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Chapter LXXIII: Ye of Little Faith
After getting caught up in the local politics of Ishgard, Aggro finally has the location of Cid's airship locked down. The party need to get into the Stone Vigil, but to do so requires House Durendaire's permission first. The Vigil is under Dravanian control, and House Durendaire's Lord Drillemont is in charge of taking it back.
Music: Fealty
In any case, it is not my responsibility to escort visitors. Take your letters and show them to... Ser Alboise. Yes, Ser Alboise can surely accommodate you—seek her in the storeroom on the opposite side of the yard.
I'm not super convinced that Alboise is who we need to be speaking to, but alright. Hopefully they're more helpful than this guy.
Music: Undying Faith
This is our first time over in Whitebrim Front, right on the border between Ishgard territory and Dravanian territory.
Right in the middle of the courtyard is this giant bonfire structure. It's sorely needed given the climate, but I can't help but wonder if this was previously the location of an aetheryte too. The only aetheryte on this (relatively) giant map is the one over in Camp Dragonhead.
We can also find Alphinaud right next to the bonfire, continuing to pretend he's in our party and taking part in the quest.
Surprise! Brunadier just gave us a random name to shoo us away. Fortunately, Alboise is more helpful than Brunadier was.
Lord Drillemont hasn't the time to spend speaking with low-ranking knights such as I. However, he always has a moment to spare for head chirurgeon Astidien. Why not visit the infirmary upstairs and show your letters to him?
Yeah. The head healer for the settlement sounds much more likely to introduce us to the local lord.
The local infirmary is in the same building, but just upstairs. We need to skirt around the outside though.
Once inside, we travel upstairs to find both Astidien and Cid next to each other. So this is where Cid was hanging out.
Cid doesn't have anything useful to say.
It turns out that we could have just walked right into the barracks and demanded to speak with Lord Drillemont without issue. I love a good goose chase.
The barracks are just across the courtyard. This is a pretty small area, actually.
Ishgard really likes its spiral towers.
It turns out that we can walk all the way up the stairs to where the knights sleep. Security seems incredibly lax for where this is situated. I know they're fighting dragons, but apparently there's an issue with Ishgardians taking their 1000 year old foe's side for some reason?
At least someone cares that they have a stranger just wandering around freely in their barracks, though Goudernoux doesn't seem to care enough to get out of his chair. Did Aggro even show him the letters before he pointed us towards their lord?
Unlike Goudernoux, Drillemont does require us to show the letters before we can progress further. Though, if Aggro was a heretic assassin, Lord Drillemont would already be in great danger.
Drillemont seems kind of impressed with our task. This might finally work out for us.
Alphinaud and Cid finally catch up. They need to look like they're helping too.
We are come to Coerthas to slay Garuda, Lady of the Vortex. To that end, we seek the Enterprise, the airship of Master Cid nan Garlond, who stands before you now.
Master Garlond, you're alive!? But that's impossible!
(Guillaime) Do not be deceived by their honeyed words. These foreigners are not to be trusted. At this critical moment in Ishgardian history, as House Durendaire marshals its forces to retake the Stone Vigil, who should appear in Whitebrim Front but three mysterious strangers...
Oh, look who it is again. Once more, Guillaime is here to cause us trouble. This dude really hates adventurers, but I guess meddling in his affairs has also made it personal.
(Guillaime) The lesser houses may have been duped by these grandiose lies, but I should hope that House Durendaire would have greater sense. I know not why these three seek the Stone Vigil, but I know that we cannot permit them to pass.
(Drillemont) You three will not enter the outpost until we have reclaimed it—and until you declare your true intentions as well.
Cid, Aggro—we must do whatever it takes to earn Lord Drillemont's trust. Understood?
Once again, Guillaime has come along and interrupted our plans. Surely he realises that the sooner we get our airship, the sooner we'll be out of Coerthas? It feels like he's taken our actions personal. I'd argue that he should be happy an innocent man was not punished, but this is a fantasy religion so...
With that being the case, we must now earn Drillemont's trust. That means working around Whitebrim Front and making a difference. You know what that means though, right? Filler. The next three quests don't really have an important narrative. We're just doing some busy work. That being said, the effort and time we put into them do matter in some sort of a narrative sense, but feel free to skip the whole block and jump straight to when we continue the actual story. I'll be keeping them short anyway.
Benedict wants us to slay 5 feral crocs.
Haustefort wants us to slay 1 Mudpuppy. We're given vinegar since that's rumoured to weaken them.
