Stone Vigil
-I head into the Stone Vigil dungeon held by a dragon cult. This is the site of the crashed Enterprise.
-I love Stone Vigil’s design. It’s a snow-swept, ruined fortress overrun by dragons.
-A giant dragon sleeps at the end with the crashed Enterprise behind it. Cid and Alphinaud try to sneak past.
-Until Lahabrea shows up and everything goes to shit. He corrupts/animates the dragon with his magic.
-His dialogue goes quickly, but he mentions my efforts as “blasphemous gifts.” Does he regard Hydaelyn (that Glinda the Good Witch-esque helper crystal) as blasphemous? Opposed to his god?
-We take out the dragon, and to my shock I get another crystal. In the past, I got one from Hydaelyn, one from defeating Ifrit, one from effectively avoiding a fight with Ramuh, one from defeating Titan. But that dragon wasn’t a primal.
Something else is going on with these crystals. Not sure what. I can’t seem to find a pattern to why I get them when I get them.
-Cid repairs the ship. We leave.
-He has an idea of how to modify the ship to get through Garuda’s storm. We just need a special type of corrupted ice crystal.
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Corrupted Crystals
-The hunt for the new crystals begins. I find an engineer who helps me get a “corrupted wind crystal.”
-The next lead shows the corrupted crystal in the “Isles of Umbra.” Isles overrun with undead. I offer my help in exchange for the corrupted crystal.
-FFV CALLBACK! Adventurers nearby talk of an “alluring voice” near the Ship Graveyard. In FFV, Siren tried to seduce our party in the Ship Graveyard.
-I wait by the shore for Siren to show up. She does. I plug my ears, and she starts sending waves of her undead thralls at me. Took em out, but she herself escapes.
-That’s good enough for the garrison on the island. They give me their corrupted crystal.
-Dang it! Again, the wrong type.
-I head to Gridania, my last hope. One particularly hungry spriggan (an ore-chewing dust bunny) ate ALL the corrupted fire crystals.
-Tracked and killed it. Yay! The questgiver trolls me hard when I turn the quest in.
“Thanks, you brought it back! But it’s the wrong type. Try this next place… LOL JK. This is actually the right crystal type this time.”
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Cid Flies Again
-We’re ready to fly past Garuda’s defenses.
ALPHINAUD: “Enterprise… engage!” lol ok picard
-Cid removes his goggles. Is that a gem on his forehead?
-Flashback time. OMG YOUNG CID
-He was a prodigy like his father. Born and raised in Garlemald.
-His father engineered Meteor to threaten Eorzea. This obsession led Cid to break from his father.
“You abandoned us all. But he was there for me, Father – there for me when you were not.” The “he” here is Gaius.
-Gaius too got sucked in by his own obsessions. Cid fled the Empire.
Hee! Biggs and Wedge were with Cid on his escape flight.
-On the flight from the Empire, Cid saw a vision me, Ququshu, descending from the stars.
-Cid wanted to prove that his talents could be used for something more than the destructive purposes in the Empire’s hands.
-Back to the present. All pureblood Garleans apparently have a third eye. That must be his “gem”.
-All Cid’s memories have now returned. He has discovered his purpose: to support and protect adventurers as we fight the good fight for Eorzea. That’s why his vision was of me.
-We descend into the eye of Garuda’s storm.
-What a great scene. Loving Cid’s character and arc.
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The Howling Eye
-Garuda’s design is so great!
-She has this wonderful cackling-evil-witch-god vibe to her.
THIS MUSIC THOUGH!!!
The fight itself is a mixture of taking care of adds and hiding behind pillars to avoid damage.
-We defeat her, though she doesn’t dissipate. Her Ixal followers give her strength. She’s determined to take out all the other Beastman tribes and their gods.
-She tries to temper me. It fails; I’m Hydaelyn’s. Hydaelyn’s power blasts Garuda, knocking a crystal from her chest.
-I’m back in this dream world thing. The circle is complete, full of crystals. Still dunno what this is about.
GARDUA: “What.. What are you? What have you done to me?”
