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Enigma
-The Illuminati made off with Roundrox’s precious trinkets/junk.
-Cid finds the thief and recovers the junk, but why did they take it? She must have something in that pile that was worthwhile to them.
-Ah, it’s a gem hidden amongst this! The gem opens up a fragment of the codex.
-Mide’s got something going on. She remembers her former lover who something tragic must have happened to. I think he was an engineer, or had some tie to this codex.
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Rearmed
-Why did the codex spring from the gemstone when Roundrox touched it? It’s protected by some sort of magic lock.
MIDE: “Only those who share its fundamental principles are able to view its contents.”
-I hope the Illuminati don’t learn that Roundrox has that power.
Roundrox.
-Mide will keep the gemstone for safekeeping for now.
-Meanwhile, Alexander has begun drawing in aether again. The Illuminati are restarting it.
-Hi Y’shtola! She sensed the aetheric disturbance and is here to help.
-OH SHIT ALEXANDER IS GETTING UP! HE GRABBED ONTO THE LAND AND IS STARTING TO PULL HIMSELF UP… Then stops.
That gives me chills. Seeing anything that massive moving.
-We entered the previous raid set through his right arm. Now his left arm is accessible, “Fist of the Son.”
-One boss here is an Illuminati scientist with the glorious name of Ratfinx Twinkledinks. Throughout the fight, Ratfinx uses colored syringes around the room to transform himself and summon different kinds of help.
-Quickthinx approaches us outside the raid. Tells us that Mide betrayed us, and sold him the gemstone. Is he lying? Idk.
-Three years ago, earthquakes rocked the area. Auri treasure hunters were seen nearby. And 100 years ago, an Auri who looked exactly like Mide wrote the Enigma Codex.
Is she super old? I’m definitely confused.
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The Folly’s Youth
-Next up in Alexander’s left arm is the Cuff of the Son. The boss here is a challenging trio, with a crapload of stuff to dodge.
-After, Mide meets us back in camp. She confesses that she met the Illuminati… but to trick them, not to betray us. She handed over a random stone, not the actual gem. The real codex is still with her.
We’ll see. I don’t know.
MIDE: “In fact, it was I who first taught the goblins how to summon the primal.” OH SHIT
-She meant to summon it for her own ends. The author of the codex was her ancestor (so not just a young version of an unaging Mide, like I thought). He strove to create a perfect world, one better and more equitable than the Illuminati’s twisted elitism.
-A few years ago, a man led a small group, with Mide among them. She fell in love with him and his dream.
-Flashback time! She helped him summon a primal. It laid their hopes to waste, dragging the man to its core as it awoke. She summoned the force field at the last second. The magic broke the codex apart.
-And Roundrox stumbled across one of the shattered codex remains.
-She tried resummoning Alexander not out of any desire for Utopia. She just wanted to see him again. “And perhaps.. walk to the ends of the world with him.”
LOLOL BIGGS: “Tale old as time, eh? Woman falls in love with man, man gets sucked into primal, woman tries summoning primal to be reunited with man.”
-The codices can control the primal. We need a complete Enigma Codex and one capable of reading it. Together, Alexander can be commanded to transport its residents wherever they choose.
-Wedge interrupts with bad news. The illuminati have captured Roundrox.
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Toppling the Tyrant
-Into the Cuff of the Son. This is very different, and has an incredibly cool look. Like a steampunk city.
(I know it’s not a city, just the inner mechanisms of Alexander.)
-The boss is Quickthinx himself. We don’t kill him, just send him scuttling off in a damaged mech.
-Mide used to be able to read the codex. Her mind was aligned with it. She had the openness of youth then.
-The Primal destroyed all that. Now, her pure curiosity is tainted.
-The section we’ve been exploring is called “Midas,” named after a king of old. The game’s version of Midas is the same as ours in the real world – the golden touch myth. The danger of getting what you wish for, if you’re not careful with that wish.
Mide’s old group has the same issue. They didn’t consider the cost of what they wanted.
Now she just wants to see her leader/lover again.
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One Step Behind
-Our push towards the middle of Alexander continues. The next section is “Burden of the Son.”
-Onslaughter is the boss here. It’s got a Voltron-type mechanic.
-This is an old fight, and my friends and I are way overgeared. But for the four of us (this is an 8 person raid), it feels like a good challenge anyway.
-We reach the second Gordian Knot. Mide goes to deactivate this core, briefly saying goodbye to her love (“Dayan”) before doing so. She thinks she’s about to destroy Alexander and Dayan’s spirit for good.
-Quickthinx descends to us. He knows one of us has the true codex.
-Lolol wedge and bigggs pretend they have the real codex while Mide and I escape.
-Not so fast. He jostles the elevator we’re on, and knocks the codex free from Mide. Crap.
-wait, how DID he jostle it free? He just made the elevator stop and KNEW it would jostle the gem? No way. Mide is in on it.
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A Gob in the Machine
-There’s a device inside Alexander capable of predicting the future mathematically.
-A primal’s presence disrupted things inside, and they’ve been using it to gaze into the future.
-Un oh. Alexander’s active again. It’s sucking aether into itself – time is flowing backwards inside its bubble.
That’s why the Illuminati didn’t fret when we destroyed the core. They can just undo the damage.
MIDE: “To erase the past… to return to a clean slate… Could Dayan have known…?”
Scene change, inside Alexander. They’re restoring the Codex. Poor Roundrox is trapped here, being used like a battery to help unlock things.
OH SHIT they did it, they used Roundrox to restore the Enigma Codex.
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Next time: the conclusion to the Alexander raid.
