Discover Top Posts Tagged with #flying fairy

I have been revisting Bravely default lately

I still love the game but I remembered that (like many people) I had issue with the big plot twist : Airy lying. Thing is that I remembered that I had gripes with it but I also found myself disagreeing with what people said about it.

I took these from a story recap made by Clemps, it's kinda old : https://youtu.be/Bj4pvZlQgKg?si=Z2duKA_gumYqS3Mw

But I am briging it up for a specific reason. As you can see in this part of the summary, he states that the party knew of Airy's nature and in fact, if you search for discussion about the twist, most people seems to believe the same, that they knew she was evil before they enter the last world when the countdown reached 0 and are asking themselves why the party is surprised

After refreshing my memory, I finally realized why I had an issue with people approaching the issue of the twist like that

See my problem with the twist comes down to one first issue being that Airy isn't that well fleshed out as a character, she comes off as the annoying loud voice fairy but we don't see her intereact with the party in any meaningful way which compared to how many relationship are well done between the cast just feel flat

We are talking about a game that makes you invested with the freaking innkeep dang !

However, the reason why I disagree with the statement that the party knew that Airy was evil was because I noticed something in the many dialogues people are refering to that I didn't noticed before

So the first dialogue about the twist is Braev telling Alternis something

The lines quite explicitely refers to Braev's motivations and a secret knew by only him, De Rosso and Yulyana

The dialogue ends here and you are back to your exploration of Eternia

When we go back to these two this is Alternis's reaction

We aren't given the convo but by Alternis's reaction, what Braev told him as to do with the truth behind the crystals. Braev tells him to not question the truth and to put an end to the vestal's party

This line explicetely reference the pillar of light before the game does

In the first world, Alternis never peep anything about the conversation that he had with Braev to Edea so what we the audience knows of this conversation seems to be strickly limited to the crystal and the pillar of light. What exactly regarding them ? We don't know.

It takes the second world for Alternis to say something different

Now we can connect this to the bit we didn't heard : when Braev told Alternis about his motives, the thing only 3 people knew regarding the secret of the crystal, it was linked to Airy deceiving the party into letting the power of the crystal run wild which should in turn end the world, meaning the only reason they tracked down Agnes was to capture Airy. Agnes replies it's not possible because the scriptures say otherwise and Alternis claims it was deceptions created by the Orthodoxy. After that Ringabel finally begins to regaing his memories.

in the 3rd world, things go as always except that Ringabel starts to question Airy, Ringabel bringing up Alternis words and the fact that Edea's father was also doubting the fact using the crystal would be a good idea, this leads to Agnes mostly to deny that. Ringabel also mentions fragments of his memories : the number 6 and Edea being killed by a monster.

When Ringabel and Tiz are talking together, Tiz questions what he thinks of Airy and Ringabel simply argues he meant that Airy can make mistakes however when question about Alternis, Ringabel say "I kept my silence in front of Airy" implying to the audience that the fact the group might be in a paralel world is somehow something that shoudn't be said in front of Airy. It's worth noting that in the party chat Tiz tell Airy that Alternis threatened to kill her but he doesn't say a word about Alternis claiming she is deceving them.

By this point in the story you need to awaken 3 crystals to unlock of Ringabel's memory : for the first one, he will say nothing, the second one he will ask Airy questions, then Agnes

The first memory he gain is him dressed as Alternis mourning the death of Edea, the second time Ringabel ask Airy what would happened if Agnes continued to pray even after Airy ask her to stop, this would lead to the crystal's destruction, the second memory involves Airy gathering light and Ringabel saying "this isn't a cure to rid the world of darkness" (the party convo has Airy scold Ringabel), the thrid time, Ringabel ask Agnes about the crystals and make a comment about the templar notes, then we unlock the final memory : it focuses on Airy's wings changing a pattern, saying "and after you'd come so far ? a pity" Ringabel begging forgiveness and remembering Edea among others, another close up on Airy's wings and that's it

After this Ringabel tell Tiz about the fact he remembers everything : he is Alternis, they are in a parallel world and

Tiz asked him dejected if he was sure it's not a dream, but Ringabel insist it's memories of an alternate past and then he asks Tiz to make his memories work

