Felicia and Bellclaire knew each other?
WAKE UP GIRL NEW DARK SOULS YURI DROPPED ok ok ok one second let me elaborate hfhhvbhnf
So, basically, their summon locations are connected; one of them they are sharing (Lost Bastille), and their other ones (Amana for Felicia and Drangleic Castle for Bellclaire) are connected throgh their items lore!
Bellclaire is one of the Hollowed Mages from Tseldora, this robe is otherwise exclusively worn by the dudes who kept shooting you near the sand pit lmao. And it is further confirmed by the fact one of her spells is Crystal Soul Spear, a spell that can be created in NG+ from the Soul of Paledrake (Seath) and lorewise originating from Seath.. who kinda possessed the Duke of Tseldora to become cringe so it only makes more sense!
Her other set pieces are Rogue Leggins (clothes of Hollowed thiefs), Lion Warrior Helm (makes sense she put it on, Lion Warriors would be on her way upon leaving Tseldora) and Creighton's Chain Glowes (assume just Mirrah stuff, but this particular one should be ignored I think, feels same as Sceptical Old Man wearing Gehrman's pants aka just aesthetic item)! I think the robe should be THE focus here, all things considered
^^^ Another thing about her is that she has this Chime, but doesn't use a single Miracle, nor even has it just unused in her data! This coincides with how Vendrick kept clerics just for ceremonial purposes and not for actually doing the cleric stuff, and Tseldora was in service of Vendrick as part of Drangleic, so that further points Bellclaire towards just being in his service 🤔
Possibly, she went on her pilgrimage after becoming cursed, rather than staying back and waiting for the curse to take its toll like fellow mages, but wasn't able to run far enough; her summon sign in Lost Bastille is in the cell (with broken bars), seems like she was captured and imprisoned.
Another thing is.. she is not a Hollow! I know the invaders and summons in Dark Souls 2 use like the same 7 preset faces, but there IS a data for Hollow character (annoying three characters fought in Shulva as bosses use it for example)! The thing is, her weapon is Staff of Amana, a weapon that has nothing to do with Drangleic/Vendrick/Tseldora/etc!
But you know what IS interesting about Amana? Right, it has an Altar with a Milfanito at it that allows to restore humanity even without a Human Effigy! It exists for this purpose, and it is possible that THIS is how Bellclaire healed from Hollowing! This staff might have been something she picked on her way! Though this particular staff also scales when you are a human and gives penalty when you are Hollow, so maybe it gives her additional motivation to hold onto her humanity!
At the same time, Felicia's summon signs are in Amana and in Lost Bastille, not far away from Bellclaire but outside of jail cells! Okay, so about her now:
She is wearing a Knight Set (all pieces have the same description), and appears that she is not an Undead since she seeks "official" Knightship in Drangleic!
I need to also clarify about her shield, because it is actually a mistake; the descriptions of Greatshield of Glory and Tower Shield are clearly mixed upon development and it was never corrected:
You can clearly see it is a mistake as the Knights serving Vendrick, who are modeled after his knight Syan, use this shield too:
Her weapon is also Heide Greatlance! (Sorry I don't have a screenshot copied) So, she has a Heide Greatlance, but also a shield she uses is found IN Heide after Old Dragonslayer battle near Targray (the Blue Sentinels guy), and the set she uses is found in the path that connects Heide and No-Man's Wharf!
Note I don't necessarily take it as her dying around, especially with how in Dark Souls 2 every other NPC just conveniently has exact replica of their set and weapon to reward the player with XD (looking at YOU, Elden CRING killing Ansbach and Thiollier to give us their sets!!!). Just more like telling the story through items locations and environment. So, perhaps she tried to become a Blue Sentinel in her pursuit for knightship, but failed.... or maybe, rather, got sidetracked!
No-Man's Wharf got under control of Vendrick, and now they are the ones responsible for capturing Undead and sending them into Lost Bastille! So how about this idea: Felicia found, maybe by accident, path to No-Man's Wharf and by effect the Lost Bastille, and was NOT having what she found out there! If we assume she wanted to join Blue Sentinels, she must have had strong sense of justice or wish to help people.. and, well, Undeads captured and locked away is not nice. Her title is also literally Felicia the Brave, she would not sympathize with peoples fear of the Undead much if at all! Especially since even becoming Hollow doesn't automatically mean being a danger to society, across the trilogy we meet some characters who are Hollow but harmless and even still having their wits and memories, just weird at worst!
So, Felicia was the one to crash Bellclaire's cell open to free her, and accompanied her into Amana to seek restoration of her humanity since Felicia has a summon sign in Amana and Bellclaire has the Staff of Amana and isn't Hollow despite she should be!!! She was not giving up the hope for Undeads and encouraged her to seek help, seeing she yet had wits and deserved a chance instead of rotting in the jailcell! Maybe not even just Bellclaire? Maybe Felicia released every imprisoned Undead that was not yet completely beyond help and put them in the boat away from here, believing they could be helped. There is hope for the Undead (The Pursuer disapproves of THE naivety and optimism sooooOOOO hard lol).
I just think this is so nice tbh hfhruybf. Though Bellclaire is a summon in Drangleic Castle too. I wonder if Hollowing did erode some of her memories still, and she was looking for familiarity like Lucatiel ;-; Or Millicent in ER, actually. Though Felicia might have been looking for Drangleic Castle too because of the Greatshield of Glory, as true knight calling.... until she didn't. Or could have picked a fight with people there? In either case, hers and Bellclaire's paths might cross even beyond their shared adventure (that has no business being as cute as it is)
I also wonder if Targray still wonders where did she go. Maybe worries about her since she isn't an Undead; if she dies then she DIES. He doesn't know she simply has 5 seconds timespan gdhtjhgjh XD
P.S.: AKTYALY Bellclaire is one of those Fromsoft's trademark GNC characters! The thing is, she is wearing a MALE robe; female variant of this clothing is black!
^^^ Black (female). @val-of-the-north Iirc Dark Souls 2 also has a male character wearing the black variant, right? Based and valid tbh. Common Dark Souls 2 W
P.P.S.: Literally no one asked about this but have this too anyways I g:
