#lavian

[chernobog13]

Ultraman Dinas from the film Ultraman Decker Finale: Journey to Beyond (2023).

Besides Ultraman Justice, this is the only male Ultra I know of who is a woman in human form (Ultraman Ace kinda sorta counted, until he didn't).

[daily-rayless]

Some people might say, Rayless, you don't need to do all these birthday pictures. It's fine to take a break, people will understand. And maybe so. But I didn't dare miss today's birthday, because today is the birthday of Lavian, Lavian from Final Fantasy Tactics, that Lavian, and I knew the Lavian fans would be disappointed if I missed it. Had I neglected to celebrate Lavian (Lavian from Final Fantasy Tactics), the Lavianites would have noticed, and the Lavianteers would have sent me angry messages, and the Lavi-Lavis would have camped outside my Tumblr, howling for blood, and so here, today, let us celebrate the birthday of Final Fantasy Tactics' amazing character Lavian.

[ask-diane]

Sammy and Diane soon arrive at the entrance of Saroka Village. Sammy seeming familiar to the town, old and a few new faces, and Diane seeming to experience the village's acoustic as well as all new faces.

Diane: "Wow people seem so friendly around here."

Sammy: "Yep, this is home alright. Saroka Village is small, but it's know to the people as a sanctuary."

[Featuring - ]

[Lavender from @ask-stardust-farm]

[Wishone from @ask-glorious-guild, as a birthday gift, wondering how they hot on a roof]

[A funny little head doodle of Magni from @kitts-poke-stop, looking out the window]

[Dravol and Lavian from @asksavel, taking a day off to visit the country]

[And hut designs with the help of @askpokesquad]

[narratorbones]

Lavian Ferroo Icons

(Feel free to use these! I would prefer you credit me, but you don't have to)

[hs-edits-n-aesthetics]

Lavian Ferroo icons for anon!

-Mod Vriska

[listen-to-my-simphony]

[endeavorsreward]

Sample of Work in Progress

I was out of commission for a couple of days, but things are very slowly moving along. Here’s previews of the two parallel stories/excerpts:

Lavian shut the window. “Warjilis? But that would add at least two days of travel.”

“In this we agree,” Ramza said solemnly, “But even were we to brave the Fenlands again, they’ll expect us to return on that road when they realize we yet live. Baert is like as not en route to the Cardinal even as we recuperate.” Lavian worked her jaw, but nodded. They had few options open. “We shall endeavor to approach covertly, perhaps in a caravan, and assault the castle from its postern.”

“Four of us, ‘assaulting’ the castle of one of Mullonde’s highest.” She looked pained. “This is madness of the highest order.”

“Five.” Mustadio raised his hand. “I’m not of a mind to walk away now.”

“Mustadio...” he warned, “Your family is restored. You’ve suffered wounds enough.”

“I’ll not suffer them to have that stone, Ramza.” Mustadio’s face darkened. “And like as not my deception will be unveiled when the Cardinal lays hands upon it—who’s to say I’ve not placed the princess in further danger?”

As Ashe and Basch went to speak to the nearest acolyte, Vaan scooped some of the snow into his hands. “Vaan, don’t--” But Penelo’s words fell on deaf ears, as Vaan jammed the snowball down the back of Larsa’s tunic. His yelp caused most of the camp to turn in their direction. The unflappable heir to House Solidor, for his part, was wriggling and twisting his arms, trying to get the snow to fall out the bottom, and Penelo ran over to aid him.

“Oh, for the world to be your playground,” Balthier said dryly. The sky pirate looked miserable in a pair of thick boots that he’d purchased from Tetran back at the entrance to Eruyt, crafted from slaven leather and absolutely hideous.

Vaan shrugged. “I’ve never seen snow before... just heard people talk about it.” He rubbed his nose. “And anyway, isn’t that what being a sky pirate is all about?”

Balthier saw a quirk of Fran’s lips. After their parting with Jote, he’d accept what he could get. He offered a bow to the young street rat. “I suppose I shall be forced to take it from an expert, then. Know you also which way we take up the mountain?”

“Well, er...” Vaan’s flustered face was rewarded with a snowball from Larsa, and he reeled backwards.

[endeavorsreward]

Excerpts (Bk.II, Chapter Indeterminate)

The Zeirchele River was known for its raw power; fed by the snow and rain from the Algost mountains, the tallest and most weather-beaten peaks in Ivalice, the river was too wild for water transport. Almost its entire length was riddled with rapids, creating a near impossible border to cross; there were only a handful of passable fords.

The river was one of two that served as natural defenses for Fort Besselat. From Mount Germinas to the east came the Dorvauldar—though a calmer river, it made up its difference in size, a wide, deep river that had once fed Lake Poescas, but now traveled uninterrupted across Zeltennia and Limberry, dividing them in twain, before reaching the sluices at Besselat and draining into the Dorvauldar Marsh. To reach the isolated Besselat, you must cross the well-guarded dam to the east, or cross the Zeirchele to the west.

While most came to Besselat via the Bethla Causeway, which crossed the river directly at the fortress, the group had agreed that Delita could not dare show himself there with the princess. The causeway, a broad stone bridge that passed the fortress on its southern side, was a taxed crossing. While King Denamda IV had instituted the tax under the pretenses of keeping Besselat's upkeep, it was largely a defensive measure – inspections were commonplace. Even with the fortress likely being Delita's goal, Duke Goltanna could not accept the princess into Besselat publicly without announcing himself as party to the plot. More likely instead that he would travel north to the falls and Germonique's Crossing.

The Algost Mountains formed a shelf where the highlands ended. During the dry season, at the river's calmest, there was a fordable pass which some enterprising merchant or cutthroat had found in a century past and linked with a simple bridge of rope and wood. Lesalian nobility had men come and fix it annually and kept it tax free, not out of largesse but to provide a route for their own to ferry contraband. It was patrolled, but only lightly. At some point, its nature as a way around the official crossing had left it named for history's most reviled traitor, but its location was something of an open secret. He'd have to bring the princess there, but once across, he might well be into the arms of the Black Lion and lost to them.

Technically the foot of the mountain range, travel was slowed for the group as they trudged through wood and glen and riverbed north to the falls. Boco time and again would snort with impatience, led along by Alicia to stay with the group. Chichiri, for her part, was more content to follow Lavian, ferrying their packs and gear. Agrias was more in the male chocobo's camp, honestly. Every muscle in her arms tightened, and her hand kept finding the pommel of her sword and then releasing it. Days of travel, and now they were sprinters approaching the ribbon-line, and they may yet have lost the race.

The mercenaries, though, seem unconcerned. Since leaving Araguay Wood, Ladd's usefulness as a guide had begun to fall away, and he now hung back, walking in a loping, casual gait that suggested either surrender to the delays that had kept them from reaching the falls sooner, or perhaps merely apathy in the day's outcome. And Gaffgarion walked alongside her without giving her a moment's notice, eyes slightly narrowed, clearly thinking about something. She didn't like his expression.

And then there was the boy.

Ramza Lugria wore a pained expression every time she glanced over to where he walked alongside Alicia. He stumbled at least twice, even, because he often marched with his eyes pinched closed. Whoever this Delita truly was, clearly the boy dreaded the confrontation. It was a far cry from the young man who had demanded he be taken along on this quest against his master's objections. At one point during a minutes-long break to rest and recollect breath, he had pulled a blade of grass from the ground and had merely stared at it before flicking it into the river, where it had spun in circles before being swallowed.

The rise grew steeper; the falls were ahead. She let her hand stay this time at her sword's hilt and increased the pace of her march. Boco ruffled his feathers. Lavian spit out the jerky that she had been chewing.

A hawk somewhere in the sky cried out, and Ramza's eyes opened and he began to jog.

The sudden movement caused Agrias to turn and find that at some point Gaffgarion had gotten ahead of her—ahead of all of them—and was taking point, vanishing into the trees. She nodded Alicia ahead to follow him, and she handed her reins to Lavian before sprinting to catch up with the older man. Boco was loosed, and he flapped twice and then started following as well. Wild chocobo or not, his previous master had trained him well.

The woods enveloped them into the dark, and then broke away of a sudden, and they were at the falls. The roar of the falling water seemed to erupt from nowhere. She couldn't see anything around the bend of the path and the cliffside. But she heard shouting. Ramza rushed ahead of her. She drew her sword.

***

Ramza vaulted over a boulder and turned to scale the last of the climb. Something had plagued his thoughts the last half-day that he could not name—in addition to all that he could—and when Gaffgarion had decided to lead of his own accord, he had understood at least as far as something was terribly, terribly wrong with this situation. When he reached Germonique's Crossing at last, he yet still was unprepared for what he saw.

