“The land of dawn can be beheld past the shining blade, at the far end of the azure sky...”
— Trails through Daybreak's slogan
The Legend of Heroes: Trails through Daybreak (英雄伝説
Synopsis[]
Setting[]
The game marks the second half of the Trails series, set in Calvard. The story is set in S.1208, a year after Trails into Reverie. Thanks to postwar reparations, the multinational state of Calvard experiences unprecedented economic growth while continuously dealing with public unrest caused by immigration and the new president's radical reforms. In a corner of Edith, a young man working as a Spriggan receives a peculiar job that will result into something larger, affecting the entirety of the Republic.
Prologue[]
"Spriggan" -
A type of underground business born from the diversity that is the Calvard Republic.
At times as a detective, at times as a negotiator, at other times as a bounty hunter, they accept all types of requests from anyone.
Subcontract work from the police on request that they can't handle, consultations about things "can't see the light of day" from civilians, even "legitimate" requests from criminals and underground groups.
That is the way of those that are called the "Spriggan".
The year is 1208 of the Septian Calendar.
In the slums of the capital city of Calvard, in a rundown old building, a refined looking girl wearing the uniform of renowned school was paying visit.
"Arkride Resolution Office"
She stared dignified at the simple letters on the plate.
She swallowed audibly and knocked on the door three times
...
"(YAAAWN), a visitor before lunch... that's unusual..."
At a glance, lazy but composed, seemingly mature but rather quite the young man's voice rang out and the doorknob turned slowly.
-Here is the beginning of a new "Trails (story)".『
カルバード共和国という多様性の
ある時は
警察では扱い切れない依頼の下請け、市民からの“表沙汰にできない”相談事、さらには犯罪者やアンダーグラウンド勢力の“真っ当な”依頼も。
それが、『裏解決屋』と呼ばれる彼らの流儀であった。
時に、七耀暦1208年――
共和国首都・旧市街にある古ぼけた雑居ビルを名門校の制服に身を包んだ、いかにも育ちの良さそうなひとりの女生徒が訪れていた。
『アークライド解決事務所』 素っ気ない文字で書かれたそのプレートを、凛とした眼差しで見つめる少女。
コクンと喉を鳴らし、意を決してノックを３回。
…………
『～ふわああっ、昼前に珍しいな……』
だらしないようで落ち着いた、大人びているようで意外と若い男の声が響き、ドアノブがゆっくりと回り出す。
――ここから、新たな “Story[]
Prologue: "Spriggan from the Old Town[1]"[]
S.1208, August 26, 20:50— Midwestern Zemuria, Republic of Calvard.
In the undergrounds of the Capital, Edith, a group of delinquents is delivering suitcase to two members of a recently rapidly growing mafia organization in Calvard, Almata. In the midst of the discussion, the group requests 1 million mira for the delivery of the contents, 700.000 more than originally agreed. The negotiations are cut short: the two mafiosi bring out their weapons and attack the group. Soonly thereafter the two parties hear the whistle of the policemen, patrolling the area. The few moments of distraction caused by the alert were enough for Giacomo Conte to sneak in using the spatial distortion invisibility function of his RAMDA and steal the suitcase which fell off the traders' hands. The arrival of the policemen forced the Almata members and the delinquents to make a break for it without the goods.
In the meanwhile, at Bistro Montmart, we see our protagonist, Van Arkride for the first time. As the managers and landlords of the bistro Victor and his daughter Paulette offer the young man a drink, he gets the feeling —or as he likes to call his intuitions— a "smell" of something fishy brewing in the town.
In another place, a young blonde girl, Agnès Claudel, is searching on the Orbal Net information about the whereabouts of the heirlooms of her great-grandfather, lost somewhen in the past. By using the "Kitty Engine", a search engine created by her high school senior Renne, Agnès discovers that last weekend an old orbment fitting the description she knew of, was stolen from an antique store. Determined to recover it, she follows the advice Renne gave her: to make a request to the Arkride Solutions Office, a business operated and managed by a "problem solver" who goes by the epithet of Spriggan. By searching the code name "4spg." (For Spriggan), she is able to find the address of the office.
August 27, 10:05 | The next morning Agnès arrives in the 8th District of Edith, Vieux Quartier, commonly referred to as "Old Town". As she follows the map, she finds out the office is located on the 2nd floor of the Montmart building. She thus knocks on the door waking Van Arkride, the problem fixer she was searching for, up.
After the presentations, Van, who is unsure of what such a young woman would ever need from someone like him, explains his line of work: a contractor who accepts any kind of job that cannot be resolved by the Bracer Guild or the Police, legal or not, as long as he wants to. Agnès thus presents him her request: she wants help with locating the stolen old orbment she found out about yesterday, revealing him a picture depicting it from her Xipha. At first, Van doesn't seem to be intentioned to help her out, being of the opinion that such job would be better entrusted to either the Guild or the Police. As Agnès says that she can't ask them about it, Van notices that he didn't treat her to anything. Agnès thus promptly tells him that she brought a limited edition cake from a very popular cafe near her school, Andalucia. Van, who happens to be a real sweet-tooth and an enormous fan of that specific place, is therefore sold immediately. He thus accepts the request (although denying that he got lured out by just a cake).
