Furina: Anyone I've ever worked with probably couldn't wait to get rid of me... Since I'm just an ordinary person now. They'll probably just laugh in my face if I go asking them for help... :(

Neuvillette, the second Furina asks him about booking the Opera Epiclese, the process for which is notably cumbersome and complex: Yes, I will take care of it immediately. Btw does this mean you will allow audiences (myself included) to enjoy your outstanding acting talents once more? 🥺

Much like irl, cleaning things up on tumblr means finding fun stuff along the way (and then proceeding to ignore the actual cleaning to play with the thing we found, obviously). In this case, it was an ask about whether an isekai'd Overseer!reader would be judged by Furina upon arriving in Fontaine.

Now, in light of 4.2, I 100% stand by what I said in my answer of that ask. However, I would like to add...

While Furina would judge us for the theatrics of it, Neuvillette would do it for real.

Unlike Furina, who would use anything she can, like how she did with the Traveller, Neuvillette would be judging us for actually serious accusations - possession (taking over someone's body is... Not Seen As Good generally), disturbance of international affairs (making the leaders of nations dissappear for days on end to go on quests would no doubt be an issue), aggravated assault (do you know how many fatui, treasure hoarders, kairagi, eremites, and etc we've beaten up? Yeah...), possible association with Celestia (we might be innocent, we might not - who's to say? Not me, I'm not Hoyoverse nor the Oratrice), bringing forth calamity (if the player doesn't move forward with the story, the events don't unfold - so, we knowingly and willingly bring disasters upon the places we visit for the sake of watching it play out)...

Well, at least we can teleport out of jail.

TLDR - if it's Furina putting you on trial, you can have fun playing courthouse and enjoying the drama of it all. If it's Neuvillette... run.

"Silk Flowers grow in pairs on small red bushes"

Other archon having twins

Zhobgli is suspicious

(Plus the god of eternity saying his story is not yet over)

“~twin where have you been~”

it’s still pretty interesting that Zhongli doesn’t have a ‘twin’

it is very clear one of the main themes of genshin is family especially between that of siblings (twins)

the traveler is the twin and all of the archons -the main characters of their respective regions have “twins”.

Venti has the nameless bard, Ei and Makoto, Nahida and Rukkhadevata, Furina and Focalors. These are characters that look identical but live very different lives.

A core part of each archon is their relationship with their respective twin. Ei struggled to move on after Makoto died, Rukkha was everything Nahida dreamed of being, Focalors made Furina play a part for 500 years. I am unsure of the dynamic of Venti and his bard but it’s pretty easy to assume he gave his life great meaning and considering he looks just like him he never could move or wanted to forget what he looked like.

So the fact Zhongli doesn’t have anybody with that kind of connection is really odd lol. I've complained so many times like “Zhongli!! where is your silly clone!” and he refuses to answer my calls. Rex Lapis is represented by silk flowers but they grow in pairs but where is Rex Lapis’ pair? Where is the moon to his beautiful sun???

Some people argue a more metaphorical twin for Zhongli is Rex Lapis/the Exuvia. The point of the Liyue archon quest was Zhongli stepping down from a role he has had for thousands of years and considering the way he talks about Rex Lapis/geo archon (he always refers to him in third person) I believe Zhongli sees him as a separate person entirely. So losing Rex Lapis was like losing his twin. Casting his exuvia aka body double on a crowd of people and burying Rex Lapis was Zhongli’s conclusion with his “twin”. He ended his reign and made peace with his life.

But at the same time I feel that interpretation is so ehhhh. Like all of the twins we’ve seen were their own person with their own thoughts and feelings. Like yeah furina and focalors were once the same person but that was no longer the case when focalors brought out the scissors and said act woman.

Let’s get venti and zhongli out of the way cause they are a little weird from the rest of the seven but we’ve never met “Rex Lapis” and then he doesn’t have a human form like the rest of them. We have talked or at least heard the voices of the “other twin” . We met rukkha, we heard makoto and neuvi let us see focalors.

A big part of the archons is their relationship with their other half but Zhongli’s stories most always focus on someone else-a different god a different entity there is just so little of what we know about him comes from his own mouth.

Besides when you look at the visual symbolism then all the archons are represented by the moon and shadows. They live in the shadows of the "twin" if almost haunted by them. They cannot live up to their glory or they are forced to be someone they are not. These 'twins' are the reason for our archon's (hell even the traveler's) existence and journey, it is why they continue forward until they eventually find new meaning in life.

However Morax is always represented by the sun and light, and you could argue that Zhongli is the moon to Rex Lapis’ sun but if you look as his symbols -his golden eyes, the golden light he uses to save xiao and his interactions with the people of Liyue he still holds that warmth.

Next the big revelation for Zhongli was his relationship with Liyue itself, not himself. We could argue that the existence of "Rex Lapis, The Geo Archon" was intertwined with that relationship but Zhongli's narrative is stepping down and taking his hands off Liyue not any personal struggle. If Liyue had failed his test he would've remained the geo archon for the foreseeable future.

