THE FIRST DAWNTRAIL DUNGEON MADE ME UGLY LAUGH I *HAD* TO CAPTURE THE MOMENT

Mankind's First Hero, and his Final Hope!

Fight at Ultima Thule.

I should name the series: Sing with me Once More

prints now available

another thing about Garlemald in EW: the irony of the Empire being destroyed not by an external enemy but from within, first by civil conflict and then by the Teleophoroi.

Many of the Garlean leaders, inlucing Varis and Gaius, were what we might call "principled villains", who thought they were doing the right thing - if only for their own people at the expense of literally everyone else. But then the works of these people who did terrible things believing they were justified get brutally dismantled by Zenos and Fandaniel, who proudly claim not to believe in anything.

It's this that makes what Zenos says to Jullus in that one cutscene make sense. No "good reason" would have made the violence the Empire inflicted on others right, just like no good reason would justify Zenos destroying the Empire and it's people in such a terrible way.

One of the typical imageries associated with the concept of "hope" is the image of light amidst darkness. FF14 does a lot of stuff with light and dark of course but in Shadowbringers they made light a thing of horror so they can't rely on the light image all the time.

Another usual image is a bird - "Hope is a thing with feathers..." from the Emily Dickinson poem. Meteion, the bird, was created with hope, but becomes a thing of despair.

So what's left as the image of "hope" in Endwalker is this:

From the cutscene "Live, Die and Know", where Venat monologues about hope and light everlasting while the camera cuts back and forth between her, blackened with blood, and the WoL succumbing to the Light corruption, both limping and stumbling along their paths. This is the face of hope in FF14 - broken, dying, bloodstained, yet defiant. That's what makes playing the hero in FF14 so damn magnetic.

Early ARR, I was cringing at the cliche chosen one, light vs dark type concepts. Further along I began to doubt Hydaelyn, given her ineffectiveness and the cruelty of the fate she bound the WoL to. But from Elpis to the end of Endwalker and beyond, I was proud, for the first time, to be called a Warrior of Light.

everything post-Endwalker hinges on the idea that even after saving the world and being released from their duty as Warrior of Light the WoL will seek adventure for it's own sake. They're still doing the same things they always do but this time purely because they want to.

And I don't think that change would have been possible without Zenos.

The final confrontation with him at the end of Endwalker, his questions spurring the WoL to think about why they do what they do, or the duel that serves to show them how fun it can be to fight without the weight of the world on your back. It's crazy to think that for all of the harm he caused the positive consequence of Zenos's actions was inspiring his friend to live freely.

“Though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light; I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night.” 💫

It's the same picture...