11:00 | The two begin their investigation in the 6th District, Riverside: Van explains that a certain information broker that might know more about it, Giacomo Conte, usually wanders there at this time of the day. They eventually find him eating from a food stall. As they show him a picture of the orbment and inquire him about it, he states that he has never seen it. After few more talks he leaves, and Van, who was easily able to figure out he was lying and probably knew about its location, decides to go after him to his hideout situated in the subway maintenance road of Riverside. As he and Agnès enter, Van notices the presence of monsters in the area and tells Agnès to go wait for him at the food stalls. She insists on going with him however, and after showing him her orbal staff, he lets her.
As they approach a bunch of enemies, Van explains to Agnès that if he deploys the Shards, a force field that can be generated from the Xipha to amplify the defenses and the attacks of the user, that will be the signal for her to follow him up in battle. After their first fight together Agnès notices that Van's Hollow Core is quite particular. He thus introduces her to his unique Hollow Core developed specifically for him: Model MK-ESV004 - Mare.
In the meanwhile, Giacomo who just reached his secret hideout starts to ponder what to do with the contents of the suitcase he stolen the day before, which happens to be the old orbment Agnès is searching for. Just as he thinks about it though, the two mafiosos he outwitted the precedent night show up. Even after pleading them to spare him, they attack him. His cry is loud enough to be heard by Van and Agnès, which immediately pick up the pace to reach his base. When they reach it's already too late- Giacomo's throat was sliced open. As Van investigates the body for clues, Detective Daswani and Inspector Nate, reach the scene together with other policemen. Seeing Van and Agnès standing next to Giacomo's dead body, they immediately apprehend them.
15:20 | Van and Agnès are brought to be questioned in the Capital Police HQ located in the 2nd District, Seiden. Van gives a sloppy, false explanation of the events to Daswani and Nate. As Nate tries to find a way to make him speak the truth, René Kincaid, Van's childhood friend and agent of the Central Intelligence Division (CID) enters the room and takes him and Agnès away. After a brief discussion and catching up, René tells Van to tell him any information he might obtain about the killers as a way to repay his help and leaves. As Van and Agnès prepare to continue their investigation a news reporter from the Tyrell Times, Marielle Aymé stops the two in their tracks to ask them a few questions about the murder case. Van lies and tells her a witness is currently being interrogated by Inspector Nate and that she should hurry there to get some information instead. While Agnès tries to futilely stop her from going, Van gives to Dingo Brad, a young information broker and one of his dearest friends, a list of Giacomo's hideouts to investigate, as he has to repay the favor the Spriggan did him few months prior (Procuring him information about Ronald Griffith).
16:39 | Back to Riverside, Van & Agnès enter into the Café & Bar Bermotti, managed by the homonymous Bermotti, another information broker and friend of Van. By putting all their information together, the three are able to deduce that last evening Giacomo must've snatched the suitcase possibly containing the orbment from his two killers. Soonly thereafter Dingo contacts Van and sends him information and security footage of the hideouts.
As Van and Agnès get out of the bar, the "Sword Maiden", Zemuria's youngest A-rank Bracer and Van Arkride's childhood friend Elaine Auclair approaches the two. Elaine tells Van that the ones behind the murder were most likely members of Almata, which in this moment is being hunted down by many factions in Calvard, including the Bracer Guild, the Police, the CID, various Jaegers Corps and even Ouroboros. Elaine soonly leaves telling him they would catch up another time.
Later into the evening, the duo takes the metro for the 7th District, Central Station, since they deduce the hideout located there is the most probable location for Giacomo to hide the contents of the suitcase. Van tells Agnès to go home, reasoning that Almata is way too dangerous for him to let a young student be involved with. Agnès once more shows her conviction to recover her heirloom however, as it is way too important for her. After persisting, Van gives up and tell her it's she can come as long as she follows his orders and stays out of trouble.
18:44 | The two arrive at their destination. Seeing how the 7th Disitrict has massive monitors displaying the weather conditions and the news, Van points out just how much orbal technology has developed in Calvard in the last 3 years. As Calvard's new president Roy Gramheart is shown talking in the news service projected on the monitor, the post-war reparations from the Erebonian Empire have let Calvard take their position as the biggest economy on the continent. After a brief discussion about the president, the duo takes an hidden passage into the ruins lying in the undergrounds of Central Station, dating from the Middle Ages. As the two enter, they notice the presence of fiends. In this moment Van is able to sense the presence of the Higher Elements and warns Agnès about it.
They thus progress onwards, fending off monsters as they go. Eventually they reach the end of the ruins: the room presents the two with a little altar with two massive gargolye statues on each side. On the altar lies the old orbment Agnès was searching for, emitting a faint blue light. After approaching it, various ghost-like fiends appear and enter the statues: the orbment thus lights red and reacts with these, giving them life, and forcing Van and Agnès to engage in battle. After an intense fight, they recover the heirloom, but just as they start talking about the origins of it, Van senses someone and evades a bullet moving Agnès out of the way. The attackers turn out to be the two Almata members who killed Giacomo. He quickly dispatches both, but after cornering them they consume a Gnosis-like drug. Van is overwhelmed by the enormous leap in combat abilities the enhancement gave them, they manage to break through his defenses. Agnès gets in-between them to protect Van, and in that instant, just before they could deal the final strike, she begins resonating with the orbment now lying on the ground: time stops.
