Expeditioner's Interview: Feel By Your Feet (Finna vid foetr thina)

Expeditioner's Joklumarkar Expeditioner Interviews
July 2023	August 2023	September 2023	October 2023
November 2023	December 2023	January 2024	February 2024

This article pertains to a subject that is not yet released in the Global server of Arknights.

Unofficial English translations provided by Sucralose with GeniusGD as the proofreader.

Transcripts of the Feel By Your Feet (Finna vid foetr thina) Expeditioner Files' Team Interviews.

Interview #1 (unlocked at the start)

“ Climbing in years of snow. ” Only after climbing to the top of the mountain did she see where the infinite field of clouds ended – it wasn't at the zenith of the mountain range, but at the end of the snowy plain at the back of the mountain. She looked back at the path she trekked. Some of the footprints were shallow, some other ones deeper, scattered in the snow, each step is in her eyes and her memory. It was like a line hooked to her destiny, every time she took rest, every time she lost her footing, and every time she got up again, were the knots that were hard to undo. Magallan could even clearly see where she took her first step. It was a normal afternoon, thick yellow pages spread out on her mother's lap, selling products to the person on the other side of the connection in a slightly raspy but friendly voice. In the screen of the muted television placed far away, a gray fluffy land creature was hitting the screen using its short and black wings. It was as if little Magallan had heard its call, and she lifted up her leg, put it back on the floor, then slowly lifted up the other leg. As she was doing this repeatedly, she heard her mother drop the phone, which had just connected, and the yellow pages, calling for her father happily, then calling over her grandma, the neighbors, even the messenger passing by, just to witness this very memorable moment – her first crawl. There was something special about this scene, and it deserved to be seen by so many people. The tiny Magallan crawls "backwards" toward the TV, then slowly turns around and reaches out to touch the feathered creature on the screen. Her first crawl, and she crawled backwards? Well, it does kind of fit her usual style. No matter what methods she uses while trying to reach it, she will always get there in the end. As these memories went through her mind, she was lying on her stomach on the expedition sled, sliding down from the top of the hill and into the snowy plains at the back of the mountain. Thump— The snow covering was like the thick blanket she was covered with when she was a baby. It took her a while to come back to her senses, or rather, to wake up from her reminiscing. The snow in front of her and above her head was thick and heavy, and she could only slowly crawl backward, and it took her a great deal of effort to slowly get out of the snowdrift, then slowing rise— Magallan shook off the past, and the ice crystals returned like stars to the snowy galaxy of the earth. Her first meeting with Sami reminded her of a sentence she heard while she was training at the exploration association. "In the eyes of Sami, everyone is a child......" "He is waiting for you to find Him."

Interview #2 (unlocked after entering the 3rd floor)

“ Escape into the veins of trees and rivers. ” Magallan walked for a few days in a row, following the vine-like river as if she was following every possible branch fate could go down. What would happen if she just kept on walking until she reached the downstream part of the river? Maybe she would see a warm area filled with sand, or maybe it would just be the northern that's colder and farther. Should she choose to go against the current? Should she choose to go down the next branch out from the river she sees? She has no way of knowing how these choices will end up, just like how she wouldn't before have known precisely any of what she had seen while wandering in Sami. Sami's rivers, Sami's branches, the vines Sami wrapped around her fingers...... Where did the choices that led to these come from, and what branch should she take to find it? Only Magallan knew that once, there had been a plain leaf that filled her heart in its entirety. In the beam of sunlight that fell from between the leaves, she held her breath as her gaze traveled slowly and repeatedly along the veins of the leaves. The fuzz, the holes, and the ants that parade past on the surface are all clearly visible in this one leaf. Little Magallan only remembered that time became slow and long, like the divergence of leaf veins, like the traces of ants wading through a journey, and that these threads, invisible or tangible, held her and stopped her in that forest – until a call untied her from this constant observation. It was the voices of her lead teacher and classmates. They had long since reached the bank of the river where they had camped, and were now on their ways home, and no one knew when little Magallan had fallen behind. A classmate even mentioned that young Magallan had joined him in putting his hand into the rushing river, guessing which meandering stream the flowing water they had touched would vanish into. A rushing river? The meandering streams? By now, Magallan had long since lost track of all this. But she still remembered a similar river in some tiny corner of that forest – and for the first time she felt like an explorer in the presence of that plain leaf. So, what choice should she make, facing the river that crossed through the marshland? She summons her drone, activating the cooling module, slowing the flow of the river, until it stops in its tracks completely. Tentatively, she steps onto the ice, slowly walking towards the other side. Ice, rocks, moss, mud. Where should she go once she reaches the other side? Bending down, she picks up a leaf. In the veins of the leaf, she thinks she saw Sami's response.

Interview #3 (unlocked after entering the 5th floor)

“ Stepping foot in Sami's shadow. ” When the explorer took her first step, she felt the breathing of the earth coming from beneath her feet. Was the voice of the earth so ragged in her memories? It wasn't until she took her second step with slight difficulty that she realized that everything was heavier here than she remembered. She had to remove the unimportant equipment piece by piece, leaving only the life support device and a video recording module. She was new to the area and just wanted to get to know her new surroundings first. Very quickly, she found that the ground she was stepping on was a bit slippery, and she had to walk very carefully so she wouldn't fall. If she slipped, she would probably be in big trouble — As far as she could see, the ground was made of smooth, hard ice. She couldn't tell whether there was an end to this field of ice, and if she fell, maybe she would have to slide and slide until she fell asleep forever. The explorer was well aware that it was not the first time she had set foot on such cold, barren earth. She had once traversed the snow and woodland in the benevolent oracles of Sami, and had stepped resolutely into that cold wilderness — the endless ice field. She had encountered it countless times, in the bedtime stories she was told when she was young, in the non-fiction books she read as a teenager, and in the things she heard as she traveled. At that moment, the endless icefield, the vast expanse that had remained in her unconscious for so long, was right under her feet. She saw the shadows cast by the mountains, saw the shadows cast down by the stars and the aurora. She then saw a big circle, creating the infinity in the cold land alongside its reflection. In the shadow of what Sami had heralded to her, she moved forward, forward, responding with her feet to the prying eyes in the nothingness, to the irresistible gravitational pull. Now that she thinks about it, the place that she thought was the end was no more than the start. The explorer had once luckily gotten away from a stare like that, but she would never have imagined that she would one day be reunited with it. Everything happened so naturally. At the end of the heavy and shiny ice field, she saw that shadow once again. As the eye contact happened, it was almost like she saw the advance of ants, the growing of the leaf veins, the blood flowing inside her body, and the invisible line of fate pulling her back to the old friend from another world. "This is your choice. This is your ending." No sound came, but the explorer clearly heard the answer Sami once had. Sami, have You already known all of this in the shadows?