Nivie lost the message she was to deliver to Lord Drillemont and needs us to find it somewhere.
Music: Fealty
The Mudpuppy can be fought in Daniffen Pass, which connects Whitebrim Front to the area in the south of Coerthas, near where we first entered the zone. First we summon it...
... then we pour some vinegar on it, giving it an HP Reduction and Damage Reduction debuff...
... and then we murder it for its tail, so the fine chef can make a meal for everyone. Easy. Though using the vinegar was a little tricky as taking damage interrupts the cast, it's pretty easy to stun the monster before popping it.
We can find the lost message near the pass over at the Whitebrim side. It's in a darkened area, summoning two easily dispatched Snowstorm Bateleur. We can collect the Letter to House Durendaire after we win.
Lastly, we have to slay the five Feral Crocs. We can find those south of Camp Dragonhead. Again, not so hard to defeat, especially when you eventually remember to summon your very good chocobo buddy to help you murder them.
Here's Ishgard and the Stone Vigil again, this time in daylight while I travel back to Whitebrim Front to finish these quests off.
Music: Fealty
Benedict's quest is done and that's the last time we help him.
Our Mudpuppy tail gets cooked and Aggro has to hand out the meat to three of the NPCs in the barracks. Two are in the canteen and one is upstairs where they sleep.
Haustefort then wants us to deliver some food over to the chirurgeons at the infirmary, but we can do that later. We have a letter for Drillemont.
The Lord still isn't happy with us and wants us out. He's only fueled by the letter coming from House Fortemps trying to win him over to adventurers more. It doesn't work, obviously, and we're back out the barracks again.
Nivie heard him from all the way on the ground floor and plans to stay so she can avoid upsetting Lord Francel. These Lords...
We can find Cenota, the chirurgeon we were to feed, on the upper floor of the infirmary.
This completes the quest for Haustefort, our final filler quest. We can pick which reward we want, and I go for the Raptor Stew since it has more focus on damage. I only realised after that maybe the Knight's Bread would have been fine.
Well, that was more painless than I expected. Aggro's cleared her three additional quests, but we're not done making improvements for Whitebrim Front just yet.
Cid now has a quest for us, and the quest window even has a screenshot in it. That usually means some actual progress!
All I require to complete the device are the cores of six ice sprites. Though commonly used to reduce the temperatures of alchemical mixtures, there is a way to alter their properties so that they draw the cold within rather than radiate it without. It must sound ridiculous to you—impossible, even. Yet somehow I know it will work.
Cid's science wizardry often may as well be magic with what he pulls off throughout FFXIV, but I'm down with it. Let's go help him magic science it.
Music: Undying Faith
Cid's quest is pretty easy, if not at least a little time consuming. We've got to murder 6 Ice Sprites for their cores, and we can find them through the western gate in Whitebrim Front. This takes us to the path that leads to Stone Vigil.
The Ice Sprites spells can all be interrupted, but considering Aggro's interrupt ability is on a 30 second cooldown and the Ice Sprite's Blizzard in on a roughly 2 second cooldown, there isn't much point. Eat their casts like auto-attack damage and smash them to pieces!
Music: Fealty
After taking care of the 6 we needed to kill, Aggro returns to Cid where she hands over the cores.
Cid finishes crafting his super fancy magic-science alembic.
(Astidien) I too am unsure what to make of this machine. While certainly impressive, I've no idea how to make use of it.
(Cenota) Nevertheless, if it is as effective as he claims, it will be a great boon to the infirmary! Think of the medicines we could create, the lives we could save!
(Astidien) Even so, I wonder...
Oh no.
Way to misrepresent the facts. Guillaime is being pretty dang disingenuous and I, for one, am not happy with it!
Guillaime successfully persuades the chirurgeons to not accept our gift.
Whatever his reasons, he clearly means to oppose us at every turn...
Guilliame is becoming a real thorn in our side, undermining both our efforts here and our efforts to appease to the people of Whitebrim Front. That particular half-truth he just sold is especially insidious and I doubt we'll be recovering our reputation any time soon. Ishgardians take issues with heretics super seriously, as if the last couple of updates didn't make that clear. As it stands, we're going to need to do something about the Inquisitor. His interference has gotten pretty personal, and all this over helping an innocent man walk free.
Of course, we can do something about the Inquisitor later. First, we now need to make Aggro reach level 40, so I guess the next update will be a quick detour to visit the Sultansworn. We do owe them some assistance to track down some lost sword or something, y'know, what with them giving us their trade secrets and stuff.
Chapter Summary