21 You know where this is from. Yes, you do. You bloody well do! Also note that 'Anders' is not actually the man's real name, but a nickname picked up from when he was a kid from the Anderfels (that is, an Anders) in a Fereldan Circle.
2 This takes place in 9:34 Dragon. Bethany, thus, is 22 years old, which is a good year for being a protagonist and a terrible year for almost anything else. Marian is 25, which is almost as bad, but at least you're halfway done with your 20s.
3 Runes and glyphs are strictly speaking different things. A glyph is a magical symbol or combination of symbols, usually in ancient Tevene or Elven, whereas a rune is a glyph used to enchant an object. The study of glyphs, however, evolved around that of runes, meaning the terms are often used interchangeably and both are taken under the category of 'runology'.
4 Cullen is wearing No. 2 Service Dress, which consists of a white shirt with a stand-up or Mandarin collar, over which is worn a deep red tunic. The gilded buttons are engraved with the flaming sword of the Templar Order, the high standing collar has scarlet gorget patches with gold lacing in a figure-of-eight knot. Cullen's rank of Knight-Captain is denoted by scarlet shoulder boards with three golden flaming swords each. The whole is complimented by a wide white leather belt with a gilded brass buckle, also engraved with a flaming sword in front of a sunburst and a quotation from Benedictions 4:10, 'Blessed are they who stand before the wicked / And corrupt and do not falter', black trousers and black shoes (to be kept polished). Normally, officers wear a pistol and a ceremonial dagger at their hip. Swords are worn only with the more formal uniform variants. There is no prescribed headgear, but black berets are common in the Kirkwall chapter of the Order. It is a basic law of the multiverse that well-established oppressive paramilitary forces tend to have fetching uniforms.
5 The olive green sergeant's rank insignia only make it look more drab and shaggy. Think Jack Harkness, but scruffier.
6 Fenris, who opposed everything that came out of Hawke's and Anders' mouths on point of principle, and Merrill, who generally accepted anything put before her without paying attention, cancelled each other out.
7 Considering that Darkspawn tactics even during Blights have all the elegance and sophistication of a horde of shambling zombies, and often find themselves unable to deal with barbed wire and machine gun emplacement, modern Blights are not nearly as romantic as they used to be. Fortunately for teenage heroes with tragic backstories everywhere, people have discovered that ground-to-air missiles are not an effective long-term solution against Archdemons.
8 Orzammar prides itself on possessing one of the most advanced armies in Thedas, with the Legion of the Dead now integrated into the royal army's command structure. The dwarves quickly found, however, that tanks and heavy artillery are of limited use in the Deep Roads, and are itching to try them out on the surface. They generally find a dictator to overthrow somewhere, ideally in a country rich in natural resources, then proceed to create utter chaos for ten years before withdrawing in the secure satisfaction that fighting Darkspawn isn't actually all that bad.
9 Kirkwall actually has two harbours: the old harbour inside the bay proper, and the new harbour outside it. This division was necessitated by the discovery that modern container ships have trouble navigating between the Twins, on account of being wider than twenty metres. Civil right groups have still not gotten around to tearing down the slave statues, because national heritage.
10 I just lost 98 per cent of my readers. (If you scrolled all the way down here, you can at least make the effort to call me a wicked sinner in your review or something like that.)
11 Gamlen Amell's ambitions were unfortunately cut short when he made some bad financial decisions about Qunari cheeses, namely, withdrawing his investment into young Mr Harold Qun's venture shortly before Qun Qunari's Cheesehouse conquered the Free Marches by storm. The Arishok, after tasting the franchise's famous Qun Qamembert, reportedly told reporters he would "never speak of this again".
