Finally, someone let me out of my cage.
I resubbed about three days ago for 6.3, more in the hopes that experiencing the MSQ content I ducked out on before 6.1 even launched would inspire me to keep writing. My idea was a minor/major rewrite fic of the events—mostly in that a certain leader of the Scions is alive again and the real protagonist, while my WoL (Galbana Lily) is more or less her girlfriend/bodyguard. I managed to get past Alzadaal's Legacy before I had to admit to myself that I just didn't give a crap about what was happening, most of the characters involved, or what was to come.
So... here I am.
On the plus side, I finished Amidst the Ashes of Paradise before the turn of the year. I'm not entirely satisfied with how it played out in the end, and in my rush to get it done I ended up avoiding some things I really wanted or could have been good—Lily reuniting with some/all of the Elpis cast, getting to meet Maia (the porxie turned Meteion-descended familiar), and so on. I'm also fairly confident that the way I ended it, with Lily actually going through with her plan to resurrect Minfilia and ending up bringing Venat's soul back into existence while finally letting go of her frustrations and grudge against her... it's probably not the most popular ending, but whatever.
Also, it feels pretty frustrating to have relented and tried to give one of Venat's conspirators a name and identity—making an OC I sincerely like out of them—only to have it all but explicitly confirmed that the developers already did that, and were just withholding it. Sooner or later they were bound to fill in those blanks, but still.
EDIT: So, because I love to stroke my own ego, I'm just gonna ramble about the fic and my intentions with it. When I set out to write Ashes, it was to vent my frustrations with Endwalker's story and address what I felt were its shortcomings. YMMV on how well I came across or accomplished that, but here we go:
Time Travel
Endwalker took an already muddy set of implicit time travel rules and half-wittedly tried to bend them to make the plot work (see: Elidibus's warning, Venat's weird fixation on merging her timeline with yours, and Claudien's "It's just like Chrono Trigger!" musings).
What I did to fix it: Lily sought out the Tycoon right from the beginning of the fic, and after establishing that it still existed and was amicable, I used it to establish how time travel was going to work in the fic: You can't change your own past, you can only feed into it (time loop) or create a new future (timeline splitting). I also used this moment to strongly suggest that, should Lily embark on such a journey, the way back would be nigh impossible (but not insurmountable).
What I wish I did: I was going to write another scene near the end of the fic, where Lily confronts the Tycoon over redirecting her destination to the post-Final Days Etheirys instead of the Elpis/Pandaemonium era. The Tycoon would explain that even if Lily succeeded in helping the Ancients prevent the Final Days altogether, Venat would be left unsatisfied with the result, as she truly believed mankind needed to experience the Final Days to prove their worth. It would remind Lily that all it took to condemn the entire universe was one innocent question from a naive Ancient and his creation (Hermes and the Meteia). I ended up not doing this, in large part because the scene it was in was taking altogether too long to finish. I also felt it was unbelievable that Venat would intentionally inflict something like the Final Days on her people. But then again, y'know... the Sundering.
Ryne and Gaia
Ryne, after being built up through all of Shadowbringers as someone who would be significant to the ongoing plot, was shoved aside after 5.3 and only made a cameo appearance in Endwalker.
What I did to fix it: Ryne and Gaia were initially introduced into the fic just to give Lily someone to bounce off of during the opening chapters. But I made the decision to bring them along into the past. This turned out to be a good idea all around: They injected much needed levity at times, I was able to develop their relationship, flesh out their characters quite a bit more, etc. I was particularly happy with the decision to have them step up to become the story's protagonists, with Ryne even being offered the seat of Azem for her efforts. Ryne's completely selfless desire to save the Ancients contrasted nicely with Lily's selfish need to assuage her own guilt, and helped both characters shine, I feel.
What I wish I did: I wanted to show their nameday celebration, to contrast the happiness she and her friends were experiencing with Atlas's scene, which took place at about the same time. But I decided not to cover it, and instead cover the ending. As an aside, it's awfully fucked up for two teenage girls to celebrate turning 17, and immediately that night have to drop everything they're doing to save the world. Poor Ryne didn't even get to say goodbye to Atlas, and Atlas never got to thank any of them for pulling her out of her suicidal rut and giving her three more weeks to live.