Tiz seems to agree and ask him about the "world before the last" where Ringabel answer that it was a 5

Tiz ask "it's ... decreasing ?" and Ringabel makes a remark about her wings bearing a pattern that looked like a 6

Then Ringabel expressed regret over his lack of action

Then Ringabel tells Tiz to tell all that to Agnes away from Airy and the boys plans to go to the Sage's house

Like in the last world, the party meets the Sage, he tells Agnes to go to meet him with one ally she trust, she chooses Tiz and off they are gone, and after endless ship teasing of Tizgnes Tiz tell Agnes that Ringabel regained his memories and that he told Tiz to tell Agnes "in private", Agnes express surprise upon the idea that Ringabel would be secretive and Tiz argues that "he believes Ringabel had his reasons", Agnes ask him further but Tiz wants to question the sage about the "angel"

In the previous world, the "angel" made revelations about the crystal that shook the party so here Tiz ask if she talked about something else

Tiz ask "was this a hypothetical future she saw" but the Sage answered that no, shefought against the evil won with her allies but they died. Yulyana shares the last words of the angel

He answer yes, Agnes react with shock and the sage argues he couldn't bring himself to harm Agnes

Tiz is interrupted by Agnes saying she can't bear to hear anymore

Now this might sound like a digression but I'll teach something I have only noticed recently despite having read that at least 10th times. In act 1 scene 1 of Romeo and Juliet, Romeo never tell the audience the name of the girl he pines for. It takes us scene 2 to learn that from Benvolio. I hadn't noticed it earlier because of the fact that Benvolio knew this meaning Romeo had to tell him yet in act 1 he never mentions it

Why am I bringing this ? Well because not once is Airy refered to as the Evil one in this conversations.

In the first world, there is no mention of airy, only the crystal and the pillar. In the second world, Alternis explicetely accuse Airy of deceving the party and making the crystal run wild which would endager the world. In the 3rd world, Ringabel starts to suspect Airy, when he recovers his memories he tell Tiz about her wing pattern changing. The sage never tells us who the Evil one is and when Tiz wants to ask he gets interupted by Agnes.

Not once is Airy being explicitely refered to as the Evil one, as a matter of fact in the way of the true ending in the last world, the party only recognizes her upon her second form, not even her first evil form.

Speaking off, I checked and the party didn"t go "HOW COULD YOU DECEIVE US", the only one who did was Agnes, the rest was simply shocked that the Chasm was still there. The other one to be shocked is Edea who has never been filled on about this knowledge (like I kept mentioning Ringabel, Tiz and Agnes, not once did I mentioned Edea)

So having paid close attention to the dialogue I could only came to this conclusion : the party didn't knew Airy was the Evil one, we, the audience do.

We do because the game is sprinkling hints but the characters don't. You have to keep in mind that in the first world Alternis doesn't try to warn Edea and co mainly because (at least to my understanding) Edea's deflecting meant to Braev and him that she wouldn't believe them since Edea grew up believing Agnes was evil until she changed her mind. Not to mention that at the moment this dialogue plays, the hints given to us are about a secret lurking with the crystals and light pillar, which are being answered via De Rosso's side quest and the visit to the sage's cave in the second world.

This was meant to tell us the audience that the crystal might be dangerous if used in a specific way. This is at the end of the second world when we awaken all crystals that Alternis shows up and start to explicetely threaten Airy. When Edea questions him, he attacks saying "you aren't Edea, you are trying to deceive me !!!" and then starts to tell what Braev revealed : Airy is lying, she is trying to let the power of the crystal run wild and lead the world to doom. We are naturally drawn to think that this is what Braev revealed in the first world however the characters are skeptikal. Agnes says it's not possible because what she believes in says the contrary and Alternis claims it was lies crafted by the Orthodoxy.

The thing is that we were shown in the previous world that the Eternian knights were wrong about Agnes and that this was this realization that led Edea to change sides, so we can suspect Alternis to be believing Braev because of his contempt for crystalism, so idealogical differences. Besides, we have been waking up the crystals for quite sometimes now and Airy always stop Agnes at some point. Lastly, if it was the case, then why do the party always end up waking up in another world ? Keep in mind, by this point the party doesn't know it's parallel world so there is a lot of elements that might make them not believe Alternis. In both world they don't have a reason to suspect Airy.

