Moon Kitty

Henceforth, he shall walk... I close my eyes, tell us why must we suffer Release your hands, for your will drags us under My legs grow tired, tell us where must we wander How can we carry on if redemption's beyond us? To all of my children in whom Life flows abundant To all of my children to whom Death hath passed his judgement The soul yearns for honor, and the flesh the hereafter Look to those who walked before to lead those who walk after Shining is the Land's light of justice Ever flows the Land's well of purpose Walk free, walk free, walk free, believe... The Land is alive, so believe... Suffer (Feel) Promise (Think) Witness (Teach) Reason (Hear) Follow (Feel) Wander (Think) Stumble (Teach) Listen (Speak) Honor (Speak) Value (Tell) Whisper (Tell) Mention (Hope) Ponder (Hope) Warrant (Wish) Cherish (Wish) Welcome (Roam) Witness (Roam) Listen (Roam) Suffer (Roam) Sanction (Sleep) Weather (Sleep) Wander (Sleep) Answer Sleep on Now open your eyes while our plight is repeated Still deaf to our cries, lost in hope we lie defeated Our souls have been torn, and our bodies forsaken Bearing sins of the past, for our future is taken War born of strife, these trials persuade us not (Feel what? Learn what?) Words without sound, these lies betray our thoughts Mired by a plague of doubt, the Land, she mourns (See what? Hear what?) Judgement binds all we hold to a memory of scorn Tell us why, given Life, we are meant to die, helpless in our cries? Witness (Feel) Suffer (Think) Borrow (Teach) Reason (Hear) Follow (Feel) Stumble (Think) Wander (Teach) Listen (Blink) Whisper (Blink) Shoulder (Blink) Ponder (Blink) Weather (Hear) Answer (Look) Answer (Think) Answer together Thy Life is a riddle, to bear rapture and sorrow To listen, to suffer, to entrust unto tomorrow In one fleeting moment, from the Land doth life flow Yet in one fleeting moment, for anew it doth grow In the same fleeting moment Thou must live, Die, And know

Was there happiness? Really what kind of question is that? Happiness is fleeting just like every other emotion. You can be happy for 10 minutes and then be angry the next and so on and so forth. Notice how each character is panned in on for each society Meteion describes. I read a breakdown of this somewhere wish I could find it/remember it. I am not sure I understand the reference for Hythlodaeus. Hermes: Who is he to decide mankind's worthiness. He is not the creator? He is just as flawed as the rest if not more so with how insane he is. Not a single one of them have the right to make that judgement. Not him, not Emet-Selch, nor is it Venat's right. She had no right to make the decision for mankind that she did even if it was the only way. Irony here. So yes lets have the depressed guy who doesn't understand his own meaning for life, his own purpose to judge everyone else's. That is great. Love the writers they did a good job. They do crazy well. I am sorry not sorry, their lives should take precedence over their creations lives. Just like in the real world a human's life should take precedence over (lets pick something cute) a puppies life. Mankind has dominion over the flora and fauna of the planet, it is in order to care for, tend to, and use all resources given to their fullest potential in a just manner for the good of all mankind. Now "just" is the keyword meaning responsibly but that doesn’t put bunny rabbits above humans. There is no equality between caretaker and creature or creator and creation. Emet-Selch: So much conveyed in the dialogue. 1. Emet just accepted us as Azem even though we are sundered and he claims to barely believe our story. We know even in his denial that he does believe us to some extant because he knows how to perceive liars. And he compared us to our ancient selves and Venat. We are incorrigible. :) 2. He accepts us as we are,that we are worthy stewards of the star. He sacrifices everything for us, for a sundered star and its remaining reflections. He condemns himself to 12,000ish years of misery, loneliness, and pain. Compare this to his tempered self when he says "You cannot be entrusted with our legacy" That smile of his... 3. When Emet starts talking to us and I might be wrong but I don't think we realize right away that he didn't or isn't going to summon Grani to get him and Hythlo out of there as well. I did frame by frame screenshots to see our reaction better and there is a moment as he says his "goodbye" we realize it is a goodbye. This look reminds me of a wait what... no moment before we yell to him. I caught it the best I could and put it on Twitter. In fact these are all statements from my twitter account. https://twitter.com/MoonKitty1022 I know twitter is not the greatest but it has lots of FFXIV posts and that is all I use it for.