12 The story of Master Sha'illa and Aneitheral is legendary in some circles (mostly composed of the sort of people that spends their weekends playing videogames like Exalted Kings IV: Warlords of Arlathan or Thedas Universalis II and find Towers Age census records thrilling). Though it is only documented in two isolated lines in the -9th century Ancient Tevinter philosopher Sarenno Arterion's De Re Caseorum, a vast folkloric myth has developed around them. Master Sha'illa was said to be the greatest mage of his age, and king of Ythalla, whilst Aneitheral was his young, beautiful and cunning apprentice. When Aneitheral declared herself to be a greater mage than her master, Sha'illa responded to her challenges by performing ever greater feats of magic, culminating in eclipsing the moon and stars for eight nights and eight hours. On the seventh night, however, Aneitheral used the darkness of the unlit night to sneak into her former master's bedchamber as he slept and create the illusion of a bright full moon and a starry night sky around him. When she woke him, he was astonished to find that she had 'broken' his enchantment, and marvelled to no end at how she had accomplished this feat. Aneitheral revealed her trickery and Sha'illa, humbled, fell in love with his former apprentice. (Because this is a Thedosian fairy tale, she proceeded to kill and dismember him, feed his remains to his children before also killing them, and take his throne. But it is said that she returned his love by the time she fell into her Long Sleep, so that's very romantic.)
13 Surprisingly enough, the members of Silverite Griffons fall neatly into the various stereotypes of MMO gamers. Warden-Commander Eleanor Cousland, Queen Consort of Ferelden, is the helpful elitist who will be the first to point out a mistake in your rotation or build and suggest more optimal ways of playing. King Alistair is the eternal noob who's only playing because his significant other wants him to. Velanna is the single-issue wonk who spends more time writing pamphlet-length tirades on her issue of choice in /zone at the slightest opportunity than actually playing. When she does play, she is pigeon-holed into healing because Keepers are generally FOTM for healers. Oghren is the expert PvPer, who can hold an objective all by himself against two dozen enemy players and routinely shows up on leaderboards, but is also completely hopeless when it comes to killing mobs. Nathaniel is his complete opposite, being able to hammer out incredible DPS numbers on bosses, but losing his rhythm when the fight requires him to move around or (gasp) use CC. Sigrun spends most her time roleplaying, and hence has come to terms with being unable to play female characters, at all. And Anders is the guy playing the beautiful elf healer in the bikini who's the reason for that.
14 For a brief moment, everyone expectantly looked towards the door. Unfortunately, the forces of Narrative Causality are not all that strong in Thedas.
15 "Order" has never been a concept easy to explain to Kirkwallers.
16 While Kirkwall originally followed the principle of "One Man, One Vote" (he's the man, so he's got the vote), it is now a democracy of sorts. The viscount of Kirkwall is the head of state of the city-state. He is elected for life by the Patricians' Council, and appoints a seneschal to lead the business of government for him, on the recommendation of the elected City Council. The knight-commander of the Gallows holds no more authority over the process than any other citizen, if said citizen was weighing a very large club in the shape of the largest military force in the country in her hands. In case you haven't been paying attention, basically everything in this section is a rip-off of Sir Terry Pratchett's City of Ankh-Morpork. Dumar may not be a Vetinari, but he'd very much like to.
17 Kirkwall does not have a standing army. In time of war, citizens' militias may be called up, but apart from that the city state relies on its law enforcement officers, who are equipped as paramilitaries, to defend the city. Kirkwall's hinterland, meanwhile, is policed by the Viscomital Corps of Gendarmes and the Viscomital Vinmark Rangers, and there is a small coast guard. In addition, Kirkwall is one of the original signatories of the Starkhaven Accord of 8:98, which obliges all Free Marcher cities to come to the aid of another when attacked by a foreign power. This lack of a standing army makes the Commander of the Kirkwall City Guard, Aveline Vallen, the highest-ranked military officer in the country.
18 Long form. Someone was bound to ask stupid questions.
19 There is no institutionalised racism in the Templar Order. It's just that, look, these helmets would be very uncomfortable to wear with elf ears and besides, wouldn't it be better if elves had their own units for themselves so they could be amongst each other, and really they're not exactly our kind of people.
20 Fenris was normally the type of person who would read one book, ideally one with a lot of pictures and not too many words per page, several times in a row over the course of weeks, carefully keeping his place with a bookmark. In other words, he was functionally illiterate, through no fault of his own, and made every effort to try and change that. Unfortunately, he appeared to have reached the natural ceiling of his literary talents.
