Was this the good ending?

Either way, I made new friends!

I was dumb and watched a bunch of losers debate each other on Wednesday, and it went long. But I did grind a little! And then I watched my football team get whooped by those guys from Detroit, and I almost didn't play tonight...

But I did! I finished off the side quests to help Zas' friend find his not-dead girlfriend. We then healed (I think) everyone sick with Glass Lung across Cinder and Ceniza.

After that, we got on with the main plot. We were supposed to speak to Azufra and tell him the good news. He's excited and ignores a quip that Zas made about killing her dad, but he also has bad news. We were going to jail! You see, Azufra is a bad guy who started a revolution. It's not explained why he started that, but Volcano and Galley are still beloved, so I suspect something is amiss. Now, though, he wants total control of the Glass Lung cure. He thanked us for our sacrifice before calling his guards. Our old stalker friend, Kari, teleports in to condemn Azufra and promises to kill him. Zas tries to plead to her sister, but Kari doesn't forget. This stress makes Crisbell lose it again. Her powers go wild, and time stops once more. The Empress of Time, who I will henceforth call Judy, senses some time buggery and investigates.

Judy is excited that Cris' powers have activated and says that Cris is progressing faster than Judy did. Cris says some words comparing Judy to Enzo and Rhallus, but Judy denies all of that. Those nerds fought for vain things, but Judy has an actual higher goal. We don't see what it is yet, but Kari returns and steals something related to the Millennial Rock. And she causes some magic to happen just as Cris' time freeze ends. Azufra dies, and his wife begins to mourn. Before the guards attack us, seeing as we're the likely culprits, the Volcano Sisters take us to the palace.

They say they're going to punish is for killing Azufra, but the charade ends. And with it, so too goes their loyalty to Judy. They know Judy knowingly used the feral goblins as her minions, as they overheard our conversation when she admitted it. The princesses care about their homeland and take this as a great offense. We're now friends, and even Galley compliments us. To prove it, they give us the royal crest, which is an item we can use to reach the Cinder Cathedral. Place that in the Azufra statue in the main square, and we can finish this chapter.

But the final side quest is a rather interesting one. Matias can hear the sisters mourning their killed parents and how Galley wants to give their gravesite her doll. We can collect that doll (for some reason) and ask Azufra's wife, Fenia, about it. She was there when the monarchs were killed by the mob and has had a heavy heart since. We convince her to tell the sisters their mother's last words: "I love you." The doll was made by the queen, and the three have a conversation where they discuss her. It's humanizing. Volcano gives us a strange mechanical device no one can translate, but I wonder if Nasar can! She can, and it's programming for how to work the Cinder lava pumps. Nasar is annoyed that JKR can't translate it, but she also doesn't know who constructed K... The mystery grows.

The Ancient Ruins are a quick trip under the lava to the giant rock in the middle of the lava lake. The house Cristoper asked about when we first entered the town would end up being the cathedral. It's a mostly straight path where we learn about the pumps. The only new mob is a stone statue weak to lightning. We can use two pumps to reach a chest, and the final one brings us to the chapel and Kari.

Kari is shocked to see us and quickly begins combat. Very quickly! Her battle is really boring. It starts as a pincer attack with a Bugat Boss behind us. It's the same as it was back in the museum. Kari's attacks involve summoning untargetable monsters to attack us on her command. She switches it up often, and it also changes her weaknesses. I don't know if using the time stones changes any stats in her attacks, but I kept it in the present. Poison is good because it's a free 150 HP. Neither the poison muka, guards, nor the sewer boss can do anything to a team with three amber rings on, so this is just a lengthy battle. Get Wilhelm to level 22 so he can learn some earth magic. Guess what he learned AFTER this battle for me!?!?

I don't remember what happened to Kari, but I think Zas said something about her. But we can approach the stained glass mural now. As we do, everything shakes. Judy is here. The Millennial Stone is this gigantic rock we're standing on. Judy uses the Millennial Flower on it to cause destruction. And the rock starts to hatch, letting a dragon emerge. But there's plenty of debris that crashes into the lava. A lava tidal wave, which is a first for video games (that I've played), spreads toward the towns. Fortunately, Paulina's shoe is nearby, but it's Crisbell who saves us again. She has total control over her time powers now and freezes the wave before it crashes into Cinder and Ceniza. We float back to Cinder and speak to the sisters to inform them of what happened. They begin to evacuate the town, while we try to stop the lava. We get a choice now on what to do! Help evacuate, activate the levee, or use the levee and pipes? The levies we rebuilt and the pipes JKR leaned about are our reward for doing every side quest. Cinder really made its side quests matter here, and I'm for it! Crisbell activates the levee but has to stop time again to give K time to power the pumps. It all works! Our team and the Cinder citizens are in the graveyard, far above the lava that still flooded the town. But it's the people we saved. But they don't know where Crisbell is. The camera cuts to the Volcano sisters in Ceniza, trying to save those still sick. The ruins in the town start to fall, but Crisbell is here to save them. We all return to the palace, where Crisbell collapses. She's just exhausted and wakes up in the morning.

Judy flew off on her dragon to Crystallis. And that's our next and final destination. We don't get any of the full town future sights as we did in Clarity and Tulira. But we can still see that the city will repair itself one day and look far better than it did before we showed up. And much better than the ruins we currently walk through. But we'll figure out how to reach Judy...

...tomorrow'

The Lions still suck!!!!!!!