PART III: AFTER THE UNSEALING OF THE BLACK MAGE

Chapter 27: Detective Rave’s Case Notes

(A/N: This is one of those storylines that establishes conditional exclusive dialogue in the future. If the player completes this theme dungeon before Hotel Arcus, they receive exclusive dialogue in future Grandis storylines that reflects this.)

A traveler received a flyer from an Angler Company Lab Tech bot, which explained that they had won a luxury tour package and instructed them to claim it in Savage Terminal. Though they were suspicious, the traveler nevertheless went to Savage Terminal, where they were surprised to see how filthy the town was.

(A/N: Classes who have been to Savage Terminal in their level 1-30 quests get exclusive dialogue, in which they instead note how the city never changes. These classes are Cadena, Illium, Ark, Kain, and Lara.)

Just then, the Lab Tech bot arrived to greet them and asked them to press a button for the welcome event. Upon pressing it, the bot shot out a rocket that blasted a ship out of the sky, causing it to crash nearby. The traveler ran to the crash site, where they found an escape pod surrounded by several thugs led by a man named Toole, who began interrogating them about why they had attacked his office. (A/N: If the player is Cadena, one of Toole’s thugs will tell him that we’re famous around these parts, which surprises Toole.)

After the traveler explained the situation, Toole realized that they had fallen for his luxury tour scam. He then introduced himself as the head of the travel agency which had sent the flyer before charging them an exorbitant fee. When the traveler pointed out that the flyer had mentioned that the trip was free, Toole explained that though the trip itself had been paid for, the traveler still needed to cover the cost of repairing their building after they had destroyed it. When the traveler refused to pay the fee, the thugs came forward to attack, but the traveler soundly defeated them.

Just then, a girl named Senya climbed out of the escape pod and greeted everyone. She explained that she was worried about the precious cargo aboard the crashed ship. Upon learning that the cargo was valuable, the thugs determined that the ship had crash-landed in the Scrapyard. Toole decided to take advantage of the situation and ordered the traveler to recover the cargo, claiming that it was their fault for crashing the ship in the first place.

On the way to the Scrapyard, the traveler encountered Corbo, who warned them to keep away from the area, as she had seen several shady people there. The traveler explained their deal with Toole, to which Corbo expressed her amazement that they had fallen for the luxury tour scam. Nevertheless, she told them to use the garbage pile to climb over the metal fence in order to reach the Scrapyard.

There, the traveler found the crashed ship and began searching it when several hoodlums arrived to claim the ship as their property, as it had fallen in their territory. The traveler began to fight off the hoodlums when they were interrupted by Detective Rave. Exasperated by his usual antics, the hoodlums decided to leave. Rave greeted the traveler and learned that they were trying to open the ship door. He suggested that they use the nails on the Hedgehogs in order to pry it open.

Upon opening the door, they found that all the cargo had gone missing. Rave recommended that they give up, as missing items in Savage Terminal were usually unrecoverable. When the traveler refused to give up, Rave decided to help them with the case. Based on the clues present, he deduced that the culprits were several children or small-sized species and led the traveler deeper into the Scrapyard in order to find them. There, they encountered several young hooligans in their hideout.

After learning that the children had sold the cargo, Rave warned that they had stolen from the Angler Company and threatened to tell the Company that the children had lost the cargo if they didn’t tell him what they had done with it. The children agreed to tell him in exchange for the traveler defeating the Foul Ooze Waste monsters.

After defeating the Foul Ooze Waste monsters, they learned from the children that the cargo had been shipped to the Black Market, and so they decided to meet with Corbo before heading there. Corbo warned them against involving themselves with the Angler Company, but Rave refused to listen and asked Corbo to track down whoever had tricked the traveler into firing the missile, suggesting that she investigate any unlicensed, modified Lab Tech bots.

The two then continued on and met with an arms dealer named Plunk. They noticed that Plunk was surrounded by several mutant fish, which Rave recognized as Gloogers. He told the traveler that the Gloogers had come from the sewers, as their numbers had increased exponentially lately. The traveler then attempted to distract Plunk while Rave looked at his ledger, but they were caught almost immediately.

Just then, the Gloogers grabbed Plunk’s merchandise and ran away. Plunk ordered Rave and the traveler to recover his merchandise and the two set off after the Gloogers. They found the Gloogers captured by another group of thugs. In order to scare them off, Rave told them that the parts that they were stealing belonged to Plunk. The thugs ran off in different directions, and so the traveler had to track them down in order to recover the parts.