The Venat cutscene
I genuinely hated the entirety of the infamous "Henceforth, he must walk" cutscene for reducing the entire history of the Final Days and the Sundering to a symbolic walk. It sidestepped all the nuance the scenario was initially presented with in Shadowbringers, substituting it with an obnoxious argument with a collective of strawmen set up for Venat to tear apart—figuratively and very literally. I also found it in poor taste to compare Venat watching generations of other people's suffering as a result of her actions with the WoL's heroic struggle against Emet-Selch.
What I did to fix it: I made that confrontation actually happen, and gave a semi-concrete timeframe for which it happened: Before the second sacrifice can take place, Venat has been doing this, confronting strangers about the choice to sacrifice themselves to Zodiark, for months. I also give three far better reasons for them to refuse and refute her, though I don't have these people say them outright. First, they are literally living in a post-apocalyptic wasteland where death by starvation is not only likely, but inevitable. Between death by starvation and death by becoming salvation itself, what choice do they really have? Second, there are more survivors than just these people. They have friends, families, and children to consider. They are willing to sacrifice everything of themselves to provide a better future for kith and kin. This completely flips the script on Endwalker's "The Ancients were just clinging to the past!" rhetoric—the Ancients Venat was opposed to were every bit as focused on the future as Venat. But I think the third, given near the end of the fic, is the most damning for Venat. After making the sacrifice, they had time to reflect on their decisions and the truth behind Venat's actions. And despite all that, they're willing to forgive Venat for lashing out at them and believe she is still able to guide their children in their stead.
What I wish I did: Nothing more, really. I felt I adequately refuted one of the most obnoxious elements of Endwalker's story there.
Tempering Expectations
In an easily missed line of dialogue in Shadowbringers, Emet-Selch confirms that Zodiark tempered the Convocation upon being summoned, and goes on to say that their purpose from then on was to bring about "His darkness". This revelation ought to have painted the ensuing story in a very different light, highlighting the tragedy of the Ascians being dutybound to act the way they do... and it never came up again. Not even after we finally developed a cure for tempering. Oh, aside from a one-off mention from, iirc, Livingway, who completely downplays the effects by calling it "a little tug", but only in the English localization.
What I did to fix it: The Convocation of Fourteen are tempered. Fixing that tempering was one of Lily's goals in the event that she couldn't stop the Final Days, and ultimately every single member has their tempering removed. How this is portrayed is more or less how it was portrayed in canon—each member has their own personality and point of view, but all are irrevocably (at the time) pointed towards means and ends that would suit Zodiark. Whether it's humanity exiling themselves to space while leaving Zodiark to care for Etheirys, or choosing to stay and work out how to bring their sacrificed friends and family back, Zodiark's needs invariably come before their own.
In the process of removing their tempering, Atlas also proves that it's possible to restore the memories Hermes erased from his and Emet-Selch's minds.
What I wish I did: Honestly, I don't know. The scenes with the whole Convocation were hard enough to write as it is. So many characters in one scene is just... difficult to handle.
Hermes, Destroyer of Worlds
Hermes never faces or takes responsibility for his actions in Endwalker. He lives and dies a hero, in complete ignorance to his role in causing the calamity in the first place.
What I did to fix it: Hermes is portrayed post-Final Days as deeply troubled by the event, to the point of believing humanity should exile themselves from Etheirys as penance. Once he's confronted with what he'd done, it causes him so much grief that he winds up wishing to be killed to atone. And this is where I worked my magicks—I had Emet-Selch and Atlas befriend him. With Emet-Selch it's a bit one-sided. Before his memories are restored he's the man's most fervent defender. And even after his memories are restored, he still takes every opportunity he can to help Hermes, despite having every reason to lash out at him instead. Hermes of course is incapable of seeing this, believing that he's being patronized with empty words as usual. He's much more receptive to Atlas and her attempts to get him to open up, and eventually agrees to have his memory restored.
