AUDIENCE FOR: Alphinaud Leveilleur

[guestservices]

this is a placeholder until you get us a funnier one

Comments

[sageguidance]

Interesting? Then...

[ Alphinaud focuses again, and the world around them shifts. I am taking so many screenshots for this game. Anyway, once again they stand near a ledge, only this time it's considerably more steep; there is no ocean below, only the vast expanse of the sky and the clouds floating along. Looking around, it becomes obvious the landmasses around them are floating high, high up in the air, and it's a long way back down. In the distance stands old, crumbling ruins and sparse forests; behind them a cave, home to the local moogles. Perhaps if Vulpecula listens carefully, they might hear the occasional stray kupo...? ]

Never shall I forget the awe I felt as I first beheld this vista.

[guestservices]

[floating islands...

vulpecula takes a few steps back from the edge, despite the fact that - well, this is a dream. what are they going to do if they drop over the edge, wake up when tey hit the ground?

...but the ruins and forests off in the distance are fascinating, and as they turn toward the sound of a kupo, they tilt their head to one side and study the cave.]

It's breathtaking, for certain.

[sageguidance]

[ They'd be falling for a long while... ]

Aye. These are the Churning Mists, a holy ground to the dragons of Dravania. Ere we first stepped foot here, no man has tread these grounds in a thousand years.

[guestservices]

[uh. excuse them.]

Dragons?

[why do you sound so stunned, vulpecula. you are talking to a dead elf, in the middle of a murdergame with a bunch of non-human characters.]

[sageguidance]

[ Alphinaud also looks at them, slightly surprised. ]

Do you find that astonishing?

[guestservices]

Er, well... a thousand years of no one being here but dragons, and you were able to set foot here... that's amazing! How did it happen?

[sageguidance]

Hah… you would almost have me believing that dragons in itself were shocking!

[ yeah. we’ll go with that. ]

How we came to travel here is… quite the story, but the short of it is that we arrived to parley with the great wrym Hraesvelgr. The dragons were, at the time, at war with the kingdom of Ishgard, and we sought a means to end it.

[guestservices]

Well, be careful who you tell this story to! For some people, they really would be!

[think of the moderns, alphi...]

I see... so you went to visit the dragons as diplomats?

[sageguidance]

[ “think of the moderns” our dragons are from another planet who fled their home world because robots came to conquer them, so like, ]

Yes. It was my hope that through peace and compromise, we could mend the rift ‘twixt man and dragon.

[guestservices]

...did it work?

[sageguidance]

On our first attempt... no. The dragons were justified in their resentment of mankind, thus Hraesvelgr was unwilling to act against his kin. Eventually, however... he did come around once we had proven we mean true in our quest to attain peace.

It could not have been easy for him, for it meant siding against his own brother.

[guestservices]

Oh... you're right, I'm sure it couldn't have been...

[that must have been really tough.]

But - once the fighting was over... he and his brother would have been able to make peace with each other, wouldn't they?

[sageguidance]

I deeply wish that could have been the outcome, but no such thing were possible. To end the war, Nidhogg was slain, too overcome with a thousand years of grief and rage to be reasoned with.

[guestservices]

...oh...

[that's




depressing]

[sageguidance]

[ he nods ]

I understand. The dragons have faced a great amount of strife for longer than I could possibly imagine, but I do hope with the war now ended that it can be different.

[guestservices]

I hope so, too. Sometimes there's no choice but to fight in order to win yourselves peace, but - peace is always a much better option, when you can have it.

[sageguidance]

Aye, I quite agree.

I am not terribly fond of fighting, to speak true, but unfortunately where there is mankind, there is conflict. That is an inevitability.

[guestservices]

...sounds like that's true in any world.

[sageguidance]

[ another nod ]

In spite of the state of our worlds... I do hope at least, whence you hail, you need not live through troubled times.

[guestservices]

...that's a nice hope.

[haha.]

[sageguidance]

[ Oh. Hmm. ]

Perhaps one day it could be more than just a hope.

[guestservices]

It's what everyone works toward, isn't it? One way or another.

[sageguidance]

Quite.

But we need not dwell on unpleasantries.

[ There's another distant kupo kupo! as if the imaginary moogle it came from attempts to lighten the mood. ]

Not with such a beautiful view before us.

[guestservices]

...right.

[right!! the view is nice, and - ]

What's that sound? The "kupo"...?

[sageguidance]

Oh—that.

[ Alphinaud turns around, looking toward a large cliff and the entrance to a cave. Along the grassy patch toward it, a few of these little guys are floating along. ]

A clan of moogles live up here alongside the dragons. 'Tis a rare sight to come upon one of their kind.