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What Could Have Been Vol. 16
Jan. 4th, 2018 12:02 amBehold, the Grand Finale! And seriously, wow. There was a reason I waited to confront this mess.
Another reason, of course, is that I was just lazy.
Okay, so then, while progressing through the Dragonian Moon (which I have as a fairly bizarre final dungeon revolving around temporal anomalies, sort of like Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs The Soulless Army's final dungeon worked, with you climbing through historical eras), the party gradually comes to understand how Lavos thinks; for all of his intelligence and power, he's ultimately a creature bound by his instincts to find new DNA, assimilate it, reproduce, and then move on to the next planet. He has no free will, and ultimately cannot be called "evil" so much as "animalistic"-he cannot consider alternate ways of behaving. He's ultimately stuck in a system that will result in the extinction of all life, even his own species, simply because his species will one day run out of life-bearing worlds to infest. It's also there that Kid and Harle try to figure out what they are in relation to Schala, before realizing that Project Galatea is pretty much a non-entity at this point given how its head scientist was possessed by an alien and the lab it was done in has been splatted across the timestream and then killed even more thoroughly when two out of three FATE components bit it.
Eventually, the party confronts Lavos, still speaking through Belthasar at the core of the Moon, who tries one last time to get them to work with him, by using his newfound ability to pull alternate timelines into existence to find a perfect world for them, one where he doesn't even exist. The party points out this would be condemning literally infinite numbers of people to untold suffering as Lavos feeds on them (Schala doesn't appear as a plot point, Lavos just invokes her as a true mother for Kid and Harle in the paradise timeline). And thus, they fight. I like the idea of the color sequence, though, so as you progressed through the Moon you learned the Dragonian harmonic sequence of the elements. The fight with Lavos' second phase (the Devourer of Time, the true, now vaguely angelic form of Lavos after defeating Belthasar) is actively unwinnable unless you perform the sequence in the proper order, which is helped by being able to force Lavos into casting spells of the needed elements by beating temporal images of his spawn he summons; they drop "tesseracts" that damage the dimensional pocket Lavos is hiding in, forcing him to cast a countering spell in order to fix the damage and eventually charging the Chrono Cross-and using time's harmony, channeled through Serge, to finally unmake Lavos completely.
Freed from Lavos' influence, Belthasar comes to his senses and realizes how selfish he was being. He apologizes to the party, and sacrifices himself to cast one final spell, using the temporal anomaly that is the Moon to create a new timeline born of the best elements of both. The ending sequence starts off the same, with Leena waking Serge up and seeming oblivious to the adventure...for about four lines, then she decides it isn't funny and drags out Sprigg to yell at her for putting her up to the prank. Serge is reunited with his love interest if it wasn't Leena, now a villager of El Nido, and receives calls from the rest of the party on their teleportation device, revealing that Guardia never fell and that they and Porre are close allies. The dwarves never invaded the fairies' home, Guile has developed a normal life as a magic tutor, basically things are great. The closing credits shows scenes from the new timeline, all altered versions of tragic events to make them happier, and the end results of major sidequests you've done.
Last shot is of Serge looking at the sole and only moon, before casting away his knife-he doesn't need to be the Assassin of Time any more.
Another reason, of course, is that I was just lazy.
Okay, so then, while progressing through the Dragonian Moon (which I have as a fairly bizarre final dungeon revolving around temporal anomalies, sort of like Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs The Soulless Army's final dungeon worked, with you climbing through historical eras), the party gradually comes to understand how Lavos thinks; for all of his intelligence and power, he's ultimately a creature bound by his instincts to find new DNA, assimilate it, reproduce, and then move on to the next planet. He has no free will, and ultimately cannot be called "evil" so much as "animalistic"-he cannot consider alternate ways of behaving. He's ultimately stuck in a system that will result in the extinction of all life, even his own species, simply because his species will one day run out of life-bearing worlds to infest. It's also there that Kid and Harle try to figure out what they are in relation to Schala, before realizing that Project Galatea is pretty much a non-entity at this point given how its head scientist was possessed by an alien and the lab it was done in has been splatted across the timestream and then killed even more thoroughly when two out of three FATE components bit it.
Eventually, the party confronts Lavos, still speaking through Belthasar at the core of the Moon, who tries one last time to get them to work with him, by using his newfound ability to pull alternate timelines into existence to find a perfect world for them, one where he doesn't even exist. The party points out this would be condemning literally infinite numbers of people to untold suffering as Lavos feeds on them (Schala doesn't appear as a plot point, Lavos just invokes her as a true mother for Kid and Harle in the paradise timeline). And thus, they fight. I like the idea of the color sequence, though, so as you progressed through the Moon you learned the Dragonian harmonic sequence of the elements. The fight with Lavos' second phase (the Devourer of Time, the true, now vaguely angelic form of Lavos after defeating Belthasar) is actively unwinnable unless you perform the sequence in the proper order, which is helped by being able to force Lavos into casting spells of the needed elements by beating temporal images of his spawn he summons; they drop "tesseracts" that damage the dimensional pocket Lavos is hiding in, forcing him to cast a countering spell in order to fix the damage and eventually charging the Chrono Cross-and using time's harmony, channeled through Serge, to finally unmake Lavos completely.
Freed from Lavos' influence, Belthasar comes to his senses and realizes how selfish he was being. He apologizes to the party, and sacrifices himself to cast one final spell, using the temporal anomaly that is the Moon to create a new timeline born of the best elements of both. The ending sequence starts off the same, with Leena waking Serge up and seeming oblivious to the adventure...for about four lines, then she decides it isn't funny and drags out Sprigg to yell at her for putting her up to the prank. Serge is reunited with his love interest if it wasn't Leena, now a villager of El Nido, and receives calls from the rest of the party on their teleportation device, revealing that Guardia never fell and that they and Porre are close allies. The dwarves never invaded the fairies' home, Guile has developed a normal life as a magic tutor, basically things are great. The closing credits shows scenes from the new timeline, all altered versions of tragic events to make them happier, and the end results of major sidequests you've done.
Last shot is of Serge looking at the sole and only moon, before casting away his knife-he doesn't need to be the Assassin of Time any more.
