#eirs apothecaries

[teryyo]

Hands of the Apothecary

[wayward-rosalind]

In pursuit of those memories that you once held dear...

[shinekittenace]

just broke down sobbing after finishing castti's story 😣

[ophiliaclement]

I know the game isn't even out yet but I've already seen some really lukewarm takes about castti. I'm begging you all don't do to her what everyone did to ophilia. these are actual characters with agency and emotion beyond mom friend-ifying them

[dazzlerazz]

The fuckin. girl with the red hair and hair accessory is Zephia to me by the way. and I think about her a lot and I want to draw her bad and I will draw her and she will be that side character that nobody else cares about and I'll churn out fanart for her in my little corner of the interwebs

[confusions-shed-of-ideas]

tw blood

"I need to remember."

[cynical-gamer-media]

MAJOR SPOILERS FOR ALL OF CASTTI'S STORY (CHAPTER 4).

When asked how the king can repay Castti for saving Timberain she requests four tombstones with the names of her Eir's Apothecaries to be made and erected in Healeaks. There at Healeaks she will deliver a eulogy and the long delayed and deserved funeral for the Eir's Apothecaries: Emma, Andy, Randy, and Malaya. Finally she can grieve.

[waitchil]

Castti the Apothecary: Chapter 1 (Part I)

Castaway...

Drifting

Saved

Lost memories

Port

Malaya, the apothecary

Eir's Apothecary

Epidemic

Searching for the source

It's here...

[these-detestable-hands]

WHEN WE GET HOME IM STARTING ON THE VEST

YAYAYAYAYAYYA

[selfdiagnosedeyemotif]

okay im just gonna call it now: malaya is trying to cure death itself and is going to get very, VERY tangled in the big bad conflict as a result.

also castti’s definitely going to to have a Not Alright moment over it

[stars-and-loops]

Castti, Edmund and Mao become the new Eir's apothecaries but really it's just Edmund and Mao keeping Castti on a leash so she doesn't overwork herself or beat mean people to death

"Castti, you can't just beat someone up because you don't like them"

"WATCH ME."

[viridiave]

"You're one of them Eir's Apothecaries, aren't you...?!"

wanted to finish the sketch so

god I cannot wait to play more of Castti's story

[blvcklizard]

Tanzy could have probably done something but her mind was occupied otherwise.

Bonus:

Just saying, I don't think Eir's apothecaries would have let this happen to you-

[loregoddess]

okay one of my all-time favorite fanarts for the first Octopath game were these doodles of the travelers sleeping, and it made me want to make art of the Octo2 travelers sleeping but I don't have a lot of energy for art lately so I don't think that'll happen, however I was still inspired to come up with a whole bunch of headcanons about the sleeping habits of the Octo2 travelers, sooo...I wrote them instead. Cheers. (some story spoilers)

Ochette Ochette has official art showing her sleeping, so we know she sleeps curled in a tight little ball (although she probably repositions herself in her sleep), but I also think she nests. Like, all the time. Staying at an inn? Ochette turns those blankets into a nest and curls up in them. Camping? no need for a sleeping bag (unless it's cold) she'll just tamp down some grass and make a nest. Will also nest in trees by rearranging the branches and leaves. Nests in Osvald's hair on occasion.

Also I think Ochette's a huge cuddler. She's usually cuddled with Akala or Mahina, but once she gets to know the other travelers better and figures out their personal boundaries, she'll cuddle anyone who's okay with it (probably usually Agnea and Castti. Throne wants to cuddle Ochette so badly but refuses to ask...Ochette eventually figures it out though. Osvald swears he doesn't know anything about Ochette making nests of his hair or snuggling into his coat during cold nights, but everyone knows he has the soul of a loving father. One time Ochette fell asleep leaning against Hikari and he was afraid to move at all for the rest of the night).

Follows something of a crepuscular sleeping schedule, so Ochette's most active at dawn and dusk, naps in the middle of the day, and sleeps through most of the night (although she's skilled at night hunting and can stay up most of the night if need be). Ochette can technically stay awake for a couple of days at a time if she's taking breaks and short rests, since it's useful for tracking and stalking prey over longer distances, but doesn't prefer this type of a hunt. Can also technically follow a "typical diurnal human" sleeping schedule, but Ochette thinks it's stupid. Would love siestas if they existed in Solistia.

