Stanley (Historical)

This article is about the Historical Character. For the NPC, see Stanley.

Stanley is a quest-exclusive NPC that appeared in Venti's Story Quest, Carmen Dei Chapter: Act I - Should You Be Trapped in a Windless Land. He was a well known Great Adventurer in Mondstadt, especially for his travels in the Mare Jivari.

Profile

Stanley was a famous adventurer from Mondstadt. Several years before the game's start, he traversed the Mare Jivari with a greenhorn adventurer named Hans Archibald, but when they were attacked by one of the beasts that was originally part of Bakunawa, he sacrificed himself to save Hans. Stanley hoped that Hans would make it safely back to Mondstadt and considered that alone to make his efforts not in vain.^[1] Out of guilt for letting Stanley die in a windless place, which Mondstadters believe would prevent one's soul from being carried to the afterlife, Hans took on the name and identity of his friend and started spreading stories of him to keep his memory alive. Eventually, when Venti learned of Stanley's plight, he revealed himself as Barbatos and used his powers to save the real Stanley's soul, allowing Hans to find closure.^[2]

As a result of Hans' posturing, most people believe that Stanley survived but his unnamed friend did not. Zhiqiong cites Stanley's friend as an example of someone who is remembered by others because they attempted something great, even if they did not live through it; the Traveler does not inform her of the truth.^[3]

Stanley survived the attack that he'd saved Hans from, but would record on his 14th rest that his left hand had been devoured by the beast, and he lost a chunk of flesh from his lower back. Having lost his medical supplies, he thought he was going to die then, but was discovered by a Muratan named Nocht, who rendered first aid. Nocht warned him to keep his distance from the beasts as they would devour each other just as soon as other beings and to turn back the way he came before continuing on his own way, but Stanley acknowledged that in his condition, death was likely inevitable and was determined to discover the Mare Jivari's secrets before then. Without a way to tell time in the absence of day or night, he recorded time by the number of pauses he'd taken to rest and hoped his notes could be discovered by a fellow Guild member someday.

On his 24th rest, Stanley would observe more of Bakunawa's offshoots, their scent reminding him of what he smelled on Dragonspine. He determined that the area he and Hans had reached earlier was not the center of the Mare as they'd assumed, but only along its edge. He also met a Muratan woman named Nanas who helped bandage his wounds, but his memory couldn't recall any more than that, not even what she looked like, which he acknowledged as being strange.^[4]

On his 34th rest, Stanley spotted a larger Bakunawa offshoot devouring a smaller one and, taking this as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, began writing down his observations. He witnessed the offshoot instantly digest the other and then expand in size, but then wrote that it was looking in his direction, and he needed to go before his writing was cut short.^[5] It was only years later that the Traveler had the opportunity to discover enough of Stanley's surviving notes from within the remains of Bakunawa made whole, illustrating that Stanley had been caught by the offshoot and eaten.