Rave then deduced that the parts they had found were part of Senya’s cargo, though the other parts had likely been sold off. They returned to Plunk and told him that the parts had come from the Angler Company in order to scare him. Though Plunk retorted that he himself had witnessed the end of the Company, along with the Angler family, he was nevertheless terrified by the prospect of their return. Rave convinced him to reveal where the other parts had gone so that the Angler Company wouldn’t intervene.

The traveler then asked about the Angler Company, and so Rave explained that it was a national-level arms dealer company that traded in advanced weaponry. (A/N: A lot of this advanced weaponry was created from technology stolen from Odium.) The company’s influence had been immense and their reputation for being cruel and ruthless had made them one of the most feared groups in all of Grandis. However, the Company had reportedly met their end with a cataclysmic explosion at their headquarters. Despite their disappearance, their technology resurfaced occasionally, along with rumors of their existence in the shadows, making their technology both expensive and hard to offload.

Rave then decided to visit Antuin and asked the traveler to find Gusto in order to recover the missing parts. Gusto agreed to hand over the parts in exchange for them finding the Scratched Cast Iron Plates that the Dangerous Nutrias had stolen from him. Rave and the traveler then brought the parts to Plunk, who began to assemble them together. Rave told the traveler that they would need to formulate a plan to rescue Senya, as neither Toole nor Plunk would cooperate with them. They returned back to Toole, where they reported to Senya that her cargo had gone missing, adding that they were on the case.

In order to help solve the case, Rave and the traveler asked Senya several questions. Senya explained that she belonged to an environmental organization called Sea Lantern, which traveled around the world to reclaim polluted places. (A/N: Sea Lantern, Angler, she really couldn’t have been any less subtle.)

She told them that the cargo was for a powerful cleaning device that could boil the impurities out of any substance. She also explained that her escape pod should have sent a distress signal to her colleagues, who had just responded that they were on their way. Rave then asked if Senya had any enemies, as it seemed that someone had planned for her ship to crash.

Senya divulged that she had received a few threats from people who didn’t appreciate the work that she did. Having finished their questioning, Rave and the traveler left to continue their investigation. Back in the city, Rave pointed out Senya’s mission to the traveler, explaining that her goal of removing pollution, while initially appearing to be noble, was actually harmful to Savage Terminal, whose power came from processing polluted sea water. He suspected that more than a few people would try to fight Senya’s efforts because of it. He also added that all the wildlife in Savage Terminal, such as the Gloogers, would go extinct without the pollution to which they had adapted.

Corbo then arrived and asked Rave to leave the culprits alone if he knew that their actions against Senya were for the best. However, Rave replied that Savage Terminal would be better off without the culprits in any case. Exasperated, she told Rave that she had finished investigating the Lab Tech bots in the area, and that she had been able to pinpoint a bot whose signals had dropped at the Brawl ‘n’ Bash Club immediately after the incident.

Rave realized that Mr. Hazard’s cronies were behind the plot, as the club had once been Mr. Hazard’s headquarters, and so he decided to head to the Black Market, believing that the culprits would close in on Plunk after hearing that he wanted the parts back. At Plunk’s shop, several of Hazard’s old cronies, led by Maroni, closed in on Plunk and the device that he had assembled. Claiming that he would soon own the whole area, Maroni seized the device and walked away.

Rave and the traveler arrived at the Black Market, where Gusto told them that Maroni had already come by, though he had left without any altercation. Rave then began wondering whether Maroni would have crashed Senya’s ship just for the purifier machine, or whether he wanted the cargo because of its connection to the Angler Company.

They went to the Brawl ‘n’ Bash Club, where they learned that a major arena match was happening, with Maroni using the prize of an Angler Company weapon to recruit more people to his gang. Maroni then approached them and suggested that they leave, as Rave had made many enemies throughout Savage Terminal.

The traveler asked what Rave had done, to which he explained that Rave had opened cages for the animals which Maroni had illegally captured and returned stolen goods to their owners. To make up for it, Rave offered the traveler as a brawler in the fight. Maroni accepted Rave’s offer, provided that the traveler pick a fight and win in the ring. The traveler entered the ring and fought off nearly every opponent that they encountered, impressing Maroni.