Overall quick to fall asleep, quick to wake up. Only feels groggy if it's cold or the weather's bad, as she'd prefer to continue sleeping snuggled up in her warm nest.

Castti Castti can sleep anywhere, anytime, in any position, but mostly because she does not have any sort of healthy sleeping habits or regular sleeping schedule. Terrible, terrible habit of just staying awake to help patients and then passing out as soon as she gets a brief break in her work (her sleeping at a table in her ending card artwork attests to this). She was better about getting proper sleep when she was with Eir's Apothecaries and could share the work, and the other travelers are good at nagging her to get to sleep, but Castti doesn't really hold her own sleep health to the same standards she'll expect of her patients (she is, canonically, a bit reckless about her own health, re: Osvald telling to her to take better care of herself in that one travel banter). Snores if she's gone too long without sleeping, and won't stop until she's gotten at least two hours of sleep.

Not a really deep sleeper, but not a light sleeper either. Castti has the ability to sort of sense when someone around her needs medical help, and wakes up accordingly to help them. If no one's in trouble though she could sleep through a hailstorm on a tin roof. Because she doesn't follow any fixed sleeping schedule, her body's innate sleeping cycles are a bit wonky, but if Castti allowed herself to return to a "normal" sleeping schedule she'd be the sort of person who was up before the sun rose, and be in bed as soon as the sun set.

Throne Throne is the lightest sleeper in the group. A mouse scampering across the inn floor could wake her. Always sleeps on her side with a dagger in hand. If she's at an inn, she chooses whichever bed is against a wall or in a corner with no windows, so that nothing can sneak up behind her as she sleeps, and sleeps facing out towards the rest of the room. If she's camping then she either chooses a location where she can't easily be ambushed (under an overhanging boulder/cliff, against a large tree), or begrudgingly sleeps on her back so she can survey the area around her. Once she's more comfortable with the other travelers, she's willing to treat them as "walls" that she can safely have her back to, but overall being raised by a syndicate of assassins made her an extremely cautious sleeper.

Given the nature of her work, Throne's mostly nocturnal, opting to sleep through the day, and be awake all night long. However, some jobs required more flexibility, so Throne also learned to just sort of be up whenever she needed to be up, and sleep whenever she could. If left to her own devices though she prefers to sleep through the day. Very quick to wake up, but also doesn't have too much trouble getting to sleep either.

Osvald Before prison Osvald was probably the sort of person to stay up late into the night as he pursued his research, and sleep in late during the morning. A very deep sleeper as well, although he did acquire the parental "oh shit, my kid needs me time to be fully awake" instinct when Elena was a baby that never really went away as she got older (Castti recruited Osvald to help her nurse the others when they get sick because he started having the parental "oh shit" reaction to the other travelers as well). If he needed to be up early for some sort of scholarly conference or to teach classes or something, then Rita was the one to get him up in a timely manner (she was more of a morning person), which was good because Osvald would take 1-2 hours just to fully wake up (very serious coffee person).

Osvald's time in prison changed him however, and between the cold and needing to survey everyone and everything in the prison, he stopped sleeping through the night and would sleep in short bursts instead. Like Throne, he became a very cautious sleeper, making sure his back was to a wall while he remained hyper-vigilant of his surroundings. Whatever his sleep schedule might have been didn't matter since he had to abide by the prison's work schedules. Being passed out as he washed up on the shores of Cape Cold was the first long "sleep" Osvald had in five years.