This is the Dungeon Only-Really funny comments made by our comrades throughout. I have no idea why I paused so long in certain spots... 2:00 Observation Journal #1 8:55 1st Boss 17:30 Observation Journal #2 20:35 2nd Boss 30:45 Flying Lifeforms: An Introduction 31:30 Hermes

I have to split this video into 2 or 3 parts the cutscene in Ktisis is really long. Dampening magicks. Well that is not fair. Hermes gets to stay at full power while we get knocked down a peg or two of course with Hades being crazy powerful it would be a joke if he was allowed to stay at full power. Same with Venat. I am not sure about Hythlo :) I really like what Venat has to say about flaws. "Yet for me, the imperfections only enhance the fragile beauty of our star. I will fight to see it delivered from destruction, warts and all.

I love that someone says it. That it is Emet-Selch even better. The premise of Hermes questions is flawed especially when given to a child empath. This is the moment I guess where he loses his mind. He fails to understand that there is no such thing as perfection. That is kind of sad that he cannot see this. It means nothing could ever give him a sense of peace, pleasure, or a sense of joy in his life and circumstances. He seems to be the type that is always looking for the unattainable and cannot see what is right there in front of his face. He doesn't seem to know how to live, learn, and grow.

1. The Proud and the Pointy-eyed 2. If I Could Turn Back Time

1. A Gazebo to Call Our Own 2. Don't Trust Anyone Over Sixty

I am curious as to how much we told Hermes. It doesn't seem like we reveal his part in the second set of final days. It seems like we only give the basics: final days, sundering, unknown root cause, dynamis plays a part. That is what I get out of this. I can understand why we tell Hades/Hythlo/Venat far more details. The bond is undeniable between these characters, and I don't mean romantic, that is just wishful thinking with a particular white haired snarky man. We know exactly who we were in their time period and what Hades and Hythlo meant/mean to us. And Venat well even with our choice at the beginning of EW and her honesty issues we still have a measure of trust in her. I am typing out my understanding/thoughts here. Feel free to correct me if I missed some dialogue somewhere or misunderstood something. So Aether essentially protects a person from dynamis but also in turn makes it so, densely aetheric people cannot manipulate dynamis as well. So no manipulation either way. So since the song of oblivion (which seems to be the little devil on your shoulder whispering for you to give into despair)couldn’t corrupt the ancient people it corrupted their magicks somehow. We know Zodiark saved the star by placing essentially a blanket of aether around the planet keeping the dynamis from even getting in. So that is gone now. Dynamis can get back in again. We know the sundered have less aether. All sundered minus WoL and G”raha have about 57% of their original soul. (Base/Source+7 rejoinings) We have slightly more. So we can be manipulated by it and manipulate it as well if we wanted to. He says dynamis has transformative potential. So it seems the source (Meteia) of the negative emotions can only latch on to the darkness that lies in every man’s soul. But that negativity needs to be heavily present within the person to manifest into the blasphemies? So the negativity has to be strong in the individual to hear the sources call (Meteia) to oblivion is what I am getting out of this. Or like our characters' experiences do people just hear and feel all that pain and suffering that is being projected upon them that they buckle under the pressure and become the blasphemies? Like a billion voices of despair and pain coming at you all at once. But it still seems to be based on individuals' current outlook on life as well because otherwise everyone would have turned almost immediately. And the examples we were given were all people struggling with their current lot in life. There is so much information given in this quest and it looks like at least Venat is coming to the correct conclusion. Not sure about the others.

