The Gullwings had heard rumors that riches could be made digging in the deserts of Bikanel island for the Al-Bhed. Despite Paine's protests that they were sphere hunters and not laborers, Yuna led the girls to Djose temple, to speak with the machine faction leader, Gippal.
Since the tenants of Yevon had forbidden the use of machina, the new faction insisted they were using "machines" not "machina", although anyone with an ounce of sense could see there was no difference.
The Gullwings waited their turn to be granted an interview with the dashing Gippal. Yuna was a bit taken aback by how quickly she was accepted. Gippal cared less about their abilities than their simple willingness to do the work; digging in the burning sands and relentless desert sun.
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| The Al-Bhed camp on Bikanel. |
With a letter of introduction now in hand, the Gullwings sped off to Bikanel. Their task was relatively simple, but by no means easy. Diggers could only survive out in the open desert for about 60 seconds before needing to ride back to camp and rehydrate. They had to search the sands using a radar, indicating where items were located under the sand. The main goal was to find important parts for the Al-Bhed, thus completing the dig. However, their were also fiends wandering about the desert to make things more difficult! Certainly not the least of which was a massive beast that was detected on the radar as an "unidentified object". When it reached the girls, they were at first quite afraid of the intimidating beast, but for some reason unknown to them, it did not attack.
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| Angra Mainu... My first thought was that I was toast when I encountered it, but as far as I can tell it has a running total of ~322,000hp, and gets more attacks as the story progresses. At the beginning, it simply watches, then eventually ejects you from battle. |
After their work in the desert, the Gullwings continued their tour of Spira, as was Yuna's wish. In Luca, they recalled the events prior to concert in the stadium. Yuna had to remain incognito of course, as the populace thought she was about to headline a concert! Unfortunately for Yuna, this meant being dressed up in a stuffy moogle suit and handing out balloons!
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| Yuna's dope threads. I think you can get this as the "mascot" dressphere. I haven't found it yet though. |
The Gullwing's travels also included stops at the Mi'Hen Highroad, which was now patrolled by machina, and the Youth League headquarters. The machina were of dubious effectiveness however, as the girls encountered a ridiculous amount of fiends while walking the road. This was why most folk now took the Al-Bhed hovers to speed through the highroad, avoiding fiends and bandits.
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| Patrolled by machina my ass... the highroad had a ridiculously high encounter rate. |
The Youth League headquarters was an imposing structure, which appeared to be built on the ruins of the massive machina used in the failed Operation Mi'Hen. While the former crusaders were very happy to have a visit from High Summoner Yuna, their leader, Meyvn Nooj, was apparently in the midst of very important planning, and wasn't available.
In this case meyvn is a title for the Youth League's leader. As far as I can tell, it's root is a Yiddish word meaning "expert".
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| Youth League headquarters. |
The Gullwings had a somewhat different experience at the palace of St. Bevelle, the headquarters of New Yevon. The Yevonites were equally excited to recieve a visit from the High Summoner, assuming she had come to join their faction. In this case however, Yuna was granted an audience with their leader, praetor Baralai. He was young and handsome, not at all what the Gullwings had expected.
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| The entrance to the palace of Bevelle. |
Relatively early in the game, the Gullwings are forced to give a sphere to either the Youth League, or New Yevon, the two main opposing forces. I'm not sure this event is really all that significant though. It certainly changes a ton of the dialogue from unimportant NPC's, but I don't feel like it changes anything major. I could be wrong, though. Once you pick a side, the other group immediately views you as spies and enemies, and word travels fast. I've done one playthrough so far giving the Youth League the sphere, and one with New Yevon. Like I said, besides dialogue from bystanders, and being attacked by gaurds in Bevelle, I didn't notice any major differences.
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| At least these two still have some sense! |
It is notable that for some reason you can achieve %100 completion on one playthrough if you give the sphere to the Youth League, but cannot if you choose New Yevon. Is this keeping with the somewhat anti-religious theme of the first game? Hohoho, who knows.
Join us again next time... for This Bard's Tales!
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