Audrey Redheart

"This was supposed to be my story!"

Audrey is the Hero chosen by the goddess Eya, and the main antagonist of the game*.*

## Appearance

Audrey has very short, black hair with the top layer longer than the underneath, as well as straight bangs. She has long tufts of hair on either side of her face that reach past her shoulders. Her skin is pale.

She wears a long-sleeved, red shirt tucked into her pants with a black belt and black sash. She has black gloves up to her elbows, and black boots that go to her knees, over her pants. Her pants are yellow, as well as her long scarf that flows behind her.

## Personality

Audrey is a hero only in name (including the name tag hovering over her sprite, which never actually reads as "Audrey"), as multiple times throughout the game she showcases that she only enjoys it for the title and not for the genuine pleasure of helping people. She is extremely arrogant, rude, and mean to the Bard, even when they try to help her and be genuinely nice - such as when she betrays them after they worked together to subdue the Overseer on Ichor Mountain.

She's also consistently rude to essentially everyone who's not singing her praises - during the Intermission, she yells at Eyala to shut up when the messenger explains her sword. She also got upset when the messenger told the "lowly bard" that killing Overseers would end the world instead of Audrey, even though she brushes it off as that she didn't mind and was just curious.

She also seemed angry that the Bard getting pieces of the Earthsong was corrupting the spirit worlds, which is hypocritical, as when she murders the Overseers, she destroys their worlds in the process. This could also be because Audrey is simply jealous, as she wants to be the *Hero*, and be famed for it; while the Bard is always appearing in her way.

Beyond her arrogant behavior to the Bard, she is shown to actually somewhat lack self-esteem, commenting how, "Without [her sword], [she's] basically nothing," and seeming honestly confused as to why others would care about her before she became the Hero, acknowledging that, "Yeah, [she's] strong, and smart, and pretty. But... lots of people are those things."

After they fall into a cave together during a rockslide in Act 6, she struggles to promise Bard that she won't end the world, insisting that she has responsibilities given to her by Eya, and that she can't just promise that kind of thing away. This could either be interpreted as strong loyalty to Eya's wishes, or an intense desire to save the world her own way.

If you trust Audrey's word throughout Act 6 (which, considering her betrayal at the end of the act, is of ambiguous honesty), she is secretly unsure if she is really the Hero and is a bit scared about ending the world, but thinks that she can't possibly tell Eyala about her worries or else she might take away her sword, and therefore her title as the Hero. After meeting with the Heart Fairy and beginning the search for the King of Hearts, she apologizes for shooting down Miriam in the act before (even though she does describe Miriam as a "real jerk", and points out that Miriam and the Bard really screwed up), explaining how she's really trying her best, and that she may have gone overboard in how to deal with the situation.

In the end, she values her destiny as the Hero more than really being a hero, refusing the Bard's offer of forgiveness and killing the Dream King. It is left (intentionally) ambiguous what happened to her afterwards, though early drafts of the game had her dying.

## Gameplay

Audrey is playable in the Intermission between Act 3 and Act 4, where you travel through the Windscape to kill the Queen of Winds. Audrey cannot sing; the song wheel is instead used to change the position of her sword, in a similar way as the Bard does in the Prologue for the brief time they have the sword. Changing directions will swing the sword and you can use this to kill the monsters situated throughout the castle.

Pointing the sword straight upwards will charge it with lightning, and once the sword is charged, it can fire in any of the eight directions except upwards. This is used to attack enemies from a distance and shoot light bulbs which can extend bridges and open doors. Audrey also has a dash in place of the Bard's dancing, which allows a quick horizontal burst of speed.