After escaping, he's sort of in a weird in-between state where part of his mind still thinks he's in constant danger and wants to continue being stressed and vigilant, and another part that realizes he's safe now and wants to finally get some rest. As a result Osvald's sleeping habits are...haphazard during his travels. Sometimes he manages to sleep just fine, sometimes he's restless, sometimes he'll be up for two days straight claiming he can't sleep. One time Castti offered him some sleeping medicine and he slept for almost an entire day. He doesn't stop being vigilant, although he's not quite as cautious as Throne (no weapons on hand), but this mostly just results in him knowing everyone else's sleeping habits and troubles. Partway through the travels, Osvald does ease up a bit as he's able to accept he's not in constant danger, and as he comes to trust the others more he begins to relax enough to start recovering his old sleeping habits.

Eventually, he is able to recover most of his sleeping habits, staying up late researching, and sleeping in late (unfortunately Clarissa and Elena have the same sleep schedule, so if they all need to be somewhere early chances are they're going to be collectively late). Osvald never does quite shake some of the habits picked up from prison though, and doesn't sleep as deeply as he once did.

Partitio Partitio doesn't sleep in any really odd positions, although he does rotisserie chicken through the night, turning from one side to his back to his other side to his stomach and back to his side, all without really waking up. Snores like a motor if he's on his back, but if one of the other travelers kicks him or tosses something at him, he'll turn over and stop snoring (won't remember this in the morning). Sleeps extremely deeply as well, and can sleep through almost anything. Coughing wakes Partitio up immediately though, because of the time he spent nursing his father's poor health--this in turn makes him a great nurse if any of the other travelers fall sick, and Castti was pretty quick to recruit him to being her aide as well.

Growing up working in mines meant Partitio was pretty tired come night, and would just pass out. He's a natural morning person, and typically follows a very regular "wake up with the rising sun, go to sleep with the starlight" schedule. Only oversleeps if he partied too hard late into the night, or else had to stay up all night for some reason.

Agnea Tosses and turns the most through the night. Not out of discomfort, Agnea just, doesn't really stay still when she sleeps, and sleeps in the strangest positions as well when she isn't moving around. At an inn the bed's covers will be an absolute mess when she gets up, and her sleeping bag ends up cocooned around her in ways the other travelers didn't think possible. Worst bedhead as well, it takes her a good half hour to get her hair brushed out sometimes. Which is fine because it usually takes her a bit to fully wake up in the morning (although if she's excited about something, Agnea can get up and be ready to go in ten minutes flat).

Also a bit of a sleep-talker, but the sort of "nonsense" sleep talk that almost seems to make sense but doesn't. The other travelers have held entire nonsense conversations with Agnea as she sleeps. She of course, does not have any memory of these conversations when she wakes up, nor do any of her dreams match the content of the conversations recounted to her. Agnea was a bit embarrassed by this at first, until she realized the others weren't teasing her to be mean, but because her nightly chatter was truly amusing in an endearing sort of way.

Prefers to sleep late into the morning/early afternoon and stay up into the night, since it fits her schedule as a dancer better. However, Angea also has one of those internal alarm clocks, so if she needs to get up early in the morning, she just tells herself at what time to wake up and then she does. Absolute envy of Pala, who does not have an internal alarm clock. Very useful when she's travelling though, since she can make sure all the other travelers are up on time if she needs too. Also, given the size of Solistia I'm assuming there's like, major time zone differences, but I feel like Agnea would be one of those people who almost never suffers from jetlag (partly bc the means to travel across the time zones quickly enough doesn't yet exist, but also because she just has a naturally good internal sense of time and adjusts to the times the sun rises and sets pretty quickly).

Temenos Temenos looks like he sleeps peacefully. On his back, hands folded over his chest, perfectly still, no matter if he's in a bed at an inn, or a sleeping bag while camping. The truth is it takes him 1-3 hours to actually fall asleep, and he's just pretending to sleep while he tries to get thoughts about whatever case (or general stress thoughts) out of his mind. Ochette, Throne, and Osvald have figured this out, since Temenos's breathing isn't actually steady until he's fallen asleep (Ochette has good ears, Throne's used to keeping a close eye on those around here, and Osvald also got good at monitoring his cellmates and the prison guards, which carried over to his traveling companions). Once he is asleep though, Temenos sleeps fairly deeply.