The crossing amounted to two cliffs at about the height of a village church bell above the water, with a single-file rope bridge spanning the width of the falling water. The water fell unevenly—there were many crags and jutting rocks splitting the stream that dry seasons had saved from being worn away. On their side of the crossing, Gaffgarion and Alicia were two-thirds of the way up the hill to the crossing, their swords drawn. On the other...

“Princess!” Agrias was at his side, Lavian and Ladd both catching up from where they'd tied Chichiri to a tree at the bottom of the cliff. And there Ovelia indeed was, on the rope bridge, with Delita.

His old friend was dressed in a red tunic and golden armor, and the sun glared off his shoulders so brightly that Ramza could not see his face. He had his sword drawn as well, but not at the princess or even Gaffgarion, but instead at the five knights who faced against him on the crossing's opposite side, bearing weapons of their own. They stood astride corpses of their own, and Delita's sword was already red. They were hungry-looking knights who, despite standing on the Limberry side of the crossing, wore the standard of the Order of the Northern Sky.

“Stand aside, ser!” The knight's leader pointed at Delita with his blade. “You are defeated! Surrender the princess, and no more blood must needs be spilt!”

Ramza's friend, his brother, the man he'd betrayed, began to laugh. It was an ugly laugh, high and mad, that reminded him of Ziekden. “Do you so enjoy the taste of lies? Your orders are to see the princess dead! And once I've watched you feed the falls her blood, I'm to believe you'd let me live, a witness to your crime?”

“What foolishness is this? We came to save the princess, not to kill her! What could we possibly gain by Lady Ovelia's death? We wish only to see her freed from the Black Lion's claws!” Contrary to his words, he took a step forward, towards the bridge. Delita's sword lanced forward, and something exploded beside the knight, sending him falling back to his own troops. The bridge rocked back and forth dangerously, and Ovelia clung to Delita to halt herself from falling into the rapids.

“Your highness!” Agrias roared, and this time she was heard. Ovelia did not release Delita as she turned, and her eyes widened to see her knight had arrived.

“Agrias!” She reached out with one arm, as though she could pull the Lionsguard up with the strength of her heart. The leader of the knights, however, saw their arrival and spit.

“Hmm. It seems we are no longer alone. Gaffgarion! Kill them all!”

Ramza's eyes widened, and he turned, but it was too late, as he watched Gaffgarion kick Alicia in the small of her back, sending her tumbling off the cliff into the water below.

***

Agrias moved to scale the cliff, but Gaffgarion's sword began to glow with the powers of his sword arts. Despite everything, they were at temporary stalemate. She raised her sword. “You would now betray us!?” Less from surprise than a hope to buy time. Lavian was somewhere behind her, but Gaffgarion's man was at her side, and they were outnumbered three, maybe four to one.

Despite accusing the older man, her eyes were on Ramza.

“Betray you? You have a viper's tongue, milady.” He was laughing, that disgustingly damp moustache of his trembling as his helmet shaded his eyes from view. “I betray no one. I am in the Order's employ, and they are of it. My task was to see the princess safely abducted. And theirs, to see the one responsible silenced.”

She took a step forward slowly, her blade off to one side, praying he saw it as emotion rather than tactics. “You mean to say the kidnapping was a ruse?” One of her eyes kept flitting to the cliffside, in hopes of spying Alicia. The fall might not have been fatal.

“The princess is an obstacle to the throne. So long as she lives, the threat remains that someone could assert her claim above Prince Orinus's. Two heirs are one too many!” There was a whimpering sound from the bridge. It was then that Agrias resolved: there would be no justice here—she would murder him.

The man in gold, the kidnapper, called back to them from the bridge without even turning. “If her death is certain, then let it least not be in vain. Kill her if you must, but let it be held she was taken by  Goltanna's men. Do that, and the stroke that fells a problem princess at once brings down a rival Lion. That was no doubt Larg's plan all along... Or was it his? Such a plot has more the feel of Dycedarg's thinking. Would you not agree, Ramza?”

Ramza stood halfway up the rise, between Agrias and Gaffgarion. She could not see his face.

“That one has the right of it, Ramza. Come, let us earn our pay!”