User:Zolo6/Veigue Lungberg

Veigue Lungberg (ヴェイグ・リュングベル) is the main protagonist of Tales of Rebirth. He is a Huma orphan from the village of Sulz and adopted to the Bennet family. Claire Bennett is his childhood friend, and he is very protective on her. Veigue himself is a cold, silent young man who is mostly unaware, not ignorant, of the problems around him, unless it is happening right in front of his face or involves Claire.

Awakening
It is not known who Veigue's parents really were, except that they are dead. When he was little, he was adopted by Marco Bennett of Sulz village and befriended his daughter Claire Bennett. Along with their pet Zapie, Veigue spent his childhood and teens in Sulz. As Huma and Gajuma (beastmen) coexisted in peace in Sulz, Veigue never has any problems about it.

However, it all changes when Veigue turns 17. In the Capital City of Balka, the Gajuma King Ladras Lindblum passes away, and at that point, a certain event of chaos erupts in which several Huma suddenly gain the ability known as Force, which was formerly exclusive to Gajuma only. Veigue is one such Huma that has his Force awakened. His Force runs wild and worries Claire. However, as she approaches Veigue, his Force attacks her, sealing her within an ice coffin. From that point on, guilt overcomes Veigue, and he spends his time guarding his house where Claire is frozen, accompanied by Zapie.

A year later, in the current timeline of the game, Veigue is visited by a boy who has no memory, Mao, and ex-commander of the Karegia Army, Eugene Gallardo. They claim that they are seeking Force users like Veigue to find out what is actually going on. Veigue refuses to listen to any of their stories, claiming that he needs to protect Claire. After a brief fight with Mao, he is told that he must learn to control his force and thus will not freeze Claire again. Mao then helps him un-freeze Claire.

As a token of gratitude, Claire invites them all to eat at her house. While eating and discussing the current situation, the village is visited by two members of the Karegia's King's Shield lieutenants, Saleh and Tohma. They demand the most beautiful girl in the village to be surrendered to them under the order of Queen Agarte Lindblum, and Claire is selected as the 'most beautiful'. Veigue tries to stop them, but Eugene knocks him out before Tohma and Saleh can seriously kill him.

Rescuing Claire
Eventually Veigue resolves to journey ahead to rescue Claire. Marco also sends Zapie to accompany him. Although he is at first accompanied with Zapie, Mao and Eugene, he later also receives the help of several more people, such as Annie Barrs, a girl with initial dislike towards Gajuma; Tytree Crowe, a hotblooded worker from Petnadjanka; and Hilda Rhambling, a Half formerly under the King's Shield. As he journeys, Veigue also witnesses some minor issues regarding on races between Huma and Gajuma (mostly due to Annie's dislike towards Gajuma). But such things mostly never concerne Veigue, as he is used to refer Gajuma and Huma as the same, or just 'people'. He also makes several confrontations against the rest of the members of the King's Shield, Walto and Militsa.

At the end of the journey, Veigue and his group arrives at the capital of Balka. They eventually learn a way to sneak into the castle; through the sewers. Before sneaking, Veigue tells his companions that should he die, they should continue on and rescue Claire. His friends say otherwise and says that they will stick together. Unfortunately, they are ambushed by the King's Shield upon reaching the Castle, and after an audience with Agarte, they are thrown to jail. They manage to get out thanks to the Black Wings trio, and eventually Veigue, after defeating Saleh and Tohma, reaches the ceremonial site where Agarte attempts to revive the 'King of Sacred Beasts', Geyorkias, in order to save Karegia. Veigue is unable to stop the ceremony. Geyorkias announces that he will destroy the impurity of the world, and that is the Huma race. Veigue and his friends battle Geyorkias and come out victorious. Just before Geyorkias explodes, Veigue leaps and manages to get Claire into safety. After these events, Veigue's group separates on their own way.

Ressurecting the Sacred Beasts
Veigue makes it back to Sulz. However, when Claire regaines consciousness, she is acting a bit weird. Before Veigue can confirm this, he is informed that his Gajuma aunt Popura causes a ruckus in the town plaza. When Veigue reaches the plaza, he witnesses Popura spewing a lot of racist remarks regarding on her race of Gajuma. Veigue tries to calm her down, but he is unable to do so. Luckily, Annie comes in and successfully calms Popura temporarily with her Force of Rain.

Annie explains that lately, many Gajuma has developed some hatred thoughts on Huma. Eugene is also one of victims, and has been calling out Veigue, Tytree and Hilda to come to him for some reason while Mao stays with Eugene. Veigue decides to meet up with Eugene along with Tytree (only because he will get angry if he is not involved), but on the way, Claire requests to tag along. Veigue accepts her request.

After fetching Tytree from Petnadjanka, Veigue heads straight to Messechinia Cavern, where Eugene holed himself up. To their surprises, Eugene tells Veigue to kill him before he is consumed with his rage and kill them all. Veigue will not let that happen and resorts to find a medicine to cure Eugene. Following Annie's advice, Veigue heads to the Eastern continent while leaving Claire to accompany Mao guarding Eugene.