That means, Liyue itself is more of his twin, it is something that plays a huge role in his identity and leaving it behind and moving forward is the core of his arc. It is Liyue that made Zhongli play the part of the geo archon, it is Liyue that made him turn on friend or foe if they were are threat, Liyue and its people are the motivation for everything Rex Lapis did. Morax’s love for his people defined every action that he did as the geo archon.

Long story short ehh if push comes to shove I can accept Zhongli's dragon clone as his twin but I would also argue against it because it doesn’t hold thematic weight that the other twins do!

In the end, we can still safely assume that zhongli’s twin has gone awol but then who are they!!! Each archon has a pair that is meant to parallel the relationship between our travelers Aether and Lumine but where is such a twin???

I've talked so much about Zhongli about everything but Ei mentions in her voice lines that she believes his story isn't anywhere finished. She even talks about him in Zhongli's teaser way back in 2020, "in his long life he has met countless people and shall meet countless more still. As they say: waters change course but mountains move not". Its kind of neat the god of eternity says your story isn't over

I may be a delusional zhongli stan but I don't think it is farfetched to say he is veryyy suspicious. We don't know his true form, we don't know the truth of his contracts, we don't know if he's hiding a twin, and the goddess of eternity herself believes his journey will continue forward.

Could he be missing a twin because he's not from Teyvat? What if he lost his counterpart a long time ago? What if we have simply not met Zhongli's twin and the two of them are separated from each other much like the traveler? I always believed Zhongli kind of crashed into Teyvat like a meteor or shooting star and that's why he's kind of weird but it could be possible that Zhongli's counterpart is just not here either long dead or with a different destiny.

Fun fact to add to Zhongli’s weirdness; Did you know Zhongli and Neuvillette are the only playable characters whose constellations are different from their character quest? Zhongli's constellation is Lapis Dei but his story quest is Historia Antiqua, much like Neuvillette's constellation is Leviathan Judicator but his story quest is called Diluvies. Which is weird cause Venti has the same constellation as Zhongli (Carmen Dei) but Venti's quests line up. Like is it a dragon thing but why?

Then most of the original archons croaked during the cataclysm and Venti went into a coma. How did Zhongli get out of the damn thing unscathed? Why didn't he lose his twin or die and shit?

I know in my soul Zhongli is hiding the secrets of the world in that pretty little head of his. He's just a bum and refuses to share it with the crowd.

Patiently waiting for your thoughts on Fontaine’s new archon quest 🫡

oh man. i do have some thoughts to share.

(warning for spoilers to those who haven't played through the latest archon quest)!

OKAY, so — overall? i enjoyed it. the fortress of meropide section felt a little tedious at times, i'm begging mihoyo to abandon those awful 'stealth' 'gameplay' sections. aside from that though, i was always interested enough to keep moving ahead. i especially like how they wrote navia. the story of her and her father got me emotionally invested in her as a character, i actually teared up at one point.

i was glad they avoided their infamous 'introduce a character and have them betray you' shtick. idk if that was a quota they had to reach before and that's why they did it so often, but in any case, it made for a refreshing change. the reveal of fontaine's history, the serial disappearances, focalors and furina; there were lots of intriguing story beats. furina's story might somehow be one of the saddest in genshin yet?? the execution of the reveal and the final conversation between focalors and neuvillette packed a strong emotional punch.

onto my gripes...

childe. why. why'd they do my man like that. the buildup was so interesting! the cutscene where he helps neuvillette subdue the space whale had me frothing at the mouth. him in his foul legacy armor ... his leitmotif playing... him growling and grunting.... oh, how happy i was, naïve thing that i am. i was a bit confused how they dedicated a total of three seconds to traveler and the floating fiend going 'oh wow there's childe ig.' like ??? at this point in the story, i thought they were sorta buddies??

the space whale's execution confused me. i expected it to be deeply tied to fontaine's past, or at the very least give some abyss bread crumbs, but it just kinda flopped around and stuff. the fight was cool, don't get me wrong. but the whole 'yeah this whale is some dude's pet lol' bit just felt odd. i get that they want to prove the Big Important Name Fella is suuuper important and suuuper strong but c'mon. at least make the space whale a creation that ran rampant or something.

i could've forgiven the space whale shenanigans if we got a nice conversation with childe at the end. how did he feel in the abyss? was he fighting the whale to keep the people of fontaine safe, out of bloodlust, or something in between? what was it like seeing skirk again? how much time felt like it passed when he was in whale abyss prison? does his vision resonate with him properly again?

instead, we just get a few throwaway lines that he's back in snezhnaya healing up. did they run out of budget to book his VA?? i get they have to be selective with lore drops, but there are so many ways around that.

my last major gripe is how they went about furina's character quest. maybe i'm just an oversensitive weenie (i definitely am), but the traveler and flying creature's interactions with furina... i was physically grimacing. how did they seriously think it was a good idea to ask the person who has been tormented by acting for 500 years to give the stage another shot? imo, it would've been fine if they tried that, furina rejected them, and everything played out about the same. but those bits where traveler + the imp kept pressuring furina felt so weeeeeeird. i genuinely didn't want to click the dialogue options. if this was framed differently, that would've also been fine, but it's kinda a 'haha :3 epic paimon says teehee te nandayo reddit gold' light.

tl;dr i liked the overall experience but someone needs to delete paimon from the game + treat their characters as more than a punchline.

