#wolsquad

[cindernet-exploded]

Well one of us has to change...

Happy All Saint's Wake!

~~~

Outfits Left to Right!:

Nabette (she/her) as A'vyra

U'nia (she/her) as a Dullahan

Shyssa (they/them) as a Dullahan

Oketra (she/her) as a Vampire

A'vyra (he/she/they) as Alisaie

[thefinalwitness]

HIIIIIIIIIIII HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII PLEASE LOOK AT THIS BEAUTIFUL COMMISSION @ELVHENLUCA GOT FROM @GUTTERTONGUE OF OUR (+ @LAMBYLIN + @DAETUR + MY) WOLS IN ULTIMA THULE???? ;_; I AM COMPLETELY CRAZY ABOUT IT WHAT THE HECK!!!!! WHAT THE HECK!!!!!!!!!!!

thank u soooooooooooo so so so much lukka and GUTTER!!!!!! i am going to roll around in this like how my mom's dog used to roll around in perfume when little droplets of it fell to the floor after she sprayed it. i will do this for the next thousand years probably

[thefinalwitness]

so l'aiha shares a canon with three other warriors of light (each belonging to an irl friend!) and we had to do the whole lightwarden thing pretty differently to accommodate the fact we all wanted a bit of fun with the light corruption hehe.

out of the four wols, l'aiha is (incorrectly) theorized to be the most resilient to the light's effects, because she already has an imbalance of aether and has lived years with too much umbral/white aether. it was believed this would make her the most tolerant to MORE umbral/white aether.

so she takes lakeland's lightwarden without much issue; the theory seems to hold. it's when she takes rak'tika's lightwarden (skipping il mheg; we'll come back to that) that she experiences problems; basically, she has the amh araeng reaction in rak'tika instead, where the light painfully surges and she blacks out.

her friends are worried about what'll happen if she takes another lightwarden, as y'shtola confirms that each taking of a lightwarden is doing considerable damage to l'aiha's aether and soul, and there's no way she'd survive taking in all five. this is around the time the group finds out aeric absorbed il mheg's lightwarden; it hadn't been the plan, he was to stay and help il mheg until the others could get help from rak'tika, but he took matters into his own hands and he and feo ul handled it.

one lightwarden didn't seem to severely endanger aeric, and in fact his soul responded BETTER than l'aiha's, revealing their theory had been wrong. balanced aether was better.

so they adjusted the strategy going forward: with only two lightwardens left, the remaining two wols SHOULDVE, theoretically, been able to take one each and all survive the ordeal. so aes'a took the lightwarden in amh araeng, and nanamei took the one in kholusia.

the problem, though, is nanamei's aether is very astral/black aspected, and upon taking the lightwarden, her aether almost instantly rejected it. this caused it to burst back out and hit l'aiha, who unwillfully took it, and it created a chain reaction where aeric's and aes'a's were ripped out and consumed by her too.

l'aiha realistically wouldn't have been able to endure THREE lightwardens, let alone five, and rapidly deteriorates. rak'tika had already bleached her hair and eyes, and this incident finished that job and much worse; she immediately began to turn, and much more swiftly than as seen in canon.

at the same time, nanamei's astral aether responded badly to the sudden influx and rejection of the corrupted light, and HER aether went out of control. she had to be fought down as basically a voidsent until her aether could be stabilized.

but this means l'aiha and emet-selch escaped. l'aiha is found again in amaurot, half-turned into a sin eater and devoid of her 'heart'. this leaves her with an unflinching 'practicality'; she's still of her own mind, it seems, but she deduces that if she dies, the corrupted light will burst fourth and cause the very apocalypse the four of them were trying to prevent. she can't succumb to the corruption, nor can she be slain, even mercifully.

so she deems it necessary to survive and contain the light for, basically, the rest of eternity. the others know this is impossible; she will eventually lose her mind too and rampage across norvrandt. but they don't want to kill her, they want to stabilize her as they did nanamei; as they believe ryne can help with.

