2018-12-08 Scene Opening Pose
In the climax of the battle for the Photosphere, the advanced scout Yarobeleedt had posed himself a potential disaster to the Drifters. Now, two greatly divergent but simultaneous paths have revealed themselves. The first, ascending, leads Drifters to the inner sanctum where Mother awaits. To destroy the world-leech and end her long history that has so smeared Filgaia since the days of the Metal Demon Wars.
And the second, descending, leads you here: the Gutter, at the very base of the Photosphere. A ghetto of haphazard streets carved of scrapheap shacks and broken shanties, a makeshift community carved over the centuries by the Tainted. The disenfranchised, the disillusioned, and the disposed all once dwelt here...
But no more. Your efforts have evacuated the majority of the Tainted, towards the Fereshte, the Yggdrasil and other rescue efforts that welcome them. And now, within this shell of a ghost town...
A circular dais, raised from the flat ground at the very bottom of the Gutter. Here, a nakedly obvious gathering of the Leyline reaches a central source culminating in a large and bright Ley Point which thrums with the very lifeblood of the planet itself. The Ley continues to roil, a blazing conflagration of bright-blue flame that shimmers with an almost deceptively gentle warmth. It is the very light of life itself, the very substance that allows such powers that sustain the world to exist.
Originally, the Ley was the Guardians' greatest weapon against Mother -- to continue to seal her power through the very vein of the planet itself, of whose anchors are the Statues so many Drifters have sacrificed time, effort, blood and grief to defend. A great number of Statues have been defended...
But all that effort could be for naught, if the channeler of the Ley is not stopped.
The channeler of the world's lifeblood... the Ley Dragon Riesenlied. She is here, under the dark auspices of the Quarter Knight Alhazred.
The thirty-foot white and blue Ley Dragon still fresh bears the scars of the battles past - the breach on her chest still scars with the effects of Lily's dark magic, Ethius' conflagration and Jacqueline's weakening solution, alongside the many pockmarks, gashes and other assaults she's endured throughout the many individual skirmishes throughout the battle for the Photosphere.
But she seems unimpeded. No, rather--
She is not permitted to be unimpeded.
She is to channel the Ley and offer it to Mother, as is her wont. Those with even an inkling of the awesome power of the Mediums know that this is a suicidal errand -- one that seems fitted, in Mother's twisted image, to deal with a traitor once and for all.
She is to be a battery and a weapon, to be disposed of when convenient.
If you fail here, your companions above may well also fail in their mission should Mother be fully awakened, permitted to devour the very vitality of Filgaia and accelerate beyond anyone's means.
But you are here now. You have come this far. You have fine-tuned your ARMs and Gears. You have honed your chi and battle skills through training. You have the very power of sorcery at your fingertips. You have plans and confidence... and what's more... perhaps more than other battles...
You have bonds. You have words. You have feelings--
to reach a creature empathic in origin.