I Already Said It In Another Post, But I Really Like Hads/Emet-selch And Venat/Hydealin. They Both Made

I already said it in another post, but I really like Hadès/Emet-selch and Venat/Hydealin. They both made choices and they lived by it. They didn’t excuse their own behaviors, or try to unmake what they did. They choose a path, and walked it to the bitter end. They are well written, and they are logical and coherent in their being, even if I disagree with their beliefs or morals. (But not Hermès. Fuck Hermès)

Again, I’m more aligned to Hydealin. An immortal race wouldn’t have been able to fight Météion. Their lifespans is too great, they change and learn too slowly. For immortals, especially immortals who lived in paradise, with little strife or hardships, the loss of one life is a great tragedy, one they should try to prevent, or even retrieve. For a mortal, it’s  fact of life. You can only live and go on. It’s partly why I believe ascians didn’t and couldn’t deal well with the loss of their world or lifes, and why a plan as stupid than Zodiark was hatched. (People, you guys would have destroyed yourselves with accelerated entropy, Météion would just have to swoop in when you bled yourself dry)

I also grew up on cautionary tales about immortality and unchanging. May you be eternal” is a curse for a reason, and only the fools believe it’s a blessing. Hadès is a prime example of it. Also, cycles are important. Everything run on them, and everything that rise will fall. We’re not better or worse, just different and suited to their environnement. I feel like for all the ascians preached about the natural cycle of Eitherys, they believed themselves above it. Which... is foolish. It’s the pistachio loukoum story. We walk on the bones and ruins of those that came before, as those that came after will on our.

Anyways, sorry for the disjointed ranting here. May have gone away from original topic.

If your friend who would have lived 100 years got divided into thirteen parrots who would only live 3 years, and you knew that by killing those parrots, you'd get your friend back, would you kill the parrots?

Or does the fact that the parrots, though their abilities cannot be compared to your own, are able to speak and reason and love in their own way mean they deserve to have their own lives, and you need to accept your friend is dead?

Your best friend? Your child? Your lover?

The friend who asked you to save them, before they vanished?

Your entire community? Your whole family?? What if there were only three humans left alive in the whole world, and you'd promised the rest that you would find a way to rescue them?

To me it's perhaps MORE impressive that Emet Selch and Elidibus ultimately side with the parrots.

I'm indifferent at best to people who don't follow FFXIV's story, or don't care for it, obviously it's not perfect.

I feel like I'm in an alien world when people say the problem is "there's so much reading/so many words"

HONEHY THATS WHAT A STORY IS HELLO???

You're absolutely right, but also, this prepared the Elpis arc in EW. This set up an understanding and respect of the ascians. It's part of why I love them as characters. They made a choice, and lived with it for the millenias after. (Yeah, I'm still salty to the dread wolf). Their morality and ideology may be twisted, it is a logical progression and make sense. That we agree with it or are horiffied does not matter, they are coherent and understandable. (Not Hermes. Fuck Hermes). So I like them.

Me explaining that Emet-Selch often uses the rhetoric of fascists and eugenicists to describe the ancients and he speaks to the scions with a bad faith mentality and his entire character arc is about being unable to let go of the past and I need you all to understand that these things are not coincidence and this is the story explicitly trying to tell you that if you are not careful your nostalgia will become worship of the past which will in turn become horrific fanaticism

So, huh.... Does this ask for previous to coming to Eorza to be an adventurers and starting to fist-fight gods?

Becaus eif it's not background oriented, yeah, all our WoL have gones through near death experience.

Hyperspecific polls but the options are based off your WOL/FFXIV OC

some sketches based off of this question from twitter, it gave me an excuse to finally draw a design for an AU where iris becomes a lightwarden. i wanted to a while back but finally am doing it. her title would be lightwarden agape, fitting the theme of forms of love