Ranking Archons from Genshin impact

Nahida- my baby. The fact that people hated her and wanted other God and yet, Nahida didn't give up on people and tried everything to save her people and her nation from disaster. She's the most precious Archon in Genshin. I will protect you at all cost.

Furina- In order to save her nation she literally has to fake her personality and her being an *archon*, which caused her to suffer for 500 years. She was a human, who just wanted peace. She deserved so much better.

Venti- my beloved <3, I loved him ever since I started playing genshin impact. He will always be my most nostalgic and fave character. The only thing I don't like about him is that people only treat him like a *drunkard* and that's literally it. He's drinking as a copium after losing his friend and still use his body for years. My beloved

Zhongli - I'm gonna be honest, he's still very interesting character. But I unfortunately lost interest in him, mostly bc he doesn't do much anymore. Like yeah he cares for his nation but like. I want to see more what he does, instead he just sits and drink tea bruh. I don't hate him at all btw, just lost interest...

Raiden Shogun, Ei - OH BOY WHERE DO I EVEN BEGIN!? Ok ok ok. Lemme say things straight. I love her design, I love gameplay, I love her story she's very cool and interesting character. BUT OMG THE WAY THEY WROTE HER IN STORY WAS GOD AWFUL. Instead of getting a very cool character, we got * UWUWUW BABY WAIFU WHO LIKES DRINKING DANGO MILK UWUWUWUW 💖💖💖* LET'S NOT FORGET THAT SHE WAS THE REASON THAT HER NATION SUFFERERED. She is also very VERY irresponsible. Instead of leading her nation on her own, she let her puppet rule everything and Ei was just... Sitting on her ass and done NOTHING. Her first story quest was also meaningless af. And the way she became kind and sweet only bc of Traveler's power of friendship is just hilarious. So yeah she's my least favorite archon.

Hi I just finished the archon quest like an hour ago

Spoilers ahead

Fuck Traveler

Fuck Lyney

Fuck Lynette

Fuck Freminet

Fuck Clorinde

Fuck Navia

Fuck Neuvillette

Fuck Fontaine

FUCK FOCALORS

Everyone can kiss my ass, fuck everyone else except Furina, because OH MY GOD.

NONE OF YOUR DESERVE HER

I’m so ANGRY it’s not even funny

Like I could not bring myself to care about anything but Furina after Focalors revealed everything. I wanted everyone to die for what Furina had to go through. Fucking GOOD RIDDANCE FONTAINE. Furina could have been so much more open if those ASSHOLES didn’t shame her for being herself. FORCING HER TO PLAY UP THE DRAMA LIKE WE DONT HAVE OTHER GODS WHO ARE ALLOWED TO BE BENEVOLENT AND KIND LIKE SHE WAS.

FUCK FOCALORS ESPECIALLY. Separating herself from Furina and the game having the fucking AUDACITY to make it about her.

“Oh but that was also technically Furina she deserves praise too blah blah blah” Yeah all FOCALORS had to do was SIT AROUND in the fucking ORATRICE waiting to DIE. That is not NEARLY AS BAD. And she had 500 years to make peace with it and still had the nerve to be scared.

And just… Neuvillette didn’t do anything wrong, but I’m SO FUCKING PISSED AT HIM. I think it because he’s ascended while Furina gets nothing. I know she gets a vision in her story quest but… just… ugh….

I’m happy with how Act 5 was. I genuinely think this is probably one of the best quests in the game because I have never been this moved by any of the previous quests. Like I cried for Carrihoe but those were happy tears and I could calm down quickly after that. It might also be because it’s late and I need to sleep but just… ugh…

Furina…

The entirety of Fontaine owes you everything. Neuvillette owes you his ascension.

Furina deserves an apology. From the Traveler, from the gang, from Neuvillette especially, from FOCALORS. I know she got one, technically, that little “I’m sorry go be a human🥹🥹🥹” bullshit.

Furina’s story is so uniquely tragic, and this feels like the first time immortality is actually being used as a curse in a heavy way. At least from what I’ve seen, I’m sure there are many other great examples. But the fact that Furina was a human girl and had to lie and never make any meaningful personal bonds with anyone for 500 years. She had Neuvillette but he’s a dragon. How many years did it take before he started “trying to feel like humans did.”

How many years did Neuvillette spend in complete distain for Furina because he was a dragon serving his usurper?

How many letters did Furina send Neuvillette encouraging him to make friends because she couldn’t?

I don’t hate any of the other Fontaine characters. The Fontaine Siblings still have my heart, Navia is still one of my favorites, Clorinde and Wriothesley are so fun, and Neuvillette is one of the best characters within Genshin.

But Furina is on a whole other level. She deserves the world and so much more. The amount of therapy she needs is probably not even enough for the short lifetime she has now. The amount of deprogramming she’s gonna have to endure, as well as the people of Fontaine. As far as I know right know, the story that the people have is that Furina was tried guilty, sentenced to death, the prophecy came true immediately after, no one drowned, and then Furina just left. So while everyone knows she’s not the archon anymore, they’re also gonna have to relearn after generations of seeing Furina as their god to just seeing her as a person.