-Gaius van Baelsar arrives on the scene. He taunts Garuda hard.
-She sends her Ixal worshippers against Gaius. He lays WASTE to them with his hand cannon.
-Even more enraged, she destroys a bunch of captive Kobolds and Amal’jaa nearby. They cry out to their gods for succor… and the gods answer. Titan and Ifrit emerge. This is EPIC AS FUCK.
-Garuda did this in order to drain them of energy, of aether.
-Gaius acts. Some Imperial thingy is flying above and drops. A bomb? No. An automaton.
IS THAT ULTIMA WEAPON?
IT RIPS TITAN AND IFRIT APART, CONSUMING THEIR ESSENCE. GAIUS TAUNTED GARUDA BECAUSE HE ~~WANTED~~ HER TO BRING OUT THE OTHER PRIMALS
IF FUCKING EATS GARUDA HAHAHHAA
-Lahabrea is above. Maybe he provided this Weapon to the Empire. It grows stronger with each primal consumed.
-The Weapon flies away. We leave on the Enterprise.
-So now the primals are no longer an issue. This Weapon is the big problem.
-Our next step is to return to Vesper Bay, rebuild the Scions, and see what we can learn.
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Black Mage – The Voidgate Breathes Gloomy
-Level 45 quest time. The Beastman Trio tells me that the voidgate seeks to corrupt black magic.
-The next voidgate key is a secret spell ciphered by an ancient black mage.
-The quest itself is the most challenging I’ve faced in XIV. A slew of void portals open up. I kill as many as I can, and those remaining after a short amount of time spawn enemies, usually a few at a time. Thank Nald’thal for Sleep to control them.
This repeats a number of times. The waves are relentless, and if I didn’t have sleep I’d be overwhelmed.
-Woohoo! The quest reward upgraded my thunder ability.
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Black Mage – The Blood Must Flow
-The Beastman Trio is convinced that I’m a legendary, prophesied black mage. *flexes casually*
-Words on the Gem of Shatotto (the black mage gem) now appear. Like the One Ring in fire.
“Know thee, brave keeper of Shatotto’s light,
As these very words wax plain to thy sight,
The seal what was cast doth shudder and sigh,
And the voidgate’s dread sundering draws nigh.
“To ward against the creeping of the Gloom,
Thou needest great garb to stay any doom,
To this sacred wear thy thoughts now must tend,
Unto thy black command darkness shall bend.”
-Before I close the voidgate, I have to find and don sacred black mage garb. I’ll have to pour blood into three void portals to procure it.
-All three of the Beastman trio offer their blood to me for this ritual. Ququshu approves.
-The resultant gear is pretty sweet. All black classic mage hat, pants, a mask. All but a robe.
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Random Stuff
-I’ve uncovered some quests that are “beast quests,” where I can help out friendly beastmen tribes. I unlocked quests with friendly sylphs and friendly Amal’jaa. If I do enough quests I can increase my reputation, get access to new stuff and more story.
-My favorite part of discovering the beastman quests is a particularly violent Miqo’te named Loonh Gah who has joined the Amal’jaa. She hates my guts and I love everything about her.
-Unlocked PvP. I have pretty much no interested in trying that right now, but there seem to be a ton of different PvP styles.
-New promotion within the Immortal Flames! It opens up new Grand Company levequests (repeatable quests) and hunting marks.
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Random Images
A super hardcore dark knight that’s also CHEEK PINCHINGLY ADORABLE CAUSE LALAFELL ON CHOCOBO WITH A BIG OVERSIZED HELMET GRRRR SCARYCUTE.
Our party in Stone Vigil, posing for our new metal album cover. “Burning Through Eorzea.” Coming fall 2018.
Nothing says black mage like bright pink.
A ruined tower in Mor Dhona with the remains of a giant Shinryu-esque dragon wrapped around.
The worst enmity list EVER as I run through a section of forested hell.
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Next time: Learning more about Gaius’s Weapon. Rebuilding the Scions of the Seventh Dawn.