While they wonder what is happening, Van's Hollow Core, Mare materializes into the world, presenting him with a simple question "Will you don the Nightmare? Or will you not?"[2]. Bewildered by this, Van queries if she, an Artificial Intelligence interface for his Xipha unit, was asking that out of her actual free will, to which she simply responds that such thing is obvious. After reiterating her original question, Van states that he has been living in a nightmare for more than 10 years now, and tells her to do whatever she is planning to. By chanting the words "Shard swell! The Grendel is all yours!" time begins moving again as a blue aura of orbal energy surrounds Van Arkride, blasting the two mafiosi away. Behind Van manifests the Darkness-Clad Armored Demon: Grendel. The Demon merges with him, becoming a powerful armor able to boost his combat capabilities: the Grendel-wearing Van is now easily able to take on his two drug-enhanced opponents.
After the fight, Mare and Grendel disappear. Pretty exhausted from the strain of donning the Armored Demon, Van checks on his Xipha but finds no marks of Mare behaving like a real person. After all, he reasons, technology to let an AI act out of free will is way too advanced to exist just yet. The two clonclude that the manifestation of Mare and Grendel, as well as the presence of fiends and Higher Elements in the ruins must've been caused by the orbment they found, which Agnès reveals to be only one out of 8. The full name of all the eight devices together is Oct-Genesis. Considering the antique look of the orbment, as well as its Artifact-like abilities, Van is easily able to induce that the identity of Agnès' great grandfather is none other than Claude Epstein, the father and inventor of Orbal Technology. As Agnès promises Van to tell him everything, the CID and Bracer Guild both reach the scene, represented respectively by René Kincaid & Kaela MacMillan and Elaine Auclaire & Alvis. As they inquire Van about the events, he gives a short explanation without delving into details and lets both of the parties each take one Almata member so that they may interrogate them. As Van and Agnès start leaving, René warns him that based on the recent events something big is brewing in Calvard and he should prepare himself.
22:05 | Arkride Solutions Office - Agnès is treating Van from the wounds he received during the fight, but both point out that they are healing way too fast, guessing that the Grendel form probably has something to do with it. Agnès thus starts explaining as promised: before his death, Claude Epstein wrote a series of notebooks which were firstly passed down and continued by his adopted daughter, Lillia Claudel (Agnès' grandmother) and then, after her disappearance, to Agnès' mother. Four years ago, after the latter's death, Agnès' father started to focus entirely on his work, and his daughter started reading the memoire left by Claude and Lillia. The journal talked about not only about science and Orbal technology but also of Epstein's philosophy and way of life. She enjoyed and treasured the read, starting to understand and feeling closer and closer to her great-grandfather that was never able to meet. As she reached the final volume however, in the last page, the final lines stated: "Please gather the Oct Genesis before the 120X. Otherwise, everything will come to an end". Unsure what Claude meant by this, but determined to take on his request nonetheless, Agnès eventually met Renne in High School, which pointed her out to the Arkride Solutions Office.
After the explanation, Agnès thanks Van for the help and informs him that she intends to recover the missing other 7 units alone while giving him 50 thousands mira as today's payment. Van however only accepts part of it, and tells her that he intends to help her out in her endeavour for no additional fees at all with the conditions of giving him all the information she possesses about the Genesis and the memoirs, as well as becoming strong enough to be able to withstand real battles alone. She cheerfully accepts, but proposes him to at least let her work for him as a part timer and help him out with paperwork and the such. Van is absolutely against the idea of having someone else working in his once solo, hard boiled business, but Agnès doesn't listen to him, and instead promptly starts making order in the office.
Arkride Solutions Office thus obtains its first new employee.
Chapter 1: "Young Flame 〜Departing～[3]"[]
Few weeks before the events of the Prologue | In an unknown mountainous region Eisen Schild and Khurga Warriors Clan's Jaeger corps are having a friendly, yet fierce spar. Especially intense is the fight between Ferrida Al-Fayed, a young Khurga Warrior, and Aida the "Firebird", former member of Zephyr and now active member of Eisen Schild. As Ferrida lands on Aida and restricts her movements, both reach for their daggers, but the battle thereupon comes to a close with Eisen Schild surrending. As Hasan Al Fayed, father of Ferrida and commander of the Khurga negotiates with Eisen Schild's leader Geraint Leger over the splittings of the rewards (resulting in a 6:4 for Khurga), the two young warriors discuss. Aida congratulates an exhausted Ferrida, which she sees as a dear little sister, and promises her that next time they meet they would together talk about the former's adventures with the Zephyr Corps, as well as the other young warrior she doted on, Fie Claussell.
S.1208, September 6, 9:30 — Arkride Solutions Office | 10 days passed since the events that resulted in Van transforming into Grendel. The young Spriggan is now searching on the Orbal Net clues regarding this phenomenon, as well as the Genesis, Claude Epstein and the operations of Almata in Calvard, but nothing seems comes out. He considers the option of asking informations to MTSC, the private military organization he is contracted with as a tester for his Stun Calibur and Hollow Core, but decides not to since he does not fully trust them. In the meanwhile, Yumé, Paulette's daughter enters the office together with a casual outfit-wearing Agnès, who already familiarized with the new environment.