Venat helps us with the Echo and we get a little bit more description. 1. Peering through walls of the soul the moment a subject is recalling the memory 2.Piecing together an event from the ripples left in the ambient aether. Notice we do not grab our heads as if in pain. Hermes kills me. He wants to know what others live for. What about what he lives for? Everyone lives for a different reason. He sent beings with the minds of children to see what others live for. He is looking for the perfect answer when there is no such thing as perfection at least not in this world or theirs. Mankind is flawed in FFXIV just like real life. I don't particularly like my answer for this one especially with what he has just done recently as Fandaniel. The incarnation he prefers is Amon who worships Xande and his ideals. Plus if you look deeply into what he has done. He is a sick twisted cruel monster with his experimentation that he does as Amon and Fandaniel. I mean does it not bother anyone that he chopped Varis up into pieces and stuck them in the towers to mass temper as many as possible and suck aether from the world? Or what about the re-enacting of his glory days as Amon who gets the recurring theme of using bodily test subjects while creating monstrosities, abusing/damaging souls, body snatching, the manhandling of a god like being with more souls involved. Or what about the pleasure he takes in all the sick things he does. Yay Emet and Hythlo are back. And Emet just inadvertently admitted that he has to believe us because he knows we are not lying...since he can perceive liars. He agrees to help and denies his belief 3 seconds later. Such a lovable grump.

Has your journey been good? Has it been worthwhile?

Short Quest: Emet is still grumpy. A tid-bit about Azem's opinion on Venat. Hythlo deciding we need to change the future or our past if its not set in stone...Elidibus would be quite angry with us if he knew about the mischief we got into in Elpis. :) It is all Hades fault he gave us aether.

4:07-8:05 Venat Sparring Session- So not fair she gets to change jobs throughout the fight. :) It is interesting to see. (Duty Failed) 8:10 Easy Mode-I never claimed to be good at this. :) 14:10 Cutscene of her big attack Yay Argos accepts us :)

These two quests were entertaining. 1. The Gigi Situation 2. The Measure of a Mammet

These are the first two quests for HW Hildibrand

It looks like we tell them just about everything based on the visions and dialogue. Poor Emet...He was completely disgusted by what was going to happen to him and the burden he ends up bearing. He can't imagine why he recreated Amaurot and led are WOL there. In Shadowbringers it seems to be implied that he was tired, he was done. (Zodiark gave him a bit too much freedom in planning rejoinings. He set himself up to fail. Purposely.) Though he seemed to have multiple schemes in play. And as Y'shtola put it we needed his overwhelming darkness to expel the overwhelming light. Even with rejoining with Ardbert the light still had to be safely expelled. He saved us with his final challenge and accepted us as the stewards of the star. And that smile at the end. He wanted to be free and at peace. He knew exactly who we were most of Shadowbringers. He was in some serious denial not being able to emotionally handle that we are a sundered version. As far as Amaurot goes it is implied that he recreated it for us. He wanted for us to remember and he needed Hythlodaeus shade to give us our crystal since he couldn’t bring himself to do it. When talking with the Ondo is when some of this is implied.

Why Hythlo? Why? Seriously lol. The landshark kills me. So Venat's magic is on us. This traveler's ward seems to be what we call the blessing of light. Lore-wise it was always the echo that protected us from tempering. So that is a little confusing but the blessing of light has also always been some sort of protection against the ascians and primals as well. But we know the echo wasn't given by Venat it is just something we have from being an ancient soul that was awoken from the vision. We know its a way to communicate with her. So what is the significance of the crystals of light then? Those supposedly held the blessing. And we have six of them. This is where it is a bit confusing lore-wise. I have every intention in going back to sort through all the information the game has provided on this. But that is a ways away.

Spoilers I don't know why this bugs me but his words to that creature really gets under my skin. Our character seems to truly feel bad for Hermes and so does Emet-Selch and I do too but I have this aversion for him. Hades is right though. Hermes does not belong in Elpis. It is too much for him. His compassion for life is what would make him good for the Fandaniel position. Leaders should have compassion for the ones they serve. It is not wrong to be sad about death even in their culture but to jump from, because death is sad everyone needs to die and never be reborn as the answer, is insane. The leap he takes I think is too much for me. I don’t like how he created Meteion either. He is literally abusing her by not controlling his emotions and all that negativity hurts her. Intentional or not it’s abuse. It seems that death for the ancients is how Dumbledore describes it. It leads to the next great adventure. These people have reincarnation and they know it. His predecessor will be reborn at least with the same soul. Guess the Dotharl had it right all along with what the game reveals.