The third world is another story, this is chapter 5 the chapter where the alternate ending also known as "false ending" is avalaible. Ringabel is the only one who gives credit to what Alternis said because he was starting to get his memories back. You have to awake 3 crystals for him to recover all of them. for the first one everything goes as usual, but Ringabel starts to remeber something after that. First is the death of the party, then it's the idea that Airy giving light to the Holy Pillar isn't a cure to darkness and the last one is the memory with the wing pattern. None of these indicates that Airy is the evil one. When Ringabel tell Tiz about the wing thing, we understand it's a countdown but Tiz doesn't seems to understand it as being a bad thing seeing as per how when he reunites with Agnes he argues that "ringabel had his reasons", meaning Tiz doesn't understand his reasons for not wanting Airy to hear about her wings. Ringabel also never finished his sentence in regards to Airy. "Airy is... She's..." She is what ? WHAT ? never told him.

Then we move on to the sage. Putting aside for a moment the fact that Tiz made up this meeting with the sage to tell Agnes about the wing thing and he ends up not telling her for a second, when he asks the Sage, the Sage never explicetely tells that Airy is the Evil one. Not even once. In fact, when Tiz was about to ask more informations about the Evil one, Agnes begs them to stop. And that's the end of the convo.

So the party never had any idea that Airy was the evil one. None.

What makes it worse is that the false ending is basically confirming this. See, I had never unlocked the false ending so I have no idea upon which point of chapter 5 you can unlock it but I do know that logically, given Ringabel's question and the fact that you need at least 3 crystals to be awake to unlock all his memories, the player will very likely try to unlock it by breaking a crystal at the 4th temple, so after Ringabel remembered and that Yulyana told them about the evil one and crystal regeneration.

And here is the dialogue

I think this scene makes it very obvious that the party only realized in this moment that Airy is the evil one. Not before, not after. Now. In this moment. They are starting to understand. This necessarily means that back then, despite all the informations we received : they had no idea !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And the reason comes from the fact that at no point is Airy explicetely refered to as the Evil one. The first accuser is a former enemy and everyone but Ringabel brushes that off, in the first two worlds they had no reason to suspect her and we the audience not so much. It's the 3rd world, in transition with the end of the second that introduces the theme of questioning Airy and there we begin to see some cracks such as the fact that she is incapable of really explaining why letting the crystal be destroyed is bad or her getting so mad at Ringabel for simply asking questions, even if we are also meant to find it a bit strange as to why he ask such specfics questions. If you stop there and break a crystal, the party is able to realize that she is the Evil one.

But if you don't and you continue as always, you have to go through it two more times. And in the 4th world, the only real time the dialogue will be copy pasted for the 5th world, this is where we can really begin to question Airy since she is incapable to deliver an answer, as for Edea, she calls out Airy on that in the party chat but Airy still acts like she usually does.

I have already said earlier that Airy wasn't really as fleshed out as the others character but this also means she doesn't do anything very suspicious, the most suspicious things she does is being unable to answer to certains questions. This might alert us, but will that be the case for our party ?

By world 4, they don't visit Yulyana or even De Rosso anymore and they don't really tell us how to fix things. Yulyana in particular, heck he even tempts the party with the idea of staying in the 3rd world. So the party's choices are limited to 1) either break the crystal and take realization of Airy's true nature 2) go through with it and realize Airy was lying about fixing the Great Chasm

Because again, I cannot stress it enough, the party's shock was the fact that the great Chasm wasn't fixed, the only one who is shown to be shocked at Airy's words is Agnes. Whom in the fake ending is shown to not want to believe Airy is evil and almost fall for another of her ruse.

In world 3, when we're in the pillar of light, Agnes ask Tiz for forgiveness realizing it's the pillar of light that destroyed Tiz's village, Tiz reply they are doing this to destroy the source of the darkness, Edea ask how much longer they have to go through this and Ringabel replies, until the countdown is over. In the 4th world, when they are still trying to get done, the party has a chat where they argue that they should awaken the crystal to help this world environement. In the 5th and last world, they begin to wonder if they weren't dreaming after all.

None of these conversation ever hints at them knowing of Airy's nature, rather the 3rd convo seems to imply they interpretted Airy's countdown as meaning they have to do this until it reaches a 0 for the great chasm to close.

