Of all the travelers of this glorious star, none are quite so mysterious as the Wandering Minstrel. He claims ever to seek inspiration for his songs, and yet, from time to time, he has been known to intervene and even take up arms against unusual threats!

Not a few have claimed that his song lyrics have predicted the future, and that the music of his harp can induce visions. While your humble author cannot capture that music on paper, she still can gather up the scraps of remembered words, that you may judge for yourself.

((The following are transcripts of in-game quest dialogue.))

Nidhogg's Rage

Eternal is a dragon's woe,
Unceasing does his anguish flow,
Yet 'fore the walls of Ishgard high,
'Gainst blood did Hraesvelgr ally.

Eternal is a dragon's rage,
Dread Nidhogg's wrath did span an age,
Yet by his hated brother's eye,
Did light quell shade, and vengeance die. (1)

(1) Quest: Nidhogg's Rage

Thordan's Reign

The song of war 'twixt wyrm and man
Some thousand years ago began
When mortals grasped for godly might,
Defaming name of king and knight...

...In Azys Lla, for woe or weal,
Did holy will meet righteous steel,
And thence was high divinity
Compelled by Light to bend the knee. (2)

(2) Quest: Thordan's Reign

Shadow of the Raven

Listen, my good adventurer, and listen well,
For the song I sing is of your tell.

Into the flesh of Darkness go bringers of Light,
For the flame that flickers in Bahamut's Tomb.
In that cloying black stirs a raven white,
Clawing blood from a barren womb.

What was slain in silver proud
Did in golden malice rise,
Metals of infamy and ruin,
That every hero must despise. (3)

(3) Quest: Sing Me Another Song

The Ultimate Ballad

From an era long forgotten,
A blade of midnight drawn,
From a battlefield awakened,
A warrior who bears the dawn.

From an era long forgotten,
A blade of midnight drawn,
From a distant land uncharted,
A warrior who bears the dawn. (4)

(4) Quest: The Ultimate Battle

A Song of Steam and Steel

O friends far and near, I challenge you all
To think of a marvel so strange or so tall,
A steely-skinned giant whose veins coursed with steam,
In whose bright-burnished bosom foul goblins did scheme,
A heaven to they who therein did dwell,
But one whose mere being made all else a hell.

Forsooth, he could not well be let to abide,
So into his huge hand a hero did stride,
And battled through legions to reach his hard heart,
Conspiring at last to rend it apart.
His core being no more, the giant fell still,
Though the goblins remained there to plan further ill. (5)

(5) Quest: A Song of Steam and Steel

In the giant's iron innards, the goblins did toil,
Through sunrise and sunset, intruders to foil,
Till the limb of their lodging did chance to awake,
A path for our weariless hero to make,
And thus did he aim for the beast's second heart,
Cleaving both it and its keepers apart.

Yet in spite of his triumph, the goblins all laughed,
And by means lost to meaning, in victory basked.
Yea, the giant of steel was far more than it seemed,
With power beyond knowing, potential ungleaned.
And thus was our hero compelled to withdraw,
Resolved to return and do battle once more. (6)

(6) Quest: A Refrain for the Undaunted

In the breast of the giant, a crystal did stand,
Whose hunger for aether spelled death for the land.
And thus did our hero swear never to cease,
Till he'd torn out the heart of the great metal beast.
Yet for all of his labors, both bruising and brave,
The goblins stood poised to make hist'ry their slave.

The giant, however, had plans of its own,
And plucked from the goblins their dreams of a home,
For it saw but one way to set hist'ry aright,
A champion of ages, a hero of light.
So the giant now sleeps, as it once did before,
In a moment repeated, forever and more. (7)

(7) Quest: Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Retells Your Story

harbinger of night

In the wake of Calamity, Light descends once more,
To illuminate a world reborn, risen from fires of war.
'Neath the eyes of heaven, deception crumbles to dust,
Those divided by malice, united by bonds of trust.

On fields awash in crimson, battle raged far and wide,
In the name of liberty, the courageous few turn the tide.
Unto a distant realm, drowned in radiance unrelenting,
Strides forth the harbinger of night, iron will unbending. (8)

(8) Quest: Glass from the Past