He's also had these issues getting to sleep since forever. When Temenos was really young, Jorg would read him stories from the scriptures, and once Temenos learned to read he'd stay up late reading and rereading these stories in hopes that the tedious language would bore him to sleep. This is at least part of the reason why he's memorized almost all the stories in the scriptures, even if he can't remember the details exactly. Sometimes if he knows he's not going to get to sleep easily, he'll still read, although he's expanded his reading list to just about every genre, and usually always has some sort of book on hand as a result.

Because he remains in the same position all night, Temenos wakes up stiff and needs to stretch to loosen his muscles. However, when he has nightmares he tends to toss and turn a bit, and then just wakes up achy from having slept in an odd position. Night owl by nature, feels most awake in the evening and early night, and would sleep half the day except his duties as inquisitor and cleric require Temenos to get up early (which he uses an alarm clock for, maybe? I mean, mechanical clocks do exist in Solistia, so...). Wakes up fairly quickly, but is always a little tired throughout the day.

Hikari Hikari tends to sleep mostly on his side, and also keeps a weapon nearby (he did grow up participating in a concerning number of wars and battles). He prefers to get up early and go to bed early, but given the need for flexibility on a battlefield, can and has stayed up through the night and slept part of the day with little consequence. Hikari's also an incredibly quiet and still sleeper, rarely repositioning except to sometimes roll onto his back.

He is also a deceptively peaceful-looking sleeper. Hikari's issue is less that he can't get to sleep easily, and more that he's afraid of the Shadow overtaking him somehow while he sleeps, a fear that was especially prevalent when he was in active warzones. Without anyone he could really discuss this with, Hikari had to figure out how to get to sleep on his own, and eventually settled for meditating before he planned to sleep. During his meditation he focuses on suppressing the Shadow the same way he's able to suppress it when he's awake, and specifically visualizes locking the Shadow away for the duration of his sleep. This meditation tactic, once Hikari refined it, did help him sleep with lessened fear of the Shadow overtaking him. It didn't stop him from occasionally having nightmares about the Shadow though, which eventually led to Hikari figuring out how to lucid dream so he could get the Shadow out of his dreams as well.

All this means that, so long as Hikari has adequate time to set up, he's able to meditate and then simply lay down and go to sleep. Unfortunately, it also means that he will refuse to sleep if he does not have adequate time to properly mediate, and has on occasion just...stayed awake for a concerning amount of time. Hikari's so earnest and polite about insisting he simply can't sleep though that the other travelers have a hard time arguing with him in these rare instances where he refuses to sleep. When, on occasion, he ends up knocked out from a battle (or getting zapped off a bridge), and doesn't have control over passing out, Hikari actually does fine, since his subconscious kicks in to keep him safe from the Shadow, but this doesn't stop him from practicing his disciplined sleep ritual.

Hikari doesn't ever truly stop his meditation before sleeping after the events of his story, but he stops forcing himself to stay awake out of fear if he can't meditate, much to the relief of his friends and retainers. It's less that Hikari no longer fears the Shadow, and more that he believes in his own strength to keep it out of his mind entirely. At that point, Hikari actually sleeps just as peacefully as he looks while sleeping.

[auncyen]

I saw tags that were like "Temenos would be a villain if he wasn't one of the travelers" and I definitely get Temenos seeming like he could be unhinged after. The game. But I don't think he'd ever be one of the Moonshade Order as long as you were keeping his background the same. I think he'd be a great potential antagonist and like. Sure if you were bringing corruption into it he could probably screw himself up somehow. But after Roi and the pontiff there's just no way he'd willingly ally himself with the Moonshade Order.

