act47side

A tree?

A tree.

Rhine certainly has style, doesn't it? A tree-shaped facility. Do you know what it is?

I have no idea. I suppose I'm just here to lighten the mood while you vent about Rhine.

Heh. Well, it doesn't matter.

What it is will soon stop mattering to the people, just like that balloon that couldn't fly.

In the DOD's game, it will become an infant slaughtered by knights, an envoy killed by the Witch King. Its fall will drive the rise of the people's wrath.

In Maylander's proposal, it will become the next symbol of the Columbian spirit, its silhouette printed on every hat that leaves the factories for the next decade.

Is that so? All I see is a tree.

You see those fowlbeasts, brushing their feathers and honing their beaks?

They've accepted that it's a tree. A tree that they can roost on.

A tree rising from the wounds of Columbia? How should people understand it?

They don't have to.

Just as you didn't need to understand the mobile mining platform on the wilderness that you skipped classes to watch when you were young.

Did you know if it was carrying a group of ambitious pioneers, or desperate debtors? Did it return with a full load of riches, or was it simply drifting aimlessly?

...Hah.

All I know is that I really didn't want to take a test that day, and the mining platform happened to be chasing the setting sun.

A mining platform chasing the setting sun, and a flying tree.

They're not so different, are they?

What is your position, Mr. Vice President?

I'm the vice president of the Columbian Union. With this position, comes responsibility.

I can't skip classes to watch a mining platform chase the setting sun, like I used to.

Still...

That was, indeed, what made me feel something about the soil of Columbia for the first time.

If the sky is the soil that nurtures the future of Columbia...

I'm sure there's enough room in it for a flying tree.

<p=1>Convallis of the Banshees, Kazdel</>

Woo—ha~!

Ya—hoo~!

Hii—yaah~!

There is still a ways to go before we pass through the reed beds and arrive at the Roosting Tree. Shall I take the helm? The boats of the Convallis were carved by incantation, and are powered by the same. They have no need for physical strength to pilot.

It's fine. Those three are busy running wild, let them burn off some of that energy.

They are more... lively than I imagined.

This is them at their calmest, if you can believe it... You don't want to see them rowing while deciding who can cry the loudest, or roar most like a manglerbeast.

They were churned up in that furnace for centuries, after all. They barely had physical form, barely had distinct identities. Anyone would be rowdy after something like that.

...It's quiet, the Convallis.

Pardon?

In Columbia, even a forward-thinking guy like me finds himself flustered at a taxicab door, struggling to find the handle on a newfangled model.

Noisy change is Columbia's natural state. The ever-pioneering, ever-advancing nation. She waits for no man, not even for a second.

But here... When was the last time I came here?

Two hundred years ago, after Kazdel was picked clean in the wake of that bitter war. Væla had only just turned this valley into the home of the Banshees.

Yep. Can't have been easy, finding a place like this snuggled up to all these Originium-doused mountains.

Mist Lake's rippling mirror, sunken trees among the reed beds, forests carpeting the land in gold... and the Banshees working the oars of their boats, gently blowing on their leaf whistles. It's like the valley itself is breathing.

Even after all these years, the Convallis hasn't changed a bit.

Aside from... the one who ferried me the first time around.

Væla.

Væla, my old friend. Did she already move into that wooden house under the Tree?

She did so last month, Tin Man.

I heard she worked you into one of her tales, telling the children that the mists of the Convallis are puffs from your pipe.

But a day later, when the children pestered her as to how you persuaded that empty suit of armor, or escaped being thrown into the Furnace, hearing your name only confused her.

...She's starting to forget.

Indeed. Forgetfulness... Death's warning to a Banshee.

She moved into the house after that, like every other Banshee she has seen off over the years, peacefully waiting for the end to come.

Seeing off an old friend who's forgotten my name... Didn't think my trip here would end up being so heavy.

I would like you to comfort her, in your own way.

She has given far too much of herself for us, for the Convallis, and for the Sarkaz.

You know her type, always insisting on wallowing in unknowable suffering. I simply...