I want Furina to reach the happiness she deserves. She deserves it the most.

Furina's Story Quest

Paimon: Someone needs to fill in for this acting troupe

Furina: I don't want to do that because it brings up my very real and vivd trauma that lasted 500 years that I only just escaped from like a week ago

Paimon: That's so dramatic! Who else is able to fill this role???

Me the entire time I was playing this quest: Yun Jin, Nilou, Barbara, Kaeya and Klee would probably be willing to give it a go they enjoyed the 3.8 event quite a bit. We could probably convince Venti to do it. Hell, I could do it myself

Paimon: There's just no other options!

(Seriously though why was there no option to be nice to Furina??? Like yeah I loved the ending but??? We could have gotten there a million better ways)

Hi I'm liveblogging arlecchino's story quest because i have thoughts TM. Spoilers below cut. Also my snipping tool doesn't work on genshin anymore so shitty phone pictures of my laptop GO

Ok so obviously the reason the house of the hearth relocated to Poisson isn't this but. Sorry, the hearth got too warm. Burned down.

Yeah that's what i figured. Clervie haunting the fucking halls.

Are you going to kill a ghost.

A) this house is too small to relocate an orphanage to B) this is the house we kidnapped Furina with

She talks about me? *twirls hair* Also. Fucking love kid offering us litteral poison. That's the kind of mildly fucked up kid character I love. The rest of them are also equally as good. They are all :D and also dangerous.

1) Don't be rude to them. 2) The plan?

Fremi!! It's nice they are going to cook for me after I cooked for them in Liyue

He's hiding a ghost dw bout it.

UNAUTHORIZED FGUCKING THING

FREM HOW

WAGH

LYNETTE LYNETTE this whole scene has me flapping my arms this is great A+. the siblings are fucking ride or die.

PERRIE

We now take a quick break to go play Flight rising before daily reset. Be back soon!

the wanderer and furina story was beautiful!! i loved the little foreshadowing to dancing a waltz alone, which i read was furina dancing at the stage as the hydro archon all alone—but she’s not alone because scaramouche is there as well.

it was genius to have scaramouche see the funeral of furina and furina the funeral of scaramouche. i’m not sure if this is reading too much but the front part of the story hints at neuvilette controlling the rain, and the fact that it rained at the end… does it allude to how neuvilette was mourning for the death of what furina was (which was her act and the furina that he grew to know) but in the midst of people mourning the loss furina is freed and found a partner who understands her turmoil and they sort of relish in that fact they aren’t alone??? either way, i loved it and i would love more author’s commentary!

i don’t think this is particularly ooc too. — @apologems

for people who missed the context it is here

ehe (venti voice) thank you!!!!! wahhh this is such a sweet note 🥺 also i'm so glad you picked up on all the things i added in by chance and intentionally FDSKFJKDSJF it's good to hear they were expressed clearly enough!!

tbh both the waltz and the rain were kinda spontaneous BUT im very happy they both had their intended effects. i was thinking about that exact scene when writing the waltz line—it's such a good cutscene from the archon quest i had to refer to it. lowkey was also thinking about coppelia and coppelius, especially since they're a pair of dancers, based off a play about an almost human mechanical doll and the creator who fell in love with her... yeah. it's not 1:1 but the pieces are there. also yeah her and scara! it worked nicely as his intro, but I also wanted to show furina as someone who's suddenly alone, but slowly trying to live for herself.. in an empty ballroom there's nobody for whom to put on an act, and now she can dance only if she feels like it. she can also teach scara how to formal dance! and maybe his puppet body can finally control its own strings </3 also im sure she's been to some kind of fancy ballroom party before with neuvillette and maybe this just reminds her of the artificial foreignness that's estranged them now. oh furina my dear actress on the stage

i was so close to cutting out the rain at the end but i was like nooooooo i need the weather symbolism (incredible archetype btw i love weather), and furiously tried to figure out a good ending sentence. you basically got all my thoughts LOL i wanted people to make the connection between rain as rebirth and the washing away of old sins, but also like. the sky is crying. it is dreary and miserable and they're soaked to the bone but the last string connecting their present to their past has finally been dissolved, and now... maybe they're free to move on to sunnier days.. etc,,, i didn't think too much about neuvillette's role in this but what you said 100% works <3 im still unsure what he thinks of furina tbh so i didn't really elaborate DSKFJKSDJ. last thought about the rain: they both have a thing about crying, but the only thing wet during that scene was the rain—i guess i was trying to show like, neither furina nor scara think that this death is a bad thing, or maybe all the tears they could've shed already dried up. it's only other people who mourn for their pasts.

also i forgot but the fire was supposed to be a lowkey callback to when scara burned the house down when his unnamed child died. the entire theme i was kinda going for was like. a farewell to your past; no matter what happened before, maybe you can finally put it down, and leave it behind, live today unrestrained by yesterday's pain, etc.