l'aiha fights them because, 'devoid of her heart', she can make the choice that 'killing all her friends' is better than 'letting the world die'. in short, she IS successfully stabilized by ryne, but the effect is much shorter (since we're already to amaurot msq) and she still starts falling apart again during the confrontation with emet-selch.

the rest is canon-compliant: ardbert rejoins to l'aiha's soul, granting her extra power to resist the light corruption with, and giving her enough time to blast all of it into the (heavily darkness corrupted) emet-selch, creating almost a cancelling effect of the two dangerous energies.

l'aiha goes back to 'still imbalanced, but not lethally m so' with some additional issues: her magic and body want to slip into 'stasis', or the passivity of umbral aether. her magic is already unusable—she can't feel or access it at all, though it's not completely gone—but her body still has a chance.

since those events, l'aiha has been keeping up a regime of physical and magical therapy to make sure neither area worsens. if her body or aether were to go completely into stasis, it would kill her. she can't reverse the damage at this time, but she can halt the progress.

and that's the story of why, even after rejoining with another shard and regaining the usability of her magic, l'aiha is constantly fighting against her own self's shutting down and going into dormancy and turning her into a mindless aether-devouring sin eater. :)

During Shadowbringers, how did the light corruption after slaying the Lightwardens effect your WoL?

[johnnystorm]

baby it's cold outside, give that catboy cuddles

[safert0fu]

Happy Holidays !

from my WoLsquad! Stay safe & warm out there, everybody ♥

[liketheinferno2]

HAURCHEWOL SAP ? gimme

I had a hard time drawing it. But Patchah'li has been reading his sister stories of dashing knights since they were little wandering orphaned Miqo'te children and accidentally given himself a miserable fantasy of being rescued and cared for by someone big and strong instead of doing all the rescuing and caring himself. Miserable because big and strong people are simultaneously very scary to him and he's always on guard around them, so all his other relationships have been other Keepers and Hyur, like, small people.

I have been imagining that Haurchefant's sweet honest genuine gentleman personality + the way that he is so willing to serve others and protect people + the fact that he is just OPENLY IN LOVE WITH YOU is extremely confronting at first because Patchi has not been cared about in that way since he was a tiny child, but once he gets used to it he's a lovebug right back. He's got friends (my buddy's other WOLs lol) who have been in a will-they-or-won't-they relationship for almost a decade and he's decided fuck that noise, if someone loves me this much I am not going to squander my time with them.

Also because w have a wolsquad, he's the crafter before Heavenward, so he's not much of a combatant until Haurchefant helps him get stronger. Up until the Vault, the relationship with Haurchefant is the only thing keeping him level amidst all the stress of losing people and going dragoon crazy from Estinien and the Eye, and afterwards... well.

I also like... Haurchefant x male WOL but it's got to be a secret because Ishgard y'know. I like it starting pre-heavensward so Haurchefant's plea to his father to let this person stay with him is like "BUT DADDY I LOVE HIM."

Not to mention Edmont having to make the choice to accept his bi sectional son for real now that Haurchefant's stepmother is gone and that bringing the whole family together finally. Artoirel resents him at first and gets over it... like that's the narrative. Also Emmanellain is massively enjoying the drama of niisan's secret foreign male lover who is a FUGITIVE living in their HOUSE I think he should become a drunken bard and sing about it.

[thefinalwitness]

l'aiha's ARR to EW timeline has been around six years! i imagine each expac (x.0) usually taking around a year (StB took 2) and the patches (x.1-5) usually between 3 and 6 months. some outliers include a gap between the end of ARR and beginning of HW (3 months) and one between the end of EW 6.0 and start of 6.1 (6 months).

i haven't done the math in a while but l'aiha was 34 or so in ARR and is 40 in 6.4 <3 normally any downtime between patches is used to address non-msq content like raids or side quests, or just for character development moments that don't fit neatly into the aforementioned categories. a lot of the 6.x downtime has been spent reconnecting with her sister!