This right here means we players have been fooled. Much how I didn't realized that Romeo never told the audience about Rosaline but it was Benvolio who did in scene 2 because of my brain connecting the dots, we completely forgot that the party was never told or shown making explicit deduction about Airy, therefore that there was nothing indicating they did knew of her nature. We were lead to make that conclusion because of the hints the game gaves us : first starting lightly with the first world with a truth regarding the crystals.

That is answered in world 2, then with Alternis accusing Airy to want to let the power of crystal run wild which might end the world. This is something the party is skeptical of save for Ringabel, but we realize there is something wrong with Airy, that the party should be wary of her, that the Evil one was apparently with Agnes on the first meeting and that her wings pattern changes.

Given how Alternis explicetely accuses her of trying to unleash the power of the crystals to wild degree, then that that Evil one, although undefined, used deceit to drive the crystals out of control to open the world's barrier and that according to Braev, De Rosso and Yulyana knew of what he told Alternis, we can easily make the conclusion = the Evil one is Airy, and that her countdown wings is refering to something linked to great harrowing.

Now, you might be wondering : does pointing this out changes something ?

Well yes. See, to go back to the Romeo examples, the fact he doesn't even mentions the name of the girl he years for and that we learn it in scene 2 through his cousin makes his crush towards Rosaline seems even stranger. Like, you'd think that seeing how crazy he is over her he wouldn't shut up about her name yet it takes us the following scene to hear it. Therefore it's weird.

Here however, this means we have to reconsider what the audience knows vs what the characters knows. We know that what Braev told Alternis was also known of De Rosso and Yulyana and by corrolation that the truth about the crystal and the pillar of light in world 1 is linked to the truth Alternis of world 2 claims to hold. But the party doesn't know that. Alternis in world 1 never tell them anything and in world 2, he only says he heard that from the Marshall but he never said anything about De Rosso and Yulyana knowing it too. De Rosso doesn't make mention of that. As for Yulyana, in world 2 he only speaks of the crystals. In world 3, mean to corrolate to what Alternis claimed, Yulyana never name Airy, he only talk about the Evil one so while we are able to make the connection because of world 1, the party can't because they aren't aware of this information, moreover Yulyana seems to realize only know that the world traveling would be due to the Evil one successfully deceiving the party but ultimately he never reveal the identity of the evil one as being the fairy.

This means the audience's knowledge of Airy's evil nature was divorced from the party !

And now I finally understood what I was trying to convey, why I couldn't agree with the fac the party "knew" Airy was evil while also having issues with the twist : the real issue isn't that they knew, the real issue was that the game dropped too heavy hints for us to assume that the party wouldn't come to the same natural conclusion as us !!!!!!

Again, I can't stress this enough, the party doesn't realize her nature as the Evil one and it never shown to come to that realization, the only time we effectively see them piecing elements together to reach that conclusion is when we break the crystal and get to the false ending. We see Edea recalls her father's words, we see Agnes opnely tell Airy she suspects him and recall her convo with Tiz and the sage and then Ringabel accuses her of being the evil one. Tiz's dialogue confirming that he didn't knew before Ringabel brought that up !

This means that if you choose to continue with the next 2 worlds, the party never came to that conclusion !!

And now what I mean by "too heavy hints". We clearly were able to make the connections but it might be weird for us that the party didn't when we are able to realize that in world 3 and clearly the game wants us to take awareness of that, to start suspescting Airy however there is severals issues in the way the hints are handled

1- Braev and Alternis

In world 1 Braev never tells Edea, and as I said before, it's likely she doesn't believe him. She saw the ritual work at least 3 times and Airy didn't do anything to make Edea suspect her of anything. But neither he nor Alternis try. I get that doing this in world 1 would have made Airy potentially suspcious too early, that being said the issue it raises goes beyond that