(A/N: Cadena has some exclusive dialogue here. When Rave offers up Cadena as a contestant, Maroni vaguely recognizes her and notes that she’s infamous enough to draw some attention to his arena match. The writers honestly did a pretty terrible job with Cadena’s exclusive dialogue in this theme dungeon. Since Maroni was one of Mr. Hazard’s subordinates, he definitely should’ve recognized Cadena immediately. Plus, wouldn’t he have some sort of grudge against Cadena, since she was the one responsible for taking down his boss?)

Maroni then told them to bring Wiggling Tails from the Specter Stray Dogs as an entrance fee, after which they were allowed in. Inside, they spotted the device under a cloth and Rave revealed that he had set bombs around the perimeter. He told the traveler to turn the device on and transmit it to Toole while he distracted everyone, as Toole would likely sell Senya on the black market if he didn’t receive it. (A/N: Well this got dark pretty fast.)

As the fight began, Rave distracted everyone and the traveler fought off Maroni’s cronies. Just then, Plunk arrived with several Lab Tech bots in order to get revenge on Maroni for stealing the device from him. Rave used the chaos in order to power on the weapon, which immediately vanished without him doing anything. He realized that someone else had planned it out, as the weapon’s disappearance would make Toole believe that they had taken it for themselves.

Just then, Corbo arrived to bail them out and Rave asked her to extract Senya before Toole sold her into human trafficking. When Corbo asked what was in it for her, Rave reminded her that when they had been brought to Savage Terminal as slaves, they had been saved by someone else. Corbo reluctantly agreed to save Senya while Rave and the traveler escaped into the sewers, where Rave believed the device was.

Upon finding the weapon, the traveler asked how Rave knew where it would be, to which he explained that Corbo had reported that the signal for the Lab Tech bot which had shot down Senya’s ship had been lost at the Brawl ‘n’ Bash Club, which had led him to deduce that the signal hadn’t stopped, but rather, it had disappeared when it had gone underground to the sewers, which matched with an entry that he had found in Plunk’s ledger.

The traveler realized that it meant that Plunk had sold the Lab Tech bot which had shot down the ship. Rave then noticed a mysterious man wearing a spacesuit and a helmet that contained galaxy patterns that obscured his face, as well as a bunny ear headband worn over the helmet. The strange man, Cosim, explained that the weapon had always been meant to arrive in the sewers.

(A/N: From the time of Cosim’s first appearance here to the Karote storyline, the writers consistently used gender-neutral pronouns to refer to him until he was revealed as male in the Odium storyline.)

Upon lifting the sheet off, Rave realized that the device wasn’t remotely close to a purifier. Cosim explained that Senya had been waiting for the device to be assembled in order to activate it. On the side of the device, the traveler found the symbol of the Angler Company and realized that Senya wasn’t part of Sea Lantern, but rather, she was Senya Angler, a member of the Angler family.

Rave then realized that Corbo, whom he had sent after Senya, was in danger. Just as Rave and the traveler resolved to chase after Corbo, the device suddenly activated. Cosim explained that if the gas within the device reacted with the polluted seawater, the entire ocean would become acidic and cause everyone to boil to death, effectively wiping out Savage Terminal.

Meanwhile, Corbo arrived at Toole’s office, where Toole learned that the weapon had disappeared. His thugs moved in to capture Senya, who revealed that she had a cybernetic arm, which she used to effortlessly defeat Toole and all his men. As Corbo moved to quietly escape, Senya noticed her and told her about the purpose of the device, explaining that it would leave behind a perfect source of energy after Savage Terminal’s destruction. With an hour before the device activated, she offered a cup of tea to Corbo while they waited.

(A/N: Please note: the following text contains major spoilers for the Odium and Angler Company epic dungeon storylines. If you don’t want spoilers, skip to the end of the author note.

Earlier in this section, it was mentioned that the Angler Company headquarters were destroyed in a cataclysmic explosion. The Odium storyline reveals that the founder of the Company, was severely damaged in the explosion, with Cosim having stolen his power source before fleeing. Because of this, he’s been sending his children on missions to harvest large quantities of energy in order to create a new power source for himself, which explains Senya’s actions here.)