The group thus moves downstairs to the Bistro. After having breakfast, Van and Agnès discuss on what to do today: the former intends to teach the latter how the job of a Spriggan works. The two thus set out for their town patrolling, the first stop being the bulletin board of Old Town: in the back of the boards scattered around the Capital it is usual for people in need for the Spriggan to leave their request and contact information together with the codename "4spg". Thus begins the first day of actual work for the new employee. After doing a pair of 4spgs including finding out why the friend of a client stole money from a cash register and delivering illegal medicines to a back-alley doctor, Van decides to treat Agnès as a celebration for her first day of work. The two eat at the Orbal Cafe Iota in Central District, and outside they run into a trio of bracers composed by Elaine Auclair, Alvis and Zin Vathek. The latter, enthusiastic to finally meet the infamous underground fixer presents himself and asks him to help them out and take on some Bracer quests, since with the emerge of Almata the workload has been unmanageable. Van accepts with the condition of being paid 20% more than a Bracer would as well as only accepting the jobs he likes. The two are immediately sent a pair of requests: one regarding a lost purse and a monster extermination in the same place where Giacomo died. When they go hunt down the monster, they meet Dingo, who presents himself to Agnès for the first time and reveals that apparently Marielle had went ahead to tackle the same quest as Van to find info on Giacomo's case in hopes of reaching Dingo's level, whom she sees as her rival. Van, feeling bad for having partially caused this by having deceptively pointed her to Inspector Nate, thus set out to find her together with Agnès and Dingo. They eventually find her being almost eaten by the slime monster the request asked to exterminate, and after rescuing her Van and Agnès start returning to the office.
As the sun sets the two buy some sweets from various places in town, but Van notices that someone is tailing them. He decides to lure them into the back alley of Montmarte, where the office's garage is located. Disappearing from their sight using a Shard spatial camouflage, the one tailing them lowers their guard and Van pins them against the garage door. She appears to be a young girl wearing middle eastern clothes. Seeing her movements and attire, Van is easily able to guess she's a member of the Khurga Warriors Clan. She introduce herself as Ferrida Al-Fayed, and asks Van for a consultation.
After sitting down in the office upstairs, Ferrida starts explaining; around a month prior, her corps were fighting against Eisen Schild in a proxy war. After the truce, the two corps were supposed to retreat to their own homelands, but soon thereafter the Khurga were contacted to ask whether they knew something about a missing squadron of Eisen Schild, which apparently didn’t make it home. Since the relationship between the two Corps is particularly good, this worried the people of the Khurga, and especially Ferrida. As it happens, it turns out that the missing Eisen Schild squadron was the one led by her friend Aida. For this reason she intended to help out searching for them, but wasn’t allowed by her father due to her tender age and inexperience. Thus, knowing that the squadron should’ve left for Calvard and having heard rumors about a “solutions office” from a soldier of her village, Ferrida decided to secretly travel alone to the Republic and seek Van’s help.
After recounting the story, the Genesis in Agnès’ pouch reacts. She explains that according to Claude’s notes, the Eight Genesis are “attracted” to each other, and so theorizes that whatever happened to Aida’s squadron could have something to do with another Genesis unit. Van thus has no other choice to accept the request and immediately starts gathering information. He first contacts Dingo and Bermotti, and finally calls René, which already knew what he was going to ask about as he was keeping tabs on Ferrida since she entered the Republic. As a thanks for having apprehended the two Almata members the other day, René explains to Van that Hercules, the special military force of the CID, intercepted Aida's group around 10 days before. Their objective was to capture the Eisen Schild squadron, but Aida easily managed to breakthrough and retreat. After consulting the Map of the Republic for a bit, Van, Ferrida and Agnès concluded that the most likely place for them to retreat was Creil, a small rural village to the Northwest of Calvard. Van thus decided they would depart the morning after, and talked with Paulette and Viktor to lend Ferrida one of the rooms in the building for the day.
S.1208, September 7, 6:04 | The trio is getting ready to depart on Van’s pride and joy, his Ingert Pickup Truck, the S.1204 Model “Night Breaker”. Another of Van’s hyperfixations other than sweets happens in fact to be cars and car modding. After a passionate, although not quite well received by the two girls, explanation of his car’s prowess, Victor, Paulette and Yumé see them off by giving them a packed breakfast.
11:25 | Near the outskirts of the village Van and Ferrida notice that something must’ve happened ahead on the road. They thus stop the car and see that a pack of wolf monsters have surrounded an orbal bus originally directed towards Remiferia. After fighting them off the bus driver thanks the three, but Van promptly asks him to contact his company to be remunerated for their work. As a bonus they would however escort the damaged bus to the village so that they could fix it.
12:20 | After escorting the bus all the way through, they finally reach Creil and have lunch at the village’s inn. While eating they confirm with one of the barkeepers that Aida has indeed been recently in this village and they discover that she was spotted around 3 days ago at night: they thus set out to know more about this by asking the townspeople.
During their information gathering they hear some ruckus at the entrance of the village. A young man got his dear bicycle stolen, and Van instantly sees this as an occasion to get some more work done. After the young man accepts the Spriggan’s conditions, the trio start searching for the thief in the outskirts of the village. Following the road, they eventually find him surrounded by some wolf-monsters. They quickly dispatch them, but Van’s intuition tells him that there is something weird with both these and the monsters who attacked the bus. Nonetheless, the three escort the burglar back, which apparently was one of the men in the bus and had thought the Spriggan and his two companions were debt collectors trying to catch him. After making him apologize with the bicycle owner, everyone returns to the village as the sun starts setting.