2- De Rosso and Yulyana

Accoriding to Braev, what he revealed to Alternis in world 1 was something De Rosso and Yulyana knew as well. Because of world 2 where Alternis reveals more, we are compelled to make the logical conclusion that Braev also told Alternis that in world 1. However, Alternis doesn't mention an evil one, only Airy, yet Yulyana when ask, never mentions Airy but only the evil one and De rosso says nothing about it. The issue is that based on these fragements alone and how they were received by the character : Braev believed that Airy was evil when in reality, according to Yulyana that would have been the Evil one that would do that. That is based on the party's pov, these informations feels like different and unrelated lest they try to connect the dots. But us, the audience, because we knew in world 1 that the reveal Braev made was also known by these two and that this reveal is the same as in world 2, this means that Yulyana at least knew that Airy was the Evil one. In fact, the fact he tell Tiz and Agnes that the Evil one was with them when they meet means that he recognized the Evil one, which he wouldn't have been able to do had he not known it was Airy. So this begs the question : why didn't Yulyana warned them in private when he could ? Likewise, given how Ringabel was able to remember Airy in the fake ending, does that mean Ringabel suspected her of being the Evil one ? Then why not tell Tiz

Also, I precise that Ringabel never mentioned the Evil one, the first one to ever call Airy that was Yulyana which further supports the idea that this ending is meant to be unlocked after speaking to Yulyana (if it is available earlier)

The problem of knowedlege isn't the party, it comes from the character that drops hints, Braev and Yulyana. These two know too much so as a result, hints meant to guide the audience ends up putting the audience in a position where they believe the character have reach the same conclusion because they haven't been given enough reason not to do so or to ask why the characters aware of it don't speak up. The reason is simple : the knowledge of these characters was solely meant for the audience to be able to pick on things before the characters could but unfortunately it went too much and thus it just created two types of questioning : why can't the characters comes up with this realization ? and why can't Braev and Yulyana tell them the truth in private ?

Given this whole "prophecy thing" and the instruction of Og Agnes, I am tempted to explain Yulyana's decision as "he did what was told" whereas with Braev, I already explained.

As to why the party can only realize this in the fake ending, I don't think it's stupidity, I think it has to do with the themes

1- Infinity

Ourobourous is a reference to infinity, the snake that eat his own tail. The multitude of world in Bravely default is meant to reflect that, however infinity also means repeat hence why we are put in a circle. This could also tie to the notion of Wheel of life in a way, the party is repeating an infinite circle over and over again. We luckily have to do it only 5 times, but in universe it happened 6 times. To make sense of Ourobouros, obviously it has to link to the idea of infinity hence why the true ending is more relevant

2- Trust

I have already said what were my issues with Airy and that's because, I can't stress it enough, BD built solid relationships between out 4 leads. During world 1, the whole story is about them trusting and doubting each other, trusing each other again etc. The more they travel, the more their solidarity and closeness grows. Agnes is initially reluctant to let Tiz comes but quickly come to rely on him, to ask himw whether or not they should trust X or Y person. As the journey goes on, they all come to trust one another, the Eisenberg arc is the occasion for some tension among the group but they quickly tie once more. This continues in the following world as well, in fact the discussion in world 3 specifcally involves Agnes saying she will trust Ringabel because Tizz trust in him and the side quest involves the 4 of them saying they don't want to stay in that world, they want to stay together and finish what they started. It's important to remember they all are isolated : Agnes lost all of her friends, Tiz's village got destroyed, Edea turned back on her country and everyone she loved and Ringabel is amnesiac, he has no home. So their boudning and trusting one another matters to them immensely. By that token, it would only make sense they extent this to Airy.

In fact, Airy's deceiving nature is meant to foil the honesty of the 4 warriors.

That's why I can't bring myself to agree with people thinking the false ending is better or should have been the true ending. Thematically speaking, Airy showing her true colors so quickly because of the group's distrust makes the whole "trust and we'll go through this together" sound much weaker. That's why thematically wise it makes more sense for it to be happening much later.

Furthermore, the idea of tying the true ending to Airy goes against the pun of (F)Lying (F)Airy mean to point to her nature, she is associated to deceit and even her defeat is still deceitful. She even barely talks about Ouroboros in this one compared to the true ending.

So the reason why the party might or not take awareness depends on whether or not the player choose to make them trust Airy or mistrust her

3- have the courage to disobey

It's a notion that comes back and people call it the "main theme of the game".

Some argued that since the only ending where you do that is the fake ending then it means the true ending is useless and messes up the theme.