i also retcon it sometimes, when in the grand scheme of things it doesn't make sense anymore. example: i originally had the gap between 6.0 and 6.1 be a month, but with how fast consequential patches have felt, i adjusted it.

i. love timeline shit.

WolQotD

oftentimes I'll get on Tumblr, eager to make a WoLQotD only to find a similar question has already been posed, or one damn near close enough that the answer wouldn't be any different. Not that it's a bad thing mind you, not everyone will see post A and will be glad to answer the same question in post B and therefore you'll have someone answering the question for the first time! but it does still keep me from posting some QotD's I've had.

also life is busy sometimes and finding time to make a post sometimes just isn't a thing I can do, but that's neither here nor there.

what IS here, however is a WoLQotD that some people might find interesting.

A few people I've spoken with in the past have expressed an interesting difference of opinion on how quickly the events of MSQ take place- some perceive it as quickly paced and all occur within months, some- myself included- perceive the story as being presented much quicker in-game but faaaaaaar more drawn-out in actuality. I'll get to the why's and wherefores in a reblog later, but now I pose to you, oh lovely followers mine;

How do you perceive the flow of time in MSQ, does it move quickly with little to no downtime in between story beats? or does everything move much slower in your eyes, a slowly winding story with ample time to dwell on each event before another turns its head?

and more importantly- how does this affect your WoL? do they try to take the time in between beats to make a life for themselves? do they have their own adventures that aren't grounded in the XIV story in this time? or are they swept along the torrential rapids of the story, whisked from one event to the next, never getting a moment to breathe before jumping back into the fire?

or maybe you're somewhere in that area in-between? a fast-paced story but with some time to stop and smell the flowers?

let me know! I'm eager to hear more opinions about it!!

[thefinalwitness]

wolsquad gets down #wolsquad

[thefinalwitness]

happy halloween! i can imagine a lot of kids dress up as the warriors of light every year :') ft @daetur, @elvhenluca and @lambylin!!

[thefinalwitness]

true to my word i proceeded to mess with this for 6-8 hours. it wouldn't have taken that long but a) i had to find something that can open .psds bc i do not have photoshop (fun fact: this website can do it) and b) i kept starting over bc i realized i could do the portraits better.

anyway, of course i did the wolsquad. who else was i going to do. every time i can give them something Kinda Official Looking you know exactly what's going to happen.

[thefinalwitness]

apparently it's yoshi video project energy this week. voice casts for the #wolsquad!!!! i just wanted to hear them all and now u can too

[thefinalwitness]

artemis lost everything during the final days. her brother, her lover and all of her friends, she had turned against them, rejecting the convocation's plan to save the star. even her mentor, her mother, venat, she turned her back against. she could not justify the loss of life that their gods made manifest would cost.

but she didn't die alone. at world's end, she and apollo were tired, and the fight was long over.

[song!]

[thefinalwitness]

saw this on twitter and discord and wanted to do it TOOOOOO :') two versions!!!! scions and ocs (includes mine and friends' <3)

scions

y'shtola: that's her WIFEYYYYYYYYYYY

lyse: they've been really close since ARR!!! as yda, lyse was one of the quickest to jump into a friendship with l'aiha, and she spent a lot of time trying to help l'aiha uncover her memories through various silly experiments, like trying foods from all over the world to see if anything tasted familiar.

estinien: l'aiha thinks he hates her, but he thinks they're friends. LMAO.

thancred: while they've bonded over the years regarding minfilia's ordeals, they got off to a horrible start due to The Ifrit Incident, and their relationship has never truly recovered. they feel IMMENSELY guilty about the other's suffering and Will Not Talk About It.

ryne: they're not QUITE familial, but the relationship is sort of like "you'd be my favorite auntie if you were my auntie".