After checking in the inn to get a room for the night, the three notice someone whistling a song. The performer ends up being a turquoise haired man named Melchior, who presents himself as a wanderer who happened to be in the bus. During the morning the young man had been strolling around towards the West, especially interested to see the pre-Collapse ruins located there, from which the Church had apparently excavated some kind of statue around 20 years ago. He however tells the group that he saw no one there out in the wild, thus debunking the possibility of Aida and her group settling somewhere in that direction.
18:20 | The trio sits around the table of their room to run over all the information they gathered. They point out how strange it was for Aida to appear in the village alone at night 3 days ago and also that the monsters they fought felt to be restless and terrorized by something or someone. As they continue theorizing where the Eisen Schild squadron could’ve set their camp, Van notices a presence and someone promptly knocks on their door. The Spriggan immediately alerts Agnès to fall back and Feri brings out her weapon as “The Direwolf”, Walter Kron, Ouroboros’ Enforcer No. VIII enters the room. He congratulates both for their quick reaction and asks Van if he could accept a request from him: Van however firmly disagrees, as he had a terrible experience during his first job with him and clearly still totally despises the guy. He thus disappointedly leaves by telling them he’s searching for a turquoise haired man. After the encounter the three decide to go understairs to eat dinner.
20:02 | Now dark outside, the three decide to patrol the village to see whether the Firebird would once again appear at night. Talking with the villagers they discover that one of the people in the bus, who supposedly would’ve all remained to the village for the night, had disappeared: the trio recognize the person description and guess Melchior had apparently ran away, probably having noticed to be chased by an Enforcer. They also discover that the night Aida was spotted on, she had apparently bought a lot of gasoline from the orbment workshop, a quite weird product that rarely gets used anymore by people in the post-Orbment Revolution age.
While walking in the village the three spot Walter’s Orbal Bike, which brings Van to recount of his episode (and reason for his hatred) with the Enforcer to a not-so-curious Agnès and Feri: some years ago the Spriggan was asked to help him out fighting and save some people. After driving to the place and engaging in combat they soon found themselves fighting against a Soldat. Finding it a quite formidable opponent, Van thus proposed to retreat, but instead Walted had the fantastic idea of bare handedly lifting up and throwing Van’s Pickup Truck against the thing. This caused Van’s extremely customized and beloved car to get absolutely wrecked, and even if the Enforcer did get him an used car of the same model in good condition, Van still absolutely hates the guy for having reduced his treasure to scrap iron and had to spend 2 years modding the new car to match the precedent’s level. Just as Van finished his monologue a bracer-usage car parks next to them and the C-Rank bracer Alvis shows up, apparently on a mission to discover the reason why monsters near Creil are acting weirdly.
As they walk towards the inn, the barkeeper calls out to them and tells them that the woman they were searching for apparently had just passed by and requested her to deliver three letters, one to Eisen Schild, one to the Guild and one to the Khurga. The three thus immediately moved out to find her, and quickly meet her at the western entrance of the village looking quite wounded and tired. Surprised by meeting Feri all the way here, she thanks Van to having looked after her but tells them to not get close. In the meanwhile Alvis and a policeman reach the scene wondering who the woman is, but soon thereafter a bright red light shines from the western hills and the howl of countless wolves is heard throughout the town: a seemingly possessed pack of Eisen Schild’s military wolves thus shows up and start attacking the villagers, presumably the same who caused fear and agitation to the local wild wolf-type monsters. Aida tells the trio and the bracer to hold the line and quickly runs toward the direction of the red light, where the ruins Melchior had mentioned were. As the defeat the first group, another one shows up, and the defeated ones rise once again like undeads. Walter shows up and tells Van he would take care of things here in exchange to forget about the car thing. Having no choice Van tells him he would consider it as they set out after Aida.
21:20 - Creil Village Highway | As the three move, they figure out Melchior was lying and that Eisen Schild must’ve definitely been somewhere around the western hills, and the first Genesis unit in Agnès pocket starts resonating. As they reach the ruins on top of an hill, the scene is quite astounding: surrounding them are ancient stone monuments, some of which have clearly possessed Eisen Schild jaegers chained to them, and the tallest one having another Genesis unit emitting the red light they could see all the way from the village. Aida, standing there in the middle surrounded by gasoline tanks, thus begins explaining what happened 10 days ago.
After breaking through Hercules’ offensive, they made their way towards Creil but met with a certain organization led by three incredible fighters. They engaged in a fierce, but one-sided fight. The Aida-led Eisen Schild corp got completely decimated; or so she thought. She woke up next to these stone monuments the morning after, surrounded by her comrades who had gone completely berserk and were unable of uttering a single word but groans. For some reason she retained most of her consciousness, but the sun pained her, and she didn’t feel hunger. The jaeger wolves too started acting out of control, and she could feel the need of having to drink human blood, like she was some kind of ghoul from old fairy tales. For this reason, using every last bit of sanity that she had left, she started gathering gasoline with the intention of burning herself and all of her squadron alive, in hopes that she would be able to put an actual end to their already lost lives.