I simply hope that as three hundred years' worth of memories slowly leave her side... She can find some solace.

Sure.

We are here.

Laqeramaline.

Do you require my presence for your goodbyes?

Nobody here.

But... But how?

Væla... left?

Where can a Banshee losing her memory even go?

Whoa! Why's the elevator so dark? I thought there'd be a window or something to look out...

Didn't you read the Propeller Paradise handbook they gave out? It's for building suspense, so everybody here for Air Expo Columbia gets an optimal high-altitude experience!

Advance tickets sold like hotcakes. I tell you what, this is gonna blow those dime-a-dozen rinky-dink drones that've been popping up everywhere the past two years—

Alright, alright, no need to show off how well you memorized the handbook.

We've already put propellers on every piece of furniture in our house that can take them. Does every Columbian these days hear the word 'sky' and get all worked up into a tizzy?

Also, did you notice? Even after all this time, we still haven't reached the levitation layer. That means—

Haha, it means this park really is as tall as the ads say, and our latest levitation tech really can hold up an entire building! We've come to the right place, dear!

Where's that music coming from? Is this... an elevator ad?

Hi everyone! I'm Oakley, your guide to the park!

I get it, being cooped up in that little black box must be awfully boring, you wanna get to the punchline already... but once you get your one-of-a-kind view of all Terra from six hundred meters up, it'll be worth it!

In forty seconds, we'll be arriving at Propeller Paradise's levitation layer. Before that, I'd like you all to noodle on one question: what sort of change will the sky bring to our lives?

You might've already had the chance to try the flying cars in the lower level exhibition area today, trading tires for Originium thrusters.

Soon, the only place you'll see anything with wheels or tracks is gonna be a museum. Doesn't matter if it's a baby stroller or a nomadic city.

Today, we struggle to decide whether to go to Minos or Siesta for summer vacation.

But our indecisionitis is only going to get that much worse once every star in the sky is a potential holiday destination.

The gifts you bring home for your kids after the tour might be a model of the Ring Lab, or maybe a DIY rocket kit.

But it won't be long before an extraterrestrial playmate is the newest preschool trend.

Tonight, we'll be gathered by the radio, betting on whether the station will, out of all the songs about the sky, pick our beloved <i>Good Night, Kristen Wright.</i>

But soon, we'll be forgetting all about that bassy, raspy crooner, because the solar wind will be our new strings, and the galaxy will be our custom-order jukebox.

'The sky is Columbia's next frontier.' That's more than just Vice President Jackson's campaign slogan.

Propeller Paradise proves that every Columbian can be the greatest of Pioneers. There'll always be a place for you somewhere beyond the Starpod.

The Air Expo Columbia begins in just seven days, and with it, everything I just said. Hold onto your tickets, or should I say, your keys to the future.

Everyone's seen the sky opening over Trimounts, of course, and the old adage of 'seeing is believing' has never been more true. So come, see, then believe!

<p=1>Levitation Layer, Propeller Paradise Experimental Park</>

Nice to finally meet you all. Recognize me? I'm the model for the funny cartoon guide you saw just now, Oakley Parsons.

Welcome to Terra's one-and-only levitating experimental park nomadic plate, Columbia's Propeller Paradise!

Welcome to Propeller Paradise. Your investment is greatly appreciated.

<i>Cloud...</i> Is this restaurant the highest point in the park? Being this close to the sky is really making my heart skip some beats!

What's your drink of choice? Your jaw's been hanging open since the moment you stepped off the elevator, so I imagine you must be mighty thirsty right about now.

How considerate of you, Mr. Tannen. What a fine administrator you are for this Propeller Paradise.

I know just how you feel. I first heard about this park back when I was with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Arts Units, and Originium. And my mouth went so dry it was like I'd been stuck in the desert for days.

Ever since Vice-President Jackson gave that speech before Congress about Columbia setting off into the sky two years back, everyone's been hoping to be one of the lucky few to reach up and touch the Starpod.

So that's why you gave up the chance for a promotion at the ATAO, to do admin work for Propeller Paradise?

That's right, sir.