minfilia: THEY LOVE EACH OTHER SO MUCH IT'S STUPID!!!!!

g'raha: they're friends. they admire the shit out of each other. they're also scared of each other. FGJKDLGDHJD.

alisaie & alphinaud: they're VERY CLOSE, and due to a technicality in the way l'aiha was resurrected with louisoix's aether, they are 1/3rd related. :) those are Her Kids.

urianger: he and l'aiha get along really well, but they don't really feel like they're Close™ friends. they'd like to be!!! but they're both awkward lmao.

krile: she and l'aiha have the sort of friendship l'aiha and thancred COULD have had if not for their Inability To Talk To Each Other. they're extremely close, and bond a lot over the loss of minfilia, their shared sharlayan heritage and the complicated feelings they have about that, and so on!

tataru: THEY LOOOOOVE to talk about tailoring together! but their friendship actually first blossomed when l'aiha asked if she could take over the waking sands' taxes because she likes doing them LOL.

ocs

l'khilo tia: l'aiha's first and best friend, as well as her adoptive brother! they adore each other and would do absolutely anything for the other. they escaped a corrupt seeker clan together, and have been with each other through every awful thing thereafter.

raih'li tayuun: l'aiha doesn't know him especially well—much like her and urianger, they are amiable to one another but awkward.

aes'a tayuun: @daetur's warrior of light, and one of l'aiha's co-wols! l'aiha admires him a lot and thinks it's really amazing the sorts of skills he has, especially because so many of them are things she just cannot wrap her head around, like magitek. his bold sky pirate personality worries the SHIT out of her though. ARE YOU BRINGING WARM ENOUGH CLOTHES UP THERE YOUNG MAN.

io/atlas: venat's familiar, and now a sorta-kinda scion. l'aiha sees a lot of herself in them, and they in her, so they became fast friends and kinda trauma bonded through a lot of shared and similar experiences.

l'rhen vhanan: the daughter of the nunh who almost killed l'khilo, and who l'aiha in turn killed first. they were enemies until very late stormblood, and now are in sort of a rocky transitional period. unlike most former enemies, l'aiha isn't scared of her. she feels bad for her, if anything, and l'rhen kinda resents that.

nanamei kazarishi: @elvhenluca's warrior of light, and another of l'aiha's co-wols! l'aiha and nanamei were "the first" two wols, so to speak, and they have an INCREDIBLY tight bond as the once-believed only two survivors of the waking sands massacre. nanamei thinks of l'aiha a bit like a sister, and though l'aiha doesn't quite share the sentiment because of how much younger nanamei is, she still adores her as strongly as a big sister would.

j'lhana eiha: l'aiha's actual biological sister! they reunited-slash-learned of each other in endwalker, and have recently come to terms with the fact that l'aiha doesn't remember lhana NOR is l'aiha who lhana remembers. even so, they've grown increasingly close, and are only getting closer as they navigate this complicated new chapter in their lives.

hsea'li qhan: @lambylingames' oc! he and l'aiha met before ARR in thanalan, and though l'aiha has always found him a little creepy (she doesn't like how eerily quiet he can be. he sneaks up on her a lot, but not on purpose), they're pretty good friends who bonded over a shared sentiment about how mistreated the beast tribes are.

aeric tracke: @lambylingames' warrior of light, and the final of l'aiha's co-wols! they actually met at the arcanists' guild because they both worked there, and have always felt an inexplicable draw to one another—one that was finally explained when they discovered their ancients were the twin azems, apollo and artemis! it also explains their uncanny, twinnish likenesses.

eir-a-yan: a padjali hearer who has acted as sort of a mother figure to l'aiha on more than one occasion, though they would describe their relationship as friends. l'aiha has gained a lot of wisdom from eir-a, and they often write to one another—an agreement that gives l'aiha advice, and eir-a a taste of the adventures they're often too sickly to take part in.