And here is why I disagree. Yes, this ending is what happens when you disobey Airy through disobeying the game's instruction and her boss dialogue makes it very obvious you did what the sage told you. However there needs to be some context here.

Agnes is a wanted woman and anyone who allies with her would be considered a criminal. Edea herself disobeyed the orders and became a traitor based on her desire for justice. In Ancheim, Agnes goes against the king of the country to make herself heard. In Florem, she goes against the rules of fashion when partaking in the beauty contest. In Einsenberg, we face a civil war, we also see disobediance via Egil's refusal to listen to Tiz. But we also see disobediance from the enemies : the eternian knights behaving badly, the thiefs of Ancheim, the girls of Florem, the Black blades in Einseberg etc.

Disobeying itself isn't a good thing it's only a matter of when, of context, nuance (something Edea has trouble accepting)

But in this context, regarding the saving of the world, the people we fight, the Eternians are constantly insisting we are wrong. At first they are a bunch of cartoonish villains so not listening to them is easy, but the more we progress the more we meet Eternians that aren't "black as pitch" to quote Mmgrgr girl, and the more we travel worlds, the more we are meant to ask ourselves : were we right to disobey in the first place ? This is why the game is trying to slowly makes us come to conclusion that maybe we didn't.

In fact, if we changed PoV, it's likely we'd be the villains and the Eternians the heroes, especially when turns out they were right

However, in this context, disobeying to Airy means we did what we didn't do back then, we aren't disobeying the Eternians anymore. In fact, the realization taking place comes from a recollections of flash back including the Marshal telling us to stop before he faints.

Ergo, by disobeying Airy we do have the courage to disobey her, to suspect her... but that's not limited to this ending

If we do that, we go for the easy way, the short way we just have to defeat her but there is no guarantee Ourborors won't try again

However, continuing the circle, the thing people argue doesn't make sense, we are choosing to disobey the game

Other example : there is this horror game called The Path where there is only one rule "go to grandmother's house and stay on the path". If you obey, you get the bad ending, because you choose the easy way. If you disobey, the game gets longer and you get the true ending. Other example : slay the princess. You have one goal : go to the cabin and kill the princess there. You can choose to go for the easy way and get the "happy ending" or disobey and get to the truth of the story.

Bravely default operates on the same way : The ouroboros ending is the true ending because it's the most difficult choice : continuing to place trust in someone that becomes diffucult to trust in and having the courage to continue to disobey not just to our enemy and the people who told us we were wrong, but to the game itself. That's why the game bombs us with hints leading the audience to suspect Airy might be lying, to the point it is in the very title of the game. The game makes it clear that the party is at wits ends, they can't bear it anymore as well. The game has given you in world 3 all the hints : about what can happen when the crystal get destroyed, about the fact you can at least do it to 1, about the fact Airy and the Evil one are the same, something our party didn't seemed to realize yet. It's encouraging you to got for the easy way, giving you keys to do it, to help the party realize the truth before it's too late.

But what if you don't want to do what the game is telling you ? what if you want to continue to put through these innocents characters through the same pain again, and again, an existential nightmare fuel ? What if you want to disobey the game itself ?

The true ending is a reward for the player daring to disobey it, for having the courage to trust in a path that is constantly being doubted endlessly, this is the main reason why I think reducing BD to this aspect is uncharitable when this also incompasses faith, confidance in yourself and trust, things that Agnes learns through her acts of defiances and resistances

So again, the twist is very clumsy in it's technical aspects but at the same time, the rest of the story is enjoyable to me, I think there are aspects when people criticize it they seem to misunderstand which distract from the real issue of the twist (the hints being too heavy) but I also don't really like people arguing that the false ending is the better one and the most logical one when it is ... unsatisfying imo

It's cool and it inscribes itself in the themes but it doesn't feel like a finale, it doesn't have the same satisfaction thematically, narratively, mechanicaly as the true ending. The true ending is grandiose, it's a perfect tie of BD's themes and characters arcs. The false ending isn't as satisyinf narratively

Is the way leading to the true ending clumsy ? Yes, and I don't blame people for not being as forgiving as I, but the way some seems to prop up an ending that feels much weaker to it in many aspects... I just can't get behind it

#bravely default #bravely default flying fairy #flying fairy #airy