In the town of Razilda, Veigue witnesses that the racism issue is growing stronger in the town, where Huma and Gajuma isolate themselves and has been hating against each other. He is reunited with Hilda in the town, and with the helps from a non-racist Huma named Igol, they manage to retrieve a cure for Eugene. Upon making it back to the Cavern, the group is forced to fight a berserked Eugene until he calms down a bit and is able to consume the cure calmly, regaining his old self.

Eugene explains that this all may have some connections with Geyorkias. It turns out that after his defeat, several thoughts of hatred from Geyorkias began to grow from the hearts of every Huma and Gajuma. Eventually it is concluded that to dispel the thoughts, they need to retrieve the power of the Sacred Beasts who fought against Geyorkias in the past.

When jouneying, they come upon the oriental town of Kyogen. In order to get the hint of the next Sacred Beast (after Tytree and Mao manage to gain the trust of two of them), Veigue agrees to become a temporary bodyguard for a man named Wan Gin, while Claire becomes his guest. Later, from Zapie, Veigue learns that Claire is kidnapped. But when he rescues her, once again she is acting rather weird. When Veigue meets two other prisoners, they tell him that they were with Claire. But when he meets her, she is alone. Regardless, Veigue knows that Wan Gin is behind this, and quits being his bodyguard.

Eventually, they reached the next Sacred Beast, and after Annie gains his trust, Mao becomes possessed by a Sacred Beast calling himself Shaorune. He tells Veigue to meet him, or he will lose something dear. Veigue becomes more frustrated hearing this.

The group decides to gather the hints in the town of Belsas. In the town, Claire asks Veigue about things regarding on Queen Agarte, which slightly confuses Veigue. But he confirms he will still like Claire even if she is of a different race. And to his surprise, he learns that Agarte is spotted somewhere in the town.

In the next day, when the racist Huma leader Scarab is about to execute Agarte in public, Agarte delivers a speech that only Claire would actually say. Veigue realizes that Claire is in Agarte's body, and that she is once again in danger. He quickly rescues her. In the meantime, the general of the Karegia Army, Milhaust Selkirk, arrive and quickly put the crowd at rest.

Eventually, Agarte reveals that during the ceremony before, she used the Force of Moon to ressurect Geyorkias. However, after Geyorkias' defeat, Agarte switched her body with Claire as an additional effect of the Force. Veigue demands that Agarte returns Claire's body to her, but she runs off. Veigue then agrees to cooperate with Milhaust to return Claire and Agarte's bodies to the proper places. Shaorune once again possesses Mao and tells the group that he is at the town of Babilograd.

The group eventually arrives at Babilograd. Shaorune claims that he will give Veigue three trials to prove his worth. As for the first trial, on the way to reach Shaorune, Veigue constantly sees several events in his life where his beliefs about which is Claire and which is Agarte is tested, such as refusing Claire's body where he knows Agarte's soul reside there.

When the group approached Shaorune, the second trial begins, which is to defeat him in combat. Shaorune is defeated and asks Veigue who the girl besides him is. Veigue vehemently answered that it's Claire, although she's in Agarte's body. The trial is considered over and Shaorune lends his help to the party, acting like an air transport. Unfortunately, he can not grant Veigue's wish to restore Claire and Agarte's body.

Doubts
After finally achieving the power of all the Sacred Beasts, the thoughts of hatred are purified. But the tensions that are born from the thoughts are not. The group is forced to go from town to town, stopping any racism issues they meet. Along the way, however, Veigue begins to feel uneasy on Claire in Agarte's body. He wants to believe that it is Claire who is next to him, but he can not help but consider her as 'Agarte' due to her body. These thoughts starts to take toll on Veigue's Force.

Eventually in Minal, Veigue hears about Agarte in Claire's body is stopping a fight. But he finds nothing. When they are asking around, several Gajuma soldiers see Claire in Agarte's body and claims that Agarte has returned. Veigue vehemently refuses, and eventually his Force goes berserk. His friends manage to subdue him. But when he wakes up, Claire is nowhere to be seen.

Veigue decides to pursue Claire, but he is stopped and soundly defeated by Milhaust, whom asks about his resolution back in Belsas. He wakes up in Minal and finds out that he's saved by Agarte in Claire's body. Veigue requests her to change Claire's body back again, but Agarte reveals that she has failed to reuse the Force for many times. Veigue then resorts to exchange Agarte to Milhaust, blaming all the events to Agarte. This irritated Tytree, who stops the confrontation and invites Veigue to meet him at the beach alone.

In the beach, Tytree suddenly punches Veigue on the face, irritated on how Veigue seems to be so closed on himself, not letting his friends to feel his pain and difficulty, and claims that it is that attitude that made Claire go away. Veigue and Tytree end up in a fight where both of them keep punching at each other's face. Eventually, Tytree demands that Veigue speaks his feelings and mind. Veigue does so, and eventually calms down a little. Tytree tells him that since they are friends, they should help each other.

