Chapter Thirteen: Master of Disguise
Our travels continue to take us through various parts of Geralt's past as we search for a missing sorceress at Radovid’s behest, free a cursed nobleman, and…put on a play?
Chapter Thirteen: Master of Disguise
A COMPLETE AND UTTER BABY PLAYS DEATH MARCH: DAY 13
PLEASE BE ADVISED: This blog series (obviously) contains major spoilers for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.
Current Level: 14
Current Location: Harborside, Free City of Novigrad
Last chapter, we spent a good bit of time on side quests, only returning to our main goal of recovering Dijkstra's treasure Dandelion towards the end. In the interest of getting to quests at a level-appropriate time in the game, that's what we will be doing again. Our travels continue to take us through various parts of Geralt's past as we search for a missing sorceress at Radovid’s behest, free a cursed nobleman, and…put on a play?
What did we do?
First, Radovid has tasked us with venturing to Est Tayiar, where Philippa Eilhart is supposedly hiding. The witch hunters on site have made little progress getting inside Philippa's supposed hideout, though, beyond finding an enchanted ceramic tile that likely does something. We put the tile in place and head into the ruins. Inside, the hideout is really only well-suited for an owl, so we have to travel through portals, slicing nekkers and activating crystals along the way. After entering the second portal, we encounter a witch hunter, who recognizes Geralt as Radovid's hired help.
We take over from here and force him to give us the next activation crystal, which he’s found but can’t use. We also found out in this room (via a stashed love letter) that Philippa had turned her sights from a female lover to...Dijkstra. We keep moving and find owl feathers—more proof of her polymorphy. Eventually, we reach the lowest level, where we have to fight a fire elemental. He goes down somewhat easily and we’re now able to enter and search Philippa's main hideout room. Geralt finds agates covered in blood, evidence of renegade surgical procedures, and a damaged megascope crystal, which we obviously do not give the hunters when we leave and kill them instead. Honestly, that fight was almost kind of rough, but I made it through, in no small part due to being able to regenerate vitality in the secret room with the feline sword inside it.
Back in Novigrad, we ask Triss about Philippa’s crystal. She tests it out and watches a conversation between Margarita and Philippa about reviving the Lodge of Sorceresses, where some not-so-kind things are said about some of the other sorceresses in Geralt's social circle. The conversation also informs us that Philippa was also trying to restore her eyesight by growing tissue on agates. I give Triss the megascope crystal and head back to Radovid, who isn't really thrilled that all we've brought him is our word, and dismisses Geralt. This nudges me up to level 15, which totally rules. It may be time for a character panel update again soon.
It's now officially time to turn our attention to the part of the main story I've conveniently ignored: regrouping with Priscilla to update her on Dandelion's whereabouts. If i'm being totally honest, that's absolutely because I can't stand the quest that follows. I don't know why I find it so tedious and annoying—maybe it's just the part of me that was never truly able to become a theatre kid despite knowing that could be my only shot at friends in high school—but I avoid this quest like the Catrionic plague every time it comes around
I digress. At the kingfisher, we tell Priscilla the whole story and face the dilemma at hand: how do we lure Dudu out of hiding so he assume Menge’s form and help us free Dandelion? Dudu was an avid fan and participant of the local acting troupe, run by Irina Renarde, and the love was very much mutual. Geralt suggests staging a play, and Priscilla insists that they need to write a completely new play that will grab Dudu's attention and deliver their hidden message to him (which is basically just that he's safe to come out of hiding with them around). Let's get script-writing, I guess...
Priscilla says a few things I don't understand and refers to a bunch of famous tales before turning (some) decisions over to Geralt. Her final chosen plot is a story about an urcheon marrying a princess and a witcher that saves him, which Geralt points out is, uh... not about a doppler. Priscilla swaps the urcheon for a doppler and asks Geralt if we're looking to put on a drama or a comedy. After deciding on a comedy, she gets to work, with some dubious rhyming help from Geralt.
We're then tasked with delivering the finished script to Irina, which requires buying a ticket. Annoying, but hey, anything to support the local arts. Irina expresses her concern at not having seen Dandelion or Dudu in a minute, but luckily for her, that's where we come in. She agrees right away to our proposal and we hand her the script to read, while she sends us off to find both street performers to publicize the show and ushers in case the audience gets rowdy. She recommends the conveniently missing Puffins for the former and the men down by the docks for the latter, and we're on our way.
