All spoilers must be tagged!I have such a softspot for this series. I love that it puts careful consideration into the lore of the world without explaining away the underpinning fantasy. I love that it's willing to skip over perfunctory action setpieces in favor of interesting dialogue. I love that characters take each other seriously and naturalistically pursue their own individual interests without getting coded as evil.
Most of all, I love that the characters can engage in a sappy non-deathflag conversation like this and have it feel completely earned:
Expand for dialogue
Will: It's amazing, though. You're going to be a Lord of the Forest someday?
Menel: In two or three hundred years, if not more. It's probably somewhere in that realm.
Will: I'll be long dead by then.
Menel: True. Maybe I'll be your gravekeeper while I watch where your kids and grandkids end up... I guess everything will have settled down by then.
Will: You've been planning to do that?
Menel: Yes, I have. I have all kinds of debts to you that I can never repay. All half-elves have to make a life-altering decision at some point. To live as an elf, almost like the fae for perpetuity alongside the earth and water... or to live the human life, like a flickering fire or a gust of wind. That's the fate of those born with both bloodlines. I want to see what becomes of all your accomplishments.
Will: I might not be able to do anything that great.
Menel: You're already enough of a legend. And you'll keep making more legends, all with that spacey face of yours. I'll be fighting by your side, and if I survive until your life ends... Yeah... it might not be so bad to wrap it all up by fading away into the forest. After I say some awesome line to make myself look good in the end, of course.
Will: You'll be a legend.
Menel: As will you. Doesn't sound bad, right?
Don't sleep on Faraway Paladin, you guys.