SPOILERS Simple Quest to get us to connect with Meteion and Hermes. I struggle with him, not so much Meteion she is a victim in this regardless of her future sins and how absolutely terrible they are. As far as I am concerned, due to her empath abilities which were purposely given and that she was literally mentally an immature little child (not an insult just reality) children in general do not have the mental capacity or maturity to experience what she experienced. But it's a little too fresh with Hermes. I mean he literally just kidnapped us in Garlemald and removed our souls from our bodies. Yes I am still bitter about that quest. Then on the moon he essentially forces our hand and we weaken Zodiark enough for him to kill and restart the final days. Do I feel bad for him? Yes, he was obviously mentally unstable in Elpis, not just as Amon, not just as Fandaniel. He is so focused on his negative emotions that he fails to see any of the good that surrounds him. If something tragic ever happened to him he would be incapable of seeing the good that comes out of it. Because for every tragedy, at least in the real world, good can be found if it is looked for. I get what he is saying as he is trying to get our character to understand him better. But emotions have to be tempered with logic and sometimes cold rationale. There has to be a balance, the ability to have those feelings is great but to understand and not lose one self in those feelings. Actions shouldn't be dictated solely by feelings. Feelings have a tendency to mislead. Now I am thinking Star Wars all of a sudden. Since they have the power of creation at their disposal they have a responsibility. What is that superhero saying with great power comes great responsibility. If you mess up and what you create would cause greater harm than good then you have to suck it up and unmake it. Doesn't mean you can't be sad but dwelling upon it, that just leads down a not so great path. Don’t get me wrong, he was a great villain in the aspect that his depression and blindness (refusing to see the actual answer was right there in front of him) led him down such a dark path. The psychology and philosophy of it all is very interesting. Forgive me I could go on forever analyzing the villains of FFXIV.

Final Set of ARR Hildibrand Quests Ok there is a Lala that keeps showing up. I cannot remember the significance of this particular character. 20:27, 57:42 (Behatted sprat) Quest 1: Shades of Sil'dih 21:33-Quest 2: Sibling Strife 50:24-Quest 3: Beneath The Mask 1:05:47-Quest 4: Truths Untold (she comes on a bit too strong as the camera pans over poor Greg who was thrown through a stone wall...) 1:27:57- Quest 5: Her Last Vow 1:48:17-Trial: Battle in the Big Keep 1:57:40-End of Last Quest

Ok this is the part that boggles my mind. Hermes does not seem to understand that just because a creature can be created that it should be created and kept. If it is aggressive and wants to kill for the sake of killing vs survival you put it down. The fact that the ancients deign to create anything that is that violent is a bit odd. Life should be held in the highest regard but there is a line and when it is crossed that life is forfeit. The concept they are looking at here. Creator vs created. Do the created have a right to live once it has been created? Who is responsible for the creation? Who gets to make that decision? Ah foreshadowing...but this one was way more obvious than most.

