TRIAL: Are there any duty instances that had a particular impact on your character (primal fights, dungeons, raids, etc.)?
Absolutely yes, most notably the Striking Tree. Alyx’s meeting with Ramuh was a catalyst for some serious character development and also the beginning of what I casually refer to her “lightning meta” because I don’t have a cool name yet.
Basically, the story goes that Alyx faces Ramuh alone, and near what would be the end of the fight absorbs and rebounds Judgement Bolt instead of trying to block it. She survives through pure chaotic dumbass energy force of will and aether channeling ability, as well as Ramuh’s lack of intention to actually kill her. Her weapon–which she used to make herself a conduit for the lightning–is shattered and her arm severely burned, but her strike back is explosive and ultimately wins the battle. After some brief words (and the gift of a crystal of light) Ramuh leaves her for Urianger to find unconscious in the clearing.
Pride cometh before a fall, but if you’re strong you get back up. It is “a brand for [her] arrogance” but also a “mark of [her] blessing.”
Though the narrative is fragmented in terms of what I have actually written, some pieces exist. Worthy is about the penultimate moments of the duel, and Venom deals with some of the immediate aftermath. Through the wound she is imbued with Ramuh’s aether and a newly enhanced gift for lightning magic (which she was also pretty good at)…. as well as some unfortunate side effects like intermittent pain and unintentional shocking things. She had a long recovery in which she basically had to regain strength and dexterity in her right hand (I went over some of the lasting effects in this drabble about wearing one glove/one sleeve). She has a lichtenberg figure scar covering her right forearm from the burn. Sometimes it glows a little bit.
This new power is one she struggles to control at first, but ultimately thinks of as a gift (after lots of patience and practice with control). It’s an extremely important point in her development because it’s her first extreme act of physical-magical hubris (aka reckless crazy bullshit move #1), and she pays for it.
This story continues into 4.0, which I have touched on a little bit (there is one trip to Schism I have written a little about, as well as a pretty cool photoset I want to re-do someday). I won’t go into that too much because Spoilers even though I am really behind …. please look forward to it.
@dragons-bones also sent me Trial, thanks so much to both of you for the excuse to finally do a somewhat coherent write up about this! There are definitely other trials and instances that had a big impact, but for the sake of everyone’s attention span (mine included) I’ll leave it here for now.
A chorus of whispers, repeating their denial, louder and more insistent with every renewed attempt at access. Unable to win cooperation, Alyx tried to seize control of the land’s aether by force and was met only with the deafening hiss, a whole-body equivalent of a sharp slap on the wrist and a shove to the chest. Lightning cracked the sky and danced around her in glittering, blinding arcs, the very air heavy both with static and with the threat of rain—the raw power of the environment teasing her, testing her, judging her. She was an unwelcome sinner on holy ground, a trespasser by very nature of her existence: a child of man, presumptuous enough to challenge a god in his own domain.
The clearing in the sacred wood left none but the two combatants, a young mortal exhausted by her own recklessness and fervor, and the hoary deity she saw herself fit to contend with; the Lord of Levin had been at least mildly impressed, at least entertained enough to not have simply put her out of her misery, though he was far from satisfied with her performance. With his arbiters slain he returned his attention to the Bringer of Light, and her hands shook with the strain of maintaining whatever shred of control she had left. Alyx stood with her heels dug into the ground, the damp earth crackling with aether that still refused to yield to her, and the whispers only became louder as the ward she had labored to build began to waver.
She was as good as naked in the storm, unprotected and primed for a finishing blow. He knows the bout is all but won at this point, she thought wearily . But as the primal raised his jagged cane into the cloudy heavens another thought came to her suddenly, recklessly, from that dangerous and desperate part of her mind she usually tried not to listen to: if you cannot take from the land, take from Him. In the instant that followed she managed to have an entire argument with herself as she tried to speak the words to cast another ward, and eventually “this is fucking crazy” lost to “but it will work.” It had to work, or she’d die—die or fail the trial, neither of which were acceptable outcomes.
She took a deep breath and willed herself open and calm as the air around her hummed. Her skin began to tingle again as Ramuh’s voice boomed into her mind, making her teeth rattle and ache. Blinding light was all she saw when she closed her eyes.
