Recently, I’ve been spending a lot of time in Assassin’s Creed Valhalla galloping across the east and southeast. There are beautiful views around Kent and Dover, and it is sometimes good to go to the beach, instead of wandering through the wet fertility of the most forested areas in Mercia.
This means that I have aspired to some of the side missions (or local mysteries) in the area that I missed before, and one, although it took three minutes to complete, really made me laugh. It’s about a sea beast called Aflanc the Terrible, but it’s actually the most theatrical filicide attempt ever, and the NPC involved has my enduring respect.
There are many interesting NPCs out there in Valhalla, from serious business pursuits, like King Lear’s three pagan witch sisters spread across East Anglia, to the more capricious, like ‘woman living in a sewer demanding snake entrails’, or’ man who really likes baseball, somehow ‘. One of the fun things about the game is that you never know when you might run into one, and whether it will result in a very engaging side mission.
When I saw these cliffs, for example, I thought: “Wow, I wonder if I go there, I will find a murder mystery where two policemen, one depressed and the other a senseless working mother, will start to disagree, but forge respect and a loving friendship. ”Is Broadchurch too dark for an AC game and takes place in Dorset, which is beyond the scope of the Valhalla map? Yes. But still. This could have happened.
Anyway, here’s what happened (spoilers for this specific mission that I thought about too much):
My crew (and the cat) and I were sailing happily down the river when we heard, on the bank somewhere between Croindene and Guildford, a woman loudly complaining about her father (whose name I forgot, so I’ll refer to as father) for pushing her imminently in the river to drown. And like, she was mad about it, but she looked mostly exasperated; his tone was almost appropriate if he had forgotten to take the chicken out of the freezer in the morning, so now they couldn’t have the chicken for dinner and she was really looking forward to eating the chicken.
Obviously, I jumped off the ship to investigate. Griseld, the young woman in question, was being sacrificed because her farm was reportedly being flooded by a satanic beast called Aflanc the Terrible. Griseld intended to appease Aflanc, who definitely existed because a guy named Godfrey said so.
So, obviously, I went swimming and found that there was no monster, just a shipwreck that occasionally released bubbles and debris. Griseld was irritated by the news, and Dad said, “Wow, no way, but is there a monster anyway?” AND So Godfrey ran and said he specifically told dad that there was no monster, and dad was just looking for an excuse to kill Griseld because she pissed him off, for example, saying he drank too much and called him a tramp. Griseld responded by expelling Dad.
So my thoughts were, roughly in order, as follows:
- Oh my God, what a champion of men. What an absolute hero. To be so furious at what is, at best, a petty nuisance, that you invent a sincere belief in a huge monster as a reason to kill it. Great Old Testament energy.
- The theatricality of everything. He covered the river bank with petals to commit his murder. Why go so far? Given the historical context, he could clearly have killed her and said he was a thug. Or just pushed it and said it was an accident. Or, in fact, he just killed her and didn’t bother to really hide.
- Like, in The Witcher 3, every village you go to has a ghost that they insist has haunted their old apple orchard for hundreds of years, when even the most superficial investigation reveals it is the ghost of a teenager who disappeared three weeks ago , and whose blood is still visible on the floor. Dad probably could have kicked some dead leaves over Griseld’s body and, if anyone bothered to ask, said “the bitch deserved it, she called me a ‘tramp’.”
- Who is Godfrey ?? Your relationship with any party here is not explained.
- Besides, Godfrey, why did you just show up now, after I have solved the problem? It is not as if this is being done secretly. This potential murder is an event. There is a small crowd. What else were you doing that was so important, Godfrey? Were you hiding in the bushes to wait for the most narratively dramatic moment to come and reveal Dad’s terrible secret?
- Griseld is really relaxed about all of this and I respect it, but I’m also concerned.
- But seriously, this man made so much effort to drown his daughter. He pretended to believe fervently that there is a dangerous monster living in the river, for an undisclosed period. He probably has a reputation.
- Imagine it meticulously collecting and spreading all the petals everywhere.
- He is clearly not a tramp.
- I’m on his side too.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t take a screenshot of Dad, but he, his undefined cloak and his bald head, are with me forever. If there is justice in the world, it will start a huge series of missions where I can install Daddy, expelled from his daughter’s house, like a king somewhere. He is the ruler that the difficult times of Valhalla need: ready to do the difficult, and totally out of proportion decisions.
What I am saying is that many of the side missions in Valhalla are absolutely pointless, and I love them even more for that.