Thread:MMYP999/@comment-27109830-20180325221800/@comment-27416494-20180402194947

Raven and Takumi are highly skilled archers who share a somewhat rocky, if still fairly supportive relationship with the rest of the party. Both of them have a good number of wind-based attacks in their arsenals, are able to rain down arrows from the sky, and are generally considered to be two of the most useful party members available.

Though at first unbeknownst to the rest of the party, Takumi and Raven have been subtly manipulated and used as pawns by Anankos and Alexei Dinoia throughout much of Vesperia and Fates (though this aspect is more prominent in the Conquest route). To clarify further, Takumi has slowly been coming under the possession of Anankos over the course of the story, to the point where he was forced to commit suicide so that his corpse could be reanimated into a soulless killing machine. In Raven's backstory, he was killed off in a Great War that took place long before the events of Vesperia, only for Alexei to bring him back to life with the use of an artificial Blastia heart. In both cases, this would allow each archer to become powerful enough to take on the entire party at once, yet at the same time, they also longed for a merciful death at the hands of the main characters as well.