Instead if Octopath had a more typical narrative structure it'd be really fun for him to be an antagonist throughout the game as you're slowly gathering up travelers. Maybe he's after Throne as a Blacksnake, Osvald as an escaped convict who uh. probably did some muggings in Flamechurch, or a big one actually would be Castti as Eir's apothecaries with Flamechurch being more connected to/affected by the Healeaks disaster. Hell as you gather companions he's probably convinced the party is some weird conspiracy. However it happens, he's repeatedly clashing with the party, as are the Sanctum Knights, and his methods seem dubious enough that they're easily lumped together. It's only as you get more dialogue between Temenos/Crick/Sanctum Knights that it becomes more and more apparent there's a significant rift between Temenos and the rest, with Crick being too well-meaning and green to be on either side. Because Kaldena's being manipulated maybe the Sanctum Knights are also involved in some of the other plotlines and it finally comes to a head with Temenos (and maybe Crick) helping the party out against the Knights. Now wanted himself, Temenos ponders his next move and is rather taken aback when Ochette offers him jerky and tells him to come along, with others agreeing they don't mind if he's no longer trying to apprehend them, and it's like. oh. Your missing eighth traveler was the minor antagonist.

[m0nost4tic]

juuuust because the holidays are around

i was thinking on it a wee little bit, and i've come to imagine there's a pretty similar concept to christmas with the travelers. they'd all have different customs and celebrations, so a fic about them celebrating together via mixing all their diverse traditions would be pretty sweet

when it comes to their individual experiences, i think they'd all [roughly] be something like...

he probably hasn't truly celebrated with family since he was young, but ku held an annual festival. it was an evening joined in laughter, dancing, drinking, and, most of all, celebration of the past and upcoming year. because ku's culture was so heavily based on war, part of this tradition was hoping for many more victories up ahead (and, for those who opposed war, wishing for a more peaceful future). hikari probably used to spend these with his friends and the townspeople, and that's where the christmas-y part of his tradition took place. many people exchanged gifts, and most valuable of them were ones crafted by one's self, because then you'd know how much dedication and thought was put into it

.. ochette

either never heard of it or had an extremely simplified version where all the beastlings shared one large celebratory feast. the humans on their island could have maybe tried to celebrate with them on occasion but, considering how things were at the start of ochette's story, it didn't always work out. this could be because the beastlings struggled to understand the tradition?

.. castti

similar to modern day celebrations and would have been shared with the eir's apothecaries. there could be an herb that she associates with the holiday. mistletoe maybe?? (/hj). also, if they were to do a mural sort of thing to keep lost family and friends in mind for the holiday, she'd 100% add things reminiscent of the eir's apothecaries to it. if the fic took place before she regained her memory, she'd be relearning things about the holiday and feeling a strong sense of déjà vu the entire time. oh, and she might even have a killer peppermint tea recipe lol

.. throné

has heard of it, has wanted to celebrate, never really has. the blacksnakes might have had a small tale that's similar to santa claus, though more...thief-themed. due to her wholeheartedly believing in the secret treasure in her crossed paths storyline, i can see her believing in that story, too. (bonus points if some of the other travelers try their best to make her first official christmas special by encorporating this tale. maybe think of it like someone dressing up as santa and pretending to be him??)

.. osvald

again, similar to modern day, and used to celebrate with his family. in the past, he got elena gifts and loved seeing her face light up. lady clarissa and her husband used to join them some holidays. in a fic, if it's before the end of his story, i can see him being a bit reluctant about celebrating due to the memory of lost family, but eventually giving in and joining them

.. partitio

used to do a sort of charity-like event around oresrush during the day where he'd help people with their daily tasks and/or donate a few spare leaves. (this guy would definitely be a sucker for carolers). could also see him spending time with joe, nikki, and his other friends, and totally used to drink with them on new years. later in the afternoon, he'd celebrate with papp (and mr. roque before his departure). chances are, while he used to scrap up any money he had and work extra hard to get his pops a good gift, his traditions were more based on family and connectedness than pure materialistic ideas

.. agnea

her home likely had a festival similar to the one in her ch1, plus her celebrating with her father and pala. she probably cooked and performed for them on holidays too. gus might have invited them to the tavern for a holiday celebration a few times

.. temenos

as a member of the church, he'd give out gifts to people who spent the holidays nearby. i could see the pontiff, "mindt," roi (before...you know), or some of the thankful citizens giving him a few gifts, as well. the church's holiday was most likely based around the sacred flame. i can also envision him putting on a puppet show for the kids like he did in his ch1. outdoor celebration might have happened around their sacred flame monument, an area which they would decorate each year

.. hikari