if i was an animator this would've gone so much better because the scenes were so clear cut in my head. ideally the flow is like this: furina says she can see kabukimono. wanderer's face whitens in a flash, until he's the color of a sheet of paper and it's actually scary to look at. he recovers, says the line about his and furina's funeral. he steps closer to her and turns so that they're directly facing each other, faces like two feet apart. it cuts to a closeup of their faces, panning from furina's, neutral/apprehensive, to wanderer's, eyebrows furrowed, face set (entirely self centered anger that this, of all things, is fate's last laugh at him). and idk the light changes and makes his eyes glassier and more reflective, and furina sees her old self—the camera gets sucked into her reflection (like you're diving into the void) as her face warps in a terrible twisted way, maybe some blood idk; the camera zooms back out, furina breathes heavily, looking disturbed and a bit sick. wanderer is slightly off to the side and his face is blurred (the focus is on furina's slightly horrified face) but he's watching her closely and carefully, but without judgement. wanderer holds out his hand, and furina takes it, and immediately the hiss of the fire starts. its like one of those gigantic funeral pyres, wild and leaping and intense, and she watches the pile of kabukimono doll get smaller and smaller. somewhere in the middle a blackened chunk of something gets spit out (his heart), lands at their feet. the most important part is that after the fire burns itself out, the rain starts immediately. sudden downpour, very heavy etc. the viewer should feel a wave of Closure and Relief after the intensity of the burning. a slow waltz starts playing in the background, low, smooth, and very quiet. they just stand there, and the camera zooms out until they're just two dark blue/black smears against a blurry gray backdrop. end scene

also about the characterization: that's good I always wonder whether I'm leaning too much into my own writing voice instead of sticking closer to the character's canonical language register and mannerisms haha

|| okey since Taco just pointed a gun toward me in my inbox on what i think furina's constellation are. I'll start first on what i think Animula Choragi is for me.

so animula choragi was translated to Little Souls of Choregos or conductor of little souls. but i did my own research and my thoughts about this is that mihoyo had given two meanings to furina's constellation name and it depicts in her role in the Archon quest ( my thoughts only)

so Animula when looked for definition it really means ' little souls' .

but when we translate choragi it has two meanings. 1. The leader of a group or movement

we can easily say that if we connect this two together it simply means that furina ( animula) (little soul) is the leader (choragi) of the group ( fontaine ) and we can leave it to that but if we use the second meaning of Choragi. It means.

2. One who undertook the expense of providing the chorus in ancient Greek drama or Someone who provides the stage equipment and theater costumes or someone who provides the necessary equipment for the performance of a chorus or an entire play. (or basically the sponsor).

If we added the animula and this meaning of choragi together. The meaning of Animula choragi's translation will change into something like this. "A small soul that provides everything necessary for a performance"

instead of " conductor of little souls"

which makes sense since furina is the one who provides everything for the chorus of the finale in the archon quest. She is the one who sponsored all of the things needed for focalors plan to be full proof. She is the small soul who provided her own self that is necessary -- an offering to the trial, so the chorus of the trial (play) would be a success. she is the one who found neuvilettte, the one who acted as an archon for 500 years , the one who involve traveler -- the one who made sure no secrets will be revealed until the later point.

so yeah my first take is that furina's constellatio name has two different meanings, and it really depicts furina's role on the story quest but we didn't know it just back then.

Okay Genshin 4.1 thoughts dump because if I don't compile my thoughts somewhere I will literally implode. Anyways, spoilers for the Fontaine Archon Quest so far (as of Chapter 4, the Version 4.1 update) under the Read More (a couple paragraphs under, but you catch my drift)

So. Something I have always absolutely adored about Genshin's storytelling is the way it goes about presenting its gods as "Human too"...

At first, it was seen painfully obvious through Ei and her incredibly human response to grief and trauma (a lot of people thought she was being unreasonable, and yeah for a ruler of an entire nation, closing yourself off to the outside world certainly seems - and is - irresponsible. And then... you consider how easily any other normal person would have done the same thing, if not worse, if they had lost nearly everyone they loved in quick succession, while also being personally responsible for a handful of those deaths).

And upon further reflection on the topic, you can see blatant traces of it present in every archon. And I don't just mean their trying to blend into/ further their understanding of humans, human society, and human nature.

I mean, Venti is kinda hedonistic and aloof; Zhongli wasn't always as wise and so intricately-versed in his knowledge about so many things - before the Archon War, he was more of a brute who preferred to solve things head-on (literally) as opposed to thinking things through; Nahida- oh don't even get me started on Nahida. Her self-doubt and insecurity as a result of facing constant beratement and feelings of inferiority to Rukkhadevata; her constant desire to learn more (both for her namesake as the God of Wisdom, to prove herself, and for her own curiosity's sake); her child-like nature (as a result of her research and human observation ofc!!! but still adorable none-the-less; I mean "dook-dook" !?! come on!)...

But now with Furina, oh. I think we've entered a BRAND NEW level and it's part of the reason why I absolutely love her so much.

In classic good-story-telling practice, Genshin achieves all of this through "show-not-tell" and it's world-class ability of characterizing its characters (IN MY OPINION ! I love them so much, okay?). And from the second I MET this girl to the very last line of 4.1's archon quest, it has been made painfully abundant to me that

Furina is just a child.

