Revisiting My Teenage Obsessions

And then Caduceus, sweet cow man, looked at death, the one thing he holds sacred, and said: not now. My friends deserve better.

STARES INTO THE SUN

Jester, alone and never taken seriously, now a master of her own imagination, with a family who loves and cares for her above all, and a romance that’s better than the books she’s read.

Fjord, a weak and picked on nobody, who was taken advantage of by the powers that be, now a warden of the Wildmother, with people behind him who don’t give a damn about the powers he may or may not wield.

Caleb, who’s life was simply a plaything to one of the most callous and evil wizards in the empire, who thought he was an unredeemable mess, has now saved all of Exandria from devastation, has found a new family that forgives him without a second thought.

Yasha, who’s old life was torn from her for loving too hard, the love of her life killed, who suffered at the hands of Obann for untold years, has found love again, and again, and feels a safety with others she hasn’t felt in a long time.

Veth, who lost her body, her family, and her life, has now regained all of those things, and gotten more confidence in herself and another family to boot.

Beauregard, who was taught at an early age that her life wasn’t her own, that all she was was her father’s proxy, that she was inherently unlovable and worthless, has now found lasting love, a family that would destroy the world to keep her with them, and an organization at her back that she feels she can place her trust into.

Caduceus, who was also alone, desperate for a connection to his goddess, yet was too afraid of the answers he might find if he looked for his family, now has his family back, is no longer alone (will never be alone), and -just based on the dice- has one of the best relationships with a deity since the calamity.

Essek, who was taught that he was the only one who would care for himself, who thought himself willing to destroy everything he knew in exchange for power and knowledge, learned that he wasn’t the only one who cared, atonement was not unreachable, and that knowledge was not as important as the world, and that that was not as important as the people around him, who loved him.

Mollymauk, who knew nothing about himself, save for the fact that he wasn’t this ‘Lucien’, who died trying to save his friends, and was forcefully stitched back into a person who he did not belong too, now back -maybe not as he once was- but with the knowledge that he was not alone, not empty. That he was with love. With joy. With the sea. The tinkerer. The wizard. The rumor. A family.

The Mighty Nien’s journey has never been about saving the world, or solving every problem the world’s ever had. It’s always, always, been about family. About finding was to live with yourself. About looking after those taken unjustly advantage of. About leaving every place, every life, better than they found it. Or at least, more colorful.

They have fought for so long, against so much, for this ending. They’ve clawed their way through a world that told them they were nothing, they were broken, they didn’t deserve happiness, and told that world ‘fuck you, I do deserve happiness. I do deserve family. I do deserve love. And you deserve love too.’

They earned this happy ending. From dropping everything to save a town from Gnolls, to going out of their way to save a Kenku child, or poor children who stole their money. To desperately risking their lives for some bozos they’d only known for less than a month, to automatically going from 0 to 100 on a man that was making the Ruby of the Sea uncomfortable, to going to unknown wilds to save the husband of one of their own. To befriending the war criminal (who didn’t make it easy), and befriending stone giants. To stopping a war -not because they cared for either country- but because they had people they cared about on both sides. To saving an entire island of people who lost their memories. To saving an old wizard who doesn’t fucking learn from the consequences of his actions.

Everything they’ve done, they’ve tried to do to help. Everything they’ve done, they’ve tried to use to give themselves a life. A family. A happy ending. And we got to watch them succeed in that tonight. Against all odds, they got to succeed. They got to switch around the E and the N.

AND WE 

WERE