After a reassuring speech by Agnès, Aida gains some determination to ask the Spriggan’s help, but their rejoicing is put to a quick conclusion by the entrance of one of the three leaders that Aida fought 10 days prior: Melchior “the Thorn”, now presenting himself as an ex Garden leader and now Almata’s second in command. He reveals the two other ruthless leaders were still part of Garden, but acting under Almata’s orders. Cutting the wires chaining the out of control jaegers, he activates the red light-emitting Genesis, making Aida go berserk and thus forcing the two sides to fight. After fending the Eisen Schild squadron back, the situation gets worse as Aida and the other jaegers resonate even strongly with the Genesis and start all fusing together. In the meanwhile Walter shows up to chase Melchior down, which thus bids adieu to everyone and starts retreating. Now the trio has to deal with a demonic ghoul, product of the fusion of the entire Eisen Schild squadron: Aida Gura. Feri tries to reach out to her in disbelief, but quickly gets attacked. Van hurriedly protects her from a flurry of blows, breaking his ribs. As the situation gets quite problematic though, both the Genesis in Agnès pouch and the second one start emitting a blue light: time stops once again as Mare materializes herself. Not too surprised by this phenomenon happening again, Van quickly tells to do her thing: Grendel thus manifests once again, and the now nightmare-wearing Spriggan engages in fight with the ghoul together with Feri.
After an arduous fight, Aida Gura returns normal, liberating everyone fused together. Feri thus runs towards an extremely tired Aida, as the souls of the entire squadron start slowly ascending to the heavens: their life had after all already ended 10 days ago, and their life was fuelled by the ghoul-effect of the second Genesis unit. Before they disappear, Commander Geraint of Eisen Schild and Hasan, Feri’s father and Khurga’s leader, reach the scene together with their corps. Everyone pays their respect and start praying for the souls of the fallen. Aida thus thanks Van and Agnès to have let her see Feri one last time. As a last request, she asks Feri to be the one dealing the final blow and end her life. Hasan and Geraint thus tells her to grant her wish, as this is an important ritual for a jaeger and a first step for her maturity as a soldier. Crying and trembling with fear, she holds her dagger onto her chest, but before she could do anything Van gets in the way, reprimanding her father to let such a small child do something like that. He thus grabs his sword and stabs her. Slowly disappearing around Feri’s arms, Aida says her farewell to everyone present, as well as Xeno, Leo and Fie and thus finally set out to reach her old leader in heaven.
S.1208, September 12, 16:00 — Arkride Solutions Office | Van and Agnès are now sitting in their office, going through all the events in Creil Village. Now owning two of the eight Genesis, Agnès reveals that this second unit was originally able to control people’s life force, and was in fact used to develop curative orbal arts like Tear. Almata had supposedly managed to get their hands on this unit and use it to test this functionality on Aida’s corps, making them immortal ghouls. While sadly there was nothing to do about Aida and the others, they had at least recovered a new Genesis and averted the crisis it could’ve brought. However Van finds himself asking whether Agnès is really sure to want to continue her part time job as his assistant, doubting that his morality, which he defines being “somewhere within the bluish-darkness“, might not sit well with her. Once again though, Agnès proves her determination by telling him that while she might not be as wise or experienced as him, she’s more than able to support him. After her heartfelt declaration, Feri knocks on the office door. Surprised by their appearance, the two wonder what she is doing here considering she had to be at the Khurga village now. The little jaeger explains that she got disowned due to her reckless acting and going against orders. Hasan threw her out telling her she had to get more experience of the real world, for this reason she immediately went to the Solutions Office to seek employment, bringing with her a letter from her father directed to Van. In the letter Hasan thanks the young Spriggan, but also scolds him for having “stolen” the opportunity for Feri to grow when he dealt the final blow to Aida. For this reason he expects Van to take full responsibility and work Feri hard to make her gain some real world experience, and concludes by telling him that if he even dared to lay an hand to her the entire Khurga Warrior Clan would set out to hunt him down, leaving him no real choice but to hire his second employee.
Characters[]
- Van Arkride
- Agnes Claudel
- Feri Al-Fayed
- Aaron Wei
- Risette Twinings
- Quatre Salision
- Judith Lanster
- Bergard Zeman
- Elaine Auclair
- Rene Kincaid
Development[]
Artwork for Daybreak's protagonist, Van Arkride.
