Louisioux's tattoo theory

[Anonymoose]

Does that seem conflicting slightly with Erik's story to you?

The Finesand Banks have a rich history indeed. They are found on the west shore of the Velodyna River, at the foot of a now extinct volcano overlooking Rothlyt Sound. The area is a sedimentary basin formed by the deposit of the fine silts and sands carried by the river. Today, it falls within Gridanian territory, but in days past it belonged to my own home nation─Ala Mhigo.

A century ago, King Manfred came to power in Ala Mhigo and decided to expand the nation's territory in order to promote economic growth. To that end, he ordered the Ala Mhigan army to undertake large-scale campaigns that would eventually lead to the onset of the Autumn War. Naturally, such action was met with vehement opposition from the other nations.

Gridania, fearing encroachment along its border with Ala Mhigo, placed the renowned lancer Vainchelon in command of its standing armies and war began. His opponent was Gylbarde, the great general of Ala Mhigo, a fervent believer in the Fist of Rhalgr, and a man who enjoyed enormous popularity among the Ala Mhigan people.

The two leaders were loved by their troops, and at the outbreak of war morale on both sides was very high. The armies clashed time and again all along the border, neither general yielding an ilm. But in a galling twist of fate for Gridania, Vainchelon suddenly took deathly ill.

After no victor emerged following the Battle of Finesand Banks, Vainchelon devised a new strategy. He ordered his forces to retreat to Camp Nine Ivies, fully intending for Gylbarde to give chase. This would lure the Ala Mhigans to terrain more favorable and familiar to the Gridanians. He died, however, before he was able to see his plan executed.

Now, the man who would replace him, Osbern, was extremely ambitious and eager to prove his worth to the Seedseers. Having neither the mind nor patience for Vainchelon's defensive war, however, he ordered a frontal assault on the Ala Mhigan position. When Gylbarde learned of this plan─if plan it may be called─he secretly deployed troops to the most vital points along the Finesand Banks.

The Gridanian forces had scarcely entered the area before they began to suffer heavy losses from highly coordinated Ala Mhigan ambushes. In response, Osbern ordered a forced march, permitting his troops no rest for several days as he attempted to surge through the region. Eventually, exhausted, the Gridanians came to entrench themselves on a hill.

But this is precisely what Gylbarde had wanted! He surrounded the hill with six thousand soldiers to deny the forestborn any hope of retrieving water, and then proceeded to rain down barrage after barrage of arrows upon the encampment. In this seemingly hopeless position, the morale of the Gridanians quickly dwindled.

Following two failed attempts to break free, Osbern himself lead the van of a third and final charge. In the end, Gridania was defeated. Osbern and several of his officers were captured, and the legendary staff Claustrum, lent him by one of the Seedseers, was taken.

This abject defeat accounted for what little morale remained among his surviving troops, and they beat a desperate retreat to Five Hangs with the relentless Ala Mhigans harrying them every step of the way. Gylbarde's victory brought him ever greater accolades from his country, and as a result both he and the Fist of Rhalgr came to wield considerable political power.

And that is a brief history of the Finesand Banks. No, no, you needn't thank me. Knowing there is a little less ignorance in the world is all the reward I require.

The conflict being that The Raven's story says Ala Mhigo "claimed dominion over the East Shroud," where Erik says that the battle took place almost entirely at a sedimentary basin at the foot of an extinct volcano which marked a border between their territories - aside from when they almost pulled back into the East Shroud before the General died and his successor ordered a march even further from the wood.

I guess you could read it that they did pull back, intending to be pursued, but were ordered to march out again before that happened. It doesn't sound like Ala Mhigo ever crossed beyond the beyond Gridanian territory borders, never mind claimed a chunk of the Shroud.

I considered the possibility that perhaps the basin was in the shroud and that part of the shroud is what belonged to Ala Mhigo already ... but then they couldn't have "claimed" it to begin with, and there's no sedimentary ANYTHING in the East Shroud. There's a little bit of water from the Springripple, but that's an isolated lake (さざなみ湖).

Am I reading it wrong?

Perhaps this is like the inconsistencies we've been finding on the official site lately?