The Puffins are actually neighbors of Triss's, and they're all barricaded in their house. They initially assume Geralt has come to collect their rent by force until he offers them the publicity job. Unfortunately, they can't do that kind of job right now: a gang of Eternal Fire devotees has targeted them after their latest round of jokes blasting the Hierarch. If Geralt deals with the gang, though, they'll be safe to promote in the streets. We find them threatening someone else nearby and tell them off. I attempt to bribe them and they take my coin and decide to fight me anyway. After one dude goes down, the bandits scatter, and the Puffins emerge from the house grateful and ready to help.
At the docks, Sofus the Bull presides over a fistfight. Geralt offers him the job of ushering the show, and he's initially hesitant, but we then offer to pay him to keep the peace and he changes his tune. Simple enough. With that all handled, now it's time to start the play. well... not quite. Irina needs to finalize some casting decisions, though some she is sure of. She wants Geralt to play the Witcher, which is actually not a bad idea considering finding Dudu is the real goal here. She defers to us for the roles of Princess and Prince, and we choose Priscilla and stage veteran Abelard. Zoltan shows up just in time to heckle us before showtime!
The play begins, and I thank god we chose the comedy genre, because Priscilla's acting is somewhat atrocious. The play goes off without a hitch, with the real message being that dopplers aren't to be feared, and there’s no angry crowd because again, this show is clearly a comedy. Dudu, disguised as a guard but recognizable by the scar Whoreson left on his face, is pulled onstage by Geralt at the end, and the show goes down as a success.
Back in Irina's office, Dudu returns to his original self and we have a chat with him. He'd wanted to find his friends, but he’d also hidden after the heist, not wanting to be found. Zoltan asks Dudu to show them what Ciri looks like, but I decide against it because I don’t like Geralt’s sad eyebrows. We then explain that while Dandelion is imprisoned, he can help us by pretending to be the dead Caleb Menge. We convince him the plan will work and set everything in motion to break Dandelion out. Once Zoltan and Dudu leave to enact their roles, Irina pays us, and it's now time to meet Zoltan at the roadside overlook where we'll be ambushing the transport. I first do some shuffling and upgrading of armor, not really because this is that much fighting, but because it's probably overdue anyway.
At the ambush site, Geralt and Zoltan are shooting the shit for a minute when Priscilla shows up. Geralt is mad, but Zoltan pleads for him to let her stay, and I agree to it. I decline the game of gwent and focus on the ambush at hand. It begins with one witch hunter and his horse falling victim to a falling tree, and the rest of the caravan quickly realizes what's happening here. Geralt, Zoltan, and Zoltan's men run down the ravine, but Dandelion is carried off on horseback in the opposite direction. Geralt pursues him while Zoltan's boys handle the rest of the caravan. We pick up a trail of hoof prints, then Dandelion's cologne, “used by the bucket.”
We eventually discover that the trail ends at an isolated hut in the forest, occupied by two halflings and a dwarf who are not really vibing with this situation. We sneak into their hut, where Dandelion is barricaded, through a secret cellar door and free the bard. Dandelion insists he had everything under control (despite being tied to a chair and gagged so he'd shut up), which is so like him. Once settled, he finally tells us the rest of Ciri's story in Novigrad.
After freeing Dudu, Dandelion and Ciri fled the scene. Unfortunately, I didn't make it very far, because the henchmen waiting for me when I got off my horse made quick work of me. The second time, I was doing slightly better and got killed by a crossbow bolt, so I guess I wasn't really doing better. Thankfully, I did slightly better on my FOURTH attempt and actually make it through the door and into the temple, where Ciri fucks up some henchmen before being surrounded by the Temple Guard. Dandelion dives to her rescue as a guardsman aims his crossbow, but Ciri disappears the second they make contact, and Dandelion is arrested.
Back in the present, the boys continue to chat and Geralt brings out the phylactery. Dandelion explains that it was him who connected her with Whoreson, but it was just to help her find someone to fix the phylactery, and possibly help lift a curse, though Dandelion didn't know more about the latter beyond the words: elven, beginning with va fail, elaine—goodbye, beauty. With little else to go off, Geralt declares he's headed off to Skellige soon, and Priscilla demands her turn with Dandelion. The bard makes Geralt promise to come see him at the inn soon. And we will, because despite this being the end of the main quest line in Novigrad, we still have plenty to do there before we sail for Skellige. But we're gonna do it next chapter.
Death Count (This Chapter): 4
Death Count (Total): 43
(as Ciri) Killed three times in combat by Whoreson Junior's henchmen while fleeing Temple Isle.
(as Ciri) Killed by a crossbow bolt while fighting Whoreson Junior's henchmen on Temple Isle.
NOTE: The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is the intellectual property of the appropriate copyright holders, including the screencaps from the game I have included in this essay. I have no official affiliation with CDPR or anyone else associated with the game/books/universe; I’m just a fan who plays Witcher to cope.