She has. NO IDEA what she's doing!!! Now, the underlying reasons for this have yet to be seen, and will most likely be tackled in the very next Archon Quest chapter, but if you'll allow me to speculate right now... Knowing that Egeria also conducted trials for citizens who broke the law (meaning she should have also been a God of Justice), I believe whole-heartedly that it was her who built the entire system Furina and Neuvillette are running right now. Meaning, I'm confident Furina has absolutely nothing to do with it. The ONLY (and I think I truly mean ONLY) thing Furina did in the time since she inherited the role was: change the perception of what justice and its deliverance should be into something a lot more akin to a dramatic play, only enacted for people's enjoyment.

Which includes her lack of knowledge on the Oratrice. Furina didn't create it. How could she? She's so utterly ignorant on what it is, how it works, and dare I say what it's truly even for.

The moment I read this statement I convinced myself that it had to have been the previous Hydro Archon. And while I concede that: looking back on the wording of this statement now, it seems like its existence would only be beneficial under someone like Furina's ruling… But, I'm willing to just chalk that up to "Egeria had great future-sight" (or something more along the lines of: she trusted the machine to help keep her in check so false charges were less likely; and it just so happens that its decision making is carrying the court system now under Furina’s rule).

Like many things related to Fontaine's history, it would seem, Egeria being solely responsible for the creation of all these staple facilities and aspects of the nation's inner workings would shed light on why Furina is so unknowing. She had nothing to do with it. And while I'm no envoy from Celestia, so I have no insight as to what the hell happens when a new Archon is born to fill in the void that was left, I think that whatever that process is (IF THERE EVEN IS ONE) went completely awry for Furina. She probably didn't even inherit the Gnosis - ever ! I'm thinking it's stuffed into the Oratrice somehow/somewhere. I'm thinking the "curse" Arlecchino sensed has something to do with that process of inheritance (or... lack thereof) going so wrong.

It’s obvious that Furina is running from something. Ignoring something. Distracting herself from the realities of the world with the “spectacle of the courtroom” (as Dain put it). And it’d be easy to just chalk it up to her being a little bitch with no deeper meaning but I don’t think that’s it.

Genshin doesn’t make it gods “just human”. They spend their time trying to prove that they’re “Human too”.

The underlying reasons for it have to lie in whatever happened when Furina was born. Cursed. Whether it was a curse to end up alone (as per the prophecy), or to never obtain the powers becoming of a god in this world... Whatever happened, it overwhelmed Furina to an unbearable degree, and naturally, like any Human would... she resorted to escapism. She found entertainment in the trials headed at the court room, realized she could make people like her by being this mascot of justice, and upon learning that it's only a matter of time before all of her subjects turn into puddles and she'll be left all alone… she decided to just- NOT think about it!! Who would?! That is a horrifying! revelation.

THAT is why she's so scared to fight - literally anyone!! She doesn’t have the power (and if she does she’s never had to use it).

THAT is why she’s turned out this way - a brat with very little humility, never knowing when to stop the act - because for centuries she’s lived in this little Lala-Land of a bubble denying the inevitable. A fate she was cursed with from the moment she inherited the title of “God”. She wasn’t really given powers, she wasn’t given dominion, and she most certainly hasn’t received instruction, or… ANY!?! HELP!! it seems, in understanding what it means to be an Archon (perhaps even in spite of those other perks she was “supposed” to receive.)

Born to be a god, yet being set up to suffer the loss of your entire people with almost no power to change it? That would fuck anyone up, even an Archon.

And it’s the way that they’ve shown how it’s fucked with Furina that blows my mind.

She’s so disconnected that Arle’s assassination attempt shocked her to her core. She’s a GOD!! Who would try to assassinate her (aside from the Fatui)!? She’s never had to even perceive the notion of being a target of something like that. Stack that on top of her general sense of helplessness in the greater context of what’s happening to her nation, and it makes sense that she broke down crying later that night... :(

Girlie just needs some help </3

thoughts on tha archon quest

prefacing this with a disclaimer that i watched a playthrough instead of actually playing the quest myself, meaning i missed a lot of in world interaction and open map exploration/lore/immersion that would have usually accompaned my overall impression of an archon quest. also i watched in eng dub which i kind of despise so that definitely affected my impressions of the cast

it was fun!

no huge complaints other than genshin typical pacing really dragging out certain segments but otherwise it was more or less successful at engaging me LOL if albeit kinda predictable or painful to sit through at times

furina :•)

i like her thing, idrk much abt the cultural/religious influences of fontaine beyond the obv french naming scheme but what w the whole mention of The Original Sin + a god manifesting themselves as flesh and blood to live amongst humanity + eventually executing themself in order to absolve all their people of that original sin. i think it could have stood to use more blatantly obvious christian iconography in the quest itself. like apples. or maybe they could have crucified her. just for funsies

are there any crosses in fontaine or does venti have a monopoly on that

that being said i think it would have been fun narratively if they hadnt made it so painfully obvious that furina was putting on an act/horrifically overcompensating for being the archon. like it would have been cool if her act was genuinely narratively convincing for at least the first half. the twist that she (technically) wasnt the archon/(more accurately Divine) would have hit harder but i can appreciate the angle they went for. idk i think its fun to see an archon that for once is kind of completely seemingly incompetent. a loss for feminism but a win for girlfailures all around the world