Meanwhile, Rave told Cosim that he would evacuate the people and save Corbo. He then asked the traveler to work with Cosim in order to stop the device. However, Cosim explained that the Gloogers had taken the buttons and parts off the machine, and so the traveler hunted down the Gloogers in order to recover them. As the water levels began rising, Cosim urged the traveler to escape while he dealt with the device.

Back in Toole’s hideout, a Lab Tech bot reported that Senya’s return ship had arrived. Just then, Rave arrived to save Corbo and Toole. He proposed an alliance with Toole to save Savage Terminal, explaining that Senya had a remote that could stop the device. Just as Toole agreed, Senya announced that she was running low on energy and asked the Lab Tech bot how many times the transporter could be used. Upon learning that it could be used two more times, Senya offered one of them a place in the Angler family in exchange for fighting the other two.

Toole immediately accepted, but Senya told him that she wanted to pick Rave instead. When Rave refused, she extended the offer to Toole, who told Rave and Corbo that Savage Terminal would be beautiful once it was cleaned. Rave then revealed to Toole that the weapon would actually turn the waters to acid. When Senya confirmed his statement, Toole realized the damage that she would do and refused to come with her.

Seeing an opening, Rave rushed forward and slashed her cybernetic arm. As the two began to fight, the traveler ran through the rising sea levels. The Gloogers who drank the water mutated into larger, aggressive variations and attacked the traveler. As the traveler made their way across town, they overheard the various thugs and hooligans of Savage Terminal realizing that Rave had been telling the truth.

Back in Toole’s hideout, Senya easily defeated Rave. When she asked why he had gone to such lengths, Rave explained that the person who had saved him and Corbo from slavery had once said, “No one is born evil. An evil world makes evil people, and evil people make an evil world. Only those who rise above it can break the cycle.” Those words had motivated Rave to never give up on the people around him.

(A/N: Given the Angler Company’s involvement in this storyline and its association with the realm of the sages, I have a strong suspicion that either Cosim or Tai Yu is the one who saved them.)

Just then, the traveler arrived and Rave claimed that they were now invincible. Though Senya wanted to test that notion, she told them that she was running low on power, and so she transported herself back to her new ship, taking the remote that controlled the device with her. However, the water levels suddenly began to recede as the traveler realized that Cosim had powered off the device, but to everyone’s surprise, they found the device being carried by a group of Gloogers towards them. The traveler remembered Cosim’s warning that the device would explode if moved.

Just then, Rave revealed that he had stolen the remote when he had attacked Senya’s cybernetic arm and used it to teleport the device onto Senya’s ship, which exploded in the sky. On the city skyline, Cosim noted that the Angler Company had returned, and that Gerand Darmoor's Apostles were making their move. He then wondered whether it was time to see the ‘oldsters’ above.

(A/N: This is a reference to the elders from the realm of the sages, which Hoyoung’s master, Tai Yu, is part of. Cosim actually says Disciples instead of Apostles, but I’m assuming that this was a translation error. Lara gets some exclusive dialogue in this scene, in which Cosim will also note that there’s a child in possession of the bell mysticant while noting the return of the Angler Company and the Apostles making their move. While it’s never actually said who scammed the player into shooting down Senya’s ship at the start of the theme dungeon, it’s strongly implied to be Cosim.

Please note: the following text contains major spoilers for the Karote and Odium storylines. If you don’t want spoilers, skip to the next section.

The Karote storyline reveals that Cosim is one of the Angler Company founder’s cybernetic children, while the Odium storyline reveals that Cosim has turned against his family by starting the explosion that destroyed Company headquarters. The explosion that injured his father also severely damaged him, and his injuries are described as being the human equivalent of broken lungs, which is why he wore the spacesuit and helmet in order to hide his damaged voice.

When we meet him unmasked in the future, we see that his hair is grey and his pupils are round, unlike the blue hair and diamond pupils of all the Angler children. This is a result of his injuries, which also freed him from his father’s programming. He continues to suffer through his severe wounds because he knows that repairing himself would put him back under his father’s control.

Cosim mentions that his siblings were also damaged in the explosion, though not as severely. He believes that his father has no regard for his children’s lives, as he’s selfishly sending them on missions to fix him, knowing full well that those missions will draw attention to them when they’re supposed to be underground, thus putting them in harm’s way when they’ve already been damaged and weakened from the explosion. Fairly soon, you’ll see that Cosim gets proven right.)