FFXIV – Part 246: Unrepentant [Dark Knight 50-60]

Summary: Helping the dark knight Sidurgu protect a girl from the world’s worst mother.

I’m excited for this one. The 30-50 dark knight quest was by FAAAAR my favorite job quest chain in XIV: http://coldrungaming.blogspot.com/2018/07/ffxiv-p...

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The Wages of Mercy

-Someone is stalking and murdering Ishgardian knights. I’m immediately the suspect and some guards attack me.

-Then a supremely badass looking Au’ra dark knight named Sidurgu joins me. An old friend of Fray, my former alter ego. Scares off my attackers.



-Even though dark knights exist as a check against power, they’re still popularly reviled. That explains the knights immediately fearful and suspicious of me.

-OH SHIT, Sidurgu followed the knight he “scared off” and killed him. No mercy in this dojo.

-I understand where he’s coming from as an Au’ra. They were seen as dragon-kin and attacked by Ishgardians on sight for a long time. He had to grow hard.

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The Knight and the Maiden Fair

-I’d thought Sidurgu trained under Fray, but it looks like he trained alongside Fray under another master.

-Before the master passed, he said: “A heart bleeds, a man weeps, a soul burns. Thence comes the darkness, to consume. Yet even in the depths, the flame endures. Submit to the flame and harness the abyss.”

Metal af but I don’t know what to make of it.

-A girl is here in the meeting. Rielle.



-Sidurgu and Fray found her under threat from the Temple Knights and protected her. Not sure why she’s under threat, but Sidurgu is dead set on protecting her. He believes Rielle is the key to the riddle.

-She’s a quiet girl. Unsure why the Temple Knights are after her beyond saying she’s an abomination.

-We take her to a Vanu (bird-beast) healer to help see what’s up. Whatever she sees FREAKS HER OUT.

VANU HEALER: “This is no child… this is… ah!” No answers, but that’s not a great sign.

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Kindred Spirits

-We’ll next check with the seers of Gridania.

-It’s a dangerous journey. We have to fend off more attacking Temple Knights.



-E-Sumi-Yan’s examination shows that she has an aura similar to a dragon or an elemental.

-He tells a tale of “The Boy and the Dragon Gay,” how someone drinks dragon blood and becomes one. We’ve seen that in XIV directly, specifically in Snowcloak.

-Later, Rielle seems to admit something like this was the case.

“There were no windows. Just walls of stone with little cracks to tempt your fingers, and iron bars colder than ice… All she said was: ‘It’s better this way.’”

Someone MADE her drink blood. Imprisoned her and forced her into it. Why? 

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Original Sins

-Now that we know dragon shenanigans may be involved, we head to a dying dragon that our scaly friend Vidofnir refers us to.

DYING DRAGON: “There you are, my beloved… How… how long hath it been since we soared through the mists?”



That answers it. Rielle was fed this dragon’s mate’s blood.

-Or wait, no. SHE didn’t drink the blood herself. One of her parents or ancestors did so to gain power.

-We head back to an Ishgard tavern to regroup when a new character barges in. Ystride, a priest of Halone.

“Will you stand before [Halone] and claim that you were righteous? That it was just to take so many lives in defense of that abomination!?”

A fanatic. Even if the dragon’s blood isn’t Rielle’s fault, Ystride is set on destroying her.



-Surprisingly, she gives us the option of trial by combat (as an alternative to just hounding Rielle the rest of her life).

-OH SHIT, YSTRIDE IS RIELLE’S MOTHER??

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The Flame in the Abyss

-Ystride’s husband was a heretic, right under her nose. He was killed when discovered (after transforming into a dragon and attacking nearby guards), and Ystride locked Rielle away.

SIDURGU: “What monster thinks to find absolution in her daughter’s death?” RIGHT??

-We head to the moogles next for help, on Vidofnir’s advice.

And Rielle snaps at Sidurgu. Sees him getting extra-murdery, taking unusual risks, all supposedly on her behalf… but she thinks he’s doing this for some other reason. Trying to make up for some past mistake, or just trying to punish himself.



-MOG REFERENCE!!! The moogle helping us, Moggie, sees how dark knights draw on power of emotion and it reminds them of a former moogle named Mog who had a penchant for dancing.

MOGGIE: “Anyway, your master was absolutely right when he told you to ‘submit to the flame.’ You just never figured out what he meant by it.”

-The moogles send us on some clearly bullshit gathering quests, and when we meet back up with them afterwards, they claim to have kidnapped Rielle because it was fun to play with her.

Uh. Wtf is going on?

-As moogles attack, they taunt Sidurgu and drive him into a greater and greater rage. This is clearly some didactic thing, either trying to get him in touch with the darkness more or trying to pull him back from some abyss. Maybe making him “submit to the flame” is making him so angry that he goes super Saiyan.

-Not quite. It was a didactic purpose, but they instead want him to realize that the strength to protect can’t just come from rage, but from love.



AND THEY TEACH THIS LESSON WITH A MUSICAL NUMBER WTFFFFFF, A LITERAL SONG AND DANCE

-Much as the moogles annoy Sidurgu, it works. He’ll pull back. Try to honestly care for Rielle, not just use her as an avenue for his own vengeance and hatred against the temple Knights.  

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Absolution

-Sidurgu is looking calmer than usual going into this trial. I think that’ll make Rielle happy.

-Boy, Ystride SUCKS. She has such overt hatred for Rielle, and whatever she may say about the corrupt dragon’s blood, it’s clearly because she reminds her of the husband.



-The fight is unusually easy. Ystride sends waves of enemies our way, but they all have very low health.

-At the end, Sidurgu makes a different choice than he did in the first quest of this series. He shows mercy. Doesn’t delivery the killing blow to Ystride.

I hope we don’t regret this. Ystride has no remorse, still intends to pursue Rielle. So much for the trial by combat.

-But I don’t really care about Ystride. Rielle steps up here and is open about how much this whole thing has hurt her. She used to pray Ystride would take her in, forgive her, love her.

She’s given up on that.



-HOLY SHIT, HOLY SHIT HOLY SHIT, SIDURGU (WITH RIELLE’S BLESSING) EXECUTES HER

-This really shocked me. I’m so used to stories of redemption. This is far more interesting and complex. Infinitely more practical too, given just how unrepentant Ystride was.

-Plus, the execution by the end was born not out of personal rage, but a desire to protect.

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Random Stuff Around Eorzea

-The sweet level 60 dark knight armor, hard as it is to see behind the gigantic weapon:


-Some great player names I’ve seen recently:

Chunchunmaru Megumin
Rusty Knuckleduster
Meowlie Cyrus
Syrup Beaversneezes
Lifeless Satan
Mathias Shaw (a prominent WoW NPC’s name)
Kawaii Ichiban
Mis T’ake
Swamplips Of-filth
Pac Mans
Beef Bourguignon
Aurora Moondancer
Rinkydink Cuttlefish
Tim’the Enchanter
Hamburger Longways

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Next time: I’ll keep leveling up my dark knight (and I’ve also started the Amal’jaa beast tribe quests), but my next post will likely be when 5.5 drops next week EEEEEE!!!!