i saw someone else say this and i have to agree the deal w the whale did feel a bit tacked on at the end LOL... it didnt really feel as well integrated into the prophecy thing but eh

how is childe. does anyone care. actually no

clorinde navia "oh are you wearing a new lipstick?" "yeah, want to try" KILL MEEEEEEEEEEEE

have not seen furinas story quest yet but what are the mechanics behjnd her (assumedly) gaining a hydro vision when focalors' whole deal was sacrificing herself precisely to destroy the throne of the hydro archon, presumably preventing another hydro archon from ever ascending. wh... i guess im just missing something or otherwise misunderstanding what "destroying the throne" entails

STILL IT KIND OF FEELS LIKE AN INSULT TO HER CHARACTER CONCEPTUALLY NGL like she spent centuries parading around desperately as the hydro archon and when she finally breaks free of the curse celestias like.... "oh btw youre actually really cool now and we've decided u can become the archon for realsies" i think i would kill

on one hand, i do recognize how the visions function as a narrative device for self actualization and realize its only a fitting way to conclude her arc, but on the other, as signs of acknowledgement from celestia marking an individual as eligible for godhood, it does feel very incongruent with furinas whole thing

on that notd i feel similarly abt wanderer LOL like okay ignore how logically they need a vision for gameplay mechanics like just narratively it doesnt cohere to me... sniffles...

small detail i like how the focalors/furina divide was foreshadowed by the fact that for every previous archon theyve been consistently only referred to as their "real"/chosen/"human"(in a sense) name by those closest to them, whereas all of their subjects would refer to them by archon name or otherwise (lord barbatos, morax, lesser lord kusanali, etc etc) but nobody has ever called the hydro archon focalors or any equivalent, it was only ever her human/chosen name lady furina

this quest had a Lot of Telling instead of Showing and i physically groaned each time they had to spell something out loud instead of just having the audience put together the (already incredibly obvious) narrative pieces but id say this is a writing problem w genshin as a whole and not exclusive to fontaine

Spoiler Fontaine Archon Quest 4.0 :

How should I put it, this archon quest somehow fresh and took different route than previous area which make it enjoyable. The writer putting jokes and high tension scene pretty well together.

Klutz Furina really funny to see hahahaha

Ace of attorney story like are interesting enough to read (lol)

The one really suprise me after read many spoiler, Arlecchino came from Fontaine ! Which explained house of hearth somehow lean on saving Fontaine aside their allignment. It would be suprised if Arlecchino join fatui, picking house of hearth and basically spying mission join as harbringer all because she know the propehcy will happens if she don't do something.

As I thought, Furina Neuvillete relationships more like cheeky young lady and all round butler so yeah Alois Claude (lol). It gonna be interesting to read Neuvillete Furina character story later to see the reasons they join together. I hoping like he's into controlling from shadow ruler type or Furina cheeky personality interest him (but seems not lol)

Aside the fact this archon quest focused on Navia, funny enough Neuvillete which had less line took most scene there (lol) and I guess we wouldn't see her for next archon quest since well... she finished her role, right (lol)

Neuvillete in this archon quest really interest me ! He's very rational kinda like machine but somehow he's still in research for human's hearts. And the things with rain, everytime rains happened, it's after a case or trials and at the end of archon quest when he's at Callus grave so yeah I guess Neuvillete is just someone can't express his feelings...

Aside the fact Tartaglia fanboying traveller and forgot his debt collector job (lol), it's funny he say about his families to us and forgotting our archenemy relationship.

The quest finished with Tartaglia arrested just because oracle saying he's guilty (he's guilty for taking too many female's hearts lol). But wow Neuvillete can stop him with only one move before going full foul legacy mode, I guess dragons pretty much a supernatural (lol)

I think Tartaglia will play a very big part in Fontaine archon quest, maybe as key person or just clown like Liyue (lol)

So far, Fontaine archon quest have three big forces play their parts : Fontaine, current house of hearth member + tartaglia + traveller and third forces. I really suspect these third forces came from previous house of hearth father, if so it explain new fatui enemies at 4.1.

So yeah it's very balanced story, not bad but not so good. But I still wondering how to do Fontaine 100% exploration with it's basically chasm underground + dessert mouseleum combination map. For now without touching any quest, I still around 30% overall and unlock most teleport waypoint while doing some chest

There's something about the pacing surrounding Neuvillette's character that I particularly adore.

Yeah, Genshin Impact is an action adventure/role-playing game, so there's no shortage of excitement, and Neuvillette is no exception -- indeed, his play style of repeatedly blasting hordes of enemies with Hydro Pump is delightfully thrilling. He fits right in. 🤣

Then I think about his roles in the major scenes he appears in, and... a couple of them -- knocking Childe out in a single invisibly fast blow; singlehandedly suppressing the oncoming flood of the Primordial Sea -- are indeed exciting and dramatic. He's spectacularly powerful.

