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Hey-hey! White Rabbit here! Lammy scanned this article and said it contains unmarked spoilers for all Trails games. Turn back now if you don't want to get lasered! Okay, byee!

“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 (くろ)の軌跡, literally "Trails of Black") is the eleventh installment in the main Trails series. It was released on September 30, 2021 on PlayStation 4. The PlayStation 5 version release was released on July 28, 2022.

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)".

裏解決屋(スプリガン)』――

カルバード共和国という多様性の坩堝(るつぼ)から生まれた、ある種の“裏稼業”。

ある時は探偵(ディテクティブ)として、ある時は交渉人(ネゴシエーター)として、またある時は賞金稼ぎ(バウンティハンター)として、彼らはどんな、そして誰からの依頼でも受ける。

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 “軌跡(ものがたり)”が始まる。

Story[]

Prologue: "Spriggan from the Old Town[1]"[]

Olivert Reise Arnor - SD (Ao)
Hello there, beautiful. May I have a moment of your time?
Please be aware spoilers for Trails through Daybreak may be present in the following section. Hit [Show] on the right if the show must go on. Adios, amigos!

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 manager of the bistro Paulette offers 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.

There we go, the end of spoilers. Thank you for your time!

Characters[]

Development[]

Van Arkride (Kuro)

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 (黎明(れいめい)), for the game promises to shed light, like a sunrise, on the mysterious of previous games. On 20 December 2020, Falcom revealed character artwork for the protagonist and heroine, and that Trails from/to Zero and Azure artist Katsumi Enami would return as illustrator for Daybreak.

Gallery[]

Key Visuals[]

Ending Visuals[]

Official Artwork[]

Packaging[]

Concept Art[]

Promotional screenshots[]

See also: Category:Trails through Daybreak Screenshots

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.
  1. "旧市街の裏解決屋"
  2. 悪夢を纏う、纏わない?
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