Nihon Falcom announced Trails through Daybreak, alongside The Legend of Nayuta: Boundless Trails and Trails of Cold Steel IV for Switch, on 17 December 2020. The character for "kuro" (黎, black) is taken from the Japanese word for dawn (
Gallery[]
Key Visuals[]
.jpg.jpg "Announcement visual (Kuro).jpg.jpg (269 KB)")
.png "Announcement Key Visual V2 (Kuro).png (3.84 MB)")
.jpg "Agency Key Visual (Kuro).jpg (1.78 MB)")
.jpg "Key Visual 2 (Kuro).jpg (800 KB)")
.jpg "Key Visual 3 (Kuro).jpg (2.66 MB)")
.png "Feri - Key Visual (Kuro).png (6.61 MB)")
.png "Risette - Key Visual (Kuro).png (3.31 MB)")
.png "Quatre - Key Visual (Kuro).png (3.13 MB)")
.png "Tharbad - Key Visual (Kuro).png (7.15 MB)")
.jpg "Grimcats Yin Key Visual (Kuro).jpg (2.34 MB)")
.png "Groupshot Monmarte - Key Visual (Kuro).png (3.42 MB)")
.png "Cover Art Key Visual (Kuro).png (2.95 MB)")
.png "Cover Art Kuro PS5 (Kuro).png (3.13 MB)")
.png "Kuro main party Key Visual (Kuro).png (6.43 MB)")
.png "Genesis Tower Key Visual (Kuro).png (3.47 MB)")
.png "Renne & Agnes illustration (Kuro).png (3.96 MB)")
.png "Gerard & Creil - Key Visual (Kuro).png (6.51 MB)")
.png "Van & Grendel - Key Visual (Kuro).png (3.04 MB)")
Ending Visuals[]
.png "Ending - Visual 1 (Kuro).png (699 KB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 2 (Kuro).png (1.17 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 3 (Kuro).png (2.14 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 4 (Kuro).png (2.53 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 5 (Kuro).png (1.62 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 6 (Kuro).png (3.64 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 7 (Kuro).png (3.57 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 8 (Kuro).png (3.36 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 9 (Kuro).png (3.15 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 10 (Kuro).png (2.93 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 11 (Kuro).png (2.35 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 12 (Kuro).png (3.31 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 13 (Kuro).png (3.9 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 14 (Kuro).png (2.2 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 15 (Kuro).png (2.82 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 16 (Kuro).png (1.91 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 17 (Kuro).png (3 MB)")
.png "Ending - Visual 18 (Kuro).png (3.76 MB)")
Official Artwork[]
.png "Twilight Journey (Kuro).png (5.36 MB)")
.png "The Girl and the Demon (Kuro).png (2.09 MB)")
.png "HOT-SHOT - Van (Kuro).png (2.76 MB)")
.png "HOT-SHOT - Agnès & Van (Kuro).png (2.74 MB)")
.png "HOT-SHOT - Agnès & Feri (Kuro).png (3.19 MB)")
.png "HOT-SHOT - Elaine (Kuro).png (2.43 MB)")
.png "HOT-SHOT - Aaron (Kuro).png (2.68 MB)")
.png "HOT-SHOT - Renne (Kuro).png (2 MB)")
.png "HOT-SHOT - Fie (Kuro).png (2.7 MB)")
.png "HOT-SHOT - Shizuna (Kuro).png (3.47 MB)")
.png "HOT-SHOT - Van & Elaine & Kincaid New Year 2022 (Kuro).png (3.29 MB)")
.jpg "Valentine's Day official artwork 2022 (Kuro).jpg (2.85 MB)")
.jpg "Valentine's Day official artwork 2022 2nd Ver(Kuro).jpg (2.74 MB)")
.jpg "White Day official artwork 2022 (Kuro).jpg (2.75 MB)")
Visuals[]
.png "Van Reading The Book of Ezer - Visual Blurry (Kuro).png (2.06 MB)")
.png "Van Diabolic Core Extraction - Visual Blurry (Kuro).png (2.19 MB)")
.png "Claude Epstein & the Three Disciples (Kuro).png (3.31 MB)")
.png "Agnès Reading Claude's Memoirs 1 (Kuro).png (2.7 MB)")
.png "Agnès Reading Claude's Memoirs 2 (Kuro).png (2.99 MB)")
.png "Feri & Aida - Visual (Kuro).png (4.1 MB)")
.png "Garden's Leaders 1 - Visual (Kuro).png (2.49 MB)")
.png "Aida 1 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.09 MB)")
.png "Aida 2 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.01 MB)")
.png "Aaron's Childhood - Visual (Kuro).png (4.19 MB)")
.png "Taikun, Yin & Heiyue - Visual (Kuro).png (5.76 MB)")
.png "Chained Taikun - Visual (Kuro).png (2.87 MB)")
.png "Van & Renne - Visual (Kuro).png (3.48 MB)")
.png "Quatre & Hamilton 1 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.6 MB)")
.png "Quatre & Hamilton 2 - Visual (Kuro).png (2.94 MB)")
.png "Maxim & Paulette 1 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.04 MB)")
.png "Maxim & Paulette 2 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.05 MB)")
.png "Maxim & Paulette 3 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.01 MB)")
.png "Maxim & Paulette 4 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.11 MB)")
.png "Maxim & Paulette 5 - Visual (Kuro).png (2.92 MB)")
.png "Agnès' Childhood 1 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.7 MB)")