And when he does? He realizes he had the answer to his question from the very beginning, and was too blinded by his own ambitions to realize it. The Meteia were what brought him happiness, and even though remembering what he did causes him no end of pain, he becomes determined to save them from the hell he'd inflicted onto them.
What I wish I did: Had Lily meet Hermes before her departure for her own timeline. She would see how much he'd changed for the better, and wonder what had caused it. This would be an appropriate time to recap Hermes' development, while also introducing her to Maia.
Venat, the Magic Conch
Venat's big plan for dealing with the Final Days in canon is notoriously lacking. All we have to work with is that she refused to tell anyone, even her twelve devoted followers, what was truly going on. She also insisted that the Final Days had to be allowed to happen, despite moments earlier trying to stop Meteion from fleeing and even trying to kill her.
What I did to fix it: Venat was an active participant in trying to alleviate the Final Days'. She fought blasphemies, including Therion. She used Anamnesis Anyder to shelter everyone she could. She even had a starship constructed so that, should she believe the people of Etheirys were strong enough to confront Meteion, they would already have the means to reach her.
I also added caveats to her attempts to help her people. Anamnesis Anyder wasn't a perfect shelter, and beyond that was ill-equipped to handle the people's biological needs. With the world in a state where nothing new could be grown, many of the survivors were forced to leave, until all that remained were Venat, her followers, and Erichthonios, who she'd contracted to create the seal that would keep Zodiark at bay. And her starship, which was just barely completed by the time it took off, was never actually *meant* to find Ultima Thule. Because of her insistence on keeping her foreknowledge a secret, it was ultimately designed under the assumption that it would take several Ancient generations to find the source of the Final Days. This is something Venat is called out for by her own followers—if she had just told them the truth from the start, they could have focused all their effort onto a smaller, faster starship, and stopped the Final Days before it ever began.
the tl;dr of it: Venat in canon is a clusterfuck of poor writing choices marring an otherwise good character. Venat in my fic is torn between saving her own people and keeping the path to Lily's future available to her. In the end it's made clear that both paths would have led to salvation, but the one Venat traveled in canon was genuinely the worse of the two, not the better.
What I wish I did: Not much, really.
Azem, the Tuxedo Mask
In canon, we have no idea why Azem opposed the summoning of Zodiark. We have no idea why they refused Venat's invitation to join them. We have no idea what they were doing at all. I wholeheartedly expect this to be retconned into "Azem secretly allied with Venat from the beginning", which I wholeheartedly disagree with.
What I did to fix it: I made Azem an actual character in her own right. Atlas, a giant of a woman from the volcanic isle mentioned in one of Emet-Selch's The Rising stories. She's built like an ox, strong of heart and sound of mind, overwhelmingly empathetic, and generally an all around lovable woman. Her objection was for the obvious and understandable reason of not wanting half their people and Elidibus to be consumed to create Zodiark. She instead believed she should be the lone sacrifice. The thing is, the Final Days did such a massive number on her cognition that this would've been disastrous. She ended up storming out in a huff after crushing her mask, rebuking Elidibus despite his efforts to convince her to return, and took refuge with Pleione in Elpis, where she became the island's sole guardian.
But isolation, especially after what she'd been through, is a slow killer. By the time she enters the story, she's one day and one Zodiark-induced miracle away from committing suicide. In Lily's timeline, she died fully believing that the people she was protecting would reclaim their world and seek out a brighter future. Instead Hydaelyn destroyed their hopes and dreams when she sundered Etheirys, and Atlas ended up in a state where, if she ever awoke again (say, by Emet-Selch jogging her memory with a certain soul crystal), she would become a worse threat to the universe than even the Meteia.
But this fate was averted for the Atlas of this new timeline. Because of the interference by Lily, Ryne, and Gaia, she was able to put her life back together, enjoy life again, and through sacrificing her soul became the wings that would carry the Ancients to victory—the Ragnarok or more specifically, its AI, Maduin.
What I wish I did: Spent more time with the Maduin AI. There was a scene where the AI shows Maia some recording Atlas made before passing away, in an attempt to lift her spirits. It would've been nice to write Lily hearing those messages as well.