esmerales: while l'aiha is the source shard of artemis, esmerales is the 13th. they have been enemies since the early days of 1.0, and while that hasn't changed, their feelings for each other have. they're two pieces of a shattered soul, desperate to be whole, but neither of them will bend to the other's ideals of how that rejoining should look.

artemis: one of the last holders of the seat of azem, a title she shared with her twin brother apollo. l'aiha is a shard of artemis, and after the confrontation with elidibus in 5.3, artemis' consciousness was awakened within l'aiha, and proceeded to haunt her until late 6.0. while they're no longer enemies, their relationship is somewhat strained, but they both want to understand the other better, and if possible, help them.

[thefinalwitness]

HELLOOOOOOO HAPPY VDAY i got. really cute comms from @honeybearries on twitter!!!!! :') of my GIRLS and all the wolsquad ships 💞💞💞💞 they came out SOOOOOOOO SO SO CUTE IM REALLY HAPPY

[thefinalwitness]

DID I REALLY NEVER POST THE "ESCAPE THE BANQUET" FIC????? I CAN'T FIND IT ANYWHERE. WHATEVER. HERE.

in which minfilia awakens. :)

---

"Come on!" Nanamei shouts. "We're almost out of here!"

The sloshing of sewage water fills her and her comrades' ears, blocking out much else. Yet if Minfilia strains, she can hear the distant chaos of Ul'dah, and closer, always closer, the march of pursuing Crystal Braves.

It's just her, Nanamei and L'aiha now. The rest had stayed behind to guard their escape; Minfilia's heart pounds with fear and grief. Yda and Papalymo, Y'shtola, Thancred...

"Oh, Hydaelyn," she prays between exhausted breaths. "Protect them."

It feels like these tunnels never end. Nanamei bravely leads the charge, keeping an angry sort of calm that's so far prevented Minfilia or L'aiha's weaker hearts from delaying too long. She barks at the two smaller women to keep up, protectiveness shining through every harsh word.

"They're gaining on us," L'aiha warns, her long miqo'te ears straining to hear the Braves behind them. "If we have to fight—"

"Then we'll fight!" Nanamei says.

Minfilia looks over her shoulder, but the darkness that yawns out before her eyes is unimpressed with the lone lantern she carries. She can't see anything but a few fulms in any direction; the rest is a suffocating blackness and seems only to get closer every time she looks.

"Don't worry, Antecedent," L'aiha soothes from beside her. "We'll make it. We're almost there."

"Thancred and the others," Minfilia says, weighed by her guilt. "If the Braves are catching up, that means—"

Oh, Hydaelyn, please...

"There they are!" shouts an unfamiliar voice; one of the Braves. "Halt! You can't run forever!"

"Dammit," Nanamei swears. "Hurry!"

The three pick up their pace, despite how it burns through their legs even in the chilly water. Minfilia cries out with effort, tears stinging her eyes as she tries in vain to shut them away.

Wherever her friends are, she can't fail them. She has to escape with the Warriors of Light. She promised Thancred...

She looks back again, afraid she'll see pursuing lanterns or even faces. But all she sees is the glint of something metal, before it zips out of the shadows and strikes her.

"Ah—!"

"Minfilia!" L'aiha cries out.

The miqo'te manages to catch her as she collapses, stunned motionless by a sharp, stabbing pain in her shoulder. Minfilia blinks whole seconds by; she's suddenly being cradled to L'aiha's chest, as Nanamei puts herself between the two and the Braves closing in, her horned and scaled visage offering more intimidation than Minfilia could ever hope to muster.

Her vision starts to swim, swaying like the tiny firelight in the lantern. Is this the end?

"Minfilia!" L'aiha calls again, but her face is blurry and her voice distant. "Hold on! Please, we have to—"

"They're coming!" Nanamei shouts, even more distorted in Minfilia's fraying consciousness. "L'aiha, I need you!"