But I also love the scenes that reflect his contemplative nature, giving the player time to breathe and think as the story progresses. I already made an unnecessarily long post about how much I enjoy that the reveal of his true identity is a gradual one, and, even in the scene where he finally confirms it himself, rather than a mind-blowing revelation, it's presented as a conversation with several back-and-forth exchanges, each bringing the Traveler -- and, by extension, the player -- progressively closer to the truth. Immediately following the high-stakes cinematics in the Fortress of Meropide and the tense "tea party" between Arlecchino and Furina, it's a welcome change of pace with ample negative space.

I just completed his story quest this morning, and I love how the atmosphere of the cutscene at the end replicates everything I enjoyed about the aforementioned "identity reveal" scene. In between tidbits of scattered dialogue, we get to spend several seconds observing Neuvillette's reaction, the subtle fluctuations in his facial expression as he processes the implications behind each line, before he continues to walk at an easy pace. But it's not monotone or boring by any stretch of the imagination -- on the contrary, there's an emotional ebb and flow to it, so to speak, with the accompaniment of a dramatic soundtrack and the swells of rain and thunder in the background. It's not an action-filled cutscene, nor would I exactly venture to call it exciting, but I still feel as though I could watch it a hundred times in a row nonetheless.

So I just finished fontaine in one go after I dropped the game mid meropide because it was unbearable...while the last act is better than that (which isn't hard let's be honest) the amount of padding they did in that last story quest is ridiculous...the characters say a whole lot of nothing and things that could've been explained in 3 minutes were drawn out to half an hour because they had Furina act out everything...like I understood what was going on even before that...I understood this must be painful for furina even before that...there wasn't a reason for that stage play. At least stuff actually happened in sumeru but this?!?! What was that just what the fuck...It doesn't help that Fontaine is just also super boring to explore, the entire land feels empty. They took the complaints of sumeru being too dense with chests, enemies and puzzles and went into the extreme opposite with Fontaine having nothing going on....its the first time I was ever super disappointed with Genshins overworld...I can't wait to leave Fontaine.....next year...in 8 months...I guess I will finish persona 5 and see what all the talk about star rail is about till natlan

Sorry this turned into a rant I'm just so disappointed with Fontaine as a whole

Yeah, Fontaine really feels like killing time until the stuff they really care about - Furina's suffering and how cool Neuvillette is.

And then how cool Skirk is.

I think what gets me about how sad Furina and how cool Neuvillette is... is that Genshin made their relationship one of the emotional pinpoints of act 5 without bothering to establish what they are to each other. Am I supposed to care that Neuvillette chose to help humanity after Focalors just looked directly and the camera and said "I planned to make you care about humanity" and that's all the buildup that payoff ever got? Why did Neuvillette even agree to come in the first place?

What else gets me about the Sad Furina On The Stage is that we got a long extended cut of her pretending to be the Archon doing things we mostly already knew she was doing, but... Genshin didn't want to spend time on how she met Neuvillette, the Oceanid-Humans as a concept, the Dubiousness (alleged) of the courts, Arlecchino or even much of all about the House of Hearth...

There was so much stuff in Fontaine that just wasn't paid off on that could've been, and I'm so disappointed by all of it. Fontaine is theoretically so cool and interesting, and this is what we get.

I really genuinely believe Genshin isn't very interested in anything except its lore and some of the characters directly connected to it. Because dear god, how else do you explain all of that.

Not the same anon but I think some people don't like Furina's story quest because supposedly Paimon and the traveler were being "pushy"

I don't think I agree personally,at least not the point people are talking about,but I guess If you do Furina's quest and the archon quest back to back you might get a bit of whiplash?

Character quests are often made to not have a clear point in the Genshin timeline because of how Genshin operates (which can be detrimental to it's writing unfortunately but that's besides the point) , which is why in Furina's quest it might seem like Fontaine got drowned last week.

I don't think it was bad,I actually quite liked it personally, I think it's especially well done that Furina sort of reclaimed acting as not "not being herself and playing someone else" and more like "playing out her emotions through the character" , it's her now,not the character.

yeah i thought about this aspect and i understand how it looks bad: she specifically sets a boundary that feels important to her, but to be fair paimon and the traveler insist for like 3 dialogue lines and then respect her decision. ultimately she's the one who decides to get involved - it does feel like it's out of guilt towards the end, but she herself feels content with it, and working with the troupe initially makes her change her mind, so im not too bothered by it personally

character quests are mostly about development and getting a deeper understanding of the character as they evolve (at least... the interesting ones). that's how it feels with furina: she went from decisive due to her trauma, but ended up healed after taking a (albeit pushed onto her) leap of faith. it's clumsy in the way it's brought but the message is still kind of beautiful

the treatment of trauma in genshin is lacking on several accounts, and often times characters are pushed beyond their boundaries for the sake of the plot and it sucks. i don't really feel like that's the case for characters like furina, tho, because she's the type to need that kind of push. she won't express her feelings honestly until you make her, no matter how desperately she wants to, so i understand the need to have it played out like that - otherwise it would've felt ooc, tbh

and yeah like you said in the end she really reclaimed acting, and it's not surprising! that's literally her calling, she just needed to heal and the journey with the troupe did heal her ♡