Sins Of The Father – Anna Replays Dragon Age 2 Pt. 7

Act Three, three years and one fancy title later Cassia is still in Kirkwall and still her usual charming self only now important people constantly want something from her. Her patience isn’t the best on a good day and she is known all over the city for both her helpfulness and her bad temper. Meredith and Orsino both try to drag her onto their side but Meredith’s words fall on deaf ears by now. With no family left in Kirkwall Cassia has thrown her support behind the mages wholeheartedly and completely out in the open. Not even Meredith’s not so veiled threats can stop her. The entire keep meanwhile is full of templar guards. Not creepy at all…

the courtyard is even creepier… This is at the beginning of the act!

This dialogue in the Gallows shows, that Meredith already sent for the Right way before Act 3 starts… What the hell?

But no matter how many people want things from her, the people she makes most time for are her friends. She lets herself get dragged into chantry business by Sebastian and meets Leliana again. The Devine is apparently considering drastic military measures if the things in Kirkwall escalate. Because from what we know so far that has always worked out super well for everyone when done so in the past. Cassia tells Leliana that it is not necessary at all but Leliana still tells them to get the grand cleric out of the city, just in case. The grand cleric meanwhile is all “hell no!” and of course stays. Cassia worries, but not more about her than about every other person in the city. “Who would dare to attack the grand cleric in the chantry?” says the grand cleric in the chantry rethorically. Oh sweet summer child… The most positive thing about this quest are Merrill and Isabela. When meeting Leliana Isabela goes all “Sister Nightingale – I remember it didn’t take much to make you sing!” (In regards of the threesome Isabela had with Leliana and Aren in DAO) Merrill is just excited: “Oh I love singing, were you in a choir together?”

Leliana

Varric meanwhile tries to sell Bartrand’s old house but apparently the house is now haunted. So Cassia goes with him to clear it out. Turns out, it actually is haunted by a shard of the lyrium idol that they destroy for safety reasons. But not before Isabela and Merrill both shriek Cassia’s ears off in the haunted house. Also Cassia gets a vase thrown in her face. That effectively ruined her day. But before she can relax in the Hanged Man again she first has to get rid of a certain evil magister that has come to Kirkwall to reclaim Fenris and set an ambush for them there. They gleefully kill him. Fenris’ sister, who betrayed him to his former master also doesn’t make it out alive.

In the meantime in Anders-Land—

Oh and somewhere in between Cassia goes to the bonepit and kills a huge dragon. Why? Because it burned down her mine. Also, because this gets us the main piece of the champion armor. Whih I modded quite a bit. Getting rid of the weird bookshelf part on the chest, better quality textures for the fur and last but not least: no buttflap!

(seriously my favourite mod atm… buttlflap be gome!)

Merrill asks Cassia for help to go seek out the demon that is bound on sundermount and that taught her blood magic in the first place because even though she tried her best the mirror still won’t work. And Merrill is actually being very responsible here. She knows what danger that demon represents and asks Cassia to come in case things turn bad and she gets possessed. Cassia decides to herself that there is no way she could hurt Merrill but agrees to come anyway. The Dalish are the opposite of welcoming and the Keeper tells Merrill one more time to give this up. There is a mention of Mahariel, the Dalish Elf Origin from DAO who dies in this canon by the taint contracted by the mirror. They seek out the demon but it is not there anymore. The keeper let it possess her so it can’t get to Merrill and they can kill it by simply killing her. And that is one of the most stupid things anyone in this game ever does. And the thing that made me really dislike this particular Dalish clan tbh? Because lets recount:

Merrill wants to fulfil her duty as a first: preserve and look for old Dalish knowledge. She is doing exactly that. Blood magic has NOT been outlawed in Dalish clans, not ever. Merrill is an adult who is close to 30 in DA2 and has studies magic her whole life, she knows what she is doing and she never pretends that it isn’t dangerous, but she thinks it is worth it. For that she is willing to leave her clan as to not worry them. She then asks for a tool that she is entitles to by law, and even after she fullfills the law the keeper refuses to give it to her. She gives it to Hawke instead as if Merrill was a child that needed a parental supervision slip. Talk about respecting a person? Additionally the keeper told everyone horror stories about Merrill so bad, that people literally DIE out of fear of her. What the fuck??? And lastly the Keeper does the demon thing… She has NO WAY of knowing what the demon actually wants. On top of it she again doesn’t respect Merrills choices and her decisions and makes them for her. And in the end Merrill is supposed to be thankful? No way… If you actually listen to her and read the codex entries, Merrill is one of the most responsible and grow up people in the entire game. So what if she remains a bit innocent in ways of personal interactions? That doesn’t make her immature where it counts. Yet she constantly gets treated like an insolent child by the people that are supposed to be her family… All this shit could have been prevented it everyone just minded their own damn business! So in the end Cassia tells her it is not her fault. She agrees with her thet the keeper, while meaning well, was frankly incredibly stupid.

Everything about Merrill’s personal quest is just so frustrating. I want to shake people constantly and tell them to fuck off. And in the end, the only way to avoid killing an entire clan is going “this is all my responsibility and I will deal with Merrrill”. WTF???

Merrill

And then Cassia gets a letter from Meredith of all people, asking for her help. Cassia goes into the Gallows, just to tell the woman that she can put her request where the sun doesn’t shine and goes looking for the missing mages, but for Orsino’s sake. She tries to save whom she can but of course everyone goes all “grrrr, argh!” on her.  There is literally bloodmagic everywhere. So after a few days of non stop bloodbaths, abominations and the likes Cassia is sick of it. So when the carta tries to capture her and she finds out they are after her brother too, getting out of Kirkwall is a welcome change of pace.

She takes Anders and Isabela with her and they meet up with Carver on the way, to find out the carta is working with some corrupt wardens and are after their blood. And the popular theme of “Blood everywhere!!!” continues. they explore an ancient prison and find out that their father made a deal some 30 years ago, using is blood to keep the prison intact in exchange for getting out of Kirkwall with his family safely. Cassia feels some long needed justification for her use of blood magic and a lot of relief. Her father never turned evil or got possessed, so her view of blood magic gets validated by that even further. Carver and Cassia have lots of family moments, Anders has a Justice!Moment and Isabela states that next time Cassia asks her to come along on an adventure she will definitely stay home! We also learn why she refuses to wear pants and after wading through disgusting goo for hours Cassia has to say Isabela might have a point.

Carver: Father didn’t want a child with magic? He got that one wrong twice over… But he spent so much time doting on you and Bethany. He never let you feel this. Well, I guess the worst he figured that could happen to me was me tripping over my own sword.

Cassia: He knew you didn’t need protecting, you were the strongest of us.

Carver: Sure, it’s easy to believe that now but I think… I just wanted to help. But as far as we get, they are still gone. I am tired of loosing things. I miss Bethany, and father. And mother. And you sometimes. Gamlen can go suck an egg!

In the heart of the prison is an ancient tevinter magister, half person half darkspawn corruption. The wardens imprisoned him in hopes of controlling the blights. Which of course didn’t work. He took over their minds instead. So after finding out that much of what the chantry says is apparently actually true Cassia has the honour of killing him. Or not quite… The ending makes it obvious that he possessed someone else’s mind but Cassia knows nothing about it. The only good thing? Cassia and Carver get along great by now. He is on maximum friendship and they are joking together and doing this new thing of being understanding of each other!

But her vacation ends with accidentally releasing probably the greatest evil around on the continent and no one knowing about it… In retrospect she probably should have stayed in bed that morning.

Ooops, sorry Inquisitor!