Clutching at Straws

“

Voyce has been thinking about the disappearance of the sylph podlings.

— In-game description

Walkthrough

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Following a sequence of questionable deductions, Voyce concludes that the podlings were spirited away by a rogue band of pirates, and suggests that you pick up the trail in La Noscea. Make for the Drowning Wench in Limsa Lominsa and deliver the scholar's missive to his colleague, a marine researcher by the name of Guston who should be able to aid you in your search.

Utterly unable to decipher Voyce's chocobo scratches, Guston is nonetheless able to provide you with some intriguing information regarding a suspicious personage sighted at the docks not long ago. Seek out more information from the researcher's son Robyn in Fisherman's Bottom.

Robyn quickly recognizes you as the adventurer who assisted him in delivering a necklace to the kind fishmen who rescued him. The reunion serving to jog his memory, he suspects that the unsavory man is targeting his scaled friends. Return to Novv's Nursery to see that the peaceful Sahagin come to no harm, and bring along Robyn's gift─a crate of juicy oranges favored by the fishmen─for good measure.

Novv's rejoicing at the sight of the juicy citruses is interrupted by the ever-excitable Seww, who is distraught at the apparent kidnapping of his young spawnbrother Bouu. Could the culprit be the same man responsible for the disappearance of the podlings from Little Solace? Make way to the scene of the crime─Moonshade Isle─by elbst, and fend off adversaries as necessary to secure a vantage point from which you may scan the waters for the kidnapper's escape vessel.

You manage to locate the kidnapper's vessel, which is swiftly making its way out to sea. As you and Seww curse your luck, Novv is quick to take action. In the blink of an eye, the clutchfather emerges from the sea to stand before his son's abductor─a menacing Miqo'te wearing a mask of metal. When an ill-timed collision with a protruding rock causes Novv to lose his balance, the feline felon is quick to take advantage of the situation, and three daggers strike the Sahagin clear in the back. Seww dives swiftly into the waters to save his clutchfather, urging you to return to the nursery to prepare to tend to Novv's wounds.

Perhaps it is paternal instinct and a desire to see his son returned to safety that gives Novv his strength, for the clutchfather is not much worse for the wear despite the wounds he suffered at the hands of the kidnapper. Novv fumes at the indignity his clutch has suffered. Who is this Miqo'te marauder, and what does he hope to accomplish from robbing the cradles of the beast tribes? The plot ever thickens...