The Echo/The Blessing of Light
So the powers the Echo and the Blessing of Light convey to people in the setting are pretty damn inconsistent, and Endwalker made that even worse by downplaying its significance (oh, it's just a simple shield) while also stripping the Echo of the only utility it consistently provided (shielding you from primal influence). It was also revealed in 5.2 that the Echo is far more widespread than anyone truly knows, but certain characters who ought to have it simply don't (or the story is very vague about it).
What I did to fix it: Atlas reveals to Ryne that everyone, including her, has the capacity to develop the Echo. She teaches Ryne how to use it to review her own memories in real time, and Ryne compares it to her ability to lucid dream (something I've toyed with in previous fics). Likewise, despite all but stripping herself of the Blessing of Light, Lily is able to resist Hydaelyn's attempts to temper her through the Echo and sheer willpower alone. She was even fairly close to snapping Hydaelyn's neck before sheer exposure to the primal's influence forcibly converted her into a sin eater.
… Oh, and also. Sin Eaters can be cured provided creation magicks are involved. That was a thing I introduced.
What I wish I did: I was originally going to have Lily be tempered, and Maia be tempted to reawaken her as Atlas while rebalancing her aether. She ultimately wouldn't, but even so, I decided against this idea on the grounds that it was too fucked up, even for me. I also wanted to come up with a much more interesting design for Sin Eater!Lily than a featureless marble statue. The idea behind that was that the whole "Hero of a Thousand Faces"/"WoL is a blank slate" thing, but still. I liked what I came up with, at least.
Ancients can't use Dynamis, except when they can
The story treats the Ancients' inability to wield dynamis themselves as an insurmountable hurdle that justifies their extinction at Venat's hands. But this ignores that the Ancients have made living things that can interact with dynamis in their stead. Even 6.3 seems to be strongly implying that the Twelve (being Hydaelyn's creations) are just as able to interact with Dynamis as the sundered, despite technically being unsundered beings by comparison (they can use creation magicks without relying on outside sources of power).
What I did to fix it: Had the Convocation discuss possible solutions to dealing with the Meteia, and ultimately come to the conclusion that working in tandem with their own creations is their best choice. This leads to Atlas and Hermes remodeling Atlas's porxie, Maia, into a familiar based on Meteion's design. This would eventually lead to more familiars being created or altered along the same line, such as Loghrif's Griever, and they would join those sent to Ultima Thule.
What I wish I did: Actually depicted the Ancients' journey to Ultimate Thule. I've had a few ideas floating around in my head on how that would play out, but the end result was always going to be the same: Maia would reveal that the Meteia have completely failed to do what they claim they're doing. There is no happiness to be found amidst the dead worlds whose souls she plundered, and all she's really accomplished is keeping them trapped in the agony of their final moments. The Ancients would ultimately succeed in unraveling the girls' control over the souls, and with the last of Venat's divine power as Hydaelyn, would also permanently break the Meteia's hive mind, forcing them to live and grow as individuals. This is in sharp contrast to Lily, who simply killed all but the one she successfully won over. Ultimately I decided not to do this, as I didn't think I could do the idea justice and it would otherwise be a retread of Endwalker's story, but with the Ancients instead of the Scions.
The Sundering
It should come as no surprise that I find the Sundering to be morally reprehensible. It only narrowly skates by in the fandom because the writing is insufferably vague about what happened, while also relying on Emet-Selch giving a brief demonstration that ended up proving inaccurate later down the line, thanks to Yoshi-P's dogged insistence that the modern day races be direct descendants of the Ancients and not the new life Zodiark created via the second sacrifice.
What I did to fix that: I depicted what Sundering does to a person three times.
The first is in a flashback to the Eden!Shiva fight, wherein Lily is sundered into eight pieces by Shiva. The result is eight "perfect" copies of Lily, being in line with Emet-Selch's description. They're one eighth as strong, one eighth as smart, one eighth as agile. And because of that, it's something of a miracle they were able to stop Shiva from causing a second Flood of Light.
