Across the land called Terra, every nation carries its own tale. This record isn't one grand event tying everything together — it's six short stories about people living in six different places.

One leaves home, one runs away, one just means to pass through. And yet, strangely enough, every one of them stops in their tracks and ends up grasping someone's hand.

Perhaps what each of these six was searching for was, in the end, 'a place where I'm allowed to be.'

To Prove You're No Beast of Burden, Just Survive a Month in the Canyon

Ila is a former Reunion warrior who has left Ursus behind and is heading into the wastes. Together with her comrade Gareth, she was walking in search of an organization called the 'Rusted Hammer,' rumored to be a band of brutal marauders.

Rumors are just rumors, Gareth says. He'd seen it once, back in his army days: an Ursus unit that had crossed into Kazimierz was wiped out by that very band — a horde that freed the Infected from the mines and smashed every trace of Ursus as it charged in like madmen.

A rusted hammer stood driven upside-down into a mountaintop. The man guarding it tosses the pair a shovel and a pickaxe: survive one month down in that canyon. That, he says, is the condition for joining the 'Rusted Hammer.'

A month of hunting burdenbeasts, scattering bone meal to plant barley, and wandering in search of water. But on the way to find water, they spot the bootprints of Ursus soldiers — the pursuit party of Colonel Lomono, come to capture Gareth.

Gareth says they should pack up and flee. But this time, Ila won't budge.

I won't run today. If I die, I'll die in this canyon. Everything here is all I have — it's our blood and sweat, and this is our new home.

— Ila

It wasn't only the Ursus army that witnessed her resolve. The 'Rusted Hammer' warrior who came each day to check whether the two were still breathing finally declares them accepted.

Warriors of the wastes packed both cliffs of the canyon, encircling the twenty-four Ursus soldiers. When Ila offers to fight alongside them, the warrior answers: we don't fight — we only break. The sound of hammered iron shook the canyon.

Saved From the Brink of Death, the Guest Swung a Weapon the Moment She Woke

This time, we're far away in Minos. In this land at war with Sargon, Heavyrain is found collapsed near the border — a young Kuranta mercenary who had crossed over from Sargon.

The one who took her in is Pallas, the priestess whom the villages of Minos call their 'goddess.' The Sarkaz mercenary at her side was wary, warning that she might be a spy, but Pallas insists on treating her, saying she cannot abandon a life so long as there's no danger.

The moment she wakes, Heavyrain swings her weapon — though the cramped tent blocks the motion. Pallas, in turn, sets her own weapon down. Looking at that weapon without a single fresh scratch, she says: you haven't fought recently. So there's no need to be afraid.

Heavyrain has no destination — she simply wants to go far away. The wastes, the battlefield, Sargon: right now she doesn't want to face any of it. Pallas presses a working compass into her hand and prays for her.

We are all walking an endless journey, enduring pain to protect our own souls. And the more important thing we must all face is this: to find a resting place of our own.

— Pallas

That night, a Sarkaz killer who had been trailing Heavyrain sets their sights on Pallas. The one who stood in their way was the Sarkaz mercenary. The battle in the dark was never recorded for posterity. Only this: Heavyrain's journey continued, and one day the light of her soul would drift toward Rhodes Island.

The Kid Who Set Out to Scare Her Big Sister Turned Out to Be the Scarier Tale Herself

The scene shifts abruptly to a Rhodes Island lounge. While looking for her doll, Annie, Bena discovers Kirara engrossed in a game in front of the TV — an operator who loves horror games but is terribly shy around strangers.

Bena's pleading to play together leaves Kirara flustered — worried about age ratings, she starts by turning off the blood effects. Even so, the two take down a hidden boss together, and Kirara gleefully explains the Shin-Akishi ghost story and the true ending. A ghost story, she says, loses its power the moment its truth is revealed.

In return, Bena tells an old Victorian ghost story: of an old woman who takes orphans away on rainy days, of a child-sized doll named 'Annie,' and of the children who never came back.

Just as Kirara is thoroughly spooked, the doll Annie quietly opens its mouth and greets her — Bena's mischievous little act. And yet, the lingering sense that the child in that frightening old tale was somehow Bena herself quietly remains behind the laughter.