.png "Agnès' Childhood 2 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.42 MB)")
.png "Grimcats & Yin 1 - Visual (Kuro).png (6.92 MB)")
.png "Grimcats & Yin 2 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.09 MB)")
.png "Viola - Visual (Kuro).png (2.77 MB)")
.png "Alexandre - Visual (Kuro).png (2.85 MB)")
.png "Ishtanti - Visual (Kuro).png (5.42 MB)")
.png "Olympia - Visual (Kuro).png (5.52 MB)")
.png "Olympia & Emperor - Visual (Kuro).png (2.66 MB)")
.png "Arioch - Visual (Kuro).png (5.5 MB)")
.png "Priest Gerard - Visual (Kuro).png (1.97 MB)")
.png "D∴G Cult Extermination 1 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.24 MB)")
.png "D∴G Cult Extermination 2 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.35 MB)")
.png "Gerard - Visual (Kuro).png (1.71 MB)")
.png "Almata - Visual (Kuro).png (4.92 MB)")
.png "Van's Childhood 1 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.72 MB)")
.png "Van's Childhood 2 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.66 MB)")
.png "Van's Childhood 3 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.31 MB)")
.png "Van's Childhood 4 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.31 MB)")
.png "Van's Childhood 5 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.38 MB)")
.png "Van's Childhood 6 - Visual (Kuro).png (2.81 MB)")
.png "Van's Childhood 7 - Visual (Kuro).png (2.91 MB)")
.png "Van's Youth 1 - Visual (Kuro).png (6.69 MB)")
.png "Van's Youth 2 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.65 MB)")
.png "Van's Youth 3 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.65 MB)")
.png "Van's Youth 4 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.49 MB)")
.png "Van's Youth 5 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.51 MB)")
.png "Van's Youth 6 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.59 MB)")
.png "The Gralsritter - Visual (Kuro).png (2.52 MB)")
.png "Zephyr - Visual (Kuro).png (3.41 MB)")
.png "The Four Gardens - Visual (Kuro).png (2.68 MB)")
.png "Garden's Leaders 2 - Visual (Kuro).png (2.44 MB)")
.png "D∴G Cult 1 - Visual (Kuro).png (2.78 MB)")
.png "D∴G Cult 2 - Visual (Kuro).png (3.05 MB)")
Packaging[]
.jpg "Cover Art (Kuro).jpg (814 KB)")
.png "Box Art (Kuro).png (594 KB)")
.jpg "Cover Art PS5 (Kuro).jpg (241 KB)")
.png "Box Art PS5 (Kuro).png (827 KB)")
.png "Box Art NS (Kuro).png (2.6 MB)")
Concept Art[]
.jpg "Edith - Concept Art 1 (Kuro).jpg (1.94 MB)")
.png "Basel - Concept Art (Kuro).png (4.41 MB)")
Promotional screenshots[]
.jpg "Announcement screenshot 1 (Kuro).jpg (222 KB)")
.jpg "Announcement screenshot 2 (Kuro).jpg (226 KB)")
.jpg "Announcement screenshot 3 (Kuro).jpg (226 KB)")
.jpg "Announcement screenshot 4 (Kuro).jpg (167 KB)")
.jpg "Van Arkride 1 (Kuro).jpg (258 KB)")
.jpg "Van Arkride 2 (Kuro).jpg (215 KB)")
.jpg "Van Arkride 3 (Kuro).jpg (434 KB)")
.jpg "Agnes Claudel - Promotional Screenshot 1 (Kuro).jpg (444 KB)")
.jpg "Agnes Claudel - Promotional Screenshot 2 (Kuro).jpg (552 KB)")
.jpg "Agnes Claudel - Promotional Screenshot 3 (Kuro).jpg (378 KB)")
.jpg "Aaron Wei - Promotional Screenshot 1 (Kuro).jpg (333 KB)")
.jpg "Aaron Wei - Promotional Screenshot 2 (Kuro).jpg (306 KB)")
.jpg "Aaron Wei - Promotional Screenshot 3 (Kuro).jpg (289 KB)")
.jpg "Feri Al-Fayed - Promotional Screenshot 1 (Kuro).jpg (483 KB)")
.jpg "Feri Al-Fayed - Promotional Screenshot 2 (Kuro).jpg (389 KB)")
.jpg "Feri Al-Fayed - Promotional Screenshot 3 (Kuro).jpg (302 KB)")
.jpg "Edith - Downtown (Kuro).jpg (395 KB)")
.jpg "Edith - Metro (Kuro).jpg (330 KB)")
.jpg "Edith - Area (Kuro).jpg (338 KB)")
.jpg "Risette Twinings - Promotional Screenshot 1 (Kuro).jpg (371 KB)")
.jpg "Risette Twinings - Promotional Screenshot 3 (Kuro).jpg (211 KB)")
.jpg "Risette Twinings - Promotional Screenshot 2 (Kuro).jpg (489 KB)")
.jpg "Quatre Salision - Promotional Screenshot 1 (Kuro).jpg (270 KB)")
.jpg "Quatre Salision - Promotional Screenshot 2 (Kuro).jpg (246 KB)")
.jpg "Quatre Salision - Promotional Screenshot 3 (Kuro).jpg (435 KB)")
.jpg "Judith Ranster - Promotional Screenshot 1 (Kuro).jpg (315 KB)")
.jpg "Judith Ranster - Promotional Screenshot 2 (Kuro).jpg (467 KB)")
.jpg "Judith Ranster - Promotional Screenshot 3 (Kuro).jpg (372 KB)")
.jpg "Bergard Zeman - Promotional Screenshot 1 (Kuro).jpg (417 KB)")
.jpg "Bergard Zeman - Promotional Screenshot 2 (Kuro).jpg (192 KB)")
.jpg "Bergard Zeman - Promotional Screenshot 3 (Kuro).jpg (198 KB)")
Localization[]
Trivia[]
- Daybreak marks the second time the first game of an arc did not end on a cliffhanger, the first being Zero.
- Also similar to Zero, the game does not contain Olivert within its story, with his only appearance being a brief cameo in the ending credits.
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