The second is in the Ryne+Gaia as Primals vs Hydaelyn fight. Hydaelyn decides to finish the fight by distracting them with a Flood of Light, then unleashing the Sundering upon them, the Moon, and all of Etheirys. Gaia uses up all of the divine power she has left to freeze time on the Moon, gets Ryne to safety, and then forcibly directs the Sundering onto herself, stopping it at the cost of her own life. The result is the already 1/14 Gaia being sundered so much that there's seemingly nothing left of her. The only person present who can even perceive her, Hythlodaeus, compares her presence to that of the scorched residue left behind when Therion incinerated his fellow Ancients with its voice when the Final Days came to Amaurot. tl;dr: Gaia got sundered to the point where she was barely a stain on the moon (she got better).
The third is, funnily enough, Hydaelyn herself! After stealing some of her power earlier in the fight, Ryne uses Elidibus and Hythlodaeus to distract Hydaelyn, then unleashes that power on her, sundering her into fourteen pieces just like she was going to do to Etheirys. The result is in line from the pictures seen in the Nier crossover. Every single description I made of the state Hydaelyn was in after Ryne sundered her screams that this is a fucking horrible fate and that inflicting it onto someone is worse than killing them outright.
What I wish I did: Nothing more. This was executed perfectly, I think.
Pray Return to Life, Minfilia
When I first began writing Ashes, I wholeheartedly intended to bring Minfilia back to life at the end of the fic. As a fan of her character, her repeated deaths over the course of Heavensward and Shadowbringers were downright frustrating to experience, and it honestly felt like I was being punished for liking her just because the fandom at large did not.
What I did to fix it: Lily's desire to resurrect her was in the story from the very beginning, and moments to suggest this was going to be the case were laced in all throughout the story. I also tied Lily's mother, Seventh Heaven, into this finale—this was also intended from the start, though not quite in the way I went about it. Notably, the demonic form Seven takes before Lily rekindles her memories is based on Japanese Hannya masks, which I felt was appropriate given the parts of her story I'd worked into this fic and the previous ones, Dreams of the Road Untraveled and Candle in the Dark.
What I wish I did: Originally I was going to have Lily leave for Dalmasca after Minfilia's revival, only to be confronted by her in Rabanastre. I ended up not doing this because that's a major dick move. I also wanted to do more with Lily's fight with her mother—Seventh Heaven was going to follow up her overpowered magicks with Ultima Masher/Shear, the ultimate technique Viera can learn in FFTA+FFTA2. But I decided that was out of character for her—she's trying to dissuade intruders, not kill them, and by the time she could've done it, Lily had already gotten through to her.
Undoing Venat's erasure
Yeah. If this was supposed to be karmic punishment for her actions, it certainly didn't feel like it. And I'm going to be blunt: After railing against her own people for wanting to sacrifice themselves or the new life to Zodiark, it struck me as bizarre that Venat turned around and did the exact same thing for us. By sacrificing her own soul, she gave us the power to restore what we lost—nine dead friends, or eight dead friends and Emet-Selch if you're not fond of him. This proved to be instrumental to our success in Ultima Thule, and is such a thorough refutation of her own beliefs that it's astonishing nobody seems to have picked up on it.
What I did to fix it: Nothing, lol. But I was in full "Fuck Canon, I do what I want" mode by then, so I decided to have Minfilia orchestrate Venat's soul revival, using her body as bait and Seventh Heaven to screen out everyone except the one person who could pull her back together. Funnily enough, this wasn't even the plan when I wrote in that Venat had sent a mysterious crystal across the timelines! That crystal was initially intended to be the means by which Minfilia would resurrect, as a gift to her. But I figured Venat forgiving her alternate self for what she'd done, and Lily forgiving her for the betrayal and heartache Venat had caused her, was more poignant.
What I wish I did: I would've liked to have present day Venat speak with Lily, Minfilia, and Seven. But I decided that having her silently show her affection before leaving, and Seven departing to keep her company, was better. Oh well.
Originally Posted by Simple_Barghest
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