It's just... hardly anyone's ever been the first to talk to me before.

— Kirara

Its Flame Dark for Decades, Still Someone Guards the Lighthouse No One Comes To

Somewhere in northern Iberia, a coastal city ruined by the Seaborne Catastrophe. Blue Poison and Glaucus descend underground to investigate a building fallen to ruin — the operator who wields poison, and the engineer from Iberia.

Inside lay the corpse of a bounty hunter, bound by seaweed and drowned — a trace of how this place had been submerged by seawater twice. In the dark, the two speak cautiously of the Ægir, of poisons, and of that catastrophe too dreadful to name.

Deeper in, a white light flickers. Caught by Blue Poison's arrow was a lost Iberian caster, Aria. She's the one who tells them that this building is, in fact, a lighthouse.

Aria is an apprentice lighthouse keeper. She says she still guards the lighthouse — one that has never been able to light its flame again since the catastrophe — together with her teacher. Even though the ships crossing the sea vanished long ago.

The light we make can only illuminate a tiny corner, that's all. The ships that once traveled the sea vanished long ago — and yet we still keep the lighthouse.

— Aria

Glaucus suggests taking the broken energy core back to Rhodes Island to study it, and Aria makes up her mind to join them. Then, belatedly reacting to Blue Poison's neurotoxin, she keels over — only to come right back around. This lighthouse might just become a new Rhodes Island outpost guarding the coast.

Bored of the Noble City, She Went for a Walk — and Picked Up a Runaway Infected

This is Leithanien. Carnelian is a Sargonian attendant who has come here in Count Hyacinth's stead for a cooperation summit. Being of a different race, she drew plenty of unkind stares.

Bored of the glittering downtown, she walks toward the outskirts and helps an Infected girl being chased by the guards. The girl's story went like this: in a mining town, her parents never came home from a shaft collapse, and the guards sealed off the village and hauled its people away.

When a Leithanien caster shows up after her, Carnelian bears down on him fiercely — pressing him about the Arts that enslave the Infected, like a dark remnant left behind by the Witch King. The caster hands the girl over and withdraws.

Carnelian entrusts the girl to a Rhodes Island operator hidden nearby. The girl prepares to set off — to find the children scattered every which way, and one day to avenge them all.

As long as you hold on to the conviction you have now, don't you think we might meet again someday?

— Carnelian

You may refine yourself to fit a foreign land, but there's no need to force yourself into its mold. Better to remain an outsider — to simply be true to yourself, she thinks.

To Send Her Sister a Single Letter, the Young Lady Secretly Climbed All the Way Up the Snowy Mountain

The last stop is Rhodes Island once more. Cliffheart is the youngest of the SilverAsh family and a mountaineer operator. She wants to deliver a single letter to her sister Enya, who left for the Holy Mountain and became a Saint.

She asks Courier, a retainer of the family, but with Kjerag's situation complicated right now, the Manju Order strictly bars any contact with the Saint. Told that the letter would be hard to deliver, Cliffheart pretends to give up.

Then she secretly packs her mountaineering gear and heads for the mountain alone. Courier, catching on, belatedly catches up and tries to stop her — why go so far as to do something this dangerous?

Cliffheart answers: she can no longer pretend not to notice how the relationship between her brother Enciodes and her sister keeps worsening.

If even family won't try to understand one another — if the day ever comes when they turn against each other — then what are we supposed to do?!

— Cliffheart

In the end, Courier throws up his hands and agrees to deliver the letter in her stead — though the monastery is as far as he can go, and he can't promise the Saint will actually receive it. Some time later, Courier returns wearing a somehow heavy expression: this time, there's something SilverAsh has asked him to pass along to Cliffheart.

What It Means to Find a Place to Belong

The wastes, Minos, a lounge, a lighthouse, a noble city, a snowy mountain. The stages were all different, but the six were really doing the same thing — stopping mid-flight to protect someone, and grasping an unfamiliar hand.

Aria headed for Rhodes Island cradling the lighthouse's core, and the darkened lighthouse may yet become an outpost guarding the coast once more. And Heavyrain's journey, too, will one day drift toward that light.

Six people from different nations, with different tales. And yet, in the end, they were all searching for the same thing: a place where they're allowed to be, and someone to stay by their side.