagine Gestahl lying would be if Celes were more than just a possible spy. She’d have to be in some kind of double-secret deep cover for a revealed lie to allow her to remain a spy, and I don’t at all believe it’s like that.
-Why does Gestahl want peace now? “Working together is our only hope.” Hm.
-Onto discussing the espers.
-Ooh, tough one. “You brought them here!” vs. “They’ve gone a bit too far.” I go with the latter. Again, I want to remind Gestahl that he brought this on, but I think it’s helpful to give a little. It’s an option that doesn’t totally indict them for their actions, but acknowledges that we have to deal with it.
Dinner dialogue.
-Gestahl’s ambitions faded. He doesn’t know why he wanted so mch power to begin with. I’m probably a sucker, but he really seems repentant and believable.
Power: its own reward?
-Uh oh. Gestahl asks us for a favor. Um… he wants to borrow Terra’s power? How about no?
-Oh, not drain her power, just ask for her help. Ok.
-We’re going to travel with General Leo to see the espers on Crescent Isle.
-Leo apologizes to Cyan for the poisoning of Doma. And Cyan absolves him! Whether Gestahl is genuine, I don’t doubt that Leo is.
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After Dinner
-Locke: “If Terra goes, I go.” Damn. I like your character Locke, but I don’t like you in combat compared with the other party members.
-Locke things something is suspicious about this whole thing. Hard to trust the Emperor. Fair point.
-Just Locke and Terra will make this journey. The rest will stay in Vector to keep a weather eye on the Empire.
-An Imperial guard comes up to me and compliments me on my poise/diplomacy during the banquet.
The fruits of diplomacy.
Hurray! I think this is basically him saying: “The game did score you, and you did well.”
-The Emperor will withdraw all troops from South Figaro and from Doma. Ooh, and they’re unlocking the armory at the Imperial Observation Post for me to loot! Huzzah.
-No mention of Albrook, Tzen, Maranda. I’m still a bit confused. Are they part of the Empire? They didn’t look like they wanted to be. Or maybe they still want to be associated with each other, but in more of a loose federation rather than a “soldiers-in-our-streets” way.
-Maybe this’ll turn into a Hannibal Lecter thing, where I’ll get to occasionally visit Kefka in jail to hear wacky quips and get advice abot the esper. And to mock him. That’s important too.
-The more I think about this, the less comfortable I am. What if Gestahl is just pretending to make nice, and then as soon as we subdue the espers or convince them to go away, he sends his troops back to South Figaro and Doma, and goes back to his old world domination thing?
Major anxiety. What makes it even trickier is that I believe Leo is sincere, and a lot of the soldiers we spoke with who wanted piece are sincere. Gestahl is the biggie that I’m skeptical on. Hm.
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Next time: To the espers.
