#updated: after finishing penacony completely i think that PART of the IPC is evil

[illiaccrest]

So, is Aventurine going to come back and have a larger role or is the writing for Star Rail just really weird?

Spoilers for Penacony

I feel like Aventurine's plot in the Penacony storyline is interesting but kind of awkward? The writing in Star Rail so far is pretty awkward in general imo, but him especially.

Like, you're introduced to him as this shifty ally but actually adversary but actually ally. He lies to you a lot, acts like a crazy person (at least he must have looked crazy from the trailblazer's perspective), and then gets YEEETED out of the story. That's all great and cool, his schemes eventually uncover the final secret of the plot, but did we really need the intimate deep dive into his backstory?

I loved getting to see all of his flashbacks, it definitely made him the most interesting and complex character so far, but from a storytelling perspective it's a weird choice.

For Aventurine to fulfill his role in the story we really just needed to know that he's the schemer among the IPC. There's really no reason to go so deep into his past and for us to actually see all of those scenes play out. It would have been enough to suggest that he had a rough past that made him the way he is.

I don't know if I'm reading too much into things but I feel like it's important. Not only does Penacony's story make Aventurine suddenly feel like an important character, but his flashbacks also introduced this idea of people being blessed by gods that aren't Aeons with Giathra which hopefully means they're going to go back and explore the nature of divinities in this universe more and not just forget about it.

Also, am I crazy of does the wording in some scenes seem to imply that Aventurine is NOT the last Avgin? When asked if he's the last of his kind he answers "perhaps". During the IPC broadcast about the genocide they report 6000+ deaths and 3000+ missing. That's a lot of missing people! And in his character story when he asks Jade about the status of his people she says "there are no more Avgins on Sigonia".

On Sigonia. Not that there are no more Avgins in general.

My prediction is that Aventurine is not done causing problems and that we might find out that the IPC is really into human trafficking 😬