Hades is ever the teacher isn’t he? In both expansions, always willing to answer questions. When Azem calls he never fails to answer. That means so much more when thinking of the end of Shadowbringers and how he saves us. It gives us a definitive why he does it. Part of this is so sad. They planned to die(return to the star) together so they could be reborn together and we know that didn’t happen. Azem reincarnated a lot over the next what 10,000-12,000 years, Hythlodaeus was sacrificed to Zodiark and trapped until we finally freed his soul, and Hades stuck immortal and tempered until we finally freed him by killing him. This is tragic. They were obviously close. You know that friendship you get once in a lifetime, that friend who will do anything for you and literally drop everything to be there when you need them the most. That seems to be this trio. That kind of friendship is a precious gift to hold onto and never let go of. I hate that we cannot admit that we are Azem in this conversation(or at least most of Azem) which is why we are so much like the Azem they know. The soul is what makes us who we are so of course we are like our original self. The differences can be attributed to current experiences and not being whole. Nature vs Nurture and all that. Unfortunately this video cuts off at a weird spot. I will have to redo this one on my other character or do this on new game+ when it becomes available. This is why I leave the recorder visible because I don’t trust it is actually always doing what it is supposed to be doing if I hit the wrong button accidentally. I have been recording Shadowbringers on my other character and have been getting better at trusting the program but user error is ever the issue. Convocation of 14: 1. Mitron- specialist in aquatic life 2. Loghrif- specialist in terrestrial life and husbandry (cultivating crops, breeding livestock, agriculture stuff) Gaia 3. Halmarut-specialist in fungal and plant life 4. Emmerololth- medicine and healing 5. Lahabrea- specialist in creation magics 6. Altima- advocate of the arts 7. Igeyorhm- enlightenment and rhetoric 8. Pashtarot- preserver of discipline and order 9. Emet-Selch- keeper of the aetherial realm, underworld, realm of the dead (quite appropriate that Hades is in charge of this) 10. Azem-Traveler of the world and counselor to the people 11. Fandaniel- pursuer of extant phenomena (Hermes is an Olympian deity in ancient Greek mythology. He is the herald of the gods, also considered the protector of human heralds, travelers, thieves, merchants, and orators. He moves quickly and freely between the worlds of the mortal and the divine, aided by his winged sandals, guiding souls into the afterlife.) Elidibus- (In Greek Mythology, Themis was one of the twelve Titan children of Gaia and Uranus. She represented justice, divine order, fairness, and law.) 13 and 14??? Is that Nabriales and Deudalaphon?

Elpis is so pretty. Ok Lore bit here. Hermes asks us the difference between arcane entities and living beings. So living beings have souls. I get that part that is easy to understand. So does that mean all creatures are arcane? Because they are creations and it states that they are incapable of creating souls, that is beyond their powers. But then he begins talking about enduring on their own? This is where I am confused. Anyone who watches these know more about this part of lore? So the butterflies have souls even though they are creations? 8:40 Cutscene: Not only do we get roasted by Emet but um…the information is really important to the entire story. So Dynamis is like wielding aether only solely based on emotions and feelings but those with dense aether can't do anything with it.This is where I get a bit confused. Zodiark blankets Etheirys in aether essentially to hide the star from the song of oblivion because aether is stronger. We as only just over half our souls can use Dynamis easier or at least can interact with this energy? So emotion based magics? Ok Dynamis may be a weaker energy but does Hermes not understand how potentially dangerous something would be if it is solely based off of emotions which, let's take a girl for example she can have like 50 different emotions in the span of a minute and then imagine making those emotions manifest, um…the world would cease to exist in a matter of minutes. Anyways off that topic my understanding is that Emet roasts us no matter which answer we pick. Though I suppose I deserved his snark with the one I picked. :)

It is sad I still have not figured it out...so yeah missing all yellow dialogue in this quest. I am guessing there is different dialogue for races without tails and fuzzy ears in the cutscene? The Shoebill again. Is there any explanation or just theories? Though I am starting to think the Emet-Selch theories are accurate especially after his comment in Ultima Thule about watching us. Found an interesting article on just this topic. https://gamerant.com/final-fantasy-14-shoebill-importance-fan-theories-emet-selch/

I was kinda of in awe of Elpis so this one is a bit slow going because I wanted to see as much as I could without going too off track. 1:36 First Cutscene So they re-affirm that they can see the color of ones souls. Did the game ever tell us what color our souls are? I am going back through Shadowbringers on another character and I just cannot remember. And I literally have all dialogue recorded from Shadowbringers and Endwalker. So the aether thing means Emet could literally track us in Shadowbringers from quite the distance it sounds like which makes sense since he found us wherever we went. 6:37 Cutscene with Hermes I think we are slightly creeped out by Meteion's attention. I am not even sure I can decipher that look she gives Hythlodaeus. Ok, the ambystomas are adorable and sneaky little guys. Does anyone know how many of them there are to find in um...certain cutscenes?

So I first uploaded the first three episodes on YouTube but they come here anyways so this is easier to work with. My goal is to get through all of Hildibrand Adventures before he is unleashed upon us once more with the upcoming patch. As a review of what we have done so far. It has been a fun little journey so far because I honestly don't remember everything. If you watch our characters reactions to things, we seem to genuinely enjoy their company and escapades.