Minfilia blinks again. L'aiha props her up against the tunnel wall, then runs to join Nanamei. Though Minfilia can barely keep her eyes open now, she watches as they stand ready in front of her, as the Crystal Braves pour in.

"You're cornered now!" one says. "Come quietly or—"

"Like hell we will!" Nanamei yells, and casts forth a surge of fire.

The Braves retaliate, as L'aiha's own magic joins the fray too. Minfilia tries to breathe, each one sharp against her throat and lungs.

There's too many. The Braves are gaining ground fast.

"Hydaelyn," she whispers. "Please..."

Her eyes become too heavy, so she focuses only on her prayer.

"Please protect them..."

"Child."

A tiny, tiny spark of strength lights in Minfilia's chest. Her eyes snap open, but her friends and the tunnels are gone. She sits in a void unending, one full of starlight and aether. She's been here before.

Before her towers the Mothercrystal, glittering blues and whites, as gorgeous and ephemeral as always. Her voice speaks into Minfilia's mind.

"Thy star darkens ever more," Hydaelyn says. "I cannot repel it..."

Tears stream down Minfilia's face. She finds her voice again. "There must be a way. Please, if L'aiha and Nanamei... They cannot be lost—"

Her dearest Warriors of Light... Without them, who would relight the star?

"I haveth a proposition... but it will ask much and more of thee."

Minfilia doesn't hesitate. "Grant me the strength to save them."

Around her, the abyss is swallowed up in Hydaelyn's purest light. Minfilia feels it flood into her, warm and gentle, erasing her pain and weakness with nary a touch. She gasps, at first sensing herself strain against it. There's so much of it, and not enough of her...

"Child," Hydaelyn's voice calls. "Be my Word."

Clarity strikes, as body and light harmonize. Minfilia's vision snaps back into focus; she sees the tunnels, her friends, the Braves...

An arrow grazes Nanamei's leg. She swears, stumbling as L'aiha runs to her. The Braves encroach.

"Got ya now..."

Minfilia stands as if weightless; she doesn't even feel her body pull herself up. She walks through the water, coldly calm, unburdened by her wounds or fear any longer. Wordless, she steps between L'aiha and Nanamei; she hears them speak to her, but the words don't penetrate her focus.

The Braves falter, but sneer away any hint of concern. It's no secret Minfilia Warde is but the mouthpiece of the Scions. She speaks, she leads, but she's never been known to fight. If the rumors of her run in with Garleans and Ascians are to be trusted, she's practically helpless.

"Protect them," Hydaelyn says.

Minfilia raises her hand, and feels the light swell within her soul. The tunnels shake and strain as a massive, glittering wall of crystal rises out of the sewage, shutting out the Braves before they can come a step closer. The passageway falls silent, almost eerie, as the barricade stops even the Braves' shouts from coming through.

The light within her dims, like a flame running out of wax.

"What the fu..."

"Antecedent?"

She blinks, for the first time recognizing herself. She turns back toward L'aiha and Nanamei, as the pair stare at the crystalline wall. Minfilia looks up at it too. Since when could she do that? She can do that now?

The wax runs out, and pain resurfaces. Minfilia gasps, stumbling; both L'aiha and Nanamei run to support her.

"She's bleeding so heavily—what did she just—?"

"Forget it, we have to get out of here!"

Minfilia feels it when Nanamei hoists her onto her back, as L'aiha takes the lead. She feels weak again, her breaths short and her vision swimming.

But she can feel Hydaelyn's light too, and Minfilia knows it cannot go dark. Not now. Not yet.

So long as her Warriors of Light live, she will bear this new torch. She must. She can.

She smiles.

"Thank you..."

[thefinalwitness]

#miqomarch day 1: selfie

l'aiha may not know how to operate magitek to save her life, but fortunately, she has a more than qualified friend in aes'a to help with the tricky parts. like operating the camera feature on a tomestone! ft @daetur