Veigue then requests to go back to Sulz, where he asks for advice from Marco and Rakiya, and later getting Popura back to her old self, which causes her to hold a festival for everyone, regardless of race. Veigue is glad on seeing the view, and speaks to Agarte, expressing his gratitude and new trust on her. He also promises not to give up, for Claire and her. Finally he learns what is important above race, and that is the heart. As he prepares to leave, Veigue calls Marco and Rakiya as Father and Mother for the first time and bids them farewell.

Final Battle
When they leave, the group finds out that the negative emotions stemmed from the tensions from the thoughts are welling up into an evil force. Veigue then decides to gamble on reviving Geyorkias once more and persuade him to save the world, as he is the one capable of doing it. They eventually make it to Geyorkias' sleeping place in Mount Sovereign, where they learn that the negative emotions gives birth to the evil being called Yuris. If this being is left alone, it can destroy the world. the group decides to defeat Yuris.

While on the way to defeat Yuris, the party feels like their power is diminishing. However, as of that time, in the real world, people start to help each other regardless of races, which gives power to Veigue and his teammates. Eventually, they defeat Yuris, and Agarte is able to execute the Force of Moon to switch back to Claire. She also uses it to revive Geyorkias, which destroys Yuris.

Afterwards, the group bid their farewells to the Sacred Beasts, as they leave the fate of the world to the people. However, Agarte dies of fatigue. Milhaust is instated as her successor, and he asks Veigue to help him fight against the discrimination and rebuild the kingdom. Veigue silently refuses, but knows that no matter which part he takes, he and Milhaust are aiming for the same goal. As he bid farewell to Milhaust, Veigue lets out a rare smile.

In the ending pictures that follows, it would appear that Veigue returns home to Sulz along with Claire and Zapie, who seems to have found a soulmate. They seem to be happy.

Tales of Graces
Veigue appears as a cameo boss at the Arena's Riot Peak competition. After clearing all of the normal ranks, he is the final person to be fought, at first taken on by the entire party. After being defeated by a full four-member party, however, all subsequent fights will be against him one-on-one by the character who fought the last round.

Veigue also gives one of the inn quests, requesting the "Requiem" sword. After fighting both Kohak Hearts and Reala in the Zone Cage, clearing the Masters Rank will instead bring a battle against him, Kohak, and Reala using a four-man party, where he wields the Requiem sword he was given.

When fought, Veigue uses many of his artes from his original game. His Blast Caliber is Celsius Calibur.

Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology 2
Veigue appears in the second installament of Radiant Mythology, along with Eugene, Mao, Annie and Claire. He has no Mystic Arte, though two of the new clases for the player are based on him.

Trivia

 * Most RPG protagonists wield the fire element, or sometimes wind element. However, Veigue is one of the rare main protagonists to ever use the ice element (the element is mostly wielded by female characters or male supporting characters, not male protagonists) - one other example is Serph, the main male protagonist from the RPG Digital Devil Saga.
 * Veigue does not possess some of the most common Tales skills such as Majinken/Demon Fang and Kogahazan/Tiger Blade. However, equipping certain items enables him to change his original skills to classic Tales skills.
 * Veigue is prone to yell "CLAIRE!!!!" loudly whenever Claire is in danger. Tales fans and producers have taken this into account and considered his yell to be unique and has been parodied several times. This is most obvious in the the Tales of Fandom Gaiden and the Viva Tales Lemon Gumi DVDs (they come with preorders of the Japanese version of Tales of the Abyss and Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology respectively), where Veigue often yells Claire's name out of the blue. Because of this, Veigue's yell is considered something of a running gag to Tales of Rebirth players.
 * Veigue is not featured in the Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology. This fact is lampooned in the Viva Tales Lemon Gumi DVD where after learning this fact, he cries and screams Claire's name.
 * In the 'Peach Pie Drama DVD', which comes with the PSP port of Tales of Rebirth, Veigue seems to be aware that the producers are really ruining his originally taciturn character into 'Someone who only yells "CLAIRE!!!!"' for humor purposes.
 * Veigue and Claire's name is a play on vague and clear.
 * Veigue bears a striking resemblance to Garr Kelvin from Tales of Destiny. In fact, there is a sidequest in Tales of Destiny's Remake that refers to the cast in Tales of Rebirth. However, they are not seen in the game. Also, in the Golden Gummi DVD that came with Radiant Mythology 2, Chelsea mistakes Veigue for Garr.
 * The resemblence goes even further; in the EX Dungeon of Tales of Destiny, there is a boss that uses Dalis' sprite. It is recolored with blue and white to suggest a direct reference to Veigue. He even has Veigue's common moveset, such as Zehhyoujin and Zesshouzan.
 * Veigue is the first main character in Tales that is fought against by the player in their own game.