21 Merrill is missing the joke here: dragons avoid hospitals. They are afraid of needles and other pointy objects, and for a good reason. The descendants of famous dragon-slayers tend to wield magical swords encrusted in gems and jewels, but most dragons are killed by plain, mundane swords that are bloody damn good at cutting things.
22 A custom that usually evokes thoughts of "fascism", but that is an injustice. Stechschritt is a mark of discipline and bodily control more than anything else. More properly, the sight of goose-stepping soldiers should evoke thoughts of "damn glad I don't have to do that, those poor sods look like they're hurting".
23 That is the correct past participle of 'to smite'. I know what you're saying: "What, this is what I scrolled down to the endnotes for?!"
24 Sure, Morrigan can turn into a bear, but what use is that? Velanna can hit people with pointy, er, roots, but what if she's in a city or a building? Vivienne has a literal magesaber and can tank dragons, but she'll get blood on her clothes. Dorian can command the dead to do his bidding, but what if there's no corpses lying around (unlikely as it is)? Well, Bethany can flay you with her mind, juggle your body around or crush you under your own weight, but she can also redecorate your living room without getting up, propel vehicles, and cheat at football. Force Magic is the applied mass effect, AKA biotics. The only reason we're not playing Commander Hawke of the SSV Denerim is that everyone who can do Force Magic seems to prefer using it to slam people into the ground and has a tendency to be possessed by Things with too many appendages.
25 That is, money. Modern Tevinter is quite liberal about magic, as in, you don't need it to be influential. Since the Corinthian Reforms of 8:69 Blessed, any Tevene citizen could, theoretically, become archon, after paying the prescribed registration fee of one million Dracons. Thankfully, no non-Magister has yet done so. This has nothing at all to do with the state-sponsored system of indentured servitude under which most non-mages and almost all non-humans live. Why, that would be discrimination!
26 Ferelden manufacturer Honnleath Clinton continues to produce fine high-end cars – the Vanquish is priced around 189,000 sovereigns – though Thedas' noveau-riche elites now prefer sportive Antivan models by manufacturers like Naterro or Avancini, or any of the famously well-engineered Anders carmakers such as Horch, Estellon-Dies or Kaes. The richest of the rich drive – or rather, let drive – Orlesian cars by Rouleau-Riz. Those are the high-end and luxury brands, but most cars on Thedas' streets are produced either in the Anders or Par Vollen. Marian cares a lot more about the car she's driving than the clothes she's wearing or the swill she's drinking. Several City Guard officers have gotten into trouble for pulling over the scruffy veteran in the fancy car.
27 A sandbank in the Waking Sea that barely surfaces long enough to plant a flag on it and has no natural resources.
28 The author begs the honourable reader to willingly suspend their disbelief on this point.
29 This is a metaphor, i.e., a lie. Attempting to describe the way mages perceive magic and the Fade is comparable to attempting to describe colour to someone who is not only completely blind, but also deaf, dumb and comatose.
30 High Energy Magic (HEM) is a young discipline of study mostly practised by young and enthusiastic mages with bad personal hygiene but amazing scientific creativity. They are also surprisingly talented at gaining funding and modern facilities, at the expense of older, more established fields. And the Pratchett rip-offs continue!
31 This does seem to be Bethany's default approach to things. Cf. her attack on the Qunari at the Viscount's Keep. Who's a cute little Leeroy Jenkins, huh? That's right, you are!
32 Blood, as a resource, is expended in blood magic. Assuming that the blood is not transfigured into physical spell components of a sort (e.g. some sort of 'magic particle'), conservation of mass suggests what is actually used to fuel blood magic is the life energy stored in blood. Hence, blood can be 'depleted' of life, which is also why blood magic can't be done using the blood of corpses. Also note that blood / life is equivalent to mana, not a source of it, and an alternative way to connect to the Fade.
33 He was, in fact, falling very slowly upwards. Gravity is weird.
34 An Anders phrase meaning 'thoughts are free' in Common. The incipit of a well-known student song from the time of the Anderfels' partition and reunification in the Storm Age, this has been the slogan of several revolutionary movements and set to music several times, most famously by Gustave Miller. Cf. youtu .be /ngwvs4G4b6M
